Sign inArathi Basin
Arathi Basin is a fifteen-versus-fifteen battleground in the Arathi Highlands, where teams fight to hold five resource points spread across a fertile valley. It was the third battleground added to World of Warcraft, arriving with patch 1.7 in September 2005, and its "domination" format, in which holding ground matters more than killing players, made it a favorite of organized PvP groups for the rest of the Classic era.
Background
The basin is one of the richest pieces of land in the Eastern Kingdoms, with a gold mine, a lumber mill, a blacksmith, farmland and horse stables. It once belonged to the human kingdom of Stromgarde, which has since fallen to ogres and the Syndicate.
Two forces now fight for it. The League of Arathor, made up of what remains of Stromgarde's people, wants to retake the basin and send its wealth to the Alliance. The Defilers, an elite Forsaken unit, want to cut the humans' supply lines and claim the land for the Horde. The Alliance base is Trollbane Hall in the northwest; the Horde base is the Defiler's Den in the southeast.
How it plays
The map has five nodes, each a building with a flag:
| Node | Notes |
|---|---|
| Stables | Closest to the Alliance base |
| Farm | Closest to the Horde base |
| Blacksmith | In the center of the map, with sightlines to every other node |
| Lumber Mill | On a high ridge overlooking the Blacksmith |
| Gold Mine | In a hollow on the opposite side of the map from the Lumber Mill |
To claim a node, a player clicks its flag and channels for a few seconds without being interrupted. The node then becomes "contested" for one minute; if the other team does not retake it in that time, it becomes fully controlled. Each node a team holds adds to its resource count, and holding more nodes makes the count rise much faster. In Classic, the first team to reach 2,000 resources wins.
Because nodes have to be both taken and defended, the battleground rewards coordinated groups. The classic plan is to hold three nodes, usually a team's two nearest plus the Blacksmith, and defend them, since three nodes is enough to beat a team holding two. Each node also has a graveyard, so the nodes a team controls decide where its players come back to life.
.jpg){kind=link}
Rewards
Playing Arathi Basin earns honor and reputation with the League of Arathor or the Defilers. Players receive Arathi Basin Marks of Honor, which are turned in through repeatable quests at the battleground's entrances, such as More Arathi Basin Marks of Honor with Sergeant Maclear at Refuge Pointe. Level 60 quests such as Control Four Bases and Control Five Bases for the Alliance, or Take Four Bases and Take Five Bases for the Horde, reward players whose team holds four or five bases at once.
The quartermasters Samuel Hawke for the Alliance and Rutherford Twing for the Horde sell level-banded blue gear and, at higher reputation, epic shoulders such as the [Highlander's Chain Pauldrons].
Getting there
The Alliance entrance is in the Arathi Highlands near Refuge Pointe, where Field Marshal Oslight recruits fighters; the Horde entrance is near Hammerfall, where Deathmaster Dwire leads the Defilers. Players can also queue from battlemasters in the capital cities.
History
Arathi Basin was added in patch 1.7.0 (September 2005), the same patch that added Zul'Gurub. Its first level bracket started at level 20, and quests for each 10-level band, such as The Battle for Arathi Basin!, let lower-level players join in.
Later Classic patches fixed geometry exploits in 1.7.1 and 1.8.1. In patch 1.12, Arathi Basin, like the other battlegrounds, began matching players across several realms through battlegroups. Later expansions lowered the score needed to win, first to 1,600 and then to 1,500.
Sources
Categories: Battlegrounds
Comments (0)
No comments yet.