Patch 5.4 patch notes
Virtual Realms feature revealed
The Proving Grounds are coming
The latest patch 5.4 newsSeason 2 Arena to sell for honor in Season 4
by Mike Schramm 
Jan 30th 2008 at 2:15PM
This wasn't exactly unexpected (Blizzard has, after all, already put Season 1 gear up for purchase), but Drysc has confirmed that Season 2 Arena gear-- that's the Merciless Gladiator gear-- will be available for purchase with regular honor as of Season 4.As usual, Drysc provides a disclaimer that Blizzard may change those plans. And of course we have no idea yet when Season 4 will drop, although the usual Arena Season timing tells us that it will likely be sometime in March of this year (possibly with the release of patch 2.4, although as usual, we have no idea if the patch will come sooner or later).
But if you spent all your honor on Season 1 gear when Season 3 started, time to start saving again. Merciless Gladiator is going on sale.
Filed under: Items, Odds and ends, Blizzard, Economy, Arena
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 4)
vildand Jan 31st 2008 3:17AM
This isn't news? The information was made official when s1 got rotated into the honor reward system...
hyos Jan 31st 2008 4:17AM
Bunkai,
if your enhancement shaman is wearing S1 you are gimping your DPS hard compared to many blue items. The only bonus you do not get with the blue items is the better armor and huge stamina on S1 gear, and I don't see where those are necessary in Karazhan for a DPS class. I was running Kara with 7.5K HP from blues all the time and was fine.
Dwarfbane Feb 8th 2008 3:12PM
Im a bit of a casual 3 hours 4-5 nights a week (That is casual in wow). Ive been playing 2 1/2 years with a couple of 70s. But my late start due to kids means i miss all start times for raids. Sometimes I get to be a replacement (2 tier 4 bits).
My mage is nearly full pve epics KARA and Heroic types with pvp staff etc. The other pvp stuff isnt great for him. cloth drops are common and tend to be useful.
My Alt is a resto shammy and he did arena every week and a few hours of BG grinding. He is just short of the epic trinkets. When I tried to do alot of PVE with him decent healing mail was very hard to come by. With the right gems and enchants Im as good as my post kara guildies 1700+ heal, 100 m/5.
For some classes the pvp gear is the way to go and for alts it offers a great way of getting usefull quickly on a part time basis.
With regards to people not knowing their class, the lack of people to do 5 mans with at lower levels is to blame here. Then at 70 very few people are still doing normal dungeons. They are forced to try for harder content.
bob Jan 31st 2008 8:35AM
Why not just have one option for gear? Wouldn't it make more sense if a raid boss just droped gear tokens instead of random loot that you could then turn in for gear? Run BGs and get gear tokens based off a system like the current honor system. Turn the tokens in for gear. Win arenas (not just play enough to keep 1500) and get gear tokens. Roll resilance into the PvE game and then everyone can turn in their gear tokens for the same stuff and no one can complain about gear. As long as the reward system is balanced twoard the amount of tokens awarded for the accomplishment (say a BT boss drops more tokens than a kara boss - as 2000+ rating earns more for a win than a 1700 rating) then everyone can advance through gear in the same way and no one has to complain. Just a thought.
Zarzuur Jan 31st 2008 8:39AM
seankreynolds said...
"You know, to everyone complaining about new skins on old gear: Did you ever think that perhaps they're using that system NOT because they're "lazy," but because adding yet another set of models into the game (rather than a skin on an existing model) is just going to add to the lag you get in BGs and Shattrath? Models are complex data objects that your computer needs to hold in memory as soon as the character wearing it approaches. It's more memory-efficient to stick a new skin on an existing model than to create a new model. Sure, it's not as COOL as having a new group of models for each gear set, but if we had 50 different models instead of 10 (?) with different skins, many people would be setting at 1fps in the BGs and Shattrath."
I don't think Blizz are lazy either, just that they are probably spending their time on Wrath atm. But the models won't cause lag because the server will just transmit a series of item codes for each character. The 3D model data will be held on the client side (your computer).
Ideally it would be better if PvP/PvE gear had different model sets. Also IMO, if they made earlier PvP gear more useless in dungeons, and the lower level 5-man/heroic/T4 mix-up of what gear to choose was clearer, then there wouldn't be a confusion between the two endgames.
seankreynolds Jan 31st 2008 1:31PM
{But the models won't cause lag because the server will just transmit a series of item codes for each character. The 3D model data will be held on the client side (your computer)}
Yes but the more models your computer has to display at one time, the chuggier it's going to get. Fewer models = less chuggy. Run ten apps at once instead of two, it's all local on your computer.
andrea Jan 31st 2008 9:00AM
To echo thoughts above, I already am having a hard enough time trying to gear a healer (pvp gear it horrible for that), and don't have the luxery of being run through Kara like many recent 70's do. LFG is already a ghostland, has been for some time now...and will not improve. IMO, things will not get better in that regard until the expansion and more people have interest in something other than bg/arena grinding.
Orestes Jan 31st 2008 2:04PM
PvP gear isn't always horrible for healers, for a holy pally at least, it's a pretty attractive option compared to everything else pre-kara and pre-heroics. Sure you get shafted on mp/5 but the spell crit and judicious use of mana pots more than compensates
paly_1 Jan 31st 2008 10:07AM
I agree with Bob. They should use token drops for gear instead of random gear drops. Our guild has been discussing this as we are farming kara, gruul, and Mag and 85% of our drops are sharded. I am sure we will do the same with SSC and Eye once we are on farm mode with them too.
bob Jan 31st 2008 11:03AM
Token drops would stop endless re-runs of raids for that one piece of gear you needed. I'm not a huge raider but I have to wonder if that is actually fun. Once a guild has a boss on farm are they really running the content because they enjoy it or or they doing it because they want the drops. I think it makes more sense story wise as well: why are these mobs carrying all this gear around with them? Random world drops are OK, but really, why does a certain boss only drop some gear some of the time? What is the lore behind that?
I think gear tokens would also open more venues for new content. Instead of having progression bassed soley on gear (need T3 to do T4 content, need T4 to do T5 content...) Any number of different accomplishments in the world could be rewarded with tokens. City raids, capturing towns, long epic class specific quest and on and on.
The best part would be to do gear in a way that would reward equal commitment and skill with equal gear. No matter what endgame route you have the time/skill/inclination twoard.
Neo Jan 31st 2008 1:44PM
To answer your question Bob. For me and my guild farming an instance is fun for about the first 2 dozen times until you start ending up sharding over 85% of the drops. Then it becomes very boring and frustrating to see an item never drop. I like the idea of a token that can be turned in for what ever item you need and not based on a slot requirement. This would speed up raid progression and make the game more fun along with having better geared characters able to run the next higher instance.
bob Jan 31st 2008 2:48PM
As someone who never raids this is what I have always thought. Thanks for confirming it for me.
When I got my main to 60 I started doing the PvP daily in Hellfire to capture the 3 points and get marks of honor hold. Knowing that I was going to get the reward that I wanted made the repetative task a lot more fun. I don't know that I would do the same thing over and over again if the reward system was the same as raiding. Maybe that is why people are going to BGs/Areans. In the honor/points system you know exactly what you are going to get. It makes it feel like the time you put in actually means something, rather than just mindless repition with the hope that you will get the piece you need.
Ras Gonzo Jan 31st 2008 1:47PM
As a feral tank, all the S3 gear is as completly viable for tanking 25 mans as T5 / T6 gear. Now I'll finally be able to get my shoulders and weapon :)
Stupid Mage Feb 4th 2008 2:52PM
Right, I was sure that for tanks, Resilience was a good thing if you haven't gotten a drop that you need in order to be uncrittable.
jake bauer Mar 6th 2008 4:07AM
you try so hard to get a full set and be half way decent in arena and bg, then boom befor you even get an opurtunity....a new set comes out and the set you have been working on is junk! same goes with levels. all the kara gear and scc gear and what not you have been working on so hard the last year to get, well be garbage when LK comes out. blizzard needs to cap it sometime. i miss pre bc when you could actually acomplish something and be know. hell now everybody and there mother has an epic and the value of epics turned in to blues because of how easy they are. pre pc how many years was it for the same bg gear. and you had to actually be ranked and play to get the best bg gear, and you could get the whole set with out it every changing on you. i dont know about you but i dont like spending 10000 hours just to get something i have to throw away a week later. cap the levels, give us back ranks in bg and end this epics for everybody non sense. an epic is and epic for a reason.
Chris Mar 24th 2008 4:46AM
Personally, I don't understand the inherent dilemma. For those of you who feel as though "welfare epics" from the battleground system will disrupt PvE progression, I urge you to spam the General channel in Shattrath, clamoring that you're actively seeking placement in a raiding guild with 400 resilience, and let me know how many replies you get. Raiding guilds that want to raid will do just that, and most if not all serious raiding guilds will find Arena gear almost marginal in their raid attempts.
Furthermore, by Blizzard making Season 2 gear available upon the release of Season 4, do you mean to suggest that every player will be 'on par' with on another? Certainly not. Season 2 gear is still (and will forever be) inferior to Season 3 gear, and it will be far inferior to Season 4. In my opinion, let those who don't mind the mind-numbing grind for Honor to purchase their inferior PvP gear, and be done with it. Constant debate won't change the fact.
Someone also mentioned purchasing Season 2 for the mere fact that the set looks awesome. I raid, and I raid pretty "hardcore", but hell! the season 2 Priest set looks awesome, and you'd be a damn fool if you thought I wouldn't be spending my out-of-raid time grinding for it.
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. That's what I'm always told. So STFU and enjoy the game for what it is: a game. If you don't like the direction the game is going, cancel your account. I seriously doubt someone is holding a gun to your head and making you hand over fifteen dollars.
Good day, all!
Dr J Mar 26th 2008 12:50PM
As of 2.4 patch download yesterday, did the Arena Season 3 sets also go on sale at the vendors?
Chris Mar 27th 2008 7:51PM
No. Season 4 wasn't released with Patch 2.4. It's projected that Season 4 will be released in the next patch, which I don't assume will release for a month, at the earliest.
You still have awhile to save, my friend.