WoW - how do the instance "saves" work?

[Matmulder]

Anyone tell me how the instance saves work?

Say you have a MC run, with 40 people. 25% of the way through, they call it a day and all log off.

Next day, they log on again. Only 30 of the original 40 are on tonight, and the last ten slots are filled by 10 new guildies who weren't around the previous night.

I assume they'll still carry on where they left off?

Does the same apply if only 1 of the original people log on, and they get 39 new guildies the following night? I know thats an extreme example, I'm just trying to understand how it all works?

 

[Tute]

This is hard to explain.

Instance are only "saved" when in Zul'Gurub, Molten Core, and Blackwing Lair.

I think ZG has a reset time of 3 days, with MC and BWL taking a week.

Basically, when you enter an instance, and defeat a boss, you are SAVED to that instance. So, if you were to go in again before the reset, that boss wouldn't be there, but all the trash mobs respawn (with some exceptions).
If you took in 10 who weren't there before, you would have to MAKE SURE that one of the players who is saved to the instance enters first. Otherwise, the others would not be able to. If somebody who wasn't saved entered first, the instance would fully spawn, and none of the saved members would be able to enter the portal.

Hope that clears some stuff up. Don't forget, you can only be saved to 5 different regular instances with a half hour cooldown, like Strat, Scholo, Dire Maul etc. This is to prevent boss farming, like Tendris Warpwood in DM West