In your opinion, why is PvP decreasing in popularity

[ArenaDk]

I feel like the comments are nonsense and made by people - who absolutely have no clue about PvP.

It's a bunch of casual PvErs talking about PvP. It's freaking annoying.

Background - I have played 2K rounds this season and I earned my 2.4K. Im among top 400-500 rogues. I just started this season, so I'm not some former gladiator or R1(you can tell - a gladiator takes about 100-200 rounds to reach same rating and even less for R1s).

Weaken the argument:

Argument 1: "It's too hard to enter PvP for new players"
Nobody buys WoW to play PvP. People who PvP are technically not new. They are PvErs, who wants to PvP.
Which makes this argument particularly nonsense. For fact - I started to PvP and push really hard this season - and I some achieved highs - this once again proves that people are just bad and they just complain.

Argument 2: "It's difficult to gear"
You can technically get BiS in few hours(this include fully socketed gear).
Never been easier for the last 20years.

Argument 3: "I want to reach 1.8K for TMOG in solo shuffle - but I can't - it's too hard".
Typical PvE perspective. Getting 1.8K is very easy. In fact - you are in balance of 2000MMR and you gain expontially for each win.
If you still fail - that's on you.

Argument 4: "I want to have gladiator title"
Typical PvE pespective. Gladiator is equally hard - if not harder than mythic raid clearing on your realm. It's supposed to be for special kind of gamer.

Argument 5: "PvP is DED"
The fact how big this thread is - in a sub that techincally been dead for years - proves that PvP is actually very popular(or atleast gaining some ground). Like it or not - this is probably because of SS.

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Ahh - yeah. Venruki - the new Bellular.

Just a reminder , if your 2,4 is in BGB it doesnt count. BGB is wellfare rating and you can climb to 2,4 with negativ win rate depending on your win streaks inbetween

[Stylia]

[QUOTE=agentsi;54636807]

And now you're backpedaling. Good job at proving my point, and failing to produce any evidence to prove yours.

Cheers.

Listen here rude kid, relax your 1.5k xp panties.

If you had ANY pvp knowledge, you'd understand that I'm right. Since you dont have any knowledge or xp, I drop this case.

Really no point in arguing with your kind of people. Would take too long to explain, for you to understand that you are wrong.

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He is right though, iirc venruki (and a few others) made a bunch of videos on this this season. Solo shuffle cr was hardcapped for a long time, then they started adding artifical mmr into the seaon. R1 was 2k for a few specs for the first few weeks of the season, now STARTING mmr is 1950.

Edit:

Just to take the example of fire mage, r1 on fire mage in solo shuffle EU was 1948 on 03.10.2024, today its 2790. So, no, you are just factually wrong here.

Thank you bro! I had no strength to search for "Proof" <3

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I feel like the comments are nonsense and made by people - who absolutely have no clue about PvP.

It's a bunch of casual PvErs talking about PvP. It's freaking annoying.

Background - I have played 2K rounds this season and I earned my 2.4K. Im among top 400-500 rogues. I just started this season, so I'm not some former gladiator or R1(you can tell - a gladiator takes about 100-200 rounds to reach same rating and even less for R1s).

Weaken the argument:

Argument 1: "It's too hard to enter PvP for new players"
Nobody buys WoW to play PvP. People who PvP are technically not new. They are PvErs, who wants to PvP.
Which makes this argument particularly nonsense. For fact - I started to PvP and push really hard this season - and I some achieved highs - this once again proves that people are just bad and they just complain.

Argument 2: "It's difficult to gear"
You can technically get BiS in few hours(this include fully socketed gear).
Never been easier for the last 20years.

Argument 3: "I want to reach 1.8K for TMOG in solo shuffle - but I can't - it's too hard".
Typical PvE perspective. Getting 1.8K is very easy. In fact - you are in balance of 2000MMR and you gain expontially for each win.
If you still fail - that's on you.

Argument 4: "I want to have gladiator title"
Typical PvE pespective. Gladiator is equally hard - if not harder than mythic raid clearing on your realm. It's supposed to be for special kind of gamer.

Argument 5: "PvP is DED"
The fact how big this thread is - in a sub that techincally been dead for years - proves that PvP is actually very popular(or atleast gaining some ground). Like it or not - this is probably because of SS.

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Ahh - yeah. Venruki - the new Bellular.

Simply, pvp is lacking players cuz it's too hard for 99% players and not enough pve rewards for pve people to go into it.

Also addon requirements don't help the pvp case either.

[HansOlo]

[QUOTE=Stylia;54638492]

Listen here rude kid, relax your 1.5k xp panties.

If you had ANY pvp knowledge, you'd understand that I'm right. Since you dont have any knowledge or xp, I drop this case.

Really no point in arguing with your kind of people. Would take too long to explain, for you to understand that you are wrong.

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Thank you bro! I had no strength to search for "Proof" <3

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Simply, pvp is lacking players cuz it's too hard for 99% players and not enough pve rewards for pve people to go into it.

Also addon requirements don't help the pvp case either.

Where do you have it from?

What is "lacking"? Lacking compared to LoL or DOTA2 numbers? Sure.

Lacking compared to before - I highly doubt that. PvP is more popular now - because of that, people are confused and polarized.

I don't remember any better time of PvP.

[Stylia]

[QUOTE=HansOlo;54638514]

Where do you have it from?

What is "lacking"? Lacking compared to LoL or DOTA2 numbers? Sure.

Lacking compared to before - I highly doubt that. PvP is more popular now - because of that, people are confused and polarized.

I don't remember any better time of PvP.

I fully agree with you, having a blast in pvp. And imo it's only getting better and better with new patches.

But you can't prove me wrong about the player base in pvp. Checking LFG, finding maybe 10 listings total for 2s and 3s.

If you don't have friends or teammates, that didn't quit the game, it's gonna take a while to find someone in LFG (1-2h of searching).

That's the only sad part I feel about the pvp state. Sure blitz and soloshuffle queues are a different thing, but for real pvp, needs either friends or time to sit in LFG.

That's my only take on "Lacking" players.

[HansOlo]

[QUOTE=Stylia;54638532]

I fully agree with you, having a blast in pvp. And imo it's only getting better and better with new patches.

But you can't prove me wrong about the player base in pvp. Checking LFG, finding maybe 10 listings total for 2s and 3s.

If you don't have friends or teammates, that didn't quit the game, it's gonna take a while to find someone in LFG (1-2h of searching).

That's the only sad part I feel about the pvp state. Sure blitz and soloshuffle queues are a different thing, but for real pvp, needs either friends or time to sit in LFG.

That's my only take on "Lacking" players.

Well, I believe SS took over.

I have played 2K rounds just this season. I might be an extreme case - but this is far more games/matches compared to regular 2s and 3s.

In that sense you play more PvP, you have more games. Now people complains about the Q time.

My average is about 15min on EU. I remember before SS - I had to find a partner(who would leave after 1st loss) - and I still had to queue. I honestly believe the 15min queue time is also what I used to spend on regular 2s and 3s(for the whole practice of finding a partner etc.). But SS just enabled way more games.

I don't think anything is dead. It just evolved.

[NekoOwlAzure]

This is a big one. The times when PvP gear wasn't a thing, it was simple for bored players to just jump in. Same with the old Southshore battles - people just wore whatever gear they had and it didn't matter quite as much.

Then why did gear become a thing?

[Grinning Serpent]

Then why did gear become a thing?

Because players in WoW are obsessed with number go up, and while a lot of them will claim they "just want good fights," they're lying. Players also like curbstomping newbies without good gear.

I'd throw out gear entirely as a concept in organized PvP (let world PvP be whatever, as it should be.) You still have reasons to push for ratings and grind currency for shiny transmog gear and other cool things. No one should have an advantage or disadvantage just because they play more or fewer hours a week.

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Basically sums it up for me, always manage to stay somewhat competitive at the start of an expansion but when I get into the "play once in a while" state it's pretty much over. Can't be assed to play catch-up and get thrashed for weeks until I'm back on a decent gear level.

And then once you finally get over the gear hurdle, WoW's frequently lackluster balancing becomes really noticeable. When a Fire Mage just kites you in circles forever spamming Scorch and you die, it's okay because well your gear just sucks - you'll get even later! And then you get the gear and you're *still* just being kited in circles forever (it just takes longer now) and you're like "well, that's kind of unfair ain't it?" And replace the classes and you still get the same results.

Arenas really fucked up WoW's PvP design on a fundamental level and they've never been able to figure out how to balance BGs vs Arenas to any decent degree. Arenas often have better balancing overall, but when you run into an obvious balance issue, it's *really* hard to ignore. But then you run into specs or classes that are balanced in arenas but horribly broken in BGs because much of the things that keep arenas balanced aren't usually present in BGs.

And *then* you run into the just generally questionable design choices in BGs in general. Like healers causing CTF to be turtle-fests due to them using traditional CTF rules instead of, for example, TeamFortress style CTF (where you don't need your flag in place to cap and the flag remains where it is for some amount of time when dropped instead of being returned instantly when a player touches it.) Or Battle for Gilneas being both too small and having serious math issues (it's something like 600-700 points where if you are behind by that amount, you literally cannot win with a 2-1 advantage so you might as well just let them 3 cap to end it faster.) And I vaguely remember a lot of pain points in BG maps introduced in later expansions, but vanilla and Cata are my recent experience with the problems.

[Ashana Darkmoon]

Because players in WoW are obsessed with number go up, and while a lot of them will claim they "just want good fights," they're lying. Players also like curbstomping newbies without good gear.

I'd throw out gear entirely as a concept in organized PvP (let world PvP be whatever, as it should be.) You still have reasons to push for ratings and grind currency for shiny transmog gear and other cool things. No one should have an advantage or disadvantage just because they play more or fewer hours a week.

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And then once you finally get over the gear hurdle, WoW's frequently lackluster balancing becomes really noticeable. When a Fire Mage just kites you in circles forever spamming Scorch and you die, it's okay because well your gear just sucks - you'll get even later! And then you get the gear and you're *still* just being kited in circles forever (it just takes longer now) and you're like "well, that's kind of unfair ain't it?" And replace the classes and you still get the same results.

Arenas really fucked up WoW's PvP design on a fundamental level and they've never been able to figure out how to balance BGs vs Arenas to any decent degree. Arenas often have better balancing overall, but when you run into an obvious balance issue, it's *really* hard to ignore. But then you run into specs or classes that are balanced in arenas but horribly broken in BGs because much of the things that keep arenas balanced aren't usually present in BGs.

And *then* you run into the just generally questionable design choices in BGs in general. Like healers causing CTF to be turtle-fests due to them using traditional CTF rules instead of, for example, TeamFortress style CTF (where you don't need your flag in place to cap and the flag remains where it is for some amount of time when dropped instead of being returned instantly when a player touches it.) Or Battle for Gilneas being both too small and having serious math issues (it's something like 600-700 points where if you are behind by that amount, you literally cannot win with a 2-1 advantage so you might as well just let them 3 cap to end it faster.) And I vaguely remember a lot of pain points in BG maps introduced in later expansions, but vanilla and Cata are my recent experience with the problems.

Cata was half a lifetime ago lol.

Blitz fixes a lot of BG issues by having fewer players and faster games. You can't really turtle with the flag debuff either, eventually you get exploded in no time.

[Grinning Serpent]

Cata was half a lifetime ago lol.

Blitz fixes a lot of BG issues by having fewer players and faster games. You can't really turtle with the flag debuff either, eventually you get exploded in no time.

???

Cata is currently active. FC debuff should just be healing reduction, not damage taken. Make it stack up to 100% and force a turnover by simply preventing damage from being healed. But a better solution would be to dump the current turtle-centric style in favor of a more dynamic style. When healers have to be able to tank through multiple DPS and interrupts/disables because otherwise they would be useless in arenas, it becomes a major design issue in BGs.

[Zantera]

I'm not a big PvPer and most of my "real" PvP experience was in TBC/Wotlk. But having dipped more into PvP recently for the sake of achievements, I will say the amount of stuns/CCs/immunities just makes PvP incredibly unfun. I know some of this stuff was in the game even if you go back 7 expansions but it feels more extreme than its ever been.

And I know BGs are very different from Arenas or even 1v1 in terms of balance, "real PvP" and so on but getting chained with stuns/fears/grips/other CCs when all you have is a 2 min cd trinket is about the least fun you can have in the game.

[HansOlo]

I'm not a big PvPer and most of my "real" PvP experience was in TBC/Wotlk. But having dipped more into PvP recently for the sake of achievements, I will say the amount of stuns/CCs/immunities just makes PvP incredibly unfun. I know some of this stuff was in the game even if you go back 7 expansions but it feels more extreme than its ever been.

And I know BGs are very different from Arenas or even 1v1 in terms of balance, "real PvP" and so on but getting chained with stuns/fears/grips/other CCs when all you have is a 2 min cd trinket is about the least fun you can have in the game.

Generally - people prefers retail PvP vs. current classic games. I have been following a bigger thread. Ironically, just like with PvE.

But PvP is not for everyone. It's just highly addictive when it clicks for you.

[Ashana Darkmoon]

???

Cata is currently active. FC debuff should just be healing reduction, not damage taken. .

Ah yes, forgot classic exists lol

Anyway I see FCs get blown up in Blitz pretty easily all the time, though maybe that's just low/mid MMR.

Really need to evangelize the game mode though, it's what a lot of people have been asking for forever. Quick games, not arena, actual ranking. It's still a BG so each person has less agency but that is the nature of the mode

[vian]

I used to raid to gain power in vanilla through wrath just so I could stomp on people, that whole fantasy has been gutted.

Also PvP servers not being a thing anymore.

So the game moved on from what I enjoyed, so It's not for me anymore.

[Lord Pebbleton]

Because people don't like PvPing. They like winning.

I have always had the impression that there is a VERY small part of the community that really cares for an healthy PvP option within WoW. I say "impression" because I am not absolutely part of that group. WoW PvP is absolutely horrid imho.

The only time PvP is fun is when you explode people with the click of a button, like with the artifact in Ashran. It is a boring slog when it turns into endless cooldown trading. That's all there is to it. Balance does not exist.

And let's not forget world PvP! The super fun casual activity that people took part in either to A) gain an exp advantage, or B) camp the poor souls that were looking for said advantage. No one was there for the fairness of it.

WoW is just not a PvP game. There are so many better options for it, it is not 2005 anymore. If it really is decreasing in popularity, I can only bid it good riddance and hope it dies even quicker and rot away

[SinR]

Can't remember if I said this.

Toxicity.

[LordVargK]

WoW PvP is way too complex for the average person.

There was a time, where I played a PvP MMO, which had balanced factions, 3 of them and only a single class that could heal and revive. World PvP was the focus and long term objectives were the goal. Also each class only had a handful of abilities, so you could know what to expect when you faced your enemy. And it was purely group content and no class had good AoE. Which meant long fights with real impact, because the respawn was 5 minutes away from the action, if you were the attacker. It also meant, that individual player skill had limited impact. That was fun.

In Cata I sometimes casually played PvP with guildies, which was also fun. But really only BGs.

Now, WoW PvP on the other had is the absolute opposite:
- 2 factions, highly unbalanced in World PvP, pretty much only ganking
- no open world objectives, only instanced content
- no impact on the game world
- every class can heal (themselves and/or others), has burst, AoE
- the game is balanced more around Arena 3v3 than any other game mode
- every spec is different and has too many abilities, meaning to properly learn PvP is a chore, not fun
- The base UI is terrible for PvP, given how important defensives are in PvP they are not telegraphed at all

Look at how literally any successful PvP game handles their game: very few abilities, focus on the action. In WoW you often have little action, in that you get burst down in a matter of seconds, but much to learn. Death recap is terrible, you most likely don't even know what you did wrong and how to counter it next time.
In random BGs you get stomped by experienced players, in Arena you have too much responsibility for a newcomer.

Also PvP is entirely different than PvE. Even if you're a god in PvE you would suck in PvP. Also new talents and other balancing, but still the same number of abilities or even more. If you don't have a group to play with, PvP is a terrible experience, even without the toxicity inherent in any somewhat competitive environment.

There is a reason why Blizzard made Plunderstorm. It's simple, easy to learn, hard to master and fast. Compare this to a BG: Even if you lose and get ganked, you most likely will sit there 10 minutes, often at your graveyard, and have to watch. Yeah, that's the opposite of fun.

So why does it get less popular? Because old PvPers leave and newcomers can't find access to the gamemode.

[Grinning Serpent]

Ah yes, forgot classic exists lol

Anyway I see FCs get blown up in Blitz pretty easily all the time, though maybe that's just low/mid MMR.

Really need to evangelize the game mode though, it's what a lot of people have been asking for forever. Quick games, not arena, actual ranking. It's still a BG so each person has less agency but that is the nature of the mode

I think that the combat-focused BGs are just a mistake at this point. Due to how severely arena has shifted PvP design (particularly in regards to healer design and how CC works/how many classes should have it), it scales poorly above the intended 3v3 scenarios (which is another issue arenas introduced, since they had to pick one of three types to focus on as the "serious one.") On larger maps, like AB or on objective focused maps like AV, Ashran, or IOC, the state of class balance is less important and you can still contribute in some way even if you're very new. On small maps, CTF, etc all that really matters is fighting and that's when the scaling issues and importance of player skill (and gear!) matters more. Since you're incentivized to either play random BGs for the bonus honor or specific BGs for the Call to Arms bonus, it can result in a lot of unhappiness.

Even doing a drastic top to bottom rework of PvP might not solve the issue because you would *still* have the arena vs BGs scaling problem. I don't know what the answer is here. I imagine neither does Blizzard, and that's why they're just letting PvP kind of rot in the cupboard.

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There is a reason why Blizzard made Plunderstorm. It's simple, easy to learn, hard to master and fast. Compare this to a BG: Even if you lose and get ganked, you most likely will sit there 10 minutes, often at your graveyard, and have to watch. Yeah, that's the opposite of fun.

Yeah, I can vouch for Plunderstorm. I did it just enough to get enough points to buy the mount and pet for classic, and while BRs aren't really my thing and it felt like there were some balance issues with regards to some items being much stronger than others (which is itself part of the BR design to keep things interesting, I think?), I went from doing a five minute tutorial to learn the gameplay basics and rebind keys to playing and having fun within half an hour. It never felt like I died for some reason I couldn't understand.

If they did this sort of thing but for, like, CTF or IOC or something I'd be absolutely fucking *hooked.* It really is a "less is more" sort of thing. You don't need 20 buttons to allow for a lot of depth of play. Plunderstorm has, what, like 5? And I could easily see how there could be a fair amount of strategy and depth involved if you chose to get into it.

[Soon-TM]

So why does it get less popular? Because old PvPers leave and newcomers can't find access to the gamemode.

Amen, brother. And the issue will only get worse with the current class design.

[kranur]

So why does it get less popular? Because old PvPers leave and newcomers can't find access to the gamemode.

Not only pvp, it's the game as a whole that is dumpsterfire to new or old time returning players. I recently had a friend return to WoW after a very long time and after playing classics a lot and the only reason he played for more than a few days wss because I kept talking with him through.
Everything is waaay to complicated and ironically until endgame, too boring. He was completely bored of leveling, questing and dungeons, and had a very tough time understanding all the currencies, gear tracks, weeklies, difficulties, tier levels, crafting.
After a lot of guiding him through, he finally understood how things worked, did some m+ and doesn't find it as bad anymore. This is why WoW can't hold on to new people ... very few are willing to spend hours and hours to understand how the game works, provided they haven't quit out of boredom.

[loras]

I took advantage of the brawl event to farm some marks to unlock some old sets, since I don't really enjoy pvp.

I started thinking about how PvP is becoming more and more niche as time goes on. IMHO it's not really a problem with WoW, because I see the same even in other mmos, and I think the main reasons are ouside the game.

People migrated to MOBA first and then Hero shooters for PvP.

People not enjoying tab targeting interactions as before (see point 1)

PvP in MMO not as spectacular/sellable as other genres prevents them from gaining momentum.

Barrier to entry (both skill and gear) is an obstacle for getting new players.

Cost is also a significant barrier when people can consider f2p pvp games.

PvP in MMO is often condidered as a secondary priority compared to PvE, and is not balanced around it.

Huge lulls of content since there are no game modes, new classes, characters etc. to create hype. Seasons/patches can also be a downside if you liked the old tier set bonus more than the new tier set bonus.

Concerning point 7, rerolling it's much harder when you don't enjoy your class anymore.

Off the top of my head those are the main reasons, but I'm interested in reading other takes

There is also the issue of it being a tad grindy, costly in terms of enchants and for whatever reason doesn't scale to the current max ilvl, lessening especially the value of gold invested due to the gear being hardcapped in pve before even considering stats, trinkets, procs, etcetera.

Basically it's just not integrated into the rest of WoW and the gap's too big to justify the spend for many.
And in my case i just have had less time to spend.

And they still haven't figured out a good spot/"reason for being" for casual pvp, which imo should just come with its own fully hidden rating to allow access to more gear from there (reputation/renown anyone? Casuals seem to enjoy the grind in delves and raids after all, and it guarantees something for their time investment, plus i.e. the free start-up weapon this season was pretty much already that, just not part of something coherent yet).

Oh and for some reason they made craftable pvp gear all wonky compared to Dragonflight.