Battlegrounds gone to waste?

[Train Wreck]

There are rumors that the 1.8 patch will include another 40x40 battleground: Azshara Crater.  Since 1.7 brought us Arathi Basin, Alterac Valley hasn't launched a single time on ER.  The Horde population is considerably smaller, and since they have rarely, if ever, won a victory in AV, they spend all their time in WSG and AB, where they dominate (honor farming ftw).  If the rumor of Azshara Crater is true, I believe AV will R.I.P. on most servers that have population imbalances, certainly on ER.

Maybe Blizzard should put these epic battlegrounds on a set schedule to launch once or twice a week, and pump up the honor bonus.  They already mentioned that they would be giving honor bonuses on the weekend to all battlegrounds to encourage the players to participate, but this isn't needed in the least bit because WSG and AB already thrive.  AV needs some love, and AC probably will too.

[Jobu]

Why not cycle them? AV one month, close it down and switch to Azshara Crater. It would push the 40v40 players into one place to keep them going. Like you said, it's already hard enough to get Alterac up as is with Arathi Basin being the preferred place to fight. Split that between two, and it's ghost town, which screws people like me who are gradually working their way up the faction trees for the awesome rewards.

Didn't Shadowbane do this with new servers or something? Cycle new worldmaps and whatnot?

P.S. How on earth did the acronyms all end up so similar? AC, AV, and AB? It drives me nuts sometimes.

[Calantus]

The weekend bonus applies to specific battlegrounds. Last weekend it was AB, we'll see what happens when WSG/AV gets its turn. Right now my server is AB all day every day but when honor and rep bonuses kick in for other BGs I'm hoping people go to them. I still need my TuF.

[XMackenzie]

Why not share the darn BG's cross server?  Considering they're just bubble worlds totally divorced from any "real" server impact they should just set them all up independently to ensure 24 x 7 access to whatever BG you want.

I guess honor ladders might be sorta messed up and guild joining a bit more difficult... although at the same time might be easier to have 40v40 setup against cross guild rivals. 

[Morfiend]

Why not share the darn BG's cross server?  Considering they're just bubble worlds totally divorced from any "real" server impact they should just set them all up independently to ensure 24 x 7 access to whatever BG you want.

I guess honor ladders might be sorta messed up and guild joining a bit more difficult... although at the same time might be easier to have 40v40 setup against cross guild rivals. 

That is one of the best ideas for BGs I have heard yet. While it would seperate the community some what, as you wouldnt always be fighting the same people, on the upside, you wouldnt always be fighting the same people.

[Evil Elvis]

Retool AV to be 30 v 30, redesign Arathi Basin to be 5 v 5, allow people to queue for multiple bg's at the same time, and put some things to battle for outside of bg's.

Fixed.

We need more small-group pvp bg's, if any at all, where super coordinated teams have less ability to competely steam-roll your average PUG or less abled group.  Another large bg is just going to split the average people looking for some fun up even more across the different bg's, making it harder to get them started up.  The bonus xp weekends are just a bandaid to try to get people to play the completely abandoned bg's (like wsg on my server).  Now, instead of 1 or 2 of the bg's being less popular (or non-existant), everyone will be forced to play the same BG in order to keep up with the bonus CP for half the week, guaranteeing the other 2 will be empty.

While having bg's be cross realmed would make things somewhat better, it isn't without it own flaws.  The alliance vs horde population difference will now be shared across all zones.  You lose alot of the atmoshpere of your 'world', since you'll be battling guilds you never heard of.  And you'll have even more /afk'ing out then ever; why fight another well coordinated guild group when you can rape a few PUG's in the same amount of time?

[MrHat]

Same ideas as above were actually posted and had 50 page threads.

Basically to fix they need to figure out a way to link BG's across 2-5 servers.  Just give the names "Horde Invader" or some shit.  Ya this makes it impersonal, but at the same time, you'll actually get to play in less than an hour.

Also, multiple BG queue with some sort of rank system for which ones you'd prefer to play would be best.  Ie, 70% Arathi Basin, 10% WSG, 10% AV or some shit.  That way, it knows which one to start queueing poeple for.

The problem is that they still haven't figured out how to link multiple auction houses in the same damn server, I can't believe they'd be able to do this too.

[Calantus]

5v5 is a sucky number. If there was a 5v5 BG I'd take shaman, holy priest, mage, MS warrior, MS warrior. Other classes and specs are NOT invited, sorry guys but you don't bring enough to the table in a 5v5.

[Train Wreck]

Allowing people to sign up for multiple queues would definantly be a large step in the right direction.  Only being able to reside in one queue at a time is probably the singlemost reason Alterac is dead on ER, as a four hour wait is usually the minimum.

[Paelos]

Yes on Multiples queues
Yes on cross server BGs
No on a 5v5 BG, it reeks of DAOC uber grouping
Yes on same side BGs for lesser awards, call them training scenarios

[Pococurante]

Wouldn't entering multiple queues just compound the problems?  Is wait based on queuing/FIFO or matching?

[Dren]

Wouldn't entering multiple queues just compound the problems?  Is wait based on queuing/FIFO or matching?

Matching.  Although, that is a good point.  If there was multiple queue'ing you would have more people waiting in line for Alterac while they hit the other BG's.

I do like the x-server idea though.  It would have to speed up matching by quite a bit.

[Train Wreck]

I don't like the cross-server idea at all because it voids the rivalry that usually develops as opposing faction members begin to recognize each other, especially after a particularly good ganking.  It would suck to never recognize the people you are up against.

It also destroys the concept of knowing your enemy, which is usually an integral part of success.

[Paelos]

I don't like the cross-server idea at all because it voids the rivalry that usually develops as opposing faction members begin to recognize each other, especially after a particularly good ganking.  It would suck to never recognize the people you are up against.

It also destroys the concept of knowing your enemy, which is usually an integral part of success.

Yeah, I really love seeing the same Horde gank squads all the time in the same BG day in and day out. It's not "rivalry", it's boring as shit.

[tazelbain]

It also destroys the concept of knowing your enemy, which is usually an integral part of success.

Being prepared to take on all challengers is a different skill than being prepared to take on a certain challenger, but its still a skill.

[Righ]

5v5 is a sucky number. If there was a 5v5 BG I'd take shaman, holy priest, mage, MS warrior, MS warrior. Other classes and specs are NOT invited, sorry guys but you don't bring enough to the table in a 5v5.

What the hell are you wibbling about? An Arathi Basin 5v5? You'd lose badly.

Horde has won AV on ER:

[Phred]

It also destroys the concept of knowing your enemy, which is usually an integral part of success.

Being prepared to take on all challengers is a different skill than being prepared to take on a certain challenger, but its still a skill.

Doesn't take a hell of a lot of skill when you can enter bg's as a group against a rag tag collection of people who never get in as a group either.

[Paelos]

Like I've said before, WoW is probably the only game that actually gives an advantage to the faction with the lesser numbers. If you can't understand why that is, you need to reevaluate the mechanics at play.

[Train Wreck]

Yeah, I really love seeing the same Horde gank squads all the time in the same BG day in and day out. It's not "rivalry", it's boring as shit.

I never took it to that extreme.  It's just nice being able to recognize people -- makes killing them more fulfilling.  Sometimes people stand out, for whatever reason.  Going against an uber gank squad with your PUG every time isn't fun by anybody's definition.

[Paelos]

Yeah, I really love seeing the same Horde gank squads all the time in the same BG day in and day out. It's not "rivalry", it's boring as shit.

I never took it to that extreme.  It's just nice being able to recognize people -- makes killing them more fulfilling.  Sometimes people stand out, for whatever reason.  Going against an uber gank squad with your PUG every time isn't fun by anybody's definition.

Unfortunately only 50 horde actually pvp consistently enough on my huge ass server to make BGs start. And 9 out of every 10 contains at least half of which that are officer rank. Some even have more than 3 that are rank 10 or above. Perhaps cross-server won't solve this, maybe we'll just get everyone elses horde gank squads. We'll see different groups with the same M.O. When you get down to it, there is no solution except to actually even up the sides trying to enter into the BGs in the first place. Thus making queues almost non-existant.

If they told me I could defect to the other side, keeping my loot, I'd do it. Would it be imbalancing? I'm not entirely sure. If anything, letting people transfer from old servers with awesome loot to newer servers barely in their infancy would be much more imbalancing than allowing same-server defections. That's just me though.

EDIT: Actually, the ideal thing would be a temporary defection. For example, what if an faction member could declare himself as a mercenary for a week, thus being able to choose which side he want's to fight on. You could make honor rewards majorly reduced for mercenaries. Say...1/5th of what you would normally receive, but you could fight against each other in mercenary battles. I think it has merit.

[Dren]

Make a faction that can be attacked by both sides and can attack both sides.  It would basically be the hardcore option and might even out the playing field a bit.

Of course, all of the BG's would have to be redesigned to include a third faction, so it would never happen.

[TheWalrus]

And that would make it starcraft

[gimpyone]

Throw in a penalty for afking out of the bgs and I'm all for the other changes.
One horde group on my server has killed the bgs because they que as a full raid, send one guy in to check who's in there and then they all hide/afk, screwing the other horde.  Several of the other horde pvpers have altogether quit because they are frustrated with that group's exploitation of a band aid system.

[Ironwood]

Uh ?

[Dren]

And that would make it starcraft

I never played it.  I heard it was nice.  No?

[Pococurante]

(...) because they que as a full raid (...)

Grammar Nazi time - it's "queue".  Que => "what" in Spanish

Sorry - I'm in IT and it grates on me to read emails from people who have been in the industry long enough to know better. ;)

[gimpyone]

Thanks.
There needs to be a penalty like:
You are unable to queue for 30 minutes or unable to gain any honor.

[Train Wreck]

And that would make it starcraft

I never played it.  I heard it was nice.  No?

Starcraft Online would be badass.  No chance of ever seeing it though.

[Strazos]

StarCraft multiplayer was annoying crap in its own right; Fuck the other units, just rush with the shitiest unit you have.

We don't need more of this.

[TheWalrus]

The problem I see is the ships. They couldn't do it without ships, and yet, whos going to want to be a marine when the other guy has a fucking carrier?

[Llava]

Make a faction that can be attacked by both sides and can attack both sides.  It would basically be the hardcore option and might even out the playing field a bit.

Of course, all of the BG's would have to be redesigned to include a third faction, so it would never happen.

That's akin to an idea I had for RvR based games a while back.  Throw in a faction that is completely computer controlled and whose activity scales based on the activity presented by the played factions.  This especially thrives in DAoC's "realm" vision.  So let's say Midgard has 5 groups active in the frontiers, Hibernia has 3, and Albion has 2.  The "enemy" faction would spawn between two and four groups in Midgard's home frontier to attack their keeps, the other realms are left untouched.  (Home keeps are top priorities, but if Midgard doesn't actually have ownership of any of its own keeps but owns tons of keeps in other realms, it would attack Midgard holdings- if the Midgard groups aren't taking keeps but still outnumber the enemies, the faction would hone in on the battles)

You could run this faction with two AI patterns- one similar to an RTS to deploy groups and direct them, another set to take over when those groups run into a fight to allow for proper micromanagement.  You could even, if you were willing to devote more resources to this, make a few groups just your average wimpy pickup group and a couple groups true, uberguild-style badasses.  Even name them- let the computer badasses gain notoriety.

Then, of course, you have to observe strategies and playstyle, updating the AIs every few months to account for new tactics.

Overall, it would take some very smart people with a lot of resources focused strictly on this to provide a convincing psuedo-PvP experience that would act as the balancing force in faction conflicts.  It will never, ever happen.  Plus, people might flip out if they saw that an AI can be programmed to be just as "skilled" as they are.

[Triforcer]

Just had a BG experience that reminded me why they are more fun than anything else in WoW.  I was top of leaderboard, 9 killing blows, 20 kills, 0 deaths in an AB that was decided by less than 50 points.  It was a very defensive match (hence the low kill total, I spent a lot of time riding around and shouting troop movement orders) and ended with me one-shotting a druid when my Gnomish Death Ray critted for 4800 hp ^^

Granted, most of the time in AB I get wtfpwnt and end up at the bottom of the board while an organized alliance group that OMG ACTUALLY HEALS EACH OTHER (I've never been healed in a BG yet) steamrolls me and the rest of the poor hopeless lumps.  But for 25 minutes last night, as the guy moving our troops around (I was only one giving orders) and with the above stats, I felt like the hero.  And in MMOs, even though they say it all the time, most people never get the chance for even 15 minutes as THE hero.  I'll probably never even come close to performing like that again, but it reminded me why WoW is special. 

[DevilsAdvocate]

Been thinking about BG's lately.

Came up with something to fix the /AFK folks and also to make them a little more competitive or so I hope.

Instead of splitting out the 60's as a separate group, integrate them back into the 51-59 groups.

Then, split the battlegrounds by... (duh, duh, duh *dramatic pause*) ...  actual pvp rank!

If ranks 0-5 and 5-9 and 9-14 were only allowed to fight within their own rank bracket, you couldn't /afk out to find a more advantageous fight. The only fights you could get would be against folks that were your own rank/skill level.

How hard does it become to farm honor in the BG's then when the only ones you can farm are just as good at farming as you are?

This also has the advantage of having the casual pvp'ers in their own bracket where they can play casually and the hardcore with the hardcore.

What do you guys think?

[Phred]

I don't pvp but it sounds good to me. Only problem is it might lead to even longer queues.

[Cheddar]

Hmmm that may work, though honor points would have to be scaled accordingly.  Then again I am only level 13, so what do I know?