WOW'S NEW LFG FEATURE or RETURN OF MAGMASKROTE

    Reading my thoughts on group-building, you may have thought to yourself, "Self, knows not this jive turkey that WoW has a new Looking For Group feature that automatically fills your group, crossing dimensional barriers to bring in players from other servers? Does he not know it teleports you to your dungeon, lets you run the same heroic twice in one day, rewards you for grouping, gives you back-rubs and converts pee to drinking water like in Waterworld? Why does he think his advice on group-building applies?"
  
    I think my advice applies, Self, because it results in stronger groups and teaches leaders valuable team-building and networking skills. Of course I think the LFG feature is wonderful and useful, and I do think it will make it easy to get groups. Chinese takeout makes it easy to get food, but you'll never learn to cook that way.

    The skills we're working on here are indispensible: A leader must learn how to search for prospective followers. They must know how to make recruitment ads fun, how to break the ice with strangers and make such a good impression that skilled players will want to get to know the leader better. My path is absolutely harder, but adversity breeds betterment. If you want to be Daniel-San to my Mr. Miyagi, you have to wax on and wax off, not just take the car through a car-wash, since the goal isn't really a shiny car.

    I am not soapboxing against the newfangled LFG system. On the contrary, I think it's a wonderful way to reward grouping, and help people just run dungeons. And of course I know that even the most dedicated leaderly trainee will run a bunch of times with four strangers in hopes of getting the adorable PUG pug. I simply think people who want to become excellent leaders need to build leadership skills the old-fashioned way.

    The good news is, leaders CAN learn something using only the LFG system. It's a great way to be exposed to jerks! Since you're with me so far in the training, you've been through random battlegrounds. Imagine that, except now you have to give those guys orders. You can't just be that guy who's fierce in battle and attracts followers, you're the leader. You are throwing yourself in at the deep end and exposing yourself to a random assortment of players. Sometimes that clicking sound you hear will be a great group coming together. More often, it'll be a metallic click, right up against your temple... But it'll toughen you up, and fast.

    (If you don't want the headache of leading four strangers, just don't sign up as leader. But prepare yourself: a competent leader randomly grouped with an inept one will quickly learn the joys of being shivved with a rusty butter-knife.)

    LFG also helps you bigtime, in that it severely reduces the chance you'll have to call a run because you just can't find that last player, and since it's a toss of the dice what sort of person you get, you effectively have to practice both custom-building groups and dealing with random elements if you include a player from LFG -- not to mention the in-game rewards for using it.

    Remember, great as the new system is, convenience is no substitute for expertise. Yes, it's very helpful to know how to lead random pickups (later,) but it's more helpful to learn how to recruit a team. If you need to, open up LFG and pick up your last guy or two. If you really want to learn to play with the hand you're dealt, and/or if you're desperate for that vanity pet reward, go in blind with four strangers.

     I'd like you to meet those strangers now: Ümläûtør , Barrackhitler, Magmaskrote and Pu.