Welcome to the World of Warcraft, a magical place where lots of fun can be had, as well as a ton of aggravation. Follow these steps to avoid making total noob mistakes and pissing off every other player you group with.
Step 1: Get familiar with the game.
World of Warcraft can be a bit overwhelming for an inexperienced MMO player. Take it slow and learn your way around. Become comfortable with moving your character. Use your mouse to turn your character, not your keyboard. Take note of how to talk in different channels. Typing “/p” [without quotes] and hitting spacebar will make it possible to type in party chat. “/g” is for Guild chat, “/1” is general chat, and “/2” is trade chat. You get the idea.
Step 2: Understand your class.
This is a very common mistake among beginners to WoW, whether it’s a hunter using only melee attacks or a warrior wearing spell power cloth. Don’t make that mistake. Learn what stats you want on your gear, and what attacks you should be primarily using. It’s really not a hard concept.
Step 3: Read your tooltips.
This is a very important point here. So many bad players just spam buttons without even understanding what exactly they are doing to the monsters they are hitting and the players around them.
For example, low level paladins train a spell called Hand of Reckoning. All they know is that the spell does damage. What they fail to realize is that they are actually taunting the monster to attack them when they use that spell.
Don’t make yourself look dumb. Read your tooltip by hovering your mouse over a button and read. It only takes a few seconds and it will help you immensely in the long run.
Step 4: Learn dungeon manners.
This step is extremely important, and ties all previous steps together as well.
At level 15, you are able to use the random dungeon tool. This is a great thing for leveling and helps you learn how to play your class more effectively. Unfortunately there are some players who are just annoying to deal with because they don’t really understand what is going on. Some people even cause other players to leave the instance before it is completed. Don’t be that guy.
First of all, you need to understand how group loot works. Once an item of uncommon quality drops from a mob, a loot box will pop up on to your screen. Don’t be hasty! You have awhile to contemplate your rolls.
The button shaped as dice is to need the item, and the button with the gold coin on it is to roll for greed purposes (i.e. to sell to a vendor). This is an example of where steps 2 and 3 will come into play. First, decide whether you actually need the item or not. A warrior tank should not roll need on a cloth item with spell power on it. If the loot is an upgrade (better than what you are using), roll need on it. If it is not an upgrade, roll greed (or pass by hitting the “x” on the corner of the box) or click the weird sword thing to roll to disenchant. This is really not a complicated thing here, but recently it seems like every time I am in a dungeon, there is someone rolling need on everything that drops. This really screws the rest of the group over, especially if some of those items are upgrades.
Next, you need to keep in mind that while in this group, these people are here to work together. Fighting or insulting each other never helps get the instance cleared faster. Even if there is some person in your group being a total idiot, try to point it out nicely. If he doesn’t stop, vote to kick him. Arguing is just a waste of time and is annoying. So chill and kill stuff.
Step 5: Use your brain.
Playing a video game is not like watching TV. You can’t just sit there mindlessly and expect anything to get done the right way.
That being said, you should pay attention to what is going on around your character. Make sure you don’t back into random monsters accidentally. Keep an eye out for players of the opposing faction who probably want to gank you. If there is fire or weird stuff on the ground where your character is standing, move out of it. It really is not hard and being observant will help you as your level progresses.
A lot of situations in the game, like dungeons, will require you to use a small amount of common sense and perhaps some problem solving skills. So take your time and figure out what is going on around you before you run and face pull that big AoE pack inside the instance. Everyone else will appreciate your common sense.
Tags: Beginner, Classes, Dungeon, Guides, World of Warcraft
