Wintergrasp Guide: Attacking and Defending WoW's Epic Siege

Wintergrasp as an epic battleground

Wintergrasp has been part of the Epic Battleground queue since patch 8.1.5 in 2019. It is a 40 vs 40 siege with a twist the other epic maps do not have: the two teams do not have the same job. One side attacks the fortress and the other defends it, and the match is a race against a 30-minute clock.

If you remember Wintergrasp from Wrath of the Lich King, this is a different fight. The original was an open-world battle that fired roughly every two and a half hours with up to 120 players per faction. The Retail version is an instanced 40 vs 40 match you join from the Group Finder like any other epic battleground.

Walls, vehicles and workshops

The fortress is protected by layers, the Wintergrasp Wall, the Fortress Wall and the Fortress Gate, and only siege damage hurts them. That makes vehicles the heart of the map. There are three kinds: the Catapult, the Demolisher and the Siege Engine, all built at workshops spread around the zone.

Two changes from Blizzard's 2021 update shape how a Retail match starts. The Broken Temple and Sunken Ring workshops begin the match owned by the attackers, so the attacking team can build siege straight away. Vehicles are gated by a PvP rank earned from honorable kills, and since that update every player is promoted to Corporal automatically after five minutes of the match. The same update cut the health of every wall and gate by 20%.

The southern towers and the clock

Three towers stand in the south of the zone: Flamewatch Tower, Shadowsight Tower and Winter's Edge Tower. They are tied to the timer. Blizzard's 2021 update set destroying towers to take 8 minutes off the match time, up from 5. Because the clock is the defenders' win condition and the attackers' enemy, the tower fights matter to both teams, so check the timer whenever one falls and plan your push around what is left.

How to attack, and how to defend

Attacking. Take the workshops first, because every vehicle you get is another source of the only damage that breaks the walls. Move vehicles together rather than one at a time, and put players around them, because protecting the siege matters more than winning skirmishes. Once you are inside the fortress, go straight for the relic; fights in the courtyard only spend the time you have left.

Defending. Do not simply wait behind the walls. Send players out to contest the workshops and kill vehicles before they reach you, because every demolisher that never arrives is damage your gate never takes. Use the fortress cannons on vehicles at the walls, and keep enough players inside to stop a small group from reaching the relic.

Achievements and the weekly quest

Like every epic battleground, Wintergrasp counts toward the weekly quest Enshrouded in War, which asks you to earn Honor in Epic Battlegrounds and pays Honor and 175 Conquest.

Where to go from here

Wintergrasp is unrated, so its rewards are Honor, the weekly Conquest and achievements. If siege and objective play is what you enjoy and you want it to count on a ladder, Battleground Blitz is the rated 8v8 battleground bracket, and its live activity shows how busy it is in your region:

Its rules and maps are in our Battleground Blitz guide, and what to spend your Honor on is in our PvP gearing guide.