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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsIs PvP gear good enough for heroics?
by Anne Stickney 
Mar 5th 2012 at 3:00PM
I don't really PvP these days. In vanilla, I had plenty of fun with my priest, running around and healing people who were on the mad dash for High Warlord. Back then, there wasn't really much in the way of PvP-appropriate gear -- in fact, when the honor system began, the most effective and deadly people you ran across in Battlegrounds were those who were raiding and collecting tier gear.
I remember that fact particularly infuriated a friend of mine, who over the course of vanilla did nothing but PvP, although at the time that meant basically running around Southshore and Tarren Mill. When the honor system was introduced, there was a contest held by Blizzard for those who engaged in PvP, and the top characters on the realm who got the most amount of honorable kills were rewarded with a special tabard. My friend spent weeks in Tarren Mill, happily murdering Alliance until his fingers bled, and he won his tabard handily -- after all, nobody really did as much PvP as he did. Then the Battlegrounds came out.
When he stepped into Battlegrounds, he discovered that despite the fact that he did nothing but PvP, he couldn't hold a candle against those people who engaged in raiding. The gear and weapons that they got from raiding were too powerful. And that's when he threw up his hands, said he didn't want to have to raid to be good at PvP, and promptly stopped playing the game.
I remember that fact particularly infuriated a friend of mine, who over the course of vanilla did nothing but PvP, although at the time that meant basically running around Southshore and Tarren Mill. When the honor system was introduced, there was a contest held by Blizzard for those who engaged in PvP, and the top characters on the realm who got the most amount of honorable kills were rewarded with a special tabard. My friend spent weeks in Tarren Mill, happily murdering Alliance until his fingers bled, and he won his tabard handily -- after all, nobody really did as much PvP as he did. Then the Battlegrounds came out.
When he stepped into Battlegrounds, he discovered that despite the fact that he did nothing but PvP, he couldn't hold a candle against those people who engaged in raiding. The gear and weapons that they got from raiding were too powerful. And that's when he threw up his hands, said he didn't want to have to raid to be good at PvP, and promptly stopped playing the game.
The reason I tell this story is because I remember those days, and I remember when there weren't such things as resilience or PvP gear. If you wanted to be good at PvP, you picked up the best PvE gear you could find. The change between now and then is so different that there's no comparing the two. PvPers got their own gear, their own stats, and their own PvP world that they could pretty much live in forever, without having to worry about gear or anything else. My friend would probably be pleased with how much it's changed, though I lost track of him long ago.
Because PvP has its own set of stats, PvP gear isn't exactly the most ideal thing to wear into an instance. Yet for those who PvP all the time nonstop, if they decide they want to see these instances that everyone's been talking about, their PvP gear is their only option. For DPS classes, it's not as much of an issue -- but when you're talking about a tank, heroics are pretty brutal, particularly the latest stretch of heroics. Can it be done? Yes -- but for new healers or healers who aren't decked out in raid gear, it's extremely difficult to do.
So what do we do about this? Should there be an option for a tank set, one that you can purchase with honor points -- one that doesn't have any PvP stats on it but is simply a starter set for those who want to try PvE tanking? Should there be some sort of gear check when you queue as a tank that looks not only at item level but the presence of resilience on gear? Is there a solution, or do healers simply continue to despair when they see a tank in full PvP gear?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, PvP
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 6)
cantu1991 Mar 5th 2012 3:20PM
Isn't there an option to change honor point to justice points? You could buy tanking gear with those I think. Don't really know, I just look at my cloth gear in the vendors n.n
Mir Mar 5th 2012 3:15PM
A few comments:
There are only three specs that can't wear PVP gear: Blood DKs, and Prot Paladins/Warriors.
For those 3 specs, it's basically 1 (long) day of work to get a complete set of tanking gear good enough for dungeons (either BG and convert HP to JP, or queue for a day as dps). Less if you have some gold laying around (BoE pants, neck, back, bracers, weapon, shield, belt, shoulders though hard to get these days, boots, cloak, trinket, ring...basically if you have gold you can be ready to go in how ever long in takes you to buy gear/gems/enchants).
As a healer I don't despair when I see one of those three specs in PVP gear, I just tell them to put on proper tank gear before they get healed. No gear, no heal.
Luke Mar 6th 2012 1:12AM
Where as I heal them until they prove they can't play their class. If they know how to use their cool downs and know how to pull, I can keep them alive.
Now if we're talking about a RET Paladin who's wearing iLvl 333 gear and has no idea what they're doing that's a different story.
vsolfronK Mar 5th 2012 3:16PM
PVP Ilvl should not count PVE ilvl. Perhaps there should be a 1 to 1 VP and CP though
Mir Mar 5th 2012 3:18PM
Assuming you're dps Jamie, PVP gear >> PVE gear you have now. 377 healing gear would also be better than your gear now. It's only tank gear (for nonbears) where this is a problem.
anthony.croft1989 Mar 5th 2012 3:18PM
GhostCrawler already discussed this http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/4544194/Dev_Watercooler_%E2%80%93_Mists_of_Pandaria_Stat_Changes-3_1_2012#blog his ideas are pretty good, lower the i level of pvp so it has less stats then add pvp stats on top of them that dont take from the i level. not as good a s pve gear for dungeons but still pretty good and vice versa with the addition of the base pvp defense
DarkWalker Mar 5th 2012 4:41PM
You got just one bit wrong: PvP gear isn't really losing stats. Instead, the iLvl will reflect only the PvE stats; PvP stats will be "free", in the sense that it won't factor into the iLvl calculation.
The end result is that a piece of PvP gear and a piece of PvE gear, if they have the same iLvl, will be roughly equivalent in PvE (though, within a single tier, the PvE gear will have a higher iLvl, and thus be better for PvE).
It's, perhaps, the best way to fix players abusing PvP gear to get into the LFD/LFR queue; with the iLvl reflecting the real PvE performance, using the PvP gear becomes a legitimate way to get into the queues. Also, with the iLvl from PvP gear being smaller, they will be much less useful to skip LFD or LFR tiers.
Phredreeke Mar 6th 2012 6:12AM
PvE players are spoiled. You got systems in place to prevent low geared players to get into dungeons/raid finder and you got the option to votekick.
Meanwhile unrated PvPers are stuck with just about anyone who queues regardless of gear
Ghost Mar 5th 2012 3:20PM
Feral tanks have long found pvp gear to be better than non-heroic-raiding tanking gear ever since blizzard stopped itemizing tank gear for bears in burning crusade.
So not all tanks in pvp gear are hard to heal.
And if you see a feral bear not in heroic firelands/DS gear without some resilience, you know they are not geared correctly for pve. Because PvP is the answer for BiS non-heroic-raiding gear for many slots.
And this is why raiding ferals are really looking forward to MoP's change to how pvp gear is done.
yab Mar 5th 2012 4:38PM
Is that so? Interesting. Thanks a lot for that bit of info, will definitely try it on my Druid soon!
daumaenis Mar 5th 2012 5:43PM
There was a time when resilience reduced a player's chance to be crit and it turned out that itemization of gear with resilience was best for bears. Right now, threat stats are quite good for bears as it allows them to maintain savage defense while reducing the effect of rng; having resilience on gear reduces your ability to have threat stats and makes you prone to the effects of rng.
Your assertion that pvp gear is bis for non-hardmode players is a little flawed. This gear is best at what? Having more stamina than someone in 378 gear? Stam is valuable to bears but if you're losing out on ~50% of your other itemization then you're losing out on a lot of threat/mastery. So would my bear's 397 normal mode gear be inferior to 397 (or whatever the number) pvp gear? No. Hardmode gear is clearly superior, but pvp is not; having only 2/3 the savage defense shield with a significantly reduced chance to crit is not an improvement.
Here's the problem: talk about item levels and whatnot is creating a false metric for players by which to judge the value of a piece of gear and/or themselves. Here's the solution: stop caring about item levels and learn about a class/spec before you sing the praises of pvp gear as the end-all.
Soulestream Mar 5th 2012 11:21PM
@daumaenis
PVP isn't great for bears because of the stam, but because of the much higher lvl of agility.
Plate tanks like a mix of stats stam, parry, dodge, mastery. Some are higher than others, but they all contribute. A-> B -> C-> etc.
Bears gear for its agility -------------------->>>>>>Everything else.
A piece of 410 PVP gear might be equivalent to a piece of 378/384 PVE gear for most tanks. For bears its closer to 397 gear. Still not ideal, but if you can't get 397/400+ gear, it aint too bad.
clundgren Mar 5th 2012 3:22PM
I hate this topic, because it reflects a mindset that gear>ability. On the official forums, you see endless threads suggesting that PvP gear not count towards ilevel, etc (typically from people who see no problem with queuing for bgs while wearing pve gear).
In general, obviously PvP gear is not as good as *equivalent ilevel* PvE gear. You will do less dps, and your healing will be less effective. And there is barely any PvP gear that is designed for tank specs.
But who cares? The question that should be asked is whether the person is performing their role effectively. If they are, I could care less whether they are wearing pve gear, pvp gear, or a paper bag. If they aren't, then I don't care if their failure is because of their gear or their general ineptitude.
My pvp gear is full cataclysmic with an ilevel of 401. Wearing it, I do at least 30k dps sustained on a typical heroic boss. Sure, I can do more if I switch to my raid set, but in either case it's ridiculous overkill. And given that even *crafted* pvp gear is ilevel 377, you are more than capable of dpsing or healing heroics in it if you know your spec.
The one exception is when it comes to the tank. This is because a tank in PvP gear is actually a tank *in dps gear*. That's going to be a problem whether the gear is designed for pvp or pve. So in that case a preemptive kick, if s/he won't or can't change to a proper tank set, will probably save everyone a lot of grief.
clundgren Mar 5th 2012 3:31PM
Oops: an addendum to my last point. For feral tanks, pvp gear can sometimes be really good.
Spellotape Mar 5th 2012 6:20PM
clun, you say "who cares?" while also addressing one of the main points of this discussion: pvp-geared tanks.
There are some (not all) pvp-geared tanks and healers whose ability to perform their role is hindered by having inadequate gear - this can also be the case for damage dealers. Their ability to perform their role definitely comes into question when they can't sustain it - if they can't take a hit, run out of mana in a heartbeat, or do such a small amount of damage that some obstacles are impassable (I'm specifically thinking about the Sylvanas encounter).
So I disagree with your assessment that this topic promotes the idea of gear>ability particularly since Anne didn't mention anything of the sort in her article and most people aren't espousing that opinion either.
gewalt Mar 5th 2012 7:11PM
methinks thou dost protest too much
clundgren Mar 5th 2012 7:29PM
@ Spellotape,
This topic is entirely rooted in the notion of skill>gear. Why would you even other looking at someone's gear, ever? If they are performing, they are reforming, if they aren't, they aren't. Why does what they are wearing matter?
I mentioned tanks specifically because it is generally inadvisable to try to perform one role while in gear designed for another, though again, if the person can do it, more power to them. I used to tank Wrath era heroics in my ret set with no problems whatsoever, but things are tougher in Cataclysm. But this article was not limited to tanks, and the majority of players can heal/dps fine in pvp gear.
Finally, I am a proud Stickney fanboy. But I still hate this topic.
threepy Mar 5th 2012 3:25PM
Most of us have a damage meter. Most of us know what damage is adequate in a dungeon and when you're just taking the piss. I wouldn't contemplate it on a tank or a healer. Neither would I contemplate it on my rogue (since I'm so bad at rogue pve). But on my DK? Sure, I'll use a couple of PvP items. I can pull decent damage on my DK and I don't consider myself to be a terrible burden.
Unfortunately my current alt of choice is a Resto Druid so I'm slogging it the hard way.
Noyou Mar 5th 2012 3:46PM
I agree to your point threepy- As long as you can pull decent numbers or keep people alive- it's golden. As soon as someone wipes, a whole different tune. I love you Anne but this topic has been beaten like a rented mule, almost to the point that it is troll bait.
Aceman67 Mar 5th 2012 3:23PM
As a healer all I gotta say is this:
*gets out megaphone, stands on soap box*
NO!
PVP gear is for PVP. Keep it that way. If you want to run PVE content, get PVE gear like the rest of us.