will work for doughnuts

I want to talk to you about Battlegrounds and what I just experienced courtesy of Blizzard. We gathered together 10 on a side, the game was CTF with 3 scores to win.

Quickly 2 groups of five were created, and people began declaring “All out assualt” as our initial strategy. Since I didn’t know the map I just followed others through a side entrance into the ogre fortress. We dropped down into the flag room and started to assasinate what appeared to be a lone defender. For the next few seconds as I’m attacking stealthed defenders begin to attack us and it takes only that long to realize that there are no more of them. We have them outnumbered and we clear the room. Before I know what’s happened we have scored and I’m still inside the horde base. Again defenders appear and this time I and my other base campers are sent to our graveyard.

Before I’m returned to life, we have scored again and are on our way to a shutout. Realizing this, the horde players use an all out defensive strategy out of desperation. We having no better option at the time keep dashing ourselves against their defenses while they employ a clever offencesive strategy of sending 1-2 players for our flag. This one player who can shapeshift into a cheetah would continually nab our flag and take off as fast as he could.

The match dragged on for another 30 minutes while they evened the score 2-2. At that point we entered a long stand off where we both had each others flags hidden and ultimately through some great playing on their players part we lost the match 3-2.

It was glorious. Even in a loss… it was a phenomenal experience because I cared whether we won or loss, we all did. The above sequence is played out thousands of times an hour in many multiplayer combat games. Whether it’s Halo, Quake, Counter-Strike… CTF and it’s derivitives are a standard option for team multiplayer.

What makes it’s addition to World of Warcraft so compelling is that now you are playing the game using a character you have created. Your particular abilities and skills have all been your choosing. Your choice of armor, weapons and techiniques are all going to have an impact on the overall experience of the match. And any glory won inside the battlegrounds is also yours to keep.

Some of my favorite sequences involved other players on my team. It’s so satisfying when pursuing an enemy withour flag to have the druid next to you cast a spell which temporarily stops that player. The druid does this knowing that in those precious seconds I’ll be able to catch the player and unleash so much damage that he can’t possibly go much further.

Battlegrounds has it’s problems right now… long wait times being the foremost, but it’s a huge addition to the game. When that’s resolved I can see my Warcraft experience morphing into something where I can login and play 1 or 2 matches battlegrounds when I have a little free time. This is much like what I would do with Halo or Battlefield, except now I’ll care more because it’s my charater instead of some nameless temporary construct.