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| Ruleset | At launch | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Normal | Yes | The baseline. PvP only when both players opt in. |
| PvP | Yes | Contested zones are open war. One faction per account. Blizzard may temporarily block new characters for the dominant faction, with faction-balance systems modeled on Season of Discovery. |
| Roleplay | Yes | Normal rules, in character, with naming enforcement. |
| Roleplay-PvP | Yes (added 22 October) | Roleplay plus the PvP rules. |
| Hardcore | Winter 2026/27 | Death carries lasting consequences. Separate ecosystem; dead characters can transfer out; 12 Hardcore-specific Legacy challenges replace the PvP ones. |
Who can play together
| Situation | Together? | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Same faction, same ruleset | Yes | Invite and go. |
| Same faction, different rulesets | No for quests, dungeons, raids. Battlegrounds may share a pool. | Pick one ruleset for the group. |
| Different factions | No | No cross-faction grouping exists. |
| Hardcore and anything else | No | Hardcore is enclosed. |
| Oceania and US friends | Yes | Oceanic characters live on Australian-hosted servers in the Americas region and share the US-wide auction house; the game picks a datacenter for the group, so expect latency for someone. |
| EU and US | Unknown | Forever is realmless, not regionless. Europe is its own region. |
Layering
Crowded areas are split into layers. Friends can land on different layers at zone lines and boats; inviting to a party pulls you onto the leader's layer. Collections and Legacy Points are account-wide across rulesets (Hardcore excepted). The Preferred Online Language option (24-hour cooldown) groups you with players of your language.
Regions and launch times
- Americas and Oceania: 3:00 pm PST 4 November; 10:00 am AEDT 5 November. Name reservation opened 1:00 pm PDT 27 October and 7:00 am AEDT 28 October.
- Europe: midnight CET 5 November; reservation opened 18:00 CET 27 October.
- Korea and Taiwan: 8:00 am KST and 7:00 am CST 5 November; reservation 7:00 am local 28 October.
Beta and stress-test characters were wiped; test-realm choices did not carry over. Each ruleset also has its own auction house.
Questions players ask
Are there realms in WoW Forever?
No. You pick a ruleset (Normal, PvP, Roleplay, Roleplay-PvP; Hardcore later) and play in one shared ecosystem per region, split into layers where it is busy. There is no realm list and no realm transfer service.
Can Horde and Alliance group?
No, and you cannot group across rulesets either. Battlegrounds queue across rulesets except Hardcore.
Can my character move to another ruleset?
No. Each ruleset needs a new character. The one exception is Hardcore: a character that dies there can transfer out to another ruleset.
When does Hardcore come?
Winter 2026/27, after raids open on 9 December. Death has lasting consequences; both factions can be made on one account; progress flows out of Hardcore to other rulesets but not in.