Rules for Raiding

I don't raid much, leaving that category of stress to my wife, but having finally downed KT yesterday (in a pug, of course, not my guild...*loving eyeroll*) I feel in the mood to link you to Simple Rules for Raiding put up by a bloggy newcomer. And a lock, to boot...why does it keep turning out that all my blog-reads are locks when I don't even play one? *sigh*.

Redheaded Warsong Stepchild

Meanwhile, to nobody's great surprise, WSG bottoms the list of Holiday places to visit :

Winning : 54.9
Losing : 28.87
Overall : 41.33
Mark Honor : 22.49

TOTAL BG HONOR : 63.83

This is a terrible number, consider that on a NON-holiday I could go to AB and pull out numbers in the mid-80s, and that's comparable across other non-holiday BGs (with the exception, of course, of WSG, which on a non-holiday is pulling about 60 at the moment). WSG is NOT the place to go, not even close.

For a better idea, look at the updated holiday chart -- WSG is pulling less than half of what AV does on a holiday. That ain't right, yo.

This got me thinking, what can blizzard do to increase honor in this BG to a comparable level? There's two things, I think -- they could increase honor for flag caps, or they could give us honor for returning flags. I've started tracking how many returns go in on a BG and it's coming to about 3.5 a game. On a holiday weekend, capping the flag gives you 124 honor; if you were awarded similar honor for returning a flag, there'd be an extra...what...434 honor every game, divided over the 21.6 minute average, giving about an extra 20.09 HPM for the BG. Then the total HPM chart (holiday) would read more like:

AB: 79.19
WSG: 83.92
IOC: 86.44
EOTS: 88.56
SOTA: 97.59
AV: 146.42

which is a much closer grouping (the beast that is AV excepted, of course) and I think more in line with what Blizzard is probably aiming for; I doubt it was their intention to make any one BG wildly better, or worse, than the others. NOTE TO BLIZ: PLEASE DON'T NERF AV BECAUSE I SAID THAT.

But let's not put too much faith in blizzard...this is the company that in attempting to make WSG shorter, made it longer. But this isn't the time to reopen that complaint, I suppose :-).

Updated Holiday HPM

ETA 4/2/10 : With the drastic revamp of 3.3.3 the old data is wildly outdated (except as relative values one to the other)! I have started a new chart, but kept the old one below it as a relic of bygone days :-)

The new, 3.3.3 Values:

Holiday Battleground	Winning HPM	Losing HPM	Overall HPM	Overall Percentages
Alterac Valley	530.83	123.2	357.37	100%
Arathi Basin	241.39	87.86	171.28	48%
Eye of the Storm	283.92	126.32	204.76	57%
Strand of the Ancients	262.84	106.55	170.76	48%
Warsong Gulch	205.65	92.41	138.84	39%

The old, 3.3.2 Values:

Holiday Battleground	Winning HPM	Losing HPM	Overall HPM	Overall Percentages
Alterac Valley	110.78	63.94	120.37	100%
Arathi Basin	60.5	43.64	81.67	68%
Eye of the Storm	78.22	33.68	88.56	73%
Strand of the Ancients	86.86	39.84	97.59	79%
Isle of Conquest	63.37	43.99	86.44	72%
Warsong Gulch	54.9	28.87	63.83	51%

Last Edited : 7/20/2010

AV : The Smell of Win

Like wow, is Alterac Valley my friend on holiday weekend. I've done 12 games so far, and will update tomorrow with more b/c with numbers like this I'm certainly not stopping. I went 7-5, not quite a good representation as our battlegroup runs 48% win, and the numbers came out :

Winning HPM : 100.17 / 132.86*
Losing HPM : 95.41
Overall HPM : 97.69 / 113.36*
Mark Honor : 33.06

TOTAL BG HONOR, AV-HOLIDAY : 130.75 / 146.42*

A word of explanation is in order. The first number, in the places above where two are listed, is an unadjusted number using my standard mathematics elucidated elsewhere. However, two of my seven wins were turtles, which SHAFTED the honor per minute rate (down to around 40, even when we won). However, those were the only two games overall that went that way. Because I have a comparatively small sample size here (as yet) I modified my winning numbers by multiplying the non-turtle wins by 80% and the turtle ones by 20% to reduce the, IMO, overly prejudicial impact those numbers were having. Outstandingly noticeable out of this run, five out of my seven wins (the non-turtle ones) and two of the losses (!) gave in excess of 120 HPM, which is a ridiculously lovely number when you consider that other BGs on holiday you're happy to get 85.

My theory is that the way in which holidays give you extra honor is based on attaining different BG objectives (capping a flag in WSG is the easy example here), and b/c AV is so big that it has so many different objectives, there's lots of room to rack up tons of bonus honor. OTOH, to take one win that I did that was a scant 50 seconds from Stormpike Perfection, one of the turtle wins, we only did about 90 hpm despite keeping all our towers and burning all of theirs, keeping balinda, etc. So maybe I'm just full of crap.

I'll post a chart tomorrow after I update my sheet for the end of the holiday, but these quick percentage numbers should convey the magnitude of awesomeness that AV on holiday is :

Total numbers, bg + marks:

AV : 100%
SOTA : 67%
EOTS : 60%
IOC : 59%
AB : 54%

Only Warsong Gulch left and I can make a comprehensive post on holiday weekends...next weekend FTW, especially since my Sox just got swept out of the ALDS and aren't going to be starting the ALCS then :-\.

All Wintergrasp, all the time

Cynwise has put up a very nice, easy to follow guide to Wintergrasp over at her blog. Complete with pictures and diagrams for those of you who, like me, are sometimes too lazy to actually read something.

Of particular interest to me :

"waves of siege should be sent against the walls with the intent of punching through and creating multiple breaches for the defenders to have to deal with. Generally, if the offense can split the defense inside the keep, any one wave should be enough to overwhelm one wall and courtyard."

but the whole thing is worth a read!

Holiday HPM Chart

I promised, and I deliver :

Holiday Battleground	Winning HPM	Losing HPM	Overall HPM (inc. marks)	Overall Percentages
Arathi Basin	59.48	49.27	77.83	80%
Eye of the Storm	78.22	33.68	88.56	91%
Strand of the Ancients	86.86	39.84	97.59	100%
Isle of Conquest	63.37	43.99	86.44	89%