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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsBrutal ratings requirement for Brutal Gladiator items?
by Zach Yonzon 
Apr 14th 2008 at 1:30PM
There is no guarantee that these item changes will make it live or if the weapon requirements -- currently 1850 for Season 3 -- have also been raised. Although Tharfor has gone on record to state that it's likely that Season 3 items' ratings requirements will be lowered in Season 4, Blizzard didn't mention raising the rating requirements for Brutal Gladiator pieces. According to Realm History, this means that roughly 12% of players rated 2000 and above in 5v5 teams will qualify for the shoulder pieces; 11% of the 3v3 bracket; and about 9% of the 2v2 bracket. That means an even smaller percentage of the general population. As much as Patch 2.4 catered to casual content, if these details make it live, it seems as though Arena play has become even more hardcore than ever.
Filed under: Items, Analysis / Opinion, PvP, Arena
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 3)
Nox Apr 14th 2008 3:19PM
Arenas are a joke. They are filled with cheating and win trading. Win traders farm points off of people in the low rating brackets while leveling their alt teams up and then transfer those points to their main team by loosing over and over to them in pre-arranged fights. This drops their alts back into the 1200 -1300 bracket for more point farming the next day.
Your average player is faced with teams that have the organization, skill, and gear of a high level arena team but a measly 1200 or 1300 rating. At best the average player could hope to pull a 10 win out of the deal while the cheaters are pretty much guarented an 18 pt windfall off of the fight.
And Bliz has no desire to shake off the cheaters suckling at their bovine teats and trampling on the bulk of pvp players because most average players don't even know they are being scammed! They figure "hey they must just be lucky or something" and continue on their way loosing over and over. I honestly dont understand how anyone trying to get into the PvP system now without having Teir gear to bolster them on their way could ever hope to bypass the barrier to enter of these cheating alt toerags.
Bliz knows this cheating happens every day. It would be fairly easy to track down who is doing it and punish them. But it will never happen. Why? I couldnt hazard a guess. But by upping the rating requirement for these items and not cleaning up the cheaters that ruin the system for most people all they are doing is encouraging more cheating and eliteist prickery that is based not on actual skill, but cunning, guile, and lack of personal character.
Bliz... making better people for a better tomorow.
GG.
Burori Apr 14th 2008 3:24PM
this is just silly. Not every class can get to 2200. Blizzard is making it easier to pve then to pvp. Not only are the new badge rewards t6 equivalent, they added badges to 25man bosses. Any guild that dose kara, gruul, and mag regularly can get free t6 quality gear... Raiding to get gear is nothing like what it was pre bc.... Raiding in bc is thousands of times more casual now... if anything pvp gear is now the harder to get gear. My guild just downed archimond and we are focusing in bt now. Ill tell you this... if you are like me and experienced pre bc raiding(bwl, mc, aq40) then you know that raiding is nothing like what it use to be. its much more casual now.
difficulty:
Arenas > Raiding and Heroics > Honor(Bg's)
Manatank Apr 14th 2008 4:01PM
Does casual mean easier? I think what you are saying is that it requires less dedication and time, which is a good thing in my opinion. I've seen terrible players pop into thier full tier sets from Pre-BC and as someone who didn't play WoW back then I only have to wonder how easy it must have been when crappy players could have gotten all that gear?
vildand Apr 15th 2008 12:20AM
"Not every class can get to 2200."
They can. Knock yourself out: http://www.sk-gaming.com/arena/
Badger Apr 14th 2008 4:12PM
/ Nathan_Explosion
Dude. 2200 Points? That's BRUTAL.
Nati Apr 14th 2008 4:26PM
Zach, your numbers off realm history are WAY off. Those are the percentage of players above 2000 rating! It's more like, 0.1% of players on all brackets will qualify for the shoulders, if even that!
Zach Apr 14th 2008 4:33PM
Are you sure? I'm looking at:
http://www.realmhistory.net/arena-statistics/rating-breakdown.html
I'm looking at the players from 2201-2300. Not sure if I'm reading the statistics wrong. Where'd you get your data? I'd love to get a more accurate assessment.
Nati Apr 14th 2008 4:43PM
You're reading the site wrong - it ONLY takes into account players over 2000 rating. Look at the site again... for example, the 3vs3 bracket. It STARTS at 2000-2100, not 0-2100. If you need further proof, add the percentages together - 67 + 20 + 9 + 3 + 1 = 100. That'd mean that 0% of all players were below 2000, which is clearly not the case. ;)
The vast, vast majority of players never even see 1700. Most are around 1500.
Nox Apr 14th 2008 6:37PM
Yeah check the numbers on the site. None of them even add up. But if you were going to take any info from it then look at the percentages. 82% of people above 2k rating don't even qualify for the new shoulders.
Only a tiny percentage of people will qualify for the new gear.
Just look at the armory. On my Battlegroup only 25 5v5 teams currently have the 2200 rating or better.
There are 4000 teams with a 1501 or better rating in the same Battlegroup.
Zach Apr 15th 2008 3:04AM
Ah, awesome. I fail at math. Thanks for the heads up. Now, I need a site that will give me actual numbers for all players, darnit.
tython25 Apr 14th 2008 6:17PM
You mean the better classes (warrior/ druid 2v2 teams) will get the S4 shoulders, not the better players.
Until the classes are balanced, gear rating requirements are just stupid...
Rellik Apr 14th 2008 9:52PM
A few of the posters are correct that the realm information only accounts for 100% of the players currently ranked over 2k.
It would be great to post true percentage of players that would qualify for the ratings based from all active teams, not just 2k+ teams.
scott Apr 15th 2008 9:49AM
Um, Nox?
You do know that arena matches are now done by the higher of team or PERSONAL rating now, yes? So having alts sink your team rating doesn't benefit people anymore.
Nox Apr 15th 2008 5:56PM
Its done with two different teams man.
Ill outline it for you. I know I'm telling people how to cheat here but hopefully if enough people know about it then it will be fixed.
Take two teams. Fill one with your elite PvP mains. Fill one with PvP alts. Level your alts up to 1700 or 1800 (more if you can). Then pick an off peak time for your Battle group (like 2 am Wed morning) and que both teams while on vent with each other. Looser enters Arena first. If Winners have the same BG pop at the same time then they enter it and likely are against their loosing team. if half your matches are against this loosing team... and you win half of your other matches... then you have a 75% win percentage for the week. Now its your turn to loose to your buddies with a different team. Then.... and here is the worst part... the next day... they take out their loosing team which now has a 1200 rating having lost 20 games in a row the night before... and start PvPing against you and me and all the other midlevel teams in the 1500 bracket. They are geared in good gear, they are experienced pvpers who play together almost every day, and as you would expect... they melt faces untill they get back up into the 1600 - 1800 brackets.
This is how they farm points off of average players and give them to their high ranked teams.
This happens every day.
Posts about it on the boards are deleted.
Wowinsider had an item about it four months ago and yet no one seems to know about this stuff.
http://www.wowinsider.com/2007/11/27/win-trading-cheating-for-the-top-arena-spots
Zach Apr 16th 2008 6:09PM
Win trading is cheap, dastardly, and absolutely considered an exploit of game mechanics.
Jeffzor Apr 16th 2008 6:06PM
Keep making arena gear better and better, and soon enough, the only places pve'ers are safe are towns and raids. I want to be able to quest without getting run over by some red name with gear that means I don't have a chance, and I don't have the time to stack up on pvp AND pve gear. And the scrubs who buy this gear do it just so they can go have fun with the opposing faction. In my opinion, blizz needs to add an in-game outfitter, and have arena gear be worn in arenas only. I can't take my legendary shield out of Kael's room, why should they take their shiny pvp purples out of designated pvp areas?
Zach Apr 16th 2008 6:08PM
PvE'rs are perfectly safe in their PvE realms, Jeffzor. Perfectly, absolutely safe.
Buuty Apr 18th 2008 12:58PM
Why do people keep making this comment? Are you not reading anything else?
"let the better players get the better loot, just like it's supposed to be."
Zor Apr 22nd 2008 4:06PM
simple solution
you can only wear pvp arena gear in the BRACKET your in,
with a small margin of error
as the OP puts it "for your off days'
no one goes from 2000+ to 1200 w/o something being messed up
omglolok Apr 22nd 2008 5:57PM
http://jumi.lut.fi/~japalvia/pics/retard.gif
learn from it.