like everybody else recently I've blown myself out grinding honor in av. it just simply isn't fun on my lvl70 main. with the new changes to leveling however I took the opportunity to level up a few alts (paladin and rogue if u care) and LET ME TELL YOU! the 50-60 av bracket is 10x more fun than 60-70. people actually pvp, defend towers, massive pitched battles, it's brilliant!

for anybody who is blown out on the lvl70 av, which is a glorified pve dungeon with purple loot, my advice to you is to try the 50-60 bracket
 

I have fun when the group works together and performs well, when there is no drama or arguing in chat and everyone particpates, even if we lose. Those collective experiences are fun.

However, since I usually pug bgs, those experiences are few and far between. So basically I do it for the rewards, and it's not fun at all.
 

I grind them. The issue with this sort of WoW PvP is that it's hugely unfair; not having PvP gear means you're going to get roflstomped, so to speak. Blizzard wonders why people AFK; maybe it's because half the time you get obliterated. Hell, one of my toons can't even make it past the archers when on offence. He can't even get to them in time without getting killed by their arrows, and there's nothing he can do about it (short of buying a potion).

Good fun.
 

Oh, and to clarify; my character IS a level 70. I'm not crazy to bring a level 65 or something into AV. That said, the low-level complaint applies. The great thing about old AV was that a lower level character could be useful in AV by working on objectives or taking the mine; I found that significantly more difficult recently while levelling another character, as well as more pointless due to shorter game times.
 

AV is still fun for me and I do like PvP. But it is the BG I get bored with the quickest. As a disc/holy priest I might go 10 straight AV's and not see actual PvP content. I was typically running with the forward group to help take deep GY's and towers. I would get seriously bored doing this.

Then I discovered defense which I used to think was pointless. It can be truly fun. Now I go and try to do things that I haven't seen people do that often. For example, on alliance and go and shadowmeld around the SH GY. The horde seldom gets resistance there so sometimes I can delay the initial cap substantially or even allow the cap and retake it when they all leave.

Sometimes I hang out at the edge of our bridge and try to stall people so the archers eat them to death. Or I MC people out of towers and off the bridge.

I have found that the cure to my AV boredom is to go try different things, especially when they aren't expected. Anything you can do to delay the offense even indirectly is great and makes the whole thing much more interesting.

As for me, I never grind. I decided a long time ago that I would play when and what I wanted to and the gear would just come as it did. The game is actually much more fun this way. If you tend to grind, the grind never stops. As soon as you get thing A as fast as you can, now it is thing B.
 

I find it boring because I mostly solo it. When doing a battleground with my friends I'm much more entertained even if we get stuck in a WSG game that takes 30 minutes.
 

I do them for the fun and the rewards. I find that while I am waiting to get a group together for a Heroic or just killing time, that I really enjoy doing a few battlegrounds. When it becomes “unfun” is when I have to play a battleground I don’t enjoy in order to get the marks for a reward I want or simply because it’s the daily. I agree with you on the lack of battleground choice selection. Some of them are getting tired and as I pointed out in my latest blog entry, at least one of them was broken by the release of Burning Crusade.

I actually think it’s kinda funny how you have one stance on PvP and Syncaine has another stance because overall I agree with both of you. With one notable exception, I don’t think that having a good PvE game and a good PvP game needs to be mutually exclusive. Providing both allows players who like both more variety. I would certainly be bored to tears with the game if I didn’t have “something to do” when “nothing else was going on”.
 

I have fun in BG's including AV, but then again, I limit how much I play them each day to around 3-5x at most. More than that, and it can get old quickly.
 

I find Battlegrounds fun -- at times.

Of all the available content I prefer questing, either solo or in groups, because my first priority in playing this game is to immerse myself in the content. I tried all the BGs a little, just to learn their stories, but the grind never appealed to me before the S1 armor was available for Honor. Since then I have spent many hours grinding Honor in the BGs toward a complete set for my main, a resto shammy, because the S1 resto armor is better than anything I can assemble through solo or small group content. After that, I intend to return to PvE content almost exclusively.

However, I have come to enjoy some aspects of the BGs, and have even taken some time in them with my alts, without any expectation of grinding enough honor for the rewards. The reason I have done so is that I have found that playing in BGs forces you to hone your skills.

Against the AI controlled mobs, it is very easy to learn a pattern of actions that work every time; if something is too hard or too easy, just find a different level quest or mob. In PvP, you have to become aware of the strengths and weaknesses of your class and all other classes. You have to react faster and more flexibly in PvP, and it encourages you to try different abilities that you might generally ignore.

Aside from being educational and remunerative, the BGs can be fun when people work together, even in a loss. As a healer, I'm always the first target; it's great when I stand their healing the DPS around me while they take out opponents trying to kill me. But when people run around fighting solo battles and ignoring the objectives of the BG, it's not much fun.

AV is my favorite BG, not because the honor is great (which it usually is) but because it is the only BG that that has a compelling story for my character. Defending the Frostwolf clan always seems like a noble cause.
 

I found the bg's most fun leveling up before the twinks flooded them. That said on an old (mature) server perhaps the most fun was lvl 50-59 AB or WG. Alterac Valley was full of haves and have nots.. lvl 60's who had uber raid gear and those who didn't and couldn't compete. I have to say that I never did do pvp for the rewards really, just for th e fun. Playing a shaman at the lvl 20s and 30s was hysterical pre-BC and my troll mage was awesome around there too. Hunters were also a lot of fun, including at AV because they can (mostly) sit back and shot so even if their gear isn't tops they don't just get wiped out of existence right away as long as theres some other people in the mess who do. Plus their dirty/fun pet annoys the heck out of healers and casters (especially scorpids) Av was fun when there was an actual war between sides taking territories which happened to me a few times early on but if its just a race to kill the leader which is what happened later, not so much.
 

You also have to consider how hard it is to make battlegrounds compared to 5 man dungeons. For those, you just have to create a layout and populate it with mobs and a few bosses. However in battlegrounds you are basically creating an entire new zone with set objectives. The effort that goes into a battleground is probably more comparable to the effort that goes into creating a new raid dungeon.
 

I had practically burned out on Alterac Valley back in the old honor system, desperately trying to reach Knight Champion before they took it away. However, even during the height of that we found ways to make it fun by doing things like doing the Ram Riders quest (we discovered that you could trinket back after capturing a ram and turn it in, which actually made it possible to do that quest back in the faster paced game AV had become.)

Doing any element of this game that many times will take the fun out of it. I can still have fun in there, but not because I am trying to get honor. It's when I go in with friends and we do things like try and defend Ballinda against the Horde.

It makes me sad though. Alterac Valley is supposed to be a battle, and a battle is the last thing most people actually want. I blame the way honor is distrubuted. If 3 hour AVs gave out equivilent honor per hour to the present short game, then folks wouldn't care. If the ram riders etc. would actually generate significant honor, people would be inclined to do that.

It's a true shame that it has come to that though. Folks have to be bribed into doing the extras, teh perks, the fun stuff...

I truly like the PVE elements in there, the fact that a tank is actually very useful there, and that there are all these turn-in quests. It is designed to be like a mini Warhammer (or what Warhammer seems to be shooting for).

Alas, the present set up pretty much makes all of that stuff superfluous (and I have to blame it as much on the rewards-are-the-only-thing-that-matters mentality mor than on the design). How many people have actually had the joy or terror of seeing Ivus the forst lord these days? How many people even care to? How many people are only interrested in doing things they don't want to do, in order to earn items that are intended to do the thing they don't really want to do.

It's a bit of a mess.
 

Well, I've grown tired of AV. And rather tired of the same old BG PvP in general. I could still use one more BG gear piece in particular, and only need about 10,000 honor to get it (I have marks, plenty of marks), but I'm not having enough fun in BGs to bother to pursue the honor. Recently I made a BG push with a 70 warrior that I had set aside, but it's just too much of a grind to do it again: BG to gear up, because you need gear to compete in PvP - it's a vicious cycle.

I'm continuing to dabble in Arena with my "main", but Arena is so chaotic that it's hard to get decent in-game feedback in order to improve. Different Arenas, different opponent class combinations, gear levels, ratings / skill levels, and a short match time at a blistering pace.

At this point in TBC, I'm so weary of the 70-grind in crafting, factions, some raiding, lots of BGs, epic flyer, daily quests, re-gem/enchant upgrades...
I'm ready for TBC endgame grind to end with WotLK.

I'm having a lot more fun leveling an alt (seeking out quests I've not done before) than in the WoW endgame.
 

I agree with vonbiram, wish it was still a battle and that you got good honor for being IN THE FRAY, not for sitting in the starting cave, in a comparable time period. Would be straightforward to just award some honor by time spent in combat in AV :P Plus more for kills.
 

I like AV and the other BGs. I'm a PvP'er, so its what I do in WoW. World PvP and Arenas are fun, but BGs are a blast. I definitely have more fun when playing with my guildmates, who are all FPS friends that go back 4+ years. Since we all have good gear, we do it for fun, rather than for Honor or Marks. We tend to do a /roll to decide which BG to play in. And, since we have anywhere from 4-7 playing at once in the same BG, we can really turn the tide. Just a few people who are working together, communicating, and know what is going on can turn the usual Alliance BG loss into a Horde pounding.

AV offers more than the other BGs, in that you can go around back capping your bunkers, or play it safe and make sure RH and the forward towers are captured and defended (Alliance). And since AV is a zone that is not just a mirror image for both sides, it gives it a world-pvp feel.

The fact that people grind AV for honor and dislike doing it is typical, since the whole game is based around grinding 50% of your time for some "benefit", such as gear, rep for enchants, professions, etc.

The people who AFK or don't try are also the people who ruin BGs for those of us who enjoy them. For all the PvE people who think raiding is swell, imagine being in a Gruuls run, where no one really wants to do anything. They may have good gear or bad gear, but what ruins the raid is them not contributing or even trying. Luckily for raiders, if someone isn't contributing, or is AFK, you kick them out and move on.

Unfortunately, the PvP'ers aren't able to kick out the people who don't want to try. We have to work around them. Literally.

Oh, and I would like to quote Vonbiram for what he said about the people farming honor who dislike BGs and PvP in general. I find it fitting.

How many people are only interrested in doing things they don't want to do, in order to earn items that are intended to do the thing they don't really want to do.

To me, nothing is worse than a bunch of people AFKing in a BG, or who are not even trying, because it's just a grind for "welfare epics". Know why? Because its only a welfare epic because I was out killing horde earning people honor and marks, while they did nothing for it.

The PvP Gear I have...not even close to being welfare. I earned my gear through gameplay, not from a macro.

If you like BGs and have nothing but green gear, come on in.

If you have all epics and plan on AFKing for "free" honor, go away.
 

I hate the misnomer that gets spread that you don’t get “good honor” for HKs in Alterac Valley. Now I am not talking about group strategy but simply where you are located on the field of play in Alterac Valley to net the most honor. If it were a mathematical equation, the most honor gained would be to locate yourself in a spot where you can add both strategic value to the team and net HKs. In other words, if you knew that each AV match was going to net you 250 honor every 15 minutes, then going somewhere where you can net ~100 more honor in HKs is only going to benefit you.

Simply due to the way most AV battles play out, the key high value points of interest that will also net you HKs are the chokepoints and the towers. And even more specifically, all four horde towers and the Iceblood chokepoint. Therefore the maximum honor is gained for the Horde by playing defense. The maximum honor for the Alliance is gained by playing offense. At least in today’s BG. Back in the day, I imagine the bridge was the place to be for the lion’s share of the Alliance HKs.
 

The BGs are about basically a grinding affair and the more people that play them just for honor the less likely it will be enjoy it if you are in there for fun.

I used to love BGs. I loved the epic and endless battles in AV and I enjoyed the tactical depths of AB.

By now the whole BG system basically feels broken. AV is a PVE dungeon with with additional players running around. WS is just a horrible drag because it can go on forever and it suffers most from BG hopping. The Eye is simply badly designed. It is based on pure chaos and does not offer any depth at all.

The only BG that has the potential to be fun and offer depth at the moment is AB. Unfortunately that only works if two groups of the same level actually play together. Most of the time it is pure chaos but AB can always turn into an exciting battle.

As much as I used to enjoy it. Today BGs are a means to get some item. I even did what was necessary with my protection Paladin for the mace.

Just accept a few hours of pure boredom and then you will be fine doing BGs.
 

I'm by no means a hardcore player in terms of time investment: I play since December 2006, and all I have to show is one level 70 character, who has never visited a raid instance beyond Karazhan. However, I ENJOY instanced PvP.

Maybe it's because I'm actually a gamer, i.e. I play and played lots of other games besides WoW. I used to be quite good in Warcraft III, and I do okay in first-person shooters. Why do you think people enjoy playing shooters? There's no "item reward" at all, but we play them for the sheer fun and adrenaline of the competition. And that's something you can to some extent get out of fighting in battlegrounds in WoW.

In my opinion, WoW attracted a lot of people who you wouldn't describe as traditional gamers, who do not know (or even want) the aspect of competition that instanced PvP brings. These are the people who PvP purely for the rewards, and hate every minute of it.

As a final remark, I'm only talking about INSTANCED PvP. Here the competition is somewhat fair (except that you can't change teams, which is a problem because the two factions appeal to slightly different player demographics.) It's not perfect, but at least there's competition at all. What I absolutely don't get, and will never understand, is Open PvP, i.e. ganking. There's no ganking in shooters or strategy games; the term doesn't exist. I don't how the existence of ganking makes a game better in any way, but all those PvP servers prove that a significant portion of WoW players think differently.
 

WoW gameplay summarized:

Kill the next monster to get the experience to get the next level to get the next skill to get the next item to get to the next zone... repeat.

It's all about what you get, not what you do.
 

In my opinion, WoW attracted a lot of people who you wouldn't describe as traditional gamers, who do not know (or even want) the aspect of competition that instanced PvP brings. These are the people who PvP purely for the rewards, and hate every minute of it.

This often seems to be true for PvE oriented MMORPGs in general, (or maybe just MMORPGs in general). Complaints about being "rewarded" in raids, for example, seem odd and out of place in most games, for me simply killing a hard boss would be enough. Similarly, "main" vs. "alts" was an oddity, given that other games it seems expected, or at least widely accepted, that someone will try out different races/civilizations/etc., and try out and learn different playing styles, while MMORPGs seem to have kept the specialization in one character around for awhile.
 

I love AV. Unfortunately being Horde on my battlegroup means sitting in the queue for about 2 hours per game. Unfortunate side effect of our side winning 99% of the games.

It's the only battleground where pugs can still work pretty effectively, in my opinion. The other battlegrounds are exercises in frustration for me, as my faction just runs around midfield killing people instead of completing objectives.
 

Battlegrounds are only fun when:

1. The average gear levels of the players playing is near equal.

2. The battleground offers equal objectives to both sides.

3. There isn't a premade vs PUG issue. Sure its awesome to take a PUG and beat a premade, but I hear its also fun to win the lottery.

In the few rare games where it is PUG vs PUG (or premade vs premade willing to fight it out), in equally balanced gear, and it is a battleground where the objectives on each side are equal, then the battleground is funny.

Any single misstep in any of those areas and it instantly sucks for 50-99% of the players involved.

To AV specifically:

1. The map isn't balanced, therefore it is tough for me to find the matches fun with Horde PUGs. With a weak premade, Alliance PUG groups usually provide a good challenge. I do find it extremely fun to win a tough match.

2. AV is a big honor point gainer, and therefore attracts the afk bots. Blizzard's system may flag them finally, but it still does not kick them out of the battleground to allow a useful team member in. Seeing sometimes upwards of ten purple dots in the Horde tunnel is heartbreaking.
 

I think nathan is right on the money. Is AV fun if you follow the crowd, rush to the end goal and try to kill the final boss before the opposition? No, of course not. It's just another PVE encounter.

Fun is what you make it though. Join with 1 friend and do nothing but take back towers/graveyards. Maybe try to get a fight started in the middle of the Field of Strife as the stragglers ride past. Doing these things solo can sometimes be fun, but doing these things with 1 friend helping you (and hopefully on some sort of voice communication) can be a total blast.

I was a HUGE fan of the old AV that could last for hours and sometimes days. It definitely had it's issues, but lack of PVP wasn't one of them. I'd done all the old AV quests, a bunch of which don't even exist any more. I still go and turn in the armor scraps and the medals to the wing commanders. We did have an AV game go almost an hour the other day and I actually turned in enough medals to get one of the wing commanders to take off and bomb the enemy and that absolutely made my week. I haven't been able to complete the ram riders before a game ends in the new AV, but not from lack of trying.

I also wish they'd include the hard packed snowballs year round. Knocking half dead horde off of the bridge to Dun Baldar and killing them with fall damage makes me laugh every time.
 

I do PvP on and off. Went back again to get the Medallion and thinking of farming for the S1 set to start arenas. Reason being that getting tired of farming and making too many alts.

Mind you, I just found out about how Mind Vision works. And it's allowed me to just relax at a Node in AB and EoS. I just give updates in the chat and that's it. It's ok if it's against a pug Horde group. Premade, well, nigh impossible unless the guild was terrible to begin with.