Karazhan is an abandoned ancient tower, located in the Deadwind Pass. It is a ten man raid dungeon at level 70 in World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. In lore,
it was noted for its famous occupant; the last Guardian of Tirisfal, Medivh. After Medivh had been defeated by the army of Azeroth during the First War,
Karazhan was abandoned and has remained in that condition. The arcane powers, however, have never abandoned the tower.
Attumen the Huntsman
Moroes
Wizard of Oz
Big Bad Wolf
Romulo & Julianna
Curator
Terestian Illhoof
Shade of Aran
Netherspite
Prince Malchezaar
Nightbane
General Information
Location: Deadwind Pass
Number of Players: 10
Level: 70
Final boss: Nightbane / Prince Malchezaar
Released: added in the Burning Crusade
Key : The Master's Key
The instance contains 12 bosses.
There is NO gryphon/wind rider transportation hub at the top of the tower.
The staircase from the gatehouse to the ballroom contains 53 stairs.
NOTE (As of 2.0.7) A teleporter has been added to Berthold the Doorman (in the front entrance of Karazhan) that activates after the Shade of Aran is killed. This will port players back up to the Aran's room to allow more attempts on Prince Malchezzar.*
Opera house - Talk to stagemaster to open the door to the stage and get in before he closes it.
"Bizarre" library which doesn't obey the laws of physics.
A very big, scripted instance - Tigole: "You could fit 20 Shadowfang [Keeps] inside of Karazhan =P"
Medivh's staff - [Atiesh, Greatstaff of the Guardian] - can be used to teleport players to the front gate of Karazhan.
A non-winged dungeon with optional bosses.
It is currently in dispute among the WoW community as to who is the 'true' final boss of Karazhan. Many feel that Prince Malchezaar, as ruler of the tower, is the final boss. Others feel that Nightbane, who is more difficult than Malchezaar and can only be summoned once Malchezaar is defeated, is the real final enemy.
Koren <The Blacksmith>, next to where you fight Attumen the Huntsman, can repair your gear as soon as you get Honored with The Violet Eye. He also sells some epic Blacksmithing recipes (resistance gear).
Outside of the Gamesman's Hall is a Reagent and The Consortium rep reward vendor who can also repair your gear.
The first guild to clear it was Death and Taxes, Korgath-US, on January 28th 2007.
History and lore
Karazhan is located in Deadwind Pass on the sub-continent of Azeroth. Existing long before Medivh inhabited it, it is unknown who originally built Karazhan or who now resides within its walls.
During the first war the tower was inhabited by Medivh, his butler Moroes, his cook Cook and his then apprentice Khadgar. Garona also resided here as an emissary in the same time of Khadgar's apprenticeship. Sargeras allowed Medivh to freely explore Karazhan. It is said many strange and disturbing visions lurked within the tower, and Moroes was known for wearing blinders to avoid seeing them. Much of the story from this era is presented in the novel The Last Guardian.
Recently, despite Medivh's absence, a new power seems to have made its home in Karazhan. The Black Riders of Deadwind Pass, though rarely seen, have a connection to Karazhan. However, no one knows who their master is. One recent sighting is cause for concern - the Black Riders seek the Scythe of Elune, a powerful artifact with the ability to summon the vile Worgen into this world.
It is believed that all ley lines on Azeroth lead to a location under Karazhan.
Worldofwarcraft.com says the following about Karazhan:
The decrepit tower of Karazhan once housed one of the greatest powers Azeroth has ever known: the sorcerer Medivh. Since his death, a terrible curse has pervaded the tower and the surrounding lands. The spirits of nobles from nearby Darkshire reportedly walk its halls, suffering a fate worse than death for their curiosity. More dangerous spirits wait within Medivh's study, for it was there that he summoned demonic entities to do his bidding. However, the brave and foolish are still relentlessly drawn to Karazhan, tempted by rumors of unspeakable secrets and powerful treasures. Forge a group of ten stalwart heroes, and journey to the tower in Deadwind Pass - but be warned that only those who have achieved level 70 should dare enter.
Karazhan Progression
Attumen the Huntsman
General Information
Type: Undead
Health: approx 350,000
Attacks and Abilities
Phase 1
Attumen
Basic Melee: Melees from anywhere between 1600 and 2100 damage on tank, 8000 on cloth. He can, and should, be disarmed. Immune to taunt.
Shadow Cleave: 360 degree Cleave for around 4k. Edit: Since patch 2.10 Cleaves are no more 360 degree.
AoE Curse: Wide-area curse that reduces chance to hit with melee and ranged attacks and spells by 50%. Can be removed by mages and druids.
Mount Up: When he or Midnight is at 25% he will mount up. All aggro will be wiped and Attumen will be healed up to the percentage Midnight had, if he had less HP than his horse. Phase 2 will then start.
Midnight
Basic Melee: Around 1800 damage
Phase 2
Basic Melee: Melees for anywhere around 1600 to 3300. Still Immune to taunt
Shadow Cleave: Same as Phase 1.
AoE Curse: Same as Phase 1.
Charge: Does a knockdown to the targeted player. Charge does about 330 Damage to clothies and can get a Melee swing on the charged person.
Strategies
Video of Attumen the Huntsman Kill
Tank and DPS
Before Phase 1 Draw aggro on Midnight. This will also pull all the trash mobs before the boss if you have not cleared them all. These mobs will begin to respawn after approximately 25 minutes, if the fight sequence is not active. After a few seconds Attumen will show up, presumably when Midnight is at 95%. The hard part is getting aggro of Attumen as soon as he spawns, otherwise he will run to your healers and probably one-shot them.
The main tank will want to be on Midnight. The off tank should stand near Midnight, but between him and the healers. When Attumen spawns (he spawns right where Midnight is standing when the fight is not still engaged and he takes like 3 secs before he'll start to move so the OT as enough time to act), it is imperative that the off tank pick him up immediately. Instant abilities such as shield slam seem to work really well here. Hunters in the group can make use of misdirection to help if a quick pick up is not successful.
Phase 1
Once the off tank has picked up Attumen, drag him to the far side of the corral. The tank should be disarming Attumen as much as possible, as that reduces the damage he deals by approximately 75%. (This is why we put the off tank on Attumen, as he does less damage than Midnight when disarmed.)
Midnight should be tanked away from the raid. Generally we keep the horse in the center of the corral. Absolutely no DPS on Attumen. Everybody should be on the horse. When Midnight is down to approximately 25%, the next phase will begin. All aggro will be wiped, so all DPS must stop immediately at this point.
(Alternatively you can DPS Midnight down to ~30%, then DPS Attumen until he mounts up. This way, the mounted up Attumen will only have about 25-30% left.)
Phase 2
Attumen will now mount up on Midnight, wipe aggro, and will be healed up to the percentage Midnight had, if he had less HP than his horse. The main tank must pick him up immediately to prevent clothies from getting one-shotted. If your hunter(s) haven't used misdirect it can come in handy here as well. Have the MT use shield wall at this time. This way the MT can get good aggro and the boss won't pull onto the healers from initial healing aggro.
Healers should keep everybody's health topped off through this part of the fight. Attumen will randomly charge once in a while and hit for 6,000+ on cloth. It's not that often though, so just heal through it. Bandaging is perfectly acceptable here.
Once the tank has a solid hold on Attumen's aggro, start DPS. We usually have the off tank continue to disarm Attumen whenever possible as it reduces his damage by a large amount. Mages and Druids must be aware of the curse that he casts as it reduces your hit rate by 50%.
You can usually avoid the random charges if you stand everybody in the dead zone - outside of the range of Attumen's cleave, but still within melee range. Make sure to keep Attumen facing away from the group, and only the tank should be taking damage. (This is a tricky thing to do, we were unable to keep him from charging our group, but it felt like he charged less when we did this.)
Keep up the DPS and there you go - congratulations, you've downed your first (probably) Karazhan boss.
Role Specifics
Tanks This seems to be a very aggro sensitive fight so be alert in case you lose aggro. Get aggro of Attumen immediately after he spawns (he spawns next to Midnight), or he will go on a rampage on the rest of your raid. After getting the -50% hit debuff, count in your head to 28, then pop shield reflection. This will send his next debuff back to him, helping your healers dramatically in their quest to keep you alive, and keeping the debuff off of you to keep threat production up.
DPS A very aggro sensitive fight so do anything you can to stay below the tank in the threat meters.
Healers Keep the tank alive. One healer should be enough for the tank offtanking Midnight (in phase 1).
Additional Notes
Attumen is primarily a gear check. Most people consider him a pushover in terms of strategy, but he hits very hard. If you find yourself having trouble it may be that your gear is simply inadequate. Collect more loot from the level 70 wings of the 5-man dungeons or from Naxxramas.
When you kill the first trash mob in his room, you have 25 minutes to engage Midnight before it respawns. Attumen should be engaged before that time or the respawned adds will engage you when you pull. You don't need to kill the 5 "humans" near the quest giver (the friendly <Blacksmith>).
Attumen is immune to bleed effects, as of patch 2.10 Midnight is now immune to bleed effects as well - Reason: He is a skeletal horse (Taken from the Blizz patch notes)
Moroes
General Information
Type: Undead
Health: Around 378,000
Abilities
Basic Melee: 1600-2500 on plate.
Vanish: Vanishes, does not drop aggro.
Garrote: After reappearing from Vanish, he will immediately garrote someone, dealing 1000 damage every 3 seconds for FIVE MINUTES (100k total damage). This cannot be dispelled, however Dwarf Stoneform, Paladin Divine Shield and Mage Ice Block do remove the effect including Blessing of Protection. After he garrotes, he will immediately return to the highest aggro prior to the vanish. As of 2/6/07 all garrotes are removed when Moroes is defeated. If you reset the encounter by running out of the banquet hall, the garrote is not removed. However, dying from garrote incurs no durability loss.
Blind: A poison that occasionally blinds the second-highest aggro, causing them to wander. Dispellable.
Gouge: Gouges the highest aggro, incapacitating them. Moroes will attack the second highest aggro. This can be prevented by having the person with the highest aggro turn his back onto Moroes.
Enrage: At 30% Moroes Enrages.
Adds
Moroes will have different adds in every instance, much like Chromaggus' breaths. Each add will be based off a class and spec.
Baron Rafe Dreuger Retribution Paladin Health: 68k
Baroness Dorothea Milstipe Shadow Priest Health: 66k
Lady Catriona Von'Indi Holy Priest Health: 66k
Lady Keira Berrybuck Holy Paladin Health: 68k
Lord Crispin Ference Protection Warrior Health: 83.4k
Lord Robin Daris Mortal Strike Warrior Health: 84k
Note: This Boss must die before Opera event can be activated for progression.
Strategies
Video of Moroes Kill
The pull should be executed by the main tanks, simply by running to the platform or by simply shooting Moroes and gathering up Moroes and his adds. Alternately a hunter can use Misdirection to pull to the main tank so that tank positioning can be setup prior to the pull.
As many adds as possible should be crowd controlled. This can be accomplished by use of priests' shackle, paladins' fear (turn undead) which should be considered a last resort becuase fearing an add out of the room resests the fight, and hunters' freezing traps. The remaining uncontrolled adds should be tanked and killed. If you have a Rogue and primarily ranged dps, the best way to deal with the adds is to have the rogue use crippling poison in the off hand and mind-numbing poison in the main hand. This will enable the ranged dps to nuke the add from the beginning of the fight and not have worry about healing a third tank. This kiting techinque is very mana efficient for the healers and enables you to down the adds quicker becuase you don't have to worry about aggro. If you have the either of the Priest, they should be killed first. In the event you have two you are lucky becuase they go down the fastest, just make sure you interrupt the greater heals from the holy priest and the mana burn from the shadow priest. If you have either of the warriors, they should be shackled and kept shackled, as they are extremely difficult to kill.
Two tanks will be on Moroes. One tank should be building aggro on both Moroes and the uncontrolled add(s). The adds need to be killed quickly, after which the raid can concentrate on Moroes. The off-tank should consistently remain second on the aggro list, because after a gouge Moroes will turn to the person with the second-highest aggro. When the offtank is blinded, it needs to be removed immediately by a Shaman, Paladin or Druid (it is a poison). If no one in the raid can remove poison, the main tank should turn his back to Moroes to avoid being gouged. If the off-tank is blinded and main tank is gouged, Moroes will run off into the healers or DPS.
Crowd control is extremely important during this fight. The incapacitated adds must not run free for long, as many of them can easily one shot cloth-wearers or heal Moroes. It is recommended shackle be applied every 5 seconds or so. If an add does break loose, a tank should taunt it; however he should not attack since the crowd control will ideally be reapplied soon. Note that the Paladin adds, and possibly the Priest adds as well, can cleanse Shackle from the other adds. Also be aware that the paladins can cast blessings on the Moroes and his entourage, so be ready to dispell or purge.
Priests: Currently the Shadowfiend will sometimes randomly target a CC'd mob even if Moroes is not vanishing. This will generally lead to complete havoc, so it is highly recommended that Shadowfiend is not used AT ALL during the fight unless there is no CC active.
Hunters/Warlocks: Keep track of your pet, make sure that it doesn't attempt to attack a shackled add when Moroes vanishes.
DPS Moroes steadily, and be sure to heal through the garrotes. Losing even one person on this fight can be devastating.
After Moroes dies, his adds will remain and will need to be killed.
Pull as mentioned above. Putting MS Warrior on shackle, Retri-Paladin gets tanked by 2nd tank. First kill the Shadowpriest because she can cast mana burn (our WL got burned for full mana), while that, keep the holy priest busy, then focus her. Then DPS on Moroes. If you have a paladin along, have him fear the Retri-Paladin, so the 2nd tank is not too busy with tanking/taking damage from him. Stun of Paladin is purge/cleansable.
Useful tip: Dropping a Earthbind totem or positioning a mage between shackled mobd and there priest to frost nova if shackle breaks, which gives more time to reapply shackle and can save lives.
Alternate Strategy (Kiting):
This strat aims to Kite/CC Moroes' guards so the MT/OT only have to worry about Moroes, it also assumes the following:
1) There are two mages in the raid. (or a mage and another class that can kite)
2) You have two priests that are shackling two guards.
3) You have two tanks, both on Moroes.
Determine your kill order of Moroes' guards. Before the pull starts, have your mages start casting Pyroblast (Followed by Slow) or Frostbolt on the targets that are not being shackled.
This is to ensure the mages get aggro of the targets they are going to kite as soon as the pull happens.
Before the spell casts all the way, the MT pulls, timing it so the adds that aren't being shackled are being hit by the mages' spells as soon as the pull happens. Priests shackle their targets, then focus their healing on the MT/OT.
Both mages kite their targets while the rest of the raid DPS's them down.
Once the unshackled targets are DPS'd down, have one mage break the next shackle and kite that one as well. (Do not break shackle of a guard that can cleanse until last)
Repeat for the last guard.
There is no need to waste any mana healing against the guards, nobody should be taking damage (watch out while kiting the MS warrior, he whirlwinds, don't kite him through your healers).
If you do not have two mages capable of kiting, stick a rogue on the 2nd target using crippling poison or a warrior with hamstring while someone else (like a hunter or warlock) holds aggro and kites.
This strat can be altered a bit to suit the classes of your raid, for example, if you have three priests, shackle three guards and only kite one at a time. Just make sure you have enough kiting so tanks do not have to worry about the guards and can focus on Moroes.
Once done kiting/killing all four guards, focus on Moroes as noted in the above strategy.
Useful Macros:
As a priest, it can be very difficult to reshackle one add and to maintain healing on the tank at the same time. A simple macro can do the reshackle, you can push it between two heals every 5-10 seconds. You must keep Baroness Dorothea Milstipe shackled all the time.
Shackle Focus Macro: The macro system in WoW 2.0 introduces a new element called focus which allows a player to save a target as its "focus" and, using macros, cast spells on the focus without losing your current target. Detailed examples from Useful Mage Macros use Polymorph, but can easily be extended to Shackle Undead. The macro is below:
Notes
The encounter can be reset by exiting the room.
The encounter is also reset if any of the mobs exit the room (such as being feared).
Immune to Charge.
Paladins can remove Garrote from other players with Blessing of Protection, and from themselves with Divine Shield. If it is skilled down to a 3 minute cooldown, it is possible to use this multiple times in one encounter. Garrote should not be removed from tanks, since they are the main heal targets anyway. Mages can also remove garrote using Ice Block.
Prior to patch 2.0.10, Luffa was a viable means of removing the Garrote. However, after patch 2.0.10, the Luffa was changed so that it only removes bleed effects if the caster is level 60 or below.
Limited Invulnerability Potions can be used to negate the bleed damage for a short period, but it won't remove the Garrote effect itself.
Dwarves can use Stoneform to remove Garrote.
The adds are immune to bleed, but Moroes himself is not.
Rogues should use Cheap Shot, Kidney Shot, Kick, Gouge and Vanish to interrupt Mana Burn (Dorothea), Heal (Catriona) and Holy Light (Keira). Do not chain stun due to diminishing returns. Vanish and Cheap Shot again if necessary. You need every ounce of DPS possible for this fight, do not bother with non-damaging poisons.
Wizard of Oz
Abilities
Tinhead
Cleave: 5 yd range. Instant. Inflicts Physical damage to an enemy and its nearest allies, affecting up to 3 targets.
Frost attacks will cause a Rust debuff, which slows Tinhead 10% and stacks up to 8 times, permitting kiting.
Five applications of Sunder Armor will also cause the Rust debuff.
Roar
Roar is rather cowardly, and susceptible to fear. However, often he will run into one of the two doors and go out of line of sight making him very difficult to keep constantly feared. Be prepared for many early breaks and resists, as he seems to do this quite often.
Frightened Scream: Instant. Lets out a scream, causing up to 3 nearby enemies to flee for 2 sec.
Dorothee
Water Bolt: (uninterruptible) Cast Time 1.5 seconds, Frost Damage 2025-2475
Summon Tito: Summons Tito. 35k HP. Ability: Annoying Yipping. Instant. Pacifies and silences an enemy, rendering it unable to attack or cast spells for 2 sec.
Untankable: Shoots her Water Bolt at a random raid member.
Strawman
Burning Straw: Extremeley high chance for Strawman to be disoriented for 6 seconds when struck by fire damage abilities. Scorch is an excellent ability to proc this debuff.
Brain Bash: Stunned.
The Crone
Cyclone: Knocks the player up into the air. Interrupts casting, although instacast spells can still be used while in the air. Avoidable by moving around the stage.
Chain Lightning: 45 yd range, 2 sec cast, Strikes an enemy with a lightning bolt that arcs to another nearby enemy. The spell affects up to 5 targets, inflicting greater Nature damage to each successive target. 2775-3225 damage.
Tips
NOTE: As of 03/19/07 you can reset this encounter, as well as any other Opera House encounter, by jumping over the edge of the balcony towards the audience (you will fall into the empty room below and will have less to clear if there are repops). Near the center of the balcony seems to be a good spot to jump...You cant clear the railing in one jump but you can jump halfway up it, then over the edge on your next jump. At the very least, you could get your warlock and two others to jump over so the warlock can summon the rest of the raid past respawns to continue attempts.
In one of our recent attempts...a person that had agro jumped over the balcony and it caused a reset even though there were still people alive up on the balcony. Luckily one of them was a priest and the priest was easily able to rez the jumper and everyone else on the audience side of the curtain. I dont know if that was a one-time fluke but its worth a shot especially if you have respawns.
Strategy 1
Summary:
Kill Dorothy
Gain threat on Roar
Tank Strawman (and kill)
Fear Roar
Gain threat on Tinhead, apply frost & kite (Mage)
Kill Tinhead
Kill Roar
Kill Crone
Dorothee is untankable and will attack at random, so have everyone unleash full DPS and burn her down as fast as possible.
Now, each add is not spawned (or "enabled") at the same time. Dorothee and Roar are attackable upon engagement, followed in 15 seconds by the Strawman, and 15-20 seconds later by Tinhead. Strawman is tanked in the Southwest corner. The off-tank should build aggro on Roar until Tinhead spawns, which will keep Roar coming back to him for the entire duration of the fight. The off-tank leaves Roar as soon as Tinhead engages and leaves Roar to be feared by the Warlock. If you have a hunter, you can have warlock fear Roar as soon possible to minimize damage and have the hunter misdirect to OT and distracting shot roar while he is feared.
A mage starts to cast frost spells at Tinhead when the tank has some aggro, and when 8 stacks have been reached the warrior stops producing aggro on Tinhead, leaving him to be kited around the room by the mage spamming Ice Lance.
When Dorothee and Tito are killed, DPS moves on to the Strawman and kills him. After that, the Warrior starts building threat on Roar again and tanks him in the Southwest corner. The Warlock also stops fearing Roar now and starts DPSing Tinhead, who is being kited around by the mage and by now should be at around 50%.
When all of these are killed there is a short break before The Crone spawns. The Crone is very easy; he is a tank and spank without a lot of HP, the only thing is the cyclone that goes around the room counter-clockwise that you have to watch out for. This means everyone has to keep moving almost constantly. This is not a problem for the healers, as two renews can keep the MT up.
Strategy 2
The overall strategy being somewhat similar to the one above, instead you do the following:
Kill Dorothee, Kill Tito. Tito has very little health and damage but his death causes Dorothee to go into a nasty enrage: make sure she dies first!
When Roar aggros, fear him every 4-6 seconds: this should be your Warlocks only focus as Roar will one or two shot cloth.
When Strawman aggros, apply non-stop fire damage to disorient him, scorch is well suited for this task (1.5 second cast allows for the occasional resist safely) and a properly specced fire mage can have him down to 60% be the time Dorothee and Toto are dead. Save your Fire Blast for those rare times when he resists 2 scorches in a row.
When Tinman aggros, tank him in the far right corner of the stage, away from everyone, while a second mage Rank 1 frostbolts to quickly apply rust. This will keep the mage's damage down and allow the tank to kite him rather than the mage, preferable since the tank can take a few hits from the Tinman while the mage may not be able to. Using rank 1 frostbolt is designed to make it feasible for even a fire specced mage to keep Tinman under control, and to apply