Forum post of the day: Honor, glory, and coercion
This may come as a big surprise, but not everyone likes to do Arenas. Even some who very much enjoy Battleground play, are not enthralled with the small-scale and highly-competitive arena environment. I'm of the opinion that if you don't enjoy the arena, you probably shouldn't do it. Sasquach of Bahazzar is with me on this one. Like me, he enjoys arenas and is not partial to the PvE game. Sporting a 2300 rating for Season Three, he's looking forward to doing arena matches in wrath.
The original poster vented his frustration that all PvP gear has an arena requirement on the test realm. Though Battlegrounds and Arenas are disparate systems with divergent goals and playstyle, Blizzard is putting rating requirements on all PvP gear. Even playing battleground after battleground, players will have to do arenas in order to don any PvP gear.
He feels that Blizzard is forcing players to do arenas, and many responders agreed. Muffy of Doomhammer agreed, she feels that Blizzard has "abandoned" battleground play in favor of arenas. Attuny of Gorgonnash believes that Blizzard will go ahead and implement the rating requirement on all gear. Folks who ordinarily avoid arenas will give them a go and quickly get frustrated. As scores get lower more folks will get frustrated and the effects will be felt throughout the arena ranks.
Some responders noted that there's no actual coercion going on. Players can chose not to PvP or not to seek out PvP rewards if they are not interested in doing the arenas. Blizzard isn't really forcing players to do anything they don't want to do.
