I don’t use consumables in M+.
I play with friends instead, and do slightly easier content where the tiny fractional bonuses from flasks and food will not give us that edge that we would have needed.
M+ was never meant to be pugged. It is not an ideal pugging situation. IO helps with this, but as many have alluded to, it isn’t perfect.
pugged to 2k in BFA in under two weeks. Was running +21’s in about three weeks. This expansion is radically different.
Regardless of how great your experience was, it probably would have been better with a tight knit group of friends, assuming they were good enough.
If you’re not getting invited to groups, it’s probably a you issue OP.
Make friends and make your own groups 
the big difference here is that good players generally understand what is required to complete difficult content, so they’re much less likely to blame rio for any perceived failures.
In my experience you don’t see anyone again in M+ until you get to around the 17+ level. Before that there is a huge pool of players with a vast array of skills.
I like io but I don’t think it goes far enough. It should hold your previous seasons io score even into a new expansion. It could also link to parses from wowlogs and show your median and/or top parses. It could record an average dps or track use of cc and other utilities. This would all take a ton of additional data space so it could be an opt in system.
My problem right now is that there is no way to distinguish yourself. My ilvl sucks because of bad rng yet I out damage players with 10 ilvl higher then myself. My io sucks because I can’t get invited into groups running higher keys because my io sucks.
I’d look for another group to run but I can’t seem to find one. When I ask randoms they leave the dungeon. I joined discord communities but they are mostly dead or have their own clicks. In this case what can you do?
Ya I get that but it’s not that they were “good in BC” they were good in every xpac, every patch, every aspect of the game both PvE and PvP.
All this is to drive the point home that this problem exists and it’s not just bad players/new players. Obviously your gimped IO score is attributed to X player not doing enough timed runs. But now we’re circling back to chicken or the egg problem where he as ahealer had a hard time finding groups and to raise IO score with because as MW monk, he has to drink after every other pull. I tried healing with monk too and it’s in a bad place I dunno how tf he does it. With every DPS not following mechanics even in low mythics, it makes his job harder. So the failure to finish that run because DPS keeps dying and he can’t keep them alive… coupled with tanks chain pulling because he expects every healer to expend 0% mana for intensive healing and then blaming healer for not correctly managing mana is just dumb and got him to stop playing mythics. Nevermind half of those groups will just kick him (this is +5s)
And the competent groups of people he should be running mythics with will not accept him in groups because 1. he’s MW monk and will oom every pull and 2. he has no io score that satisfies hosts. And him starting a group won’t be a thing because he wants to hop in a group and start within 5 minutes. The dude has 3 kids and has IRL aggro. He’s just stuck in an unfortunate place. He has time to play, just no time/effort to host a group. That shouldn’t be something where people say “Well that’s your problem only.” Good amount of WoW players have jobs and kids/families. Part of the whole QoL improvements and seamlessly being able to hop in and out of any content was done to allow the changing demographics to continue playing.
I think you can check this on the site. My BDK hit 3000 in Legion and I went back and checked recently and it was still there. I had to thumb down through the menu though, it wasn’t obvious at first glance, and nobody will know unless they went and looked meticulously.
In the case you mentioned, find a friend that tanks. Make groups with him.
Seamlessly hopping into M+ is basically asking to be carried, not in all cases, but in a lot of them.
Group leaders can pick their own members, and that shouldn’t change. Without stripping away the ability of people to pick their own groups, this is a tough one to solve. And that solution would cause more problems.
All the RL arguments, wife aggro, kids, jobs, chores, etc are non sequiturs and have no place in this discussion, I would argue, particularly if they are being used to take away the ability to choose your own group.
As someone with as much skill as you claim to have, you wouldn’t want to be forced into groups with people who constantly kill your keys. It is…painful.
It’s not an addon that is exclusively used by toxic people, it’s an addon used by people who pug alot.
Your chances of landing in a toxic group are the same with or without raider io.
In fact, past a certain IO rating, those people are MORE likely to leave after a single wipe because their chance of upping their score disappears. The “IO ONLY” crowd bail more than the terrible players. Again, not meant for pugging.
I’m shocked a game without M+ doesn’t have M+ problems.
There’s some truth to this.
I tend to avoid inviting people who’s ilvl is too high relative to the rest of the population.
Exactly. If you have a group of 500 guys, be wary of inviting a 3k+ player to the group. One missed kick, and he’s gone.
He will then learn why io is important when he starts pushing keys or runs a raid and wonders why he keeps wiping.
This is false. It’s extremely hard to get into raids in FF14 without experience. The first thing leaders do is check your achievements. You obviously have no end-game experience with FF14.
Sure you can. After an hour waiting there still hasn’t been a tank or healer who signs up.
Im a tank main in that game and Ive had 0 problems with it. I can pull at my pace and never had anyone complain i was too fast or slow. Dark knight tank OP 
Savage and extreme fights in that game reward so much more and you can farm at your own pace. Not including the fights offer more of a challenge than this game does.