With the release of patch 2.3.0, players have seen many changes to the way that honor gain occurs in Battlegrounds and most noticeably in Alterac Valley. Many aspects of this battleground have been changed to promote a more strategic event and rewards players for participating in many aspects of the battleground. Despite the changes made, the overall intention of these changes is to maintain a level of honor gain that players have become accustomed to as well as maintain pacing of how long the matches may last. Prior to the changes implemented in patch 2.3.0, honor gains were less consistent in how they were calculated, there were long games, extra-long games, short games, and holiday bonus honor calculations all factored in. With the patch, we have better simplified and defined this for active participants in these matches.
With these changes has also come some confusion in regard to where honor bonus comes from during holiday weekends as well as how best for players to optimize gaining bonus honor within the battlegrounds. To help clear up this confusion, we have taken the time to put together more information.
Diminishing Returns
It’s important for players to understand the nature of gaining honor and what role diminishing returns plays with this. Diminishing returns on honor occurs over time as you kill the same opponent. For each kill you make past the initial kill, the honor gained for it is reduced by 10%. After ten kills of the same opponent, that player is no longer worth any honor.
Estimated Honor
Estimated Honor will show an amount of honor that does not factor in diminishing returns. This number can be less depending on whether or not you had a lot of kills where diminishing returns were applied. Honor is shared among players in a Raid when they are within range of a kill. When fractions of a kill or decimal amounts of honor are gained by a kill, the User Interface will round the estimated honor up to show one Honor point gained. Given enough time what shows as ten Honor points, could actually only be five Honor points gained.
Daily honor calculations can also cause estimated honor to appear larger than what it actually is. If a player plays prior to the honor calculations being run, and then during or shortly after, the estimated honor may appear as a part of the previous day’s totals. In actuality, this honor applies to the next day and will be correctly calculated the next night when the next batch of honor calculations are run.
Regular Honor vs. Holiday Honor
Some weekends are considered Holiday weekends for a particular battleground. Envoys for the holiday battleground will be located within the major cities. Holiday weekends grant bonus honor for meeting particular goals within the battleground.
The chart below shows the amount of regular honor and holiday bonus honor for each of the battlegrounds as well as the reputation gains.
It is important to note the following: one kill= 20.9 honor at level 70.
*Map Complete refers to the bonus honor awarded on holiday weekends for both the winning and losing teams when the match has concluded.
Alterac Valley
Bonus Honor Normal Holiday
Tower Destruction 3 Kill(s) 3 Kill(s)
Enemy NPC Kill 0 Kill(s) 0 Kill(s)
Captain Kill 3 Kill(s) 3 Kill(s)
General Kill 4 Kill(s) 4 Kill(s)
Map Complete 0 Kill(s) 4 Kill(s)
Per owned Graveyard 0 Kill(s) 0 Kill(s)
Live Captain 2 Kill(s) 2 Kill(s)
Per Undestroyed Tower 2 Kill(s) 2 Kill(s)
Per Owned Mine 0 Kill(s) 0 Kill(s)
Reputation Normal Holiday
Tower Destruction 12 18
Enemy NPC Kill 5 5
Captain Kill 125 185
General Kill 350 525
Map Complete 0 0
Per owned Graveyard 12 18
Live Captain 125 175
Per Undestroyed Tower 12 18
Per Owned Mine 24 36
