Is Pugging Flashpoints Newbie Friendly?

As stated in the title I’m going to talk about pugging flahpoints from a new(ish) player’s’ perspective. I’ve been playing this game since October 2016 and have run all the fps that are solo-able either by myself or with my brother and sister. For the most part I have avoided doing group content and so there are a number of fps that I’ve never experienced because you need a group of at least four players or three players and a high level (preferably 50) companion.

In real life I am very shy and reserved and like most introverts I hate stepping out of my comfort zone. There are two types of introverts. Those who have trouble with communicating and interacting with others in real life but have no trouble finding their courage via online games to the point many wouldn’t suspect they are normally shy. And then there is the introvert who is shy not only IRL, but also in games. They are the lurkers who stand in a crowd and say nothing. They may also be uncomfortable with trying out new things and would prefer to hang with those they are comfortable with over strangers. I unfortunately fall squarely into the second category for introverts.

When I first joined the Mandalorians guild there were probably a few members wondering who in the world I was because all I did was lurk in the background. Any time there was an event, I would be right there watching them, not saying anything. As I became more comfortable with the idea of being part of a guild, I began to interact with them more. They now know who I am on discord where I talk to guild members the most and every now and then I say something in guild chat, though I rarely communicate that way. It took me two months to start talking to everyone in the guild and more recently to participate in their weekly pvp tourney (more on that in a later post).

The guild has been helping me step out of my comfort zone and has made me want to try out new things…mainly the group content that I’ve been missing out on all these years. So last month, I queued up for my first flashpoint and got the Czerka Core Meltdown. Before we started, I told the others in the group up front that I had never done this flashpoint before and asked what we were supposed to do. One person, oh so helpfully said we kill all the bad guys and the tank in the group said that he would be in charge of yanking the boss around the room.

So, I hung back and tried to follow their example. Everything was alright until we came to the first boss fight and wiped on the first try. I asked what strategy we were going to use to fight it the second time around and the tank told me that he would be yanking the boss around the room and the rest of us needed to deal damage. We tried that and wiped again…and then again…and then again. The tank became so frustrated with us that he quit abruptly and then next thing I knew the other two in the group also quit.

I thought about quitting myself, but I was really curious to see how the flashpoint played out, so I queued for more people. Luckily, the next tank was a lot nicer and not only explained to me why the tank needed to yank the boss around the room, but also helpfully suggested what I should do. This time around was much easier and after watching the tank in action I realized he was ten times better than the other tank, who would yank the boss around the room once and then stood there and tried to kill the boss and then yelled at us because we were all killed by the sandstorm. This tank kept yanking him around the room to prevent the sandstorm from killing us and let the rest of us heal and deal damage while keeping the boss’s focus on him.

At the end of the flashpoint, I thanked him for his help, but by the time we were done I was so nervous and rattled that I didn’t queue for another fps as I had intended because I had gone above and beyond my level of comfort and I was a little miffed at the first tank for getting frustrated with his group even though it was clearly his fault we kept wiping out.

It took a couple weeks before I worked up the courage to try queuing for another flashpoint. This time I landed in the The Foundry and inwardly cheered because I’ve done this one before in both story and veteran mode, so I knew what to do and how to skip all the trash. I figured this time around I wouldn’t feel like a complete idiot because I didn’t know what to expect. It didn’t quite go the way I thought it would.

One guy kept pulling trash even though the tank in the group was trying to skip them. Naturally, he became overwhelmed and died before I could turn back around and help him. Then we reached the HK fight. I was running around hitting the kolto stations whenever everyone’s health dropped low since we didn’t have a healer in the group and fighting the droids that HK would call for reinforcements. Apparently, the tank didn’t like me doing that and called me a moron, saying I needed to focus on HK and we would deal with the other droids once the fight was over.

As I said, I have played The Foundry in veteran before with my guild mates and knew how much damage the droids can cause if they are ignored. The last time I played this fp, my guild mates and I wiped the first time around because most of us solely focused on HK and the droids overwhelmed us. We had to kill the droids first and then deal with HK. I tried to explain that and while the tank was in the middle of yelling at me, we wiped. The tank called me a moron again and a few other colorful phrases and then told me to listen to him this time.

I didn’t appreciate his attitude, so when we started fight HK again, I didn’t touch the kolto stations and focused on healing myself with the few heals I have. I will admit it was very satisfying to watch the tank die almost immediately and even though the entire group wiped out again, it was worth it. Needless to say, I never finished the flashpoint because everyone rage quit.

The third time I queued for a flashpoint was probably by far the worst experience out of them. I don’t remember which flashpoint it was since I was never able to finish. After I told the group I’d never done that flashpoint before I was vote kicked out. Since I was geared up properly for a vet mode fps, I can only assume they kicked me out because they didn’t want to deal with someone who didn’t know what they were doing. I haven’t been able to bring myself to queue up for another flashpoint since then.

So, to answer my question is pugging flashpoints newbie friendly? I have found the answer to be overwhelmingly no. I don’t know if it’s this particular server or maybe I’m queuing up at the wrong times. Maybe there are a lot of very rude people playing SWTOR these days. Whatever the case may be, I think I’m done pairing up with random people to do flashpoints for now. Perhaps if I was more confident and knew how to do all the fps, I would be tolerant of all the rudeness, but that last one where I was kicked out has me rethinking trying out more group content.

I’ve been toying with the idea of asking my guild to either start a weekly fps run or ask my guild mates to run fps with me in chat. It is very hard for someone like me to step out of my comfort zone and especially hard when most of my experiences have been negative. I don’t want to give up on flashpoints, uprisings, and warzones and would like to continue experiencing them all, but until I’m more comfortable with the content and know what to expect, grouping up with rude strangers is out of the question.

I can only hope I’m in the minority and other newbie players haven’t been dealing with the same problems.