Arena: A Negative Influence on PvP

[Deleted]

In a perfect game, every spec would be balanced. It would have it's strengths and weaknesses but overall competitive on equal terms. Unfortunately, this is an MMO, they are terrible to balance properly but I would like to see Blizz address issues that actually need to be addressed.

For example:
- Ele shamans are still the only caster dps class that can run out of mana indefinitely. They haven't done a tiny change all expansion to address it. They also suffer from a complete lack of defensive cooldowns.
- Rogues are extremely dominant right now and the excuse for NOT putting out a small patch or hotfix is the unofficial motto of 'MoP will fix it'.
- Fire Mages combustion just carries the spec right now, without a strong combust, fire mage team has a tough time taking down a target.

Tbh, favoritism seems to be a key point in balances this expansion especially. The amount of frost mage changes and buffs I saw that weren't really needed pre 4.2 was astounding yet other classes were in the gutter of PvP and PvE yet didn't see many changes. Anyone remember destro locks pre 4.1? They were mediocre in PvP but were good in PvE. Got nerfed to oblivion and didn't get a single tweak until 4.3.

One thing that people should be afraid of in MoP is self-healing on pure dps and non-healer hybrid. There seems to be so much of it, it's going to be a pain to balance on top of damage, healers and CC.

If you want a more balanced, sensible game of PvP, try something that isn't an MMO and get's attention from the developers, like SC2 or BF3.

[PizzaSHARK]

And because of this, their design philosophy is completely broken.

If they balanced the game around the 1%, then anytime a player feels that their class is weak, it is because they don't yet know how to play it at its full potential. When the game is balanced around mouthbreathers, it becomes incredibly broken when anyone who isn't a mouthbreather plays it.

Players should have to better themselves to do better. Weird concept, right?

As you referenced in an earlier post, Hunters are pretty much a great example of what happens when the class is balanced around bad players playing it; Hunters are just "okay," when the person playing them doesn't really know what they're doing - you'll kill some people, probably die a lot, whatever. But when a really talented player is using one? They basically turn into ranged Rogues and everyone fighting one gets another gray hair.

@Doggyballs: Do you not see a problem in "if you aren't the correct class/spec, you can't play with your friends"? Not everyone wants to play a healer, and not everyone wants to go Frost instead of Fire, or whatever. I'm not saying arenas should be removed, but that any data Blizzard pulls from the game to use in making balance decisions should come purely from rated BGs, and that any development time spent on adding or tweaking content should be focused into Battlegrounds.

@Blueobelisk: How is a rated BG not able to be balanced? BGs have objectives beyond "kill red names," which means strict compositions aren't important like they are in arenas. Every single BG has a use and a place for players that want to use a tank spec. Healers are always useful. DPS of all varieties (whether squishy or not) are always useful. There might be some classes that are more desired than others due to current numbers (e.g. Doomkins are highly desirable for a BG team right now), but you'll almost never run into a situation where you can't compete because your "comp" is weak - except CTF (must have Smoke Bomb, must have a tank to carry the flag), but I've already made threads discussing ways of fixing the issue with CTF in WoW.

If anything, it's harder to balance arenas than BGs because arenas don't have objectives, which greatly restricts the usefulness of many specs.

And yes, almost 99.99% of complaining comes from people that do not play arenas at a higher level. I believe they are not balancing the game around arenas alone, they try to do it both in 3v3 and raids. These are the landmarks on which the game is being balanced.

I agree, and I'm saying that I don't think it's possible to really balance the game when you have raids on one hand and duels in a box on the other. Classes have to have that crazy-huge DPS to kill the boss, but when you put that crazy-huge DPS in a duel (even with it being reduced by resilience and potentially even a global "nerf aura"), you're going to have issues because you only have the one life. BGs can partly get around this because it doesn't matter if you're stomping mudholes in the other team if they can keep you off the flag.

EDIT: And I forgot to mention: I'm predictably seeing a lot of flak from the hardcore arena players, with the implication being that RBGs are easier than arenas. If you're talking about pushing ratings... yeah, definitely, and that probably won't change because RBGs aren't based around having a set team (and that's probably a good thing; can you imagine having to assemble the same 15 people three times a night for three hours at a time to push ratings?)

But in terms of the actual content? No, assuming we're involved with two highly-skilled teams in a non-CTF BG (again, CTF BGs have some issues that need to be dealt with first), like Arathi Basin, it's harder than arena. Each node is going to consist of what amounts to an arena battle, except you have to worry about the objective there, and you also have to worry about reinforcements streaming in for either team. Can you win that 3v4, take the flag, and then hold it long enough for reinforcements to arrive while fending off enemy respawns or reinforcements? Can you maintain control of your three bases while adequately pressuring the two bases the enemy holds? Can you react on the fly to a change in the enemy's gameplan and maintain your lead?

There's more that goes into a high-end RBG than an arena, because RBGs by default include everything that's present in arena in addition to the actual objectives of that BG.

[Deleted]

I don't see how you can justify the state of Rogues this season, or the state of Mages for the entire expansion without saying it's focused on arena. Frost Mages have always been powerful, and Fire Mages can be even worse (in BGs) if the people know how to play them.

I'd agree that Blizzard's lax stance regarding balance updates mid-season is a major problem as well, but I don't agree that arenas haven't been the primary focus.

I don't justify the state of rogues or frost-mages this season, if you read closer, I use the fact that they are brokenly OP (well rogues are), especially in arena, to point out that Blizz aren't balancing around arena. I also pointed out that classes that are good in RBG's but bad in arena have been left like that. Moreover, you didn't address my point about RBG balancing. Supposedly we've had an entire expansion of it (I don't think anyone expects further balance patches at this point) and what improvements have we seen to random BG's? None. In fact, as I argue the net effect has been negative. I can't understand why you're arguing we should try something that has just been tried and didn't work very well.

[PizzaSHARK]

I don't justify the state of rogues or frost-mages this season, if you read closer, I use the fact that they are brokenly OP (well rogues are), especially in arena, to point out that Blizz aren't balancing around arena. I also pointed out that classes that are good in RBG's but bad in arena have been left like that. Moreover, you didn't address my point about RBG balancing. Supposedly we've had an entire expansion of it (I don't think anyone expects further balance patches at this point) and what improvements have we seen to random BG's? None. In fact, as I argue the net effect has been negative. I can't understand why you're arguing we should try something that has just been tried and didn't work very well.

You really think they'd nerf rogues or mages if they were balancing around arena? You're using rogues and mages having been broken all expansion (well, mages anyway) as proof they aren't balancing around arena? Really?

Insofar as some classes doing good in RBGs but not arenas, that's how things have always been - you have an elite handful of specs and classes that are actually good at arena, and who cares if the rest aren't. That's always been Blizzard's way of handling things; nothing has changed. That's the point.

[Deleted]

You really think they'd nerf rogues or mages if they were balancing around arena? You're using rogues and mages having been broken all expansion (well, mages anyway) as proof they aren't balancing around arena? Really?

Insofar as some classes doing good in RBGs but not arenas, that's how things have always been - you have an elite handful of specs and classes that are actually good at arena, and who cares if the rest aren't. That's always been Blizzard's way of handling things; nothing has changed. That's the point.

You're using lack of balance around arena to "prove" that Blizz are balancing around arena. I honestly don't know how to respond to that. You're either a troll or deeply confused about how logic works.

[PizzaSHARK]

You're using lack of balance around arena to "prove" that Blizz are balancing around arena. I honestly don't know how to respond to that. You're either a troll or deeply confused about how logic works.

I'm using it to point out that nothing has changed - Blizzard's still balancing the way they've always had, and since RBGs never existed prior to Cata, that means they aren't balancing around RBGs.

[mcbeaty]

they stated that the game was easier to balance on the basis of 10v10 instead of 3v3 at the start of cata. Also saying that there is just two dominant comp is just silly.
here is a list of all Rank 1 viable comps:

KFC
MLS
Fire MLS
RMP
RLS
RPS
Shadowplay
Shadowcleave
PHD
Vanguards Cleave
Triple dps
lsd 2.0
lsp

If you can see the pattern, the problem with this game is lock/shaman synergy. Almost every comp i listed has a lock/shaman

[Deleted]

I'm using it to point out that nothing has changed - Blizzard's still balancing the way they've always had, and since RBGs never existed prior to Cata, that means they aren't balancing around RBGs.

Except they're not. In S6, disc priests started off strong, very strong. Within two weeks, they'd received significant nerfs, because Blizz didn't want to see one healer that dominant. By S8, all healers had glad viable comps, from RMP to shatterplay to TSG and of course LSD. Throughout the expansion, tweaks buffs and nerfs happened. That isn't happening anymore. Lock/shaman started out strong, became dominant and have stayed there. This is not the same as previous expansions. Blizzard aren't balancing around arena in the way that they have previously. Repeatedly stating that they are doing this, while failing to show any example, theory or anything except your own conviction, just makes you look like some guy who doesn't like arena saying 'hey guys, doesn't arena suck?'.

On another note, you seem to be talking entirely about class balance. One of the arguments about RBG's was that the BG's themselves would be balanced. Currently;

AV: no change
IoC: no change
AB: no change
EotS: no change
SotA: significant change, but not in the RBG rotation
WSG: GY changed, random BG's now more susceptible to GY farming than before

A strong argument can be made that Blizz are neglecting BG's and pvp balance overall, to a greater extent than in any previous expansion. To argue that they're doing it because they're focused on arena just doesn't match the facts. They've neglected arena just as much as the rest of pvp.

[Doggyballs]

they stated that the game was easier to balance on the basis of 10v10 instead of 3v3 at the start of cata. Also saying that there is just two dominant comp is just silly.
here is a list of all Rank 1 viable comps:

KFC
MLS
Fire MLS
RMP
RLS
RPS
Shadowplay
Shadowcleave
PHD
Vanguards Cleave
Triple dps
lsd 2.0
lsp

If you can see the pattern, the problem with this game is lock/shaman synergy. Almost every comp i listed has a lock/shaman

This is stupid. EVERY comp is "viable". Abni is playing Disc/Hpala/Arcane Mage and it's R1 sat on over 2.6k rating. Comp is an important part of arena...vital near enough. Comps on paper work well (RMP and the more popular comps etc.) but in practice and in real life, every comp is viable and can work dependent on the player's skill level.
I agree with lock/shaman synergy being silly but it's not the main problem lol if it was, every r1 comp would have a lock/shaman.

[lockedout]

This is stupid. EVERY comp is "viable".

Sorry not EVERY comp is viable you just sound foolish now.

[Darnassian]

The issue with arena is that people are too shit at it so they hate it and complain.

that's not just arena, that's pvp in general. They just fail to recognise they are the baddie who sucks, not everyone else has an OP class that needs to be nerfed.

[mcbeaty]

This is stupid. EVERY comp is "viable". Abni is playing Disc/Hpala/Arcane Mage and it's R1 sat on over 2.6k rating. Comp is an important part of arena...vital near enough. Comps on paper work well (RMP and the more popular comps etc.) but in practice and in real life, every comp is viable and can work dependent on the player's skill level.
I agree with lock/shaman synergy being silly but it's not the main problem lol if it was, every r1 comp would have a lock/shaman.

like i said RANK 1 viable, just because u have one case of someone breaking off from the pack isnt a good example. how many disc/fplal/arcane mage to do see running around at top lvl play??? What i thought... none, and 8 out 13 comps i listed have a lock/shaman

[Doggyballs]

Sorry not EVERY comp is viable you just sound foolish now.

Every comp has the potentional to be viable...Hence the air quotes. It's all based on players skill level. Get 3 multi glads and put them in a comp you wouldn't call viable. They would get rank 1 cos they have the knowledge and the skill level to pull it off.

like i said RANK 1 viable, just because u have one case of someone breaking off from the pack isnt a good example. how many disc/fplal/arcane mage to do see running around at top lvl play??? What i thought... none, and 8 out 13 comps i listed have a lock/shaman

This is stupid. 1 case is enough to disprove your theory. But there are more cases out there. Do your research.
You can't sit there and say how you need a certain comp to be rank 1. Comp makes things easier, I'm not saying comp doesn't help but you can't say that comp is more important than skill level. That is just stupid.

[Stanton Biston]

Faulty axiom, hyperbole, faulty axiom, false equivalence, red herring, hyperbole, faulty axiom, red herring, incorrect information, red herring.

These posts get old, especially when it's more of the same as has been said before.

What's worse is when the posts don't accurately reflect or depict anything close to reality; filling obvious gaps with biased conjecture.

http://arstechnica.com/science/2012/...heyre-awesome/

This actually has some constructive information on why rating the 'balance' of the PvP in WoW is as testy as it is.

[PizzaSHARK]

Faulty axiom, hyperbole, faulty axiom, false equivalence, red herring, hyperbole, faulty axiom, red herring, incorrect information, red herring.

These posts get old, especially when it's more of the same as has been said before.

What's worse is when the posts don't accurately reflect or depict anything close to reality; filling obvious gaps with biased conjecture.

http://arstechnica.com/science/2012/...heyre-awesome/

This actually has some constructive information on why rating the 'balance' of the PvP in WoW is as testy as it is.

The entire point is to foster discussion. If I'm wrong, I learn why I'm wrong in the process. If I'm right, maybe I can help others understand where they're wrong.

And, sure, a lot of balance whining is in the heads of the people doing the whining, but I don't think players are responsible for everything - a lot of it is probably due to Blizzard's relative lack of effort this expansion in trying to fix problems as they arise. I have no idea why they were so slow about it this expansion.

[Aaryki]

I suspect seroius arena players chose their class / combo and change accordingly. Random Bgs are ppl queueing with their favourite char / spec. If you like mages, np, if you are a dot class with CoC, great. If you like frost Dks - bring it on for randoms bgs - but most others arent current op class - so I agree balance around random BGs and let the arena guys swop classes depending on what works at that level.

[Wolfdragon]

Listen, Arena used to be competitive, and about reaction time, and huge plays, plays you probably never could coprehend, try watching the blizzcon that fabio enigmz and hrk won, the match that was replayed shows how little you know, arena back then was a merit to skill, hell I'm a cata player, and I can't fathom myself pulling that kind of stuff off, but then again... different times.

Even so, you can deny arena requires skill, I still see you don't have a 2.2k arena achievement, I guess your excuse is warriors being horrible, or something similar, I got mine my first season, hell I even got 2.4 the first season, all it takes is a crap ton of practice. I have friends who are miles more talented than the used to be wow elite, but they can't even compare to them, due to the difference in practice, they aren't even close, they pull off stuff greater than whoever you consider the best, any of the tournament players, but it's a 1 time deal, and they can't do it again if they want to.

The difference is the players that are currently elite, and tournament players aren't that extraordinary as they were back in the day, but wow lost it's blazing glory when it comes to arena, most of the best lost interest, as there is no way to make real life cash, and they live off of gaming, take Ocelote, he's captain fo the lol SK team now, he used to play a warrior at tournament level in TBC. You know so little, and are still trying to get your point through, Blizzard would gain alot more by making arena balanced and an e-sport, as it'd sky rocket sub-wise, plus ad revenue from streaming wow arena was always huge, didn't you ever think of that? WoW needs to be an E-sport if you ever want a balanced game. Learn for once, ARENA is PvP, the rest is an illusion.

[PizzaSHARK]

Even so, you can deny arena requires skill, I still see you don't have a 2.2k arena achievement, I guess your excuse is warriors being horrible, or something similar, I got mine my first season, hell I even got 2.4 the first season, all it takes is a crap ton of practice. I have friends who are miles more talented than the used to be wow elite, but they can't even compare to them, due to the difference in practice, they aren't even close, they pull off stuff greater than whoever you consider the best, any of the tournament players, but it's a 1 time deal, and they can't do it again if they want to.

Honestly, I don't think it'd be hard to hit 2.2k even as a Warrior; Warriors are weak, but they aren't so weak that they aren't at least 2.2k-capable. But I don't find Arms or Fury fun, which means I don't really do arenas outside of silly little gimmick comps (Blood/Protection was hilarious when Vengeance was still in PvP, and rogue/prot was fun in WotLK during the ATC era.) It's more of a lack of caring than a lack of capability.

The difference is the players that are currently elite, and tournament players aren't that extraordinary as they were back in the day, but wow lost it's blazing glory when it comes to arena, most of the best lost interest, as there is no way to make real life cash, and they live off of gaming, take Ocelote, he's captain fo the lol SK team now, he used to play a warrior at tournament level in TBC. You know so little, and are still trying to get your point through, Blizzard would gain alot more by making arena balanced and an e-sport, as it'd sky rocket sub-wise, plus ad revenue from streaming wow arena was always huge, didn't you ever think of that? WoW needs to be an E-sport if you ever want a balanced game. Learn for once, ARENA is PvP, the rest is an illusion.

Arena can never be an eSport unless it's balanced, and that can't happen without separating PvP from PvE. There's no way you could ever have WoW's PvP balanced to a fine enough edge without completely retuning it for PvP, and only for PvP. Now, I think that's actually a great idea - and where better to do that than on an arena tournament server, right? The problem is that it'd require a lot of effort from Blizzard (they'd also need better casting tools, it can be very difficult to keep track of everything going on at once with current tools) without any guaranteed returns - so it's almost never going to happen, even if it could potentially result in significant gains for them. Remember, Blizzard's a public company and they have to convince the investors and shareholders that it's worth paying the overtime and the commissions to get this done in the first place.

As for what's more interesting to watch? Assuming the same amount of effort was put into shaping up the RBG system, a good RBG would kick the shit out of an arena match every day of the week. You need to watch some high-level Quake or UT CTF if you think otherwise

[bajcli]

I'm using it to point out that nothing has changed - Blizzard's still balancing the way they've always had, and since RBGs never existed prior to Cata, that means they aren't balancing around RBGs.

Actually, just to give you one example, they have added Mass Spell Reflection to warriors in MoP beta as well as lowered SR's base cooldown to 15 seconds.
Then within a week, changed SR's cooldown to 30 seconds (which is even higher than the already high 25 secs which it is on live) precisely because of RBGs.
Granted, MSR with 15 sec cooldown would be very strong in a 3v3 setting (however justified it would be), but nowhere near as broken as say 3-4-5 warriors with it in a 10v10 setting.

Heck, Spell Reflect's cooldown was nerfed from 12 seconds (IIRC) to 25 seconds because of RBGs just to begin with. (Prot warrior FCs being too strong against casters)
It always has been 12 seconds, we went into Cataclysm with it, then it was changed in one of the first major patches...

I know it is but one example, but all in all, blizzard does seem to take RBG balance in consideration as well.
However if I was asked to demonstrate the amount of concern that goes to certain aspects of the game when addressing balance issues, I'd without a doubt go "PvE > Arenas > BGs & whatever", neither of those being by a small margin.

[PizzaSHARK]

Actually, just to give you one example, they have added Mass Spell Reflection to warriors in MoP beta as well as lowered SR's base cooldown to 15 seconds.
Then within a week, changed SR's cooldown to 30 seconds (which is even higher than the already high 25 secs which it is on live) precisely because of RBGs.
Granted, MSR with 15 sec cooldown would be very strong in a 3v3 setting (however justified it would be), but nowhere near as broken as say 3-4-5 warriors with it in a 10v10 setting.

Heck, Spell Reflect's cooldown was nerfed from 12 seconds (IIRC) to 25 seconds because of RBGs just to begin with. (Prot warrior FCs being too strong against casters)
It always has been 12 seconds, we went into Cataclysm with it, then it was changed in one of the first major patches...

I know it is but one example, but all in all, blizzard does seem to take RBG balance in consideration as well.
However if I was asked to demonstrate the amount of concern that goes to certain aspects of the game when addressing balance issues, I'd without a doubt go "PvE > Arenas > BGs & whatever", neither of those being by a small margin.

Yeah. I think at this point people have debunked my idea that they've been balancing only around arenas this expo - if anything, it just seems like they've been taking a hands-off, "who cares, lol" approach.

Spell Reflect was nerfed due to the glyph more than anything else... 5 sec duration, 7 sec cooldown... 70% uptime and with the rage refund from Shield Specialization you never have to worry about being starved for rage. They probably should've just nerfed or removed the glyph and left the base ability alone :/