Take a stand for politeness!

[Irisjir Callard]

Ok.

I gave myself a good 36 hours to calm down after the latest infringement on my personal moral standards as pertains to Sneak and Invis.

But at this point, what used to be a small damp spot of irritation on the floor of my mind has become a widespread, roiling flood of enraged fury.

For the love of all that is holy, whitemages are not sneak-invisible dispensers for the worlds assholes.

I have no problem S/I'ing party members, so long as they ask nicely. I don't take vicarious pleasure from it, but it's not unpleasant.

But when six people including the Redmage all line up at the entrance to an agro area and all stare at me expectantly, I'm prone to stare right back.

You expect sneak and invis.

I expect to hear you ask me for them if you need them. I expect to be treated like a human being, not a trained dog.

If you don't want to ask, there is an Auction House full of magic oil and powder to save you from the "indignity" of saying the words "Can I get a sneak, please?"

I have had this policy ever since Kuftal Tunnel, because parties aggravated me so badly there, expecting me to run back and forth across the zone trying to keep them all sneaked with minimal assistance (IE them not telling me sneak was wearing until they had agro).

This is an incredibly huge pet peeve of mine, and yet it keeps being aggravated. I had a party a few nights ago tell me I ought to be automatically sneaking melees, and they didn't need a whitemage who had to be told minute by minute how to do her job. The only reason I can think of for people to continue to expect the whitemage to S/I as automatically as curing is because other whitemages DO it.

I honestly don't beleive its in the job description, kind of like I don't beleive curing everyone who runs past me with low HP is in my job description, or instantly teleporting everyone literate enough to communicate that they would like a teleport to an unnamed telepoint from an unnamed location.

I believe the job description is to hand out sufficent Cures to keep the party from dying. Everything else I do (haste, buffs, regen, etc etc...) I do from pride in my work.

But I take no pride from being treated like a slave unworthy of two words (both of which are in the auto-translate.)


Bottom line:

I believe it's time for whitemages to take a stand on this issue, and start letting people know we aren't their doormats.

[Eohmer]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

And this is why I ALWAYS carry my own Sneak Oils. (I'm a Ninja so I already have my Tonko tools.)

[Shanisasha]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

Agreed.

I'm lucky enough to have ran into several melees that carried oils and powders, which is such a moment of awe it is unbelievable. If I see my party waiting for me at an aggro zone, I will assume they want me to s/i them. Usually ends up in me scolding them for having no pots/oils, and forcing the other mages to help me drag melee butt across the zone (3 mages...3 melees... coincidence? I think not).

I will automatically sneak friends when they're /nin, because I know they carry tonko and oils, and I'd rather spare them. If not /nin, I'll also invis them.

"omg I cant aford oils or powders are you crazy? lolz" is something I cannot handle. You can't afford oils and powders as a melee, how on earth are you affording your equipment, weapons and food? You have no right to level if you can't even afford 40K of meds that will last you for months. Better yet, I'll synth you some if you get me ingredients. 20K for a stack of each in the end.

You give them a hand once, they take all the way to your Blessed hammer if you let them.

I have found out if you remind melees about oils/powders before leaving towards camp, with specifications of what they are needed for, they're more liable to get them.

[Linra]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

I'm not actually high enough to even experience this... so can someone tell me alittle about all of this? o.o Like why is Sneak/Invisible important while killing mobs? x.x

[Shanisasha]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

Not while killing mobs, really, but while moving to camp. Say you have to cross kuftal tunnel with Guivre on the loose and 4 melees are staring at you to sneak/invis all of them while berating you for not being faster at doing it. Of course, most of them dont have the map and end up lost, and you have to go find them. For some sneak will wear without them telling you and they'll drag 20 crabs behind them.

It's a bit of a mess.

[Ellipses]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

I'm not actually high enough to even experience this... so can someone tell me alittle about all of this? o.o Like why is Sneak/Invisible important while killing mobs? x.x

It's not. It's important while trying to get to your camp, which is sometimes across multiple zones of aggro you have no choice but to walk through.

[DakAttack]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

It's not important while killing them, but important while traversing dangerous areas to eventually arrive at your destination camp to begin killing them. A lot of people like to camp in Cape Terrigan, but that requires running through Kuftal Tunnel, and only Kuftal Tunnel. In Kuftal even players who are level 75 will catch aggro, and almost everything there aggros sound.

You can't really expect a Whm to run back and forth keeping tabs on everybody with Sneak, and you can expect even less when Guivre is up and about. If you're not smart enough to bring your own supplies, you deserve to be dead on the ground.

[Taolynn]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

Even though I am a brd/whm, I will help the whm(or rdm/whm) sneak invis people. Although sometime I just sneak/invis myself and run on and the whm does the same(hey no one asked for s/i!).

I'm not going to stop and wonder if someone wants a sneak or invis. If they want one, they can ask, otherwise I will just s/i myself and run to the camp.

I think it's understandable for someone to get aggrivated when people can't ask nicely and treat you as a dispenser.

[Raydeus]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

OP why don't you just tell parties that as soon as you join the party? Specially if you know you are gonna go through a zone that requires a stealth-ish aproach.

I know you must think you shouldn't have to say it and that it should be common cortesy, but if you are seeing that it isn't the case then you gotta say what's in your mind.

In my case as a RDM I just let people know that I'm just casting invis and sneak at the entrance so they can save oils and powders but that once we are inside the zone they are pretty much on their own.

It's the same when I'm playing as PLD or another sneak/invisless job, I usually ask for Sneak or Invis at zone to save an oil and a powder, but recasts inside the zone I always do it myself.

[nazlfrag]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

I like doing sneak/invis, it's not like I'll do anything else with my mp on the way to camp. Regardless, it's rare that people need it and I find it ridiculous that people expect it. Help keep alchemists employed and buy your oils and powders!

[Grizzlebeard]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

Nothing to do with politeness really. Although I would happily get behind a sterilisation program to prevent people such as the ones you partied with from ever procreating.

[Feenicks]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

Hold on, it's the WHM's (or anyone subbing WHM) job to help Sneak/Invis the party to the camp. It's not an extra task that we fancy on people, it's expected of us. Asking people in your party to ask for Sneak/Invis is like asking them to ask politely for a teleport to the nearest telepoint when the party is first formed. It should be a natural reaction - when you arrive at a zone with aggro, you start Sneak/Invising the people who can't do it by themselves in the same manner that you start tossing Cures at a fellow PT member when their HP goes down. There's no real call for 100% politeness and formailty because it's expected of you.

I do however agree that party members should tell people when Sneak/Invis starts to wear off because it's annoying as hell to clean up the mess that can result sometimes.

Everything else I do (haste, buffs, regen, etc etc...) I do from pride in my work.

I'm sorry, but if you think that these are extras and don't come with the job description then you haven't quite grasped the complete role of WHM in this game. It's like saying that melee only have to beat the crap out of the enemy and that WS's and skillchains are only executed under certain circumstances for certain people.


We definitely are not the doormats of the world, but asking people to suck up to you in order to get vital transportation requirements is just arrogant. Perhaps BRD should start complaining that the puller who accidentally linked the mob didn't ask nicely for the link to be slept? Or holding great big thank you parades for NINs who use ninjutsu other than Utsusemi?

[Skoal]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

I do not trust sneak/invis spells so I alway bring my own stuff. I just don't see the logic on relying on 2 maybe 3 people to keep 6 sneaked and invised when the spell potentcy is so random.

[Tirocupidus]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

If I'm playing a job that has sneak and invis, then I'll sneak and invis if we need it. I'll do it automatically if we're running through an area that requires it. Honestly, what's the big deal? Why the hell would anyone whine about something so trivial? No clue why you feel like a slave for it, but it's your job to use the spells that you have for the good of the party.

So I'm in this party, and the warrior is missing about half his health, and he's just staring at me. What? If he wants a cure, he can ask for it. If he doesn't want to ask for a cure, he can buy potions at the AH. What am I? A slave just there to cure them?

Blah, blah... I see that in nearly the same light as your post. Grow some skin. Your "job description" isn't to only keep the party from dying. Your job (and everyone's job) is to use what tools they have to make things run smoothly.

[Gentoo]

Re: Take a stand for politeness!

I'm with the others that have indicated that keeping party members stealthed up is part of the job description -- falls under that "keep the party from dying" category.

However, unlike Cure (or Erase, Viruna, etc), it's not possible for a White Mage to know that a party member needs magical stealth versus using chemical means. After the Yungles I've pretty much come to expect everyone to have at least a vague notion how unreliable the sneak and invisible spells are -- and I assume that people bring their own stealth methods because of this. Like the OP said, I expect anyone that needs sneak and/or invisible to tell me so.