Now comes the fun section. This is the section where I get to talk about all those annoying habits or personality types that are out there. I also put a section in for group horror stories that I have had or that other players may send in.

Things not to do in a group:

• Attempt to re-create the Leroy Jenkins movie... It's been done, it was funny the first time, now let it die.
• Do not try to do it all, you're not the Messiah (I am). Everyone has a set role, stick to it and everything will go a lot smoother.
• Do not forget to buy all the reagents you need for heals, rezzes, pops, poison, etc. There is not much worse than being in an instance and having something go wrong and not being able to recover because someone forgot to buy a reagent.
• In the same vein as the above note, Always remember to repair your equipment before going into an instance! It sucks to die once and have all your items turn yellow or red and have to take a repair break! It makes it even worse without a Warlock for a summons.
• Attempt to explain to everyone how to play their class! Offer a few suggestions, ok, but be constructive. No one likes a know it all though, and it can get annoying fast.
• Attempt to play a role that your character is not meant for! It's bad for the whole group, stick to what you do best, and the role you have been assigned too.
• Blow through all your mana or energy in the first few seconds of an encounter! It generally pulls aggro and you die. You will be far more effective pacing yourself and staying alive.

Bad Personality Types:

LEROY! - You know, the person from the famous Leroy Jenkins video. This person runs around collecting as many adds as possible for no apparent reason. Avoid them if you know who these people are, or kick them at the first sign of trouble.

The Loot Hog - This person collects as much loot as possible, for them, alts, others and sale. They step away from combat to loot so that they are the first one in there on an item. They will most likely argue for 15 minutes over a green item that they NEED for something. Put them in their place and setup loot rules right off the bat, so they either wont come along at all, or will get the picture that the group has set rules.

Ninja - A ninja is probably the worst kind of player type. Because they do this on purpose knowing that it will piss everyone off. They are the reason that most groups run with master looter on for boss fights. A ninja will wait for everyone to pass on any good loot so that you can discuss and then snag it. Occasionally they will say "oh sorry, didn't realize someone wanted that" and try to get out of it, just to do it again on the next drop. On the worst cases they grab expensive rare or epic Bond on Equip items and hearth out to sell them in the Auction House. These players should be added to your ignore list and your do not group with list (you do keep one right?), so that you are never suckered again.

Mr. Invisible - This person disappears all the time, either to get the phone, door, a drink, feed the dog, walk the dog, etc, etc, etc... They spend more time on auto follow than actually doing anything. Real life does come up and unexpected breaks happen, but this personality type makes it the rule rather than the exception.

The Complainer - If you said that the sun was yellow this person would argue about it being blue. They disagree with everything and always know best. It's generally funny since they tend to show how much they don't know and you can laugh at them, and ignore their comments.

Group Horror Stories:

I have been in many groups where things like this have happened, but this was one of the worst. I joined a group going into UBRS searching for my devout robes for my priest. They had been spamming in Orgrimmar for a healer for a while and I was bored so decided to go. They didn't want to do Father Flame which I wanted to, but understood that it's a tricky encounter and we had a time limit due to several members raiding in about 2 hours. The only other healer is druid and most of the group was a guild. I feel ok about this since, I will be sure to get the robes if they dropped and it should go smoother than most PUGs. Anyway, we fought our way to the end of the instance and the robes dropped! Hurray! I wait to accept them and the mage in the group says, we could use them, and wants to roll! He's in the leaders guild and he lets him! Of course I lose the role and the robes.

Lessons: Make sure that everything is communicated before you actually get through the instance! Especially loot rules. Most groups run with class priority for items, but obviously not all. If you are going for something specific, find out the exact rules that are being used so you are not disappointed.

Another group, this time in BRD just running it for experience. This time the issue was partially my fault and partially the rest of the group for not asking questions or letting others know what the plan was. I never paid that much attention to what we were doing or why we were there so some of the blame is mine. However we were working our way down the jail cells, when we came to Marshal Windsor. All of a sudden he starts moving! Someone started jailbreak, and we had not cleared his path yet. The leader of the group (nor apparently anyone else other than me) knew that you needed to clear his path first to make the escort a whole lot simpler. We were all at a low level to begin with for the instance and I hadn't worried as I did not expect to be doing allot in it other than gaining experience. It very quickly turned ugly and we wiped. People got angry and when I asked why no one had cleared it, they all said they didn't know you had to and then got mad at me for not telling them before hand. They were partially right, I should have mentioned it, but assumed that the leader knew what he was doing... well, you know what the saying is about those that assume... :-(

Lessons: Just because someone is the group leader does not mean they know anything, they may have just started the group. Ask who knows the instance and who is going to lead, if no one does, and you do, offer to lead. Make sure you know what is going on around you and what the groups objectives are.

Have more? Send them to me to publish!

Have comments or suggestions? Thought of something that has been missed? Found an error? Have a group horror story that you would like to share? We would love to hear from you! Please email me at [email protected].