You know you have ...

... been playing too much WoW when you briefly glance at someone in the real world and distinctly saw a red circle around their feet.

Battle

It's AV weekend and for the first time in a long time I have been involved in a couple of games that have turned into epic battles. Just fantastic!! So enjoyable just to battle it out; honing your class skills against the horde. Hahahahaha. We won the first one and lost the second. Neither boss was killed, it was just a battle of attrition. You cannot value highly enough having a good healer in those battles, so many times I was pulled from the brink of death by timely and generous heals.

It was so nice not having to worry about game strategy; it had all gone to pack when a large part of the team decided to take out Galv first. Groan. It's ok to take out Galv but it has to be timed right. The best timing is after IBT and/or TP have gone down. The Towers are the most important things to take out. It only takes 10 people to take down Galv, sooo ... theoretically ... following the plan .... IBT should have been taken by 10 people, and when it goes down ... work it out.

Anyway I digress into strategy. Any game is a lot of ifs and buts, all you have to do is have sufficient numbers following the plan for it to work. It also requires the Horde to NOT defend, or be slower in the attack. So with the first wonderful epic battle, guess what, the Horde defended. Totally, no attack. Woot. It was just fantastic seeing those snowy fields with close to 80 combatants all in one place. Nothing to worry about but killing and not being killed. This sort of thing certainly stretches the internet connection. In particular a Hunter with Track Humanoids on. I use Mobile broadband and the connection can fluctuate so I was disconnected twice. Oh man, I so did not want to lose those Honour points. Anyway what am I doing here talking to you dear Reader? Cya, off to some snowy fields :)

Relief Hut

As an update to a previous post on Alterac Valley I have come across a finesse for the strategy that seems quite sensible. Take Relief Hut before you take Frostwolf Graveyard if you can. Doing so stops the Horde from resurrecting at the Alliance end game. You don't want them there, they just get in the way of taking down Drek. Ideally they should be resurrecting at Iceblood Graveyard (IBGY). They then have to choose between two long runs, back to the defence or off to the attack. Only true believers will head back to the defence and leave the cowboys to the attack. If they do make the long run back then it will take them a while and we have time to consolidate the defence.

Eye of the Storm Reprise

I have been doing a few of these lately, mainly because the daily PvP has sent me there. It is an interesting place, to say the least. Most people don't get it. They have a pre-occupation with running the flag and fighting in the middle. Forget the flag, it's a distraction, just a piece of fun. Towers are the thing. Towers, and how many your team holds determines the rate at which points are accumulated. The more towers you hold the faster the points are awarded to the team. If you want to run the flag then make sure you have at least three (3) towers before doing so otherwise you are losing players to the defence of, or offense against, the towers.

Sweetest Thing Happened in ...

... Arathi Basin a couple of days ago. I was part of a small group attacking the Lumber Mill. We had come up from the Stables and I did my usual thing. I dismounted just near the top of the hill and ran to just behind the bushes between me and the flag. I started attacking randomly but attracted the attention of an undead rogue. !@!%^$#. As he ran at me I started backing away and firing at him. When I was clear of the bushes and he was close enough I hit him with Concussive Shot. I backed away further and laid down Freezing Trap. I suspected and hoped that once the Rogue has you in his sights he will not let go. On queue he blundered straight into the trap. Woot!! So I ran off and kept attacking the flag defenders. On queue he attacked again 20 seconds later, so I repeated the procedure. Woot!!

During the next 20 seconds I moved closer to the flag and quite randomly put my back to the cliff as I pelted a resto druid. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the rogue come shambling towards me. I thought, this is it, and kept firing at the druid. The rogue came at me and went behind. Hahahahahahahaha. ROFLMAO. He fell off the cliff. I couldn't believe it. I am still giggling about it days later. All those times I have been murdered by rogues are now forgiven.

Gotta Dash ... things happening

"... Well... four things. Well... four things and a lizard." This memorable quote from the Doctor in the Blink episode sums up pretty well my feelings about Alterac Valley. The strategy for taking Alterac keeps time warping, seemingly depending on which shift is on and what day of the week it is. I have seen just about everything lately. I have seen the now obsolete strategy of holding SHGY, yes I know I made a big thing about it but with 2.4 patch it is obsolete. I keep seeing people take IBGY, and man that makes it hard to win. Taking down Galv is a good thing but it has to be timed right. Doing him first when everyone is riding past seems simple enough to do but no. No people. No. Take him out by all means but let the groups who defend Iceblood Tower and Tower Point do it once the towers are gone. Let the Horde have IBGY otherwise they get in the way of taking FWGY and Relief Hut. The latest strategy is about speed. Strategic points must be taken and taken quickly. See previous posting about the details.

Winning Strategy

Over the weekend I finally came across a strategy for Alterac Valley that was a consistent winner. In the chat bar the guy reckoned that he had won the previous 12 battlegrounds using this strategy so I thought there was nothing to lose by trying. It flew in the face of what I thought was a basic requirement but it worked a treat. So here it is:

Group 1, 2: Iceblood Tower
Group 3, 4: Tower Point
Group 5, 6: Frostwolf Graveyard (FWGY)
Group 7, 8: Frostwolf Relief Hut (RH)

That allows 10 players to take and hold each target. In reality you won't get 10 players at each target but you will get enough. For groups 3 - 6 as the target is taken you move forward and start on the East and West Frostwolf Towers, once they fall you take out Drek. When the Iceblood Tower falls groups 1 and 2 take out Galv.

Do not put any energy into Iceblood Graveyard, leave it for the Horde. However FWGY and RH are very important and must be taken. Perhaps we got lucky because there wasn't much resistance from the Horde and whatever there was we overcame it. I think the important things were that a clear strategy was applied and we had no dissenters in the chat bar.

After those two battlegrounds we had a different option put forward, an older classic strategy that included taking IBGY. We went close and neither we nor the Horde got at Drek or Stormpike, however we lost it through attrition by about 80 points.

With this new strategy I came out with zero killing blows and zero deaths but many hundred honour points. In fact I didn't see a lot of action. I was part of a team that had jobs to do, we focussed and we did them.

My advice is put the strategy into a macro and pop it into BG chat before the gates open. Once, maybe twice, then followed up with gentle chat to maintain peoples focus. Best of luck.

Communication

The number of times a battleground has been won because each individual is providing meaningful and timely feedback to rest of the team is without number. The number of times a battleground has been won where the team argues about tactics, the skill of other players or there is just plain abuse and YELLING, can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

I remember being in Warsong Gulch an age ago when my character was not x9 (substitute a number, 1 - 4, for x). I can't remember what exact level it was but I was x3, way down the food chain. This player who was x9 began harassing me from before the gates opened. What was I doing there? Get out!! You are crap noob. The torrent of abuse was substantial. I must also admit that his abuse of my character and through it me, raised my hackles and I began to bite back. I don't recommend it and now-a-days I just ignore abusers. They can't physically do anything to you so there is no need to fear pain. This particular player decided to report my character, which I suspect was after my son told him to go "piss up a flag pole", so I reported him too (the player, not my son). I actually got to chat to a Blizzard employee who assured me that "level intolerance" in a battleground was unacceptable.

Funnily enough we didn't win that BG; with two players fighting each other they are not fighting the farm animals and "scarey" creatures that make up the Horde and so reduce the effectiveness of the team.

If someone is spending most of their time yelling and abusing they are not attending to the game as well as they should. Some of the quickest and best wins were either virtually silent or filled only with status reports, requests for assistance, and praise for jobs well done.

Eye of the Storm

I know this battleground is not helping me become a Conqueror but the tokens are helping me get epic kit from the Champion's Hall. However that is not what I am hear to write about. Initially when I tried this BG out I didn't like it, I felt like a fish out of water and I didn't understand it. I left it alone for a very long time. Well, stupid me is all I can say now. Not really, I didn't waste my time by not being there. There is no reputation to be had but there is Honour, and tokens, and now there is a daily quest called Concerted Efforts which will give you Honour in return for a token from each of the BGs. Handy I can tell you, especially when you are max'ed out on tokens and need Honour pts.

Anyway, back to it. Eye of the Storm. It's a mix of Arathi Basin (AB) and Warsong Gulch (WSG). There are four bases. Mage Tower (MT), Drenai Ruins (DR), Blood Elf Tower (BET) and Fel Reaver Ruins (FRR). These are basically the corners of an imaginary square. The Alliance enter on one side of the field of battle and are able to take MT and DR straight off. To take a Tower all you need to do is occupy it for a few seconds; not sure how many but not that many. If the Horde come to take it from you they need to completely evict Alliance forces from the Tower before it is theirs. The General chat log will tell you what's happening. Occupying Towers will generate points for your side. Generating 2000 points first wins your side the game. I have been in a game that the Alliance won 2000 - 1998. That was as close as I have ever seen it.

In the centre of the battlefield is a Flag plinth. Click on the flag and carry it to an identical plinth at a Tower belonging to the Alliance and you will get points. I believe it to be 100 points. This is handy but the real points lay in ownership of Towers. I should say that the rate of generating points is higher the more Towers you occupy. Like AB the more bases you occupy the faster you get points, so if you cap (occupy all available bases) then you win quick as.

So what is the strategy here? Keep the Horde busy defending their bases, take them off them is the goal, own as many bases as you can - preferably four. Keep running the flag, it keeps a hundred points away from Horde. You don't have to plant it, just own it. Bases are the thing. If you do plant it, then it's nice to have Alliance at the flag plinth in the centre to pick it up again when it respawns there. The battle for the centre can get pretty hectic at times; a study in fire works.

Once last tip. Try and get the flag in the last quarter of the game and hold it till the points hit 1900, then plant it. Win. All over red rover.

The New Alterac

With Patch 2.4 and moving the Horde entry point further to the rear, basically bringing the travel distances for both teams into line appears to have made a big difference to the outcomes for the Alliance. It seems that now the Horde are more actively defending Ice Blood Graveyard. It is the point which if well defended creates a geographic bottleneck and is difficult to get past. It hasn't meant that the Alliance will defend Stonehearth Graveyard any better but has made it's defence a little less necessary. The team still rides off in bulk and runs straight past SHGY. Ho hum. I am much less concerned about it now with the changes.

The latest strategies seem to revolve around either going straight for the Relief Hut (RH) then taking out Drek or going straight for Frostwolf Graveyard (FWGY), then the Towers (East and West) then Drek. Either way it pains me to see so many people going straight past Galv when so many would take him down in seconds. The body of opinion, if you can suspend credulity and call battleground chat opinion, is that it takes too long and we don't have time to waste. I just weep at so much honour being left behind. There is bonus honour for "map completion", which I understand to mean that all the Towers, Graveyards and Bosses are destroyed or controlled. Drek, of course, must be the last because his death will end the game and win for the Alliance.

I believe there must be a better balance between speed and map completion. Further observations will come.

Outstanding

I thought this worthy of a report. We won Arathi Basin 2000 - 0. The horde never stood a chance, perhaps there weren't enough of them to play the game initially and that helped us do it. Whatever. One person took the Stables and the remaining three groups went GM, BS, and LM. Each one claimed. From each claiming team a few then converged on the Farm. A couple of defenders were overwhelmed and we 5 capped in the first 60 seconds. Game over not long after. Outstanding humiliation for the Horde team and nice to be doing it to them for once.

Although. Out the last ten ABs I have been on 8 winning teams. Each and every one we controlled the Blacksmith. The two losses - no Blacksmith; in fact we followed the strategy of hold 3 and win. Apologies to the Battleground Leader who wanted us to do that but we lost, it's in your record. Never be satisfied with holding 3 and winning, it rarely works.

By the way. Also won an Eye of the Storm 2000 - 1. Almost as good and we capped all towers soon as.

The Blacksmith

Sometimes you just need a defining moment, or just doing something for long enough that you get bored and your mind actually bubbles things over in the background. Well about 5 or 6 weeks ago I finally worked out the thing that has been staring me in the face for so long. In Arathi Basin the Blacksmith (BS) is in the centre of the map!!!! Well, der!

Just like in chess if you control the centre then you can control the game. So, what have the Horde been doing for so long? Winning more ABs than Alliance. What else have you noticed? More often than not BS is taken by the Horde first, and more often than not they hold it for most of a game. It's the shortest point to any other flag in the game.

Not long after realising this I flukily ended up as battleground leader. So i thought "what order do i give an anarchic, chaotic, narcissistic bunch of self serving toons?" Hmm perhaps I didn't really say that to myself but I should have. I asked the people to do something they weren't used to - take BS first. Quite a number did try and help take BS first however because the Alliance do not have a direct route to the flag (and I am sorry but the Horde do) we reached it a little after they did and found it difficult to take. I kept asking people to try (I do not insist, I just ask and advise) but we were losing the other flags and people's attention was beginning to wander.

Then up jumped a voluble turkey who kept insisting that it was a crap strategy. "The only strategy is to take Stables, Gold Mine and Lumber Mill. Hold them and you win. If we don't win then it's because you are all crap noobs who can't hold a flag." Hmmm, I think I might have my hands full with this one. The game is too short to change minds and evangelise. So I pretty much left it alone, firing off the odd verbal shot when the turkey started using CAPS and telling us we were all crap noobs, we should leave the field and not do AB again. Striking exercise in leadership I thought.

Anyhoo. The BS is the centre of the board. It is the shortest distance to any other flag in the game - for either attack or defence. The premades know this and so do the Horde. Now you do too. Good luck :)

Old Dog New Tricks

Learnt a few things over this last weekend in Alterac Valley. It was character building being in so many battlegrounds where it ended with the Horde still on 400+, and sometimes 500+, reinforcements.

The first thing I realised was that the Horde have a shorter run from their start point to SHGY than the Alliance has from their start point to IBGY. It has been so obvious when you look at the map and yet I never saw it before. Apparently the new release of 2.4 is going to fix that. Will this change the game? Possibly. The current tactic for the Alliance is to go first to IBGY, take and hold it, then the two towers (Iceblood Tower and Tower Point). From there it is either Galv or the Frostwolf GY. Rarely do the Horde have an issue with taking Stonehearth Graveyard (SHGY). Alliance forces will generally run straight past it heading for Iceblood Graveyard (IBGY). What happens next most people will be familiar with. Alliance fails to hold IBGY or take either of the towers. Horde take both SHGY and Stonehearth Bunker, then Stonehearth Outpost and Icewing Bunker. From this point it is virtually game over as the Alliance reinforcements are in disarray with the loss of these imortant places. Read the Frostwolf Artichoke and work out why. So, will the change make a difference? None at all if the Alliance doesn't learn to keep SHGY for as long as possible; at least until IBGY is in our hands.

The second thing I learnt was how powerful 3 rogues and 2 druids working together can be. Sadly it was not an Alliance group but a Horde group. They took and held Dun Baldar North Bunker then moved on to take and destroy Dun Baldar South Bunker. Combined with their destruction of the Stonehearth area this was the final straw for the Alliance - game over.

The third was confirmation of something I suspected anyway. The Horde have a small team in the rear whose job it is to reclaim towers and graveyards. I was able to run the gauntlet at Stonehearth and break through. I was chased but eventually they gave up. I ran to the Coldtooth Mine and then back tracked to near Tower Point where I went stealth and watched. It was so empty and vacant up there. I saw 3 separate horde patrolling. When all was clear I went through and claimed Tower Point. I knew I couldn't hold it so I trapped the flag and then bolted over the side to find a safe place to watch what would happen next. Stupidly I landed on top of an NPC patrol - an orc and two dogs. My pet took on the two dogs and I lead the orc away and trapped him in an ice block. My health was low when I saw the expected Horde patrol come along. I feigned death however it did not fool the patrol and they killed me before reclaiming the tower. I did not immediately accept return to the graveyard as I wanted to see what was happening. It was just the one in the patrol and after they reclaimed Tower Point they ran back out and took my insignia, thereby sending me straight off to the First Aid station at Dun Baldar. If I had a second elf with me, someone who could stealth it would have been possible to reek havoc behind their lines. I hope to try this next time.

The Drek Rush

The Alterac Valley weekend just passed was very interesting. I usually run them numerous times to get as much Honour as possible. Win or lose doesn't really matter to me just so long as it's interesting. And, this was interesting.

There was a move afoot to try something that I haven't seen so publicly discussed before. I shall call it the "Drek Rush". The chat was filled with cries to rush Drek, everyone rush Drek and kill him, quick as possible. Kill Drek and the game is over and won. Anyway, "interesting notion" I reflected to myself. I put in a comment encouraging the idea and maybe a warning that leaving everything undefended would give the Horde an equal chance to do the same thing to us. Prophetic as it turned out, several times over.

The first time, I died at Tower Point and ended up "rezzing" at Dun Baldar First Aid Station. Thats how far the Horde had advanced while we were still only at Tower Point. They had already taken Stonehearth GY and Stormpike GY. We had taken Iceblood GY but it wasn't ours yet, perhaps they were in a similar situation. Through attrition at the frontline our numbers increased in defending Dun Baldar. We were able to push the Horde back and eventually retake Stormpike GY however it was far too late. Our reinforcements were depleted to the point where it was only time before we ran out.

The second and third times our people actually got as far as Drek and the two Frostwolf Towers, and there it seemed to stall. Once again I ended up in the defence however this time we were outgunned and outclassed. The forward elements seemed to have the numbers and the time but kept arguing about what to actually do. Both times they just ran out of time. The Horde, far more together and co-ordinated, and no appearance at all of hesitation over what they needed to do, just pushed through against all opposition and killed Stormpike himself.

So why didn't it work. The Drek Rush. Well I figure for several reasons. One, it was AV weekend. All the best Horde are going to be there when there is bonus honour to be made. Two, it was evening. The Horde are at their worst early in the morning; as they start waking up late morning they get on and go for it. Three, there must be no hesitation about a Drek Rush. All your own resources are abandoned in the hope of taking theirs quicker than they take yours. Four, everyone thought it was a good idea but there was no precise plan of action, and no clear idea of what actually works.

So. What actually works? Phase One. Take Iceblood Graveyard. Leave a small group to defend it and move up to Tower Point. Wait for Tower Point to fall to you, burst into flames, before moving forward. While waiting send a group to take out Iceblood Tower. This is a short period of defence. The team must hold Tower Point, Iceblood Graveyard and Iceblood Tower. These three make an immensely strong triangle in the middle of their territory. When all three are definitely yours then move on the Frostwolf Graveyard in bulk. This begins Phase Two and roughly 10 minutes have elapsed.

Frostwolf Graveyard must be overwhelmed and a small force must defend it to ensure that it comes to the Alliance. FWGY is the resurection point for troops who die when taking out Drek, the run from IBGY is too long. The bulk of the forward elements must then take both East and West Frostwolf Towers, and they must burst into flames before taking out Drek.

Phase Three. Final Phase. Take out Drek. Everyone goes in and focuses on Drek. The Drek supporters are not material and will die however it is important that Drek dies first. Drek dies and the game is won. In the old days there was time to take out the Drek supporters one at a time. Not anymore. Go in, spread out and focus on Drek. DO NOT leave the room. If Drek leaves the room chasing an idiot runner then he resets to full health. (Same applies to Galv).

When I was part of a team that took out Drek in 20 minutes we also took out Galv and the Frostwolf Relief Hut. It was dream like. I have not mentioned Galv or the Frostwolf Relief Hut here however so long as the team can do them without being distracted by the main goal then by all means do them. Galv must be brought down while waiting for Tower Point to fall and when Tower Point falls everyone must be ready to move on FWGY. The Frostwolf Relief Hut can be taken while waiting for the East and West towers to burn. Good luck.

Static

I rarely get sick of Arathi Basin (AB). The only time I do is if I have been grinding through battleground after battleground there for some while; usually getting reputation or Honour (or Honor if you are from the combative states). It's fairly quick because the points keep ticking over regardless of the bases occupied; only at the beginning does neither team have a base and that doesn't last long.

The Stables are the first base taken for the Alliance, of course, however what gets taken next is always a point of conjecture, discussion or argument in battleground chat. Some people seem to have a formula for what to do. There are fifteen players, so send 5 to each of three bases, take them and hold them. The natural grouping, for a host of reasons, is the three raid groups so they say group 1 - Stables (ST), group 2 - Goldmine (GM) and group 3 - Lumber Mill (LM). My belief is that this simple formula has the least chance of success. If it succeeds it is because of dumb luck or the group is a "premade" and has already balanced the teams and discussed tactics before ever going in.

Why does it fail so often? The groups are each made up of people who have probably never met before, each with their own agenda, class, level, individual PVP ability and knowledge of the battleground. Each has also varying levels of courage, timidity and feelings of group responsibility. This formula is a guideline and rarely is it followed. Few players want to stay and guard the Stables at the begining of the game. There is a race to claim the banner and then people head for the GM, LM and even BS (Blacksmith). You will usually find that most head for LM and 3, give or take, for GM. There is reason in the random madness which I will discuss later. The Horde seem to have a monopoly on the BS in the majority of the games I have played in. The geography of the battleground gives them a more direct run to it.

The reason most people go into a battleground is to fight. If you are not in the fight then you are not getting kills or participating in kills. Staying around to guard a banner can be lost moments of boredom interspersed with intense battle - death loss effort elation - depending on the outcome. I have played both frontline and rearguard many times across different battles and also in the same battle. Both are exciting and rewarding for me.

However, given these observations, it is remarkable that the Alliance get it together enough to win an AB. Yet despite these observations I have participated in many, many AB wins. There is one observation that I can make that will start to make sense of AB. It is not a static game as the simple formula implies. It is fluid and if it isn't played with this in mind your side will be washed away. The Horde know this and have every appearance of being masters at it. Very frustrating at times :) They particularly like to be the washers rather than the washed.

Defending Stonehearth Graveyard

If you like straight out PVP and massive melee then SHGY is a good place for it. The Horde really want this place because it is generally the beginning of the end for the Alliance if it is lost. Not always, but mostly it is. The Horde need it to successfully take down Balinda Stonehearth and Icewing Bunker. Without it they have to run from either Snowfall (Winterax Hold) Graveyard or Iceblood Graveyard (aka IBGY) after they die. This takes time and time is crucial.

So defending SHGY can be pretty frantic and it is not that easy to defend. Really, you are aslo defending Balinda Stonehearth in her outpost and Icewing Bunker. The Stonehearth area is quite large and spread out with split levels. The Outpost itself is a large building and the attacks when they come from across the Field of Strife can flow around the Outpost on either side. If the bulk of the attack is coming from one side I have seen small groups of Horde sneak up the other side and cause havoc. Sometimes enough to take the graveyard because the Alliance are focussed on looking and defending the other direction. Always watch both approaches to the graveyard banner. The majority of times the Horde come from the shortest direction, up the road leading from Stonehearth Bunker.

Another successful strategy is the mass charge lead by a shadow priest. The priest will run into the waiting Alliance and fear everyone within their attack radius. They are quickly followed by the rest of the group who focus on the graveyard banner and the npc guards (if they are not already dead), while the defence is running in fear like headless chooks. This strategy is how they make the yards forward in a number of scenarios, not just at SHGY. See a shadow priest, silence it, suck away its mana and kill it. In that order. Same with warlocks.

Hunters should constantly lay traps around the banner. Renew them all the time. The Frost Trap is effective at slowing the opponents down and should be used in all front line battles. The explosive trap is excellent because of its area effect and because it explodes twice; once when set off and again when the cooldown expires. Anything to interrupt a player trying to claim the banner.

Warlocks and Shadow Priests for the same reasons used against the Alliance. Mages should freeze opponents in their tracks with Frost Nova. Rush in set it off, turn and Blink then range attack.

There may well be a whole host of other individual class strategies to disrupt attacks which I am not familiar with. If you have worked something out, use it. Slow them down, disrupt spell casting; whatever damage you can, do it. Especially when the Horde are close to the banner.

Elite Player

This is a short Arathi Basin tale of something unusual that I saw. I was outclassed being level 44 in an Arathi Basin however there is always some way to contribute positively. For me the contribution was as fodder for the Horde. Distract them, annoy them, slow them down - it still takes time to kill a Paladin. Heh heh.

We had lost the Stables, which makes you want to cuss, and we were about to lose the game; there was probably 40 seconds remaining before the Horde realised 2000 pts. I headed out of the gates at Trollbane Hall and feinted towards the Gold Mine but what I really wanted was a last hit at the Horde defending the stables. As I was approaching the horse yard another Alliance character came up on my left. I don't remember why but I clicked on them. I vaguely remember that I might have wanted to whisper them for a co-ordinated attack. I didn't do that in the end, their icon was surrounded by a silver dragon. It was an elite player. The only thing I know is that they were not from Khaz'goroth. Game over and they disappeared of course.

Since then I have been trying to work out how I can get an elite player. There is nothing on the web about it. They may have been a Blizzard employee. I have an idea that there must be something special available to players who take the trouble to get Exalted with all the core factions. Much more than just being able to get an epic mount from an alternative faction.

Drek'thar

This is a most surprising tale, lacking the sort of detail that I usually like, however the sequence of events took me so by surprise that I felt like a piece of flotsam on the tide with little control over events.

It started at the beginning of an Alterac Valley battleground and at the time surprised to see that I had got in at the first. The gates hadn't opened yet. I had got a little used to coming in with the battle already started and little hope of getting through to the forward elements. As part of the general chaos getting mounted we surged forward and took the usual path. As we cruised past Stonehearth Outpost we were a flood. My tracking Humanoids showed a river of blue dots on the mini-map.

Some of us departed to capture the Snowfall Graveyard. There was little talk but a feeling of invulnerabilty was strong. We flowed past Galv and his Tower, straight for Iceblood Graveyard. The sheer ferocity of the attack overwhelming the Frostwolf guards and the few Horde attempting to stem such a tide. We moved straight on to Tower Point and overwhelmed it too. It was here that we seemed to pause. I remember working out that we were waiting for the tower to be claimed and destroyed. The odd Horde turned up and the chat bar reported the loss of Stonehearth Bunker and Icewing Bunker; Balinda still alive.

Apparently a few of our number, possibly half, returned and took Iceblood Tower and brought down Glav. As these people returned we gathered new momentum, the Tower burst into flame, and we headed to Frostwolf Graveyard. Little resistance, seconds only to claim, capture and destroy Horde resurrecting there. The mass heading through the village and up to claim the East and West Frostwolf Towers. I took part in claiming the East Tower but by the time I got to the top it was already done. I leapt off the Tower and headed for the last Graveyard but the Frostwolf were so demoralised we had that too in brisk fashion however the chat bar reported the loss of Balinda; the graveyard there long since gone and not noticed.

I had not been in this position since the days before Reinforcements were introduced. Standing on the mound outside Drek'thars Keep waiting and preparing for the beginning of the final assault. We had people scattered around waiting for the East and West Towers to ignite. I remembered the routine. Someone would go inside and kite out a wolf, this happening in turn until ony Drek was left. I thought perhaps I should begin this process and headed into the keep, targetted a wolf and attracted his attention. I then bolted outside.

There was no one there and no wolf had followed me. Quizically I turned around and took stock. Everyone had surged inside not bothering with pulling mobs one at a time. I ran back inside targetted Drek and just began hammering away. The score was roughly equal, around 280 each and falling. With shock and awe I noticed Drek's health dropping steadily. I thought to myself "We are going to kill Drek!" I just fired a steady stream of anything that was going to do damage, focussed entirely on willing his death with every breath.

Then it happened. Alliance Wins. Leave Battleground. I was in shock, elated, oh my god!! I managed to quickly check the stats. Bowforce, 1 killing blow, piss weak, as if I had hardly taken part, zero deaths. Yes, correct, I didn't die at all. Another shock, I usually die several times! It took somewhere between 15 and 25 minutes. I did not record the time so I can't be sure but it all happened so quickly; with our points around 250.

Stonehearth Graveyard

SHGY. Stonehearth Graveyard. Some of the best battles I have been in in Alterac Valley have been in the defence of Stonehearth Graveyard. Alterac Valley can be won without holding SHGY however, sadly, the majority of them are lost if SHGY is lost. The Horde know this.

A simple fact of battle is bringing superior force to bear on the enemy by the shortest possible route. This is why the graveyards are so critical. The graveyards are WOWs supply chain. If you die, and you will die, then the closer the GY is to the battle the quicker you get back into it. There is only one thing more frustrating than having a 30 second resurrection and that is having to do the interminable run from Stormpike Graveyard back to the Icewing Bunker heights. This is where my children learned a few choice oaths, watching Dad do an AV when SHGY is lost.

There are four strategic points in a close but geographically horrible area. Stonehearth Bunker, Stonehearth Outpost (Balinda Stonehearth), Icewing Bunker and Stonehearth Graveyard.

Typically Stonehearth Bunker is a gimme for the Horde. There is too much to defend, so the bunker is not heroically defended. The Horde know that to take down Balinda they need to bring superior force to bear over the shortest possible route. So after the Bunker they will attempt to take SHGY. If after we kill them they have to run from Iceblood Graveyard across the Field of Strife to get to the battle again then it favours the Alliance. Their supply chain is long and they wish above all things to shorten it by taking SHGY.

If the Horde take SHGY the following things become possible for them:

1. Take Balinda Stonehearth down at their leisure with plenty of the ugly bastards getting back into the fight very quickly;
2. Destroy Icewing Bunker; and
3. Make it impossible for the Alliance to get past the Icewing Bunker heights.

Once all four strategic points are taken and destroyed there is a bottle neck on the road leading up the hill to Icewing Bunker that is easily defended by even the moderately intelligent. I have tried to run through the mass of Horde holding the heights a few times. I made it once, only to be picked off by a group coming in from behind their lines. I have tried to find a sneaky mountain pass that will get me past them without their knowing. I haven't found one yet. Effectively Alliance forces in Frostwolf Territory are split from those on the wrong side of Icewing Bunker. These forward elements will not get re-inforced in their attempts to take the Towers.

It is not essential to victory to keep SHGY but it is a challenge to hold on to it and it frustrates the crap out of the Horde if you do. In another post I will tell you how I have seen Horde take SHGY despite a determined defence.

Alterac Valley map from WOW Wiki.

Battleground Madness

When I first started playing WOW I spurned battlegrounds and PVP. I had no idea, and quite possibly still don't, however now I enjoy battlegrounds. This blog is simply an outlet for letting people know what I experience, the strategies that I believe will work, and observations that I have made.

Since discovering that PVP is fun and frustration all rolled into one, it has become a little obsessive for me. I am not on a PVP server, because that would be more frustration than fun, and it is my understanding that Horde outnumber Alliance in these worlds. It is not PVP per se that thrills me its the Battlegrounds themselves and what it takes to win a battleground. Out in the big wide PVE world there is plenty to do and its hard enough without having bloody Horde pouncing on you whenever you go out to achieve something.

No, it's a madness totally to do with getting into a battelground with a group of others and defeating the opposition (read effing Horde). I suppose if I wanted to win a lot I should have taken up a Horde character, so the challenge for me is to get a character to Conqueror in the Alliance. That is my battleground madness, I want a Conqueror.

For those of you who don't know, a Conqueror of the battlegrounds has to achieve Exalted reputation status with each of the three Azeroth battleground factions. The Silverwing Sentinels (Warsong Gulch), The League of Arathor (Arathi Basin) and The Stormpike Guard (Alterac Valley).

That is my goal and along the way I shall tell you how it goes.