Tired of fighting for those pansy Night Elves? Hate marching side by side with those stinky Undead? Blizzard's got the answer with their upcoming Faction Switch service!

There are a scant few details about the service so far, the Blizzard rep who posted about it on the forums seemed to just want to let everyone know it was coming. The gist of it is you should be able to switch your character to the opposite realm and have him be roughly equivilant to how he was on his originating realm. All other specifics are pretty much up in the air at this point, including pricing.

We wanted to give everyone a very early heads-up that, in response to player requests, we’re developing a new service for World of Warcraft that will allow players to change their faction from Alliance to Horde or Horde to Alliance. There’s still much work to do and many details to iron out, but the basic idea is that players will be able to use the service to transform an existing character into a roughly equivalent character of the opposing faction on the same realm. Players who ended up creating and leveling up characters on the opposite factions from their friends have been asking for this type of functionality for some time, and we’re pleased to be getting closer to being able to deliver it.

Get the full story here.

About GD time!

Now my Alliance shaman and mage can quit collecting dust and join me on the Horde.

GG Blizzard, should have done this 2 years ago.

Going to wait to see what the details are before making a decision.

Originally posted by skydragonren

About GD time!

Now my Alliance shaman and mage can quit collecting dust and join me on the Horde.

 

GG Blizzard, should have done this 2 years ago.

Agreed.

Might breath a little fresh air and life into the game to switch factions and meet new people, form new guilds, just kind of get a different feel for things.

I'm really tired of hanging out in Ogrimmar with a bunch of Trolls....

Get it? hahaha i'm so funny

wow it sure took them long enough. Although i bet the vocal community is going to be upset .... as usual .....

I remember the days when you just rerolled and experienced the other side.... I can see that the "I don't have to time to play" crowd is getting what they want but in the meantime they live on the WoW forum 24/7. I predict that premade characters will be sold soon.

Originally posted by Hives

I remember the days when you just rerolled and experienced the other side.... I can see that the "I don't have to time to play" crowd is getting what they want but in the meantime they live on the WoW forum 24/7. I predict that premade characters will be sold soon.

I can pretty much assure you that will never happen unless Blizzard is completely corrupted from the insideout.

Possible but HIGHLY unlikey

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

don't blame them because the economy isn't doing so well now...

Originally posted by heerobya

Originally posted by skydragonren

About GD time!

Now my Alliance shaman and mage can quit collecting dust and join me on the Horde.

 

GG Blizzard, should have done this 2 years ago.

 

Agreed.

Might breath a little fresh air and life into the game to switch factions and meet new people, form new guilds, just kind of get a different feel for things.

I'm really tired of hanging out in Ogrimmar with a bunch of Trolls....

Get it? hahaha i'm so funny

Well... Then why do you hang around here? We have even more Trolls... Lets wait and see what the details are.

I am kind of split on this one.

On one hand I like the idea as I could port one of my less used 80s to the alliance side to allow me to play with my real life friends who run up allies.

On the other hand this means the Horde is going to get flooded with Alliance players.... I do not know what the deal is with Allies and PvE servers but it seems like the vast bulk of the kids play on that side (And the reverse is true on PvP).

Come to think of it the reason I have never gotten past 40 as a Allie is all the BS you have to put up with, every zone is Barrens Chat. Every instance run has some kid who stops the run for 20min while his Mom has him do his chores. Whenever you see a fellow allie you are not thinking, good I am a little safer as they may help me if the fight goes wrong... No you are thinking oh gods someone to steal the quest items I just cleared the way too and who will send me rude comments if I get in trouble rather then help.

Yeah... on 2nd thought I would prefer Blizzard to not do this.

can Changing Races be far behind ?

Originally posted by qbangy32

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

 

Yet still no in game items offered for real money...

Sounds like blizzard still wins in that aspect.

Blizzard is just milking WoW for the rest of its worth before they announce their next MMO, imho.

On another note, I see this as another factor contributing to the downfall of WoW, seeing as no one I know of is going from Horde --> Alliance, and most people will be going from Alliance --> Horde. Population imbalance is going to be something that Blizzard actually needs to think about.

Originally posted by Laughing-man

Originally posted by qbangy32

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

 

 

Yet still no in game items offered for real money...

Sounds like blizzard still wins in that aspect.

 Key word is YET its coming blizzard already patched the infrastructure in on a shop a few patches back someone found the files.Item wise I dunno what all they will sell prob just pets and other various items same as SOE.

Originally posted by Seamz

Blizzard is just milking WoW for the rest of its worth before they announce their next MMO, imho.

On another note, I see this as another factor contributing to the downfall of WoW, seeing as no one I know of is going from Horde --> Alliance, and most people will be going from Alliance --> Horde. Population imbalance is going to be something that Blizzard actually needs to think about.

See, the alliance is already more played, every census program I've found and every one I've run personally has told me this.

If you google it you too can see how the alliance out numbers the horde.  So if what you are afraid of happening actually does happen then maybe the sides will even out for the first time since launch.

Originally posted by rznkain

Originally posted by Laughing-man

Originally posted by qbangy32

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

 

 

Yet still no in game items offered for real money...

Sounds like blizzard still wins in that aspect.

 

 Key word is YET its coming blizzard already patched the infrastructure in on a shop a few patches back someone found the files.Item wise I dunno what all they will sell prob just pets and other various items same as SOE.

RMT is totally fine as long as they only offer COSMETIC things.  Wow being as casual as it is, I don't see this change being a big deal at all.

If people are looking for a game that makes them feel like they're hitting their head against a wall.  Well this isn't that game.

Originally posted by rznkain

Originally posted by Laughing-man

Originally posted by qbangy32

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

 

 

Yet still no in game items offered for real money...

Sounds like blizzard still wins in that aspect.

 

 Key word is YET its coming blizzard already patched the infrastructure in on a shop a few patches back someone found the files.Item wise I dunno what all they will sell prob just pets and other various items same as SOE.

If they come out with an item shop, it won't be any items that make the game unbalanced for other players,

Originally posted by Laughing-man

Originally posted by qbangy32

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

 

 

Yet still no in game items offered for real money...

Sounds like blizzard still wins in that aspect.

Give it a year and I'm sure it will happen, if you remember they also said "If you transfer from a PvP server to a PvE server you can not transfer back" and now we have a service that allows just that, funny how things change.

Personally I like the idea of giving customers more options but it does stink of them trying to squeeze extra money out of their playerbase for every little thing they possibly can.

Originally posted by qbangy32

Originally posted by Laughing-man

Originally posted by qbangy32

And they say $oE likes to bleed their customers dry of their money, seems nearly everything in WoW is available at a price.

 

 

Yet still no in game items offered for real money...

Sounds like blizzard still wins in that aspect.

 

Give it a year and I'm sure it will happen, if you remember they also said "If you transfer from a PvP server to a PvE server you can not transfer back" and now we have a service that allows just that, funny how things change.

Personally I like the idea of giving customers more options but it does stink of them trying to squeeze extra money out of their playerbase for every little thing they possibly can.

That does not change the game at all.  I don't care if they break their word on things that I hope they break their word on.

What does it really mater if a PVE person transfers to PVP?  Doesn't really change anything, if someone wants to spend all that time getting to 80 without the chance of getting ganked and then they want to go to a server where they can gank people, that is kinda what people are signing up for when they click PVP.

World PVP is merely ganking in WoW, there is no meaning, they don't tryt o balance it for 1v1  I've played on a PVP server in every game i've ever picked up and only recently have I wondered why.

The only time world PVP seems fun is when its a skill based game (Darkfall, UO) or a twitch based online game (Counterstrike)

Just my two cents!

edit: I agree it sucks how much these wonderful options cost...  25 bucks for a 1 minute server transfer procedure seems rediculous.  Oh well.

I no longer play WoW, I quit in Feb this year. The game for me is just becoming to EASY and full of instant gratification.

This to me is rubbish and only panders to those who must have instant gratification. When YOU CHOOSE your faction, race and class it was all up to you. If you want to play as the other side then friggin roll a new character and PLAY the game.

WoW has this year really began to show it's age in that it is pulling out all the stops to retain their casual playerbase and a easy way of doing this is to offer some sort of instant gratification, for a nominal fee. Dual Specs because you can not be bothered to earn money for respecs like before? Here you go! Need a gender change because you can not be bothered to level up another character (in our now very very quick and easy quest xp) no problem! Is raiding to hard, do you lack the ability to invest even an hour or two into the game, do you suffer from ADD, do you simply dislike raiding but feel you need raiding gear??! Ok then, we will make raiding gear so easy to get a caveman could do it!! What now??? Paladins are OP...no no no Shamans are!! Wait wait...well shoot, screw balancing them and keeping faction flavor, lets just botch the game lore and give Alliance Shaman and Horde Paladins!! Easier for us, easier for them! Wait...there is more! Did you roll alliance but not the cool guys are horde?? Well do not worry, you will not have to make a horde character, play through their content and enjoy the game, we will simply swap you over to that side for a small fee!

Coming next?? For a nominal fee we will be allowing players to purchase a level 70 geared character of their choice. Enjoy Northrend from the start and get your epics within days!

Makes me sad, WoW had some integrity but that is all gone now and they are doing whatever they can to retain interest and keep people playing.

A mmorpg is meant to have choice and consequneces for those choices. You are meant to go on an adventure and work your way up in power. However people no longer want that all the want is to hit some magical number that denotes endgame and get items that are classified with purple writing, this is sadly what these games are coming to.

I'm ok with it but it is nickel and diming

we've gone from Server Transfers for a fee  (in the mmos of yester year)

to everything for a fee now

- server transfer

- name change

- skin color change

- sex change

and who knows whats next ...

I imagine with WoW approaching what many would agree is its life expectancy, Blizz is happy to implement anything that will enable it to generate more revenue for future projects.  This certainly won't be a game breaker and it will absolutely be used by many in the player base.  Yes, the loud minority will scream and moan, but ultimately they will continue to play and probably even use the service themselves in time.

Its another sound business decision in my opinion.

Whats wrong with instant gratification? 

That is what i'm paying for thank you very much.

yeah nothing to complain about it. You could play both factions on the same server anyway. Just a way to get more money and hey their a buisness so sounds like a smart buisness choice to me to bring in more money.