battleground
Latest
Tips for Strand of the Ancients and how to win it
Eye for an Eye has a great set of tips up for the Strand of the Ancients battleground. Their tips are aimed towards Ret Pallies, but they're useful for almost anyone, and especially any melee-based classes. And the general idea -- focus on the relic and getting to it, not the players attacking you or other teammates -- is great for anyone to know.I don't know what it is about Strand and Wintergrasp that has pulled new players into PvP, but there's something new there -- DanO also has found himself PvPing in those places when he never guessed he would. It seems like the objective is a big part of it; the goals in Strand and Wintergrasp just seem more epic than the skirmishes in Warsong and Arathi Basin (and they come with none of the major issues in Alterac Valley).Still, while most of the tips are common sense, some of them are worth listening to if you haven't though of them yet (I liked the tip about sniffing out Rogues around the tanks -- whenever I've played Strand, I've always headed for the walls, but protecting the tanks is a great tactic, too). If you haven't tried either of the new PvP areas yet, give them a look, and bring these tips along with you.
Wrath 101: Wintergrasp zone overview
These days, my schedule revolves around partitions of two and a half hours. This is the time I allot for meals, errands, work, showers, and most other mundane things. In between those two and a half hours, I take a break from whatever I'm doing and play ten to forty minutes of Wintergrasp. Ever since I made my way into the zone, I've made it my second home in the World of Warcraft. I log out in Wintergrasp about as often as I do in Dalaran. I know I said that PvP is sort of pointless right now, but Wintergrasp is the most fun I've had in Wrath and the game in a while. Nowadays, whenever I dream, I dream of siege vehicles and exploding walls and towers.Wintergrasp is the smallest zone in Northrend, bordered by Sholazar Basin, Icecrown, and Dragonblight. It is a PvP zone, which flags all players entering it for PvP. This isn't an issue on PvP servers, but on normal or RP servers, this makes everyone in the zone fair game. There is no physical way to access Wintergrasp other than through a flying mount, creating a natural Level barrier of 77 although lower-level players can be summoned or take the portal from Dalaran. It is my favorite zone in Wrath of the Lich King, although it isn't without its flaws. %Gallery-39251%
Majority of player base does not have a level 80 character
Vaneras on the EU forums this morning responded to some criticism that everyone is already 80, etc... He makes a few interesting points.First, he notes that they have internal numbers that the majority of players don't yet have a level 80 character. This might be a known or assumed fact by some, but for many of us it's interesting to hear Blizzard extrapolate on the issue.Vaneras goes on to point out an important tidbit – don't assume just because all your friends are 80 that everyone else is as well. People that play all the time tend to gravitate towards other people that play all the time, and folks that only log on once or twice a week gravitate towards each other as well.This means that just because everyone on your friends list is 80 doesn't mean the whole server is yet. I know that for myself nearly everyone's main is either 80 or high 70s now, and most have alts quickly getting up there in level too.But then I'm reminded of my brother, who just dinged 77 a couple days ago.This is also good to know as it means battlegrounds and Wintergrasp will be filling up more as a greater number of folks ding. That's only going to lead to more fun for everyone.
Shifting Perspectives: State of the class, part 1 - Balance
Every Tuesday, or possibly Thursday when the writer votes on Tuesday and spends Wednesday screaming and beating her laptop over formatting errors, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week Allison Robert steals John Patricelli's column once again, secure in the knowledge that she will never be forced to atone for her crime as long as she writes something nice about ferals and keeps a respectful distance from Dan O'Halloran's whip.I hate Tauren cat form.Good. I got that out of my system and can write something productive. Although, believe me, if I could get away with it, an entire Shifting Perspectives would be devoted to just how much I hate Tauren cat form. I mean, just look at it! Look at the angle on the horns! The cat can't bite anything! Christ, I just -- hi, Dan. Yes, I'm totally writing the column! Look at me go!This week, mindful as always of American election-year politicking, I'm going to borrow a page from presidential duties and write a little something I like to call "State of the Class." Druids have undergone a number of changes in the transition to Wrath of the Lich King, and will acquire even more as they level to 80. We are one of Blizzard's primary targets for both gear and role consolidation, which raises a few questions over how comfortably we're going to scale in relation to pure classes and what we can realistically expect on the march to a new level cap.The TL:DR version of this article -- I believe our future is generally bright, the Druid community continues to have a few concerns over certain aspects of the class, our focus in PvP seems to be changing the most, and I hate Tauren cat form. This is a three-part post, so let's get started with balance. However, if you want to jump ahead to feral, you'll find that here; and the third part, restoration, is here.
Honor points and marks reset in WotLK
We all had an inkling this was coming, right? I mean, it is Blizzard and they do things that are occasionally "evil." So it should be no surprise to anyone that Eyonix announced today that they will be resetting all the honor points when Wrath of the Lich King is released.In his post he does mention that they will be putting in a few new items that are purchasable with honor points only. At least those that have piles of points saved up can get something. Let's just hope that it's something you can use. They will be appearing on the PTR shortly.The reasoning behind this is that Blizzard wants there to be an even playing field when everyone hits 80. If people saved up tons of honor points and marks, they could be used to immediately purchase the newest PvP gear. That would create an imbalance.
Ten of our favorite Achievements
A few readers have emailed us recently asking just what kinds of things to expect in the Achievements releasing with Wrath of the Lich King later this year. There are going to be over 500 of them (with more added later), and while there are a few standard things you might expect (getting Exalted with all the reputations, exploring the world, and maxing out your character), there are lots more that are meant to do what Achievements do best: extend gameplay.So we hunted through all the Achievements in the beta, and pulled out ten that we really liked. Not all of these are unique (for the Alterac Valley time limit one, there is actually one of those for every battleground in the game), but all of them are great examples of why you should be excited about Achievements when they hit the live realms. From the silly to the "requires a serious commitment," here are ten great Achievements we've seen in the beta. %Gallery-31080%
The inevitable loss
Around every 4th of July I reread Michael Shaara's The Killer Angels, which is a book about the battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War. There's an early passage about the Southern general James Longstreet's unease over the Confederate push north to Pennsylvania: He had never believed in this invasion...He did not believe in offensive warfare when the enemy outnumbered you and outgunned you and would come looking for you anyway if you waited somewhere on your own ground. Longstreet, one of the finest military minds of the age, spends much of the subsequent bloody fight knowing that Union forces had a terrain advantage impossible to overcome.There's been a lot written about battleground strategy (particularly Alterac Valley) but I think all of us have known the sinking feeling you get when you realize that your side isn't going to win. Some causes of failure are relatively easy to pinpoint; starting a battleground with a heavy numbers or healing disadvantage often seals the fate of a match. And of course the collective quality of a team's gear will always play a role; people in Season 4 are unlikely to lose to those in Season 1.All other things being equal, what I find most fascinating are the matches -- PuG versus PuG, or premade versus premade -- where the battle can swing either way depending entirely on each team's degree of foresight and strategy. Rarely, single players can sometimes decide the outcome; I once saw a protection paladin in a 2-cap versus 2-cap Eye of the Storm prevent the opposing side from taking any flags by parking himself in the middle and simply taking forever to die, and one of my own favorite techniques is to suicide/harass heavily-defended nodes in Arathi Basin and EOTS while Horde quietly caps elsewhere (you'd be amazed at the number of players who prefer an easy kill over responding to "Inc!" calls elsewhere). But failure and success are usually collective and hard to pin down. How do you convince people to do the less-glamorous jobs -- defense, distraction, crowd-control -- more likely to result in a victory? How do you know when the battleground is lost for sure?
"We're going to need a montage."
I hate arena. I'm pretty sure I realized I wasn't going to like it right around the time in Season 2 when I hit a nasty Priest/Warlock combo. They outgeared my own little team massively and knew it. Six of our ten games that week were versus this charming pair, and they reached a point somewhere around the fourth game where they'd kill my partner, Mind Control me, heal me to full, and then Fear me around endlessly while reducing my health inch by agonizing inch. A lot of PvP has the potential be extremely frustrating (she said, eyeing another Arathi Basin match with 4 Horde versus 15 Alliance), but that night was one of the few that has left me wondering whether bursting into tears or just going AFK for a sandwich while they amused themselves were the better option.So you might say that arena and I have had an uneasy relationship. I need arena for some PvE gear and to get people off my back about doing arena (it's a vicious cycle). Arena quite patently does not need me. And yet -- it remains the last great challenge before Wrath hits. It is the part of the game that I have yet to conquer, or even do anything other than suck horribly at. I'm a Druid, right right? Isn't there some sort of vague, hazy strategy involving HoT's and Travel Form and possibly Cyclone that makes us never, ever die? Some crap like that. And I owe it to the rest of my class to put a badly-played Druid back in arena to see if we can convince people to stop screaming for nerfs.So. I'm going to commission someone to write some compelling montage music for me, I'm going to BG every day for Season 2 gear, and I'm going to find me a partner with a (um) generous approach to what constitutes "advancement." There's a lot of talk around the forums about the gear gap being too horrible to overcome and the ratings requirements being a barrier to newbie entry. I'll play your game, you rogues. Let's see whether a total scrub still stands a chance. Ratings Watch: 1500
WWI '08 Notes from the PvP panel
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/The_future_of_PvP_in_WoW_Notes_from_the_WWI_08_dev_panel'; Here at WoW Insider, we pride ourselves on bringing you the latest, greatest news about the World of Warcraft we all know and love. (You haven't all gone off to play Diablo, have you?) What this means is that we crawled out of bed at what our watch says was three in the morning, even though by local Paris time it was already mid-morning under a sunny sky. We've fought our ways through crowds at the Worldwide Invitational to bring you a front-row seat to today's PvP panel, starting shortly. For the latest updates on the game's PvP system -- right from the developers! -- keep reading for live updates from the panel.
Breakfast Topic: What Blizzard didn't announce at the opening ceremony
By now I'm assuming you've read the liveblog or seen the announcement post and heard: Diablo 3 is go. By now you have probably also heard that there really weren't any other announcements at the opening ceremony. Don't get me wrong, Diablo 3 is awesome. But as much as we're Blizzard fanboys (and fangirls) here, we're all about the WoW first, and we need some WoTLK news to sustain us too -- and we still don't know what that mysterious "next generation MMO" in development is either -- it seems most people are assuming it's Starcraft now though. Me, I'm not convinced. After all, there's a Starcraft game in development too, so it could presumably be either franchise, or simply an updated World of Warcraft 2. There's quite a few things that could come out about WotLK today and tomorrow, of course. I'm still hoping for an opening cinematic and an official release date to start. While we're at it, how about giving us a demo of the Dance Studio or Barbershop, or better yet, some other unannounced new major feature for the expansion? I might even settle for new skills, talent trees, or even a new battleground preview. What are your expectations and hopes for news from the World Wide Invitational as it soldiers on?
Shifting Perspectives: PvP as a moving target
Every week, John Patricelli of Big Bear Butt presents a well-researched, educational, and entertaining look at the state of the Druid class in WoW today. This week we said, "Screw that," and got someone off the street. Veronica: Look at you, all helpful.Logan: Your peskiness being unleashed on Connor brings me joy. Annoy, tiny blonde one! Annoy like the wind!-- Veronica Mars, "An Echolls Family Christmas" With apologies to Diane Ruggiero, the writer of the episode quoted above, but I find Logan's snarky comment (did he even have another kind?) to be a perfect, albeit general, means of describing successful Druid PvP.Let us be frank; I am not, nor am ever likely to be, a hardcore PvPer, and to a great extent this post is directed mostly at people like myself. If you're one of those Druids carrying a 2K+ rating in full Vengeful, then I invite (nay, implore) you to leave comments and corrections based on your own experience, but the article's mostly for regular folks like me, who may not even particularly like PvP but recognize that it is desirable or perhaps necessary, given our ingame goals. As such, most of this applies to battlegrounds, and on a later date we're going to get into arena. Today, we are simply going to talk about how to avoid letting your PvP experience turn you into a miserably unhappy player who would rather undergo an appendectomy via Roto-Rooter than set foot in another EOTS.
Battleground anti-tip of the day
Based on your votes last week for the best piece of anti-advice, congratulations to Eldron for submitting the winning entry: "Hey everyone! Type /afk list when to see who is afk!" He wins fame, respect, and ooh and ahhhs from crowds of adoring fans! Eldron's anti-advice won with 28.7% of the votes.When I first saw this piece of anti-advice I have to admit I went and tried it right away. I went in AV and typed in /bg, "Man... look at all these AFK people." A few folks responded and agreed with me, annoyed about it. "Type /afk list and report everyone that comes up, please," I say next.I kid you not – 15 people immediately afk'd out. At that point I started getting some pretty hate-filled tells, so I decided to /afk out myself.But nonetheless, I just about died from laughter. Of course, this is kind of mean, and just a tad underhanded, but really... sometimes things like this are just too funny to pass up. I tried this again later in a AB match that was going awful, and after I told everyone to type /afk list, someone replied "Yeah, wow, look at all those people." He then sent me a tell: "lol! I've been doing that all day!"All the people that were dragging us down left the BG, and new ones came in and we won. So maybe this isn't that bad of advice after all...
Breakfast Topic: Should there be honor in PvP?
And by honor I don't mean the honor-as-currency system that's currently in the game -- I mean a sense of personal honor as in, there are things you make a conscious decision to avoid doing just as a moral gesture. I thought of this recently after a truly miserable losing streak in Arathi Basin. I wound up in three consecutive matches with a full complement of 15 Alliance players to 7 or 8 Horde (with both sides being PuG's, mind you). Being out-numbered and out-gunned sucks no matter what, but it's made immeasurably worse in places like Arathi Basin and EOTS due to the dwindling number of sites you'll have to rez when your side is being utterly destroyed. There was one particularly awful game where the Alliance decided to see how much honor they could get from us before the inevitable 4 or 5-cap ensuring their victory, and simply zerged us in the graveyard as we rezzed (or tried to). The feeling was made worse by knowing, having also played Alliance in BG's, that Horde would almost certainly have done the same thing had the situation been reversed. PvP is the subject of a lot of emotional dicussion in the WoW community as a result of situations like these, and I think we can all agree that it's not the losses that drive you nuts so much as knowing that the game is full of places and times where no amount of strategy or skill will keep you alive.There are a lot of things in PvP that I just don't like being a part of. I don't attack fellow Druids unless I'm attacked first (yeah, I know it sounds crazy, but a surprising number of Druids subscribe to this). I don't join in when an enemy player is obviously being dog-piled. I don't /spit on opposing players or do other rude emotes, and I don't participate in griefing. There's not much about WoW's PvP system that's really all that fair to begin with, especially when compared to games more explicity designed around PvP combat, but in the back of my mind there's still that notion that your opponent should at least have a sporting chance. I risk being called a hopeless carebear for this statement, but I think "honorable kills" are a lot more enjoyable when there's a measure of actual honor involved.
Blizzard's internal tools need an upgrade
Susana of Hyjal speculates about something I've thought about a few times before -- just what exactly are Blizzard's internal development tools like? Most games that have mapmakers can churn out new maps pretty rapidly, but we've had the same BG maps for years now, and only one or two per year since then. And even the created maps aren't fixed easily, apparently -- a few map tweaks on WSG would probably fix the turtling problem, but Blizzard instead is tweaking the rules to fix things. Just what is Blizzard using to make their game that they take so long with development?To be fair, the rules here are a little more complicated than most first-person shooters (since you can do a lot more than just shoot at each other), so obviously the maps would presumably be a little more complicated as well. But in the age when players have access to the Neverwinter Nights toolset and even the Forge on Halo 3, surely it's a little crazy that Blizzard takes months to release one map, when other great games can pump out whole packs of them in the same time.Now, this is WoW Insider, so it's ok if you're a Blizzard apologist. It's fine for you to say "Blizzard has the biggest game in the world not despite the fact that they're so slow, but because of it," and it's fine for you to be a fanboy/girl and say you'd rather wait three years for a Blizzard-quality Arathi Basin than play a whole "Hidden Fronts" pack. And the truth is that when Blizzard does release content, they don't disappoint. But we're still left wondering just why, after doing this for so long and having so much practice at it, it still takes them so long to do it.
An optimists roundup: Things I'm excited about in Patch 2.4
Every new patch to World of Warcraft brings buffs, nerfs, new content, and sweeping changes. The game has evolved tremendously from when I first started playing two years ago. I was thrilled with Hunter changes and leveling tweaking in patch 2.3. Sure there are plenty of things to be unhappy about, but I'm a "glass is half full" kind of girl. Read on for a roundup of the top ten changes I'm most excited about.
Arcane Brilliance: Magery in 2.4
Every week, Arcane Brilliance endeavors to inform and entertain Mages everywhere, and also to brainwash non-Mag es into becoming Mages. This week we take a look at what's to come for the Mage class, even though last week we promised to write about newbie instances. The newbie instances aren't going anywhere, ok? We can write about them next week. Also, this is the last time we refer to ourselves in plural first person. We know we aren't part of a collective. We understand we are not Borg. We promise. Is this whole "progressive patch" thing blowing anybody else's mind? Am I the only one? When the patch notes were first released, Mages everywhere let out a massive, unequivocated "Meh." There were no significant changes for anybody, really, much less the wizarding community at large. As it turned out, Blizzard was holding out on us. Each build of the patch brings a few new nuggets of change, slightly like when Wendy's switched from chicken nuggets constituted of several differently colored kinds of ultra-processed chicken product to all-white kinds of ultra-processed chicken product. Though we've gotten nothing as drastic as what may or may not be happening to Shamans and Warlocks, some of these changes could prove to be significant. It's important, I suppose, that I stress yet again that none of these changes are guaranteed to see the light of the live servers, and that future nerfs/buffs could be rolling down the pipe. By the time I finish writing this, chances are it will be out of date. And the way things have been going, if we Mages see something hit the notes that we don't like, all we have to do is unite and QQ the living crap out of the official forums. You never know what it'll get you. After the jump, rampant speculation!
What to do about perpetual losers?
Many Alliance players have this impression that the Horde is constantly united, more cooperative, and generally understands how to play better than the Alliance does. Whether this is true or not is not something I myself can speak for, though I have heard my Horde friends say they have just as many clueless PvP people as the Alliance does. So perhaps both factions can relate to Mendax's complaint that so many people seem to go into the battlegrounds with no idea how to win, and somehow fail to learn how, even in spite of playing a great deal and getting a lot of good gear. Their tendency is just to go in and lose over and over again, repeating the same old proven-to-fail methods for various reasons: possibly because they don't know anything better, possibly because they don't care anymore, and possibly because they've already identified themselves, their faction, or everyone else in their faction as born losers.In any case, Mendax thinks that Blizzard should make the battlegrounds themselves reward you for better play, so that the game mechanics themselves encourage you to play in such a way that you're more likely to actually win. First of all, they could provide more honor for kills near contested objectives (such as flags or towers), and secondly, they could deny all bonus honor if you lose. His first idea quite interesting -- I like the possibility that the reward system of the battlegrounds could somehow teach you to play better in itself, if that's really possible. However, while I can understand his reasoning in removing all bonus honor gain for losing teams, I think this would just make the "losers" stop queueing up altogether. We might be happy to get rid of whiners, complainers and all them, but in the end would the increase the waiting time in between battles be worth it? And in any case, would the "losers" really go away, or would they just look for ways to get around the system?
AV improvements slated for 2.4
It seems like they just can't leave Alterac Valley alone. In this case, that's probably a good thing, because there is a lot of discontentment with the state of that battleground right now. Bornakk just announced (and three different people just dropped us tips to let us know) that AV will get some "very significant improvements" in the upcoming patch 2.4: Horde starting tunnel moved back "to a more equal distance from the first objectives" Each faction's Generals and Warmasters will buff each other for health and damage: the more of them your side has, the stronger they all are. Hopefully this will more strongly motivate killing the Warmasters. Balinda Stonehearth will do more damage, but she and Stormpike will have their recent health increases repealed. Will these changes appease your wrath with AV? If not, what else is required?
.jpg.cf.jpg)
Addressing time issues with Warsong Gulch
As our own Zach Yonzon has pointed out, Warsong Gulch, the capture-the-flag battleground, is broken. Despite Warsong being his favorite battleground, there are several issues confronting PvP'ers.Here's the short version: WSG has the lowest honor gain per time played of the four battlegrounds, even on its holiday weekend. Warsong is the least effective battleground from which to farm honor. Warsong reputation is not necessary to acquire PvP gear. In addition, reputation gains with the faction are low. Games often last a very long time. Fortunately, Drysc commented this morning on a forum thread started by Moobert, designed to call attention to the issue and draw out a response. While Drysc confirms that the developers are aware of the problems with Warsong Gulch, and that in fact, several possible solutions are already being tested internally. Unfortunately, he cautions that these changes are not likely to be seen any time soon. How do you feel about Warsong right now? Do you love it or hate it and why?
The Art of War(craft): A Resilient Argument Part II
A while back, I wrote that the single most important change to World of Warcraft PvP was the introduction of Resilience. Many of you had strong feelings for or against the new mechanic, but one thing is clear: PvP has changed in the post-TBC world. Combat has become less a matter of how much hurt you can dish out but how much of it you can take. The result is -- in single combat encounters, at least -- longer battles and more creativity with the use of spells and abilities. High Resilience is a necessity in Arena combat, particularly in the current Season where Resilience gear is abundant and easily attainable with Honor. Resilience will allow combatants to survive just a little longer against focus fire. In matches that sometimes last under a minute, an extra second or two of survival can make a big difference.It is also interesting to note that Resilience is almost exclusively an endgame item property, clearly designed for Arena combat. There are no items with Resilience usable below level 60 other than Elixir of Ironskin, which is usable at Level 55. Aside from token items from the Reinforced Fel Iron Chest in Hellfire Ramparts and uncommon quest rewards in the Outlands, most items with Resilience are usable only at Level 70 -- the level where competitive Arena play begins. The idea behind PvP in today's environment is all about damage mitigation. Last week, I discussed the key talents and a few abilities that classes have access to prior to obtaining Resilience. In the process of accumulating gear with Resilience, it helps to be familiar with the various forms of damage mitigation.Today, however, we dive right into the juicy part. Resilience is an item property or statistic that reduces the chance you will get hit by a critical strike or spell critical strike; reduces the damage taken from critical strikes and spell critical strikes; and, as of Patch 2.2, also reduces the damage taken from Damage-over-Time effects (DoTs). Each 1% of Resilience will reduce the chance you will be crit by a spell or attack by 1%, reduce damage from crits by 2%, and reduce damage taken from DoTs by 1% (edit: It was erroneously written as 2%. Thanks to Phlipy for pointing it out!). A Resilience Rating of 39.4 grants 1% Resilience at Level 70 and -- as a bit of useless information -- a Resilience Rating of 25 grants 1% Resilience at Level 60. Because of the clear advantages it provides, any player moderately serious about PvP should accumulate Resilience gear.
