Some Talent Updates:

[SurfD]

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html;jsessionid=90DC0409BF6ADBF8CEF2873AE9679A23?topicId=28355332&sid=1

Druid full list posted, check the other thread.

Warrior


      Arms
    * Axe Specialization – Renamed “Poleaxe Specialization”: Now increases crit chance with Axes and Polearms by 1/2/3/4/5%.
    * Mace Specialization – Now “Gives your melee attacks a chance to stun your target for 3 sec and generate 2 rage when using a Mace.”
    * Polearm Specialization – Replaced with "Weapon Mastery”: “Increases skill with all weapons by 2 and increases your chance to resist Disarm effects by an additional 25/50%.”

      Fury
    * Rampage – Cooldown removed, rage cost increased to 30, description changed.

      Protection
    * Vitality – Now also increases your total Strength by 2/4/6/8/10%.



Warlock


      Affliction
    * Empowered Corruption – Now increases by 12/24/36%.
    * Lasting Afflictions – Removed.
    * Contagion – Now “Increases the damage of Curse of Agony, Corruption and Seed of Corruption by 1/2/3/4/5% and reduces the chance your Affliction spells will be dispelled by an additional 6/12/18/24/30%.”
    * Improved Howl of Terror – Now reduces the cast time by 0.8/1.5 sec.

      Demonology
    * Demonic Fortitude – Renamed "Demonic Resilience".

      Destruction
    * Nether Protection – Chance to proc is now 10/20/30%.
    * Soul Leech – Now returns 20% of damage as health.
    * Shadow and Flame – Bonus is now 4/8/12/16/20%.
    * Shadowfury – Now a 0.5 second cast, new rank values.



Shaman


      Elemental
    * Totem of Wrath – Now 166 mana (at level 70), has no cooldown, lasts 2 minutes, and increases spell crit by 3%.

      Enhancement
    * Stormstrike – 5 yd range.
    * Shamanistic Rage – No longer has a mana cost and regenerates mana equal to 15% of your attack power.

      Restoration
    * Mana Tide Totem – Now restores 6% of total mana every 3 seconds, costs 83 mana (at level 70) and has no replacements.



Rogue


      Assassination
    * Remorseless Attacks – Added Mutilate to the list of affected abilities.
    * Mutilate – Description changed: “Instantly attacks with both weapons for an additional 44 damage with each weapon. Damage is increased by 50% against Poisoned targets. Must be behind the target. Awards 2 combo points.”

      Combat
    * Surprise Attacks – Added Shiv to the list of affected abilities. Now damage caused by the affected abilities is also increased by 5%.



Priest


      Discipline
    * Silent Resolve – Now also reduces the chance your spells will be dispelled by 4/8/12/16/20%.
    * Improved Mana Burn - Cast time reduced by 0.5/1.0 sec.

      Holy

    * Improved Renew – Added Circle of Renewal to the list of affected abilities.
    * Empowered Healing – Greater Heal bonus is now 4/8/12/16/20%, Flash Heal bonus is now 2/4/6/8/10%.



Paladin


      Holy
    * Divine Illumination – 3 min cooldown, 10 sec duration.

      Protection
    * Improved Resistance Auras – Description changed: “Your Resistance Auras also reduce spell damage of the appropriate type taken by an additional 3/5%.”



Mage


      Fire
    * Playing with Fire - 1/2/3% increase for 1/2/3% penalty.
    * Burnout – Replaced with “Pyromaniac”: “Increases chance to critically hit and reduces the mana cost of all Fire spells by an additional 1/2/3%.”
    * Molten Fury – Description changed: “Increases damage of all spells against targets with less than 20% health by 10/20/30%.”
    * Empowered Fireball – Bonus is now 4/8/12/16/20%.
    * Dragon’s Breath – New rank values.

      Frost
    * Empowered Frostbolt – Bonus is now 2/4/6/8/10%, now increases crit chance instead of hit chance by 1/2/3/4/5%.
    * Summon Water Elemental – 3 min cooldown, reagent cost removed, 492 mana (at level 70), 45 sec duration.

[Simond]

Heh, Alliance get shaman and suddenly mana tide gets changed to be slightly less useless.

(Bitter? Me?)

[Chenghiz]

Suprise Attacks is now the single biggest damage increase for a talent point in the rogue trees. Pretty huge change!

[jpark]

Nice to see the mace effect was improved for a warrior - previously its stun only effect was quite useless in raids.

[Valmorian]

Heh, Alliance get shaman and suddenly mana tide gets changed to be slightly less useless.

(Bitter? Me?)

In the same way that Horde get Paladins and suddenly paladins get taunt?

[jpark]

Heh, Alliance get shaman and suddenly mana tide gets changed to be slightly less useless.

(Bitter? Me?)

In the same way that Horde get Paladins and suddenly paladins get taunt?

Sound like this is the "horde owns because they have uber racials! and shaman!" whine.

Horde are uber all right - they move as a group - and heal each other in pvp.  The difference is night and day when I fight with them and against them in AV.  Alliance hardly heal each other - it's a joke - literally.  As for coordinated activities...

[Zane0]

If you have 7k mana, manatide is equivalent to 700 mana per 5..  hmm. 

[Threash]

Suprise Attacks is now the single biggest damage increase for a talent point in the rogue trees. Pretty huge change!

You mean the lowest dps for TEN talent points in any of the rogue trees.  I don't know what was wrong with their original 41 point combat talent that added 10% shadow dmg to any dazed or poisoned target, surprise attacks is a huge waste of talent points when theres zero dps increases past 31 in combat.

[Zetor]

Heh, Alliance get shaman and suddenly mana tide gets changed to be slightly less useless.

(Bitter? Me?)

In the same way that Horde get Paladins and suddenly paladins get taunt?

Sound like this is the "horde owns because they have uber racials! and shaman!" whine.

Horde are uber all right - they move as a group - and heal each other in pvp.  The difference is night and day when I fight with them and against them in AV.  Alliance hardly heal each other - it's a joke - literally.  As for coordinated activities...

Strange, I have exactly the opposite experience in AV [battlegroup 2]. Alliance heal each other like crazy, and also win AV in less than 20 mins. Healing is also not the only thing that decides the outcome of pvp fights... and how is "paladin taunt gets implemented for BC" more of a whine than "shaman mana tide gets fixed for BC"?

Obligatory ontopic: It's kind of amusing how warlocks [y'know, the DOT class] got their talent that makes DOTs longer lasting removed. Because making micromanagement slightly easier is clearly against the intended design of the class!!!1 I can also see the nerf cries from here regarding improved HOT, kek.


-- Z.

[SurfD]

longer dots from warlocks are NOT needed, especially with all the stuf they get in the affliction tree in ADDITION to yet another dot (which is also dangerous to dispell no less).  Its bad enough that a warlock simply needs to dot me up and then run away and i die, adding another tick to all their dots would be overkill.

[Morat20]

longer dots from warlocks are NOT needed, especially with all the stuf they get in the affliction tree in ADDITION to yet another dot (which is also dangerous to dispell no less).  Its bad enough that a warlock simply needs to dot me up and then run away and i die, adding another tick to all their dots would be overkill.

Out of curiousity, which class considers 'locks an easy kill? WoW's got that rock paper scissors model -- which class has an easy time against warlocks?

[Venkman]

Mage Fire changes look slightly better than they did prior.

As to Horde/Alliance in BGs, it's been my experience that Horde rules AB while Alliance rules AV. Purely on PvE servers vs PvE servers though.

For AB, I attribute this to Horde always having been sort of the underdog. They almost have no choice but to work closer together in general, given their disadvantage population-wise. Of course, I also think the map itself gives them an advantage, though not a game breaking one: it's easier for them to hold Blacksmith and Farm than it is for Alliance to hold Stables and anything. This is PUG based though. Two guilds going at it is different, and in my experience that's closer to 50/50, sometimes decided by who's got more epic mounts, or if only one side is using VoIP.
 
For AV, I think it's simply because more people in Alliance have had more experience dungeon crawling/boss-fighting, purely by numbers alone. Most of my AV battles have NOT been about PvP, but rather, races to see who can get to the boss faster. It's like old-style Splitpaw runs, competitive raiding if you will.

Ultimately, AB is all about other players, and Horde are just more coordinated in general. Meanwhile, AV is mostly raid mechanics with other players occasionally getting in the way.

I haven't played WSG. I imagine Horde rules that though.

[Merusk]

longer dots from warlocks are NOT needed, especially with all the stuf they get in the affliction tree in ADDITION to yet another dot (which is also dangerous to dispell no less).  Its bad enough that a warlock simply needs to dot me up and then run away and i die, adding another tick to all their dots would be overkill.

Out of curiousity, which class considers 'locks an easy kill? WoW's got that rock paper scissors model -- which class has an easy time against warlocks?

Nobody I know of.  I've seen some hunters on the Hunter forums claim that locks are easy, but these same hunters have lots of Naxx gear... so their opinions on the ease of other classes means about squat.

[Threash]

longer dots from warlocks are NOT needed, especially with all the stuf they get in the affliction tree in ADDITION to yet another dot (which is also dangerous to dispell no less).  Its bad enough that a warlock simply needs to dot me up and then run away and i die, adding another tick to all their dots would be overkill.

Out of curiousity, which class considers 'locks an easy kill? WoW's got that rock paper scissors model -- which class has an easy time against warlocks?

It really depends on their pet for me, anything but succubus and i can deal with them just fine on my rogue.  If that slut is out though i have zero chance.

[Driakos]

Out of curiousity, which class considers 'locks an easy kill? WoW's got that rock paper scissors model -- which class has an easy time against warlocks?

If the warlock has roughly equal gear to me (Shaman) the fight comes down to how far apart we started from each other.  If he/she has big distance on me, I'll probably lose.  If I get to close distance, I'll probably win.  Tremor and grounding totems help a lot.

I'm not sure any class is a warlocks foil.  Priests do okay against them.

[jpark]

I haven't played WSG. I imagine Horde rules that though.

Horde wins pretty consistently.  Horde knows it as well as alliance - since I have heard the confidence on the former side and the whines on the latter side.  Interesting thing though - that map is truely symmetric :)

[Kail]

Out of curiousity, which class considers 'locks an easy kill? WoW's got that rock paper scissors model -- which class has an easy time against warlocks?

I don't know that the idea of "rock, paper, scissors" has ever really been accurate.  There are some classes that just dominate in certain situations.  Rogues are amazing in solo global PvP; hunters are insanely powerful in battlegrounds, paladins are virtually harmless if they're by themselves, warriors are unstoppable if they've got good gear and pansies if they don't, that kind of thing.  In large group PvP (like AV), warlocks aren't terribly uber (since they go down fast to focused attacks, their DoTs are less useful than a quick nuke like Shadowbolt, and their pets are either fragile or useless); it's mostly in small fights where being able to keep one enemy constantly feared/charmed is extremely powerful.

[stray]

I do well against them. Decursing, HoTing, and usually having the opening shot goes a long way. Rooting takes care of the pet, but even then, I can win by ignoring it.

In group situations, it's a little trickier. Warlocks still won't kill me, but they can take me out of the fight quick. Once you're dotted, their team members seem to want to zerg you....Therefore it's best to just get in travel form to decurse and heal in a safe spot. Not really a good tactic for my team, but it is for me personally.

That's Feral...I've recently been experimenting with Balance and do an even better (and quicker) job at taking them out.

[Chenghiz]

Suprise Attacks is now the single biggest damage increase for a talent point in the rogue trees. Pretty huge change!

You mean the lowest dps for TEN talent points in any of the rogue trees.  I don't know what was wrong with their original 41 point combat talent that added 10% shadow dmg to any dazed or poisoned target, surprise attacks is a huge waste of talent points when theres zero dps increases past 31 in combat.

Maybe you missed the change.

    * Combat
    * Surprise Attacks – Added Shiv to the list of affected abilities. Now damage caused by the affected abilities is also increased by 5%.

5% more damage for those specials for 1 talent point is pretty huge. I can see where you might complain that the other talents that get you there don't add to your DPS, but Vitality is hardly shabby, and you could hypothetically just skip that tier of talents by taking combat talents elsewhere like this: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent-bc=wZMeEz0Ez0fd0o.

[Zetor]

WSG is 50-50 in my battlegroup. Horde wins AB about 90% of the time though, since thanks to the multi-queues, it always starts with 15 horde and 7 alliance, staying that way for about 4-5 minutes, which is enough for a 4-cap or even a 5-cap if the horde are remotely competent (and the fact that most alliance seem to suck monkey balls at organizing and communicating in AB... oddly enough, they coordinate just fine in WSG). And alliance wins every single AV, I think I've seen horde win once two weeks ago.

Anyway, there are plenty of foils for locks. Warriors in general mess them up -- I never had any problem with locks on my warrior, unless they were undead (or had a pvp trinket not cooling down) with the succubus out, and even then I had a shot if I could get the charge in. If my warrior was undead (you should be able to kill the succubus in the 5 second WOTF window), I imagine I'd have a very good success rate against equal geared locks. Lots of hp + on-demand fear immunity + multi-target attacks = ouch, even against soul link.
Rogues are the same way.. undead rogues completely obliterate warlocks (two fear breaks, there should be no need for a third), other rogues too if they don't mind blowing cooldowns (if your ping is better than the warlock's, using vanish immediately after deathcoil will prevent the fear from hitting you).
Hunters can win if they stay at long range (fear is 20yd, deathcoil is 30yd) and wear the lock down. Viper sting helps, it'll cause the warlock to kill themselves via lifetap. (warlocks typically have pitiful mana pools)
Priests basically outlast the lock thanks to shadow protection, shields, heals (optional) and maybe even mana burn... paladins can try too, but they're more susceptible to fear kiting and usually end up losing.
Smart enhancement shaman (who know how to spam tremor and grounding) are also extremely tough, since dots, fear and deathcoil don't destroy grounding totems, and once in melee range, locks go down pretty fast. Elemental shaman are pretty much screwed against soul link, though.
In general, dots are NOT enough to kill you by themselves (unless you're in greens and the lock is in AQ40-naxx epics), and definitely won't be enough at level 70 with the increased HP pools.

Of course, according to the WOW forums, every warlock in BC will have 41 points in affliction (shadowbolts hitting for 3000 (30 points), instant AOE fear (37 points), undispellable dot (41 points)!), 31 points in demonology (super felhunter with insane resists (30 points) and soul link, making them unkillable (31 points)!) and at least 31 points in destruction (fast-casting shadowbolt (10 points), instant nuke (11 points), shadowbolt crits for 5000 (21 points), immunity to fire and shadow (28 points), insane burst damage (31 points)!). I maintain that people who complain about warlocks should level one to 60, preferably as alliance on a pvp server (so you face undead rogues) and see for yourself just how 'ezmode' they really are. That is all. :p


-- Z.

[bhodi]

5% more damage for those specials for 1 talent point is pretty huge. I can see where you might complain that the other talents that get you there don't add to your DPS, but Vitality is hardly shabby, and you could hypothetically just skip that tier of talents by taking combat talents elsewhere like this: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent-bc=wZMeEz0Ez0fd0o.

Things are still in flux, and I'm sure the designers are considering it, but the fact remains that it's *still* better to spec to seal fate and AR instead of going down into the combat tree for combat swords; They're trying to up the damage of daggers to compensate (notice both mutilate does extra damage now and surprise attacks have been buffed) but as far as I can tell, it's still inferior. Needs more tweaking.

[Morat20]

Out of curiousity, which class considers 'locks an easy kill? WoW's got that rock paper scissors model -- which class has an easy time against warlocks?

I don't know that the idea of "rock, paper, scissors" has ever really been accurate.  There are some classes that just dominate in certain situations.  Rogues are amazing in solo global PvP; hunters are insanely powerful in battlegrounds, paladins are virtually harmless if they're by themselves, warriors are unstoppable if they've got good gear and pansies if they don't, that kind of thing.  In large group PvP (like AV), warlocks aren't terribly uber (since they go down fast to focused attacks, their DoTs are less useful than a quick nuke like Shadowbolt, and their pets are either fragile or useless); it's mostly in small fights where being able to keep one enemy constantly feared/charmed is extremely powerful.

I think the "insanely powerful Hunter" in BG's comes down to situational awareness. If I can get my Hunter somewhere with good range (30+ yards) and just shoot away, I really do eat through opponents. I've watched warriors and rogues and mages jumping around and fighting each other while I stood motionless 30 yards away dropping Viper stings on the mana users, Scorpid on the warriers and bear-druids (hey, it lowers their DPS a bit) and generally killing priests then mages then locks/rogues while they all ignore me because I'm not right in their face.

Once I'm spotted, I have to bail. If I've got room to run and no complications, I can kite -- works better on some classes than others, but my DPS drops dramatically. Mostly though, I have to bail back to the next line of tanks and let them deal with whomever is chasing me. Kiting is just too slow to be worth my time in a BG. Better to fall back and let the warriors and rogues deal with it.

I've seen some mages do the same thing, though. It's just their distance attacks are more noticeable than ours.

[Valmorian]

In the same way that Horde get Paladins and suddenly paladins get taunt?

Sound like this is the "horde owns because they have uber racials! and shaman!" whine.
Horde are uber all right - they move as a group - and heal each other in pvp.  The difference is night and day when I fight with them and against them in AV.  Alliance hardly heal each other - it's a joke - literally.  As for coordinated activities...

Huh?  I have no idea where you get that from my statement.  I mentioned neither racials nor Shaman in my post.  Nor did I mention PvP or alterac valley.  Also missing was any reference to whether Alliance heal each other or not.

In short, what are you smoking?

[Phred]

I think the "insanely powerful Hunter" in BG's comes down to situational awareness. If I can get my Hunter somewhere with good range (30+ yards) and just shoot away, I really do eat through opponents. I've watched warriors and rogues and mages jumping around and fighting each other while I stood motionless 30 yards away dropping Viper stings on the mana users, Scorpid on the warriers and bear-druids (hey, it lowers their DPS a bit) and generally killing priests then mages then locks/rogues while they all ignore me because I'm not right in their face.

I had an undead rogue in AV fight my pet while I killed him from range. Who said that PvP was with smarter opponents again?

[Morat20]

I think the "insanely powerful Hunter" in BG's comes down to situational awareness. If I can get my Hunter somewhere with good range (30+ yards) and just shoot away, I really do eat through opponents. I've watched warriors and rogues and mages jumping around and fighting each other while I stood motionless 30 yards away dropping Viper stings on the mana users, Scorpid on the warriers and bear-druids (hey, it lowers their DPS a bit) and generally killing priests then mages then locks/rogues while they all ignore me because I'm not right in their face.

I had an undead rogue in AV fight my pet while I killed him from range. Who said that PvP was with smarter opponents again?

Yeah, I know what you mean. One of my fondest memories in WoW was when I was waiting for that idiot guy to spawn outside of Stormwind (where you go in and watch the dragon guards all fight). It was me, another hunter, a mage and a priest -- all level 60. We had a rogue wander in for a bit. Just guildmates. The mage and the priest were wanting to get into PvP, so we did some dueling there to show them how to deal with hunters -- me and the other Hunter PvPed a decent amount.

That was fun. We spent an hour doing 1 on 1, showing the mage the tricks he needed to use against a hunter. It helped that I was still BM specced and the other guy was MM specced. He didn't win much, but by the end he was putting up a good fight. Learned my dead zone, learned to hate Viper sting, learned NEVER to give me three seconds to line up an aimed shot, all sorts of things.

Since neither he nor the priest had pets, a lot of time was spent on learning when to ignore my pet and when to focus on it -- and how it changes if you're facing a BM specced hunter. (God I hope TBC makes BM viable again. I miss it).

[Typhon]

sounds like a good opportunity for a guild trying to make some cash: for 50 gp duel against the class of your choice for a half an hour to learn how to be more effective in PvP.

[stray]

Heh. 50 gold? I'm not sure if I'd even pay 50 silver.

Dueling won't teach a lot anyhow.

[Venkman]

Hey, if they're making money from it, it's all good :)

Personally, I agree with you though. If most PvP is in BGs, then most PvP is not dueling. You never want to duel in a BG because there's always some invis'd Druid/cat or Rogue nearby your enemy. I've found that the best way to learn PvP is to just continually diving into BGs. That's the great thing about cross-realm: 90% of the people in your instance you'll likely never see again. Don't be an ass, learn quickly and you'll learn more in a few hours than in weeks of dueling.

Dueling has its strengths of course, specifically giving you the time to focus on one class/template and learn the weaknesses. It's just not how the game was balanced though, so it can get frustrating.

[Morat20]

Hey, if they're making money from it, it's all good :)

Personally, I agree with you though. If most PvP is in BGs, then most PvP is not dueling. You never want to duel in a BG because there's always some invis'd Druid/cat or Rogue nearby your enemy. I've found that the best way to learn PvP is to just continually diving into BGs. That's the great thing about cross-realm: 90% of the people in your instance you'll likely never see again. Don't be an ass, learn quickly and you'll learn more in a few hours than in weeks of dueling.

Dueling has its strengths of course, specifically giving you the time to focus on one class/template and learn the weaknesses. It's just not how the game was balanced though, so it can get frustrating.

This was months back -- well before cross-realms BGs. We did make that point several times, and did some chatting about common mage and priest tactics we'd seen in BG's and their strengths and weaknesses (I have a mage alt, but haven't PvP'd too much with it.). The dueling was to give our mage some experience up against hunters -- it's about the only time I've ever dueled and enjoyed it.

Call it a mini-boot camp.  We ran the mage and priest against each other, and the rogue as well. It would have been nice to have a warrior and a druid there, but we were just killing time. I think dueling is better for learning the PvP abilities of other classes -- in a BG, there's generally three or four people minimum tossing crap everywhere. Still, one v one is valuable experience -- you learn which classes you can take quickly, and which to leave to your teammates. As a hunter, I live the druid in dire bear form to others (the druid in travel form is my problem, as I'm the only one that can keep up), and try to avoid the warriors. The priests and mages, on the other hand...

I wouldn't consider dueling to be good BG experience. I would consider it a good way to get a feel for other class abilities. What you learn won't be 100% applicable to BG's, but it gives you a solid foundation to build from. Plus, if you've got PvP newbies entirely (never PvPed in any MMORPG), letting them duel Guildies means it's a hell of a lot less annoying an experience. Don't discount the value of just being able to say (over TS or chat, whatever): "Okay, here's what you did wrong. Here's what other mages have done against me in similar situations, and how it worked".

It's not just the experience -- the feedback is something you don't get from BG's. Horde 'locks aren't going to chat you up after WSG with "Here's what went wrong when you and that hunter tried to tackle me and our warrior....". Can you do Alliance/Alliance matchups in the new Arena system?

[Morfiend]

Not to mention that some people get very nervious in PVP and make silly mistakes or freeze. Dueling is a good way to get used to fighting another player rather than a mob. you have to get used to your character in a PVP situation before you can start doing well in PVP.

[Morat20]

Not to mention that some people get very nervious in PVP and make silly mistakes or freeze. Dueling is a good way to get used to fighting another player rather than a mob. you have to get used to your character in a PVP situation before you can start doing well in PVP.

I think the mage changed his casting bar around at some point during the matches. He seemed much quicker with the mage "Oh shit!" stuff. It really is a change from straight PvE.

[stray]

I suppose dueling can get people loosened up, but so can playing in battlegrounds a lot. As far as learning what other classes do, I've learned more out of leveling different classes at least to the 20's or more, and/or looking over all of their skills. Couple that with observing how people play them in bg's and you've got a good idea of what the different classes are capable of.

The way combat plays out in duels though doesn't translate well to bg's. Sometimes it doesn't translate at all. The three main range classes, for example (hunters, mages, and warlocks) stand little chance against me in 1vs1. Warlocks are a little tougher than the others, but mages and hunters get outright dominated (To the point where I have 80-90% health left at times....Which is what happens to me when I fight Shaman). I have all kinds of ways to break their control and get them where they're weak (i.e. melee range).

In BG's however, these 3 classes are a thorn in my side -- What they're all good at is taking me out of a fight. It might as well be death. Mages cause me me to waste a lot of mana (due to shifting out of polymorphs and freezes). Hunter's mark and pets are a bitch -- Something that's hardly an issue in duels. Warlock dots, as I said, force me to back out of a battle to decurse and heal.

[Fordel]

The key difference between PvE and PvP is the dieing. You don't die very often in PvE, and when you do, it is mostly from badluck. In PvP, you can do everything right and still die. People who don't PvP reguarly just aren't used to dieing reguarly, even when they play well. Hence alot of the "omg hax" or "totally OP!! wtf!" stuff that gets spewed out.


I find once people get comfortable with the fact that 'Yes, yes I will probably get killed alot' in the BG's, they perform alot better.

[SurfD]

Coming from the other side of the fence, I really understand where Stray is coming from.  As a mage, I really HATE fighting druids 1 on 1.  Absolutely none of your croud controll sticks, and their ability to soak up loads of damage through direct healing and Hots makes it almost impossible to kill them unless you get the element of surprise and catch them flat footed with a big alpha strike.

its especially bad if you are not pvp specced, since being unable to drop an improved Counterspell on them at the critical time to allow you to burst damage finish them off really hampers your ability to take them out.

[Venkman]

That was the biggest realization for me when i firsted started BGs. You just KNOW you're going to die quick. In AB, my shelf life is about two minutes :) I'm glad I did a bit of reading about Mage PvP beforehand though. So I have no problem blinking in and softening up groups with IAEs and BWs while the ranged folks pick them off (love AV bridges for example).

Druids can be real rough for me. Comes down to speed and which of my timers are up. Shamans I hate going up against though. Too many totems and i never seem to have my insta AEs up when they're around :)