Games - Arathi Basin

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	Games - Arathi Basin

Arathi Basin is a Battlegrounds instance dungeon in the MMORPG World of Warcraft. The dungeon was included in the version 1.7 patch to the game.

Gameplay

Arathi Basin is a capture-and-hold game, where the more buildings controlled results in the faster generation of team resources. The first team to get 2,000 resources wins. It is a 30 player Instance, 15 v 15. There are 5 resource buildings, which are the Stables, Gold Mine, Lumber Mill, Blacksmith, and Farm.

AB (as it's commonly known) has grown, on many servers, to be the premier battleground due to the brevity of its games. It is currently the only battleground with any sort of "timer." Where Alterac Valley can literally last days, and Warsong Gulch can stalemate for hours, once a resource has been captured it's only a matter of time until one team hits 2000. Arathi Basin games typically last about a half hour but some attrition-style matches can push the hour mark, while "shock-and-awe" games can be over within five or six minutes.

Arathi Basin is one of the best ways to improve your ranking in the honor system. Each winning game awards at least 1000 bonus honor. Even losing games can reward very high amounts of honor if it was a close match. A team must collect at least 330 resources before bonus honor is awarded, however, and many organized teams have become proficient at rushing the opposing force and capturing all five resource nodes very quickly. Having all five nodes captured is a 99% assured win as the collected resources accumulate at a startling rate.

There are several pickups in Arathi Basin that spawn at the various resource nodes including Berserking, Regeneration, and Speed. Improving your reputation with your respective faction opens up various rewards including armor sets and epic-quality weapons at the highest Exalted tier.

Finally, Arathi Basin is very popular for PUGs (pick-up groups). In general, an Alliance PUG and a Horde PUG stand a fairly equal chance of winning on most servers. If a PUG encounters an organized, guild-based team (and this is true of the other battlegrounds) it is almost always an assured loss.

Strategy

Because of the 15-player nature of Arathi Basin, raid groups are generally broken down into "squads." A popular strategy at the beginning of a game is to have one person capture the node nearest your base (farm / stables), send one full group of five players to the Mine or Mill, and send the remaining two groups to the Blacksmith.

Once a resource node is captured, it is a common practice to leave one or two players to guard it while the rest of the raid fights elsewhere. The selection of players usually includes some form of dps (rogue, or a mage for area affect damage) and a healer. On the Horde side, a Shaman can be useful due to his periodic damage totems to will interrupt flag captures. Rogues are also an excellent choice for both sides as they can easily sap and stunlock solo players who try to capture the node. Hunters also make good flag protectors due to their range, pets which can interrupt multiple players, and frost traps. The preferred class to defend Alliance nodes is the Paladin due to his survivability. A single Paladin can generally guard a node against a small Horde group for a good amount of time while backup is called through the use of plain weapon hits, immunity shields, and the Hammer of Justice stun.

The most assured way to win Arathi Basin matches short of a rush tactic is to control three nodes, preferably your "home" node (farm / stables), the Blacksmith, and one of the satellite nodes (mine / mill). Many players consider the Blacksmith to be the most important node due to its central location in the map. From the Blacksmith players can monitor most of the surrounding area and dispatch reinforcements to flags that come under attack fairly rapidly.

Warriors are of great importance in AB due to their large health pools, high armor ratings, and brutal attacks. Warriors are most often employed to "tank" a flag. Savvy players will know to ignore the warrior and focus on healers instead. Fear is of paramount importance in AB as it can quickly turn the tide of a node capture by sending the opposing force scattering in all directions. Liberal use of crowd control tactics (sap, polymorph, frost trap, fear) is a mainstay of Arathi Basin matches. Area of Effect attacks are also crucial during node-capture attempts as they will interrupt a player from capturing a flag.

The key to winning Arathi Basin is communication and speed. When a node comes under attack, players need to respond immediately. Forming a raid group and keeping in contact with your team is the best way to facilitate a win. Speed is also key to winning the game and Epic mounts are almost a necessity in level 60 matches.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Arathi Basin ]

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