Introduction to the World of Warcraft Raid Guide

Welcome to WoW Raid Guide, an indepth guide to raiding in World of Warcraft the Wrath of the Lich King and beyond!
In this blog I will be writing walkthroughs and videos on how to take down those WoW raid bosses that have been giving your guild trouble, how to survive PUGs and how to advance into the end game content of World of Warcraft with step by step instructions and guides. Ontop of how to beat WoW instance bosses I will be giving boss and class information, helping you improve how you play your character and which professions may prove useful to you in and out of the instances and raids in World of Warcraft.

Tuesday 29 April 2008

Patch 2.4.2 Class Changes (PTR)

Well the new public test realms are out for world of warcraft with Patch 2.4.2 and we have already seen some pretty random class changes going on. There doesn't seem to be anything major or raid breaking just yet but we ought to keep an eye out!

Ontop of the class changes it seems mages will be able to portal/teleport to Theramore or Stonard depending on their allegiance, something that should cut a fair bit of travelling time for them! and Mount speed increase items will become Mount Enchantments, so goodby stacked Carrot on a Stick and Riding Crop :(

The Class changes in PTR Patch 2.4.2 are -

Druid

  • Talent: Primal Fury (Rank 2) will now be properly unlearned when it is untalented.
  • Talent: (Restoration)- Natural Perfection will no longer proc by normal melee attacks.

Hunter
  • Aspect of the Viper: This ability now grants an additional amount of mana each 5 seconds equal to 35% of the hunter’s level.
  • Boar Charge: This ability will no longer make Growl cast immediately after it generates excessive threat.
  • The pet ability Growl will no longer scale with pet Attack Power.
  • Dire Ravens in Blade’s Edge Mountains now tameable.
  • Scare Beast: The range on this spell has been increased to 30 yards and it is now instant cast.
  • Tamed Drywallow Snappers now will know Bite 5 (instead of Claw 5.)

Mage
  • Talent: Improved Blink (Arcane) now reduces chance to be hit by 13/25% and the duration of Rank 1 has been increased to 4 seconds.
  • Completing the quest “Arcane Refreshment” will now properly teach the spell Conjure Water (Rank 7).
  • Polymorph: Mounted creatures will no longer remain mounted while polymorphed.
  • Mage Armor no longer reduces the duration of beneficial magic buffs.
  • Molten Armor will now do damage while a damage absorption shield is active.

Paladin
  • Flash of Light and Holy Light will now work properly with castsequence macros.
  • Seal of the Crusader: This ability now increases the damage dealt by Crusader Strike by 40%.
  • Crusader Strike (Retribution) will now properly receive a damage increase from Seal of The Crusader.
  • Talent: Precision (Ranks 1-3) will no longer improperly display daggers and staves as a weapon class in the tooltip.
  • Paladins that already have Apprentice Riding skill can now properly learn Summon Warhorse from the trainer.

Priest
  • Fear Ward will no longer be consumed while under the effects of cyclone.
  • Mana Burn: This spell can no longer trigger effects that require the target to be struck with a critical hit.
  • Power Word:Shield now has the correct sound associated with it and can no longer be heard from large distances.
  • Talent: Power Infusion will now consume the correct amount of mana when cast on yourself.

Rogue
  • Ability: Blade Flurry: This ability can no longer hit critters as its secondary targets and will now use a proper range calculation for all secondary targets.
  • Talent: Mutilate (Assassination) will no longer incorrectly appear multiple times in the combat log when used.

Shaman
  • Ability: Frostbrand Weapon: Rank 6 damage has been increased very slightly.

Warlock
  • Drain Soul: Channeling of this spell will now always stop when a player target dies.
  • Pets: Using a sacrifice effect to kill your own pet will no longer trigger effects that should only occur when killing an enemy.

Warrior
  • Sweeping Strikes: This ability can no longer hit critters as its secondary targets and will now use a proper range calculation for all secondary targets.

Thursday 24 April 2008

Al'ar Evade Bug in Tempest Keep

Most guilds have been here, you are doing a run of Tempest Keep, you get Al'ar past phase one and are dealing with the second stage magnificently. Then the unthinkable happens. It has happened to me, and chances are if you are reading this its happened to you. Al'ar evades, resets and laughs at you from above.

This evade bug has stretched already strained tensions to breaking point in a few guilds, especially those that have just entered TK and are on their first attempts at the big bird. We were 17% off downing him for the first time with a full raid still alive and at high health when it happened to us.

So why does Al'ar evade?

The usual cause of Al'ar evading is when he is in his second phase and casts Dive Bomb. If he dive Bombs anyone on the platforms or near the doorway there is a very high likelihood that Al'ar will glitch and act as though he left the room.

This is not only irritating because of the fight resetting, but also because one of the major glitch points (the door) is also one of the few real landmarks you can use as a raid regrouping point.

But whatever you choose to do it's best to avoid the possible bugging points, fight in the central area of the room and have fun downing Al'ar!

The Actual Magtheridon Changes in Patch 2.4

There has been a lot of confusion with people going to Magtheridon's Lair in Patch 2.4 and expecting the 3 cubes that were active in the public test realms. I thought I best clear things up here. A lot of writers talking about the Patch 2.4 notes based their research on the Public Test Realms. In the Public Test Realms (PTRs) prior to patch 2.4 Magtheridon Only had 3 cube clicking boxes, this was expected to be the major nerf Blizzard were talking about.

However when the live version of patch 2.4 was released we soon discovered that Magtheridon was back to 5 boxes and had been nerfed in other areas.

For instance, the infernals now spawn less frequently, the channelers are easier to take down and their is no debuff when you click a box, making rotations significantly easier.

For a Full Rundown of the actual Magtheridon's 2.4 Patch Changes (Not PTR notes) Click Here

Monday 21 April 2008

Tempest Keep Al'ar Guide

Al'ar is tehnically the first boss of tempest keep, though groups new to TK may skip him and go to the relatively easier Vod Reaver and Solarian first.

Al'ar is basically a large pheonix pet of Kael'Thas Sunstrider, and it's a pet that drops some pretty nice loot!

But down to the nitty gritty, Al'ar stands at 2,800,000 health and hasa couple of tages you need to watch out for. Al'ar also has several attacks that can devestate a raid,

Phase 1

  • Flame Quills: Al'ar will fly to the center of the room instead of moving to a new platform occasionally. Al'ar will then launch Flame Quills that hit anyone on the platforms or the outer part of the ramps. Deals around 8k Fire damage a second, for around five seconds.
  • Ember Blast: Explodes upon his first death, knocking back any raid member within 15 yards. This hits for about 10k fire damage, and upto 1k fall damage. WHen this is cast it signals phase 2

Phase 2

  • Rebirth: deals around 5k fire damage to any raid member within melee range, with a knockback across the room. This occurs several seconds after a Dive Bomb. He will spawn in the same location where the Dive Bomb hit. Al'ar will also use this ability at the start of Phase 2, when he respawns in the middle of the room.
  • Dive Bomb: Al'ar flies up, and targets a random player. Al'ar then dives into the ground at that location. This hits for around 5k fire damage, and spawns two Ember of Al'ar adds. Al'ar will then cast Rebirth at the same spot. 30 second cooldown.
  • Flame Patch: Tragets an area around a random player, deals 3k fire damage per tick.
  • Melt Armour: Target's armor is decreased by 80% for 60 seconds, another tank must taunt immediately after this is cast.
  • Enrage: Al'ar enrages 10 minutes after the start of phase 2, wiping the raid very quickly.

Ember of Al'ar

  • 70,000 health.
  • Hits for 1500 melee damage.
  • One spawns after each position change in Phase 1, two more spawn after each Dive Bomb in Phase 2.
  • Each time one is destroyed, Al'ar's health is drained by 3% of max health in phase 2.
  • Ember Blast: Explodes upon death, knocking back any player in range (~15 yards). Deals ~7k fire damage, and an additional ~1k fall damage.

These can be stunned but are immune to any other types of Crowd Control.

Gear

Despite the large amount of fire damage in this fight it is generally recommended that Fire resistance is not stacked unless you are a tank. As much damage as possible should be self healed in this fight so stock up on bandages and potions. Greater Fire Protection Potions are pretty useful in this fight!

Tactics

Phase 1

When the fight first begins Al'ar will always fly to platform on the far left, A tank should be ready and waiting to avoid flame buffet. During the entirety of phase one Ranged should be stood on the ground firing upwards, it is impossible for ranged to pull agro at this point of the fight. Melee can draw agro so must be careful to avoid pulling Al'ar as they will most likely be out of LoS. Tanks should stand on the very edge of the platform so healers can reach them, if they move too far into the platform they may lose line of sight.

In theory you should have five tanks on this boss though it is doable with three, one tank is required to handle the Embers of Al'ar, the other two should take each side of the platform, if you have an extra two tanks thy should cover the middle platforms. Flame Quills does cause some problems hear and can be avoided by jumping off the platforms. While it has been said that you can avoid it by moving against the walls on the ramps you can miss this as well, but with an 8k damage a tic debuff hitting up there My guild has never risked doing this. In the meantime whenever Al'ar starts spinning anyone left on the platform should jump down immediately and run back up. It is imperative your tanks return to their places immediately or your entire raid will start taking damage from Flame Buffet.

Once Al'ar has been on the first platform for 30 seconds he wil move onto the next one clockwise, he will repeat this pattern until a flame quill effect takes place..

Everytime Al'ar eaves a platform an Ember of Al'ar will spawn, these tend to go to the healers but a tank standing at the bottom of the two ramps can easily pick up any flying down. Since Melee are fairly ineffective on the boss they should help with the adds, a rogues stun is usefull around 3-4% health on these as it gives dps time to move out before the add explodes (This does mean one has to stay behind to finish it off, Paladins or Rogues cloak of shadows is good here.

If Al'ar casts Flame Quills he will return to either platform one or four. If your raid group does not have enough tanks for every platform you can have a tank waiting at the bottom of the platform ready to run up as soon as the flame quills ends.

Phase 2

A well proven tactic in phase two is to save Al'ars adds. Each time one of these is killed in phase two it removes 3% of Al'ars health. During phase one you can reduce an adds health down to ~5 % and in phase two a warlock can cast Seed of Corruption plus a couple of dots. When the explosions start chances are the tank holding the adds will die, unless they have a paladins bubble handy.

Phase 2 occurs when Al'ar reaches 0% health for the first time. When Al'ar hits 0% health it will explode for a large amount of fire damage and will reappear at the centre of the room casting a massive knock back effect. Flame Buffet is till in effect in phase two so a tank must pick Al'ar up immediately.

When phase two hits Ranged dps are better suited to the adds and melee on the boss, this helps when scattering to avoid meteor.

While on the ground Al'ar will spawn random flame patches on the ground. Players should move away from these asap, although since flame patches are targetted on a player they can be Spell Reflected.

Al'ar will occasionally charge, tanks should follow Al'ar when this happens, since he does not always return afterwards and can begin casting flame buffet. During this time Alar will cast a Melt Armour debuff on hte Tank lowering his armour by 60%, when this happens he should cease threat generation and another tank should take over.

When in the air Al'ar will cast Dive Bomb (Formerly Meteor) that will hit for around 5k on a target and people surrounding him. When this happens move away asap, he will return in teh same area with a hefty knockback spell. When this occurs we will spawn two more Embers of Al'ar on the ground he hit, tanks shouldbe ready to pick these up!

During this fight all players should stay off the ramps platforms and near the door as Al'ar has been known to bug and evade when dive bombing these locations, resetting him.

If you are a warrior jump into a flame patch and cast spell reflection. (This may have changed in Patch 2.4, Can any readers verify this??)

Tuesday 15 April 2008

Tales of Adventure in WoW

I have recently decided to take a bit of a break between writing my more serious posts by writing an in theme comedic journal of my wanderings around azeroth and the outlands. Bear with me as I am new to writing in my style but please take a look and comment at http://journalofadventure.blogspot.com/

I would am grateful for any support while I try to get in teh swing of writing this!

For those unsure, here is a quick excert,

"Todaye I also sawe a Warloke, whom I tolde to reforme his ways. He introduced me too hys fiende Shara, she yst prettey as a royale princesse, I shalle proposee to wedd her todaye,"

Later...

"Myne blessed princesse hath a whip ofe most acute payne. Indeed myne flighte hast never been so hastily runne as myne mistress tooke too thy aire on great leathern wings. I do notte hath a clue as too howe I missed those great thynges.

Fromm thys day forthe aye shalle seeke women from myne realme onley."

Monday 14 April 2008

Tempest Keep - High Astromance Solarian Tactics Guide

High Astromancer Solarian is usually the second boss taken down in Tempest Keep. This walkthrough will show you the tactics to help you down Solarian in no time!

Dispite Al'ar being the first boss seen in Tempest Keep (TK) Many groups have great difficulty taken down Al'ar so go for either Void Reaver or Solarian due to their relative ease.

Solarian has around 2,800,000 and has several abilities you must watch out for.

  • Wrath of the Astromancer: Turns a random raid member into a Bomb that hits for around 6k damage after 6 seconds, before it explodes the effected player will deal AoE damage to the raid. When the AoE hits everyone effected is thrown into the air and takes 90% fall damage. It is pretty much gaurenteed everyone effected by this will die. The person who was effected by the bomb will land unscathed from fall damage.
  • Arcane Missiles: Hits 3 times for 3k damage on a random raid member.
  • Blinding Light: 2.5k AoE arcane damage to the entire raid. Has a 20 second cooldown.
  • Every 50 seconds Solarian will disappear and three beams of light will appear. summoning around 12 - 15 non elite adds, after these fade Solarian will re-appear with two priest adds.
The adds have the following attributes,

Non elite Adds (Agents):

  • 30.000 Health
  • 1500 damage on cloth

Elite Adds (Priests):

  • 80,000 Health
  • 300 damage on cloth
Tactics

When setting up your raid group it helps to have some arcane resistance, but do not nerf yourself. The Violet Badge from a karazhan quest chain is incredibly useful here. Due to the large number of adds a Paladin tank is especially useful here and all raid members should group around him when the adds appear.

Phase One.

The raid should be split into two groups, melee and ranged. Each group should have a leader and back up leader marked by a symbol. All members of each group must gather around their relevant leader. This ensures that when anybody gets the bomb debuff they can move out of the way of everyone else ASAP.

The bomb is the raid breaker in this fight, who ever has it will have large purple flairs emminating from his body. They must move out of the way of your raid as soon as physically possible to reduce raid damage. Everyone hitby this will get thrown into the air and will take around 90% fall damage apart from the person with the bomb debuff (they will land unscathed). Anyone who gets hit by this will most likely die.

The second thing that needs to be watched out for is Arcane Missiles, these hit for 9k damage in quick succession, all but the main tank healer need to keep an eye out for this and throw some quick heals on, flash heal and flash of light are perfect for this.

Phase 2

When phase 2 hits Solarian will disappear and three beams of light will appear. From these between 12 and 15 non elites will spawn, these hit for 1.5k damage so must be tank controlled. This can be done by tank rotation on AoE agro but it is much more effective if you have a paladin Tank. When this occurs to avoid problems both groups must group together, if this doesnt happen then the adds will go after random players and it is very likely they will die. After 15 Seconds Solarian will respawn along with two priests. The priests must be stunlocked and interrupted, otherwise they will heal both Solarian and Themselves. All DPS should nuke these down as soon as they can.

The first two phases will rotate several times.

Phase 3

Phase three turns into a simple tank and spank. When Solarian hits 20% health she will turn into a voidwalker. This will significantly increase her armour and her previous attacks will cease. She now has an arcane bolt attack and a fear spell. The fear should be avoided with spells such as fear ward or stance dancing, failure to do so can result in Solarian attacking DPS.

Manage to handle all this and you have managed to down Solarian, i hope this walkthrough helped, and even more so that the guide led you to success!

Sunday 13 April 2008

Tempest Keep - Void Reaver (Loot Reaver)

For many guilds Tempest Keep and Serpent Shrine Cavern are their ultimate goals. Tempest Keep tends to be easier for most who are new to 25 man content, but only on certain bosses.

Although Al'ar is meant to be the first boss in Tempest Keep he is fairly difficult, for this reason many guilds new to the instance may find themselves heading to Void Reaver, otherwise known as Loot Reaver due to how easily he is downed and the pretty damn nice loot he drops.

So onto what you need to know about the Void Reaver, his health stands at around 4,750,000 and life and mana drain effects will not work on him. The fight only has two main points, one part for ranged and one for tanks. Ranged must look out for Arcane Orbs, Tanks must be aware of KNock Away, a threat reduction ability. To deal with knock away you will need three, but preferably four tanks in your group. But back on point, here are his skills in a bit more detail!

  • Pounding: An 18 yard AoE around the Void Reaver that lasts for 3 seconds and hits for around 1k to 2.3k arcane damage per second, This can be resisted and isfor no more than three seconds.
  • Arcane Orb: A ranged AoE with a 6 second silence effect that hits for around 6k Damage to a player. This has a 3 second cooldown and will be fired towards a random player, it moves pretty slow and can be avoided, or rather, must be avoided as they can do a lot of damage. This will only be fired at raid members outside the 18 yard range of Pounding.
  • Knock Away: A Single target push back ability that is used on the tank with the highest threat and reduces the players aggro significantly. It has a 20 sec cooldown and can be missed, parried or dodged to avoid the threat reduction debuff.
Due to Voidreaver being a fairly simple boss the tactics are likewise very easy. As previously noted you should have four tanks keeping agro on the boss, he is untaunatble so keeping your threat up is a priority if you are tanking Void Reaver. the Melee and tanks should all be placed in the same groups so AoE heals have full effect. These should be used liberally to counteract Pounding. Circle of Healing and Chain Heal are ideal for this.

For ranged players everyone should spread out ina circle at maximum range from Void Reaver. When he casts an arcane orb towards you it is imperative that you move out of the way as soon as possible. It may help to assign your healers locations around the room, this should prevent anyone leaving healing range.

Agro Management is the absolute key to this fight, A sharp eye is needed on your threat meter as tanks all too often dip below the top DPSers on this boss, and chances are that will wipe your raid group!

Tuesday 8 April 2008

Addons - Gazmik Fizzwidget's Adspace

For those of you who have spent a look at addons you will no doubt have come across some of Fizzwidget's wares. A lot of his addons are aimed towards professions or hunters, however one of his addons shines out to me above all others.

Adspace is laughably simple but ingeniously brilliant.

We have all been there, we goto the auction house, there is a white recipe you want going for 15g. You know that somewhere it will be on a vendor, but finding ouch which one is a royal pain in the behind.

Adspace however comes to the rescue quite neatly. on the end of any recipe/pattern/etc tooltip it adds another couple of lines describing vendor locations for your faction (Alliance or Horde). So if you are in the Auction House and you hover over a recipe instead of wasting your hard earned gold you now have something telling you it is infact only a flight path away.

I know this isnt a game changing addon, it wont help you in a raid and it wont help you kill anyone else. It could however save you 10 minutes of tabbing and searching the internet every so often, and it could save you wasting your gold on items you could have bought significantly cheaper at a vendor!

Zul'Aman - Akil'zon Guide & Tips

Akil'zon is the second boss you should reach in Zul'Aman, especially if you are attempting the timed event. To reach Akil'zon you must first run the gauntlet, which requires you to run up the hill defeating the mass of mobs in your way. To complete this it is best to have a paladin tank up front and another tank behind your group. Two AoErs are advised for this and keep your DPS on their toes when looking for the elites that will come towards you.

Akil'zon himself is the Eagle formed boss of Zul'aman (ZA) and will call forth the powers of the birds and the air against you, the birds he calls are a nightmare to control, but they can fortunately be taken down with relative easy by affliction locks, hunters or shamans. The electrical storms are what will really get you!

But down to business, Akil'zon is regarded as one of ZA's easiest bosses if your raid is on their toes. He sits at a rather meagre 660,000 health but does have high armour, mitigating physical damage and making it preferable to keep warlocks as boss dps and hunters on bird control. He has a fair number of spells at his disposal and it is essential you know these and how to avoid them as much as possible.

Summon Amani Eagle - Summons Soaring Eagles which hit for around 1.5k damage with their Eagle Swoop attack. They can only be hit by ranged DPS.
Static Disruption - Deals 3.5k damage to Akil'zon's target and those arouns it. Also debuffs players, increasing nature damage taken by 25% for 20 seconds.
Call Lightning - Deals around 3.5k - 4.5k nature damage to the target.
Gust of Wind - Throws a player up into the air, the player will lose around 50% health when they hit the ground. For this reason it is important to keep players above 50% hp at all times"
Electrical Storm - Channeled spell that raises a player into the air and forms a cloud around him. Anyonenot underneath the palyer will receive an increasing amount of nature damage, first hit for aroun 1k, second 2k, third 3k and so forth. This lasts for around 7 or 8 seconds.
Enrage - He will enrage after 8 minutes increasing damage dealt by 50%, this will meana wipe.

Tactics

Positioning is key for the Akil'zon fight, spread out to avoid the AoE from static disruption. Melee should all strive to stay as far as possible away from each other, this is hard to do in such a mall space but hte further you get the less jumps the spell will make!

The main reason for wiping in this fight is electrical storm. During this spell a player will be lifted into the air and electricity will fire out and damage all players not directly underneath him. To achieve this all players should gather at Akil'zon (So melee DPS cans till attack) approximately 7 seconds before the storm starts, addons such as deadly boss mods are useful for predicting when the storm will happen. Even then a raid leader should shout out for everyone to group up at the boss, since one person not moving can wipe the raid!

You should wait till 7 seconds before hand to avoid Static Disruption causing mass damage to your raid group. The only problem with this is that the timer used by addons like deadly boss mods only times the cooldown, Akil'zon may cast this any time after the cooldown has finished. For this reason your healers must be on the ball incase he casts a static discharge before electrical storm.

After the first Electrical Storm is first cast Akil'zon will cast his summon soaring eagles spell. These cannot be attacked by melee classes and will dive about causing around 1.5k damage a hit. While these can be succesfully ignored by a good group I would not recommend it as it can put a huge strain on the healers if too many spawn at once.

Instead warlocks, hunters and shamans should use instant cast spells to take down these pesky feathered fighters. Due to the difficulty of casting a spell while the birds are still in range it is suggested that mages continue to DPS on the boss.

Once you have mastered surviving the Electrical Storm you will have mastered this boss. Good Luck!

Sunday 6 April 2008

Wii Competition!

You heard it here first!

Our friends over at WiiRinControl.com have announced their new competition to win some Wii VC Goodies. The competition is 100% free to enter and you can up your chances five times over by referring some friends!

To Enter all you have to do is sign up and introduce yourself, stay active and you will even automatically be entered into future competitions to win fantastic prizes around once every 3 weeks!


So if you are a Wii fanatic, interested in talking about all teh latest Wii news and games tehn take a look at http://www.wiirincontrol.com and check out this brand new Wii games and hardware discussion website!

Saturday 5 April 2008

Void Shatter - One Void Crystal into Large Prismatic Shards.

With the release of Patch 2.4 and Sunwell Isle we saw the release of a new enchanting spell, namely Formula: Void Shatter. The formula for Void Shatter can be picked up on Sunwell Isle and trained at 360, however you also need a Runed Eternium Rod. These babies need 370 enchanting and can cost between 500g to 600g to make, good job Blizzard.

Void Shatter simply turns one void crystal into two Large Prismatic Shards. It has a 24 hour cooldown to prevent the market getting flooded, but it has started to affect the price of both items ingame. Large Prismatics are getting cheaper and void crystals getting mroe expensive. This is kind of a shame since Large prismatics were a great source of income from heroics for me, boosting each heroic run to an easy 70g profit.

I believe the reason Blizzard released this was two fold.

First to balance out the cost of the two items. Large prismatics and void crystals have become massively disproportioned on most servers with Void Crystals selling at upto half the price of Large Prismatic Shards on some servers.

The second reason is most likely the upcoming release of the Wrath of the Lich King Expansion. As with most things they are making items easier to get so that people can be more prepared for the expansion. This has happened to Epic gear with welfare epics, now be prepared for welfare enchants!

Wether this is a good change or not is debatable. I however am in favour of it, I believe enchants currently cost an insane amount, much more than they should do compared to other things. Getting a slight upgrade via an enchant can cost easily double that of a gear upgrade, im not sure why this is!

Tuesday 1 April 2008

The Magisters' Terrace Guide -Sunwell Isle (MrT or MgT)

The Magisters' Terrace is a brand new 5 man instance that appeared in Patch 2.4. Yes I know this isn't a raid but due to its increased difficulty and in heroic mode Kara equivalent drops I thought I should cover it!

There are four bosses, each of which I have done a write up for,

Selin Fireheart
Vexallus
Priestess Delrissa
Kael'Thas Sunstrider

But not only are there four kick ass bosses (Including Kael'thas from Tempest Keep) but the trash is also insane, and requires good and well played crowd control.

Here is a rundown of the trash in Magisters' Terrace (Known as MrT or MgT depending on your server!)

Mob Normal Heroic Mode
Sunblade Blood Knight Hits hard and can heal with Holy Light. Uses a stealable seal (Seal of Wrath) that adds a large amount of holy damage to each melee and spell. Can be mind controlled, sheeped, seduced or trapped.
Sunblade Mage Guard Casts a stationary Magic Dampening Field that reduce spell damage and healing received by 75% on a player. Also has an AoE stun seun effect and a random Glaive Throw. Can be mind controlled, sheeped, seduced, or trapped.
Sunblade Magister Uses Arcane Nova and Frostbolt. Every spell cast gives them a stacking 10% haste bonus to spellcasting, the haste buff is stealable and dispellable, so if you have a mage wait for this to stack a few times then spellsteal! Immune to Mind Control and Seduce. Can be sheeped.
Sunblade Warlock Repeatedly casts Incinerate and occasionally casts Immolate. Has a stealable fel armor buff that provides 250 spell damage. Mages should steal this as well! Comes with an easily killed Imp pet. Can be mind controlled, sheeped, seduced, or trapped.
Sunblade Physician Their weapons have Inject Poison that puts a DoT on the player for 1.2k-1.4k nature damage to the target every 3 sec for 15 sec. He will also use Prayer of mending. Can be seduced, mind controlled, or sheeped. You must keep this guy crowd controlled as prayer of mending can heal for a lot.
Inject Poson hits for 3k - 3.5k per 3 seconds for 15 seconds.
Wretched Bruiser Low power Melee mob, can be ignored till al one CC'ed mobs are taken down. He has a Fel Infusion spell that increases speed and damage dealt for 10 sec. Also uses Wretched Strike (Mortal Strike like) that reduces healing done to the target
Hit clothies for 2-3k. Dont AoE in Heroic Mode
Wretched Skulker Dual Wield mob. Uses Fel Infusion to increase attack speed and damage for 10 sec. Also uses Wretched Stab to do normal damage plus 150. Hit clothies for around 2-3k. Don't AoE in heroic mode
Wretched Husk Casts Frostbolt and Fireball as well as casting Fel Infusion to increase attack speed and damage for 10 sec.
Sunblade Sentinel Casts fel lightning on all nearby party members which hits for around 1.5k fire damage.
Brightscale Wyrm These come in large packs of between 8-12 before the boss Vexallus. They provide a stacking damage buff called Energy Infusion upon being killed. Each kill gives everyone in the party another 1% to their damage done. These ahve low health so all AoErs get in on this, including priests with holy nova/
Sunblade Keeper He occasionally spawns with the Wyrms and will detonate a mana cell. This causes the Wyrm groups to go into a feeding frenzy and become a single large and difficult to take down group. The person with the highest agro wil usually get banashed, be warned this is often the healer. On top of that he also has Shadow Bolt and Shadow Bolt Volley in his arsenal.

Sister of Torment Will use a seduce called Deadly Embrace, on random targets as well as Lash of Pain. Can be enslaved or banished, and is susceptible to a Paladin's Turn Evil.
Ethereum Smuggler Will occasionally teleport to a random target and spam a lot of Arcane Explosion very quickly. Can be sheeped, trapped and Mind Controled.
Coilskar Witch Attacks with a bow and has the spells and effects Forked Lightning, Frost Arrow, and Mana Shield. Can be mind controlled, sapped and seduced.

As with all trash pulls of this type you must crowd control or nuke down the healers asap. At the start of the instance you will see a lot of stationary magic dampening fields, use these to your advantage. A well co-ordinated group can step in these till they hit around 50% health (If they are taking spell damage), then step out so your healers can top you up.

Be careful though, stepping in these reduces reduces damage and healing taken, so your healer must remember not to cast heals while you are in the field (Since teh heal will be reduced by 75% and become very mana inefficient. Doing this reduces your damage taken by spells by 75% and stepping out gives you the opportunity to receive full healing effects. If you are taking damage from a melee class move out of these asap as it has no benefit and massively reduces the healing you take!

Magisters' Terrace Guide - Kael'thas Sunstrider

Kael'thas Sunstrider is originally in Tempest Keep, however at the final boss of the Magisters Terrace you will find Kael'thas Sunstrider alive and well, although with a big green rdiamond stuck in his chest.

So far it is estimated that Kael'thas Sunstrider has around 170,000 Health, but dont let the low amount fool you, this boss is no cakewalk. He has a host of abilities that will decimate your raid if you are not careful!

  • Fireball - Hits for around 2.5k in normal, 6k in heroic mode. Its not resistable but can be interrupted and reflected.
  • Flamestrike - A large circle will appear on the ground, you have 5 seconds to get out of there or you and any other party members inside it will get hit for 5k (9k in heroics)
  • Summon Phoenix - In phase 1 towards a party member, they have a threat meter and can be kited, mages or hunters are good for this. In phase 2 they will stop moving and cast fireballs at party members. They pulse hellfire consistantly meaning a Pheonix can kill itself. When they die they will emit a low radius but high damage explosion with the knockback effect, leaving an egg. This must be destroyed ASAP or another phoenix will hatch!
  • Gravity Lapse - Gravity Lapse is cast in phase two (beginning at 50% health) Gravity lapse does several things, dfirslty it throws you into the air, especially when youg et close to the ground. Secondly it creates a DoT on all raid members for 300hp a second and thirdly he will spawn 3 Arcane Orbs (I hate these things) which do high melee damage. YOu can move during Gravity Lapse in a similar way to swimming.
In Heroic mode he casts two more spells
  • Shock Barrier - Absorbs 10k damage and makes him immune to interrupts. This usually signals the casting of pyro blast so all players must nuke asap to take the shield down and a player with interupt capability must do so ASAP
  • Pyroblast - Around 55k Damage on the current target, usually the tank. Cannot be reflected and can only be interrupted when you get the Shock Barrier down.
Tactics

To begin with Kael'thas will mostly melee, casting only an occasional fireball. To make things even better these can be interrupted, so anyone with the ability should use it! He will cast Flamestrikes regularly, everyone in your group should however be able to avoid taking damage with ease.

When the phoenix spawns be sure to nuke him down ASAP, especially if you are nearing 50% of Kael'thas's health. If his health nears 50% and the PHoenix is still not dead cease DPS and take him out.

The best way to deal with the pheonix is to kite and nuke with two ranged DPS, the DPS must keep the phoenix away from the main group AND themselves to avoid taking damage on it's death. You will usually have at least 2 spawn during the fight. Make sure you destroy the egg or you will have to deal with an additional respawn!

To gain distance on the phoenix DPSers may find it usefull to jump down from the stage, forcing the phoenix to go down the ramp, this is a great way to gain some extra dps time.

When Kael'thas hits 50% he will cast the first gravity lapse. When this happens you will float freely around and take 300 damage a second for 30 seconds. At the same time he will summon three Arcane Orbs these hit for 2k a time so your party should fly around and avoid these. During Gravity Lapse there is no tanking required so everyone should all out DPS Kael'Thas if they get the opportunity.

After 30 Seconds Kael'thas will end Gravity Lapse due to him becoming 'tired' During this time he takes 50% plus damage and will not attack, so all out DPS him and use all DPS cooldowns. When this ends after another 30 seconds he will get back up and recast gravity lapse. It is possible for several classes to solo this boss after 50%, most notably Affliction warlocks, since Kael'Thas no longer attacks and the adds can be out manouvered.

No player should release spirit while any other player remains alive.

If you are doing this boss in heroic mode the fight is very similar but with one major difference. Shock barrier/pyroblast needs tobe taken down asap. If Kael'Thas casts Shock Barrier you must immediately take down the shield and then cast an interrupt on his Pyroblast or it is nearly gaurenteed you will wipe. The two possible escapes are a paladin bubble and warriors Shield wall/last stand (Sometimes)