First time for everything...

Been playing off and on for over three years and for the first time ever one of my Scrappers got turned down for a TF. Tin Mage was looking for two more, I sent a tell, and got back "Sorry no room for a Scrapper" or something to that effect. Then I see in Broadcast that person is tossing out ITF looking for 2 more, prefer tank, heals or MM.

*shrug*

I went and ran a tip and came back to the RWZ joined a team of three Scrappers, three dominators and two controllers and ran the Tin mage. Director 11 was a pain, but the rest of the TF went well. No tank, no healzor (the controllers were both Stormies).

I've never actually run into AT discrimination before. And as my subsequent Tin Mage showed it really is uncalled for under any normal game circumstance. You want to run a Red-side respec, maybe a little picky....really want that Master of *whatever*? You might want to be a bit selective. But short of trying to Duo a Mother Ship Raid, or something equally bizarre you just don't need to be selective in this game. Thankfully ; )

I have ran plenty of TFs without a tank and/or healer. The line I use is "Tanks and Healers are nice but not required"

I have seen a little bias on STF with too many melee, But not on any other regular TF run. Some people like to hate on Stalkers too, I know a couple of very good players who uses Stalkers as their main.

I was actually told once that they would prefer me not play my MM on their STF run. Told them to have fun without me. 10 minutes later I get tell from saying that I can bring my MM. My reply was the same. Have fun without me.

It is not the AT, it is the player. A team of Good players regaurdless of AT can overcome almost anything in this game.

Unless your team already has eight Scrappers, you obviously don't have enough Scrappers yet.

Seriously though, if I feel a certain team needs something, as team leader I feel it's my duty to bring that certain something. If it's a 'cuda and we don't have an MM or Defender, I switch to one. If it's an LGTF and we don't have enough controls, I switch to someone who has'em.

And that's mostly it. I'm hesitant to start an STF without a meatshield, but I'm confident even that can be done without any major complications if you plan ahead (read: OD on purple inspirations). There's plenty of people talking about how the game is already too easy, so why bother making 'perfect' teams when sub-optimal teams still kick a ton of ***?

There are very few circumstances where a specific AT is a must have on any of the content in this game. That's one of the joys of its flexibility.

"You got to dig it to dig it, you dig?"
Thelonious Monk

I just did the Tin Mage for the first time last night. Three scrappers, a brute, a tank, a blaster, a dominator, and some other debuff/support character. I died several times, which is a bit unusual, but we got it done, and a bit faster than I expected.

I was actually worried when I saw all the scrappers, but it didn't seem to be a problem.

I do get that once in a while with my stalkers (It's amazing how quickly some teams that are suddenly "full" when you offer a stalker mysteriously lose members and start recuiting again a few minutes after they tell you no. ), but I can't say I've ever had anyone turn down one of my scraps, even when the group was already heavy on melee.

With just a couple of notable exceptions, if I see someone advertising for pretty much anything, and they're looking for anything more specific than "more people", I generally don't bother. This game, to my mind, should be, and for the most part, is something where you can succeed by being a good player on a good team regardless of AT spread.

The only exceptions are asking for the Temp Power ATs for the Barracuda SF (which is, to my mind, pretty much the pinnacle of both bad design and bad storytelling, and which I'll probably ignore advertising for anyway) and for controls on the Lady Grey TF (where more controls can be handy, though with APPs and a smattering of other such abilities, I think most teams tend to overcompensate anyway).

I have extremely low tolerance for people who form a TF with AT biases in mind. However, we don't know that's what happened here. Many times, if you take people on a first come, first-to-join basis, you get a lot of one thing and not enough of something else that you know will be really helpful. The team you were joining might have had 4-6 melee characters already and no support, and might have wanted to keep the other slots open for buffers, debuffers and the like.

Yes, teams of all Scrappers or what have you can almost certainly complete everything we've seen so far. But not everyone forming a pick up team is going to want to risk that the team they'll form will be able to do so in a what they think is reasonable amount of time. (If I want to form an all-Scrapper ITF or something, I wouldn't form it as a PuG.)

In short, I don't approve of people forming a TF with the mindset "I don't want any of "AT X on this team," but I also think it's a bit silly to expect folks to accept absolutely anything that pipes up without any regard to team composition. Realistic expectations lie somewhere in between.