Stats from the Arena Tournament...

[Stealthy]

Hi All,

I'm not going to comment on the balance of PvP at the moment as I feel these as I believe the stats speak for themselves...

Class breakdown of the top 100 teams on the US Tournament Realm:

Top 10 US:
8 - Paladin, Warlock, Death Knight
3 - Hunter
2 - Shaman
1 - Mage

Top 20 US:
15 - Paladin
12 - Warlock
11 - Death Knight
5 - Hunter
4 - Shaman
3 - Rogue, Mage, Priest
0 - Druid, Warrior

Top 50 US:
35 - Paladin
22 - Death Knight
20 - Warlock
19 - Mage
18 - Rogue
17 - Priest, Hunter
10 - Shaman
0 - Druid, Warrior

Top 100 US:
61 - Paladin
41 - Death Knight, Rogue
40 - Warlock
38 - Mage
37 - Hunter
30 - Priest
24 - Shaman
3 - Druid
0 - Warrior

Faction Breakdown of the Top 100 Teams on the US Tournament Realm:

Top 10 US:
10 - Alliance
0 - Horder

Top 20 US:
18 - Alliance
2 - Horde

Top 50 US:
45 - Alliance
5 - Horde

Top 100 US:
87 - Alliance
13 - Horde

Cheers,
S.

[Souca]

Yea, DK/Pally/Lock is just evil right now. I'm two boxing ele shammies with a friend healing as holy pally and we are hovering around 1450 with about 90 games played and 50/50 win loss ratio. One of the things that was frustrating the first week was facing teams as we tried to break through 1500. A lot of the teams were fresh and didn't have hidden ratings so it seemed like every time we got close, we got beaten down by a team that is likely 1900+ now.

I don't regret doing the tourney, as I'm learning a lot, but I must say that some matches just leave me insanely frustrated. It's one thing to be beaten by skill, but its another to out damage your opponent by 60k damage only to lose to them as they sit at full health. Warlocks seem to have been stealth buffed to a point where they are pretty much a harder target than a DK. Generally when choosing between a DK, a Lock, and a Pally, the Pally is the easiest target to burn down even with they're bubble. Sometims you get lucky and they don't realize how much damage is coming in, but even the ones that do bubble are more likely to die in the next salvo than a DK or a Lock.

One thing I've found to be very interesting is the interupting potential of fear. Assuming the lock doesn't macro his pet to pick off my grounding and tremor totems, a Howl of Terror is effectively a AoE interupt even if the tremor frees me instantly. Couple that with a chain fear until DR immunity kicks in and a lock can keep a caster tied up for a long time. Add in spell lock and it just gets worse. Instant Lava Burst focus fire might be the only way to kill locks now as they seem to self heal at an insane rate.

Oh, and all those shammies in your list are likely Resto. We've seen more resto than we can count, but only 2 or three enhancement and elemental each.

- Souca -

[Dominian]

Combos varyied alot more in the EU..

We even had RMP on the 1 spot wich is considered a skill setup compared to paladin/lock/dk wich dominate the US group.

[Souca]

Combos varyied alot more in the EU..

We even had RMP on the 1 spot wich is considered a skill setup compared to paladin/lock/dk wich dominate the US group.

The RMP we see are the most skilled. Even though we aren't in the high brackets, we got a lot of new teams at 1500 and the RMP groups were the ones that used tactics and seemed to have the best team play. Their victories were usually faster than those from the DK/Pally/Lock which tended to just be unkillable and slowly burn us down.

I'm not sure if I think team comp playing such a large role in arena is a good or bad thing. It seems to go counter to "bring the player not the class", but I'm not sure I agree with that motto either. The downside to comp being so important is that I feel like I have to have an 80 of every class if I'd like to be able to stay in high brackets everytime the flavor of the month changes or a patch comes out. I'm not sure there really is anyway to balance arenas so that player skill isn't overshadowed by class comps.

- Souca -

[Dominian]

Combos varyied alot more in the EU..

We even had RMP on the 1 spot wich is considered a skill setup compared to paladin/lock/dk wich dominate the US group.

The RMP we see are the most skilled. Even though we aren't in the high brackets, we got a lot of new teams at 1500 and the RMP groups were the ones that used tactics and seemed to have the best team play. Their victories were usually faster than those from the DK/Pally/Lock which tended to just be unkillable and slowly burn us down.

I'm not sure if I think team comp playing such a large role in arena is a good or bad thing. It seems to go counter to "bring the player not the class", but I'm not sure I agree with that motto either. The downside to comp being so important is that I feel like I have to have an 80 of every class if I'd like to be able to stay in high brackets everytime the flavor of the month changes or a patch comes out. I'm not sure there really is anyway to balance arenas so that player skill isn't overshadowed by class comps.

- Souca -

I agree that its pretty much impossible to balance it all 100%, atleast Blizzard dont nerf classes to the ground like they used too. Gear/talents/setups changes all the time and its virtually impossible to keep track of it all, but some talents just seems weird. Like the current survival hunter talent TNT, a proc stun who is pretty much aimed only towards pvp. They removed mace stun due to RNG, but manage to add a new one.

Supreme players always make it to the top with nearly any class, warlocks havent recived any buffs latley but score extremly good from the rogue/dk/ret nerfs.

[Souca]

Like the current survival hunter talent TNT, a proc stun who is pretty much aimed only towards pvp.

Yea. I'm not a huge fan of that talent. Sitting in a frost trap with entrapment proccing as your trying to kill a hunter that just Disengaged and you get Deflected on most of your classes just makes me wonder how I'm suppossed to kill them. Bad enough that they can wait till 1.7 seconds into a Lava Burst to feign and interupt my cast. Add in Wyvern Sting, Scatter Shot (which isn't broken by tremors) and an Ice Trap and they have the largest selection on stunes and CCs.

- Souca -