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World of Warcraft’s next major patch is coming May 31, Blizzard has announced, and while the 9.2.5 update is light on new content, it will finally add cross-faction support to the long-running MMORPG.
Cross-faction support will let members of the Alliance and the Horde, traditionally opposing factions, team up for instanced content like raids, dungeons, and arenas. Blizzard has released more details on how the system will work, and notes that players will need to have either added a member of the opposing faction to their friend list via BattleTag or Real ID (or be a part of a cross-faction WoW community in-game) in order to invite that player to a group. Matchmade activities like Heroic dungeons and random battlegrounds will remain same-faction only for the time being.
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Once in a group, players will be able to communicate with each other (a first for members of opposite factions) via party chat and raid chat, as well as communicate using /say or /yell as long as party members are within close proximity to one another. This will work even outside of instanced content, although members of the opposing faction will appear as unfriendly when out in the open world.
There are, however, a few specific older dungeons and raids that will not support cross-faction play due to faction-specific elements. Those dungeons/raids are Trial of the Champion, Trial of the Crusader, the Vault of Archavon, Icecrown Citadel, Baradin Hold, Siege of Boralus, Battle of Dazar’alor, and the Exile’s Reach starter dungeon Darkmaul Citadel. Cross-faction guilds won’t be supported as part of the new cross-faction feature, although a recent bug on the game’s public test realm made it a reality for a short period of time.
Outside of cross-faction support, there’s not a ton of new content coming as part of patch 9.2.5. There will be two new questlines for Blood Elf and Dark Iron dwarf players that will unlock new mounts and cosmetics. A new PvP arena is being added as well, and the patch also lays the groundwork for Shadowlands Season 4, which Blizzard states will be coming later this summer.
Season 4 will see older dungeons and raids repurposed to once again be relevant, and looks to serve as a way to tide over players eagerly awaiting the next expansion, Dragonflight, which is likely to be released sometime in early 2023. Dragonflight will introduce a new region of Azeroth to explore, the Dragon Isles, as well as a new playable dragon race, the Dracthyr. Patch 9.2.5 and Blizzard’s recent reveal of the Dragonflight expansion come as Activision Blizzard continues to be in the spotlight over ongoing sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuits.
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