Old-school BattleGround fun and games

Its time to put fingers to keyboard again as I've got Battle Grounds on my mind. I wrote about Strand of the Ancients when it was fresh and new, and I am a little sad that I havent really kept up with current thinking on that theatre of war, as I have been on something of an odyssey involving the other ones.
My favourite BG at the present time is Arathi Basin, and I have finally made it to friendly with the league of Arathor, which seems (bizarrely) like something of a milestone, even though it affects nothing at the moment. I have the easy achievements for all the BGs now, and am working on AB and WSG quite a bit, trying to get to the minutiae of the tactics involved. The Basin can be really awesome when you roll the opponent before you at the start of the match, which is technically quite easy if you've got some heavy hitters or fast movers, and the optimum situation is where you have forced them all into respawning at one end, and just contain them for the 2 minutes you need to win if you've got all 5 flags capped. In my first 15 games of last month, 10 games went more or less like this, which is heady stuff in our battlegroup. It has been more mixed recently, but AB provides the most interesting variety of situations to be in; Will the base you've chosen to guard or assault become the flag you spend the whole twenty minutes fighting for? Will the stealthy operative, who you are guarding the flag with, actually be looking at you when you get jumped? Is this Shaman any good at healing, and therefore nearly impossible to kill, or will he just die really easily, as it seems 70% of shamans do? can you respawn in time to defend the flag you died at? Or will the assaulted flag switch sides, and force you to quantum leap back to Stables, waking up dazed and confused, miles from the target... Questions, questions.
The battle for Warsong Gulch offers you none of these complexities. The question here is often; are we going to be beaten with big sticks, or do we get to do the beating? There is no subtlety to it really, but it is still a game worth playing. The main business, i.e, the business of getting the your flagcarrier on the roof and then chasing the enemy flag carrier is something that up until very recently I found really perplexing, but only because it is not carefully explained that in order to capture a flag, the enemy cannot be carrying yours. Its very simple, and it must seem so obvious to those who were around when the bgs were just kicking off, but for many who turn up in WSG looking for a punchup it is easy to assume that the business with the flags is just a cheeky footrace - who ever caps theirs first scores the goal. As I never carry flags, the primary evidence never presented itself to me otherwise.
Slowly, I am building a suit of gear (my Retribution pvp set, outfitter tag fans) with Krakenoah that is expressly for the purpose of carrying flags, and I intend to spend one sunday in WSG chasing the Ironman achievement. Three flags in a row in one quick, smash and grab game. I only pvp as Ret for this purpose, and find healing and fighting at range far more satisfying. Partly because I switch targets in a slightly clunky way, and don't do the jumpy dancing quite as well as most of Magtheridon do. My main interest in WSG currently lies in the 10 to 19 bracket where my mage is doing very nicely. As a fire mage with a 1000 hp at lvl 19, I am working on all the achievements, starting with the defender titles, as defence is a game I really enjoy, and a mage is the best equipped to deal with it in many ways. I wish I had a bit more speed perhaps, but crowd control and AoE are hilariously effective sometimes, particularly when I've got surprise (or a good rogue bodyguard) on my side.
I've never held an opinion on twinking before, however, the Horde are always well equipped, and the culture of twinking is alive and well on our battlegroup, so I feel the small amount of gold I've spent on this process is well spent. Were the players and the games not there, I'd sack it and probably level the mage. Also, the Gulch comes down to one-on-one so often that I think it is the easiest way to test yourself as a player, particularly in the 19 bracket when all you've got is 5 spells and no "nuclear" capability. I've indulged in a few of the classic protocols for twink characters too, by maxing his professions to 150, and enchanting the best blues I can find. I've even been for a wander round Shadowfang Keep looking for classic items, but that was more with an eye to recouping my costs than shopping. I have had so little time for the game in the last 2 months, compared to most of last year, that doing some of the generic fun stuff, like builidng a twink, or equipping your banker with a dinner suit, has actually been fun, and accessible with not much time on your hands.
I am still trying to picture how a WSG premade ought to go. You don't see many advertised these days, but I feel like I might try to kick one off soon, once I've worked out the class balance I'd like to see. I might have to build a premade for the Ironman run, and even then it would be better if is built from people I know. At 19, you wouldn't need as many healer types as you'd need at 80, where I think you want 3 melee dps (me, I like Cats, but Rogues or DKs would be the trad choice), 1 Hunter and 2 Priests as your attack group, and 2 Paladins, 2 Mages or Locks as your defence team. To be honest, at 80, you could probably have 8 locks and a couple of feral druids and do really well, and the druids would only be there for the occasional burst of speed and flavour. Some of the pundits are saying that Locks aren't as overpowering as they used to be, but they are still the ones for really putting you on the ropes. Multiple fears and DoTs will take out 90% of the regular BG crowd. The availability of the battlemasters trinkets in 3.1 could provide an answer to this, but then the Lock might well be wearing hers too.
I realise now that there wasn't much of a point to this article, other than as a counterpoint to the things I read which morosely describe the BGs as dead in the water, and a lot of the guff you get in the trade channel from kids so hyped up on cola they can't concentrate on doing anything else but dancing in Ironforge and bickering over the price of vanity pets. I think that the low level grounds are excellent, and given a proper chance, can demonstrate the variety of the game and let you practise a few new ideas. To get the same experience outside of WoW, you could probably go paintballing with strangers, but that's generally more expensive and will almost definitely involve leaving the house. Alterac Valley is more problematic to defend as a "good time", because whilst it is more of an interesting tactical war than all of the others, Its very hard to get the numbers in there to make it worthwhile, and it will be a 10 versus 40 whitewash nearly every time. When it is balanced, the way that the numbers go in reverse to the other BGs is fascinating, and the little mini quests and wing commander missions business is great for the feel of the thing. I hope we see some renewed interest in it in a future patch. I'm halfway through revered with the Stormpike, so I will almost certainly be returning at some point, if only to get my Exalted ticket, and get hailed in my home city. I may have to do it soon anyway, as that little quest and scene happens so little these days they'll probably remove it and no one will notice.