Arathi Basin is the hardest map to lead on, which is positive, considering you can win against teams much better then you by just outleading them. What you need to do is keep your cool at all times and keep control of your group, people have the tendency to think that they know better on this BG and try and ninjacap bases/go on their own for some reason. For this game you need to split up your group in 4 subgroups G1=Arms warrior/feral druid (if they have this offspec decently geared, if not just stay prot/guardian) & Hpala, the arms warrior will cap farm and move to BS to try and stall the enemy there G2=Rogue, hunter or mage (if you have 2)=If you dont have a rogue or hunter or only 1 mage and they do have a rogue/hunter/2 mages, its not worth going for GM since you will lose it anyway, rather have that one extra dps up on LM. G3=Rsham+Dpriest+4 DPS=LM, once (if) you get LM, they will slow fall down to BS and try to get that aswell G4=Mage going to LM aswell to fight there and then defend.

In the start all groups will go to their assigned base, the BS group is just stalling the opposing group for as long as possible. If your G3+4 succeed in doing this, have the mage stay LM, give everybody slowfall and have them jump down to BS to cap that aswell. As soon as your dps land on BS, your warrior will go to the Farm/stables and defend that for the rest of the game.(arms should obv go sword+board) G3+4 should then be able to cap BS, since all their DPS are still ressing at farm/stables, or even their starting place if the LM group was quick. If they manage to get to BS before you can safely cap it, just wipe them again If your G2 also manages to cap mine, you should now have 4 bases. Most groups however will send 1 dps to mine to help guy cap, this is okay, just have your defenderstall them as long as possible and then die. Like that they will have 1 less player on the BS which makes the fight easier there. Once you have those 4 (most likely 3 unless its a really bad team) you should spread out your players, 1 healer on each base (if you have LM preferably you on LM, since you have a nice overview there) and all your DPS on blacksmith. Nowadays it's almost impossible to win a full teamfight on a base that is controlled by another player, so most of their attacks wil be having most of their group go to 1 base and then having 2 sneak attack on another base. Therefore, if they are attacking 1 base you should only send your 2 other healers there if all enemys have been located (except those defending their bases ofcourse) The above was all assuming that the enemy doesn't wipe you and that you can get 3/4 bases in the start.

The hard part starts when you arn't able, for instance you get wiped on LM. What you do then depends on how fast you get wiped, if you lasted long enough to ress on stables/farm it should be fine, you can easily get to BS before the enemy team caps it by slowfalling down from the LM. Send your mage to help your GM attacker at GM if he hasn't capped that yet so you atleast get that base. Then have the frostmage stay there. If you failed badly on LM and get a ress in your starting base, you may consider going LM instead, if they are all in the air slowfalling they are really slowed down from getting to LM, and if they only left 1 person there you can easily nuke him and ninja the base. This does however give you the LM-GM-Farm/ST base combination, which is really hard to defend. If you fail on this aswell and the opponents take BS, you first and foremost need to keep your calm. What you then do is move your entire group to the point inbetween the 3 bases they have (so for instance if they have LM-Farm-BS, move to the bridge between ST and farm. There you should try and wipe anyone in your way, which should be easy since they usually have a couple of floaters. Once those are dead you need to see where they have least people defending, BS or LM/GM. Have your mage leave the GM/LM and have him go with another dps that can cc to open on the stables or the farm (whichever applicable) and then send your entire team to the base where they have the least players. Have your DK stand between the BS and that base to slow them down. Make sure you kill 1-2 of them before they are there in full force, once they are all there have 1 person disengage and send your mage from GM/LM to the Farm/Stables (whichever isn't yours) leaving LM undefended and then have him go with that 1 dps to cc cap that base This should get you back to 3 bases and then just employ the defending strategy I mapped out earlier, even though the bases you are defending arn't fully optimal. The key to winning this map is the opener and communication, people need to be constantly on the lookout for enemy movement patterns to see where they are going asap, keep an eye on the enemy team rogue and their other stealthers, every person assigned to solo defend a base should be able to keep that base alone for atleast 30 seconds if they use full cooldowns. If you are doing a mass fight you should always be on the lookout for people who are trying to ninjacap, this is mainly the job of the person assigned to defend that base, so if he sees someone trying to ninja while hes cc'd, he should ofcourse call it out. The person best suited to keeping an eye on the flag is the DK and the destro lock(s), since howling blast/rain of fire allows them to instantly stop any capping attempt. This BG is where the good people distinguish themselves from the average ones, keeping a base against 2 people helbend on either ripping you apart in a global or ninjaing that base from you is really an art. If you have incommings here, make sure you say it, even if it is only one and you think you can handle it, as soon as its needed people should be coming over to wipe them.

Thats about it for AB, the key to winning this place is great internal communication combined with excelent strat knowledge and solo performance. Good luck, this is the hardest BG to lead that there is.