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Comment by 81147

Here can be found Archavon the Stone Watcher, a boss that is available in both 10 man and 25 man raids. However he can be challenged only by the faction who won the Wintergrasp PvP event and it will last for 4 hours. Also the faction that holds the keep will have a portal to Dalaran opened for easy access.

It seems like there is a blue post on world of warcraft forums about this as well:

Looking forward to seeing all you guys in Wintergrasp tomorrow night for the playtest. In the meantime, let's try to clear up a few things.

Flying was never intended to be allowed for Wintergrasp. We have flying vehicles but players will not be allowed to use their flying mounts. Casting of flying mounts from within Wintergrasp will be disabled and anyone flying into the zone from the outside will get the dismount debuff.

Faction imbalance is just as important to us as it is to you guys. We definitely have some ideas on how to deal with it. We have a couple buffs that scale as population balance changes. These buffs increase survivability, damage and honor. We also plan to grant advantages to the attackers such as free ranks and early access to workshops and GY's. These bonuses would only come into play after a serious losing streak though. We are being pretty liberal with the bonuses but like everything else, it's a work in progress.

We are going to disable the creature spawn regions at the GY's for this patch. It's already fixed internally but I don't want that messing with your feedback.

I saw a couple questions about travel to Wintergrasp. Here is the current plan:
--Both Alliance and Horde have standard flight points on the grid that go to Wintergrasp.
--Portals to Wintergrasp will be available to players one hour before each game from Dalaran. These will be removed at the beginning of each game.

We have a lot of rewards lined up for Wintergrasp but most importantly we are planning to introduce a new raid boss that will be available to the winning faction for the 4hr duration that they hold the fortress. His name is Archavon the Stone Watcher and he will be available in both 10 and 25 player raids. The zone will be located inside the Wintergrasp fortress. The current plan is to put him on a 3 day reset but we will speed this up during beta to 30 minutes for testing. As an added bonus, the faction that holds the keep will also have a portal open in Dalaran that ports players directly to fortress for easy access! The portal will be de-activated during games however.

You can read it here too: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=9679633237&sid=2000&pageNo=4#64

Comment by ChrisChaud

The Vault of Archavon is a short raid with two bosses in it that are only accessible after your side (Horde or Alliance) has claimed victory in Wintergrasp. The entrance to this raid can be found in Wintergrasp Keep.

Archavon the Stone Watcher
Health: 2,300,925 - 9,970,675 HP

Abilities:

* Rock Shards - Hurls a jagged rock shard, inflicting 707 to 793 Physical damage to any enemies within 5 of the target.
* Crushing Leap - Leaps at an enemy, inflicting 8000 Physical damage, knocking all nearby enemies away, and creating a cloud of choking debris.
* Impale - Lifts an enemy off the ground with a spiked fist, inflicting 47125 to 52875 Physical damage and 9425 to 10575 additional damage each second for 8 sec

Strategy:
None required.

Emalon the Stone Watcher
Health: 2,789,000 - 11,156,000 HP

Abilities:

* Chain Lightning (H) - Strikes an enemy with a blast of lightning that inflicts 4625/7400 to 5375/8600 Nature damage. The bolt will arc to additional nearby enemies, inflicting 50%/20% more Nature damage to each successive target.
* Lightning Nova (H) - Emit a pulse of energy that deals 20813 to 24187 (30000) Nature damage to enemies within 20 yards (to enemies in the immediate vicinity of the caster, and less damage to those who are farther away.)
* Overcharge- Overloads a nearby Tempest Minion with a surge of storm energy.

Adds:
Tempest Minion

Health: 202,215 - 741,455 HP

Strategy:
* Have your off tank run in and aggro all the adds, and drag them to a corner while your main tank taunts Emalon off the off tank.
* Attack the boss until Emalon casts overcharge on a Tempest Minion.
* Attack the overcharged Tempest Minion. This is critical - if the add is not dead within 24 seconds of the overcharge cast, you will be dead instead. The Tempest Minion will explode. The ad
* Have the offtank pick up the newly spawned replacement Tempest Minion.
* Rinse and Repeat.

Comment by 177673

I like this idea, for one it keeps people interested in world pvp, and it is also a original idea to put a raid boss in a PvP zone, and can only be challenged by the victors. Only problem is if this ever becomes part of a raid schedule. If they lose (this information may be wrong, I'm not in beta just speculating) that the other side would have to wait 4 hours.

Comment by 170009

Ya....I see this as more of an after raid event if your faction happens to have control. Otherwise dont plan on it....oh well.

Comment by Soroush

we cleared 10 man version today and he drops one t7 chest (not token)

Comment by 116607

Killed today got tier 7 warrior chest AND tier 7 druid legs. The boss is so easy they might aswell just have put a chest there.

10-man version btw.

Comment by 17512

This is my take on the fight after Main Tanking the fight for both 10 man and 25 today.

Rough Stats
10man, ~2.5 mill hp
25, ~7 mill hp
Hit me, as a bear tank without armor trinkets, for 6k in normal, 10-11 in Heroic

His Abilities
Hop + Cloud
Hops to a random raid member and puts a cloud where he lands, simply countered by moving out of the cloud. The boss will simply run back to the tank after.
Shards
Shoots a series of little stalactites at someone in the raid, dealing damage to them and those around said person, easily healed through, even with the AoE.
Lunge
Grabs and incapacitates (you're in his hand) the Main Tank for ~10 seconds, have the OT/someone who can survive a few 7k hits with heals taunt the boss for this duration. MT taunt back after making your way back to the boss after being thrown (Feral Charge makes this part cake)

Recommended Composition:

10 Man
Main Tank (~18-22k buffed hp recommended)
OT or someone that can Taunt and survive the 10 seconds or so that the Main Tank is incapacitated by the Lunge
Two or three healers
DPS as needed

25
MT (~25k buffed hp recommended)
OT, see 10 man
3-4 healers
DPS as needed

Hope this helps someone <.<

Comment by 53060

I gotta love how annoying the drops can be in this place. Downed him the other night and drops t7 enhance shaman legs and hateful boomkin chest piece >.> Even better is we had neither of those classes in the raid.

Comment by Gorehowl

Ridiculously easy on normal. I Off-tanked him last night (23k hp unbuffed, 512 def) and he hit me for 4k (when he managed to land a hit)

It's just a tank and spank fight on normal as you just have to move away from the AoE.

Only trick is that he will reset threat table on the 1 with most threat (Main Tank) and the Off-tank needs to be 2nd highest on list. The main tank will just taunt him off of you.

I'd dare call him the new "Free epics" boss of WoW.

EDIT: typos

Comment by Spacemancer

does this guy really drop arena gear? that seems a little dumb for blizzard to put in arena gear in a boss. instead it should be gear that has resilience on it but not considered arena gear rewards or it should be different kind of gear. whichever way u see as.

Comment by 254627

Vault of Archavon: 10-Man Guide

Good Group Layout

1 tank (22k+ unbuffed, for best results)
1 off tank (20k+ unbuffed)
2 healers (one for MT, one for group and OT)
6 DPS (doesn't matter what class)

BEFORE ARCHAVON

Before Archavon there is 3-4 pulls. Depending on how you do it. There is 5 mobs, in one room there is 2 so if you want you can pull them both, it is possible to kill them both without wiping. The mobs are 81 elites with 135k health.

ARCHAVON

Main tank starts the fight.

Archavon does a spell (the name escapes me) that is like 5 seconds, and what it is is he shoots out spikes to kill you. If you are the target...RUN. Do not run near other players (especially healers) because the spikes come out together in like 10's so if you run near a party member you will cause them to get hit as well.

He also lunges at players, when he does this, MAIN TANK DO NOT MOVE! He should come back to you, and if he doesn't (give it about 3 seconds once he lands) the off tank needs to pull aggro off whoever Archavon is attacking (unless, of course, it is the main tank). Then the off tank is to bring him to the main tank, when he is close enough to hit again, the main tank will pull aggro.

But when he lunges, GET OUT OF THE AREA because he leaves a nasty poison cloud that deals like 2500+ damage per second and that can be what wipes your group.

Overall this fight is very easy as long as you don't get caught in the spikes, poison cloud, and follow this guide.

As for loot, he usually drops 2 epic items (T7 or Epic PvP Gear). You also must have have control of Wintergrasp to enter. If you are in VoA when the new Wintergrasp battle starts, you will be teleported out.
Hope I helped.

Comment by 244175

Hard to believe this hasn't been posted before but to save you the frustration I experienced.

To get to the instance, go to Wintergrasp Fortress. The easiest way is to use the portal in Dalaran (its by all of the other BG portals). As others have said this is only available after your faction has won. This portal is labeled Portal to Lake Wintergrasp.

Once you are at Wintergrasp Fortress, go to the Keep. This is in the middle of fortress to the north. You will see a large door labeled Wintergrasp Keep Door if you hover your mouse over it. Just in front of the door to the right is a portal. This will take you inside the Keep.

In the back of that room is the portal to the raid. In addition, you will find a portal back to Dalaran and to BG's.

Comment by 245511

I am unsure how the loot listed for bosses on wowhead is updated. I received https://www.wowhead.com/cata/item=39592 from a drop just last night from Archavon the Stone Watcher.

Comment by Drogba

This place is puggable but there can be certain unforunate things that can happen considering loot...When we downed him he dropped Tier 6.5 Hunter chest, and Shaman Gloves, and we had none of those classes present, best advice is to bring every class so gear dont go to waste to avoid nightmare scenarios.

Comment by 284420

Do not try to do this too close to Wintergrasp changing hands.

Attempted this with 15 minutes left to go, was all like, sweet, no problem. A few AFKs, and suddenly it's "This instance will reset in 5 minutes" before we pull boss.

Then when it got closer, not even the full 5 minutes it said "This instance is about to reset. Prepare to be removed" and ported out of instance, with boss engaged and everything to start of Wintergrasp battle.

Comment by 285677

Why does blizzard undermine the raiting req on the pvp gear by adding a pve boss simpel as hell ?
You should not get pvp items by killing a pve boss. Same with the emblems you should not be able to buy pvp gear by doing pve.

Comment by 237147

Confirmed on the s5/T7, easy Pug providing players present know how to conduct themselves during a raid. Last run I was present in, Heroic 25 Pug. Drops included Valorous Crypstalker gloves, chest and legs for Hunters and one T7 piece for Mage (on that particular takedown). Confirmed that the drops are primarily gloves, chest and leg pieces, random drop, for all available classes.

Do not discount viable players because they may appear under geared; this is a good instance to bring players together and get those players geared for future runs; who knows, the people you pug with that day, could be your future mates in further raids.

Comment by 169025

Loot needs be done in token system just like all the other raid bosses.

Stuff needs to be DE every time because a certain class is not present. We're talking about people in green/blue watching good epics gone to waste

Comment by 267115

Just did a 10-man in here, first raid i ever really led, and it's not really that hard, just a few tips to give out.

1. Trash mobs (admittedly only about 5 or 6 in the whole instance) will do a targeted aoe called "rock shards" or something along those lines, doing around 2k damage per tick to all in the targeted area, on 25-man this is less of a problem unless it hits the main healers, but on 10-man this can result in a wipe if healers get caught in it.

2. The whole raid should spread out during the fight with the main boss, as he does an aoe with a small area of effect on random party members. Easily healed through if people don't clump too close together

3. During the fight, Archavon will charge random party members, doing around 5-6k damage, with a raid warning appearing saying "Archavon charges for .........." this will create a choking cloud where he charged to, which is easy for casters to stay in if they aren't really paying attention to what's going on.

Happy hunting =)

Comment by 213677

Ok so I set up a 10 man last night to try and get it in before the week reset. I had only ran the 25 man this week and when we cleared the trash and got to where the boss should have been he was no where to be seen. Can you only do one either the 10 man or the 25 man out here? I did both the 25 man OS and ran a 10 man so I don't get why this would be any different.

Has anyone else ran into any problems like this? Also could someone else have been saved to the instance that entered before me and caused this?

Comment by Erinar

Had a Reins of the Grand Black War Mammoth drop last night off this boss. It was the first time anyone in the raid had seen one so I'm guessing a low drop rate, but it does drop in heroic at least.

Comment by 235651

Looking at tier 7, I have noticed for PALADINS, Healers and Ret have legs that drop, tanks have hands and chest. It should no Chest or hands for Ret or holy and no legs for Prot. Can somone confirm otherwise? Id like to kno I have a chance at my legs, LUCKY healers and ret, get the legs, Chest and gloves are from badges.....

Comment by 174507

VoA is one of the easiest raids ever. Its almost just tank and spank that gives free loot=)

Comment by 303711

In order to use this stuff, do we need to have a special arena rating?

Comment by 182101

EASIEST RAID EVER. If you have a decent raid group this is a quick in and out. Wham bam thank you mam. Did the heroic and picked up the season 5 chest. beautiful.

Comment by 72798

Personally, this loot table makes me upset. I don't like how people can do arenas successfully, obtain a rating that allows them to purchase the S5 items, wait a few weeks in order to acquire enough points to purchase the deadly arena gear or simply do the easiest raid known to man and get 3/5 of their set. I think by making this boss blizzard almost made arena points obsolete which really is to bad for the people who play this game solely for the pvp content.

Comment by 59603

I just want to add that, be very careful of the raid setup when u try to do a 25/10 after a 10/25 raid, that will potentially cause you saved unintentionally.
For example, player A started a 25 men raid,he has already done 10 men. Player B has not done any 10 men for the week, when the 25 men is finished, player A leaves the raid and that automatically makes player B the leader of the raid. Player B thought he was not saved, so he started inviting ppl for the 10men raid, player C, D, E joined the 10 men, and when they enter the 10 men instance, they become saved to a cleared one! So be careful of that and reform the raid always before running a new instance.

Comment by jclement30

I was originally under the impression I could run this 4 times a week, specifically:
10 Man Reg
10 Man Heroic
25 Man Reg
25 Man Heroic.

However, it seems that from the resets, I can run only twice a week, specifically:
10 or 25 Man Reg
10 or 25 Man Heroic

Can anyone confirm or clear this up?

Comment by 188920

i found out today that he can drop 2 of the same item. our 10 man raid got 2 feral druid t7 chests

Comment by 283241

This raid is short, we did the 25 man in about 10 mins.

Comment by 140772

tankyDruid: Please, remove curses, this takes forever.
Mage 1: I do it to my group..
Mage 2: I lose lot dps if I only decurse.
tankyDruid:.. So? *checks his macros* Make a macro /targetraid /cast remove curse.
Mage2: Whats macro?

Comment by 268213

very easy instance. one of our dps died in the first smoke cloud and we still did it. very simple and fun.

Comment by 37093

Okay, so I am a priest and we just got through this, he dropped a warlock chest piece, and since we don't have a warlock we all just rolled for it, and I won! So okay can I do anything with this thing or should I just destroy it now?

Comment by 314572

Had Reins of the Grand Black War Mammoth
https://www.wowhead.com/cata/item=43959 drop tonight, I dont think its in the loot table, it was normal mode

Comment by 322960

https://www.wowhead.com/cata/item=43959
Dropped for my 10 man group yesterday

Comment by 258919

To correct the information in Wowhead's description, I believe the timer on the Battle for Wintergrasp is 2 and a half hours. Probably a patch.

As for this raid, it's phenomenally easy to get into a group immediately after your faction wins a WG battle (especially if you didn't have control before the battle). There's usually a few 10 mans and at least one or two 25 mans started. Not necessarily one of the harder raids in Wrath, and this is probably a good place for people unfamiliar with Wrath of the Lich King raids (or raids at all) to start. Just make sure your gear doesn't completely suck.

Comment by 160439

just to confirm the probably obvious what are the requirements for the heroic difficulty? sorry never been had to ask.

Comment by TMWNN

Two points:

I don't know where this strange idea that Archavon's drops can't be disenchanted came from. Twice I've tanked Vault raids in which a piece dropped that no one could use. Each time I awarded it to an enchanter, then told those who hadn't won anything roll for the Abyss Crystal.
The Vault will get a second boss that will drop Season 6 and Tier 8 gear, likely when Ulduar opens.

Comment by 13864

If you are inside the instance when the Battle for Wintergrasp begins, your group will be removed.

Comment by mythwolf

i just did this on normal mode, had 1 tree healer and a 31k dk tank, and a 23k off tank, me as a fury dps, the healer didnt cause any problems, and he kept us up, very easy if you have a good tank and especially a good healer

Comment by 329762

Actually saw the Valorous T7 Moonkin head piece drop in an H run. Anyone else seen that too?

Comment by 313628

This raid is a godsend to people who don't have the time to raid multiple times a week, but have the basic skills required to down a raid boss. Haven't seen it mentioned here, but the quality of your DPS is very important, and should average on 1500-1600 per DPS spot at the lowest.

Comment by 274984

Something to add:

If your wondering why sometimes, when you try and zone into this instance, your loading screen gets stuck, it is becuase there is a large amount of people already on the server load for Vault.

Just be patient, about 10-15 minutes, and you should be able to zone in once the server load goes down.

Comment by 333189

So, last night, we decided to do a quick VoA before WG was up. We had 10 minutes before the reset and we burned through everything. Then, just as Arch started to fall over dead, the instance reset and we were ported out. 2 of the 20 of us were able to loot him for the badges, but the rest of us, myself included, were not. I just went back in there by myself (just invited a random guildie to make a raid so I could enter) and I noticed the trash were back. If we were to clear the trash, would his corpse be sitting down there for us still to loot? I'm not even sure if he dropped and pieces for me, but it sucks to miss the 2 badges at least. Any ideas? Thanks!

Comment by Silentone

Just had 3 deadly glad hunter legs, all the same ones, and 1 valorous gloves for rogue in Heroic. So I'm guessing all 4 drops could possibly be the same. What a waste!

Comment by 324648

i have a question is the mount he drops for allie only or is there a horde one

Comment by 177764

Bliz just updated the "story" and it does sound like they are adding the second boss.

Intrepid champions who have journeyed even farther into the vault have discovered a second guardian. Presiding over an adjacent wing, Emalon the Storm Watcher strikes furiously at any trespassers in his domain. This tempestuous giant also commands a group of storm revenants, all of which are restless after the long span of silence since their watch began.

Looking forward to it being just a little bit longer than a 10 minute run.

Comment by 162023

This new boss will drop T8 gear and Furious gear, like Archaveron except with 1 tier higher gear

Comment by 316564

Wow just crashed while we were fighting the last boss. Turns out, the adds are the most dangerous part of the fight. They will start to get this buff that stacks up to what I believe is 5, that when it taps out, devastates the raid. (Keep in mind, I'm talking about 25 man voa 3.1 boss)

Since it's only been out like 3 hours right now, I'm not sure if the damage that's outputed is magical or not, but it brought me down from 23k to where I was flashing critically. Truly, if anything, this boss is a naxxramas level of difficulty where your dps needs to be on the ball.

The boss himself uses chain lightning and some aoe if one of his adds gets too close (I'm assuming this from the people I was running with). Unless you've got a dps that just switched over to tank spec using dual spec without getting new gear, your tanks shouldn't have much problem holding him or the adds. I would reccomend (at least) 4 healers, 2 tanks; 1 tank holds adds while the other holds the boss on opposite sides of the room. the adds tank should have macros set up so he can /rw the add which is buffing itself up so that dps immediatley switch over to it. The adds themselves only have like 716k hp, so it shouldn't be too hard for ~19 dps to take down before it goes nuclear.

When 1 add dies, another is spawned immediatley, which the add tank MUST grab. Failure to do so will wipe the raid, which is what happened to me just a few minutes ago. As long as the mobs don't explode and they stay a good distance away from the boss, there should be minimal aoe damage to the dps.

Basically, if anyone screws up at all, the raid is pretty much screwed. The key, in the end that must be focused on is:
1) Tanks must seperate the boss and adds by a reasonable difference.
2) DPS must be alert and pop cds on the nuclear adds instead of the boss. Mainly, their reaction time will be critical in keeping the raid alive
3) Healers are the band-aid solutions where if an add does happen to get too close to the boss and a dps takes damage, like a rogue, they must be willing to heal him. 2 heals on MT, 2 heals on OT. A good idea is to seperate the heals to every group, and have them set focus to the tank their healing so they can keep an eye on dps.

This is one of the first strategies that has been developed within 3 hours of the 3.1 patch being available on the Malygos realm.

Comment by 45875

Your link about the new VoA boss leads to a FAQ about arena matchmaking.

Control-F "vault", there he talks about the new boss a bit.

Comment by Rotalik

you can NOT decrease the adds hps before they get there charge. The second they get charged they go back to full health.

Comment by Spooned

Yeah Rotalik is right. I was in a PUG 25 man earlier today and we tried having 5 dps focus on AoE'ing the four adds so when one of them was enraged it would be faster to kill, but as soon as the add was enraged it instantly went back to full heath. PUGing this will be possible but you'd have to get really lucky and get a really good group put together. Any DPS in the group pulling under a constant 3k DPS might as well just leave because the enraged add needs to be killed in less then about 22 seconds or he explodes and everyone dies. We made about 15 attempts in my PUG, however we had too many DPS under the constant 3k so we could only get the add down to about 5% before he exploded. The concept of the fight is pretty straight forward but literally everyone in the raid needs to be geared and on top of their game or downing this boss just won't happen =\

Comment by 223475

Vault of Archavon has a summoning stone now.

Emalon the Stone Watcher the new boss in Voa is much harder to kill than Archavon the Stone Watcher,
don't be illusioned by how easy Archavon the Stone Watcher is and try Emalon the Stone Watcher with a pug group, maybe try with pug after 1 month from this post

Comment by 42766

Emalon the Storm Watcher 10 man strategy:

2 Tanks, 2 healers, 6 DPS.

MT tanks the boss where the boss stands when you enter the room and turns him. OT tanks the adds on the stairs. We had the add tank charge in first and then the MT go in and Taunt the boss of the OT. These made picking up the 4 adds easy for the OT.

Melee DPS need to be aware of the AOE cast he does (Like Murmur). When you see the long cast (~3-4 sec) run about 10-15 yards away, its not a huge radius (much less than murmur, distance more like a wide Whirlwind radius), and then return. It will do a good 15-20k damage. So you could potentially heal through it. But easy to just run out for a few seconds.

Ranged DPS should spreadout to reduce chain lighting damage, but it's really not that big a deal.

When the boss gives one of the adds an electrical "Charge" all dps most immediately focus on that one add. Have the health bars turned on over the add (V key), the Add that gets "charged" will go to full health. Target that one and nuke. Melee DPS should anticipate the charge occuring and already be running to the adds on the stairs. It seems to be at least once every 30 seconds, but i don't know that it's always the same interval, but as dps on the boss isn't critical, its best if they are ready for it.

FAILURE TO KILL THE ADD BEFORE EXPLOSION WILL WIPE THE RAID

After the add is down, Have a Hunter or Rogue MD the new add to the Add tank. The add spawns where the boss is tanked (not sure if it spawns at the boss, or the location we tanked the boss).

That being said. I personally cant imagine the typical VOA pug on my server from being able to do this boss. DPS needs to be very HIGH and nonretarded. Two things a VOA pug usually lacks.

And I wish you all better luck on loot then us. 2 of the same warlock chest piece, and no locks in raid. tyvm blizz

Comment by Spooned

And I wish you all better luck on loot then us. 2 of the same warlock chest piece, and no locks in raid. tyvm blizz

OMG lol that really sucks...but when I read that I literally laughed out loud haha! Srsly tho, that really sucks =/

Comment by Pirwzy

So does Emalon always Charge the add that has the lowest health? I know it heals them to full when charged, but I'm wondering if you can predict which add will get it based on their health levels.

Comment by 117904

we just did it with pug(10 man), total 4 tried

2 tank 3 healer 5 dps
in vent for yelling the add which be charged (we had all add marked so easier to make it clear)
of course assist macro will help too if u didnt know well on new boss yet

i am the pally(33k HP buffed) doing boss and other War(37k HP buffed) take add
i was tanking BOSS on wall which behind he standing and War on stair with ADD
i didnt avoid the nova BECOZ we got 3 good healer to heal it thru (i think u should avoid it if just 2 healer, so lesser heal loading)
and the main ptn u need to dps down the CHARGED ADD asap, then go back to boss
and hunter for SPAWN ADD lead to ADD TANK, becoz add with boss will make a lot of damage to the rest of raid

i agree save all CD for CHARGED ADD seem the boss dont hit hard, 12k-15k nova and melee hit plate 3k-6k,
so ADD is the goal not BOSS

guide with picture
http://valkyr.guildlaunch.com/forums/viewtopic.php?gid=70102&t=2542132

Comment by 144200

archavon now has an enrage timer of around 4 minutes and 50 seconds (or 5 minutes)

Comment by 316564

I've come to the conclusion that all those wanting to kill Emalon need to be at least naxxramas geared and dps has to do OVER 3k dps. It's unfortunate that now anyone pugging VoA as their first raid will have a much harder time finding a group.

Comment by Meringue

A new boss was added into VoA with the 3.1 patch. Emelon, the storm watcher.

He can drop T8 and Deadly gear on normal, T8.5 and Furious PvP gear on heroic. Some new drop types have been added as well, such as rings, belts, etc.

The strategy for the boss is pretty simple. The MT tanks Emelon at one side of the room, an OT tanks four Elemental adds at the other side, every so often Emelon will enrage one, causing it to stack a buff that will rise up and up fairly quickly to 10 stacks, causing him to explode for basically raid wiping damage.

If dealt with in time, Emelon will spawn another elemental to replace the dead one that will need to quickly be picked up by the OT (hits for about 5k on cloth on normal).

The boss also drops a hard hitting Nova attack at regular intrevals ala Loken and has a chain lightning move that does more damage on each jump, requiring you to space out ala C'thun and Kel'thuzad.

This time around, you aren't going to be carrying Dethknght, the freshly dinged Death Knight in blues and greens in with you. This boss requires geared and very competent DPS. If you want to comfortably down him, the average raid damage on the 10 man version seemed to be around 2500-3000 when only using two healers. Any real amount lower and you'll only beat him by the skin of your teeth.

Like Ulduar, the normal mode version seems to expect you to be in an average of ilvl 200 gear for normal and ilvl 213 gear for heroic and of course, aware of how to play your class well.

Good luck to those of you who have to pug VoA's, like me! On my last failed VoA 25 run, we had 8 DPS below 2000 and several people screaming about how the boss was impossible.

Comment by 346479

did they add a new boss to vaults as of 3.1?

Comment by Psyblade1st

Otherwise known as the Vault of Free Epics.

Comment by 252180

After the 3.1.1 nerf Emalon's adds have only 140k in normal, assuming 2 tanks 2 healers and 6 dps the raid needs only 7k sustained dps to take down the add in 20 sec. easily doable as long as each dps does over 1.5kdps (1.2 is minimum for each dps but the better geared can carry a little weight) and as long as everyone switches to the add in 5 seconds and you dont have dps below 1k (it happens) you will take him down. It is about the same in Heroic maybe 300 more dps from each person.

Emalon is now doable by pugs as long as the tanks dont get pwned on the pull (ive had it happen)

in Heroics as long as each dps does 2k hes killable with 20 people

Comment by BHLimbslicer

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Vault of Archavon is the only raid instance in World of Warcraft without lore.

Comment by Shenk

In patch 3.2: New boss (left side) Koralon the Flame Watcher. And yes he drops T9 on normal and T9,5 on heroic and Gladiator's Season 7...

Health 15,339,500 (Heroic) 4,183,500 (Normal)

Abilities:

Meteor Fists – Attacks inflict damage split evenly to nearby targets within 10 yards of the primary target. Applies Meteor Fists. Duration: 15 seconds.

Meteor Fists – Inflicts 100 to 125% Fire weapon damage, split with nearby targets.

Burning Breath – Inflicts 3,900 to 4,100 Fire damage to all targets every 1 second for 3 seconds.

Flaming Cinder – Inflicts 5,363 to 5,637(Heroic: 3,900 to 4,100) and another 4,388 to 4,612(Heroic: 2,925 to 3,075) Fire damage every 1 second to enemies within 4 yards of the Burning Cinder. Leaves a spot of blazing fire on the ground.

Burning Fury – Increases damage dealt by 5%. Activated when Koralon is engaged and stacks every 20 seconds.

Tactics:

Right after pull, he begins to stack Burning Fury.

Koralon does have hard enrage,

Because of his Meteor Fists self-buff (amplified by Burning Fury), you will need to use two tanks standing in one spot. The Meteor Fists damage will be shared between those two tanks.

Everyone must get out of the fires spots quickly, tanks should agree on which side to leave

Make sure you have fire resist up!

Comment by 147680

KORALON THE FLAME WATCHER IS COMING! From what i heard, he is somewhat hard, stay out of the fire thingy, BUT, he's gay (nah, i don't really know, just a fun quote from a live TV blooper) anyways, aside from the fires, he has some kind of punch that splits on targets infront of him, im not sure but i think it is 40 k on a single target, secondly he seems to have a ongoing buff on himself that increases his dmg done and it increases every single stack and will not be dispelled until death. It only makes sense that Koralon drops T9 and such. Any idea about a Tide Watcher or something? And where should he have the space then? in the middle there's a stair down to him maybe, Koralon is gonna be on the west side of the map.

Comment by 299179

so what's the deal with this now? can you do vault 4x a week now that theres 10/25 norm/heroic? or is it just twice a week like the old? and is there a difference between reg and heroic modes (probably huh?) or is it just the same... for now?

Comment by tmptfate

Koralon the Flame Watcher is now live on realms and playable. Offical Blue response (with link) below! =D

"Coinciding with the launch of Arena Season 7, Koralon the Flame Watcher will be activated in the western wing of Wintergrasp Fortress and awaiting the controlling faction. Koralon will drop loot for slots similar to Emalon, which includes both raiding tier items and PvP gear. Both 10- and 25-player versions will drop Emblems of Triumph as well. See you in Wintergrasp!" Source

Comment by 380685

The boss will drop 2 tier / season drops on normal and 4 on heroic.
The dungeon is only available when your faction controls wintergrasp.
The dungeon will reset every Wednesday.

It actually resets every TUESDAY, not Wednesday as stated above.

Comment by mortedamos

Seems that Archavon tests tanking and threat exchange, Emalon tests DPS and positioning with other players, and Koralon tests healers and environment awareness.

Comment by Jita

Since Koralon isn't in the database to comment on directly, here's how we beat him in 10-man:

He has three special attacks. One is a massive hit that's done to people directly in front of him, and distributed among those it hits. Keep ranged dps out of a direct line, and have two tanks stacked nearly on each other to absorb it between them. It might be range limited, I'm not sure as I was on healing duty.

Second is a spinning flame attack that hits the whole raid and leaves behind patches of deadly deadly fire. DO NOT STAND IN THE FIRE. This can actually be trickier than it sounds because the whole room is orange and glowing, but it's still one of the most basic truths of any pve content. Having a good raid healer is key here, but you'll generally have enough time to spam Chain Heal / Wild Growth / w/e and get people topped off before his next big thing.

Last, but not least, he does a Meteor Fist attack that drops a meteor on (I think) all the people in the raid individually, which gives you a fire debuff that you have to move to dispell, and leaves behind another patch of deadly deadly fire. DO NOT STAND IN THE FIRE.

Once you get the hang of it I think he's easier than Emalon. Please correct me if I got any of this wrong, it was rather late at night and it took us a while to beat him, though most people were fighting him for the first time.

Comment by cem3203

downed today with pugs
2x251 ilvl and 2x245 ilvl dropped on 25 mens
and 2 x triumph

was a good fight, you need to prepare many wipes :)

Comment by Sutekh

Mage T9 Gloves drop off of the Flame Watcher guy in the 10man version.

Comment by Ketho

Archavon the Stone Watcher - Stomp (10) + Impale (10), Rock Shards (10)(*), Crushing Leap (10) -> Choking Cloud (10)
Emalon the Storm Watcher - Overcharge, Lightning Nova (10), Chain Lightning (10)
- Tempest Minion - Overcharged -> Overcharged Blast, Shock
Koralon the Flame Watcher - Meteor Fists (10) -> Meteor Fists (10), Burning Breath (10) -> Burning Breath (10), Flaming Cinder (10), Burning Fury
Toravon the Ice Watcher - Frozen Mallet -> Frostbite (10), Whiteout (10), Freezing Ground (10), Frozen Orb (10)
- Frozen Orb - Frozen Orb (10)

Archavon Warder - Shield Crush (10), Rock Shower (10), Whirl (10)
Tempest Warder - Overcharge -> Overcharged -> Overcharged Blast, Shock
Flame Warder - Meteor Fists (10) -> Meteor Fists (10), Lava Burst (10)
Frost Warder - Frozen Mallet -> Frostbite (10), Frost Blast (10)

Comment by blabbo

Will be getting a 4'th Boss for patch 3.3.0. "Toravon the Ice Watcher"

Anyone else noticing some sort of pattern amongst the bosses?

Comment by 223475

Blizzard should place Toravon the Ice Watcher new upcoming boss in a room behind Archavon the Stone Watcher so there will be no raid deserters!

Comment by orreborre0

Blizzard should place Toravon the Ice Watcher new upcoming boss in a room behind Archavon the Stone Watcher so there will be no raid deserters!

If you look on the map above the comments you will see that Archavon will be moved upwards and it'll be a crossing where he used to be. (Archavon's boss color is blue and Toravon is green on the map.)
Noone need worrying to be saved before Toravon. :)

Comment by mixter

A few months i posted aqualon the sea watcher was gona happen....

SO CLOSE

Comment by 332502

Information on Vault of Archavon:

1) Loot:
-Archavon the Stone Watcher (10man) - T7 & Deadly
-Archavon the Stone Watcher (25man) - T7.5 & Deadly

-Emalon the Storm Watcher (10man) - T8 & Furious
-Emalon the Storm Watcher (25man) - T8.5 & Furious

-Koralon the Flame Watcher (10man) - T9 & Relentless
-Koralon the Flame Watcher (25man) - T9.5 & Relentless

-Toravon the Ice Watcher (10man) - T10 & (Probably the next arena season gear)
-Toravon the Ice Watcher (25man) - T10.5 & (Probably the next arena season gear)

2) Locations:
-Archavon the Stone Watcher - The very back of the instance, just go straight down the stairs and don't turn. You'll see a rock elemental in the way.

-Emalon the Storm Watcher - Go down the stairs, and make a right at the center of the instance. You'll see a lightning elemental in the way.

-Koralon the Flame Watcher - Go down the stairs and take a left at the center of the instance. You'll see a fire elemental in the way.

-Toravon the Ice Watcher - Go down the stairs and go to the center of the instance, once you reach the center, keep going straight, and right before you reach Archavon the Stone Watcher, make a right. You'll see an ice elemental in the way.

3) Fights:
-Archavon the Stone Watcher:
A) Choking Smoke - Hurts a little bit, try to stay out of it.
B) Rock Shards - Puts them on any random group member, can't really get out of them, just has to be healed through.
C) Tank Grab - Grabs the main tank, make sure you have an off tank to pick him up while the main tank is in his hand.
D) Charge - Charges at any random group member.
E) Enrage Timer - 5 minutes.

-Emalon the Storm Watcher:
A) Lightning Nova - Casts a nova of lightning energy, hurts worse the closer you are to him. On 10man, you can completely get out of it. On 25man however, it cannot be completely avoided no matter how far away you are as long as you are still in the instance.The main tank should not run away, he has to stay there to keep aggro, must be healed quickly.
B) Chain Lightning - Casts a lightning chain that hits a few of the group members. Just has to be healed through.
C) Lightning Adds - There is 4 adds when the fight starts. Have the off tank go in an pick up all of the 5 lightning adds, give him at least 2 seconds to get full aggro, then have the main tank run in and taunt Emalon the Storm Watcher off of the off tank. It is ideal to tank Emalon the Storm Watcher on the right side of the room, and tank the adds on the left side of the room. Emalon the Storm Watcher will overcharge one of the adds. The overcharged add will be healed back to full health, and will get really big. If you have Deadly Boss Mods (DBM), it will automatically mark the overcharged add as a skull for you. The overcharge buff will stack up to 10. You must kill the overcharged add before he reaches 10, or else he will explode, instantly killing everybody in the group that is currently in the instance and has less then 28k health. There is no way to get out of it. If you are in the instance at all, and he reaches 10, and you don't have at least 28k health left, you are going to die.
EBOA ----- Tank Emalon the Storm Watcher at the right side of the room, and the adds on the left side of the room.

-Koralon the Flame Watcher:
A) Flames - He will put a patch of flames across the ground anywhere in the room. Anybody standing in it will take loads of damage every second, very unlikely that it can just be healed through, lots of damage going on there. You can tell when you in the fire by when you get the debuff. If you see the debuff, just run around til it goes away, basically go to the other side of the room, and you should be alright, you will still require some heals though.
B) Meteor Fists - Hits any target in front of the boss. The way to minimize this damage is to have every dps stand behind the boss, and you will not be hit, as long as you have both of the tanks stacking up on each other in front of the boss, and abosrbing all the damage. This does require a nice amount of healing to survive through it.
EBOA ----- The tanks should be kiting the boss around the room in a clock wise rotation.

-Toravon the Ice Watcher:
A) No information on this fight has been found yet.

Vault of Archavon is only available to the faction that currently owns Wintergrasp. This is the only time where you are actually having to do PvP in order to be allowed to do PvE.

Hope this information has helped you guys in some way. More information will be added on the Toravon the Ice Watcher fight as soon as information is gained via the Public Test Realm (PTR).

One last note:
To mixter - I would not be surprised if they actually did add a boss called Aqualon the Sea Watcher. Because, if you think about it, water is the only element that they haven't used yet in the instance. Well i guess you could say Toravon the Ice Watcher will be considered a water boss, but frozen water anyways. And plus, since they are putting Toravon the Ice Watcher where he is on the map in patch 3.3, they will likely fill up that spot on the left side of the same hallway. Because it went from just Archavon the Stone Watcher, then they added Emalon the Storm Watcher to the right side of the first hallway. Then to make it even, they put Koralon the Flame Watcher on the left side of that hallway. So now with Toravon the Ice Watcher on the right side of the extension of the Archavon the Stone Watcher hallway, well it would just be wierd if they didn't put another boss on the left side. I don't know, that's just my personaly opinion.

Comment by Ketho

~~Physical~~ Archavon the Stone Watcher 3.0.3
~~Nature~~ Emalon the Storm Watcher 3.1.0
~~Fire~~ Koralon the Flame Watcher 3.2.0
~~Frost~~ Toravon the Ice Watcher 3.2.2
Shadow ...
Holy ...
Arcane ...

Comment by 336613

What's recommended for tanking 10/25?

Comment by 347772

Heres how Toravon's fight goes:
At the moment its bugged so he dissapears / is unattackable after the 1st attempt (don't know if Blizzard wants it like this)
He spawns orbs which Ranged dps wants to kill (MELEE DONT GET NEAR THEM) They have a type of 'aura' which does damage to nearby enemies so move around during this fight. Frost resistance is needed so your banked Hodir and Sapphiron gear has a purpose now =P.

-I didn't have all the information of the fight so if I missed any just say so.

Comment by 435017

For 10man you need 3-4k DPS 8-9% hit and 25 expertise as DPS, i think.
You need 5-6k in 25man because of the one boss who summons an add you have 10secs to kill! (or 20?)

Comment by nikbos

O.K. Blizzard, now your map just looks sloppy! I was hoping for an elevator, maybe an outdoor fight with the Ice Watcher on the top of a mountain. Then we could hide this loser in a underground basement so groups won't waste their time!

Comment by dumac

Archavon the Stone Watcher - earth
Emalon the Storm Watcher - air
Koralon the Flame Watcher - fire
Toravon the Ice Watcher - water(ice is water frozen so)

As you can see there is a connection of the bosses in this instance. They represent each a branch of the elemental type current in game.

This is kinda obvious pattern if you know all bosses, but thought it would be fun to point out.

The instance itself is a titan construction, so kinda interesting if you think about it, due the titan banished the elemental lords from the world and its army. So would not be too far fetch to think that the titan had some purpose then they created this giants, due the connection you see.

Allthough it could just simple be a fun way to bring some new bosses in.

Comment by Sache

Toravon the Ice Watcher - We kill it last night in 10 with my guild from the first try (max 4 min). We have a medium of 4.5k gs in raid. The exception was two hard tank, two healers and one strong dps (me). Rest was even blue & some green items :D.
Conclusion - he is a pussy ;)

Tonight we will do it in 25 (if we find enough ppl).

Comment by kabookiejoe

The violent little people have started attacking my brothers. which is sad. they leave me mostly alone now though, which is not sad.

i think they want the shiny baubles i gave away. I feel guilty.

-Archavon

Comment by Xirobe

Have later patches made this harder? I ask because I have a warrior tank with about 24k hp unbuffed, and I keep being told I need more health to be accepted in the raid. Only just now did I come here and see here people talking about 22k being enough.

Comment by Zabam

Well, IMO, just looking at the things found around WG, it would only make sense that the next would be shadow or life. But than again, in Cat there will be a new WG thing so they may hold those for than. Not sure, just a guess :P

Comment by 311760

Okay people, now think of all the elementals in Wintergrasp, there's even quests around them. In fact, you can just look at the different eternals. Earth, Air, Water, Fire, Shadow, Life. Thus either shadow or life will be next. I'm betting on shadow, since life sounds like it would try to heal you to death. That or have many many adds.

Comment by savagekrosa

One important thing which isn't mentioned here in the Vault description and is important for those who are coming late after your faction captured the Wintergrasp:

ALL BOSSES BECOME STONED 10 MINUTES BEFORE START OF NEXT WINTERGRASP BATTLE - THINK TWICE BEFORE STARTING A GROUP OR GOING FOR MORE THAN 1 BOSS SOON BEFORE THIS TIME.

Here is the debuff (however in case of VoA bosses, it isn't 30 second duration as mentioned in the link).

Comment by Flagg

Doing VoA 25 before VoA 10 every week is a good thing for everyone.
if you win something at VoA 25 (ilvl 264), and the same item drop from VoA 10 (ilvl 251), you will not need it and we have 2 happy players.
if you win something at VoA 10 (ilvl 251), and the same item drop from VoA 25 (ilvl 264), you will need it and we have a ilvl 251 item wasted.

Comment by ExEliminator7

can any1 tell me the min GS for dps or tank?

Comment by 431832

WHY isn't this place color coded? The ice boss is in the green room and the fire boss is in the purple room? Makes no sense!

Comment by Esploratore

Vault of archavon can atm be soloed entirely by blood dks at 10-man, done myself archavon at 351 item level dps gear, it's just a tank and spank in which you have to beat the enrage, most boring boss ever; emalon is a bit harder (done at 381 dps gear), you have to nuke the adds which overcharges, else he'll deal too much damage, and overheal 4 adds + boss, which is not very easy but there aren't particular problems; koralon is harder again (done at 389 dps gear, and I also had the tol barad resistance trinket), he doesn't have adds and doesn't do much melee damage, but as you go on with the fight he stacks burning fury (+5% damage) and every 40-45 seconds he casts meteor fists, when they are active he deals something like 35-40k fire damage every 1-2 sec, you cannot absorb fire damage with blood shield, so depending on how long in the fight you are, you will have to ams for 7 seconds and kite the rest, or take a bit of damage, then spam 2-3 death strikes so that they heal 30-40k each.

Toravon is the hardest boss to solo in VoA 10 man, and I haven't been able to, so far; even here all physical damage is absorbed, the problem is frost damage, he stacks a dot which lasts 21 seconds and slows other than doing a lot of damage, can be stopped using ams, but only lasts 7 seconds, so you have to choose the right moment to run away from the boss (while he is casting whiteout, while he is casting frozen orb, etc.), also using speed potions or nitro-boosts, the only objective is letting the stacks reset, once they reset you can dps him with no problems till they stack to 7-8 again, which is when they start to hurt.

Time for a couple of things at 25-man now: all of this raid can be 2-manned at 25 if one of the 2 is a blood dk, except toravon 25 for which we had to use 2 blood dks and a hunter.

Archavon again is the easist, he has a lot more hp, like 9,7 millions, and considering the low vengeance he gives and the time he lets you lose when he grabs you, only dks in full heroic DS gear could be able to bring the dps for his enrage, which is just 5 mins; two-man is ofc no problems since you can outheal him in dps gear at 25 as blood dk, he doesn't even deal damage.

Emalon 25 does already more physical damage than 10, same for the adds, which also have a lot more hp (more dps needed for them when they overcharge), so I had to go in tank gear for this one, around 390 item level, and had a hunter dps the boss and in case the overcharged add to beat the enrage, which wasn't particularly hard, although from what I saw the enrage is not beatable solo as blood dk.

Koralon 25 seems like he has a non-working enrage! Again full tank gear with a hunter who did full dps in order to keep the stacks low, at first meteor fists it was possible to just kite a bit, after over 20 stacks of burning fury you really have to run away from him + ams at meteor fists; on the other hand physical damage is not a problem, I had 200k blood shield all time. Killed in 5 mins 30 with 5 mins enrage, that's why not working enrage.

Toravon 25, seems like this one does even more damage than 10 with frostbite, also he has 15 millions hp, so we decided to try with 3 people, rather than 2, else would've had enrage problems also. Used 1 blood dk in tank gear, 1 blood dk in dps gear (again for enrage reasons) and taunted at like 7-8 stacks of frostbite. Due to not perfect timing, we both died once during the fight, but could ress each other once, and also had a hunter to beat the enrage, ofc. Took us around 4 mins 30, which was 30 sec before the enrage, and to avoid dying from the dot while resetting the stack, we death striked the adds he spawns, which are also a lot on 25.

Comment by Dedmeett

Emalon and Archavon are soloable for a ilvl 388 blood dk.

Archavon is actually easy, I never drpped below 90% health, just a long fight, so maybe dps gear would have sped things up a bit.
Emalon is a little trickier, make sure to kill the overcharged tempest minion when he casts it and try to avoid his big aoe.
I tried Toravon, the fire one, with no strategy. got him pretty low. I was popping everything to stay alive, but he got me.
Dunno about Toravon, health to high to even try.

Bring a friend or two and the whole place is doable, no sweat.

Links

Vault of Archavon

Vault of ArchavonArchavon the Stone WatcherEmalon the Storm WatcherKoralon the Flame WatcherToravon the Ice WatcherVault of ArchavonWintergraspDalaranHaving trouble finding it? Click "Location" in the Quick Facts box to the right!

Vault of Archavon

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