Originally Posted by
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WARNING: This is a long post with some very good ideas, please read it all and leave your comments as to any flaws in the system, how it can be improved, or suggestions on what you think will increase participation.
Arena participation is getting lower and lower with each season. The biggest problem is obvious class imbalances which are not easy fixes but that's not what this is about. The problem is there is no incentive or motivation for average players to continue playing outside of getting your conquest capped and waiting for next Tuesday. The reason for this is the current rewards system. You have Glad Titles/Mount that .5% of the PvP player base will obtain along with 2.2k weapons that maybe 20% of players will get? This isn't very incentivizing for a vast array of average arena players (such as myself) Now to figure out what we can do to get players queueing let's look at a model that is successful, that being the PVE model.
PVE players have a vast array of different things to motivate them to keep playing whether it be doing dailies for cool mounts at exalted, or hunting rares for vanity items, heroic raiding for the best gear/bragging rights, challenge modes for transmog gear, it goes on and on. Why can't PvP have similiar rewards?
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I propose the implementation of a token currency system for arenas. With each arena win the player will be granted one token. With these tokens, the players would have access to NPC's offering number of cosmetic/vanity items/pets etc. Here are some ideas of some different items that could be offered:
Mounts: People love mounts, there are people that will farm the same content over and over and over again just for a chance at a flashy mount. PvPers have access to the old BG mounts that were implemented ages ago and have never changed. The mounts could work like this: (the token cost could be raised or lowered)
No Rating: 125-300 tokens - Some type of cool mount
2.2k Rating: 300-500 tokens Same mount, reskinned or possible armor or something added to it. This distinguishes those players that got high rating for there mount and the players that just grinded out the wins for the no rating mount. (NOTE: once you've hit 2.2k that season you qualify to buy the mount regardless of your rating)
PETS: Same as with the mounts, there are a lot of people out there that love them and will spend tons of gold or put intons of hours farming to get them.
No Rating: 75x Tokens - Some type of cool pet
1800 Rating: 75x Tokens - Either same pet reskinned or unique pet for those pushing their rating
TABARDS: I'm not a huge fan of them but that's not to say there aren't others that are.
1550 Rating: Tabard 1
1750 Rating Tabard 2
2.2k: Rating Tabard 3
Gems/Enchants: There are a lot of PvPers out there that have very little interest doing anything in game other than PvP. Not everyone wants to spend a large amount of time in game gathering, doing dailies or farming the AH.
No Rating: 10-25 tokens - Your choice of any uncut blue quality gem
No Rating: 30-50 tokens - Your choice of any uncut meta
No Rating 50-75 tokens - BoP nice bracer enchant of your choice (170 int/str/agi)
I think this could help some of the less wealthy PVPers get some gems and enchant for their gear. It also helps the server economy giving JC's in trade more gems to cut and by making the enchants BoP (maybe BoA) you would not run the risk of people reselling on the AH.(More enchants could be added)
A BOA SOLUTION TO GEARING ALTS: After you have leveled a couple characters to max level the BG grind can be unpleasant to say the least. How about a Bind on Account badge that can be mailed to an alt and turned in for honor?
No Rating: 10 tokens - BOA badge that can be exchanged for 1k honor (the number of tokens to honor reward can be adjusted)
VANITY/FUN ITEMS: Some of the items dropped from the new rares are really cool, but hunting down rares sucks. We could implement some of those items found on the current rares to the vendors.
No rating: XX Tokens - Hardened Turtle Shell used to knock players off their mounts. Why do we have to hunt down rares to get a PvP item? Only makes sense that you should be able to PvP to get it.
No Rating: XX Tokens - Gnomish Cloaking Device 30-60 min CD - This item would transform your appearance into that of world mob. So for example you can go to a questing area with tigers, click the tiger and transform yourself into it. Other players would see you exactly the same as the other mobs. When a player comes up to attack you you are instantly shifted into your normal form and the fight is on!!!
Keep in mind the token cost of items may need to be raised or lowered significantly but you get the idea. They KEY to this system working is that every arena season new mounts, pets, and a vanity item or two be added, while the previous seasons mounts will no longer be available.
This is just a handful of ideas I had as to some of the rewards that I think would get even non PvPers into arenas as well as further motivating the existing PvPers. Blizzard puts a TON of resources into the PVE side of this game, and they should as it is the main focus of a lot of the player base. However, I feel as though a small amount of resources could go into an excellent Progression/Reward system for arena players that oculd put some life back into PvP!
TL;DR: We need a better rewards system to encourage participation. This could include mounts, pets, tabards, vanity items, BOA honor system for gearing alts ETC.