Alterac Valley (AV or just Alterac) is a location set in Blizzard Entertainments video game and book series, Warcraft. In the MMORPG World of Warcraft it acts as an instance dungeon (Although it's a PvP environment in the virtual world.

Background

Before the First Great War, the warlock Gul'dan exiled the Frostwolf clan to Lordaeron. After the clan leader Durotan's death, the clan settled in the Alterac Valley developing a repoire with the native Frostwolves and continuing a semblance of their former shamanistic lives. Thrall, son of Duratan and the true leader of the Frostwolf Clan, united all the clans under one banner but the Frostwolves decided to remain in the valley led by the shaman, Drek'thar. In the World of Warcraft, the introduction of the Dwarven Stormpike Expedition into the valley in search of ancient relics has sparked conflict between the two encampments. Both sides feel the other are interlopers and rage a perpetual battle for control.

Instance

Alterac Valley was one of 2 battleground instances introduced in patch 1.5 of the MMORPG World of Warcraft. It contains Dun Baldar, the Dwarven Stormpike Expedition base and Frostwolf Keep, home of the Frostwolf Orcs.

Gameplay

Alterac Valley is a PvP (Player vs Player) instanced Battleground for players level 51 - 60 with a maximum of 40 players on each side. Their are quests available to each faction and are essentially the same:

There are two mines, Irondeep Mine to the north and Coldtooth Mine to the south. Each is guarded by Troggs and Kobolds respectfully. Capture a mine and gather it's resources. Capture the enemy's mine and turn in their supplies which are worth twice the amount of your own mine's resources. Collect enough and you can gain some elite NPC troops to aid you in battle.

Capture mounts (frostwolves for the Horde and mountain rams for the Alliance) and kill the other factions animals for leather saddles. When you have turned in 25 mounts and saddles, you can acquire elite mounted troops (Wolf Riders for the Horde and Mounted Rams for the Alliance) which will either enter the front lines or patrol the roads in your territory. Your reputation with the various factions determines what orders you can issue.

Kill enemy leaders and faction NPC. Defeating the enemy lieutenants and commanders will prevent certain NPC's from respawning and also grant your team added honor points.

Rescue your Wing Commanders / Wind Riders. Each faction has three captured flight masters. Once they are freed, they will return to your base where you can then turn in medals looted off of player corpses. Turn in enough medals, and the flight masters will take to the air and pelt ground targets in specific locations depending on the orders you give them. Your reputation with the various factions determines what orders you can give them.

Turn in trinkets looted off of player corpses. Player corpses can be looted for coins, armor scraps, flight medals, Storm Crystals, or blood. Turning in these items to their various vendors (blacksmiths, druids, etc.) provide the players with armor bonuses or elite NPC.

Battles in Alterac Valley vary wildly in length. The game ends once one side's general is defeated. Before patch 1.9, it was possible to join entire groups into Alterac Valley; high-end raiding guilds would often gather 40-man raids and win the match in a half-hour or less. This was removed, however, and the battleground has become known for its long, drawn-out battles, which can possibly last for six hours or more.. Oftentimes, one player will not start and complete the same match.

Much of the time during a battle will be spent pushing forces back towards their own compound and capturing points along the way, or attempting to recover points which have been taken from you.

Graveyard points on the map serve as a respawn point for your forces. As such, it is usually the goal of the majority of the group to capture and hold these points in order to push their respawn closer to the enemy compound. Obviously, the closer you have these points to the opposing forces, the quicker reinforcements can reenter a battle upon death. This is often the point which causes Alterac Valley matches to last for hours, as forces slowly push forward and back against one another. Retaking a graveyard will reward your side with honor. Towers, once taken, are destroyed.

There is, however, a strategy that allows Alterac Valley battles to end in less than an hour. This is when both factions more or less "ignore" one another and rush to kill the enemy general. This is called the "race" strategy.

Rewards

Participating in Alterac Valley can not only be fun, but can be rewarding. There are multiple ways to earn rewards in AV. The first is by completing quests such as retrieving the Stormpike banner from Icewing Caverns on the Alliance side. The second is to get reputation with your factions AV allies to get purchasable items including Epic weapons and the best vendor purchasable ammo in the game.

The final way to get rewards is via honor system using the contribution points earned by both killing other players, and by staying in the instance until it is completed. Winning an Alterac Valley battleground will net you substantial contributions points in the honor system, along with any honor earned by killing enemy players.

The Unstoppable Force is just one of the epic rewards available for people that are exalted with Alterac Valley and is the best 2h weapon available until rank 14 or instances such as Molten Core.

Exploits and Updates==
Up until patch 1.10, it was possible to destroy an opponents towers without entering the flag room by "capping" the tower flag through the wall. After the most recent patch this exploit was removed.

Currently, the Horde tactic for destroying the North Baldur Bunker involves running onto a ledge behind the bunker and jumping into the top level. Contrary to popular belief, this tactic does not enable the Horde to bypass tower NPCs, as they will rush the top chamber regardless. It's only advantage for the Horde is in the fact that they can start the tower destruction timer about five minutes before they would otherwise be able to.

Currently, the Alliance tactic for capturing the Horde Relief Hut involves bypassing both Frostwolf Towers by climbing up the Frostwolf Village Waterfall. This enables the Alliance to capture their final offensive graveyard (Horde's final defensive graveyard) by killing approximately 5 NPCs, as opposed to the 50 NPCs necessary that would otherwise need to be killed.

Alterac Valley underwent a significant change with patch 1.11. Many NPCs were removed including most of the tower guards. Now, only bowmen guard the towers for both sides and they possess no melee skills. Prior to the patch, most NPCs, including the Troggs and Kobolds that guard the mines, were elite and dropped treasure when defeated. Now, they are not. Another significant change is players can now loot and increased number of supplies off of player corpses. This allows for faster accumulation of elite troops or armor bonuses. Games can now be won in less then an hour and even in the thirty minute range using the "race" strategy. Some players feel that Alterac Valley has now lost it's "epic' quality but others welcome the change, happy that they do not have to endure two or three hour games that they do not have time to complete.

== See also

Warcraft Universe

External links