The Waiting Game
by Elizabeth Harper 
Apr 24th 2006 at 10:15PM
It was 8PM, local time for me, when I got home. An hour's drive in traffic. I hop on the computer, intent on working out the stress of the day in some PvP matches, but there seems to be a 400 player queue to log on to my realm - that's another half hour. Well, okay - I can go find something for dinner and it will be done by the time I'm back. All I want is to run a few Warsong Gulch games, and hopefully get my new priest up to friendly with the Warsong Outriders - humble enough goals, right? But, wait - now that I'm logged on, there seems to be an hour's queue to get in to Warsong at all. Hmm, I suppose I do have a good book I've been meaning to read. But, honestly, I have to wonder - when did I start to spend more time waiting than I did playing? Because this new waiting game is not nearly as fun as the game I used to play.
Of course there's hope - new servers and hardware improvements, as well as the possibility of cross-realm battlegrounds will both cut into this waiting game - but, until then, all there is to look forward to is more of the same. I know I'm not the only one out in Azeroth who's hit this wall - what do the rest of you do when all you want to do is play, but the game is, for one reason or another, out of your reach?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, PvP
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Mike Apr 24th 2006 10:56PM
Happened to me tonight too because of the double honor in WSG this weekend. The only thing is, the game is never out of your reach. You can always quest and stuff. If you're on a PvP realm, you can go looking for a fight. Or you can farm for mats and skill up a profession or two. There's always SOMETHING to do...
joey Apr 24th 2006 11:21PM
PVP in WoW? BWHAHAHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... ahem.. allow me to collect myself.
Yeah, i'll one day try to play it again once they figure out how to implement cross server games so as to reduce wait times by connecting my players. Till then... PVP? What PVP?
Waiting for AV Apr 25th 2006 2:21AM
How is cross realm battlegrounds going to cut the wait time down? If all realms have the same 1 hour + wait for AV, etc.. how is linking them all together going to solve anything?
elizabeth Apr 25th 2006 3:18AM
If you have five horde players and five alliance players who are interested in playing Alterac Valley on each of eight servers... You've gone from eight individual servers not having enough players to run a single AV match to having enough for one combined AV match. By linking them, each server needs lower participation to open a single battleground. So if you're on a server that perpetually has not-quite-enough players, combined with several other servers of the same sort, you have enough players quickly.
Waiting for AV Apr 25th 2006 4:50AM
So it sounds like this is an offpeak solution to long queues.. linking all the BG queues during peak really won't fix that issue of too many players waiting to get in.
Would be nice if they implemented a postion in queue like they do for inital login so you could see how many people are in front of you in the queue.
Fabian Apr 25th 2006 6:29AM
Interesting, I have always experienced waiting for battlegrounds for the reason that there were not enough players willing to fight. And cross-realm bgs would definitely cut time in that.
...I never had to wait for a bg because there were too many players...
jennie Apr 25th 2006 6:31AM
"linking all the BG queues during peak really won't fix that issue of too many players waiting to get in."
Well, it'll help; it'll increase the likelihood that there are enough players to open a second AV, surely?
Thomas Apr 25th 2006 7:48AM
I gotta tell you that the login queues are really starting to make me think about looking for another game. I am not paying to *wait* to log in. And I haven't heard a word about doing anything to clear down some of these queues lately. I have this strange idea that I should be able to sit down, log in, and *play* any time I want to without waiting a half-hour. If Blizzard doesn't get that, then it may be time to just walk away.
joey Apr 25th 2006 9:42AM
I'm suprised more people aren't understanding how linked cross server BGs would help to reduce wait time. Not just during peak, but at ALL hours.
Right now each server is grabbing players from a very limited pool. The issue is never with "too many people" wanting to play. It is ALWAYS an issue of too FEW people being available to start the next BG.
When you pool all of the players from the hundreds of servers available you now not only have more people to join servers you have more games that are constantly ending which supply massive numbers of new players into the queues thus causing new games to be created faster and so forth.
With linked BGs I'd be suprised if you ever had to wait more than 3-5 mins (if that) for a BG to start.
To me this issue is exactly like the one I experienced in the Friends and Family Alpha test phase when the Auction House was first being introduced. I fought for a good 20 posts on the Alpha forums for all the reasons why the Auction house needed to be linked and exist in each of the 3 main cities for each faction. A lot of people called me an idiot or had various reasons for why it shouldn't be that way. Now, that is just the way it is today and nobody complains anymore.
Mark my words... what I am proposing will be the way Battlegrounds are run in the future. It's just a matter of time due to what a no-brainer it is. Just like linked auction houses.
tibbsy Apr 25th 2006 10:43AM
I'm thankful that I don't suffer from the problems that some of the posters have been complaining about. On the server that I play on, I have very seldom moments where the bg invite isn't instant. The only cases where it isn't is BG weekends, where it's usual to see 4 instances full but a 5th one doesn't quite have enough players to start the game. Even then, AB waits are super-short because of the nature of the game, and WSG rounds tend to be quick with 4 instances running.
Brandon Apr 25th 2006 12:17PM
PVP queue wait times are the reason I already have 2 60's and another new toon halfway there. any wait over 10 minutes is unreasonable when your play time each evening may be limited to less than 2 hours. Hitting 60 feel pretty anti climatic once you realize whats left to do at that point.
Mat Apr 25th 2006 12:26PM
The horde may rule on Ner'zhul, but my dwarf never has to wait for an invite :) :)
I don't care if I lose, because I always get an instant chance to play.
Benjamin Apr 25th 2006 2:06PM
On the majority of populated servers there is a severe imbalance of Alliance to Horde ratio. Some times up to 4 to 1. Lets assume just a 2 to 1 ratio. Now when we are waiting to pvp we are waiting for the current team of alliance to finish and hoping the current team of horde come back. With 16 linked servers we will have 32 alliance teams and 16 horde teams. Still the waiting game will continue as long as the imbalances are left unchecked.
Linked servers will reduce wait time in off-peak play but will do absolutely nothing for peak hours when there are already matches going on. Unless they can link severely imbalanced alliance servers with their horde imbalanced counterparts the waiting game will continue. BTW, there may be 4 Horde imbalanced servers out there, so the lucky 4 alliance servers that get paired with them will be overshadowed by the other 12 imbalanced servers.
The best way to fix this would be to allow same factions to fight each other in the BG?s. Allow guilds to go head to head in real competition as well as being able to participate in the rewards for the BG?s. This might go against the lore a bit but no faction is without internal conflicts as there were many such fights in the WC3 world.
Another way would be for Blizzard to admit there are severe imbalances and offer incentives to the minority population in an attempt to lure new players to the server for a given side. Of course that would just create a huge flame fest on the boards, but doesn?t everything incite that reaction there.
Personally I create a horde on the imbalanced server specifically to participate in PVP. I loved the no wait time and the ability to get to exalted but hated that I couldn?t be with my guild doing it. Consequently there was less end game opportunities besides BG?s because there were only a select few guilds doing any large instances compared to the plethora of alliance showing up with MC and BWL gear in the BG?s.
Vladya Apr 25th 2006 2:37PM
I guess it's those most upset that are the most vocal. On my server (not telling so that it stays this way) there are never ANY queues just to log in and the BGs are all up when i want them to be, with the exception of AV, which doesn't bother me a whole lot. I'm very aware that Blizz has some work to do, but in some cases they are doing a great job. I