I don’t play to give up.
At a time when more often than not people are lamenting the lack of difficult PvE encounters, I have chosen to spend my time playing against people, unpredictable people, in PvP encounters.
Katherine commented on my last post that people probably just want to collect their honor for the loss and start again.
I’m sure she’s right, after all 3 quick losses will give you the same honor as one long win and significantly more than one drawn our loss.
Still I don’t play for honor points, I play for battleground honor.
The honor of knowing I never gave up, I gave as good as I can for as long as the battle lasted.
Really, we are lucky to get honor for a loss.
Imagine a boss kill attempt, where you are given gold and epics for taking the boss to 30%. You only get rewards in PvE for successfully completing a task.
When I enter a BG, it is to win it.
If I can’t win it, then I am going to do everything in my power to make the Horde earn their win.
I won’t let the Horde 5 cap, or 3 cap in WSG, or any other feat if I can help it.
They don’t deserve that win while I breath unless they completely dominate me.
Imagine once again a PvE encounter, where at 30% health the Boss lays down his flaming axe, submits and hands you an achievement.
You didn’t earn it, you don’t deserve it. You want the hard fight and the achievement is the acknowledgement that you had what it takes.
If that same boss used to be hard, but got hit by the Blizzard Nerf Stick, you would be pretty pissed off if every man and their Gnome got the achievement.
When I get an achievement in a BG, I want to earn it and I can assure you I am not going to hand them out to the Horde like party poppers at a kids birthday party.
If they want the achievement, they better bloody earn it. My team mates better make them earn it, else they are nothing better than the Alliance Deserters the Horde keep in pig pens in Borean Tundra.
Quitters make me sick in the stomach. The amount of energy they expend harassing other players, bemoaning a lost game is crazy. Generally they suck the energy out of everyone else, occasionally they drive people on to new heights by realizing what a tosser they are playing with.
Often at the time they are proclaiming at the top of their CAPS KEY that we are all noobs that need to L2P, we the noobs are taking control of the BG once again.
I’ve mentioned how I love the close WSG battles, but they come in the other BGs as well, including Arathi Basin.
In AB, there is even more pressure to NOT give up. There is an achievement on the line. I want it, they want it. They don’t want me to have it and I will bust a gut, capping the last node of the game with seconds to spare.
Those games. They are the ones that force you from your chair in jubilation or frustration. They make the game worth playing.
I was in an AB with some Frostmorne heroes with their “I’m the top of the leader board, which proves how crap you are.”
Yet if they, the organised ones, guarded nodes instead of racing about like the rest of the pugs, the game can easily be won.
That’s how I play with my mates.
If there are 3 of us, we can protect 2 nodes, and we will, while the pugs hunt for more nodes.
Occasionally an opportunity will arise for us to take advantage of and we will, but usually the best use of our superior communications is calling support over the two nodes we are protecting.
No heroics… just game winning sense.
I wont give up, because sometimes you lose some, sometimes you win some, and sometimes those games are decided by tens of points at the end, when at the beginning it seemed impossible.
When those achievements come, whether 1st game, or 262nd game.. they are worth it, because you tried and wiped, but never gave up.
Gnomer and Out!
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I was beginning to think that I was alone in having this attitude towards BGs. Excellent post.
/salute
My youngest kid, who enjoys watching me struggle in BG’s as someone learning the ropes of the all unpredictable PvP part of the game, will often walk out of the room when I start yelling at the screen when I see quitters. Whether it’s people who, after the first minute and we’re down 2 bases to 3 in AB, or people who get fed up and quit the BG entirely, it makes my blood boil in a way a DK would be jealous.
It’s not that I hate it WHEN people quit, it’s that I actually hate people WHO quit. I subtle distinction, but there it is…
Couldn’t agree more!
Always play to win, it defines who you are.
I level tanks for fun, and it irritates me to no end when I am more than double the next dps.
My leveling partner gets to listen to me yell over vent about slackers and people that don’t, or won’t, take a little time to figure out their class.
Our next toons are going the same route, but through battlegrounds, should be a fun learning experience
Keep up the good articles Gnomer!
Totally agree. Got the similar achievement in the Battle for Gilneas the other day – the one that involves coming from behind after a 500 resource deficit to win. Just a couple of us that had concluded that it wasn’t over and we could still turn it.
Too many times you hear people saying – just let them cap and get it over with. Not as long as there is another opponent to set fire to!
I’ve said it before – but I’ll say it again – it’s those close games that are the best – giving up is never a winning or enjoyable strategy. The one advantage of the bonus HP for winning is that it generally means the winning teams doesn’t stop ‘playing’ and start farming honor kills as much.
But it’s the ones that point to the score boards and complain that get to me. Classic one for me recently was in a WSG one mage was yelling at everyone – ‘this is why we are losing – looking at your damage people it’s pathetic’… otherwise known as ‘look at me’ however whenever I looked at the map he was always in the middle, nowhere near either flag. I spent my time trying to recover our flag… and most of that time in frozen, iced, slowed and pretty much out of range of everyone because 5/10 of their team were frost mages (although admittedly I had forgotten I could cleanse myself of some of those as I was playing ret at the time).
Great post!
I agree with everything you had to say. Mind of a warrior! I think just the same way when on the battlefield. If only everyone shared the same attitude and mentality.
Keep them comming,
- Jamin
I always felt that with everything else in rapid decline, PvP was still one of the places to find challenge in WoW. unfortunately they have experimented and tampered with PvP to no end in this game, but I guess you can still find comfort in the thought that your opponent is no script at least. So anyway, more power to you!
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