Although this is a good thing in keeping areas with a lot of people secured, some areas of wilderness don't have guards and, depending on if you're on the race war server or whether you've just fought in an online battle, could cause traveling on an open roads in zones that are contested risky. Blizzard is currently evaluating what "dangerous" it intends the areas to be for travellers, and the studio is adjusting the actual combat system. https://www.mmoexp.com/Wow-cata-classic/Gold.html Guards can shield you from the attacks of enemies...somewhat. As one would imagine from an early-test versions of games which is months away from releasing Battles between players aren't far from being balanced currently. We've witnessed numerous unbalanced encounters that have seen massive group of players banded against one another or even locations where high-level players have slipped into zones where new characters from different races are beginning their journey. Assassins of the highest level (some players may refer to them as high-level sneaks by cleverly removing a few words from "assassins") cannot actually be able to attack lower-level characters until they have their own consent to play initially, we've seen cases that players have engaged in abusive actions, such as killing key trainers and quest-givers leaving lower-level players without a chance until the NPCs who are key to their lives respawn. It's funny, Blizzard has implemented protection against such activities in which crucial NPCs are spawned with high-level guards whenever they come under attack.