Tempest Keep. Black Temple. The Sunwell. The Battle for Mount Hyjal.
Three of these raids are awesome. One of these raids is simply torturous.
TEMPEST KEEP: THE EYE
Void Reaver: You’re definitely going to want Kil’jaeden’s Cunning for this one, as the boss sends orbs down from the sky that silence the area they land on. This means you need to strafe a LOT. Have your voidlord tank the boss while you unload Incinerates onto it while being on the move around constantly. Drops the Pocket Reaver pet!
Al’ar: Drops the Phoenix Hawk Hatchling pet. Usual tank and spank, the boss dies… and resurrects for you to kill it again. Do so and move along.
High Astromancer Solarian: Kill the trash beforehand, they’ll MC you and reset the fight otherwise. Another easy tank & spank. She knocks you upwards a lot, but you can lay a Demonic Circle down and teleport to it as she knocks you up to save you a few seconds. The fall won’t damage you. Drops the Lesser Voidcaller pet. It’s a mini voidwalker!
Kael’thas Sunstrider: One of those multi-phase fights, and one of those aforementioned difficult fights, if you’re unprepared. Take Grimoire of Sacrifice, but keep your Voidwalker out for the first parts. There used to be a strategy where you’d drag each advisor around throughout the instance so you could face them one at a time in phase 3, but alas that seems no longer possible, as the doors close VERY fast when you engage KT now.
- Phase 1: Advisors! He sends each advisor out one at a time to fall at your feet, and you get an introduction into what they can do. Thaladred is first, and he knocks you around, but he walks very slow. Nuke. Lord Sanguinar follows, and he fears. Nuke. Capernian is third, and she knocks back MASSIVELY, but only to people in melee range. She also disorients. Nuke. Telonicus is the last advisor, and he places a debuff on you called Remote Toy that you want to avoid, as it randomly stuns you over the course of a minute. Nuke him before he casts it on you, or wait for it to drop off before killing him. If you like, you can kill them in varied places around the room to ease phase 3.
- Phase 2: Weapons! The shield should probably be your first target, as it interrupts. Nuke the rest. If you like, loot and equip the Staff of Disintegration and use it from your character pane. This puts a buff on you that makes you immune to CC effects like fear and disorient. At a high gear level, it may not be fully necessary.
- Phase 3: Advisors!? Yeah, he rezzes them. Mages with combat rez?! This is the tough part of the fight, and you wanna prioritise your targets if you don’t have the staff buff. Kill Telonicus first, as his Remote Toy debuff is simply annoying, then Capernian. The other two kill however you like. When they’re dead, you should sacrifice your demon.
- Phase 4: Kael’thas! The reason you sacrifice your pet is that he can mind control you, and oopsydaisy that’ll reset the encounter when you inevitably nuke your pet to death. You don’t wanna do it ALL OVER AGAIN, do you? Anyway, nuke KT to 50%. If he summons a phoenix, kill it, then kill the egg. Watch your health, pyroblasts hurt quite a bit, considering he’s “only” a level 70 boss. At 50% he floats in the air and has a tantrum, beginning…
- Phase 5: Swimming! He casts Gravity Lapse, which flings you into the air, and keeps you there. You can “swim” in the air, but trying to touch the ground will see you flung back up. The effect wears off after a while, and you WILL take fall damage, so bear that in mind. Do not go within 8 yards of the elf, or you’ll start to take stacks of Nether Vapor, which reduces your maximum health by 10% (stacks up to 90%, which means a Pyroblast or two may be lethal). Nuke.
He drops a couple of cool items, the most notable being Ashes of Al’ar, the fabulous-looking phoenix you killed earlier, in mount form! If you equipped the staff, then remember to re-equip your weapon.
BATTLE FOR MOUNT HYJAL
You know how Black Morass and Violet Hold are predetermined waves of enemies with a couple bosses here and there? Well, have a whole raid of it!
Rage Winterchill: This boss is the major threat here. He roots you, which is annoying enough on its own, but when coupled with Death & Decay, it can be deadly. D&D deals %age-based damage, and the attack extends just slightly past the ground effect, so MOVE OUT OF IT AS SOON AS YOU ARE ABLE. I cannot stress that enough, it WILL kill you otherwise. Each tick hits for 15% health. You basically have 7 seconds to clear the fuck out. Nuke the bastard with extreme prejudice.
Anetheron: Nuke him. Carrion Swarm puts a healing reduction debuff on you (to the tune of 75%). Kill the infernals he summons, they only have about 150k health, but they pack a wallop (to the NPCs at least).
Kaz’rogal: Nuke! He stuns sometimes.
Azgalor: Don’t use a pet, or turn off your pet’s taunt ability and Threatening Prescence. He has a spell called Doom he casts on whoever he doesn’t have aggro on. If your voidy is tanking him therefore, he’ll use it on you. It causes you to die after 20 seconds. Can silence you. Otherwise, nuke.
Archimonde: Definitely go petless for this one. He casts Air Burst on targets he doesn’t have aggro on. This ability sends you flying up into the air, and the fall can be deadly. Otherwise, nuke.
BLACK TEMPLE
<insert preparedness joke here>
High Warlord Naj’entus: Grimoire of Sacrifice again, as he uses Impaling Spine on targets that don’t have his attention, which effectively stuns you for a long-ass time. Try and nuke him down before he uses Tidal Shield. This ability shields him and restores his health, and you have to wait until it wears off. Nuke more.
Supremus: There is literally nothing that stands out about this fight. Heck, if you’re feeling fancy, let your demon solo him.
Shade of Akama: Lots of adds that might as well be equipped with feather dusters, for all the damage they do. Talk to Akama to start the encounter, then kill anything chanelling a purple beam at the ghost. It’ll float towards Akama, then become attackable. Kill it. This turns the Broken in the temple friendly, and there’s even a vendor for you to use!
Teron Gorefiend: Another GoSac fight, or ensure you keep him aggroed onto you, otherwise he’ll cast Shadow of Death on you, which kills you after 55 seconds. Nuke.
Reliquary of Souls: A three-part fight, with an add phase in-between each part.
- Essence of Suffering: Nuke!
- Essence of Desire: The slightly difficult one. Spirit Shock disorients you for 5 seconds. Aura of Desire mirrors damage you do back onto yourself, so I’d forgo Chaos Bolts on this one, and mind your health! Ember Tap if needed, and watch out for Deaden, it doubles damage you take, making a reflected Chaos Bolt a possible one-shot on you. Wait for it to wear off before attacking, or just be extra mindful of your hitpoints.
- Essence of Anger: Nuke!
Gurtogg Bloodboil: This one’s a DPS race. He has a 6 second disorient, along with some stacking DoTs and bleeds that can eventually dish out a LOT of damage. The thing is… have your pet tank and the boss is trivial. Oh well. Ember Tap/Health Funnel as needed.
Mother Shahraz: She has 10 second silences, and she casts these relatively frequently, meaning that when she casts the first one, you probably have about 5-10 seconds of casting before she does another. Make those seconds count! With your pet tanking, it’s again rather trivial.
The Illidari Council: This one is actually rather difficult if you are unprepared! What I do is try and keep them stacked closely, then keep up Rain of Fire on them all. They share a health bar, but each RoF tick will effectively hit 4 times if you keep them close together. Focus single-target spells on one target, preferably the paladin Gathios the Shatterer. He has a tendency to bubble characters to make them immune to magic damage, but never himself. At lower gear levels, definitely have your voidlord tank one or two of them to ease the pressure on your health bar. If you can, interrupt Lady Malande’s heals. You really need to keep the damage rolling to outDPS the priest’s healing. Once you beat them, Akama’ll show up again. Talk to him to move on.
Illidan Stormrage: Honestly, it’s a relatively simple fight. You can use GoSac if you like, or have your voidlord tank if your gear level is low. Nuke him, he’ll fly up and throw his blades to the ground to summon 2 Flames of Azzinoth. You take them too far away from the blades they spawn from, they’ll do MASSIVE damage to you. You see the circular part on the ground? Stay in the centre of that, and you should be fine. Nuke, get stunned, Maiev shows up, they both chat, nuke some more, he chats some more, then you can loot him. Notable for dropping 2 legendaries: The Warglaive of Azzinoth main hand weapon, and Warglaive of Azzinoth offhand.
SUNWELL
Time to play whack-a-mole with Kil’jaeden, but before we can, we have a few bosses to kill. There’s a trash mob to watch out for called Sunwell Slayer. Kill them first, they do %age based damage, so they’re a threat.
Kalecgos & Sathrovarr: DISMISS YOUR PET! Use GoSac for this fight, as having a pet kinda glitches it. Nuke Kalec, wait a bit, nuke Sathrovarr, collect loot. He’s skippable, if you’re so inclined.
Brutallus: With your voidlord, this fight becomes a joke. Don’t stand in front of him, as Meteor Slash hits in a wide cone. Meteor Slash stacks, increases fire damage taken by 75% per stack, and deals fire damage itself. The damage can quickly ramp up. The jokey part? Meteor Slash can’t stack on your pet. Tank and spank.
Felmyst: You can bypass the air phase of this fight with about 95k DPS, in which case this is a tank & spank. If your DPS isn’t that high, then make sure you set her as your focus, so she shows up on your minimap. She’ll fly off, and eventually do an attack called Fog of Corruption. You’ll see the message “Felmyst takes a deep breath!” to indicate the attack is coming, and you need to basically NOT BE IN THE AREA SHE’S GONNA AFFECT. You can tell where she will by the minimap, hence why she is your focus. If you get affected by the fog, you’ll get charmed, and instantly die if you don’t have a pet out. 
Eredar Twins: Tank & spank. Keep an eye on your health. Don’t bother AoEing, when one goes down, the other heals back up again.
M’uru & Entropius: Nuke. Kill adds if they bother you. It’s amusing how a boss that was a guild breaker, the hardest boss in the instance, is now the easiest by far.
Kil’jaeden: Another nuke. Kill adds if they bother you (they look like you!). Drops a legendary item, Thor’idal, the Stars’ Fury! It’s a bow, so useless to warlocks. I keep it in my bank regardless.
Well, that concludes the Burning Crusade raids. The Lich King raids are a lot bigger, so I may dedicate a whole post to each one, rather than lump a lot together. The exception being Trial of the Crusader and Onyxia, as they are relatively short.
So next up… Naxxramas!
In other news, who do I have to speak to in order to get Kil’ruk as a permanent mount? 😀
Panda Steve Types Stuff 