Alliance Battles Thoughts
Edited and Published by: Magi
Alliance battles have become the new mode of Random and Team Arenas in Guild Wars. They are more or less the focal point in Factions. By winning enough you will push the opposite faction further back and gaining more faction for your side. Of course this means a near endless and dynamic experience; it really makes the game interesting.
The point of Alliance Battles is to control certain points on the field such as resurrection points, defense points, dragon hatcheries, etc. You go about taking these points by killing all the defenders until the bar of your side is full and the light turns your colour.
There are many different strategies to winning Alliance Battles. I have seen different things from both factions. From what I have seen (and I have seen a lot) Luxons and Kurzicks tend to do two different things.
Luxons are the less favored of the factions and / or most of the guilds that are aligned with them don't bother with Alliance Battles. Their strategy is usually a group of eight: two Warriors, one Minion Master, two Elementalists, one Mesmer, and two Monks. They also have one group of four running around where the Kurzick forces are not present taking points. Luxons do tend to stick in packs and they usually tend to have more experience and a higher chance of getting the whole guild on one team so they can dominate the field.
Kurzicks are more favored in this game (from what I have seen). Kurzicks like to stick in the small four man groups but tend to group up to face the larger Luxon forces when needed. The four man groups usually consist of: one Warrior, one damage dealer, one Minion Master, and one Monk. These groups work quite well when apart and together. I guess you can say Kurzicks use a big split build. From my experience the split seems to work better because the Kurzicks tend to skirt around the big groups and seize strategic points that the Luxons have taken.
I thought the Alliance Battles in the Factions Preview Event was more fun and enjoyable. You had the big twelve member party so you could communicate with the other members of your team. ArenaNet changed this because they said the whole party effects had to be cut down. I honestly think that was good but you need some way to communicate with them. Perhaps something like alliance chat would be good for this purpose. Also, being able to choose the teams you go in with would help tremendously. This way much more organized and intense battles can be fought and thereby making victory that much sweeter.
Another thing I liked about Alliance Battles were the bases. These bases have guards that can do up to 1000 damage a hit. They also protect the permanent resurrection shrines of each team. This prevents camping and waiting for the enemy to respawn giving the losing side a chance to fight back.
Alliance Battles are also a great source of faction. If you win then you get the 500 faction plus the bonus amount that the other team got. So if it is a close game then you get more faction. Even if you lose, you get the amount of faction that your team earned. So it's a win-win situation.
Alliance Battles truly are fun and a really enjoyable experience. Just be prepared to get down and dirty; twelve vs twelve can get hectic.
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