WOW, Season 4. Arena or GTFO

[Izuldan]

Originally Posted by Erumaron

The failed implementation in WoW is that they chose to make classes the rock, the paper, and the scissor. In a proper set up wouldn't each individual class have the full set of counters (rock-paper-scissor).

If each class had 3 different counters/implementations, it would result in an HUGE number of additional permutations, way too many to develop and balance.

[Deris]

Wow. There is alot of fucking crying in this thread.

2v2 is broken, sure - but even then, there are plenty of "undefined factors" outside of class comp and luck. In 2's and 3's, and sometimes 5's - Drain teams basically insta-lose to me. Not my team, but me. Why? My gear absolutely shits on every single mana burn/drain in the game. When I am completely oom, I can heal someone infinitely with R2 FOL for 850 healing done, on top of Illidan Mace procs for 300, and SSO Exalted Neck for 640. This is ignoring crits as well. If the game is that late in the stage where I am OOM - no way the other team has any measure of burst able to take someone down through that much healing.

Even when a team is "setup" to destroy another, it still comes down to skill at the end of a day. I can name -2- mages on my entire Battlegroup worth a shit. Warriors? Maybe 5. A lot of players who think they are good are fucking terrible. I'm not the best Paladin, but I make up for the lapses in judgment with ridiculous gear and it has worked so far, I can hang with the best of them.

5's is pretty well balanced, I like it - we run all kinds of stupid setups, and they almost always work.

I do wish 2's and 3's was balanced better but 5's is pretty close, and if they would stop going with 3v3 for the tournament concept, life would be alot better - since plainly put, most classes just aren't viable in 3's at the 2200+ level.

[Dumar]

5's and up there is enough variation to again, mitigate and smooth the balance curve, but it's still controlled. ie, you see the class setup, you know what's gonna happen. 2v2 and 3v3 there is no hope. it should be scrapped.

it only comes down to skill if someone is terrible at playing, in which case there's no reason to argue about balance.

[Deris]

Originally Posted by Dumar

5's and up there is enough variation to again, mitigate and smooth the balance curve, but it's still controlled. ie, you see the class setup, you know what's gonna happen. 2v2 and 3v3 there is no hope. it should be scrapped.

it only comes down to skill if someone is terrible at playing, in which case there's no reason to argue about balance.

Yeah, and everyone below 2000 is pretty terrible from my experience.

In 2's and 3's - yeah, but again you can do unorthodox things to win. Warrior/Paladin can shit all over Warrior/Druid unless the druid has the luck of baby jesus on his side.

[Antoine]

Originally Posted by Deris

Wow. There is alot of fucking crying in this thread.

2v2 is broken, sure - but even then, there are plenty of "undefined factors" outside of class comp and luck. In 2's and 3's, and sometimes 5's - Drain teams basically insta-lose to me. Not my team, but me. Why? My gear absolutely shits on every single mana burn/drain in the game. When I am completely oom, I can heal someone infinitely with R2 FOL for 850 healing done, on top of Illidan Mace procs for 300, and SSO Exalted Neck for 640. This is ignoring crits as well. If the game is that late in the stage where I am OOM - no way the other team has any measure of burst able to take someone down through that much healing.

Even when a team is "setup" to destroy another, it still comes down to skill at the end of a day. I can name -2- mages on my entire Battlegroup worth a shit. Warriors? Maybe 5. A lot of players who think they are good are fucking terrible. I'm not the best Paladin, but I make up for the lapses in judgment with ridiculous gear and it has worked so far, I can hang with the best of them.

5's is pretty well balanced, I like it - we run all kinds of stupid setups, and they almost always work.

I do wish 2's and 3's was balanced better but 5's is pretty close, and if they would stop going with 3v3 for the tournament concept, life would be alot better - since plainly put, most classes just aren't viable in 3's at the 2200+ level.

If it's that late in the game your bubble and probably trinket is down too so you'll just be locked down until your teammate is dead.

[Saban]

druids take far too much effort to kill.

Druid hate in this thread.

[Mippo]

There are some concepts that go over the heads of most players that definately help in arena.

When I group with Warriors in 2's on my pally or druid you can tell the skill level of the Warrior immediately and it usually doesn't change no matter how much you try to explain certain concepts.

Last season I ended up hitting 2100 with a Warrior in season 1 gear on my Paladin, but grouped with many, many Warriors far better equipped and got stuck between 1750 and 1950 with almost all of them.

Certain basic concepts go over the head of so many players.

Building rage on one target to use on another. Like when we (pally/war) fought Druid / War we just had him fight the Warrior and build up his rage so when the Druid popped out, he had a full rage bar -> intercept to Druid, I JOJ and freedom the Warrior, stun, holy shock and that's a dead druid right there.

Always knowing which targets to attack, when to help the healer out. Awesome at drive-by snaring. If I was kiting another class I'd just call out when I'm coming in, and he'd get a hamstring or howl in on them without physically losing his target. Other warriors will intercept to the target on me, then they lose the target they are supposed to be attacking because intercept is down instead of waiting for me to bring the target in for the snare.

There are certain times where it makes sense to run away from your current target to intercept right back to them for the stun. Primarily these times include trying to interrupt a healer when your pummel is on cooldown. A lot of warriors do it when they have no need to do it, and then don't have intercept up when it's needed -> druid popping out to cyclone.

When I play my Druid and I see a Warrior intercept my Warrior I immediately come out to CC him because I know he can't get to me because his intercept is down. You don't get chain CC'ed by druids unless you are stupid, and wasting your intercept is stupid. It's there so you can get back to your target when they get away, it's not there for you to stun another warrior that you were attacking for a few seconds cutting down on minor dps that was going to be healed anyway. It depends on the situation obviously but I'd venture to say the vast majority of the time unskilled Warriors are wasting their intercepts for the stun when it isn't needed, then end up getting kited because the shit is down.

It's like the same shit when a Warlock opens an arena match with death coil, which for some stupid fucking reason, a lot seem to do. You aren't even benefitting from the healing portion since you were full life when you casted it. Use it to kill somebody, use it to crowd control a healer when someone else is about to die, use it at a smart time. Why waste it?

Knowing where to position yourself and opponents so people have to come out in the open. Against Druid / War whichever target the Warrior is on, we move to a position that makes the Druid come out in the open, far from an object he can hide behind - he usually never makes it back alive.

Knowing the situation of both yourself and your healer. So many times I've seen Warriors kill one person, then chase the 2nd person around a pillar out of LOS with like 10% life. Good job. A smart player comes back to his healer, gets healed, then finishes off the game easily and with no risk.

When the healer is crowd controlled, the smart warrior will do what he needs to do to mitigate damage. Possibly intercept to the other person and kite the melee on him, board and shield and spell reflect, or LOS the casters until the Healer can heal again.

Even something as simple as knowing what to use your trinket on is beyond the skill level of most players. If we are pally / war facing Mage / Rogue why would you trinket out of a polymorph I can cleanse. Save it for when the rogue blinds you.

It's really night and day comparing good players to bad.

[Deris]

Originally Posted by Antoine

If it's that late in the game your bubble and probably trinket is down too so you'll just be locked down until your teammate is dead.

Locking a good Paladin down isn't that simple - between juke casting/positioning/LOS and maintaining 40 yards from your current heal target can go a long ways.

[Gnome Eater]

Originally Posted by Deris

Locking a good Paladin down isn't that simple - between juke casting/positioning/LOS and maintaining 40 yards from your current heal target can go a long ways.

Exactly. I think the biggest difference between a 2k + player and a 1700+ player is positioning.

A good healer always heals maintaining los on his target but keeping los on the mage, or juggles distance perfectly. I also need to add that you require a warrior partner that understands that overextending is bad bad bad. A warrior that makes gets himself pulled out of los or doesn't intervene back is an idiot.

Versus a double dps team, a lot of times, the best thing a warrior can do is put on shield+sword, hamstring both other players, and just follow his healer until the enemy's cooldowns are down.

Deris, 5's is kinda fun, but is annoying as hell to set up. Getting 5 people on a regular basis is like pulling teeth, and part of the reason why 5's feel more open ended is because nobody takes the format seriously. If 5's was the name of the game you'd see a shitload of countercomping, with eurocomp destroying 2,3,4,5/6, four dps teams destroying eurocomps, and 3 healer double warrior or 3 healer/warrior/hunter raping 4 dps teams.

I also agree with Deris that the very large majority of players in fotm combos are awful and just getting carried by an overpowered combination. I have lost track of how many druid/warrior we beat as priest/rogue because their warrior is a retarded and runs away from his druid.

[Trifle]

Originally Posted by Gnome Eater

I also agree with Deris that the very large majority of players in fotm combos are awful and just getting carried by an overpowered combination. I have lost track of how many druid/warrior we beat as priest/rogue because their warrior is a retarded and runs away from his druid.

Irony++

(Note that I don't actually have a point, I just thought that was amusing)

[Gnome Eater]

Originally Posted by Trifle

Irony++

(Note that I don't actually have a point, I just thought that was amusing)

Anything without a druid is fighting a very uphill battle in 2 vs 2, and isn't FOTM. The top tier 2vs2 teams are druid/warrior, druid/hunter, druid/warlock. Shadowpriest/rogue and icemage/rogue are strong teams only because they are very good versus druid/warrior, however, icemage/rogue is awful versus druid/warlock.

[Vardisk]

Originally Posted by Erumaron

I just read a lot of talk about rock-paper-scissors a page or two back and kinda started thinking. The failed implementation in WoW is that they chose to make classes the rock, the paper, and the scissor. In a proper set up wouldn't each individual class have the full set of counters (rock-paper-scissor). I would be willing to bet that the balance at 80 incorporates this..Blizzard has said some things that suggest they're doin some significant balancing tweaks in the interviews and the likes about lich king.

They said they'd be doing that for TBC too. All that's going to happen is the different compositions are going to get switched around in their rock-paper-scissor order. That's it.

[Mippo]

It's pretty annoying trying to explain to a Warrior how important positioning is. The majority of the time it's up to the Warrior to do the proper positioning. If I can start the fight within los, 40 yards back with the other healer / caster dps on the other side far away, it makes the game so easy. If the Warrior does his job correctly, I can start almost every game with perfect positioning.

If it is a longer fight, 1 dps / 1 healer, you have time to properly move and properly position yourself throughout the fight. Against double dps teams, initial starting position a lot of times means the difference in a win or a loss.

If my Warrior can find the Rogue from a Mage / Rogue combo out in the open and I'm still mounted I can just run to the opposite side of the mage right at max healing range and it is usually a very easy win. I just throw sacrifice on the Warrior and spam Holy Light and it doesn't take long before the rogue is dead. I'm too far for the mage to counterspell me, and sometimes the rogue is stupid and tries to run towards me to blind me not even realizing that sacrifice will take blind right off. If they decide to come after me when I demount, which is probably what they initially wanted before my Warrior found their rogue, we will get a giant head start on damage by the time they get in range to damage me (he'll probably be at least half dead by this point) and it would be extremely hard for them to overcome that. Mage / Rogue isn't really a hard combo for Pally / Warrior, I was just using this as an example.

A lot of Warriors don't use intervene, and a lot of Warriors seem to suck donkey balls at finding rogues. Some Warriors I group with find them all the time, and others can't find a rogue to save their life. I was grouped with a Warrior today around 1850 rating that got sapped while he had the eye on. Apparently he changed forms to charge, the rogue got the sap in before he charged, and since he was in the wrong form he couldn't even get out of the sap. It was classic.

[Zest]

Rogue/Priest is ahead of both Hunter/Druid and Warlock/Druid. It's the #2 setup.

Fear, Blind, Sap, Fear = wins

[Gnome Eater]

Most warriors are absolutely awful at their class. They won't put a shield up and turtle up, follow their healer, or try to peel people off, but will mindlessly auto-attack one person the entire match without pummeling any spell.

The sad part is that you can quite easily get to 2k with enough persistence just by doing that if you are partnered with a decent druid.