An analysis on the current PVP balance

PVP Arenas
1

So in the last weeks the PVP forums haven’t been very positive. A lot of people have problems with the current balance of PVP. Everyone is demanding nerfs or buffs from all classes. I made this post to discuss a more objective look at the current class balance.

First what would be pvp balance. Having all classes have same representation in arena? Not really.
Classes are not equally played. Some classes are more popular than others. We should strive to have a class representation in arena close to their overall representation. If a class is played by 10% of people overall, 10% of people in arena should have that class.

Current class active population at max level:

  1. Druid 557,645 12.3%
  2. Hunter 534,287 11.8%
  3. Paladin 509,266 11.2%
  4. Priest 377,941 8.3%
  5. Mage 369,964 8.1%
  6. DK 356,381 7.8%
  7. Shaman 343,751 7.6%
  8. Warrior 333,591 7.4%
  9. DH 329,153 7.3%
  10. Rogue 283,878 6.3%
  11. Warlock 280,039 6.1%
  12. Monk 249,744 5.5%

The arena ladder would logically be somewhat close to this distribution.

The current class representation in 3vs3 at 2400+:

  1. Priest 19.6% (478)
  2. Paladin 17.5% (428)
  3. Shaman 11.2% (274)
  4. Mage 11.1% (272)
  5. Warrior 9.9% (243)
  6. Druid 7.7% (187)
  7. Monk 6.9% (168)
  8. Rogue 6.7% (163)
  9. Warlock 2.9% (70)
  10. Hunter 2.7% (67)
  11. Death Knight 2.4% (58)
  12. Demon Hunter 1.5% (36)

It should be noted that this distribution remains about the same at lower arena brackets. So how hard or easy are classes doesn’t have much of an influence.
3vs3 1400+:

  1. Priest 20.2% (2022)
  2. Paladin 16.5% (1648)
  3. Shaman 10.7% (1073)
  4. Mage 9.8% (976)
  5. Warrior 9.6% (961)
  6. Druid 8.4% (837)
  7. Rogue 7.1% (705)
  8. Monk 6.2% (617)
  9. Warlock 3.7% (374)
  10. Hunter 3.5% (352)
  11. Death Knight 2.7% (274)
  12. Demon Hunter 1.5% (149)

Currently we have 4 classes which are far underperforming Warlock, Hunter, DK and DH. And 2 classes which are far better Priest and Paladins. Rest of the classes are somewhat balanced BUT we do have some cheesy/ one trick ponies specs which have their issues.

So first of all before targeting balance changes we should look at which specs are the problems inside the classes. Let’s take a look at the strong and weak classes and see what specs they are played. We are using data from 3vs3 2400+.

Both priest and paladin are very strong currently also because of the meta. They have access to some of the best defensive cooldowns in the game and they can defend very well againts the “one shots” in the current meta.
Priest:

  1. Priest Discipline 59.3% (284)
  2. Priest Shadow 38.2% (183)
  3. Priest Holy 2.5% (12)
    Both disci and shadow are close, so big nerfs should target both specs.

Paladins:

  1. Paladin Holy 64.8% (278)
  2. Paladin Retribution 30.3% (130)
  3. Paladin Protection 4.9% (21)
    Holy should receive big nerfs and retri slight nerfs.

Druid

  1. Druid Balance 50.5% (94)
  2. Druid Feral 32.8% (61)
  3. Druid Restoration 16.1% (30)
  4. Druid Guardian 0.5% (1)
    Currently the druid is the middle of the pack, in what would be considered the balanced tier, BUT Balance and Feral are close to a one trick pony at the moment relying too much on Convoke the Spirits, this is not fun thing for the druid or for the one receiving the damage. I would suggest taking some of the power away from convoke and giving it to other base skills.

Mages and Warrior only have 1 spec played: Fire and Arms. So switching some of the power from one spec to another might be a good idea.

Monks:

  1. Windwalker 92.3% (155)
  2. Mistweaver 7.1% (12)
  3. Brewmaster 0.6% (1)
    Another class with only 1 good spec, also the only hybrid with an unviable healing spec. The MW has always been weak when faced with bursts of damage while CCed. In the current meta the MW has no response. I would suggest adding some defensive skills, an answer to CC is needed.
    The windwalker also has issues, again a one trick pony. I would suggest taking away some of its offensive and move it to utility. Currently it has poor defensive options, touch of karma can be removed quite easily.

DK, DH , warlock and hunter are very far behind.
DK, DH and warlocks while they might have acceptable damage, suffer greatly from horrible defensive options.

So let’s come with opinions and suggestions on how to balance the classes.

SOURCES:
arenamate
official leaderboard
wowranks io

15 Likes
2

We don’t really have to, since Blizzard doesn’t read the forums, ignores all feedback and is unlikely to change anything before 9.1 or perhaps even 10.0

11 Likes
3

You know why representation is a poor source for balancing? If we were to follow this, protection paladin and affliction warlock would be buffed and marksmanship and subtletly would have their nerfs reverted.

8 Likes
4

Why waste our time? Its not like blizz gave a puck about our feedback in the past 6 months of alpha, beta,prepatch or sl.

2 Likes
5

Imagine having more cr on fire mage a class i never played than dk a class i played for 2 years and have 2.6 exp with

7 Likes
6

Afliction, MM, and sub are the only played spec of their respective classes. You can buff a weak class by simply buffing a weak spec and leaving the specs which are fine as they are.

7

The game is designed for PVE - so the interaction between classes constantly varies across time.

The game is, at it’s core, broken in PVP. Humans are amazingly adaptable however and will find a way to solve problems. The balance is achieved when players ‘solve’ each PVP season and then the representation of classes starts to flatten out. Meta-game information teaches lower rated players how to deal with whatever FOTM comps exist and low to mid ratings.

To balance the game, they’d have to go back to the absolute basics of each class and rip them apart, rebuilding them for PVP balance. This won’t happen however, so here we are: Playing Arena, the greatest format ever designed in an online game… hamstrung by the total ineptitude and lack of interest shown for class balance by the developers.

They don’t agree with top level players.
They actively tell people they are wrong.
They never achieve their goals (e.g. there should be no BiS covenants? Laughably false).

I know we are all frustrated with different parts of PVP, but the fundamental issue is WoW is rotten to it’s core. The design philosophy is misguided and detrimental to gameplay. Worst of all: Lots of people in Blizz know this and are ignored, so they leave and the issue becomes worse.

6 Likes
8

Warrior and mage also only have 1 viable spec, yet they hold far more representation at high rating. Should we buff demo lock but not fury warrior, just because one class has a lower rep than the other? They’re both equally unviable.
Last season, DH had a low representation in 2v2 and in 3v3 survival was #15 with feral not even being on the list, despite that jungle cleave was one of the two S+ comp in the game.

Representation is a poor argument for buffing/nerfing anything.

6 Likes
9

This is a point well-made. I think you can use representation to make informed decisions, and it can sometimes provide some indications that something is up.

But it shouldn’t be a goal onto itself to have equal representation amongst all classes and specs.
There are few healing specs but any 3v3 team needs at least one healer, so healing classes/specs have high representation by design.
Tanks are somewhat undesired both by players and developers, so they’re historically left somewhat purposefully weak, because viable and powerful tanks leads to gameplay that isn’t too desirable.
And for pure dps classes there’s a natural tendency amongst players to seek optimization and play whatever spec is perceived best, so a huge popularity of one spec doesn’t necessarily indicate that the other specs of the class are bad. It just means players gravitate toward the specs that are seen as best, even if the edge is only marginal.

That for example is a flawed conclusion to draw based on numbers alone.
It may as well be that Holy is weak and both Discipline and Shadow are fine. So if you buffed Holy, then some of the Discipline representation might shift and you’d have somewhat equal balance amongst all 3 specs.
But it can also be that the history of Arena, the preference of players, and the general gameplay design and comp preferences lends itself naturally toward Discipline being higher represented in Arena than Holy.
And perhaps a high representation of Shadow is not entirely unexpected given a huge design revamp. Whether strong or weak it would seem natural that many players would be drawn toward the spec entirely because it’s new and exciting.

I think the better approach is to look at the outliers – those that have really high representation or really low representation – and think about the reasons why that might be. And if the conclusion is that they’re either too powerful or too weak, then what are some fair and measured ways to make them more in-line with other similar specs in terms of performance?

Just blindly adjusting the balance based on representation alone seems to miss the point of seeking balance in the first place. Perfectly equal representation does not necessarily make for enjoyable or fair gameplay.

1 Like
10

I presented the representation of priest specs because priest are the outliers, there are more priest then DK, DH, Warlock, Hunters and monks COMBINED in arena.
If all the classes would be balanced we would see a class representation closer to the class overall popularity.
I have pointed the spec distribution of the priest to point out that both specs are strong. It’s not the case that disci or shadow alone are carrying the class, both specs are strong and deserve a nerf.

11

Fantastic idea to give “big nerfs” to the only healers that can deal with the current oneshot meta, instead of buffing the others. Didn’t even need to read anything else to know that you have no idea what you are talking about.

3 Likes
12

Yea let’s just all pretend that hpala isn’t miles ahead of any other healer

6 Likes
13

Two points:

  1. Why specifically do you think there are more Priests in Arena than those other classes? You say Priest is an outlier, but why is it an outlier?

and

  1. You say that if classes were balanced, then Arena class representation would be closer to the game’s general class popularity.
    What makes you think that the class popularity of Arena should be equal to the class popularity in general? I mean, Arena is a very specific form of gameplay with a format that’s quite different from the rest of the game.
    A 3v3 Arena team requires 1 healer per 2 dps.
    A Dungeon group requires 1 healer per 3 dps and 1 tank.
    With that in mind, wouldn’t you naturally have a higher representation of healing classes in Arena than in the rest of the game, since more healers are needed relative to dps?
14

First of all, representation of classes includes one huge factor - PvE. Simply based on that your whole analyzes after that is…softly put, not very usable.
Balance is done by first placing a goal. What do you want? Equal representation of classes? Bad idea, that will lead to even more chaos and unbalanced game. Equal ability for every spec to be competitive? Also bad idea, too many specs, too many “unfun” specs (like tanks). Designate 1 or 2 (in case with healing classes) specs for each class for PvP and choose to balance those, as each of those spec should have relatively equal chance and ability to perform well in arena. Some other goal? How do you measure that you have achieved or are close to your goal? Diversity throughout the whole spectrum of arena rating? Lack of specific meta or constantly changing meta (arguably the same as overall lack of specific meta)? Objective and subjective data - gather, polls, observation.
Those 3 are good candidates.
And then:

  • analyzing objective data gathered, ttk, arena time, dmg, done, healing done…tons of it and interaction between those, not simple, a lot of interactions.
  • plyaing at different brackets with different comps to actually see how it flows - very important, data analyses is integral for balancing, but not enough and sometimes do not express real human interactions very well
  • observing others play at different brackets for the same reasons.
  • fun factor? Quite subjective but surprisingly some things are quite commonly accepted as fun or unfun, gather data, polls if you need to, analyze.
  • …
    Appoint the tools and methods to reach your balance goal, based on all the data you have. Take iterative steps, which should be bigger and more often, and decrease with time in volume and frequency as you repeat the process, and get closer to your balance goal.

Now, part of that above is an excerpt (changed and rephrased to match more WoW) from a PP presentation for balancing of a game (not mmorpg exactly). But a lot of it can be applied to many games. Of course it can be changed, expanded or may not fit Blizzard’s vision at all but, do they actually have one?
And the actual truth - this requires resource. Blizzard doesn’t want to spend it, hence we have half-baked or none balancing in PvP.

15
  1. Priest 19.6% (478)
  2. Paladin 17.5% (428)
  3. Shaman 11.2% (274)
  4. Mage 11.1% (272)
  5. Warrior 9.9% (243)
  6. Druid 7.7% (187)
  7. Monk 6.9% (168)
  8. Rogue 6.7% (163)
  9. Warlock 2.9% (70)
  10. Hunter 2.7% (67)
  11. Death Knight 2.4% (58)
  12. Demon Hunter 1.5% (36)

This is the represantation in 3vs3 at 2400+. Please tell me how is this not an outlier? As i have written in the post shadow also has a good dps spec. You are making counters to my post without even reading it first.
If you would remove the healing specs of the priest it would be still 3rd place in the rankings.

Also on your second point, why we dont see so many resto druids or MW in rankings?
You are saying priest are top place because they are healers, but this doesn’t apply to the other healers.
Priest Discipline 40.5% (282)
Paladin Holy 39.7% (276)
Shaman Restoration 13.6% (95)
Druid Restoration 4.5% (31)
Monk Mistweaver 1.7% (12)

Also you could you at least be bothered to read the post before answering?

1 Like
16

I’m not saying it isn’t. I’m simply asking why you think the outlier(s) are there?

Something will always be first, second, and third. That in itself does not indicate an issue with a spec or class.

It’s fine to point at the numbers, but the follow-up is to deduct something from the numbers that is true, not just blindly make random changes because the numbers say so. You need to identify that which needs to be changed and why it needs to be changed from a gameplay perspective.

No, I said that healers have a high representation in Arena because they are in high demand since every 3v3 team needs a healer.
Individually a class may err more toward a strong dps spec, even if it has a healer option. And that might be the case with Druid and Monk. They both have excellent dps specs with Balance and Windwalker, so the spec popularity errs toward that and not Restoration or Mistweaver.

I have read your posts and I have replied respectfully to them – in detail and at length.
Please don’t insinuate that I am disregarding the points you’ve made just because I don’t agree with the premise you put forth.

17

I don’t see your point, how does this change the fact that it would be a better idea to buff underperforming healers instead of nerfing the working ones.

Also, “miles ahead of any other healer” when at 2.4+ Disc has a higher rep doesn’t sound right to me. If you go higher than that, the sample size gets too small to draw any useful conclusion anyways. And even if you do, at 2600+ there’s only 8 more Hpals(46) than Discs(38) out of 101 healers in total. The next spot is Rsham(10).

Hpal and Disc are way ahead of any other healer, if anything.

18

I consider an outlier a class which has far more representation at all levels of the arena. This is not a case that a class is better at higher or lower level of play. Arena representation is quite similar from 1400-2400.
Also Shadow priests outnumber windwalker and balance+ feral.
So priest are the best healer and also the 3rd best dps.
Shadow priest currently outnumber the last 3 classes in representation. 3 class with all specs. Shadow is not even the best priest spec.

19

Sure. But that still doesn’t identify what the problem is.

Let’s say Discipline Priest is an outlier.
And so is Restoration Druid.

One is over-represented, one is under-represented.

But because they’re both healers, then there’s a symbiosis between them.

If there are many Discipline Priests, then there aren’t spots for many Restoration Druids.

If Restoration Druid is weak, then Discipline Priest being mediocre would still be over-represented.

So even though Restoration Druid and Discipline Priest can both be identified as outliers, that doesn’t necessarily mean that both are in need of changes.
Changing one indirectly affects the other.
So which one is it that needs changes?

I think there’s also a gameplay perspective to consider. Again, balancing solely around numbers does not a good game make. Maybe you achieve numerical balance, but that doesn’t have to translate to gameplay balance.

I would argue that both Discipline Priest and Restoration Druid are well-designed specs that are generally well-balanced.

The difference between the two is the environment. Discipline Priest thrives in a fast-paced environment, whereas Restoration Druid thrives in a slow-paced environment.

That is a by-product of their design.
Discipline Priest revolves around healing through damage which excels in a fast-paced and offensive game environment, which is what we currently have.
Restoration Druid revolves around heal-over-time effects and mana efficiency, which excels in a slow-paced environment where attrition is a focus-point. That used to be the environment Arena often found itself in.

Just because the two specs excel in different gameplay environment doesn’t mean either one is imbalanced. It just means they have different strengths and weaknesses. And that is a good thing. If every class and spec has to be balanced to perform the same in all gameplay environments, then there’s no true distinction between classes. Then you’re seeking to homogenize everything to perform the same, making the variation of gameplay a farce if the result is the same everywhere anyway.

Again, numerical balance is not a goal onto itself. That’s just homogenization, and that’s hardly a goal to strive for in a game that is meant to offer differentiation between classes and specs.

20

you cant even read charts correctly.
You have to look at each spec individually not at each class.
because shadow for example is not an outliner. they are a top tier s tier spec but warrios and mages as dps have far more representation at 2400+ which you dont even mention.

I dont think any class is godmode right now. Only thing i would nerf is convoke and prot palys