Why can't the Alliance win in Battlegrounds?
by Chris Jahosky 
Sep 8th 2007 at 12:20PM
Recently, Phaelia over at Resto4Life wrote an article about a specific aspect of battlegrounds: the Horde (almost) always win.
She's backed up this fairly common viewpoint with some compelling reasons, and I have to admit they make sense to me.
I've played Alliance almost exclusively for 2+ years, and I remember wanting to try and get into some serious PvP, but I also remember getting my spirits crushed, along with any desire to continue running BGs due to the constant losses. I realize that you can't win all the time, but it's hard to continue playing if you don't win one at least once in a while.
Even Alterac Valley, the battleground that Alliance supposedly wins most of the time, is only won in my battlegroup if both sides race. If the Horde plays even a little defense, Alliance loses 9 times out of 10. And with the changes Drysc mentioned recently coming to AV, I wonder if Alliance will have any way to gain honor.
She's backed up this fairly common viewpoint with some compelling reasons, and I have to admit they make sense to me.
I've played Alliance almost exclusively for 2+ years, and I remember wanting to try and get into some serious PvP, but I also remember getting my spirits crushed, along with any desire to continue running BGs due to the constant losses. I realize that you can't win all the time, but it's hard to continue playing if you don't win one at least once in a while.
Even Alterac Valley, the battleground that Alliance supposedly wins most of the time, is only won in my battlegroup if both sides race. If the Horde plays even a little defense, Alliance loses 9 times out of 10. And with the changes Drysc mentioned recently coming to AV, I wonder if Alliance will have any way to gain honor.
Filed under: Horde, Alliance, Analysis / Opinion, PvP, Factions
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 5)
plixer Sep 18th 2007 9:30AM
Ha.. tried to BG in WSG yesterday.
We got owned..
FTH
James Sep 8th 2007 12:34PM
Alliance healers would rather cast Shadow Word: Pain than throw a warrior some heals once in a while
Chai Sep 8th 2007 12:43PM
I like how everyone assumes it's only a one sided thing. In my battlegroup, 9 times out of 10 an alliance PuG will outgear/outplay a Horde PuG.
Don't even get me started on AV in that Battlegroup either.
If you always lose bg's chances are the players in your battlegroup just suck.
Fearless1 Sep 8th 2007 1:58PM
I think the question should be why Horde PuGs do better than Alliance PuGs in Battlegrounds? A premade will almost always beat a PuG, and a battle between two premades comes down to gear and skill (probably in that order). I don't know why Horde seems to be working together better than the Alliance, but they do. Whether Horde are more mature players, more "hardcore" PvPers or something, but they do. Alliance, meanwhile, is all about e-peen waving and HK counts and damage dealt and greatest crits... while the battle goes to the Horde.
Octagon Sep 8th 2007 12:55PM
This blog is just flame bait. I fail to see how the article is intended to illicit constructive comments from the fan community. Please don't post inflammatory posts about other factions, especially when you don't actually have any facts, just opinions. This isn't an Alliance only site, and the Horde could counter your opinions easily.
Do you think they'd be making all these changes to the battlegrounds if statistics didn't show a trend or pattern that needed to be addressed? You have no access to battleground wins/losses, and neither does the poster on Resto4Life. I don't want to knock you to hard for this, but I just think that future articles should probably aim to cause more constructive comments with the site's visitors.
Grimm Sep 8th 2007 1:00PM
"And with the changes Drysc mentioned recently coming to AV, I wonder if Alliance will have any way to gain honor."
Sure they will - by getting out of the goddamn cave and actually trying to win the thing.
andrea Sep 8th 2007 1:00PM
@1...alliance players would rather play pewpew useless classes like hunters and rogues than something useful like a healer.
i giggle a little everytime i go into a pug and see just ONE person who might be capable of healing. and then somehow, that ONE person is responsible for all healing, regardless of spec...thats fun gameplay isn't?
go roll a pally if you want to tank and get heals. till you pugs learn how to win and accomplish an objective (newsflash, that means not letting 5 hunter pets crawl up a healers ass), i'll never heal you.
on the odd occasion i do go in to do nothing BUT heal, i can be a full dps spec, no healing gear on at all, and still come out no. 1 healing by nearly double what others do --and THAT is incrediably sad.
Shawn Sep 8th 2007 1:02PM
#3 Chill, dude. It's a fun topic to discuss even if we don't have cold, hard numbers about win/losses.
Shawn Sep 8th 2007 1:06PM
#1 - You want me to heal you and keep you alive? Then kill the gd level 49 undead rogue that is interrupting my healing spells, instead of getting one more HK from that level 43 troll mage.
Jason Sep 8th 2007 10:32PM
I love how anytime someone mentions how Alliance lose a lot of BG's people come out in droves to tell you how wrong you are and how much you suck.
Alliance lose more BG's consistently than Horde. Don't believe me? Roll an Alliance get to 29 and try various battlegroups if you wish.
Oh, we have a winning streak some days. Most often it just an occasional win.
I like Alliance so I deal with it, but yeah it does suck losing a lot.
Durane Sep 8th 2007 1:11PM
The problem with Alliance is that players have their heads so far up their "leet" asses that they refuse to do things like heal. I don't care if you are shadow, retribution, enhancement, feral... whatever, you can heal and by god if you aren't fighting off immediate attackers then you could pop your head out of your corn-hole and do it. Nothing pisses me off more than when I try to run the flag and I have someone following me who COULD heal me and make sure I capture it, but, no, they are to busy wailing on my attackers. GG, Alliance, GG...
Nick S Sep 8th 2007 1:16PM
just from my personal experience, BGs where we WIN are BGs where we TALK. (i'm horde on smolderthorn, btw). i don't care how many twinks the other side has, if we talk and coordinate, we win, 19 times out of 20. if we don't talk, it's anybodies game.
so maybe the alliance just need to spend less time farming gold for their crusader enchants and more time in /bg? i dunno. i don't wanna rip on the alliance - they field good teams. i think they just need more teamwork focus.
ringu0 Sep 8th 2007 1:19PM
Could someone please enlighten me about Horde's "considerable advantage in Arathi Basin"?
Daaraluna Sep 8th 2007 1:20PM
IMO, most alliance fail to understand what teamwork is. I gave up playing BGs after I hit 40 but prior to that my observation was that most everyone in alliance wants to be the leader/hero. In Arathi, they take a base and leave it completely undefended. In Warsong, they would either all run to get the Horde flag or just stand in the middle and try to get honor kills.
IMO the worst part of this is the alliance people that claim the lower levels are to blame. When I played Warsong in the lower 30s, I was frequently in the top 5 on the charts... and that was while playing defense, guarding the base. In late 30s, I was almost always at the top, again, playing defense. Now, IMO, you should not be able to top the charts by standing inside the home base defending... logically, that should be going to the guys playing offense. *shrugs*
Mir Sep 8th 2007 1:26PM
If you play in the belief that horde teams always win, you might as well hand the match over at once.
In fact, I quite often see people yelling "Just let them win and be done with it quickly" 30 seconds into the game. Showing some spirit instead of whining goes a long way.
(And yes, the article is flame bait and will probably just annoy people, sorry)
vern Sep 8th 2007 1:24PM
The author of this article should be FIRED.
It's just plain troll baiting.
Not worth discussing.
Richard Sep 8th 2007 1:33PM
@11
The farm is much easier to defend because of the.... OK, that fact was pulled out of the same place as the rest of the statistics in the article.
Nails Sep 8th 2007 1:38PM
hmm, i have a few horde chars, and one alliance character on another server
i seem to almost always win AB, WSG, and AV, no matter what character i use. and both servers are in the same battlegroup. am i just that good?
RogueJedi86 Sep 8th 2007 1:41PM
Why? Because if Alliance wins consistently, the Horde will complain till the map gets changed so that they win more. See AV. Hordies lose, they cry for map to be changed. Alliance never whines about map imbalance excuses, so WSG and AB stay the same.
Matt W. Sep 8th 2007 1:43PM
Here's my honest opinion about the battlgrounds and why horde with 95% of the time.
It's the same reason why horde rape alliance in random raids on small towns/cities/area's.
The alliance can't play as a team. They are too out for themselves.
I don't know how many countless times I've called out for help in Astranaar/Sentinel Hill/Any city and have been told that "I have better things to do" or "Why bother?".
It's sad, but true. It's also had me considering rolling a horde, and finally giving in on another server.
That's just my two cents on it.
-Belfour Level 70 Mage on the Khaz Modan server