I'm glad you can psychically interface with your computer but us humans need a combat log to see what exactly is going on with other people in your raid, and what abilities are causing what type and amount of damage. If you can do it without that information, it can not be a difficult encounter as the "difficulty" is overcoming lack of information rather than the actual encounter mechanics. What you really want is difficulty through obscurity not true difficulty. People claiming they did it in EQ1 without this information are flat out lying. EQ had a combat log and log parsers to get that information. Even WITH damage meters top guilds in wow use log parsers because you get a much more accurate replay of the encounter with them. The DPS meters are only used as real time feedback for people trying to modify their play to be the best it can be. You can do this kind of experimentation with parses but it's only after the fact. Its not any different just less convenient. Essentially it comes down to convenience. The so called "hard core" people shouting down dps meters and combat logs want difficulty through annoyance or obscurity.

And this is an example of another feature wow has that I would like to see added and that's a group trade-able option for bop items for a limited time period. For all the complaining I've seen about people ninja looting in dungeons I've found that if I whispered someone "hey that tinket is plus heals not plus dmg" or something along those lines I'll often times get the item.

I don't get why that is an argument against x-server LFG especially if its optional. Anyone you ignore in wow be it same server or cross server will never group with you again.

Agreed, what people think of as "server community" is forum drama and busybodies proclaiming black lists that only the very small percentage of people who were actually reading those forums ever heard about. While finding out who slept with who for loot or who ninja'd the raid prior to hearthing and /gquit ing was entertaining, I don't really think of it as a GOOD reason for server community. Most of the good community interaction came guild to guild through guild leaders or pvp pre-made groups. I understand the want to meet people on your own server, and thats why I think any LFG tool should at least have the option to flag server only. Having experience with off-peak, low pop, low level manual and automated dungeon finding I can say not having cross server grouping for those cases seriously hinders the ability to do a dungeon.

I also found I could level up w/out dungeons, but that questing was more engaging and faster unless I had the quests for the dungeons or full rested xp always. Since I was the tank and usually had lead so I could mark prior to LFD I would also kick willfully bad players. I helped new players or new to the dungeon players before and after LFD, because I'm not an ******e, not because of LFD. Before LFD I ALSO chatted a lot, teaching people the instance. Now I don't have to chat as much because dungeons are so accessible that most people have done them and know what is going on. I don't have to spend half the instance teaching the instance. In this game, it has been the same. My talking is hi, good group, and any instructions I need to pass along to succeed at the instance. Before LFD I generally didn't chat because general is always gutter trash like barrens. This game has been no different. I still answer questions when people ask, but that is not as common as the other spam. Just a couple weeks ago I grouped up on a level 20 something alt with another person in a leveling zone in wow, which some people on these forums would have you believe is not possible because no one quests in the game anymore. Also, if you didn't notice, a few patches ago bliizzard added priority to same server people. I have met and friend-ed people on my server due to LFD. If you choose not to do so, that's not LFD's fault. For me though pugs are for gear runs when my guild isn't available for groups. I never grouped specifically to meet people. I've never seen general chat as anything other than what you've said. Aside from the times where people are asking a question or looking for help on a group quest. Not in this game, not in wow, not in eve, rift, swg, asheron's call, DDO or lotr. However if you like the locker room style talk, it can be entertaining. LFD changed nothing about this. Bots were in wow practically at launch, LFD absolutely didn't cause them. If your bots comment is saying that people who don't talk in dungeon's are essentially bots then maybe strike up a conversation. Most groups i've been in will socialize if anyone starts talking. Sometimes I'm not in the mood to fire up a conversation or respond much. LFD isn't going to change that. Now I will agree that it removed the primary reason I had people outside of my guild on my friends list. And that is being consistently able to put together groups by whispering people and asking them to come along. Now maybe it was a bit of an ego boost to have them constantly asking me to heal or tank for them because they like the way I did those things. But luckily I don't need that kind of ego stroking to enjoy the game. I'd much rather just play the game as much as I can when I have time. If I want to meet people I have other avenues in real life where I can make that happen. That comes from the ease/experience with the dungeon. That behavior happened in vanilla wow. What you experience is the effect of scale. Before LFD you could not do as many dungeons as you do now and neither could everyone else. Now people have more experience with all the dungeons and you are exposed to more people. In absolute terms you've run into more ninjas, dbags, autopilots, etc than you ever have. But in relative terms you have not. As soon as you start adding people to your friends list to run constant groups you aren't pugging. You are playing with a group of friends that are at least as consistent as your guild. I did pure pugs a ton before dungeon finder so maybe thats why I have such a different outlook on it than the people who think it ruined wow. Awfulness happens in pugs, always has, always will. At least with a dungeon finder you can recover from them quickly and move on to the next group. If you want a friends list for consistent groups, do that, but don't call it a pug any more. Its essentially an extended guild and can be done w/ or without a dungeon finder. I have JUMPED off the platform from the 2nd boss in the nexus miss judging the gap and falling to my death. This was on an alt after dungeon finder. The whole group had to wait for me to run back because I didn't want to run down the ramp. What happened? I cracked a joke everyone laughed, they buffed me when I got back to them and we continued on with the run. I bet 90 out of 100 groups I've been in through dungeon finder would have done the same thing. If the last 10 groups wanted to be dbags about it, I would have been back in a dungeon in a few minutes, no harm no foul. The whole accountability thing that people seem to talk about with reputations is something people talk about as if it's the panacea for all things bad in pugs. The reality is that they will make a stink about it in general, and personally ignore the person but that person will be able to continue on as if nothing happened. They want the illusion that they can punish people for their wrongs I personally feel like its some sort of napoleon complex, but the reality is it doesn't work. Its even worse when the person acting out is a tank or healer because w/out a working LFG system the desperation to fill those two positions leaves people in a bad spot. The tank/healer is an ******e and the dps in the group are stuck because they don't want to lose another hour and a half trying to get a group. I've seen it happen. What I don't think should happen is for BW to half *** a dungeon finder. If they ARE going to bring in one they need to learn from all the things wow HAS learned. 1) Make same server people a priority to match with each other. I personally also think there should be a server only option because even if it takes longer if I DO want to meet people from my own server when grouping that should be an option. 2) Make sure boe drops bind on pickup if needed on. This takes away most of the monetary incentive for rolling need on something. 3) Make sure need rolls on boss loot are only applicable to the class rolling need. No sith warriors rolling on aim gear, no one rolling on things for their companions unless they happen to use the same armor as them. 4) Kick voting 5) Ignores work cross server and block that person from being in any group w/ you again. 6) Minimum gear level so people truly undergeared for the instance aren't hurting everyone in the group by joining. I personally didn't mind the requirement they had at the beginning of wrath where you had to find the dungeon entrance before you could queue for the dungeon. This doesn't really apply to swtor however. I also wouldn't mind the pre-wrath version that is similar to the one in swtor now, but it was global and not limited to the current zone. TL/DR: DF isn't the problem, pugs can be horrible, not having a dungeon finder will not change that. A poorly implemented DF may be worse than none at all.

Gee that's not how it works in my guild in wow, maybe you should take your own advice, take responsibility for yourself and join a guild not populated by tools.

I have my gripes with this game, tbh the interface and bugs and makes life easier for you features in this game are not even where Rift was at launch. However the game is something that I never really got in Rift, and that is something fun, and a story/world I care about. I've tried a couple MMOs after wow and this is the first one that has me excited. Yes there are problems, but the game itself is fun enough that I will continue to play until they are addressed and I continue to have fun or not and I start to not have fun anymore. They have obviously not failed, but when you charge 15 a month the question "What have you done for me lately" is valid.

It doesn't have to be exactly like wow but lets go over wow's version: Selectable roles and a match finding algorithm. I've played games like DDO (at least at launch) where they didn't match and just left that up to people. What you got was people in LFM, and people in LFG who didn't bother to look in the other tab or there just weren't enough people in LFM to match to the people in LFG. Sure using the tool properly makes it easier but not everyone wants to start a group to do the LFM thing. If the goal is to speed things up random is better, if the goal is to meet new people, random is still better. Brings you to the instance: A very nice perk, not something that really applies to SWTOR as all the instances are in the same place. At the same time, there's no argument AGAINST bringing you to the instance because you're not exploring anything to get to the fleet anyway. Personally I like to be able to pick up right where i left off before I grouped up. Cross server: This is the feature that most people dislike. These people must have never played on a low population server, off times, or leveled after the majority of the server hit max level. Still, saying you want to meet people on your server makes this a pretty easily corrected solution. They could do it in the manner wow does it where people on your own server get priority or you could make a toggle where you only look for others on your server. If you select the toggle you only play on your server. To me servers don't really mean anything except for a pool of people to recruit from for your guild. Especially in this game which is so heavily instanced anyway that you really don't feel like you're playing with a large amount of other people. Another server is just more people that have been segregated from you on another instance of the game. Anonymity and reputations: People argue that you can be anonymous and thus act like a *******. This happens regardless of dungeon finders. I've seen drama and "blacklists" in the past. They don't work, people can re-roll, do a payed name change (which is a revenue stream that EA is not going to ignore) or just whisper people instead of respond in general chat and no one will be the wiser. YOU might have blacklisted that person but you're really deluding yourself if you think you can keep that person from pugs. With dungeon finder you can /ignore dbags and they won't ever be in your group again. Now we know how wow addressed those issues, what remains to be seen is how Bioware does. I think they'd be doing a poor job to ignore refinements done in other games even if they don't decide to implement it in the exact same way.

I'm sorry but waiting 45 minutes while guiding someone to mara was not good times, it was annoying. Having a person leave in the middle of that instance meant the death of the group if we couldn't find a guild member and have a warlock to summon. Hearthing back to IF to spam general to get someone to travel all the way to Desolace to finish the instance.. yeah didnt happen. Again, people who look back at launch wow dungeoning as some great experience beyond the fact that the dungeons themselves were a great experience are seeing through the filter of nostalgia. Pugging in classic wow was great once you got to the dungeon. Every thing else about it was annoying and far more painful than it had to be. This is coming from a tank/healer.

Maybe I just haven't found it but it would be nice if I had an option to show companions in the group/raid ui so I could heal the companions off people i'm grouped with.

I played wow from launch, always a healer or tank. You know what most of my 'socialization' was? Teaching people how to run the instance. You know why I don't have to do that very often any more? People can get into instances so easily and often they actually know how to run the instance. Now if no one wants to talk no one has to. Most of the time if someone actually says something like hey whats up did you see the game last night? People will respond. Dungeon finder is great, even for me as a tank. I definitely had the friends list w/ people who were good to group with, but now I don't have to worry about feeling bad about turning down an instance as a tank when I don't want to run an instance because I know they'll have to spend hours spamming trade chat. I also get instant queues into the dungeon instead of having to spam trade myself or having to go to a main city. I think dungeon finder was one of the best things to happen to wow and if you really think that people are somehow less social than they were pre-dungeon finder you're letting nostalgia blind you. *edit* also, if you're ok w/ a server only LFG then just make the finder have a check box for realm only queue then you have the option to go xserver or not depending on your preferences.

It does if your idea of community is /1 LFG <instance> Need Heals and DPS 30 minutes later /1 LFG <instance Now need tank and DPS 30 minutes later /1 LFG <instance> need tank and healer /1 Good night everyone enjoyed spending the time hanging out in general chat with you all maybe tomorrow we can get a group! Seriously like I said in wow I always played a tank or healer and there were nights that I spent all my play time spamming for instances w/out success. Success depends on server population and hour of the day, which is why server only LFGs don't solve the issue either. Poor low pop server people get screwed.

Rift killed rift, not the LFD tool. I played wow long before LFG tool. I've always played in guilds where I could get guild groups a lot, but I still pugged a lot. I always played as a tank or a healer. Even though Ihad all those advantages I still consider the LFG tool to be one of the BEST things that have happened to wow. Waiting to find someone, to wait to run to a dungeon, to wait forever or disband if someone dc's or the group leader has to kick someone, or worse if the group leader is a douche and you have to drop and regroup is NOT FUN. All the time wasted doing that is time not having fun actually playing the game. I will occasionally have bad people in a dungeon usually a vote kick solves that issue fairly easily. You may occasionally lose a piece of gear to someone who ninja's but you have so many more opportunities for that piece of gear due to the fact that you aren't waiting in a hub for 2 hours BEFORE you even get a party formed that the inconvenience is offset. All of the issues with an LFG tool happen w/out an LFG tool. People will still ninja, or d/c or roll on your upgrade even though they can't really use it or act like morons. It will just happen a lot less, because instead of being able to get into 20 dungeons a week you get into 5. Sure, there may be a few less opportunities to find good people to add to my friends list so that I can have a list of people to bypass the sitting around looking for a group, but the entire purpose of that list to me was made obsolete by the LFG tool. I think people against the LFG are either the masochists that think that making things annoying is equal to making things challenging or rewarding somehow because you had to put up with the annoyance, people who think that doing it the "hard" way somehow makes them better, or are simply remembering "the old days" with some kind of rose colored nostalgia glasses. If you think its a lore issue, we're in a world with interstellar communication and travel. A jobs board is out of scope? TL:DR Bad groups happen, the time saved not waiting hours for a group outweighs the bad groups which still happen they're just spaced out because you can't get as many groups. Spend time playing the game not spamming general chat.

It definitely messed me up the first time I ran through one. Then I just started viewing it as clicking something on my desktop rather than flying and I was able to work with it.