I have some concern with the Honor System in Vanilla WoW. As many are aware, the grind to Rank 14 typically involves Premade Battleground groups farming 10+ hours a day. Any other method for farming honor won't get you anywhere near Rank 14. The honor system measures your gains against other members of your faction, so only a small % of players are assigned to the top ranks. There is also the issue of honor from World PvP being diminished once battlegrounds are released. Ranking up in World PvP is no longer an option really, because of how much more effective Battlegrounds honor farming is. For the majority of Vanilla the battlegrounds were serverwide. This meant that players often ventured into the world while they were waiting for long queues to pop. Classic battlegrounds will be crossrealm, which will likely reduce the long queue times and lead to fewer players roaming the open world.

What are some improvements to the Honor System in Classic that could eventually be made?

What if there were two separate honor rankings. One for Battlegrounds and one for World PvP. This way players could achieve high honor rankings doing isolely World PvP. This gives players more options for ranking up, rather than just Premade battleground all day for high rankings.

How do you all feel about changing the Ranking System to static honor values that are not based on the performance of other members of your faction? This way anyone could eventually achieve Rank 14 if they grinded enough. Rank 14 would require a certain maximum amount of honor earned, and once it was reached, a player would earn the ranking.

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

What are some improvements to the Honor System in Classic that could eventually be made?

Either you change it right out of the gate, our you don't change it. It wont be fair for the people who earn it the hard way just to have it nerfed in difficulty later on.

Stfuppercut wrote: ↑

5 years ago

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

What are some improvements to the Honor System in Classic that could eventually be made?

Either you change it right out of the gate, our you don't change it. It wont be fair for the people who earn it the hard way just to have it nerfed in difficulty later on.

Would creating a second Honor Rank system for World PvP be a problem? Classic WoW PvP devolves into a 24/7 WSG Premade fest. If you don't play that way then you are stuck at Rank 10. Is World PvP not a drastic selling point of Classic? What is the point if you can't even progress doing it once Battlegrounnds are released?

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

What is the point

Some people play for fun.

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Would creating a second Honor Rank system for World PvP be a problem? Classic WoW PvP devolves into a 24/7 WSG Premade fest. If you don't play that way then you are stuck at Rank 10. Is World PvP not a drastic selling point of Classic? What is the point if you can't even progress doing it once Battlegrounnds are released?

This isn't my idea haha. You're supposed to be sharing an opinion with us. If youre asking if two honor systems should exist simultaneously, no, I think that would be stupid. But I would be willing to hear you out on how this could be good. I'm not sure how you could balance this without invalidating BG's and rewriting the game. Players will always go for honor per hour. If the best honor per hour is BG's, premades will farm BG's and ruin pug teams. If world PvP offers the best honor per hour, players will camp flight paths and kill the lowest level players that still give honor. This is the game. This is how players will play. This is how I will play. I'm not sure how you will change this without changing the entire game... In fact, from all your previous suggestion, you would destroy the game by trying to change it. Your proposed changes are historically awful.

Back in the days of yore, I enjoyed doing world PvP while I waited for queues to pop. It was a great way to increase my honor gains against my peers who preferred to sit in town and wait for the BG to start. When cross-realm BGs became a thing I was super happy about it because it meant I didn't have to wait 45 min for WSG to start. Of course, by that time I was already geared and wasn't as focused on world PvP as much. I feel that cross realm BGs will certainly have an impact on world PvP and that kinda bums me out. I also feel that Blizzard did this so that it would appeal to the masses who want faster BG queue times while also creating the second order effect of diminishing world PvP which helps negate PvErs getting ganked all the time.
I was initially for cross-realm BGs but have since changed my mind based on everything I've mentioned. Cross-realm BGs are (and were) the first step in removing people from 90% of Azeroth and instead populating the major cities with everyone standing around the battlemaster.

Edit: How does this change the race for R14? Not much. Those who are invested in grinding out honor will do it the same as it was done before only now they will less time sitting around. It'll still be the BG farm groups pushing the highest honor numbers regardless if they are doing 1 BG an hour (2005) or 5 (2019). The gains are relative to how often you get a chance to kill people when compared to your peers who are also farming.

Cletus wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Back in the days of yore, I enjoyed doing world PvP while I waited for queues to pop. It was a great way to increase my honor gains against my peers who preferred to sit in town and wait for the BG to start. When cross-realm BGs became a thing I was super happy about it because it meant I didn't have to wait 45 min for WSG to start. Of course, by that time I was already geared and wasn't as focused on world PvP as much. I feel that cross realm BGs will certainly have an impact on world PvP and that kinda bums me out. I also feel that Blizzard did this so that it would appeal to the masses who want faster BG queue times while also creating the second order effect of diminishing world PvP which helps negate PvErs getting ganked all the time.
I was initially for cross-realm BGs but have since changed my mind based on everything I've mentioned. Cross-realm BGs are (and were) the first step in removing people from 90% of Azeroth and instead populating the major cities with everyone standing around the battlemaster.

Edit: How does this change the race for R14? Not much. Those who are invested in grinding out honor will do it the same as it was done before only now they will less time sitting around. It'll still be the BG farm groups pushing the highest honor numbers regardless if they are doing 1 BG an hour (2005) or 5 (2019). The gains are relative to how often you get a chance to kill people when compared to your peers who are also farming.

Great post Cletus. I agree that Crossrealm battlegrounds are not appropriate for Classic. We didn't get them until the very end of Vanilla, and we all see the type of behavior they fostered. I played Horde and remember the 30minute + queue times, but it helped develop the dueling scene outside of Orgrimmar, as well as put more players in the world. Crossrealm BGs gave way to the type of playstyles that defined the expansions and destroyed server community.

Stfuppercut wrote: ↑

5 years ago

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Would creating a second Honor Rank system for World PvP be a problem? Classic WoW PvP devolves into a 24/7 WSG Premade fest. If you don't play that way then you are stuck at Rank 10. Is World PvP not a drastic selling point of Classic? What is the point if you can't even progress doing it once Battlegrounnds are released?

This isn't my idea haha. You're supposed to be sharing an opinion with us. If youre asking if two honor systems should exist simultaneously, no, I think that would be stupid. But I would be willing to hear you out on how this could be good. I'm not sure how you could balance this without invalidating BG's and rewriting the game. Players will always go for honor per hour. If the best honor per hour is BG's, premades will farm BG's and ruin pug teams. If world PvP offers the best honor per hour, players will camp flight paths and kill the lowest level players that still give honor. This is the game. This is how players will play. This is how I will play. I'm not sure how you will change this without changing the entire game... In fact, from all your previous suggestion, you would destroy the game by trying to change it. Your proposed changes are historically awful.

Players will pursue the system that gives them the most honor. I agree with that. However, there will be players achieving the highest rankings in both World PvP and Battleground system. It doesn't matter how fast someone is ranking up doing World PvP, because their progression doesn't affect somebody ranking up in Battlegrounds. The players ranking up in World PvP aren't directly competing with players ranking up in Battlegrounds. If ranking up in World PvP becomes too competitive, then a player can choose to rank up in Battlegrounds instead since there would be less competition. So I don't see how it is an issue. Players rank up relative to the competition. World PvP has saturation due to limited zones, while Battlegrounds are an number of instances and players.

The big issue with Classic is that once Battlegrounds are released, players can no longer viably rank up in World PvP. Having two systems allows players who prefer World PvP to be able to rank up doing it. I understand why there are Battlegrounds in Classic. It is partly so that casual players can enjoy PvP on more equal and forgiving terms. That is fine. This way World PvP and Battlegrounds can co-exist.

While I was unemployed I managed to get Lieutenant Commander (10) on Lights Hope private server.
I think that the entire system is unfair and unless you have literally nothing better to do than to queue and sit in battlegrounds for every second that the server remains active then you will not achieve rank 13 or 14. It's not worth disregarding your health over getting high rank because there will always be a group of people with heads wired different, nothing better to do, no real life or job and probably regretting it later.
Just play because you want to have fun.

I don't see any alternative to the system that players would be happy with.

Kazukii wrote: ↑

5 years ago

While I was unemployed I managed to get Lieutenant Commander (10) on Lights Hope private server.
I think that the entire system is unfair and unless you have literally nothing better to do than to queue and sit in battlegrounds for every second that the server remains active then you will not achieve rank 13 or 14. It's not worth disregarding your health over getting high rank because there will always be a group of people with heads wired different, nothing better to do, no real life or job and probably regretting it later.
Just play because you want to have fun.

I don't see any alternative to the system that players would be happy with.

Pretty much. The system is literally made for people to play 12 hours a day.
I don't see how you would solve that without making people "upset".

Tec wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Kazukii wrote: ↑

5 years ago

While I was unemployed I managed to get Lieutenant Commander (10) on Lights Hope private server.
I think that the entire system is unfair and unless you have literally nothing better to do than to queue and sit in battlegrounds for every second that the server remains active then you will not achieve rank 13 or 14. It's not worth disregarding your health over getting high rank because there will always be a group of people with heads wired different, nothing better to do, no real life or job and probably regretting it later.
Just play because you want to have fun.

I don't see any alternative to the system that players would be happy with.

Pretty much. The system is literally made for people to play 12 hours a day.
I don't see how you would solve that without making people "upset".

Well you could make it so that players need a certain amount of total honor for each rank. That way players can eventually reach the top rank if they play enough.

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Well you could make it so that players need a certain amount of total honor for earch rank. That way players can eventually reach the top rank if they play enough.

This is what retail WoW is. Legendary items, top PvP ranks, etc. aren't anything special if everybody can have them. When everyone is special, no one is special.

Cletus wrote: ↑

5 years ago

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Well you could make it so that players need a certain amount of total honor for earch rank. That way players can eventually reach the top rank if they play enough.

This is what retail WoW is. Legendary items, top PvP ranks, etc. aren't anything special if everybody can have them. When everyone is special, no one is special.

I don't think that the system should be changed to where its based on cumulative honor earned. The issue with the system is that you are forced to premade battlegrounds to reach high honor ranks. I am suggesting that there are two honor ranking systems. One for World PvP and one for Battlegrounds. If you aren't doing premade battlegrounds 15 hours a day then you are pretty much stuck at Rank 10/11. That becomes really boring. Players should be able to reach rank 14 doing World PvP. It is better to give players more options. World PvP rewards basically nothing once BGs are released, because you are competing against players spamming crossrealm battlegrounds. It is one of the biggest issues with the game.

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

I don't think that the system should be changed to where its based on cumulative honor earned. The issue with the system is that you are forced to premade battlegrounds to reach high honor ranks. I am suggesting that there are two honor ranking systems. One for World PvP and one for Battlegrounds. If you aren't doing premade battlegrounds 15 hours a day then you are pretty much stuck at Rank 10/11. That becomes really boring. Players should be able to reach rank 14 doing World PvP. It is better to give players more options. World PvP rewards basically nothing once BGs are released, because you are competing against players spamming crossrealm battlegrounds. It is one of the biggest issues with the game.

I don't fully disagree with your dual system idea but is it fair to reward someone with R 13/14 if they farmed level 50's to get it versus someone who spent most of their waking hours stacking bodies against other level 60's. I loooooove world PvP but I don't think that alone should warrant the same result as a combined effort (world and BG PvP). I feel that if someone is completely serious about the grind to R13/14 then it becomes imperative to go to a low population server. Preferably one where you are the outnumbered faction. Since you are competing against your server peers, this will give you the most bang for your buck in world PvP and more likely that you will be grouping with the small community of other BG-grinders for that pool of honor and get you to a desired rank much faster. After that, swap servers to live the high-population lifestyle. That's my plan anyway.

I would imagine what you brought up is available in retail and that's a good place for it to stay.

Cletus wrote: ↑

5 years ago

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

I don't think that the system should be changed to where its based on cumulative honor earned. The issue with the system is that you are forced to premade battlegrounds to reach high honor ranks. I am suggesting that there are two honor ranking systems. One for World PvP and one for Battlegrounds. If you aren't doing premade battlegrounds 15 hours a day then you are pretty much stuck at Rank 10/11. That becomes really boring. Players should be able to reach rank 14 doing World PvP. It is better to give players more options. World PvP rewards basically nothing once BGs are released, because you are competing against players spamming crossrealm battlegrounds. It is one of the biggest issues with the game.

I don't fully disagree with your dual system idea but is it fair to reward someone with R 13/14 if they farmed level 50's to get it versus someone who spent most of their waking hours stacking bodies against other level 60's. I loooooove world PvP but I don't think that alone should warrant the same result as a combined effort (world and BG PvP). I feel that if someone is completely serious about the grind to R13/14 then it becomes imperative to go to a low population server. Preferably one where you are the outnumbered faction. Since you are competing against your server peers, this will give you the most bang for your buck in world PvP and more likely that you will be grouping with the small community of other BG-grinders for that pool of honor and get you to a desired rank much faster. After that, swap servers to live the high-population lifestyle. That's my plan anyway.

The Rank 14 grind in Classic will involve Premade groups winning 5 minute games in crossrealm battlegrounds. It renders World PvP obsolete. Crossrealm battlegrounds will also lead to fewer players roaming contested zones most likely. Part of what differentiates Classic from Retail is the open world aspect. Having two systems allows players who prefer to do battlegrounds to achieve Rank 14, while still making World PvP a valid playstyle. I don't see the downside. The world wouldn't be as crowded with players camping flightmasters or greifing level 50s, because a lot of level 60s would be grinding battlegrounds for ranking as well.

Zacheous wrote: ↑

5 years ago

I would imagine what you brought up is available in retail and that's a good place for it to stay.

Classic WoW Honor Ranking will be dominated by premade groups sitting in Capital Cities 15 hours a day farming pugs in crossrealm battlegrounds.
It will make World PvP honor ranking pointless. Why is that a good thing? Crossrealm battlegrounds didn't even exist for most of Vanilla, yet we are getting them in Classic when BGs launch. How does nobody see how potentially damaging this will be for the game. That is what Retail is. Spam battleground queues 24/7. That is not how it was in Classic.

Whole vanilla is about: time invested>>>skill. So just leave it as it is.

I will patiently wait for tbc

I plan on grinding as much as my time allows me. Rank 14 is a pipe dream, but a fun dream. As a teacher, the only way I can possibly get it is in the summer time. However, as fun as the dream is, I'm 100% okay with it being just that. A dream.

With that being said, I do wish it were set up a little differently. I don't think it should be easier to obtain, per se, but just healthier. Adding World PvP into the mix would be super helpful, but they need to get rid of DHK's to make it work. I personally believe DHK's are more detrimental to World PvP than the Rank 14 grind is, imo.

I am not a fan of cross-realm battlegrounds; they eliminate meaningful rivalry between factions on a server. World PvP will always be my favorite kind of PvP, but I understand why Blizzard originally introduced battlegrounds. There are some factors that could make World PvP unenjoyable (population imbalance, lack of immediacy), and battlegrounds gave players a way to have a guaranteed fair-ish fight without having to go searching for it, potentially for hours.

Changes in Classic scare me because if one thing is changed, why can't other things be changed, you know? And I worry that any change would snowball into enough changes for Classic to no longer be what we wanted. I wish that World PvP had been equally incentivized as battlegrounds in the original game, but it wasn't. Luckily, Alterac Valley was introduced, and it became my favorite battleground of any battleground I experienced (Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, Eye of the Storm, Battle for Gilneas?, Strand of the Ancients, Twin Peaks, Isle of Conquest). I remember in Wrath of the Lich King, there was the battle for Winter's Grasp, but I didn't particularly find that more exciting than Alterac Valley. So if you love World PvP, I hope to see you in Alterac Valley.

s1atan wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Whole vanilla is about: time invested>>>skill. So just leave it as it is.

I will patiently wait for tbc

And this notion, which is 100% accurate, is what created the massive gap between the top players and the bottom players in Vanilla... Because the top players played more so they were typically more familiar with the game and more knowledgeable AND had an insane amount of gear. Imagine being in raid gear, understanding the strong synergies in your talent tree and using a build that was theorycrafted, using addons and keybinds and fighting against people with half of your health who were keyboard turning and clicking ALL of their abilities - this was vanilla. There was a massive disparity between the top and bottom of the playerbase and I think this made the game strong because you could be strong (as @cletus eluded to above, you cant be strong when everyone is strong). The game rewarded effort. A combination of time (with an emphasis on time) but with an element of self-development and know-how. If you put effort into vanilla, you could be awesome but without effort, you were going to suck. No amount of inherent skill could carry you at a certain gear threshold. Vanilla was not balanced, vanilla was not forgiving and inclusive; vanilla was a story of the haves and the have-nots. You were either lounging at the top as an apex predator or you were being hunted. This added to the games social dynamic and ingame social hierarchy while setting achievable parameters for greatness that incentivized spending time ingame... In an MMO... Gosh, who'da thunk it??? Its almost like they wanted people to log in!

Dont get me wrong I was pumped to PvP in BC in a truly competitive environment in the form of arenas and I loved that era of the game, but this is a different era and those changes in BC came at a cost. Unpopular opinion from some who played a SHITload of Vanilla and BC and peaked as a player in BC: BC may have been the most casual version of the game we have ever seen. Yes. More casual than retail. As a warrior I was able to craft my BiS PvP weapon in the form of stomherlad, not contested until LATE into BC. I was able to buy badge reward fist weapons from a vendor after completing heroic dungeons that provided MORE DPS than the legendary swords off of Illidan. My season 3 gear, was better for PvE until I got into Sunwell. Resilience... Oh resilience... The game tried to build a competitive atmosphere and sacrificed a lot of the MMO vibe. I had friends who would casually log into alts and complete their 10 arenas per week while sporting (arguably) the best gear in the game. It was the equivalent of war tables and took about as much time cumulatively in a week, as managing war tables did or less.

As always, you could nitpick these individual issues with BC and offer a solution to some of the inherent problems of BC, but this will always be a balance. You can not create the perfect game, so you balance attributes of your game to the best of your ability while adhering to your core game philosophies. When you step outside of those philosophies and begin to change major aspects of the game, you sacrifice the integrity of the game and the authenticity of your project.

Hey Redridge, didnt you say you part of development or something for vanilla at one point?

What is the downside of having 2 honor systems? One for World PvP and one for Battlegrounds.

RedridgeGnoll wrote: ↑

5 years ago

What is the downside of having 2 honor systems? One for World PvP and one for Battlegrounds.

Its dumb.

Man, do you post about anything other than changing the Honor system in WoW to reward casuals who can't put up with the grind in this game? Your last 4 threads had nothing but "let's add more incentive for people out in the world" but in reality the recurrent theme of what you're asking is for easier ways to grind R10/R14 gear.

There enough incentives for World-PvP as is, there's no need to pursue any discussion on your proposed Ashran-like changes. I have over 300 people in my guild who are interested in World-PvP and I've never once heard them say they need an incentive to do large scale World-PvP fights. The incentives are already there, especially for P2 of content - the only people crying for changes to the PvP system are the people who want the gear but don't want to/can't work for it.

Nymis wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Man, do you post about anything other than changing the Honor system in WoW to reward casuals who can't put up with the grind in this game? Your last 4 threads had nothing but "let's add more incentive for people out in the world" but in reality the recurrent theme of what you're asking is for easier ways to grind R10/R14 gear.

There enough incentives for World-PvP as is, there's no need to pursue any discussion on your proposed Ashran-like changes. I have over 300 people in my guild who are interested in World-PvP and I've never once heard them say they need an incentive to do large scale World-PvP fights. The incentives are already there, especially for P2 of content - the only people crying for changes to the PvP system are the people who want the gear but don't want to/can't work for it.

It's like trying to explain the concept of fun to an alien without a personality.