“A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.” – Napoleon Bonaparte, on Honor
Today’s article is a guest essay from my BFF Nyssa. We go waaaay back–to the earliest days of Asheron’s Call, and we’ve been fighting bugs ever since.
We were emailing back and forth today, talking about the game, and I reiterated my dislike (distaste? aversion?) to PvP. Oh sure, I have done the occasional bombing or defense of Halaa; I’ve (tried to) repulse the Horde in Ashenvale and Auberdine; I’ve even (once) raided an empty Horde settlement (and made the mistake of attacking the flight master). But Arenas? Battlegrounds? Fuhgeddaboudit.
It’s not that I fear being ganked (I got over that years ago). My biggest problem is I get tunnel vision in PvP. I don’t know much, but I do know that is a Bad Thing. So anyway, Nyssa’s been doing a few BGs lately (she’s a 70 Rogue), and passed on some advice. It sounded so logical (and much of it, I’ve seen here and there) and concise, that I wanted to share it with my more casual readers (so, like, not Megan, for instance, but if she were to comment, that would be tres cool).
So I asked Nyssa if I could share this with you, and she was all for it. Since the original Nyssa (her D&D character) is a pink pixie, her words (copy editing only) are in pink. Any editorial comments by me are in the default format.
Caveat: Neither Nyssa nor I profess to be PvP experts. What follows are her opinions; as always, your experience may vary, and objects in the mirror may be closer than they appear.
PvP is loads of fun, and a fantastic way to learn new tricks with your class, (not to mention learning what the OTHER classes are capable of, since they’re doing it to you 
).
When you do try, start with the BGs; Arena teams are a whole other monster.
Just accept a few pvp truths:
- You will die…a LOT. Don’t let yourself get frustrated because you die. It’s just going to happen. Luckily, you only take "wear and tear" damage to your items in pvp, no death damage, so it’s not as expensive as dying a lot in an instance.
- Don’t expect to WIN a lot of BG’s. Alliance [on Kul Tiras] kinda sucks in general. Every now and then we get lucky. I knew this from listening to the whining in /Trade.
- There are a lot of stupid kids that play. Lots of trash talk and crap. I /ignore everyone of them. I don’t want to have to deal with it. It makes my pvp time a lot more enjoyable.
Just go in with the intention of learning. If someone there seems to be taking the lead, follow their directions. Otherwise, pick someone and follow them. Kill what they kill (or heal if you go with Osprey), at least until you learn your way around the BG’s.
Arathi Basin and Eye of the Storm are my personal favorites, and I think the easiest to get your start on, since it’s mostly just capture and defend points. Stay on defense: You won’t get as much honor, but the pace will be a little easier.
Warsong Gulch is a "Capture the Flag" game, can be very fun as well, but easy to get disoriented. If you do that with your rogues or hunters, stay on defense to start with, stick around the Alliance base. Rogues are great for keeping the horde from taking the flag, hunters are good because you can track and see them coming. With Osprey, you could do either, either stay with the defenders and heal them, or run with the offense folks and keep the flag-bearer healed.
Alterac Valley is confusing…it’s HUGE, easy to get lost, I hate it. If you try it, just try to stick with someone as much as possible. Or stay near the Alliance start point and defend (you’ll see where the bottle-neck spot is there).
Also, if you go with Osprey, get him a different set of clothes to wear. Priests/healers are a big enough target, and Primal Mooncloth is just a big neon sign saying "kick me!" You can sacrifice a little +heal for pvp. I knew this, really I did!
I play games with myself when I’m in on my own. I’ll pick a class to focus on, learn how to beat them. (Generally the same thing…keep ‘em stunned :p) There aren’t many I’m intimidated by anymore. I may not win every time, but I stand a decent chance.
I only had one truly infuriating BG: Some clever hordie managed to find a bug in Arathi Basin and jumped the gate and captured a point before the BG started. Then a good portion of the Alliance team showed themselves to be [Horde] plants, and instructed the rest of us to "just let it happen". OMG.. . Screenshotted, /afk’d out, and reported. (If enough people /afk (flee) out of a BG it will shut down entirely…I know at least 4 of us did.)
So there you have it. My next PvP-related article just might be entitled "Dr. Strangedove, Or How I Learned to Love the Basin."
Nice ! Really interesting stuff. Keep it coming.
I’m really bad at PVP, but once in awhile it can be fun.
Ironically enough I’m not very good at dueling, but better in any battleground. The best thing I can recall was maybe a month ago. I was in AB. Myself and a warrior were at the mine. We held of wave after wave of alliance until finally he bit the dust and i followed. I then read in BG chat him asking who the heck the hunter was that raped all those alliance. Great job he says! So I pipe up and type “I do what I can” after that I get several tells from him and we strategize who to destroy next and what point to capture. We did really well together. It helps to receive random “mad props” like that too. Really gets ya in the mood to play to your best potential.
But then again, I was born into pvp (though i didnt know better). I’ve been pvp’ing since BG’s first opened…and pvp’ing without much choice when not in BG’s due to the servers I began playing on.
Nowadays I still love AV best. pvp’ing on my hunter is just pure joy for me
Granted, there are days where you want to chuck your computer out the window…that’s when you know to go on an alt, walk away, or just flat out log off and watch a movie.
All things in moderation!
Loved the post though…really made me recall several things about BG’s.
Great article, even better advice, especially eschewing the bit about having patience.
My main, Arrens, is a warlock. And since we’ve been beaten about with the nerf bat in PvP for so long, they’re no fun. My alt, Soldin, is an almost lvl 55 rogue that I’m dying to get into the BGs with. I want to beat the ever-loving crap out of warlocks the way other rogues beat up my warlock. I assume it’s something like poetic justice. Or revenge. Whatever