Sharding vs Layering

[Hailiaxx-stormrage]

I dont know that this is true. I think sharding functions in conjunction with cross realm zones in retail, but isn’t part of the same functionality. I could be wrong.

Sharding is breaking off your specific bite size chunk of the world (shard) into a new instance once it reaches the cap of players for that chunk. Layering is the same concept but for the entire continent and the player cap is close to what an entire server in vanilla would handle so you don’t run into the issues where you see people popping in and out as you travel through the world but would still have the issues of not seeing your friends until you invite them if you’re in different layers.

Someone correct me if my understanding is wrong.

Only if your server population roughly exceeds 6k… otherwise you will not experience layering at all.