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Currently, we're satisfied with the Warlock spells which require a Soul Shard. We do realize that that the current system of Soul Shard management is a bit too cumbersome, and improvements to that area are underway, as has been stated in the past.

Here is the community managers' answer to your question. Developers may have something different to say though:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=w ow-general&t=4449108&s=blizzard&tmp=1#blizzard

I'm so sick and tired of these warlocks outright dimissing obvious class problems just because the've either got better gear, specced around it (Demonology) or chosen a helpful profession (Engineering).

The rest of us have serious problems gaining any sort of distance to any type of melee class in combat. Just look at the recent post Blizzard made regarding what warlocks want the most. Just count the number of times "Escape capability" and "Shard solution" show up.

What do you want us to do? Drain-tank them? We can't even get a 1.5 sec Fear off, and even if we did, almost everybody can break it or become immune now.

How do you think the priests would like it if their shield were an end-tier talent into the Holy tree?

Or what about mages? Make Blink, Frost-Nova and Polymorf talent based, and when they whine you just say "Learn to play your class"? "Spec for it you noob!"?

People are not asking to be overpowered - they simply want to be at the same level with other classes. Where does it say in the class description that warlocks aren't supposed to survive a rogue, warrior or any undead unless they spec demonology, pick up Engineering and buy potions from the auction house?

"Escape Spell: You have more hit points than any given mage or priest COMBINED, unless you have really exceptionally bad gear. I routinely have almost 5K, unbuffed, with my PvE gear on. My PvP gear has more stamina on it."
Looks like you have some epic gear! Congratulations! On top of that you're probably Demonology specced too, right? Good for you!

"Here's your escape spell to keep from getting ganked by rogues: Team up with a rogue. Be bait."
Aaahhh, the priceless "outnumber them if you can't beat them" argument! We're talking class balance here, not zerging. You do think classes should be somewhat balanced, don't you?

"Then, at some point, explain to me how ice block saves a mage from a rogue"
It doesn't. But the cooldown on Frost-Nova and Blink is now over, so...

"Or an 8 second easily dispellable polymorph that fully heals it's target helps a mage with a rogue"
This definately helps a mage escape. Besides, I thought this was more than 8 seconds.

"Soul Shards: Please go read the class description. You should have known what you were getting into when you signed up. Your lack of ability to RTFM is not my (or Blizzard's) problem."
I'm sorry, I must have missed the part saying "Once you hit lvl 60, you must travel 2 flightpaths and then spend 40 minutes farming shards."

And these issues are "just" class-issues - don't even get me started on the list of current bugs (incomplete list) plaguing us.

Why don't you do some research before opening your mouth? News of this has spread to the mass media and Blizzard has admitted on their official website that they are doing this scanning but that we should trust them because they are only doing it to stop cheaters. Several threads containing hundreds of angry replies, many of them legal threats continue to be locked on the WoW forums. Detailed methods of monitoring this scanning have been posted and confirmed by players on the forums e.g. using a tool like Filemon. WoW start scanning your hard drive from the moment you start the game.

Oh noes, the CUSTOMER SERVICE reps don't play warlocks. But what's this?

The developers DO play warlocks?

Oh, I guess you have absolutely no point then! So, yes, please go and whine about your class over there because NO ONE CARES HERE .

Blizzard ALREADY BUFFED WARLOCKS IN THE LAST PATCH. And, they're doing it AGAIN in the next one.

They've listened, and they've acted. Yes, Fear is no longer an IWIN Button. Now you have to use skill. Doesn't that suck.

Oh noes, the CUSTOMER SERVICE reps don't play warlocks. But what's this?

The developers DO play warlocks?

Oh, I guess you have absolutely no point then! So, yes, please go and whine about your class over there because NO ONE CARES HERE .

Blizzard ALREADY BUFFED WARLOCKS IN THE LAST PATCH. And, they're doing it AGAIN in the next one.

They've listened, and they've acted. Yes, Fear is no longer an IWIN Button. Now you have to use skill. Doesn't that suck.

Are paldin's ever going to get the love they deserve from the Dev's. Reading, only briefly from http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/board.aspx?fn=wo w-paladin it's easy to see that they really do need some attention now.

Disclaimer: Yes I do have a level 60 paladin.

While technical issues were a problem for the first few months of retail service, prompt patching and additional world servers have left the game in excellent shape. -original /. story

The next vein gave me the same problem. In fact, I had gotten stuck, and had to re-log on 4 of the first 5 veins that I mined with this toon. If I had been a new subscriber, I would have returned the game later that same day, and demanded a refund.

This problem is obviously not just with mining. Sometimes, it can take 7-15 minutes to get an item out of a mail sent to me from another player. Sometimes, it can take 45 minutes to list all one-handed maces on the auction house, even though there's only 23 to list.

What data structuring technique did you use to hash items in the game? (I need to know, so that I stay away from it.) Also, is it too late to fix such a fundamental problem as this?

Lastly, what makes you think that the servers are in "Excellent shape"? Have you forgotten about posts such as this one? I count 397 people who disagree with the developers response (that's 100% of the players who have replied to the initial blue post). Why can you just respond with "ok, we're looking into it" ??

Try looking at the World of Warcraft website. There is a big, obvious, "World of Warcraft Jobs" banner.

While I am no hiring coordinator for Blizzard, I'd say that you should at least posess the ability to use the Internet (at least try to click on the linked content in this story) and/or read.

You might want to take a look here and here to see their official postings about employment opportunities.

"While technical issues were a problem for the first few months of retail service, prompt patching and additional world servers have left the game in excellent shape."

I would submit that the game is -not- in excellent shape. Your own server status messages tell some of the tale:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/board.aspx?fn=wo w-realm-status ...but not all of it. Like massive db lag that can cause 20-30 second delays or longer every time you send mail, use the auction house, or even loot a quest item from a mob.

Granted, things have improved since launch, but there seems to always be a long way to go.

What kind of priority does correcting this have, compared to other activities that will tend to make things worse, such as new content and boxed expansions?

Or, put another way, how many PSI of pressure is Vivendi's vice exerting on your jewels for the release of the next box set? Or are they happy with your success thus far, and leaving you alone to make things right?

If Vivendi isn't making the call, who at Blizzard is making the choice to focus more on content than stability?

Also: Has Blizzard been approched to drop Bittorrent technology as their patch delivery mechanism because it's "primarily used for illegal purposes" or is a "disruptive technology"?

In the near future will it be possible to freely switch servers, not just using the random character transfer page? - (My friends created characters on different servers.) Also is there any plans for Cross-Server Battlegrounds, that's being talked about on the forums, to reduce queue times for BG content? Check it out here here.

Running World of Warcraft at 1600x1200x32 @ 85Hz with all options on and no slowdowns... garrrrgh.... drool.... gurgle....

pH34r T3h w4R10cK!

Sorry 'bout that. Just getting all, um, warm and fuzzy thinking about it.

Some links for you. First,

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/imple mented/1p3.html
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/imple mented/1p5.html

and then

http://www.fence.org/images/Birds/FenceBirds/crow. jpg

Some links for you. First,

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/imple mented/1p3.html
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/imple mented/1p5.html

and then

http://www.fence.org/images/Birds/FenceBirds/crow. jpg

So, we will have less younger annoying players playing World of Warcraft.

Actually, for many of these Chinese, playing WoW is their job. Read up on any WoW forums about the "sweatshops". Excerpt:

In the average sweatshop you have 1 person manning 2 or 3 computers. The first 1 or 2 computers is a charecter being ran by simple macros(and looting programs) requiring minimal player interaction, farming scarlet monestary for example. The final one is usually a level 60 rogue farming difficult mobs, such as the elites in tyr's hand. ( If you go to tyr's hand on any server you will find about 5 to 10 rogues farming 24/7, all chinese)

The biggest issue with the chinese farmer sweatshops where players get payed 37 cents an hour to farm gold, is that there are always employees that speak english near by. These employees who have a degree in english have 3 main functions.
1.) Sell items to players in IF/ORG trade.
2.) Assist other employees with player interaction.
3.) Respond to GM tells.

From their FAQ:

Why isn't World of Warcraft free? World of Warcraft will require a fee to play. This fee will be used to support the costs associated with the high-quality levels of service, support, and ongoing content creation that we are planning for World of Warcraft.

Are they really adding $30million of value each month? Somehow I think not.....

The linked screenshot is plainly edited to show multiple copies of the same item: the texturing behind each Krol Blade item line is identical and there is a cut line horizontally between each one, whereas normally the item line is transparent and the auction window texture should be seamless & varied behind the items.

This doesn't confirm the existence of the bug either way.

Additionally, Blizzard has extended their normal Tuesday maintenance to investigate the duping claims.

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=w ow-general&t=4096051&s=new&tmp=1#new

Sorry, here is a link to the first page of the thread I linked to above:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?FN=w ow-dungeons&T=89153&P=1

1. 7/19 - Weekly maintenance extended | 7/19/2005 10:52:00 AM PDT
(Tyren)

The weekly maintenance has been extended while we investigate the validity of the claims regarding a possible exploit in the game. We remind our players that discussing possible exploits on the official forums is a violation of the Code of Conduct, and such threads will be deleted without prior notice.

(http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?f n= wow-general&t=4095298&p=1&tmp=1#post4095298)

I'm not convinced that this exploit really exists. If there is an exploit, I'm not sure I believe that the linked instructions are correct.

First of all, people started wondering if something was wrong when they noticed level 30 players in Maraudon, a level 45+ area.

That is suspicious.

Then, they noticed them cycling between locations repeatedly.

Again, suspicious.

But the "instructions" that this article links to say it can be done in The Deadmines, which is a level 20+ instance.

If it can be done in the deadmines, then why bother going to an area like Maraudon at level 30 where you are likely to be killed?

In addition, it is suspicious that this has to be done "early in the morning after a reset" in order for it to work. Convenient to dissuade people from testing it.

A lot of people are treating this as fact this morning, but no one can actually log in to try it for themselves because the servers are down for maintenance.

The supposed source of the exploit is http://www.gamebugs.org. Take a look at their public forums where everyone is writing "please activate my account!!!" messages. A number of messages on the official WoW forums list the gamebugs.org URL in the subject line (very convenient for them, don't you think?).

Here is a link to a more detailed thread on the official forums:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?FN=w ow-dungeons&T=89153&P=7

From a community rep on the Blizzard Official WoW Forum, the scheduled weekly maintenance will be extended while they investigate the dupe bug.

Presumably they aren't going to bring the servers back up until the dupe bug is fixed, which might take awhile, because it appears that the bug is a result of a race condition and crappy servers (the bug occurs when the instance server spazzes and the character reverts to a previous instance).

So ... who wants to take bets on how long until the WoW servers will come back up? And will they refund their customers for the days of server outages?

Also ... what is going to be done about all of the gold and items duped already before they took down the servers? A rollback seems like the only sure bet, but it would definitely piss off a lot of people.

We want to formally address player concerns regarding issues found in Blackwing Lair. Blackwing Lair is currently the highest tier raid dungeon in the game, designed to be a very challenging encounter for even the most powerful guilds to defeat. Since its launch, we have discovered some key issues which are making Blackwing encounters easier than intended. This applies to both Razorgore and Vaelastraz encounters. One related issue is also preventing the door to open after Vaelastrasz dies, not allowing players to advance beyond the Vaelastrasz the Corrupted encounter. While this is a bug, players currently should not be able to progress beyond the Vaelastraz encounter by any means, and anyone found in areas beyond the second door will be considered to be exploiting the game.

"World of Warcraft isn't doing anything July 4th specific"

News to me...

World of Warcraft isn't doing anything directly related to Independence day, but they do have vendors out selling fireworks!!! See their front page for more info : http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/

Good points on all of the above. I haven't played PVP at all (I think I'd get ganked given I'm only in my 50s) so I don't know the PVP instances - I assumed PVPs 1 and 2 were in production and 3 would be upcoming. PVPInstance02 in Wowmapview is Azshara Crater, which after reviewing http://worldofwarcraft.com/pvp/battlegrounds/ I think is not out yet.

Outland: I really don't know if it's an instance, right now it's about the size of a zone, a pretty big one though. Ideally they would create an entire world on that side (technically I think Outworld is a different planet). Good stuff for an expansion pack.

Airport is supposed to be safe for exploration (Blizz said it was ok somewhere in the forums), as are the "swimmable" spots. As to other places, honestly, I don't care if there's a ban threat or not. I know it was a big issue in beta, but I really don't see how this would be a problem nowadays. It's not like there's monsters or mining to be done in the unpopulated areas.

Finally, in response to one of the messages earlier, I think Blizz closed the hole allowing players to enter the Caverns of Time as a Ghost, but I could be wrong.

-Jack Ash

No point in trying to get to these on the live servers unless you have too much time on your hands.

Or have decided to stop playing and don't mind not being able to come back.

Exploring such areas on the live servers will get you banned.

I'm beginning to think it isn't. I'm sure everyone here has heard of World of Warcraft. It was supposed to be casual friendly and managed to succeed fairly well at it - for the first 35 levels or so. Some time around level 40 it reverts to the "grind XP" model and once you hit end-game, it's back to EverQuest-style raids.

The problem is that World of Warcraft is ultimately starting to alienate both hardcore gamers, who rushed through the content and are now bored, and casual gamers, who are just now starting to finish the content and are now discovering that they're getting bored too. A proper setup needs to somehow balance both casual gamers and hardcore gamers.

Final Fantasy XI had an interesting system set up originally that could have made it casual friendly and allowing hardcore to have fun too, by allowing casual players to play one job and hardcore players to play several jobs (on the same toon) thereby allowing hardcore players to get more rewards than casual - but not sufficiently more to be completely overpowering. Except FFXI made soloing impossible (no, Beastmaster doesn't count, because you have to have grouped to get it in the first place), and that concept was totally defeated when they raised the level cap from 50 and started adding end-game pseudo-raid content.

Ultimately, you have to find some way to allow both casual and hardcore players to succeed, or else both are going to get bored and leave. WoW is an interesting case-study in that - it'll be interesting to see how the next several months go as more and more casual players reach level 60.

It's explicitly not a priority. I'm not going to bother to find the post on the official forums, but Blizzard has officially stated that Paladins are considered complete. They are concentrating on Druids and Hunters now. Paladins aren't even on the list.

So, yeah, I haven't quit yet - because I was an IDIOT and took the 6-month plan - but once that runs out next month, unless there are some major changes - buh-bye! Battlegrounds being a COMPLETE FLOP basically cemented that for me. They have until July 15th to convince me to stay.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/jobs/

Indeed, Blizzard uses Bittorrent to distribute patches for World of Warcraft.

I've been playing WoW now for 6 months. I'm amazed at it's success, because 2 million subscribers is quite an accomplishment. It is the most fun mmorpg I've played.

That said, they need to work on their customer support. If they have 2 million subscribers paying 15 dollars a month, they could at least hire one community manager for each class. As of now, on their forums feedback from developers funneled through their community managers (I believe there are 5) is extremely rare.

With the recent addition of battlegrounds which gave a set place for PvP, the lack of balance between the factions is showing. There are two 'faction only' classes, the Paladin and Shaman. The Shaman is the most powerful character in the game, while the Paladin is the weakest. When you combine this with the fact that the Horde has the better racial traits, battlegrounds is lopsided. People have been bringing this to blizzards attention for months with minimal feedback. Maybe now that battlegrounds are around they will do something to balance out the classes and races.

If they would hire a community manager for each class, then they could have the current ones moderate the other boards, such as PvP, RP, General, etc.

Overall, they need to get their act together before people notice they were never ready for this kind of userbase. The latest thread of doom in their forums is about someone with cerbral palsy who was banned for using '3rd party programs' which allowed him to play world of warcraft even though he was disabled.

They can't let PR disasters like this go on for too long. It is a game, but it's also a service. Blizzard needs to wake up and realize that.

How many times to people have to be told before they get it?! Unless you go on one of the high population servers, THERE ARE NO WAIT QUEUES TO JOIN THE GAME. I think it's mainly because people believe they get a more epic experiance on larger servers, which isn't actually true. There are loads of mid/low pop servers, just look here: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/serverstatus/ [worldofwarcraft.com]

The only feature that has regular queues is the BG, and that isn't because of server infastructure, it's because of lack of interest on the players part. It probably doesn't help that most of the areas for the BG are miles away from anything else, I bet queues would be a lot shorter if they enabled you to join the BG queue at any capital city.

No, you can't. They haven't allowed that for months. Go ahead, try it. (You need a WoW account for that.) You'll get told:

The Character Move feature is currently closed. We are continuing to monitor realm populations, and are keeping the option in mind to re-open Character Moves in the event any realms become overpopulated. In addition, we are looking into the possibility of allowing customers more freedom in transferring to realms of their choice in the future. No further details are currently available concerning this feature, but any new information (regarding this or similar services) will be posted on www.worldofwarcraft.com as soon as it is available.

Battleground queues are insane on most servers. People have been waiting 15 hours on some servers just for the chance to play! Blizzard really needs to find a way to reduce the wait time, but so far, we've been hearing nothing.

What's even better is that sometimes an AV instance will start, and then all the Horde will randomly up and leave, killing the instance, so the Alliance who have been waiting 8+ hours get screwed. GG, Blizzard!

No, you can't. They haven't allowed that for months. Go ahead, try it. (You need a WoW account for that.) You'll get told:

The Character Move feature is currently closed. We are continuing to monitor realm populations, and are keeping the option in mind to re-open Character Moves in the event any realms become overpopulated. In addition, we are looking into the possibility of allowing customers more freedom in transferring to realms of their choice in the future. No further details are currently available concerning this feature, but any new information (regarding this or similar services) will be posted on www.worldofwarcraft.com as soon as it is available.

Battleground queues are insane on most servers. People have been waiting 15 hours on some servers just for the chance to play! Blizzard really needs to find a way to reduce the wait time, but so far, we've been hearing nothing.

What's even better is that sometimes an AV instance will start, and then all the Horde will randomly up and leave, killing the instance, so the Alliance who have been waiting 8+ hours get screwed. GG, Blizzard!

If you are claiming Shaman are over powered you are:

1. Alliance

2. Do not understand PvP

3. Lazy

To help you in your retarded state, read this and all of your questions/fears will be answered/assuaged. Since I know you're lazy (and might not read the link), answer me this: Why are no shaman at the top of the PVP honor rankings anywhere if they're so overpowered? PWN3D!!!!!

Typical 'omgnoob' reponse. At least have the decency to post from your account.

The particular ability that you are (humorously enough, given your condescending tone) whining about yourself happens to be a 31pt talent in the demonology line. This is a line that most warlocks do not spec past Improved Imp and Demonic Embrace since it is largely a waste of points outside of PVE. I don't know what server you play on, but I am betting it is not a PVP server. My first character ever was a warlock, and despite server moves and faction changes, I have always carried a warlock in my arsenal. I have survived more nerfs than any other class out there with the possible exception of hunters and still keep on trucking with not a single complaint in the WOW forums. Because.....
You see, and this really is the rub, you can choose to roll any class you like that is available for your faction. There is no limit to the number of characters you can play. So, if I was really complaining about my class being weaker than another class in all respects, what would stop me (or you) from rolling one of those??

Regardless, I never said "omg teh warlocks r gimpd!!1" If you read my post again instead of responding in a typical immature kneejerk fashion, you'll see that I was posting answers to the parent about why more locks don't run with their Felhunters and spam Hellfire periodically. You'll also notice that I mentioned that I play a rogue myself, among the many other characters I have and play daily.

Please post constructively or not at all. The kiddie forums are available to you at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/ if you want to post more 'learn to play your class' business. You will have more company and sympathy there.

Shaman are not over powered, read this. Since this story has become essentially an extension of the blizz forms I will reply properly: STFU if you think Shaman are overpowered, you're obviously a n00b and have no idea how to get around our omgwtfuber frost shock. =D

omgwtf. The damn shaman form has been overrun with nerf posts to point that Blizzard now locks nerf posts the moment they come up (at least the ones IN ALL FREAKIN CAPS). See for yourself.

Aphext - 58 Shaman Crushridge

Can't wait to get home to try this thing out, since I never bothered to get on to the test servers. (Don't like being a beta-tester, what can I say.) Looks really exciting.

Been reading the Blizzard forums to see how people are reacting.

Apparently there are some huge queue problems with people waiting to get in to Battlegrounds. Hopefully Blizzard'll fix that soon, but it's probably just because there are so many people waiting to try it.

And, then, of course, there was this post by a Whinelock who apparently is upset that despite the fifteen or so large buffs given to the Warlock class, they fixed an exploit that Warlocks could use. I just found that funny. :)

See you in the Battlegrounds!

Can't wait to get home to try this thing out, since I never bothered to get on to the test servers. (Don't like being a beta-tester, what can I say.) Looks really exciting.

Been reading the Blizzard forums to see how people are reacting.

Apparently there are some huge queue problems with people waiting to get in to Battlegrounds. Hopefully Blizzard'll fix that soon, but it's probably just because there are so many people waiting to try it.

And, then, of course, there was this post by a Whinelock who apparently is upset that despite the fifteen or so large buffs given to the Warlock class, they fixed an exploit that Warlocks could use. I just found that funny. :)

See you in the Battlegrounds!

I would like to see a MMORPG based on FOX's popular science fiction franchise. I don't care about Predator (Aliens vs. Predators). I know FOX had a game like this before MMORPG was known.

I would like to see something like World of Warcraft, Star Wars: Galaxies, etc. with various missions (quests) in various places. There would be different classes as well like Natural Selections including commanders, ships (medic, weapons, etc.).

This seems like a very bad idea. Isn't it exactly this sort of thing that got sites like Suprnova shut down? I mean, they weren't hosting a single copyrighted product, but they got killed anyway. Then again, perhaps Bram is looking for a big legal fight.

Such a thing, I think, will only serve to showcase how BT is used only for piracy. The MPAA will be able to say, "Look at all these copyrighted works they're distributing!", while good uses of BT, like Blizzard's BT distribution system, will be overlooked as a legitimate use of the technology. It seems that this will only serve to (further) de-legitimize BT in the eyes of the public, when in fact it's a godsend of technology. We should be promoting its legal uses and trying to minimize the perception of BT as solely a tool for piracy.

WOW, that was a lot of URLs!

You may not be aware, but Blizzard runs an entire forum dedicated to trolling about World of Warcraft.

Well... in World of Warcraft they do exist according to this screen capture. [grin]

It was quite fun, very easy to get into, and familiar if you've played capture the flag before. The initial games I had were fairly quick, ended within what seemed like 15 minutes or so of starting. Finding a team of 'good' people, or co-ordinating a team was a little bit trickier, but eventually things worked out.

There were some bad things, but I'll post about them near the end.

The first thing that I noticed was the bases. The bases are fairly well laid out with 2-3 main entrances which you may or may not want to be defending. It took a little bit getting used to the design, but after the first few games the layout became second nature. Something I didn't discover for a bit was the fact that the layout of the Horde and Alliance bases are the same, even if they look different from the outside. I guess this makes things more fair, but from a Lore perspective I would expect it to be a bit different on each side.

The second thing I noticed were the floating buffs. There are atleast 3 of these on each side, I'll give a short description of each.

• Berserk. gives you +15% damage but also increases the damage you take by +5% ( might have the numbers slightly wrong. This one was kind of useful, and was the first one i found. It could typically be found as I don't think people picked this one up as often.
• Speed. gives you a speed boost for about a minute. very well located so that you can use it to either grab the flag, run away with the flag, or maybe catch someone who has the flag. This changes the game a bit, and was very nice.
• Regrowth / Regeneration. gives you back some health. again useful, but not that big of a deal, as you'll see when i get to rezzing.

When you die in the game ( and that was probably the next thing I did after finding my berserker item.) You are transported to the graveyard, where you're asked if you want to rez. The guy is on a 30 second timer, and it's going over and over. He rezzes you with mostly full health and mana so it doesn't really make sense to take a rez from another player, although that works too. The 30 second timer never seemed to change, so you were never really out of the game for too long.

I found the dying / rezzing part to be fairly well executed, my only complaints were when I just missed the rez window and could maybe have rezzed if the interface had come up faster. The other annoying bit was when the alliance was camping our graveyard, and there wasn't much we could do about it.

After I got all that sorted out, I started to get into the actual match. This is where the people you're playing with make a big difference. If you stay together, and keep each other healed / buffed you can do really well. Typically players who were running out alone would get quickly taken out by the other side. I maybe haven't pvp'd agaisnt hunters before, but I really noticed them here for the first time. Hunters seemed to be doing really well, and due to the nature of PVP you had to actually worry about their pets ( as opposed to a Duel where you can ignore them and take out the hunter first. ) I had one hunter try to feign death on me in battlegrounds. When his pet didn't die, I figured what was going on and took out the corpse ;-)

The game was pretty fast paced, and I lost two or three matches in fairly quick succession, mostly due to lack of coordination on the team. We could possibly have slowed them down a little bit, but I'll claim unfamiliarity on everyone's parts as the cause.

The level breakdown made the matches fairly even, and there wasn't that often that I felt outclassed. One match I was fighting a number of level 49-50's which made it a lot harder than the others, but in general the spread was good enough that I felt that I had something to

Nope. The onyl thing you lose for a dishonorable kill is the time it took to do it. You get rewards for honorable kills, but no punishment for dishonorable kills.

You do not technically get rewards for honorable kills. What gets you rewards and moves you up in rank are contribution points. These are only awarded to you if the player is within a certain number of levels from you; the kill will also only be honorable if they fall within this range (though I do not believe it is dishonorable if they are not). From the Blizzard site:

"An honorable kill occurs when a player takes part in the killing of an appropriate player or NPC in the player's level range. The color system for players works the same as it does for monsters. Grey level players will not yield an honorable kill."

Futhermore, killing the same player over and over is not worth anything, as there are quickly diminishing returns. You can read more here.