Too slow is totally just as bad as too fast! As much as we all hate it when some jackass goes haring off through the instance, pulling things willy-nilly with a pet, the needless hesitations you describe here are just as awful.

I've often found that, as a healer, I can get a laggard tank to pull a bit faster just by whispering them and saying, "Please go ahead and grab the next group. I'll let you know if I need to stop, otherwise let's keep moving!" Some of it is just confidence, but I also know from experience that many tanks have learned to be conservative from healers who just couldn't keep up.

And many healers can't keep up. Just as chain-pulling is an art tanks have to learn, we healers have to learn how to chain-pull-heal. You can always tell beginning healers, because they act as if they expect mana breaks to be like some kind of communal picnic that will be announced and shared. Sorry, sister! You drink whenever you're not in combat or otherwise moving. Lots of water, lots of potions, and careful triage are the name of the game for healing low-level instance at a brisk pace.

I also laugh out loud when DPS ask the group to wait for their mana. Surely, you're kidding, right? Just drink when you need to. Your life won't end if you're not on the meter for ten seconds. Not that I have opinions. :)

Ooh, some tasty new reads! Thank you! And thank you, also for the link! :)

I recommend you give it a fertilizer spike. If it doesn't like that, and starts asking for blood, you know it's a demented vegetable alien bent on slaughter and world domination!

If you find the plant whining, "feeeeed me", terminate with extreme prejudice!

It's wonderful that you take that into account! Sadly, it seems many raid leaders, even ones who are otherwise very good raid leaders, don't get that one right.

This. The trouble is, though, even if you hide the meters during combat, you know they're there, and there's an incredible temptation to do things you know will look good on them later, even if you can't see them now.

This is how we always lose at least one DPS caster on the Sindragosa trash. :)

I absolutely agree with you here. Meter-humping is the source of so many problems in a raid, it's enough to drive a girl crazy.

But allow me to play the Devil's Advocate for a moment. Why do people hump meters? I argue they do it for the same reason that my students used to worry more about their points than about their understanding: Because the rewards go to those with the highest grades, not those who learn the most. They're not dumb. They optimize what gives them the best return.

Of course, we'd ideally like to make it so that you can't get high grades without learning the most, but in reality it just doesn't work like that, ever. Ask any teacher anywhere—heck, ask the students, they know it too.

So yes, the DPS and healers humping the meters is bad, but those of us who lead the raids and give out the assignments are also to blame. We give the highest praise and the best DPS jobs to the people who—are most effective at raid utility? No: To those whose numbers are highest. We send the healers in to do the fun portal job on Valithria Dreamwalker based on—the healers who did their assignment most reliably? No: To the healers with the best output.

It's true that we will still fail if we neglect the things you mentioned—careless threat, standing in bad, waste of mana, and so on. But a wipe is only one kind of punishment, and many of the meter-humping behaviours we see are also reinforced by OTHER kinds of reward—praise, good assignments, and reputation among your raidmates—that are harder to measure.

Great stuff! Congratulations to the winners, and yes, to second Zelmaru, please publish the rest! :)

I simply can't imagine. :)

Next thing you know, you'll have DinoTam in a Haliscan suit, strutting up and down pontificating. Let's just say, I wouldn't be surprised, anyway!

"A woman has to work twice as hard as a man to be thought half as good. Fortunately, this is not difficult." ;)