Death Death , in the form of necromantic magic , is an unavoidable force that breeds despair in mortals and pushes everything toward a state of entropic decay and eventual oblivion . The realm of death tangentially connected to the physical world is the Shadowlands . The counter - balancing force to Death is Life in the Emerald Dream . In World of Warcraft . In " World of Warcraft " , death is the state a character is in when their health reaches zero ( or less ) . They have 6 minutes to stay there , or resurrect from the spirit immediately . When this happens , they leave a corpse at the location where they died . If the player decides to release their spirit from the corpse , they will turn into a spirit form ( a ghost or , in the case of night elves , a wisp ) , and the spirit form spawn s at the nearest graveyard . A character will stay dead until they return to their corpse as a spirit , are resurrect ed by the spirit healer at a graveyard , or are resurrected by a player character near the corpse . While you are dead , there are some interesting graphical effects . The sky looks like a white whirlpool , and everything you see is white and black . Death will automatically remove all Buffs and Debuffs from the character , except for the " ghost " debuff , which is applied , and certain Flask effects that persist through death . Inaccessible areas . If you die in an inaccessible area , such as falling off the edge of Outland , or far past the Fatigue limit in the ocean , your ghost may not be able to get close enough to your corpse to rejoin it ; in this case you will have to resurrect at a graveyard . When falling off of Outland , the corpse of the player " usually " is placed at a reachable area on the edge somewhere ; it may , however , place the corpse in an unpleasant location . Instances . If you die in an instance , and release spirit , you will Teleport to the Graveyard and then you must reenter the instance to be able to recover your corpse , and you will do so the second you enter , no matter where your corpse was in the instance . Something interesting to note is that when you are dead , you pass through any gates or barriers and the instance door ( if any ) . Ghost run . The term " ghost run " originally described an exploit to travel to certain areas while dead ( and thus immune to damage ) but now refers to the distance a player would have to cross from the graveyard to their corpse . This may even have an effect on how willing players are to reattempt entering dangerous areas . For example , dying in Blackrock Mountain instances sends the player to the graveyard at Thorium Point , which is located on nearly the other side of the zone ; as a result , many players are hesitant to play in that location with inexperienced players and suffer repeated death and the time - consuming run back . Unfortunately , ghost running mostly doesn ' t work anymore ( as of Cataclysm ? ) , as you can ' t try to resurrect far from where you died anymore . You now will always resurrect at the nearest graveyard to where you died . Durability as a ghost . When your ghost is killed , you suffer another 10 % durability loss on equipped items . For example , if you are killed in combat and you get your ghost killed trying to rejoin your corpse ( now having died twice ) , then give up and use the spirit healer , you would suffer a 3x10 + 25 = 55 % durability loss on all equipped items and 25 % on inventory items . Your ghost can breathe underwater in lakes , rivers , coastal waters , and even lava , but if you swim into the deep ocean your ghost can still die of Fatigue . Exceptions to the rules on durability loss . If you are killed by another player in PvP combat , you do not take the initial 10 % durability hit . However , you will still take a 25 % hit and suffer from resurrection sickness if you are resurrected by a spirit healer . Also , during the Second Scourge Invasion event , there was a glitch , when you stayed long enough as a zombie , you would NOT take durability damage . If you are killed by self - inflicted death — such as a paladin ' s , a warlock ' s , using a life draining trinket / item like the , or using a — then you will not suffer any durability damage to your armor or items unless you are resurrected by a spirit healer . Movement . In general , you can run much faster and walk on water in spirit form . Some special cases : Spirit healers . The spirit healer s present in each graveyard can bring you back to life immediately , saving you a trip to your corpse . However , doing this will cause all of your equippable items to take an " additional " 25 % durability hit ; this applies both to equipped items , and to items in your inventory . In addition , you will suffer from resurrection sickness . This sickness decreases all of your attributes and damage dealt by 75 % , and has a duration that varies depending on your level : Starting in patch 2 . 4 , players that have the resurrection sickness debuff will be worth no honor when killed by a player of the opposite faction . Quests accessed while dead . There are a few quests that can only be accessed while the player is dead . Those quests start by talking to a NPC ( Non - Player Character ) who is only visible and accessible while in ghost / wisp form . On a side note , if one levels due to turning in one such quest , they shall regain all their life and mana but will not resurrect ( which is a bit weird ) . It was rumored in the past that there were over twenty quests that could be accessed while dead . Not a single shred of evidence was provided . The only Blizzard post — to be found — confirming ghost quests is cached here and those few quests are listed below . Some of the the quests accessible while dead were removed in Cataclysm .