PvP is broken and this is why

[Bidybag]

I cannot speak for the community but as a pvp-person who has been doing only that for about 5 years I'm going to list my suggestions on how to make pvp better as a whole. I will start with the less obvious and uncommon suggestions and end with the common ones (since they got posted a few times already).

Balance around 3v3, but keep 2v2 and especially 1v1 in mind.
I have read many posts where players get frustrated about a single ability or talent. One of the most popular ones was maybe Second Wind. In every post people would call it overpowered and others would try to counter that argument with saying that it’s balanced in 3v3.
The thing is… both of them are right. Second Wind is way more powerful in a 1v1 situation than in a 3v3 situation. People will always have 1on1 fights, (especially) more so than 3v3 fights. Keep in mind that not everyone does 3v3 arena, some players might only like BGs and duels or they simply don’t have time to find 2 other players every time they want to do pvp.

Make defensive cooldown usage proactive instead of reactive.
This means that a dk would have to use IBF when he anticipates a stun instead of doing it only when he got stunned. The problem with reactive cooldowns is that it makes the game a lot easier. Furthermore pvp becomes something like a binairy fight where you can almost simulate what is going to happen. Proactive cooldown usage would promote skillful play and makes fights less predictable and more interesting.

Less damage from (static) damage sources that don't really require the players attention.
Examples of these are usually pets (Wild Imps, BM hunter pets) and procs like Cobra Strikes (makes the hunter pet do critical strikes for over 20k damage easily without any awareness from the hunter). I think it’s fairly self-explanatory as to why these shouldn’t have a big influence on the outcome of a pvp battle.

Just because an ability looks or feels cool and gets a lot of player praise doesn’t mean it shouldn't apply to the balancing rules.
Even if the players like it, in the grand scheme of pvp it will do more harm than good if it’s overpowered. (Example: Avatar at the start of MoP)

Keep RNG but reduce it’s influence.
Generally as a pvp’er I don’t like RNG. But I agree that it has a place in pvp and it’s sometimes fun to have back to back procs/ RNG luck. However this element should be kept at a minimum because it’s based on luck and nothing else. An example of RNG that is too strong in some cases is Paralytic poison. A rogue might just put you into a Garrote followed by a 6 second kidney shot for 10 seconds and get a fourth application of the Paralytic poison at the end making it a 14 second lockdown scenario compared to a 10 second one. It’s all just a game of luck and rewards the player for attacking, not for playing smart.

Removal of abilities with multiple charges.
I feel like Blizzard has gone overboard with the system of abilities having charges. I see a few problems with them. The first problem is that it becomes very hard to track or memorize enemy ability usage. Let’s say we gave all abilities 3 charges, would you be able to keep track of them? The second problem is back-to-back usage of these abilities which makes it hard to balance around. An example of this is the double charge system of warriors. When balancing warriors with a single charge of Charge you could use the logic that when the warrior charges, the opponent can get away with some form of escaping tool and now the warrior cant attack for *insert number here* seconds. Based on this you can get a general idea of warrior uptime which means you can balance their damage appropriately. As soon as you bring a double charge into play things get messed up. Some classes with a limited escape mechanism toolkit won’t ever be able to get away while other classes still can. This makes a very big difference in terms of uptime and makes for a less balanced system. Shifting example ( A = class with plate and one tool to escape, B = class with cloth and multiple tools to escape).
Single charge system: Uptime on A = 70%, Uptime on B = 20% (difference 50%)
Double charge system: Uptime on A = 95%, Uptime on B = 25% (difference 70%)
As you can see the difference becomes bigger which creates problems that can only be solved by giving class A (dull) passive damage reduction buffs (Focused Will, Glyph of Lightning Shield,…) or other band-aid fixes that have a further negative impact on pvp balance in general.

Diminishing returns on cc reworked
In the current state of the game I feel like diminishing returns on cc should work differently. It’s always one type of cc followed by another and into another. While I could suggest a different DR system I don’t think it would be relevant for 6.0. It’s up to Blizzard to think of a DR system that is appropriate to how CC works in the next expansion.

No more blankets on interrupts.
Shortly said it rewards bad play and punishes the better player (person who managed to fake cast successfully) to have these combined in one spell. If you insist that a class needs a silence AND an interrupt you should just give them a shared cooldown. You could for example make counterspell an interrupt only that interrupts for 6 seconds and you could give them a silence that silences for 3 seconds. However, if either one gets used the other one should go on cooldown as well. You could even make one trigger a shorter cooldown than the other (like shaman shocks).

Promote casting, reduce influence of instant casts
While the cooldowns on interrupts got increased I still feel like it didn’t help too much with the “promote casting” thing. Only when instant cc gets reduced to a much lower amount casting can become viable again.
Another factor is also that instant casts are usually more powerful that casted spells. Be it Ice Lance or instant Lava Bursts, it’s all instant and it’s a lot of damage. Getting a Lava Burst proc is like doing 2 casted lightning bolts.
Lastly mind numbing effects have to be removed. There is actually no question here, if you intend to let it stay it should be 5 or 10% at maximum.

Make instant cc a niche, don't hand it out to everyone.
I think many would agree that instant cc in MoP got out of hand. This doesn't mean that all of it should be removed. In my opinion it would be better to have it as a niche, like how HoJ was always instant for paladins but they don't have a slow or MS effect.

Bring back uniqueness for each class.
It’s something we all crave.

Offensive cooldown stacking removed or diminished
Right now I think everyone is using a macro with all their offensive cooldowns listed in it. I don’t think that’s what Blizzard intended with offensive cooldows because it’s rather stupid (ME PRESS 1 BUTTON FOR HIGH DMG!!!).
Now this doesn’t only apply to class specific abilities, but also damage buffs from trinkets. (I like the pvp on use trinket by itself, but not paired/macroed with any offensive cooldown).

Increase the cooldown of offensive and defensive cooldowns.
Generally when I’m fighting in battlegrounds I have most of my cooldowns available in every other fight. It just feels like I have to use them all the time because they will be off cooldown in the next fight anyways. Maybe they have received a lower cooldown because most abilities have become reactive abilities(as explained earlier).

Make classes easy to learn, but hard to master.
However the game turns out to be, I believe this is the most important one to keep in mind at all times. Reward those who have learned to be a better player. If it means that one very good player can kill 2 bad players then so be it. Don’t have it like the current state where one of the bad players can “outplay” you with the press of a dps burst macro.

These were the suggestions that I could come up with at the moment. WoW pvp can be great but steps have to be taken and I'm hoping for a better game in 6.0.

[Omaski]

I agree, wholeheartedly, with everything you just said and i would personally love to see most, if not all, of these changes go into effect. The only problem i see with it, and this is the reason Blizzard wont do it, is that making ~30% of these changes will radically change the entire game of Warcraft. We already know that Blizzard wants to make the game fun, not just for the exceptional players that probably make up about 35% (just a napkin calculation based off how many popular WoW'ers i see that have lots of commercial success and of the amount of decent players I encounter in the game when I play), but for the players who arent really so good. Yes, these changes would make the game better but also toooo different.

TLDR >Blizzard would rather piss off the top 35% of Wow'ers and lose ~2 mil subscribers than piss off the other 65% and lose ~6-7mil subscribers

[Terahertz]

I especially agree with Offensive cooldown stacking removed or diminished.

Since wotlk blizzard has been adding way too many "Increased X damage for Y duration". Balance druids used to be probably one of the least CD dependant spec out there. Now they're basically (or used to be) balanced around all of those CDs (2 damage increasing CDs if they're specced into incarnation).

Many specs have become a ret paladin as I like to call it, because rets used to be as I can remember the only real class out there with a static damage increasing CD besides bestial wrath.

To be honest, damage from burst should be transferred more to sustained damage. Burst should be an extra little push, not something that literally doubles your damage for a small duration like for Windwalker monks. On my WW monk I usually literally do 100%+ more damage when I pop my tigereye brew + my trinkets procced. Same goes for my rogue with find weakness up and CDs. My eviscerates literally do roughly 4-5x more damage.

The only reason why blizzard keeps adding bullshitty cooldowns and random ass procs is because of PvE. But whenever I PvE I absolutely hate it having to cater to RNG and play around CDs. I don't want to pay full attention to my CDs and whatnot. It makes the game feel like a DPS race. I want to fight like I'm playing a singleplayer game; focus on mechanics and more instead of having to monitor everything.
I'm not saying I can't monitor my CDs and all, but it does make PvE less fun to me, and you can not tell me it's actually fun having to monitor 100 things at a time.

I like simpler gameplay like wotlk.

[Rorke]

Balance around 3v3, but keep 2v2 and especially 1v1 in mind.

So you want them to focus on 3v3 balance but then want to 1v1 to be "kept in mind." What do you mean by "Kept in mind?" How do you expect Blizzard to adjust each class accordingly in 3v3 balance and then at the same time make 1v1 between classes somewhat balance able without effecting pve?

Make defensive cooldown usage proactive instead of reactive.

So you want DK Icebound Fortitude and I also assume something like Rogue CoS to be reactive like its Rogue Feint or something. Do you want every class to be reactive? And how do you balance every class around that? Wouldn't classes feel the same? And I do believe we already have defensive cool downs reactive. A Warrior can survive by predicting an enemy burst set up by using Shield Wall to survive the damage in the stun. Aren't defensive cool downs that reduce damage already reactive?

And how exactly does a reactive defensive game style take more skill than something like Icebound Fortitude? Don't bad DK's use Icebound Fortitude to break stuns when they're not in any real danger or aren't closing in for a kill? Wouldn't a bad Rogue use a defensive CoS on something completely trivial only to get killed after it fades. Why is "Should I break the stun or not" risk type gameplay take less skill than a reactive type method where you "guess" that you might get stunned?

Less damage from (static) damage sources that don't really require the players attention

But how do you add a mechanic in the game that doesn't affect pve? And then how does that affect pet classes? Do you have to adjust their main abilities to hit harder? And how do you balance that around pve? Do you somehow make those abilities hit harder against player targets? Sounds like a little too much for something that isn't even a big deal.

Just because an ability looks or feels cool and gets a lot of player praise doesn’t mean it shouldn't apply to the balancing rules.

The problem is that I assume you're not a developer. Game developers are not automated robots that have no attachment to things they design. Believe it or not, any design team is going to have a certain bias to ideas they create for certain classes. Sometimes its hard to hold back on powerful ideas for a given class because of how awesome it would be if the class could do such a thing.

Take season LK DK's for example. LK DK's were probably the greatest designed class in the history of the game where each spec could play a tank or dps spec, dual wield or 2h. No class in the game had anywhere near the amount of versatility as wotlk dk's. Today's DK's are just a neutered version of their LK days in the name of "balance."

I mean if you were given an opportunity to design a new class wouldn't you want it to kick ass? Would you bend some of the rules of "balance" to give it a slight edge on the battlefield? These are questions you need to honestly ask yourself.

Keep RNG but reduce it’s influence.

Of course you need to keep RNG as its a mechanic that literally effects every game. But you can't possibly reduce its influence in MMO games where RNG is a god king of not just loot rolls, but most classes are designed around this god king. And how does RNG take less skill than a rigid system? Didn't you want reactive type gameplay where you need to guess and make an educated decision that the "Lucky Rogue" might get a paralytic stun and preemptively icebound fortitude it? Wouldn't you agree that RNG does add a lot of unpredictability for the enemy team?

And again how are you going to balance around certain specs that rely on RNG in pvp without affecting pve?

Removal of abilities with multiple charges.

Now you're just arguing 1v1 mechanics. Who cares if a Warrior can gap close twice on something like a shadow priest which has limited amounts of anti melee tools when in a 3v3 setting the shadow priest should have good team mates to peel for him. And how do you exactly balance Warriors by comparing it to something with low anti melee tools. You're only applying it to one situation. What happens if the Warrior is against something with a lot of anti melee tools like a Warlock or Mage? Now how do you balance Warrior uptime/damage with those two while maintaining the same rules for Shadow?

It makes things overly complicated. And Warriors are just one melee class. What about Rogues, DK's, Rets and monks? There's just way too many variables that its impossible to balance without completely overhauling every single class and the game itself. And then what about pve?

Diminishing returns on cc reworked

If they work this, then wouldn't they need to rework defensive healing capabilities of healers and hybrids? Wouldn't they need to remove defensive cool downs for every class for someone to actually die. As much as every claims to hate CC chains its always been a part of the game to score a kill. And good players with good coordination are good at effectively using CC chains. It doesn't need to be reworked.

No more blankets on interrupts.

So it takes no skill for the mage to use a blanket silence but doesn't that increase the skill cap for the enemy player who has to react and survive the counterspell? And if they remove Blanket silences for classes that have them, how does that affect those classes? How do you compensate them for that loss? Would certain comps still be as effective? Wouldn't healers benefit from this and how do you counter that?

Make instant cc a niche, don't hand it out to everyone.

Then we should remove Shadowfury from Warlocks, Storm Bolt from Warriors, Asphyxiate from DK's and so on. But would you be happy as a designer to remove those abilities? Would you be happy as a player to find out that "your" class lost a lot of toys in the name of "balance." Seems lame.

Bring back uniqueness for each class.

And I ask you, how would you exactly do that? Contrary to popular belief on these forums, each class still has an identity. If that weren't the case, you wouldn't have idiots on here siding with their favorite class like its some sports team and defending it to the death. Believe it or not, the classes mechanically are played different even though they may have similar abilities. When I'm on my DK, I feel like I'm playing a DK. When I'm on my Rogue, I feel like I'm playing a Rogue. When I play Warrior, it feels like a Warrior. Are Frost DK's and Arms Warriors a little similar? Yes. But the core abilities and priority system are much different, even the gcd is.

Taking things away from classes and making the game like its wotlk won't make the classes "feel" more different.

Offensive cooldown stacking removed or diminished

How do you achieve this without affecting pve? And how do you know that Blizzard didn't intend the game to be like this? And how does cool down stacking not take skill for the person doing it and the enemy player? The person cool down stacking is trying to achieve a kill and is pooling all of his resources for that moment. He then makes an educated decision when to use everything in which the enemy player must react to accordingly to survive. Doesn't that take skill? Why would you want to play a game that's a slugfest and doesn't end until the healers run out of mana. Does every class have to now have to have high sustained damage for the game to take skill.

You seriously want to remove something that has been in this games pvp forever.

Increase the cooldown of offensive and defensive cooldowns.

Yep and in the process make every class less fun and take less skill. Let's have it like vanilla with 30 minute shield wall cool downs and such. The fact is, the more classes can do, the more skill classes take. And how in the world are you going to convince a developer at Blizzard to revert all of the offensive Ret cool down buffs and defensive Warrior cool down buffs? Wouldn't this also affect pve?

Make classes easy to learn, but hard to master.

So not only do the developers have to worry about class balance, but now they have to adjust each class to have a basic skill floor but a high skill cap without defiling balance. How is this possible? And what is skill exactly? Is there an invisible measuring stick to determine how much skill a class should take at its cap? How do you as a developer figure that out?

[Itisamuh]

Not once in there did I see that healing is far too powerful, so I guess we have very different views of why it sucks.

Personally I think they should just balance around battlegrounds and say screw arena. It will never be balanced, ever.

[Sevyvia]

Not once in there did I see that healing is far too powerful, so I guess we have very different views of why it sucks.

Have you ever actually played a healer? Because all you do is get blown up as soon as you step outside of 3v3. There are a huge number of people for whom arena is not their main enjoyment in PvP, and the focus on 3v3 to the detriment of 1v1 or even 2v2 (Which keeps 1v1 more balanced than 3v3) is hurting everyone.

[meathead]

getting rid of pvp and pve specs is the main reason why wow's pvp is all messed up,along with the normalization of classes and talents or what you called "uniqueness for each class."

every class should have one and only one pvp spec,this would make things much easier to balance.their is a thread going on atm about shadow in pvp.i made a few posts there and im getting trolled hard because of it.i went into detail on how and why every spec viable crap is killing wow.read peoples comments,they are half to balme for this mess wow is in.people wan to pvp as blood and piss and cry when they cant.they same can be said for every class in game.people piss and moan when "example" feral is not as good as restro in pvp.its sad it really is.

OP-if you like read my comment in the other thread and let me know what you think.bring back pvp and pve specs and separating pvp and pve would fix 90% of the problems in wow's pvp.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...amage-is-awful


people in the linked thread really are clueless.read the posts like i said,they have no idea of what pvp and pve specs are/were.i gave an example of how warriors use to have the biggest health pools,one guy said warriors do not need them because they are so op'ed.that is what you dealing with in todays wow.

[Thunderbleem]

-- wall of text --

I got to the point where you argued with him about making defensives reactive, when in fact in his post he said he wanted them to be proactive. Reading comprehension.

I don't agree with all of the OP's ideas but you just seem like you want to argue for the sake of it. Especially your whole bit about "you're not a game developer." In essence, you're saying "developers want to make something cool, so it's ok if it's overpowered." That's just a piss poor argument, there.

[walkingtall]

I could quibble on specifics but if all that went through I wouldn't file a complaint.

Honestly, the only thing I would add is too many auto-applied bleed mechanics. Make em actually press a button to apply it.

And, on homogeneity. There is very little variation between classes. Ranged all kind of do the same thing, usually a mechanic that triggers you to do something because you did something. Melee is close to the same as well. Healers, well, they all have to rely on instants because they simply can't cast most of the time. So whatever form of instant they have, they have to use. Every class has some form of CC, usually instant, usually 3 or 4 with at least 1 interrupt. Damage is usually applied via some sort of proc. Every class has a burst sequence of some sort.

Too much sameness.

[washacked]

they've actually chosen to go the opposite way of what you want in cata and mop, mainly the way DR are even stupid-proof now


are you in a stun? that dipshit pally can't stun you .1 seconds into your stun to force you into DR now (thereby reducing the time you're in your initial stun) because DR can't kick in now until the original effect is dispelled or runs its course. you simply can't stun a stunned player anymore.

and how about those dispels with cds...that remove fucking every debuff. more stupid proofness

face it, blizzard still believes the idiots will keep them afloat

[Deleted]

Not once in there did I see that healing is far too powerful, so I guess we have very different views of why it sucks.

Personally I think they should just balance around battlegrounds and say screw arena. It will never be balanced, ever.

I totally agree with OP.. but I also agree with this quote..... this debate has been raging for years sadly.... unless everyone rolls a warrior then Arena will never be balanced... there are lots of things that ruin Arena.., CC - DR - Ability bloat - Dmg and healing are all out of hand..

the biggest problem for me in Arena is the amount of fast damage being thrown out far too easily while being CC'd by way too easy to apply CCs... Wheres the fun in being CC'd for 90% of an Arena match while watching yours or your teammates HP drop like a brick with chuff all you can do ????? I dare cast any sort of spell in arena these days as its pointless..

solution could be...... ban PVE gear from PvP, reduce dmg/healing once in PvP. all CC should share DR, reduce duration of all CC, remove some instants or make them castable, remove some instant CC make them castable...

I dunno lol, this aint gonna happen ever tho so pointless moaning about it.....

[stickyjam]

and how about those dispels with cds...that remove fucking every debuff. more stupid proofness

I actually think this was one of the sillier changes, A good dispeller was noticeable and apart of being a good healer.

Going into 6.0 they really need to work on the niches more like how Rdruid is HOT and CC. Rshaman is big heals and anti-CC tools. Priest used to be the offensive heal able to provide dmg support. Monks are mobile. This sort of thing should apply more. Instead of balance is giving every class a button does the same as another.

[Skit]

imo all they need to do is, separate PvP & PvE.

[wholol]

I cannot speak for the community but as a pvp-person who has been doing only that for about 5 years I'm going to list my suggestions on how to make pvp better as a whole. I will start with the less obvious and uncommon suggestions and end with the common ones (since they got posted a few times already).

Balance around 3v3, but keep 2v2 and especially 1v1 in mind.
I have read many posts where players get frustrated about a single ability or talent. One of the most popular ones was maybe Second Wind. In every post people would call it overpowered and others would try to counter that argument with saying that it’s balanced in 3v3.
The thing is… both of them are right. Second Wind is way more powerful in a 1v1 situation than in a 3v3 situation. People will always have 1on1 fights, (especially) more so than 3v3 fights. Keep in mind that not everyone does 3v3 arena, some players might only like BGs and duels or they simply don’t have time to find 2 other players every time they want to do pvp.

Make defensive cooldown usage proactive instead of reactive.
This means that a dk would have to use IBF when he anticipates a stun instead of doing it only when he got stunned. The problem with reactive cooldowns is that it makes the game a lot easier. Furthermore pvp becomes something like a binairy fight where you can almost simulate what is going to happen. Proactive cooldown usage would promote skillful play and makes fights less predictable and more interesting.

Less damage from (static) damage sources that don't really require the players attention.
Examples of these are usually pets (Wild Imps, BM hunter pets) and procs like Cobra Strikes (makes the hunter pet do critical strikes for over 20k damage easily without any awareness from the hunter). I think it’s fairly self-explanatory as to why these shouldn’t have a big influence on the outcome of a pvp battle.

Just because an ability looks or feels cool and gets a lot of player praise doesn’t mean it shouldn't apply to the balancing rules.
Even if the players like it, in the grand scheme of pvp it will do more harm than good if it’s overpowered. (Example: Avatar at the start of MoP)

Keep RNG but reduce it’s influence.
Generally as a pvp’er I don’t like RNG. But I agree that it has a place in pvp and it’s sometimes fun to have back to back procs/ RNG luck. However this element should be kept at a minimum because it’s based on luck and nothing else. An example of RNG that is too strong in some cases is Paralytic poison. A rogue might just put you into a Garrote followed by a 6 second kidney shot for 10 seconds and get a fourth application of the Paralytic poison at the end making it a 14 second lockdown scenario compared to a 10 second one. It’s all just a game of luck and rewards the player for attacking, not for playing smart.

Removal of abilities with multiple charges.
I feel like Blizzard has gone overboard with the system of abilities having charges. I see a few problems with them. The first problem is that it becomes very hard to track or memorize enemy ability usage. Let’s say we gave all abilities 3 charges, would you be able to keep track of them? The second problem is back-to-back usage of these abilities which makes it hard to balance around. An example of this is the double charge system of warriors. When balancing warriors with a single charge of Charge you could use the logic that when the warrior charges, the opponent can get away with some form of escaping tool and now the warrior cant attack for *insert number here* seconds. Based on this you can get a general idea of warrior uptime which means you can balance their damage appropriately. As soon as you bring a double charge into play things get messed up. Some classes with a limited escape mechanism toolkit won’t ever be able to get away while other classes still can. This makes a very big difference in terms of uptime and makes for a less balanced system. Shifting example ( A = class with plate and one tool to escape, B = class with cloth and multiple tools to escape).
Single charge system: Uptime on A = 70%, Uptime on B = 20% (difference 50%)
Double charge system: Uptime on A = 95%, Uptime on B = 25% (difference 70%)
As you can see the difference becomes bigger which creates problems that can only be solved by giving class A (dull) passive damage reduction buffs (Focused Will, Glyph of Lightning Shield,…) or other band-aid fixes that have a further negative impact on pvp balance in general.

Diminishing returns on cc reworked
In the current state of the game I feel like diminishing returns on cc should work differently. It’s always one type of cc followed by another and into another. While I could suggest a different DR system I don’t think it would be relevant for 6.0. It’s up to Blizzard to think of a DR system that is appropriate to how CC works in the next expansion.

No more blankets on interrupts.
Shortly said it rewards bad play and punishes the better player (person who managed to fake cast successfully) to have these combined in one spell. If you insist that a class needs a silence AND an interrupt you should just give them a shared cooldown. You could for example make counterspell an interrupt only that interrupts for 6 seconds and you could give them a silence that silences for 3 seconds. However, if either one gets used the other one should go on cooldown as well. You could even make one trigger a shorter cooldown than the other (like shaman shocks).

Promote casting, reduce influence of instant casts
While the cooldowns on interrupts got increased I still feel like it didn’t help too much with the “promote casting” thing. Only when instant cc gets reduced to a much lower amount casting can become viable again.
Another factor is also that instant casts are usually more powerful that casted spells. Be it Ice Lance or instant Lava Bursts, it’s all instant and it’s a lot of damage. Getting a Lava Burst proc is like doing 2 casted lightning bolts.
Lastly mind numbing effects have to be removed. There is actually no question here, if you intend to let it stay it should be 5 or 10% at maximum.

Make instant cc a niche, don't hand it out to everyone.
I think many would agree that instant cc in MoP got out of hand. This doesn't mean that all of it should be removed. In my opinion it would be better to have it as a niche, like how HoJ was always instant for paladins but they don't have a slow or MS effect.

Bring back uniqueness for each class.
It’s something we all crave.

Offensive cooldown stacking removed or diminished
Right now I think everyone is using a macro with all their offensive cooldowns listed in it. I don’t think that’s what Blizzard intended with offensive cooldows because it’s rather stupid (ME PRESS 1 BUTTON FOR HIGH DMG!!!).
Now this doesn’t only apply to class specific abilities, but also damage buffs from trinkets. (I like the pvp on use trinket by itself, but not paired/macroed with any offensive cooldown).

Increase the cooldown of offensive and defensive cooldowns.
Generally when I’m fighting in battlegrounds I have most of my cooldowns available in every other fight. It just feels like I have to use them all the time because they will be off cooldown in the next fight anyways. Maybe they have received a lower cooldown because most abilities have become reactive abilities(as explained earlier).

Make classes easy to learn, but hard to master.
However the game turns out to be, I believe this is the most important one to keep in mind at all times. Reward those who have learned to be a better player. If it means that one very good player can kill 2 bad players then so be it. Don’t have it like the current state where one of the bad players can “outplay” you with the press of a dps burst macro.

These were the suggestions that I could come up with at the moment. WoW pvp can be great but steps have to be taken and I'm hoping for a better game in 6.0.

I agree with most of the things said here, one more thing that I would add to that list is the fact that self healing has also gotten out of proportion because of everything else you've listed.

The best solution I can come up with ( which has been stated here and in other places several times ), is to make abilities work differently in pvp and pve, though the only problem with that is the fact that most casual players will find it " hard" to learn 2 sets of spells according to blizzard ( though I think most casuals will not be doing both pvp and pve, even if they were wow has been evolving constantly and most players have learned to adapt so I don't think it is a bad idea to split the way abilities work).

Also regarding CC, imo instant CC should have cast times, this would fix most problems regarding CC chains and would actually promote skillful plays.
Another way to fix the mass amount of CC that every class can chain off DR is to add the "resolve" system which was seen in star wars , it's a small bar that fills up the more CCs u take regardless of DRs, after 3-4 CCs on you the bar will fill up entirely and start counting down from full , it provides total immunity to CC for about 10-15 secs, the bar drains down while the effect of the resolve is active until it is empty.

Everything else regarding cds/ burst and class uniqueness I also agree with so I will not say anything since there's nothing further to add , except that maybe interrupts should also be looked over, some classes have too many ways to interrupt casts which promotes the instant cast play style, if we are to move to casting again interrupts should be looked over again.

[Tart]

I dont know why Blizzard doesnt make class abilities all do the same base damage before gear.

[Deleted]

PvP won't ever get balanced because it's always on the backburner in terms of developer time, and they are too slow to make adjustments.

[Tart]

PvP won't ever get balanced because it's always on the backburner in terms of developer time, and they are too slow to make adjustments.

Didnt Blizzard say having PvP in Warcraft was one of their biggest mistakes?

Or have i just dreamt that up.

[Coraulten]

Didnt Blizzard say having PvP in Warcraft was one of their biggest mistakes?

Or have i just dreamt that up.

They said they way they did it was.

[Deleted]

Balance around 3v3, but keep 2v2 and especially 1v1 in mind.

So you want them to focus on 3v3 balance but then want to 1v1 to be "kept in mind." What do you mean by "Kept in mind?" How do you expect Blizzard to adjust each class accordingly in 3v3 balance and then at the same time make 1v1 between classes somewhat balance able without effecting pve?



So you want DK Icebound Fortitude and I also assume something like Rogue CoS to be reactive like its Rogue Feint or something. Do you want every class to be reactive? And how do you balance every class around that? Wouldn't classes feel the same? And I do believe we already have defensive cool downs reactive. A Warrior can survive by predicting an enemy burst set up by using Shield Wall to survive the damage in the stun. Aren't defensive cool downs that reduce damage already reactive?

And how exactly does a reactive defensive game style take more skill than something like Icebound Fortitude? Don't bad DK's use Icebound Fortitude to break stuns when they're not in any real danger or aren't closing in for a kill? Wouldn't a bad Rogue use a defensive CoS on something completely trivial only to get killed after it fades. Why is "Should I break the stun or not" risk type gameplay take less skill than a reactive type method where you "guess" that you might get stunned?



But how do you add a mechanic in the game that doesn't affect pve? And then how does that affect pet classes? Do you have to adjust their main abilities to hit harder? And how do you balance that around pve? Do you somehow make those abilities hit harder against player targets? Sounds like a little too much for something that isn't even a big deal.



The problem is that I assume you're not a developer. Game developers are not automated robots that have no attachment to things they design. Believe it or not, any design team is going to have a certain bias to ideas they create for certain classes. Sometimes its hard to hold back on powerful ideas for a given class because of how awesome it would be if the class could do such a thing.

Take season LK DK's for example. LK DK's were probably the greatest designed class in the history of the game where each spec could play a tank or dps spec, dual wield or 2h. No class in the game had anywhere near the amount of versatility as wotlk dk's. Today's DK's are just a neutered version of their LK days in the name of "balance."

I mean if you were given an opportunity to design a new class wouldn't you want it to kick ass? Would you bend some of the rules of "balance" to give it a slight edge on the battlefield? These are questions you need to honestly ask yourself.



Of course you need to keep RNG as its a mechanic that literally effects every game. But you can't possibly reduce its influence in MMO games where RNG is a god king of not just loot rolls, but most classes are designed around this god king. And how does RNG take less skill than a rigid system? Didn't you want reactive type gameplay where you need to guess and make an educated decision that the "Lucky Rogue" might get a paralytic stun and preemptively icebound fortitude it? Wouldn't you agree that RNG does add a lot of unpredictability for the enemy team?

And again how are you going to balance around certain specs that rely on RNG in pvp without affecting pve?



Now you're just arguing 1v1 mechanics. Who cares if a Warrior can gap close twice on something like a shadow priest which has limited amounts of anti melee tools when in a 3v3 setting the shadow priest should have good team mates to peel for him. And how do you exactly balance Warriors by comparing it to something with low anti melee tools. You're only applying it to one situation. What happens if the Warrior is against something with a lot of anti melee tools like a Warlock or Mage? Now how do you balance Warrior uptime/damage with those two while maintaining the same rules for Shadow?

It makes things overly complicated. And Warriors are just one melee class. What about Rogues, DK's, Rets and monks? There's just way too many variables that its impossible to balance without completely overhauling every single class and the game itself. And then what about pve?



If they work this, then wouldn't they need to rework defensive healing capabilities of healers and hybrids? Wouldn't they need to remove defensive cool downs for every class for someone to actually die. As much as every claims to hate CC chains its always been a part of the game to score a kill. And good players with good coordination are good at effectively using CC chains. It doesn't need to be reworked.




So it takes no skill for the mage to use a blanket silence but doesn't that increase the skill cap for the enemy player who has to react and survive the counterspell? And if they remove Blanket silences for classes that have them, how does that affect those classes? How do you compensate them for that loss? Would certain comps still be as effective? Wouldn't healers benefit from this and how do you counter that?


Then we should remove Shadowfury from Warlocks, Storm Bolt from Warriors, Asphyxiate from DK's and so on. But would you be happy as a designer to remove those abilities? Would you be happy as a player to find out that "your" class lost a lot of toys in the name of "balance." Seems lame.



And I ask you, how would you exactly do that? Contrary to popular belief on these forums, each class still has an identity. If that weren't the case, you wouldn't have idiots on here siding with their favorite class like its some sports team and defending it to the death. Believe it or not, the classes mechanically are played different even though they may have similar abilities. When I'm on my DK, I feel like I'm playing a DK. When I'm on my Rogue, I feel like I'm playing a Rogue. When I play Warrior, it feels like a Warrior. Are Frost DK's and Arms Warriors a little similar? Yes. But the core abilities and priority system are much different, even the gcd is.

Taking things away from classes and making the game like its wotlk won't make the classes "feel" more different.



How do you achieve this without affecting pve? And how do you know that Blizzard didn't intend the game to be like this? And how does cool down stacking not take skill for the person doing it and the enemy player? The person cool down stacking is trying to achieve a kill and is pooling all of his resources for that moment. He then makes an educated decision when to use everything in which the enemy player must react to accordingly to survive. Doesn't that take skill? Why would you want to play a game that's a slugfest and doesn't end until the healers run out of mana. Does every class have to now have to have high sustained damage for the game to take skill.

You seriously want to remove something that has been in this games pvp forever.


Yep and in the process make every class less fun and take less skill. Let's have it like vanilla with 30 minute shield wall cool downs and such. The fact is, the more classes can do, the more skill classes take. And how in the world are you going to convince a developer at Blizzard to revert all of the offensive Ret cool down buffs and defensive Warrior cool down buffs? Wouldn't this also affect pve?


So not only do the developers have to worry about class balance, but now they have to adjust each class to have a basic skill floor but a high skill cap without defiling balance. How is this possible? And what is skill exactly? Is there an invisible measuring stick to determine how much skill a class should take at its cap? How do you as a developer figure that out?

I couldn't disagree with you more. You are making very weak arguments for keeping things like they are.

I mean if you were given an opportunity to design a new class wouldn't you want it to kick ass? Would you bend some of the rules of "balance" to give it a slight edge on the battlefield? These are questions you need to honestly ask yourself."

Umm no absolutely not. I would be paid to create a new class that fit the game, not a pet project where i can do whatever the hell i want because it's cool. That would have been highly unprofessional.

[Rorke]

There is nothing weak about my arguments. You people like to sit around all day and complain about core aspects of the game that are literally never going to go away. I don't know how the hell some of you even play this game if you agree with everything in the OP. There are times where I feel as though some of you literally must get some masochistic drive out of complaining on the forums just like the same idiots who secretly love it when "their class" is bad.

Some of you need to get this through your skulls. The people who design this game aren't EVER going to make sweeping overhauls similar to what the OP is asking in this game. It would require an entire development team dedicated to make these unrealistic changes that would end up hurting the company. None of you realize the amount of resources and time required that would be needed to "attempt" to apply such changes on top of all of the pve crap and pet battles with the addition of an entire new expansion.

Sorry to burst the bubble you people live in, but Blizzard doesn't give a shit about the tiny percentage of people who pvp this game at a somewhat serious level. They mainly focus on the average person who does solo content, LFR and Flex Raids. Everything added in MoP as been catered to this kind of player because they bring in the most $$$ a year for Blizzard. They aren't going to waste development time drastically changing how each class works in relation to pvp. They aren't going to remove all of these extra abilities and cool downs that you people think make each class "feel the same" and "need to be "removed or raised cool downs" in the great holy name of what you people call "balance."

And if they did cater to you people, they would have a lot of unnhappy employees losing their pay and their jobs. Not as if any of you probably give a shit about anyone else. Some of you act as though these people have no lives, that all they should do is serve you and they must always answer to you and do what you say they should do.

Stick to complaining about certain classes that you think are overtuned and explain why they're overtuned. Or complain about pvp players not getting gold for bg's. Those are actually realistic things to complain about because its within the boundary of what they can actually do.