Tales of the Shroud

In my ongoing quest for drama and enjoyment of car crash PUG runs, I invite you all to share your tales of the Shroud

39th run. Two fighters, two sorcerors, two wizards, two rangers, two clerics, one barbarian and a rogue walk into the quest. An interesting set up, with more than the usual caster quotia. I'm intrigued to see if the uber caster dps that players on the ddo forum keep talking about will be revealed, as honestly I've not noticed any difference but people keep on going on about it.

First round at the portals and things are going slow. Five of us are hitting the portals and one of the rangers is pew-pewing. The clerics are watching us work with their auras on ... and the casters, well they seem a bit confused. They all want to clear trash and are all over the map. Eventually they realise they don't all have to run ahead to the next portal and by about half way through two of them are starting to hit the portals with their spells. Still kinda slow and as the portal keepers start to appear the casters run off to deal with them. The pew pew ranger died at some point as she was starting to help with the trash too and I think got overwhelmed. Anyhooo...

Round two, none of the casters spoke up when the leader asked for a volunteer for the elemental and crystal. Eventually one of the sorcs said she was newish to shroud but would have a go and another said they'd do the elemental but would need help. I drop my expectations of seeing uber caster dps and start to wonder how the harry encounter will go with so few hardhitting melees. Took two goes to get through part two as someone didnt know about prepping the lieutenants. Almost didnt make the second attempt either as the pew pew ranger ended up grabbing the cat aggro just as we were taking the others down, and then running away! Where to? Why, to the centre of course. We gazed in disbelief as the cat bolted away from us after the ranger and then gave chase, finally hitting its tail and killing it before it got to the centre. Luckily the newbie sorc had the crystal nailed! Yay!

Round three was special. It was the first time I'd seen the wall. It's very pretty! The SE 5x5 was the problem child. I'm not sure who went in to help solve it, but they couldn't do it either. Lots of shouting and panic, and then two dings. I decided to sit down in the center and admire the wall as it passed by. One of the clerics then hopped into the puzzle and completed it. He got a hero's cheer from the group =)

Round four was interesting. As the five melees ran towards the middle to circle and wait for Harry to appear, one of the clerics called out that their heals would be centered on the rogue. It may not surprise you to hear that within about 15 seconds all the melees were dead. *grins* We all poofed into the penalty area, blinking and dazed, shortly followed by a couple of the casters and one of the clerics. Lag, they said, had got them. We tried to be charitable but eventually someone said what we were all thinking ... don't center your heals on the one most likely to be squishy. No one was angry, which was cool, although two released quickly. The rest of us stayed to cheer on the remaining team who valiantly tried to save the day. Alas it was not to be. The last to die was the pew pew ranger!

I hope you don't mind me making a comment about one point only, but I actually know quite a few clerics who like to centre their heals on the squishiest member of the party (as long as they aren't stupidly über squishy with only 250 HP). The theory is, that if they can keep the squishiest member up, then they can keep all the others up.

So if say a rogue has around 350 HP - there's no reason why the whole party can't stay up as long as they stay close to the rogue for mass heals or Mass CLW (which can hit for up to 300 a time).

However, if the rogue has less HP and dies, then the risk is that the healer will be healing nobody as his target is on a dead man!

That's interesting but ... why take the chance and risk wiping the pary? Is it for the personal challenge? They can still see the rogue's health bar and time their heals to keep that one up even if centered on another also in the melee crowd. No one's moving about, or shouldn't be - especially if there's only 5 in the centre otherwise Harry could break out and start running around. Surely its best to keep the heals centered on the one most likely to survive?

heehee I've noticed a few shrouds with clerics/fs not using divine punishment, and I just stand there in amazement. It is an awesome spell and can seriously cut the pt 1 time down. It also helps in pt 2 with the devil since he's always running around, and in pt 4&5 its usually 2 heal spells 1 dp, and repeat.
I only ever center heals on a rogue if I know the rogue in question. Otherwise, it goes to someone I know will stay in and take a beating

I love that rainbow wall too Beth... its even prettier wen there's 2

Oooh does a second one pop up? Awesome! Can't wait to see that =)

I've heard rumors of 3....but never seen that, have seen 2 tho

Only interesting one I had recently was the first one I've ever led. Didn't feel like waiting for a group so I put one up, filled rather quickly. Was going to just solo heal but another cleric applied for the 11th spot so took him on.

Everything went pretty smooth till part 4 when the other cleric died within the first 20 seconds. A few "uh oh"s from the group, but they kept beating.. I didn't say anything, just did my thing and no one else died.. Raised the cleric after part 4, shrined, and went on to part 5.

So part 5 the other cleric dies again within the first 30 seconds. I don't bother raising him since I don't want to stop healing to do so. Solo-healed both parts without a problem, again no one else died.

Before I TR'd I'd solo-healed a couple times but it was tough. Now it's surprisingly easy

Ouch. I think I would have /shamequit in that instance.

So how does it feel to be awesome, Jill

Well, the cleric's pretty awesome.. still working on the other toons lol

As a rogue with not horrible hp, I know exactly what Zog is talking about. I died four, count them, FOUR times in pt 5 the other day, and it was because the mass heals weren't coming in time to keep me up. I could understand that if, say, it was a single healer. But when there are two FS and one cleric in the group, is it wrong to expect more than THREE mass heals during the fight? *sigh* I wasn't getting one or two shotted either, I'd go down after maybe 7-8 good solid hits from Harry. Plenty of time. So as Zog said, if the heals are centered on the rogue, and the group is all together, and the rogue doesn't do something stupid like run off, it makes perfect sense because the heals come in time for everyone.

I dunno ... I mean, can't they centre on someone with rocksolid hp and just time their heals according to the one with the lowest hp? Y'know ... to minimise the risk of a wipe if the squishiest one dies while heals are centered on them. Reading the situation above, I'm not sure what difference it would have made to center heals on you.

Thanks for the Great Story Beth, it hurts not being able to get back in the shround.

The squishier one shouldn't die if the heals are coming timed correctly. If the hp is so low that the squishy goes down with one or two shots from Harry, the healer generally (from what I'm told) just grabs another target with hotkeys. Healers rarely raise dead during a Harry fight anyway unless it's really needed to bring him down.

That's what really drove me nuts during my last Shroud run, I guess. There were almost no heals at all, but the guy kept raising me from the dead. Total mana mismanagement.

When healing I rarely if ever use heal. Its mass cure light and moderate.

with your group Grace, it's possible that neither fs were actually healing... most don't.

Then again, I've had my bard in shroud a couple times...she has close to 400 hp, and has died in pt 5 every time.

As for mana mismanagement, most raise from scrolls, that may be what he was doing ? I always raise people in pt 5 unless they keep dieing. (tho its good to remember once you've died in pt 5 you NEED your resists back. People tend to forget that and jump right in again, and ding)

And when healing, you dont pick the squishy one as your anchor because you have no clue how long the fight will be. You will end up over healing if you have them as the target and therefore waste more mana then needed. (those pools in pt 5 do dry up)

Not trying to make excuses for the bad healing(tey could have been crapy healers), just giving my experience on the side of the one who does the healing

When I say heals I mean mass cures. My point about the raising was that if the mass cures had been coming in a remotely timely manner, the raise deads wouldn't have been necessary. Like I said, there were only three mass cures the entire fight, which in my admittedly limited experience in pt 5 of shroud is fairly nonexistent. In every other shroud I've ever run, if there were several people capable of healing, the group leader sorted at the beginning who was healing and who was not to make sure that it was covered.

I might add that even prior to this, there were massive struggles with pt 2 because they could not coordinate worth anything to kill everything at the same time. It took at least five tries (I gave up counting). Every time would end with the leader yelling "kill the crystal!!! KILL THE CRYSTAL!!!!!! and other people saying "my bad, I killed the cat/kobold/etc." Le sigh.

Still not getting how having heals centered on you would have made any difference, which I think was your original point.

one thing to note:

if you die in pt 5 and lose all your resists/poison etc, dont jump back into the fight until you have them, or you will die even with 800 hp. if you cant get resists and poison to jump back in (FoM isnt really necessary to a melee but it helps), then range him if you got to.

harry's poison attack does 1d6 con damage the first tick, second tick it does 1000 con damge, killing you.

and of course meteor swarm without a fire resist hits for 60-90 fire damage times four. so fire resist itself can block 120 out of 240-360 damage.

I suppose my point is that it doesn't much matter who the heals are centered on, whether it is a squishy or tank, as long as they come in a timely fashion. Some divines prefer to center on the squishy, some on the tougher ones, but it's a matter of personal preference and not poor tactics.

and some healers just suck.


that said, i have noticed a LOT of new people who cannot listen to instructions in the shroud.

its sometimes annoying, but it does make this usually boring raid somewhat interesting

Ah okay, I read your original post as being in agreement with choosing the rogue over others. These words led me astray.

Quote :

So as Zog said, if the heals are centered on the rogue, and the group is all together, and the rogue doesn't do something stupid like run off, it makes perfect sense because the heals come in time for everyone.

My bad.


Meh, hear you on the inability to listen to instructions, Anto. I'm also rolling eyes at the leaders who are silent for the majority of the time and who seem to be hoping that either the raid will complete by good luck or that someone will step in to organise shit. Feckers should never try to have the star in the first place. For me part of the experience of ddo is the team aspect of it, and no team is complete without a leader. Hate hate hate absolutely silent PUGs where you have to read the leaders mind. I'm not a big talker in quests, but I like to know that the leader has got a handle on the situation.

Necro!

Had an awesome shroud fail today. Was on my secondary fighter Xillee, the eternal shroud farmer, who seems to be magnet for these sort of runs ... All I want on Xillee is a quick normal completion each time. She's not particularly twinked out, although i recently relented and finished off her smoke goggles for the blur/hp. Anyhow, joined a normal shroud LFM and soon took the headset off while waiting to fill due to a major outbreak of nerd talk. Sometimes I like it, but just wasn't in the mood today.

(what is it about divines? get more than three in a raid and they get all excited and can't stop talking about how awesome divines are)

So I'm at the entrance waiting to go in and cast a glance at chat. Notice that there's a vote going on about whether to do hard difficulty. Most seem happy to do so. How can we fail! We have 4 divines, an arcane, 2 arties and some random melee types! Deja vu strikes me. Been here with Xillee too many times when an advertised normal shroud suddenly becomes hard difficulty.

Don't get me wrong. I love that extra chest, but I'd rather join a shroud that's advertised as hard, rather than one that switches to it.

Meh, round one was okay. For some reason I assumed with 4 divines that one of them at least would be running ahead to dot up the next portal with DP. Nope. Well, at least we only had one portal keeper arrive.

Round two was fine! A nice smooth south side beat 'em up and separate.

Round three was okay. I got to solve two extra puzzles which I always enjoy. Why is it though that when you go in to a puzzle room to solve someone else's puzzle, they stay to watch rather than go run water? Blah.

Part 4, I told the clerics to not centre heals on me cos I've an unfortunate habit of dcing at the worst moment. So they center on the other fighter. Communication broke down I guess. Everyone thought we were fighting through the blades, but the other fighter jumped out. Two died. He said he'd be jumping out next round top. Which he did. A few more died during the second round. The gnolls didnt go down that fast. Third round the numbers are looking thin. Just me and the fighter smacking harry, and the gnolls are up and healing the big red guy. Eventually the other fighter runs off to take down the gnolls, while I stay in the blades. We still have three healers* left and I think one of the arties. Fourth round ... the figher says its not worth it. I silently concur but we give it a go, ignoring harry initially as we run around killing the gnolls first. The artie dies, and the other fighter gets a lag spike and dies.

I'm giggling as I start to attack Harry. The clerics are OOM but one of them runs into the centre to try and heal me with his aura. I last another 15 seconds then ding.

I dunno. It was a cool trainwreck, I got enjoyment =) And yes, I do believe that divines are an awesome class. But back up plans are needed for when the mana runs out.

*pls note I am now calling them healers rather than divines. I could ascertain no particular spells damaging harry by this point.

Mmmm ... more shroud goodness. The only reason why I'm not sick to death of this raid is its capacity to entertain me beyond going through the motions of each part. Even when something happens that pisses me off to the extreme, in that same moment there is a masochistic streak within that helps me enjoy the ridiculous nature of some players.

First up was Zillee on a normal difficulty. The run itself was smooth. Sure a few hiccups but nothing unusual. What tickled me in this run was spotting a particular type of player that always makes me giggle to myself - the wannabe leader. You know the type? No matter how competent the person is who is carrying the star, no matter how clear they are in their instructions, no matter that we are all actually doing exactly what the leader has asked for ... the wannabe leader is there too, echoing each instruction, sometimes embellishing on it, sometimes correcting someone unnecessarily or making an observation on something they think the leader has missed.

I dunno ... may be they had intended to lead a shroud and saw they would have competition? Or may be they didn't feel quite ready to be the star, but want to demonstrate that they know the raid as well as (if not better than) the actual raid leader? Heck knows, but entertaining all the same. I giggled, and muttered under my breath ("but we already are separating them out you stupid man" etc...) each time he felt the need to reiterate what the leader had already established.

Next on Xillee - I was tempting fate, I know. I have no one else to blame but myself but damnit, I just had to join the lfm for the hard difficulty shroud. Why? Well ... it was one of those dumbass LFMs that namechecks the leader of the raid within the description - like they're some kind of fecking celebrity. I know Gawna and Stainer do this ... but they insist this is to warn players of the chaos that might occur. I know Big does this and thank god, as it means we can avoid him. Tonight a name popped up that I'd never heard of - and nor the guild either. Dethsklok or something? Anyway, the description was 'Deth's Hard shroud. One caster and the rest DPS.'

How could I not join that?

Asides from the neediness of having to repeat who is leading the raid (when it already states this in the LFM as part of the information automatically generated), that ONE caster and the rest dps stipulation was soooooooooooo old school shroud from prior to the arrival of the savants, it had 'potential drama' stamped all over it.

So I join with high expectations. Now my first expectation when joining a raid/quest that has the leaders name reiterated in the description, is that at the end you leave with some impression of what makes that raid/quest different, special or noteworthy under the leadership of this player. Well Deth let me down there. I could only discern squeaks and background noise whenever she hit the PTT button (although I heard enough to ascertain she was indeed a woman). And there was feck all in the typed communication too (except later on after the fail ... but I'm getting ahead of myself). Others who appeared to know her led the raid on her behalf. So I can only assume that Deth has already reached some level of cult status amongst those who like to run with her, and is happy to step back and let them run her raids. Poo! Very disappointing, Deth! 1/10 for effort there.

What made the raid noteworthy for its awfulness however was the arrival of the second caster - another woman - and yes this should not matter. It really really should not matter. I'm a woman who plays DDO and so should really not let the sex of the player influence me - but OMFG - I really wanted to stab her. From the moment she hit the mic to the horrible horrible end (yes, we failed in part 4 - massive lag made the healing job very difficult for the two divines) she spoke in this tone of voice that reeked of 'girly flirtation'. I'm not sure if men are aware of this - and often I think women do it unconsciously when they want to seem appealing - but it irritates the heck out of me. The voice is slightly higher than normal, there is a lilt to end of a sentence, the words slur together, and take on a 'babyish' tone. The underlying message from the tone (not the words, just the tone) is that we are just weak girlies who need big strong men to look after us. Its what I term the "fairy pwincess" voice.

Drove me mad. I was swearing under my breath for the whole raid.

I'd like to stress that she wasn't actually saying anything that was particularly flirtatious. And her gameplay was topnotch. No complaints there. But I know that tone ... and it may come as no surprise to learn that her nick is Naughtygal, or Naughtygirl, or something like that. Its just so Monroe, ya know? Stop it! Save it for the pub after work, or when you're on a date or whatever. But please, not in a raid on an MMO that is dominated by men where its often difficult to say anything without some creep getting all 'oooh a woman!' on you.

Anyhoo ... bad lag. Wipe. Healers unfairly blamed. Party broke up and then reformed five mins later. I joined again but left when I finally heard Deth speak up only to be sarcastic about one of the healers whom she didn't reaccept. Went on to do a normal shroud with a different group. No drama. Got a shrapnel and an arrowhead.

Good times =)

Hehe, always fun and games in the Shroud.

I run my own now normally, unless there is already one up. I did one just the other day and some guy said at the end fight in pt 5 - "This is so damn quiet - I mean where's the guy with the obnoxiously loud mic? Where are the arguments? This is Shroud and we need drama!"

Made me lol, but I took it as a good sign that nobody had to whinge about the way things were going or the leadership.

Beth, I love reading your stories

Agree with your observations about Naughty hehe.