Mythic Archimonde Mark of the Legion Knock Back

Table of Contents

• +1. General Information
  • 1.1. LFR Difficulty
  • 1.2. Normal and Heroic Difficulty
  • 1.3. Enrage Timer
• 2. Overview of the Fight
• +3. Summing Things Up
  • 3.1. Tanks
  • 3.2. Healers
  • 3.3. DPS
  • 3.4. Everyone
• +4. Phase One: The Defiler
  • 4.1. Abilities
  • 4.2. Strategy
    • 4.2.1. Tanking Concerns
    • 4.2.2. Positioning
    • 4.2.3. Handling the Mechanics
• +5. Phase Two: Hand of the Legion
  • 5.1. Abilities
  • 5.2. Strategy
    • 5.2.1. Tanking Concerns
    • 5.2.2. Positioning
    • 5.2.3. Handling the Mechanics
• +6. Phase Three: The Twisting Nether
  • 6.1. Abilities
  • 6.2. The Twisting Nether
  • 6.3. Strategy
    • 6.3.1. Tanking Concerns
    • 6.3.2. Positioning
    • 6.3.3. Handling the Mechanics
    • 6.3.4. In the Twisting Nether
• 7. When to use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp
• 8. When to use the Legendary Ring
• 9. Learning the Fight
• +10. Loot
  • 10.1. Armor
  • 10.2. Weapons
  • 10.3. Amulets, Cloaks, Rings, and Trinkets
• 11. Concluding Remarks
• 12. Changelog

Introduction

This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the encounter with Archimonde in Hellfire Citadel. It is targeted at anyone who desires to understand the fight mechanics.

This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.2.

Archimonde is the final boss of the Hellfire Citadel raid instance. This is an extremely long 3-phase encounter which will put your raid to the test. In particular, coordinated and reactive movement will be required for success.

About the Author

This guide is written and maintained by Azortharion, a top Hunter with 6 years of raiding experience, who currently raids in Ðanish Terrace, a world top 20 guild.

For the Looking for Raid version of the fight, we provide you with a special LFR guide. This will tell you everything you need to know in order to complete the encounter, in a quick and concise way.

1.2.

Normal and Heroic Difficulty

This guide covers both the Normal and Heroic versions of the encounter, as far as mechanics and general strategy is concerned. The only difference between these two modes is found in the tuning, with Heroic being more difficult.

When we speak of extreme situations (such as the difficulty of a soft enrage timer, or damage from a certain source being too high to survive), we mostly refer to Heroic mode.

We do not currently know what the hard enrage timer for this encounter is.

Archimonde is a 3-phase encounter during which your raid will face Archimonde, as well as a number of different adds.

Each phase has two separate parts. Because of this, Archimonde can almost be classified as being a 6-phase encounter. However, the differences between these phases within phases are rather small, and the overarching idea of each of the three phases is what is important to your raid.

Phase One starts when you pull Archimonde, and ends when Archimonde reaches 70% health. At 85% health, Archimonde gains an additional ability that he will use for the rest of Phase One.

Phase Two starts when Archimonde reaches 70% health, and lasts until he reaches 40% health. At 55% health, Archimonde gains an additional ability that he will use for the rest of Phase Two.

Phase Three starts when Archimonde reaches 40% health, and lasts until he dies. At 25% health, Archimonde gains an additional ability that he will use for the rest of the fight.

In this section, we will very briefly summarise what the players belonging to each of the three roles have to do during this fight. This is by no means meant to provide sufficient information to master the encounter, and it is only supposed to give you a very rough idea of what to watch out for.

Save healing cooldowns for Shadowfel Burst in Phase One, Unleashed Torment in Phases Two and Three, and Rain of Chaos/ Hellfire in Phase Three.

• DPS the targets that appear in the following priority:
  1. Doomfire Spirits;
  2. Hellfire Deathcaller;
  3. Living Shadows;
  4. Felborne Overfiends/Dreadstalkers;
  5. Infernal Doombringers;
  6. Archimonde.

• During Phase One
• During Phase Two
• During Phase Three

Phase One lasts from the start of the fight until Archimonde reaches 70% health.

Throughout this phase, Archimonde uses several abilities against your raid.

• Roughly every 45 seconds, Archimonde causes a Doomfire Spirit add to spawn near him. It cannot be tanked and instead fixates on a random raid member for 10 seconds, using Doomfire Fixate to continuously create lines of fire that begin from itself and grow towards that player. Every 10 seconds, the Doomfire Spirit chooses a new target to fixate on. The fire lines persist until the end of the fight, and standing in them applies Doomfire, a 8-second, stacking Fire damage DoT, to players.
• Death Brand is an ability that Archimonde uses roughly every 45 seconds. It has a 3-second cast time, at the end of which it deals a massive amount of Shadow damage to his tank, and spawns a Hellfire Deathcaller add.
  • Hellfire Deathcaller fixates on the tank that Death Brand was used against. While alive, they regularly use a single ability, called Shadow Blast. It deals heavy Shadow damage to its tank and to a number of random raid members, increasing the Shadow damage taken by all affected players by 25% for 30 seconds. This effect stacks.
• Allure of Flames is an ability that Archimonde uses roughly every 45 seconds. It instantly relocates all the Doomfire present on the ground to the locations of random raid members, indicated by green ground effects.
• Shadowfel Burst is an ability that Archimonde uses roughly every minute. He targets a single raid member and knocks them and any allies in an 8-yard radius around them high up into the air. At the same time, a green ground effect marks an area underneath the targeted player. A few seconds later, players who were knocked up into the air will fall to the ground and take lethal fall damage split between all players located in the green ground effect.

Once Archimonde reaches 85% health, he begins using a new ability called Desecrate. Archimonde uses this ability roughly every 30 seconds. It marks a large area on the ground near the boss, and after a few seconds, a large, black pillar spawns from it and deals massive Physical damage to any raid members standing in the ground effect. After it has spawned, the entire raid takes moderate Shadow damage every 3 seconds while the pillar is alive, through an ability called Desecration. The damage done by subsequent pillars' Desecration is increased by 25% for each pillar that spawned before it during the encounter.

The pillars cannot be attacked or killed by your raid. However, shortly after each Desecrate pillar spawns, the friendly NPC Yrel destroys it. This spawns a number of light, glowing orbs around where the pillar was destroyed, which persist for up to 30 seconds. If a player comes in contact with an orb, the orb is consumed and everyone within 15 yards of it receives the Light of the Naaru buff, which provides immunity to Shadow damage and increases movement speed by 40% for 25 seconds.

Phase One is all about correctly prioritising targets and reacting quickly. Namely, the Doomfire Spirits must be killed extremely quickly, to reduce the amount of Doomfire they spawn, while raid members must be ready to move out of this fire.

Your goal is to bring Archimonde to 70% health as quickly as possible, all while handling all of the abilities used against you.

We recommend continuously pulling the boss around the edges of the room in Phase One. Whenever a Doomfire Spirit leaves fire lines, the boss should be moved along the edge.

Active tank mitigation cooldowns should be used for Death Brand. The ability's cast time makes it easy to time your abilities so that they are active for when the damage hits.

The Hellfire Deathcaller that spawns when a tank is by Death Brand will remain fixated on that tank for as long as it lives. This means that once Death Brand has been used, a tank switch should be performed, so that the tank on whom the Deathcaller is fixated does not also tank Archimonde.

We recommend that the raid remains spread out at least 8 yards apart (to avoid having more than one player knocked up by Shadowfel Burst, while staying comfortably far away from Archimonde. Additionally, we recommend staying close to the edge of the room, where Archimonde is also being dragged along by your tanks.

4.2.3.

Handling the Mechanics

When Doomfire Spirits are created, all DPS players should switch to them and kill them off as quickly as possible. Care must be taken to avoid acquiring stacks from the Doomfire that it leaves on the ground.

When Archimonde casts Allure of Flames, raid members must move away from the ground effects that indicate where the fire will land, as quickly as possible.

When Shadow Blast is cast on random raid members, healers must be aware of the stacks applied to individual raid members, and heal these players accordingly (possibly even using defensive cooldowns).

For Shadowfel Burst, have as many raid members as possible stack in the ground effect to split the damage from the landing player(s).

Finally, when Archimonde begins using Desecrate at 85% health, move away from the ground effect that indicates where the pillar will spawn. The passive damage done by Desecration must be healed through, but the raid can minimise damage taken by ensuring that Phase One ends as quickly as possible.

When Desecrate pillars are destroyed, we recommend that raid members move towards the orbs that result, while a single raid member walks into the orb to apply the Light of the Naaru buff to as many raid members as possible. It is important for tanks to be in range to receive this buff, as they take a lot of Shadow damage during this phase.

5.

Phase Two: Hand of the Legion

Phase Two starts when Archimonde reaches 70% health, and it ends when he reaches 40% health.

In Phase Two, Archimonde stops summoning Doomfire Spirits, and he stops using Shadowfel Burst and Desecrate. As soon as the phase begins, Yrel also casts Purifying Light, destroying any remaining Desecrate pillars. Archimonde uses a number of abilities in Phase Two.

When Archimonde reaches 55% health, he will begin to spawn 1 Felborne Overfiend and 3 Dreadstalker adds roughly every 30 seconds.

During Phase Two, the raid will face many similar challenges to Phase One. The overall goal remains the same, namely to bring Archimonde to the health required for the next phase, all while handling the abilities being used against you.

The Felborne Overfiends that spawn must be tanked. Otherwise, the tanking in Phase Two is the same as in Phase One. The boss will regularly need to be moved due to Allure of Flames, and Hellfire Deathcallers will continue to spawn.

Similarly to Phase One, active tank mitigation cooldowns should be used for Death Brand.

Tanks should help interrupt the Flames of Argus cast as much as possible.

For Phase Two, we recommend that the raid stacks up at a comfortable distance from Archimonde, preferably near the edge of the room, while continuing to move when needed for Allure of Flames. As we will see, this positioning will help handle the Shackled Torment and Wrought Chaos/ Focused Chaos abilities.

5.2.3.

Handling the Mechanics

Both Allure of Flames and Death Brand must be handled similarly to Phase One.

For Shackled Torment, have the affected raid members break their tether in a staggered fashion. If three Unleashed Torments go off at the same time due to raid members parting with their Shackled Souls at the same time, that will most likely result in a wipe. Thus, we recommend having the first raid member break his shackle, healing the raid to full, the second raid member breaking their shackle, and so on. For best results, the raid leader or a healer should specifically call out the order in which shackled players should break their tethers each time.

For Wrought Chaos, have the raid members debuffed with both Wrought Chaos and Focused Chaos move out of the raid to ensure that the beam does not strike anyone else. Once the beam has gone off, the player who had the Wrought Chaos debuff can move back into the raid, while the player who had Focused Chaos should remain out (they now have the Wrought Chaos debuff). The player who has the new Focused Chaos debuff, who is probably located inside the stacked raid group, will have to move out, and so on.

When Dreadstalkers cast Consume Magic, raid members should move out of the ground effect that it spawns before the 3-second cast is over.

To deal with the Felborne Overfiends' Flames of Argus, interrupt the cast as much as possible. In principle, none of the casts should be allowed to go off.

6.

Phase Three: The Twisting Nether

Phase Three starts when Archimonde reaches 40% health, and it lasts until he dies.

In Phase Three, Archimonde stops using Allure of Flames, Death Brand, and stops spawning any adds from the previous phases. Adds that are still alive from previous phases do persist, however. Archimonde uses a number of abilities in Phase Three.

• Shackled Torment and Wrought Chaos continue to be used, and they work exactly the same way as during Phase Two.
• Nether Banish is an ability that Archimonde uses on his current tank roughly once per minute. It places a large, green rune on the floor at their feet. After 7 seconds, all raid members within this rune are teleported to the Twisting Nether, a unique room that we explain in detail further below. This ability also requires a tank switch.
• Nether Tear is a void zone that is placed at the location where Archimonde's tank was when Nether Banish was cast on them. It deals low Shadow damage to anyone standing in it every second, and persists for the rest of the fight. Nether Tears regularly spawn Living Shadow adds.
  • Living Shadows cannot be tanked, and have rather low health. As soon as they spawn, they each pick a random raid member and follow them. If they reach their target, that target is affected by Devour Life, reducing their healing received by 40% for 45 seconds. Additionally, the Living Shadow is instantly killed if this happens.
• Demonic Feedback is a passive ability that affects the entire raid in Phase Three. It deals heavy Shadow damage to all raid members every 20 seconds or so, and causes players to deal the same amount of Shadow damage to players within 6 yards of them as well.

When Archimonde reaches 25% health, he gains the Rain of Chaos ability. This ability causes large meteors to fall every second for 10 seconds. The locations where meteors will land are indicated by ground effects roughly 2 seconds beforehand. Landing meteors cause heavy Fire damage to all raid members, with the damage reduced if raid members stand further away from impact points. Meteor zones usually spawn near raid members.

After a number of meteors have landed (we are not yet sure how many), 3 Infernal Doombringer adds will spawn from the ground where meteors have landed. The Infernal Doombringers spawn roughly 5 seconds apart. They can be tanked and have two abilities: Eternal Flame and Hellfire.

The Twisting Nether is an alternative realm where the raid members who stood in the Nether Banish zone are teleported to. It is a medium-sized platform within which players must face adds and handle a few abilities.

During Phase Three, your raid will have to strike a balance between quickly killing Archimonde (especially once he reaches 25% health and unlocks his final ability) while still correctly handling all of the abilities and killing all the adds with a higher priority than Archimonde himself.

A tank switch must be performed whenever a tank is affected with Nether Banish. The boss must then be pulled away to avoid unwanted raid members standing in Nether Banish.

Inside the Twisting Nether, the Shadowed Netherwalkers must be tanked.

In Phase Three, we recommend the same general positioning as during Phase Two. However, the raid must remain spread 6 yards apart to avoid taking unnecessary splash damage from Demonic Feedback. The raid should remain relatively far away from Archimonde, except for the raid members who are chosen to go to the Twisting Nether, as we will explain further below.

6.3.3.

Handling the Mechanics

Shackled Torment and Wrought Chaos should be handled in the same manner as in Phase Two.

For Nether Banish, we recommend sending a number of raid members based on the raid size into the Twisting Nether. Besides the tank who will always enter, we recommend at least one healer, one melee DPS, and ranged DPS with powerful single-target damage (against targets that will not live for very long). The assigned players will have to stack up with the tank targeted by Nether Banish to enter the Twisting Nether. Due to Nether Corruption's one minute duration (the damage of which would cause a player already affected by it to die if they were to re-enter the Twisting Nether), two groups must be created that alternate entering the Twisting Nether. We explain what to do in the Twisting Nether below.

For Nether Tear, avoid standing in the void zone. Additionally, stand as far away from the void zone as possible in order to give Living Shadow adds a further way to travel. Ranged DPS players will have to focus down and kill these adds as quickly as possible, before they reach their intended targets.

Due to Demonic Feedback, you must remain spread 6 yards apart to avoid taking splash damage.

For Rain of Chaos, use movement speed cooldowns on the entire raid to move from falling meteors in a timely fashion, and also take as little damage as possible.

For the Infernal Doombringers, we recommend having a second tank tank them together. From this pile, individual Infernals are to be taunted out by other raid members to stop them from healing, and allow them to be killed as quickly as possible. When only one tank is available (due to the other being inside the Twisting Nether), a single tank will have to handle all the Infernals. It may also be possible to have melee DPS players each tank an Infernal.

6.3.4.

In the Twisting Nether

Inside the Twisting Nether, things are quite straightforward. Your goal is to kill the Shadowed Netherwalker in order to return to the normal realm. That said, you have a few tasks to complete.

The constant damage from Nether Corruption must be healed through.

All players must avoid standing in Nether Storm void zones.

The Shadowed Netherwalker's Touch of Shadows must be interrupted as much as possible.

The Void Star must be kited and killed off with high priority. If the Void Star somehow reaches its target, you will have to attempt to remain on the platform by using abilities such as Disengage, Blink, and Displacer Beast.

7.

When to use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp

We recommend using Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp when Archimonde reaches 25% health, as the fight gets extremely difficult at this point.

8.

When to use the Legendary Ring

We recommend that DPS players use the Legendary Ring as often as possible when non-Archimonde targets are up that must be killed, especially Doomfire Spirits, Hellfire Deathcallers, and Infernal Doombringers. We also recommend saving a usage for the end of Phase Three, to combine with Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp and finish the fight as quickly as possible. It is possible that ring usage in the Twisting Nether and back on Draenor is separate, which would allow raid members inside the Twisting Nether to use their ring for the Shadowed Netherwalker.

We recommend that healers use their Legendary Ring when Shadowfel Bursts are released in Phase One, Unleashed Torment goes off in Phase Two and Three, as well as during Rain of Chaos and Hellfire in Phase Three.

Finally, we recommend that tanks use their Legendary Ring in conjunction with Death Brand in Phases One and Two, as well as towards the end of Phase Three.

Archimonde is a long, complex encounter that will challenge your raid's ability to handle multiple things at one time, especially as the fight intensifies towards Phase Three. DPS players and healers will be tested on their ability to deliver throughput when needed.

Right from the start of the long encounter, there are abilities that can very easily kill an inattentive raid member. Wasting combat resurrections this early in the fight will be a large roadblock to progressing through the encounter. All new abilities that are introduced during the fight have a rather steep learning curve, and it will take all raid members numerous tries to be able to execute them all without fail. None of the three phases are simple in execution, and it only gets more difficult towards the end.

In this section, you will find the loot table for Archimonde. The section is divided in 3 subsections: armor, weapons, and the rest (neck, back, finger, and trinket items).

In addition to all the items listed below, Archimonde drops a mount, Felsteel Annihilator, in Mythic mode.

Item Name	Armor	Slot	Secondary Stats
Demon Prince's Ascendant Crown (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Head	Mastery Critical Strike
Voidsight Hood — LFR	Cloth	Head	Haste Multistrike
Mantle of the Eredar Lord (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Shoulders	Haste Multistrike
Felfume Robes — LFR	Cloth	Chest	Critical Strike Haste
Demonbuckle Sash of Argus (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Waist	Mastery Multistrike
Ironpelt Jerkin — LFR	Leather	Chest	Multistrike Mastery
Felfinger Runegloves (Heroic, Mythic)	Leather	Hands	Haste Mastery
Waistwrap of Banishment (Heroic, Mythic)	Leather	Waist	Multistrike Mastery
Shadeflesh Legguards — LFR	Leather	Legs	Multistrike Critical Strike
Rancorbite Chain Shirt — LFR	Mail	Chest	Mastery Critical Strike
Eredar Fel-Chain Gloves (Heroic, Mythic)	Mail	Hands	Critical Strike Multistrike
Vintage Draenic Handguards — LFR	Mail	Hands	Haste Critical Strike
Doomcrier's Shoulderplates (Heroic, Mythic)	Plate	Shoulders	Critical Strike Mastery
Demonbreaker Chestplate — LFR	Plate	Chest	Mastery Critical Strike
Treads of the Defiler (Heroic, Mythic)	Plate	Feet	Haste Multistrike
Stompers of Echoing Doom — LFR	Plate	Feet	Critical Strike Mastery

Item Name	Type	Main Stats	Secondary Stats
Gavel of the Eredar (Heroic, Mythic)	1H Mace	Intellect	Haste Multistrike
Fractured Soulgem Staff — LFR	Staff	Intellect	Haste Mastery
Edict of Argus (Heroic, Mythic)	Staff	Intellect	Haste Mastery
Greatsword of Chaos — LFR	2H Sword	Strength	Critical Strike Mastery
Calamity's Edge (Heroic, Mythic)	2H Sword	Strength	Critical Strike Mastery

10.3.

Amulets, Cloaks, Rings, and Trinkets

Item Name	Type	Main Stats	Secondary Stats
Choker of the Great Betrayer (Heroic, Mythic)	Amulet	Agility	Multistrike Critical Strike
World Ender's Gorget (Heroic, Mythic)	Amulet	Agility Strength	Bonus Armor Multistrike
Cloak of Incendiary Wrath (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloak	Strength	Critical Strike Mastery
Portent of Disaster — LFR	Trinket	Intellect Haste	Multistrike
Decree of Demonic Sovereignty — LFR	Trinket	Intellect Spirit
Pressure-Compressed Loop — LFR	Trinket	Agility Mastery	Multistrike
Unquenchable Doomfire Censer — LFR	Trinket	Strength Mastery	Critical Strike
Grasp of the Defiler — LFR	Trinket	Agility Strength Bonus Armor Mastery
Repudiation of War (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Sacred Draenic Incense (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Talisman of the Master Tracker (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Reaper's Harvest (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Tome of Shifting Words (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Worldbreaker's Resolve (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Libram of Vindication (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Fragment of the Dark Star (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Core of the Primal Elements (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Bleeding Hollow Toxin Vessel (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket
Seed of Creation (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket

This concludes our raid guide for Archimonde. We hope you have found it helpful. Please do not hesitate to post any feedback you may have on our forums.

• 28 Aug. 2015: Added a link to the LFR guide.
• 24 Jun. 2015: Fixed two errors in the guide. The guide now correctly states that Consume Magic cannot be interrupted, and that the Hellfire Deathcallers fixate on the tank that was hit by Death Brand.

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Mythic Archimonde Mark of the Legion Knock Back

Source: https://www.icy-veins.com/wow/archimonde-strategy-guide-normal-heroic

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