The purpose of this thread is to keep everyone updated on what's happening in Warlords of Draenor and what it means in regards of PvP.
This thread is maintained, updated, cleaned and organized by Thornass (@ThornassEU on Twitter) and Recycle (@RecycleEU on Twitter). We are but two people, so we hope that you have the patience of giving us a few hours after new data has been released to update the thread!
Table of Contents:
1A. Trial of the Gladiator
Trial of the Gladiator is a new ranked arena and rated battleground system which will be introduced in Warlords of Draenor. This particular system will allow players to equip themselves with the highest tier of Arena Gear free of charge (system similar to the Arena Pass realm) and enter to fight using that equipment - and this gear may only be used within Trial of the Gladiator, and is also the only allowed gear to be used within TotG. This means no PvE or any other PvP Gear may be used in TotG, and TotG gear may not be used elsewhere.
Trial of the Gladiator is a system designed to give players of high skill be able to face opponets of equal skill whilst fighting for prestige rewards (such as titles) where gear is not a deciding factor, but your 3v3 Class Setup, Team- and Personal skill is.
1B. Progressing in TotG
Trial of the Gladiator is aimed not only to give players equal level of opponets, but also to monitor matches more close. You might have noticed players in the past have gone 20-0 during nighttime, and gained anywhere between 100-400 rating using devious methods and cheated the system to gain an unfair advantage. TotG plans to have matches more monitored close, as in order to gain rating and progress in Trial of the Gladiator you can only gain rating at certain times.
The current plan for times in TotG is twice a week, four hours at a time. Arena and Rated Battlegrounds will have their separate days rotating.
1C. Queueing at other Times
While Trial of the Gladiator only allows you to gain rating during those specific hours, you can queue up at any given time! You can make a group, queue up, practice and hone your skills for the appointed times.
1D. Old Ladder
While Trial of the Gladiator is basically the 'New Ladder' - the current ladder will stay. Even though now that Gladiator titles are being awarded from Trial of the Gladiator, people will ponder: "What's in it for doing old Ladder?". Well, old ladder will reward you non-gear rewards, but these items may not be tied to rating. More details on these rewards will be released on a later date. (Subject to change)
What we also do is that your Conquest Point Cap will increase just like it does currently in Mists of Pandaria, which you can use in the outside world, battlegrounds and not to forget, the new World PvP Zone: Ashran.
(http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/10572507239?page=4#61)
1E. Work, Night-Shifts, School
We all have lives, we have jobs, schools, girlfriends, boyfriends and whatnot. So what if we can't attend on those days because of said occurances? Or Live in different time zones? Holinka has tweeted the following about the situation:
"We want to be inclusive but we also want to focus on competition. We'll try to accommodate as many as possible."
2A. World PvP Zone - Ashran
Ashran is a small island of the eastern cost of the Tanaan Jungle on Draenor. It's a staging area near the Dark Portal that the Horde and Alliance are fighting to gain control for. It includes faction bases and a variety of hotspots that each faction wishes to control.
Ashran will be different from the old World PvP Objectives such as Eastern Plaguelands Towers, Wintergrasp and Tol Barad since it will be a constant progressive fight to partake in. From gathering items to summoning creatures, there are tons of action on multiple levels. While you can enter before you reach level 100, you're likely to be biting your own hand faster than you could expect. Old-school Alterac Valley fans, rejoice!
2B. Features of Ashran
Not a lot of information has been released towards Ashran, but there are a few things that have been released, for example..
2C. Server & Faction Imbalance
Even though Realm Merges have been ongoing for a while now, without a doubt some servers will suffer from faction imbalance making fights one-sided. But fear not, Blizzard has stated that they will be implementing their cross-realm technology to reduce faction-imbalance and make battles of Ashran more fair!
2D. Rewards
Nothing so far has been mentioned about rewards to obtain from Ashran.
This section will be updated once more information is available.
3A. Hit & Expertise
With the introduction of Warlords of Draenor, Blizzard has stated that they are removing Hit and Expertise from gear. What does this mean for PvP?
Unfortunately, as we haven't had the glorious opportunity to play the demonstration at BlizzCon nor DreamHack we're not entirely sure. Not a lot has been mentioned about it. However, in sense of removal of these stats we can speculate things:
Abilities can no longer miss
Now that you can no longer gain hit from gear, your spells and abilities will always hit the target and not have an irritating white or yellow "Miss" above the target. A very huge Quality of Life change which means no need to reforge around anymore in order to obtain that hit cap, only to find yourself to be 2.99% instead of 3.00% hit.
It also means a bit of RNG is removed from PvP combat. We have all had that moment you were about to kill someone and collect a win to then have your stun being parried.
What does this mean for parrying or dodging my x ability?
We do not know as of now (unless someone who has played the Test version at BlizzCon or DreamHack can inform us, /hint) if characters still have passive dodge and/or parry. Because the game is not only focused on PvP Combat, it would make sense that we still have passive Dodge & Parry. But will our attacks in PvP Combat no longer be able to be dodged or parried unless using abilities such as Evasion or Die by the Sword? Right now only time will tell.
Same as with Hit rating, this change should reduce the amount of RNG in PvP combat.
Once we do have this information, fear not, this shall be updated!
4A. BG Rewards, BG Score & UI Improvements
With Warlords of Draenor, we're receiving some UI Improvements regarding the PvP User Interface such as the Scoreboard, Visuals and other improvements. These changes are more quality of life, and providing in-game features which some AddOns provide which we'll get into soon!
4B. Battleground Random Loot Rewards
This is a discussed topic, that there may be a feature after winning a battleground you might receive a random reward - an item. This item could be a PvP Set Item, a random Bind on Equip item, consumable item, it could be honor or even a weekly quest to upgrade an item. The reward would be random, and currently there is no details yet on what affects your chances on obtaining these rewards.
4C. UI Improvements
There will be new UI Improvements into Battlegrounds. The scoreboard will have a new look, on top of other changes such as:
These timers are also viewable on the map overview of the battleground!
4D. Battleground Score
Blizzard will be adding a new feature to the Battleground Scoreboard for you to view. By competing objectives, you gain battleground score which you can sort from highest to lowest just like healing- and damage done, honorable kills or killing blows and deaths.
Battleground score will be awarded on objective-based gameplay you take part in, for example returning flags, interrupting flag/base captures, healing done, damage done and more.