3v3
Latest
Zynga teaser trailer introduces new mobile MOBA called Solstice Arena
Last fall, Zynga acquired the small mid-core, multi-platform game developer A Bit Lucky with the aim of expanding into that market. Today, the fruit of that team's labors is unveiled: Zynga announced the new 3v3 free-to-play MOBA Solstice Arena. Solstice Arena, which is playable on mobile devices, breaks away from the tethers of the PC and hopes to introduce new players to the MOBA genre. The game offers fast matches that average only 10 minutes and three game modes to make it fun for new and experienced players alike (solo vs. A.I., co-op vs. A.I. and player vs. player) and . Heroes will earn experience as they play and have the option to progress along one of three ability upgrade paths, unlocking various ability upgrades. Solstice Arena also offers customization via skins and armor. Want to catch your first glimpse of the game? Check out the trailer after the cut. [Source: Zynga press release]
PSA: New Twisted Treeline map now live in League of Legends
The brand new version of the 3v3 Twisted Treeline map in Riot Games' League of Legends is now live for players. This is no mere tweak: Riot has completely remade one of the game's three modes. As you can see above, there's a new layout and redone art, new map-specific items in the store (no more generic wards!), Dominion-style speed shrines, and special altars with buffs to grab. There's also a new giant spider boss named Vilemaw who, like Baron Nashor, will grant a teamwide bonus when defeated. The map is still in beta right now and is expected to be considered as such for a while, though the new version is being used in ranked Season 3 play already. Twisted Treeline's 3v3 player variant has almost always been part of League of Legends, but with this revamp LoL's millions of players have gained yet another way to experience the game.
Eden Eternal calls forth the Ranger
The wet-behind-the-ears Eden Eternal is already hard at work beefing up its content, up to and including a brand-new class. Aeria Games just released a huge update for the game, and it's hard to say where players should start first. Perhaps they should check out the new Ranger class, which excels at ranged damage with a bow, artillery gun, or eagle (don't scoff -- a face-full of eagle will ruin anyone's day). If Rangers aren't your bag, then there's an increased level cap to 65, PvP improvements such as a 3v3 matchmaking system, and new high-level areas and dungeons to explore. Eden Eternal just added the Samurai class to the game last month. You can get a peek at all of this update goodness in the gallery and video below! [Source: Aeria Games press release] %Gallery-120523%
The Light and How to Swing It: Patch 4.2's effect on holy PVP
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Light and How to Swing It for holy, protection and retribution paladins. Every Sunday, Chase Christian invites you to discuss the finer side of the paladin class: the holy specialization. Feel free to email me with any questions you want answered, like why paladins are so awesome. I have a feeling that the developers have a hard time balancing healers for PVP combat. How should healers be killed in PVP? Should we run out of mana eventually, or is a bursty switch the only answer? Can the focused efforts of a single DPSer be enough to topple us, or should it take two players to finish us off? Trying to balance all of these elements for four different classes with five different healing trees is a challenge by any measure. Every organized PVP encounter revolves around the healers involved, especially in the golden bracket of 3v3. Prior to patch 4.2, teams loved seeing a holy paladin across the arena from them, as holy paladins weren't exactly amazing at 3v3 matches in the first few months of Cataclysm. We have a few key weaknesses, notably our lack of any long-term crowd control like Hex and our lone school of magic, holy, which leaves us defenseless when interrupted. We weren't completely ineffective in arenas before patch 4.2, but we also weren't breaking any records or winning any #1 Healer trophies.
Blood Sport: An early analysis of Cataclysm PvP
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Blood Sport for arena enthusiasts and The Art of War(craft) for fans of battlegrounds and world PvP. Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women? C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 Gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more. If I had to summarize Cataclysm PvP in one word, it would be fun. Between the novelty of rated battlegrounds, a very strong emphasis (and success) on balancing classes in PvP, and the presence of a diverse metagame at the top of the arena ladders, this is shaping up to be a great expansion. We're almost two months into Cataclysm now, and it's been quite an expansion for PvPers. Are there problems? Sure. Is the patch going to throw us for a loop and possibly switch things up considerably? Perhaps. But is the whole of Season 9 miles better than Season 5? You better believe it.
MLG DC starts tonight for WoW
If you're not keeping up with the PvP tournament scene, this is a friendly reminder that MLG DC starts tonight at 8:00 p.m. EST. You can watch the MLG stream at MLGPro.com when it starts. I'll be in attendance at the event personally, so if you have any questions you want answered by the teams and players, leave a comment and I'll do my best. The WoW tournament will only run for a couple hours tonight, then continue all day Sunday. Notable teams competing are Nerdstomper Blue, the winners of MLG Raleigh, and their sister team Nerdstomper Black. Also in attendance are Arenapwnage, Evil Geniuses, Complexity Red and Black, Skill Capped, and Penguin Smash. Unfortunately, as World of Ming reports, the tournament will not be played with the new 4.0.1 patch. Apparently, there was a conflict with MLG's viewing client and the new patch.
Nerdstomper Blue win MLG Raleigh
The latest WoW champions in the 2010 MLG Pro Circuit are the members of Nerdstomper Blue, who claimed their victory Sunday evening in Raleigh. It was a close win for Nerdstomper Blue, after its opponents, Evil Geniuses, won the first set of the finals three to one. Evil Geniuses entered the finals from the lower bracket, though, and needed two winning sets to claim the championship. Things seemed doubtful for Nerdstomper Blue after it lost the first two games of the second set, but it made an impressive comeback, winning three games in a row and taking the championship. In addition to the $9,000 prize for first place, Nerdstomper Blue will now be seeded favorably at the MLG Finals in Dallas later this year. If you missed the livestream, you can still watch the rebroadcast from Sunday's games at MLG's site. For those of you who are curious, Nerdstomper Blue used a shadowplay comp (priest-warlock-shaman) for their first set against Evil Geniuses, then switched to RLS (rogue-warlock-shaman) for the second. Evil Geniuses used RLS for both sets. Congratulations to Realz, Glickz and Kollektiv of Nerdstomper Blue!
Blood Sport: 3v3 archetypes and why they are successful
Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women? Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column. Listening music: I asked you to provide me with some awesome music for this week's article, and you didn't let me down. The Flaming Lips with "A Spoonful Weighs a Ton" is our listening music for today. Last week: We talked about arena PvP in Wrath of the Lich King and some egregious errors with MMR and starting arena teams at 0 -- there are some upsides in there, too. This week: While many different types of teams rise to the front page of arena ladders, it seems like only 10 or so compositions are really successful. And those 10 usually (if not always) fall into one of four archetypes. According to the SK-100, elemental shaman + affliction warlock + restoration druid seems to be occupying a fair share of top spots all around the globe. Why is a composition like this one more successful than hunter + rogue + warrior? Err, OK, maybe that's a bad example to pick. Classes work very well with certain other classes. Affliction warlocks and restoration druids complement each other for hundreds of reasons. Affliction warlocks and retribution paladins? Ehh, maybe not so much. So what makes a good team composition and why are certain strategies more successful than others? Read on, my friend.
The Colosseum: Jeebeez, restoration shaman of Hyjal
The Colosseum takes us inside the world of the Gladiator to interview some of the top Arena fighters on the battlegroups. Our goal is to bring a better understanding of the strategy, makeup, and work that goes into dueling it out for fame, fortune, and Frostwyrms. We're especially focused on the people who play these games, to further shed light on the world of the PvP player. If you'd like to be interviewed for The Colosseum, please feel free to contact us -- be sure to include your armory as a link! Today's interviewee is Jeebeez, current holder of 1st place in US-Whirlwind's 3v3 bracket. He plays a somewhat unusual composition of restoration shaman-frost mage-shadow priest. We thought it'd be interesting to ask him a few questions about arena and his 3v3 team. WoW.com: What's the most impressive thing you've ever done as a restoration shaman in arena? Don't be modest. Jeebeez: I 2v3'd Worlds team back in season 6 playing restoration shaman/rogue. Also, we just recently had a pretty sick kill on a warlock (playing WLD). We killed the pet, switched to warlock. I shocked Fel Domination, blanket silence into another shock on Fel Domination into death of the warlock. That was when I had about 30 ms though (almost no lag). Restoration shamans are about consistency more than anything, so its probably more important to be consistent with shocks/grounds/heals/Purges than it is to pull something crazy off. WoW.com: Why did you choose to play your 3v3 team makeup over other possible compositions? Jeebeez: Well, I've tried comps like RLS (rogue-warlock-shaman) and warlock/mage/restoration shaman (wizard cleave or spell cleave) and have found the skill cap on wizard cleave just isn't that high on live. RLS has a steeper learning curve than shatterplay (frost mage-shadow priest-restoration shaman) but I lacked the people to play with. I guess I play shatterplay because I enjoy the switch coordination and the high damage output it does.
The Colosseum: Diziet, Brutal Gladiator druid
The Colosseum takes us inside the world of the Gladiator (Relentless, Furious, Deadly, Brutal, Vengeful, Merciless, and otherwise), to interview some of the top Arena fighters on the battlegroups. Our goal is to bring a better understanding of the strategy, makeup, and work that goes into dueling it out for fame, fortune, and Frostwyrms. We're especially focused on the people who play these games, to further shed light on the world of the PvP player. If you'd like to be interviewed for The Colosseum, please feel free to contact us -- be sure to include your armory as a link! This week, WoW.com had the pleasure of interviewing Diziet of Lightning's Blade, a healer who plays a 2500+ rated druid-warlock-death knight 3v3 composition. He also balances competitive road cycling and a PvP blog on Elitist Jerks on the side! Diziet had a lot to say about arena and WoW PvP, in addition to some other things that might surprise you. WoW.com: Why do you play restoration druid? What is it about the class's toolbox that appeals to you for competitive arena? Diziet: I started playing a druid late in season three. I was overwhelmed by the extensive mobility and flexibility of the druid and warlock classes, having played a mage. The concept of playing a flexible class with a seemingly never ending repertoire of abilities was a very different experience than that of playing a mage during late season 3. Druids provided, and still provide, a great and easy to use amount of 'raw power', an amazing amount of healing output usable on the move. That was a very different and powerful play style rewarding basic and strong gameplay. Back then, and still now, druids could just stand in the open and out heal any kind of caster without casting a single spell, based on hots alone. I always stuck with a very defensive style of gameplay on my druid, utilizing tree form even in The Burning Crusade days. I would try to watch for any kind of hints of target switches or incoming crowd control spells from my opponents and I would try my best to prevent or negate them by doing simple things such as moving away, out of LoS (Line of Sight), or by putting hots before damage came. Back during TBC, druids had the ability to either play a more control based playstyle with feral charge (a tool I utilized a lot) or with a restokin spec to provide damage (something similar to what priests might do now). I enjoyed those play styles quite a bit too, especially in the 2v2 and 3v3 brackets. With the talent tree changes in WotLK, I was forced to play a more one-dimensional but effective play style. So, in a nutshell, I was attracted by the raw power of the class (in terms of heal per second, heal per global cooldown, and heal per mana), and used it to build a very defensive healing style.
Command & Conquer 4 devs show off what's new in multiplayer
With all of the furor around the StarCraft 2 beta going on this week, you might actually have forgotten that there are actually two major, big-budget RTS sequels due out in 2010. Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight is arriving in just a few weeks on March 16, and, to remind you of that fact, here are a few of the game's developers telling you about how they balanced the multiplayer component. The main feature is the new class choices -- whenever you start up a map, you choose whether you want to play as offense, defense or support, and your teammates can make the same choice, allowing each of you to choose to run your own units entirely, with their own strengths and weaknesses. There's also some information at the end about the co-op campaign, which will also let you use the complimentary classes to split up the fight against enemies and follow objectives that much more quickly with a friend. Sure, your Marines and your Zerglings and your Zealots are fun to play with, but it looks like C&C4 is ordering up some new ways to play one of the older genres in PC gaming. [Via Big Download]
Blood Sport: Season 7 - The Death of 2v2 [Updated]
Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women? Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all-things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column.Season seven is here! The new season brings the same familiar arena combat that we've come to know, love, and sometimes hate. However, the season of the Relentless Gladiator also has many meaningful changes for arena enthusiasts. Abandonment of 2v2 bracket rewards. New ratings requirements on gear. Match Making Rating - is it still busted? The 2v2 bracket is experiencing a significant revampingBefore season seven had started, 2v2 rewards were slated to be completely cut. 3.2 patch notes indicated that Relentless Gladiator gear could only be purchased if a player met the requirements with their 3v3 or 5v5. 2v2 teams, however, could still be used to purchase the previous season's gear (Furious Gladiator gear).
World of Warcraft Patch 3.2 PvP Guide
WoW.com has covered patch 3.2 extensively. Everything from the surprising changes to flying mounts, to the latest and greatest loot, and all the changes in between. In our patch 3.2 class, raiding, and PvP guides we take a look at exactly what changes and how the changes will affect your playing.Patch 3.2 is finally here, and is anyone else kind of surprised by how fast things are coming these days? To be fair, as most of my co-workers here at WoW.com have assessed, this newest patch is one of the more lackluster patches in a while considering it merely appends to much of existing content (the Argent Tournament). There's a smattering of stuff for raiders, soloists, hardcores and casuals, but what's in store for PvP enthusiasts?There are a lot of major changes in this patch that will impact PvP greatly, one being the blanket change to Resilience which now affects all damage taken, rather than just critical hits. Another is the effective neutering of the 2v2 Arena bracket with the change blocking access to the best weapons and end-of-season rewards. A third big change coming is the introduction of a brand new Battleground, the Isle of Conquest, which is the technically the first 40-man raid instance since the original Naxxramas. There's also the whopping introduction of experience gain in Battlegrounds, too. Caught your breath yet? There are a lot of other things in between, and we'll take a closer look at everything after the jump.
Patch 3.2 Druid changes
3.2 approaches! Sort of. The PTR itself isn't up yet (at least, not as I write this), but nonetheless, 3.2 approaches on little cat feet.I'm going to examine the 3.2 PTR patch notes line by relevant line, just because there are several changes that impact Druids while not being class-specific. If you want a quick summary without being massively spoiled, Balance is getting a huge and welcome change to the functionality of Eclipse, Cats are getting bonked by the nerfbat, and PvP-Restos are really getting bonked by the nerfbat. Bears, well...not much is going to happen to bears this patch, which is a little demoralizing given the improvements being made to Pally tanks, but that's OK. We still have our, uh, amazing Tier 8 set bonuses and...um...the best -- sort of -- tanking cooldowns in, uh, the...uh......Oh, screw it, just stack the hell out of stamina and pray to the gods of RNG if your guild's dumb enough to try Ulduar on hard-mode. Congratulations; you have now done all you can possibly do to prepare yourself for modern tanking.Sad lolbare is sad. But cough syrup for everybody! Is nise! Now let's take a look:
Lichborne: PvP pointers for Death Knights
Welcome to Lichborne, Your weekly peek into the world of the Death Knight.Death Knights have it pretty good in PvP. Thanks to big whomping two-handers and magic damage strikes and spells, we can do massive burst damage and tear through armor defenses pretty easily. On the control front, we have Strangulate, Mind Freeze, Chains of Ice, and, depending on spec, maybe even a few other ways to silence, slow, or shut down an enemy player. Finally, our plate armor and defense cooldowns assure that should we the unlucky target of the burst train, we can hold out a lot longer than many. Still, it's not just being a Death Knight alone that gets you PvP fame and godhood. It does help to have the right talents, gear, and strategy. So we're going to talk about that a bit, focusing mostly on the talents. Here's two popular PvP Talent builds.
GC on Hunters and their DPS
It took a few tries, but Ghostcrawler has finally agreed to post a "state of the Hunters" on the forums, and there's both good and bad news. First of all, GC flatly lays out that Hunter DPS was too high in Naxx -- Blizzard wants Hunters to be fighting with Locks, Rogues, and Mages for top DPS, not head and shoulders above them. And Survival is still the top DPS build in PvE; while GC says it's probably not a huge increase from the other specs, they are seeing it do better consistently. That said, Hunter DPS may be a little low now, but Blizzard isn't quite sure, for two reasons. First, people are still learning the Ulduar fights, and they don't completely trust the data they've gotten so far. And second, the main goal for fights in there was supposed to be variety, so there are very few places where DPS can just go all out and test how powerful they really are. GC says you should be asking "what's my DPS in this fight," rather than just "what's my DPS?"As for PvP, he says that the T.N.T. stuns and the big mana drains that Hunters could pull off in the past were just plain overpowered, and they won't be coming back. But as for where Hunters are going next, he says it's more of a function of nerfing other classes rather than buffing Hunters -- it's not that Hunters aren't going into Arena because they suck, it's because other classes are taking their place because they're better. He does say that Hunters are better in 5v5 (which makes sense -- Hunters have always been better from the back rather than forced into the middle of things like they might be in 3v3, and 2v2), and Blizzard is fairly OK with that, as not all classes are going to rock at all Arena levels.
EU Arena Tournament standings posted in anticipation of phase 4
Vaneras has posted the latest EU Arena tournament rankings over on the forums (after the latest phase ended), and it looks like PMR has found their way back on top across the pond: Priest/Mage/Rogue teams have taken over the top three spots. The Death Knight/Paladin/DPS teams, formerly dominating, have fallen down to just two spots out of ten, and two Shamans have made an appearance, one partnered with a Druid and a Mage, and the other with a Lock and Hunter. Very interesting.We should see the US standings posted soon. You can see the rest of the EU teams in the big listing over on the Armory if you want. Phase 4 of the tournament, Vaneras says, will be an invitational, and will start next week on April 14th. Congrats to all of the winners so far, and good luck in the rest of the tourney!
Korean team H O N takes the trophy at ESL's Global Arena Tournament
The Electronic Sports League's Intel Extreme Masters Global tournament has ended, and Korean team H O N have come out on top. And according to World of Ming, they completely impressed every player at the tournament -- while they were one of four teams taking the Rogue/Mage/Priest combination to the upper brackets, they apparently played that comp in a way that just rolled on through any competitors (including having their mage, Orangemarmalade, apparently keeping a match alive even after his teammates dropped). Everyone's expecting the RMP domination by the time the next Arena season rolls around, but for now, RMP is where it's at in professional arenas.Unfortunately for us Americans, the US teams didn't put on much of a showing -- they dropped out quick, and WoM reports that their behavior after the losses was less than classy. They apparently blamed a teammate for dropping out, and it doesn't help that, unlike the Korean teams who have played the same classes and characters for a long time, the Americans apparently came up with their teams and tactics only recently. Looks like they'll have to do a little reforming and rebuilding before this year's BlizzCon.Congrats to all the teams who walked away with victories in the ESL's Arena tournament. Even from Ming's commentary, it sounds like it was an exciting few days for Arena players.
College Gaming League 3v3 Arena Tournament
Blizzard announced that World of Warcraft 3v3 Arenas are part of the new College Gaming League, the first official amateur league partner of the Championship Gaming Series. The Dell-spearheaded venture works with Intel and Microsoft to offer educational discounts and PC bundles for students, faculty and staff at numerous partner schools all over the United States. Students and faculty at Dell University partner schools can register and receive benefits like special offers on games and systems, access to public game servers, and compete in tournaments.Among the tournaments -- which include Xbox 360 and PC games -- is the World of Warcraft 3v3 Arena competition. Registration began last August 21 and closes on September 11, while the official matches span from September 15 to October 5. Loot up for grabs are three Alienware m15x notebooks as Grand Prizes, three Microsoft Zune players as First Prizes, and three $50 Dell gift cards for the runners-up. It's an underwhelming selection past the Grand Prizes, to be sure, but registration is free and members can participate in other tournaments with a host of other prizes to be won. Initiatives like these certainly give students something to while away their time... after they've submitted those term papers, of course.
Blood Sport: Cleave carnage
So. Arenas. How have your Arena campaigns been coming along? Lately, we've been encountering a lot of melee teams in our bracket. Melee has been enjoying a rise in popularity since Season 3, when Armor Penetration made its debut in Arena gear. Of course, with Armor Penetration stats maintaining status quo across the board in Season 4 while Armor values went up, this has become less of a factor. Nonetheless, the melee pain train continues to chug along, with more double melee teams having a strong showing in 3v3 and of course the popular triple melee Cleave setup in 5v5. For the most part, any team comp with two or more physical DPS classes is technically a Cleave team.Melee in 5v5 was popularized by Serennia in his Warrior / Rogue / Enh. Shaman and 2-healer set-up which he tried to dub 'Trifecta'. Trifecta never stuck, of course, so Cleave became a more popular term coming both from the Warrior ability and the fact that a target descended upon by multiple melee will feel like she's being cleaved in half. More than a few clothies have cried foul, and some have accused such comps as being brainless, skill-less, and -- pardon me quoting the term -- "gay". [EDIT: No, it is not okay to use the term "gay" in a derogatory manner, let's just make that clear.]
