Shadowlands: A Look at Cross-Faction Instances

[Stoy]

Shadowlands: A Look at Cross-Faction Instances

Make frenemies of your enemies when you party with players from the opposing faction!

As initially outlined in a previous post, cross-faction instances will break the faction divide by allowing friends from the opposite faction to play together. It will also expand opportunities for players to pursue their favorite group content.

Grouping Up
To invite members of the opposite faction to a party, players must have a BattleTag or Real ID friendship or be members of a cross-faction WoW Community.

Players will have the ability to find Premade Groups in the Group Finder for dungeons (Normal, Heroic, Mythic, and Mythic+), raids, rated arena/RBGs, and also Torghast. However, the group leader may restrict the listing to same-faction applicants if they choose.

Once in a party, members of the opposite faction will remain unfriendly while outside of instances, though they will be able to communicate through party and raid chat, as well as use /say and /yell within proximity of one another.

Upon entering a dungeon, raid, or rated PvP match, however, all members will be friendly and able to assist each other in combat, trade loot, earn shared achievements, and otherwise fully engage the same way members of the same faction do.

Guilds
Guilds will remain single-faction, and random matchmade activities like Heroic dungeons, Skirmishes, or Random Battlegrounds will all remain same-faction.

Legacy Instances
The functionality of the cross-faction instance feature will also apply to legacy instances and is available at all levels. However, there will be several older instances that cross-faction parties cannot enter due to faction-specific components, and they are:

• Trial of the Champion
  
• Trial of the Crusader
  
• Vault of Archavon
  
• Icecrown Citadel
  
• Baradin Hold
  
• Siege of Boralus
  
• Battle of Dazar'alor
  
• Darkmaul Citadel (Exile's Reach dungeon)

Cross-faction instances are ready for you to reach across the faction divide in the Shadowlands 9.2.5 content update. We'll see you in the Azeroth!

[Rucati]

"To invite members of the opposite faction to a party, players must have a BattleTag or Real ID friendship or be members of a cross-faction WoW Community."

I could have sworn they said this would work through group finder, which doesn't use any of those. If it's actually only for people on realID or in a community that's basically useless for m+ and arenas, which are 2 of the 3 things you're able to do with this.

[Edlarel]

"To invite members of the opposite faction to a party, players must have a BattleTag or Real ID friendship or be members of a cross-faction WoW Community."

I could have sworn they said this would work through group finder, which doesn't use any of those. If it's actually only for people on realID or in a community that's basically useless for m+ and arenas, which are 2 of the 3 things you're able to do with this.

Literally the next sentence.

Players will have the ability to find Premade Groups in the Group Finder for dungeons (Normal, Heroic, Mythic, and Mythic+), raids, rated arena/RBGs, and also Torghast. However, the group leader may restrict the listing to same-faction applicants if they choose.

[Rucati]

Literally the next sentence.

Players will have the ability to find Premade Groups in the Group Finder for dungeons (Normal, Heroic, Mythic, and Mythic+), raids, rated arena/RBGs, and also Torghast. However, the group leader may restrict the listing to same-faction applicants if they choose.

Ah, see it really helps a lot to not skip over paragraphs rofl. Good thing at least someone around here reads the whole post.

[InfernalDark]

Alliance dogs are not welcome to my raids, sorry.

[Rendark]

It's a good start.

[Deadite]

Alliance dogs are not welcome to my raids, sorry.

LFM Normal Sepulcher 280ilvl NO GNOMES!! You know it is gonna happen.

[3DTyrant]

LFM Normal Sepulcher 280ilvl NO GNOMES!! You know it is gonna happen.

I can see it now, "My weapon broke, load the Gnome Launcher 3000!"

[Knight Meta]

So I may have missed a detail somewhere along the line here but did they ever explain WHY they are not opening up for LFD and LFR to be done cross faction? Like don't get me wrong; I got no friends so it does not really phase me too much but since I just can't recall ever seeing WHY they are not opening up for this; I figured I'd just ask and hope that someone can confirm for me that it's NOT due to "technical limitations" seen as Private Servers have done cross-faction LFD for like 5+ years now.

Yeah I know you can just "Make group and go there manually" with the premade group finder, but this means that they do allow cross faction to in fact do dungeons together. So why not allow it to be done via LFD / LFR?

[Alayea]

So I may have missed a detail somewhere along the line here but did they ever explain WHY they are not opening up for LFD and LFR to be done cross faction? Like don't get me wrong; I got no friends so it does not really phase me too much but since I just can't recall ever seeing WHY they are not opening up for this; I figured I'd just ask and hope that someone can confirm for me that it's NOT due to "technical limitations" seen as Private Servers have done cross-faction LFD for like 5+ years now.

Yeah I know you can just "Make group and go there manually" with the premade group finder, but this means that they do allow cross faction to in fact do dungeons together. So why not allow it to be done via LFD / LFR?

From what I recall, it's been stated that they wanted cross-faction to be an opt-in experience. That approach wouldn't work for LFD/LFR.

[Klingers]

Alliance dogs are not welcome to my raids, sorry.

So as long as we're not Worgen we're fine?

[Biomega]

From what I recall, it's been stated that they wanted cross-faction to be an opt-in experience. That approach wouldn't work for LFD/LFR.

Why not? Have a checkbox, "I'm fine with cross-faction" -> if not checked nothing changes -> if checked you can mix and match with other faction.

Doesn't seem like a massive hurdle to overcome, no?

[Cosmic Janitor]

Why not? Have a checkbox, "I'm fine with cross-faction" -> if not checked nothing changes -> if checked you can mix and match with other faction.

Doesn't seem like a massive hurdle to overcome, no?

Let the tribalistic man babies get used to some simple 5 man cross faction stuff first.

[Caprias]

I'd really love to make 2-3 classes alliance now for dragonflight but that's all for naught if there is no cross-guilds in the prepatch or at launch..

[Biomega]

I'd really love to make 2-3 classes alliance now for dragonflight but that's all for naught if there is no cross-guilds in the prepatch or at launch..

Yeah I don't think we'll see significant improvement until it works for guilds.

Don't get me wrong it'll help some right away, but guilds is where it's at for alleviating the bulk of the problem.

[bruxx]

I'd really love to make 2-3 classes alliance now for dragonflight but that's all for naught if there is no cross-guilds in the prepatch or at launch..

Yeah, as far as I'm concerned, nothing has changed until it affects guilds.
A good first step to be sure.

[Rafalga]

So this says party members will be unfriendly till they enter the instance except chatting is open as usual but what does this mean for the summoning stone?

[PsychoSe7eN]

Alliance scum not welcome to come.

[Doffen]

LFM Normal Sepulcher 280ilvl NO GNOMES!! You know it is gonna happen.

No gnomes is already a requirement in many Alliance raids.

[Relapses]

No gnomes is already a requirement in many Alliance raids.

To be fair, Goblins get a similar treatment here on the Horde.