The Slave Pens (Level 62-64)
The easiest of the three 5-man instances, this place is swarming with Naga and neutral slaves that join in the fight when you attack. This place is a Naga controlled subterranean pumping station, a semi-aquatic theme, in some ways like the Sunken Temple, but brighter and seemingly more chaotic. You will find yourself learning to skip certain groups of foes, making this dungeon a real easy one to get finished quickly by more experienced teams. The first boss is Mennu the Betrayer, a simple "tank and dps" fight with a painful DoT (damage over time) spell. Just be sure to take care of the totems, and it is a pretty simple fight. Mennu is followed by Rokmar the Crackler, a giant crab-like creature. He seems to hit pretty hard and has a bleed debuff, as well as a frost AoE movement slowing spell. Despite being hard, he too is a standard tank/heal/dps encounter. The final encounter in the Slave Pens is a Bog Lord named Quagmirran. Another tank/heal/dps fight, but he does dish out a ton of damage to the tank. He also has a poison DoT that needs to be removed, so proper group make-up is important. Right now, he is being killed by pulling him out of his room to avoid the "fearers". A pickup group can complete these bosses in less than two hours; an experienced group, much less.

The Underbog (Level 63-65)
The first instance in the Outland with four bosses, the first of which is Hungarfen. Finally a boss with a little more intelligence then the straight tank and kill foe. Hungarfen is a huge Nature Elemental who randomly spawns mushrooms around the room that in-turn pulse area damage. Of course everyone will need to keep away from these, and some nature resistance gear might help the slower folk. Besides it might be the last chance you have to use all that nature resistance gear you gathered for AQ-40. Towards the end of the battle, Hungarfen will root himself and start to drain the life of everyone in melee range. When he does this, move away! He is rooted in place, so he won't follow. Up next is Ghaz'an, the three-headed hydra. He has a poison that damages those in front of him, and a knock-back attack. It pays for the tank to face him away from the raid. After his defeat, Ghaz'an triggers an event that leads him into epic battle against a Naga Champion! After that comes Swamplord Musel'ek, who appears to be a Hunter that has found a way to tame a Druid as a pet! If you are a Druid, I wouldn't worry though, he already has a pet Druid in bear form. Hunters need to be careful though, this guy can mind control your pet. Use beastly wrath, if you have it, to break out of this. This guy is apparently very buggy, but has some slick Hunter tricks like a frost trap that hits everyone! Even with all his complexity, he is still a simple tank/heal/dps fight for the most part. The final boss in the Underbog is The Black Stalker, a bigger version of the swamp stalkers found other places in this zone. The trick to this boss is to spread out as he does an occasional chain lightning effect and some sort of debuff that causes damage to those around you. A decent group can finish this entire instance in 90 minutes.

The Steamvault (Level 70-72)
The trash in this place moves around a bit, so pulls are a bit harder then Hellfire Citadel. The first boss is Hydromancer Thespia. Hopefully you brought a warlock to banish one of her elemental guards. Even still, water bolts and explosions can really hurt. Healing needs to be on point perhaps more so then ever before in a 5-man instance. Her Lung Explosion debuff appears to be dispelable, so it helps to bring someone who can take care of this. If you can keep Lung Explosion cleaned off without "decursive" and keep one of the guards banished the entire fight, you just might make it to Mekgineer Steamrigger. Figuring out how to deal with his "adds" with the team you brought is the trick of this encounter. Warlord Kalithresh is the final boss of this instance and at first appears very hard. He has distillers that need to be taken care of immediately or he becomes too powerful for anyone to deal with. Other then the small complexity of needing to "dps" the distillers, this is actually a simple tank/dps/heal encounter. At this time Blizzard plans to make changes to this encounter.

Serpentshrine Cavern (Raid)
This place is suppose to be a full fledge 25-man raid instance full of Naga and finally a confrontation with Lady Vashj. Read more about Lady Vashj in Blizzard's new Warcraft Encyclopedia. Currently this instance remains unreleased in closed beta.

Outdoor PvP
The PvP encounter in this area involves two towers a decent jog apart. Taking control of these towers is done just like the other outdoor encounters, where being in the area with your PvP flag on causes the tower to slowly move towards your faction's control. Once a faction captures both towers, a small team is charged to run back to town, while everyone else keeps control of the towers. If your faction manages to keep control of both towers, and return the flag, you get a zone wide buff that increases damage +5% and control of the nearby graveyard, which gives your faction an advantage in trying to keep control of the two towers.

Labels: burning crusade, guide, instance, outlands, Zangarmar