Article Credit: SprawlTrees soaring high above forming a canopy that blocks out the sunlight. First stop in this area is the neutral Naaru/Draenei capital city of Shattrath. Where the Dark Portal serves as the only means into the Outland, Shattrath serves as a "subway" back to Azeroth. The center of this city houses a building with eight portals, one to each of the four faction capitals back on Azeroth. This city also has two sections, with two opposing factions: the Aldor and the Scryers. Earning reputation with one, reduces it with the other. Each faction has its own quests and rewards. On two different vendors in town, each classes' Tier 4 Epic Armor sets are viewable. Auchindoun, the local instanced dungeon, was once a Draenei holy burial ground, which was blown up by Orcs in an attempt to summon a Demon into the realm. Luckily they failed, but unluckily they blew up the entire place including the surrounding country-side, now referred to as the Bone Wastes. What was once a holy ground is now a site of war as numerous factions now struggle for control of the powerful Arcane energies that linger in the area. Old fans of Warcraft should recognize this place as the Bleeding Hollow base from the Warcraft II Human Campaign. This area is for players level 62-65.
Cities
Allerian Stronghold
Stonebreaker Hold
Shattrath City
Instances
Mana-Tombs (Level 64-66)
Auchenai Crypts (Level 65-67)
Sethekk Halls (Level 67-69)
Shadow Labyrinth (Level 70-72)
We are introduced to another new faction group in this instance called the Consortium. The Draenei and Naaru have a heavy sci-fi slant to their lore, and the Consortium fit well into the backdrop as a faction of inter-planer traders with eyes only for money. Apparently renegades of the Consortium, ethereal beings of arcane energy, have been locked up inside the instance, and your party is going to save the day. So far this instance moves slowly as the "trash mobs" are very tough, and hit very hard, but good crowd control, and things drop relatively quickly. There is some confusion as to which instance is for which level range due to Blizzard having it completely wrong on the Outland map.
Mana-Tombs (Level 64-66)
It could very well be that this instance is for a much harder level group, and experience suggests as much. Pandemonius is the first boss, a huge void walker with shoulderpads! First off, this boss has a defense shield, where during it, any attack reflects damage back at the attacker. Needless to say, when this buff is present, everyone needs to back off and heal. Currently there is no animation that shows this effect, so you pretty much have to wait until you are taking damage to back off. It is possible to bring a Mage for detect magic, but even then, this can be tricky for groups that don't use voice chat. If that wasn't hard enough, this boss also randomly dishes out four huge bolts that deal some 2500 damage and knocks the person back. The target of these bolts is random, and it is very possible to be the random target of multiple bolts. After all, there are only 5 of you present. Pandemonius deals exclusively shadow damage, so a little protection never hurt anyone. If you managed to defeat the voidwalker, it doesn't get easier. The next boss, Tavarok, is a giant with spikes on his body. He kind of reminds you of Doomsday from the Superman comics, and he hurts like him too! He has an earthquake ability that deals 1000 damage to everyone, and stuns them for a few seconds; a great time to die! He can also randomly petrify a target, which is not a good thing if it happens to be your healer or tank. However the general approach is to tank/heal/dps, but inevitably each fight something goes wrong and someone important is petrified or a healer is stunned. Two healers greatly increase your chance of success for this encounter as well as a heavy usage of HoTs (Heal over time spells) to survive the stuns. Even still, this is perhaps one of the hardest encounters yet. Some players have been trying to run out of his 40 yard range during the earthquakes, but with limited success. The final boss in this wing is Nexus-Prince Shaffar, actually one of the easier encounters considering what you've been through. Currently tank/dps/heal is the general tactic with some "adds" running around that need to be taken care of by everyone except the tank and healer. Tanks are generally spamming "spell-reflect" in order to keep aggro. He was nerfed towards the end of Alpha, when he once had twice as many hit points. He is pretty much a mildly annoying mage with "adds" that can be taken care of easily. Other than that, he basically blinks around the room and fireballs the tank.
Auchenai Crypts (Level 65-67)
This instance is actually easier than Mana-Tombs. It wouldn't be surprising if this instance came before Mana-Tombs. This place has a lot of trash and invisible enemies that join the fight when you least expect it, so the trash is definitely more surprising/annoying. The "pulls" with more than one enemy healer can be tricky without some good crowd control, but overall this instance moves at a decent pace. Oddly enough, there are only two bosses in this instance: Shirrak the Dead Watcher and Exarch Maladaar. Shirrak is the same model as Broggok from Hellfire Citadel's Blood Furnace and the fight with Exarch seems a relatively simple tank/dps/heal fight with some sort of "aggro wipe".
Sethekk Halls (Level 67-69)
There is a lot of repetitive trash in this instance and again, only two bosses: Darkweaver Syth and Talon King Ikiss. Darkweaver Syth is a very fast paced fight with a ton of elemental "adds" that deal a lot of damage, while the Talon King Ikiss is similar to Shazzrah from the Molten Core, doing Arcane Explosions, volleys and blinking around the room. His hit points are a bit low, and if you can stay alive, this fight isn't too challenging.
Shadow Labyrinth (Level 70-72)
In some ways it feels as these instances get bigger, Blizzard just puts in more trash to clear. We aren't even talking unique creative trash, just duplicate pulls over and over. This instance makes up for the others only have two bosses by providing four bosses for your dying pleasure. First up is Ambassador Hellmaw, who requires you to tank him facing away from the group due to a frontal-arc attack. He also has an AoE fear that makes it hard to keep him facing away. Many times this boss will fear the group, only to turn around and blast the entire group while they run around like chickens. Think phase 3 of Onyxia. If you are lucky enough to defeat him, you are rewarded with a ton more trash to clear, at least twice as much as there was to get to the first boss. On the bright side, the pulls are very easy, not even requiring crowd control, just repetitive. The second boss, Blackheart the Inciter, is known for turning foe against foe with a group Mind Control that sends everyone into a free-for-all frenzy for a short period of time. This can make this fight very unpredictable as it is very easy for two players to gang up on "a squishy". He also has an annoying habit of performing an "aggro wipe" and random knockbacks. Grandmaster Vorpil right now is pretty easy if a Warlock is with the group. They can enslave a nearby demon and let him do the killing, while the group takes all the loot. Needless to say, this tactic won't last through beta. The final fight against Murmur is mostly a tank/dps/heal fight, against a 5-man Ragnaros without "the sons". He basically is rooted in once place, dishes out decent damage to the tank, and has knockback/AoE abilities.
Outdoor PvP
In the center of the Bone Wastes lies Auchindoun, and around the perimeter are five spirit towers. Every 40 hours, these towers become PvP objectives. Whichever faction manages to control all five first, gets control of them for the next 40 hours. During this time, all players of that particular faction receive a zone-wide buff with the regular increase to damage by 5% but it also provides a 5% increase in experience for killing. In addition to this, players inside the Auchindoun instance can loot spirit shards from bosses that are redeemable for prizes while this buff remains present. Due to the visable countdown timer on everyone's screen in the area, this event, given the rarity of it, brings everyone!
Eye of the Storm (Battleground)Technically this battleground is located in the Netherstorm area, but there is a battlemaster in Shattrath that will give you access to this 15-man battleground. The battle starts with one faction all the way at the top of the map, and the other at the bottom. Both teams are encased in a purple energy field until the beginning of the match. There are four towers to control and a flag in the center. The layout is similar to Arathi Basin except the Blacksmith is a flag. Capturing the towers is similar to the outdoor pvp objectives where you need to be in close vicinity to make a capture. The flag itself takes 10 seconds to capture, much like in Arathi Basin. The object is to reach 2000 points first. You acquire points from capturing and holding towers. There is a bonus for capturing the flag and bring it back successfully to a tower your team controls. So basically you are playing two games at once, capture the flag, while fighting for control of four different towers. The rewards vendor is located in the Netherstorm area, and since that area is currently closed, the rewards are unknown at this time.
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