Short answer: No. Long answer: No because of thisâŚ
When pushing into high keys, thats where you tread through territory where you have to learn the routes, mechanics and even your classes toolkit and coordinate, doing a key above 14+ requires this, reason why IO is needed for pugs, a key above 14+ is not a push over, its not âeasyâ as you seem to see and mistakes you often make in a regular mythic or low level keys is often unforgivable in these high level keys. Also, there is a lot of these groups and the leader isnât feeling obligated to carry and thats the nature of the beast, get over it, its not because the leader is toxic nor elitist, its that he/she wants a smooth run with a decent coordinated group.
However, if you want to run a 15+ key without IO, please let this mold into your memory. There is some experiences within my guildmates and even myself with pugging, its a chance you will get good people or people who are not experienced with the said content, however in one of my guildmates run, he had a healer who died the most and ended up getting lost, which means to backtrack and get the healer⌠also as a prot warrior⌠he was out healing the healer, after the run he left and felt like it was a complete disaster after spending 20+ minutes in overtime, from mine I had couple there is one time I had sit and wait for a couple of seconds in Siege of Borulas for someone because that person was dying in the water 3+ times, ended up beating the timer by like 5 seconds left, I left the group and felt like the start was a disaster but smooth after that, there is a couple of examples I would like to mention but that would be alot. However, if you want to start that 15+ key without raider io, good luck, in most cases its either a make or break, mostly break, Not going to be a pleasant experience nor fun, may end up being a disaster, going to spend 20+ minutes, Iâm not responsible if you attempted this and your key depletes because someone leaves or the run was a disaster.
These are the reasons why IO is almost used in pugs to determine someones experience in the said dungeon level, its not because someone is not obligated to carry you for free gear, its not because someone wants a person to be a detrimental to their own key they want to push, the leader of the group wants a smoother run, its his group, his way of doing things when doing it. If you want to do M+, I would advice you, the OP and people here against IO to build your IO from scratch, learn the ways of M+ and your Classâs toolkit please do so if you want to get into high keys, make your own group or get a guild that runs M+ through the week or weekends.