So I'm taking it that the previous convention of only playing ten games a week is not true?
Once people have reached a point where improving their rating is impossibly hard and they stand to lose much more from a loss than gain from a win, I think you'll see more people playing the minimum ten because each game carries much more risk than reward. Right now, the games are fun, and it may seem advantageous to play the "random walk" game and try to stop at one of the peaks -- if my team's "true" rating is 1650, over the course of 100 games, I should see streaks that bring it up over 1700, or down below 1600. In theory you'd want to keep playing until you get one of those "lucky" streaks of consecutive wins, and then stop right there while you're ahead.
Next week you'll probably drop right away since you are above your true rating, but in the meantime, you'll get more arena points for the week.
If this is the case, my team is going to have to re-evaluate our strategy for games played during a week.
Since people seem to be playing a large number of games right now, how are they handling distributing games among your teammates? With a 5v5 full roster it would seem rather difficult to keep everyone above 30% for matches played.
If this is the case, my team is going to have to re-evaluate our strategy for games played during a week.
Since people seem to be playing a large number of games right now, how are they handling distributing games among your teammates? With a 5v5 full roster it would seem rather difficult to keep everyone about 30% for matches played.
Well, for each ten games you play without a member, you have to play another five (4.5 actually, which means 5) with that member on the team to get them caught up. Twenty games without one members means playing nine with that member, and so on.
With a full roster, this can get a bit messy if one person is absent for a large number of your games.
My 5v5 is well.. sucking right now but that's due to the fact that none of us are big PvPers. Also out of the 10 matches we did we had the same team opponent 4 times which destroyed us. I'm only really looking for the caster dagger from arena points, I don't know how long that will take but I expect it will be several months.
My biggest complain about arena is that around 1920+ rating you see the same people, over and over, sometimes 10+ times in a row. While it's good practice, it's lacking on the fun side.
My biggest complain about arena is that around 1920+ rating you see the same people, over and over, sometimes 10+ times in a row. While it's good practice, it's lacking on the fun side.
This also seems to happen at non-peak times even at the middle rating. Hopefully once more people get teams registered you won't see the same team as often.
After getting destroyed by a druid / rogue team three times in a row, we decided that it was probably time to take a break for the day.
The most frustrating thing about arenas currently is the disconnect bug. My team started last night around 1800, with the goal for the evening of pushing to 1900. Two games without our warrior later against teams that took 20+ points from us and we were in a serious hole. We managed to fight our way back and make some progress, but it certainly had me really pissed off.
As others have said, the first week is not a good reflection of the ten-games-a-week norm, because teams are fighting to establish a high rating to start racking in points - not to mention that the games are still fresh and fun. It takes quite a few games for a strong team to approach its true rating, especially if they get unlucky and play against strong teams that are highly underrated (i.e. a 1900ish team playing against a newly formed 1500 team of about the same overall skill).
edit: As for getting the same team multiple times in a row - that's one of the most interesting parts of arena "theory" to me. Evaluating your expected value (EV) against teams currently queueing is an important aspect to maximizing your rating. If there are higher rated teams queuing who you feel you have a decent chance to beat, you should be queuing. If there's a tough team who's underrated that you keep running into, you should not play. Last night we figured out a solid strategy for beating one of the good teams queueing at the same time, and we would've been happy to play against them all night. The other night we ran into another group from our guild who'd recently formed and decided to just stop playing until they were done, because our EV playing them was so low - a win was worth maybe 8 points, and a loss cost us over 20, and we certainly didn't think we had 3-1 edge.
As for what the top ratings are out there - I've heard of a number floating around 1900, but no one maintaining a 2k+ rating. The team we played right before we went to sleep last night had apparently just broken 2k, but losing to us knocked them back down. It's not easy to stay at the top.
I definitely feel you on the disconnect bug. It hadn't happened to me in arens prior to last night, but it happened twice in a matter of ten or so games and I was pretty pissed after the second.
From the two times it happened (very limited) I noticed that my computer was running considerably slower at the time and the load times were generally about double the time they usually are. I restarted my computer and I was good for another 10-15 games when it started slowing down a bit again so I didn't take any chances and restarted it again. Again its just my simple observations and its very possible they have nothing to do with the problem, but I haven't disconnected ever since and it hadn't happened to me before (specifically in arenas, it has happened when hearthing or zoning in/out of instances before).
As for what the top ratings are out there - I've heard of a number floating around 1900, but no one maintaining a 2k+ rating. The team we played right before we went to sleep last night had apparently just broken 2k, but losing to us knocked them back down. It's not easy to stay at the top.
The top teams in our Battlegroup are floating around 2k, but having a very difficult time getting substantially above. If this stays the case, it's going to be very tough getting that arena set finished by April.
The top teams in our Battlegroup are floating around 2k, but having a very difficult time getting substantially above. If this stays the case, it's going to be very tough getting that arena set finished by April.
Is there some kind of online resource you get this information from? Or is this simply by word of mouth?
The top teams in our Battlegroup are floating around 2k, but having a very difficult time getting substantially above. If this stays the case, it's going to be very tough getting that arena set finished by April.
The rating-to-points conversion is based around acquiring the full set in a 13 week season - it's not clear to me that the arena tournament qualification cutoff date is actually the end of the season.
I edited my original post but it strangely didn't go through - one thing I find very interesting is the theory of managing your rating with respect to when you queue. Maintaining a high - or at least neutral - expected value (EV) for your games is crucial. Last night we found a team with a rating comparable to ours and devised a strategy that had us winning every game, and it was clearly in our best interests to just keep queuing and hope they did the same. Similarly, the other night we ran into another team from our guild who was drastically underrated because they'd just formed that night, and we stopped queuing until they quit - even if we had an edge, it wasn't a 3-1 edge to justify risking 24 points to win 8. Especially with the disconnect bugs, it seems like it's generally in your best interests to play when the top rated teams are playing rather than trying to dodge them - you stand to win much more and lose much less.
The Arena system seems rather alt friendly. If you were able to pug each of your alts into a 5-man team (of alts) that was able to maintain an even win/loss record wouldn't you have 1500*.206+99=408 points each week? And if so, it would take 1875/408=4.6 weeks to get a gladiator 1h weapon, shield, or chest (all item level 115). Even in a 2-man team, it would only take 7.6 weeks to get one of these items.
This assumes that you could maintain 1500, not sure how hard that is yet.... Also, unless the queue times are very quick, it would probably not be very practical.
These gladiator items are pretty awesome. Certainly, giving a dps warrior or rogue a level 115 weapon would dramatically increase their pve performance over a blue level 115 weapon. However, the items are not just amazing for dps classes. Compare the shield to the "Crest of the Sha'tar," the gladiator shield has more block value even though it doesn't spend any itemization points in it 122 vs 117, and it has the same stamina as if you had socketed the rep shield with 2 solid stars of elune. The trade off is 814 armor and 27 resilience vs 11 defense rating.
I know this thread is mainly focusing on getting a full set as quickly as possible, but the possibility of getting *one* of these level 115 epics even if you're not very good at PvP is sort of interesting.
So I'm taking it that the previous convention of only playing ten games a week is not true?
The convention that the advantage to playing more than 10 games is minimal once you have reached your true strength is as true as ever.When that point can realistically be reached has always been in doubt (and obviously depends on your strength). The thread starter seems to think top teams won't be able to reach it before the season ends, which I really doubt. I, and others thought it might be possible during the first couple of weeks, which may be too optimistic, as the range seems to be spreading quite slowly.
Originally Posted by spronk
Unless they changed it in the last few weeks I am pretty sure arena points never expire, and the max you can accumulate is 5000. The most expensive items, the 2h weaps, cost 3750 so there's no real reason to hoard points beyond 3750.
.
Well, you should always hoard 5000 at the end of the season. Points are always more valuable the next season.
Two things have been the only true annoyances so far, but they are pretty bad.
First off, the disconnect bug. I would say that on average, we would get one disconnect every 10 games. That's basically a guaranteed loss against any decent team. At around the 1800 mark on sunday night, we would lose 15-20 points on average for each loss, and gain on average 5-10 points per win. That means we needed roughly a 7:3 win ratio to remain stable on points. With one guaranteed loss every 10 games, that's a required 7:2 ratio just to not lose points. I'm sure this will get better with more teams up there on rankings, but as it was, moving further up seemed extremely hard.
The other insanely annoying thing was: Heroism/Bloodlust. We were regularly faced with a rog/war/enhsham/priest/pal team that we just couldn't figure out how to beat. The ridiculous dps output of Heroism/WF plus MS meant healing their target was impossible, and BoP made sure we couldn't race them for dps either. CC? Tremor/Grounding. It was absolutely disgusting to see the amount of dps incoming on one character from only 3 dps'ers, due to heroism. It easily surpassed what 4-dps teams had been throwing at us all night.
Yeah, cooldown classes definitely have a good thing going. i played a team with a shaman and two BM hunters - each time we get Bloodlust and two Bestial Wrath/Rapid Fires. Still, Heroism is definitely even a step above other cooldowns.
I still think its a problem that the non-5v5 brackets are worth basically nothing. I had assumed all along that point totals from your teams would be cumulative, so there was at least a reason to play in other brackets just to get a few more points each week. Yet as it is, a 600 rating 5v5 team is still earning as many points as a 1900 rated 2v2 team. As long as you can put 5 people together to play 10 games a week, no matter how bad they are, you'll still get more points than by being gods of lower brackets.
I still think its a problem that the non-5v5 brackets are worth basically nothing. I had assumed all along that point totals from your teams would be cumulative, so there was at least a reason to play in other brackets just to get a few more points each week. Yet as it is, a 600 rating 5v5 team is still earning as many points as a 1900 rated 2v2 team. As long as you can put 5 people together to play 10 games a week, no matter how bad they are, you'll still get more points than by being gods of lower brackets.
Aye. This is stupid and is the main reason I won't be PvPing anytime soon. I don't have a time to organise a 5 man team and be decent enough to find it fun while doing all the PvE stuff. I'm just going to 2v2 and 3v3 for fun every now and then.
Yet as it is, a 600 rating 5v5 team is still earning as many points as a 1900 rated 2v2 team.
Did you mean this literally? According to Marketa's spreadsheet, a 1900-rated 2v2 team will accumulate 4286 points at the end of the season, which is approximately equivalent to what a 1625-rated 5v5 team would pull in.
Did you mean this literally? According to Marketa's spreadsheet, a 1900-rated 2v2 team will accumulate 4286 points at the end of the season, which is approximately equivalent to what a 1625-rated 5v5 team would pull in.
If that is accurate, at 600 rating a 5v5 team will earn 223 points per week. A 1900 rated 2v2 team will also be earning 223 points per week. This is why I was saying the 2v2 bracket is pointless from the standpoint of earning arena points - you may as well scrap together a 5v5 team and play 10 games a week even if you are horrible, since you'll still end up better off than being good in the 2v2 bracket.
3v3 is better. A 1900 3v3 team would be the equivalent of a 1630 5v5 team.
Ok I'm a little confused about one issue.. What happens with toons that are alts on your team that dont play as much as you do, for instance...
On my 2v2 team we have myself and a hunter which play about 90% of the games...and there is another person on the team that plays the other 10% with either of us. Will he gain the same amount of arena points as we do on a weekly basis even though he's only playing 10% of the games?
Also, do points for 2v2 3v3 and 5v5 teams acccumulate? Or is it just the "highest" rated team the only one that counts towards your weekly arena points? Thanks.
You need to have played 30% of the games to get actual points for a week. And the team that gets the highest points will count.
So while waiting for your 2vs2 to get higher rating you could in theory 'farm' some arena points the first couople of weeks just by making a 5vs5 and playing 10 games.
To be honest, I don't want to get into the mess of organizing a 5 man team now, even though that would probably yield some very nice upgrades for me, since we just started raiding again at a pretty casual pace. Together with another rogue from my guild I played some 30 games yesterday and it was fun, pure fun, even though our rating still hovers at about 1500. I guess we can do better since we both were pretty rusted and inexperienced, but we won't really practice for it unless we feel like it. Some combos are pretty hard to defeat whereas others seemed to be matchups that greatly favoured us.
I dont know if it has been mentioned yet, but it seems to me people are still under the false impression that the 3 vs 3 bracket is not worthwhile anymore. Its points gain was upped to 80% of that of the 5 vs 5 bracket.
It clearly seems to me that 3 vs 3 is the way to go for the slightly less serious PvPer. You still gain some good points and it is far easier to manage than 5 vs 5. 2 vs 2 now gains 60% of the 5 vs 5 points, but I would stil rather just grab an extra person myself.
There is light at the end of the tunnel.
The only problem is, it's often an incoming train.
It also seems to me that so far the opposition in the 3v3 group are far weaker than what you are facing in the 5v5 group.
But then again that might just be my imagination.
02/19/07, 12:33 PM
Similar Threads
