A little story about gear...

[Shadowwolf]

So this evening, I did my daily on my priest, and I got Old Kingdom for a change (usually I get HoR every damn time). Earlier before the raid I tried to get my daily done and got HoR and a horrible group.

What makes this group different in OK was the tank. She was a green tank, this was her first heroic ever, as in no alts, just started playing the game a little bit ago, didnt even have a guild. Normally, when in a group with a tank thats under geared I cringe a bit and statistics have shown for me its going to be a wipe-a-thon from start to finish. She had literally 22k hp unbuffed, and in OK thats a recipe for disaster.

[attach=1]

However, to my surprise, this person was one of the best tanks I have ever grouped with outside of this guild. I say that because lets face it, I PUG somewhat often on my alts, so ive run with many many people. I know we house some of the best tanks on the server, and others do exist outside of our little family, however there are only few out there in the wilderness. This person just played to her class like she'd been playing for years. We had a mage in full t10.5 items which I thought she would be struggling to keep aggro off him, not once, not a single time, did any adds get loose. She held aggro throughout, did everything she should have, even was able to scoop up mobs on an accidental body aggro from the druid in group. All the while, the healing on her was not unpleasant in the slightest. Yes I had to pay more attention than usual because her HP pool was smaller so I did need to make sure i kept her topped off more than other tanks.

Now I say this to everyone as a story because this is a primary example of how gear, while helpful, doesnt always mean everything. I have played with many tanks that out gear her by a landslide who cant hold aggro on mobs if they were alone in the instance. Yes gear improvements help you overcome harder instances/raids and bosses, however it doesnt have to always be a handicap like the stupid people in trade chat and most random PUGs tend to perpetuate. With that stupid Gearscore addon, people have lost sight of the fact that you can still do a lot in this game even with gear thats not top notch. Something that we have proven as a group of folks many times.

I just wanted to share that experience with you so the next time you end up in a group with someone in lesser gear, dont count them out. While rare, they could be like one of us, someone who knows how to play this game well, just not fortunate enough to be getting drops they can use all the time. Same goes for everyone here, if you take the time to learn your class and learn fights, you can overcome quite a lot of obstacles.

[Lyte]

I love groups like that!