• The void pools dropped by Encroaching Shadows now give stacks of void corruption in addition to damage
• Despair’s secondary explosion now deals 120% of tank’s missing HP, up from 90%
• New add from the Gateway – Iron-Willed Enforcer
  • This add is immune to all CC
  • It regularly casts No Escape, pulling 3 far away players into melee range and casting Brutal Smash
    • Deals 980k Physical and stuns players that are hit
• In Phase 3, a Shadow of Vexiona appears
  • This Shadow will cast Twilight Decimator, the Phase 2 flyover mechanic
• Desolation now applies 60 stacks of Void Corruption total, up from 30. These are still split between everyone hit

Strategy

We recommend a comp of 2-3 tanks, 4 healers, and 13-14 DPS. Both tank comp strategies are viable and will be discussed below. Regardless of which tank comp you run, it doesn’t really come into play until Phase 3.

• Phase 1
  • This actually remains largely the same as Heroic. The new add does not materially change the overall strategy
  • The tank who’s in charge of picking up adds should prioritize getting the Void Ascendant’s Annihilation lazer beam to blast the rest of the adds. This’ll deal massive damage to them, and make killing them much faster and easier
    • This is also the primary goal of using the orbs that drop from Ascendants when they die. You want to maximize the damage the tank can do with the orb on the rest of the adds
    • The rest of the raid needs to be careful to not get hit by the laer
  • You’ll want to time killing the Void Ascendant add right before you enter a Phase 2
    • The Boss tank, who’ll have Void COrruption stacks, should pick up the orb when the P2 adds spawn, and use the Annihilation beam to blow up the adds
  • When the adds are out, if you get pulled in by the Iron-Willed Enforcer, just make sure to move back out of the circle so you don’t die
  • Adds spawn at 0:36, 1:11, 2:20, 2:56, 3:28, 4:32, 5:10
    • An Iron-Willed Enforcer spawns each gateway except 2:56 and 5:10
  • As far as Encroaching Shadows is concerned, you want to drop this near the side wall, not the stairs. The puddles last MUCH longer on Mythic, so you want to ensure you’ll have enough space to maneuver around
  • During your SECOND Phase 1, you’ll want to retain your new Ascendant add that spawned during P2. The add tank should carefully aim the lazer to blast the new adds during this second Phase 1
    • Kill this second Ascendant add after the 2nd Dark Gateway adds are killed in this second Phase 2.
    • Your boss tank should pick up the orb when the second Phase 2 begins and the new adds for that spawn, using the lazer to destroy them
  • When you enter your THIRD Phase 1, continue managing the newest Ascendant add as previously. You’ll want this add to die right before you enter Phase 3
    • When this Ascendant does die, your boss tank should hold off on picking up the orb until after the 2nd Breath in P3 to reset Void Corruption stacks
    • Try to position the Ascendant so it dies near where your tank will be in P3
• Phase 2 starts at 1:20 and 3:30
  • Management of this phase really doesn’t change at all from Heroic. Deal with the adds, kill the Ascendant, don’t get hit by breath
  • Your FIRST Phase 2, DO NOT kill the new Ascendant add
    • You want to keep this newly created Ascendant alive until the end of the second Phase 1, with your add tank carefully aiming the lazer to hit the new adds as they spawn
  • The boss tank should pick up the orb from the recently killed Ascendant add and use the lazer to annihilate the new Phase 2 adds
    • By doing this, your boss tank will always enter your next Phase 1 with no Void Corruption stacks
  • Again, prioritize dropping Encroaching Shadows puddles near the side walls of the room, not by the stairs
  • In your SECOND Phase 2, again DO NOT kill your newly spawned Ascendant add
    • You’ll still want your add tank using the Ascendant’s lazer cast to destroy any new Dark Gateway adds that spawn
• Phase 3 – 40%
  • This is a tight burn phase on Mythic, and where the majority of your wipes are likely to occur
  • You should Bloodlust immediately upon entering Phase 3
  • Your raid leader should prioritize calling out which third of the room the Shadow of Vexiona is flying down. Call as early as possible to give the raid time to move
  • Healers should use cooldowns for Heart of Darkness, starting with the second one
    • Because of the Void Corruption stacks, the damage towards the end of the fight gets nutty. Healers should be prepped for this
    • You can also assign raid-wide Healthstones or Health Potions as extra healer CDs
    • The hardest part is just surviving long enough for the boss to fall over
  • Just as a reminder, make sure you’re within a few yards of at least 1 other player at all times during this phase, especially during Heart of Darkness.
  • For Desolation, the handling of this changes based on which tank comp you decided
    • Option 1 – 2 tanks
      • If going with a 2 tank comp, you’ll have one tank hold Vexiona for as long as possible in this phase. The other tank needs to be ready to grab Vexiona if the first tank dies
      • Have assigned people for soak groups, each group should be 2 people with immunities
        • You only want 3 people soaking each time total, including the tank
        • The people with immunities WILL STILL GET VOID CORRUPTION STACKS, so as the phase drags on these people will need a lot of healer attention
        • Stacks do NOT RESET upon death.
      • To help mitigate the number of stacks on the raid, have your first group of immunity players soak the first 2 Desolations
        • They’ll immunity the first Desolation, and just simply sacrifice themselves on the 2nd one and die. This prevents all of the Void Corruption stacks they take from instead needing to be healed through
        • Have your second group of immunity players soak Desolations #3 and #4, doing the exact same thing as the first group
      • Ideally, put your tank with better Magic damage mitigation to be tank #1
      • You should also save an Annihilation orb from a Void Ascendant. To do this, simply don’t click the orb after killing the Void Ascendant from the second Phase 2.
      • Your tank should use the Orb immediately after the 1st Desolation inflicts damage and stacks
      • If tank #1 dies, tank 2 needs to taunt immediately, and continue soaking Desolation as before.
      • As a note, you should be striving to kill the boss before a Desolation #4 happens.

• • • Option 2 – 3 tanks
      • If you can have a BDK as a 3rd tank, this strategy may prove easier for you
      • Your 3rd tank Blood DK will be permanently assigned as one of the Desolation soakers
        • You’ll still need to assign 1 person with an immunity as the “sacrifice” player. This person will immunity Desolation #1, and die on Desolation #2
        • You’ll also still need to assign another person with an immunity to help with Desolations #3 and #4, working the same way
      • By doing this, the 3rd tank BDK can self-heal a LOT of the incoming damage from the Void Corruption stacks, allowing the healers to primarily focus on the rest of the raid
        • Additionally, the BDK should be able to survive until the stacks from Desolation #4. This’ll reduce how many DPS you sacrifice, and again remove more and more Void Corruption stacks from the rest of the raid

Positioning

You’ll want to position Vexiona near where she starts, and handle P1 and P2 positioning largely the same as heroic. The big thing with positioning is that you want to ensure you drop the Encroaching Shadow puddles off to the side, instead of the front or back. They don’t despawn on Mythic, so if you drop them in the front or back you can eventually run out of room to dodge the flyovers. See below:

As you get into Phase 3, you’ll have a large chunk of the room covered by the puddles. You’ll want to be moving towards the opposite end of the room, to make sure you have enough space to dodge the P3 Flyovers.

VIDEO GUIDE

Wrathion

Creeping Madness

• This is a debuff applied to everyone at the beginning of every Phase 1
• As a player moves, they gain stacks of Slow
• These stacks last 25 seconds, but accumulate quickly
• If a player reaches 50 stacks, it’ll start dealing 300k damage per second while moving
  • Using an ability that clears movement affects also clears this, like a Paladin’s Blessing of Freedom or a Hunter’s Posthaste talent.

The Crackling Shard pillars in Phase 2 are invulnerable to damage

• When the players who soak Scales of Wrathion run over pillars, they lose their invulnerability
• DPS players will need to kill these pillars after the invulnerability is removed

Strategy

We recommend going with a 2 tank, 4 heal, 14 DPS comp, and use Bloodlust on pull.

• Phase 1
  • To deal with Creeping Madness, you want to be aware of your positioning at all times
  • The melee should obviously still be next to the boss’s side, but the ranged and healers should be stacked together ~30 yards away
    • Players affected by Incineration still need to run out of the raid, but only go about 10-15 yards.
  • When Gale Blast occurs, move as little as possible to get just outside the edge of the animation
    • Do NOT start moving for Burning Cataclysm until you see the boss stop moving and pick the side he’ll be on, then run in the opposite direction of where Wrathion stopped
      • You can get a glimpse of where he’s going as Gale Blast ends, since the boss model will turn and point in the direction he’ll fly
    • After the explosions from Burning Cataclysm end, do NOT run to the boss, let HIM run to YOU
      • Again, this helps minimize movement and reduce your total stacks
      • As a note on Burning Cataclysm – it is a bit trickier to identify the safe spot on Mythic than Heroic, which may require a pull or two to get used to
      • There should still always BE a safe spot, but it may be more difficult to quickly identify it.
  • If players get above 40-45 stacks, they should either use an ability to clear stacks, or ask for a Blessing of Freedom if available
    • Things like Hunter’s Posthaste after disengage and Warlock’s Demonic Circle will reset stacks, so save these for tight situations, especially during Burning Cataclysm

• Phase 2
  • Creeping Madness fades temporarily in P2
  • Each of your 3 players that soak Scales of Wrathion will have 10 stacks of Burning Madness to use
    • There are 30 Shards that need the immunity cleared
    • You’ll want to assign faster classes to this job, things like DH, shaman, or even use Skystep potions
  • Once all the shards are down and you reenter Phase 1, get back to your P1 positioning and pump into the boss. Rinse and repeat until Wrathion falls over
  • Breaking all of these Shards is the single most important part of this fight. Any shards you fail to kill will tick for raid-wide damage the rest of the fight. Pair this with the other damage going out, and 3-4 shards not dying can quickly turn into a wipe.

VIDEO GUIDE

Maut

• Ancient Curse
  • Curse effect which is cast periodically on everyone in the raid
  • This curse slows players by 15%. When removed by any means, this deals 34k Physical damage to the raid
  • Lasts 24 seconds
  • If this EXPIRES on a player, they die
  • This must be removed with a de-curse ability
  • It can also be removed by stepping into one of the Devour Magic puddles

Strategy

We recommend going with 2 tanks, 4 healers, and 14 DPS for this fight, and using Bloodlust on pull.

• Phase 1
  • Need to coordinate clearing Ancient Curse
    • Tanks should be dispelled immediately
    • After that, rotate clearing the Curse off players by having them step in the puddles
      • 3 possible ways to handle this.
        • 1) Raid Leader calls 3-5 people every few seconds
        • 2) Assigned groups of 3-5 people. Groups step in puddles together, every 3-4 seconds
        • 3) Yolo it
      • Make sure everyone gets the Curse cleared off before it expires
        • Also make sure you don’t have too many people clear at once. 10 clears = 350k damage to the raid, easy to wipe
  • Tank Strategy
    • This fight can be either 2 or 3 tanked.
      • 2 tank strategy (recommended)
        • One tank is assigned as “boss tank,” other tank is “add tank”
        • The “add tank” actually starts on boss, holds until 2 stacks of Shadow Claws
        • Immediately after 2nd Shadow Claws, “Boss Tank” taunts the boss, holds until Phase 2
        • “Add Tank” then goes and picks up adds
        • As a note, the “boss tank” should be your tank that’s better against magic damage, as the DoT will start to hurt
      • 3 tank strategy
        • 2 tanks focus on boss, swap every 2 stacks of Shadow Claws
        • 3rd tank just grabs all the adds
  • Add Strategy
    • Raid needs to DoT and kill Add #1
    • Add #2 gets DoT’d, but don’t need to worry about killing it here
    • Add #3 gets eaten by the boss ASAP, should start Phase 2
    • Add #2 will just die to cleave during Phase 2
• Add Cheese Strategy
  • A fairly straightforward and simple way to deal with Phase 1 is to essentially ignore that the adds exist
  • You have your tanks taunt the adds into the boss, and force him to eat them ASAP. By doing this, you never deal with them or interact with them.
  • Tanks swap at 2 stacks of Shadow Claws
  • You’ll push into Phase 2 in about 1:15-1:20, but it removes any difficulty from dealing with the adds and lets your tanks just focus on keeping stacks low
  • There are two primary drawbacks to this strategy
    • First, you must have the DPS to kill Maut before a 3rd Obsidian Shatter (Phase 2) occurs. If you cannot get that much DPS into Maut, this strategy won’t work
    • Second, later on in the tier as guilds are more geared, prolonging Phase 1 will become beneficial. It’ll most likely be possible to kill Maut with a single Phase 2, but you’ll need P1 to last as long as possible. Once this gear level is achieved, use one of the other strategies listed above.
      • Addendum – Once gear levels and DPS output is high enough you can kill the boss with a single Phase 2, AND insta-eat the adds, just do that instead.
• Phase 2
  • The DPS check is much tighter on Mythic to break the shield
  • Getting out and dispelling Drain Essence ASAP is vitally important
  • Healers will want to rotate raid CDs during Phase 2, as the damage being reflected by the Shield is enormous and it’s very easy for people to die
    • DPS should keep an eye on their own health pools as well. Maybe hold off on a Chaos Bolt if you only have 30k HP left. Don’t kill yourself
• Overall goal is to kill Maut after only 2 Phase 2’s occuring.
  • After 2nd Phase 2 ends, hold all the adds in the back, don’t DoT them unless it’s a single target dps increase, don’t waste the GCDs. Pump into the boss and kill him.
  • In time, with higher ilvls and corruption, it’ll be possible to kill Maut in only 1 Phase 2.

VIDEO GUIDE

Prophet Skitra

• The Clouded and Twisted Mind debuffs, which are only active during the Intermission on Normal and Heroic, now both go out on the pull and last all fight
  • Shred Psyche adds can only be seen by players affected by one debuffs
  • Images of Absolution walls are also affected by this, so any individual player can only see half the wall.

Strategy

We recommend going in with 2 tanks, 4 healers, and 14 DPS. Do NOT use Bloodlust on pull.

• Primary Phase
  • Functionally, very little changes from Heroic to Mythic
  • Place a raid marker ~8 yards away from where the boss is being tanked
    • This is the drop point for Shred Psyche
    • When the add comes out, wait 5s for its initial cast, then all players who can see it need to nuke ASAP
    • The tanks should still drag the boss on top of the add, even if they can’t see it. This’ll allow for some amount of cleave from the players targeting the add
  • For Images of Absolution, assign 3-4 people to focus on CC’ing an add to create an open space. Always ensure you have at least 1 person with each debuff
    • Mass Entanglement is OP for this. Druids should be running this talent.
• Intermission Phase
  • Finding the correct Image as quickly as possible is much more important in Mythic. The stacking Shadow Taken increase debuff will come back to wreck you later on
  • On the 3rd and 4th Phase 2s, healers will want to rotate CDs, as the raid will be getting high on stacks
  • Use Bloodlust immediately after identifying the “real” Skitra during the 4th Phase 2. This’ll push you out of the phase as quickly as possible and prevent deaths
• And that’s really it. Execute the fight like it’s Heroic, but with a little more added coordination. GGs!

VIDEO GUIDE

Hivemind

• Devouring Frenzy, the raid-wide damage ability that occurs following a Hivemind control swap, now gains 20% increased damage each time it’s cast, up from 15%
• When Ka’zir is in control, adds now heal 5% health per second after their health falls below 20%. This is increased from 3% health per second
• The add affected by Volatile Eruption now has its healthpool increased by a larger percentage
• For the Acidic Aqir, the bowling-ball type adds, two waves spawn back to back
• Mind-Numbing Nova now reduces haste by 100% if it’s not interrupted, up from 50%
• The add buffed  into being a Ravager gets a larger Health increase buff
• After Echoing Void deals damage, it leaves behind a new purple swirlie effect
  • Getting hit by this swirlie deals 200K damage and afflicts you with the Nullification effect, causing 73k Shadow damage every 2s for 6s, plus reduces healing by 100% for the duration

Strategy

We recommend going in with 2 tanks, 4-5 healers, and 13-14 DPS. It’s doable with 4 healers, but generally a little safer with 5. We also recommend using Bloodlust on pull. To help with add management, you can also run 3 tanks. If doing this, at least one of your tanks needs to be a Blood DK.

• As mentioned above, there aren’t really any new mechanics on Mythic, but all the Heroic mechanics are amped up to matter more
• You’ll want to have several players be AoE specced, as well as multiple players running the Focusing Iris major essence
  • Drone Adds spawn at 0:15, 1:25, 2:40, 3:53, 5:10
    • Spawns 1, 3, and 5 are during Tek’ris control, meaning all adds plus the bosses can be stacked for cleave
      • All players should just collapse on the 2 bosses here to stack all the Drones up and annihilate them
      • Use Focusing Iris major here, any other big AoE CDs. Make sure they all die.
    • Spawns 2 and 4 are during Ka’zir control.
      • Since the adds heal 5% per second during Ka’zir’s control, we decided to ignore them until it swapped back to Tek’ris control, and use healer CDs as needed to keep the raid stable.
        • This may not be a viable option for your guild.
        • If the healing is not manageable for your guild, you should instead pick a boss and have the entire raid collapse on it
        • Blow Focusing Iris here instead, as the add’s self healing is much more potent and you need to make sure they die
  • Darters spawn at 0:53, 2:02, 3:17, 4:20, 5:37
    • Sets 1, 3, and 5 are during Tekris. 2 and 4 are during Ka’zir.
    • If you have a BDK, they should use Mass Grip when these spawn during Ka’zir.
    • DPS need to make sure they actually swap and kill the Darters, as their Psionic Burst cast actually does a fair amount of damage. Keep them slowed and rooted as much as possible
• When a Drone gets buffed into a Ravager, the tank with better Physical damage mitigation should pick it up.
  • These get created at 0:16, 2:40, 5:10. DPS should hardswap and nuke these
• We recommend ignoring the Volatile Eruption adds, as the damage required to kill them is not worth the savings in damage taken from the explosion.
  • Instead, utilize healer CDs for this. Devo Aura is amazing. Barrier is certainly doable, but you’ll have an overlap with bowling ball adds, so be careful. If you have neither, use throughput CDs and have the raid use personals
  • Volatile adds are created at 1:25, 3:53
• Bowling Ball adds come out at 0:46, 1:38, 2:27, 3:17, 4:07, 4:56, 5:46, 6:38
• Echoing Void occurs at 0:27, 1:20, 1:50, 2:48, 3:40, 4:35, 5:41, 6:25, 7:20
• Tek’ris in control 0-1:15, 2:34-3:45, 5:04-6:15
• Ka’zir in control 1:15-2:35, 3:45-5:04, 6:15-7:30
• Don’t stand in Volatile Eruptions. GGs.

VIDEO GUIDE

Shad’har the Insatiable

• Mythic introduces a new overarching encounter mechanic – Hungry
  • Shad’har gains a stack of Hungry every 4 seconds
  • If he reaches 10 stacks, he’ll begin dealing 250% increased damage
• Living Miasma
  • This now roots the person they fixate to
  • After the Miasma reaches its target and explodes, it’ll leave a “tasty morsel” on the ground
    • If this Morsel is fed to Shadhar, it’ll reduce his Hungry stacks
    • After a player picks up a Morsel and feeds it to Shad’har, they’re afflicted with a moderate DoT effect
      • They also cannot pick up another Morsel for 3 minutes

Strategy

• You can fight this boss with either 4 or 5 healers. 4 will get you out of P2 faster, making that phase safer. 5 healers will keep you more stable throughout the fight, and will most likely be the best option for most guilds.
• Living Miasma
  • Miasmas spawn every 16 seconds
  • The player fixated by Living Miasma is affected with a 99% slow. This can easily be countered
  • Warlock’s Burning Rush, DK’s passive, Ghost Wolf, and any other ability that gives a class a “minimum” movement speed immediately counters the 99% slow
  • Other slow-prevention abilities also work. Hunters using Disengage with the Posthaste talent is a good example
  • Most notably, though, is Blessing of Freedom. This fully counters the 99% slow. If you have 2 paladins in your raid, you’ll have a BoF available for every single Living Miasma spawn
  • After having a movement-freeing ability cast, the player fixated by the Living Miasma should run to the furthest point away from the raid possible
    • The raid should also shift away from the direction the fixated player is running
    • Get the raid as far away from the Miasma explosion as possible
• Dealing with Hungry
  • Shad’har gains 1 stack every 4 seconds
  • You’ll want to feed him after every 2nd Living Miasma. Aim for 8-9 stacks of Hungry as your target to feed Shad’har a Morsel
  • You do NOT want to feed Shad’har every single Morsel as soon as they’re available
    • The player who fed Shad’har gets a 3 minute DoT. Because there’s a large amount of damage going off during the fight in general, you want to minimize the number of these debuffs
• The tank swap mechanic should be handled the same as you did on Heroic
• Healers still need to focus in on the players with the 4 stack of Debilitating Spit
• Phase 1
  • Dodge the breath
  • Dodge the swirlies
• Phase 2
  • Bloodlust this phase
  • There’s a stacking DoT that goes out during this phase, so the healing requirement gets nutty
    • Healers should use heal CDs throughout this phase, just keep everyone alive
  • The breath is NOT dodgeable in this phase. The raid should be spread out around the room to minimize the number of people hit per cast of the breath
• Phase 3
  • Largely the same as Heroic
  • Dodge breath, don’t stand in green
  • Nuke down the boss
• GGs

VIDEO GUIDE

• The two portals for “Soccer” no longer spawn on opposite ends of the room every time, potentially forcing the kicking team to go further around the room
• Voidwoken debuff gains extra effects
  • Imminent doom, the debuff from kicking, has a 12-second duration. This is up from 6 seconds on Heroic
  • If a player reaches 3 stacks of Imminent Doom, they die. This is decreased from dying at 5 stacks on Heroic
  • When a player kicks the orb, an Awakened Terror will spawn
    • These have a very low health pool, and chain cast Terror Wave
    • This does AoE damage to the raid and fears for 3s
    • However, this cast is interruptible
• Obelisks now come in two sizes, with the new size being about double the normal Obelisk
• A single “fail” at soccer now results in an instant raid wipe. This happens if the orb hits a wall, an Obelisk, or the circle around Azshara
• Because of the larger sized Obelisks that now spawn, plus needing to potentially go further around the room, soccer is much more dangerous and much more lethal

Strategy

For this encounter, we recommend 2 tanks, 4 healers, and 14 DPS. We also recommend using Bloodlust on pull.

We’re going to be completely up front about this – you will wipe a lot on this boss. Almost every single person in the raid WILL be the singular reason for a wipe, multiple times. There’s no two ways about that. Keep your heads cool, don’t flame your guildies, and get through it together. The boss itself is not difficult, but you will wipe a LOT to the mythic soccer mechanics.

Here are two public Weakauras that may aid you. The first is a kick guider, the second is an interrupt rotation WA for the adds. These worked decently well at the time of writing.

Weakaura – Kick Guider
Weakaura – Interrupt Rotation

Firstly, the non-soccer related mechanics have minimal changes, essentially just increased damage. The entirety of the difficulty and wipes to this fight is related to soccer. As such, that’s what the guide will focus on.

When it comes to handling the soccer mechanics, there’s two portions to focus on – the actual 5 assigned teams of 3 playing soccer, and the assigned 3 teams of 3-4 people for interrupts. For your kicking teams, make sure you assign which one of the Void Ritual soak orbs each person is supposed to soak.

For the interrupts – every single time a kick occurs on the ball, an Awakened Terror add spawns. As we’ll talk about below, we recommend ensuring you only ever do 3 kicks per soccer round, so there’ll always be 3 adds. YOU WILL NEED AN INTERRUPT ROTATION, as they chaincast a raid-wide fear. A missed interrupt likely results in a raid wipe. Each of these needs an assigned interrupt rotation with 4 people in the rotation for each add. Use an interrupt WA, either the one linked above or a different one, to assign and track who should be doing which interrupts. This is a primary mechanic and will require attention to detail.

For soccer: the idea is straightforward. Each soccer phase, you need to kick the ball exactly 3 times. No more, no less. The execution is difficult. There are 3 map layouts of Obelisks, and they will be in exactly the same order every pull. These then repeat. Set 1 = Map 1, Set 2 = Map 2, Set 3 = Map 3, Set 4 = Map 1, Set 5 = Map #2. The only thing that can change is which portal the ball itself will spawn at. We’ve included diagrams of the maps below. PLEASE NOTE – WE ARE NOT SKILLED ARTISTS. THESE ARE ESTIMATIONS, AND MAY NOT BE COMPLETELY EXACT. THE LOCATIONS ARE MEANT TO SHOW YOU WHERE YOU NEED TO BE, BUT THE ACTUAL EXACT LOCATIONS MAY BE SLIGHTLY OFF. The X and Diamond represent where the portals are. For illustration purposes, we’ll show Diamond as being the starting point for the ball. You WILL experience the X location being the ball sometimes.

Map 1:

Map 2:

Map 3:

As far as the rest of the raid is concerned, in general you want to have the boss near where the ball starts every time. The tanks should be moving the boss to follow the ball, stopping where the adds are. When the add you’re on top of dies, move to the next one. Continue moving throughout the room to follow these adds until the 3 of them are dead. While that’s going on, obviously the assigned interrupt teams need to ensure they never miss an interrupt on an add.

Don’t die to torment, blow up the boss. Once teams 1 and 2 have gotten their kicks down solidly, swap them with teams 4 and 5. These teams will share the same maps, so moving teams 4 and 5 up lets them practice earlier on. This will make your wipe progression seem odd, going from sub 40% wipes to 75% wipes, but it’s absolutely worth doing. Other than that, there isn’t much to say. As a side note, if one of your tanks has a viably geared Protection Paladin, you should consider bringing it in for this fight. Avenger’s Shield may be the single best ability in the game for dealing with add interrupts.

Again, this will be a tedious progression. Keep your raid calm, don’t flame each other. Every kicker will need to try and practice several times.

VIDEO GUIDE

Welcome to our TL;DR Cheat Sheet! This is meant to give you basic information on the key aspects of each fight, and is over-simplified. We strongly recommend that after you finish reading this, you visit the page for each boss to get more in-depth information on how the abilities work and a detailed strategy.

Wrathion

Back and forth between P1 and P2 till he dies

Phase 1

• Nobody stand in front of, or behind, the boss (except for active tank)
  • Tanks swap at 1-2 stacks
• Red circle under you, get out
• Boss does the giant red swirlie, get 35 yards away
  • Immediately after, run to the furthest edge of the room and wait for explosions to end

Phase 2

• 3 people need to soak the red soak circles, run over pillars
• Everyone else finds and kills stealthed mobs
• Kill any pillars your 3 person team couldn’t

Maut

Back and forth between P1 and P2 till he dies

Phase 1

• Melee stand to the boss’s side, ranged and heals behind him
• Don’t get hit by Black Wings
• If you get the purple targeting circle, move towards the edge of the room to drop puddle
• Don’t stand in giant purple swirlie. After it explodes, add spawns from the middle
• Tank 1 gets boss, tank 2 gets add 1 when it spawns
  • When add 2 spawns, tank 2 taunts boss. Boss will eat add 1 when it gets close
  • Repeat this when add 3 spawns
• Stand in the purple puddle during Stygian Annihilation

Phase 2

• Everyone stack in melee
• Tanks run around and soak blue orbs coming from the side
  • Drop your debuff on the raid group
• If you get small purple swirlie, move 8 yards out till it goes away

Skitra

Back and forth between normal and intermission phase. Intermission every 20% HP

Normal Phase

• Everyone stacks in melee behind the boss except the tank
  • Tanks swap at 7-8 stacks
• If you get Shred Psyche, move 8 yards away until it falls off
  • Wait 5s after add spawns, then nuke it
• CC one of the Images to give yourself a safe spot
• Lust on pull

Intermission

• Boss splits raid in half with debuffs
• Each half sees 4 Images of the boss
  • Most are fake
  • Find real one, kill real one

Xanesh

Soccer boss!

Normal abilities

• Tanks swap at 1-2 stacks
• Move away from red targeting circle if you see one
• Don’t stand in the Obelisks
• Stay out of the goop during Torment
  • Raid use movement CD here like Stampeding Roar

Soccer!

• 3 players soak the orange soak circles
• Find the glowing portal, ball spawns here
• “Kick” ball to the other portal on opposite side of the room
• Ball can NOT touch wall, Obelisks, or Azshara
• After scoring goal, you can’t play soccer for 3 mins. New team next time.

Keep doing these till she dies

Hivemind

1 phase fight against 2 bosses. They don’t share health pool. Summon adds all fight

• Tek’ris in control = stack bosses
• Ka’zir in control = spread bosses 20 yards
• No tank swaps
• Don’t stand in Tek’ris’s purple frontal
• Spread out when purple circles go on everyone
• When Tek’ris makes a Ravager add, everyone hard swap
• When Ka’zir makes an add do Volatile Corruption, hard swap
• Dodge bowling ball adds
• Interrupt Ka’zir’s cast
• Keep adds slowed, AoE fest. Kill them as they keep coming
• Lust on pull

Shad’har

3 phase fight against a 2 headed doggo

All Phases

• Boss does a frontal cone breath ability at a random player
  • Does damage + a debuff. Debuff changes based on phase
  • Can always be dodged
• Does a 1-2 combo on tanks Crush and Dissolve. Always taunt swap as soon as Crush deals damage
• If you get the 4 stack application of Debilitating Spit, use a cooldown
• If you get fixated by a Living Miasma, move away from people

Phase 1 – 100%-66%

• Dodge purple swirlies, they come out more frequently the longer you’re in p1

Phase 2 – 66%-33%

• Soak void orbs when they spawn

Phase 3 – 33%-0%

• Burn phase, lust at 30%
• Green goop puddle starts in the middle of the room, grows over time
  • Racing to kill the boss before goop takes over the entire space
• Boss does heavy AoE to the raid the rest of the fight
• Enrages at 30%, increasing damage done 25%

Drest’agath

One phase encounter against a giant tentacle and her smaller tentacle adds

Drest’agath Abilities

• Heals 11 mil every 5s
• Puts big purple circle on the tank. Taunt swap when this happens
  • Tank with the circle needs to run to an add and explode on the add
• Move away from boss when she does Entropic Crash
• If you get purple swirlie, move away from people
• Dodge Void Glare lazer beam
• At 100 energy, does a large AoE on the raid

Adds

• 3 types, Tentacles, Eyes, Maws
  • Eyes do mind flay, interrupt it. Kill these last.
  • Tentacles drop Smoke Bomb. Melee get inside smoke & kill it
    • 1-2 healers need to go in smoke to heal
  • Maw does a heal absorb to anyone near. Ranged nuke this
• When adds die, they drop purple goop. Run over goop to get Void Infused Ichor
  • When you have Ichor, any damage you deal to the boss can NOT be regenerated by her passive healing. Raid should all grab ichor at same time and use CDs

Rotate through killing adds & boss 3-4 times and kill her

Il’gynoth

2 phase encounter. P1 you fight Il’gynoth, P2 you kill organs. Killing 1 organ moves you back to P1. Need to kill all 3 organs to win

Il’gynoth abilities

• Beam nukes the tank. Swap after taking 2 of these
• Also does standard Eye Beam lasers at a few people. Run away from this. Leaves goop on ground, try to keep goop in a small circle
• MC’s random players. Everyone swap and kill MC’d people
• In your 2nd and 3rd P1, you’ll have blood goop adds. Slow & kill them
• Lust during 3rd Phase 1

P2 abilities

• If you get red circle on you, spread out from people
• Pick 1 organ to kill each P2, all DPS focus it
• Interrupt organs when they cast. If you miss, you’ll get a blood goop add
  • Blood goop adds need to be slowed and killed

Vexiona

3 phase fight. Alternates between P1 and P2 until boss reaches 40%, then goes into P3.

Phase 1

• Start fight off against boss + one big Ascendant add
  • Nuke Ascendant add asap
  • Ascendant does a massive lazer beam at it’s tank
  • Leaves an orb where it dies, this comes into play later
• If you get the purple circle under you, move to the edges of the room
  • Drops a puddle. Try to drop new puddles on or near old ones
• Boss does a frontal breath on the tank, gives tank stacks of a DoT
  • After 3rd breath, tank should get the orb the Ascendant dropped. Resets your stacks
• When tank gets Despair, healers need to bomb heal them
• Boss also periodically puts down a gateway and small adds come out. Casters, rogues, weak warriors. Just kill these

Phase 2

• Boss flies into air, summons new adds, make 1 add turn into Ascendant
  • Everyone nuke Ascendant ASAP, then Vexiona tank pick up new orb to reset stacks
• Dodge the flyover flame breath from Vexiona
• Handle the purple circles like in P1, drop puddles near edges
• After 3 flyovers, back to P1

Repeat P1 and P2 until boss hits 40%

Phase 3

• Burn phase. Lust here
• Everyone gets DoT stacks now whenever you take damage
  • Healers save raid CDs for late in fight, boss sub 20% hp
• Move away from boss when she does Heart of Darkness, get out of glowing orange circle
• Stand next to a friend all phase
• Have 5+ people stack on tank when Desolation goes out

Ra-den

2 phase fight. P2 starts at 40% hp

Phase 1

• Everyone but tanks should stack in melee range
  • Put 2 markers behind the raid, one left one right
• Orbs spawn, one void one lightning. Kill one, let other hit boss
  • Alternate which type of orb you kill
• Boss explodes for AoE damage when orb hits him
• An add spawns based on which orb
  • Lightning orb makes a lightning add casting Chain Lightning
  • Void orb makes Void add casting a big soak circle. Targeted player make sure you’re with the group to split damage with everyone
• Also does an Unstable ability based on which orb hit
  • Lightning orb makes a jumping lightning bolt. Affected player runs to one of the markers behind raid. Someone else runs to other marker for bolt to jump to. Keep repeating until bolt stops jumping
  • Void orb makes small soak circles. Soak these
  • Different people need to soak or be hit by bolt every time
• Tanks swap at 2 stacks of the debuff he does

Phase 2

• Burn phase, lust here
• Heavy AoE to everyone for rest of fight
• Dodge purple swirlies
• If you get Chained, run away from people you’re connected with
• Healers should rotate raid CDs after lust ends
• Keep tanks around half health this phase, so the DoT from Decaying Strike doesn’t wreck them

Carapace

Coming Soon. See full guide for now.

N’zoth

Coming soon. See full guide for now.

Wrathion is a 2 phase fight. Phase 1 is the primary phase where you fight Wrathion himself, Phase 2 he melts away, and you need to deal with some gripping pillars.

Phase 1

• Searing Breath
  • Frontal cone ability, deals 285k Fire damage to anyone in front of the boss.
  • Applies Searing Armor
    • DoT, deals 21k Fire damage per second for 20 seconds. Also increases damage taken by Searing Breath by 80%. This effect stacks.
• Incineration
  • Occurs at 0:33, 1:33, 2:22 in each Phase 1, give or take 2 seconds in either direction
  • DoT placed on a small number of random players
  • Deals 53k Fire damage every 2s for 8s
  • After 8s, explodes for 322k Fire damage to everyone in the raid. This amount is decreased the further away you are from the explosion point

• Gale Blast
  • AoE ability, deals 322k Fire damage to everyone within 30 yards and knocks them back
  • Deals 160k damage to all players further than 30 yards away
  • After the initial AoE, shoots fire balls at random target locations. Fire balls deal 267k Fire damage to anyone within 5 yards of impact point
  • Occurs at 1:00, 2:30, 5:00, 6:30

  

• Burning Cataclysm
  • Wrathion teleports to a random location, and spits fire. Deals 35k Fire damage per second for 8s to the entire raid
  • Also spits out Scorching Blisters
    • Location of these is indicated by orange swirlies on the ground
    • After a couple seconds, the swirlies become pools of fire which expand outward over 10 seconds
    • Standing in the fire pool deals 120k Fire damage per second
    • After 10 seconds, the fire pools explode, dealing 430k Fire damage to anyone standing in a pool at that time
    • These cover most of the available encounter area
• Occurs at 1:10, 2:42, 5:12, 6:42
  • This always follows a Gale Blast, roughly 10s after the explosion

  

• Molten Eruption
  • Occurs right after a Burning Cataclysm
  • Throws a hail of fireballs around the area. Being hit deals 120k Fire damage and knocks you back. 3 yard range from impact.
  • Leaves Molten Pools wherever these Eruptions landed
• Tail Swipe
  • Conal attack from the tail. Deals 285k Physical damage and knocks back anyone hit.

Phase 2

• Wrathion casts Smoke and Mirrors, starting P2
• Crackling Shard
  • All Molten Pools become Crackling Shards, basically pillars. When a Shard is destroyed, deals 53k Fire damage to anyone within 10 yards
  • Any Shards not destroyed turn into Lava Pools at the end of Phase 2
    • Lava Pools deal 120k Fire damage per second to anyone standing in them, and Lava Pools persist the remainder of the encounter
    • Additionally, each Lava Pool causes a raid-wide DoT of 1400 Fire damage per second for the remainder of the encounter, which stacks
  • Crackling Shards have a health pool and can be attacked and destroyed.

• Scales of Wrathion
  • 3 Scales fall from the sky, denoted by a red soak circle
  • Each must be soaked by 1 player
  • Any not soaked deal 250k Fire to everyone in the raid
    • The player who soaks is affected by Burning Madness, a 10 second debuff with 10 stacks.
    • While you have this debuff, running through a Crackling Shard pillar destroys it. Each pillar you destroy uses up 1 stack, and adds 1 second of duration
    • PLEASE NOTE – this is how the Journal is written. On PTR Testing, in heroic you DID NOT get additional duration for running over a pillar. Unknown for sure if this is a bug or intentional.
  • On testing, there were 32 Crackling Shards to destroy per Phase 2

• Ashwalker Assassin
  • 3 adds spawn stealthed. While stealthed, they apply a 10 second stun called Noxious Choke to their target, and also attack with Dark Ambush, dealing 285k Shadow damage
  • When the Assassins have their stealth broken by any means, they become attackable and tankable, and stop casting Noxious Choke and Dark Ambush
• Phase 2 lasts 1 minute.

 

Strategy

• Phase 1 – Fight times 0:00-3:05, 4:05-7:07
  • Lust on pull
  • Tank the boss near where he starts, facing sideways. Either side is fine, your choice. Raid should stand in the safe area where they will not be hit by either the Searing Breath or the Tail Swipe. See positioning graphic in the last section.
    • Tanks should swap either every stack, or every 2 stacks. Whatever you’re comfortable with and won’t die to. It makes no difference either way, so don’t risk trying to be a hero with too many stacks and killing yourself.
  • Players with Incineration need to move away from the raid, spread out from each other. Rest of the raid should be stacked in tight for healing/CDs
    • You will probably want to use a raid healing CD for the explosion here every time, as it’s a large burst of damage.
    • Because of the way timings for this are spaced out, as long as your comp has at least 3 healers you can use a healing CD each time
  • For Gale Blast, your raid (except your active tank and any melee DPS who can immune the damage) should stack 35 yards from the boss to take the reduced damage. This would put you near the center of the encounter area.
    • The added benefit here is that it makes every spot easily reachable for the upcoming Burning Cataclysm
  • Each Phase 1 will have Burning Cataclysm occur twice
  • As Burning Cataclysm starts, your raid leader/officers need to identify where a safe spot will be based on where the orange swirlies are located. You can almost always find safe spots on the exact opposite end of the platform from where Wrathion is, or just off to the side of that opposite end.
    • Finding the safe spot may take a pull or two to get used to, but you got this.
    • You do not need to use raid healing CDs during this. Just get to a safe spot and you’ll be okay
  • After Burning Cataclysm ends, during your run back to the boss, Molten Eruption will occur. Try to avoid being hit by the explosions denoted by the targeting circles.
    • After the first Burning Cataclysm of a Phase 1 cycle, by the time you reach the boss you’ll have an Incineration go out. Use a raid healing CD for that.
  • After you’ve completed a second Burning Cataclysm during a Phase 1 cycle, you enter Phase 2
• Phase 2 – Fight times 3:05-4:05, 7:07-8:07
  • Have three players assigned to soak Scales of Wrathion. These should be players with Sprint, and preferably people who also can use an immunity to keep themselves alive while breaking the Crackling Shards
    • As soon as these players receive the debuff, they should hit their sprint and get going to break as many of the Shards as possible.
    • Any Crackling Shards not destroyed need to be DPS’d down and killed
  • Hunters should turn on Track Hidden for this phase, and use Flare to help find the Assassins
    • Players being attacked by the Assassins while they’re stealthed need heavy spot healing
    • Use AoE near the targeted players to break the Assassins out of stealth
    • Once they’re out of stealth, tanks should pick up Assassins, and the raid nukes them down
  • Players should try to stay 10 yards away from shards as they’re about to be broken if possible. Don’t stress too terribly hard about being near 1-2 Shards as they break, but any more than that can become overwhelming damage
  • After 1 minute, the phase ends. Any Shards not destroyed by this point become Lava Pools, which is bad. Try to not let this happen.

Positioning

Normal Positioning for Phase 1

Move when you have Incineration. Here’s showing how the 3 affected people can all move.

Gale Blast, stack away from the boss, on Blue.

Run to the far edge for Burning Cataclysm. Mostly everyone will be on Blue, run from Blue to the far edge.

Video Guide

Maut is an encounter which alternates between two phases. During Phase 1, he gathers mana, during Phase 2 he begins a cast using all his mana. This cast ends when his mana reaches 0, and you re-enter Phase 1.

• Dark offering = 2% Maut mana
• Adds lose 2% mana per 2 seconds within the circles, so 100 seconds in circle = ded
• Adds spawn every 35-40 seconds
• Maut naturally gains about .66% mana per second, or 1.5 seconds per 1% mana.
• Maut gains 1% mana per person hit by devour magic
• Boss has exactly 2x HP vs mana
• Adds have 10% boss’s mana
• Killing add is 5% of boss HP

Phase 1

• Shadow Claws
  • Deals 268k Physical damage to the current tank, and applies the Shadow Wound Debuff
    • Deals 36k Shadow damage every 2 seconds for 24 seconds. Stacks.
• Devour Magic
  • Marks 4 players with a purple targeting circle
  • After 6s, the circle explodes dealing 53k Shadow damage to everyone hit
  • Each person hit also generates 1% mana for Maut
  • Leaves a Devoured Abyss wherever the explosions happened
    • 9 yard radius purple circle of bad
    • Standing inside silences you, prevents incoming healing, deals 42k Shadow damage every 2 seconds, and drains your mana
    • While inside, you’re also immune to all other forms of magic damage
    • These explode when P2 starts, dealing 268k damage to anyone standing in them

• Stygian Annihilation
  • AoE, deals 1.7 million Shadow damage to the entire raid
• Consuming Shadows
  • Periodically puts a 3 second DoT on the raid that deals Shadow damage every 3s. This DoT deals more damage as Maut’s mana increases
• Black Wings
  • Frontal cone ability, deals 142k Physical damage and knocks back anyone hit
  • Targeted at a random melee
• Dark Manifestation
  • Large purple swirly pool of bad spawns, lasts 6 seconds. After 6s, it explodes dealing 267k Shadow damage to anyone inside
    • Has a relatively weak sucking effect, dragging players towards the bad circle
  • After the explosion, a Dark Manifestation add spawns where the explosion occurred.
    • Adds take damage to their mana instead of HP. At 0 mana they die.
    • Periodically cast Dark Offering. If the cast completes, the add loses 20% mana and the boss gains 2% of his max mana.
    • If the add gets within 20 yards of Maut, he’ll eat it, consuming all the adds mana and adding it to his own. The max amount of mana an add can give Maut is 10% of Maut’s mana pool.

Phase 2

• When Maut reaches 100% mana, he casts Obsidian Skin, followed by Obsidian Shatter. He also destroys all of the Devoured Abyss circles on the ground, dealing 268k Shadow Damageto anyone inside them.
  • Obsidian Skin
    • All damage dealt to Maut is instead dealt to his mana pool
    • You take 100% of the damage you deal to Maut as Arcane damage
    • Making Maut reach 0 mana immediately ends Phase 2 and stops his cast of Obsidian Shatter
  • Obsidian Shatter
    • 60 second cast. Upon completion, deals 1 million Shadow damage to the raid. You wipe. Don’t let this happen.
  • Consumed Magic
    • Every 6 seconds during Phase 2, Maut consumed 10% of his mana pool, and gains 1% increased magic damage dealt. Stacks.
  • Forbidden Ritual
    • Mana orbs spawn one at a time from the altars at the edge of the room.
      • When an orb spawns, it drains Maut of 10% mana
      •  If they reach Maut, they restore 20% of his mana
    • These can be soaked by players. Soaking deals AoE damage to the raid. The further the orb has traveled, the more damage it deals. Soaking an orb gives you the Forbidden Mana debuff
      • After 6 seconds, you explode with mana. All players within a 20 yard range of the explosion gain 150% increased mana regen and 50% increased healing done for 8 seconds

• • Drain Essence
    • Purple swirly on 2 players, deals 35k Shadow damage and burns 4k mana per second for 8 second. While the debuff persists, Maut gains 1% mana per second
    • DIspellable
    • When dispelled, deals 71k Shadow damage and burns 10k mana from players within 8 yards

Strategy

During testing, two strategies worked well to defeat this boss on Heroic. Option 1 makes Phase 2 longer in exchange for longer Phase 1s. This increased the strain on healers in Phase 2, and also allows the boss to accumulate more stacks of Consumed Magic, increasing the overall damage of the fight. Option 2 is basically a zerg strat, and required a higher DPS output. Both will be explained below. We’ll first talk about the fight as a whole, then break out the differences, as it all boils down to how you handle the adds.

• Phase 1
  • Lust on pull
  • Tanks should start the boss either where he is, or just off to the left. Raid should stand behind the boss, loosely spread
    • Tanks swap every 2 stacks, preferably when there’s only 1 add alive
    • Tanks should slowly move the boss around the room to make sure the raid doesn’t run out of room from puddles
  • The rest of the raid should be loosely spread behind the boss, leaving space to the right-hand side (closest to the outer edge)
    • Players affected by Devour Magic will move to this open area on the right side to drop their puddles
    • When Stygian Annihilation goes out, everyone needs to step into a purple puddle, as it makes you immune to the damage
  • Melee need to move to the side of the boss right before Black Wings occurs to bait it
    • You want this going harmlessly to one side or the other, not through the raid
    • As soon as Maut starts casting, melee need to quickly move and get back with the rest of the raid
  • Consuming Shadows just needs to be healed through, no big deal
• Phase 2 – Boss hits 100% Mana
  • Boss runs to the middle of the room, and simultaneously makes all the purple circles explode and begins casting Obsidian Shatter
  • Whole raid should stack together in melee range of the boss to help the healers be more efficient
  • Tanks should focus on soaking the Mana Orbs. After soaking, yeet yourself back on top of the raid stack point to apply the mana buff to your healers
  • Players affected by Drain Essence need to move 8 yards away to be dispelled, then move back after being dispelled
  • You’ll want to use 2 healing cooldowns each time you’re in this phase. Spread them out however works best for your raid, but this is a high intensity healing phase so CDs will be necessary to keep the raid stable
  • Once the boss’s mana hits 0, you go back to Phase 1. If you don’t do this before his cast ends, you lose gg
• Add strategy Option 1 – slow and steady
  • Have the tank not currently on the boss pick up the add when it spawns, and drag it near a purple circle
    • When it begins casting Dark Offering, drag it into the purple circle. After the cast ends, bring it back out. This prevents the cast from actually finishing, and stops the mana from going into the boss
    • DoT up the adds, but don’t prioritize damage
  • Tanks swap whenever a new add spawns. When taunting the boss, bring your add with you and let him suck it. Do this for add #1 and add #2. Don’t let add #3 get sucked.
  • By doing this, you’ll have Phase 1 last around 2 minutes,give or take, assuming you did well with Devour Magic.
  • Once you enter P2, just kill the last add from cleave damage, focus DPS on boss
• Add strategy Option 2 – Zerg
  • Have the tank not currently on the boss pick up the add when it spawns. Immediately drag it under the boss he can eat it.
  • All DPS just keep nuking the boss
  • Repeat for Add 2
  • Repeat for Add 3, although he’ll spawn when the boss is close to 100% mana, so make sure you get it eaten
  • Idea here is to maximize effective DPS on the boss with minimal downtime. By doing this, your Phase 1s will last between 1:35 and 1:45, so quite a bit less time than doing it slow and steady. It’s simpler overall, but not by much, and adds a little more risk of not killing the boss during the 2nd Phase 1
• During PTR testing, the Zerg strategy seemed easier than the “Slow and Steady” strategy. However, we recommend using the “Slow and Steady” strategy, as it’s more forgiving and still pretty simple. It’s also much more likely the way Blizzard envisioned the fight, and more like what you’ll be doing for Mythic.

Positioning

Basic positioning during Phase 1. You’ll need to move the boss slowly as the Devour Magic puddles block too much space.

Phase 2 positioning. If you have Drain Essence, move away from the raid, somewhere like to X.

Video Guide