#37 - Aug. 7, 2010, 4:46 p.m.
WoW Arena, Round 1
Our first round of WoW matches is now over; the results include some early victories by the following teams:
LightZ CaMerA ActioN,
SK Sansibar,
*aAa* and
Virtus Pro. The line up still features one of the previously favoured combinations -- Rogue, Mage, Priest -- in the form of
Team Dignitas. But this year we’re seeing a very clear trend towards the current particularly favoured combination of Warlock, Shaman & Druid, which started gaining attention seemingly after an update of gear available for competitive Arena play.
French & Italian team
*aAa* did well in employing this newly popular class combination to win against their fellow Alliance team
Stay Small, and another set of matches where this class combination proved effective were some noticeably long games between
LightZ CaMerA ActioN (Warlock, Shaman, Druid) and
x6tence (Paladin, Death Knight, Druid). Alliance-playing
LightZ CaMerA ActioN managed to take advantage of crucial windows for bursting down the members of the opposing Horde-aligned
x6tence.
Though Warlock, Shaman, Druid also proved very powerful in ensuring
Virtus Pro’s victory over
Team Dignitas, it didn’t seem like it would at first. During their first round,
Team Dignitas made a successful assault on warlock Shurko from
Virtus Pro: focusing on him, killing his pet and then ensuring he was stunned, silenced and essentially unable to re-summon his pet to assist him. This was crucial for their victory in the first round, but unfortunately for them
Virtus Pro bounced back and defeated them in the following three rounds.
Using a currently favoured combination skilfully is obviously an effective strategy, but the use of skill is still the real winner, as
SK Sansibar are apparently proving with their deployment of Warrior, Warlock & Paladin. Horde-playing team
hehe xo aimed at bringing down either SK’s warlock Draintrain or their warrior Barb, while keeping paladin-healer Fraki crowd-controlled. But SK kicked back the assault effectively: Draintrain using his Fel Hunter pet to devour the controls whilst trying to ensure the opposing healer, Demun, was controlled himself. SK warrior Barb performed a couple of well timed intervenes to help ensure Fraki was still able to get off some crucial heals. The end result was victory for SK and their choice of Warrior, Warlock & Paladin.
Already as I type the second round of WoW matches has come to a close, so if you were unable to see them on the live stream, be sure to check back here later to see a recap of those matches too.