LFM ICC 10, taking first 9 people to whisper me

Nobody starts a PUG this way, but given how so many people go about it, they might as well.

Recently I realized the yellow text didn’t mean anything.  People can get carried in raids or do the carrying, and both of them will get the same achievement.  Not to mention the various ways to fake it (linking someone else’s achievement, using Underachiever, linking the incomplete achievement, etc).  I bet you’ve had a lot of successful PUGs where you finished the raid and yet half the group got the achievement, and I bet you’ve had a bunch of fail PUGs where everything went to shit despite the PUG organizer insisting only people with achievements can come.

If you really want to start a raid PUG, you have two options – grab 9 random people and hope everything works out, or do some actual work.  Quiz them on the strategies.  Inspect them to see if they have a clue on how to spec and gem/enchant. That may mean you have to have your own clue on how different classes and specs gem/enchant.  Well, if you're going to be leading the raid, shouldn't that be the case?

I’m not saying grabbing 9 random strangers is bad.  You’ll get a PUG up and running fast and depending on what your goal is, it may be worth just rolling the dice instead of meticulously filling every spot.  I essentially do this for the raid weekly if it's something like a Naxx boss or Flame Leviathan and it works just fine.

I’m just saying if your entire vetting process for a PUG consists of “link ach plz,” or "pst Gearscore" then you're spending a lot of extra time doing something that probably won't result in much of a difference in the skill level of the player you pick up.