Is alliance really that much better for pve?

[sempiternus]

I'm asking because i wanted to play a sword combat rogue, cause i find the playstyle more fun than daggers, but from what people are saying, alliance is way better for pve because of paladins buffs (+10% stats) and threat reduction.

I wanted to play an undead rogue and an orc warlock, but i might have to play daggers with the undead, not having the benefit of the human racial with swords, and warlock threat is a pain on the horde side.

But there is also pvp, where WOTF is a huge advantage when you're playing a rogue : i don't wanna make an alliance warlock because of that, plus dealing with the orcs stun resistance as a human rogue (and the inability to escape fear as a human compared to an undead) sounds painful.

Is the choice of the faction such a huge problem pvp and pve wise?

thank you

[Pokeypointy]

Yes they are.

Paladin, sword specialization and fear ward to name a few reasons.

[Larsen]

It's mostly down to Blessing of Salvation. It's not that big of a deal in the earlier content where DPS classes aren't generally threat-capped, but tank TPS doesn't scale at the same rate that people's DPS does, so by AQ/Naxx you've got this situation where DPS classes can't always do as much DPS as they're able to do because it's just too much threat. Salvation makes it so that they can then do 30% more than that.

Sword racial isn't significant. It's nice but it's like a 1% difference in DPS. There's no reason why this should be the deciding factor in anything. You don't have to go daggers just because you're playing some other race than human, that makes no sense. The only place where faction has any reason to matter in terms of class choice is with warlock, and then only if you're serious about PvP. It's a noticeable disadvantage to be alliance warlock.

[Soyoen]

I'm asking because i wanted to play a sword combat rogue, cause i find the playstyle more fun than daggers, but from what people are saying, alliance is way better for pve because of paladins buffs (+10% stats) and threat reduction.

Is the choice of the faction such a huge problem pvp and pve wise?

thank you

Hi, I've played both Horde and Alliance in vanilla content and this is what I have to add:

You will have the best experience as a rogue on the Horde faction in terms of raiding. You will have a harder time managing your aggro due to windfury and the lack of threat reduction (unless you shaman trades windfury for it or totem dances for you), but the Horde faction is so much more rewarding when playing a rogue in raids.

A simple example is that a rogue playing with windfury needs to time his special attacks in combination with windfury procs to gain the maximum attack power value for his special attacks, whilst an Alliance rogue doesn't have any incentive to pool energy in encounters to increase his DPS.


Finally, since you are a rogue you are a master of controlling the threat - playing on Horde will be a perfect fit for the set of tools the rogue class have.

[QuaRk]

More so than the racials, it probably comes down to people associating Alliance with PvE and Horde with PvP, so PvP-focused players roll Horde and PvE-focused players roll Alliance. This gives Alliance more top raiding guilds total, while Horde is more likely to have a stronger median pug or premade for PvP. The win/loss ratio (as posted by Viper) is surprisingly even, despite Horde having a very low degree of premading these days (due to queues) and what is likely a negative gear gap as a result of PvE, while premades are endemic on the Alliance side (compare the honor gain of the top 10 alliance players with the top 10 horde players on realmplayers.com). Furthermore, the first guild to clear BWL was a Horde guild (Dreamstate).

The racials are important, but I think the importance people attach to these racials (the psychological factor) is the bigger factor.

PS: WotF is overrated, especially when Alliance has already decided to roll less fear-based classes to play around it. Orcs' hardiness is the big badass.

[Whisperwind]

Don't forget humans spirit racial for holy paladins/priests and gnomes int racial for casters passive buff. Those are but a few that made a decent impact in terms of pve and why people rolled alliance over horde. Most of alliance racial's were slotted in favor of pve. Where as hordes racial's were more pvp oriented from the start.

[Moozer]

Their racials give them passive bonuses, some nice (5% intellect, 5% Spirit) and some fantastic (Swords for Rogues is great, since then with talents they can easily push glancing blows off the table.)

Plus you throw Paladins and their blessings making Bosses easier since they can bring resist auras and lower raid threat. And come Naxx they'll be throwing out zero mana heals which'll be insane.

Horde really stands out in melee dps damage due to windfury, and Shamans shine in Mana return and Ahn'qiraj due to poisons. But otherwise, they face more standard Vanilla problems such as threat and glancing blows without some help.

[Viorus]

Don't forget horde is filled with angry teens with raging testosterone.

[Soyoen]

Their racials give them passive bonuses, some nice (5% intellect, 5% Spirit) and some fantastic (Swords for Rogues is great, since then with talents they can easily push glancing blows off the table.)

Glancing blows will always be present on Human rogue tables "until" they get the OH from Kel (Bosses have 315 defence skill as they are set at level 63). Humans are the best rogue class on paper though no doubt, but it's far from the most entertaining one to play - in fact life without windfury is dull and gray unless you're a fury warrior who finally get to push some buttons.

Horde rogues will have a much better experience all across the board; Dungeons will go faster, raids have more individual challenge, and PvP racials stand superb aside from perception (Human).

[joshbpepper]

More so than the racials, it probably comes down to people associating Alliance with PvE and Horde with PvP, so PvP-focused players roll Horde and PvE-focused players roll Alliance. This gives Alliance more top raiding guilds total, while Horde is more likely to have a stronger median pug or premade for PvP. The win/loss ratio (as posted by Viper) is surprisingly even, despite Horde having a very low degree of premading these days (due to queues) and what is likely a negative gear gap as a result of PvE, while premades are endemic on the Alliance side (compare the honor gain of the top 10 alliance players with the top 10 horde players on realmplayers.com). Furthermore, the first guild to clear BWL was a Horde guild (Dreamstate).

The racials are important, but I think the importance people attach to these racials (the psychological factor) is the bigger factor.

PS: WotF is overrated, especially when Alliance has already decided to roll less fear-based classes to play around it. Orcs' hardiness is the big badass.

Wtf. Theres still gonna be PvE guilds horde side.