Why is Shield Bash disabled for Warriors in PvP?

[Smithe]

I have been super pumped about end game PvP. However, just recently I discovered how Arena PvP works. On my first go, I was pretty surprised to learn that Shield Bash does not stun in PvP. This seems odd. Was interested to hear the decision behind this?

A solid mage can 2-3 shot me at that level with one frost bolt and then 2 instant ice lances.

A musketeer can outheal me easily.

A ranger is a ranger.

But as a warrior I feel pretty gimped. Not only does my shield not have its main move, but also my horn is pretty worthless in PvP aswell.

Was wondering what sorts of Warrior PvP changes we can expect in the future? Or if there is any chance shield bash will be turned back on to at least get some larger community feedback.

Thanks!

[Sparky]

The main problem with shield bash is that it stuns the target stopping it from moving completely, So in pvp the amount for time that it takes for stun to ware off you could get several kill shots with both archer and mage. healer probably could too. I hope this answers your question.

[Fern]

Nah, crowd crontrol is an integral part of pvp. New players always complain about being stun locked then one shot, but experienced players know how to decurse, position better, and use cc themselves. CC adds depth to pvp and rewards team coordination.

[Fern]

Warriors should get shield bash. Maybe on a longer cool down though. If mages get polymorph, rangers traps, and musketeers can decurse, then warriors should get shield bash.

[Johann]

All classes should have some form of crowd control, there should also be some LOS in the arena. I agree, they should be able to stun.

The devs did say that the arena is going to be revamped and the classes balanced in the future I believe they said they were going to start looking at if after content 2 patch.

[Logan]

It was suggested we might have a stun(polymorph or shield bash) that would disarm the opponent rather than lock them in place. Could be a cool idea

[Draven]

To my knowledge, as of right now in pvp, mages can’t polymorph or knockback, warriors can’t bash, musketeers can’t gravity orb, and rangers can’t trap.

I can appreciate wanting some level of CC integration, but if they just let all of these things work as is, you will basically have warriors that can instagib nearly any target (charge, stun, wound, wound), mages that can make people sit as a chicken forever or make motion sensitive people throw up from being knocked around violently, etc, etc. In my opinion, all of these would need a serious rebalance/adjustment/redesign pass before being enabled in pvp.

[Johann]

lol, I didn’t even think about the knockback motion sickness. Lots of stuff would need to be reworked, all of the stuns would obviously have to be shortened to prevent instagib and any cc would have to have diminishing returns. Definitely adds a bit of more strategy.

[Valway]

I’m all for CC in pvp, but it will have to be something they intentionally tweak to make it work differently than normal. Maybe a much shorter stun duration, maybe it just interrupts current action, etc.

Will take a lot of balancing and testing to get in a good spot though, and I can see why they would rather just disable it at the moment, as opposed to leaving the system inherently broken.

[Fern]

Yup, everyone agrees balancing is in order, the devs say it’s coming.

CC complaints in pvp, in my experience, are totally overblown. Balance issues, however, are very real. For a long time it was thought that WoW suffered tremendously for trying to make pvp and pve balanced without altering class abilities for each type. Class balance is incredibly difficult to get right and requires constant tweaking.