The Raid & Dungeon Panel at Blizzcon showcased some of the 5-players dungeons and raid dungeons available in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King. A very special flying mount is available for the most hardcore players at the Obsidian Sanctum, and high tier sets are available from 25-players raid dungeons by purchasing them at Dalaran Quartermasters with Emblem of Valor tokens.
5 PLAYER DUNGEONS
Halls of Lightning
The Halls of Lightning is a level 80 5-players raid dungeon is part of Uldur which is located in the Storm Peaks. The design philosophy behind this dungeon is to follow in with the lore of titans to discover their secrets. You can find various servants of the Titans in Ulduar, such as the Runed Vykrul. Runed Giants and Runed Iron Dwarves. The first boss encounter is an Iron Vykrul that uses three Iron Dwarves as lightning battery. The idea in this encounter is to kill all the mobs around the halls first, then to kill the three companions that follow the boss. Pulling the boss has to be timed. Once he reaches a corner in his patrol path, he energizes and gets a buff that increases his damage output.
The last boss is Loken, who uses the same model as Aman in the very early questline of The Absent-minded Prospector from Darkshore. Loken can be a challenging fight, but doable. It is a fun dungeon I have played in beta. Loken has succumbed to the whispers of the Old gods and wishes to scour the world for his new master. The scenes of this dungeon are amazing, specially the chamber with the star map.
Some of the dungeons are going to be non-linear where you can fight bosses in any order you want, and others will be completely linear.
Another 5-player raid dungeon is Ahn’kahet: The Old Kingdom in Azjol-Nerub, accessible from dragonblight. It features both indoor and outdoor terrain. The purpose of this dungeon is to reveal what horrors lie underneath Northrend with the influence of the old gods lingering with the arrival of the Twilight’s Hammer in Ahn’kahet. There is much to discover in this dungeon. On one end we have the Scourge army represented with Shades, Geists, Skeletal Storm Giants, and one of the high elven Princes—second boss in the dungeon. The third boss is a female orc leading a large band of cultists from the Twilight’s Hammer. The key to defeating her is to kill the acolytes who sacrifice to empower their leader before they reach the beam of power. The last boss in this dungeon is amazing and unique ... the reemergence of the Faceless Ones.
RAID DUNGEONS
The Obsidian Sanctum
Among the raid zones available in World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King is the Chamber of the Aspects: The Obsidian Sanctum, which may be found at the basement beneath the Wyrmrest Temple in Dragonblight. You may choose to play the Obsidian Sanctum as a 10, or 25 players raid dungeon mode. This dungeon has three twilight drake mini-bosses and the main boss: a black dragon. The twilight drakes have different abilities. One of them resembles the Kalecgos event slightly. If you decide to not kill all of the mini-bosses, the black dragon boss will be harder to kill but offers better loot tables. One of this bigger rewards is a twilight drake mount. Only the best raiding guilds will have a shot at acquiring one of these rare flying mounts.
Eye of Eternity
This is the home of Malygos, the blue Aspect of Magic. It is a very hard encounter, but the red dragonflight will assist you in defeating the dragon aspect.Not much could be shown in the Blizzcon panel, since there was an unforseen inconvenience with the event. From what I could see, portals similar to those of the Caverns of Time: Black Morass dungeon were opening up. This event showcases various features introduced in the expansion and is designed to be an epic multiple phase fight.
In order to play in the Eye of Eternity, at least one player in the raid needs to have the key obtained from Sapphiron in Naxxramas (Northrend) to start the scripted event.
Itemization
Blizzard is working on higher quality loot from heroic dungeons. The loot is escalated up one tier from normal to heroic difficulty. There will be different currencies per raid tier: Emblem of heroism are gained from heroic-mode dungeon bosses, while emblem of valor tokens are gained from 25-players raid dungeons. You can obtain high tier set pieces with these tokens by visiting the Alliance or Horde quartermaster vendors in Dalaran.
