World of Warcraft will push the alliance and tribe cross-faction team function (dungeon, team copy and rating PVP will be opened soon). This is the first time the game has made such a change in 18 years. Since its inception in 2004, “World of Warcraft” has released 9 expansion pieces in the past 18 years, and the game content has changed many times, but the core of the game has always been the struggle between the two camps of the alliance and the tribe, and it has never been Changed, until today, Blizzard announced that it will break this rule and launch the cross-faction team function.
It’s happening. 👀
Cross-faction dungeons, raids, and rated PvP will begin testing soon.
🤝 https://t.co/kz5ZvLs1aQ pic.twitter.com/85lN5v64I4
— World of Warcraft (@Warcraft) January 31, 2022
Official Specific Content
For a long time, many players have asked the question: the communication and cooperation between the Alliance and the Horde are severely restricted. Is this rule necessary to be so rigid? Faction restrictions cause family and friends to gather together but not play together.
Players may also feel that faction restrictions make their favorite party content elusive. These negative effects have always been considered reasonable sacrifices in order to preserve the core elements of the Warcraft universe – the source of all this is the game called Warcraft: Orcs and Humans. But, as the former tribal chieftain said, “Times have changed.”
I’m excited to announce that we’re working on a new feature that will allow Alliance and Horde players to pre-group together to challenge dungeons, raids, and rated PvP. For nearly 20 years, all code and content defaulted to “teams can only be made up of players from a single faction”.
While we want to roll out this feature as soon as possible, due to the magnitude of the changes involved, it won’t be live in the next content update, The End of Eternity. Therefore, we plan to test and roll out this feature in the subsequent 9.2.5 update. We’ll be sharing the feature details today and landing on the NA Beta once End of Eternity goes live, and we’d love to hear your feedback.
When setting the rules for new features, we followed two main goals:
Focus on well-organized dungeon gameplay. When it comes to relaxing faction restrictions, dungeons, raids, and rated PvP are always the hottest topics. This content is designed to require players to form a team in advance, and this social barrier can have a huge negative impact, making it difficult for players to experience the game content as they wish.
Try to design it as an “optional” feature. Due to world settings and player preferences, we are now faced with decades of opposing emotions. We look forward to giving players the freedom to choose whether to cross-faction constraints and work together against a common enemy. But we also know that many players will be wary of this change, and we don’t want to take it away from them. We should give players more choices.
Based on these guidelines, we have designed the following systems:
Players can directly invite members of opposing camps to join the team through Battle.net nicknames or real-name friends, or by becoming a member of the cross-faction World of Warcraft community.
In the team finder, pre-created team lists for epic dungeons, raids, or rated arenas/battlegrounds will be open to applicants from both factions, but captains can choose to apply only to the same faction.
Guilds are still limited to a single faction, and random matching activities such as hero dungeons, arena practice matches, or random battlefields are still limited to the same faction (because the faction of random teams is less stressful, it can also avoid accidentally matching orcs and night elves together, thus violating the “optional” nature of the function).
After forming a party, members of the opposing faction will remain indifferent in an “outdoor” environment ( hostile in war mode), just as they are now, but can communicate via party chat. After entering a dungeon, a team instance or a rated PvP match, all members will become friendly and can support each other in battle, trade loot, obtain shared achievements, and cooperate in all aspects like members of the same faction.
This feature was announced early because we wanted to meet player expectations and requirements for a comfortable and smooth experience. Whether it’s the same faction or a cross-faction team, teaming up, keystone tiers or PvP tiers should make for a seamless experience.
This feature also applies to classic dungeons, which can be used at all levels, but some early dungeons cannot be accessed by cross-faction teams, at least not yet: Battle of Dazar’alor, Trial of the Crusaders, Icecrown Citadel (remember the gunship battle) ?), and other dungeons with faction-specific content must be reworked to support cross-faction teams.
Reading this, some players may feel anxious, worried that this will shake the foundational principles of Warcraft. At BlizzCon 2019, a visitor asked about cross-faction gameplay, and our answer at the time was, “The division between the Alliance and the Horde…that’s why Warcraft has become the backbone of Warcraft.” But On second thought, this statement is too simplistic: the identity of the alliance and the tribe is the foundation of “Warcraft”.
Although this sense of belonging has set off confrontations and contradictions, since “Warcraft III”, the Alliance and the Horde have often found common interests and joined hands to fight against the enemy (there was also a “Warcraft” chapter called “The End of Eternity” at that time). The examples of cooperation in World of Warcraft are even more numerous.
In fact, we hope that these changes will enhance the sense of belonging to the faction, allowing more players to choose a faction based on values, appearance and character design, rather than being forced to choose between personal preference and having fun with friends.
After the “Battle for Azeroth” war ended, the Alliance and Horde reached an uneasy truce. Although the leaders of both sides cooperated closely in the “Shadow Country”, the two camps are still tit for tat, and their actions during the war cannot be forgiven or forgotten.
Although there are cooperating factions like Jaina, and there are also main fighting factions that are the same as Jean, they are unlikely to change their opinions. However, when the main point of the plot is to join forces to fight a sinister and powerful enemy, why not allow players to make their own choices?
We’re eager to hear what you’re thinking about the cross-faction gameplay feature and look forward to getting your feedback when the feature hits the North American 9.2.5 Open Beta. See you in Azeroth!