How do you feel about group content?

The Battle of Dazar’alor has arrived, and the raiding has begun in earnest. I’ll admit it, sometimes I really miss raiding. There’s something innately satisfying and fun about tackling a complicated raid boss as a team and unraveling the puzzle of how to take it down. The same could be said about dungeons, too – yes, it’s on a smaller scale, but on higher difficulty levels, those little dungeon bosses can be a really tough challenge.

Beyond that, there was a sense of camaraderie in every raid guild I was in. I have tons of memories of particularly hysterical boss pulls, in-jokes from former guildmates, and pranks and hijinks pulled on unsuspecting afk pals. It’s only natural when you spend so much time together, and hey – you need something to do between pulls, you know?

I haven’t raided seriously since Mists of Pandaria. Oh, I still raid, but it’s just via LFR. I get the experience of the raid, but I find myself missing that connection I had when I was part of a dedicated group. And the same goes for dungeons – if I want to do a dungeon, I go to the group finder and wait until I’m plopped in a group of strangers. We might crack a few jokes, but most of the time it’s dead silence and down to business to get through the run as quickly as possible and then we’re out, never to see each other again.

It seems a little strange, when I think about it. I mean you have a couple of tools meant to bring people together, yet it’s rare that any of these people pipe up and say anything in chat. It feels like people aren’t really there to connect or have fun, they’re just there to kill the thing as mechanically and efficiently as possible without saying a word. To be honest, it mostly makes me avoid group content unless absolutely necessary. There are still dungeons in Battle for Azeroth I haven’t completed.

That may just be me, though – I’ve been guildless for quite some time now, and my perception of group content is based on a lot of fond, old memories of how things used to be. Maybe it’s just nostalgia on my part, but to me, it feels like the Group Finder and LFR, while incredibly useful, kind of stripped that sense of camaraderie right out of group content.

I’m curious how you guys feel about group content, though. Are you part of a raiding, PVP, or dungeon-running guild? Do you enjoy doing group content – is it something you look forward to tackling? Do you think tools like the group finder and LFR are useful ways to complete content? Are you one of those people that pipes up in random groups, or do you prefer to stay silent? And how do you feel about chatty groups when it comes to the group finder or LFR?