Drysc reveals more about season 4 personal rating changes
by Daniel Whitcomb 
Mar 20th 2008 at 12:30AM
Drysc posted yesterday to tell us a bit about what will be forthcoming when Season 4 hits the servers. It's honestly mostly stuff we knew already. Season 4 will not begin immediately upon the release of 2.4. Season 1 will go the way of the old level 70 honor gear and disappear from vendors, Season 2 will be gained via honor, and season 3 will go down in price, while still keeping the personal rating requirement to purchase the shoulders and weapon. However, the surprising little tidbit is how little they currently plan to change the requirement. Drysc quoted a requirement of 1950 for the shoulders and 1800 for the weapon. That's a total drop of only 50 points for each item. Of course, he also stressed that this information was not final, and neither the final requirement drop on season 3 nor the start date of Season 4 had been announced yet.
There is some concern from some comers that that drop is possibly a bit too low. Drysc responded to one player's voicing of those concerns with a somewhat cryptic reply that he thought they were making a few too many assumptions. I'm not quite sure what he could mean by this. I myself can't imagine a team that would climb to 1800 rating and simply satisfy themselves with season 3 weapons when they could make one last push to season 4 rating, so to me, the confusion is justified. Perhaps Drysc is hinting at a mechanics change in the way arena rating is calculated, or the fact that his numbers could easily change themselves? Perhaps he simply means that Blizzard is actively trying to shake the "welfare epics" stigma, and that people shouldn't assume they're entitled to low requirement ratings on the season 3 gear. I'd tend to lean towards that last one myself.
What do you think? Are these numbers too high? Are you expecting Blizzard to change them? Or do you applaud this as a step away from making Arena gear a welfare system for those who can't or won't raid or save badges?
Filed under: Patches, Items, Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Blizzard, News items, PvP, Arena
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
fLUx Mar 20th 2008 12:48AM
Honestly? This sucks. For me anyway.
At the moment, with no resli, nothing, just PvE gear (not even good PvE gear at that, tbh), I kind of suck in arenas, depending on the team I'm playing against. I don't think its possible, with my current gear, to get anything near 1800 rating.
So, as of now, the best choice (other than grinding BGs for honor), is S2, pretty cheap, can afford a full Warlock set in around 2 months at my current rating.
But come 2.4, I will no longer be able to get those S2 items for arena points, only S3/4, so I will need to get my rating upto 1800 (doubt thats even possible for us, tbh, never mind keep it there), or grind BGs to get S2 for honor.
So what if they are kinda easy to get atm, EVERYONE with a few friends has the chance to get them too.
Hopefully blizzard removes or lowers (1600 rating sounds OK to me) this rating before 2.4, else it looks like I'll be grinding the BGs, which I don't call fun. I like playing BGs, I dont like grinding them.
Pffft.... :(
brittwilson Mar 20th 2008 1:11AM
1600 rating? Seriously? My team sucks, I suck, and our rating is 1378. But thats not the point, I'm just setting the baseline that I am awful and cant even keep at the starting 1500 rating. But THAT is my point. You START at 1500, and so only after 100 point increase, you should be able to get the shoulders and weapons?
Thats just plain silly. Why even have a rating at that point?
fLUx Mar 20th 2008 1:25AM
Personally I think the ratings should be for you to BUY the items, if your rating drops, what happens, you become semi-naked? That's not good IMO, for somebody who is forced to get S3 instead of S4 because its cheaper, if you drop below 1XXX, and you are forced to get back to it with worse gear than you had before you were struggling, how are you meant to win? Only people who already have epic gear is gonna be any good at getting to a decent rating.
Thats just my opinion anyway, I know it shouldnt be "easy" to get them, but you shouldnt have to play a min of 10 arena games a week so you have the minimal chance to "spoil" your rating by mistake....
theRaptor Mar 20th 2008 2:41AM
@3 because getting to 1850 rating is trivial for anyone in S1 who PVP's with the right class/spec balance and isn't a failure. You are screwed far more by not using the right arena combos then having a *slight* downgrade on two pieces of gear. It is only once you start to push up and past 2000 that arena starts becoming a challenge, if you can't even reach 1850 you are either bad at PVP or have a terrible combo.
IMO more gear needs personal ratings. Arena is a joke because the worst players get nearly all the same gear as the best players, and so a lot of people don't even try and compete. Why not just periodically mail everyone gear upgrades? It makes as much sense as requiring people to do nothing but sit in an arena queue for two hours a week.
censorman Mar 20th 2008 10:46AM
I used to think arena was entirely gear based and sweated newbs getting S1 gear.
Now that I'm finally above 1800, I realize gear is only 50% of the battle. Team make up is the rest (5v5 here). We were running with a 3 shaman team and hit a 17xx ceiling for weeks. Going to the cookie cutter make up (H. Pal, D. Priest, E. Sham, MS. War, and another heavy DPS). Sad, but we blew through teams which were smoking us before, simply by going cookie cutter.
Coruptus Mar 25th 2008 1:21PM
What do you think? Are these numbers too high? Are you expecting Blizzard to change them? Or do you applaud this as a step away from making Arena gear a welfare system for those who can't or won't raid or save badges?
What the hell does that mean? It sounds insulting! You are insinuating that people who are killers are doing somthing wrong because they don't want to be stuck in some stupid cave fighting mindless computer programs!!
I hate instances and raiding. I did it for 7 years in Everquest with uber guilds and got burned out, but WoW PvP has instilled a new level of gaming rush within me. To say that we are too lazy to go into an instance shows what a loser you in understanding the very game mechanics and idealisms of the poeple playing!!!
I am a killer...I kill people who raid and do instances...it makes me happy to mess up their day!
If Instances ever become more powerful then PvP again I'll just go to the next best game like I did when I left Everquest. I pay good money to enjoy the game...you destroy the enjoyment of killas and we will all leave and find some game that does fullfill our need to kill players who can adapt and respond..unlike mindless instances and raids where once you get them down they go on farm status.
If you really wanted people to enjoy raiding you would place real poeople on the boss mobs with the powers of that mob so that the person could change stuff up and it would constantly change.
I am so burned out on dungeons and your insult is just going to make me grab my guild and hang around a summoning stone murdering instance pussies ~grins~. Now how is that for a true insult, instead of your lame watered down politically correct one?! ~grins~.
Kieron Mar 20th 2008 1:12AM
The rating's i think are a good idea to make sure that the game is flooded with toons who are overgeared. It help to make sure that new 70's who haven't had the time to build up resil or arena have a chance to contribute in a pvp setting.
Heilig Mar 20th 2008 1:14AM
1700-1750 is the point where skill begins to become a real factor in arena. Scrub resto druid/ms warrior teams with zero skill can get to about 1700 without trying, but after that they begin to have to know what they're doing. If they're going to keep the requirements, they should be around 1750 for the weapons and 1850 for the shoulders. That's enough to prove you have SOME skill, but not so high as to make them too difficult to acquire.
Werther Mar 20th 2008 1:22AM
I always thought the Arenas were supposed to be about skill and not gear when they released it. Clearly this is not the case except among the top teams who are the only ones fighting on the same terms.
Arenas should only be about skill. Best would be if everyone got full arena gear when they entered and that it then was about the team that played the best and not the one with most resilience or gear.
The better teams will get their gear with the rating system also the only thing that happens is that the casual arena players have an even smaller chance of ever winning an arena match without the gear they need.
I say remove the arena rating and lets all fight on the same terms!
hpavc Mar 20th 2008 1:59AM
You see S3 versus S3 teams where the outcomes are hilarious. If there is a grind, there is going to be a lack of skill and a flood of players mindlessly participating.
I would like to see something along the lines of gems that worked based on your current personal rating. A 1800 gem would give you +24, a 2200 gem +32. When you loose the rating the gem is gone.
Simple compromise compared to loosing full gear and it gives a /salute to the hardcore and skilled players.
Habib Mar 20th 2008 3:44AM
Keeping the requirements on the shoulders makes absolutely no sense. It was put there purely for e-peen enhancement among the top players in the current season. Leaving it on last-season's clearance rack goods is retarded. The weapon I can understand, as it can be a substantial gear improvement - particularly for melee classes.
theRaptor Mar 20th 2008 2:42AM
So people who have the personal rating to get S3 shoulders but not S4 wouldn't like that system? I think you are wrong.
hoeding Mar 20th 2008 2:43AM
The thing that scares me is that so far the s3 gear has been ilvl equivalent to T6 gear. What is the s4 gonna be like without an equivalent T7 to go with? It really is a kick in a face that even once I finish my t6 set on my warlock I'll still be undergeared for pvp.
theRaptor Mar 20th 2008 3:07AM
If you think you can beat people in arena gear using *any* level of PVE gear you are deluded. The resil and stam they have will let them kick your ass with ease. Have fun never critting and doing 3/4's of your full damage against targets that have twice your health. They really are two separate gear paths now.
Eternalpayn Mar 20th 2008 6:50AM
Honestly, I think a warrior, paladin, or druid with the right set of t6 tanking gear could PvP pretty well because of all of the defensive stats, especially with offensive enchants.
Also, if S4 is even pre-WOTLK, chances are it won't be a whole lot better than S3. My guess is the rating requirement went down by 50 because S4 is only marginally better. That makes more sense than T7 PvP gear, right?
dan Mar 20th 2008 2:24PM
Sadly you're wrong, Eternalpayn. The lack of resilience is still noticeable.
To answer the op's question: I think the ratio is rating drop should match the ratio in honor drop.
SSquawk Mar 20th 2008 4:43AM
I love when "leet" pvp'ers complain that someone else can get the same gear they can. If you are as good as you think, you wouldn't care if they could gear match you. Stroke your team balance (or unbalanced if you prefer) egos somewhere else.
You had your advantage with your trump cards last cycle; afraid someone might challenge you with equal gear? Get over yourself. If you are as awesome as you think, you'd welcome the fights on equal ground gearwise.
theRaptor Mar 20th 2008 5:34AM
I don't arena and I complain about the ease of the gear. You don't get full sets of raid gear by failing at raiding, yet you can fail your way into full PVP epics. What is the point of competing? Where is the incentive to be good?
If you are just PVPing for competition go play a real PVP game. If you want an equal competition you go play an FPS or RTS where everyone is equal from the beginning. Not an MMO where you have to grind for months to be "equal".
Pavid Mar 20th 2008 5:49AM
Lame. They should get rid of the personal rating for pvp gear in my opinion. The pvp community is different than the pve community from my experience. We don't really make a big fuss over other people having the same gear as us. It makes the fights feel more epic. So this rating requirements isn't something the pvp community has been asking for. It's the raiders who demanded their be rating requirements. It should be 1750 for the weapons and shoulders as a compromise to make the obnoxious raiders happy.
theRaptor Mar 20th 2008 5:57AM
Why not just have no gear in arena then? Or give everyone standard gear just for signing up? If it really is just about the equal combat then gear should be taken out of the equation.
Here is a hint, millions of people aren't arena failing there way to epics so they can engage in equal PVP combat. They just want to see shiney purplez on their characters and feel more uber then the people without the purplez.