It'd be nice if instances had item level requirements, perhaps a required minimum total of all of your ilvls added together.
One of the main things that gets on my nerves these days is new 70s jumping straight in the queue for heroics, with barely a 70 blue to their name. I think grinding to revered was a bit much, but I got much better groups back then at least.
It'd be nice if instances had item level requirements, perhaps a required minimum total of all of your ilvls added together.
One of the main things that gets on my nerves these days is new 70s jumping straight in the queue for heroics, with barely a 70 blue to their name. I think grinding to revered was a bit much, but I got much better groups back then at least.
Well it's not perfect, there's been plenty of times I've dragged an undergeared mate through stuff for upgrades myself, but it's more relevant than the entry requirements in place at the moment imo.
I kind of agree with you. People are diving into heroics with shit gear, but at the same time you're seeing really geared out players (For heroics at least) just destroying those places
Soviet Waffle on
League of Legends: Studio
0
Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
edited February 2008
unrealistic expectations unite! late last night i was asked to tank normal Mechanar.
I am a prot paladin.
I have made a fairly good name for myself tanking instances from 35 up to where I am now.
Where I am now is level 63. I politely declined the offer.
Our gmotd was Thursday: MH, then illidan, then more MH!
It was exactly as retarded as it sounded. Time between 2nd boss MH kill and Illidan pull: 27 minutes. Time between Illidan kill and start horde side: 19 minutes. That's some real efficiency there Lou. Total time idling: About 55 minutes during a 4 hour raid (Not counting recovery runs). End result is pulling Archimonde only 40mins before raid end, with tired people and a less then ideal setup. 5 wipes on archimonde yay.
SanderJK on
Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
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ClaymanDon't be a baked potato. Be a person.Registered Userregular
Yes, one of our mages managed to get hit by the three first spouts and acctually managed to avoid the last one. His answer was "I didn't die".
This is the same mage that refuses to spec anything else than frost since he can't do arenas otherwise. I demoted him to trial again a long time ago...
Clayman on
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Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
But, like most fanfictions, it has pretty bad writing. The actions scenes are top notch, but the guy who voices Thrall and Sarafang is horrible. Though the guy who does the Lich King voice is amazing.
Munkus Beaver on
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
But, like most fanfictions, it has pretty bad writing. The actions scenes are top notch, but the guy who voices Thrall and Sarafang is horrible. Though the guy who does the Lich King voice is amazing.
to be fair, its quite a step up from the first 2 tales they made, it seems they shoulda just waited for wotlk to come out once it was announced, some things they made up in there were pretty O_o , like the naaru at the end.
and anything that shows WC2 is awesome in my book.
polloface on
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Liquid GhostDO YOU HEAR THE VOICES, TOO?!Registered Userregular
Baxter Stockman, lol! edit: oh jeez, now I'm on a Wikipedia adventure about Ninja Turtles characters
In the same vein as "What's Spout?" we always make sure to list all 'Thaladred, the Darkener' Phase 1 deaths in our GMOTD. I've died to a spout on it's 370th degree of rotation, but under no circumstance have I let slow slow slow, out of rangeable death get the best of me!
I'd say that's a closer approximation, only because the Arena is PvP in its most distilled form. No hokey objectives or lopsided groups of players against a smaller group, just equal PvP, and that's why the horrendous class imbalances are starting to show themselves. At this point they're just chucking buckets of kerosene on the fire.
That being said, as long as the PvE element remains mostly intact, I'll continue to pay to play what is essentially Diablo III.
I'd say that's a closer approximation, only because the Arena is PvP in its most distilled form. No hokey objectives or lopsided groups of players against a smaller group, just equal PvP, and that's why the horrendous class imbalances are starting to show themselves. At this point they're just chucking buckets of kerosene on the fire.
That being said, as long as the PvE element remains mostly intact, I'll continue to pay to play what is essentially Diablo III.
The "horrendous class imbalances" show up in arenas because arenas are the imbalancing factor. The original class balance implementation (and what still mostly exists today) was based on objective-based PvP. Those "hokey objectives" are part of the balance. You can't burst down or focus fire a flag or other objective like you can a player. Without those deterrents, everything is thrown off. Healers become the objectives, tanks are even more useless than they were, and damage-dealers have almost no reason to divide their attention between multiple targets.
Arena is death-match bullshit. It is not PvP in it's most distilled form, it is a mutation of real PvP which removes a critical element. It fundamentally requires the least amount of thought, because it simply doesn't have enough additional variables to take into consideration when playing. Depressingly, Blizzard considers it the epitome of competitive PvP.
Anyway, it's been obvious for a long time that this is a PvE game with PvP awkwardly tacked on. I'm okay with that; I accepted it a long time ago. It's still a fun game. And I certainly don't think "arena is ruining this game", because battlegrounds are still fun (that's a testament to the lasting power of those simple game types, even without any map variations after three fucking years). But with that said, I do think this game would be a lot better if Blizzard would stop proclaiming arenas the best thing since sliced bread and toss us a fucking bone in the form of some new battleground maps and standardized PvP gear.
I'd say that's a closer approximation, only because the Arena is PvP in its most distilled form. No hokey objectives or lopsided groups of players against a smaller group, just equal PvP, and that's why the horrendous class imbalances are starting to show themselves. At this point they're just chucking buckets of kerosene on the fire.
That being said, as long as the PvE element remains mostly intact, I'll continue to pay to play what is essentially Diablo III.
The "horrendous class imbalances" show up in arenas because arenas are the imbalancing factor. The original class balance implementation (and what still mostly exists today) was based on objective-based PvP. Those "hokey objectives" are part of the balance. You can't burst down or focus fire a flag or other objective like you can a player. Without those deterrents, everything is thrown off. Healers become the objectives, tanks are even more useless than they were, and damage-dealers have almost no reason to divide their attention between multiple targets.
Arena is death-match bullshit. It is not PvP in it's most distilled form, it is a mutation of real PvP which removes a critical element. It fundamentally requires the least amount of thought, because it simply doesn't have enough additional variables to take into consideration when playing. Depressingly, Blizzard considers it the epitomy of competitive PvP.
Anyway, it's been obvious for a long time that this is a PvE game with PvP awkwardly tacked on. I'm okay with that; I accepted it a long time ago. It's still a fun game. And I certainly don't think "arena is ruining this game", because battlegrounds are still fun (that's a testament to the lasting power of those simple game types, even without any map variations after three fucking years). But with that said, I do think this game would be a lot better if Blizzard would stop proclaiming arenas the best thing since sliced bread and toss us a fucking bone in the form of some new battleground maps and standardized PvP gear.
In the eye of every other MMO on the market WoW is viewed as the epitome of a PvP game. People from EQ2 don't look at WoW and think, "Huh, I want to raid in WoW." They think "Huh, it sure is fun PvPing in WoW."
I'm sure that's true from multiple other games too...
Disclaimer: I play EQ2 and WoW. Is such a thing possible?!
Anyway, it's been obvious for a long time that this is a PvE game with PvP awkwardly tacked on. I'm okay with that; I accepted it a long time ago. It's still a fun game. And I certainly don't think "arena is ruining this game", because battlegrounds are still fun (that's a testament to the lasting power of those simple game types, even without any map variations after three fucking years). But with that said, I do think this game would be a lot better if Blizzard would stop proclaiming arenas the best thing since sliced bread and toss us a fucking bone in the form of some new battleground maps and standardized PvP gear.
They said in the new blizzcast thingy that in the future they were looking to make it so instead of joining Warsong Gulch, you'd que for a CTF game and be taken to any of X CTF maps, same with domination type games, etc. That'd be pretty rad.
Totally agreed about BG's being where WoW's PVP gets interesting, putting 10 guys in a box and saying "go kill eachother" isn't fun; it's fucking boring. It's an idea they've taken from twitch-FPS games where even among them it's considered a dumbed down form of gameplay.
In the eye of every other MMO on the market WoW is viewed as the epitome of a PvP game. People from EQ2 don't look at WoW and think, "Huh, I want to raid in WoW." They think "Huh, it sure is fun PvPing in WoW."
I'm sure that's true from multiple other games too...
Disclaimer: I play EQ2 and WoW. Is such a thing possible?!
People from real PvP games, however, do not look up to WoW as the epitome of a PvP game. I don't think Warhammer or Age of Conan aspire to bring bullshit arena PvP to our door because no one likes that crap.
Maybe in EQ2 the PvP-grass looks greener in WoW, but in comparison to past experiences in Shadowbane, UO, or even Guild Wars, it looks puke yellow.
If WoW looks like the epitome of a PvP game to those people, I shudder to think what they must be used to. Now, I'm not saying PvP in WoW isn't fun. It is. It's very fun. But it pales in comparison to a real PvP game, like DAoC. It could be so much better if the devs knew how to do world PvP properly, or would even offer up some new battleground maps.
Anyway, my main point was that arena isn't ruining the game, even if it is taking development time away from other forms of PvP. The reason is that the developers either don't know how to -- or don't want to (for whatever reason) -- improve the other forms of PvP, even if they had all the development time in the world.
People from real PvP games, however, do not look up to WoW as the epitome of a PvP game. I don't think Warhammer or Age of Conan aspire to bring bullshit arena PvP to our door because no one likes that crap.
Maybe in EQ2 the PvP-grass looks greener in WoW, but in comparison to past experiences in Shadowbane, UO, or even Guild Wars, it looks puke yellow.
First off, while I recognize that both AoC and WHO are stating that they're going to focus more on PVP at release than WoW did, until they're released (has the NDA even been lifted for WHO yet?) or we have public betas, how can we possibly know how the two stack up?
Furthermore, didn't we just have a conversation (possibly in the AoC thread) or somewhere else where it seems that they're putting in a system similar to the old honour ladder one? A retarded grind form of advancement? I wasn't looking too closely, but I remember there being bitching.
Forar on
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
Anyway, it's been obvious for a long time that this is a PvE game with PvP awkwardly tacked on. I'm okay with that; I accepted it a long time ago. It's still a fun game. And I certainly don't think "arena is ruining this game", because battlegrounds are still fun (that's a testament to the lasting power of those simple game types, even without any map variations after three fucking years). But with that said, I do think this game would be a lot better if Blizzard would stop proclaiming arenas the best thing since sliced bread and toss us a fucking bone in the form of some new battleground maps and standardized PvP gear.
They said in the new blizzcast thingy that in the future they were looking to make it so instead of joining Warsong Gulch, you'd que for a CTF game and be taken to any of X CTF maps, same with domination type games, etc. That'd be pretty rad.
Totally agreed about BG's being where WoW's PVP gets interesting, putting 10 guys in a box and saying "go kill eachother" isn't fun; it's fucking boring. It's an idea they've taken from twitch-FPS games where even among them it's considered a dumbed down form of gameplay.
I don't know. I wouldn't directly compare an Arena match [well, not a 2v2 or 3v3; 5s are just chaos by nature] with UT, or something -- at the highest levels of play, matches can drag on for 20 min. or more, just because it's a bigger mana / cooldown game than simply killing someone on the other team faster than they can reciprocate. Sure, sometimes it does come down to who can put up the most burst while the target has an MS on them, but not very often, in the ~2k range.
I don't know. I wouldn't directly compare an Arena match [well, not a 2v2 or 3v3; 5s are just chaos by nature] with UT, or something -- at the highest levels of play, matches can drag on for 20 min. or more, just because it's a bigger mana / cooldown game than simply killing someone on the other team faster than they can reciprocate. Sure, sometimes it does come down to who can put up the most burst while the target has an MS on them, but not very often, in the ~2k range.
Except only a small fraction of the playerbase is in that 2k+ range, where between skill, gear and class balance, you have lengthy, drawn out matches.
Speaking as someone more frequently in the 1600-1800 bracket, games are usually either an overwhelming victory for one side or the other based on class or gear difference, or a slightly longer battle with a similarly foregone conclusion.
Or a full Gladiator team that shows up to rape us through the pants, but that's why I've all but given up on arenas altogether anyway. I've got my S2/S3 level gear that helps me in BG's and when I'm bored enough to do 10 arena games, and that's it. It's gone from "I can lose 10 games to get epics" to "Well, I can queue for 10 games and see how many times a Gladiator/Gladiator/_____ (possibly 3rd Gladiator) team gets matched up to me and violates me and my crew."
And of course, due to the glory of people intentionally tanking their ratings at like 4am, any time we WIN against these fucks, we get like 7 points, but losing to them is like a 21 point contribution to their 'being a douchebag for money' fund.
Basically Blizzard needs to drastically change how arena ratings matter to players and exist even between brackets. There needs to be a tangible reason NOT to tank your ratings into the 1200 so you can sodomize teams at half your gear and skill level.
Forar on
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
First off, while I recognize that both AoC and WHO are stating that they're going to focus more on PVP at release than WoW did, until they're released (has the NDA even been lifted for WHO yet?) or we have public betas, how can we possibly know how the two stack up?
We don't know. It's only speculation and hope that they aren't trying to mimic WoW from the PvP side but you'd be hard pressed to convince me that WAR or AoC are looking at the WoW Arena system and saying "We need to bring players more of that."
It's not that WoW's Arena is really that bad. I play and enjoy the arena system, but it's not fulfilling as a primary form of end game PvP. I can't get my whole guild(or even a good portion of it) involved at once and there are no consequences. It really should be a secondary or even tertiary avenue of play.
The "horrendous class imbalances" show up in arenas because arenas are the imbalancing factor. The original class balance implementation (and what still mostly exists today) was based on objective-based PvP. Those "hokey objectives" are part of the balance. You can't burst down or focus fire a flag or other objective like you can a player. Without those deterrents, everything is thrown off. Healers become the objectives, tanks are even more useless than they were, and damage-dealers have almost no reason to divide their attention between multiple targets.
Arena is death-match bullshit. It is not PvP in it's most distilled form, it is a mutation of real PvP which removes a critical element. It fundamentally requires the least amount of thought, because it simply doesn't have enough additional variables to take into consideration when playing. Depressingly, Blizzard considers it the epitome of competitive PvP.
Anyway, it's been obvious for a long time that this is a PvE game with PvP awkwardly tacked on. I'm okay with that; I accepted it a long time ago. It's still a fun game. And I certainly don't think "arena is ruining this game", because battlegrounds are still fun (that's a testament to the lasting power of those simple game types, even without any map variations after three fucking years). But with that said, I do think this game would be a lot better if Blizzard would stop proclaiming arenas the best thing since sliced bread and toss us a fucking bone in the form of some new battleground maps and standardized PvP gear.
PvP is simply Player versus Player. Not to be pedantic, but nowhere in that acronym does it imply that the players will be pitted against each other while trying to hoist a flag or capture a node or what have you. What you have there would be PvO, or Player versus Objective.
"Deathmatch bullshit", while reprehensible to some I'm sure, is absolutely PvP in its most distilled form. It's an encounter where players test their abilities against one another and victory is (ideally, but sadly this is far from true due to class imbalances, hence my point) decided by who uses their skills to the best of their abilities. I strenuously disagree with your statement that it requires the least amount of thought. Each match is, to some degree, different depending upon what classes your opponents represent. By contrast, you have objective battlegrounds where the strategy is the same each and every time. Cap the flag, defend the chokepoint, take the stables, every single game is nigh identical. If anything requires an absence of thought or strategy, it's the BGs. How many Arena matches can you /afk in and hope to come out victorious?
I don't care for PvP at all, let me be clear, but the fact is that the class imbalances show themselves in the arena because there are no other variables to dilute the outcome. It really just comes down to 'which player's class can defeat/outlast the other first', and as we've all seen, resilience and healing are now woefully imbalanced with certain classes, fear is a ridiculous mechanic in its current state, and all of this can be proven because you don't have so many differing factors to weigh in consideration. Healers of course will always be targets, tanks don't have (and probably will never have) the true 'tanking' ability that they have in PvE in the arena/bgs and the damage dealers, well, they continue to focus on the weakest target, which I think you'd find to be the case no matter what type of PvP is played.
Halfmex on
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
PvP is simply Player versus Player. Not to be pedantic, but nowhere in that acronym does it imply that the players will be pitted against each other while trying to hoist a flag or capture a node or what have you. What you have there would be PvO, or Player versus Objective.
I'm not really going to take issue with the rest of your post, but this is just dumb.
PvP DOES mean simply player versus player. It doesn't even imply combat. Just that one player (Or group of players) is actively working against another player (Or group of players) in a competition. Playing NHL 2008 against your friend is PvP.
So your thing about PvO is pretty much retarded. Arena IS just deathmatch. Battlegrounds is an objective based competition. Which is better is simply up to what the player wants out of PvP.
Arena is just a grind I sit through 10 times a week to get gear to remain competitive in battlegrounds and pve content. Deathmatches are boring. I don't like them in FPS game, either.
I recently made 70 with my hunter and am trying to figure out whether I should focus on PVP/arenas or Heroics/Kara to get myself ready for later endgame PVE pursuits.
I'm in a nice little guild that runs Kara, Gruul/Mag, SSC, the Eye and Zul Aman every week, so I have definite access to Kara on a weekly basis and can gear up that way if I choose.
I've always enjoyed PVE more than PVP and don't fancy myself any good at PVP, but all the talk about how easy it is to get outfitted in good arena gear (which supposedly is good for PVP or PVE) makes me wonder if I shouldn't just do arenas for a few weeks (even if I lose, and lose I will) and get a good set of S1 gear.
I'm still in random 60s blues and a few greens so gods know I could use the upgrades. If I do the recommended 10 games a week, about how long should it take me to get a full set of S1 gear and a new weapon?
Is there much of a reason NOT to outfit oneself in arena gear as a fresh 70 if your ultimate goal is endgame raiding? Thanks in advance for the input!
Well, it really depends on class. I'm not sure how it is for hunters, but for me (a rogue), arena gear isn't so hot outside of the weapons. The gear has too much stam/resilience/crit and not enough agl/hit for my taste. Is it better than blues? In most cases yes. Personally, I'd just go for the weapons. There's plenty better PvE gear that can be gotten through crafting/badges if Kara isn't being nice.
Also, the ten games a week is for arena. Where you get the s2/3 pieces. S1 is for honor/marks.
PierceNeck on
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HalfmexI mock your value systemYou also appear foolish in the eyes of othersRegistered Userregular
PvP is simply Player versus Player. Not to be pedantic, but nowhere in that acronym does it imply that the players will be pitted against each other while trying to hoist a flag or capture a node or what have you. What you have there would be PvO, or Player versus Objective.
I'm not really going to take issue with the rest of your post, but this is just dumb.
PvP DOES mean simply player versus player. It doesn't even imply combat. Just that one player (Or group of players) is actively working against another player (Or group of players) in a competition. Playing NHL 2008 against your friend is PvP.
So your thing about PvO is pretty much retarded. Arena IS just deathmatch. Battlegrounds is an objective based competition. Which is better is simply up to what the player wants out of PvP.
Meh, frankly both could be true, but I suppose I see your point. Fair enough.
Well, it really depends on class. I'm not sure how it is for hunters, but for me (a rogue), arena gear isn't so hot outside of the weapons. The gear has too much stam/resilience/crit and not enough agl/hit for my taste. Is it better than blues? In most cases yes. Personally, I'd just go for the weapons. There's plenty better PvE gear that can be gotten through crafting/badges if Kara isn't being nice.
Also, the ten games a week is for arena. Where you get the s2/3 pieces. S1 is for honor/marks.
I play a ret paladin. There isn't better gear from pve. I just do heroics and kara for badges and fun, when I can. ;_;
DisruptorX2 on
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
Well, it really depends on class. I'm not sure how it is for hunters, but for me (a rogue), arena gear isn't so hot outside of the weapons. The gear has too much stam/resilience/crit and not enough agl/hit for my taste. Is it better than blues? In most cases yes. Personally, I'd just go for the weapons. There's plenty better PvE gear that can be gotten through crafting/badges if Kara isn't being nice.
Also, the ten games a week is for arena. Where you get the s2/3 pieces. S1 is for honor/marks.
I play a ret paladin. There isn't better gear from pve. I just do heroics and kara for badges and fun, when I can. ;_;
Yeah, I've noticed I don't get much gear out of farming Kara for my ret pally. :P Ret pallies are the flavor of the month for neglected class specs it seems. Ah well, I'm sure it'll improve eventually.
PvP is simply Player versus Player. Not to be pedantic, but nowhere in that acronym does it imply that the players will be pitted against each other while trying to hoist a flag or capture a node or what have you. What you have there would be PvO, or Player versus Objective.
I don't care for PvP at all, let me be clear, but the fact is that the class imbalances show themselves in the arena because there are no other variables to dilute the outcome. It really just comes down to 'which player's class can defeat/outlast the other first', and as we've all seen, resilience and healing are now woefully imbalanced with certain classes, fear is a ridiculous mechanic in its current state, and all of this can be proven because you don't have so many differing factors to weigh in consideration. Healers of course will always be targets, tanks don't have (and probably will never have) the true 'tanking' ability that they have in PvE in the arena/bgs and the damage dealers, well, they continue to focus on the weakest target, which I think you'd find to be the case no matter what type of PvP is played.
Granted, objective-based combat is not intrinsic to the acronym. But I think what is intrinsic is the notion that the archetypal class roles of tank/healer/damage should be preserved as much as possible. This can be done in one of two ways: 1) collision detection, so that tanks can tank players and protect the healers; or 2) objective-based combat, to effectively act as a damage mitigator for the healers in place of actual tanks. When there exists an objective, the damage-dealers have to split their attention between that and the healers. This lowers damage on the healers enough to maintain balance.
As you may notice, arena lacks either of those provisions, so healers have to just be able to take all that damage. Blizzard apparently tried to allow for this by implementing resilience and promoting massive gobs of stamina on gear, but that just convolutes things more, without addressing the actual issue. Now healers are either tiny gods if they get enough resilience and stamina, or they die in half a second because they don't have enough. Neither of those outcomes is balanced. This is the source of all imbalances in arena.
"Deathmatch bullshit", while reprehensible to some I'm sure, is absolutely PvP in its most distilled form. It's an encounter where players test their abilities against one another and victory is (ideally, but sadly this is far from true due to class imbalances, hence my point) decided by who uses their skills to the best of their abilities. I strenuously disagree with your statement that it requires the least amount of thought. Each match is, to some degree, different depending upon what classes your opponents represent. By contrast, you have objective battlegrounds where the strategy is the same each and every time. Cap the flag, defend the chokepoint, take the stables, every single game is nigh identical. If anything requires an absence of thought or strategy, it's the BGs. How many Arena matches can you /afk in and hope to come out victorious?
The battlegrounds do have a consistent strategy, but that doesn't mean it doesn't require dynamic thought to execute that strategy, no matter how many times you do it. On top of that, the skirmishes that take place in battlegrounds are like miniature arena matches. So you've got to deal with all of the variables of an arena match (sometimes more, since fights can be lopsided and people can join in mid-way through), while also constantly thinking about everything else going on in the overall match. You don't just set aside the other stuff while you're engaging in each skirmish, you have to be constantly aware of the status of all the objectives, the status of every other skirmish that's also occurring at the same time as yours, and what your enemy is thinking on those same subjects. You have to decide things like whether to abandon your current fight to pursue the objective, whether to sacrifice yourself to protect the objective, whether to even engage the enemy at all, and all manner of things that you just would never have to think about in arena, because it's a simple deathmatch.
The point I'm trying to illustrate is that even something as elementary as capture-the-flag adds so many more variables over deathmatch that they're scarcely even comparable. I'm not saying deathmatch requires no thought at all, since the smarter team usually wins, but it most certainly requires the least thought of any form of PvP I've ever seen, and on top of that it seems to be inherently impossible to completely balance. And because of that, I think it's ridiculous that Blizzard would choose to establish and maintain this as their primary venue of PvP.
Well, it really depends on class. I'm not sure how it is for hunters, but for me (a rogue), arena gear isn't so hot outside of the weapons. The gear has too much stam/resilience/crit and not enough agl/hit for my taste. Is it better than blues? In most cases yes. Personally, I'd just go for the weapons. There's plenty better PvE gear that can be gotten through crafting/badges if Kara isn't being nice.
Also, the ten games a week is for arena. Where you get the s2/3 pieces. S1 is for honor/marks.
I play a ret paladin. There isn't better gear from pve. I just do heroics and kara for badges and fun, when I can. ;_;
Yeah, I've noticed I don't get much gear out of farming Kara for my ret pally. :P Ret pallies are the flavor of the month for neglected class specs it seems. Ah well, I'm sure it'll improve eventually.
They are fixing this in 2.4
I can't find it in the notes, but I'm damn certain they're changing all existing Ret sets to fit 2.3.2 paladin.
Pretty much all the spelldamage on the tiered/arena sets is being converted into strength. Spelldamage on non-set stuff is being changed into other things, but usually strength.
My point was more that the paladin arena gear is just as good as the tiered stuff at pve, making it redundant, as its harder to get than the arena gear.
Posts
One of the main things that gets on my nerves these days is new 70s jumping straight in the queue for heroics, with barely a 70 blue to their name. I think grinding to revered was a bit much, but I got much better groups back then at least.
No one would take my 68 Healadin to Heroics
I am a prot paladin.
I have made a fairly good name for myself tanking instances from 35 up to where I am now.
Where I am now is level 63. I politely declined the offer.
its a hard job but someone has to abuse the totally overpowered nature of the two specs.
http://www.wowinsider.com/2008/02/27/wow-moviewatch-we-will-rock-you/
It was exactly as retarded as it sounded. Time between 2nd boss MH kill and Illidan pull: 27 minutes. Time between Illidan kill and start horde side: 19 minutes. That's some real efficiency there Lou. Total time idling: About 55 minutes during a 4 hour raid (Not counting recovery runs). End result is pulling Archimonde only 40mins before raid end, with tired people and a less then ideal setup. 5 wipes on archimonde yay.
Yes, one of our mages managed to get hit by the three first spouts and acctually managed to avoid the last one. His answer was "I didn't die".
This is the same mage that refuses to spec anything else than frost since he can't do arenas otherwise. I demoted him to trial again a long time ago...
This is probably the most epic fanfiction I have ever seen: http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=53953
But, like most fanfictions, it has pretty bad writing. The actions scenes are top notch, but the guy who voices Thrall and Sarafang is horrible. Though the guy who does the Lich King voice is amazing.
to be fair, its quite a step up from the first 2 tales they made, it seems they shoulda just waited for wotlk to come out once it was announced, some things they made up in there were pretty O_o , like the naaru at the end.
and anything that shows WC2 is awesome in my book.
APRIL IS KIDNAPPED BY MOUSERS -- DEADLY ROBOTS FILL EVERY HOLE
KRANG SHOWS SHREDDER WHO'S BOSS WITH HIS NEW BODY CYBERNETICS
TOKKA AND RAHZAR TAKE ON BEBOP AND ROCKSTEADY -- IN THE BEDROOM
3.99 PER ISSUE -- BUY 'EM NOW
In the same vein as "What's Spout?" we always make sure to list all 'Thaladred, the Darkener' Phase 1 deaths in our GMOTD. I've died to a spout on it's 370th degree of rotation, but under no circumstance have I let slow slow slow, out of rangeable death get the best of me!
That being said, as long as the PvE element remains mostly intact, I'll continue to pay to play what is essentially Diablo III.
The "horrendous class imbalances" show up in arenas because arenas are the imbalancing factor. The original class balance implementation (and what still mostly exists today) was based on objective-based PvP. Those "hokey objectives" are part of the balance. You can't burst down or focus fire a flag or other objective like you can a player. Without those deterrents, everything is thrown off. Healers become the objectives, tanks are even more useless than they were, and damage-dealers have almost no reason to divide their attention between multiple targets.
Arena is death-match bullshit. It is not PvP in it's most distilled form, it is a mutation of real PvP which removes a critical element. It fundamentally requires the least amount of thought, because it simply doesn't have enough additional variables to take into consideration when playing. Depressingly, Blizzard considers it the epitome of competitive PvP.
Anyway, it's been obvious for a long time that this is a PvE game with PvP awkwardly tacked on. I'm okay with that; I accepted it a long time ago. It's still a fun game. And I certainly don't think "arena is ruining this game", because battlegrounds are still fun (that's a testament to the lasting power of those simple game types, even without any map variations after three fucking years). But with that said, I do think this game would be a lot better if Blizzard would stop proclaiming arenas the best thing since sliced bread and toss us a fucking bone in the form of some new battleground maps and standardized PvP gear.
In the eye of every other MMO on the market WoW is viewed as the epitome of a PvP game. People from EQ2 don't look at WoW and think, "Huh, I want to raid in WoW." They think "Huh, it sure is fun PvPing in WoW."
I'm sure that's true from multiple other games too...
Disclaimer: I play EQ2 and WoW. Is such a thing possible?!
Totally agreed about BG's being where WoW's PVP gets interesting, putting 10 guys in a box and saying "go kill eachother" isn't fun; it's fucking boring. It's an idea they've taken from twitch-FPS games where even among them it's considered a dumbed down form of gameplay.
People from real PvP games, however, do not look up to WoW as the epitome of a PvP game. I don't think Warhammer or Age of Conan aspire to bring bullshit arena PvP to our door because no one likes that crap.
Maybe in EQ2 the PvP-grass looks greener in WoW, but in comparison to past experiences in Shadowbane, UO, or even Guild Wars, it looks puke yellow.
Anyway, my main point was that arena isn't ruining the game, even if it is taking development time away from other forms of PvP. The reason is that the developers either don't know how to -- or don't want to (for whatever reason) -- improve the other forms of PvP, even if they had all the development time in the world.
First off, while I recognize that both AoC and WHO are stating that they're going to focus more on PVP at release than WoW did, until they're released (has the NDA even been lifted for WHO yet?) or we have public betas, how can we possibly know how the two stack up?
Furthermore, didn't we just have a conversation (possibly in the AoC thread) or somewhere else where it seems that they're putting in a system similar to the old honour ladder one? A retarded grind form of advancement? I wasn't looking too closely, but I remember there being bitching.
I don't know. I wouldn't directly compare an Arena match [well, not a 2v2 or 3v3; 5s are just chaos by nature] with UT, or something -- at the highest levels of play, matches can drag on for 20 min. or more, just because it's a bigger mana / cooldown game than simply killing someone on the other team faster than they can reciprocate. Sure, sometimes it does come down to who can put up the most burst while the target has an MS on them, but not very often, in the ~2k range.
Except only a small fraction of the playerbase is in that 2k+ range, where between skill, gear and class balance, you have lengthy, drawn out matches.
Speaking as someone more frequently in the 1600-1800 bracket, games are usually either an overwhelming victory for one side or the other based on class or gear difference, or a slightly longer battle with a similarly foregone conclusion.
Or a full Gladiator team that shows up to rape us through the pants, but that's why I've all but given up on arenas altogether anyway. I've got my S2/S3 level gear that helps me in BG's and when I'm bored enough to do 10 arena games, and that's it. It's gone from "I can lose 10 games to get epics" to "Well, I can queue for 10 games and see how many times a Gladiator/Gladiator/_____ (possibly 3rd Gladiator) team gets matched up to me and violates me and my crew."
And of course, due to the glory of people intentionally tanking their ratings at like 4am, any time we WIN against these fucks, we get like 7 points, but losing to them is like a 21 point contribution to their 'being a douchebag for money' fund.
Basically Blizzard needs to drastically change how arena ratings matter to players and exist even between brackets. There needs to be a tangible reason NOT to tank your ratings into the 1200 so you can sodomize teams at half your gear and skill level.
We don't know. It's only speculation and hope that they aren't trying to mimic WoW from the PvP side but you'd be hard pressed to convince me that WAR or AoC are looking at the WoW Arena system and saying "We need to bring players more of that."
It's not that WoW's Arena is really that bad. I play and enjoy the arena system, but it's not fulfilling as a primary form of end game PvP. I can't get my whole guild(or even a good portion of it) involved at once and there are no consequences. It really should be a secondary or even tertiary avenue of play.
"Deathmatch bullshit", while reprehensible to some I'm sure, is absolutely PvP in its most distilled form. It's an encounter where players test their abilities against one another and victory is (ideally, but sadly this is far from true due to class imbalances, hence my point) decided by who uses their skills to the best of their abilities. I strenuously disagree with your statement that it requires the least amount of thought. Each match is, to some degree, different depending upon what classes your opponents represent. By contrast, you have objective battlegrounds where the strategy is the same each and every time. Cap the flag, defend the chokepoint, take the stables, every single game is nigh identical. If anything requires an absence of thought or strategy, it's the BGs. How many Arena matches can you /afk in and hope to come out victorious?
I don't care for PvP at all, let me be clear, but the fact is that the class imbalances show themselves in the arena because there are no other variables to dilute the outcome. It really just comes down to 'which player's class can defeat/outlast the other first', and as we've all seen, resilience and healing are now woefully imbalanced with certain classes, fear is a ridiculous mechanic in its current state, and all of this can be proven because you don't have so many differing factors to weigh in consideration. Healers of course will always be targets, tanks don't have (and probably will never have) the true 'tanking' ability that they have in PvE in the arena/bgs and the damage dealers, well, they continue to focus on the weakest target, which I think you'd find to be the case no matter what type of PvP is played.
I'm not really going to take issue with the rest of your post, but this is just dumb.
PvP DOES mean simply player versus player. It doesn't even imply combat. Just that one player (Or group of players) is actively working against another player (Or group of players) in a competition. Playing NHL 2008 against your friend is PvP.
So your thing about PvO is pretty much retarded. Arena IS just deathmatch. Battlegrounds is an objective based competition. Which is better is simply up to what the player wants out of PvP.
I'm in a nice little guild that runs Kara, Gruul/Mag, SSC, the Eye and Zul Aman every week, so I have definite access to Kara on a weekly basis and can gear up that way if I choose.
I've always enjoyed PVE more than PVP and don't fancy myself any good at PVP, but all the talk about how easy it is to get outfitted in good arena gear (which supposedly is good for PVP or PVE) makes me wonder if I shouldn't just do arenas for a few weeks (even if I lose, and lose I will) and get a good set of S1 gear.
I'm still in random 60s blues and a few greens so gods know I could use the upgrades. If I do the recommended 10 games a week, about how long should it take me to get a full set of S1 gear and a new weapon?
Is there much of a reason NOT to outfit oneself in arena gear as a fresh 70 if your ultimate goal is endgame raiding? Thanks in advance for the input!
Also, the ten games a week is for arena. Where you get the s2/3 pieces. S1 is for honor/marks.
I play a ret paladin. There isn't better gear from pve. I just do heroics and kara for badges and fun, when I can. ;_;
Yeah, I've noticed I don't get much gear out of farming Kara for my ret pally. :P Ret pallies are the flavor of the month for neglected class specs it seems. Ah well, I'm sure it'll improve eventually.
Granted, objective-based combat is not intrinsic to the acronym. But I think what is intrinsic is the notion that the archetypal class roles of tank/healer/damage should be preserved as much as possible. This can be done in one of two ways: 1) collision detection, so that tanks can tank players and protect the healers; or 2) objective-based combat, to effectively act as a damage mitigator for the healers in place of actual tanks. When there exists an objective, the damage-dealers have to split their attention between that and the healers. This lowers damage on the healers enough to maintain balance.
As you may notice, arena lacks either of those provisions, so healers have to just be able to take all that damage. Blizzard apparently tried to allow for this by implementing resilience and promoting massive gobs of stamina on gear, but that just convolutes things more, without addressing the actual issue. Now healers are either tiny gods if they get enough resilience and stamina, or they die in half a second because they don't have enough. Neither of those outcomes is balanced. This is the source of all imbalances in arena.
The battlegrounds do have a consistent strategy, but that doesn't mean it doesn't require dynamic thought to execute that strategy, no matter how many times you do it. On top of that, the skirmishes that take place in battlegrounds are like miniature arena matches. So you've got to deal with all of the variables of an arena match (sometimes more, since fights can be lopsided and people can join in mid-way through), while also constantly thinking about everything else going on in the overall match. You don't just set aside the other stuff while you're engaging in each skirmish, you have to be constantly aware of the status of all the objectives, the status of every other skirmish that's also occurring at the same time as yours, and what your enemy is thinking on those same subjects. You have to decide things like whether to abandon your current fight to pursue the objective, whether to sacrifice yourself to protect the objective, whether to even engage the enemy at all, and all manner of things that you just would never have to think about in arena, because it's a simple deathmatch.
The point I'm trying to illustrate is that even something as elementary as capture-the-flag adds so many more variables over deathmatch that they're scarcely even comparable. I'm not saying deathmatch requires no thought at all, since the smarter team usually wins, but it most certainly requires the least thought of any form of PvP I've ever seen, and on top of that it seems to be inherently impossible to completely balance. And because of that, I think it's ridiculous that Blizzard would choose to establish and maintain this as their primary venue of PvP.
They are fixing this in 2.4
I can't find it in the notes, but I'm damn certain they're changing all existing Ret sets to fit 2.3.2 paladin.