Hello. I am a M+ and mythic raiding-focused player, but I also dabble in crafting, collecting, and delving. I occasionally spend a day or two to get the 1800 PVP rating mog for my class each season. But WoW’s PVP has never grabbed me. I did the mog run again this season, and I’d like to give feedback about PVP from a PVE player’s perspective.
I want to start by saying I think Solo Shuffle and Rated Battleground Blitz were great ideas. It allows players like me who just want to hop in a chance to play without having to queue in LFG, a process I could never be bothered to do for competitive PVP. They are great game modes. However, they only show how outdated the other PVP game modes are to me. I don’t understand the reasoning behind restricting rewards players would want to receive for their progress behind less popular game modes. For example, I know I am a Rival-rated player who can get my PVP mog without too much hassle but what would entice me to go further? Queuing 3s and getting crushed by the meatgrinder of decade-long Glad-ranked players? There is no chance players like me would even attempt that harsh grind, which undoubtedly contributes to the low population of WoW PVP. I think it is cool that there is something for skilled players to obtain but locking the best rewards to such a small pool of players is questionable. I think there has to be a fundamental shift in how rewards are thought of in PVP. I don’t know what that is or should be but off the top of my head, an agnostic rating cosmetic/mount reward path like a renown track would go a long way to enticing players to keep queuing or even bring back old rewards that can no longer be obtained. I do know that the current system of trying to funnel people into archaic game modes such as grouped 3s just to do a harsh rating grind is unappealing and should be retired.
Another pain point I found is gearing in PVP. The number of people I saw queuing in low-item honor gear, sometimes not even that was astounding. How is gear disparity even allowed in competitive PVP? It is absurd, that before you even start the game you are at a disadvantage based solely on if someone farmed for hours for their conquest/honor gear to be on par with the rest of the playerbase. Everyone’s gear should be scaled up to the 639-item level in PVP. It feels completely unserious that grinding item levels in a competitive game is even a thing. That alone ensures I can’t take WoW’s PVP seriously with the other great end-game modes that exist.
While doing the new Rated Battleground Blitz I found it a breath of fresh air and wholly fun. Battlegrounds are amazing and the changes they made to speed up the game in Blitz felt appropriate and modern. It brought a lot of feelings of nostalgia from when I played Vanilla as a kid. From a PVE perspective, I find the objective-based gameplay of battlegrounds to be far more appealing in a game mode than arena. My only complaint here is less about the game mode itself and more about the kits classes have access to. There is far too much CC and movement bloat in PVP for it to be enjoyable. I understand the hesitancy of changing players’ kits from PVE to PVP, but the amount of movement and CC we have access to in PVE makes PVP feel abysmal. I’m not exaggerating when I say I saw a MW monk fly across from our base with our flag to their base with the flag in 15 seconds, maybe less and capped. Granted the entire team helped him which is cool, but I just think the movement is a bit too much. Also, there is so much CC in the game. It’s not fun. CC is never fun. I am sure there is a lot of strategy and min-maxing you can do, but from a PVE player’s perspective being CCed for more than 2 seconds ever is incredibly frustrating. I just want to hit my buttons.
I also feel like I should mention the elephant in the room. Plunderstorm. Plunderstorm was amazing. It is everything WoW PVP should be. Fast, engaging, high risk high reward, low amount of CC, classless design. No gear. You just logged in and gamed. I can’t wait for it to return. I found it to be just as fun as M+ or mythic raiding. It was the most fun I have ever had with WoW PVP, and I wish I could be playing it right now. The more we go in that direction of PVP the happier I would be and would love to have PVP alongside M+ and mythic raiding.
I hope I don’t come across as negative about PVP, that is not my intention. I just want to give my perspective as a player who occasionally PVPs to get a cool mog. I have fun with PVP. Just not enough that would ever keep me going back after I have got the rewards I wanted. I did enjoy just hitting people and making some hero plays this season, so there’s that. From an outsider’s point of view, PVP seems to get good changes but it is just too little. Good steps in the right direction, but never enough to get me interested in diving deep into it.
Cheers!