Dungeons and Instances

"Instance" is the everyday word for a dungeon or raid. The game makes a fresh private copy of the area for each group, so your fights and loot are separate from every other group playing the same place. The same technology is used for battlegrounds, arenas, scenarios and Delves.

Most enemies inside are elites, much stronger than normal world monsters, and there are several bosses with their own abilities. Dungeons are harder than quests but quicker and easier than raids. You usually enter through a swirling portal in the world, though today most players join through the Group Finder.

A standard dungeon group is one tank, one healer and three damage dealers (see roles). Bosses usually drop Uncommon and Rare items, and very rarely Epic ones; higher difficulties give better loot. Running dungeons for gear is one of the main ways to gear up at max level, mostly through Mythic+.

The Dungeon Finder, found inside the Group Finder, unlocks at level 15. Pick your role, queue for a random dungeon or choose specific ones, and it builds a party from players on many realms, then teleports everyone inside. You can only queue for dungeons in your own level bracket.

• Mythic dungeons are not in the queue: walk to the entrance or get summoned with a Meeting Stone or a warlock's Ritual of Summoning.
• If someone leaves, the leader can ask the finder for a replacement, and players can be removed with a vote kick.
• Leaving a group before any boss dies gives the Dungeon Deserter debuff, which blocks the Dungeon and Raid Finder for 30 minutes.
• Call to Arms gives extra rewards for queuing in the role that is in short supply.

• Each account can enter at most 10 different instances per hour. Resetting a dungeon and going in again counts as a new instance; simply walking in and out of the same one does not.
• Queuing through the Dungeon Finder still works when you hit the limit, and Follower Dungeons have their own limit of 50 new instances per day per account.
• Harder content uses instance locks: once you kill a boss you are saved to it, which limits how often you can clear it in one reset period.