They say, “Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer”—we hope you’re ready get very, very close indeed.

Mercenary Mode arrives in patch 6.2.2. This new feature allows you to act as a mercenary for the opposite faction in PvP. Whenever your faction is experiencing a long wait time to get into Ashran or unrated Battlegrounds, agents of the enemy faction will appear in your base in Ashran (Stormshield for the Alliance, Warspear for the Horde). These agents will allow you to enter Ashran or Battlegrounds disguised as an enemy player, and fight as the opposite faction.

When you compete as a mercenary, you still earn all of the same rewards you would have by winning or losing as your own faction (with the exception of faction-specific achievements). Your race also automatically changes into one appropriate for the opposite faction while you’re still inside the Battleground or Ashran. Perhaps most importantly, you can expect to experience much shorter queue times, as our matchmaking system will be able to fill up groups much quicker!

Mercenary Mode allows players who want to participate in Ashran or unrated Battlegrounds the ability to do so without having to wait through long queues, while still maintaining the spirit of the core Alliance vs. Horde fantasy. We’ll see you on the battlefield—hopefully as a friend and not a foe!