Virtual Hurly-burly: PVP experiences
Last night, for the first time in a long time, I visited the WoW battlegrounds. Before going, I respecced my 70 dwarf priest to a standard PVP build (this one), took a deep breath, and plunged into Warsong Gulch.
I chose Warsong because I spent long hours there back when I was level 19. For my first visit back to a world fighting intelligent enemies (instead of moronic mobs), I figured a familiar battleground would be a good idea.
And I’m not happy with my performance at all.
Oh, we did well. We won both matches (one 3-to-0, the other 3-to-2). And I think I aided in the victory in both counts. As a “face melter,” I was in the top five on the damage count both times as well as being second in healing for the Alliance side.
But I played without skill. I performed as well as I did on the ladder partly because I don’t think many others played with much skill. In my case, I spent a lot of time trying to remember button mappings. (And accidentally trying to use the click-to-cast combinations from Clique while forgetting to actually mouse over a unit frame—duh!)
When I wasn’t distracted by figuring out how to cast a spell, I was bewildered by what spell to cast. Should I be healing? Spamming damage? And if so, what damage spell was best?
I occasionally made good use of Mass Dispel, both offensively and defensively. I saved some lives by with Vampiric Embrace, but I don’t think my direct heals were ever done wisely.
How do I know I can do better? Because a few of the enemies were played with true finesse. I don’t know if they had highly superior gear or better mods or macros, but they obviously did the right thing given the situation. I was lucky if I even realized what class I was facing.
I think, in the end, that I need to practice. Just as going through any PVE fight has become so simple and automatic that I almost don’t have to think about it, I’ll need to achieve the same in PVP fights if I want to feel happy about my skill. It may take a lot longer to get there, given the intelligence behind the pixels I’m fighting and the great variety of abilities I’m up against, but it’ll be fun learning.
So, once more into the breach, dear friends. Once more!
Add comment July 20th, 2007