The massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft contains many cities, eight of which are of significant importance, playing the part of capital city for each playable race within the game. Each faction, both Alliance and Horde, has an equal number of four capital cities. These cities are marked with special icons on the in-game map, and these cities not subject to the usual fog of war which normally requires players to manually map each newly discovered zone. This lack of fog is persistent for all players of either side, to an unusual effect: players who venture in to the opposing faction’s capital cities have immediate access to the in-game map of that city.

Each capital city duplicates much of the game infrastructure, so that players are not forced to use one city over another. Banks, profession trainers, flight paths connecting to other cities, and inns are amongst the utilities present in each city. Some individual cities may host unique trainers, but players may interact with the in-city NPC guards who will direct players either to the closest trainer in question, or to the city in which the trainer is present.

Each faction has their own system of auction houses, for which only the respective players can access. In prior versions, only one city for each faction hosted the auction house, which ultimately turned those cities into major population centers. Patch 1.9 linked the auction houses across the world, so that players are no longer forced to utilize any particular city for their buying and selling activities. [1].

Related to the auction houses is a chat channel known as “global trade”, which is also duplicated across the capital cities, so that players may participate in commerce from any capital city. An amusing side effect is that the global trade is linked across all capital cities, so that if a player enters the opposing factions city, the player still has access to their global trade channel. It’s not unusual to see a player of the Horde boasting “I’m in Ironforge” over global trade chat.

There is another system of auction houses, known as the “neutral auction houses”, hosted in Booty Bay and Gadgetzen, where all players of either faction may engage in commerce. Banks in the goblin cities are linked world-wide, regardless of location.

Players may enter the capital cities of the opposing factions, but such an action will immediately target that player valid for player-vs-player combat. Since each capital city is the seat of the leader for each race, it was not uncommon for players to organize “raids” against the opposing capitals, in the hopes of killing a faction leader.

Many minor ports of call exist as well, many of which are linked by the “taxi” transportation system.