mofidik

I strongly suggest you stop your unfounded and stupid claims now. Everyone knows hunters take more than avarage skill, but claiming druids and rogues don't because they're generally more succesful classes is laughable. Your point applies to warriors (and paladins in S1), but then again, at your level class balance is nothing of your concern, just something to blame for your incompetence. Do some classes do poorly in raids? Sure they do, but arenas are simply more complicated so it's obviously far harder to balance and some classes are just more straight-forward by disign. You can't just make haste slightly worse and increase the frostbolt coefficient to be done with PvP balance.

System rewards you for achievements, what on earth don't you get about no achievement -> no reward? Just because you've been pampered with free top quality loot until now doesn't mean it's in any sense fair, does it? You can keep bringing up how you don't like not getting stuff for free (playing 10 games a week and not progressing is not "working for stuff", fyi), but that won't change anything so you might aswel stop trying.

I think you just have a completely wrong view of what this arena system is ment to do. It's awesome for people that just want to have fun PvPing and don't want to be competative to fluctuate around the 1.5k rating, but it's obviously not what it is about. Once you are succesful and move higher up in the ladder, you gain access to better loot, exactly how it is ment to be. Like I said, the arena system is just more hardcore than you apparantly think it is or should be. You can always go back to battlegrounds when arenas are too hardcore, what does an arena player do when arena is too carebear?

 

morohtar

I think there are about 100 links to be had with a simple Google search that prove my "unfounded and stupid claims" of how many of each class have been able to achieve a certain ranking. I just tried it. I'm sure you can to. I'm a hunter so let me use my class as an example. We have the highest population of any class on average in the game, yet some of the lowest rankings. From Kalgan in March:

This chart is set at 2200+ rating. In this particular chart, a value of 100% means the class is represented as we’d expect, a value over 100% means the class is represented that much more often than we’d expect, a value below 100% means they’re represented less than we’d want (obviously this chart doesn’t include a spec breakdown in any way).

2v2 3v3 5v5
Druid 276.0% 184.0% 80.5%
Hunter 43.0% 50.2% 43.0%
Mage 8.7% 96.0% 96.0%
Paladin 19.7% 29.5% 147.4%
Priest 113.3% 164.8% 185.4%
Shaman 37.8% 50.4% 138.6%
Rogue 144.2% 175.1% 61.8%
Warlock 149.2% 93.2% 111.9%
Warrior 130.4% 90.7% 79.3%

Here's 1850...

Druid 184.0% 138.0% 92.0%
Hunter 50.2% 50.2% 50.2%
Mage 61.1% 87.3% 87.3%
Paladin 68.8% 88.4% 137.6%
Priest 133.9% 133.9% 154.5%
Shaman 75.6% 88.2% 138.6%
Rogue 154.5% 154.5% 82.4%
Warlock 121.2% 102.5% 102.5%
Warrior 90.7% 85.0% 85.0%

Bold emphasis mine for sub 50% data

From last season:

If you take the makeup of the top 140 teams and compare it against the makeup of the lvl 70 US WoW population you get this.

5v5
Warrior Total: 250 -- (20%) - 1 in 1,018
Paladin Total: 247 -- (19%) - 1 in 708
Priest Total: 188 -- (15%) - 1 in 1,176
Shaman Total: 176 -- (14%) - 1 in 733
Mage Total: 149 -- (12%) - 1 in 1,849
Warlock Total: 127 -- (10%) - 1 in 1,699
Rogue Total: 55 -- (4%) - 1 in 4,191
Hunter Total: 43 -- (3%) - 1 in 5,990
Druid Total: 34 -- (3%) - 1 in 5,536

3v3
Warrior Total: 120 -- (17%) - 1 in 2,121
Priest Total: 114 -- (16%) - 1 in 1,940
Warlock Total: 112 -- (15%) - 1 in 1,926
Paladin Total: 102 -- (14%) - 1 in 1,716
Rogue Total: 81 -- (11%) - 1 in 2,846
Mage Total: 79 -- (11%) - 1 in 3,488
Shaman Total: 63 -- (9%) - 1 in 2,049
Druid Total: 43 -- (6%) - 1 in 4,377
Hunter Total: 11 -- (2%) - 1 in 23,414

2v2
Warlock Total: 104 -- (24%) - 1 in 2,074
Priest Total: 67 -- (15%) - 1 in 3,302
Warrior Total: 62 -- (14%) - 1 in 3,799
Druid Total: 62 -- (14%) - 1 in 3,036
Paladin Total: 59 -- (13%) - 1 in 2,968
Rogue Total: 49 -- (11%) - 1 in 4,705
Mage Total: 18 -- (4%) - 1 in 15,307
Shaman Total: 15 -- (3%) - 1 in 8,606
Hunter Total: 3 -- (1%) - 1 in 85,853

After looking up some awesome statistics:

With a 1 in 79,746 chance, you are more likely to die from Lightning....
With a 1 in 62,468 chance, you are more likely to die from Legal Execution...
With a 1 in 11,289 chance you are 7 times more likely to die from drowning and submersion while in or falling into a bath-tub...
...than be in a top percentile 2v2 arena team as a Hunter in Season 2.

Do you still believe I'm making this stuff up? Is raiding this rough on certain classes?

The system has rewarded, and BGs (which is now directly tied to arena) still continue to reward, failure. I haven't been pampered. Do you know how many hours of gaming it takes to grind the honor and marks needed to get full season gear? I have seen some data, and it's on par with raiding. <reserved for link to data>

That's just it, Blizzard just forced BGers to go to arena since honor gear also has a rating now. Blizzard just made a change to the system that will cause a huge portion of the PVP players to have little chance to get any rewards in S4. Do you really feel that all those people should quit? Because, there is really nothing else for them to do unless they love to arena and BG with a full pool of points/honor and nothing to spend it on. The PVP system has always rewarded failure. BGs still reward failure in S4. And BGs in S4 are tied into arena...so there is a contradiction in this.

Again, 1500-1600 "300 point-per-week" arena team will need a full year to get their PVP set. Why did they need to add ratings? Isn't there enough of a penalty for being a bad PVPer (or choosing to stick with friends/guildies/family) without personal rating?

 

mofidik

The reason why representation numbers for hunters are in no way related to how good they are has been beaten to death. Hunters take more skill than avarage to play and so does their partner (same for rogue/druid for example, amazing setup, but it just requires ten times the druid one with a warrior or warlock would, so it's less popular), that and the fact that lots of people chose a hunter as a farming alt etc means your data means nothing as to how well a hunter _can_ perform. And even then, if hunters would infact be terrible, that still doesn't mean you can't break the personal rating requirements if you'd be good. I don't know if you like hearing it so much but if you can't atleast get to 1850, YOU'RE THE PROBLEM YOURSELF.

I played a shaman in blues/greens, I know what it's like to suck in arenas, but I made an effort and got to a (for that gear) respectable ~1750 rating. And you know what? I enjoyed being the underdog more than having loot handed to me. I had to work for what I got, not just spend time. Spending time looking at your lawn doesn't reward money for gardening either, mowing it does.

The BG system is a huge failure for two reasons. First off, like you said, it's a time sink that requires no skill at all. Secondly, you need to do it to arena. That has always pissed arena players off, and now suddenly it's a huge problem since you actually need to have some kind of skill to get gear? It just doesn't make sense, don't you play a game to have challanges? It's not all about showing your welfare epix off in shatt. It's about having fun in a game, not impressing fat inspect geeks, y'know.

And yes, if a game would be too hard for me, I'd either quit or learn it. Take the easy way or take the hard way, but don't drag the only competative PvP system in the game down to the pool of what the carebears do with their time, or atleast don't justify this because you in particular couldn't compete. There's always BGs, dailies and heroics to waste your precious time on while arena players have a challange.

 

• Kinz

Ok ok, first off, is everyone agreed that arena is skill based? Because that has been mentioned about 20 times in this thread, but whenever someone claims it is, instantly people say it's not. If it is a skill based system then all players should have equal gear or be easily able to get that gear, 3 months in BG's and the same sitting at 1400 to buy 1 season behind gear is not equal, not even close, ever seen the difference between a S3 Rogue/War/Hunt vs 1 without, it's fairly impressive, with Armor pen and the weapons the difference is vast. If it's skill based, everyone should have the same gear, if not then stop claiming it is.

Secondly, where is the fun or skill in watching your team get picked apart in the 1600 by a team in full S3 with near perfect CC/Timing and then losing 19 points, at what point do I learn? Stuck you are a prime example, full S3 rogue with 2 teams in the 1600. I am sure the people you take 19 points from in S1/S2 mix matched gear are a test of skill for you, why not play in the 2k+ bracket that your gear indicates you should be in? This is why people bitch, facing teams that are clearly that much better than us, yeah I said it you are better than me at this game, so why not play with people of the same skill level, why are you in a lower bracket than me when I can't hit 2k rating?

My mages team, at 1820 should only just start to face the worst 2k rated teams, maybe 1 in 10 games, and even then that should be a rarity, but it's not. Played 10 games today, 7 had full S3 across the board, we beat 5 of them and got a whopping 11 points from most of them, loosing 19 to the other 5, your right though I should just L2P, even though we are already beating teams with the gear advantage.

PR were a novel idea, but they do not work because the system is too easily manipulated by the better players, getting rid of PR didn't ruin S1 or S2, infact most would say their best times were in S1/S2, most all the high end players seem to of stopped caring about S3 yet I remember significant competition right to the end of S2. Good players will have full S4 in 4-5 weeks, bad players will have it in 38+ weeks, and the so so players like me may just get their full sets before WotlK.

Also has any of you tried to level a new alt in BG's, the honor is worse than ever, I am even tempted to say it is nearly as bad as the old HWL grind, if you have some semblance of a life outside WoW then it is a good 3 months to get the full Honor set. Can feel an infaction for this post, it's a bit of a whine, but I feel it is needed when something you do for fun is the main source of bitching in the week. I would say though the better players need an incentive higher up, no idea what but a full set of gear is not enough.

 

• Nurru

Season 3 went live on November 13th. That's roughly 24 weeks thus far, meaning that if a team was sitting at 1600 rating in 3v3 (I'll use it as an average) then they should have ~9800 points by now. That's more than enough to have full Vengeful without even taking into account the point buying that so many lower ranked players took part in. Why is it unfair to see s3 gear in the 1600 bracket? Do you even think before you complain?

I recently switched my priest to Holy for arena and getting full season 1 and a mix of Veteran's / Vindicator gear wasn't hard at all. They've added many mechanisms to the game since BC came out by which to begin gearing for arena. Run Karazhan/Gruul/Mag for tokens, spend badges on Veteran's pieces, do the daily heroic for easy honor.

19:31 <@Zyla> I fuck like a gorilla
19:31 <@Zyla> wait
19:31 <@Zyla> wrong chat room

 

mofidik

Oh jibby, the gear argument. Well, let me tell you, physical classes are all build around their weapon. If you can't get to 1850 for your weapon(s) in 4/5 S3, then....you know the drill. S2 shoulders to S3 is barely noticible, it's just the fact they're apparantly 2k material, but you can't really claim they "outgear" you.

If you looked right you'd see I didn't at all dominate even in those lower brackets, because frankly gear doesn't matter one bit when you run with 6 second lag spikes (when you run double/tripple DPS that's about half a game) and 3 FPS in combat. If you start a new setup that neither of us have any expirience with (I never ran double DPS or with a hunter/Spriest/Mage, ever) and have the worst PC in the universe, everyone would feel inclined to start at lower ratings to get decent practise when you're not getting rolled by people that have played their setup for months. I still think having an awesome match with a rerolling rogue/priest from a 2.2k+ RMP team was by far the prime of the evening.

I think it's rather terrible that new 70s are pigeon holed in BGs for weeks to be competative, I really wish they'd change this somehow. Like I mentioned I have a terribly geared shaman alt that used to arena (before all my former arena partners quit, also the reason I'm not actually around the 2k+ mark anymore) and I just could not be bothered to farm all the honour and marks for the off bits. I'd love to see a decent gearing up system (although I guess the rep bought pieces are a decent start for arena PvP), give up your life to farm system is just bad when you're aching to really start.

 

• Kinz

Nurru:
I think you misread it is not the 4 pc Vengful I have a problem with, I have that and I expect my opponants to have that, at 1800 I expect my opponants to have the weapons, but shoulders as well shows they are capable of pushing another 150 points higher and yet I see these teams down in the 1600, it's not the gear as shoulders give you a rather small upgrade it's the fact this team is obviously much better than you to the extent that they are probably higher than 2k, and should not be in the 1600. I'm not sure whats so hard to understand, it's like having Kel'Thuzad on farm and still rushing to claim every green dragon back in the day, you're not meant to be there.

As a holy priest you'll only be wanting the Shroud from badges, you can get vindicators from Mags/Gruuls if you guild is willing to carry you there or even go back, my guild is fairly casual and even we have dropped gruul months ago, mags is the only real option you listed that is viable. So you're still sitting in BG's for hours on end, if you have hours this is fine, alot of people do not or just cannot spend another 3 months in Av etc. And please tell me which heroic daily gives honor?

Stuck:
I never once said outgear in my post, I said outplayed because that's what I get when I fight 2k rated teams who clearly should be in a bracket 200-400 points higher. The gear argument is valid for melee classes, what you said there "If you can't get to 1850 for your weapon(s) in 4/5 S3, then....you know the drill" this is true in 4pc vengful you should be able to get weapons, so how does a new person do this? They sit in BG's for their offsets and S1 for 3 months, while getting 1400 rated points, when they finally have some sembalance of decent gear they go into a system where to progress past 1650 they must beat people who are 2k rated? Nice system. Though we are in agreement on the BG's, currently horribly implemented and of no fun at all, but that's another thread.

Most people who have level a new alt and say "It;s easy" do it with a S3 partner who can carry them, I played my shaman sporting of the eagle greens and got him to 1680 with a warrior because "Lolwindfury" and some decent gear on my friend allowed it, try starting a team with both players in S1 or below and not having any outside help and you'll get a taste of the real arena system.

 

mofidik

Erm, your entire first paragraph is about outgearing. But I agree the weapons make a huge difference at lower ratings, and that people with shoulders should _probably_ not be bellow 1.9k-ish.

Skill is a tougher thing though, because realisticly, a fresh 70 won't be as skilled as someone who's been dueling and world PvPing before it even gave rewards. Gear helps so much, and it can be really annoying when you fight rerollers (although the odds of running into them are fairly small if you play at the right time, or so I found), but I still think personal skill/expirience is what prevents you from getting higher, all the outside factors only to a lesser extent.

Btw, if you're rerolling, it's probably best to try to get honour/mark/point capped before the next season even if that means not buying stuff in the current season. Starting the next being able to buy as many new pieces as the gladiators helps more than being primarilly covered in 4 months ago, granted that you feel secure about atleast hitting the requirements for the early S4 stuff.

 

Talgog

He's not talking about the weapons per-se, although S1 v. S3 isn't that much of a fair fight in terms of gear. Baring gross class or skill differences, the 4/5 S3 team with S2 weapons should put the hammer down on a newly formed S1 geared team every time.

He's talking about the fact that teams with S3 weapons indicate true strength of 1850+, and teams with shoulders indicate true strength of 2000+. Most people should not be fighting 1850/2000+ teams because most people aren't anywhere near that strength bracket, and if they do fight them in a 1600 match, they shouldn't be penalized as if they lost to a 1600 strength team, because what they fought sure as hell isn't.

*That problem* is not about gear. If you are fighting some point buyer, you can tear them apart 1v1, even if you are 1.5 tiers of equipment lower. I've done this routinely in battlegrounds and world PvP since I reactivated my account. My gear is improving, but it's a slow process because of my outside time demands. I still mop the floor with people who have flashy gear but clearly didn't do anything for it. When you are fighting people with legtimate Arena ranks, weapons and shoulders, that's a different issue entirely.

The first problem, gear proliferation and no gear better than S1 available outside Arena, will go away with next season as S2 will be on the honor vendors and S4 will be much more difficult to come by. The difference between one tier of Arena gear isn't nearly as significant.

The broader abuse of what was supposed to resemble an ELO system (and you don't compete with people grossly out of your strength range in an ELO system, or if you do, it's all reward and no risk for the lower-ranked person, and all risk and no reward for the higher) is a different question and one that Blizzard is trying to address.

 

• Kinz

What Talgog said is much more eloquent than what I could say. The doors opening and a PMR with shoulders/weapons etc are not outgearing me persay, but the fact they have all that and are in the late 1700 to early 1800 followed by the complete lockout skill wise is what bothers me, then we lose the match and 19 points goes to them. Can anyone truthfully say this system is fair?

 

mofidik

If that bothers you to an extent that you think the entire arena system is flawed, I'd strongly advise not to advance to the point where countercomb = grats you lose. I don't know, I (and apparantly tons of other people) think these downsides of the system don't outweight the fun you can have, but I suppose that's dependant on how much negativity you can take and the frequency of how often you meet higher rated folks/counter combs.

This has moved quite a long way from the rating requirement discussion, though.

 

morohtar

Seeing S3 "shoulder & weapon" teams in the 1500-1800 range is the worst case scenario in arena...and yet all too common. The only way around this would be to stop putting ratings on gear (so noobs stop paying teams to bring them up for the covetted items) and also stopping team selling (maybe a program tracker for constant selling and penalizing it if more than 3x per season). I know S4 has new improvements to supposed stop som eof the issues, but I am not totally convinced.

Like I said, I would care less about class imbalances if ratings were taken off the table, because then I'd at least be able to get the gear I want while dealing with the fact that my class in arena is already a couple steps behind many others. And I am not alone.

 

• Kinz

Stuck is right while this has diverged off the PR it is basically the whole reasoning behind why there should not be PR. In a system that works and have no loop holes or imbalances then PR is a great idea, people can work their gear up and become better and get the higher rated gear when the people better than them move onto other brackets, but in this system it does not work, which is why so many people beleive PR's are a good theoretical idea but lousy practical one.

I continue to play because I like the arena, I enjoy fighting those games where my skill and gear is equally matched and we barely pull out a win, it's alot of fun, and even when we lose in those games we have an idea of how to win it next time, that is why I play and continue to play in the hopes a fix will come.

 

morohtar

No need to yell at me. It's ironic that as someone who not too long ago said to me, "I strongly suggest you stop your unfounded and stupid claims now.", you seem to be making a huge claim with no data about how hunters are only played as farming alts. I showed you my data, now show me yours. Even if you are correct in your guesstimation about so many hunters not PVPing, doesn't that in itself show a problem with the system?

I am happy that you are a rare success case. But what if you are in a competition to cut your grass the fastest (all yards being assumed equal in size), and are told that you have to use the mower you have in your garage, but your lawn mower is much smaller and bogs down more than any other model in the competition? And you are then told that only the fastest cutters could get new mowers for next year's competition? What if your competition had riding mowers (resto druids/MS warriors in 2s)? I know, it's the worst stretch of examples I've ever had 'pre-morning coffee', but it gets my points across. There are classes (forget specs) that are not equitable to play in arena, therefore a system that requires high achievement fails those classes, not the other way around.

I am not sure why you feel BGs take no skill. Yes, there is a much greater chance for success when someone fails than say, raids, but you still get very little for losing when looking at 3 marks vs 1 mark and a hell of a lot less honor (AV is special). BGs are such a casual fun part of this game to many of the non-hardcore people that I know. It seems wrong to make those people arena just to get gear that already has a huge timesink in marks/honor. At least reduce some of the requirements if I also have to have arena ratings.

BGs can't be done without arena anymore. They are now pretty much tied together. But aside from that, you are not understanding my point. Let's look at sports since arena is gearing up to be an E-sport. Should players that are stuck in minor leagues not get paid? Should they not be able to update their gear each season? Should they only be able to upgrade their pants and shirts since they are not major league players, and only major league teams can upgrade their bats and mits? They may never be in the major leagues, but does that mean they are not competitive and putting in time? If I, as a hunter, am forever stuck in the 1700s, does that mean I am a total failure to huntering in PVP and not putting in proper time? Could the system be failing me?

Telling me that all classes can succeed if they practice hard enough is true to an extent. Sure there may be some hunters in 5s that do very well when surrounded by amazing classes. That's all fine and dandy...but what bothers me is that there is a rating system to get gear, but some classes don't have an equal chance to get that gear. Telling me I have to do 5s (and even then unlikely based on the data) with much less chances for success at 2s/3s with my class seems like a broken system. Any 2/3 classes working together with similar skill should have an equal chance of winning in all brackets for there to be balance and fairness within a rating system for gear.

 

mofidik

Apparantly yelling wasn't enough seeing as you still simply ignore the point, instead insist on claiming hunters have it bad. To my knowledge there's no-one who bothered to put the strength of hunters in an exact overview, because really, if you care about arena enough people just know why hunters aren't popular. And this is not because they're so bad, it's because they're hard and they're hard to play with for their partner. I didn't claim all hunters are farming alts, hence the "etc", but it's a fairly valid reason since alot of people actually rolled a hunter alt to farm easilly and that hunter is on that list just fine, on top of the fact that the class is just too hard to PvP with for many.

Would it be good for all classes to be equally easy/hard to play? I don't think it would. Some people roll warriors to crit people's faces off, some people roll mages because how badly vurtne outskilled people. Power to both, chose what you like and go with it, sorry if you made a wrong call. While some classes are harder to master, all of them can succeed. In your example, I've said it before and I'll have to say it again, hunter/druid is honestly OP'd through the roof if you've got two good players. If you really want your class to be easy so you can be just as cool looking, you'll just get disappointed when you've got your phat purple longer than 3 days.

I'd like to make a few cuts in your (E-)sports reference and see if you think it makes more sense, I think it does. Amateur league is BGs, you can get carried by a good team, you can shine yourself sometimes by making a good move, but you don't get paid. Appart from that last part (because BGs is carebear) this makes sense, right? Now arenas are the professional players. 1.5k is second league in <insert countrey you never heard off> and pays you reasonably well, but you've barely made it into the professional circuit and your team can carry you at this level. When you're 2.4k+, you're a star player, get all the good shoes (yea, good shoes don't make the difference S3 weapons make, I know, but the hot tub after just might) and get paid alot. Aren't you as good as they thought? You'll probably just be dropped from the team because you won't get carried at that level. Why are these players in these leagues? Because that's how good they were born to be and that's the training their dad paid for. Not fair, is it?

The reason why WoW will most likely never be an e-sport is RNG, the fact it's not watchable for someone who's not already a very aware PvPer himself and the nature of the "counter setup'ing" to win. If blizzard would ever try this game to be a real e-sport, I doubt they'd start with working on what classes bad players can't play.

 

Locrius

Arguing that your class/spec is hindering your progression is valid... at 1850. But, until then, arena really is quite easy despite class imbalances. Hiding behind your class for why you are stuck at 1550 is ridiculous. The reason you are at that rating, to be brutally honest, is because you are bad at arena. Bottom line. Hunters aren't so underpowered as to not break 1600, neither is any other class, spec, or arena comp.

 

Entr0pic

Indeed. I dare say most class comps can even break 1700. Hell, my friend had a mage/hunter thing going on in the 1700s.

 

morohtar

Well, since I got a demerit for going on a quoting spree on Mofidik, let me try to generalize this a bit more without getting personal. BGs honor gear will no longer be "carebear" in S4 since arena ratings will be needed for honor gear. Lower ratings, yes, but still ratings in arena.

Alas, I am obviously in the minority here arguing for mediocrity on an elitist forum, so I will simply vanish back to forum lurker status. Thanks for taking the time to share your views with me.

 

Spatula