SWTOR Arenas: How it Should be Done

[Unthinkkable]

Mistake.

[Superhusky]

here is the entire blizz article btw (the part concerning arena anyways I will link to the article at the end for everyone)

 

As for the biggest mistake? There's a lot of them that I think, were ... they just "fell out" of things. One example: I wish the servers were more stable when we launched, of course - there's a lot of that sort of thing. We have a lot of excuses for that - we didn't expect nearly the response - but we can't say it wasn't a mistake. If I was going to pick on a game design thing that I look back on and think was a mistake? We really never designed WoW to be a competitive e-sports game; it was something that we decided to start tackling because there was such a desire and demand to evolve it in that direction, to introduce competitive arenas. I'm not sure that that was the right thing to do with the game.

 

We didn't engineer the game and classes and balance around it, we just added it on, so it continues to be very difficult to balance. Is WoW a PvE cooperative game, or a competitive PvP game? There's constant pressure on the class balance team, there's pressure on the game itself, and a lot of times players who don't PvP don't understand why their classes are changing. I don't think we ever foresaw how much tuning and tweaking we'd have to do to balance it in that direction. Either I'd go back in time to before WoW ever shipped and change the rules to make the basic game more conductive for being an e-sport, or if not that, just say it doesn't make sense. Right now, WoW has a bit of a schizophrenic philosophy behind it, and we're trying to figure out how to guide it.

 

It's tricky, now that we've gone down that road, because we have a passionate, large audience that enjoys it - the Arena, the e-sport - so we can't just chop off that head. We can't just say, "We fouled up and will go back to how it used to be before," because we have a really passionate audience that wants it in the game.

 

If I could go back in time before we shipped WoW, I would have either made serious changes to basic class balance to facilitate that type of play, or if I went back to when we had the idea two years later, I would have said, "Maybe we shouldn't go there."

 

Key parts:

 

"If I could go back in time before we shipped WoW, I would have either made serious changes to basic class balance to facilitate that type of play"

 

Which BW has already done by balancing PvP at the creation of the game, not its first expansion. He only wishes that if they hadn't done the initial balance within the first 2 years, then they probably shouldn't have done it period.

 

we have a passionate, large audience that enjoys it - the Arena, the e-sport

 

From Blizz's mouth. Large audience. Regardless of what percent arena players are of the population, it is still a huge number of people that BW will have a hard time ignoring. I am sorry but there was enough people before they even invented it to cause a drive towards it.

 

...we decided to start tackling because there was such a desire and demand to evolve it in that direction, to introduce competitive arenas.

 

Now imagine what the drive is like now that so many have played arena in WoW, and have the chance at it here in a game that in a lot of people's opinions, is a much better and more thought out game.

 

 

Edit: article for reference: http://www.warcry.com/articles/view/interviews/6773-Five-Years-of-Warcraft-Speaking-With-Blizzards-Rob-Pardo.2

Edited January 11, 2012 by Superhusky

[Cyphen]

I'm at work so I have nothing better to do... I was curious about this as well, so according to:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/pvp/?battlegroup=

 

3v3 teams with rating 2200+

Bloodlust - 175

Cyclone - 87

Emberstorm - 57

Nightfall - 100

Rampage - 111

Reckoning - 47

Retaliation - 26

Ruin - 83

Shadowburn - 81

Stormstrike - 58

Vengeance - 46

Vindication - 102

Whirlwind - 79

Total - 1052 teams, *3 = 3156 players

 

+ EU guys that is around 10K. Damn that is quite low, would of thought it would be more. Haven't played Arena since S8 (quit WoW)

 

Back in around S5-S7ish I know there was around 10K players per Battlegroup from 1.5K to top rating.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Cyphen

[BDutch]

+ EU guys that is around 10K. Damn that is quite low, would of thought it would be more. Haven't played Arena since S8 (quit WoW)

 

Back in around S5-S7ish I know there was around 10K players per Battlegroup from 1.5K to top rating.

 

I wouldn't imagine that anyone with a 1.5k rating was necessarily a huge arena fan, but even with 10k players per battlegroup, you're not really talking about a huge portion of the population. A chunk large enough to where you don't want to simply blow them off, sure... but a portion large enough to dump development cycles into game design that will in any way impact the vast majority? I dunno about that...

[Qeuzolt]

The only way I'm going to be okay with Arena is if the game balance isn't thrown to hell because of arena. Which would mean special coding just for arena, which won't happen...

 

So although I respect your points made and agree if there were an arena system these points are valid, I don't want an arena system ruining this game. The objective based PVP is encouraging team play. That is something arena does not encourage, large-ish scale team play. It where people who have 2 friends can get together and play. That's fine for them but I don't think BW is focused on groups of 2-5 but more on groups of 8-16 so find a couple people intrested in arena stick them together and you have a rated WZ team

[elidion]

I'm at work so I have nothing better to do... I was curious about this as well, so according to:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/pvp/?battlegroup=

 

3v3 teams with rating 2200+

Bloodlust - 175

Cyclone - 87

Emberstorm - 57

Nightfall - 100

Rampage - 111

Reckoning - 47

Retaliation - 26

Ruin - 83

Shadowburn - 81

Stormstrike - 58

Vengeance - 46

Vindication - 102

Whirlwind - 79

Total - 1052 teams, *3 = 3156 players

 

Weird, when I look I see 1,998 teams for US.

 

Add in EU there were 3,997 total teams which is 11,991 players if you multiply by 3.

[seanisawake]

+1 We need Arenas, Bioware!!!!!

[Superhusky]

Weird, when I look I see 1,998 teams for US.

 

Add in EU there were 3,997 total teams which is 11,991 players if you multiply by 3.

 

Add in the number of people that only play 2v2 or 5v5, and all the players under 2200. That equals a large enough number to implement into this game. 18000 above 2200 in one bracket alone. lol.

[Michieltjuh]

If you're going to base arena popularity off season 10/season 11 you're out of your mind.

 

As a 9x multichar gladiator I can tell you that alot of high rated veterans have quit, myself included.

 

Arena peaked in TBC/WotLK, Cataclysm's been a joke. Don't base your statistics off that.

 

That said it'd be a great idea for SWtoR, too.

[Toegrinder]

Love the map thing at the end

But what you said about PvE and PvP damage, why not just make it that moves do a certain amount of damage to a player, and a different amount of damage to an NPC.

[BDutch]

Add in the number of people that only play 2v2 or 5v5, and all the players under 2200. That equals a large enough number to implement into this game. 18000 above 2200 in one bracket alone. lol.

 

Ok, filter by 1500+ (try to tell me that a team with under a 1500 rating loves arenas)

3v3 is the popular tournament bracket, so I picked that one. Actually, pick whatever you want, but you can't pick multiple because the same people can be in multiple brackets.

 

Come up with the best number you can, just remember that 1% of 1 million is 10k. 10 million subscribers, carve it up however you want based on region/inactive accounts or whatever. I'd just like to see the math that makes this arena percentage a group that really needs to be catered to... or else!

[BDutch]

If you're going to base arena popularity off season 10/season 11 you're out of your mind.

 

As a 9x multichar gladiator I can tell you that alot of high rated veterans have quit, myself included.

 

Arena peaked in TBC/WotLK, Cataclysm's been a joke. Don't base your statistics off that.

 

That said it'd be a great idea for SWtoR, too.

 

Just out of curiosity, why in your opinion was cata arena a joke compared to tbc/wotlk arena?

[Stilleto]

You just said that 10% of the total WoW population is above 2.2k in arena and i'm deluded. 10% of the total WoW population doesn't even PLAY arena.

 

10 % of 10 million is 100,000?

 

bg 9 had over 13600 teams in S7 for the 2v2 bracket above 1500 mmr

 

2x13000= 26000

 

26000 x 9 9 leaving out a number of bg's = 234,000.

 

from these very undercut figures - we can see that for just the 2v2 bracket ( least played as it no longer gave glad titles) that at least 2% of the population played arena in 9 bgs for 1 bracket. if we used the same figures for the 3v3 bracket then.

 

3x13000 = 39,000 = 351,000 ect ect

 

 

however what you fail to realize it seems is that arena brings commerce equal to that of the entire population that does not arena. Which is why Blizzard chose to cater to the chunk of people that played arena over those that did not. Then with time as those who did not arena wanted to become a part of the that niche' rated bg's were implemented. In short - Arena brought in more money to the game than the group of people who did not arena.

 

By no means am i saying arena made WoW. Its no secret raiding is what makes WoW. Arena is/was simply the games form of catering to those who seek competition in a structured manner. Arena worked quite well for 9 seasons. And is currently the worlds only NON FPS NON RTS form of semi-pro /pro arena combat.

 

 

Instead of docking WoW arena out of your own personal standpoint you should look at the pros/cons of what a arena-ish or arena will bring to a MMORPG. People seek to compete. People seek means to test their characters ability. These are 2 staples in any successful MMORPG. And i hate to be the bearer of bad news but it was not WoW "fanboys" or "lore retainers" that lead WoW to its current reign - It was the combination of hardcore PVE'rs who cleared content allowing devs to raise/lower the bar and the Hardcore PVP'rs in arena who allowed devs to see how various changes affected the game for both PVE and PVP.

 

Right now - PVE content is a joke - any group of raiders with half a brain can clear normal raids and hard modes with ease. PVP is even worse - you grind to 65 valor and then.. do nothing but the dailys for bags for battlemaster gear. Guess who will shape the future of PVP.. its not you casuals who jump in for a relaxing time. It will be the hardcore people who most likely want to arena.

 

"what? no.. casuals lead where the game goes!!@#$@!! trolling trolling trolll...." no..

Game devs look for "caps" the peak of the current game model, casual typically dont reach that peak so its up to the hardcores to do that. And when these Hardcores reach that peak dev then sit down and say " ok target group 1 typically reaches target A by X time, we need to have a new bar for them to reach before target group 2 reaches target A" this applies to both PVE and PVP. Right now there are maybe 1000 battlemasters running around in the game, so 1000 people are reaching the "peak" of the PVP aspect of the game. In turn - dev will start to consider bringing a new peak in before the "flood" of gamers catch up to that peak. So we can expect new PVP content in a few weeks. Most likely the 50's bracket ( rofl...without rewards suited for 50's only because the bag gear is straight up lame to attain)

 

Now then.. Arena has a very hard peak to reach - as the creator of this thread stated politics play into it currently. For swtor ideally most of us want a PVP outlet that has a hard peak to attain but worthwhile and few in number so that trading and politics arent favorable. Think how most servers currently trade on ilum simply because there is no reason to not do so.

 

 

also... PVP in this game does NOT OFFER THE BEST GEAR IN GAME. T3 is best and battlemaster is comparable only to t2.

 

Arena would logically offer rewards comparable to t3 - and be suited more so for PVP. Now think back.........that peak....once a decent amount of the game pop have t3 can you guess what will happen? NEW PVE CONTENT omgggg, which will render the arena gear for PVE uncomparable. This is a basic formula...that does NOT take away from world PVP. What takes away from World PVP is the lack of purpose within world PVP.

 

lets follow this ghetto chart:

 

PVE non raid = gear level 1

PVE raid = gear level 2

PVP warzones = gear level 2

PVP world ( hypothetically) = gear level 1

PVP arena = gear level 2.1

 

if the above were true - then yes world pvp would be pointless as there would be no rewarding reason to do so. As much as you fanboys want games to be fun, the majority of players will partake in facets of games that offer rewards over entertainment. This is why we grind... in any MMORPG.. because of the rewards. as you can see the above also renders non raid PVE in a odd setting.

 

Now if the following were true for PVP then we all would be somewhat satisfied

 

PVP warzone = gear level 2 ( high pvp stats/pvp set bonuses)

PVP arena = gear level 2.5/3 ( high pvp stats/pvp set bonuses)

PVP world = gear level 2 ( high pvp stats/pvp set bonuses)

 

Why is arena higher gear than wz/world pvp? ..... because arena takes more skill than random ganking and zerg mentality playstyles

 

with the above there is a reason to world pvp, there is a reason to warzone ( but you arent forced into either/or for gear) and arena offer better gear because its on a different competative tier it makes sense to award people who work on that small team better gear than those who simply ride the train in warzones/world pvp.

 

 

in ending of my textual epilogue - Arenas are a good thing for any mmorpg. They "NEVER" forced anyone in WoW to arena for the best gear...there was ALWAYS a PVE comparable to the PVP arena weps. You simply had to be in a raid guild and be killing that content to have a chance at it. World PVP is often dead in most mmorpgs without rewards attached to world pvp. Before adding arena, the current state of PVP should be fixed and that wont happen until a 50's only bracket is introduced.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Stilleto

[Superhusky]

Ok, filter by 1500+ (try to tell me that a team with under a 1500 rating loves arenas)

3v3 is the popular tournament bracket, so I picked that one. Actually, pick whatever you want, but you can't pick multiple because the same people can be in multiple brackets.

 

Come up with the best number you can, just remember that 1% of 1 million is 10k. 10 million subscribers, carve it up however you want based on region/inactive accounts or whatever. I'd just like to see the math that makes this arena percentage a group that really needs to be catered to... or else!

 

 

Percentage is irrelevant. 400,000+ people are playing arena, counting us and doubling it for EU (afaik EU has more arena players?) and that is only counting the data from last season, that finished the season out to the end with an active team. Or the fact that the data capped at 2000 teams in almost every BG on every battlegroup, so the number are actually much higher. Or the fact 5v5 isn't added into those numbers. Or counting in the BULK of the WoW playerbase in the eastern hemisphere. Ya those guys. The ones that make up at least half of the 10 million? Those guys.

 

Safe to say we have enough people to cause a nice drive for arenas being implemented.

[beetz]

ohhhhh yes please

[Stilleto]

Just out of curiosity, why in your opinion was cata arena a joke compared to tbc/wotlk arena?

 

tbc/woltk after the DK fix and the DR fix of CC's between certain classes alloted far more comp variations and spec varations of equal caliber for the 2v2/3v3 brackets at that time.

 

examples of this are comps such as MutR/restoD ( blind cyclone fixs) HolyP/mutR or combatR

Ele sham/HolyPr/ for 2v2 RMP for 3v3 has always been strong but tbc introduced spell cleave as well as DemoL/MutR/DiscP as well and many many other comps that had equal versatility. Early TBC = sub rogues/discP/ArcaneM

 

cata however caused alot of these comps to become unplayable competativly and forced old comp or Rock paper scissor comps to be the grand staple. In cata some class comps were unbeatable by all comps except their direct counters assuming skill was comparable, though the same was true early TBC with arms warrior holy paladin, or mut rogue/ disc priest ( for 2v2) eleshaman/feralD/combat rogue for example in cata could easily plow through most comps with little effort - ergo joke, because bad players playing this comp could still beat good players with a lesser viable comp.

[elidion]

Add in the number of people that only play 2v2 or 5v5, and all the players under 2200. That equals a large enough number to implement into this game. 18000 above 2200 in one bracket alone. lol.

 

Actually that was all rating level, including people with 700ish rating.

 

5v5 teams, EU+US is at 20k players. But you can't just add them to the 3v3 because a lot of players are in multiple brackets, plus most arena players I knew did it with all of their alts as well. To be fair, I would add half of the 3v3 and guesstimate the total unique players between US and EU to be about 25k based on the current season of the armory. I have no idea where people are getting these 200k arena players because none of the information supports this.

 

Also these numbers don't reflect people that even care about it. I have arena teams in wow, I am counted in these statistics...but I hate it still...I do it because it is a quick and easy way to get PvP gear and since it rewards the best PvP gear I must do it to remain competitive. On a PvP server I need the gear.

 

The arena community is one of the most vocal because they are the people constantly crying about class balance. That should not be confused with popularity. No matter how it is implemented, there will always be a flavor of the month and everyone else will be crying for nerfs, and the game just goes to crap.

[BDutch]

1 % of 10 million is 100,000?

 

bg 9 had over 13600 teams in S7 for the 2v2 bracket above 1500 mmr

 

2x13000= 26000

 

26000 x 9 9 leaving out a number of bg's = 234,000.

 

from these very undercut figures - we can see that for just the 2v2 bracket ( least played as it no longer gave glad titles) that at least 2% of the population played arena in 9 bgs for 1 bracket. if we used the same figures for the 3v3 bracket then.

 

3x13000 = 39,000 = 351,000 ect ect

 

I don't think picking the most popular BG and multiplying its population by 9 provides an accurate sum of the BGs. I also don't think that 2v2's lack of glad titles is relevant since creating a 2v2 team didn't prevent you from having a 3v3 or 5v5 team. You're also assuming that the current lower season statistics have nothing to do with people's opinion of arenas, despite arena numbers dropping disproportionately faster than subscription numbers. You can blame that on a lot of things, but it seems naive to blame it on everything but arenas.

 

however what you fail to realize it seems is that arena brings commerce equal to that of the entire population that does not arena. Which is why Blizzard chose to cater to the chunk of people that played arena over those that did not. Then with time as those who did not arena wanted to become a part of the that niche' rated bg's were implemented. In short - Arena brought in more money to the game than the group of people who did not arena.

 

What is this theory based on exactly? That's a pretty bold statement that could potentially change my opinion on the necessity of arenas.

[Mattderp]

I support this, although, if it is for competitiveness only, it should be server vs server imo.

[Superhusky]

Actually that was all rating level, including people with 700ish rating.

 

5v5 teams, EU+US is at 20k players. But you can't just add them to the 3v3 because a lot of players are in multiple brackets, plus most arena players I knew did it with all of their alts as well. To be fair, I would add half of the 3v3 and guesstimate the total unique players between US and EU to be about 25k based on the current season of the armory. I have no idea where people are getting these 200k arena players because none of the information supports this.

 

Also these numbers don't reflect people that even care about it. I have arena teams in wow, I am counted in these statistics...but I hate it still...I do it because it is a quick and easy way to get PvP gear and since it rewards the best PvP gear I must do it to remain competitive. On a PvP server I need the gear.

 

The arena community is one of the most vocal because they are the people constantly crying about class balance. That should not be confused with popularity. No matter how it is implemented, there will always be a flavor of the month and everyone else will be crying for nerfs, and the game just goes to crap.

 

Let's keep the straw man arguments out of this. And I was saying everyone. not just above a certain rating. And arena isn't the quickest way to get gear either. RBGs are. That many people play arena, period. And they don't get any gear that is better because you can get all but a weapon (barely any stats) via honor grind and RBGs. Took Blizz a long time to figure that out but they did.

[Michieltjuh]

I support this, although, if it is for competitiveness only, it should be server vs server imo.

 

Nothing competitive about that.

 

I can already tell by now I would end up with a 99% winrate, only potential losses being disconnects.

[Stilleto]

 

 

 

What is this theory based on exactly? That's a pretty bold statement that could potentially change my opinion on the necessity of arenas.

 

I only picked bg9 because thats where I played for 10 seasons. I suppose I could have picked a lesser populated BG.

 

 

typically casual players bring on 0-2 of their friends to play with them for months at a time then they will stop, when one stops the litter of friends also stops playing.

 

typically hardcore players bring on 0-4 of their friends to play for years at a time - if they stop its usually short term during which their hardcore friends typically remain playing.

 

i guess another way to say it is : casual players play for the socialism involved with the game they play, they play because their friends play and so when that social aspect is at a low their want to continue playing is also low. Whereas hardcore players do not play for socialism they play for the content/aspect of the game they play. Hardcore arena players played entire seasons each week/ each month without fail as to maintain or practice or progress their associated ratings. Whilst casual players would stop/quit/play another game canceling their sub until they wanted to play again. In turn because hardcore players play to play their subs are usually constant, casuals however will for times stop paying for their subs.

 

hardcore players are also the ones who pay entree fees for blizzard sactioned tournys

casuals do not.

 

duo-boxing tri boxing, quad boxing, and multi licensing for gamers are also from the hardcore players. You tube videos of raids/arena websites fansites ( mmo champ/aj) also bring newer players to the game. Its due to the hardcore media coverages that such sites are staples to mmorpgs now

Edited January 11, 2012 by Stilleto

[goulet]

it should be done by not doing it. it's silly enough we're at "war" and take a break to play space football against our same faction no less. Now we're gonna engage in gladiatorial combat to help win the war? How about we get more then one world pvp area, and more then one world pvp area where people actually pvp before we throw other things on top of the mess.

 

side note: have fun with arena when you:

- get sapped and get 3 orbital strikes (or bh aoe) cast on you.

-have teams where sorc just spam shields on people

-have a team of stealth that can focus fire the crud out of one target, restleath and do it to another target decimating teams of 3 or fewer.

-have a team that can group stealth, non stealth classes.

[Cyphen]

it should be done by not doing it. it's silly enough we're at "war" and take a break to play space football against our same faction no less. Now we're gonna engage in gladiatorial combat to help win the war? How about we get more then one world pvp area, and more then one world pvp area where people actually pvp before we throw other things on top of the mess.

 

side note: have fun with arena when you:

- get sapped and get 3 orbital strikes (or bh aoe) cast on you.

-have teams where sorc just spam shields on people

-have a team of stealth that can focus fire the crud out of one target, restleath and do it to another target decimating teams of 3 or fewer.

-have a team that can group stealth, non stealth classes.

 

Not all Bounty Hunters, Sith fight every single day to contribute towards the war effort. You know, they have fun too and I am sure Space Football is part of it, they gotta chill and forget about the war at some point.

 

In terms of Lore, there are pits and gladiator fights in the Star Wars lore.

 

Just sayin'

[Superhusky]

it should be done by not doing it. it's silly enough we're at "war" and take a break to play space football against our same faction no less. Now we're gonna engage in gladiatorial combat to help win the war? How about we get more then one world pvp area, and more then one world pvp area where people actually pvp before we throw other things on top of the mess.

 

side note: have fun with arena when you:

- get sapped and get 3 orbital strikes (or bh aoe) cast on you.

-have teams where sorc just spam shields on people

-have a team of stealth that can focus fire the crud out of one target, restleath and do it to another target decimating teams of 3 or fewer.

-have a team that can group stealth, non stealth classes.

 

Ya, happens in real life now. called the olympics.

 

And you can make the same strats in wow currently...but they never seem to be popular? Priests spam shields. Rogues sap. People can AOE. Trip stealth can focus fire in wow quite effectively. I wonder why they aren't seen at all? O ya! They are all easily countered by using strat and skill. Don't make up hypothetical scenarios when I can just do the same to counter you. Then the thread turns into a what if game.