I do keep some extra gear pieces with int and +healing on them for BGs, but basically I am a typical prot pally. Anyway, I just won an AB and topped the healing charts for Horde and it was great fun.

I enjoyed laughing at the Alliance as I healed up my teammates (mostly a 69 warrior although a few other hordies got tossed heals once or twice as well) and then realized I could keep laughing when the hunters and rogues eventually came after me. Pushing 9,000 health self buffed with all kinds of armor meant that even after their 69 rogue had me stunlocked for a good 15-20 seconds I was only down to about 5,000.

I have to figure out what to do with this toon when I hit 70. My 4 real life friends need me to tank, but I might respec holy for pvp. Then again if BGs as prot are this entertaining, why switch? I wonder how different things would be as holy (assuming I use the same pvp healing gear). Less health and better heals? No holy shield for rogues and warriors who don’t realize I’m wearing tank googles? Holy shock instead of avenger’s shield? I see where the extra healing would be needed in really competitive arena play, but for BGs?

The new season 4 arean rating requirements have me seriously reconsidering buying a better computer and Age of Conan. I love World of PvP and often enjoy BGs. I want to be part of big epic battles where I kill Alliance (especially gnomes), not a 2 on 2 against other Horde in an arena match that is totally meaningless.

Except arena is the only way to get serious gear for PVP, which sucks for people who don’t have fun in arena. Raiding Stormwind is hard, why doesn’t that make me eligible for gear? Defending Thrall against 200 Alliance would be tough too so why doesn’t that make em eligible for gear? Because when I walk into Stormwind, I want as much resilience as possible. When I’m in AV I want as much resilience as possible.

These are my choices as I see them:

1. Spend many hours not having fun in arenas hoping to get a high enoughr ating to purchase some S4 gear. Then do the stuff I enjoy in awesome gear.

2. Do the stuff I enjoy in pve gear and the limited pvp gear I get from BGs. Basically meaning I have to be a rogue or a paladin. I’d like to play a shadow priest but their survivability in pve gear sucks. Eventually I could do enough BGs to get all S2 or better gear, but I don’t like grinding BGs…

3. Quit “world of arenacraft” and find a game that actually supports world PVP.

3 is lame because I hate starting over. I do have close friends playing AOC and if they say it’s cool I’ll have to consider it.

2 allows me to spend most of my time having fun, but pvp is more fun when I live and it doesn’t give me access to a lot of good pvp gear.

1 means I spend a lot of time playing a game and not having fun doing it. I might as well just work and earn some money while not having fun.

So I’m gonna try choice 2. We’ll see what happens.

Possible objections – I know some people will say that this is good because it rewards the serious pvpers. That is an exaggeration though. This system rewards the serious arena players. I am or would like to be a serious pvper, in battles with hundreds of other players. However for pvpers like me there are no gear rewards.

The rules we’re tlaking about by the way:

When Season 4 begins, Season 3 items will be reduced in personal and team arena rating requirement to:

Shoulders: 1950
Weapon: 1800

The new Season 4 items will have the below personal and team arena rating requirements:

Shoulders: 2200
Weapon: 2050
Head: 1700
Chest: 1600
Legs: 1550
Gloves: none
Off-hand: none

In addition, some of the Season 4 quality items that will be purchasable with honor will also carry a personal and team arena rating requirement:

Boots: 1700
Ring: 1650
Bracers: 1575
Belt: none
Necklace: none
Trinket: none

The Season 2 items, which will move to the honor system when Season 4 begins, will continue to have no rating requirement.

I’ve been doing some more BGs on Gnometosser, and I think maybe I need a new class for pvp. Hunters do great damage – at level 53-54 I was often in the top 10 in damage in AV and the top 3 in AB.

The problem is that I’m also pretty high on the death list too. It seems like once a rogue reaches me I’m stunned then dead. Or if a lock DOTs me up I die (though often I kill the lock before I do).

I think I prefer a toon with more defense in pvp – Goldsong for example is nothing special on the damage charts (though even prot spec I’m alwys in the top 5 on heals except in AV) but he is pretty good at surviving – my hunter feels kind of like a wuss.

I also like healing, Horde often loses battlegrounds I’m in because there are no healers. And while I used to think Alliance were all hunters and rogues they do always seem to have healers, unlike Horde.

I was thinking about a dreamstate druid – Balance for a bit of damage, Boomkin for armor, resto for the heals obviously. This toon should be very useful in BGs and large scale world pvp like city raids (never done one but that is my WOW goal – to get into some city raids). The big drawback would be no real protection from stunlock except that hopefully when the stun wore off I’d still be alive thanks to Boomkin armor (assuming I didn’t get caught in caster form – then I’d die faster than my hunter).

I hate stun and fear more than anything else in WoW. So Orc shammy or Undead priest are other healing possibilities. There’s just something about Boomkin…

And if you’re wondering why I don’t try a rogue since they do ridiculous damage, have crazy control, and have ludicrous defensive skills it’s because I am a keyboard mover so melee pvp = I fail.

There is a serious problem now – BGs are often starting with one side vastly outnumbering the other. When I was around 60 with Goldsong, AV rocked – numbers were even – and we won more than we lost. That was before I transferred Goldsong away from Dethecus so…

Now Gnometosser is entering AV, a bit early at 51, because I want some quest rewards and gear from AV marks. I don’t know if I’ll ever win an AV in this bracket though. I just lost 5 in a row and Horde is outnumberd about 40-20. It just sucks roayally.

With Goldsong, I’ve been doing EOTS for marks for S1 mace and shield. There Horde is often outnumbered as well (different battle group but same problem). 15-10 is a common starting point.

Blizzard, don’t start a BG when one team has twice as many players as the other. WTF?

Gnometoseer is 48 now and pretty soon he can get into AV. At lower levels I may not be able to do much but I will go in there and try to do my part fairly early (level 52 or so).

On Goldsong I waited until level 58 to enter, but with Gnometosser I will be a bit more greedy. I want some stuff from AV before I hit 60:

Bandolier and quiver at 55, plus I want my crossbow as soon as spossible (like level 51 or 52).

I think I also want a Frostwolf mount (not a big kodo fan) and a battle standard (becauses it might be kind of fun / cool). That stuff I can earn later. Maybe get the mount from 58-60 and maybe do the banner then or maybe at 70 or maybe not at all.