I will tell you a secret: I have a very low tolerance for voice chat abuses.

Anyone who ever PuGs heavily can tell you that how a raid uses voice chat can vary enormously between groups. Some groups use it exclusively for mid-fight calls, and the next group may do all their social chatting this way, while another falls somewhere in between. The worst part, however, is when you get that one player in the raid who has a radically different approach to vent than the other nine members and is oblivious to it.

With that in mind, I thought it might be a good idea to lay out some general guidelines for using voice chat when raiding with new players, whether in a PuG or as a sub or with a new start-up raid.

• Pay attention to what everyone else is doing. Before you say anything on voice chat, listen to how the other people are using it first. If they are being social there, then it’s okay to join in. If they are only using vent to talk about the fight itself, then don’t start yacking it up about what you did last weekend. It should seem obvious but experience has taught me that it isn’t.

• Don’t chat about irrelevant stuff while in combat. It can be very distracting for some players, and it prevents critical raid calls or strategy adjustments. It also encourages more people to do the same by responding to you. While some raids do continue to be social even during boss fights, this is usually with an established raid that has a fight on farm, and is rarely appropriate in a PuG environment.

• Don’t do mid-fight call outs unless assigned. One person calling out an event on vent can be helpful. Three people calling it out on vent can make what would have been valuable information into an incomprehensible mess. Let the raid leader pick a single person to make calls so half the raid isn’t shouting over each other. Furthermore…

• Not everything needs a call out. Every raider can groan about that one guy who shouted on vent every time he needed heals, or every time he died (despite performing a non-pertinent role), or whenever he was targeted by an ability everyone could already see in their raid warnings. If this doesn’t sound familiar, you may be that guy. Don’t be that guy, because that guy is on mute.

• Don’t fight on voice chat. Yes, sometimes groups can be frustrating and you just want to yell at people, but don’t do it through your mic. On top of making everyone uncomfortable, there are usually other people in channel who aren’t at fault and don’t deserve to be yelled at. Pick your battles. If you really need to say something, say it privately or at least in /chat. No one wants their speakers blown out by Mister Angry.

• Censor yourself. Don’t talk make inflammatory or controversial comments, even if you aren’t being serious. You don’t know if someone will take a remark personally, and they don’t know you enough to tell if you’re joking or not. Additionally, don’t vocalise every single thought that comes to your mind; some things are not relevant or interesting. You don’t need to add a witty quip after everything that is said. It becomes tiresome.

• Don’t dominate voice chat. Even if a raid has a very active vent channel and everyone is participating, remember the channel is not your personal soapbox. Don’t hog the mic and don’t talk over other people. You’re not really being social if 99% of the chatting being done is by you and everyone else is stuck listening.

• Don’t use vent if you’re only communicating with one person. If you want to have an extended conversation with one particular person, whisper them. No one else wants to be a captive audience to a personal discussion.

• Respect your raidmates. If someone asks you to quiet down or stop talking about a particular topic, do it.

Voice chat can be an amazing tool or a painful aggravation depending on how it’s used. Use your common sense to make sure that you are conducive to the former and not contributing to the latter.

Survey any raider on the worst offenses one of their fellow raiders can commit, and you will generally find they fall under one of the following four categories. While no raider is perfect, a good player will always be aware of how their behaviour affects their teammates and will make good effort to make sure these sins do not occur.

Making People Wait On You

Time rules a raider’s schedule. Whether it’s getting that one last attempt in before calling it for the night or plowing through trash to get to the boss, everything is balanced around the amount of time a raid gets together each lockout period. Time is the most precious commodity a raider can have and nothing makes people angrier than those who waste it for everyone.

Sins:
• Showing up late
• Taking excessive AFKs
• Waiting until immediately before start time to buy flasks or gems, set up addons, or get enchants.
• Failure to travel to instance in advance and expecting a summons

Being Unrealiable

Raiding, like many sports, is all about teamwork. Raiders rely and count on each other, and the mark of a good raid is making your strengths work together and balancing out each other’s weaknesses. Unreliable people erode the framework of cooperation at the foundation. If a player can’t count on his teammate, the raid’s performance stunted and resentment festers between members.

Sins:
• Having a poor internet connection
• Failure to respond to the calendar invites
• Habit of not showing up when promised
• Being distracted during raid time

Showing An Obvious Lack of Effort For Your Role

Although being a good raider means being able to work well with your raiding peers, every player has an individual responsibility to prepare him to contribute to the group as best they can. This means doing research on the class you play, the instance you’ll be visiting and your roles and duties within. A good player will be proactive about reading guides and strategies, monitoring patch notes for changes and keeping up with relevant theorycrafting and always showing up for a raid prepared.

Sins:
• Failure to keep gear gemmed and enchanted
• Ignorance about class playstyle
• Lack of research on boss strategies or guides
• Showing up in the wrong spec or gear
• Didn’t bring proper consumables or reagents

Bad Attitude

By sheer virtue of being an activity that involves working closely with other people for many hours of the week, raiding is a highly social activity. While knowledge and skill may rule a raid’s success, the attitude of a raid controls how happy the players are with that group. People who harm the social dynamics of a raid are like a poison, causing disharmony, hurt feelings, a tense atmosphere and making raiding feel more like work than a hobby.

Sins:
• Blaming other people constantly
• Excessively offering unsolicited advice and critiques
• Being mean, rude, or belittling teammates
• Whoring loot at the expense of others
• Dominating voice chat constantly
• Inability communicate issues in a constructive fashion.