Details on 1.12 PvP Content - Page 2

Malan · 07/13/06, 9:22 AM

Good luck to anyone trying to grind CC rep in Silithus after this goes into place - can't really say there will be a lot of "PvP" going on in the sense of what they're implementing, but its sure as hell going to increase the random gank squads roaming around.

Honestly though, am I the only one who sees World PvP and Cross Server BGs as imcompatible? Near instant queue times 24/7 with new teams from other servers? Who the hell would ever leave Org/UC to go to EPL or Silithus?

• frmorrison · 07/13/06, 9:25 AM

Certainly the devs need to provide some amount of Honor for holding the objectives, possibly some quest rewards as well. The harvesting, similar to Arakkiss spice farming, is an interesting idea. Druids/Shaman will be good spice runners ;).

I have no idea how they will balance factions, but on a PvE server you choose to flag (if you feel it is safe enough to do).

Also, this preview isn't everything, another thing I know they are going to do is allow more people to get rank 10 and below (maybe by lowering honor decay at those ranks).

Mem · 07/13/06, 9:26 AM

Originally Posted by Malan

Honestly though, am I the only one who sees World PvP and Cross Server BGs as imcompatible? Near instant queue times 24/7 with new teams from other servers? Who the hell would ever leave Org/UC to go to EPL or Silithus?

Or at least instant BGs for the minor faction. But I think, don't speculate too much about it, wait, how people react to this. Sometimes the momentum of the masses can produce truly unpredictables results.

♦ Praetorian · 07/13/06, 9:30 AM

The problem is largely what was hit on in the first replies to this thread: Population imbalance across factions is the elephant in the room when it comes to designing world PvP objectives.

Would it be cool to be able to attack Kargath, kill the tower guards and an elite named inside, and defend it for 15-20 minutes while Horde rushed to defend it after hearing the call on WorldDefense, and shift the outpost to Alliance control? Hell yes. Would it suck to be a level 40 Orc trying to level in Badlands on an Alliance-dominated server if that were possible? Hell yes.

On a 50/50 server, you could have all sorts of cool back-and-forth, with territories and outposts shifting from one faction to another on a regular basis. But on an imbalanced server (almost all of them), all that means is further inconvenience to the already-ganked minority who have no power to stop it.

Blizzard doesn't want to force world PvP on anyone, particularly on PvE servers. Their attitude in that regard is clear. That's why they limit it to high-level areas, and that's why they've structured the rewards the way they have. I think that philosophically, if Horde A kills Alliance B, they don't want that to have an indirect negative effect on Alliance C who hasn't participated at all. At least not in the old world.

I know for a fact that world PvP is far more integrated into the Outlands, which are being designed with it in mind, so I wouldn't give up hope just yet. Playing at E3, if I brought up the map of the Hellfire Peninsula, I could see the Horde and Alliance outposts marked as red-flagged points of interest on the map, and I'm fairly sure I recall quests available at the Horde outpost that sent me to the Alliance outpost to do stuff. They were clearly fortifications with NPC guards beyond what you find at a typical settlement like Stonard or Nethergarde or whatever -- there were named officers and other elites -- and I expect that Outlands will bring a new meaning to the term "Contested" zone. Or so I hope.

oldmandennis · 07/13/06, 9:33 AM

The underpopulated side just woln't bother. Why fight the odds when you can easily go to a BG and face even odds, while getting PvP items for rep? On PvE servers, it woln't change anything. On PvP servers, one sides farmers get a buff, while another sides get a bunch of kiddies trying to gank them all the time. Cheaper agility enchants - another benefit of playing the pretty toons. Now I have to consider if I want to try and grind out CC rep and badges, while I have a chance.

To the extent that its not underwhelming, it seems pretty stupid. If anything it should be in the lower level zones, that way even on PvE servers people would have a chance to opt in to a bit of PvP action.

Edit: Jebus, this topic is moving fast. These remarks weren't so bland when I started typing them.

Kazanir · 07/13/06, 9:42 AM

The way Gurgthock proselytizes for the expansion you'd think he was a Mormon missionary or something. ;D

I think the major point made earlier is the "fought over a tower because it was there" statement. World PvP is actually remarkably easy to generate as soon as you get a certain number of people in a place such that you know others will be there. Last night a group of Alliance rolled up outside Orgrimmar and started killing the duelers and within about 5 minutes there was a group of about equal size rolling out the gates of Org to chase them off. This repeated itself about 4 times before I had to log off and do some real work. If the PvP objectives do nothing else, it will give you a way to know that there will be people to fight at those locations, which Light's Hope and Cenarion Hold were good for anyway (especially LHC pre-patch.) I think it's a given that the rewards will not be anything very significant, and that based this, I don't think that the faction imbalance is a huge danger.

In DAoC, if you had significant faction imbalance, it created major endgame issues because it severely impacted the gameplay experience for the other 2 realms. Fortunately, no one faction was ever so imbalanced that they could single-handedly wipe the floor with both other factions at once; and with a limited number of PvP objectives available, the amount of hardcore RvR players on a given server was limited just by the amount there was to do (only so many towers to hold, and so on.) In WoW, with only 2 factions, this could be a much bigger issue, but I don't see this new content giving rise to groups that continually (i.e. more than a couple hours at a time) lock down a given tower or a given zone, even with major population imbalances. Alliance significantly outweighs Horde on Sargeras to my knowledge, and yet Virakar never has any trouble enjoying ourselves in BRM or Silithus, or camping boats on any given Tuesday. If factions were more organized around consistent, continuous domination of PvP objectives, this would be a big issue, but I don't see it happening, especially given reasonably mediocre rewards.

Edit: WTB New items!

Glyphs of Cenarius. Requires level 60. Requires exalted with the Cenarion Circle.
Creates a portal to Cenarion Hold.
Circle of Light. Requires level 60. Requires exalted with the Argent Dawn.
Creates a portal to Light's Hope Chapel.

xkmonkey · 07/13/06, 9:56 AM

I think the biggest problem with world PvP is the honour system. The reason hillsbrad was such a big pvp area before the Battlegrounds came out was because there were other people there. It was a pretty decent spot to grind honour. But once the battlegrounds came out, with bonus honour for winning, there just wasn't any way to compete with that with world pvp.

My fondest memories of pvp before the AV and WSG came out were from the Plaguelands and Felwood. Usually in groups of 2-4 of us going around everywhere running into other groups looking for pvp as well. The hillsbrad zerg was always there, and I did spend a lot of time there, but I found myself more worried about the guards then about the horde. The guard zerg just seemed to be what pushed the front lines more than anything else. I still have no idea why some people still claim those fights as some of their fondest memories of world pvp.

I like that Blizzard is moreso trying to just give a small nudge to world PvP, instead of trying to force it. Unfortunately, world pvp comes down to numbers above all else. Geared and skills groups can overcome certain numerical discrepencies, but given enough opposition, all groups will fall. Which is really the reason I like the concept of battlegrounds so much more than world PvP. Groups are even on both sides to an extent.

If I were to redesign the system, I would add ladder system. To stay at the top of ladder, a team shouldn't have to play all the time, but rather beat all other teams consistently.

Either way, when the patch comes out, I'll probably be in EPL ganking horde because there were more alliance or being destroyed because a raid decided to come take out my small group. Could be fun for a bit, but I'm not sure how long it'll keep my interest.

Oneiros · 07/13/06, 10:03 AM

PVP with a chance of paying repair costs vs PVP with even odds and probably more HK's, probably more CPs(honor).. hmm

the honest system right now is pretty dumb, but i dont know how to fix it so i guess i cant really say much. i do think they need to nerf honor earned in bg's though, to encourage more world pvp.

oh and this will make it exponentially more fun, and by fun i mean not fun, to:
1) farm CC rep
2) farm cultist sets
3) do lords/dukes
4) get to AQ

• malthrin · 07/13/06, 10:25 AM

I think this will be fairly popular on some servers (and totally dead on others). A significant segment of the Battleground population isn't particularly enthused about the Honor system and either has better gear or just doesn't care about exalted BGs; they just want a fight, and right now they play Battlegrounds because they're the only place to find one. These are the players that will be drawn out to these new objectives. As long as both sides can regularly field a competitive force, this should be a healthy niche for people that just like to PvP. On the servers where Horde isn't too whipped to leave Org, anyway.

Hopefully the Honor doesn't surpass Battleground honor. If it does, both the previously described segment and the honor farmers will be out in full force, which will likely drop the full weight of the population balance onto the system and smother it before it can start to build a community.

*Had some power flickers while writing this, took a few tries to post, hopefully its not too redundant

TheRealJon · 07/13/06, 10:27 AM

I don't know about anyone else but my guild has a blast rolling the top alliance guild on our server sitting in front of the entrance to AQ40, trying to keep us out. I'd love to maybe see some kind of "King of the Hill" type thing in the same vein ... rethinking it, the premise sounds dull, but it will get people out there and that may be all the spark needed to start some type of fire, the more stuff you put out there, the more inclined people will be to take advantage of it ... arena events, world bosses, etc.

Cth · 07/13/06, 10:37 AM

its sounds almost like the notum wars system in anarchy online (which failed). the underpopulated side (on the server i played) just gave up while the big zerg faction runs around with their nice buffed stats (and the more bases you had across zones the bigger you XP modifier was, which resulted in more people starting on the "winning" side). i wonder why someone like blizzard tries to steal an allready dead horse.

maybe its just me, but i think wow just reached the stale point in content, this was a lot faster than in any other mmorpg. blizzard must stop copying/polishing content from other games and invent their own stuff.

• frmorrison · 07/13/06, 10:44 AM

Copying/Polishing other's content is fine, as long as it is changed to fit your game. You say Notum Wars failed due to imbalances, who is to say that the Horde (or Alliance is they are the losing side) gets guards to help them? I am sure there are other ways to make a balance, the devs are learning.

What before the final changes before saying content is stale.

Malan · 07/13/06, 10:49 AM

Originally Posted by Praetorian

Blizzard doesn't want to force world PvP on anyone, particularly on PvE servers. Their attitude in that regard is clear. That's why they limit it to high-level areas, and that's why they've structured the rewards the way they have.

I dunno, Hillsbrad comes to mind immediately, as you brought up before. What in the hell ever convinced them to place a lvl 20s Horde outpost just a few hundred yards away from an Alliance outpost where most players are mid 30s-low40s?

Edit - on a pvp server this sure as heck forced pvp on me! I learned quickly that hillsbrad is not a place to go for lvling.

Zagzil · 07/13/06, 10:54 AM

This change is nothing exciting, but if leads to even some decent World PvP, I'm all for it. Right now the best you can do is camp Blackrock Mountain and Searing Gorge, and hope you get some decent groups running through.

Either way I have high hopes for Outland. Of course if they put in Ladder rankings for WSG I'll be about 10 times more excited for that than this change.

Agrimat · 07/13/06, 11:23 AM

I don't think that I agree with the population imbalance argument. Most servers have more Alliance than Horde, but it seems there are usually more Horde who are interested in PvP. On my server, for example, there are far more solid Alliance guilds than Horde guilds, but Alliance BG queue times are still extremely fast.

I'm generalizing here, of course.