PvP Q&A with Blizzard's Cory Stockton
by Zach Yonzon 
Jun 18th 2009 at 7:30PM
- Experience gain in Battlegrounds is slightly slower than questing or grinding
- Players can toggle experience gain on and off with a mere 10 Gold
- There are plans to include greens and "the occasional blue item" at the end of each Battleground match (!) but won't make it to Patch 3.2
- The Isle of Conquest is in the Frozen Sea, North of Icecrown
- Objectives in Isle of Conquest are captured exactly like flags in Arathi Basin -- I totally called this wrong when I said it would probably be a numbers and proximity thing
- Battlemaster Achievement isn't likely to change (whew!) but Blizzard is considering what to do with the Achievements for the Isle of Conquest
- Rated Battlegrounds are coming. Not quite soon®, but an announcement will be made during BlizzCon
- Blizzard plans "to deliver more Battlegrounds to the players as often as we can"
Patch 3.2 will bring about a new 5, 10, and 25 man instance to WoW, and usher in a new 40-man battleground called the Isle of Conquest. WoW.com will have you covered every step of the way, from extensive PTR coverage through the official live release. Check out WoW.com's Guide to Patch 3.2 for all the latest!Filed under: Blizzard, PvP, Interviews, Battlegrounds
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Alchemistmerlin Jun 18th 2009 7:39PM
Oh good, let's help twinks but not separate them into their own PvP bracket.
Uhg.
Malkeior Jun 18th 2009 7:41PM
People who pay the fee ARE placed in another bracket.
my2cents Jun 18th 2009 7:47PM
Virtually no one other than the twinks will opt out of getting experience in BGs. And those who opt out are put in a seperate bracket. Think about that one for a bit... ;)
Darias.Perenolde Jun 18th 2009 7:51PM
Those that twink are SERIOUSLY going to have to know their stuff. It won't just be pwning non-twinks any more.
Janaa Jun 18th 2009 8:04PM
Twinks deserve whatever they get. I can't believe some twinks actually think that because the characters they've spent 3000g on at level 19 can "own" other players, that they actually have any semblance of skill. What a joke. Twinks are by and large the worst BG players and least talented PVPers, as they rely on their gear rather than their skill. Protip: If you're top of the scoreboard and you're twinked, skill didn't get you there. You're only deluding yourself if you think it did.
On the other hand: All-twink BGs are excellent. It means the twinks actually have to learn how to play if they want to stay there.
Aykwa Jun 19th 2009 12:50AM
I really like most of these changes. But my main concern is the possibility of longer queue times. Here's why:
1- Seperating out twinks and non-twinks means that there will be far fewer players queued up for each BG in each bracket. IF enough non-twinks start gaining their XP by playing BGs, that may alleviate the problem for non-twinks. However, twinks in all brackets could now face much longer queue times.
2- More battlegrounds and having each battleground more viable means more options, but with the same number of players, that means fewer players per battleground, which in turn means longer queue times overall.
I would think the simple solution is to have larger battlegroups. More realms on each battlegroup could decrease queues and allow you to play against more different players, whether a twink or a leveling player or an 80. In many cases, long queue times are already problems, I'd hate to see those problems made worse.
kuri Jun 19th 2009 11:00AM
Au contraire, I see people leveling actually embracing the BGs as they level specifically because they have less of a chance to be pitted against twink teams. Less games and a longer queue, sure... but coupled with the queue-anywhere system and twink separation, there's finally potential to work PVPing into your grinding.
Retropally Jun 18th 2009 7:42PM
"# Experience gain in Battlegrounds is slightly slower than questing or grinding"
I can understand the logic in quests...but GRINDING. Wont people be grinding BG's to level, but now grind slower than other grinding. Urgh :(
CrusaderStrike Jun 18th 2009 7:45PM
I am one of those who loves BG's and only doing arena to stay competitive in terms of gears. If they keep adding BG's I might come back to pvp again.
Wither Jun 19th 2009 12:44AM
I gotta say I LOVE battlegrounds. I've done a little PuGing, a little formal guild raiding in 10s and 25s, a little Arena, but BGs are for me. I inadvertently spend hours playing them.
On the whole I'm REALLY excited about the various changes Blizzard is putting forward. Finally, BGs are becoming a viable mini game in themselves that give XP (any maybe even loot?!).
I don't "compete" with raiders, I don't ever intend to. However I'm really glad that soon I'll be getting rewarded much more for my time now.
Darias.Perenolde Jun 18th 2009 7:52PM
Wow, we may actually see Azshara Crater open for business? That'd be sweet!
Alchemistmerlin Jun 19th 2009 12:47AM
Oh wow, I missed that entirely somehow.
I deserve to be rated down, thank you everyone.
Kris Jun 19th 2009 12:47AM
So, now that level 20s can get mounts, they should open up all the other BGs to lower levels. I have a 29 twink hunter and I'm pretty bored with just WSG and AB. Bring on AV ffs!
Krick Jun 18th 2009 9:33PM
When are we going to see level requirements on gems? It seems kind of overpowered to have level 60 items with three sockets that can use wrath epic gems.
...
Krick
http://www.tankadin.com
Heremod Jun 19th 2009 12:50AM
I generally like all the changes to the bgs, but two things I"m not sure they've thought about:
1. This will kill all non "19 twinking" bgs on emberstorm. Which is unfortunate, because 29, 39 were the brackets you could actually competitively play in for only 400 gold (You try playing at level 80 with less time than it takes to earn 400 gold, and compare that to levelling an alt to 29 and doing dailies for 400 gold, the twink alt takes about a 2% of the time investment of a level 80 serious bg player.)
The reason it will kill non-19 twinking is because, right now, the queue at level 29 is 15-20 minutes long. With only one AB (with fewer than 30 players often) and 2 WSGs running, split that in half, and you have 0 ABs and 1 WG. Good luck grinding exp at one game every hour or so :-). . . and of course for the twinks, who want to pvp for something less than the 15 hours a week of bg play it takes at 80, well, too bad, competitive play on a casual time schedule will die. Now, if they merged emberstorm with antoher battlegroup, I would fully support the change. P.S., Most "twinks" I play with are wearing all greens they got off the ah and bg rewards from playing at their level :-). A person who runs instances and has BoA gear can rpobably outgear them :-p.
2. We run like 1 AV at non-peak times, and they're adding another 40 man bg? I mean, I like 40 vs 30 games as much as the next person, i.e., once a week :-). . . but again, I just don't think emberstorm has the population to support all these changes.
So, I like the changes, but I worry the subdivision into 2 different queues below 80, and hte addition of another level 80 bg that requires 40 people will completely outstrip the number of people who actually play on emberstorm.
Bossy Jun 19th 2009 2:44AM
Simple solution.
Make the Battlegroups bigger so the queue lines get smaller.
Also the only queue lines that will be longer are the twink BG's. Since a LOT of players will want to level by doing BG's AND will be assured most (not all) twinks will not be playing, the lower level BG's will be full of players liking PvP.
I think the higher brackets (59 and above) will still see a lot of twinks in the experience BG's though as the experience needed to level is rather big.
Any idea how the experience off will influence the lvl 60 bracket of doing old Raids and just play endlessly the old Wow Raids ?
Liltimmy Jun 19th 2009 1:58AM
This seems like it will increase the number of lower level players in BGs, which is almost always a hindrance to the team. Even knowing that I would be basically useless at level 44, I would probably still queue my shaman up for some AB/WSG for the XP and possible green/blue (which sounds pretty awesome, would love to hear more details on this).
Bossy Jun 19th 2009 2:50AM
It is a misconception that you can't play a BG at level X3 or X4 or X5.
You still can contribute to the overall battle situation - even in WSG. You just play it differently.
It also depends somewhat what class you play, but a druid or rogue can do things to stall players at least 5 levels above them.
Your damage output is of course less, but you can contribute a lot.
Of course you will not be the single hero of the BG and one shot other players, but the gradual power you gain when going from X4 to X8 is very satisfying.
Actually you learn to play the class far better by doing this.
Dragoniel Jun 19th 2009 1:07PM
/agreed
If people even in level 80 BG's would remember from time to time, that they have crowd control and ressurection spells, majority of the fights would be a lot different.
Even being at the bottom of the bracket, you can still heal, ressurect sheep, root, stun, incapitate and whatnot.
The problem is that it wont help you survive another minute, but thats different topic. You CAN be useful.
Liltimmy Jul 8th 2009 2:49PM
I agree that lower level players can contribute in BG's, absolutely, but it's also true that the same class would be *much* more helpful to the group at level x9, assuming equal skill.
Sure, a 14 rogue in WSG could throw out a few saps here and there, but he can't survive in a fight with a non-fail level 19 of almost any class. You can contribute at lower levels, but you can contribute much more at x8 or x9 when you have all your skills for the bracket and better gear (probably).