Overhauling PvP

[Arbitrary]

The most significant changes in the 2.2 patch are PvP related. Nerfs to Paladins, buffs to Blind, and an oddity - 10 second max duration vs PvP targets for MC, Polymorph, and Fear. Finally some abilities have different functions in PvP and PvE, something that many felt was necessary to maintain balance.

The 2.2 patch message thread pretty much fell apart over the primarily PvP nerfs and buffs and that isn't helpful. Individual class bitching doesn't address the larger problems so I thought I'd make a thread just for that.

It isn't so much about losing but how you lose. The system needs to be changed so that players lose while playing instead of losing while their character is rendered helpless by a perfectly coordinated contra code. Now, I'm not some PvP deity but I know the problems I have and I know a messed up system when I see it.

Lowering the amount of damage dealt in PvP has been batted around from time to time. Players are dying too soon against ever increasing damage dealing capabilities. Defenses are not scaling at the same rate. The issue now isn't burst damage it is crowd control. Arena play has shown what a skilled and coordinated team can accomplish. There is nothing quite as frustrating as having your character turned off like a light by an intelligent combination of crowd control abilities.

Early in WoW's PvP history we saw diminishing returns added to a number of abilities because they were simply too powerful if used continuously. A player could be completely shut down for extended periods of time and that wasn't conducive to fun or balance. It was a good change but it really only addressed the sort of unorganized and random nature of world PvP and BGs. The competitive no respawn Arena and the rewards available have focused the problems in inherent in the system. Intelligent and continuous blending of a myriad of CC abilities combined with burst damage is the way to go.

Rogues who Sap/Blind/Vanish/Sap/Blind or Hunters who Silence/Scatter/Frost Trap/Silence/Scatter/Frost also can take a player out for an uncomfortable amount of time. Hunters also have Intimidate, Improved Concussive Shot, and Wingclip. Counterspell is incredibly good against Paladins and Shaman healers and then Polymorph has solid value. Charge/Intercept/Deep Thunder/Mace Spec/Pummel/Hamstring/Intimidating Shout combine to great effect and Mortal Strike is essentially mandatory. Rogues like Mace Spec too. Warlocks have Fear/Intercept or Spell Lock/Deathcoil.

Those classes have an awful lot of abilities at their disposal to neutralize their opponents. That by itself is not necessary a problem but weaving the abilities between two or more classes becomes a real issue.

Fear - Spell Lock - Death Coil - Silence - Fear and excellent synergy makes the Warlock/Shadow Priest partnership incredibly strong. They are the iconic example of stacking CC. Diminishing returns is meaningless and a trinket click doesn't really accomplish much of anything. Boom, you might as well get a cup of coffee because you are done. Smart players combine CC and combining CC gets around what diminishing returns was supposed to accomplish. Losing is fine, losing while not even getting to use abilities is not.

My proposal is as such -

First of all, remove every racial ability that counters CC. Make WotF, Escape Artist, etc. into passive abilities similar to Hardiness. Then remove/change the PvP trinket. It is important to equalize the playing field. Balancing among races brings extra variables that are not welcome, and the presence of the PvP trinket has a negative effect as well. For diminishing returns to actually work there cannot be these extra wildcards.

The next step is to take a good, hard, long look at the categories of crowd control and which abilities should and should not share diminishing returns. Many long duration forms need to be grouped together such as Mind Control, Blind, Sap, Fear, Poly, Seduce, and Frost Trap all sharing DR with an additional look taken at their durations. The interrupts/school locks/silences and stuns have essentially the same effect and need to be combined and reassessed. As it stands right now a player can be snared and rooted for an extremely long time with few counters available. Mortal Strike is a format defining ability and needs to be brought more in line with Rogue Wound poison (a stacking effect, a way to remove it, etc).

That's what I think~

[The Ancient]

Originally Posted by Arbitrary

First of all, remove every racial ability that counters CC. Make WotF, Escape Artist, etc. into passive abilities similar to Hardiness.

This, at least, I agree with wholeheartedly.

[Quineloe]

Healing needs to be buffed a lot. Damage is fine as it is, however it is far easier dealing damage under pressure than healing is. This starts with something as simple as Dmg casters having multiple trees if one gets counterspelled, goes on to healing being cut in half most of the time and ends with DD classes having multiple _powerful_ instant casts with short to no cooldowns whereas the few weak instant casts healers have are also limited by rather long cooldowns.

This of course would result in limited damage classes (mana bars) being far weaker than they are now, so in PVP zones mana cost for spells should be halved as well.

[Mist]

Blind buff was removed before the patch ever went live.

Oh, and PvP is fine. People who are bad at it will always claim there is something wrong preventing them from winning; if just X, Y, and Z changed they would suddenly do much better than the good teams!

PvP is as balanced as its going to get. Other than maybe druids, no class is horribly under-represented among the top tier teams. There are more of some than others, but that's just because some are EASIER to master and/or effective in larger numbers of possible permutations than others, like Warriors and Paladins. And the only reason druids are under-represented is because the class has been long since abandoned by the majority of competitive players, in PvE OR PvP. There is nothing really stopping Balance druids from being used in PvP, they're certainly powerful enough, but no competitive players really take the class or spec seriously.

You can change all you wish about PvP but in the end I'm thinking within a small margin the same group of players would end up in the top teams regardless of the changes you made. They might swap their classes around here and there but ultimately the same people would be at the top.

PS: Trying to balance 2v2 is and always will be a joke.

[Tindel]

hunter is sickly underepresented

[Draegan]

There should be more cone healing spells, aoe healing spells and auras that require no target and are mana efficient with different schools. Add an incredible amount of utility and survivability to Disc Priests and I'll blow the dust off mine.

I'd love to run around like a mage fucking shit up but healing instead. But as a priest, I don't have any CC or get away skills like a mage.

[Quineloe]

Originally Posted by Mist

Blind buff was removed before the patch ever went live.

Oh, and PvP is fine. People who are bad at it will always claim there is something wrong preventing them from winning; if just X, Y, and Z changed they would suddenly do much better than the good teams!

So I can't be a winner and at the same time think that something could be a lot bettr?

[Jubee]

Diminishing returns was a step in the right direction but it's one dimensional. I was chain sheeped last night and I was sheeped 5 times until I become immune and was able to cast. Then their warlock started in with the fears and the process started over again.

CC should be split into 2 different types similar to the alchemy changes and each should have their own diminishing returns. These should have less casts before you go immune and the DR should last longer. Split them up into 2 groups - the "lose full control of your character" such as stuns, poly and fear. And then a "lose functionality" group that includes snares, silences, and roots.

MS and wounding poison need to be nerfed. MS needs to lose the -50% healing and Warriors need to get another attack on a much higher cooldown that does the same thing (to be saved for bursts similar to Bloodlust.) Wound poison needs to drop to 5% per stack. Burning Crusade introduced even more interrupts and healing is just too weak as it stands. When you finally get a heal off, it should do more than a Warrior's auto attack.

[Mist]

Originally Posted by Quineloe

So I can't be a winner and at the same time think that something could be a lot bettr?

But the eventual outcome is what? Other than fucking with all the classes and creating a ton of unintended side effects.

There's a reason you don't overhaul everything at once, or make huge changes. Because they always create a ton of issues you never thought of. Balance is always best done incrementally.

Lets take the whole CC argument with regards to stuns. You nerf stuns and Rogues go from really gimped in 5v5 to totally worthless. Rogues are either going to be a stun class or a damage class, and yet nobody seems to want them to have either. So you give in and give them more burst damage to make up for the nerf to stuns. And then at the same time, you buff healing, making any buff to burst damage completely pointless. Now you've got a class that was just barely viable and send it directly to the dust bin.

[Zbkuk]

Originally Posted by Mist

PvP is as balanced as its going to get. Other than maybe druids, no class is horribly under-represented among the top tier teams. There are more of some than others, but that's just because some are EASIER to master and/or effective in larger numbers of possible permutations than others, like Warriors and Paladins. And the only reason druids are under-represented is because the class has been long since abandoned by the majority of competitive players, in PvE OR PvP. There is nothing really stopping Balance druids from being used in PvP, they're certainly powerful enough, but no competitive players really take the class or spec seriously.

You're seriously going to try and argue that across the entire wow playerbase, all the druid players are just bad and don't care about competition? We've got serious tournaments now that offer premade, geared characters so people can pick and choose whatever lineup they want, and they aren't picking druids. Even on my shithole server I can think of a few druids who are just as competitive and skilled as anybody, and they still continue to search up and down for ways to succeed in the arena. Sure, lots of people have probably abandoned the class, but by no means everyone.

[Mist]

No, but the more people who abandoned the class, the less you're going to see of them in the top ranks. There ARE druids on the top 1% of the ladders, just not many of them, meaning SOMEONE out there can make them good. When people go to major tournaments, they still play the classes they're familiar with, or the classes that are easiest to setup and pwn with. I know a lot of people say WoW takes no skill, but really, you cannot just load up a level 70 ANYTHING except maybe Warrior and own with it in PvP against people who have been playing their classes for a long time.

[Quineloe]

So there are no bad warriors out there?

Given how most warriors are also main assist I'd have to say it takes a lot of skill and having played with 4 different warriors in 5on5 now there is a huge difference between a good and an average one.

[Gieve]

Originally Posted by Mist

Blind buff was removed before the patch ever went live.

Oh, and PvP is fine. People who are bad at it will always claim there is something wrong preventing them from winning; if just X, Y, and Z changed they would suddenly do much better than the good teams!

PvP is as balanced as its going to get. Other than maybe druids, no class is horribly under-represented among the top tier teams. There are more of some than others, but that's just because some are EASIER to master and/or effective in larger numbers of possible permutations than others, like Warriors and Paladins. And the only reason druids are under-represented is because the class has been long since abandoned by the majority of competitive players, in PvE OR PvP. There is nothing really stopping Balance druids from being used in PvP, they're certainly powerful enough, but no competitive players really take the class or spec seriously.

You can change all you wish about PvP but in the end I'm thinking within a small margin the same group of players would end up in the top teams regardless of the changes you made. They might swap their classes around here and there but ultimately the same people would be at the top.

PS: Trying to balance 2v2 is and always will be a joke.

3vs3 isnt much better. Are you saying balance for anything but 5v5 ( or more ) is impossible ?

Edit: In addition, are you saying it's coincidence there's a ton of spriest/warlock teams? That these players would be as equally successful playing a druid/hunter?

[Mist]

Originally Posted by Tindel

hunter is sickly underepresented

Here's a break down of the top five 5v5 teams by class:

Total: (522 members queried)
Alliance Teams: 31
Horde Teams: 39

Warrior Total: 78
-Arms Total: 60
-Fury Total: 4
-Protection Total: 14

Paladin Total: 78
-Holy Total: 77
-Protection Total: 1
-Retribution Total: 0

Priest Total: 74
-Discipline Total: 18
-Holy Total: 40
-Shadow Total: 16

Mage Total: 72
-Arcane Total: 31
-Fire Total: 13
-Frost Total: 28

Shaman Total: 55
-Elemental Total: 24
-Enhancement Total: 0
-Restoration Total: 25

Hunter Total: 49
-Beast Master Total: 5
-Marksman Total: 42
-Survival Total: 2

Rogue Total: 48
-Assasination Total: 20
-Combat Total: 17
-Subtlety Total: 11

Warlock Total: 40
-Affliction Total: 11
-Demonology Total: 18
-Destruction Total: 11

Druid Total: 28
-Balance Total: 1
-Feral Total: 11
-Restoration Total: 16

Really? Does that pass for 'sickly' under-represented? I don't really think so. Warriors, Paladins, Mages and Priests are all 'holy-trinity' style classes, very popular in all aspects of the game, all very solid 'primary role' classes in PvE and PvP. Their 'holy-trinity' status makes them useful in ANY permutation of groups. Given that, there still aren't really that many less hunters than Those 4 main classes, despite the fact that hunters work only in certain types of group setups, IE less possible permutations produce a group situation ideal for hunters.

[chaos]

I think they should just do away with CC as a whole. in certain cases (ie rogues) some kind of PVP burst damage would have to be added, butin most cases nothing would. IMO, it's arbitrary who they give CC to, based on balance from 2.5 years ago, and does not reflect the current reality of the game. But that will never happen because of the epic crying, so whatever. CC makes PVP not fun, period.