WoW's haunted: Players report that their disconnected friends' characters are starting to play the game on their own
Who's playing when the player isn't?
World of Warcraft players are reporting eerie behavior from their disconnected friends' characters. Since the release of patch 12.1, disconnected characters have been seen moving and fighting on their own, rather than simply being unresponsive. The phenomenon was first noticed after the patch and has been documented on the WoW subreddit.
A redditor shared a video showing an Evoker character continuing to fight after disconnecting, displaying typical signs of a mid-encounter disconnection but then starting to fight again. This behavior is unsettling, as it feels wrong for a character to perform actions when there are clear visual signals indicating they shouldn't be able to.
Players have reported similar experiences, including one where a warrior character charged the boss during a raid after reconnecting. While this could be a prank, the most plausible explanation is that Blizzard might have implemented an unannounced disconnect protection feature. This could involve reworking the NPC dungeon follower technology used in casual content to prevent dropped connections from ruining group experiences. Blizzard has not yet commented on the issue, leaving theories up for speculation.
Written by urgent.news from PC Gamer's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
