The neutral city of Halaa is prized for its strategic importance to both factions. As a highly visible target, with its own unique rewards, the city is the focus for the world PvP that occurs in Nagrand.
By defeating enemy players in the city's vicinity, you gain Halaa Battle Tokens which can be redeemed for a selection of PvP-focused rewards. You can purchase these rewards from special NPCs who only appear for the controlling side. Other vendors also sell special jewelcrafting plans and gems to the side in control of Halaa.
In addition, friendly players in Nagrand get a buff of a +5% damage boost when the city is in their side's possession. The passive buff helps for questing as well as fighting enemy players.
Besides the rewards, there are other motivations for fighting over Halaa. Foremost among these is that it's a fun objective. The feeling of fighting hard to take over a town with your allies, defeating the enemy, and seeing your side's flag raised in town can be very gratifying. You and your allies will surely feel a “woot!” coming on when you see it happen.
Attacking Halaa
Marshalling the Troops The side who controls Halaa receives several benefits when defending it from subsequent attack:
The battle for Halaa is often a numbers game. If the enemy has more players, you're going to need to do hit-and-run tactics or get more players on your side. Try asking in the General, Local Defense, or World Defense channels for more players. Shattrath City is quite close to Halaa so you can send someone to ask for reinforcements.
It's common to ask if there are any PvP groups going if you're interested in joining in Halaa PvP Combat. Then join and invite players as needed. If you have more than 5 players, start a raid group and balance the groups.
Assaulting Halaa To take over Halaa you first need to get rid of all of the enemy guards before the town can be captured. While you can fight the guards on foot, it's a very slow process because their hit points are exceedingly high. A better way to get rid of the guards is to bomb them on the wyverns. It's best to have as many players as possible bombing the guards so that they will die more quickly.
10 bombs are placed in your inventory when you mount a wyvern. If you use some bombs and later get back on a wyvern, your bomb supply will be replenished. Place the bombs on your action bar to access them more easily.
Learn where all the Halaa guards are located so it will be easier to find and bomb them. Practice your bombing runs repeatedly, so that you can launch more bombs per pass as well as aim them more precisely.
Each wyvern post sends its wyvern flights on different flight paths. If the wyvern you're on isn't reaching the guards you need to hit, try a different wyvern post.
While bombing with other allied players, it's sometimes a good idea to do bombing runs from the same wyvern post. That way, when the enemy shows up, you can join the battle after dismounting in one group. If you use separate wyvern posts, it will take some time for you to fly or run over to assist your allies.
Stay in a group if possible. Meet up at a location outside of town, pick an area to attack, and then travel there together. That way, if you meet up with the enemy, you'll be organized. Otherwise, an enemy party or raid of players can pick you off one by one.
Bombing enemy players isn't that effective in comparison to attacking them directly. Enemy players can also just get on their flying mounts and stay up in the air to avoid bomb damage. But for a source of amusement, you can take potshots at enemy players standing near your wyvern posts just before you land.
If you let up on bombing runs after a while, the guards will start to respawn. Keep up the pressure on the guards at all times. Sometimes it's a good idea to have one or two players bombing while the rest are fighting the enemy.
It can be useful to the attackers if one player sits above town on a flying mount to scout and give updates as to the battle's progress.
Make sure you don't attack the enemy vendors or other non-guard NPCs - they will defend themselves. You will need to run out of town before they will stop chasing you.
Once the guards have been defeated, have everyone gather in the middle of the town. You need to hold the town for a length of time until it officially changes hands to your side. Each side has a graveyard in town so you should expect your enemies to come back quickly after dying.
After you capture the town you can get more Halaa Battle Tokens by defending it further. You can also take advantage of having the guards on your side, as well as the friendly NPCs that appear.
Army of One If you're trying to attack Halaa all by yourself, you need to really work hard with hit-and-run tactics focusing on bombing runs. First, convert the destroyed wyvern posts to functioning wyvern posts. After converting one, run away. After you've converted three or four of the posts, the enemy will have a much harder time finding you. Start your bombing runs. Run away after landing from a bombing run to another post and bomb again. The goal is to keep the enemy guessing as to which wyvern post you're using, and doing as much damage as possible.
If you start attacking the town by yourself, sometimes other players will be inspired by your bravery (sometimes only after being informed on the public chat channels) and join you! You may soon find yourself leading a full-scale assault on the town.
|