Why it seems like Blizz doesnt care about PvP

[Dabrix32]

I get the assumption that people feel like the Devs dont care about PvP. They are absolutely correct. Blizzard just doesnt care about PvP because PvP is not a huge part of this game. People dont play WoW only for the PvP. If people wanted only PvP they would either play a game like LoL and DoTA or a more PvP focused MMO like Guild Wars, EvE, or Aion.

WoW just doesnt have the same things as PvP MMOs had. Ultima Online had many kinds of PvP like Order vs Chaos alignment fights, Guild Fights, and just straight up PKing. No where was safe and even in towns enemy guilds could kill you without guard retribution. Death also had a consequence because if you died the people who killed you looted all your gear. If you died while flagged a murderer you couldnt rez until the murderer flag had worn off. I think it was around 8 hours online for each person you killed. If you rezed you suffered a hefty stat and skill loss. Dark Age of Camelot was pretty much 95% PvP. The entire end game was RvR. EvE is basically Ultima Online set in space. Kill everyone and take their shit. Griefing is encouraged. Guild Wars is very similar to DAoC. No end game except PvP. Aion was also PvP oriented. Constant danger of enemy players in all zones. And they actually killed you every time they saw you unlike most WoW pvp servers where I have seen Horde and Alliance questing right beside each other with no one ever attacking unless they were pussies with 60 levels on the poor kid. There is absolutely no consequence to death. No exp loss, no gear loss, nothing. If this was a PvP game then being killed by other players would have consequence.

People in WoW are carebears. They complain about everything and want hand holding and feeding via silver spoon. Just read the post below where someone actually think its wrong for their to be a grind to get gear. Wait you mean someone with better gear can kill me? Off to the forums I demand to be on equal ground with someone who has spent many hours EARNING their gear. If you wonder why the Devs dont care about WoW pvp look to the players. They are the reason PvP is so bad in this game because Blizzard seems to listen only to the people who want WoW to be easy mode.. All they want is fairness and hand holding. Wars arent meant to be fair and thats what PvP should be. A war between Horde and Alliance. If Blizzard actually had some employees with a set of balls maybe they could make PvP more of a central activity rather than something like Pet Battles.

[Deleted]

I play WoW ONLY for PvP so you're wrong. I don't wanna play a moba based game for pvp, jesus man!! And there are currently NO good, fluid combat MMO and I've played like, in 10 years, I've tried 30-ish different MMO's. I've had real fun in maybe 3-4 tops. And quit all since they were only fun in the first month. In the end wow is a pve game with pvp minigames. That's how it is Wish they could divide it into 2 games.

[Knolan]

I played wow for pvp only for most of my time and I have many friends who do so too.

The main problem with gear IMO is that the difference between conquest and honor gear is far too big, a 2k players on 496 gear will lose to a 1200 522 geared player simply because he spent some time earning gear before hand. In a competitive game this is pretty bad and I don't find it fun at all and it was even worse when there was no recap system and upgradable gear.

Still, the reason people say that blizzard don't care about PVP is because they take far too long to fix broken specs (if they fix them at all) and because there are some PVE buffs that makes PVP even worse (recent hunter's buff for instance, when hunters are already a very strong class).

[Venziir]

I play WoW ONLY for PvP so you're wrong. I don't wanna play a moba based game for pvp, jesus man!! And there are currently NO good, fluid combat MMO and I've played like, in 10 years, I've tried 30-ish different MMO's. I've had real fun in maybe 3-4 tops. And quit all since they were only fun in the first month. In the end wow is a pve game with pvp minigames. That's how it is Wish they could divide it into 2 games.

That doesn't actually mean he is wrong though, that just means that you only play WoW because of the PvP, which makes you a TINY minority, akin to the Hc Raiders - let's face it, the vast majority of WoW players aren't dedicated enough to be HC raiders or Super-Duper pvp'ers. He is actually quite right in some aspects, mostly the part about Blizzard not really caring too much about PvP, which obviously isn't 100%, but it just very much seems like it, or rather it seems as if they don't really know what to do with PvP, since it's mostly just in the game because it has to.

Also, 10 years, 30+ mmo's and not one you found to have a better PvP than WoW? I find that very strange, since basically every MMO that's been released in the past 10 years have more or less all been said to have had "Better PvP than WoW", besides SWTOR.

- - - Updated - - -

I played wow for pvp only for most of my time and I have many friends who do so too.

The main problem with gear IMO is that the difference between conquest and honor gear is far too big, a 2k players on 496 gear will lose to a 1200 522 geared player simply because he spent some time earning gear before hand. In a competitive game this is pretty bad and I don't find it fun at all and it was even worse when there was no recap system and upgradable gear.

Still, the reason people say that blizzard don't care about PVP is because they take far too long to fix broken specs (if they fix them at all) and because there are some PVE buffs that makes PVP even worse (recent hunter's buff for instance, when hunters are already a very strong class).

Well, that sadly works both ways, as there have been *many* PvP nerfs over the years which in turn completely and royally butt-fucked PvE abilities and specs. This is mostly a case about Blizzard should give abilities different functions, kinda like Rift I think it was.

[Tinsoul]

I get the assumption that people feel like the Devs dont care about PvP. They are absolutely correct. Blizzard just doesnt care about PvP because PvP is not a huge part of this game. People dont play WoW only for the PvP. If people wanted only PvP they would either play a game like LoL and DoTA or a more PvP focused MMO like Guild Wars, EvE, or Aion.

The only part of this that is correct is the first statement. Blizzard does care about pvp. They have employees whose job is to care about pvp. There is frequent communication from them about pvp. Adjustments maybe aren't as frequent as we'd like, but I can appreciate they don't kneejerk everytime a "Nerf X!" thread shows up on a forum.

[Reveries1]

I believe Blizzard cares a lot about pvp but its the community that gets annoyed when what they personally want or believe doesn't get changed or added. There has been and always will be people in the forums thinking something is under powered, over powered too easy to get or too hard to get.

Does pvp have issues? Yes, but pvp evolves. It is not some project that one day will be finished and perfect. WoW pvp is WoW pvp so comparing it to pvp in other games is kind of pointless almost as pointless as complaining about someone not listening but not nearly as pointless as me actually responding to it.

[Tulkus]

I wouldn't say that Blizzard does not care about PvP, but I do agree with the fact that PvP is a minigame in WoW and they dedicate the greater amount of their resources to PvE.

Despite how much you think you know about creating and balancing an MMO, Blizzard is an incredibly smart company and they know to cater to the more casual crowd, which makes up the majority of their subscriptions. They don't have incredibly steep penalties for losing because they know it isn't fun when you die and lose all of your gear or cannot play again for hours at a time. Instead, they chose to make it so when you die/lose, you simply fail to gain anything as opposed to outright losing something. Technically, it is a loss (opportunity cost) and of course you feel bad for losing, but at least you can get back on your pony and keep going.

I also get the vibe that you are the kind of person that wants to get ahead of the gear curve then go around stomping all the casuals. When considering a game that is supposed to be balanced for competitive reasons, you have to put people on roughly the same grounds for fighting instead of letting the people with more time be the winners simply because they have farmed more gear. They know this and this is why we're getting Trial of the Gladiator or whatever the hell it's called in WoD.

[Lilly32]

compared to other MMOs yes the OP is correct in saying PvP isnt a selling point of the game. Ultima Online was very PvP oriented. You had to constantly be watching out for PKers. If you were in a guild then you had to watch out for enemy guilds. I loved PKing because of the fact that you did get to loot other players. Before they added a 1 house limit I had around a dozen from killing people dumb enough to be carrying house keys. DAoC again pretty much 100% PvP. I dont count ToA expansion as it was basically the Cata expansion for DAoC. End game in DAoC was PvP and thats all you did. Only time you ever did PvE was to get a few pieces gear for PvP as most of your gear was crafted by other players. I only played Aion on private servers but again end game was PvP. Guild Wars 1 had PvP only characters. The only raiding in Guild Wars 2 is large scale PvP battles. Never played EvE but from what I have read its basically Ultima Online in space so very cut throat and hard core.

To me in order for PvP to be a central part of the game it has to be semi hardcore. There has to be pros and cons and death has to have meaning. In Ultima Online for example there was massive penalties for death. as a PKer I was flagged as a murderer. If I ever got killed then I could not rez until I was no longer flagged. If you rezed you ate a 25% stat penalty. So if you had 7 skills at 100 then rezed as a murderer they all went to do 75% If you died you were going to love all your loot. If you had a house key and recall rune on you then they got your house. In WoW Death has absolutely ZERO consequence. There is no loss of gear or even EXP.

In order for a game to be centered more around PvP you cant have a bunch of weaklings playing. People hit the forums and QQ about everything PvP related in WoW. People camping quest givers or lowbies? To the Forums! WoW players are just carebears plain and simple. Even when people play on a PVP server they complain about getting ganked. Seriously why did you even pick a PvP server in the first place? Also what the hell did you even lose? You didnt lose your gear or even a single percent of EXP so shut up and stop crying. People cried that they were bads and couldnt win Wintergrasp so Blizzard nerfed it making both sides have even numbers. People cry about the gear grind so Blizzard gives them wellfare resilience. People cry that other people have better gear so Blizzard puts in ilvl scaling. People cry about twinks so item enhancements got nerfed. People cry about level 10s having to play against level 19s so BGs got split into 10-14 and 15-19 brackets. Apparently that wasnt good enough for these sissies so they kept crying and Blizzard added some retarded ass scaling up for people at the lowest level of each bracket so they could have similar health as the higher levels. People in WoW want to be pvp gods but they dont want to work for it. Look at the 2 largest BGs AV and IoC. They could be awesome massive fights between Horde and Alliance yet Blizzard made them into PvE zones. Thats why this will never be a PvP game. You have a vocal group of bads who keep getting everything nerfed and getting free handouts.

- - - Updated - - -

Does pvp have issues? Yes, but pvp evolves. It is not some project that one day will be finished and perfect. WoW pvp is WoW pvp so comparing it to pvp in other games is kind of pointless almost as pointless as complaining about someone not listening but not nearly as pointless as me actually responding to it.

Except in this case its evolving for the worse. Lets look at what has happened over the years.

Twinks nerfed and placed in their own EXP off brackets
No more 10 level brackets
Low lvl get scaled up
Wellfare resilience
You still get a decent amount of Honor even for losing

PvP is supposed to be hardcore not casual. It isnt supposed to be fair. Its killing other players not giving out hugs and kisses. If you dont like getting killed you get better gear and you learn to play. You dont hit the forums crying for daddy Blizzard to come carry you.

[Deleted]

I also think blizzard cares about PvP, I don't think they'd make so much effort with making gear and BGs and everything else related to PvP if they didn't. But it was also an after thought after WoW was originally released was it not?

The problem maybe that as time has gone on after numerous xpacs, character level rises, gear level rises, extra abilities, more and more people doing PvP (maybe?) it's an ever evolving process unlike PvE (which is basically scripted fights that never change, except for buffs or nerfs, and are far easier to manage I think), so as it's an ever evoloving process it's harder to balance between each season and xpac. Maybe you have old players no longer playing, new players coming into PvP getting beat up and then coming to forums to complain about being beaten up due to unbalance?
PvP is far from perfect but it's not uncared for I feel.

Also PvP gear is far better looking than most PvE gear imo so why would they do that? unless Blizzard think giving better looking will cover over all the shortfalls?
I could be wrong about all I just said though. I'd be interested to see how many people who focus purely on PvP (and I mean high end PvPers not part timers) agree with you OP. The game is so old now too people just probably can't be bothered anymore with PvP in the way other games do it.
I'm talking lots of rubbish now I've been on the wine tonight

[Prag]

You made a lot of assumptions and didn't really provide any proof as to why they're "correct". Things Blizzard doesn't care about:

- Your money. They want all of it.
- Your time. See above.
- Balancing around the highest and lowest of skill levels.

Everything else is important enough to devote even a small amount of Dev time to, which is a monetary investment, which means they care (even if a little).

[Cwimge]

Because blizzard does not, and should not care about pvp

[Reveries1]

Except in this case its evolving for the worse. Lets look at what has happened over the years.

Twinks nerfed and placed in their own EXP off brackets
No more 10 level brackets
Low lvl get scaled up
Wellfare resilience
You still get a decent amount of Honor even for losing

PvP is supposed to be hardcore not casual. It isnt supposed to be fair. Its killing other players not giving out hugs and kisses. If you dont like getting killed you get better gear and you learn to play. You dont hit the forums crying for daddy Blizzard to come carry you.

Twinks nerfed and placed in their own EXP off brackets
(Superior geared players playing against Superior geared players)

No more 10 level brackets
(Players in instanced pvp playing players closer to their level)

Low lvl get scaled up
(Attempt to give players slightly more = footing)

Wellfare resilience
(pvp power and pvp resilience were added based off a need)

You still get a decent amount of Honor even for losing
(time not completely wasted)

I don't really see the downside to any of these things. All but the last one are adjustments to make someone who had no chance at ever winning a fight kind of ish have a chance.

What happened to the PVP'ers saying pvp is about skill or learn to play. Seems there is a lot of I cant rofl stomp you anymore so its carebare now. Thats how it was if you weren't at the top of the level for the bracket. if you didnt have your honor gear in a BG and you spent countless BG's grinding it out and often losing because you were getting carried by others.

I guess people will just have to learn how to rofl stomp others with skill instead of just being over geared or over leveled compared to the person they want to kill. What is Blizzard thinking....

[zenga]

Blizzard just doesnt care about PvP

I always wonder what goes on in the heads of people who make simplified and quite silly claims like this. If you think for 2 seconds you know that this simply can't be true. You could say that it's not one of their priorities, but not that they don't care. It's factually not true, since there are new arena maps/new bgs being added, there are balance attempts (whether they got it right or wrong), the introduction of pvp power that made pve gear inferior, etc etc ...

PVP might not be a priority, but nor are challenge modes, nor are dungeons, nor are dailies, nor is transmog, nor is the brawlers guild, ... etc etc. Those are all individual features that together make up for the WoW experience. And that's what they try to do, make the WoW experience as good as they possibly can, since that generates revenue and keeps players playing. And pvp is part of that.

[Lilly32]

Twinks nerfed and placed in their own EXP off brackets
(Superior geared players playing against Superior geared players)

No more 10 level brackets
(Players in instanced pvp playing players closer to their level)

Low lvl get scaled up
(Attempt to give players slightly more = footing)

Wellfare resilience
(pvp power and pvp resilience were added based off a need)

You still get a decent amount of Honor even for losing
(time not completely wasted)

I don't really see the downside to any of these things. All but the last one are adjustments to make someone who had no chance at ever winning a fight kind of ish have a chance.

What happened to the PVP'ers saying pvp is about skill or learn to play. Seems there is a lot of I cant rofl stomp you anymore so its carebare now. Thats how it was if you weren't at the top of the level for the bracket. if you didnt have your honor gear in a BG and you spent countless BG's grinding it out and often losing because you were getting carried by others.

I guess people will just have to learn how to rofl stomp others with skill instead of just being over geared or over leveled compared to the person they want to kill. What is Blizzard thinking....

all those things do is cater to bads. Its not making the game better its making it worse. Its like saying being on wellfare is better than working hard and earning your money. People with your kind of thinking are the reason PvP will always be a joke in WoW. Most people in WoW would never have made it in a game like UO. They would start crying after the first time someone kills them and takes all their loot.

Also anyone happen to know when another game like DAoC or UO will be coming out that actually has real, meaningful PvP not yet ruined by bads wanting to get carried?

[Dabrix32]

I always wonder what goes on in the heads of people who make simplified and quite silly claims like this. If you think for 2 seconds you know that this simply can't be true. You could say that it's not one of their priorities, but not that they don't care. It's factually not true, since there are new arena maps/new bgs being added, there are balance attempts (whether they got it right or wrong), the introduction of pvp power that made pve gear inferior, etc etc ...

PVP might not be a priority, but nor are challenge modes, nor are dungeons, nor are dailies, nor is transmog, nor is the brawlers guild, ... etc etc. Those are all individual features that together make up for the WoW experience. And that's what they try to do, make the WoW experience as good as they possibly can, since that generates revenue and keeps players playing. And pvp is part of that.

I have played many MMOs going back to Ultima Online in 1997. I have PvPed in every one of them if it was available. WoW has the worst PvP of any of them. So compared to other MMOs then yes Blizzard does care less about PvP. With every patch they just make it worse. Its like they just want WoW to be played by a bunch of bads or something.

[Hand Banana]

Ugh this again. Obviously blizzard cares about PVP or they wouldn't make changes every patch and expac that influence pvp specifically. Obviously they devote more resources and time to PVE, mostly because pvp doesn't require any resources and time outside of class balance. Its essentially impossible to balance 28 specs (assuming tanks aren't a factor) in a 3v3 setting with all possible synergies between classes and exploit/bugs that people try very hard to find. Im not saying blizz does a very good job at balancing pvp, and many of the reasons are because of pve changes fucking everything up, but they do care about it IMO.

Well, that sadly works both ways, as there have been *many* PvP nerfs over the years which in turn completely and royally butt-fucked PvE abilities and specs. This is mostly a case about Blizzard should give abilities different functions, kinda like Rift I think it was.

And has been said *many* times, changes in pve spec's and abilities doesn't do anything to hurt pve in a meaningful way. All it changes is the order the top .1% has on recount; the boss still dies all the same. If your guild sits you because you are a spec that underperforms at the elite level then you aren't ready to be at an elite level or you would have the specs that are good already available to swap in, just like top PVP'ers do when changes hit. That and your guild is a bunch of douchebags, no one ever sits their friends in pvp because of nerfs. In pvp, making hunters jesusmode (aka all of the first 2 seasons of MoP) affects everything in pvp, from comps you see most of the time to rbg setups to world pvp and random bg encounters.

Either way, I am pretty sure WoD is seperating pvp and pve abilities more, at least one can hope.

[Chirri]

If Blizz really didn't care about PVP, they wouldn't continue to screw both PVP and PVE over trying to keep both balanced, without bothering to keep them separate. "It would be too complicated!" is a shit excuse.

[Bloodjunky22]

scripting a boss takes a lot of time so anyone saying PVP is a mini game because they spend more time making PVE has a slightly skewed opinion.

[Dabrix32]

Ugh this again. Obviously blizzard cares about PVP or they wouldn't make changes every patch and expac that influence pvp specifically.

making bad changes doesnt count. It would have been better if they just did nothing at all.

[Hand Banana]

making bad changes doesnt count. It would have been better if they just did nothing at all.

Besides not finding bugs fast enough (stampede), not punishing win-trading and exploits enough, and having balance issues what changes are bad exactly? They have made alot of good changes lately on how pvp works: cross realm arenas, pvp gear being better than pve in instanced (THANK GOD), conquest catchup system, baseline resil affording you some sort of chance when undergeared. Besides balance being out of whack and it generally is, not seeing the bad changes you are talking about.