There are three ways to earn honor points: 1) Through honorable kills, 2) By killing racial leaders, and 3) Achieving objectives in Battlegrounds.
**Honorable Kills**
Honorable kills are earned by killing players within your experience range, meaning players that appear green/red to you. No honor is awarded for killing gray-level players. Several factors influence the value of each kill:
1. **Enemy Level**: Killing a level 60 character gives more points than killing a level 50. As mentioned, killing a gray-level character does not award any points.
2. **Your Level**: A level 60 player killing another level 60 gains more honor than a level 40 killing another level 40.
3. **Sequential Kills**: If you kill the same enemy once, twice, three times, etc., within a 24-hour period, the honor points decrease by 25%, 50%, 75%, and so on. After the fifth kill, no further honor points are awarded. This was implemented to prevent "farming" honor points by repeatedly killing the same opponent from the opposing faction.
4. **In Raid Groups**: Honor points are significantly reduced when killing an enemy in a raid group because they are distributed among all members of the raid. Additionally, raid members who are too far from the location of the kill do not receive any honor points. Furthermore, the rule about diminishing returns applies to all raid members for subsequent kills. For example, if the raid kills a character five times, no member will gain additional honor from killing that character again.
5. **Contribution to the Kill**: Anyone, whether alone, in a group, or in a raid, who contributes to killing an enemy will receive a share of the honor points. Monsters also contribute, so even if you're solo but the enemy was hit by a monster first, you'll receive fewer honor points proportionally.
6. **Enemy Rank**: The higher the rank of the enemy killed, the more honor points are awarded.
7. **Proximity to Death**: You must be near the location where the enemy dies to receive your share of the honor points.
8. **Healing Effects**: If an enemy is healed during combat, it doesn't increase the honor points you receive; instead, you simply need to deal more damage to finish them off.
**Killing Racial Leaders**
If you kill one of the racial leader NPCs, you'll receive a significant amount of honor points depending on whether you're solo, in a group, or in a raid, as well as how much damage you or your group inflicted.
The racial leaders include:
- Thrall
- Cairne Bloodhoof
- Lady Sylvanas Windrunner
- Highlord Bolvar Fordragon
- King Magni Bronzebeard
- Arch Druid Fandral Staghelm
**Achieving Battleground Objectives**
In Battlegrounds (BGs), you can earn a substantial number of honor points not only by killing enemies but also by completing objectives. For example, if you win all three rounds of a BG or your faction wins the match, such as in Capture the Flag, you'll receive additional honor points.