Premades Save Our Sanity
What’s the difference between an EOTS premade and an EoTS pug? Our vocal cords not being destroyed as we scream at little characters on our screen being complete goobers and NOT TAKING BLOOD ELF TOWER! TAKE IT YOU B@STARDS!
Um. Being able to effectively coordinate tactics, that’s it, really. Oh, and no AFKers. And no traitors.
We know there are people who log on their alliance toon to honk-up a PvP match for their Hordie buddies. They trade “traitor day” with each other. They must do this. Don’t you?
If Alliance is doing it, we suck at it. Wouldn’t be a big surprise there, would it.
We went 0-2 in our EoTS puggery before we were able to form a guild premade. 6-0 in EoTS after that, and an AB win to top it all off.
But what’s nuts is how close the horde kept it almost every time. We never 4-capped, and we won our last one because we strategically gave up a base so we could capture a base closer to our hidden flag runner. Impossible to do in a pug, really amazing that an opponent pug could keep up. And keep up they did. Is it just inbred? Does someone take charge of every Emberstorm Horde battleground and organize it?
When we pug a battleground, the only place we ever see anybody try to lead is in AV. The other three, it’s just a free-for-all of asshattery and noobosity. Look at our poll results in the sidebar. Almost 40% of us all are getting brutalized by the Horde daily.
Thank Elune our guild has some people who can lead, and a lot who can follow directions. Well done, fellas and ladies. You did great.
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I think you forgot a screenshot. You know, the one where Doomilias came in on top in kills? It’s ok, just send it to me and I’ll edit the entry for you.
As a Horde player, I would say that more yelling at noobs for doing stupid things occurs than actual leadership. The obligatory defend stuff/call out INCs (location+nubmer+BEFORE you engage, because you are useless if you wait until you die to do it).
Something to keep in mind: The Aggressor makes the rules.
If you get outzerged, you lose. If you are forced to defend with all of your resources, you lose. If you lose sight of the BG objectives because red names are close, and you just want to mow them down, you lose.
Play the numbers game.
Is it smart to run into a group of 5 of the opposing faction by your self…usually. The reason being: They see red. If you are able to deal some damage to all of them and maybe kill one or two, you effectively CC them for the amount of time it takes for them to drop combat, eat/drink, figure out where to go, mount, and get there. The opposite is true as well, dont get sucked into a situation where anything you do, will be overkill. (It doesnt take 5 people to kill a paladin that likes to bubble+run, no matter how tasty they will be when the bubble drops) You’re likely better off doing something else.
Use the following to your advantage:
Watch what other players are doing, and take it upon yourself to compliment them, by assisting, or timing your burst damage with theirs. Protect your healers (dont just pewpew whatever’s pwning the heallah, CC them a bit so the healer can heal/run, then heal you more).
As for beating Horde, 99% of the time, they use a random zerg strategy (the 3-5 people that rez together stick together until they die, and ususlly have some succes). All you have to do is know where they are going and stop them before they get to the node (especially in EotS, because if they arent in your node, they arent helping their team win).
Be the MVP of your PUG.
I only PUG BG’s. I play Drenden hordeside on Emberstorm and usually take EOTS as a given.
I have never played alliance but so can’t comment but the BG chat in the PUG’s I play in is confined to useful information. I hardly ever see people slagging of other players maybe that is the difference. Despite being a PUG we play as a team. It’s not a difficult game and and if in AB you read “3 inc LM” people will react.
Probably the thing I have noticed the most, again this is from my point of view, is that the Horde NEVER gives up and fights to the bitter end, even when it looks hopeless.
It has been my belief for some time now that people who enjoy PVP are more likely to roll Horde and PVP on their way up. Whether that is because of the Horde Racials or looks or whatever, I don’t know.
I’m not big into PVP, I rarely would go into battlegrounds leveling up or even at 70. It takes a really good incentive (Season 2 Mace, Battlemaster trinkets) to get me doing much PVP at all. and even when I do PVP, I prefer AV because there are actual threat tables in there, and I know how to pwn a threat table.
The great thing about PVP is you never have to actually win to get your reward. I can go in unskilled, and undergeared and walk away with really good rewards. I do that in PVE (barring joining a “farm” night) and all I walk away is a large repair bill.
Behold the power of Horde.
Seriously outside of AV, where it’s like the Horde have lost their mind, I don’t see much bickering. Sure you’ll get some folks who can’t figure it out, and at times I will bicker with a noob who can’t seem to figure out that we CAN win without stables.
I know of no one who plays both sides to “buy wins” of course i suppose it could happen. There are a few I’ve played with that seem to be so idiotic, trading wins would be the easiest excuse.
I’ve just started (this week) playing BGs. I’m lousy at PvP. (At least now I have a viable build!) Playing mostly on my rogue instead of my hunter, I did okay on day 2; but last night (day 3), I sucked royally. The only reason I didn’t slit my wrists is that people with way more honor points/kills than I, were worse.
Someone did try to do a bit of direction before we started EOTS but it sure seemed like every place I went there 8 Horde. That adds up to at least 24…wtf??
If you’re on a PUG group for a BG the biggest thing is that people maintain being positive. When you have people bickering or complaining about others in the chat you’ve lost. If people are sending out strats and calling inc then you’ll have decent chances. If you face a premade well hopefully you’re also in mostly a premade because they will have much better coordination and no bickering.
Horde or Alliance has nothing to do with it as I’ve played it from both sides. Its just the matter of whether you have a pug full of whiners or those who will listen/read and contribute.
I’ve never heard of people rolling on alliance alts to deliberately lose. People “afk” (they walk in circles, stand by flags, move slightly, just enough to pretend) on horde side all the time. You don’t know until the node is falling and they are standing there not helping. So it’s not one side only getting sabotaged.
While leveling up horde tends to win, but at 70 not as much. Not on Rampage at least. I don’t see much organization on horde side either. I think 1-2 years ago before cross-realm bgs you could say that, but not now. Enter a horde match and try to lead, or try to get people to do anything. I don’t know where these people come from.
And after playing LOTRO for about 10 months and coming back to WoW, I guess I forgot how much swearing and whining and idiocy infects WoW battlegrounds. But Sonvar has it right: if you stay positive and do your job, calling INCs, etc, you can help contribute to a win.
What is with all the SS of you top with killing blows? You’re a Hunter, firing at Range, whilst not taking any flags at all.
I do love the site, but if you really want to show how ‘leet’ your PVP skills are, break 2k in Arena.
People BG for welfare Epics, that is all.
Fish
In the early Days of PVP trading wins were the standard.
Then some folks (Randoms in first place) telling this to the Gamemasters and every single account of the PVP Junkies (Betrayers) get banned for 2 weeks.
I’ve never seen trading wins again.
Sorry for my bad English.
Greetings from Bavaria!
Ahh something I want to say for Months now:
THIS IS THE BEST WOW BLOG EVER!!!!!!!
First of all, to fish:
I would like to politely remind you that some people enjoy battlegrounds, where there are objectives, terrain and a lot more variables to consider, more than Arena. Arena is more about gear and pure skill. I haven’t made up my mind yet as I’m just starting into Arena.
And to the topic:
When Horde BGs in my battlegroup, we tend to win AV usually, EotS is about 50/50, and the noobs tend to stay in AB and WSG. Pugs tend to go one of two ways: chaos and asshattery, or people communicate and get it done. I have found that simply asking “Who’s on D?” at the start of AV gets people to volunteer to play D… especially if you call you’re on D when noone responds. Simple stuff like calling who’s flag running and where so nearby folks can support or letting people know before you ninja a tower lets them take advantage of the situation.
I think overall, horde does PvP more than alliance. That or we take it more seriously. Everyone I know that PvPs more than PvE is horde… all my alliance friends are raiders or balanced. And yes, horde fights to the bitter end. I was in an EotS the other day I thought was hopeless, but noone gave up, we three capped, and turned it around. Sometimes its a matter of who wants it more.
For the Horde!
Ralowae and BlackTooth
I’ve pvp’d both sides and what i’ve noticed on the Horde side is that someone always takes charge. Grp1 LM, grp2 FM, grp3 GM or what ever. That’s really all it takes communication. Also when I was a noob and horde in BG you learn a lot faster if your getting called out for your mistakes (usually not in a nice way). The key is don’t be a pansy and take it personal and give up. This week I have played the alliance side and I must say dont call out “premade group” and give up make the other side earn it.
Don’t know what it is about Emberstorm. Maybe the feed the little Horde babies steroids as they grow up?
Heya BRK,
I used to read your blog on a daily basis but due to a lot of real life things I haven’t really read much on it in the past 8-9 due to baseball and trying to keep up with things in WoW. I read this post and noticed you’re in Emberstorm which came to me as a big surprise. I tend to spend whatever free time I have in WoW in bg’s or arenas and I’ve never seen you. I would really like to see you in action as I’ve used a lot of your hunter tips for guildies and they’ve really proven to work.
Anyways,
I’d hope to see you around in a few bg’s. The name is Zabrz (70 Night Elf Rogue) or Zabrtue (70 Human Rogue).
I play in the Stormstrike battlegroup, horde side and they seem to be the biggest group of whiners out there. Especially since they cant just pop into AV on a 5min queue and /dance for 1-2k honor per hour anymore. BG chat is so full of flaming and insulting that I usually have to spam INCs for people to pay attention.
I play on Shadowburn and at the moment its hard for the horde to win any of the bg due to the fact of premades. And yes AV premades also it appears you Alliance scum (:P) have figured out how the Horde has been group queing for AV for over a year now.
That said in the other three BG’s its not unusual for a horde pug to cause a premade to have to work for the win. But most of the time a premade will roll the other team. There is nothing worse than getting the new BG daily quest and getting into it and seeing a premade on the other side for 10 matches. Whats even worse is Ihave three toons that I do the bg daily on and that is a lot of loses when its nothing but premades.
I do remember when the only premades you saw was doing the bg honor weekend. That always meant you could hop in que for another bg and not constantly face a premade but not anymore.
I play in Cyclone. Boy that sounds wierd…Nobody ever says they play on Cyclone.
Anyway, if you’re Horde, throw a party. Alliance in AB very rarely (you can say never) get their heads out of their asses. They always go for a 3 spot and hold. That leaves the Horde with 2 guys guarding each of their flags and an 11 man zerg to take the Alliance spots one at a time while the Alliance wonders why they’re losing with 5 men at each flag.
In EOTS my wonderful Alliance alliance try to grab the flag when they have only 1 or no towers. When it’s two towers, they think it’s AB and hold when 90% of the Horde rolls over them.
Don’t talk about WSG..that’s like Aliens 4.
And don’t forget, in addition to the 38% who get stomped by the Horde, there’s the 24% that are the Horde that do the stomping, and the 18% who have left themselves unknown by picking the “Premades FTW” option, which could go either way.
And the Horde have the gall to bitch about the new AV changes?
On Sentinels, which is in the Nightfall battlegroup, Horde generally wins EotS because we understand that 3 bases=win, and usually ignore the flag. Then the games were 10 of our team decide to camp in the middle and try to win with 1 tower or something stupid like that. But we lose AV (half bots and all retards), AB is about 50/50 depending on time of day, and WSG…I’ve seen one win in the last 2 months, no lies. Usually is 0-3 alli wins.
@ Dougie 2K The only issue I have with the new AV is the fact that the horde queue times are 1.5-2.5 hours in my battlegroup. This means that you have to have the ability to play for 3 hours consecutively to even get a shot at finishing AV. I’m usually limited to 2 hours playtime per day, so this has absolutely killed AV for me.
On Whirlwind battlegroup:
It feels like all the things you’re saying are the same for me but from my Horde perspective.
We have whiners, and afk’ers, and honor bots. We face some horribly wicked premades from Cenarius.
Concerning Cenarius pre-mades, we’ve been driven to refusing the rez at GY because they camp the game. It can be faster honor/hour to give up a quick loss and get on with the next BG. This usually is only possible with a premade in AB or EotS.
What I’d really love to see are Blizzards statistics on win/loss and honor for the different battlegroups to really see what is happening. Wouldn’t that be interesting data?
With March Madness not far away, I wish Blizzard had single elimination BG tournaments between guilds on each server. The winners advancing to a national tourney.
Baetylus,
I understand those Cenarius premades you are talking about… I always PUG BGs and I think we have beaten them in AB once, the rest of thime is pure epic failure with them camping the graveyards. I still rez up and run into the fight, stinging everything in sight, silencing who i can, and grabbing a few kills anyway.
On a side note, i am very happy to hear diminishing returns will be going away because I always choose to defend a node and it seems the same 2-3 ally attack the whole game, so while I may rack up 30 kills, it is 3 players, and I get very little honor for it. The current system doesn’t make people want to play defense in AB and EoTS, so I am happy to see it ending, even if i am a PVE-content based player, PVP for me is a nice way to fill nights when not enough people show up to raid…
-Hoder & Yogin/Ripper Bladefist US
I’d say the BRK poll is a very very small sample size. Considering I haven’t even voted on it yet, there is a possibility that many of BRK’s loyal and rabid readership hasn’t voted either.
My question to you and the other folks who say QQ less Horde you start closer to the objectives etc., you can stop ally by defense at IB, blah blah…is this:
Once the changes in 2.4 occur, meaning the horde start further back, mini-bosses get some buffs etc. Will the ability to wall jump the horde base and get in be an advantage over the base setup the ally have?
My major complaint in AV is the archers have way too long of range. You can be hit by archers from the other tower, standing in the doorway of one of the towers. That goes both ways.
SPGY is more of a straight shot into the base, than FWGY is to the Horde. I don’t think the RH and AS are any harder or further away from the entrance to the keep respecitively.
I’ve played on premades where the ally team has received 0 bonus honor. Let me say that again. For an entire day we, horde from QD on Emberstorm were keeping the Ally teams we were playing from getting very much IF any bonus honor.
We had time to summon Lok, complete each of the commander’s quests and release the units and I think upgraded the units as high as we could go. It took tons of people to accomplish this. I think we have 30 in the premade group and had the strat developed before we queued.
I said that last part to let you know I know the correct strats to use to get the wins, even overcoming any advantages the ally may or may not have.
I got so sick of dealing with 14 year alliance turds that my friends and I re rolled horde on a pvp server. I’ve only just dinged 28, but hopefully I find out that the grass really is greener.
Emberstorm Horde always roll the PUGs I’ve been in, though my Shaman friend has had nothing but luck with his AVs. Now that I have all 20 of my WSG marks (GODS that was torture, getting them one. by. one.), I’ll be heading into AV as well. Hopefully I’ll get a few decent games to learn what, exactly, it is I need to be doing.
When I want to really PVP, I’ll probably roll a Horde Druid. Maybe in the Emberstorm group. It’d be good fun to squash a few of the idiots from my server once in a while.
While on my battlegroup (Cyclone EU) Hordes does tend to dominate WSG, AB and EOTS, we have absolutely no chance in AV. It makes no sense at all, but that is how it is. I stopped long ago doing the daily PvP if it was AV as once three days in a row it was AV and I never completed it once in those days.
What I have noticed is that the Horde team is generally afflicted heavily by AFKers in AV. Alliance is also, but not upwards of 15 players. Once I could count the players that left the tunnel on two hands… No amount of communication or leet skills can make up for that. And the more Horde lose, the more people will AFK for their marks and the more Horde will lose again.
However we win the others 60-75% of the time. If it is EOTS day, I smile as I know it is done in one go.
How come that is? I’m not sure. But some time ago there was a test of the subscribers’ age, and Alliance was in general much younger than Horde as well as most often outnumbering Horde about 2:1 (on Cyclone BG it is more like 3:1). That means that Allaince teams change all the time and have much longer qeues. People will be much more impatient, while the Horde players hardly wait and often get into raids with people they have just fought with. It doesn’t take more than a few victories to make a Horde pug act and play like a premade with lots of valid communication and high spirits.
It is like AV reversed. Horde players will have confidence and a will to fight, and coupled with less pecentage of kiddos chances are they will have less tards messing it up. And since they win fast most often, they will be willing to give a few more go’s.
That is why Horde wins more often than not on Cyclone. And why they lose AV almost every time. The changes will utterly destroy any remaining hope of actually getting three marks in one battle for me.
[...] I’m noticing an interesting trend in our WoW blogging community, that where a lot of the raiders are starting to try our their hand at PvP to fill in the gaps or because of a slowdown of raiding. [...]
Pure and simple fact of the matter – Horde has a higher percentage of older players, players who are willing to lead or have the ability to do so even if they don’t want to. Therefore they are more organized, more focused, and we naturally win more BG’s consistently (in pugs). In premades, we don’t lose. We just don’t. I’ve been in hundreds of premades and can only remember losing one or two of them to alliance guild premades, one even from the same server (a PVP guild). Even then, we made it close and made them fight to the bitter end to win it.
I play Horde Whirlwind and agree totally with Baetylus.
I am new to BG’s and I am just trying to find my groove.
The most successful strategy I have seen in AV for Horde is 10 defending IB and Galv, this slows down the preliminary attack and stuns them because they never defend Balinda and they expect us to not defend Galv. Another 10 take Balinda and the remaining 20 zerg SP GY. By the time they get it secured the 10 that fought Balinda have got to SP GY. Leaving 30 to storm Avandar. The 10 that have fallen in defending Galv would need to fall back and protect Frostwolf Village. When all this happens we usually win. We rarely get a leader that organizes our attack so sometimes we fall short in D. But sometimes when somone organizes D it dosn’t work out. (i.e. the following story.)
Understand I am a noob in BG’s. So forgive any noobishness in the following story. The other day I was having success in BG’s my second day EVER doing it. This was my 3rd time EVER to do AV. The 1st AV I was in, I just wandered around trying to see what to do. We won but I had nothing to do with it. Then I researched and got back on knowing a bit more of the basics of AV objectives. 2nd run we had an extremely organized team with the previous tactics I described. We won a resounding victory. I mistakingly thought this was how it always was.
The 3rd attmpt at AV was horrible. A Troll says he wants D to meet at IB. I think we are imitating the previous tactic, great. I get there and there are 3 other people waiting, I say to myself hope others are on the way, this is the first time I have attempted D so I familiarize myself with the surroundings. I check on Galv (he is very unarmored for a captain, but hey what are you gonna do?) He’s cozy and half naked so I head out to entrance and I see the 3 other guys in the distance riding off as fast as they could, and lo and behold 20 allies are riding up to IB doorstep. @$&* So I run in and stand behind Galv. but only after laying a snake trap at the door and really that only pissed them off. I was able to kill a clothie unfortunate enough to run in first (I love snake traps) with Cinnamon and Galvs help. They proceeded to lay waste to me and eventually Galv. I proceeded to attempt to D at FV for the remainder. It was really close but we lost.
Anyway I like BGs and AV particulary its alot different in pace and it requires alot of “stategery” as Bush put it once. I have played several more since and the key seems to be communication before the battle. If everyone zergs Van without securing SP GY (nothing worse than dying attempting to kill Van and have to run from Stonehearth) it is almost always a loss. Most times its a win based on who Zergs faster. But when an experienced player jumps in and gives orders and others follow them we can totally dominate. I guess the same goes for Alliance but they tend to achieve more objectives to get honor. Anyway pardon my noobish ramblings, but BG make me as giddy as a school girl.
Can’t wait to get my welfare epics. Next is EOTS. Ought to be fun.
Much love to my Hordey Peeps,
Stroglin & Cinnamon
I guess it depends on what server you’re on; the concentration of player types and faction choices. In my memory of time on Silver Hand (long long ago), it was Horde getting pwned by Alliance all the time, pug or no pug. Results could be fairly even in WSG in small groups, but the bigger BGs were pretty much a case of Zerg For Honor.
We all run to the middle of the map and/or objectives and fight like crazed ants. Meanwhile, a small team or pairs of Super Epixed Alliance goes in and kills our bosses or wipes our defenders and the game is over; we sigh, collect our meager honor, and leave. At some points, with the 2 or 3-to-1 population of Alliance, we were often told to “Show up, shut up, and let them win so we can collect and get done faster.” Some fighting spirit all right!
But the occasional opportunity to play with a group of gritty, determined Horde was a real pleasure; pug or not, those were the rare chances to dig in, stand up, draw blood, and make the lazy, zerging Alliance work for every inch they took. Sometimes we’d even win. Especially if they came from a server where they were used to winning easily. The Horde on my old server were a tough bunch, and we had to be, often outnumbered from the first days of WoW in world-PvP. Those who took the battles seriously could make mincemeat out of individual Alliance who just there for a lark, even if we lost out to the Epix Elites who ran the show in small cliques.
I never had the chance to play in Arenas, so I can’t really say anything to that process. Pwnzing someone in a couple of hits is worth a chuckle, but a fight with someone who challenges you, looking you dead in the eye and pushing you to your limits, is really worthy of bragging rights. Regardless of group composition, any battle that you can really feel, from the moment it begins ’til the moment you realize it’s over and you’re still standing with your brief comrades, bloody and barely alive but victorious – those are the kinds of fights that are worth it.
^^ So even if you lose, if you lost to someone who was really worthy of your time and effort, who was worthy of killing you and worked for it as hard as you did, there’s no shame in it. Was it an enjoyable fight? is what I’d ask. Was it fun, or did it challenge me, or did I laugh at something that happened (like shooting myself off a cliff and landing at the feet of a troop of Alliance!). As long as we’re all having fun, a little aft-kicking either way is all good. But it’s true, it’s NOT fun if you’re stuck in the midst of general stoopidness.
Alliance Drenden Premades are not nice. It’s ugly. Vera vera ugly. I count it a victory if we can make them work for their win.
We’ve done premade QD horde vs Premade Drenden Ally and they won, once in AB, once in EOTS, both were hard fought. We had no clue in EOTS until they stormed us and tried to play catch up all game. Ooops, not looking at the scoreboard for the loss. In AB, the leader queued us before setting up groups right and giving us assignments and again we got hammered. We fought them for it, but dang harsh.
PUG vs Drenden premade…nope.
Playing mostly horde and playing mainly on hellscream, I can promise you that (in that battlegroup..whatever it is…) that 90% of the time, noone takes charge. We just kind of know where we want to go and go there. It seems that those that play horde have a slightly better grasp of being able to see where everyone else is going and either go with them or join a slightly smaller group going elsewhere.
Now, once my rogue (happily undead..i love eating gnomes ;-D) hit level 70, it seemed like horde cohesion in BGs slumped quite a bit. whether that was because of better powers and better raiders on alliance, i’m not sure, but it seems to go 50/50. sometimes horde is great, other times we suck completely.
But yeah, any attempt to take charge on horde is met with fierce adversity and insinuations of noobishness.
Great wee article BRK – but then everything you write is enjoyable, and usuall very informative. Go BRK!
Anyway, a couple of poits on what has already been spoken about.
1 Other than AV, Horde BG groups seem to be willing to be co-ordianted by other players. In EOTS for example, I always start by asking if there are 3 others who will join me to take either Mage or Dranei. People usually respond., If they don’t I ask if the group is going to flag farm. If they are I know I have to find and defend a node (or that it’s going to be a looong night and we are going to get spanked). But that is very rare.
2 The Horde teams I join consistently have a “It’s not over til the Fat Dwarf Lady Sings” attitude. I was in a WSG last weekend, and it began at Horde 4 to Alliance 10. We defended and defended, no-one just AFK quit. We moaned about the numbers, but kept going. Lost the first flag (of course), but kept going. Then more players bgan to turn up, and hey presto! by the end it was Horde 3 flags, to Alliance 2. I know this NSD attitude is part of your personal character, but honestly it seems in short supply among the Aliance teams I have played in and against. Perhaps you should roll a Horde…
Most of the time, taking the lead in alliance doesn’t work. Some people /ignore me, other people say in chat “Oh, lets go to mid just to piss him off!”, and the other half has the combat log on. Usually, there are about 2-3 calling incs and the rest are just shooting whatever they see in red letters and staring at their dps meters. By the way, my battlegroup is Rampage.
Thank you, it is very good! I like it very much