Alliance Battle

From the Factions FAQ:

Alliance Battles are large-scale, strategic PvP battles that allow factions to conquer new territory.

Each faction fields a team of 12. This team of 12 can be formed by 12 individuals or 3 random groups of 4 pre-chosen players, or by any combination that adds up to 12.

The battlefield map varies depending on where the alliance border currently is between the two factions. The more territory one faction has, the "harder" the map will be for them (with most control points starting closer to the losing faction's team's base).

There are usually 7 control points on the map which are captured by having more players than the other team in the area. Once captured they spawn a few NPC guards (which count towards holding the control point) and offer some other special ability (melee bonus to people in the arena, elemental protection, spawning resurrection orbs, creating a pet dragon, etc). The NPC guards do not respawn unless the point is lost and then recaptured so it can often be advantageous to kill one even if it means your character's death.

The more points you control, the more points your team gets. The first team to 500 points wins the war and gets a bonus 250 faction points. The losing team just gets 1 faction point for every point their team has at the end of the game.

There is no death penalty during alliance battles and characters are respawned regularly. This makes minion masters and IWAY warriors quite powerful, as there are almost always corpses lying around to exploit.

It is very important to spread out and focus on gaining control points vs directly fighting the enemy. A clumped up team has problems winning because they can't easily capture or defend multiple control points. Sometimes it is worth giving up a control point and then recapturing it in order to respawn your NPC guards.

A tutorial to the current map is offered by a NPC in the outpost. Be sure to have read the instructions before forming a group.