I like it how it currently is.
I think the issue here is that before recently you didn’t flag from merely being slapped by one.
Is this 100% true? I normally play on PvP Realms. But I don’t see the logic of being able to be so bold that you can get attacked by horde guards and still not get flagged. Where do you draw the line?
Walks into Valley of Strength in Orgrimmar
gets flagged
complains he was forced into unconcental PvP
My bad, this was on a PvE server, so the comparison since HC is essentially PvE. (Just got up and uncoffied. 
I’ll head there on Era later and check if it’s changed when I’m alert and have a moment.
I just mentioned I normally play PvP Realms in hopes of making it clear my memories won’t matter or how these NPCs normally behaved.
City, maybe. Capital, decidedly not. They should not flag you.
i’ve been flagged by guards attacking me on classic era dude 
stop thinking this is new.
Not a town.
If I attack forsaken NPCs that are horde friendly in Ashenvale, I don’t get flagged. Not sure about the lumber mill. This includes Forsaken NPCs that are essentially at a camp not far out of their main town in Ashenvale.
The Swamp guards on patrol are much further away from town than the Ashenvale NPCs. PvP flagging makes no sense for them.
Yes, if you make a macro and raid mark them it’s easy to avoid them, which is what I ended up doing… after randomly getting hit in the back in the middle of nowhere by one while fighting something else.
How easy it is to avoid them isn’t really the point though. It makes no sense to PvP flag players on HC realms when getting hit by these individual NPCs in the middle of nowhere. It also opens up the opportunity for other players to flagrantly ignore the rules of engagement as they are written and should obviously be changed on that basis alone.
aren’t those unflagged quest mobs? of course they don’t flag you.
Im busy leveling a rogue to gank in SoS for this very reason
Of course there’s no reason for the swamp patrols to flag you.
There’s no logical rational reason to flag you for PvP when encountering a horde NPC in the middle of nowhere, far away from their actual town.
there is if it’s a guard… you are comparing guards to quest mobs that’s silly.
It’s not that complicated. See an npc of the opposite faction? Stay far away.
Yea, they’re totally guarding those trees in the middle of nowhere and you def need to PvP flag people on servers that have rules of engagement that actively tell you not to kill people on purpose. It makes so much sense if you try not to use any critical thinking skills at all and just try to justify everything exactly as it is regardless of how absurd it is.
Your takes are so bad on literally every topic you comment on it’s astonishing.
Guards go on patrol all the time, mate
You really have no single useful point or argument to make on this topic as to why a NPC in the middle of nowhere needs to PvP flag you so I’m just going to ignore you now.
Your inability to understand the rules of engagement and the spirit of HC servers as Blizzard chose to define them isn’t my issue. It’s really not difficult to comprehend why PvP flagging people in this way on servers where you’re told not to intentionally kill people or your account could be perma-banned is problematic.
why shouldn’t it?
Because engaging an NPC away from a town is not a player versus player activity first of all. Second of all, again, try reading the rules of engagement and then tell me if it makes sense to you to randomly PvP flag people in the middle of a zone and make them vulnerable to ganking given how strongly Blizzard feels about intentionally killing other players that had no interest in PvP.
I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree. I don’t see a problem with 1 zone having guards patrol a road, and you have to be careful around them.
Games don’t have spirits.
They’re not alive.
HTH
Thanks, that was really deep.
LOL.
‘Guards on patrol don’t count!’