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Comment by 13105

The Mana-Tombs are located in Auchindoun. It is the north instance entrance.

Comment by 12652

Priest is useful more for shadow resist buff than dispels (which can easily be healed through with a pair of hots from a resto druid).

we ran this place with a well-coordinated group. a tank at 64, dps at 63, and a 62 druid healing. it was pretty dang hard, though it's easier now. good shadow resist helps a lot on the first boss, as do multiple tranquilities. later in the instance, there are a few mobs that poly, so druid tanks are safer. the last boss took some learning. (dps his minions down FAST), and was much easier when i ran in with 8 hots ticking.

Comment by 11676

If your group can beat the first boss you're pretty much in the clear for the rest of the instance. The other two bosses are quite a bit easier in comparison.

As was mentioned earlier the other thing to really watch out for is the enemies that cast Shadow Word: Pain which ticks for 1000dmg and can quickly bring down anyone, including the tank if they aren't healed.

Comment by 3316

What a pain of an instance!
1. Location & Party Setup
Mana Tombs are located in the North side of Auchindoun, as you wait near the meeting stone. You can't miss it. You can go down by jumping/slowfalling/walking down through various tunnels
As for the party, get a warrior. Shadow resistance on him is nice but you can do it without. Get two healers, a priest (you shall need a Shadow Protection) and a backup healer. Some people are good and some others - I won't argue shamans over druids, just promise them they can dps on whatever else they want but heal on bosses. Besides these, crowd control is appreciated. Any kind. Mage is ideal! The mobs are humanoids and sometimes demons.

3. Mobs, trash pulls and such
The trick to killing trash with no headaches is waiting for the right moment. You can easily pick up two groups or a group and a patrol. Patience and understanding, they hit VERY hard and their movements are crazy. Overall, there are : Apprentices, arcanists, Crypt Raiders, Darkcasters, Priests, Scavangers, Sorcerers, Spellbinders and Theurgists, in no particular order and Nexus Stalkers/Terrors. Whenever you see a group with a priest, kill it first. Abilities for the trash include a wide range of spells/skills such as : Gouge, Immolate (theurgists/spellbinders I think), Polymorph (Theurgists), Charge (Scavangers), Holy Nova and Flash Heal (Priests), Arcane Missiles (Sorcerers) and some elemental fiend summoning from caster mobs.

Anyhow. First boss is in order!

Pandemonius (https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/npc=18341)
is close to the entrance. He is a very decisive fight. You either make it or not! No way of skipping, no resetting, nothing. He is very hard for lower level groups with not enough healing. It's a mana-heavy fight and requires anything that might help you. I don't want to make it sound harder than it is, but I'm a tank and I've seen the good and the bad of it so it will always be extra caution first for me. As you enter the room, notice a purple flame and some boxes on the right. Tank him there with the wall behind you and let the rest of the party stay on the skeleton pile in the back.
Void Blast does 800-1800 AoE Bolts, deals physical damage to everyone in his 36-40 yard range, damage reduction from armor, does a knockback multiple times.
Shadow Shield reflects all spells and deals 750-900 damage on melee. It is a green shield at his 'feet'. Get a macro for it and spam it or keep detect magic up.
Melee is shadow damage 100%. You decide what to do :)
http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/3514/pandemoniusdmgua9.gif is a sample!

Tavarok is 2nd (https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/npc=18343)
If you could kill Pandemonius, this should be cake.
Melee deals 250-500 damage, Earthquake stuns, deals 750-1000 damage and has a 36 yard range or less and Crystal Prison selects a target at random, dealing damage equal to 10% of his HP every second for 5 seconds. In other words, half your HP!

Nexus Prince Shaffar (https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/npc=18344) is the last. He has 3 Ethereal Beacons surrounding him. They cannot be crowd controlled, kill them right away and get any pet/felguard/player available to offtank them. Shaffar himself does so many things I don't know where to start. He has Frostbolt, Frost Nova. He Blinks after he does his Frost Nova sometimes. Not far, doesn't wipe aggro, it's just annoying. As people should be busy with adds, there is no such thing as losing aggro. Your newly learnt Spell Reflection at 64 makes you reflect up to half his spells. Use it wisely and time it well.

The three quests involving this area are (to my knowledge, non-heroic)
https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/quest=10216 Safety Is Job Done
https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/quest=10218 Someone Else's Hard Work Pays Off, do it AFTER you have cleared the instance, it can be very difficult. You will end up having to kill another level 66 Elite Ethereal at the end.
https://www.wowhead.com/wotlk/quest=10165 Undercutting the Competition gathered from the last boss

Comment by 10954

The trick with the groups of trash mobs is to clearly identify the real villain and deal with it first, just as with any other instance.

It is possible to race through the trash without any difficulty whatsoever if the Darkcaster is either killed first and very quickly or polymorphed and killed last.
If the Darkcasters are handled correctly and prevented from casting their mana burn spell by a timely interruption (or swift death) there is not any great difficulty. If the mana burn spell does hit a player it depletes almost their entire mana pool.
Later in the instance there are Theurgists that need to be given the same priority as Darkcasters, they have a nasty AoE blastwave that does a great deal of damage and they polymorph players. Again use polymorph on Theurgists if possible or kill them first and quickly, if there are two kill one first and polymorph the other to kill last.
Priests need to be handled in a similar manner to the mobs mentioned above, they cast a nasty SW:P spell as mentioned in previous posts.
Sorcerers are more of a nuisance than a threat in comparison and occasionally summon an elemental or two which don't need much damage to kill. Most of the other trash mobs are easily handled with a little group co-ordination.

Comment by 10620

Here's my attempt at a concise guide for this instance.

Pull Difficulty: 4/5
Nothing super tricky, but there are some pulls with 4 enemies, and most of the enemies here just get nastier and nastier the longer they're left alive. No CC hurts here. Make sure your puller isn't a moron with a bad sense of timing, because it's very easy to drop two groups on yourself here.

Trash:

Mana Leech- Come in packs, non-elite, blow up for 1000 or so damage when killed. Don't AoE.

Melee-Type Wraiths- Nothing special. Mostly rogue-types that gouge and warrior-types that deliver a mortal strike knockoff. Keep em off the clothies.

Darkcasters- Shut these things up. They mana burn for thousands of mana.

Sorcerers- Summons two adds if left alive too long. CC or shut them up.

Theurgist- Randomly polys people. Casts immolate/blast wave. Annoying but not as bad as the others.

Spellbinder- Another caster that summons adds when left alive too long. Kill, CC, or shut them up.

Priests- Nasty Power Word:Pain, AoE healing/damage, shields. Annoying. Shut them up.

Nexus Terror: Pull far away from other groups, since they psychic scream a lot. Drops an annoying DoT and has a fair amount of HP but they're nothing to worry about.

Bosses:

Pandemonius- Not nearly as scary as everyone makes it sound if your party has its head and ass wired together.

Let the tank establish aggro, then DPS away.

STOP DPS WHEN THE SHIELD GOES UP. This the difference between free blues and a 6-second wipe. If you stop DPS when you spot his yellow shield, then quickly resume when it stops, you'll be fine. His AoE is damaging but not frequent enough to warrant any worry unless your healer stinks. The knockback is very minor so don't worry too much about tanking against a wall.

Tavarok: Tank and spank, mind the DoT, loot, move on. The amount of ranged DPS you have will determine the stress on the healer. Good luck if you have no casters or hunters.

Nexus Prince: Nice accent, fruity. Let the tank have his fun, and SMOKE those orbs as fast as humanly possible. If there's an orb up and you're DPSing the boss, you're hurting the group. While no orbs are in play, DPS the boss.

The prince himself doesn't really do anything special. He'll blink off and on, and frost nova. Both ignorable as long as the group moves over to him (he'll be pelting the tank with rapid fire bolt attacks the whole time you're closing with him).

It may take a while to kill him due to focusing on the orbs, but trust me, you don't want those piling up.

Comment by 17157

This is one of the best instances to keep doing.
Why the hell do I hear you say ? Well.... this is the perfect place to multi-task.

-1: Get Blue drops to get Small Prismatic Shards, and therefore 1/3 Large Prismatic shard. Allways fun to have.

-2:Get alot of Netherweave Cloth, because the damn 20slot bags take up alot of it....

-3: Spirit Shards. I recommend to get a small stack of these to place a nice looking Meta-gem in a newly lootted headpiece for a cheap (free) price, or at least until a better one is on the way.

-4: Rep with the Consortium. In general to get acces to the monthly mailed bag of gems you will get (higher rep means better gems). I think that everybody should be at least revered. Too EZ toachieve for a nice selection of gems. Allso I believe the Jewelcrafters and Enchanters need a nice rep here to get their hands on some nice stuff. So when the enchanter who is so kind as to diss all the drops for the Shards, will get a reward for his effort.

!!! Reason 3+4 combined make the Mana-Tombs THE place to get gems of better then normal quality.

-5: Gold. The obvious reason, mobs drop Silver, etc....

-6: Other drops.. I dnu what other usefull things you get here, but some greens for AH money/dissing are allways fun to get.

SO in conclusion, if you convince 4 other lvl 70 peeps to do a run or 2 a day here for about a week, you will have a small supply of large prismatic shards, a bunch of stacks of netherweave, spirit shards perhaps enough to get the 50Shard ring, or at least a couple of those nice meta gems in supply. If you are a Jewelcrafter/Enchanter youll be able to do some nice shizzle, and above the sold/dissed greens that got some more money for your epic mount, you'll know that at the end of the month a nice bag of gems will drop into your mailbox.

When you hit revered you'll have a small advantage, but a good WoW player knows that that LIIIITLE bit of extra swing is just what you need to get the job done other nUbs keep whining about :D

My only question is what is the effect of playing this instance on Heroic difficulty... which would also give as another Pro the Badges Of Justice youll be getting.

Comment by 15654

dont know if its been mentioned but the second boss can be mined each time i mine him i get 3 green named gems 5 adamantite ore 3 lesser planar essence :D

Comment by 25559

So... just yesterday, 19/02/07 we made it through on the Heroic difficulty, doing probably the first Alliance kill on Drak'Thul server. We had a full lvl70 group consisting of 2x priest (1 shadow), 2x mage and feral tank. First think you will encounter is, that trash mobs are now hitting much harder, 5k-7k non crit dmg to cloth wearers, so pull should be always conducted by the tank. Massive crowd control is advised.

Pandemonius

He is now doing insane shadow dmg, 5k non crushing hits will kill the tank without SR within few seconds. SR 360+ is advised for this encounter.

Tavarok

Quite similar to normal mod, only difference is, that he is now hitting harder and crystal prison is only cast on tank, so watch his/her hp and you are fine

Nexus-Prince Shaffar

Insane combat... He is spawning adds with blazing speed, so any attempts to kill them will lead to wipe. It seems, that currently only working tactic is to nuke Prince fast and burn him down, while fearing adds. Don't forget to use your wizard oils, food, elixirs, pots, drums, whatever to boost your dmg output and magic resistances. You will probably die when he's at 0% but it doesn't matter, he is dead for good :D

http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/9867/wowscrnshot021907230626dq2.jpg

Comment by 6341

It's a pretty hard instance. Most mobs are humanoids so mage is a very helpful here. Priest with shadow resistance as well.

The first boss is really hard. Good healing is the key to get him down. Second boss is much easier, just typical tank+dps+healing fight. The third boss is pretty hard as well.

My group contained a warrior (prot), paladin (holy), mage, hunter and druid (feral). We were doing pretty good until we reached last boss. After 2 wipes we tried that tactic :
Warrior is tanking prince and noone else, pala heals (loads of mana needed), mage and hunter are nuking boss and feral druid were offtanking adds. As a feral druid (66) I was able to kill any adds with 2-3 hits, so the crowd control was pretty good. The boss went down easy.

Comment by BobTheGreat

heres a funny question, in mana tombs do u ever lose mana? i mean it is called mana tombs

Comment by 52057

If you are a druid, you may tank this instance in cat form (or zerker stance if you are warrior) provided that your healer is a bit competent. It makes the instance go a lot faster since the mobs inside have a laughable amount of armor and can be stunned.

However you should never kitty tank the Nexus Terrors, simply keep them stunned to minimize damage.

I did this instance with only a shaman healer. Only popped innervate once on him during final boss, the rest of instance me and a rogue pretty much insta-gibbed all the casters.

Here's a rundown of bosses
Pandemonius: Does shadow damage, wear tons of stamina gears to allow buffer for bigger heals, as the fight is mana intensive. If your group has a shaman, grounding totem works wonders against shadowbolts. Tank near walls because he knocks back.

Tavarok: Tank and spank, ranged and healers stay at max distance. Melee dps learn to run out to bandage.

Prince: Most groups will wipe if inexperienced, the key is to down the beacons asap (remember when you first play MC and wipe on those firelords?), again, stack stam when tanking since the prince is a mage type boss.

Comment by 45405

I just ran this last night and i here's my opinion on a good group:

1.Paladin/Warrior: Tank(I am ret spec so tanking wasn't so bad)

2.Holy priest/Paladin: Healing(having Discipline priest wouldn't be too bad either)

3.Rogue: Dps. Must have imp sap if you have one.

4.Mage: Dps, Water, and CC.

5.Any Hybrid (we used a second priest with shadow spec to off heal at bosses and Vampiric embrace/touch for downtime reduction) A druid or shaman would greatly be needed to offtank/dps.

We managed to down Pandemonious on first try so it must've been a good party.

Comment by 51360

U cant mindcontrol any in heroic mode, trust me :P

Comment by 68719

Is it possible to complete the instance with a 63 holy pally , 64 prot. pally and lvl 65 demonology warlock ?

Comment by Flatus

Me and few of my friends are farming first boss for spirit shards. As a paladin tank, I can easily take many mobs at one time, resulting faster killing. There's about 6 packs of mobs before the boss, depending how you take them. First boss is pretty easy when you just know what to do. Takes maximum 15 mins to run it once when you have good group.

Also, I'm trying to get tanking shield from it. Done it now 22 times, and haven't dropped...

Comment by 56397

Minimum required level for entry on Normal is 55.

Comment by 93865

It is possible to skip most of the instance if a druid with Feral Instinct, a three-point second-tier talent in the Feral tree, is in the party. The feral druid can stealth past the trash after Pandemonius, the first boss, and sneak behind Shaffar, the last boss. The rest of the party, including a rezzer, can then pull the trash and kill themselves beneath the ledge that leads down from the upper level and out of the instance. The druid may then Rebirth a rezzer, who then rezzes the rest of the party onto the ledge. The party then hugs the wall and sneaks around Shaffar, clears his room, and kills him and Yor, earning three badges (from Pandemonius, Yor and Shaffar) and assorted loot for far less effort than required for a full clear. This is not an exploit.

Comment by 99871

I've done this on heroic twice in the past 3 days. First was much better but it was all still rather simple. Had healadin, warrior tank, enhance shammy, marksman hunter & the first time a fire mage, second destro lock. The CC on the first run went much better (poly>seduce) but it wasn't what caused us problems. Our biggest issue was the spellbinders. Their Immolate ticks for a LOT (not sure, just know it was keeping me busy with dispelling/healing) and it's disasterous when you get 2 spellbinders in a pull. My advice would be to CC them (sheeping works best, they tend to break seduction) and take them out last.
Also, I'm sure that more shadow resist would help on first boss, but all we had was my shadow resist aura (+70) and we did fine, so don't sweat it too much.

Comment by Lanceler

Lovely instance on heroic, when you outgear most heroics, this one still keeps you and your healer alert. =)

Also, if you're feeling confident in your healer + tank, Go without CC, great fun for your tank.

Comment by 4634

This instance is used for stealth chest farming to generate large quantities of gold for rogues and druids. There are several "how-too" videos on youtube and elsewhere. There are several of these videos floating around if you're so inclined to look for them. Mages are capable of going invisible to similar effect. Other instances have their own stealth methods.

Comment by dongjinkim

Heroic Mana-Tombs is quite easy compared to most heroic instances, with the exception of Nexus-Prince Shaffar who is extremely difficult comparatively speaking.

The strategy we used to beat him on heroic mode was to have ALL DPS on the beacons whenever they spawned, while the tank continued to focus on the Prince.
The tank won't be losing aggro so he should focus on doing DPS instead of generating threat. For example, warriors should make liberal use of Devastate.

Important: Kill beacons ahead of humanoids, even if it means stopping DPS on the existing add to burn down a newly spawned beacon.

As a mage, I used 1 Frostbolt (not enough time to do 2), followed by a Fire Blast, and possibly a Cone of Cold on each beacon.

Using this strategy we were able to keep the adds under control, however it was a very mana intensive fight. With this strategy, approximately 80% of my DPS was spent on adds, and only 20% was on the Nexus-Prince himself.

Comment by 145457

The hardest part of this dungeon on heroic, for me, was the crypt raiders, they do a charge as soon as you pull them which knocks you down for a few seconds, if your DPS doesn't hold back for those few seconds it usually ends up with them pulling the mob before you've even got back up off the floor (happened to me anyway, lock would starting firing from the second I pulled...) usually resulting in them dieing if you don't get off a quick taunt.

Other than that it's relatively easy, I highly recommend a grounding totem on the first boss though. Only shadow resistance I had was from the priest buff, combined with the grounding totem, we ended the fight with everyone on full health and about 70% Mana, and I by no means out gear this dungeon. Positioning which worked well for me was I pulled him, moved to the right side where the two 'crypts things' are, with my back against the closest one as you enter, while everyone else stood against the back wall with the small mound. If you follow me...xP

Second boss I tanked him where he stood, spun him away from the party while they all stood on the hill/mound at the entrance to his chamber part, he got a few DoTs off on the ranged DPS (which was all our DPS) if they moved to close, but other than that it's pretty much tank and spank. Never had a problem with his cleave mentioned above.

Tried two methods on the last boss, first was kill the adds, second was kill the boss. Second worked much better for us, mainly because the rate in which they turn into non elites is much much faster than on normal, usually resulting in the beacons transforming and getting their health back before they could be killed, so why waste the mana and dps? We killed him (albeit wiping at the same time) and were left with a room full of adds, but it was only our second wipe for the dungeon (our mage hadn't done the escort quest and foolishly clicked the quest item, resulting in a room full of friendly consortium dudes...who happened to look almost identical to who we were fighting, so things got chaotic, and we died :( ).

Other things to note: The Void terror/walker guys do Deathcoil (instant fear which hits for damage) maybe able to reflect it if you're lucky but I'm not sure.

As someone has said, take you time when pulling, 10 seconds while you wait for a patrol to be safely out is better than 3 minutes while you wipe and run back, as it is incredibly easy to pull 2, or even 3 groups at a time.

Other than that it's a pretty fun dungeon to tank.

Comment by 155580

Ok just a quick and easy trick to getting rid of those adds that Nexus-Prince Shaffar has...

1st - have a warlock in your group
2nd - have the warlock summon the Eye of Kilrogg
3rd - have him take the eye under the legs of the prince
4th - the prince should desummon his adds

Note: the prince will still summon more adds as his health gets to be lower but the good part is that you won't have to worry about his starting adds.

:) good luck

Comment by 106615

Do not be suprised if u get invited for only a quick badge run(Heroic) as the first boss is within 10 minutes of starting.

Comment by fenom

about how long would this instance take on normal for an average group?

Comment by 176866

at what lvl should a marks hunter be doing this instance i want the bow from here
i know a 65 pally and 2 70's am lvl 64 atm should i do it now or ding 65 then do it

Comment by Zoer

easily soloed by 80 DK :P

Comment by vanzan

At level 64, (the level at which the two quest can be taken from just outside of the instance) a full clear, the escort quest along with the other two quest from outside, with no rested xp bonus and your faction in control of the spirit towers;
will give approx 14500xp.. just shy of 7 bars of the level.

In other words, around a 3rd of the xp need to get from level 64 to 65 - from one instance run.

I completed this while box-booting my hunter

Comment by jadrianz

Solo'd on my lvl 80 DK (Dorgranth - velen).

No problems until Tavarok. He kept me stunned and killed me.

Went around him after ghost running back to instance to continue. Cleared all the way to the Prince. Summoned AoD and boar. He was dead. Went back to attempt tavarok again. Same stunning so dead again.

Comment by 361704

Heroic mode gives Consortium reputation in patch 3.1.1.

Easily duo-ble by two level 80's in naxx gear. 30min for 1.5 - 2k rep. Better than grinding Zaxxis insignias in Netherstorm.

Consortium exalted gives Chief Exalted Officer achievement.

Comment by 27259

If u solo it..don't try without clearing the boss room...everything adds...found out hard way...:P

at least at 1st boss

Comment by citrique

I soloed this instance on heroic today as an 80 blood DK in tank gear with DPS spec. Mix of Ulduar 10/25 epics with some naxx stuff. Elected to go in DPS spec so the instance wouldn't take two hours to clear, my tank gear is set up for EH rather than threat.

Trash is easy enough, no issues to speak of, though some of it hits like a truck. Melee between 550-2200 on plate with SW:P ticking for about 1200 and immolate for 570. Silence/phys damage increase effects were a plus since blood DKs do mostly physical damage. All of the trash except the spellbinders will run into melee range so no need to death grip it. Conjurers and spellbinders spawn annoying adds that will wipe you fairly quickly so burn them first. Priests just cast a big single-target heal that's easily interrupted.

Pandemonious: use cooldowns during dark shell, tank and spank otherwise. Would be extremely difficult as frost.

Tavarok: Challenging. I used DPS cooldowns (hysteria, DRW) to burn him down as quickly as possible to avoid more than 3 crystal prisons. Earthquake tickles, but crystal prison is quite deadly. Always always be above 50% HP. Vampiric blood is no help other than to recover HP with Death Strike after the second prison. Sacrificed ghoul, used every cooldown, wouldn't have lived through another one had he not died. Arcing smash can vary, it hit for anywhere from 2.5 to 6k.

Shaffar: Annoying. I elected to burn him down and ignore the adds since I was just doing it for the achievement. Killed him, adds killed me afterwards. Interestingly doing this netted me more Consortium rep as the six adds that were up (they don't despawn on death) all gave me full rep for each when I came back to loot his corpse and killed them.

Overall soloing this is doable but not terribly profitable. 2 deaths, about 45 minutes, about 140g from looting, about 2.5k rep. Shattered halls provides more gold and has much easier bosses.

Comment by 392465

Soloed this with my lvl 80 fury/prot warrior in moderate gear http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Kil%27jaeden&n=Imhotdunhate. The only trouble I had was with Tavarok because he does an attack that ticks based on a % of your health (10% every sec for 5 seconds). Other than that it was pretty easy. I would use fury for boss fights to burn them down quickly and prot on the trash to gather and shock wave/thunder clap to death. Good source of netherweave if you are a tailor or in my case funding my alt's tailoring skill.

Edit: Confirmed % of Tavaroks damage

Comment by 383467

What is that flickering, big portal thing?

Comment by citrique

I went back in here and decided to try soloing this on heroic as a 51/0/20 specced blood DPS DK in DPS gear, for the challenge. Also, soloing the instance takes about 25 minutes in DPS gear/spec, making this worthwhile to grind rep and netherweave cloth; doing it in tank spec/gear takes quite a lot longer.

This was remarkably easy - but I do have pretty close to BiS gear as of this date. The key is not to pull more than one pack at a time and to use large single mobs like Nexus Terrors to heal up with Death Strike inbetween group pulls. You should have an armor penetration proc trinket such as Grim Toll or Mjolnir Runestone, and pull packs at 45 second intervals to match the ICD of the trinket so that your burst damage will burn two of the the mobs in a pack down in the first 2-3 GCDs.

Wyrm packs are annoying as you can't heal up on these due to their low health. I'd cast DnD in front of the pack, taunt then run away so the pack had to pass through DnD on its way to me, then turn and spam heart strike.

Priests can be ignored and the most damaging mobs in a group (stalkers, crypt raiders, darkcasters) should be killed first, as the priests will die from heart strike's cleave effect.

Pandemonious: Straight burn. Hysteria/DRW and antimagic shell since all of his damage is shadow. Took about 12 seconds to kill.

Tavarok: Use army so he doesn't target you with crystal prison, otherwise DPS him down.

Shaffar: Straight burn again, adds will be vaporized by Heart Strike cleave effect before they can even materialize. You want him dead before he can teleport the first time, so blow all cooldowns. When I killed him I did over 8,000 DPS.

The most dangerous packs are those with two Crypt Raiders or two Stalkers in them - the Crypt Raiders melee white swings can crit for 6,000 on plate and the Stalkers can gouge you leaving you open for quite a lot of melee damage. In such pulls I'd usually set one as focus, chains of ice it, death grip a caster over and burn it down, recast chains of ice, then kite and kill the mobs one at a time. This made it so a bad streak of RNG / mob crits wouldn't instagib me. Pulls with Crypt Raiders, you must walk up to the Crypt Raider and hit it first from within 5 yards so that it can't charge stun you. Being stunned in here (and in heroics in general) will cause you to die quickly.

While some may downrate this post saying "lol DKs can solo anything" I'm willing to bet the vast majority of people who play DKs would not be able to solo clear a BC heroic dungeon in pure DPS gear and spec.

Comment by Kaliopae

As a group without crowd control (resto druid, hybrid druid and warrior, all 70), we found the trash to be much more difficult than the bosses.

> The Spellbinder's Immolate and the Darkcaster's Mana Burn reduced the tree to ash a great many times. A priest would have helped immensely.
> The Void Terror feared us into another group, but were simplicity when pulled back.
> About 1/2 of the groups can be safely skipped if you can pull well.
> The boss fights were all doable easily (if slowly) with minimal dps.

Comment by 554789

soloed as an affliction warlock, everything is easy, took about 40 minutes to wipe out all the heroic instance

Comment by Fingulfin

Solo'd HEROIC* Mana Tombs as a level 80 Affliction (PvP) warlock in mostly BiS 264/277 gear. Unlike most instances that warlocks solo, this one requires you to use your succubus (as opposed to Voidwalker or Felguard). Surprisingly, I didn't die a single time. Remember, Crypt Raiders should be your #1 CC priority; their Mortal Strike is particularly nasty (and does over 10k damage to you!). Remember to keep an eye on your Succi's HP, there are alot of mobs in here who find it hilarious to DoT her up.

Pandemonius - This boss gave me the most trouble. He hits like a truck, and although Shadow Ward will even soak his melee once he starts casting Void Blast it can be very difficult to cast.
Tavarok - I actually went Demonology for this boss so my felguard could tank him. He doesn't hit especially hard with Curse of Weakness up (~1100-1500). The only "scary" part was Crystal Prison, however it is quite easy to simply drain life back to full HP.
Shaffar - Was a pushover. DoT up his spheres and then spank then boss... Rinse and repeat until dead.

*because everyone knows normal difficult isn't hard.

Comment by Thottbot

Took definitely crowd control with! A mage is a gold to have here but a skilled hunter is good as well. Take a lot of water with! Aside of it this instance needs concentration and right handling of groups, plus quick improvisation when crap hits the fan, otherwise you will wipe often.

There are 3 bosses to kill plus one you meet in the case you manage to do escort quest. Here comes boss list:

Pandemonius (1st boss, Demon) - We place our tank on the right side between two sargs standing by wall, healers having standing from a side to the boss with their back at one sarg to minimize healing downtime during knock-backs. I do not seen real need to keep at range for them. Do not attack when the boss has shield up, otherwise just DPS him down. If you are a hunter, you can DPS whole time even with boss's shield up (WoW 2.0.6). You need a main healer for tank, an off-healer for the rest of the team after AoE shadow bolts. Get some shadow protection up.

Tavarok (2nd boss, Giant) - Let the tank tank him, your main healer on tank and off-healer for the rest of group and/or tank when the main healer gets in a crystal trap. His attack includes AoE Earthquake. He traps one person into some trap. Aside of it nothing special, just DPS him down.

Nexus-Prince Shaffar (End boss, Humanoid) - Let the tank occupy him, your main healer on the tank and the rest of group kills as quickly as possible around flying Ethereal Beacons. AoE them, do what you want, just do it quickly as every Beacon will transform itself into full add, that can be dangerous. When boss spawns a new Beacon, kill it immediately. Other then that, DPS him down.

Shadow Lord Xiraxis (Quest only boss, Humanoid) - You will meet him if you manage to escort Cryo-Engineer Sha'heen from the "cube quest" till end of his route. There is not simpler boss. Just tank him and DPS down. Aside of some HPs to lower he has nothing special.

The right trickery of this instance are actually groups on the way that need really careful execution. Crowd control is very big help here. Follows dangerous trash mobs in killing order (sheeping moves them to end):

Ethereal Darkcaster - Kill on sight and keep him out of casting. He sucks AoE mana with horrible speed and he can manage wipe in second.

Ethereal Spellbinder - Simulates a warlock. They debuff people so cleanse if you can and they summons adds that are dangerous, however has few HPs. Killed them quickly and if adds come, kill adds immediately before continuing.

Ethereal Theurgist - Mob that works as mage, they sheep people and have fire blast AoE. Take care with AoE, on the second side most sheeps they do will be broken by themselves. You will meet this at the end.

Ethereal Priests - AoE damage and healing. Simply kill them before killing meleeing trash.

Ethereal Sorcerer - Caster mob with arcane missiles. Kill before melee one as usual.

Ethereal Stalkers - Rogues who gauge and poison. They like to go for healers, so do not let slip them.

The rest of Ethereals are nothing special, they do just some damage.

You will meet some different mobs as Ethereal family as well:

Nexus Terror - Pull far back into clear area because he fears and getting adds you will wipe for sure. Keep a distance if you are a mana user. He can fear even tanks but you can tank him with Deathwish. You can kite him to death as well. He is stunnable.

Mana Leeches - They look like eels. AoE them to death. They explode, so shield your mage and give him load of healing.

Notices to quests:

Safety Is Job One - You will get this one before entrance. Why cleaning instance you will definitely complete it. You can return it in the last room just before end boss. There is a teleporting cube on the right side. DO NOT RETURN IT BEFORE THE WHOLE INSTANCE IS CLEARED! After the instance is cleared, get with whole group back to cube. Return the quest, but DO NOT ACCEPT FOLLOW UP. For details see next quest note.

Someone Else's Hard Work Pays Off - If whole group return pre-quest, see above, let one of the group take the quest, all get option to accept it as well. The guy starts the work and you will be ganked by some grouping of Ethereals. You have learned how to handle the groups, so try to kill them, it is tough. You will meet 2 or 3 ganking groups and some Nexus Terrors as well. At the end or escort route you will face simple boss Shadow Lord Xiraxis.

Lot of luck! :)

Comment by Thottbot

I have now added a map over the instance.
A better version will arrive (of the 3rd boss room).

Enjoy it!
Whisper me in-game if you have any questions.

Aerchion @ Zenedar EU, or mail me: cyklonen@msn.com

Thank you!

Comment by Thottbot

64-66 is good.

Comment by Thottbot

I (protection warrior) have main-tanked this place at 63 (then 64) for about 6 times w/ different groups of people (lvl 63-66) and it has been great. This instace is somewhat of a challenge, and getting the right people who know what they are doing is the key to clearing the instance.

For WARRIORS who tank last boss, use your SPELL REFLECTION whenever he "freezes" you and run away to cast fire ball or frost spell on you. This would save a lot of your HP(and your healer's MP).

Ideally, this should be done with:
- Tank (preferably protection warrior)
- Mage (DPS and sheep)
- Rogue (DPS and imp sap)
- Main Healer (Priest or Resto druid - Tranquility FTW, and can off-tank also)
- Another DPS class (Shadow priests in my opinion would be great since can DPS and also heal, hunters, locks)

Have fun looting!

Oh, the ESCORT QUEST at the end is not too bad at it seems. 4 mobs come at you whenever the guy operates the electric thing.

Comment by Thottbot

CC and taking down one target at a time.

PUGs will wipe unless people CC and focus fire.

Comment by Thottbot

What rep do you need to get to get the heroic key for here or is there not one?

Comment by Thottbot

you need lower city revered to get the heroic key here

Comment by Thottbot

What is the quest that gives you access to the repair guy outside mana tombs?

Comment by Thottbot

if a 70 still gets consortium rep for normal mode?

Comment by Thottbot

Can anyone confirm at what reputation level Mana Tombs stops giving reputation, or is it at 70 it stops giving reputation?

Comment by Thottbot

Where do u get the heroic key?

Comment by Thottbot

The last two times i've tried the escort quest, It's imidiatly failed. Is it because we already killed final boss? Or is this a new glitch that blizz needs to work on?
<3 irrsec of alleria

Comment by Thottbot

I dont know why but i can never seem to find a balanced group to run this instance. It's like everyone hates it for some reason. Tanks are the worst. And then the only healers i ever seem to be able to find for it are shadow priests, which work well for back-up but not for a main healer. Ive tried many evenings in a row and never have any luck. All I want to do is finish the entire instance (and escort quest) just one time, is that too much to ask?

Comment by Thottbot

I cleared this last night in a PUG as a level 65 prot pally and I can tell you that, while it would certainly help, CC is not a necessity. What is important is patience and careful pulls. At one point we had no choice but to fight four mobs at once but usually we were fighting no more than three at a time. The trick is a little patience as there are several patrol mobs running around so it pays to wait and observe the patrols for a bit to make sure they won't get pulled into the fight. Another important tactic is to take on the Nexus Terrors last and alone and only after clearing a wide area around them as their fear ability can easily cause wipes.

The Mana Leeches weren't so bad. What I found succcessful was to hit a group of them with Avenger's Shield at max range, consecrate the ground immediately and then walk backwards so that the leeches would have to come through the whole consecrated area before they were within melee range. They're not elites and have so few hit points that they're usually nearly dead already before the rest of the party needs to get involved.

The most trouble I had was the Ethereal Stalkers. They would routinely gouge me and then turn on the clothies or the healer. Fortunately, once the gouge faded they would immediately turn back onto me but it was annoying nevertheless.

Overall it was a pretty smooth and enjoyable run. We had two wipes - one at Pandemonius, one at the Prince - and one or two random deaths but otherwise it went pretty smooth. Just make sure you have a patient party that isn't trying to rush it and that you have a tank that knows when and what to pull at it should be a relatively painless instance.

Comment by Thottbot

I just healed at 63 (holy pally) and dinged after second boss :) no1 else could heal in group (very well) so i pretty much did all the important heals..(some little help heals in between battles from a ench shammy)

pretty easy.....dident get any phat lewts though QQ

Comment by Thottbot

My new favorite instance. In 2 runs with my 65 prot warrior i got Shield of the Void, Scimitar of the Nexus Stalkers, Ethereal Warp Bow, Nexus Bracers of Vigor an the pattern for a glinting noble topaz...guess i'm through there...lol

Comment by Thottbot

How long does this take if u got a GOOD group?

Comment by Thottbot

How long does this take if u got a GOOD group?

Comment by Thottbot

where the hell is it ?
anybody ever think of putting down where things are?
why not be the first to brag about something that useful to everyone? instead of how many times you did it...worthless

Comment by Thottbot

Auchindoun is in the centre of the Bonewastes in Terrokar. At 35,49 is the entrance to a corridor which leads you to the Ring of Observance.
In the corridor, you can take left or right, it doesn't really matter; both ways will lead you two floors down to the Ring of Observance, a huge open space with big entrances to the four instances. North (on 40, 62) is the entrance to mana-tombs, east is Sethekk halls, south is Shadow Labyrinth and west is Auchenai crypts.

Comment by Thottbot

A lot of these places that used to be horrible a year ago seem to be much better now. I attribute this to the idea that most of the characters now leveling in outlands are peoples alts. :) (At least on my fairly mature server.) As a result you get much better play, people know how to work together in a group better, and usually most members know the fights. I've not had any real problems with this instance. As a plus, it is one of the easier of the mid-60's ones to find a tank for because of the shield and other nice tanking gear (by far the hardest spot to fill on my server). So if you are leveling a second character and have horrible memories of these mid-60's instances, it might be worth another try. The one thing I will say is that for the escort quest, make sure you clear everything as you go through the first time, and if by chance you fail it abandon the quest! This way the next time you run the instance you can complete the quest. I ran again and completed quest, but since I still had old attempt in my log it didn't count it. Finally, in regards to the healing comments, this place is no big deal to solo heal at all. And this was as a pally (no instants or hots for group). Level 65 and decently geared. (700 +healing and 7.5K mana)

Comment by Thottbot

Ran yesterday with a:

70 Protection Warrior (agreed to help, from my guild)(tank)
69 Arms Warrior (DPS)
67 Ret Pally (DPS)
66 Shadow Priest (healer)
63 Enhancement Shaman (me) (DPS)

It would of finished quickly, but the priest and pally were constantly AFKing. Drop-wise it sucked for me, a wand, bow and sword dropped off the bosses and a cloth and leather green dropped. XP-wise, if you are running at a lower level (63) and rested then you get a stack of xp just from the monsters. No wipes.

Comment by Thottbot

Good job Blizzard™! Graphics are amazing and futureistic in this instance

Comment by Rotroable

On Pandemonius, you can have all ranged stack on the little hill, the right hand corner after you enter. The ranged won't go anywhere during the knockback. Tank him just in range of the healer and dps which is at the bottom of the hill... about where the terrain changes to steps. Done this numerous times so I know it works.

Nexus-Prince Shaffar - we finally all ran at him as a group. Then mage arcane blasted and the warrior kept pulling agro off peeps... then the mage mana pot/ priest bubble, and inervate. Other dps stayed on the boss. I could not get any other method to be successful at this char level (67/68). We all died anyway since the apprentices don't go away... but were able to come back and rez/loot after killing those remaining.

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