Flux

It’s an embarrassing fact of life. And most have had it or have given it to someone else, PvP Disease. It starts when a player, and you know who you are, joins your party or raid who is flagged PvP. And it quickly spreads like the plague when others start buffing and healing. Of course if you play on a PvP server you are immune, or more accurately you always have it.

Why is this a problem? There is of course the annoyance of getting ganked outside an instance or whereever you are grouping up. This particularly bothers healers and tanks who can’t always fight back. But more importantly when some players are flagged and some are not, it interferes with group buffs. This can cripple your groups effectiveness. And players typically will eventually have to buff two or three times to work things out which costs reagents and generates real life aggro.

What can you do? It is incredibly easy to stop this disease. Take a ride from any flight point. As soon as you do, the PvP flag is immediately removed.

Note that in patch 2.4.3 any time you zone into an instance on a PvE server you are automatically unflagged. The problem only occurs now for groups outside of instances.

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This battleground is like watching bugs fly to a light. In most pick up groups, there is that group of people that run straight for that shiny flag in the middle. They will fight tooth and nail for it, even if your side doesn’t have a single tower to turn it into.

To win EotS your side has to get two thousand points. You get points by controlling any of the four towers and capturing the flag in the middle and bringing it back to a tower you control. But fighting for that flag so hard usually loses the game.

Why do they do it?

You can still win with almost everyone on offense, so the fact that very few people like to defend doesn’t make much of a difference. The reason everyone seems to run to the flag is likely a combination.

• it’s shiny, people like flags
• Warsong Gulch conditioned people to get the flag
• they don’t know how vital the towers are to winning
• it’s more fun to fight in the center and ignore everything else

How important is the flag?

To get a feel for that we need to know how many flag captures your side can get before the game ends. Because of the distance needed to run the flag, it’s difficult to capture the flag faster than once a minute assuming the other side lets you. It usually takes closer to three to five minutes if both sides are fighting for it.

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Arathi Basin (AB) for level 70’s has become a red headed stepchild. It started when titles were removed from battlegrounds and made honor the most important reward, removing the competitive aspect and turning it into an honor grind. And then it became a ghostland when Alterac Valley become the fastest place to get honor. You will still run into very organized pre-made groups but most avoid it now unless it’s a bonus weekend, daily quest, or they need some marks. For those times winning is essential for getting anything out of it. So let’s go over what works for a vaguely coordinated pick up group, the beloved pug.

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