worldpvp
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Are we the bad guys of Azeroth?
After publishing a recent Breakfast Topic on whether there should be a sense of personal honor in PvP, I wasn't really all that surprised to see a few comments echoing the sentiments of "If it's red, it's dead" and "Don't roll on a PvP server if you don't want to get ganked." These crop up in any discussion about PvP, and while there's an undeniable sense to them -- why would you roll on a PvP realm unless you wanted to, I dunno, PvP? -- I've always felt that they did actual PvP a disservice. You can't frame ganking as true PvP. There's no such thing as strategy, skill, or even combat when a player one-shots another, so I've never considered ganking to be defensible along the same lines that actual PvP is.
Going at it with PvP Bingo
Reader Marcel sent us this great idea that a few players (including Siij of Laughing Skull) have had around the realms: PvP Bingo. Basically it's all started on a forum thread, where a square full of players (who have consented, I assume, although it might be funny if they didn't) are laid out as targets on a bingo card. Kill a player, mark the card, post a screenshot, and the first to finish up a line wins. Fun.Here's another one on a different realm. I especially like how some instructions are clearer than others (one of the instructions says to just kill a member of a certain guild), though it's not really fair to put just one guy in the center. Then again, maybe he wants to be there-- would you enjoy having a big price on your head, and players gunning to empty your health meter? Zerging groups are apparently acceptable, and though tracking via friends or alts is allowed, I'd think that would be a gamebreaker. Apparently switching to alts is acceptable, too-- all the kills don't have to be done with the same character.This kind of thing almost makes me wish I played on a PvP server, although I'm sure the same thing could be accomplished via duels. Fun idea, and definitely should make for some good world PvP. Makes me wonder, too, if Blizzard would ever consider player-created bounties ingame-- while there's probably a lot of potential for griefing, players who consented to it would probably have a lot of fun.
Holla for Halaa
Blizzard has posted a helpful page of tips on how to run, in my opinion, the best setup of organized World PvP so far: Halaa, the conquerable city in Nagrand.The tips are pretty straightforward: stick together (team-- where's my CS homies at?), do as much bombing as you can before heading into the town, and make sure, once you've liberated Halaa from its evil oppressors, that you stick around to keep control and defend against any counterattacks. One thing I like about Halaa is that the Wyverns make it super easy for even lower geared players to join the fight and make a real difference. Plus, the layout is done well, and I like, as we heard at BlizzCon, that Blizzard went with a pretty persistent reward-- it's no fun to conquer something just to lose it again in 5 minutes.And Halaa, surely, will serve as a model for the next big noninstanced PvP zone coming in Wrath of the Lich King, Lake Wintergrasp. Blizzard hasn't actually designed the zone yet, but they did share their goals with us-- multiple targets and rewards, a persistent effect, and of course while Halaa doesn't have them, siege weapons will make an appearance as well.So if you haven't tried Halaa yet, definitely check it out. From everything we've heard, this kind of thing is the future of where World PvP is headed.
We've become carebears in Shattrath
Arrianae has a great point over on the forums: since when did Outland take the war out of Warcraft? Remember all that blood spilled on the Crossroads? Remember the massacres that took place at Southshore, or the daily incursions at Orgrimmar and Stormwind. STV ganking is legendary, and BRD used to have skeletons all over it. So why is it that, in Shattrath, Horde and Alliance are suddenly buddy-buddy?The answer, says Nethaera, is that there are bigger foes to worry about in Outland, the Burning Legion definitely not the least of them. There is some good PvP to be found in Outland, although the Auchindouin nodes are usually just grabbed rather than conquered. But while Halaa in Nagrand is covered with the entrails of both sides, you still get the feeling that there, we're just fighting for a turn-in vendor. It's fun, but it doesn't have the epic, original Warcraft flavor that was so sweet in Azeroth.I think what players want is some good old Orcs and Humans combat. Before Burning Crusade, we were asking for more World PvP, and we definitely got it-- from HFP to Zangarmarsh to Auchindouin, there are tons of ways to fight the other faction, and tons of reasons to do it. But no amount of standing around in a PvP objective feels better than sticking pointy end of sword into enemy, and that kind of ruthless attack is what players miss.
Flying mounts and world bosses
Recently, a lot of guilds have been having some problems with Doom Lord Kazzak. Not on the actual fight, which isn't that difficult. Instead, players (of the same or opposing faction) have been flying above Kazzak, getting killed from his AOE shadowbolt and healing him, effectively griefing the raid. A forum thread from a few months ago brings up possible solutions to this problem. Generally, if you're on a PVP server, this isn't considered griefing because you can kill the other faction before they get in range. But on flying mounts, this is a bit tougher. Someone suggested staging a raid on Honor Hold/Thrallmar to distract possible attackers before you attempt, which is a nice idea. You can also send up shadow priests or mages to POM/pyro them before the fight, or just kill them until they have ridiculously long rez timers. If you're doing this on a PVE server -- or doing it to someone of the same faction on any server -- that's considered griefing and is reportable. Other people suggest that Blizzard solve this problem through game mechanics. For example, they could make Kazzak's AOE shadowbolt target only members of the raid who engaged him, or have only deaths in that raid heal him. But this sort of ruins the idea of world bosses, where you could theoretically get everyone on an entire server to come take down the boss (or fail to take it down, as was evidenced when Highlord Kruul visited Azeroth.) How do you think this problem should be solved?
Does anyone do the world PVP objectives?
The world PVP objectives were a nice addition in the Burning Crusade. Capturing objectives in Nagrand, Hellfire Peninsula, Zangarmarsh and Terokkar Forest provided minor buffs to everyone in the zone, as well as exchangable tokens for the capturers. Yet today, at least on Magtheridon, barely anyone actually does the world PVP objectives. What went wrong? As best I can figure:
