Posts with tag arenas

Gear that's used as a currency will keep its upgraded status

by Olivia Grace Nov 28th 2012 at 3:00PM

Gear that's used as a currency will keep upgraded status

If the title confused, you, fear not, you're not alone. WoW Insider had to read Bashiok's post a few times to wrap our collective heads around it, too.

Bashiok

Quote:

So here is my question.. If you upgrade the Regular Season 12 Malevolent gear twice and then say you get 2200 and upgrade to the elite, does your upgrades you already made to the previous gear remain or do you now have to spend additional conquest to upgrade the 2200 gear twice now?

They remain. If a piece of gear is used as currency for a new piece of gear, upgrades are preserved.

source

Say, for example, you have a piece of the standard-issue Malevolent set, the current conquest set. You achieve a rating of 2200, and in order to upgrade your piece to the Elite equivalent, you have to hand in the original piece. It's a straight swap.

And players can now upgrade the standard-issue Malevolent pieces with conquest points, so what Bashiok's saying is that those upgrades will remain in place on the Elite equivalent. The Elite equivalent can, of course, also be upgraded with conquest points. This is only currently relevant for conquest gear changes, as this is the only situation where gear items are used to purchase other gear items. It would not apply to raid finder tokens, as it's the token that is redeemed, rather than the item itself. That is not to say that other applications of this rule will not arise in future, as they have in the past. Wrath heroic raid upgrades used a similar system, and, of course, both Cataclysm legendary weapons. With the minimum item level for upgrades set at 458, these items will not be applicable for the upgrade system.

However, it will be interesting to see if it applies with the Elite conquest weapons. These, unlike the armor, are a substantial upgrade in item level, going from 470 to 490. If the upgrades are passed on with these items, it could result in an even more problematic gear escalation situation than currently exists in PvP.

Mists of Pandaria is here! The level cap has been raised to 90, many players have returned to Azeroth, and pet battles are taking the world by storm. Keep an eye out for all of the latest news, and check out our comprehensive guide to Mists of Pandaria for everything you'll ever need to know.

Filed under: PvP, Mists of Pandaria

Countering heavy burst in PvP

by Olivia Grace Nov 21st 2012 at 4:00PM

The early part of the first Mists of Pandaria season features a lot of what Blizzard was trying to avoid -- heavy burst damage. This is particularly a problem when combined with a high level of crowd control, and as I've regularly said, heavy burst is one of the more frustrating things to counter. There is still heavy burst in the game, post the fixing of the hunter Stampede buff, so the question remains, what can you do about it?

I won't be giving you a class-by-class guide on what exactly to do about burst damage. Unless you happen to play one of the classes I specialize in, chances are you know your class far better than I do, and even if you do play one of my classes there's still a possibility you know it better! This definitely isn't class-by-class advice, but a general guide about mentality, tactics and the like. And please, do add to it in the comments with class-specific advice if you have it! Everything helps.

Prevention is better than cure

This is me stealing something doctors and aunts and grandparents used to say when I was a kid, usually referring to illness rather than WoW PvP. But it applies for this, too. If you can stop someone unleashing their heavy burst on you or your team-mates, that's a far better solution than having to pick them up from extremely low health afterwards. I haven't seen something in an arena in a long old time that can genuinely take a player from 100% to dead in one global, but there are some really hard-hitting abilities out there.

Filed under: PvP, Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

Arena rating reset for players over 2200

by Olivia Grace Nov 20th 2012 at 5:00PM

Rating reset for players rated over 2200

After the release of last week's information from Blizzard Community Manager Daxxarri, more has been added to the list of action Blizzard is taking to rectify the problems caused by the recently discovered arena MMR exploit.

Amongst other things, this exploit made win-trading far less onerous. Win-trading is a practice, completely against the terms of service, where players queue, particularly in 5v5 at the quietest times of day, to attempt to ensure they face the same team repeatedly. The two teams will then trade wins, allowing one team to advance to a high rating, then the winning team may switch to an alt team, allowing the losing team to do the same. This is, as we mentioned, completely against the terms of service, and will likely get you banned.

With the exploit, win-trading could be carried out without the losing team suffering an MMR loss. Thanks to this, very high ratings were achievable, and in order to rectify this issue, Blizzard has decided to reset every team and player with an MMR or rating above 2200 to 2200. This would usually have an immediate effect on conquest point caps, but that will take effect next week and will be implemented as usual.

Is this fair? It seems like it might not be for those who have legitimately gained 2200+ ratings, without using the exploits, and for those who benefited unwittingly from the exploit. Equally, why has Blizzard not gone further and completely reset MMR and rating? Do these things only matter at the top?

Hit the break for Daxxarri's full post.

Filed under: News items, PvP

Blizzard will take decisive action against arena exploiters

by Olivia Grace Nov 13th 2012 at 5:00PM

Blizzard Community Manager Daxxarri has posted today regarding a recently discovered Arena exploit. While precise details are not known, it appears this relates the a method whereby players could escape from playing against comps they were struggling with, countercomps, or teams they had faced previously, without losing MMR by exiting the game.

This, while not win-trading itself, led to win-trading, and, as Daxxarri says, both win-trading and the use of exploits are completely against the rules.

Daxxarri

Providing an environment where players can compete in the spirit of fair play is extremely important to us, particularly in rated Player versus Player combat. As part of that commitment we regularly monitor gameplay, and have discovered an issue where some Arena teams have exploited the queuing system to obtain high team ratings, "dodge" unfavorable team compositions, and engage in win trading.

These, and all, exploitative activities are absolutely prohibited. We will investigate the situation carefully, and players that have been found to have participated in exploitation will be subject to the appropriate actions against their World of Warcraft accounts. In the meantime, we are currently working to resolve any remaining issues with the queue system to prevent this behavior in the future.

source

Players will have to wait and see just what Blizzard's investigation reveals, and what their actions will be as far as punishing the perpetrators. Many are already calling for ladder resets and MMR resets, but of course, these can punish the innocent as well as the guilty. The nature of this bug is such that it's possible some players benefiting from it may have been unaware they were doing so.

Filed under: News items, PvP

Arenajunkies interviews top Arena priests

by Olivia Grace Nov 9th 2012 at 4:00PM

With the Battle.net World Championships coming up in just a few days' time, ArenaJunkies has been very busy interviewing some of the top arena players who'll be battling it out in Shanghai. We've got interviews from two of what I can fairly confidently say are among the world's top priests, Zunniyaki and Talbadar.

Zunniyaki is a member of Yaspresents, with Another on a death knight and Cara on a paladin. Yaspresents stormed to a decisive victory in the Battle.net European Invitationals in Cologne, comfortably dismissing most of their competition in an undefeated run of best of 3 matches.

Talbadar is one third of Team Evil Geniuses, along with renowned shaman and warlock Cdew and Azael. Again, like Yaspresents, Evil Geniuses took a victory in the North American Invitationals, comfortably securing their place in Shanghai.

Both these priests are at the top of their game, and bound to make a splash during the tournaments coming up between November 16 and 18. Hit the break for the second video interview with Talbadar!

Filed under: PvP, Worldwide Invitational

Is crowd control out of control?

by Olivia Grace Nov 9th 2012 at 2:00PM

There has been an interesting discussion taking place over on the EU forums with Blizzard Community Manager Nakatoir about the state of crowd control in PvP. There seems, predictably, to be a focus on arenas in the discussion, which is logical, since they seems to be where crowd control is generally used most effectively.

Nakatoir's contributions are largely in response to complaints from players about chain CC. Chain CC is where an opposing team manage to keep a player controlled for a long period of time by "chaining" together their crowd control abilities. This can be a hugely frustrating experience, as a good CC chain can keep a player out of action for a long period of time. Often, as is the CC-ing team's plan, long enough to land a kill on the CC'd player's team-mate.

Nakatoir provides some great advice for countering CC, rightly saying that chaining together one 33-second chain of CC, as one poster describes, requires a great deal of focus and communication. A CCing team is playing offensively, if they're using the CC to land a kill rather than to turtle, and sometimes attack is the best form of defense.

Filed under: PvP, Mists of Pandaria

Dissecting the Dev Watercooler on PvP

by Olivia Grace Nov 7th 2012 at 1:00PM

A few days ago, Blizzard Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street released a very lengthy Dev Watercooler on Mists of Pandaria PvP. Now that the dust has had a chance to settle, we're going to take a look at the blog and its implications for PvP right now. Next time we might look at some of their zany ideas for future PvP!

MMR

MMR, or Match-Making Rating is how teams are matched in rated PvP. MMR is separate from rating, but both are altered when you win or lose against other rated teams. Explaining the difference between the two is a little tricky, but essentially, MMR is how your matches are found. MMR is linked to players and teams, so a player forming a new team will carry some of their MMR with them from previous PvP escapades, in order for them not to face far lower-rated players. Rating is also linked to both players and teams, but doesn't dictate who you face.

Rating is won and lost via winning and losing against teams with better and worse MMRs. Say you're at 1500 MMR and 1500 rating, and you face a team at 1600 MMR and 1600 rating, and you lose. You will only lose a small amount of rating, let's say 5, and they will only gain a small amount, again let's say 5. Both your MMRs will adjust similarly. Now say you beat them. They will lose a big chunk of rating, but likely not such a big chunk of MMR. You, equally, will gain a big chunk of rating, and depending on how many matches you've played, likely gain a reasonable amount of MMR. The MMR is saying "hey these guys beat a 1600 team. They're better than a 1500 MMR".

Filed under: PvP, Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

More Conquest Point Changes: PvP to PvE?

by Olivia Grace Nov 6th 2012 at 1:00PM

Following the recent alteration to a so-called bug which had existed since the launch of Patch 4.2, conquest points are to undergo further alteration. In preparation for Patch 5.1's system, which will allow PvP and PvE players to upgrade their gear with all four types of point, Blizzard Community Manager Daxxarri has posted about an upcoming increase to the conquest point cap:

Daxxarri

To help everyone keep up with the upcoming system in 5.1 that will allow you to upgrade your Conquest gear with Conquest Points, a hotfix is being implemented very soon that will raise the Conquest Point caps:

At 1500 rating, the Arena Conquest Cap will now be 1800 (up from 1350), while the Rated Battleground Conquest cap will be 2200 (up from 1650). As always, when your rating increases, so will your cap.

Plan accordingly!

source

While this is a welcome change, the question remains: does this repair the earlier issue of players having to enter rated battlegrounds to complete the weekly cap? We aren't sure. And furthermore, it seems possible that Blizzard's team could be opening themselves up to a second issue. Since the stats on PvP gear were altered to all but match those on PvE gear, PvP gear is viable in PvE. But conquest gear has no reputation requirements, and conquest points can be earned far faster than valor, with one arena win awarding 180 points. With these increased caps, will PvP become the way to gear for PvE?

Filed under: News items, PvP

Beast mastery hunters may escape Stampede nerf

by Olivia Grace Nov 1st 2012 at 12:00PM

Blizzard Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street posted a lengthy Dev Watercooler yesterday, focused on Mists of Pandaria PvP.

Within that Dev Watercooler, one thing he mentioned was the extremely high burst being put out by Beast Mastery Hunters, saying:

Ghostcrawler

Beastmastery Hunters – We agree that stacking too many cooldowns to blow someone up is not interesting, skillful, or fair. (I also want to be clear that with all of these issues, we're not blaming players for using the tools that we gave them; we're blaming ourselves.) We're taking a hard look at the various Hunter cooldowns with the intention of reducing their burst. Hunters are receiving a buff in that they will no longer need to swap between Aspect of the Hawk and Aspect of the Fox. We also hope these changes help result in higher representation of Survival and Marksman Hunters.

source

Very shortly after the Dev Watercooler was posted, Ghostcrawler took to twitter, announcing that a substantial bug had been discovered, which only affected beast mastery hunters in the arena:

Good news. We found a bug with Stampede being too high only in Arenas. That accounts for why feedback can be so varied. More info later.
- Greg Street (@Ghostcrawler) October 31, 2012

Community Manager Zarhym emailed us late last night to inform us that the bug had been isolated and added to the beast mastery hunter-specific section of the blog. The bug is now detailed as follows:

Filed under: PvP, Mists of Pandaria

The state of PvP: Current issues, balance and communication

by Olivia Grace Oct 24th 2012 at 4:00PM

First and foremost, before we get into the heavy stuff, I wanted to give a brief run-down of the Tol'viron Arena. As you can see from the header image, it's very similar to Nagrand Arena, the 4-pillar arena much beloved of caster teams and tree-huggers everywhere. Again, if you take a look at the header image you can see that there are 2 pillars on one side, and one on the other. The result of this from the games I've had so far is simply that most caster teams prefer the two-pillar side, while melee teams will try to draw casters out. It's much the same play experience as Nagrand Arena, only with slightly fewer options for pillar-humping.

The three pillars seem to be equidistant apart, with the two pillars naturally closer to the doors, and quite a run to the single pillar at the start. The runs between the pillars are somewhat longer than in Nagrand, so be aware of your line of sight and distance to healers if you're both on different pillars. This arena seems to only rarely permit a healer to hug one pillar while healing a DPS who is hugging another, range-wise. Be aware! Also, I ran to the wrong side at the start several times. Get your bearings!

Filed under: PvP, Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

Getting started in PvP Season 12

by Olivia Grace Oct 10th 2012 at 1:00PM

PvP Season 12 has begun, as we informed you last week. First and foremost, where are the vendors with the PvP gear? They're a little hidden away in Mists, that's for sure, with the Alliance vendor on the Serpent's Spine, the huge wall, level with the border between Vale of Eternal Blossoms and Valley of the Four Winds. There is a flight point there, but you won't have it unless you happened to pick it up while looking for Bowmistress Li. The Horde vendor is also on the wall, but between Townlong Steppes and Kun Lai Summit, a short way west of the corner. Again, there's a flight point there, but you likely won't have it. For both vendors, you can reach them by getting up onto the wall at pretty much any point you can, and running along it. Of course, you'll likely be 90 before you're interested in hunting them down, so you can just fly on over!

And do check out our guides to the Silvershard Mines and Temple of Kotmogu.

Weapon Problems

The PvP vendors sell both item level 458 honor gear, and item level 483 conquest gear, but there is currently a complete absence of honor weapons. Rather flying in the face of the so-called "you can play the game how you want to" Mists philosophy, PvPers are yet again required to get their early PvP weapons via PvE. While hardly new at the beginning of an expansion, it's rather frustrating.

Filed under: PvP, Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

PvP Season 12 has begun

by Robin Torres Oct 2nd 2012 at 4:00PM

It's time to spend your honor points on some Dreadful gear and get back into the rated PvP game, as Season 12 began today. All ratings have been reset and the level 90 rated battlegrounds and arenas are open for play.

Two new stats have been introduced to PvP gear this expansion: PvP Power and PvP Resilience. For more information about these stats and the difference between PvP and PvE gear, see this helpful Blood Sport guide.

Wowhead has a preview of the new gear, where to get it, and the prices of all the pieces that are currently in game. Their model viewer will show you how the new outfits will look on your character, as well.

So assemble your teams and get to it! For the Horde! [Insert Alliance battlecry here.]

The full announcement from Blizzard is after the break.

Filed under: News items, PvP, Mists of Pandaria

PvP Power, PvP Resilience and PvE gear

by Olivia Grace Sep 28th 2012 at 4:00PM

For any readers who don't know, Mists of Pandaria brought about a fairly substantial change in PvP gear. Resilience and Spell Penetration were removed, and replaced with two shiny new stats: PvP Power and PvP Resilience. PvP Resilience is essentially the same as the old Resilience stat, reducing your damage taken from other players. It's active all the time, whenever you're wearing your PvP gear.

PvP Power is not, as many believe, a direct 1 for 1 counter to PvP Resilience. PvP Power increases your damage against other players. So, if you're a player who has 0 PvP power, hitting a player who has 50% damage mitigation from PvP Resilience, and your hit does 100 damage, it will only hit them for 50 damage.

Say you are that same player, only now you have a 100% damage increase against other players from PvP Power. Your 100 damage hit now hits another player for 200 damage. But, the player with 50% damage mitigation is still resisting 50% of that damage, so it hits them for 100 damage.

Of course, these values are not correct in-game, but we're getting to that. They're just for illustration!

Filed under: Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

Blood Sport: Sitting down with a top arena team

by Olivia Grace Sep 12th 2012 at 1:00PM

Blood Sport interviews a top Arena team not in 3 with this title

I was lucky enough to attend the World of Warcraft European Invitational tournament in Cologne, it was a fantastic tournament, with some of the most exciting games I've watched in a while. If you want to check out the video coverage, you can do so by visiting ESL's twitch TV channel.

Among the games, I was lucky enough to sit down for a chat with one of the eight competing teams, Eat Nerds Get Birds. This amusingly, if hastily named team comprised Jimos, playing a retribution paladin, Dreamz, on a restoration shaman, and Colarn, on an Arms warrior. While they weren't one of the top 2 teams who made it through to the World Championship finals in China, these guys are PvPing at the highest level, and it was great to sit down with them and get their tips on what makes a good arena team, and discuss various other elements of PvP right now.

Q: Do you go into matches with a pre-defined strategy, or are you more going in to see what happens and react accordingly?

A: We always, always have a pre-defined strategy for our comp against pretty much every other comp. We don't think you could play without that, it's pretty vital. You need to work out what strengths your comp has against the other comps you see a lot, and play to those strengths. To devise these strategies, though, you need to try out lots of different approaches, and see what works and what doesn't. When you're trying things out, you need to take a strategy and do just that. You might lose a few games if your strategy is bad, but if you don't give it a proper try you won't know!

Filed under: Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

PvP impressions in 5.0.4

by Olivia Grace Aug 29th 2012 at 2:00PM

So here we are. The patch has landed in both the United States and the EU, and we're all looking, bewildered, at our new talent screens. Alas, there are no arenas or rated battlegrounds available with which to really try out our talents, but we can take some small comfort in the continued availability of non-rated battlegrounds. (I do, by the way, find it rather frustrating that the main PvP content is absent from the game for an entire month. Imagine if raids were closed down! But anyway, that's a complaint for another time.)

Of the things I am really excited about in 5.0.4, the top one has to be talent trees. A lot of these talents, while providing situational bonuses in PvE, are really going to be game-changers in PvP. It was promised to us by Tom Chilton that, before arenas, we would be able to see the class and spec of the opposing team and be able to modify our talents accordingly. We won't, however, see exactly how the opposition's talents are distributed.

One important change for healers to note is that your dispel now has an 8-second (current beta build) cooldown but removes two effects rather than one. Gone are the days of spam dispels -- warlocks, rejoice! Warlocks are doing a lot of rejoicing right now.

Also notable is that Spell Penetration has been turned into PvP Power, Resilience has become PvP resilience, and everyone is now running around with a base 40% damage mitigation. PvP resilience numbers seem to provide a little less mitigation than the old resilience did, in a full conquest point set, gemmed for resilience, damage mitigation is 68.32%. The tooltip indicates that what was 5,200 resilience has been altered to 3,058 PvP resilience. This translates to 28.32% of the 68.32% total mitigation figure.

Filed under: PvP, Blood Sport (Arena PvP)

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