The Wow Blog

My Adventures in Arathi Basin

by Erik

April 20, 2007 – 7:46 am

I decided that it was time I got some better gear, and I figured the best way to do that was to increase my PvP honor score and get some new gear that way. I know I can get some killer gear by running raids, but I honestly don’t feel like waiting around and trying to find a group, let alone spending the time attuning myself to the point where I can even enter the raids. So that is why I am now working in battlegrounds.

I have to admit that I made fun of my son for doing this a few months ago. “Why not level?” I asked. Unfortunately he was not able to answer me in a way that I understood, but eventually even the simplest ideas get through to me.

Not knowing much about PvP, I bought a guide that helped me learn a fair bit about PvP. I didn’t want to go into the battleground completely ignorant, after all. With my new-found knowledge I did a lot better than I ever did in normal PvP action that I got into outside the battlegrounds (such as in Halaa). I had bought some knew armour with an eye to increasing some of the more important stats for hunters, such as agility and stamina. Also, knowing a bit more about what spells and shots work against which classes helped.

In addition, the guide helped in explaining not only what the objectives for each battle ground are, but some strategies on winning. For Arathi, which is what I will concentrate on first, the strategy appears to be simple: control 3 of the 5 resources, and your team will eventually win. With better communication, you can shoot for 4 or 5, but this is tough to do. If you can, you will win faster. This advice matched what I found in some free guides on line.

Of course, that advice requires that everyone has the same thinking, which in a Pick up Group is unlikely to happen. Everyone will have their own idea about what the best strategy is, and how to go about implementing it. And no one will really know what the other side is doing, because they aren’t telling anyone what they see.

After two narrow losses to the Horde, I decided to try my own approach. As a hunter, I need to work from a distance. As a group, we have the best results where we outnumber the other team. So rather than look for resource objectives, I simply looked for the greatest concentration of my own team, and went there. I then stood at the outside, and tabbed through the enemy players until I found someone fairly low in health, preferably a low-armor class. Then I would let loose the bear and the bullets.

By concentrating on players I could kill quickly, I was able to turn the tide in that area, send several horde players back to their GY, and free up my teammates to gang up on the remaining enemy players in the area. We could then move on to the next objective.

This not only increase my kill score (not just because I was making killing shots, but because we outnumbered the enemy in that area and could kill faster than they could), but we had a decisive victory, where we controlled all 5 resources and the enemy graveyard. I don’t think my new strategy was the only reason for this, but it could not have hurt.

Anyway, even losses result in honor points, so I plan to stay at Arathi Basin (with side trips to farm for gold to pay for my battling) until I get my new Spaulders. Then I will move on to the next battle ground for the next armor upgrade.

I will keep posting on my results, and starting tomorrow, I will keep a running tab of my kills and honor score.

Erik