PvP

[Xanthippe]

I've wanted to kill my own side when I'm killing the mob that is on the node and someone runs up to steal it while I'm fighting.

[SurfD]

I've wanted to kill my own side when I'm killing the mob that is on the node and someone runs up to steal it while I'm fighting.

Dont even get me started on THOSE assholes.

[Righ]

Now I know that I don't belong on a pvp server.  Does this really irritate you?  I mean... really? 

I think its safe to say that this has nothing to do with the PvP mechanics of the realm, and everything to do with a culture of greed and entitlement fostered by modern capitalist society and gloriously amplified by hordes of uncouth youths playing achievement oriented MMOGs 'together'. :)

[Selby]

I've wanted to kill my own side when I'm killing the mob that is on the node and someone runs up to steal it while I'm fighting.

Which is funny, because last night I ran up to a node after having cleared a few mobs near it only to discover a BE warrior was already there (hidden from view).  He offered to let me mine it once for the skill gain, which I did.  Then I sold him 2 iron ore I had for 3G.  Sometimes people can surprise you.

[Fordel]

I almost always leave herb nodes on my druid to the slow mount people, regardless of side, even if I was 'first'. By the time he'll pick the node and take off again, I'll have taken another 5 :p

[Jayce]

I've wanted to kill my own side when I'm killing the mob that is on the node and someone runs up to steal it while I'm fighting.

I would never roll on a non pvp server though. All the ganking in the world pisses me off less than seeing an opposing character picking an herb node I want, and not being able to knock them off of it.

Now I know that I don't belong on a pvp server.  Does this really irritate you?  I mean... really? 

I think this is a mistake, and a fairly common one.  PvP is not for teaching cretins a lesson, because much of the time you find that the cretins are more powerful than you, and what does that teach them?  That they can do what they want with impunity because they're more catassed out or better at PvP?

WoW PvP is only for fun, not player policing.  It's not designed for policing.  Even if fun consists of the sense of danger that comes from knowing cretins are lurking in the area

[Chenghiz]

WoW pvp is for finding any reason at all to spend as much time as you want to repeatedly killing the opposite faction and making them hate their lives. Or in my opinion, the best kind, competing with the opposite faction for quest spawns. I think I have the most fun in that sort of random non-escalating engagement.

[Dren]

Ok, after week 2 of working BG's like a dog I've figured out the reason Alliance can't seem to win a majority of BG's.  This is probably a problem on Horde side too, but I can't speak for them.

Most people (without experience and maturity) will attack and try to kill any opponent no matter where they are on the BG map.  So, they basically are getting kills or getting killed without any attempt at winning the actual game.  They will also completely ignore sound advice from others not only on the basic good sense of fighting on the flags, but to any sense of strategy at all.  They just ignore it or have /BG shut off.

This has a rolling effect because once those that are giving advice realize it isn't being taken and we are being in score, they continue to stand there berating everyone instead of fighting.  You notice by the number of people that either won't res (dead bodies laying around) or those standing in one place on their mount with battles waging all around them.

Lack of common sense and too much pride seems to be the ingredients for our failures.  However, I sometimes get into sync with a good group of people hitting PUG BG's and everything just clicks for 4-5 games in a row.  Seriously, the feeling and success is immediately noticeable win you are in a group of experienced BG PvP'ers.  I think I continue to play them just for the chance at getting into those on occasion.

[Arrrgh]

You should try to join BG premade groups. They have a lower idiot rate. Even a /trade channel premade is better than a PUG because you don't have to worry about AFKs and bots.

I also know a lot of people who let their kids play wow. So some of those people in your BG who act like a little kid really are little kids.

And before someone launches into the the alliance is all little kids line I'd like to mention I see the same sort of thing on the horde side when I play my horde alt.

[Der Helm]

You should try to join BG premade groups.

Could you explain how they are created, the article I found on the blizzard homepage was not very informative.

[Dren]

You should try to join BG premade groups.

Could you explain how they are created, the article I found on the blizzard homepage was not very informative.

I actually just now started delving into this myself.  I heard the same advice from many of my guildmates.  On our server there is a chat room named /pvpkillers.  Somebody will create a raid and start adding people to it.  They call it a "list" for some reason.  It might be because they start creating a list of people waiting to get into their raid.

It is kind of a PUG for a Premade.  The best solution is a guild premade, but this is the next best thing.  I actually think of the times we just blew away the horde was when I accidentally got added to a BG that was 75% premade.  You can tell because everyone is from the same server....but you.  Whenever that happens it just seems like everyone clicks and things get done.  I'm telling you the difference is amazing.

[Merusk]

You should try to join BG premade groups.

Could you explain how they are created, the article I found on the blizzard homepage was not very informative.

You find a bunch of people who want to go into a particular battleground, then group and form a raid.  The raid leader gets an option at the NPC for "join as group"  when they pick that it queues everyone and you'll all get into the next BG that starts-up.  (I have no idea what happens if you queue, say, 20 people for Warsong.. probably only the first 10 folks in the raid get queued.)

[Azazel]

I actually just now started delving into this myself.  I heard the same advice from many of my guildmates.  On our server there is a chat room named /pvpkillers.  Somebody will create a raid and start adding people to it.  They call it a "list" for some reason.  It might be because they start creating a list of people waiting to get into their raid.

It is kind of a PUG for a Premade.  The best solution is a guild premade, but this is the next best thing.  I actually think of the times we just blew away the horde was when I accidentally got added to a BG that was 75% premade.  You can tell because everyone is from the same server....but you.  Whenever that happens it just seems like everyone clicks and things get done.  I'm telling you the difference is amazing.

Not called a list on my server, but much the same thing. We have a pvp channel which is kind of an open secret /allianceunited. The people in such channels tend to be a little more keen and serious about their pvp in terms of being team players and able to follow simple instructions. You still get asshats of course, but far fewer that a trade channel premade and of course tons fewer than a solo-queue PUG.

[Xanthippe]

That's neat, that idea of a channel for bgers.

There is little difference between the horde and the alliance.  And yes, plenty of people playing wow today are real kids, not just acting like kids.  The crowd seems much younger than it was at launch - many teenagers these days (and younger!).

The only battleground you can't group queue for is AV.  There is a mod called Stinkyqueue (and others, I'm sure) that is used to group queue for AV but basically what it does is automatically tells your raid which AV you are queued for.  So you have to queue simultaneously on someone's count, and then if you don't get in the one the majority of the group gets into, you have to force join it (queue for the particular number).

[Merusk]

There is little difference between the horde and the alliance.  And yes, plenty of people playing wow today are real kids, not just acting like kids.  The crowd seems much younger than it was at launch - many teenagers these days (and younger!).

I blame the WoW commercials. They're snappy and play on teen and "tween" (I hate that word) oriented channels a lot.  Well, at least the ones my daughter watches. 

[Dren]

There is little difference between the horde and the alliance.  And yes, plenty of people playing wow today are real kids, not just acting like kids.  The crowd seems much younger than it was at launch - many teenagers these days (and younger!).

I blame the WoW commercials. They're snappy and play on teen and "tween" (I hate that word) oriented channels a lot.  Well, at least the ones my daughter watches. 

This is really becoming a problem for me.  I had two occasions that this has struck home for me.

1.  Brother and Sister in-law were here for a long weekend.  I played WoW off and on when nothing was going on.  They travelled back and stopped at some friends' house for dinner (old college friends.)  One of their kids (17) plays WoW and made the statement that, "Yeah, most the people in my guild are old men with kids."  STRIKE ONE.

2.  My boss stopped by to drop something off at the house.  He had his 10 year old son and his friend with him.  They basically catch me while I'm in a Karazhan raid so I can't really just drop and go afk in the middle of a pull...I'm the healer!  The son comes around and looks at my screen.  He says, "What level are you?"  I respond, "I have multiple level 70s."  With complete and real awe he says, "Whooooaaa, I'm only at level 50!"

My wife then asks him if he plays the game to which he says yes and his friend plays too.  My boss says he's addicted (HA, level 50? Go home NEWB!)  Anyway, my boss says, "Oh, I didn't know you were into that game...."  And my wife says, "SEEEEEEE!"

Strike 2 and 3.  Get out of my damned game you rotten kids!

Benefit?  Everytime I see his son (hockey practice) he looks at me like I'm the coolest adult he knows.

[Dren]

Finally got a chance at 2v2 arenas last night.

F.U.N.

Healadin/Lock combo.  We lost 2 and won 1 before heading into BGs for the daily and then logging.  Was a lot of fun and lasted quite longer than I expected.  The first one went probably 8 minutes.  The real issue was that the lock is not geared very well yet and was demon specced.  We think if he goes back to Affliction we can get the dps up to where we needed.

I knew my lack of dps was going to be a big issue especially paired with a somewhat gimped dps character.  We'll turn it around.  We also had an issue with strategy on first target, etc.  That will eventually click.  We should have gotten on Vent too. 

Between BGs and Arenas I have a lot of pvp to do and it is all very fresh to me as a newb.  This will more than out last my need for something to do before the expansion.

[Zetor]

Actually, as a warlock/pally combo, you're probably better off with the warlock as soul link (either felguard or 24/37 aka. siphonlife/soullink). Otherwise he will be way too squishy against rogues/warriors/hunters while your heals get interrupted by the rogue/warrior/hunter's partner. Demonology has less dps (though felguard is quite formidable), but it's a heck of a lot more survivable. :P

In arenas, it's typically not a problem if only one of the classes does "steady" damage. The basic tactic then is to outlast the enemies, and depending if the enemy composition is dps+dps or dps+healer, killing one of them asap while fearing/stunning/etc the other, or controlling the dps while mana draining the healer (while keeping the pet and the warlock up, etc).


-- Z.

[Fordel]

SL/SL locks might be the absolute most frustrating things to fight in the game currently. Certainly in the small scale fights. They never OOM, they can force you to OOM, they are a a giant bitch to kill and they have CC coming out of their ass.

[Dren]

The problem is that he's paired with a healadin.  I have no dps to mention except as finishers with shock and my hammer.  I can CC some with stuns, but that's it.  We kept getting into these matches of who can outlast the other and while the lock can outlast anyone, my mana pool is limited.  It takes forever and day to find the bottom, but I get there.

Typically we've found that there is a melee/helar combo for 2v2 teams.  I've got enough staying power to get past stuns and the like to heal my partner and myself, so I really need the DPS from the lock or we'll just get tapped out on mana from my end.

After writing that last post, I dualled up with the other guy in the team, a feral druid.  We did much better at 6 wins and 3 losses.  The 3 losses were mainly due to the other team out gearing us and eventually winning out over time. 

It's been fun either way.  We're looking to start up a 3v3 now too.  I've got my two pieces of Gladiator gear now, so I got a huge jump in res. with limited to no loss in other attributes.  I think my healing actually gained while my mp5 went down a bit.  Now I just have to save up for my trinket.  Hopefully my arena fighting will net me some other fun and fabulous prizes too!

[Zetor]

That's the thing, SL warlocks always have a healadin or resto druid (not contributing much dps either) as a partner, very rarely a discipline priest or a 2nd dps class like a rogue/shadowpriest (in that case the warlock is specced UA). The warlock basically locks down the DPS (curse of exhaustion + blessing of freedom combo on melee, curse of tongues and LOSing on casters) and either CCs the healer and dots + drains / nukes the dps (curse of tongues and fear spam on the healer, along with counterspell from the felhunter should secure a kill), or CCs the dps and mana drains the healer. The DOTs are going to do hideous amounts of damage over time [I was in an EOTS a few days ago where a sl/sl warlock was #1 in damage done by the end, and he had twice as much damage done as the next person] and even if they get dispelled, the warlock can just reapply them and indirectly drain healer mana.

All this time the felhunter/voidwalker is beating on the healer, keeping them in combat; if the other team doesn't have a pet, the paladin can run away and drink to full mana at any time (a SL warlock will stay alive long enough) by using the "Star's Tears" you can buy from the pvp vendors. In an endurance match, the warlock/pally team should come out ahead thanks to drinking, blessing of wisdom, fel armor and either blessing of light or blessing of sacrifice... and that's assuming the opponents are smart and stay on the warlock while trying to CC the pally. Otherwise the warlock will have free reign to spam CC, dots, and high-damage nukes (shadowbolt and searing pain actually hit for a decent amount with a SL build). The weak point of the team is if the enemies focus onl the pet and drop it before it can get heals, but SL warlocks can just instant-summon another.

Here's a summary page (not sure how accurate it is, as I never arena'd on my warlock as soul link) -- http://arenajunkies.com/strategy/2v2/Pal_Wlk/
Of course this isn't the ZOMG BEST 2v2 combo, but it's very competitive and was popular in season1 and season2. Nowadays every warlock seems to prefer resto druids, though. (no vulnerability to counterspells, mobile, cyclone, roots, curse removal, what's not to like?)

Healer+feraldruid isn't that powerful as it might seem; it's basically healer+rogue without any essential rogue stuff (poisons, stuns, blind, sap, cloak of shadows) and with occasional emergency cyclones and a bit more survivability on the druid's part. The lack of direct (MS, wound poison, aimed shot) or indirect (curse of tongues, mind numbing poison, fast recharge spell interrupts) healing reduction means that against teams with a healer the healer can recover quickly after the initial strike (which probably won't do enough damage to take out a typical DPS class). There's a feral druid in my guild who complains about this a lot. :P (probably the same with enhancement shaman, though at least they have quick heal interrupts)
It could be pretty fun to play though, and would probably catch a lot of teams by surprise. (the cat hit me for HOW MUCH?)



-- Z.

[Fraeg]

Healer+feraldruid isn't that powerful as it might seem; it's basically healer+rogue without any essential rogue stuff (poisons, stuns, blind, sap, cloak of shadows) and with occasional emergency cyclones and a bit more survivability on the druid's part. The lack of direct (MS, wound poison, aimed shot) or indirect (curse of tongues, mind numbing poison, fast recharge spell interrupts) healing reduction means that against teams with a healer the healer can recover quickly after the initial strike (which probably won't do enough damage to take out a typical DPS class). There's a feral druid in my guild who complains about this a lot. :P (probably the same with enhancement shaman, though at least they have quick heal interrupts)
It could be pretty fun to play though, and would probably catch a lot of teams by surprise. (the cat hit me for HOW MUCH?)

-- Z.

i do a 2v2 on a feral druid with a rogue, then switch to my rogue so it is rogue rogue.  against some teams the feral /rogue combo works well.  I chortle with glee at times:  Sap healer, jump on dps, cyclone healer, finnish off the dps target.  But as you mentioned it is just a rogue with bigger crits but without some very important tools. I am an OT in my guild but am hoping this other druid catches up to me in gear, as being feral in pvp is essentially a dead end.  At least in arenas.  In world and bg pvp i am a monster, but in arenas the limitations of a feral druid are huge. 

give me duel wield and poisons plz 

[Threash]

You should be able to outlast most teams as sl/sl lock + healadin.  You need to constantly fear and mana drain while slowly dpsing the other team down.  Between your pet on their healer and your dots on everyone + you ccing the hell out of them with fears and draining you should have an easy time with most teams until at least the 1700s.

[Fordel]

Which is part of the frustration!


You'll be fighting a SL/SL Lock, *thinking* you're doing well, holding your own. Then a little time goes by and now your OOM and the damn lock hasn't budged either way 

A SL lock killing you doesn't actually look like it's killing you, but your dead, make no mistake about it :(.

[Dren]

The lock in my 2v2 group is finally getting the hang of it.  We went 4 and 0 last night with ease.  I did my respecs as discussed in the other thread (healadin.)  The added healing/damage power I have now is nice and I do not notice any change losing improved conc. aura.  That thing is busted I think.

We haven't had a chance to get our 3v3 gonig yet, but that should be fun.

I am still amazed to see so many 2v2 teams that go in without a character that can heal.  A mage/hunter team has a lot of nice DPS, but if you don't have the gear to ownzor the other team right away, you're just toast.  Between our warlock life drainining and me healing, we really are in no risk.  Those kinds of match-ups are easy.

One question I have is why the hell are the queue times so long for 2v2.  Then, you consistently get the same group you fought the last time!  Are they purposely putting a time sink into this thing and only allowing 5 queues at any given time?

[Zetor]

Oh, 2dps is very, very viable, they just need to be coordinated and not let up on CC -- still, unless one of 'em is a rogue, they won't be able to nuke the warlock before one of them dies, probably. Typical 2-dps pairings are mage/rogue, rogue/rogue, shadowpriest/UAlock, shadowpriest/rogue and some wackiness like warrior/warlock (there is a 2000-rated combo in our battlegroup!!), retpally/mage, moonkin/eleshaman, etc.
What they do is basically CC you [the paladin] and obliterate the warlock before the CCs wear off. With well-timed counterspells, sheeps, fears, mass dispels (if one of them is a shadowpriest), blinds / saps and such, it's definitely doable.

2v2 queue times are tricky. Either too few people are queuing (the system tries to match you with a team around your rating), or too many (there IS a limit to the number of arena instances open at any one time). If you both have flexible-ish schedules, try queuing at different times during the week and get your games in when the queues are shortest.


-- Z.

[Dren]

Oh, 2dps is very, very viable, they just need to be coordinated and not let up on CC -- still, unless one of 'em is a rogue, they won't be able to nuke the warlock before one of them dies, probably. Typical 2-dps pairings are mage/rogue, rogue/rogue, shadowpriest/UAlock, shadowpriest/rogue and some wackiness like warrior/warlock (there is a 2000-rated combo in our battlegroup!!), retpally/mage, moonkin/eleshaman, etc.
What they do is basically CC you [the paladin] and obliterate the warlock before the CCs wear off. With well-timed counterspells, sheeps, fears, mass dispels (if one of them is a shadowpriest), blinds / saps and such, it's definitely doable.
-- Z.

Well some of those combos have characters that CAN heal.  They may or may not typically.  If their initial drive to kill the weakest link doesn't succeed, they at least have a way to recover and try again.  The warlock's are a bit different in that they CAN heal themselves with health drain, so that's a bit of a grey area.  I can see a warrior/lock team being good just for the fact that it will take forever to take the warrior down and a well played and geared warlock is just always hard to take down fast.

As for CC on me, those really don't work until you have me on all my cooldowns.  I can trinket and bubble to stop the initial drive.  I've seen opponent teams just fall apart because they don't keep me out of the equation fast enough.  If they stay alive 20-30 seconds into the fight, then I'm in trouble.  Although I can still use BoP on my partner and for a last minute effort use Lay on Hands.

The smart teams actually fake me out by only seeming to go all out dps at the beginning.  If they can scare me into blowing my anti-cc powers early, they can rally back and whip me.  That has happened many times.  My only hope at that point is that my partner takes up the slack and kills one of them quickly.  The good thing about that is that if all cc is used up on me, then the Warlock is free and clear to do maximum carnage.

[MrHat]

You can use Lay on Hands in arena? 

[Dren]

Ok, now to my latest experiences with BGs:

I've become somewhat burned out on them right now.  I think, for the most part, my main reason for this is that on my server Alliance gets owned over and over when it comes to PUGs.

I'm told, "Join the server's pvp channel get organized young man!"  So, I do just that.  I get into several premades.  Life gets better, but something becomes crystal clear and explained a lot of the losses I experienced in PUGs.  Not only are premades obviously better due to the use of voice chat and a ton more organization before even going into a BG, but the fact that the system is used to "fish" for instances that don't have premades on the other side of the BG!

I had often wondered in the past why many times (I'd say at least 50% of the time,) I would enter a BG and less than half of our team would be populated while facing a premade on the other end of the field.  The gates open and within 2 minutes we are completely devastated and being camped in our own graveyard.  NOW I KNOW.  That is the result of premades putting a few spies into one BG, let's say AB.  Then, if the other side is made up of a premade, the leader of the raid queues up for EoTS.  Once that queue comes up, the spies go over to that BG.  This happens until the other side is obviously a PUG and everyone joins at once.

THAT annoyed me.  While I was getting lots of wins and points it just felt stupid.  We were playing the system to get honor and marks as fast as we could.  The fun of PvP was left behind way way behind.  The really troubling thing was that both sides and multiple servers were doing this constantly!

Now that is one thing that bothered me.  The other is that for some reason our horde side is way better equipped than Alliance.  Even with all of our shenanigans we got beat a couple times.  Once was because we decided to fight against a horde premade from our own server.  We got nailed.  Our organization was there, but we just couldn't execute because they could outlast and out damage us at every battle.

The other was a PUG that just happened to be made up of a bunch of really well geared and smart AB players.  While we had the communications, they had the ability and understanding of the flags that we didn't.  I have a lot of complaints about AB being all about CC and nothing to do with kills or dominating the opponent and that one fight just showed it.

I constantly am getting into PUG's, noticing our equipment and then getting waxed by a horde side (PUG even) that is decked out in full pvp epics.  I'm thinking this is the old issue of Alliance having the masses so we work with the LCD in addition to being on the light end of a pvp balance that continue to become more and more unbalanced as Horde get more and more pvp equipped and Alliance doesn't.  I haven't even mentioned the fact that even our premade teams can't seem to win AV and I have several items I want with AV marks!  My current plan at this rate is to get those slots filled by Arena prizes.

I'm not about to quit.  I just have to let my discouragement cool down, but dang if this isn't all annoying.

[Dren]

You can use Lay on Hands in arena? 

Yes, and even better, it gets reset at the beginning of each match.  It is still the last ditch effort though because it takes ALL of my mana even if full to execute.  The best way to do it is wait until  you are near zero on mana and cast it either on myself or my partner.  Then you pray that your partner can use the full health to finish off the opponent quickly because a Paladin without mana is pretty useless.

[MrHat]

Wait, I thought the cooldown with talents on that is like 40 mins.

[Jayce]

The way arenas work is that you lose all buffs and reset all cooldowns upon entry.  You also can't use most consumables.

[Chenghiz]

The way arenas work is that you lose all buffs and reset all cooldowns upon entry.  You also can't use most consumables.

Yeah but the abilities you are able to use in BGs are limited based up their base cooldown time. I guess they just decided to throw pallies a bone or something.

[MrHat]

Right, I'm fairly certain that any skill with a cooldown over 15 mins isn't allowed to be used in Arena play.

[Threash]

Im guessing hes confusing bgs with arenas, you cant use loh in arenas.