Alterac Insanity

So tonight I was in an AV that took nearly an hour. We wound up winning via reinforcements because they turtled after someone capped IBGY.

It was pretty epic. I was in the midst of things for most of the battle. We denied them nearly everything with some excellent defense. Eventually we summoned Ivus, which was a really cool thing to see.

At the end we got 546 honor (not the highest I've seen, but definitely above average) and I had 152 honorable kills and 630,000 healing.

Insane. Also a lot of fun.

Theories about BG healing... especially AV...

So I've been pvping for a while, and I'm starting to develop actual tactical skill. See, healing is basically just having a proficiency at button-mashing and mouse-clicking. Once your gear is average, the only thing that will set you aside from the other healers is how you apply your toon to the battleground.

Last night everything sort of crystallized for me. Standard operating procedure used to be to make sure Galv went down and then sit on a tower. Doing that is boring. I don't feel any different or more useful than the next guy when I do that.

I think the true way to make yourself an asset to your side, especially as a healer, is to play defense. The best place to defend is in the Stonehearth/Balinda/Icewing area, if you're looking for maximum effect. I've tried defending Dun Baldar, and usually you're either wasting your time doing nothing or one man facing tens of horde.

Your healing number in Alterac Valley isn't really a gauge of who has the best gear. What it really means is who was healing actively for the most time. That's the crucial part there. While in the AV from which I took a screenshot and gushed about in my previous entry, I spent the merest fraction of time out of combat. As a healer your job is to find combat and mitigate losses to your side. Not to simply sit on your ass defending a tower and being ready to heal. I've also noticed that in the fights like Galv and Drek, there're usually enough healers there that my presence or absence is unlikely to change the outcome of the fight. Following the zerg guarantees that you are not a special or unique snowflake.

It's easy to get bored healing if all you do is heal the galv fight, repel a token effort by 3 hordlings to take back Tower Point, and then rush to Drek to do some more incidental healing.

My new strategy in Alterac Valley is to defend Balinda and try to keep Stonehearth and Icewing Bunkers from capping. You're guaranteed a good time and more action than you can shake a Merciless Gladiator's Salvation at. And the best part is you will actually feel like you made a difference.

Epic healing in AV

So I decided I needed to have a WoW blog too.

I decided this because I've realized I really do kick ass at PvP. I will mostly be bragging about how awesome I am in battlegrounds here, because I seem to suck at arenas. And when I say battlegrounds, I mean Alterac Valley, because the other ones are just difficult.

Between the hours of 3am and now I ran AVs. I met a hunter from our server who I ran with from 4am onwards. We won a couple games doing the standard rush Galv and then hit TP routine. Then I got sick of it. Things needed to be shaked up a bit. I proposed in BG chat that we defend Balinda. I've realized that if I tell people I'm a healer, they will come and do damage. I heal them, they kill things, Balinda lives, we win. It's a beautiful thing. Especially since it was usually warlocks, hunters, mages, and druids there with me.

The AV that inspired this blog, though, was special. I led another effort to save Balinda. There were six or seven of us there at the outset. We repelled the initial assault easily. Another wave came, and defenders started to die. As defenders die, they tend to drift off toward other pursuits. Eventually it was me, my new hunter buddy, and a warlock. We're standing out front killing stragglers and suddenly a wave of horde come around the side. At least 4. We finished off the straggler we were currently occupied with and backpedalled back into the bunker. The hunter died, which was unfortunate, but seemingly inevitable. So there I am healing this lock like there's no tomorrow. I saw a 3300 holy shock crit on him at one point. We repelled a couple small waves of attackers just by ourselves. Eventually we were both killed, but not before I had reached the 250k healing mark!

I rezzed at Stormpike GY and then rode back towards Stonehearth and Icewing, where I encountered a swirling melee at the crest of the hill. Apparently, some enterprising hero had capped Iceblood Graveyard, so the horde kept about half their people in a turtle, and were trying to send the other half forward. They were under 100 reinforcements by this point, so we basically established a chokepoint at Icewing. I kept healing until I ran out of mana, at which point I rezzed at Snowfall. So I noticed as I was riding back that they horde had Stonehearth Graveyard, and that was why there was a never-ending supply of the bastards flowing towards Icewing. So I started taking out the guards there, and noticed that a mage was helping me. We both got killed by resurrecting hordies. So we both rezz, and I ask him if he wants to try it again. We charge back and kill the guards and a single hordie as the rest horde reinforcements trickled away. I was about 2 seconds from getting the graveyard capped when the battle ended.

I had 368,000 healing. Easily a personal best. I felt like I carried that AV on my shoulders. I realized that's an unrealistic and possibly arrogant thing to think, but I know my healing stymied the horde at Balinda, Icewing Bunker, and parts in between. I wasn't completely ineffectual in combat either; I had 9 killing blows and was credited with nearly 90 HKs. I haven't ever broken 100 HKs on Tanthius. I think this may have been a personal high for me on HKs as well.

Simply put, I felt like an MVP. AVs went very well. I only lost 1 in about 5 hours of play. That's definitely solid. I ground out about 7000 honor. I love AV weekends.