Dungeon already in progress

Whenever my daily frost run pops up (not even sure why I do them any more I have not needed any frosts for months) and I see that I think the worst.  How bad is the group going to be?  It becomes a little game in my own mind.  Walk in and try to find out what is wrong based on the surroundings.  Usually you can pick out what is going on the second you zone in.  Other times it is a bit of work to figure out what just happened here.

Yesterday my pop up came on screen and I saw that.  Was hoping for another one of those ones where someone dropped out or was kicked out just at the last boss.  I love those.  Zone in, do 2 minutes of pew pew and walk away with my frosties.  This time I popped into PoS right after the first boss was downed.  Being I am a Hunter I knew that I was filling a DPS spot that was lost.  So my choices now are the top 3 for when zoning in right after a dead boss.  1) Something he/she wanted did not drop so they left. 2) Their DPS was so damn horrid that they were kicked. 3) The DCed and the people got tired of waiting for him.

There is a forth option but that forth option is rare.  There needs to be an exact situation that requires three people being from the same realm, all friends, and they kick someone that pissed them off just because they pissed them off.  They could have won someone one of their friends wanted.  They could have called out a bad healer, bad tank or bad DPS as being bad.  Like it is really offensive to tell someone doing 900 DPS in PoS that they are not doing as well as they should.  I usually keep my mouth shut but if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it is a duck.  Saying someone is bad for pulling 900 DPS in a 232 item level 5 man is not bad.  It is damn right.  They do suck.

I say hello and we start to move down the stairs.  I get a whisper from the lock that was with the group instantly telling me that this is a totally fail group.  I ask him why that is.  He says the tank sucks.  So immediately I start thinking that this must be one of those cases where three people are friends and the DPS said something so they kicked him.  Most DPS will not leave a dungeon unless it is really bad because they know they have to wait forever to get into another one.  I check the realms and they are all different.  The DPS must have left on his/her own.  I am officially worried about this tank now if it could scare a DPS away. 

I took a quick look over the tank and he has 50K hit points.  He has all tank gear on.  He has a protection spec.  I ask the lock what was so bad about the tank.  I mean come on, it looked fine to me from all I looked at.  The lock said, I needed to tell him to put Righteous Fury on.  Okay now.  That explains a lot.  The first skeleton after we walk down I do my little test on the tank that I gauge what I can do with.  I start slow and pick it up.  I do not misdirect at all.  By doing this I know how I can lay the pew pew down.  Doing a MD would disrupt my figures when trying to do this so I do not do it.  Usually I can gauge a tank on the first pull with doing that and know exactly what I am capable of getting away with.  Sure, some surprise me and do better then their gear might say they can but that just means they are good at what they do.  Most people are not, so never assume that.

The next pack of guys I MD on because it is a pack and I am going to volley.  Even a tank with awesome threat generation I will never do AoE unless I wait a bit first or do an MD.  So I can not really see anything from that.  The packs before our little friends ick and crick where not much of an issue.  I grabbed aggro once but that is normal unless there is a super tank around being they chain grab them and my MD cool down is a little longer then I would like.  He keeps them out of the poison puddles, so he does that right at least.

Once we get to the boss he does well from the start.  We are moving along nicely and he is about to do his little melee AoE thing.  Now I know from my experience as a Hunter I never even noticed that.  I am never close enough to him to have noticed it.  The first time I tanked him on my Druid was an oh shit moment.  I had an excuse however, I had never tanked it before.  This guy would not have the gear he has if he had never tanked before.  This is not the standard starter tanking set.  This guy was full out tanking gear with all the right gems and gear and such.  Even if he was a new tank if he had gotten that much tank stuff at a high level and did enough research to know how to gem and enchant it then he surely had a clue how to tank things.  Nope, I was wrong.  He did not move an inch.  The healer did amazing to somehow keep his stupid ass alive.  He was down to like 2K life, maybe even less.  All I thought to myself then was burn this mofo down because there is no way he can live through that again.  He got lucky once.  It will not happen again.

We ended up downing the boss with no other problems, even before it ever had the chance to do those barrage bubble things all over.  Before the fight he said that he wanted everyone to mount up right after and run for the top so we could skip those packs.  So guess what I went and did?

Yeap, I was the total idiot that mounted up and ran to the top.  Alone.  As the 2 mobs started going down and I saw no one else coming I decided it was suicide run time and see if I can make it back.  No such luck, the activate as I am halfway down.  I do not want to kill the rest of the group so I jump off to the side and FD.  My poor doggie dies but I lived even if only at half life.  I say to party, I thought we were running up?  Then add, I am good from here.  Pull when you are ready and I will join in.

The tank pulls and as you know no matter what role you play, those pulls can be rough.  The mobs are all over the damn place.  I pop up, hit MD, Silence the one caster that was far away from the pack to make him move to the pack and then drop a volley on them all to help the tank gather them up.  Of course, being I know what I am doing I was able to get the caster to him and everyone else on him.  We down them.

I say, let me get mana and revive my poor pet first and hit my revive pet button and while waiting the tank goes running full steam ahead after marking all the targets.  I put my pet on passive so he does not run in and die instantly.  Click mend pet and then do my thing.  I silence the one caster away from him so it will go to him and then MD and volley to help him collect them all up.  We down them but even after my MD I had aggro every step of the way.

Seems that our friendly neighborhood tank had no idea what marking targets is.  Yes, he is the one that marked them.  He just did not attack them in the order he marked them to be attacked in.  There is a standard attack order for marked targets, skull first x second, so on.  He didn't do any of that.  So much for target marking.

The next two packs where not as bad.  I silenced the ones on the right so they went to him and all was well.  It was not like he, or anyone else for that matter, was paying any attention to the one on the right.  So I had to do it, not because it was right, not because I had to protect the healer, but because if I didn't the tank would have let that one mob go off and kill everyone.

Now it is time to make the run.  Everyone knows what to do.  I put my pet on passive as always while on the run and we make it through to the middle.  Once we are all catching up the healer throws a heal on the tank.  All the packs except the big one peel off and head for the healer.  I quickly hit MD and volley them all sending them all back to the tank. and switch to main target the big guy.  Only 2 shots into the big guy all the packs peel off again and head straight for the healer.  I pop readiness and MD as fast as my cool downs can allow to bring them back with another volley but it was already too late.  Healer was dead and they just ripped a new asshole into one of the DPS.  All this time the tank is jolly happy pounding on only the big guy in the middle with no clue what was going on around him. My volley finally started when the other two DPS where dead and it was just me and Mr. I tank only one target at a time.  I send all the packs his way and he goes down faster then a fat kid fills his plate at an all you can eat.  I throw a kill shot on the big guy being I do not want to have to deal with him again and FD.  Big guy is dead but now here I am faking death in a tunnel full of enemies with ice sooner or later sure to land on me.  Oh, and my poor doggie is dead... again.

If you have not noticed I did not tell you the class of the tank yet.  I did that on purpose because that is the best part.  You might have noticed that I mentioned a protection spec which limits things you you also might have noticed I never once mentioned a Consecrate  being dropped, at any point.  Ah, a warrior then.  Nope.  A pally, that never once used Consecrate, that enter without Righteous Fury on, that doesn't move from damage that even the tank needs to move from.  The second try we made it through because I made sure to kill off the big guy this time.  Without the big guy keeping all his attention he was able to help us burn down the others.  With my MD onto him and lots of AoE from everyone we downed them fast enough for him not to lose aggro on them all.  Again.  Maybe if he had thought to drop a Consecrate the first time we would not have wiped.

Final boss went surprisingly well actually.  I thanked everyone for the run and left when it was over with one burning thought in mind.

How much does a Pally in full, perfect, tanking gear cost now-a-days?

I ask because that was a bought account.  I am totally sure about that.