Same faction battlegrounds -- e.g. Horde vs Horde - like RBGs

[Swes-draenor]

A proposed solution to the long battleground queues

I think its pretty clear given by the state of these forum posts that the players are un-happy with the long battleground queues, and so are a lot of people who are being killed in w-pvp as a result of this. This change doesn't effect any other part of the game like mirroring racials or rebalancing them does :frowning:

Mercenary Mode ❌

Although Mercenary mode may help the queue times for Horde, I'm personally not in favour of this system. I chose Tauren because I want to play Tauren, I don't want to have to be a gnome just so I can evade 1.5 hour queue times, if I wanted to be alliance I would have chosen alliance.

Rebalancing Racials ❌

I think just about everyone can agree that rebalancing racials is a bad "solution", not only would this effect the rest of the game but another meta would just develop.

To my knowledge Blizzard attempted this again in WOTLK and ended up adding Every man for Himself, so I expect people to mass-reroll alliance for WOTLK PvP

Same faction battlegrounds ✔️

I personally think the best solution is giving us the ability to queue into the same factions in Battlegrounds, just like Arena / RBGs function. This solution doesn't effect any other part of the game or meta like having human racial on an orc would.

I understand some people think this change “affects the lore” but does it really if this exists in RBGs / Arena?

Combining this post with a comment I made as a sort-of continuation of the post

➡️ I may repeat some things below, I'll clean it up soon enough ⬅️

Reasoning

It all just comes down to actually wanting to play the game. Nobody wants to wait a 1.5 hour queue for a single battleground and nobody can deny that. No, It’s not comparable to wanting LFG and It’s not fair to tell us to go back to retail, I really like TBC… I just want to actually be able to PVP in it, which is why I and you rolled on a PVP server.

Gatekeeping changes and understanding the benefits of implementation

I don’t care how butt-hurt people are over being ganked in P2 and being ganked now, as countless people have said, this the only real way to gain honor as horde unless you have time and/or want to queue for 1.5hr (and that’s assuming you win). This change would reduce the amount of World PVP farming and benefit the alliance as well.

Faction Imbalance

I agree there’s a huge faction imbalance, but I disagree that allowing players to queue into the same faction would take anything but a small minority of alliance (that was only there for the queue time) away, and I completely disagree with “the only reason to be alliance is for the queues” when alliance is known for not PVP’ing as much as horde.

Clarification

Just to clarify, when I say same faction BG I mean exactly how RBGs and Arena work, is it really lore breaking if these systems already existed in the older versions of the game?

I really do think allowing players to queue into the same faction has such a minimal effect on the rest of the game.

What I disagree with

Mirroring racials

I completely disagree with the idea of changing racials or mirroring them (this has huge game-wide effects that can be meta defining for PvE and PvP and would ultimately change the game).

Mercenary mode

I also disagree with the idea of mercenary mode, I see this the same as RBG style except my character is suddenly a gnome unless I would want to wait a 1.5 hour queue, I don’t want to be a gnome - that’s why I chose horde.

I do understand that this is seen to bring more to the alliance - but is it really? They’re still horde, you can’t interact with them after the battleground, they don’t affect your economy, they don’t affect your queue times.

Why It’s unfair

I understand some can see this as a player made issue, and in many ways it is (although boosting would have had an effect on this), and I completely understand that having horde reroll alliance would reduce queues but here’s why this mindset is unfair and too optimistic.

You cannot expect such a huge majority of the horde playerbase to reroll alliance after arleady having:

• All there friends / guild on horde
• Achievements, legendaries, gear and characters on horde

It’s so unfair to ask someone to completely abandon their characters for this, who would want to do this? The majority of people would just quit the game.

FOTM Rerollers

My understanding of it

I do understand that the horde has had a lot of rerollers for TBC. A lot of things have effected this and some examples are:

• Blood elves
• FOTM rerollers
• Boosting enabling FOTM rerolling more

Although I can sit and argue that a LOT of the alliance racials are insane for PvP (e.g. Gnome for warrior, Dwarf for priest and other classes, human vs stealth), the player-base is aware that the horde racials are stronger in more aspects of the game and less niche.

FOTM Rerolling - WOTTLK

The playerbase has to understand that this is 2021, although I love the old game and have fond memories of it, the playerbase is not the same. Everybody is more aware of what’s best for them and most people do not like to “intentionally make their character worse”.

I fear that in WOTLK we will see a huge majority of FOTM rerollers transfer to the Alliance, especially if Blizzard is planning to add a “Frozen Path pass” or something like the “Dark Portal Pass”, I mean why wouldn’t they? They had already added it for TBC. This makes me support the idea of RBG style battlegrounds being implemented even more, why would I want to reroll alliance just to be faced with the same problem in a year, but this time I have to lose all my new progress to go back to the horde?

Free one-way Faction Changes

I do think a free one-way Faction change could be very beneficial for this, and lower queue times by a huge margin, but there’s a few problems with this…

• You would have to move all of your characters to the Alliance, TBC doesn’t support having horde and alliance on the same account
• If this service is free, how do Blizzard control the amount of players that transfer? This could very likely result in the service being paid only.
• Is the idea of having the service free until the H/A alliance ratio is 50/50 fair? What if you’re one of the last few to transfer, and your friends didn’t make it.
• What if not enough people change?
• How would this affect the economy?
• How would it feel as a player of the Horde to suddenly lose population? Some may feel as if the game is dying.

There’s a lot to think about when implementing changes, some can have such a huge butter-fly effect.

Sorry if there’s some wild structure in this response, I think I got a bit carried away

I really hope Blizzard does atleast something about queues, even if some people have a grudge against the horde I’m sure everyone can understand that is ultimately frustrating to wait 1.5 hour for a queue and that nobody intended for the queues to be this long.

[Bodiebonk-gehennas]

@Swes-draenor

I personally think the best solution is giving us the ability to queue into the same factions in Battlegrounds

Horde already dominate most realms and all but one pvp realm. They have all the advantages in both pve and pvp and dominate world content like quest hubs, summoning stones and farming areas. That’s why the majority choose that faction.

Do you think that removing the only negative for that faction would help faction balance or make it worse?

[Eyehaveyou-earthshaker]

Merc mode would be better, alliance lacks pvp players. Faction change would be even better.

[Bodiebonk-gehennas]

@Eyehaveyou-earthshaker

Merc mode would be better, alliance lacks pvp players.

Horde already dominate most realms and all but one pvp realm. They have all the advantages in both pve and pvp and dominate world content like quest hubs, summoning stones and farming areas. That’s why the majority choose that faction.

Do you think that removing the only negative for that faction would help faction balance or make it worse?

@Eyehaveyou-earthshaker

Faction change would be even better.

Do you think the game would be more fun if we remove the value of choosing a faction?

I mean it’s super easy to make suggestions to “solve” a queue problem. But you need to focus on OTHER things, the CONCEQUNCES of your suggestions.

[Swes-draenor]

I think the only people it would stop choosing alliance are the people who re-roll because the queue times are so long for horde, whilst also stopping mass horde from quitting (which I guess would make the queue shorter, but is having people quit really a solution to that?)

Allowing these people to go back to the faction/race they prefer would be better for them imo. There’s always going to be a fotm faction.

Lemme know if there’s anything I missed

[Eyehaveyou-earthshaker]

I think faction change is the solution here, but what I was saying is that Merc mode is better than horde vs horde bgs.

And yes I think some population control is needed in this game.

[Черница-chromie]

So you are proposing mercenary mode, but on steroids? Even most Horde biased retail has Mercenary mode that forces you to use our racials 70% of the time.

Name any reason for new player or existing Alliance PvP player to play for the Alliance after Retail Mercenary mode of more so after cringy change you are proposing.

[Bodiebonk-gehennas]

@Eyehaveyou-earthshaker

I think faction change is the solution here, but what I was saying is that Merc mode is better than horde vs horde bgs.

Ok but what about the NEGATIVES?

You are making a low effort suggestion to a specific “problem”. But HOW WOULD THIS AFFECT OTHER ASPECTS OF THIS GAME?

Talk about that.

[Morgomir-noggenfogger]

@Bodiebonk-gehennas

Do you think that removing the only negative for that faction would help faction balance or make it worse?

Unfortunately, this is how it has to be. Alliance have a simple solution, transfer off pvp servers. Open world pvp is a gimmick anyway. And the over all faction ratio is good enough, so the majority of pvp players shouldn’t suffer 1,5hours queues because of this.

[Swes-draenor]

No I’m proposing Merc mode except you get to play the race you chose to play, why would I want to be a gnome all day everyday in BGs when I chose a tauren? Should I wait 1.5hrs to be the race I want to be?

You’d be alliance for the same reason you are now.

[Bodiebonk-gehennas]

@Morgomir-noggenfogger

Alliance have a simple solution, transfer off pvp servers.

Ok so your solution to ruining faction balance to lower the queue time for Horde in bgs is to have Alliance players move away from pvp realms making it even worse.

How dumb is that? Are you serious?

[Swes-draenor]

I don’t understand how people think Merc mode is better and that it helps faction im-balance.

You’re still horde, just queued as Alliance. It’s just the same as Horde vs Horde except your race and racial changes to something you didn’t want or else you would’ve already been that race, right?

Am I missing something?

[Bodiebonk-gehennas]

@Swes-draenor

You’re still horde, just queued as Alliance.

Do you think more or less players would choose Horde faction over Alliance with a merc mode?

[Morgomir-noggenfogger]

@Bodiebonk-gehennas

Ok so your solution to ruining faction balance to lower the queue time for Horde in bgs is to have Alliance players move away from pvp realms making it even worse.

How dumb is that? Are you serious?

What is your solution to 1,5+ hours queue times? “re-roll alliance” ? Well, that is a more dumb solution than a simple server transfer.

[Eyehaveyou-earthshaker]

I don’t know really, of course everything has both sides. Faction change wouldn’t alter the game itself. It would affect the economy, but maybe put a cap on gold when transferring from horde to alliance. Also I think it should be only from horde to alliance at this point in time, maybe depending on realm population.

Nothing too bad comes to mind about faction change for me at the moment.

[Swes-draenor]

I have absolutely zero doubts that the LARGE majority of players would choose having a random racial and race they don’t really want over a 1.5 hr queue

I think the people who re-roll to alliance because of the insane queue times are likely to go back to horde, but how is this a bad thing? They get to be the race they actually want, and with Horde vs Horde they can do that without slaughtering queue times

And even then we’ll just see a reserve of this in WoTLK right?

[Eyehaveyou-earthshaker]

I’m playing alliance now and we are losing almost all pug bg’s because so many pvp players are on horde side. Merc mode would level the playfield, horde v horde would not.

[Bodiebonk-gehennas]

@Morgomir-noggenfogger

What is your solution to 1,5+ hours queue times?

It’s a consequence of player choice. Nothing more nothing less. Let players make choices and deal with their choices. That’s the only solution in this recreation of a game.

@Morgomir-noggenfogger

“re-roll alliance” ? Well, that is a more dumb solution than a simple server transfer.

We don’t need “solutions” in this recreation of a game.

The queue is a consequence of player choice. Players can make a different choice or DEAL WITH IT.

[Черница-chromie]

I will, but my Faction will diminish, just like it happened on Retail. Only in retail Mercenary mode was added in 6.2.2. so you can wait for WoD Classic if you want to.

[Morgomir-noggenfogger]

Pathetic response. People will not accept 1,5hours queues and will leave the game. Just transfer to a PVE server where you belong, and let horde have shorter queue times.