Abilities

• Summon Astral Flare – The Curator will spawn one Astral Flare every 10 seconds. This ability costs 10% of the Curator’s mana. The flares have approximately 12,000 Hit Points and attack using Arcing Sear and dealing arcane damage to up to 3 players in melee range every second. Everyone needs to be spread out to avoid this damage. The flares deal only Arcane damage and obey threat rules, but are immune to taunt.
• Hateful Bolt – The Curator occasionally targets the second person on his aggro list with an arcane bolt that hits for approximately 4500 to 6000 Arcane damage. This ability is both fully and partially resistable.
• Evocation – Upon exhausting its mana pool by summoning one last astral flare, the Curator will channel evocation for 20 seconds. During this evocation all damage taken is increased by 200%. The Curator will not attack or summon flares during this spell. The list of “prime” targets for Hateful Bolts is reset at this time.
• Enrage – At 15%, it will enrage. This largely increases melee damage output and rate at which Hateful Bolts are cast. It will not summon Astral Flares or use evocation during this time.
• Berserk – If the Curator is not killed within 12 minutes, it will go berserk and end your raid quickly.

General Tips

• The Curator and Astral Flares are immune to all arcane damage.
• The Curator is also immune to all mana-draining abilities and spells.
• The Hateful Bolt tank should be kept at full health, as the target for Hateful Bolt will change if the current Hateful Bolt target drops too low.

Class-specific Tips

• Priests can easily gain a full mana pool back during an evocation if Shadowfiend is cast at the most opportune time. Be aware though, that the Shadowfiend has been known to change targets should an Astral Flare hit it, rendering it much less effective than if it were attacking the vulnerable Curator.
• Priests should remember to refrain from the use of Shadow Word: Death during an evocation, as the reflected damage could prove fatal if it critically strikes or you’ve sustained damage from flares.
• Shamans can maximize raid damage with a Bloodlust (or Heroism) timed several seconds before an evocation. Considering the fact that it lasts 40 seconds, it will cause the last flare to die more quickly and give the raid much more time to deal as much damage as possible during an evocation.
• Warlocks – Timing a Curse of Doom to tick during evocation can massively boost your damage dealt during this encounter. Casting Death Coil during evocation can deal heavy instant damage and heal you for just as much.
• Mages – Save damage cooldowns for evocation. As a caster, the flares can prove to be annoying with spell interruption, and you’ll miss out on a load of damage you could be applying to the curator when it’s taking 200% extra damage.

Strategy

For new raids first entering Karazhan, the Curator is rather hard to kill. It’s not a coincidence that this boss drops the first class set tokens – they really want them to be earned. There’s not much strategy or room for fancy maneuvers – either the raid has the required DPS and the necessary mana endurance, or it does not.

Most of the fight consists of two alternating phases: a 90 second Flare Phase followed by a 20 second Evocation Phase. Once the Curator’s health drops below 15% it does a soft enrage, stops summoning Flares and Evocating, but instead increases melee attack speed and Hateful Bolt frequency. 10 minutes after the pull the Curator does a hard enrage and wipes the raid very quickly.

Flare phase

During the Flare Phase, The Curator summons ten Astral Flares, hits the tank with moderate melee damage, and casts Hateful Bolts.

The Curator summons one Astral Flare every 10 seconds, at a cost of 10% of its mana. Each Flare spawns with about 1000 threat from a random, non-tank player character and advances in that character’s direction while hitting nearby enemies with Arcing Sear.

Each Flare must be destroyed within 10 seconds, before the next one spawns. Failure to do so results in multiple Flares dealing damage at the same time – this situation usually means a wipe. It is not necessary to damage the Curator at all during this phase. Damaging the Curator is permissible, but only when no Flares are up (unless the raid has excess DPS: see Positioning below).

This cannot be over-emphasized: By far, the most important part of the fight is killing the Astral Flares as quickly as possible. Wipes usually happen because the healers run out of mana. They run out of mana because the Flares live too long. The solution is almost always to kill the Flares faster. The faster each Flare dies, the easier the healers’ job becomes.

While it is not necessary to tank the Flares, doing so gets them to hold still and makes them easier to kill. A hunter pet with attack power buffs and specced for arcane resistance and stamina is ideal for this task. Warriors, bear druids, paladins, and enhancement shamans can do the job, too. A decently-geared retribution paladin can rather easily hold the flares in place with Righteous Fury and burst Holy damage threat.

The Curator casts a Hateful Bolt every 10 to 15 seconds. The current best theory is that the Hateful Bolt hits the non-tank character that has generated the most threat on The Curator since the last Evocation and currently has enough health to survive the damage from the Bolt.

It is possible to assign one character – preferably a warlock or a shadow priest – as Hateful Bolt soaker. This character attracts most of the Hateful Bolts by steadily damaging The Curator. Equipping the soaker with arcane resistance gear negates a substantial amount of the damage from the Hateful Bolts. Note that using a soaker is reasonable only when the raid is still able to kill the Flares fast enough. It’s typically done when using only two healers.

Evocation phase

Immediately after The Curator summons the tenth Astral Flare with the last of its mana, it enters a state of Evocation for 20 seconds while it refills its mana. While it does so, it goes completely inactive and all damage dealt against it is tripled.

Most raids must first concentrate on killing the tenth and last Flare before switching damage over to the Curator. Otherwise, there may be two Flares up after the Evocation, which is bad (see above). Killing the Flare quickly also grants the healers a few seconds break for mana regeneration. Overgeared raids can attack The Curator immediately to speed up the fight, and clean up the extra Flares after Evocation.

Cooldown and single-use abilities that temporarily increase damage output should be saved up for this moment and be activated at the beginning of the phase to quickly kill the last Astral Flare and to make the most out of the Curator’s temporary vulnerability.

Once the Curator has finished refilling mana, the fight continues with the next Flare Phase.

Enrage phase

When The Curator’s health drops below 15%, it immediately switches to the Enrage Phase. It stops summoning Astral Flares, ceases Evocations, and increases melee damage output and Hateful Bolt frequency. This means that the healers have to give the main tank and Hateful Bolt victims more attention while everyone else just nukes The Curator. This phase is actually the easiest part of the fight.

Positioning

Positioning is a secondary concern, but it can help raids with marginal gear. A concentrated setup increases damage on the Flares by eliminating the need for melee damage-dealers to chase down Flares. A distributed setup reduces damage from the Flares by reducing the chaining of Arcing Sear.

Concentrated

If melee damage dealers are needed on the Flares, everybody except the hunters sets up close together, with the hunters as close as possible, just at their minimum range. The main tank is on one side of The Curator, and everybody else is on top of each other on its back (within melee range). This makes it easy for the melee characters to damage the Flares and quickly switch to The Curator when no Flares are up. The drawback of this method is that the Flare damage is maximized. This is offset to some extent because multi-target heal spells like Chain Heal also have their maximum effect. More importantly, the Flares die more quickly in this formation, so they have less time to do damage.

Distributed

If the raid’s ranged DPS is high enough to kill the Flares quickly (in less than eight seconds) without support from the melee characters, the melee group sets up close to The Curator and stays put. The ranged damage dealers and healers spread out and each stays at least ten yards away from everybody else. This significantly reduces Flare damage, because Arcing Sear doesn’t jump farther than ten yards. Also, the melee group is on the Curator all the time, which shortens the fight.

If melee characters have to help killing Flares, the distributed setup does not work well. Even a single melee damage dealer chasing Flares breaks the ten yard pattern, and thus the Flare damage is maximized anyways. Worse, that melee character loses a lot of damage output while running around. Because of this, a concentrated setup is best for most raids new to this encounter.

Miscellaneous Tips

• For most problems on The Curator, the solution is to kill the Flares faster. If that doesn’t work, the best solution is usually to come back later with better gear, better specs, and more consumables. Underpowered raids simply cannot win this fight.
• Mana is an issue in this fight. Make sure everyone has enough mana potions and mana regeneration consumables.
• Threat is not an issue in this fight. Use buffs or totems that facilitate quick Flare-killing. Don’t use buffs like Salvation that reduce threat.
• Multi-target heals are very effective, especially Chain Heal and Prayer of Mending. Circle of Healing can be good too, but requires very good priest gear to be really efficient.
• The following simple macro is handy to help damage-dealers target live Astral Flares quickly:

  /cleartarget
  /target Astral Flare
  /stopmacro [nodead, harm]
  /target The Curator

• While it’s tempting to use arcane resistance gear, it slows down Flare-killing. It’s somewhat useful on the tank, any Hateful Bolt soaker, and any Flare tank, but generally harmful on other characters.
• Flares spawn to the left or right of The Curator in a pattern. Learn the pattern to pick them up faster.
• When The Curator starts evocating, some DPS meter chasers are tempted to cheat by attacking The Curator before the last Flare is dead. This leads to wipes in marginal raids. Watch out for cheaters and stop them. On well-geared raids though this is actually useful.
• The fight can be reset by running down the last stairs before the room.
• Astral Flares do not live long enough for damage-over-time spells to be effective. Warlocks can use Searing Pain or Shadow Bolt instead.
• If there are multiple hunters, they should spread out from each other. This avoids more than one being forced into melee combat when an Astral Flare comes their way. Feign death and (manually cast) Growl can keep the Flares at range.
• A Cauldron of Major Arcane Protection gives the healers a break.
• Warlocks can cast Curse of Doom on the Curator somewhere between the summoning of the fourth and sixth Astral Flares. It’s best to time it such that it goes off right at the start of the Evocation, so that it can be replaced by Curse of the Elements or Curse of Recklessness when the rest of the raid starts to deal damage.
• Priests should use their Shadowfiend during an Evocation phase. While dealing triple damage, the Shadowfiend can refill your whole mana bar.
• Shamans should use their Bloodlust or Heroism during the eighth Flare.
• If The Curator is mistakenly pulled while other players are elsewhere in the dungeon (i.e.: repairing in Midnights room), those player may be teleported up into The Menagerie. This causes certain death if the players cannot get to the stairs to reset the Curator.

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Abilities

She hits relatively hard and fast, and is immune to taunt effects.

• Holy Fire: Consumes an enemy in flames for 3500 fire damage, burning it and inflicting additional 1750 fire damage every 2 seconds over 12 sec. Targets a random person not in melee range, counting pets.
• Holy Wrath: AoE chained holy damage, inflicting more damage for every target it hits. No cast time, 20 sec. cooldown. Similar to the ability High Priest Venoxis uses. Hits for around 2000 on the first target, 2900 on the second, 3800 on the third, 5400 on the fourth.
• Repentance: Puts all players in a state of meditation, incapacitating them for up to 12 sec. Any damage caused will awaken the target. Also deals about 1500-2000 holy damage. She casts Repentance at random intervals, but no more often than 25 seconds. This affects all players. This effect cannot be dispelled, but several abilities can make you immune to it. Does not hit her current target.
• Holy Ground: Waves of virtue emanate from the caster, infusing nearby ground with holy power, for 240-360 holy damage every 3 sec. 12 yards. Silences for 0.5 seconds every 1 second, preventing non-instant spellcasting. Breaks the Repentance stun

Strategy

The Maiden of Virtue does not have phases in her fight. She behaves the same from the start of the fight to the end.

The Maiden uses all her abilities at random, not on a strict timer. For example, when the Repentance cooldown is over, she does not always cast it immediately; it just means that it’s possible for her to cast it. However, she does not cast Holy Fire while Repentance is active.

Wipes occur at this boss for mainly two reasons – either the tank dies while the healers are incapacitated from a Repentance, or too many raid members die from Holy Fire. A wipe is also possible due to poor positioning which leads to a chained Holy Wrath. Once these risks are managed correctly, this is a fairly easy fight.

Positioning

Correct positioning of the raid is the key here, healer positioning in particular. Ranged and healers should be far enough away from the Maiden to be outside of the Holy Ground attack. At the same time, the whole raid needs to be in range and sight of a dispeller and be spread out far enough to avoid chaining Holy Wrath. These requirements are easily matched with the following setup:

There are eight pillars around the room. Put one non-melee raid member at the outside wall in each gap between two pillars. Place the healers opposite of each other. Melee and tank can start wherever they like.

Tank her in the center of the room, right where she stands. After the pull, the raid members all move to their assigned gap between the pillars, and take exactly one step up the stair leading to her. This puts the whole raid in LoS, healing and dispel range of each other, but far enough apart to prevent the Holy Wrath from hitting more than the melee group.

Instead of standing between the pillars, it’s just as good if the raid members stand with their backs to the pillars. Just synchronize so that everybody takes the left (or right) pillar, and no two people end up using the same one.

Repentance

There are several ways to survive Repentance:

• A paladin healer casts and refreshes Blessing of Sacrifice (rank 1) on any melee character to constantly take damage, breaking the effect.
• A paladin uses Divine Shield to dispel repentance, then heals. This is usable only once per paladin.
• A healer (preferably one which cannot dispel) moves into the Holy Ground after the Repentance cooldown is over. Since it can take a while until she casts Repentance, this may effectively take the healer out of the combat for a while (due to the silence effect). This also increases the danger from a chained Holy Wrath. After she casts Repentance, the healer moves out of Holy Ground and resumes healing.
• The tank moves the Maiden towards a healer, to wake up the healer with damage from Holy Ground.
• The tank is loaded with HoT spells.
• The tank uses cooldown moves such as Last Stand, Shield Wall, potions, healthstones, and Nightmare Seeds.
• Melee damage-dealers that can heal (cat druids, retribution paladins, and enhancement shamans) run out to heal during Repentance.

All of these methods work well, and they work better in combination with each other.

Holy Fire

Holy Fire will quickly kill its victim unless removed. It is imperative to deal with it.

The easiest method to deal with Holy Fire is to have Grounding Totems up. With an alert Shaman and a little luck this one totem can absorb all Holy Fires targeted at that group. With one shaman in each group the fight actually becomes quite easy. Grounding totems have a limited range, so positions must be assigned carefully to make sure that everyone in the group is protected.

Holy Fire is a Magic debuff, and thus can be removed by the following:

• Priests’ Dispel Magic
• Paladins’ Cleanse and Divine Shield
• Felhounds’ Devour Magic
• Restorative Potion
• Warlocks’ Spellstone
• Mages’ Ice Block
• Rogues’ Cloak of Shadows

Holy Fire can also be spell reflected.

Healers and dispellers must be very alert to deal with Holy Fire. Every raid member needs to be topped off at all times, and Holy Fires must be dispelled as quickly as possible. This cannot be stressed enough, as it is the most important aspect of the fight: Dispel as quickly as possible. Unless someone would die, cancel the spell you’re currently casting to dispel immediately, so you spend less time and mana healing Holy Fire victims. Some raids place two dedicated dispellers on opposite sides of the room.

Holy Fire deals fire damage (not holy), thus Major Fire Protection Potions are useful.

This is the first fight since Chromaggus where dispelling debuffs is critical. Priests and paladins that are new to this fight usually have some initial difficulty dispelling fast enough to avoid wipes. This is normal, so be patient. Once they have a little practice and figure it out, though, the Maiden is a fairly easy fight.

Additional tips and methods

• If a Priest casts Shadow Word: Death on the Maiden during the 0.5 second cast of Repentance the backfiring damage will break the Repentance. This requires a timing mod, keeping the Maiden as the target (or using a focus macro) during the time she could cast Repentance and of course a fast reaction by the priest.
• Pets are not valid targets for Holy Fire or Holy Wrath, and may thus be sent into melee with no fear of causing a chain.
• Melee should stand at the edge of Maiden’s hit box, as far from each other as possible (forming a triangle or square around her). Holy Protection potions help diminish damage taken by melee significantly, and are recommended over health pots.
• Warriors who pop Berserker Rage can become immune to or break Repentance. Being immune to Repentance effect also prevents the 2k front-end damage.
• In contrast to some people’s belief, paladin tanks can tank Maiden well despite Holy Ground’s silence. The silence effect only lasts one second for every three seconds. As all of the paladin tanking skills used during the actual tanking are instant cast, the one second silence does not cause much problem usually.
• Dampen Magic on melee DPS reduces the Holy Ground tick damage to 150-200 so that a single HoT, shadow priest, or feral druid can keep them alive.
• Amplify Magic is not a good idea at all; it appears to drastically boost her damage.
• The rooms off the hallway prior to the Maiden do not need to be cleared. If you choose to skip them, be sure to hug the wall to your right or you risk drawing aggro from the mobs in the side rooms. The hallway and patrols are on a 60 minute timer. However, the servants quarters adds spawn quicker at 20-25 minutes.
• The following macro is handy for warrior tanks to pull the Maiden to a healer under the effects of repentance:

  /target <healer's name>
  /cast Intervene
  /targetlasttarget
  

• Priests, paladins, and warlocks may use a dispel assist add-on such as Decursive, Healbot, or Smartbuff to speed up removal of Holy Fire. The following simple macro is a reasonable replacement:

  /stopcasting
  /cast [target=mouseover] Dispel Magic

  (Replace “Dispel Magic” with “Cleanse” or “Devour Magic” for paladins or warlocks.) Drag the group windows out of the raid panel before the fight. When the Holy Fire icon appears beside someone’s name, just point at the name and hit the macro hotkey. No clicking or target switching is required.

• The following macro is useful for Paladins keeping up Blessing of Sacrifice on the Main Tank but are busy targeting other party members with cleanses and heals:

  /cast [target=NAMEOFTANK] Blessing of Sacrifice

  The macro will not mess with your targeting at all. Max-rank BoS is recommended since the whole point is to keep the tank up and the pally won’t take much damage anyway.

• The Maiden cannot be reset. She will pursue her targets all the way to the zone portal.
• Since Maiden casts Repentance at specific intervals throughout the fight, certain mods exist that can warn the raid of an impending Repentance. This can allow a healer to walk into the Holy Ground effect just before the Repentance lands, instead of having to stand there taking damage for an extended period.
• Beast Mastery Hunters can use Bestial Wrath just before a Repentance to negate its effect.
• The Insignia of the Alliance and Insignia of the Horde can both be used while under the effects of Repentance to break its effect.

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Background

In The Last Guardian, Moroes was described as Medivh’s castellan or personal house servant. He was an oddly thin man, too thin. It made Khadgar think Medivh mutated animals to serve him. He was also ghostly in appearance, who wore horse blinders over his eyes in order to escape the wandering visions that plagued Medivh’s tower. He described to Khadgar (who had traveled from Dalaran to serve as Medivh’s apprentice) how he had seen a vision of himself breaking one of Cook’s crystal dishes and — despite trying to avoid doing so — ended up shattering it anyway; he wore the blinders until the day he died. He was killed by Medivh, who was in the final stages of madness, and is now buried beside both his master and Cook outside of Karazhan. It seemed that Moroes wasn’t surprised that he was murdered by Medivh, according to The Last Guardian, it said: His eyes were wide and open, but his face was surprsingly composed. Not even death seemed to surprise the castellan.

Moroes has been resurrected by the new master of Karazhan. He is one of the first bosses encountered by adventurers. He has been revived as an undead and wields two wicked daggers when attacking. He seems to have retained much of his personality during life since after wiping the raid he states Medivh will return from Stormwind City.

The party he “holds” in the tower’s Banquet Hall includes ghosts of relatives of Darkshire noblemen as guests. Names of all of the NPCs in the Hall, including Ebonlocke who refuses to take part in the festivities, can be found as names of notable citizens of the Duskwood town.

Abilities

• Basic melee: 1600-2500 damage on plate wearers.
• Vanish: Vanishes, does not reset aggro.
• Garrote: After reappearing from vanish he will immediately garrote someone, dealing 1075 damage every 3 seconds for five minutes, a total of 107.5k damage. Can be removed by (Spell #1020), Hand of Protection, Ice Block, and Stoneform.
• Blind: A poison that occasionally blinds a target in melee range, causing them to wander. Dispellable. If one tank is gouged and the other tank is blinded, Moroes will run rampant on the group.
• Gouge: Gouges the person with the highest threat, incapacitating them for a few seconds. Moroes will then attack the person with the second highest threat.
• Frenzy: When Moroes’ health reaches 30% he will enrage, increasing his damage done by 20%.

Strategy

The Moroes encounter tests your raid’s ability to control several targets while also maintaining high DPS. Success requires a solid control strategy for his four dinner guests. If allowed to go free, they will quickly put an end to the squishies. Control must be established immediately on the pull and maintained throughout the fight.

Once control is established, the encounter becomes a race between the raid’s damage output and the building damage caused by Garrote. Each time a Garrote is applied, the strain on the healers increases. Moroes must die before the healing needed becomes too much to handle.

The dinner guests (adds)

Moroes has four different random dinner guests (adds), consisting of the members of Noble House of Darkshire, from the following list in every instance. Each add is based off a class and spec. The following table lists them in a good kill order:

Baroness Dorothea Millstipe

Her mana burn spell is the single most dangerous factor in this fight. It can burn all the mana from a healer, leading to a wipe. Fortunately, her cloth armor makes her easy to kill. Burn her down first, and as quickly as possible. Interrupt, silence, and stun her attempts to cast the mana burn. She does not need a tank, but make sure to heal her target.

Lady Catriona Von’Indi

She does not appear to use her Dispel Magic to free the other dinner guests from shackles or traps. Instead, she uses it to remove buffs from players. Her heals must be interrupted. If she is killed, no tank is required.

Lady Keira Berrybuck

Her heals and cleanses make her extremely disruptive, as she will release her friends from Shackle Undead and Freezing Trap. Her Blessing of Might adds 550 attack power and is also dangerous, especially on Moroes. Due to her armor and Divine Shield she is more difficult to kill than the priests. Therefore, she is a high priority to keep shackled the whole fight. If she is killed or trapped, warn the raid that shackles and other traps will break early and that priests, hunters, and shamans must get rid of the Blessing of Might. Her Divine Shield can be dispelled with Mass Dispel. If she is to be killed, a tank is a good idea, but not required.

Baron Rafe Dreuger

His main threat is his ability to stun his main target with Hammer of Justice and take off after a healer. While he has a documented Cleanse ability, he does not appear to use it much. He may be trapped, so long as the hunter is careful not to let him get close enough to stun. A tank is required to kill him.

Lord Robin Daris

His main threat is his powerful Mortal Strike. He will quickly kill anyone but a tank. He should generally be chain-trapped by a hunter, then tanked and killed. If no hunters are available, he should simply be off-tanked (with extra heals) until it is time to kill him. He can also be kept shackled the whole fight, but with great caution; the priest will die in one hit if he gets loose for long enough. Keep him away from the raid, as his whirlwind causes damage if he uses it in a crowd.

Lord Crispin Ference

He doesn’t do a lot of damage, but takes a long time to kill. Therefore, it’s reasonable to attack Moroes while Ference is still alive. Although his disarm ability is annoying, it is reasonable to off-tank him as a “rage battery”, especially as a druid bear. Once the other dinner guests are dead or shackled, he can be trapped, turned, or killed when Moroes vanishes.

As many adds as possible should be crowd controlled. The adds can be controlled with the priest’s Shackle Undead, the paladin’s Turn Evil, the hunter’s Freezing Trap, off-tanking, snares (with kiting), and stuns. Be careful when using a paladin to fear the adds, since if an add exits the room, the encounter resets.

Shackles can be maintained until Moroes is dead. Adds for which no shackle is available should usually be killed before Moroes. One good sequence is to follow the above list from top to bottom – the priests have the least health and require no tank, the paladins can dispel, and the warriors take longer to kill due to their high health (particularly Ference).

Garrote

Moroes vanishes every 30 seconds, and upon return randomly Garrotes a raid member. Garrote is a bleed effect and deals 1,000 damage every three seconds for 300 seconds (5 minutes, for a total of 100,000 damage). After he garrotes, Moroes immediately returns to the highest threat target. Garrote can be removed by the following abilities only:

• Dwarves’ Stoneform
• Paladins’ Divine Shield and Blessing of Protection
• Mages’ Ice Block
• Items which remove bleeding effects (Luffa no longer works)
• Death (hopefully followed by a combat resurrection)
• It seems that hunters can avoid Garrote by Feign Death during Vanish

Since the possibilities to remove Garrote are limited, there is no choice but to heal through it on most raid members. One active HoT from a well-equipped healer should be enough. Group heals work well when multiple targets are garroted.

In theory, all Garrotes are automatically removed when Moroes is defeated. However, sometimes they persist even after Moroes dies. Resetting the encounter does not remove Garrotes.

Dying from Garrote does not inflict a durability loss penalty. It is a good idea to plan ahead (while clearing other bosses) and save all combat resurrection cooldowns for Moroes. Do not cast soulstones before the encounter, but wait until an important target is garroted, and only then soulstone. This method of garrote removal has the advantage that the resurrection restores some mana. If a raid member is garroted and a combat resurrection is planned, the player should quickly spend all his mana, then just die and be resurrected.

If possible, Garrote should always be removed from a priest that is maintaining a shackle. All healers are important too. Damage-dealing classes should be cured only towards the end of the fight, while the tanks should never get the Garrote removed — they are the main heal targets anyways, and the Garrote breaks the Gouge.

Gouge and the tanks

Generally, two tanks are needed on Moroes. The off-tank must always be second on the threat list, because Moroes periodically gouges the main tank then turns to his target with the second-highest threat. This must be the off-tank. However, it is possible to avoid the gouge by turning your back to him, and backing up slowly until you can use your attacks.

Since the off-tank gets hit only while the main-tank is Gouged, rage may be a problem. To counter rage-starvation, the off-tank can grab one of the adds to act as a rage battery. This also controls that add.

If available, a third tank can handle the adds that require tanking, or one of the two Moroes tanks can do the job.

As a variant, a paladin can tank Moroes and all four adds. The paladin firsts casts Blessing of Sacrifice on a temporary off-tank (or a warlock who can then use Hellfire to cause the paladin some damage) and later on a Garrote victim. This breaks Gouge as soon as the Garrote ticks or the hellfire passes some damage. If Baron Rafe Dreuger is present, the raid stun-locks, silences, and kills him quickly, so that he cannot stun the tank.

Dealing with Blind

Moroes casts Blind on his closest enemy that is not his current target. This is a poison-based disorient effect that causes the victim to temporarily lose aggro and wander aimlessly for ten seconds. It is broken by damage. It is devastating if Moroes Blinds the off-tank then Gouges the main tank, as he will then generally attack a healer.

To avoid this, assign a non-tank character to stand on top of Moroes at all times. This character takes the Blinds instead of the off-tank.

Naturally, paladins, druids, and shamans should remove the Blind effect. Shamans should keep down a Poison Cleansing Totem to help with this.

Preparing for battle

Given the random nature of the adds and the raid’s composition, every Moroes fight is different. The raid must make a plan before the pull and stick with it. This fight requires more planning than anything that comes before it in the game.

1. Clear the entire room of all the trash.
2. Mark Moroes and all the dinner guests with raid icons.
3. Determine and announce the kill order
4. Assign targets to players for:
   • Shackling
   • Freeze trapping
   • Fearing (via Turn Undead)
   • Tanking for Moroes, as crowd-control, and for kill targets
   • Off-tanking, for Moroes
   • Healing, for the tank, off-tank, and the rest of the raid
   • Backup duties, should someone die before his assignment is complete

Executing the fight

Once a plan is established, it’s time to execute it.

Pull Moroes, kill targets, and off-tank targets to one side of the room. Pull shackle and trap targets to the other side and control them there. This makes it less likely for the crowd-control to break from AoE attacks, dispels, or cleanses. The tanks generate threat on Moroes and any off-tank targets, while the controllers shackle or trap, then switch to healing or attacking as quickly as possible.

Use all cooldown abilities available to attack and kill the first target as quickly as possible. The fight becomes considerably easier to control once one or two targets die. There’s no reason to save damage-dealing cooldowns for Moroes. Focus fire on the planned kill targets, in order, until Moroes dies.

The tank calls out when he is gouged, so that healers can switch focus to the off-tank.

Anyone who is controlling an add calls out when there is a problem so that someone else can help.

Once all non-shackled adds are killed, the raid may kill Moroes next to speed up the fight and reduce the pressure from multiple garrotes, or kill the shackled adds to remove the risk of them getting loose and causing trouble.

After Moroes is dead, the raid may kill any remaining adds or despawn them by leaving the room.

Class specific tips

Paladin

Paladins should use Divine Shield to remove Garrote from themselves. They can use Blessing of Protection to remove it from important raid members it lands on, generally priests. A reduced cooldown on Blessing of Protection (Guardian’s Favor) is a big bonus in this fight.

Paladins can use Blessing of Sacrifice on a Garroted party member or the off-tank to mitigate the damage. This can make a difference for low-health casters and breaks Gouge on paladin tanks.

While Turn Evil is not reliable long-term crowd-control, it is useful to protect healers and other crowd-controllers, should a target get loose. To avoid resetting the encounter, do not use it near either of the entrances to the room.

A paladin that is assigned to crowd-control duties can use one of the following macros to cast Turn Evil without losing his current target:

/cast [target=Lord Robin Daris] Turn Evil

/clearfocus [modifier:shift] [target=focus,dead] [target=focus,noexists]
/focus [target=focus,noexists]
/script SetRaidTarget("focus", 1)
/cast [target=focus] Turn Evil

See Useful Priest Macros for detailed examples and explanation.

Priest

Shadow priests generally have more spell hit than Holy Priests, and are thus better at maintaining Shackles. Re-cast the shackle every ten seconds or so to reduce the possibility of a target getting loose. If a shackle target does get loose, make sure to call for help.

The following macros are useful for casting the shackle without losing your current target:

/cast [target=Lord Robin Daris] shackle undead

/clearfocus [modifier:shift] [target=focus,dead] [target=focus,noexists]
/focus [target=focus,noexists]
/script SetRaidTarget("focus", 1)
/cast [target=focus] Shackle Undead

See Useful priest macros for detailed examples and explanation.

An addon called UberShackle can also be helpful in reshackling Moroes adds.

Warlock

The following macro will allow a warlock voidwalker to build threat on a shackle target without breaking the shackle. If the shackle breaks, the target will attack the Voidwalker instead of the priest.

/clearfocus [modifier:alt]
/focus [target=focus,noexists]; [target=focus,dead]
/clearfocus [target=focus,help]
/petstay
/petfollow
/cast [pet:voidwalker,target=focus,exists,harm] Torment; Torment

Hit the macro while holding down the alt key to set the focus. Keep the Voidwalker in passive, and repeatedly hit this macro during the fight to use the Torment ability.

Use Curse of Tongues on the caster adds to slow down mana burn and heal spells.

Hunter

Hunters can chain-trap one add indefinitely. This is made easier by survival talents or the Beast Lord Armor set bonus. They can also kite.

However, given the importance of high damage output in this fight, it is not always a good idea to trap or kite for a long time. If the hunter is busy trapping, he can’t put out as much damage. It may be best to pull a target into a trap, drop a second trap, and trust in an off-tank to pick up the trap target before the second trap breaks.

Hunters can use Misdirection to help the off-tank maintain threat on Moroes.

Hunters can drop a Freezing Trap on any (player) priest that is keeping a target shackled. If the shackle breaks, this will give the priest time to re-shackle the target instead of taking hits.

Hunter pets specced for armor and stamina can tank kill targets, so long as they get heals.

Warrior

Any spec of warrior can off-tank Moroes and tank kill targets.

Intervene does not appear to catch Garrote.

Shaman

Shamans should drop Poison Cleansing Totems to get rid of Blind. They should also be prepared to die and reincarnate if they get Garroted.

Druid

Druids can switch into bear form and use Growl to protect any healers or crowd-controllers that get unwanted attention. They should generally save their Rebirth battle resurrection for priests that are maintaining shackles.

Mage

Mages can and should use Ice Block to get rid of Garrote.

Rogue

Use Mind-Numbing Poison on the caster adds to slow down mana burns and heals.

Quick Facts

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The original satyrs are the descendants of the kaldorei highborne, the first being Xavius, who allied directly with the Burning Legion during the first invasion ten thousand years before the First War.

Abilities

Terestian

• Melee: Hits for roughly 6,500 on cloth.
• Shadow Bolt: Terestian fires a shadowbolt at the target with the most amount of threat.
• Heal: A random character is summoned to the center of the room and becomes paralyzed. They immdediately begin to suffer 1,500 unresistable (and unabsorbable) damage per second until the chains that bind the person (which count as a mob) are destroyed. While sacrifice is in effect, Terestian is healed for a high amount. The chains have approximately 13,000 health.
• Berserk: After 10 minutes, Terestian goes into a rage, and begins to spam shadowbolts that hit for 7,000 damage on the entire raid.

Kil’rek (58.000 HP)

• Melee: Hits for roughly 2,000 on cloth.
• Amplify Flames: An undispellable debuff that Kil’rek will place on the target highest on his threat list.
• Broken Pact: A debuff placed on Terestian upon Kil’rek’s death. It causes Terestian to take 25% more damage.

Fiendship Imp (4.300 HP)

• Melee: Roughly 400. Typically used if the target is immune to fire damage, or in close proximity.
• Firebolt: Inflicts 150 fire damage. Will inflict 650 damage if Amplify Flames is on the target. Has a very fast cast time.

Strategy

Overview

• Illhoof and his imp aggro when you pull him. After around 10 seconds, he emotes and summons two portals from the back of the room. Imps continue to pour out of these portals at a steady rate throughout the entire fight.
• If Kil’rek is killed, he respawns after roughly 45 seconds and rejoins the fight.
• When Illhoof sacrifices anyone, they appear in the circle in the middle of his room.
• Staying bunched close to Illhoof is a good idea. Illhoof and Kil’rek both should be tanked near the circle where the Sacrifice happens. This makes it easy to quickly switch from Illhoof/Kil’rek to the chains. Bunching also makes sure the warlock’s Seed of Corruption hits a lot of imps.

Tanking

• Depending on the strategy used, one or two tanks should suffice for this fight.
• Illhoof is not particularly hard to tank, although he needs to be kept near the imps he summons so that he receives AoE damage as well.
• Kil’rek, his imp, can be problematic because he spawns in the middle of battle, which generally leads to him attacking an AoE class or a healer. A standard warrior, druid, or paladin tank works. Even moonkin druids, hunter pets, and voidwalkers work fine, so long as they get attention from the healers.
• If steady AoE is used, imps should be on that class the entire fight. Note that if the imps are not immediately hit, they may aggro on the healers.
• If only one tank is used to tank both Illhoof and Kil’rek, they should be kept out of the AoE to avoid Kil’rek aggroing on the AoE.
• Note that a Paladin tank with Fire Resistance Aura can effectively tank Illhoof, Kil’rek, and many of the imps by spamming Consecrate with Righteous Fury active. The healing received will refill the Paladin’s mana pool via Spiritual Attunement.

Kill priority

• The most important thing in the fight is to destroy Demon Chains as soon as they appear. Demon Chains should go down REALLY fast, not just because the Sacrifice victim will die very quickly but also because Illhoof will heal a lot during it AND the designated Demon Chain healer will lose more mana spamming heals.
• As of 2.3 Wound Poison does affect the healing from chains along with Mortal Strike and Aimed Shot.
• The Demon Chains may be vulnerable to some DoTs (e.g., poison) and AoE, although chains should be dying fast enough to make the former of little use. The Chains are not vulnerable to Blast Wave, Dragon’s Breath, Arcane Explosion, or Consecration.
• Kil’rek can be either slowly killed via AoE or rapidly killed as soon as he spawns. Killing him rapidly reduces the danger of losing your AoE to Amplify Flames, but can make tanking problematic for the off tank. Killing Kil’rek first will ensure that he has the Broken Pact debuff on longer. As long as you can kill Kil’rek in under roughly 10 seconds, you will do more damage by killing him and reaping the benefit of Broken Pact.
• If it takes longer than 10 seconds to kill Kil’rek focus DPS on Illhoof and allow Kil’rek die from AoE/off-tank. This results in more damage to Illhoof.
• The following macro is hugely useful in selecting targets for this chaotic fight:

  /cleartarget
  /target Demon Chains
  /stopmacro [nodead, harm]
  /target Kil'rek
  /stopmacro [nodead, harm]
  /target Terestian Illhoof

Dealing with Imps

• The easiest way to kill off the spawning imps is a pair of warlocks spamming Seed of Corruption on Illhoof or on the imps themselves. Hellfire also works. The imps rarely live long enough to hit the warlocks. One warlock also works fine.
• Because the imps have an own aggro table it is most likely that at a certain point in the fight multiple imps will attack one of the healers or aoe caster, causing much spell pushback. Therefore it’s wise to keep all healers and aoe casters in one group with Concentration aura. If there is a Shaman or second Paladin available it might be wise to also use Fire Resistance Totem or Aura in this group. Keeping up Earth Shield on the Warlock would be a wise choice. The Nether Protection talent, an Earthen Elixir, Dampen Magic, Blessing of Sanctuary and Power Word: Shield are also able to help.
• If no warlocks are available, well geared mages may suffice.
• If your AoE is not up to the task, designate one high-damage melee DPS (well-geared rogue or cat) to burn them down one at a time. The Kil’rek tank can help clean up any left-overs when Kil’rek is down.
• To give warlocks and other AoEs a break, the imps can also be feared.
• Another extremely effective way to deal with the imps without warlocks is to release shaman fire elementals. Chances for effective kill go up dependent on the spell damage of the shaman or shamans and the number of shaman. But the use of chain lightning and the elemental pretty much guarantee a downing of the imps. This fight is absolutely not dependent on locks alone as many have come to believe. Shaman are also extremely effective in this fight as well as they are the only class with an AOE pet which does not draw aggro to the player.

Dealing with Sacrifice

At least one healer with a quick reaction time should be designated to heal sacrifice victims. A paladin works well here, since they can bubble out of it if they themselves become sacrificed.

• If you have trouble keeping sacrifice victims alive, have each healer use one mid-level heal on the victim at the start of the effect, to provide a cushion of health for the main sacrifice healer to work with. At least one of these heals should land quickly enough to keep the victim alive while the other heals are cast.
• Illhoof’s Sacrifice has a three-second cast time and it’s the only occasion for which he changes his target to someone other than the main tank. If Healers are using addons that supply them with a “Main Tank Target’s Target” such as CT_Raid, or use Healer Bbuttons, Clique or [target=mouseover] macros for healing which allow them to heal while constantly keeping Illhoof targeted, it will give them some seconds of advance warning on who is about to be sacrificed.
• Mages can use Ice Block and Paladins can use Divine Shield to get themselves out of a sacrifice. Druids can use Barkskin to reduce damage taken. Divine Intervention will also dispel a sacrifice if a soulstoned paladin who is low on mana opts to use it when Illhoof is close to death.
• Healers need to be prepared for pushback when the person handling imp AoE is sacrificed, as they draw aggro from a rapidly increasing number of imps. Concentration Aura helps, as does a Challenging Shout/Challenging Roar/Holy Wrath from the tank.
• Here is a useful healer macro that will help improve sacrifice response time tremendously – use your own spell of predilection in place of regrowth:

  /stopcasting
  /target Demon Chains
  /target targettarget
  /cast Regrowth

• Keep Illhoof as close to the Sacrifice circle as possible so that Melee can make an easy switch to bring the chains down ASAP.
• Hunters can drop a snake trap. Illhoof sometimes sacrifices a snake instead of a player character, making things much easier.
• A bug exists where if a member moves in between getting teleported and getting bound by the chains, they will still take damage even after the chains go down. If Illhoof casts Sacrifice while targeting you, be sure to not move. Typically, this should not concern anyone but melee DPS that have to move for Kil’rek or the chains.

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Aran is located in the Guardian’s Library in Karazhan. He must be fought in a very small arena which is a circle approximately 45 yards in diameter. He is completely untankable, almost never melees, doesn’t have a standard aggro list, and if he is pulled away from the center of his arena he’ll run right back.

Shade of Aran is an optional boss. However, after he is defeated, a teleport to his room becomes available from Berthold <The Doorman>, and all trash mobs from The Curator to Aran (exc. one pack outside Illhoof’s door) cease to respawn.

Characteristics

• Very low armor.
• Immune to Mind Numbing Poison, Curse of Tongues, and Silence.

Basic spells

• Frostbolt – Three-second cast, 3500 to 4500 frost damage and four-second slow. Interruptible.
• Fireball – Two-second cast, 3910 to 5290 fire damage. Interruptible.
• Arcane Missiles – Five-second channeled spell that shoots five missiles, each dealing 1260 to 1540 arcane damage (6300-7700 total). Interruptible.
• Chains of Ice – Ten-second root, does not break on damage. Dispellable. Appears to be a chance on hit with frostbolt, similar to mage’s Frostbite.
• AoE Counterspell – Ten-yard radius AoE around Aran, goes off very frequently with no warning, locks out schools of magic for 10 seconds.

All of Aran’s basic spells have infinite range (even through walls — they hit anywhere in the instance) and are randomly targeted. Pets are valid targets for these spells, including the snakes from Snake Traps.

All slowing and root effects are dispellable (magic), and can be broken by the usual methods.

It is possible to interrupt and lock out all his basic abilities to the point where he starts to use his melee attack. He sometimes takes a swing even when not all his schools are locked. When meleeing, he uses a normal aggro table. This can cause problems, as he can move out of the center of the room and leave the raid out of position.

Arcane Missiles seem to be semi-intelligently targeted at the raid member with the lowest percentage health, but this may simply be a random effect.

Special abilities

Every 30–35 seconds, Aran uses one of his three special abilities (never the same twice in a row). The special abilities cannot be interrupted or locked out.

• Flame Wreath: Five-second cast which creates a fiery aura around three random characters for 20 seconds. When the auras are triggered by moving over them, they deal 3,000–4,000 fire damage to everyone in the room. They do not disappear upon Aran’s death and can still be triggered after the fight.
• Circular Blizzard: Large AoE that moves slowly clockwise around the room. Deals 1313 to 1687 frost damage every two seconds and slows movement speed by 65%; does not hit the center of the room
• Magnetic Pull / Slow / Super Arcane Explosion: Pulls everyone to the center of the room and Slows them. This is followed by a ten-second cast Arcane Explosion that deals 9,000-11,000 damage in a 20-yard radius.

Conjured Water Elementals

At 40% health, the Shade of Aran summons four elite Conjured Water Elementals with 13,000 health. They shoot a constant stream of Waterbolts for ~1000-2000 damage and despawn after 90 seconds.

Polymorph / Drink / Pyroblast

At 20% mana or less (about 30k), Aran mass Polymorphs the entire raid, conjures some water, and starts drinking. After about ten seconds, or if his drinking is interrupted, the polymorph breaks and Aran does a pyroblast for 7000-7500 fire damage on the whole raid.

Shadows of Aran

After 12 minutes, he goes berserk and calls Shadows of Aran. They have various high-damage AoE abilities which wipe the raid within seconds. This is not a serious concern; the fight should never take that long.

Strategy

The key to success here is survival. The Shade of Aran’s basic attacks are not very dangerous, but the special attacks are deadly. Each raid member must pay attention to which attack is upcoming; nobody can sit back and just do their usual routine. Once everybody learns how to move (or when not to move), the fight actually becomes rather easy.

In order to avoid the Magnetic Pull/Arcane Explosion, everybody must run to the outer wall of the room; the Blizzard forces people towards the center (or the other side of the room); and Flame Wreath inhibits movement. Beyond this, casters want to stay outside the AoE silence, and classes with spell-interrupt abilities want to concentrate on what he’s casting.

The encounter cannot be reset.

Safe zone

There seems to be a “safe zone” that provides good positioning for healers and ranged DPS during the encounter.

Drawing a 3×3 grid using the floor tiles around Shade shows four corners that are out of range of both the AoE counterspell as well as Blizzard. Although it’s possible to find a safe spot there, Aran may move a little and thus put players there in the counterspell. The Blizzard may also sometimes affect these spots.

Blizzard has given no indication that they consider use of these safe spots to be an exploit.

Gear

Aggro is of almost no relevance, because Aran chooses his targets semi-randomly. Hence it is important to remember to replace all threat-reducing buffs, such as the Paladin’s Blessing of Salvation, with something offensive instead. The tanks should wear damage-dealing gear. If the raid chooses not to interrupt arcane missiles, some arcane resistance can be useful. Everyone in the group should strive for at least 8,000 health after buffs. More is better. Even healers and ranged damage-dealers must be able to survive a wave of arcane missiles (7,000 damage), and everybody must be able to survive the Pyroblast (7,500 damage).

Interrupts

Aran’s standard attacks (Fireball, Frost Bolt, and Arcane Missile) can all be interrupted. By interrupting his spells, the raid can influence how fast Aran spends his mana. This is important, because the Polymorph/Pyroblast (at 20% mana) and the Water Elementals (at 40% health) must not occur close to each other. When either health or mana reach the critical percentage, the other must be clearly away from the threshold.

For a raid new to this encounter (with comparably low damage output), it is advisable to interrupt only Arcane Missile, and let him freely cast Frost Bolt and Fireball. This will maximize Aran’s mana usage, and thus the Polymorph/Pyroblast occurs early, well before he reaches 40% health. After the Pyroblast, the raid can interrupt any of his spells, to minimize damage taken.

If the raid’s damage output is high enough that Polymorph/Pyroblast and Water Elementals happen close to each other even though only the Arcane Missiles are interrupted, it’s time to switch to letting Aran cast the Missiles freely and interrupting Fireball and Frost Bolt. This conserves his mana, so that the Water Elementals occur first. If damage output is really high, the Polymorph/Pyroblast does not occur at all.

Fireballs and Frost Bolts should be interrupted near the end of their casting time, because he expends mana only at the end of the cast and does nothing else for nearly two seconds. Arcane Missiles should be interrupted early, as he spends the mana upfront anyway, and early interruption reduces the spell’s damage output. It is useful to assign each player with an interrupt ability one type of spell. This avoids everybody interrupting at the same time and, therefore, having nobody left available to interrupt the next spell.

The following abilities interrupt a Shade of Aran cast:

• Rogues’ Kick
• Warriors’ Pummel and Shield Bash
• Shamans’ Wind Shear
• Druids’ Feral Charge
• Mages’ Counterspell
• Warlocks’ Spell Lock
• As of 3.0.2, paladins’ Hammer of Justice and Death Knights Mind Freeze

The druid, mage, and warlock abilities have long cool-downs, and are thus not very effective. Note that the Shade is immune to the silence, daze, and root effects of some of these abilities, so casting them produces an “Immune” message. However, the abilities still interrupt the spell cast.

Also, a druid with the gloves from Vengeful Gladiator’s Sanctuary can interrupt Shade of Aran with the Maim ability.

Rogues that have Gladiator’s Leather Gloves, Merciless Gladiator’s Leather Gloves, or Vengeful Gladiator’s Leather Gloves equipped can interrupt Shade using their Deadly Throw ability. Opportunist’s Leather Gloves, Grand Marshal’s Leather Gloves, and High Warlord’s Leather Gloves also work with doing this.

Particularly for healers: To save mana, it is generally a good idea to understand when an interrupt is successful and a heal is not needed. There are two ways to achieve this:

• Watch Aran’s cast bar.
• Listen to distinctive sounds of interrupts.

Healers can improve their response time to (Fireball, Frost Bolt and Arcane Missile) with the macro:

  /target Shade
  /cast [target=targettarget] Greater Heal

• Watching Shade’s target and cast bar is also advisable.

Circular Blizzard

This special attack materializes as a blue, translucent cloud on the floor that slowly moves clockwise along the outer perimeter of the room. It is trailed by a damaging Blizzard which fills up to half the room. The cloud and the Blizzard snare anyone caught in them. The Blizzard does not affect the center of the room.

Players in melee range to Aran normally do not have to worry about the Blizzard (as long they stay in the center of the room). Ranged classes should always keep a lookout for the cloud and run away clockwise (but avoid running into the tail of the Blizzard). When caught, players get snared and should immediately turn and move to the center of the room. The periodic AoE silence/counterspell there is the lesser of two evils.

Flame Wreath

If Flame Wreath is upcoming, the whole raid must immediately stop moving, simple as that. People must wait until the auras are clearly visible, and may only move again when they are sure they will in no way come near one of them. Melee’rs have a few seconds to move into melee range of Aran from the second Flame Wreath is announced and until he casts it; however, this requires some practice and careful timing.

The effect is triggered by the following:

• Player character movement
• Accepting a resurrection (Rebirth or Soulstone)
• Mages’ Blink
• Druids’ shapeshifting
• Shaman Elemental Totems (Fire Elemental Totem, Earth Elemental Totem)

The following do not trigger the effect:

• Spell casting
• Movement resulting from a spell cast (like Mind Flay for priests or Aimed Shot/Steady Shot for hunters)
• Paladins’ Divine Shield
• Rogues’ Cloak of Shadows
• Warrior’s Whirlwind
• Nether Protection
• Pets
• Companions

Flame Wreath is confirmed to crit, having an estimated crit chance of 10-15%, dealing 7.000+ damage to the target.

Magnetic Pull / Slow / Arcane Explosion

Magnetic Pull can be avoided by standing behind one of the tables near the wall — players fixed there do not need to worry about the pull or the explosion at all.

All other raid members must immediately run to the outer edge of the room — no turning or finishing up an attack. Even with the slow debuff, everybody can reach the wall well before the Explosion.

If possible a priest in the raid should cast a Mass Dispel centered on the Shade immediately after Magnetic Pull. This automatically takes care of everybody reacting slowly and Chains of Ice. If Mass Dispel is not available (or the raid feels confident and wants to save priest mana), Priests and Paladins still should pay attention to slow reactions or Chains of Ice.

Water Elementals

The Water Elementals can be banished, stunned, and feared; and are susceptible to Curse of Tongues. Crowd control, tank, and kill them quickly; they have only 13,000 HP each. It helps if the tank wears some frost-resistance gear. They despawn after 90 seconds. One warlock can keep two crowd controlled the entire time (fear and banish); with two warlocks, you can just keep all four of them crowd controlled until they despawn.

If the Elementals spawn at the same time as one of the special attacks takes place, it’s difficult to control them properly. It is a good idea to control DPS and bring the Shade’s health down to 40% at a time when there is no risk of a Flame Wreath, Blizzard, or Polymorph / Pyroblast.

Trinkets and abilities with cool-downs should be used when the Elementals spawn.

Polymorph / Pyroblast

If the raid’s DPS is high enough and the interrupts work well, this phase may not occur at all. If it does, the healers have to be on their toes to heal the raid very quickly after the Pyroblast (preferably using AoE heals). The Polymorph breaks at the same time as Pyroblast is cast, so there’s just the spell’s travel time to cast something before it hits. This can only be effectively done by healers outside melee range. After the blast, all raid members should use health potions and Healthstones to heal quickly.

This Polymorph works on characters who are normally immune. Only druids in Tree of Life form remain unaffected. If Aran is interrupted while drinking, he simply uses a potion and Pyroblasts anyway. PvP insignias do not break the Mass Polymorph; only the Water Elementals may break sheep during this time. The Pyroblast can be interrupted.

If Aran reaches 20% mana again after the first Mass Polymorph, he does not Polymorph and Pyroblast again. He just drinks a potion and continues.

Tips for healers

Healing for this fight is noticeably different from the other encounters in Karazhan for two reasons:

• Healers must be far more in tune with their surroundings and move around like everyone else in the raid; this means they must be able to take their eyes off of everyone’s health bars and become more situationally aware.
• There is no benefit to having a regular tank, which means all healers in the raid are raid healing.

The ability to heal while moving is very useful. Priests and Druids excel at this as they have several instant casts. Instant casts also have the major advantage that they cannot be counterspelled by Aran’s AOE counterspell. Aran’s counterspell is not continuous, so quite often you can get a flash heal or equivalent off, but attempting to cast a longer spell like Chain Heal, Greater Heal, or Holy Light when close to Aran is highly unrecommended as getting locked out of your healing spell school can be devastating.

Dispel Magic and Cleanse are important spells for this fight; be prepared to dispel anyone who is ice-chained and cannot move. This is especially critical if a Blizzard is going on at the same time. Dispel yourself and those around you when Aran does his Magnetic Pull.

If your raid is sheeped, be prepared to immediately start group heals the moment you are out of the polymorph. You may wish to coordinate with the other healers to pre-determine who heals which group for this.

It’s important to have 8k HP, and PvP gear is a good way of getting this, but care should be taken because PvP gear is itemized for stamina and burst healing, and you may well find yourself running out of mana in a full PvP set.

Unlike Aran, the conjured elementals use a standard aggro mechanism, so if not attacked or controlled they will very quickly lock on to healers. For your own sake, ensure your raid has a plan to deal with them. The elementals are vulnerable to most forms of CC, so self-defense mechanisms like Psychic Scream will work on an elemental that takes an interest in you.

Quick Facts

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He may be a form of emberwyrm or magmawyrm, although he was raised from the Blue Dragonflight.

Special Abilities

Nightbane possesses two phases, which will be transitioned between several times during the course of the fight. During the first phase, the boss is tanked on the ground in a style reminiscent of Onyxia. At 75%, 50%, and 25% health, he will enter phase two and take to the sky, during which time the raid’s attention will be focused elsewhere. Phase two lasts approximately 45 to 60 seconds.Ground Abilities

• Bellowing Roar: Typical dragon fear; it has a 30-second cooldown. He casts this from time to time.
• Cleave: Typical dragon cleave, frontal arc. Hits for approximately 6,000 on plate; 11,000 on cloth.
• Charred Earth: Creates Charred Earth, similar to a fire-based Void Zone.
• Distracting Ash: Reduces the chance to hit with spells and abilities by 30%. Can be dispelled.
• Smoldering Breath: 3700 to 4300 direct damage, plus 1688 to 1912 damage every 3 seconds.
• Tail Sweep: 450 direct damage, plus 2250 damage over time.

Air Abilities
While in the air, Nightbane is not immune to damage. However, the raid may wish to (read: should definitely) kill off the Restless Skeletons which spawn due to Rain of Bones, which is cast upon one random player or pet. Restless Skeletons hit for approximately 400 damage to plate armor, and have roughly 17,000 to 18,000 health points.

Nightbane also possesses the powerful Smoking Blast, which, oddly enough, deals physical damage for the initial strike. This can be mitigated by armor; it strikes plate armor for approximately 2000. The damage over time component of Smoking Blast deals fire damage; it is dispellable. Note that the DoT stacks up to four times, so it is suggested that it actually be dispelled.

Targeting for Smoking Blast is determined by the individual with the highest healing threat after he goes into the air. He resets healing threat at some point in the air, be it right as he goes up or when he “takes in a deep breath”. A way to deal with this is to have a Paladin chain cast heals with Righteous Fury active. Smoking Blast hits a Paladin with around 12000-13000 armor for 1900-2100, and the fire debuff when stacked can tick for similar amounts.

There is yet another ability that Nightbane uses, primarily to prevent exploitation: Fireball Barrage. If any member of the raid is too far away from Nightbane while he is flying he will begin pelting members of the raid with fireballs, each doing 2550 to 3450 damage. One comes per second until all members are within 40 yards. This spell should not be noticeable if the raid does the fight correctly.

Strategy

• The battlefield consists of a long, narrow terrace, bordered by a dome on one side and row of battlements—the rectangular spaces cut out of the top of the wall—on the other.
• Nightbane initially lands near a skull close to the dome, two-thirds of the way on the south side of the terrace. After Phase Two (flight), he lands much closer to the center of the terrace.
• Main tanks should generally have their back to the outside wall, to direct the cleave and breath attack away from the rest of the raid.
• Melee DPS should stand in typical dragon-meleeing position, at the hind legs on either side. Staying between the legs is important because both the tail and the head do cleaves/swipes.
• Ranged people need to be far enough from Nightbane to avoid his Fear ability. Also, the Charred Earth ability lends itself to people staying close to walls and split into two groups. It centers itself on a player, so a player close to a wall will create half as much affected area.
  • One viable strategy is to split up the ranged members, sending group 1 to the north side and group 2 to the south. However, many raids see superior results keeping both groups on the same side, with group 1 clustered next the dome and group 2 clustered next to the battlements.
  • From the landing spot, the max range of DPS and healers should be six battlements away from the main tank (not counting the one the MT is at)
• No one should stand on the domed roof, as this causes Nightbane to evade-bug. But shouldn’t be a problem because it’s impossible to wall climb up now. Players with the correct know-how of how to jump up, still can as of 2.3, although it is much more difficult. However these players must be very careful of aggro, misdirecting and aggro-dumping every chance they get. The melee, and the tank, should remain down in the “playable area”.

Ground Phase

The Ground Phase lasts from when Nightbane lands until his health hits 75%, 50%, or 25%, at which point he then takes to the air for the Flight Phase. All during the Ground Phase Nightbane casts Charred Earth, Fears, and Cleaves.

Tanking Nightbane

Tanking Nightbane is a fairly straightforward affair, with the exception of fear. Handling fear is paramount to success, as one or two uncontrolled fears will guarantee a wipe. Warrior tanks can minimize the effect of fear by stance dancing. Having a macro to avoid fear really helps. For the Druid or the Paladin tank, however, things are not so easy unless Fear Ward is present. Patch 2.3 changed the cooldown of Fear Ward to 3 minutes, making it difficult to rely on by itself for the encounter. But since Nightbane will chase the tank even if the tank is feared, raid members can run out of range of the fear to avoid getting caught by a cleave or tail sweep. A tremor totem in the tank’s group is a huge help for this strategy by reducing the amount of time the tank gets feared.

Everyone else

Healing in this phase is not particularly difficult, with the fight resembling a simple Tank and Spank, but be careful not to rip aggro with an early heal on the tank. Nightbane has a lot of burst potential when his melee is combined with his cleave and smoldering breath, so healers need to be somewhat awake, even though they can get outside the 5 second rule quite often.

Another ability that might be problematic during the Ground Phase is the Charred Earth. Assuming it appears beneath Group 1, Group 1 should briefly shift over to Group 2′s position until the area is safe again, and vice-versa. Occasionally, both groups may fall victim to Charred Earth at the same time—if this happens, all healers and ranged must temporarily shift forward to remain in range of the tank and the boss. Consequently, both groups will be closer to the boss and vulnerable to the fear. The tank must be ready to take preventative measures as required should the raid’s healers suddenly find themselves incapacitated. When melee DPS are avoiding Charred Earth, they must be careful not to move into the area vulnerable to Cleave (ahead of his front legs) or Tail Swipe (behind his back legs). Any melee-type wandering into his head area are prone to being one-shot.

This is a long, healing-intensive fight that can last upwards of 10 minutes. Timed correctly, many mana-regenerative cooldowns such as Innervate and Shadowfiend may be used twice during this encounter.

Flight Phase

Nightbane flies into the air, signaling the start of the Flight Phase. Flight Phase lasts until Nightbane has finished using his two abilities of Rain of Bones and Smoking Blast.

Preparing for Smoking Blast

Immediately after Nightbane summons skeletons while in his Flight Phase, it targets the raid member with the highest threat and repeatedly casts Smoking Blast on this target. This is typically a healer.

Smoking blast deals physical damage, so the more armor the target has, the better. Paladins would be ideal; however, due to their mechanics, it is very difficult for them to have the highest threat. Even if paladins have improved righteous fury, their healing threat generation is only 0.5*1.9=0.95 compared to the 0.7*0.8=0.56 threat (Priest or Druid with blessing of salvation, 0.595 for a Shaman) that the other healers will have. In general, it is fairly difficult for the paladin to compete with healing aggro for Smoking Blast against priests and shaman who have AoE heals.

Healers must be prepared to spam heals on whomever the affected primary healer is. This will likely occupy a majority of your healers’ time, which complicates dealing with the skeletons. When formulating a strategy for killing the skeletons, remember that your healers are otherwise occupied.

Alternate Method #1 This method requires a Resto Shaman with Earth Shield. When Nightbane takes off, have the Shaman place an Earth Shield on the tank. Once the Rain of Bones begins and the skeletons start to spawn, have the tank grab aggro on as many of them as possible (Thunderclap [improved talent works wonders here] for Warrior tanks, or Swipe for Feral Druids). The skeletons will proc the Earth Shield on the tank, thus generating the healing aggro on the tank. This will limit healing in multiple ways, 1) only one to three people actually taking damage from Rain of bones, 2) Earth Shield will keep the tank up easily provided the resto shaman’s gear is decent, 3) the Smoking Blast will only be hitting the tank with the Earth Shield (which will in turn proc it more). You can drop a Tranquil Air Totem if the tank is not in the healers’ group to ensure that healing can still go out, but Smoking Blast will hit the tank.

Dealing with skeletons

All healers and ranged collapse to where the main tank is standing in order to avoid the Fireball Barrage. Once Rain of Bones starts, all players must immediately move away to avoid taking too much AoE damage. Five skeletons will spawn during the Rain of Bones. These hit fairly hard. To mitigate this damage:

• Warriors and feral (bear) druids should use taunt and cleave/swipe liberally to keep aggro off of the healers. Warriors can use Challenging Shout and Druids can use Challenging Roar, during one of the phases. Grenades also work very well to establish initial aggro.
• Pets with taunt abilities (especially hunter pets) can hold aggro temporarily
• Paladins are uniquely suited to this phase. A Paladin should activate his DPS cooldowns from trinkets and avenging wrath and tank the 5 skeletons. The primary advantages of this strategy are that all skeletons are controlled during the Flight Phase and will not run about killing the healers, skeletons die much faster due to the AoE and all healers will be able to get the Blessing of Wisdom buff to help mana issues instead of the Blessing of Salvation buff. Warlocks and mages can then begin AoE and down the skeletons much sooner than single target DPS allows.
• Shaman can drop Stoneclaw Totem or Earth Elemental Totem to buy healers an extra second or two
• It also helps in the group spreads out a little bit after gathering, so the tanks can identify who has aggro from a skeleton and pull aggro from them as soon as possible. Note: Do not spread out too far as this will make pulling aggro from the skeletons even harder.
• Hunters can drop Frost Trap on the skeletons to keep them anchored for a tank, which can be a huge help. Entrapment spec is a plus.
• Combat rogues can save Blade Flurry, Adrenaline Rush, and Evasion for this phase, activating it to hold temporarily evasion tank the adds and keep them from moving away from the actual tank.

Lacking a good Paladin tank, it may be more effective to kill the spawns one at a time rather than AoEing them. Be warned: Due to the Smoking Blast occupying the healers, there isn’t much chance for survival if a mage or warlock draws aggro from AoE.

Also, If you are still having trouble with this fight being the Skeletons still are not going down fast, people are dying or its killing the healers mana, It might be an idea to have your raid pre-prepared with Stratholme Holy Water from the Undead side of Stratholme. Using this when all 5 are up will deal decent damage, and if everyone that can’t AoE uses this they should go down much quicker.

Transition to the Ground Phase

Ten seconds before Nightbane lands, all members of the raid should fall back to the previous positions, dragging whatever skeletons are still alive with them. Ideally, all adds will be dead at this point, but having one or two still up before Nightbane descends is fine. The tank must remember to keep an eye on the casting bar, and stance dance to avoid an early fear. A recent change has made this fight a bit easier for raids that do not have fear wards/tremor totems/warrior tanks. Nightbane will keep aggro on the tank, regardless of whether the tank is feared or not. This introduces the challenge of the tank being feared into the ranged group, but it does make paladin and druids tanks more of an option.

The most dangerous parts of this fight are the transitions between the Flight and Ground Phases, when the main tank must reestablish aggro. Hunters’ Misdirection is especially useful here, to make sure the boss goes directly for the tank.

Ground Phase begins again when Nightbane lands, rinse and repeat at 50% and 25% until victory.

Warrior Tanks – the stance dance is thus:

1. When you see him begin casting, hit Berserker Stance, then Berserker Rage.
2. Switch back to Defensive stance.

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Attacks and Abilities

• Summon Infernal – Every 45 seconds or so, Malchezaar will summon an infernal which, about 3 seconds after landing, casts a Hellfire Area of Effect (AoE) roughly the size of the one Baron Geddon uses. Each infernal lives for about 180 seconds, and there is no limit to the amount that can be up at any given time. Typically you will have 3-5 infernals up at a time until the end of Phase 2 (see below), after which they will start increasing rapidly. These infernals are stationary, and can be avoided by the raid.
• Enfeeble – Malchezaar will periodically apply this debuff to five random raid members (excluding the player with the highest threat), which reduces their hit points to 1 and healing effects and health regen to 0% for 8 seconds. Enfeebled players must stay 30+ yards away from Malchezaar and watch out for Infernals. After the Enfeeble is up, players return to their previous health.
• Shadow Nova – Malchezaar will cast Shadow Nova 3-5 seconds after Enfeeble. This ability has a maximum range of 30 yards. Deals 3000 shadow damage and includes a knockback. This attack can be outranged by healers and ranged DPS, so even if they are enfeebled it will not cause much concern. Melee must get out of range, however as long as they start running right away they will have plenty of time to avoid the Shadow Nova.
• Shadow Word: Pain – Cast periodically on a raid member (generally hits the Main Tank (MT)). Can be dispelled. Cannot be reflected. 1500 shadow damage per tick.
• Thrash – Attacker will gain 2 extra attacks on next swing. Works similarly to the windfury proc without the added damage, and unlike windfury, it is activated and has a cooldown.
• Cleave – During phase 2, Machezaar will use a melee range cleave.
• Flying Axes – Malchezaar will release his axes in the third phase, allowing them to fly around attacking random raid members. Healers will need to heal through this damage.
• Amplify Damage – Cast on a random raid member, in the last phase of the fight which increases all damage taken by 100% for 10 seconds.

Phases

• Phase 1 – Casts Enfeeble, Shadow Word: Pain, Shadow Nova, and summon infernals.
• Phase 2 – Malchezaar switches to duel wield which does significantly more damage. He also sunders the main tank and cleaves. No longer casts Shadow Word: Pain.
• Phase 3 – Prince will spawn the flying axes, however his damage will return to normal and he will no longer sunder or cleave. He will resume casting Shadow Word: Pain, summon infernals at a much higher rate, start casting Amplify Damage and no longer cast Enfeeble.

General Tips

• Healers can stand at max range for heals on the MT and be out of range of the shadow nova, thus able to continue healing during enfeeble.
• Malchezaar cannot use Enfeeble on the highest target on his threat list. However, since aggro is not pulled until 110% of the MT’s aggro for melee and 130% for ranged, it is possible for someone to be higher than the MT without pulling aggro, and thus cause the MT to be a target of Enfeeble.
• The radii of the Hellfires from the infernals are not nearly as wide as they seem based on the graphic. If you feel you must, test the limits during phase 1, when the encounter is relatively less stressful. Testing the radius of a hellfire during a later point in the fight could spell disaster if you’re lost to a stray axe hit or enfeeble.

Background

Little is known about him, except that he is a man’ari eredar, he claims to be a prince, and that he is a member of the Burning Legion. It is unknown how or when he arrived at Karazhan or what his purpose there is. He apparently arrived while some agents of the Violet Eye were still alive inside Karazhan, notably Keanna. It was likely shortly before Karazhan was sealed, as the Violet Eye were aware of Keanna’s death.

From his loot, we can learn more about him and what he did before coming to Karazhan. He has the Sunfury Bow of the Phoenix, which could indicate that he has been in contact with the Blood elfs. Possibly, he sealed the alliance between Kil’jaeden and Kael’thas Sunstrider. He has also obtained Grom Hellscream’s axe Gorehowl. It’s possible that he went to Ashenvale and invocated the Demon in Demon Fall Canyon. If he has the Book of Medivh, the Burning Legion has a plan for him, invocating something (possibly Nightbane (boss) as the players) or for a furture use. Anyway, he had to maintain the power and the influence of the Burning Legion in Karazhan.

Due to his death giving the player the Karazhan achievement, he is now considered to be the tower’s final boss. However, some used to consider the creature Nightbane to be the true final boss of Karazhan due to his superior difficulty in the early days of the dungeon’s release. Their comparative difficulty is now disputed.

In any case, Prince Malchezaar is a difficult boss for raids when they first reach him. Beating him requires good gear on everyone: The tank, the dps, and the healers. It also requires skilled execution by all players.

Prince Malchezaar can be encountered after the Chess event and controls all of the trash between the Game Room and Netherspace.

Strategy

The fight with Prince Malchezaar has three phases:

Phase One

Phase One starts immediately when Malchezaar aggroes. The door to the balcony closes, and Malchezaar starts summoning infernals and casting Enfeeble and Shadow Nova. He casts Shadow Word: Pain on the tank.

• Fight Malchezaar with the tank’s back to the wall to avoid knockback.
• DPS him steadily down to 60%, being mindful of Enfeeble, Shadow Nova, and the Infernal AoE.
• One strategy is to use White damage only for Phase One, except for hunters and classes with aggro wipes. This allows the tank to gain plenty of aggro to counter the high raid DPS of Phases Two and Three, meaning the tank will never get enfeebled.
• If you start to get cornered by Infernals, have your tank move to another part of the platform. Try to do this before Phase Two.

Phase Two

Phase Two starts when Prince Malchezaar is reduced to 60% health. He warps in axes, which substantially increases his melee damage. He stops casting Shadow Word: Pain and starts Parrying and Thrashing and casting Sunder Armor on the tank. Infernal summoning, Enfeeble, and Shadow Nova continue as in Phase One.

Thrash is the biggest threat during this phase and can deal more than 12,000 damage inside of a second. Healers should keep the tank as close to full health as possible and stagger movements during group shifts to ensure the tank does not go very long without a heal.

• Keep attack power and speed debuffs up at all times (Thunderclap, Demoralizing Shout or Curse of Weakness)
• Healers should use preemptive and not reactionary heals during this phase (cancel unnecessary heals instead of only healing when needed)
• Paladin tanks can stop melee attacks and focus on using magic damage to reduce the chance of parry damage spikes
• He is considered “dual wielding” during this phase; as such, his melee auto-attacks have a 19% greater chance to Miss. His melee specials (including Sunder Armor) don’t suffer this penalty, though.

Phase Three

Phase Three begins when Prince Malchezaar reaches 30% health. Melee damage on the tank returns to Phase One levels. He stops using Enfeeble, Thrash, Sunder Armor, and Parry. He continues casting Shadow Nova. He starts casting Shadow Word: Pain and Amplify Damage on random raid members. He throws his axes into the air where they fly around attacking raid members at random. He starts summoning infernals much more frequently.

• Make sure the person being attacked by the axes communicates to the raid chat or on Ventrilo or Teamspeak so they can be healed. The damage they do is easy to heal through, but if ignored may cause the death of your healers or damage-dealers. The axes do physical damage and as such can be mitigated with armor. A Paladin’s devotion aura is advised.
• The Infernals will spawn much more frequently and Malchezaar must be killed as soon as possible. Raid movement and communication is paramount during this phase to avoid taking damage from the Infernals. Each infernal will land on a fifteen-second timer. In less than two minutes, the infernals will completely cover the combat area, leading to a wipe. Burn him down fast.
• A badly placed infernal during this phase can easily wipe the raid. If this happens, don’t be discouraged, since you managed to get him through the most difficult part of the fight (Phase Two).

Safe Spots

While the safe spots were removed in patch 2.4, raid groups were formerly able to use several pairs of small areas where infernals would never land. This was never confirmed officially as an exploit, but was still removed.

Infernal Spotting

Malchezaar emotes either “You face not Malchezaar alone, but the legions I command!” or “All realities, all dimensions are open to me!” immediately before summoning an infernal. If you look to the sky beyond the balcony, you’ll see a bright yellow meteor headed toward the raid. Its trajectory is a little tricky but somewhat predictable.

One responsible non-melee raider should act as a spotter. He receives a raid marker and has three jobs:

• Watch for falling infernals and move to a safe spot.
• If an infernal will fall on the melee group, announce it in clear terms and suggest a new location (e.g. “infernal on far side of door from melee group, move along the wall from the door”, or maybe a minimap ping).
• Stay within range of the melee group so the healers can do their jobs.

The other ranged raiders stick close to the spotter. It’s possible to skip the raid marker and announce safe spots, but using the marker requires a lot less communication.

As for the infernals themselves: before landing, they fly in a straight line toward a point in the arena, but shift direction suddenly at the last second, usually down.

Naturally, your spotter should be smart about choosing a safe spot. A wide open place is better than sandwiched between two infernals’ AoE, and the area of the Prince’s Shadow Nova is right out.

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It is unknown whether Medivh’s apprentice Khadgar was a member of the Violet Eye, or whether he knew of their activities at the time (though he does seem to be aware of them now).

The Violet Eye was present before the release of the Burning Crusade, however they did not offer any quests.

Reputation Rewards

Archmage Leryda will offer players rings as rewards for reputation level gains in the form of quests. The first such quest is available at neutral standing and may be completed at friendly. You will receive a new and upgraded version of the ring you chose each time you break into a new reputation tier. The rings are sorted into the following 4 categories:

• Path of the Violet Assassin: Violet Signet, Violet Signet, Violet Signet and Violet Signet of the Master Assassin
• Path of the Violet Mage: Violet Signet, Violet Signet, Violet Signet and Violet Signet of the Archmage
• Path of the Violet Protector: Violet Signet, Violet Signet, Violet Signet, and Violet Signet of the Great Protector
• Path of the Violet Restorer: Violet Signet, Violet Signet, Violet Signet and Violet Signet of the Grand Restorer

Koren, a blacksmith located inside Karazhan just after Attumen the Huntsman, offers players with high enough reputation the ability to buy epic blacksmithing plans. Players who are honored or above will also be able to repair armor and weapons at this vendor.

Apprentice Darius, who stands just outside the main gates of Karazhan, will sell an epic jewelcrafting recipe and shoulder enchant to players who have an honored or above standing with The Violet Eye.

Known Members

• Archmage Cedric, outside Dalaran Crater, leader of the Violet Eye
• Archmage Alturus, outside Karazhan, high ranking member
• Archmage Leryda, outside Karazhan
• Apprentice Darius, outside Karazhan
• Apprentice Tasserel, World’s End Tavern, Lower City, Shattrath City
• Keanna (died within Karazhan)
• Kamsis (deceased, spirit inside Karazhan)
• Gradav (deceased, spirit inside Karazhan)
• Wravien (deceased, spirit inside Karazhan)
• Khadgar, Terrace of Light, Shattrath City (Strongly associated. Member of Sons of Lothar but gives VE rep.)

Reputation

You get reputation for killing bosses and trash mobs in Karazhan. Each trash mob awards around 15 reputation and the bosses 250 reputation. The reputation gained from killing mobs remains consistent from Neutral through Exalted.

Reputation is also gained from the quest line for [The Master's Key], as well as the quest line which takes place inside the instance.

Quests

There is a large and complex chain that has the player visit several dungeons of Outland in order for them to obtain the Master’s Key, which allows for entrance to Karazhan and beyond.

10275 reputation total

• [70] Archmage Alturus (5 reputation)
• [70] Arcane Disturbances (250 reputation)
• [70] Restless Activity (250 reputation)
  1. [70] Contact from Dalaran (75 reputation)
  2. [70] Khadgar (75 reputation)
  3. [70] Entry Into Karazhan (250 reputation)
  4. [70] The Second and Third Fragments (350 reputation)
  5. [70] The Master’s Touch (350 reputation)
  6. [70] Return to Khadgar (500 reputation, rewards [The Master's Key])
  7. [70] The Violet Eye (75 reputation)
  8. [70] Assessing the Situation (250 reputation)
  9. [70] Keanna’s Log (250 reputation)
  10. [70] A Demonic Presence (250 reputation)
  11. [70] The New Directive (3000 reputation)
• [70] Medivh’s Journal (250 reputation, requires honored reputation to start)
  1. [70] In Good Hands (10 reputation)
  2. [70] Kamsis (10 reputation)
  3. [70] The Shade of Aran (250 reputation)
  4. [70] The Master’s Terrace (250 reputation)
  5. [70] Digging Up the Past (250 reputation)
  6. [70] A Colleague’s Aid (75 reputation)
  7. [70] Kalynna’s Request (250 reputation)
  8. [70] Nightbane (3000 reputation)

Other Rewards

• Honored:
  • [Inscription of Endurance] – Shoulder Enchant
  • [Design: The Frozen Eye] – Jewelcrafting
  • [Plans: Iceguard Breastplate] – Blacksmithing
  • [Plans: Iceguard Helm] – Blacksmithing
  • [Recipe: Flask of Chromatic Wonder] – Alchemy
• Revered:
  • [Plans: Iceguard Leggings] – Blacksmithing
  • [Pattern: Shadowprowler's Chestguard] – Leatherworking
  • [Mysterious Arrow] – Ammo
  • [Mysterious Shell] – Ammo
• Exalted:
  • [Formula: Enchant Weapon - Greater Agility] – Enchanting
  • [Pattern: Cloak of Darkness] – Leatherworking

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History

Karazhan is located in Deadwind Pass on the sub-continent of Azeroth in the Eastern Kingdoms. Existing long before Medivh inhabited it, it is unknown who originally built Karazhan or who now resides within its walls. The land it sits on “was similar in shape to a human skull. Many had noted it over the years, though only a few had been sufficiently brave, or powerful, or tactless to mention it to the property’s owner”.

Karazhan’s history begins with an explosion that carved out Deadwind Pass and weakened the fabric of reality in the region. Someone then built the tower, probably to take advantage of this weakened reality and heightened magic. Medivh eventually took up residence there, but mused that the explosion and the construction only happened because he would eventually arrive.

During the First War, the tower was inhabited by Medivh, his steward Moroes, his cook named Cook, and his then-apprentice Khadgar. Garona also resided here as an emissary in the same time of Khadgar’s apprenticeship. Sargeras allowed Medivh to freely explore Karazhan. As a result of the region’s weakened reality, many strange and disturbing visions lurked within the tower, and Moroes was known for wearing blinders to avoid seeing them. The visions were ultimately ended when most of Karazhan’s ambient magical power was absorbed by the resurrected Medivh, reducing it to “a pile of stone in the remote reaches”, its power taken to serve the Prophet.

Much of the story from this era is presented in the novel The Last Guardian.

Recently, despite Medivh’s absence and the draining of magic, a new power seems to have made its home in Karazhan. The Black Riders of Deadwind Pass, though rarely seen, have a connection to Karazhan. However, no one knows who their master is. One recent sighting is cause for concern — the Black Riders seek the Scythe of Elune, a powerful artifact with the ability to summon the vile Worgen into this world.

It is believed that all ley lines on Azeroth lead to a location under Karazhan.

Worldofwarcraft.com says the following about Karazhan:

The decrepit tower of Karazhan once housed one of the greatest powers Azeroth has ever known: the sorcerer Medivh. Since his death, a terrible curse has pervaded the tower and the surrounding lands. The spirits of nobles from nearby Darkshire reportedly walk its halls, suffering a fate worse than death for their curiosity. More dangerous spirits wait within Medivh’s study, for it was there that he summoned demonic entities to do his bidding. However, the brave and foolish are still relentlessly drawn to Karazhan, tempted by rumors of unspeakable secrets and powerful treasures. Forge a group of ten stalwart heroes, and journey to the tower in Deadwind Pass — but be warned that only those who have achieved level 70 should dare enter.

Optional Attunement

Note: While the attunement is completely optional, at least one person in your group must have the key in order to unlock the instance.

1. Complete the quests Restless Activity and Arcane Disturbances given by Archmage Alturus outside Karazhan.
2. You must then visit Dalaran and talk to Archmage Cedric who will send you to Khadgar in Shattrath City.
3. Khadgar will give you a quest to retrieve the First Key Fragment from a Arcane Container in Shadow Labyrinth. It is located in the room of the last boss Murmur.
4. Next you need to retrieve two more key fragments from The Steamvault and The Arcatraz. The Steamvaults fragment is found just before the first boss in the water. The Arcatraz fragment is found in the corner of the blue room after the first boss.
5. Khadgar will now ask you to visit Medivh in The Black Morass and give him the key. You will need to complete the encounter before Medivh will talk to you.
6. Return to Khadgar in Shattrath and he will give you The Master’s Key.

General information

• The instance is huge, scripted, and non-winged, containing twelve boss encounters, with 22 different NPCs.
• In order to open the first door right after the instance gate, at least one person in the raid must have [The Master's Key] which is obtained through an attunement process. The door can be lock-picked by rogues or using a blacksmith skeleton key.
• The following bosses and encounters must be defeated in order: Moroes, the Opera Event, The Curator, and the Chess Event. All other bosses are optional.
• Note that Karazhan is a level-70 instance, and many of the bosses can be easily defeated by players above that level. Certain classes with well geared and experienced players behind them are able to solo the instance at level 80.

Shortcuts

• Killing the Shade of Aran makes a teleport to his room available from Berthold the Doorman.
• Karazhan has a side entrance. When climbing the tower to the right of the main entrance (across the small creek), the stairs lead to a bridge and to a door which can be unlocked from the inside once the Opera Event has been cleared.
• Medivh’s staff — [Atiesh, Greatstaff of the Guardian] can be used to teleport players to the front gate of Karazhan.
• There is a servants’ entrance from the mezzanine above the ballroom that leads to the broken stairway. This door must be opened from the stairway side. While this doesn’t help for initial clearing, it can later shorten some paths e.g. from the blacksmith to the Curator, or from Nightbane to Berthold (in order to get to Aran).

Vendors and repair

• Koren <The Blacksmith>, next to Attumen the Huntsman, will repair gear for players who are Honored with Violet Eye. He also sells some epic Blacksmithing recipes (frost resistance gear). Near him is Calliard who wanders around, babbling how evil Midnight and her owner are.
• Outside of the Gamesman’s Hall (before the Chess Event) is Ythyar, a reagent and The Consortium reputation reward vendor, who can repair gear (however it is worthy to note that Ythyar has no faction attached to him, so no reputation discounts are available — whether this is a bug or intentional is unclear).

Related quests

Getting [The Master's Key] opens the following follow-up quests:

1. [70] Archmage Alturus
2. • [70] Arcane Disturbances
   • [70] Restless Activity
3. [70] Contact from Dalaran
4. [70] Khadgar
5. [70] Entry Into Karazhan
6. [70] The Second and Third Fragments
7. [70] The Master’s Touch
8. [70] Return to Khadgar
9. [70] The Violet Eye
10. [70] Assessing the Situation
11. [70] Keanna’s Log
12. [70R] A Demonic Presence
13. [70] The New Directive

(Must be Honored with the Violet Eye) This is part of the Nightbane quest chain:

1. [70] Medivh’s Journal
2. [70] In Good Hands
3. [70] Kamsis
4. [70] The Shade of Aran
5. [70] The Master’s Terrace
6. [70] Digging Up the Past
7. [70] A Colleague’s Aid
8. [70] Kalynna’s Request
9. [70] Nightbane

For the old Serpentshrine Cavern attunement:

• [70] The Cudgel of Kar’desh

Tier 4

Tier 4 parts dropped by The Curator (Glove tokens):

• [Gloves of the Fallen Champion]
• [Gloves of the Fallen Hero]
• [Gloves of the Fallen Defender]

Tier 4 parts dropped by Prince Malchezaar (Helm tokens):

• [Helm of the Fallen Champion]
• [Helm of the Fallen Defender]
• [Helm of the Fallen Hero]

Badges

The bosses of Karazhan drop [Badges of Justice] in addition to their normal loot. In Karazhan, all bosses drop two Badges each, except for the animal bosses (zero), Attumen the Huntsman (one) and Prince Malchezaar (three). Since the chest at the Chess Event also contains two badges, a total of 22 Badges can be obtained from clearing the entire instance.

Quick Facts

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Tactics

This fight is not similar to Maiden of Virtue in Karazhan despite the same NPC model and incapacitate effects. The fight is a moving fight with heads up tactics needed.

She occasionally drops a big void zone (Storm of Grief) under herself and puts a magical debuff dealing shadow damage (Pillar of Woe). Everyone including the tank should move out of it to avoid the relatively significant damage incurred. On Heroic mode, the void zone does a lot more damage (as much as 5400 a tick on a plate wearer).

She also casts Shock of Sorrow, which deals 1750 to 2250 shadow damage, incapacitates all group members for 10 seconds. This ability has a 4 second cast time. If the healer is positioned near a void zone they can jump into it to avoid being incapacitated for the full duration. In the event this happens too quickly, PvP trinkets are able to clear the incapacitate. This is NOT an aggro dump. However, if someone clears Shock of Sorrow and the tank doesn’t she will attack that person as an NPC’s tendancy is to not break CC. If all members are incapacitated she will attack the person with the highest threat.

Heroic abilities

• Storm of Grief: Creates a huge black circle on the ground that damages ~1800 Shadow per second to everyone in it. Just move out of it when she creates a new one.
• Parting Sorrow: Mana burn for 2660 to 2940 Shadow, 2 sec cast. At least partially resistable.
• Shock of Sorrow: Does 3063 to 3937 Shadow damage and incapacitates all group members for 10 seconds; damage will cancel the incapacitate effect. This is treated as a party wide gouge and follows NPC CC rules accordingly.
• Pillar of Woe: Magic-type, does ~5.5k Shadow damage, and then adds a DOT that does ~2k Shadow damage every 2 sec for 10 sec. Dispellable. She seems to cast it on random targets, not necessarily the tank.

Strategy

On normal, the best strategy seems to be to have the casters stand in the middle of the room as the tank keeps her moving in a continuous circle around the outside perimeter. Before she finishes casting Shock of Sorrow.

On heroic, kite the boss around the perimeter and interrupt casting of “Pillar of Woe”. The tank can jump into the void zone to negate the 10-second incapacitation during the casting of “Shock of Sorrow”.

Note: use Shadow Resistance Aura or Shadow Protection if available. Debuffs are dispellable

Quick Facts

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