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Wednesday, December 13, 2006
This is too popular, let's nerf it
Blizzard found a solution to everybody doing PvP: they nerfed it. Honor gain is now 30% less than before. In case you are bad at math, let me run you through this. If you previously gained 1,000 honor per hour, saving up for an item costing 7,000 honor, you needed 7 hours to get it. After the nerf you only get 700 honor per hour, 30% less. So now you need 10 hours to get that same 7,000 point item, which is 10 divided by 7 = 1.42857 times as much, or 43% more. Lowering the honor gain instead of raising the prices has the advantage for the players that it doesn't affect previously gained honor. It has the advantage for Blizzard that most people can't do math and think they need 30% more time to advance now, while in fact it's 43%.
Don't get me wrong, I think the new "cost", the effort needed to get a specific reward, is better balanced. And by making PvP less popular, the load on the servers will be reduced. But of course the way Blizzard got to this result was probably the worst possible: First overshooting in their goal to make PvP more popular, showing everybody that the servers can't handle this, and then slapping a big nerf on it, making everybody angry. Imagine Nintendo declaring that they found their Wii console being too popular, always being sold out at the current price, and so they'll increase the price by 43% from now on. If Blizzard had tested their PvP better and put the new cost structure in from the start, it would have been a lot better.
Another problem has turned up with the PvP reward system: Items cost a combination of honor points and BG victory marks. And Blizzard considers every victory mark to be equally valuable, thus for example the epic PvP mount costs 30 each of the three battleground victory marks. But as you get victory marks only for finishing a battleground, in reality the victory marks from the much shorter battlegrounds WSG and AB are a lot easier to get than the AV marks. That is especially annoying for the Horde, which due to AV geography strongly favoring Alliance there very rarely wins AV. In the time it takes me to get 1 AV victory mark, I can easily get 10 AB marks.
I believe the honor gain to be essentially equal for all battlegrounds, although I need to test that. But although I spent less time in AB than in AV, I already have far too many AB marks, over 40, while still only having 10 AV marks. People who do most of their PvP in AB or WSG complain that they are reaching the stacking limit of the victory marks, while still not having enough honor points to buy what they want. For me that is okay, I actually like AV, so I'll just do my honor farming there. But if you would much prefer the other battlegrounds and are forced to do AV to get the victory marks from there very slowly, I can see how that wouldn't be much fun. Maybe Blizzard should introduce some possibility to trade 3 victory marks of one type against 1 of a different type.
- posted by Tobold @ 7:08 AM Permanent Link
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AV Marks are getting easier for Horde to earn now. Even one at a time. The Alliance has gotten the rushed win in AV down to about 20 minutes now. That's five minutes faster than pre-patch. All those new talents are speeding them up I guess.
I enjoy AV too, despite our capabilities there, and I'm very happy to see the HWL gear I want takes AV Marks. It's a new grind, but at least there's rewards at the end that won't be denied even if I want to take a break.
I enjoy AV too, despite our capabilities there, and I'm very happy to see the HWL gear I want takes AV Marks. It's a new grind, but at least there's rewards at the end that won't be denied even if I want to take a break.
# posted by 
: 13/12/06 09:18
: 13/12/06 09:18
Just a quick comment to say that, in my battlegroup on (Nordrassil/Euro), Horde wins AV nearly every single time, but we have real trouble winning WSG or AB... I wish Blizz would let us exchange marks from one bg to another...
The issue is compounded by the fact that WSG and AB are dominated by premade in tier 2 or 3 who pulverise pugs... My choice is usually queue for AV, get in within 30 secs, win within 15 minutes, get around 300 honor (before the nerf) and 3 marks, or queue for WSG/AB, get in quick, get farmed for 15 minutes, get no or very little honor and end up with just one mark...
All in all, as a casual pvp/pve player I'm glad for the new pvp system, even after the nerf (it will just take me that much longer, but at least it is still miles better than before) - I just think that some adjustments could be made...
The issue is compounded by the fact that WSG and AB are dominated by premade in tier 2 or 3 who pulverise pugs... My choice is usually queue for AV, get in within 30 secs, win within 15 minutes, get around 300 honor (before the nerf) and 3 marks, or queue for WSG/AB, get in quick, get farmed for 15 minutes, get no or very little honor and end up with just one mark...
All in all, as a casual pvp/pve player I'm glad for the new pvp system, even after the nerf (it will just take me that much longer, but at least it is still miles better than before) - I just think that some adjustments could be made...
# posted by : 13/12/06 10:34
: 13/12/06 10:34
I read the "solution" link.
Translation: "We used the live PvP servers as our (free of charge) test environment rather than using competent project management, test, and evaluation processes pre-release."
Laughable.
I could say more, but it wouldn't be nice, so I'll stop.
Translation: "We used the live PvP servers as our (free of charge) test environment rather than using competent project management, test, and evaluation processes pre-release."
Laughable.
I could say more, but it wouldn't be nice, so I'll stop.
As one (anon) poster above mentioned, I too am surprised at one aspect of the new pricing. IMO, pricing should not include having to clog my bank with marks of three different battlegrounds -- actually, *five* slots when Arena and Eye of the Storm come online. Those four bank slots you were gifted in the patch are already taken, plus one, if you're an avid PvP-er.
Easy to fix: Eliminate physical 'marks' and just track them on the PvP sheet like 'honor currency' is tracked.
Easy to fix: Eliminate physical 'marks' and just track them on the PvP sheet like 'honor currency' is tracked.
Here is why Horde loses AV:
1) Lack of Teamwork - everyone wants to lead
2) Healing Classes unwilling to heal - attitude: I PVP for fun, not to heal
3) Impatience - better to get 1 mark in a 20 min loss than 3 marks in a 4 hour victory, and AV is for marks, AB and WSG are for honor grinding
4) Horde gives up - Allies play 90% defence, get the Druids, Summon the elemental, Bomb the Horde base and stemroll Horde after 3 hours of suicidal AOE Defence (works well, see 2)
1) Lack of Teamwork - everyone wants to lead
2) Healing Classes unwilling to heal - attitude: I PVP for fun, not to heal
3) Impatience - better to get 1 mark in a 20 min loss than 3 marks in a 4 hour victory, and AV is for marks, AB and WSG are for honor grinding
4) Horde gives up - Allies play 90% defence, get the Druids, Summon the elemental, Bomb the Horde base and stemroll Horde after 3 hours of suicidal AOE Defence (works well, see 2)
# posted by : 13/12/06 15:22
: 13/12/06 15:22
Not a good explanation, because the lack of teamwork, healing classes unwilling to heal, and impatience should affect both factions equally. There is no reason whatsoever to believe that the Alliance has better teamwork, healer who heal, or are very patient. Their performance in other battlegrounds disproves that.
I find this debate laughable on a number of fronts:
1) Blizzard gives us a 90% discount on the amount of work required to get Rank 13-14 items. Then they boost prices by 40%, making the total price only an 85% discount. People happily accept the 90% but cry bloody murder when it's reduced to only 85%. (Numbers are approximate.)
2) Sure, Blizzard didn't test enough. I'm hoping they're spending their time fixing and refining BC stuff instead! In 5 weeks, we'll find the battlegrounds completely deserted (at least for 60's) while everyone levels through the new content.
1) Blizzard gives us a 90% discount on the amount of work required to get Rank 13-14 items. Then they boost prices by 40%, making the total price only an 85% discount. People happily accept the 90% but cry bloody murder when it's reduced to only 85%. (Numbers are approximate.)
2) Sure, Blizzard didn't test enough. I'm hoping they're spending their time fixing and refining BC stuff instead! In 5 weeks, we'll find the battlegrounds completely deserted (at least for 60's) while everyone levels through the new content.
For the record:
1) I'm not "crying" about the new 'easy epics' system (frankly, I'm much more disturbed by PvP server failures and PvP class balance issues). I'll exploit the at least one easy epic (I'm with Tobold on priorities - weapon first), then I'll probably save my HC and marks for higher-level stuff.
Bottom line: I'm troubled because indications are very strong taht Blizzard used the live realms to test their PvP honor currency system, with easy epics as the bait. And then Blizz threw the unwitting testers a bone with, "Keep your pre-nerf honor currency (guinea pigs)!" How sweet!
Which leads directly to point 2...
2) We *are* talking about BC content! The new PvP system is BC content - the patch is called 2.0.1, not 1-point-something, for that very reason. And this newly-introduced BC content (though already behind schedule) was not well tested!
So if the upcoming BC PvE content is "well tested", IMO it will be likely be because of the work of the (free) beta testers, not because of Blizz internal project management and testing.
1) I'm not "crying" about the new 'easy epics' system (frankly, I'm much more disturbed by PvP server failures and PvP class balance issues). I'll exploit the at least one easy epic (I'm with Tobold on priorities - weapon first), then I'll probably save my HC and marks for higher-level stuff.
Bottom line: I'm troubled because indications are very strong taht Blizzard used the live realms to test their PvP honor currency system, with easy epics as the bait. And then Blizz threw the unwitting testers a bone with, "Keep your pre-nerf honor currency (guinea pigs)!" How sweet!
Which leads directly to point 2...
2) We *are* talking about BC content! The new PvP system is BC content - the patch is called 2.0.1, not 1-point-something, for that very reason. And this newly-introduced BC content (though already behind schedule) was not well tested!
So if the upcoming BC PvE content is "well tested", IMO it will be likely be because of the work of the (free) beta testers, not because of Blizz internal project management and testing.
2) Healing Classes unwilling to heal - attitude: I PVP for fun, not to heal
/sarcasm
I don't understand why players who pay $15.00 would want to have fun.
/sarcasm off
/sarcasm
I don't understand why players who pay $15.00 would want to have fun.
/sarcasm off
The real complaint people have is not that the ability to accumulate honor over time was reduced, but the manner in which it was done.
The tier 2/tier 3 premade teams that steamrolled pugs all week and made obscene amounts of honor have already purchased the couple of epic pieces they wanted to round out their sets. They got to do this under the higher honor gain. These same premades are the ones that resulted in blizzard deciding too much honor was being accumulated too quickly. Premades caused the nerf, but are not affected by it (lolz, I already got 5 HW pieces this weekend! - paraphrased from forums). Casual players didn't cause the nerf, but are affected by it the most. See the complaint?
A much better mechanic for limiting honor gain would have been to either cap the amount of honor you can earn per day, cap the number of bg instances you can enter per day (sort of like raid lockouts), or (and my personal preference), institute pvp 'rest'. The first 2 hours spent pvping each day accumulate honor at 100%. Time spent pvping beyond that earns honor at 50%. This would reduce honor accumulation overall, without impacting casual players that much or denying anybody the ability to play as much as they want.
The tier 2/tier 3 premade teams that steamrolled pugs all week and made obscene amounts of honor have already purchased the couple of epic pieces they wanted to round out their sets. They got to do this under the higher honor gain. These same premades are the ones that resulted in blizzard deciding too much honor was being accumulated too quickly. Premades caused the nerf, but are not affected by it (lolz, I already got 5 HW pieces this weekend! - paraphrased from forums). Casual players didn't cause the nerf, but are affected by it the most. See the complaint?
A much better mechanic for limiting honor gain would have been to either cap the amount of honor you can earn per day, cap the number of bg instances you can enter per day (sort of like raid lockouts), or (and my personal preference), institute pvp 'rest'. The first 2 hours spent pvping each day accumulate honor at 100%. Time spent pvping beyond that earns honor at 50%. This would reduce honor accumulation overall, without impacting casual players that much or denying anybody the ability to play as much as they want.
# posted by : 13/12/06 18:11
: 13/12/06 18:11
Graktar,
Love your idea for pvp rest.
I finally got to play my 60 priest in BGs this past weekend and noticed that the number of people who were demanding heals from me, when I was in shadow form and fighting Alliance no less, had approximately quadrupled. I suspect this is because of the influx of raiders who are used to having tame priests doing whatever they want.
In AB we were struggling against an alliance premade, score had gotten to about 1600-900 so essentially over, when a mage started complaining about how we could have won if the priest and shaman would "l2p" and heal him. Of course, the shaman and I had significantly more damage output than he did. I sugested he learn to play and bandage me.
Frankly, if Blizzard is going to take away decursive and screw up the emergency monitor, they have made it too much of a pain in the ass for me to heal in BGs. I'm just not going to do it anymore.
Love your idea for pvp rest.
I finally got to play my 60 priest in BGs this past weekend and noticed that the number of people who were demanding heals from me, when I was in shadow form and fighting Alliance no less, had approximately quadrupled. I suspect this is because of the influx of raiders who are used to having tame priests doing whatever they want.
In AB we were struggling against an alliance premade, score had gotten to about 1600-900 so essentially over, when a mage started complaining about how we could have won if the priest and shaman would "l2p" and heal him. Of course, the shaman and I had significantly more damage output than he did. I sugested he learn to play and bandage me.
Frankly, if Blizzard is going to take away decursive and screw up the emergency monitor, they have made it too much of a pain in the ass for me to heal in BGs. I'm just not going to do it anymore.
# posted by : 13/12/06 19:11
: 13/12/06 19:11
On my server alliance tend to win AV because there are so many guilds doing 40 man instances so the scale of the fight and some of the discipline seems to just come to the PUG that forms there. Essentially on the alliance side it just looks like an experienced 40 man group burning trash in MC (no offense to the hordies).
The other key discriminator on my server is that AV is used as a distraction while the horde are waiting for the lighter BG's, i.e. you'll see horde players join for 5-10 minutes and then leave. I don't know what its like now that the marks are required - maybe thats improved but certainly they had a much higher churn of players than alliance.
I really don't think it has anything to do with the geography as you suggest tho Tobold, that sounds a bit like the alliance folks saying that horde always wins WSG because they have shaman...
The other key discriminator on my server is that AV is used as a distraction while the horde are waiting for the lighter BG's, i.e. you'll see horde players join for 5-10 minutes and then leave. I don't know what its like now that the marks are required - maybe thats improved but certainly they had a much higher churn of players than alliance.
I really don't think it has anything to do with the geography as you suggest tho Tobold, that sounds a bit like the alliance folks saying that horde always wins WSG because they have shaman...
I'd love to see the geography taken out of PvP.
Mirror AV 50% of the time; Alliance plays from the current Horde side and visa-versa.
Everything is already there to do it, just swap the graphics.
In fact, WSG and AB could also be mirrored with very little effort.
After all, if evening things out is the Blizz solution -- we're already giving Pallies to Horde, and Shammies to Alliance -- why not even out the BGs too?
Mirror AV 50% of the time; Alliance plays from the current Horde side and visa-versa.
Everything is already there to do it, just swap the graphics.
In fact, WSG and AB could also be mirrored with very little effort.
After all, if evening things out is the Blizz solution -- we're already giving Pallies to Horde, and Shammies to Alliance -- why not even out the BGs too?
One thing that I've noticed happening, at least on the alliance, is a significant shift towards more defense at SP and less rush. I get a feeling that people are farming for HKs and letting the O win the game for them, to maximize their honor gain.
# posted by : 13/12/06 21:48
: 13/12/06 21:48
You complain that the horde have it bad with AV, but the alliance has a very big disadvantage with the AB and WSG bgs due to the fact that the horde are somehow amazing at this (or maybe they just cooperate with eachother, unlike half of the alliance nubs in PuG bgs. Only way to win in either AB or WSG is to make a premade, and even then its a throw up, since horde guillds do premades for those battle grounds too. I just dont think the horde should QQ about AV, since they completely shit on us in AB and WSG.
Don't take this personally though, i love your blog and i read it everyday, keep up the good writing =D
Don't take this personally though, i love your blog and i read it everyday, keep up the good writing =D
# posted by : 14/12/06 03:21
: 14/12/06 03:21
I like the idea of 3 of any kind of mark being exchangeable for 1 of another. This is doubly so for reasons below...
One thing that is clear to me from the comments as well as observation is that which faction dominates any given BG (or even level range within a BG) is cyclical. Basically winning breeds an expectation of winning, which leads to wins. Losing leads to an expectation of losing, which is self-fulfilling as well.
When I first started WSG in the 10-19 long ago, the conventional wisdom on our server (same realm as Kinless) was that Horde *always* wins WSG. People whined about it all the time. But my experience was that Horde won 60-70% of the games I was in. Far from "always". Over time, this reversed, and eventually Alliance dominated the bracket, to the point that it was boring. But for a long time, Alliance players would enter the BG sure they were going to lose, planning to lose.
You see this today on our BG group. In the higher level brackets, Alliance expects to lose AB and WSG. Horde expects to lose AV. And guess what? It doesn't take very many people not trying in WSG or AB to *cause* a loss. I can't speak to Horde-side AV as I don't have a character that high, but I expect there are a number of players who get in there and think "eh, I'll get some HKs and a token".
Which brings me around to the observation that the new system seems to be reinforcing this (hopefully this is transitory). If you need marks and honor, the incentive seems to be "I go to X BG that we win all the time for honor. I go to Y that we lose just enough to get those marks." And the incentive for that player IS to lose at Y as quickly as possible. They are not even trying to get honor there.
Maybe I'm just coming off of some bad experiences, but I was in a WSG match where some players were literally not trying. Down 1-0, and they were standing in the base (though not actually playind D) or hanging out in the GY.
The only silver lining is that the incentives are now also all about ending it quickly, so the Horde showed no interest in camping or farming HKs.
Isolated incident? I hope so. But it sure looks to me like the incentives are lining up *against* competitive efforts.
Now, if you could swap 3 tokens for 1 (aha, back to the first paragraph), you could dispense with this. No one *has* to go to a BG they don't want to do!
On the other hand, would some battlegroups fall into ruts where Alliance only queue for certain BGs, and Horde only for others??
- Brock
One thing that is clear to me from the comments as well as observation is that which faction dominates any given BG (or even level range within a BG) is cyclical. Basically winning breeds an expectation of winning, which leads to wins. Losing leads to an expectation of losing, which is self-fulfilling as well.
When I first started WSG in the 10-19 long ago, the conventional wisdom on our server (same realm as Kinless) was that Horde *always* wins WSG. People whined about it all the time. But my experience was that Horde won 60-70% of the games I was in. Far from "always". Over time, this reversed, and eventually Alliance dominated the bracket, to the point that it was boring. But for a long time, Alliance players would enter the BG sure they were going to lose, planning to lose.
You see this today on our BG group. In the higher level brackets, Alliance expects to lose AB and WSG. Horde expects to lose AV. And guess what? It doesn't take very many people not trying in WSG or AB to *cause* a loss. I can't speak to Horde-side AV as I don't have a character that high, but I expect there are a number of players who get in there and think "eh, I'll get some HKs and a token".
Which brings me around to the observation that the new system seems to be reinforcing this (hopefully this is transitory). If you need marks and honor, the incentive seems to be "I go to X BG that we win all the time for honor. I go to Y that we lose just enough to get those marks." And the incentive for that player IS to lose at Y as quickly as possible. They are not even trying to get honor there.
Maybe I'm just coming off of some bad experiences, but I was in a WSG match where some players were literally not trying. Down 1-0, and they were standing in the base (though not actually playind D) or hanging out in the GY.
The only silver lining is that the incentives are now also all about ending it quickly, so the Horde showed no interest in camping or farming HKs.
Isolated incident? I hope so. But it sure looks to me like the incentives are lining up *against* competitive efforts.
Now, if you could swap 3 tokens for 1 (aha, back to the first paragraph), you could dispense with this. No one *has* to go to a BG they don't want to do!
On the other hand, would some battlegroups fall into ruts where Alliance only queue for certain BGs, and Horde only for others??
- Brock
# posted by : 14/12/06 18:44
: 14/12/06 18:44
These days I'm playing Defense on Alliance so that better to gain more honor points. Others too. AV time from start to finish has now gotten to nearly an hour with everyone trying to get the points. Most times, we forget to go and get Drek. LOL!
# posted by : 14/12/06 19:05
: 14/12/06 19:05
"Which brings me around to the observation that the new system seems to be reinforcing this (hopefully this is transitory). If you need marks and honor, the incentive seems to be "I go to X BG that we win all the time for honor. I go to Y that we lose just enough to get those marks." And the incentive for that player IS to lose at Y as quickly as possible. They are not even trying to get honor there."
Brock,
I'm seeing the very same thing in post-patch Battlegroup 6 AV. The AV "open battlegrounds" are still up about 450% three weeks post-patch. And Horde has gone from pre-patch 40%-50% AV win rate to about 10% AV win rate in my experience so far.
Horde battleground chatter reveals that the attitude in AV on Battlegroup 6 is still very much one of turbo honor-farming; all-O, take out the objectives that yield honor and let Alliance win quickly (rogues even bypass SP GY and try for the Dun Baldar towers). And with an honor rate of about 400+ honor / ½ hour, there is apparently little incentive to the Horde to try for a win, especially if a win takes more time than a loss. Fast loss = back into a new AV faster, to farm NPCs and towers again for more honor, and there's no pressing need for AV marks either. For example, the stack-limit 100 AV marks (at one-per-loss) and about 200 honor-per-loss = 20000 honor currency. Bottom line: Losing AV quickly is probably the most efficient way to gain PvP honor - therein lies the problem.
Rather oxymoronic, eh?
Lose AV fast = most honor.
No wonder Hordies keep on queueing up for the beatings...
Pre-patch I enjoyed AV a lot, and favored AV for my honor-farming, but I don't think I'll be able to stomach AV as 'risk-enhanced PvE' in which the factions take out uncontested PvE targets, run past each other, and the Horde noobs stubbornly feeds a low-road Alliance HK meatgrinder.
Fortunately, I have AB as a viable option. Based upon my evaluations of AV and AB this week (after mostly laying-off PvP for a couple of weeks), I'll be spending most of my PvP time in AB in the run-up to the BC.
And in the face the various PvP issues, Blizz stepped with a PvP solution:
Nerf honor gain.
...
Thanks, Blizz! Hopes for the AV situation being "transitory" just got reduced/extended by 30%...
Brock,
I'm seeing the very same thing in post-patch Battlegroup 6 AV. The AV "open battlegrounds" are still up about 450% three weeks post-patch. And Horde has gone from pre-patch 40%-50% AV win rate to about 10% AV win rate in my experience so far.
Horde battleground chatter reveals that the attitude in AV on Battlegroup 6 is still very much one of turbo honor-farming; all-O, take out the objectives that yield honor and let Alliance win quickly (rogues even bypass SP GY and try for the Dun Baldar towers). And with an honor rate of about 400+ honor / ½ hour, there is apparently little incentive to the Horde to try for a win, especially if a win takes more time than a loss. Fast loss = back into a new AV faster, to farm NPCs and towers again for more honor, and there's no pressing need for AV marks either. For example, the stack-limit 100 AV marks (at one-per-loss) and about 200 honor-per-loss = 20000 honor currency. Bottom line: Losing AV quickly is probably the most efficient way to gain PvP honor - therein lies the problem.
Rather oxymoronic, eh?
Lose AV fast = most honor.
No wonder Hordies keep on queueing up for the beatings...
Pre-patch I enjoyed AV a lot, and favored AV for my honor-farming, but I don't think I'll be able to stomach AV as 'risk-enhanced PvE' in which the factions take out uncontested PvE targets, run past each other, and the Horde noobs stubbornly feeds a low-road Alliance HK meatgrinder.
Fortunately, I have AB as a viable option. Based upon my evaluations of AV and AB this week (after mostly laying-off PvP for a couple of weeks), I'll be spending most of my PvP time in AB in the run-up to the BC.
And in the face the various PvP issues, Blizz stepped with a PvP solution:
Nerf honor gain.
...
Thanks, Blizz! Hopes for the AV situation being "transitory" just got reduced/extended by 30%...
My complaint is also with the fact that Blizzard didn't due enough testing to put out the correct honor gain in the first place. They need to open a statistical analysis book or hire someone with some quality or Six Sigma background to help them test the numbers using software, and not the player-base.
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# posted by : 15/12/06 03:35
: 15/12/06 03:35<< Home
