My friends and I subscribe to WoW specifically for SoD PvP. I promise I’m not here to complain about pvp balance or make some moronic claim about how the devs favor this class or another. I actually love SoD PvP and know many others who think it is incredibly fun.
But I can’t tell you how many fresh 60’s in guild and general chat have expressed sadness and disappointment in finding out that AV is dead, WSG is dead, and AB is barely hanging on.
I understand the dev team does not have pvp anywhere near the top of its priority list, but you guys have proven to us in the past that you are willing to take feedback and shift gears in a surprisingly receptive and efficient manner. I am under no illusions that a forum post will make you guys suddenly do a 180 and pour all your manpower into pvp, so instead in this post I am going to ask you to consider some changes and additions that I think would have the highest impact towards PvP longevity in SoDs imminent “era” phase, while hopefully staying realistic for what your team is willing to tackle.
I am by no means a game developer, so please excuse my potential ignorance in what I assume could potentially be a practical endeavor for the team right now.
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Allow players to que for battlegrounds from anywhere in the world à la retail. I see this as a small change that could help revive battlegrounds, allowing players to que up and continue to world pvp or farm gold or do whatever they want in between ques. I understand the drawback of this is less foot traffic in the cities and could be considered against the spirit of classic, but this is SoD, not classic era, and at this point the battleground que rooms in all major cities are completely empty anyway.
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Allow players to turn in AB and WSG marks for something valuable. This is potentially the most critical aspect to reviving pvp in SoD. Now, “something valuable”, what does that mean? The most obvious answer is tarnished reals and gold. While I do believe this would incentivize players to que, I think taking the rewards one step further could absolutely guarantee a thriving revival of SoD PvP: Cosmetic Rewards. I am aware that this is absolutely not a small task and requires a good bit of manpower, but new recolors to existing tier sets and new glowing enchant effects on weapons would 100% bring a level of excitement and participation to pvp that SoD has never seen before. But again, if this is not a realistic option at this time (this would be so damn cool if you guys did this
), then I totally understand and would again default to tarnished coins and just raw gold as rewards for pvping. Further, making the different marks from each different BG required to get the rewards will solve the issue of players congregating towards only AB or only WSG. -
Arenas. This does not have to look like retail arena, where it’s the ultimate test of competitive pvp skill and ability. We can approach this from an angle of just pure fun. I’ve brought this concept up to countless players, and every response goes something along the lines of “YESSS” or “That would be so much damn fun.” We don’t need 10 different maps, 1 map will work just fine. A 1v1 dueling arena seems very much in the spirit of classic to me, and of course a 2v2 and 3v3 would also be welcome. You que for 2v2, get matched up with 3 players super quick, and just duke it out. You can add ratings for bragging rights, but adding new gear is absolutely not needed and would be counter to the idea of it being just for fun. If I had to put myself in the dev team’s shoes, I could imagine that there have been reservations to adding arena due to the competitive integrity of SoDs current pvp meta, but my argument to that would be that it would still be an incredibly fun and popular addition to the game despite that.
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New Battleground. Again I’d like to mention my potential ignorance regarding how realistic this endeavor would be, but I only even mention it because I’ve seen multiple developers mention how surprisingly quick and easy it was for them to make Demonfall Canyon. If making an entire dungeon was less effort then they thought, I can only imagine a simple battleground where they don’t have to worry about mobs, boss mechanics, loot, or a huge layout, would only be even easier. Still though this would obviously require hard work from the devs but would go so far in revitalizing pvp.
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Blackrock Mountain and Bloodmoon. These have been some of the most creative and fun pvp implementations in any iteration of WoW, but just like battlegrounds, they are completely dead. This is especially problematic with bloodmoon because the vendor has become effectively inaccessible to players who missed that wave, leaving them unable to get critical pieces and trinkets. Some solutions could be to make blackrock mountain also give bloodmoon coins for its event, as well as tarnished coins, gold, and cosmetic rewards similar to my proposal with battleground marks of honor. Also making a portal to each event in the major cities so players can quickly jump into the action could go a long way. Additionally, the loa boss coin bonus needs to also stay in 1 part of the zone (Gurubashi arena and its surrounding area), to concentrate player activity in one area.
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Fix Warsong Gulch. There are 3 major issues making warsong gulch a broken battleground right now and im quite sure you guys are already aware of all 3: Flag carriers spamming consumables being impossible to catch, a broken map with glitches and jumps over terrain that shouldnt be possible, and a lack of a timer. Keeping in mind minimal effort on your guys part, I concede that fixing the broken terrain might be a big undertaking, but adding a 20-30 minute timer and making the flag carrier unable to use consumables would go a long way. (Im not adding “fix AV” to the list because I think that battleground is just broken to its core and needs an entire rework from the ground up).
I think the SoD team have done a genuinely amazing job with the game, and I really do believe there is the potential for more juice to be squeezed out on the pvp side of things. The thirst is there, I see it with all the new and old players I talk to every day.
I realize I’m throwing a lot out there on this post, and am of course not demanding any of these changes be implemented, but I do hope they may get some ideas flowing for you guys. I think you would be surprised at the reception to some PvP love (especially the arenas!). Either way, thank you for all the work you guys do!
