Thinking about trying out Arenas for some change of scenery, and need some advice.

Looking for some tips and advice regarding arena 2vs2 and 3vs3. Got a tad bored with PvE lately, and wanted to get into PvPing a bit more seriously than I have been previously. I have from time to time done PvP on my main Paladin as Retadin, but never more seriously than to run some random BGs once in a while just to break the monotony of PvE.

I got the following characters to choose from:
Account 1: Pally(85, Ret and Prot), DK(72, Blood and Unholy), Warrior(80, Prot and Arms)
Account 2: Druid(85, Balance and Resto), Priest(81, Disc and Shadow), Shaman (68, Elem)
Account 3: Mage(85, Fire), Shaman(81,Elem)
Account 4: Warlock(85, Demonology and Destruction), Shaman(81,Elem),Hunter (65, Elem)
Account 5: Shaman(85, Elem and Resto)

I had a go yesterday with a friend for 2v2 with my Retadin(not optimally talented nor glyphed for PvP, but for PvE, and in all Bloodied Pyrium PvP gear) and his Shadow Priest. We got owned. Three first fights we were dead a few seconds after the gate opened, fourth was fairly close. This was more a trial run as I wanted to see a bit how they play out before I start boxing arenas.

Now I want to try to multibox 2vs2 or 3vs3. Of the classes I currently have what combination would probably be easiest to get a decent result without sacrificing PvE viability? Granted my Shammies I have no problem making the secondary spec the PvP spec, and I guess that I wont really loose too much PvE viability of my Retadin if I have to use a PvP talent build. For my mage I can easily pick up frost as secondary spec as I understand that is THE PvP spec for mages.

Do you drive with the healer/caster and let the melee run around with IWT?

3 Frost Dk's gogo

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Originally Posted by Toned

3 Frost Dk's gogo

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That.

Preferably you don't play a healer in Arena. in 5's someone else can play it and for 2vs2 or 3vs3 you want 3 dps champs, because you lack the ability to control your CC/movement good enough to play with 2 dps in 3vs3.

If you're serious about PvP, I would start with as much of the crafted PvP sets as possible.

And then run battlegrounds a lot.
This is the practice ground, where you learn your set up, tweak your macros, etc.
Plus you earn honor here, which gets you much better pvp gear.
You'll probably want at least the 2 minute trinket from honor before you do arena.

I've not done much 3's; in 2's so far I've played only a single toon.
But could see playing both (or all three, in 3's) as DPS working.

Losing constantly does suck.
But your personal MMR raises or falls with wins or losses.
If you queue at primetime on Tue (after patch) or Mon (before patch), or in the afternoon/evening on weekends, the pool of opposition will be huge, and you'll end up against opponents much closer to your MMR.
Keep at it, and you'll get your 8 wins.

It might be worthwhile to run a single toon at a time, with someone who is at least half geared.
To get your weapons, which will be 2-3 weeks of arena; weapons are a substantial boost.
It is hard to break in, mid season.

I picked up 3v3 last week for something to do with my DK's I'm already 1840+ It works... and it works well.

I've normally kept my arena like this:
2v2 - Since the removal of titles/awards. I use this as a place to burn time and carry friends to 1850(pre-cata) for weapons, and post cata I just help random friends and guildies cap their pts with 2.
3v3- This is where I played the majority of my single toon pvp since BC. Untill now with my 3 DKs. I did toy around with 3 Ele shams in WOTLK when I got sick of ICC (hit 1700+ with few headaches).
5v5- This is where I've played my multi-box pvp 4 DPS + Some one healing. Currently this season I've been doing 4 DKs + a Priest (all me).
I've broke 2K multiple seasons since BC with shamans + 1, but my personal goal for this season is 5boxing 4 DK + either my priest or pally to 2k.

Based off your post my first reaction was... If you don't like losing and plan to multi-box arenas... Then you need to level some new toons. The mixed class groups in pvp don't work so well. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it appears to me that you are new to this as you've stated. I'd recommend getting 3 of 1 class for 3v3 if you are serious about it. 3 Dks, 3 Wars, 3 Shams, 3 Druids... something. 3Mages would be fun it's on my list of things to do.

I think 2s are a great place to learn how to arena and get in alot of practice while gearing up at the same time. You also get the luxury of playing any comp you choose. For 3s, you need to run the current fotm OP comp (currently frost DKs) however, it changes every patch. There is currently a 2900 2 Frost DKs/pally healer (non-boxed) since 4.2.


In my opinion the pvp landscape is changing in wow, pick classes that are good in BGs and then learn to arena with them. Boxing 4-5 characters wont get you or will rarely get you an RBG win. I could see 3, but I have only done 2 myself in rbgs. Something to keep in mind. The encouragement of blizzard or forcing rbgs upon players to gain max points is only the start.

I don't care that much about losses just don't want to be destroyed as I enter the arena :). As I said I'm not gonna go completely insane with PvP, just to get a break from PvE.

I've decided to give Pally(Ret) and Shammy(Ench), Warrior(Arms)/Shammy(Ench), Warlock/Mage a test. Just to see how it goes, I'll update when I've tried it out a bit. Now I just have to craft all this PvP gear. :)

I don't want to level up more toons right now, I dont have that much time to play, and by the time I've reached high enough levels, DKs will be nerfed into oblivion. :)

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Originally Posted by Atrocious

I don't care that much about losses just don't want to be destroyed as I enter the arena :). As I said I'm not gonna go completely insane with PvP, just to get a break from PvE.

I've decided to give Pally(Ret) and Shammy(Ench), Warrior(Arms)/Shammy(Ench), Warlock/Mage a test. Just to see how it goes, I'll update when I've tried it out a bit. Now I just have to craft all this PvP gear. :)

I don't want to level up more toons right now, I dont have that much time to play, and by the time I've reached high enough levels, DKs will be nerfed into oblivion. :)

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DK's will always be OP they were designed to be OP ><

Early season 9 when warriors were out of control and shit all over DK's was about the only time Dk's weren't "good", but vs non warrior teams DKs were tearing it up still before the ridiculous frost buffs.

I have bit the big one and created three more DKs, but haven't started leveling them yet, but I'll keep em around and try to only level them through PvP/Arenas when I've done all the other PvE I've wanted to try out.

Had a go yesterday with my Retadin and Ech Shammy, both in full crafted PvP gear, the ech shammy was fully specced according to a guide to Shammy PvP, the Retadin is PvE specced when it comes to talents and glyphs. As soon as I lost a few more fights and my MMR dropped below 800, things started getting easier, but havent won yet. But now it's a fight and I manage to atleast kill one of them before they take both of mine out. The rotation for the Ech shammy is not optimal, but doesn't seem like anyone has posted their macros for ech shammy anywhere(that actually work, aradent has, but they do not work). Managed to get about 6k on a training dummy, which was not bad. Need to work on the rotation for the shammy, since most of the abilities are on cooldowns in a similar manner to Retadin I think I might be able to make something better.

But I am learning, for example a lot of potions and abilities do not work in arena, so have to figure out which work and which don't, and get that working a bit better. Also need to get Gladius set up properly. Unfortunately the ech shammy spell hit is too low to get Hex to working reliably. Need to create CC and interrupt round robins, also my fire elemental totems.

Until my ranking tanks sufficently it will be an uphill battle, as I am currently fighting people with way better gear than me and more experience. A bit frustrating, but I got a good outlet for that. :)

Atrocious, I would love to hear an update.

I was thinking of jumping into some 2vs2 myself after getting bored with pve, maybe 3vs3. Like you, I don't really have any experience in arenas.

I've been thinking I have nothing to lose short of frustration from losing. However, I wouldn't mind a little insight on what to expect. As in, expect to lose your first 1000 games.....HA!

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Originally Posted by Cluch

Atrocious, I would love to hear an update.

I was thinking of jumping into some 2vs2 myself after getting bored with pve, maybe 3vs3. Like you, I don't really have any experience in arenas.

I've been thinking I have nothing to lose short of frustration from losing. However, I wouldn't mind a little insight on what to expect. As in, expect to lose your first 1000 games.....HA!

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It's very subjective on how well you do in arena. Basically what it starts with is monitoring a lot of different things and judge on that. Mainly your cooldowns and the oponants cooldowns. If you know you got tunnelvision while gaming. Dying in flames etc, then it might be tough. If you're aware of all those things in a PVE environement, then you'll probably do OK in pvp.

Basic thing is that people who die in fires in pve will suck at pvp.

Thank you Littleburst. Going to mess around with a few combos right now. Will update how it goes.

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Originally Posted by Cluch

Thank you Littleburst. Going to mess around with a few combos right now. Will update how it goes.

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Good luck!

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Originally Posted by Cluch

Atrocious, I would love to hear an update.

I was thinking of jumping into some 2vs2 myself after getting bored with pve, maybe 3vs3. Like you, I don't really have any experience in arenas.

I've been thinking I have nothing to lose short of frustration from losing. However, I wouldn't mind a little insight on what to expect. As in, expect to lose your first 1000 games.....HA!

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I havent PvPed in a week because I've been working on getting my finalized PvE team done, but in 2v2 I did not do well, but I have been experimenting with different setup in ISBoxer, so I think when I try my hand at it later this week, I hope I do better.

But as new to arena it is frustrating, was running a pally + ech shammy with all bloodied gear. Not inexperience plus not the most optimal characters = fail. :)

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Originally Posted by Atrocious

I havent PvPed in a week because I've been working on getting my finalized PvE team done, but in 2v2 I did not do well, but I have been experimenting with different setup in ISBoxer, so I think when I try my hand at it later this week, I hope I do better.

But as new to arena it is frustrating, was running a pally + ech shammy with all bloodied gear. Not inexperience plus not the most optimal characters = fail. :)

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I don't understand why anyone would box 2vs2. The only way I see you're able to win that is 2 double dps teams, where you win from the oposing team. In any other setup you mainly have a disadvantage by boxing.

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Originally Posted by Littleburst

I don't understand why anyone would box 2vs2. The only way I see you're able to win that is 2 double dps teams, where you win from the oposing team. In any other setup you mainly have a disadvantage by boxing.

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Because some of us were under the mistaken impression that controlling two in an arena would be easier. :)

So the interesting question would be, what would be easier to break into for a multiboxer with little to no experience? 3v3 or 5v5?

I'll do some more 2v2 just for experimentation and learning the PvP arena dynamic in a setting that doesn't earn me the crap that apparently MBs experience in battlegrounds.

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Originally Posted by Atrocious

Because some of us were under the mistaken impression that controlling two in an arena would be easier. :)

So the interesting question would be, what would be easier to break into for a multiboxer with little to no experience? 3v3 or 5v5?

I'll do some more 2v2 just for experimentation and learning the PvP arena dynamic in a setting that doesn't earn me the crap that apparently MBs experience in battlegrounds.

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The advantage Boxing brings is that you can coordinate burst and CC good, by some simple macro's + gladius. The more characters you have, the bigger the advantage.In 5's you should be able to kill someone relatively fast compared to 3's, since you can burst hard. In 3's it's more about timing your CC's well, so you can lock the healer out for example, while killing the dps. Personally, I never even came close to boxing 2's or 3's succesfull, allthough that was with Shaman.

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Originally Posted by Littleburst

The advantage Boxing brings is that you can coordinate burst and CC good, by some simple macro's + gladius. The more characters you have, the bigger the advantage.In 5's you should be able to kill someone relatively fast compared to 3's, since you can burst hard. In 3's it's more about timing your CC's well, so you can lock the healer out for example, while killing the dps. Personally, I never even came close to boxing 2's or 3's succesfull, allthough that was with Shaman.

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My lack of arena expertise made me think that doing 2v2 would be easier as coordinating CC and DPS there would only really be one option, CC one, kill the other. :)

But I totally see your point of in 5v5 it's "easier" as maybe even the most dedicated healer cannot out heal 4 vs 1 dps-wise.

In general I find that people are posting lots of strats, macros, setups etc. on the PvE issue, but very few are willing to share their PvP tips. So I just wanted to start with something and try to figure it all out by myself.

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Originally Posted by Atrocious

My lack of arena expertise made me think that doing 2v2 would be easier as coordinating CC and DPS there would only really be one option, CC one, kill the other. :)

But I totally see your point of in 5v5 it's "easier" as maybe even the most dedicated healer cannot out heal 4 vs 1 dps-wise.

In general I find that people are posting lots of strats, macros, setups etc. on the PvE issue, but very few are willing to share their PvP tips. So I just wanted to start with something and try to figure it all out by myself.

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The massive difference in that is that PVE is scripted, so you can comment on events you know that will happen. With PVP the only thing you can make a tactic for is against a certain setup and then still it's doubtful that it still works. Since for example, there's a huge difference in playstyles. One team could be recklessly offensive and the other team with the same setup can play very defensive. It just boils down to judging situations to where you see fit. I couldn't think of any "tips" to share.

Things that are generally usefull is knowing what spells/abilities every class has. And what cooldowns are on key spells/abilities. If a priest can cast a pain suppression every time your offensive cooldowns come free, you know that waiting for your offensive CD's and trying to burst then isn't gonna cut it. Watching some PVP vid's with commentary learns you most I think. Possibly read some guides for classes you're interested in.

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Originally Posted by Littleburst

The massive difference in that is that PVE is scripted, so you can comment on events you know that will happen. With PVP the only thing you can make a tactic for is against a certain setup and then still it's doubtful that it still works. Since for example, there's a huge difference in playstyles. One team could be recklessly offensive and the other team with the same setup can play very defensive. It just boils down to judging situations to where you see fit. I couldn't think of any "tips" to share.

Things that are generally usefull is knowing what spells/abilities every class has. And what cooldowns are on key spells/abilities. If a priest can cast a pain suppression every time your offensive cooldowns come free, you know that waiting for your offensive CD's and trying to burst then isn't gonna cut it. Watching some PVP vid's with commentary learns you most I think. Possibly read some guides for classes you're interested in.

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You see, now you're actually providing me with some hints and tips. :)

I'll head back over to arenajunkies and see if I can find some vids that aren't of the stroke my epeen type(ie. see me obliterate x teams to some black metal/electroica tune).

I guess that a good idea might also be to solo PvP with the classes a bit first to learn a bit more?

Tripple Dps 3s teams can blow people up with unhealable damage still.

3 Frost Dk's works to 2kish.
Tripple warrior works

5's can be easier in a sense that you can land a kill with 4 dps on some one fairly quick, but there is more going on. I'd say if you are just starting go with 3 DPS in 3s. Like 3 Frost Dks, 3 Wars, 3 Ele Shams, 3 Boomkins, 3 Mages... etc That way you can perfect your setup. I'd suggest leveling 4 of whatever you do decide on. This way you can just add your 4th toon + a healer and start on 5s. Perfect your CC setup using focus targets / gladius and @arena# macros.

Check out the 2 links in my signature even though they are Shaman / DK specific you can get the general idea of what kind of macros you need. The shaman setup has a "new to pvp" mindset when I wrote it.

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Originally Posted by Atrocious

You see, now you're actually providing me with some hints and tips. :)

I'll head back over to arenajunkies and see if I can find some vids that aren't of the stroke my epeen type(ie. see me obliterate x teams to some black metal/electroica tune).

I guess that a good idea might also be to solo PvP with the classes a bit first to learn a bit more?

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Some things that can be helpful, it's mainly aimed at solo play though. But most things are basically the same for any team/comp/bracket.

A warrior explaining every move in a replay of an arena match. Switches are key.
http://warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=190183

Besides arenajunkies http://www.skill-capped.com/ could be nice aswell. You need a registered account to gain acces though, haven't made on yet.

Skillcapped isnt free

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Originally Posted by Toned

Skillcapped isnt free

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LOL. Ok that's new. That explains all that skill capped spam in warcraftmovies video's. They probably get payed. That's sad.

I decided to follow the advice of someone here and do more BGs to get better gear and experience. So far it's been fun, but I hate that people assume that I am botting and/or won't pull my wight in a BG. This is probably just stupid me using the sameish name on my shammies which makes it easy to spot. In general I feel that I perform better than you're average PvPer as so many of them just want to get the kills and not do the objectives, or in general don't play that smart(never attacks the healers, etc.) In the last BG where someone complained, Two of my toons where in the top five for killing blows and honorable kills.

How do the rest of you deal with the hate? I try to stick to the 15+ BGs as it's harder to notice me there.

ya. i actually made my names different this time lol. not liiikllllii and liiiliklll anymore. They look like completely different normal characters.

speaking of arena, it is just a meta game that gives imaginary rewards. no need to hang yourself over it. An arena match is no different than a DOTA match, a Call of Duty ranked match, or a street fighter 4 ranked match. Nothing special, except it is NOT as fun as those matches because it was way too short! We've come to far and spent way too much time to get frustrated by a 30 sec match. if you see past the reward, it is merely normal pvp. With the right mind, the matches go easie. and you perform better too if you are not under pressure. When too much is on the line, most ppl just lose.

as for the BG hate, most of them AREN"T even ppl playing. PVP bots are crazier than ever. They have no rights bugging you when they can't even kick the DK that runs the same route every match. Nowadays, the outcome of a BG is determined by which side has fewer bots.

if it bothers you still, try box 3s in bgs for starters. queue with 5, if WSG or AB pop, only 3 go in etc.