I was thinking today, and one idea to increase participation of Alliance players in epic bgs is to simply provide an “Against Overwhelming Odds” style quest with an appropriate welfare gear piece as the reward. It could be a recurring/weekly quest like the AOO quest already in the game.
Just brainstorming here , but off the top of my head maybe it could be something like this “win an epic battleground” as the win condition for the quest. As for the iLvL of the quest reward, something like 370-385 could work.
We know from experience (ex. when AOO quest was first rolled out) that a welfare payment works for bribing Alliance into participating more in PvP.
This would help lower queue times for Horde, while also increasing Alliance participation.
I did a few “normal” epic bgs last night for the first time since reset, some other unannounced changes I saw or noticed:
in Isle of Conquest docks now pumps out 3 glaives instead of 2 (!!!)
IOC catapults have some sort of self-defense “blight thrower” ability now
in Alterac Valley the little “reinforcements” counter at the top got a neat little graphical update (Alliance is blue + Alliance logo, Horde is red + Horde logo)
The docks changes to IOC are actually huuuuuuuuge, they pretty much changed the IOC “meta” overnight while everyone wasn’t looking/busy leveling up their Zandalaris
It seems docks has finally been balanced with the other 2 nodes, it’s about time
The boss in IoC seemed stronger too. It took way longer to burn him down than I remember, but I haven’t played since Jan so that might be an old change.
Been too busy playing my brand new Zandalari this week, honestly I’ve barely logged into my main since Tuesday
Like, I’ve only logged into my main like 3 times this week, once to try out Wintergrasp, two other times to list some stuff on auction house/check my mail… literally like 95% of my playtime this week has been Zandalari alt
These are requests I think everyone can agree on (???):
For Wintergrasp, PLEASE FIX:
1. “Camera bug” after exiting vehicles.
Does not happen every time but when it does it’s really irksome, and IIRC can’t be fixed without a relog or portaling to a different zone, both of which are not the best solutions in a BG.
2. Vehicle abilities not working.
Sometimes when driving a demolisher the Hurl Boulder ability does not work. Not sure if there are similar bugs with catas and siege.
If Blizzard makes a change to a BG they need to make it more obvious than just posting it to patch notes because a lot of people don’t even read them. Players need to be ported into scenarios that show what the objectives are, what the advantages and disadvantages are and what the goal of the BG is.
The issue I’m seeing on Alliance side (I don’t play horde so I can’t speak for them) is that there have been changes to the maps and boss health over the years. The PVP population has developed several different strats to adapt to each change so much so that now players are just straight up confused and they don’t know which strat to use. We have 40 different players calling out 40 different strats, each convinced that their way is the right way. Instead of working as a team for a common goal players are afk and arguing in instance chat over which strat we should be using. There’s a battle within the battle!
It’s soooo frustrating when 1/8 of the team understand that Blizzard made a change to Stonehearth graveyard and they want to use that advantage but 1/4 of the team charges ahead and rushes to IBT (with the exact same slaughtered outcome every time) and then the rest of the people are running around aimlessly and in total confusion not knowing WHAT to do or where to go because there’s a complete breakdown of communication and teamplay.
And last but not least - Blizzard, you can’t serve 2 different populations at one time.
You can’t expect retail players to even TRY to fight it out and not gain rewards when you’ve been dumbing the game down and handing them gear and achievements like candy. You’re trying to throw these kids into BG’s of a different era, when we didn’t have or expect the rewards and achievements that they do now. It’s NOT working!
Editing in: And dare I say it. It’s also not working that you are placing realms that don’t speak the same language on the same battle server! Something that Blizzard knew but Activision just doesn’t seem to grasp is that MORPGs require communication and team play. You need to stop ostracizing your player base!
the strat you use depends on the situation and how it evolves over the match. the problem of too many cooks is one alliance players need to solve on their own.
sometimes i lead the bg, sometimes i don’t, what i don’t do is fight with people when they pick the the wrong strat, that guarantees a loss.
we know for a fact that handing out participation awards causes more problems than it solves, you need to earn your rewards. a lion who fails to secure his next meal doesn’t get a participation dinner.
if you can’t/won’t play without rewards for losing, then don’t play.
The tool tip when queuing for Winter Grasp says it will only be in the brawl queue for 12 hours. Will the Winter Grasp bugs be fixed before the WG Epic BG is added into the Epic BG queue lineup?
In my post I clarified that I can only speak about my experience as an Alliance player. I don’t know if you have ever played on the Alliance side but even if you haven’t I’m sure you can see the chaos on Alliance side. I’m currently leveling a Horde character for the double agent achievement and as previously stated I don’t regularly play Horde but I have seen the way Horde laughs at the Alliance lack of team play, the players who fight in roads, the afk’s hiding in the tree’s and you all take full advantage of it. It’s a smart strategy on your part and I know it’s very fun for you but try to place yourself on the other side. While YOU may not feel you need to learn anything new about BG’s I know from being in the BG’s and experiencing it but also by recruiting for my guild that a fair amount of players have never entered a BG because they are either new or come from a PVE server where it’s very rare for players to que for BG’s. There is also a very large player base who is returning to the game and are leveling their characters, trying to play catch up. Part of the leveling experience is to take a break from the grind and que for some BG’s. Each one of these pieces to the WoW population are very important and they shouldn’t be neglected or ignored. They are unhappy right along with a max level Alliance players who are unsubbing as I write this.
As for your comments on strat use. What you are saying is a given. Strats do evolve and this is why I believe there should be something to guide them so they can be brought up to date on new and old strategies.
My response to, “many cooks”; this is a major issue on Alliance side but only because so many unknowing players are calling out strats that worked 3 and 4 years ago but are not effective in 2019. The cooks have no idea that they are misleading the clean plates who in turn keep the cycle going. YOU personally may not create conflict within your own team but Alliance is struggling in a big way with too many cooks, lack of strat knowledge and are over flowing with frustration.
Throw in Horde racial buffs that plow us over with 1 and 2 shots and we’ve just isolated Alliance even more. Who wants to que up for that?
NPCs in Epic BGs need to be buffed with every single content patch. You can’t just keep increasing our gear level and leave them static for an expansion, when they’re really not that hard at any point. Power growth for players is way too large as it is, if we’re increasing in X% DPS/Health, plan on doing the same growth for NCPs. You have these numbers!
![:thinking:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/thinking.png?v=6" ":thinking:")
, but off the top of my head maybe it could be something like this “win an epic battleground” as the win condition for the quest. As for the iLvL of the quest reward, something like 370-385 could work.![:sweat_smile:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/sweat_smile.png?v=6" ":sweat_smile:")
![:grin:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/grin.png?v=6" ":grin:")