Alterac Valley

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Alterac Valley is a Battleground.

Overview

Alterac Valley is very different, on many levels, from either Warsong Gulch or Arathi Basin. In short, WG and AB are shorter, on smaller battlefields, and have a game-like quality to them. AV is war.

The goal in AV is nothing short of total conquest. Players form large, 40 man raids. The goal is to destroy the enemy’s forts and forces in the field, then to force your way into the main fortress. Once inside, players must kill the enemy general. Killing him results in victory.

None of this is easy. In AV, you will fight, and fight hard, for every step leading up to the general. The game is designed to give your side an advantage whenever you take a tower, fortress, or graveyard. Capturing even one of these takes time and considerable, concentrated effort. Because of the time and effort involved at every step, winning in AV usually takes hours. An AV match can easily take an entire day to complete.

Length

Let me put it this way: you could start an AV match, play for an hour, log out, go to work, go out for drinks with the guys, go home, have dinner, take your wife to the movies, take her for dessert afterwards, come back home, log on, and find that the exact same AV match is still going strong.

Battlemasters

As with the other BGs, there is an AV battlemaster in each major city, as well as in the other major cities for your faction. There is also a battlemaster, as well as a quest giver and a reputation rewards vendor at the field entrance to AV (see the map).

Insight

AV has a heck of a dedicated following. Some folks just love AV, despite its many difficulties. Often you’ll log in to see the same folks fighting in AV day after day. Personally, I enjoy AV much more than either of the other two battlegrounds. I find that I fight for at least a little while in AV every day.

Unlike the other battlegrounds, which cater to all levels, you have to be level 51 or higher to enter Alterac Valley. Sorry, no newbs allowed!

Another difference from the other battlegrounds is that AV has NPCs. These NPCs are not pushovers, and are formidable adversaries. There are a series of generic guards at various points on the battlefield, and aggroing them can cause you some difficulty. These generic NPC guards respawn and, most often, end up being defensive in nature. I.e., these NPCs end up doing a lot of the work protecting your bases, towers, forts, and whatnot.

More serious are the NPC elite officers. There are six lieutenants (staged at various points on the battlefield), four commanders (in charge of towers), a captain (who commands a mid-field fortress), and a general. The general is so tough that it will take most of the raid to take him down, and only if there is some dedicated effort. He is truly epic.

Another big difference between AV and, say, Arathi Basin is the time required to capture a tower or graveyard. In AB, capturing a spawn point means controlling its flag for a mere one minute. In Alterac Valley, your side must maintain control of a graveyard’s or tower’s flag for five long minutes for it to be considered “captured.” A lot can happen in five minutes, including a lucky push by the other side to keep you from holding onto that banner. It is because of this feature – one that makes it extremely difficult to capture anything – that making progress in AV often takes so long.

Strategies

Remember, fighting in AV isn’t an event, it’s a process. Each of the strategies below is effective, but you’ve got to use them wisely. The first three are closely related, but particular details require that each receive some individual attention.

The “Fight for Control Points” strategy

This is one of the basics. If you are going to accomplish anything in AV, you must realize that fighting in the Field of Strife is a complete waste of time. Sure, the Field of Strife is tempting, since your enemies are probably gathering there, but it accomplishes nothing to fight there. Instead, you must focus, and choose to fight at a control point (a tower or graveyard). If you wipe out some snotty Alliance players in the field of strife, what have you gained? Nada. If you wipe them out at the Stonehearth Bunker, you are now in a position to rush the bunker, kill the NPC guards, and capture the banner inside. Taking out that bunker is the first step to defeating them utterly. The same holds true for Alliance players; fighting at Iceblood Tower not only wipes out the Horde forces gathered there, but grants you the opportunity to capture it.

The “Piece by Piece” strategy

This is the next logical step derived from the previous strategy. After capturing their first tower, move on and capture your enemy’s closest graveyard. After capturing that, move on to the next tower, then the next, then the next. It’s all very sequential, but capturing each control point on the map is a strategy lost on most players. However, without doing this, it is nearly impossible to win in AV.

The “Graveyard Zerg” strategy

Capturing a tower doesn’t do all that much in AV; it merely eliminates a spawn point for enemy NPCs, and gets everyone some bonus honor and bonus rep. Capturing a graveyard, however, gives your side a new spawn point. This spawn point is closer to your next objective, so it’s actually critically important.

Consider that every time you die, you’ll normally have to run a considerable distance to return to the action. If your side has captured a graveyard nearby, however, you’ll spawn only a few steps away. In effect, by capturing a local graveyard, you’ve created a constant zerg – your troops keep flowing from the graveyard and right at your enemy. This is a major advantage, so use it whenever possible. It is for this reason that graveyard fights are so hotly contested; if you control one, it’s much easier to win. Lose one, and the enemy has a significant edge over you.

The “Skip Snowfall” strategy

Some have postulated that capturing the only neutral graveyard in the game, Snowfall, is important to overall victory. I don’t agree; I think in most cases it’s a significant waste of time. Here’s why.

Snowfall is really somewhat out of the way, so holding it gives your side little advantage. The whole point in controlling a GY is to spawn closer to the action, and effectively zerg, your enemy. Snowfall just doesn’t really do that. In addition, there is an NPC at that graveyard – Korrak the Ravager – who, unlike most NPCs, totally lives up to his name. This guy is a freakin’ killer, folks. It will take most of your 40 man raid group to kill him. In short, Snowfall just isn’t worth your time.

The “Planes, Rams, and Shreddermobiles” strategy

There are a series of quests that can be completed during the course of an AV matchup. The quests generally involve gathering something, and turning that something in to an NPC. After enough of that critical something has been gathered, you get your reward. The reward is a powerful NPC or gaggle of NPCs that are somewhat controllable, and will fight for your side.

• Upgraded NPCs. You can upgrade the generic NPC guards that already exist at various points on the battlefield, making them higher level, by turning in 20 armor scraps to an NPC in your fortress. You’ll have to repeat this quest many times to qualify for each upgrade, but several upgrades are available. You pick up armor scraps from dead players, so killing a lot of the enemy faction helps here. This counts as a ‘turn in’ quest, so it also gives you a reputation increase (but more on that later).
• The Portable Shredder: By rescuing Engineer Zinfizzlex at the Snowfall Graveyard and escorting him back to your fort, you earn the right to operate one of his shredder units. Well, after you bring him a bunch of other valuable and expensive supplies, of course! (This is one quirky quest.) When Zinfizzlex gets the supplies you’ll get a portable shredder unit, an item that, when you click on it, turns into a level 60 shredder. The shredder is a death-dealing machine, lasts until killed (not easy), and can turn the tide of a battle by itself. It’s fun to operate too, but you have to realize that you actually channel the darned thing. Your character stands around, zombified and helpless, while you control the shredder. Obviously, it’s best to hide somewhere safe, then activate the shredder.
• Deadly Foot Soldiers: By capturing a mine, gathering the supplies found inside, and turning them in (over and over again) to the NPC in your base, you’ll be able to launch an assault of elite ground troops at your enemies. The troops take general commands from you, but aren’t exactly controllable. The big downfall to their use is user stupidity. Most people simply send these guys as far up field as possible, which results in their early destruction. Conserve them, and use them only as reinforcements to players trying to take a particular objective.
• Deadly Ram Riders: This is a very similar concept to the previous one. First, gather wild rams (if you are Alliance) or wolves (if you are Horde) using a special harness, and return them to the appropriate NPC. Then go out and gather hides from enemy mounts. (Hordies must gather ram hides, and Allies must gather wolf hides.) After enough of everything has been turned in, you gain control over some cavalry. Again, use as you would the infantry, above. Throwing them at your enemy is wasting them.
• Deadly Flyboys: This is a two-step quest. First, you must rescue one of several wing commanders. These are held in your enemy’s towers or in other dangerous locations. After you free them, you have to escort them back to your base. Not satisfied with being rescued, these ingrates want you to turn in items you gather from dead player characters. The Alliance must turn in medals of various kinds, while the horde must turn in actual chunks of flesh. (Wow, the Horde sure are icky, aren’t they?). After you’ve turned in enough medals or chunks of flesh, you’ll be given an item that creates a flying wing commander. Basically, these dudes are not controllable, but instead hover over a section of the battlefield, dropping firebombs on everyone’s heads.
• The Big Dude: Each side can create a huge elemental to fight for them. Ivus the Forest Lord fights for the tree hugging, bunny kissing Alliance, and Lokholar the Ice Lord fights for the Hordies. The Allies obtain Ivus by turning in Storm Crystals, which they loot from dead Horde players. The Horde, once again demonstrating their ickiness, turn in blood that they gather from dead Alliance players. After copious quantities of both are turned in to the appropriate NPC in your main fortress, druids saunter out to the Field of Strife and begin a summoning ritual. Players must participate, both by assisting them in summoning the Big Guy and by keeping the druids alive while they summon. After a few minutes of summoning have passed, the appropriate elemental appears. He is pretty small at first, but marches around the Field of Strife like an angry PCP addict. Each time he kills an enemy, he grows. After he is full size he marches up field toward your enemy base.

Note: Keeping your giant elemental alive is a really, really good idea. I’m not sure why I have to say this, except that some people – especially healers – just don’t seem to understand the concept. Heal him, buff him, kill anyone that attacks him. He is the second most powerful thing in all of AV, and can totally turn the tide of the battle.

If your opponent spawns the Big Guy, try really really hard to train him to the toughest thing in AV, your general. As big as he is, your elemental isn’t smart, and will follow the first player to whack him until that player is dead. So whack the Big Guy hard, then run like the dickens to your general. Your general will make short work of the enemy elemental, ridding you of a really large problem.

If you are good enough to get an elemental, prevent the above from happening to you. How? Simply by killing any enemy players near him. The Big Guy will help you, no questions asked, so this isn’t hard to do. In particular, a timely root, snare, frostbolt, etc will generally hold the player in question right in place, and Ivus or Lok will finish the job. Again, most players don’t understand the need for this and simply allow their hard earned elemental to be trained and killed the moment he is created. Bad idea; protect him, and he’ll carry your team right into the enemy fortress.

In choosing to generate the above units – each of which takes a lot of work – you are doing your side a LOT of good. As indicated, however, this can go to waste if you and your teammates don’t play things smart. Don’t throw them at your enemy mindlessly, heal them, and protect them a bit, and you’ll be giving your side a very big advantage. I’ve seen a single shredder turn the tide of a losing battle, simply because the player was skilled and she got a fair amount of support. You should do likewise, my young padawan.

Gaining Honor

You gain honor in AV just like anywhere else – by killing enemy players. The kicker to AV is that since there are 40 players per team the honor from every kill is divided with numerous other people. This means that even if you manage to kill that irritating gnome rogue or slippery dwarf hunter, you may only get 15 honor points. Contrast this to WG or AB, where the amount of honor per kill is divided by 10 or 15 other people at most, and you get the idea. You also get bonus honor according to Blizzard’s formula, reproduced below:

• Killing the enemy General - 6 Bonus Kills
• Killing the enemy Captain - 3 Bonus Kills
• Killing enemy Lieutenants/Commanders - 1 Bonus Kill each
• Destroying an enemy tower - 2 Bonus Kills each
• Keeping your captain alive (until game end) - 2 Bonus Kills
• Owning an intact tower (at game end) - 1 Bonus Kill each
• Owning a graveyard (at game end) - 1 Bonus Kill each
• Owning a Mine (at game end) - 1 Bonus Kill each

As you can see, although many of the bonuses are awarded mid-game, many others are only awarded at the end of a particular AV match. Thus to maximize the amount of honor you receive from fighting in AV, you’ll just have to fight until the end.

Gaining Reputation

Alliance players are attempting to build reputation with the Stormpike; Horde players are attempting to build rep with the Frostwolf. For both, reputation in AV is gained primarily from turn-ins. Turn-ins are items you receive from dead enemy players. Humans, for example drop bone chips. Gnomes drop tufts of hair, trolls drop mojo, orcs drop teeth, etc. Players also drop some of the quest turn-in items mentioned earlier: armor scraps, medals (dead Horde only), chunks of flesh (dead Alliance only), and some pocket change. Every time you turn in an item, everyone in the zone gains one reputation with either the Stormpike or the Frostwolf. Small amounts of bonus reputation can be earned by slaying the named elite NPC officers.

Reputation Rewards

The rewards given for the various levels of Frostwolf or Stormpike reputation are various. There is some armor, some weapons, and some jewelry. Most of it is actually quite good, and some of the items available at exalted rep are deep and purply epic. The pig-headed hammer (no, really, it’s a pig) known as The Unstoppable Force is one of the more popular items, as is a dagger named The Lobotomizer. You can find the great big list of uber reward items here.

The Reputation Farming Controversy

AV is so different from the other battlegrounds that it has given rise to it’s own unique phenomenon: reputation farming. Rep farming is a fact of life in AV. In fact, it is common to find half your forces functionally doing nothing during an AV battle. That’s because those folks are farming. The following is a very honest discussion of rep farming, including the specific ins and outs of how it’s commonly done. In the below paragraphs, I’m neither advocating nor condemning rep farming, but I do discuss the problems that have given rise to the phenomenon. Feel free to make your own assessments.

The first problem is that it takes an eternity to gain exalted status in AV, and people get tired of waiting for the reputation to trickle in. Initially, it may appear that you’re gaining a lot of reputation when you see someone turn in half a dozen elf heads or tauren hooves. That’s a total of +6 to your AV rep, scrolling up impressively on your screen. Soon, however, many players realize that reaching exalted status means gaining a total of, oh, 40,000 reputation points and, at this rate, it’s going to take forever. The slow trickle of reputation in AV – seemingly much slower than in the other BGs – is the first reason many people farm for reputation.

Another reason people farm for rep is because the auto-afk feature is such a royal pain in the arse (in a short time, you too will come to hate this hellish “feature”). On top of this, the deserter penalty is quite the lovely kick in the nards, and these two go hand-in-hand. Real life sometimes gets in the way for a few minutes and you simply have to deal with the dogs, your mom, my mom, your girlfriend, a phone call, or some other temporary distraction. Getting kicked from an AV match because of the /afk feature, especially after waiting in a long queue to get in, is infuriating. Then getting stung with the deserter penalty to top it off will make the anti-afk techniques listed below look a lot more like a “reasonable workaround” than “cheating” to many people.

Some folks go a bit further in their thinking on this subject, especially considering that AV matches take hours to finish. Consider the following: You’ve played in AV for three hours, but the match is nowhere near ending. You’ve killed several of the elite NPCs, you’ve defended your towers and graveyards, but you simply cannot play any longer. All the bonus honor and reputation you’ve worked for, because it will only be awarded at the end of the game, will not be credited to your account. You will not get any honor tokens. Other players will reap the benefits of all your hard work – the bonus rep, the bonus honor, and the honor tokens – simply because they log in after you’ve had to log out. Many players, experiencing the above situation one-too-many times, consider rep farming techniques legitimate solutions.

Considering the above problems with AV, some have gone so far as to voice the idea that reputation farming in AV is Blizzard’s fault, simply because the system they’ve set up in AV is intrinsically unfair. Although people still enjoy AV – the combat is great fun – many folks feel that the AV systems for both rep and honor are just plain broken.

As a result of the above difficulties, some folks have taken to using a variety of techniques to “even the odds” and get the reputation they feel they deserve. Some of these techniques ensure a steady flow of rep to the player, while others – specifically macro programs – may even be used not for reputation farming per se, but as a preventative workaround to subvert the auto-afk feature during hours-long AV match ups. Below I’ve listed some specific techniques.

• Getting in just as an AV starts, if you can manage it, is a solid way to get rep. People tend to turn in items right at the beginning of a match, so this is a good time to gain a bit of favor with your AV faction. After being in the match for 5 or 10 minutes, these farmers then log out.
• Getting into an AV match that is about to end is equally good. You’ll gain some bonus reputation when the match ends whether you win or lose, as well as at least one honor token, so signing up for the end of the battle has its benefits.
• “Keyboard tapping” is as common as dirt. The idea is to sit at your computer, get into Alterac Valley, and then watch TV or read a book or do your homework. Every couple of minutes or so, tap a key on your keyboard to keep from going /afk. (Blizzard’s auto-afk feature is built around detecting key presses. As long as keystrokes are detected, you won’t go /afk.) In short, if you press a key, any key, this simple action subverts the mechanism of the hated auto-afk. This is probably not a violation of Blizzard’s rules in regard to going afk, at least technically. However, if a GM contacts you about being /afk, you may not be paying enough attention to respond. As a result, you’ll be kicked and possibly punished.
• Macro programs are also common, but you can get in trouble for these. Macro programs can be found easily on the web. They simulate keystrokes. Thus you can use a macro program to press your spacebar 10,000 times, once every 30 seconds. If you are logged into WoW while a macro program is running, it will cause the spacebar to be pressed, and your character to jump in the air. This prevents you from going /afk, and allows you to remain in the field without the need to tap your keyboard every few minutes. Get caught using one of these, and you’ll be kicked and possibly punished.
• While not a macro program per se, there are numerous mice and other peripherals on the market that can be programmed to circumvent the auto-afk feature of the game. These work in functionally the same way as the above example.

While I am not advocating the above, I am passing it on to you as it is. Bottom line is that no matter what your reasons, if you get caught using a macro program, or even engaging in some absent minded keytapping, or you come up with some other workaround to remain in AV and subvert Blizzard’s strict kick-em-out mechanisms, you’ll get the following little love note, full of run-on sentences, from the WoW GMs:

Greetings, Pig-

This email is to inform you of our policy in regards to going away from keyboard in Battlegrounds in an attempt to gain honor points while not interacting in battle. Such actions may be considered exploitation; in order to preserve a fair and fun Player vs. Player environment, we have decided to prohibit such actions. While we understand that there are sometimes situations that will require you to leave your computer during a battle, you should not be doing so for an extended period of time in Battlegrounds and you should not be using any third party applications to prevent your character from being automatically logged off after the preset duration. Please be aware that automated unintended play is against our Terms of Use agreement. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, but we assure you that this is necessary to preserve the enjoyment of Battleground environments as a whole.

Please note that this email is simply a notification of our policy. While your character has been viewed away from keyboard in a Battleground environment, your account will not be negatively affected at this time. However, future violations of this new policy may result in disciplinary action. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

For any game play questions, please refer to our site at http://www.blizzard.com/support/wowgm/

Regards, Terisendor Game Master Blizzard Entertainment www.worldofwarcraft.com

I was naughty. So sue me :)

Again, I am not recommending rep farming. I am, however, realistic about it, and I’m presenting it to you as it is. Like it or not, agree with it, embrace it, or hate it, rep farming is currently a fact of life in AV. It will only change when Blizzard changes some of the rather harsh kick-out mechanisms they’ve put into place; these impact AV far more than any other BG, and make this particular battleground seem less than fair to the average player. If you do choose to do a bit of rep farming, even as a workaround of the above-mentioned problems, I can only remind you of the aforementioned risks.

General Strategies

When discussing the battlegrounds, it’s important to include some general PvP tips. The battlegrounds are unbelievably tough, and new players will generally get pwned. In an effort to keep that from happening, I’ve included the following suggested tactics.

• Do NOT over-penetrate. This is listed first because it is, without any question, the first rule of PvP. PvP generally evolves into two unorganized groups of enemy players facing off on the battlefield. The principle is a basic one: if you get too close to their lines, and too far from your own, you’ll get dog piled. Be disciplined. Don’t chase runners too far to get the kill; don’t charge forward to get someone on their front line; always be aware of where your front line is, and don’t get in front of it.
• Kill the enemy penetrators. This is the counterpart to the above tactic: when an enemy over-penetrates, pounce on them. Practice this a bit and you’ll be able to read what the enemy is going to do, and anticipate who is going to over-penetrate.
• Have an exit strategy. No matter where you are, or who you are fighting, have a safe place to run to. Generally speaking, these are guards or your fellow players. Don’t get too far away from these guys, either. Having a safe place to run doesn’t do you any good if you can’t actually get there.
• PvP is generally about burst offense. Put your best moves together, so that they can be used in rapid succession. This will do you a lot more good than you think. In the battlegrounds, a good offense IS the best defense.
• Any spell or maneuver that requires a long casting time is of very limited usefulness. The naked truth is that you probably won’t be able to get your Uber Fireball of Instant Death to actually launch before your target is dead or out of range, or before you get interrupted twelve times. Use instacast abilities instead, even if they are of lower power.
• Snare and snare again. If you have an ability that limits enemy movement, use it. This is surprisingly effective – probably more than any offensive ability you have – because snared/frozen players tend to get dog piled.

Aside from the above individual strategies, I’ve included a few for you burgeoning leaders out there. Here goes:

• Use your paladins (Alliance only): Paladins are famous for several things: whining about how underpowered they are, tirelessly posting on the official boards about how rogues, shaman, warriors, warlocks, hunters, etc need to be nerfed, and for being a dominant force in PvP. Here’s the deal: two paladins can hold a node in Arathi Basin as well as any group of four or five, if they play reasonably well. This would include using their shields wisely, healing themselves and each other, using their ‘lay on hands’ spell when things get desperate, stunning, interrupting spellcasts, and generally meleeing any interlopers to death. While it is true that many paladins lack the aforementioned skills, a skilled (and patient) paladin can defeat any other class in the game, and quite easily too.
  • I’ve also seen a single paladin hold off four of us veteran Hordies in the middle of nowhere simply by playing to his defensive strengths. We even had a couple of near-death experiences at his hands, and several of us would have died but for our experience. Even badly outnumbered, pallies can be impressive.
  • In short, place a pair of skilled paladins at a node (non-whiney ones are preferable, if you can find any) or any other defensive location, and this frees up a few other players to go out on offense.
• Use your NEs (Alliance only). Night elves have one of the best racial skills in the game: shadowmeld. This can be a tremendous PvP tool, if several NEs gather around a defensive point and meld. Horde players walk up for an easy flag capture and bammo!, they’re perforated with arrows, daggers, and maces (Um, I meant bludgeoned with maces. Yeah.).
• CC the Pallies (Horde only). Every Horde player knows what a nightmare paladins are. They cannot be snared, they cannot be rooted, and it takes about 10 freaking minutes to kill one. They are able to stay in the field longer than anyone else, and they’ll be harassing your efforts the entire time. The only effective strategy to deal with them is to utilize, as much as possible, crowd control. Sheep them, fear them, mind control them if possible. It is often advisable to dedicate an appropriate caster to this task. After the other threats have been eliminated it’s possible to dog pile and, eventually, kill the pallie.
• Use the warrior-healer combo. This is surprisingly effective, probably because no one seems to notice the healer. A warrior can be a force to be reckoned with, but they are surprisingly fragile. Having a healer nearby transforms a warrior from a momentary danger into an unkillable monster.
• Have a defensive team in AV. While the temptation is to put every single player on the front line (and this does work), consider putting together a small team of rogues and druids to simply harass the enemy. Any time the enemy force is trying to capture a graveyard or tower, don’t simply ignore them. Instead, have the rogues (other characters can do this as well) sap, gouge, or otherwise try every trick in the book to interfere with their progress.

Of course, there are numerous other survival tactics that are useful and effective in the BGs. The above tricks and tips are only my suggestions. Feel free to use these, and to develop your own techniques as you gain experience.

Ok, friends, that’s pretty much it. I hope you’ve found this guide useful and helpful. I look forward to your feedback, and will update this guide as the game necessitates.

Good hunting!

Other Resources

PvP Guide Reputation Guide Battleground UIs/Mods PvP Reward Mounts