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Blizzard to offer compensation for PVP Season 10 transition woes

Yesterday, we talked about an issue that had PVP players in an uproar: Conquest points were accidentally down-converted to honor points a week early, with excess points converted to gold. On top of that, Blizzard launched a new tier of ilevel 371 gear without warning, just after making ilevel 365 gear available for purchase with honor. Players who spent their points decking themselves out in the latest PVP armor found themselves abruptly faced with the stunning realization that had they saved their points, they could have had better gear.

It was a mistake, and it was acknowledged by Zarhym (Blizzard community manager) in a fairly lengthy blue post, along with a mention that Blizzard was exploring some options to try and make it up to players.

Happily, it appears those options have been explored, as Blizzard's Bashiok posted today with a proposed solution for compensation: Players who were caught off guard by the change will be provided with 4,000 honor points, stacking over the cap. Players will not be able to accumulate more honor until spending below the 4,000 cap, but that should give PVPers a chance to pick up that new gear. This will not be immediately implemented, as it seems Blizzard is still trying to figure out how, exactly, to determine who was affected by the sudden transition and who was not -- so don't expect those 4,000 points on your character tomorrow.

Still, it's nice seeing Blizzard acknowledge something that was clearly a miscommunication in regards to the transition between seasons and that it will be making sure those players caught in the middle of the fumble will be getting something back. Follow after the break for the full announcement from Bashiok.



Bashiok
We wanted to let everyone know that we're working to address the miscommunication that occurred regarding the introduction of new item level 371 PvP gear, and share our current plans.

For background, many players spent their Honor Points on item level 365 gear once Season 9 ended only to find that more powerful item level 371 gear was available when season 10 started. We should have communicated ahead of time that this was going to be the case, and we apologize for the mistake.

We've been working over the past few days to evaluate and determine the best course of action to offer players some kind of compensation for those who were caught off guard by the new gear. The plan we've found to be achievable within an acceptable amount of time is to provide players who were affected with 4000 Honor Points. This extra Honor would function similarly to the currency down-conversion in that it would stack over the cap, but you would not be able to earn more until you spent under the 4000 cap.

The process of determining who was affected is certainly the most difficult task of this issue, and the entire process of figuring out who should receive the Honor or not and then delivering it isn't anything less than a giant undertaking. We're still evaluating many of the processes that will be required to make this happen. Although we're fairly confident we can pull it off, there is still a chance it may not be possible. Due to other service related work the soonest we would be able to distribute this Honor is the 7/19 Tuesday maintenance. More complicated solutions we discussed could take months to implement, but we felt getting something to those affected as quickly as possible was more important.

Although some of this is still uncertain we felt it best to let people know as far in advance as possible to allow for adequate planning. We'll be able to provide more information and specifics on how this process will be carried out, and the requirements to receive the 4000 Honor, next week.

Again, we apologize for any inconvenience caused by our miscommunication. We greatly appreciate those who took the time to give us constructive feedback on the matter.




The news is already rolling out for the upcoming WoW Patch 4.2! Preview the new Firelands raid, marvel at the new legendary staff, and get the inside scoop on new quest hubs -- plus new tier 12 armor!