THE WOW FOREVER COLLECTION · DISPATCH · RESEARCH CHECKED OCTOBER 17, 2026
Short answer: WoW Forever will not launch with an RP-PvP ruleset, and Blizzard has no plans to add one. Josh "Aggrend" Greenfield said so on the October 15 WoW Forever Podcast: "we don't have any plans right now," but "never say never." His reasons were that RP-PvP realms since 2019 haven't stayed RP, and that the RP community is too small to split across two rulesets in a realmless game. The same episode said no to lowbie camping protection and to arenas, and yes to keeping premades away from solo players. Forever launches with Normal, PvP and Roleplaying rulesets (Roleplaying is PvE), with Hardcore after launch, and you pick one when you make a character. Our realmless explainer covers how that works.
What Aggrend said about RP-PvP
Episode 4 was the PvP episode, with Savix and Tips Out as guests alongside Aggrend, Tim Jones and host Josh Corbett. Aggrend opened with RP-PvP, saying "this has been a difficult thing for us to comment on," and gave three reasons.
Grobbulus was the exception. "A lot of people really remember fondly stuff like Grobbulus," he said, calling the 2019 Classic realm "this perfect little lightning in a bottle gem of a server." Then: "the unfortunate reality is every other RP PvP realm we've done since then has followed a very different trajectory."
Crusader Strike. Season of Discovery's Crusader Strike was RP-PvP and, by Aggrend's account, the biggest realm in North America when SoD launched. About three months in, Blizzard removed its RP tag. Aggrend played there and said the removal "was well earned," because "it was essentially just a PVP realm." His explanation: "A lot of content creators rolled there. A lot of people brought their communities there that weren't really used to the RP rule set."
The RP community is small. This is the reason that matters most for Forever. "RP as a community is honestly pretty small" compared with Normal and PvP players, he said, and "with our realm-less system... we sort of need a critical mass of players" for social play, world PvP and the economy. Adding RP-PvP would split those players between two RP rulesets.
His summary: "we don't have any plans right now... but you know, never say never."
Why the forums haven't let it go
RP-PvP is the biggest single request on the Forever forum. The first "RP-PVP is a must!" thread ran past 5,100 posts and was split on October 15, the day the podcast aired. Part 2 had 1,142 posts and over 6,000 likes by the morning of October 17. A thread asking "Why is RPPVP Difficult to Discuss" reached 179 posts in a day. Another collects players' answers to the podcast under the title "You think you do, but you don't" Part II, a nod to the line Blizzard used at BlizzCon 2013 when players asked for vanilla servers. Another asks Aggrend to "tell us about your time on Crusader Strike."
The main counterargument is that Forever already fixes the things Aggrend blamed. The "Why is RPPVP Difficult to Discuss" post argues that characters can't freely move between rulesets and that Forever isn't a temporary seasonal realm, so it shouldn't play out like Crusader Strike did. One thread suggests keeping a single RP ruleset and adding a 24-hour war mode to it. Blizzard hasn't replied in any of these threads.
If you want RP-PvP specifically, the choice at launch is RP-PvE or a regular PvP realm. Pick carefully: you can't swap a character between rulesets, and Blizzard hasn't announced a transfer service for it.
No protection from being camped
Savix asked whether there were plans to stop level 60s "camping low levels until they log out." Wowhead attributes the answer to Aggrend: "The short answer is no. PvP occurs on a PvP server. It has been true for 22 years of this game." He added that Blizzard will act on exploits or cheating, but "you may have a frustrating game session because that just happens."
Asked to explain why, the developers said drawing a line between "too much camping" and normal camping is "not just difficult, it's onerous," and that they want the frustration to push players toward guilds and friends who'll come and help. They left one door open: for world PvP events that Blizzard switches on itself, like SoD's Blood Moon, it could use the brief immunity on resurrection that SoD had.
Wowhead pointed out that China's Titan Reforged realms do have a lowbie protection aura: if someone five or more levels above you kills you, you're immune to them for an hour. So Blizzard has built it elsewhere and chose not to here. A forum thread called "On the Camping of Lowbies" is already pitching alternatives, such as a debuff that marks anyone who kills gray-level players.
Premades, arenas and honor
| Topic | What was said |
|---|---|
| Premades | "Pre-mades get slotted against other pre-mades... if you queue solo, you shouldn't get put up against a pre-made." Small groups of two or three may still queue with solo players. The exact number is still being tuned |
| Arenas and rated battlegrounds | Blizzard is "very, very, very leery" of adding them. Arena "has a tendency to kind of warp the playing field." The team wants battlegrounds to feel casual and plans new battleground maps instead |
| Honor | According to Wowhead, Tim Jones said Alterac Valley will be "a little less lucrative" and all the other battlegrounds "greatly increased" so Warsong and Arathi Basin are worth queuing |
| Rank and honor | Rank points and honor currency are balanced separately, so the fastest way to earn one may not be the fastest for the other |
| Duel arena | A crater in Mount Hyjal kept from vanilla and split off as a dueling arena, used for day two of the Forever Open. It was "planned for later" and pulled forward into the beta |
A forum thread about the premade change reached 170 posts in two days. The episode also said the Open had "over 6,000 people sign up" when the organizers expected about 1,000.
What it means if you're picking a realm
Nothing in the episode changes the launch rulesets. If you were waiting for RP-PvP, it isn't coming in November, and Aggrend didn't give a timeline for reconsidering. If you're going PvP, expect to be camped and don't expect Blizzard to step in, but do expect battlegrounds other than AV to be worth your time. The best class and tier list pages cover what's strong in world PvP right now, and the Mage fight shows how fast PvP balance has been moving in the beta.
Sources: Blizzard, The WoW: Forever Podcast: Episode 4 - The PvP Episode ft. Tips Out and Savix (October 15, 2026, quotes checked against the episode's captions) and Kaivax's forum post for the episode (October 15); Wowhead, Blizzard Confirms No Current Plans for RP-PVP Ruleset in WoW: Forever, Blizzard to Lower Alterac Valley Honor and Increase All Other Battlegrounds Honor and No Lower Level PvP Protection Planned for WoW: Forever (all October 15 to 16); Blizzard forums, RP-PVP is a must! (Part 1) and (Part 2) (October 15 to 17), Why is RPPVP Difficult to Discuss (October 16), "You think you do, but you don't" Part II (October 17), Tell us about your time on Crusader Strike, Aggrend (October 17), If RP-PVP isn't a ruleset, can the RP server have a 24hr warmode? (October 17), On the Camping of Lowbies (October 16) and WoW Forever Premades will be matched against other premades (October 15).