Cataclysm - Rated Battlegrounds

[Darunis]

We'll just have to wait and see what happens in Cata.

[jetjetster]

Blizzard has announced already that rated BG's will only be premades vs.premades.

They said you can queue solo and they also said you cant lose rating.

[Scottishpaladin]

Bg's = Win
Arena = Gets old...

Ive Dueled/played against ppl who were rated high in arena and there not good unless they got a healer backin them up or another dps to help them.

[Zoros]

Those things doesnt push you as hard as arena does. when you're doing arena you always know that you can get better and will try to do so at any cost. im not talking about communication or even game mechanics im talking about pushing yourself to the limit when it comes to reacting, thinking and performing. nothing beats arenas in that aspect and nothing ever will.

You haven't played vainilla battlegrounds when old rank exists. Those premades were really hardcore.

[Fabrio]

You haven't played vainilla battlegrounds when old rank exists. Those premades were really hardcore.

err hardcore because they grinded honor for 12 hours a day every day for 3 months straight or hardcore because they were good? please make yourself a little clearer


to top this thread off, whenever I see a good arena player in a BG, they're always near impossible to kill if you have a bad team...and thats just PUG v PUG with one of the bads have a gladiator or two on their team, it makes a huge difference.

You're gona see a team of tichondrious glads rofl-stomping people in cata, you watch

[Xpace]

For you Grammar Nazis that really couldn't comprehend what the hell was being said (and noticed that the OP tried his best at it, anyway), here's a slightly edited version that may or may not be more pleasing to the eyes:

Judging by the class previews, a lot of Blizzard's design effort seems to be shifting towards rated Battlegrounds in Cataclysm. This is not necessarily a bad thing, though I'm slightly confused as to why this is. The impression I have garnered from blue posts is that the rated Battlegrounds are there to offer players who enjoy PvP but dislike Arenas a chance to obtain the same gear as those prefer the latter. It seems to me that if this is the reason for the shift of focus to rated Battlegrounds then the developers over at Blizzard perhaps haven't thought this through. Battlegrounds are already very different to Arenas. They are generally player-centric, against varying opponents of skill, gear and number. Battlegrounds are an attempt to try and capture the ever changing nature of world PvP in a more adaptable environment. Blizzard's been successful in this manner, with the exception of Wintergrasp.

As far as I can tell, there are two kinds of people who fall into Blizzard's category of liking PvP and disliking arenas. Those who prefer the play-style offered in Battlegrounds because of the variations in the objectives and those who prefer Battlegrounds because they are unsuccessful in Arenas. I believe that most people simply claim to hate Arena because Battlegrounds are so much more fun, ignoring the fact that they hate Arena simply because they fail at it. Regardless, I personally can't see how those players are going to be satisfied by Rated Battlegrounds. Players who fail in Arena will also fail in Rated Battlegrounds. I would love to see some more interesting, varying Arena play-styles as well as more competitive gameplay in the expansion. Besides, the more difficult logistics really look forward to rated BGs but I can't help but feel that rated battlegrounds will fail to please those at whom they are aimed and will only outdo arenas for the arena players if they offer stronger rewards.

* Text in bold is undecipherable. Someone else give it a go.

[EDIT]

Battlegrounds have always been less forgiving than World PvP, but way more forgiving than Arenas. With Rated Battlegrounds, hopefully, you won't get:

"Shit, it's that Rogue/Mage/Priest team we met half an hour ago. They have low ratings but that's cause they just formed their charter. We just wasted the past half an hour, DAMN IT."

"Ohhh, look, another Trifecta. Oh, and all the melee are targeting our healer, how original. Just leave and requeue and hope we don't meet these guys again, DAMN IT."

"Oh crap, I lagged and couldn't cast that ONE spell, yet that ONE spell was so CRUCIAL that it cost us the entire match, DAMN IT."

[hazer221]

Lol i seriously laughed...

Listen here.... believe it or not there are players that have been playing wow only for pvp reasons B4 arena was even bought about. To sit there and clearly state as if its some kind of absolute that people that favor BGs over arena are just bad at arena is pathetic.

There is a COMPLETELY different mind set regarding large scale pvp, involving organized flag caps, or base capping, splitting up groups and causing distractions, the list goes, its an ENTIRELY different animal, who are you to assume players are by default more often then not "bad" because they like Bgs styled pvp over arena

Not being "good" at arena isnt even a bad thing.. its such a left sided pvp past time, that favors very unforgiving restrictions with class comps to even be effective.. it says alot about itself when u look at how it was implamented, in such a shoehorned fasion, with character class mechanics that werent even designed with that type of play in mind.

Its no ones fault that blizzard has yet to offer a rewarding pvp experience for those that ACTUALLY DO like world/large scale styles of pvp, believe it or not, there are players that love that feeling. and there have been since vanilla

Its disgusting that arena is considered the end all be all demonstration of pvp "skill" in wow. What a joke.

Is a match of Doubles Tennis that much more prestigious then a game of world class soccer?

its almost embarrassing, the kind of idiot elitist community blizzard has given birth too with arena.

100% correct. Personally, I hate arenas, they are basically just as much of a grind as pre-BC was (Rank 12 player here). My arena team is currently at 2104 pushing for our T2 weaps and I find next to no fun in arenas. I've been playing since beta of vanilla and nothing will ever beat world-pvp, but BGs are the closest thing. To throw out the blanket statement of "If you don't like arenas it's cause you're bad at them," is just an ignorant statement.

[worlddan]

To throw out the blanket statement of "If you don't like arenas it's cause you're bad at them," is just an ignorant statement.

Look at the responses on this forum. A lot of people who play arenas are ignorant. They not interested in having an open discussion or recognizing that perhaps being good at BG's requires an entirely different skill set. Oh no.

Arena=GOD
All Else=Fail.

You can't get past that mindset so it's not even worth trying anymore.

For me, rated battlegrounds will only be a success if two things happen. (1) Arena players go elsewhere and don't come into BG's anymore. (2) The weekend warrior crowd stays away. Will that happen? I don't know. My attitude is wait and see.

But it doesn't matter what happens to BG, arenas will always be PvP as far as the dolts are concerned.

[Broccolii]

I find it really funny that there are all these people commenting about the high level arena players mind and skill-set without any sort of personal experience. The amount of planning, coordination, teamwork and awareness REQUIRED in arena play is much more astonishing than that of players that run BGs.

BGs haven't even started, and I am under no illusion that you will need a difference skill-set to deal with them, but arena players will just be so much better prepared.

You can argue that once people are interested with the release of rated BGs they will learn everything they need to, and be on par with arena players. But that is just simply not the case. BGs are of a larger scale, so the knowledge and skills gained will be on the more vague sidee.

As mentioned prior,

i could easily say that its just as much of a demonstration of skill being able to observe your suroundings, is this a fight i should pick or should i back off and wait for some more players... class x is with me... but they have 2 class Ys and one class Z... what are my chances..

These concerns are so abstract and vague for an arena player. Arena players are almost hardwired to think things like... do they have a decurse, is that rogues evasion up, 20k hp.. he's in pve gear, who and what is able to heal and how can I lock him down, where should my focus go, where should I position myself, how should I initiate.

The one thing I KNOW will change, is the addition of a strong leader. Almost as a raid leader, you need someone who can have a vision, know how to execute it, and alter things as parameters change. The only reason I could think of arena players being worse is ego, thinking they know what is right, and going against the 'vision'.

Have you ever watched a pvp video of a mage consistently taking on 3+ people at a time, or a rogue destroying 5 people. This is a result of being 'better' than people at pvp and if you check out their armories, 99% of the time you will find extensive arena experience. Arena teaches you there are tools and counters to most abilities. There are ways to control and predict what is happening in a battle, and if you fight people who are not as well informed as yourself... It's going to get bloody. You don't learn to SW a sheep or repentance in a BG.

The defense and attacking of nodes, flag points, capture points are going to just be segmented arena fights in various locations with various team sizes that happen over and over again within a BG.

EDIT: The skill-set that will be utilized in rated BGs will be different. But heading into it, arena players will already have a huge advantage. And I argue to say that even if you are doing BGs consistently now. Due to lack of competition, you do not have much of an advantage since your skill-set is as well developed as you think it is. Which is why the stalemates of premade vs premade used to, and still do, happen. Individual skill will mean less, and group mentality and LEADERSHIP will be more important. But being able to hold your own, and use certain abilities in the correct time will always be important.

TLDR : Arena players are better at pvp than non arena players. If for no other reason than they know and keep up with ways to counter/exploit/utilize/prevent and survive the many abilities in this game.

[worlddan]

This actually is true. I've had one or two experiences of 40man premade versus 40man premade on AV. That was an intense battle, right down to the wire. Saving TP with 10 seconds left because of good CC and thundershocks, things like that.

Unfortunately, that really isn't the norm.

I agree except that I don't think you need a premade to make that happen. I was in AH RBF where we lost 1590 to 1600. We gave them the achievement! But it was a total blast, nerves on the wire the whole time. I don't think they were ever more than 30 points ahead.

I think that if rated BG's are to be successful they must make that experience the norm.

Can that happen? Yes.

Will it happen? We'll just have to wait and see.

[worlddan]

TLDR : Arena players are better at pvp than non arena players. If for no other reason than they know and keep up with ways to counter/exploit/utilize/prevent and survive the many abilities in this game.

Oh nonsense. Pure unadulterated bullshit.

OK. Let me take a step back and say that I can see where Blizzard designs rated BG's where what you say is true. But then, IMO, they aren't really BG's. They really just become 10 on 10 player arena.

This is why I have a wait and see attitude. If "rated battlegrounds" means in practice nothing more than "large scale arena" then frankly I won't play it. That's uninteresting to me. But if BG's are designed to fit a different mold then in fact you expereince in arenas will be a significant handicap.

[Broccolii]

Oh nonsense. Pure unadulterated bullshit.

Where is the evidence to the contrary?

[worlddan]

Where is the evidence to the contrary?

I have no evidence to the contrary. All I'm saying is that you have no evidence to support your claim, either. That's why it's BS.

The details of how people's performance in a battleground will be rated has not been released and the devil will be in those details.

[Broccolii]

The way they are rated has no bearing on their ability as a PvP player.

Without a clear definition of what makes a good pvp player, than we can safely use a system already set in place which rates players based on their performance in a pvp setting.

If you are to contradict this, than you would need some sort of alternate definition, and I can almost assure you that an arena player will either exceed others, or be on par with all the extra skills being good in arena entails.

[Memory]

Arena players are better at pvp than non arena players. If for no other reason than they know and keep up with ways to counter/exploit/utilize/prevent and survive the many abilities in this game.[/b]

I only partially agree. GOOD arena players are better than non arena players. Oh God, what a surprise that good arena players are good at PvP. But good arena players are just the very top notch of the arena crowd, a crowd going around with level 277 weapons and doing a lot of mistakes in their matches. The average high rated arena player is just average skilled as well.