I have not previously participated in forum discussions, but I’ve been an active PvP player for over 15 years. In that time, I’ve never seen the state of large-scale battlegrounds deteriorate to the extent it has now. What prompted me to write this is the recent decision to introduce a new 40v40 battleground, despite ongoing balance issues in existing ones.
Many players are expressing frustration in 40v40 environments, and understandably so. These battlegrounds often create conditions that foster negative behavior. Simply issuing bans or penalties to players who react poorly, without addressing the underlying design flaws that contribute to the toxicity, is both ineffective and unreasonable.
To be clear, the root cause of toxicity in these scenarios is not inherently the players. Rather, it is the structure and lack of meaningful updates to the content.
For example, Alterac Valley has become a race to the final boss. Most incoming damage is easily healed through, and the strategic value of towers has significantly diminished.
Taking another example, Isle of Conquest, which currently appears most frequently in the random battleground rotation, presents even more apparent design issues. The battleground is decided almost entirely by the outcome of the initial teamfight. Losing Hangar results in a near-certain defeat. Capturing the mid lane offers no real strategic advantage, and the Docks are similarly obsolete, as Glaive Throwers have minimal durability and are easily destroyed.
If the goal is to reduce toxicity, then the solution lies not only in community moderation but also in addressing the gameplay systems that create frustration. These are not environments shaped by player behavior. They are the result of design decisions and ongoing neglect.
I feel like this is just not true at all.
When in the recent past have players fought more over towers and GYs in Alterac than now when the horde plays defense in every round?
I agree that WS and docks are underpowered, but hangar can be taken back by a focused enough push. Most teams leave it poorly defended after taking it in the start. Regroup and attack with 20 players or more and its not hard to take back. If that fails, defending the keep and playing for resources is an option.
AV is not being played that way, and if it is, it’s because premades are doing so. Most pugs it’s a rush to the boss, ignore all towers and maybe win on resources. IF by then you still have a good amount of players.
Recall to base should also not be a toy that you have to obtain in a certain way. It should be an action button for everyone in the battleground. New players have a hard time as is with the absolutely bloated UI, let alone having to find the toy to recall (that is if they even know it exists).
Ofcourse, that’s how it should be played. It’s just not happening.
What you’re mentioning, is wishful thinking. Defending the keep is nearly imposible. Because Hangar is such a choke point, most players leave after it’s lost and you will have an almost complete new group of 40 people by the end of the game.
Leading into another topic → joining ongoing bgs after 30+ minute queues and realising you’re in a losing team. That for sure motivates people.
Whenever I played for the alliance, the horde would wait at iceblood, regardless if they have a leader / premade or not. I guess it works well for them since alliance, for some reason, always rushes in, splits their raid and rewards them with a free win, so they keep doing it.
Anyway, proper alteracs with fights for towers and GYs are probably more common nowadays than rushes. It’s also pretty hard to kill the Boss with 3 or 4 marshals / warmasters, which is good.
Maybe more players here can tell how often they play Alterac in rush mode (riding past each other) or proper. I think much more players will say they have more games where they fight for towers.
It’s literally free.
I make sure everyone has access to it by marking the NPC who sells it and call for its use by /rw when it’s necessary. That usually results in enough people recalling to recap.
No, it’s practical reality. It’s hard to defend the base when the attackers send everyone in and half of your team is outside at docks doing nothing of value for the team.
If you get them to regroup in the base, it’s very hard for the attackers to cap the keep flag. Then you hold ref and quarry and deplete their resources, maybe you can even down their gate once their attacks become less frequent which is -50 lives for the other team and then you can also kill their boss.
You always have 5-10 deserters that leave right after losing the hangar zerg and once your team is refilled, you attack again, all together. If you have workshop, you can bring demos to the push, if not, regroup in base and go from there. Just need to have one big push with 25+ players who attack at the same time and you can quickly overwhelm the few defenders at hangar.
I find that most “epic” BGs are basically just groups mindlessly headbutting until the timer/resources run out, with very little strategical play. Most people aren’t knowledgeable enough to twist an epic BG into something fun. Mainly ordinary Ashran is absolutely mindnumbing. IoC also when the losing group is headlocked, and lacks the intelligence/knowledge to come up with any counter strategy.
For me personally, yes.
I prefer Alterac with actual PvP.
This is true and also kinda sad, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Tactics make epic bgs a lot more interesting and they don’t require a lot of effort, just a bit of communication with your team. The results are great and it’s not hard to do. Comebacks like recapturing hangar become possible.
nothing is important in Epic Battlegrounds when you are with joe half pve half pvp items and rest of his friends that are the same and your enemy team is full of veteran pvp players all with crafted or conquest gear.
that premade groups in bgs ruined pvp
maybe blizzard is doing nothing in order to kill pvp for good or they just dont care,
all im saying is this. its very Embarrassing for a $70 billion company to not be able to fix such problems in an online game in 2025.
I used to think they did not care , so they did not fix these 40 man bgs .
But it seems the truth is they specifically leave imbalance in them to force 40 vs 40 fights .
The description of the new battleground
“Players will begin on opposite sides of the map and initially make their way to the middle where a 40 vs 40 brawl will take place over an initial control point that will give the controlling party an early advantage in the map.”
40 vs 40 mid fights are the worst that PvP can offer . They are PvE aoe fest for the ranged and healer . They are horrid for any mele players as they get sniped by 20 players if they get close .
They produce so much lag that even people with high end new rigs run at like 20 FPS . Let alone others who are stuck at 5 .
But they keep forcing these 40 vs 40 fights .
An epic 40 man bg should have been a bg with many many objectives , where you can take small parties , or huge armies and contribute to the overall result .
It should be a place where stealthers can go to the enemy bases and cause havoc .
Where mele can pick off careless players , or push tough enemies .
Where every point has some strategic meaning and should be contested over .
Where you have varied terrain like open fields , cliffs , water , lava , pillars , slowing swamps , reduced visibility . Everything you can think of . Stuff where you can really have fun.
The whole point of 40 man bgs should be that you have 80 people and you can exercise numerous strategies to win and every bg should be a new experience .
Or you can make 5 40 vs 40 bgs and have them all be 80 man mindless midfield fight , but with different background scenery .