Season 3 Arena equipment change stops ratings abuse
by Dan O'Halloran 
Dec 11th 2007 at 3:47PM
Today's maintenance is over, but the Season 3 Arena gear drama has only just begun, or ended depending on your point of view. Late last night, Tyren posted that when the servers came back up there is a new change to purchasing S3 Arena equipment. Before the maintenance, a certain Personal Rating was needed to buy the S3 gear, but now the same gear requires the purchaser's Team Rating to be in the same range.According to Jagoex at Warlock Therapy, this was done to stop a practice of artificially inflating your Personal Rating. Our own Zach Yonzon explained this smurfing concept. Players would form teams with their main and alts, winning with their mains and losing with their alts, thus ensuring a slow and steady Personal Rating gain. Now that the equivalent Team Rating is required, those people working the system have to play the Arenas the way Blizzard intended.
Tyren also mentioned that though the new purchasing requirements are in effect as of today, they won't be displayed by the in-game vendors yet, but in an "upcoming patch." So though you won't see it listed in-game, the Team Rating is now required.
EDIT: Clarified last sentence.
Filed under: Items, News items, PvP, Arena
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Chedder Dec 11th 2007 3:53PM
This really only means that their alts will be on different loosing teams now is all. This isn't going to stop win trading. The welfare epics will still be easy to get.
amasen Dec 11th 2007 8:03PM
I'm so tired of people calling Arena Gear or PvP gear "wellfare". I'm also tired of people calling it "easy".
If I were to gear out my warrior with full s3 epics (assuming I somehow managed to get a 2k rating), that is a cost of 13,000 points.
At a 1500 rating that's:
2v2:50 weeks
3v3:43 weeks
5v5:38 weeks
At a 1850 rating:
2v2:21 weeks
3v3:18 weeks
5v5:16 weeks
At a 2000 rating:
2v2:17 weeks
3v3:15 weeks
5v5:13 weeks
If you have a 1500 rating you are winning half your games. This is fairly easy. However you won't see your 5 armor peices + weapon + stat stick for a year on a 2v2 team... So the price of your "wellfare epics" is an INSANE amount of time required to get them. Get your rating past a 1500? Then your going to need more PvP gear and skill and lots of practice
Just for the new vindicator's, that's
78,094 honor
But you'll also need to farm all the old stuff if your just starting off in arena and want to get your rank to the 1850 level... Let's add up all that honor
65,250 honor for just your 5 piece set
11,934 for your s2 ring
8,000 for your stat stick
27,000 for your 2h weapon
So 190,278 honor points to get geared enough to begin being competitive in arena... At a generous 1500 honor an hour (assuming you only play one hour per day and win the daily and your next two matches), that's 126.8 hours of work... And because your only getting 1.5k honor a day, that's 126 days (4 months) of grinding battle grounds ( the most broken and abysmally absurd part of this game).
As for raiding... you gamble over and over that your loot will drop... and the morons you raid with can actually figure out how to dance together so that you can get your loot. If you find yourself good raiders... you instantly have wellfare epics... join a good guild that has content on farm with gear no one needs... Bam 1 night and you can easily see yourself completely decked out in epics... all from someone else's work....
Give the wellfare epics a rest... PvP is an accomplishment to itself, and serves no other purpose than to play against other players on an equal footing. You enjoy raiding? Good. Some people enjoy PvP... Both require hard work... At least raiders get to see more than the same 3 arena's and 4 battlegrounds... over and over and over and over... At least raiders get a story... At least raiders are actually a part of the legacy that is warcraft lore...
Chedder Dec 12th 2007 1:21AM
I'm sorry but it is welfare epics. All you have to do is show up for long enough and you get loot. Regardless of if you win or loose. Granted you'll get it faster if you win, but still you just only need to show up to arena's to get the points.
Raiding requires actual skill to even get a chance at loot. Note the word chance. Yes you can get invited to a raiding guild that already has something on farm and perhaps pickup a whole set of T1 in a couple nights work. But i've never met any guild that decked out a rookie in a complete set and then not have them contribute to progession of raid content later.
Face it, they're called welfare epics for a reason. Everyone can get them with little or no work, just takes time. Keep pvping long enough and you'll get your gear. If you are a horrible raider, you'll never get the gear no matter how long you do it. That's the differance.
For the record, i'm not a raider (anymore) or a hardcore pvper. (Although i do have my welfare set now.)
Verit Dec 12th 2007 12:45PM
@ Chedder
Actually raiding doesn't require any skill really - it requires that everyone fully understand the mechanics of a boss fight. Thats actually the biggest challenge of any raid.
If content is on farm and no-one needs that fancy new item that dropped you probably don't even have to spend dkp on it - very likely its yours for the asking.
I've taken alts through Karazhan and geared them up nearly completely in one night. You can't do that in Arena or BG.
Chedder Dec 12th 2007 2:02PM
Take a bunch of scrubs to Hyjal and see how much "free loot" you get.
Charles Dec 11th 2007 4:10PM
Lolz, goodbye smurf teams. Back to the 1300s where you belong, scum! And its good to see the hardcorians QQing about pvp epics bein better than thier raid gear. Where's your leet skillz now ya overgeared nerds!
Lucas Dec 11th 2007 4:18PM
Umm... you're a nerd too.
If you're a harcore arena player that makes you an over geared nerd too, its just that its different gear gained by a different type of play.
You're a nerd to.
Morons who think they aren't a nerd because they spent 2 days a week playing PvP as opposed to PvE can DIAF.
Freehugz Dec 11th 2007 5:54PM
lol. you seriously think that just because they changed this requirement on 2 items, all of the sudden top teams are going to sink to 1300? how does that even make sense?!?!
Baluki Dec 11th 2007 4:07PM
Wait, I'm confused. Has this gone into effect or not? The last sentence in the post seems to suggest that it hasn't.
Khanmora Dec 11th 2007 4:09PM
This stinks for legitimate players who want to play with friends who may not win as much. My personal rating is already 50 points higher than my team after just a couple of weeks b/c the warlock/pally combo is stronger than our druid/rogue combo.
Charles Dec 12th 2007 7:55AM
I guess not. It said "in a future patch" hopefully it will arrive just in time to screw over a brand new smurf.
Hoatzin Dec 11th 2007 4:12PM
The original post linked at the beginning of the article says that the change is going into effect, but the display will not be accurate until fixed in an upcoming patch. I agree that the wording of the last sentence was a bit confusing.
zygote Dec 11th 2007 4:13PM
For me the arena game and gear is just a minigame. You're bored, want to kill some time, go battle against someone else.
It's like battle mode on Mario Kart -- fun, but I hate the fact that it's bleeding into the rest of the game with the gear.
Warcraft is epic. It's about battling the forces of evil. I want to get my 1337 gun because I pried it out of the still flaming hand of some demon who threatened a city, not from some goblin dude standing around Tanaris shrieking, "I GOT WHAT YOU NEEEED!"
And I'm not a hardcore raider. I've only done a couple of heroics. But I want to feel like I actually did something for the armor and weapons I have. PVP mounts and other display things don't bother me. It's kind of a cool badge of honor.
But I loathe all of the Jim Henson PVP Babies wandering around Shatt now who are doing the minimum to get their gear.
onetrueping Dec 11th 2007 4:21PM
Oi, don't drag Jim Henson into this.
Ryan Dec 11th 2007 5:08PM
I like your attitude. Seriously. The people who will placate to the arenas only, don't really get how the game really is. It's an MMORPG built on years and years of lore. It's one MINOR facet of a much larger beast that is Warcraft. The hardcore arena people aren't really the type of player I like to associate myself with as I don't do arenas. Hell, at least the BG's have lore about it.
I think the advent of arenas were just another way for Blizzard to have another tournament style game like WC3 and Starcraft. I can't fault them for that by any right, but it's in their history to have games like that, so kudos for them in lieu of making a whole new game entirely.
Callandra Dec 11th 2007 4:13PM
Can people seriously not try to 'game' the system and get their easy epics even easiar???? People are already walking around with BT/M. Hyjal gear 2 weeks after S3 opened, what more could you want???
I understand that this is clever, and people want to get their stuff the fastest (even I figure the best way to gain honor points, which gear is best etc.,) but it's getting ridiculous.
(selling points, win trading, this new business)
Jack Dec 11th 2007 4:50PM
It's important to remember that personal ratings and team ratings don't gain the same number of points each time: if your team rating is 1500 and your personal rating is 1800, and you win against a 1500 team, you'll gain 15 to your team rating but much less for your personal rating.
But I guess this change just makes the system a bit more safe from abuse.
Freehugz Dec 11th 2007 5:56PM
I have tried so many times to explain this to people who claim they're going to sink their team to 1200 before they start winning but they never listen.
Scoottie Dec 11th 2007 4:53PM
HAHA time to earn you epics
Ian Dec 11th 2007 6:03PM
im glad blizz found a way to stop the smurfs.