Horde has to be ilvl 197 to queue Merc Mode.
I see too many zero geared horde on my team and don’t like it. I’m convinced, based on my limited data, that horde who have no gear run merc mode, and geared horde run with horde thereby making Alliance BG’s even more miserable.
Sounds good to me.
I was in a Twin Peaks the other night with seven mercs.
Seven mercs!
I have more data points. So far since my post I’ve had an orc merc with 22k life and a blood elf merc with 23k life. I have yet to see a geared merc.
edit:
1 person ilvl 220
2 more people, both 22k and ilvl 150.
Most of the time they’re going for the quick queue and quick loss to grind out the honor. Requiring a certain item level won’t necessarily fix the issue, however I completely agree that something does need to happen to discourage people from playing the game so…formulaicly?
if the horde queues for “quick” loses and sits down talking trash while “grinding” honor it’s clear that they don’t deserve the merc mode…
but daddy dev’s benefit the horde generally outside pvp so this isnt changing.
I’ll be that was 7 ungeared teammate and a loss.
This is 100% factual.
They had some gear. They were around 28k HP.
They actually were like the perfect BG group lol.
They focused on objectives, communicated, and we had an easy win.
They told us they were mercs at the start, and one of them even said “for the alliance. I don’t care what side i’m on as long as I win”.
But how many are like that vs a bunch of super low ilvl horde?
I’ve seen a few ilvl 213-220 horde which I’m more than happy to have on my team, but about 80% of what I see are 22k with ilvl 150-170 gear. There are VERY few in the 28k-32k range for whatever reason.
Personally, I don’t think the Alliance should hire poorly equipped mercenaries and we should implement some quality control on who we allow to fight on our side.
This again? 
Sorry OP, merc mode isn’t going anywhere.
And actually it was originally designed for Alliance players back in WoD, so the claims about “faction favoritism” aren’t even true.
Another one for the “BG forum myths” folder 
EDIT: just noticed you have “0 posts” under your belt… someone’s forum alt? wouldn’t surprise me if you’re the same dude from that other thread about merc mode 
I’m cool with merc mode, I just want there to be standards for who we accept as mercenaries… and I dunno, maybe we can enforce those standards with ilvl restrictions kinda like queing into a heroic dungeon, or a raid since the technology exists.
Some entry barrier to avoid further unbalancing it’s good.
I strongly dislike horde players that they think they are entitled to get carried while doing absolute nothing… but zerging on roads or talking trash like “lose fast so I can get my honor quick”
For some stupid reason post counts on this forum are by character not account. All of my characters are some variation of Kontric with different symbols over different letters. So nope, not me.
A lot of undergeared actual alliance are inclined to queue because you get a massive honor bonus, making farming honor a faster way to starter gear than it would be for horde.
If they implement WoD style ilvls on PvP gear and hopefully crafted gear as well, then the real issue will be solved, or at least made dramatically better. The real issue is gear disparity, not merc mode or the ilvl of the average merc.
Merc mode could be used by both horde and alliance. The fact it can only be used by one faction is a bit questionable to say the least
I wouldn’t say 100%. I merc from time to time depending on the time of day.
Usually if it’s early in the day like 10am to 4pm or so PST I will merc some because it seems I win more at those times and in the end I just want to win the game.
I have decent gear (213) and still merc. Both sides have their super low level geared teams through out the day. I’ve been rolled mercing and have been on teams that destroyed the Horde. Just the roll of the dice.
honestly the disparity is reaching levels where alliance should just boycott battlegrounds all together. force the horde to a 1 hour q time to get games or force better geared players to do merc mode.
im hard q WSG to finish my 100 wins and i only need 5 when this week started… im 27 games deep and after the 5th game i started taking a tally.
on most games we have 5 players who are fresh 60 with HP pools less than 24k.
so its 5 v 10. at this rate im 4-23 and im RNG farming a decently geared team to get my last WSG Win.
They need to just remove horde vs alliance in BGs, slap anybody into any team, and then throw in some form of pvp gear scaling and call it good. PVP will see a HUGE uptick this way, I’d be willing to bet money on it.
So punish people that decided to play a different faction instead of asking Blizzard to figure out a way to fix the problem?
So far in my experiences this xpac it’s still pretty close to 50/50 w/l. A lot of games I go in to and I see over half my team with less than 25k hp I think to myself, “Well this is probably going to hurt.” And usually it does and I move along to the next game and may have a team that’s mostly 32K+ hp.
Part of the deal with doing a random BG is knowing it’s going to have a mix of players that are geared and players that are not. Doesn’t take away the frustration I know but it is what it is.