I wanted to share some thoughts on how PvP boosting is negatively impacting World of Warcraft, especially for those of us who genuinely enjoy competitive play.
The rise of boosting services has created an environment where skill no longer matters as much as gold or real-world money. It’s frustrating to queue into rated arenas or RBGs and constantly face teams that are clearly being carried. It devalues the rating system and undermines the satisfaction of climbing through skill and teamwork.
For newer or returning players, it’s even worse. They get discouraged fast when they’re up against boosted teams, making it harder to learn and enjoy PvP. It creates a toxic imbalance that pushes real competitors away and rewards those gaming the system.
PvP should be about strategy, practice, and personal growth—not about buying your way to Gladiator. Blizzard needs to take a harder stance on this, or risk losing more of the competitive player base that has kept PvP alive for so long.
Curious to hear how others feel—has boosting affected your PvP experience?
Appreciate your post and totally understand where you’re coming from. As someone who also enjoys the competitive nature of PvP, it’s frustrating when it feels like the integrity of the ladder is being undermined. No one enjoys queuing into a team where it’s obvious one player’s making all the plays while the others are just trying to keep up (or stay alive).
But here’s the flip side—boosting, for better or worse, exists because the current system isn’t welcoming to newer or time-constrained players. The skill gap, gear disparity, and general learning curve in rated PvP are brutal. Boosting—at least in some cases—is the only way some players feel they can even participate. It’s not just about paying to win—it’s sometimes paying to be included.
Does it devalue the rating system? Maybe. But one could argue the system already devalues itself when people face gatekeeping, toxicity, and no real incentives for long-term participation. Boosting didn’t cause those issues—it’s just a symptom.
And sure, I’d love a world where PvP is only about strategy and growth. But that world probably also includes better matchmaking, rating inflation control, more coaching tools, and better rewards for playing well, not just for winning.
At the end of the day, if boosting is pushing you out of the scene, I’d say the bigger failure is on Blizzard—not the players trying to survive in a broken system.
But hey, maybe one day the devs will implement real fixes—right after the AI starts healing properly and stops bubble-bopping random pets
Blizzard profits from people buying boosting services. Besides, when you’re facing boosters that means they have atleast 1 bot in their team so it balances out.
it is but you cant stop boosting for gold in an mmo rpg when 95% of content allows groups, mythic raiding gladiator etc all are available if u pay gold, i think only achievments that dont count are like famed slayer or r1 in wow. ofc im talking about self play here cuz other ppl playing for u should result in a ban
I tried to help 1 total noob to teach some arena ropes. Im not r1 player casual andy, but compared to him I was pro. We played for a week or so, I could not talk him in to equip medallion trinket, at all, cos he enjoyed passive trinkets. So against rogues it was auto lose. We struggled at around 1800 ratings. I went away for few days, logged in and he was gladiator, he bought a boost :d he did offer to buy for me boost also, I declined and removed him from my friend list.
We got new gladiator in our ranks.
I added some from ss once till they were bragging to use something to insta kill totems without having to target or think about it so I removed. I dont care hear about any cheats or scripts or play with any, also not a surprise that there are r1 who bot or use some scripts. Right call, whats the use of knowing people who cant play game without cheats. And if you try play with some ppl who only buy boosts then you are just trying hard carry some anchor. The people that buy boost each season are the most lost in any game. Nobody will ever improve in anything by just cheating either.
This. And it applies to all boosting, both PvP and PvE.
Because in WoW, you´re either a hyper sweatlord that nolifes the first 2 weeks of every season to an arguably unhealthy degree, or you don´t deserve to participate after week 3 starts.
Don´t have AotC week 1? Have fun getting into even NHC groups.
Dont have full elite set by teh end of week 2? Have fun grinding your way up against people that do.
We had a system in WoD specifically in PvP that made a level laying field passible and took gear out of the equation almost entirely.
And PvPers hated it to teh point of absurdity, because it meant they couldn´t get an advantage over other players. Yes, it had flaws, but none of them insurmountable… except that players never wanted a fair playing fireld to begin with. Today´s PvP scene might be different (though when I read some of the takes by some players, i highly doubt it), but effectively WoD-era PvPers killed any desire for most to even try because it became blatantly obvious that for the majority it was in fact always about being able to deprive others of any chance to reach the same level, much less actually present what yould be regarded as a fair fight.
Rated pvp has never in the games history been as easy to get into as it is now. Never.
Seriously, go back to wotlk, if you didn’t roll on a large pvp server and/or managed to get to know people interested in pvp you weren’t doing arenas. At all.
I dont agree, you can just spam blitz/ss any given time of the season. There is no need to buy boost to play soloqs or gain seasonal ranks and its not mandatory to start playing start of season either if you dont want to. Pvp is the most accessible now than it has ever been, ppl can just que and play if they can stomach the long waiting times. The only thing that is wrong in pvp now is the long ques and the rated system itself is outdated and failing from people being split in dozen modes and expansions.
Not to sound facetious, but the entire game is by far more accessible than it´s ever been.
But we still have the same number of daily whines about 3-4 different classes being OP because someone can´t cope with pressing their buttons, and it´s no different on the PVE side. And all of teh other “suggestions” are generally also either regurgitated versions of things that have either been tried and failed, or things no sane person actually has to try to know what will happen.
Naja, long story short, Just because something is more accessible doesn´t necessarily make it more attractive. Shorter queue times for example might (which at present would more likely than not simply lead to wildly mismatched skill legels which helps nobody), but I dare say that´s a symptom of the attractiveness being low and not the cause.
That is true, balancing has been atrocious as always, fury owned half season till they received nerf but it was way too slow. Fistweaver could use some nerfs now. But still, ppl dont need to buy boosts or anything to gain seasonal ranks. But all who buy boost usually say something like “I could otherwise but I dont have time” which is the oldest excuse ppl lie to themselves to justify something
i dont play retail anymore as the win trading and greifing makes me ILL also tilts me so i lose my mind ive been suspended multiple times for language against players doing this and nothing happens to them so whats the point in playing? even if they were to get banned end of season which they rarely do people still do it and you have to endure people playing like this all season its a waste of time
Boosting was causing harm, but frankly. If we’re talking about proper prestige, solo shuffle and BGB is probably doing just as much harm, if not more harm than Boosting ever did, the number of clueless 0 skill players with basically no match up knowledge betwen 1800 & 2.2k is wild and even to some amount 2.4 is relatively infested
Boosting pages selling boosts like bread in bakery…
Easy solution: Make rewards aviable only for people who play throu entire season, introduce ratting decay, minimum games played for titles etc… Im sorry but when I see guy with 50 games played on top ladder it asap smells fishy and stinks.
