PVP alts are feel awful

[Turtlewithnoshell]

I've always been a player who levels up 5-8 characters to max and pvps on whatever I feel like playing that day.
With legion PVP is very alt friendly. Item levels aren't as important, getting gear is easy, honor talents are good way to progress a character instead of gear.
There's on big problem though, Artifact weapons. Alts are so behind on artifact power it's really discouraging.
Obviously it wouldn't be fair to give anything for free in the world, but for instanced pvp maxing out the artifact weapons would put everyone on a more even playing field. Since it's pretty much impossible for an alt to catch up to someones main character. This would create a much better competitive environment for pvp players.
One thing I heard proposing this idea: "Why should your alt be as strong as my main?"
Instanced PVP should be about skill, not artifact power.
Catching up artifacts is a huge amount of artifact power that takes a long time to get especially since the artifact knowledge research takes days.
With how powerful traits are the artifact weapons are becoming "elite weapons" on a whole new level.

TLDR: Just Max out artifact weapons in instanced PVP.

[Roarkin]

I totally get where you are coming from, I do. I have 5 lvl 110s and decided to finally main my last one which is my mage. My mage has artifact knowledge of I believe 3, about to be 4, while my Hunter who I dinged 110 day 2, is Knowledge 7 or 8.

That being said, I am about to hit my 2nd gold trait on my mage, I am not a 2200+ player but I push competitively as i can, and while my 2nd gold trait would be nice and will be nice it is not what is holding me back, in fact 2400+ players are only about 2-5 traits ahead of where I am at.

I agree it would be nice to have artifacts maxed out, but you are playing an MMO, not a moba. PvPing on alts (awful honor grind aside) is in a much better spot then when you felt you shouldn't even que for skirmishes until you grinded an entire set of epic PvP gear.

TLDNR: I doubt 99% of the player base is good enough that their artifact lvl is what is holding them back from being good at pvp

[khazlol]

TLDNR: I doubt 99% of the player base is good enough that their artifact lvl is what is holding them back from being good at pvp

i don't know some of the gold traits are really powerful

[Roarkin]

i don't know some of the gold traits are really powerful

You are right, and you will lose some games you could have won every once in a while because of them, but you get your first gold trait before you hit 110, or almost immediately after, and you get your second within the following two weeks,

pvp seasons are long, and this is s1

[Deleted]

I totally get where you are coming from, I do. I have 5 lvl 110s and decided to finally main my last one which is my mage. My mage has artifact knowledge of I believe 3, about to be 4, while my Hunter who I dinged 110 day 2, is Knowledge 7 or 8.

That being said, I am about to hit my 2nd gold trait on my mage, I am not a 2200+ player but I push competitively as i can, and while my 2nd gold trait would be nice and will be nice it is not what is holding me back, in fact 2400+ players are only about 2-5 traits ahead of where I am at.

I agree it would be nice to have artifacts maxed out, but you are playing an MMO, not a moba. PvPing on alts (awful honor grind aside) is in a much better spot then when you felt you shouldn't even que for skirmishes until you grinded an entire set of epic PvP gear.

TLDNR: I doubt 99% of the player base is good enough that their artifact lvl is what is holding them back from being good at pvp

I just wish artifact knowledge was account wide, it would make things a lot easier. BTW the second golden artifact trait for frostmages is REALLY important, but yeah, getting the first 2 is fast.

[Turtlewithnoshell]

I just wish artifact knowledge was account wide, it would make things a lot easier. BTW the second golden artifact trait for frostmages is REALLY important, but yeah, getting the first 2 is fast.

Agreed here, if artifact knowledge was account wide it would be much better.

- - - Updated - - -

I totally get where you are coming from, I do. I have 5 lvl 110s and decided to finally main my last one which is my mage. My mage has artifact knowledge of I believe 3, about to be 4, while my Hunter who I dinged 110 day 2, is Knowledge 7 or 8.

That being said, I am about to hit my 2nd gold trait on my mage, I am not a 2200+ player but I push competitively as i can, and while my 2nd gold trait would be nice and will be nice it is not what is holding me back, in fact 2400+ players are only about 2-5 traits ahead of where I am at.

I agree it would be nice to have artifacts maxed out, but you are playing an MMO, not a moba. PvPing on alts (awful honor grind aside) is in a much better spot then when you felt you shouldn't even que for skirmishes until you grinded an entire set of epic PvP gear.

TLDNR: I doubt 99% of the player base is good enough that their artifact lvl is what is holding them back from being good at pvp

I did mention in my post that it is better than it was in the past. but artifact weapons are a problem imo.
Also, yes it is an mmo, that doesn't mean that we cant have a more balanced pvp experience. I'm fine with gear how it is now giving a slight advantage but the artifact traits are a bit much.

[xhisors]

You are right, and you will lose some games you could have won every once in a while because of them, but you get your first gold trait before you hit 110, or almost immediately after, and you get your second within the following two weeks,

pvp seasons are long, and this is s1

A lot of the most important artifact points that mean living or dying in pvp are not even golden abilities. Such as spriests dispersion which heals you over the duration. Artifacts are a huge advantage to anyone who wants to push rating at any skill level.

Artifacts NEED to be maxed out in PvP by default, there is literally no point to not having it not maxed other than making people grind PvE for the sake of grinding PvE content... to compete in PvP. Blizz logic.

[Revik]

I've always been a player who levels up 5-8 characters to max and pvps on whatever I feel like playing that day.
With legion PVP is very alt friendly. Item levels aren't as important, getting gear is easy, honor talents are good way to progress a character instead of gear.
There's on big problem though, Artifact weapons. Alts are so behind on artifact power it's really discouraging.
Obviously it wouldn't be fair to give anything for free in the world, but for instanced pvp maxing out the artifact weapons would put everyone on a more even playing field. Since it's pretty much impossible for an alt to catch up to someones main character. This would create a much better competitive environment for pvp players.
One thing I heard proposing this idea: "Why should your alt be as strong as my main?"
Instanced PVP should be about skill, not artifact power.
Catching up artifacts is a huge amount of artifact power that takes a long time to get especially since the artifact knowledge research takes days.
With how powerful traits are the artifact weapons are becoming "elite weapons" on a whole new level.

TLDR: Just Max out artifact weapons in instanced PVP.

The thing you need to dispel is the idea that PvP is meant to be truly fair within an MMO. Depending on your MMO this could be true or not true but it is not set in stone that PvP is supposed to be fair or even balanced. In MOBA's and Fighting Games this absolutely has to be true because that is their main focus or else the game itself has no substance. That is not true of all MMOs.

At one time WoW tried to have a truly competitive scene but have since backed away from that. There is competitive play with ladders and such but now this is with the foreknowledge that things are subject to change and experience may vary.

In this iteration of PvP Blizzard has decided that instead of gear your progression with PvP will happen with your artifact. This is a much longer lived progression that can span throughout an entire expansion. The good part about this (for Blizzard) is that they dont need to come up with 3 new PvP sets for class. Instead they have a new skin for your artifact. This allows Blizzard to have more than 3 seasons typical for every expansion which has to line up exactly with each new raid release.

At some point later in this expansion when all your alts 'Mature' in artifact knowledge the balance you are looking for should work itself out at which point only very minor power differences will remain after all traits on all your artifacts have been gotten.

[xhisors]

The thing you need to dispel is the idea that PvP is meant to be truly fair within an MMO. Depending on your MMO this could be true or not true but it is not set in stone that PvP is supposed to be fair or even balanced. In MOBA's and Fighting Games this absolutely has to be true because that is their main focus or else the game itself has no substance. That is not true of all MMOs.

At one time WoW tried to have a truly competitive scene but have since backed away from that. There is competitive play with ladders and such but now this is with the foreknowledge that things are subject to change and experience may vary.

In this iteration of PvP Blizzard has decided that instead of gear your progression with PvP will happen with your artifact. This is a much longer lived progression that can span throughout an entire expansion. The good part about this (for Blizzard) is that they dont need to come up with 3 new PvP sets for class. Instead they have a new skin for your artifact. This allows Blizzard to have more than 3 seasons typical for every expansion which has to line up exactly with each new raid release.

At some point later in this expansion when all your alts 'Mature' in artifact knowledge the balance you are looking for should work itself out at which point only very minor power differences will remain after all traits on all your artifacts have been gotten.

No, the progression is the PvP talent tree for PvP. The artifact "progression" is the entire expansion that you have to do PvE to progress through it with any efficiency. One world quest ranges from 1.5k-4k+ AP for me.. one battle ground which takes longer, 500. There is no artifact progression in PvP right now when it takes over 100K per level.

[Revik]

No, the progression is the PvP talent tree for PvP. The artifact "progression" is the entire expansion that you have to do PvE to progress through it with any efficiency. One world quest ranges from 1.5k-4k+ AP for me.. one battle ground which takes longer, 500. There is no artifact progression in PvP right now when it takes over 100K per level.

Actually that is a NO if you believe that is true. Getting full honor level pvp talents is NOT meant to be for PvP progression. If this is so then Blizzard only intended for you to progress in PvP for 1 week for the ENTIRE expansion? No I am afraid not.

[xhisors]

Actually that is a NO if you believe that is true. Getting full honor level pvp talents is NOT meant to be for PvP progression. If this is so then Blizzard only intended for you to progress in PvP for 1 week for the ENTIRE expansion? No I am afraid not.

No, they intended for you to PvE for your artifact to progress your character, not PvP. There is literally no progression right now in your artifact if you solely PvP. It was never intended to be a way of progressing your artifact, and if you think thats the case.. go grind pvp for a week and see how much AP you gain.

For the bolded: Also.. I mean, if only there was a prestige system in place and cosmetic rewards for doing it.

[Revik]

No, they intended for you to PvE for your artifact to progress your character, not PvP. There is literally no progression right now in your artifact if you solely PvP. It was never intended to be a way of progressing your artifact, and if you think thats the case.. go grind pvp for a week and see how much AP you gain.

For the bolded: Also.. I mean, if only there was a prestige system in place and cosmetic rewards for doing it.

Let's not move the goal posts here. As mentioned earlier the Artifact Weapon was meant as a progression for both PvP AND PvE. NO where did I mention that just doing BGs/Arena is meant as the sole driver for advancing your Artifact. And yes that is different from previous years and that is another thing that Blizzard has decided to change with this iteration.

Your Artifact is the main difference and your source of progression for PvP.

What Blizzard has done is allowed people to advance their Artifact in a variety of ways including Artifact Power from nearly all facets in the game. Which includes traditional PvE (dungeons and raids) and PvP and even Pet Battles. A player who partakes in all facets are going to have the most progression on their artifact.

As mentioned earlier the PvP in this game is NEVER going to be 100% fair and balanced nor is Blizzard trying to. They want things to not be totally out of wack lest it affect other parts of the game negatively like BGs and Arena. Blizzard knows that progression is the key to keeping people playing a game and they are going back to the concept even for PvP.

[Cinnamohn]

There's more to artifacts than just the gold traits. Every point also increases your stamina. The difference between 1 and 25 right now is 1.8 mil health and 2.2 mil health. Factor in ilv, spec adjustments, and honor talents (in some cases) and you have some people in the range of 2.5-2.7 mil health.

[LLiass]

Actually that is a NO if you believe that is true. Getting full honor level pvp talents is NOT meant to be for PvP progression. If this is so then Blizzard only intended for you to progress in PvP for 1 week for the ENTIRE expansion? No I am afraid not.

You know, guild wars 2 structured pvp system is awesome, and everybody is fighting fair from the start.

[Caolela]

Let's not move the goal posts here. As mentioned earlier the Artifact Weapon was meant as a progression for both PvP AND PvE. NO where did I mention that just doing BGs/Arena is meant as the sole driver for advancing your Artifact. And yes that is different from previous years and that is another thing that Blizzard has decided to change with this iteration.

Your Artifact is the main difference and your source of progression for PvP.

What Blizzard has done is allowed people to advance their Artifact in a variety of ways including Artifact Power from nearly all facets in the game. Which includes traditional PvE (dungeons and raids) and PvP and even Pet Battles. A player who partakes in all facets are going to have the most progression on their artifact.

As mentioned earlier the PvP in this game is NEVER going to be 100% fair and balanced nor is Blizzard trying to. They want things to not be totally out of wack lest it affect other parts of the game negatively like BGs and Arena. Blizzard knows that progression is the key to keeping people playing a game and they are going back to the concept even for PvP.

No one has "moved the goalposts" here, because the goalposts Blizz has set simply are: you gear up far quicker in PvE than PvP, so very few if any are going to exclusively PvP for their gear/weapon/AP/AK.

The game is already out of whack in BGs & arenas because of this bullshit system. It was a way for Blizz to spend less time/effort/money on modeling, new content and new PvP rewards while still causing longer grinds and sub times - a total win-win for them profit-wise while most or many PvP'ers hate it.

Meanwhile, their Lead PvP Asshat seems to be of the opinion: "Don't like it then GTFO."

PvP'ers want to get in and play their chosen area of the game being at very similar power/gear levels in a fairly short time, so they can work on ratings, titles, achieves, mounts, or just have fun with the fights - not take months and months waiting for RNG and endless PvE grinds. It is fucking monotonous. That's a big reason why people twink and many PvPe'rs don't raid much if at all.

Painting rosy scenarios and trying to make it sound good when it really is not is disingenuous at best.

[Deleted]

No one has "moved the goalposts" here, because the goalposts Blizz has set simply are: you gear up far quicker in PvE than PvP, so very few if any are going to exclusively PvP for their gear/weapon/AP/AK.

The game is already out of whack in BGs & arenas because of this bullshit system. It was a way for Blizz to spend less time/effort/money on modeling, new content and new PvP rewards while still causing longer grinds and sub times - a total win-win for them profit-wise while most or many PvP'ers hate it.

Meanwhile, their Lead PvP Asshat seems to be of the opinion: "Don't like it then GTFO."

PvP'ers want to get in and play their chosen area of the game being at very similar power/gear levels in a fairly short time, so they can work on ratings, titles, achieves, mounts, or just have fun with the fights - not take months and months waiting for RNG and endless PvE grinds. It is fucking monotonous. That's a big reason why people twink and many PvPe'rs don't raid much if at all.

Painting rosy scenarios and trying to make it sound good when it really is not is disingenuous at best.

No you don't gear up "far quicker", and there is a lot of people who are going to gear up from basically just pvp. If I wanted to get from pve the ilvl I'm receiving from pvp, I would have to raid mythic, and that would be a LOT more time consuming. There's nothing "out of whack" in arena or bg, specially not because of gear or AP differences. The existing problem is class balance and Blizzard is working on it weekly thanks to their new templates. And again, I have to ask: why do you keep spinning bullshit anout a game you aren't even playing.

INB4 "you're a fanboy yadda yadda" without saying anything that resembles reason.

[xhisors]

No one has "moved the goalposts" here, because the goalposts Blizz has set simply are: you gear up far quicker in PvE than PvP, so very few if any are going to exclusively PvP for their gear/weapon/AP/AK.

The game is already out of whack in BGs & arenas because of this bullshit system. It was a way for Blizz to spend less time/effort/money on modeling, new content and new PvP rewards while still causing longer grinds and sub times - a total win-win for them profit-wise while most or many PvP'ers hate it.

Meanwhile, their Lead PvP Asshat seems to be of the opinion: "Don't like it then GTFO."

PvP'ers want to get in and play their chosen area of the game being at very similar power/gear levels in a fairly short time, so they can work on ratings, titles, achieves, mounts, or just have fun with the fights - not take months and months waiting for RNG and endless PvE grinds. It is fucking monotonous. That's a big reason why people twink and many PvPe'rs don't raid much if at all.

Painting rosy scenarios and trying to make it sound good when it really is not is disingenuous at best.

This so much. Everything in here is 100% accurate and sums it up nicely.

Yesterday I faced a team who had almost 100 ilvls on us collectively. My team is around 835 ilvl, while theirs was around 870. Their team as a whole had roughly ~20% more stats collectively than us, with each person being about 7% (the stat gain is closer to ~2% per ilvl than the 1% blizzard told us).. we had a 11 minute game then lost, they lived through our setup with 2%-4% health every time. Could we have played the match better? Yes. Should we have won if gear was 100% equal? Absolutely.

This is just an example, and I'm sure there will be some that will say we just suck. But a lot of matches in the 2k-2300 range right now have a gear factor included. This includes the artifact and traits with that. All of which are 100x more accessible through PvE and easier to obtain through PvE.

I ask this question quite often, but why is it fair to have the best possible PvP gear obtained through PvE. Why not flip that around, what if the best PvE gear was obtained through PvP.. I wonder how much hell would be raised? Remember PvE players complaining they had to do three random battlegrounds for a legendary? Oh the tears would overflow the ocean!

[Zen-]

I understand your argument, I really do. But beforehand, you had to grind for gear on alts anyways. Now, gear isn't really a thing but you have to grind AP. It's still grinding, so they didn't really change much in my opinion. Honestly, world quests are extremely simple to do (and you might get some WPVP out of it to boot).

[Illiterate]

I understand your argument, I really do. But beforehand, you had to grind for gear on alts anyways. Now, gear isn't really a thing but you have to grind AP. It's still grinding, so they didn't really change much in my opinion. Honestly, world quests are extremely simple to do (and you might get some WPVP out of it to boot).

You could grind full gear in a weekend and be competitive. In Legion, you will be grinding AP and AK for months if you start late. The difference between 20 and 25 or 30 traits is massive. That's not even considering the gear ilvl difference which will be another 5-10% difference in stats.

[xhisors]

You could grind full gear in a weekend and be competitive. In Legion, you will be grinding AP and AK for months if you start late. The difference between 20 and 25 or 30 traits is massive. That's not even considering the gear ilvl difference which will be another 5-10% difference in stats.

Currently its 2% per 10 item levels, I just tested it to make sure. So later in the expansion when we have 900+ ilvl a fresh 110 will be over 20% behind in stats, which is absolutely disgusting. They will have to spend weeks just gearing up through PvE to catch up in terms of gear, artifact and traits not included.