Need gear help with mage tower challenges

[Steelangel]

Two random edgelords come in to tell me that having to play for possibly hundreds of hours over 10 separate characters just to gear them for arbitrarily cheap content that I will have to run dozens of times each (all for weapon skins almost as ugly as the player-base) to clear is not "doing anything."

That insults me enough to consider spending my time more wisely than in a worthless game, so thanks?

Why are you even here then? You came to the thread asking for help as to how to do the mage tower challenges with minimal gear and prep, and were told that the challenges were.. well.. challenges, and you should gear up and given some hints and tips and you've stubbornly refused to even considering even PLAYING THE GAME THAT YOU WANT WEAPON MOGS FOR.

You won't get them. Go back to playing CS GO.

[Darktbs]

I read that frost gets harder with better gear.

Why is fire easy?

Because is a Dps check.The difficult part is sustain but if you can get a lego/use blink or get the right nethercrucible bonus you are good.

>Start damaging
>Kill adds
>Burst the shield
>Repeat

Compared to other challenges that you have to keep track of a bunch of things.

Easy gear -Farm argus currency, do Lfr, Great invasions, get the Antorus Free legendary, work on app and the right Relics for the right procs.

[Spazlord]

You sound like you hate the game OP. Anyway, you can gear an alt to 930 in about 2 weeks of half assed play, which is plenty gear to do Mage Tower. I dare say you won’t one shot anything because it seems like you do t like putting any effort into your play and they do require handling multiple harsh mechanics at a time, but with some persistence you’ll knock them out.

Here’s how you gear:

Ding 110.
WQs, heroics, BGs, LFR to replace your quest gear.
Mythics and low level M+ to further advance.
Argus questline, all of it, to get all the WQs open and a big stash of arginine for 910 vendor gear.
Relics from Argus WQs.
Current LFR, normal mode, M+ for some higher level gear and a free legendary ring.
Do some emissaries and Argus invasions and you’ll prob get your first legendary in 2 weeks.
Go do Mage Tower.

[thisisuseless]

Easy gear -Farm argus currency, do Lfr, Great invasions, get the Antorus Free legendary, work on app and the right Relics for the right procs.

You speak repeatedly about the "right nethercrucible procs." What are they?

Also, what would be the recommended ilvl for the fire mage fight.

Feral is an absolute joke. You can do it at sub 910 without any legendaries with ease.

All you need is brutal slash and to understand one of the easiest MT fights.

Well if it is so easy, could you explain exactly what there is to understand?

Why are you even here then? You came to the thread asking for help as to how to do the mage tower challenges with minimal gear and prep, and were told that the challenges were.. well.. challenges, and you should gear up and given some hints and tips and you've stubbornly refused to even considering even PLAYING THE GAME THAT YOU WANT WEAPON MOGS FOR.

You won't get them. Go back to playing CS GO.

This waste of time will take me -again- possibly hundreds of hours over 10 characters of doing crap I HATE just to attempt crap I don't want to do, just to get some transmog that I don't care for but need to do it before it goes away.

During all of that, I am playing the game. What mental quirk leads you to think spending weeks gearing up and learning fights just to do the mage tower is "not playing the game?" What exactly is "playing the game" if logging in days worth of played time is not "playing the game?"

You sound like you hate the game OP. Anyway, you can gear an alt to 930 in about 2 weeks of half assed play, which is plenty gear to do Mage Tower. I dare say you won’t one shot anything because it seems like you do t like putting any effort into your play and they do require handling multiple harsh mechanics at a time, but with some persistence you’ll knock them out.

I don't care for the game, the community and incompetent devs is the real problem. I am only coming back to do this, on top of the fact there are barely any worthwhile pc games and I need to justify my purchase of a new pc somehow.

[Darktbs]

You speak repeatedly about the "right nethercrucible procs." What are they?

Dps:
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=252888/chaotic-darkness
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=252875/shadowbind
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=252906/torment-the-weak
Healing:
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=253093/infusion-of-light
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=253070/secure-in-the-light

They are extremly usefull and proc very often.They already saved me on my Arcane mage challenge(they have no form of self healing) so what happens is that i just spammed Arcane explosion on them and the procs healed me up from 20% to 100%

Also, what would be the recommended ilvl for the fire mage fight.

I did mine with 908 without the nethercrucible and was pretty hard to beat, i recommend being 915+ and try getting some active trinkets, stuff that deals AoE dmg, slow or just add more damage is, in my experience, better then a stat stick.

[thisisuseless]

Dps:
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=252888/chaotic-darkness
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=252875/shadowbind
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=252906/torment-the-weak
Healing:
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=253093/infusion-of-light
http://www.wowhead.com/spell=253070/secure-in-the-light

They are extremly usefull and proc very often.They already saved me on my Arcane mage challenge(they have no form of self healing) so what happens is that i just spammed Arcane explosion on them and the procs healed me up from 20% to 100%


I did mine with 908 without the nethercrucible and was pretty hard to beat, i recommend being 915+ and try getting some active trinkets, stuff that deals AoE dmg, slow or just add more damage is, in my experience, better then a stat stick.

So for arcane would you just recommend using AE instead of AB for the sigryn fight?

[Nalorakk]

I've started trying to clear all of the challenges (currently 19/36 I believe) and my advice is this:

Argus WQs for relics. If ever there's one up in Antoran Wastes, check your toons that need relics for their specs to see which slot it is.
Try do invasions often for the argunite.
Open your unsullied pieces, sometimes you get a neato titanforge that saves you 650 argunite.
Most challenges are doable around 900 ilvl even if you're not so great at the spec, just remember your buttons.
The NLC relic traits are amazing - prioritise whatever fits your challenge (e.g. shielding/healing for Enhance/Ret/Arcane challenge).
Try get 1 legendary and then get Insignia to fill the 2nd slot.
If you have the time, do one M+ a week on each toon (doesn't have to be a high level one), again it can save you 650 argunite.
Become familiar with each challenge and learn what differences or strengths/weaknesses your chosen specs have for each of them.

[Darktbs]

So for arcane would you just recommend using AE instead of AB for the sigryn fight?

Only when running.

The challenge is only difficult at the start, because you have 7-8 mechanics that overlap and you need to deal with otherwise they one shot you or just leave you with minimal HP.

Luckly, they always do the same thing, at the same time, the same number of times.

1-The fight start with everyone attacking you.The jarl will hurl axes, the Rune caster will cast and Sigryn will follow you and throw spears.

2-The jarl will enrage and chase you(Keep him on slow and use Arcane barrage with the talent to steal movement speed) along side the first set of runes.

3-After you clear the first set, the jarl will no longer be enraged but Sigryn will cast blood of the father(Poly her and get back to dps) and the Jarl will go back to hurl axes.

4-The Runecaster will cast the shield and start casting a spell, break the shield and Interrupt him,

5-Val'kyr line, go to the spot where no Valk'yr will hit you

6-The jarl will cast whirlwind and Sigryn will cast blood of the father again.

If you came this far, just counter each mechanic at least 2-1 times and they will eventually stop minus the Shield of the Runecaster and the Val'kyr.

Use AE when running and use the 4 charges on Arcane barrage to slow and keep the spell Slow on the Jarl and Sigryn.Save the rest of the spells and Cd to break the Runecaster shield and save Ice block/invisibily in case you mess up.

And for the love of god.Never, Double Blink.

The mage is the only one that can exist the Yellow ring you fight on and if you do, the fight ends.

[thisisuseless]

Only when running.

The challenge is only difficult at the start, because you have 7-8 mechanics that overlap and you need to deal with otherwise they one shot you or just leave you with minimal HP.

Luckly, they always do the same thing, at the same time, the same number of times.

What about for ret and enhance?

[Darktbs]

What about for ret and enhance?

The encounter remains the same.

The difference is now you have heals and you just need to use different spells to slow the Jarl and cc Sigryn.

Repetance and Hex on Sygrin

The shaman can use slow totem/stun totem(i forgot the names) on the Jarl and use Ghost form to run while the paladin use Hammer of justice and Hand of hindrance.

[thisisuseless]

The encounter remains the same.

The difference is now you have heals and you just need to use different spells to slow the Jarl and cc Sigryn.

Repetance and Hex on Sygrin

The shaman can use slow totem/stun totem(i forgot the names) on the Jarl and use Ghost form to run while the paladin use Hammer of justice and Hand of hindrance.

Seems like it will be hard no matter what.

[Lime]

Well if it is so easy, could you explain exactly what there is to understand?

The absolute basics of the Agatha fight. Priority:

- Don't get hit by the boulders
- Fireball Imps (at high stacks)
- Umbral Imps (even over the fireball imps if she's doing her channel)
- Pop bubble and interrupt during her channel
- Fireball imps (at low stacks)
- Stun and kill the Channeling Imps (letting them channel for a tiny bit isn't terrible)
- DPS boss

and avoid suicide imps, don't just kite them endlessly. Let them start their channel to blow up, then move out of range. In all honesty, you could probably ignore them.

Keep your bleeds up on the boss as much as possible.

You'll take high damage during 1 of 3 things:
- Getting hit by a boulder
- Letting the Fireball Imps stay alive too long (they gain a stacking damage buff)
- You let her constantly channel (missing an interrupt or ignoring her)

All in all, try to save defensives for her channels that pop up when your offensives are on CD. You can also make use of them during the many imp spawns.

As a Feral, take Brutal Slash and make frequent use of your free heal after dumping 5 combo points. You'll be at 90%+ HP most of the fight. The reason you want Brutal Slash is for imp clearing. You can use it to help pop the bubble if you wish, but it shines for wiping out those pesky imps.

Another talent you might want to look into is the "TF cooldown resets on enemy kills if they were bleeding". It makes it so that TF is up almost 100% of the time. So just put a rake/thrash on everything before it dies. And yes, suicide imps blowing up also counts as a kill that will reset the CD.

It might take you a few tries (like 5 tops), but imo, it's the easiest one. It just requires knowledge of the fight and the basics of Feral abilities and talents, which has been made extremely easy since the rework.

Edit - There's also going to be a part where she starts her channel while umbral imps are up. Pop a DPS cooldown here for sure unless you have enough charges of Brutal Slash. In case you haven't done the fight, Umbral Imps make her immune to damage as long as they're alive.

[Kazuchika]

Seems like it will be hard no matter what.

If you can't handle "make a focus CC macro and not get stomped by valks" you're beyond help.

[Deleted]

I did the druid challenges on my main when they came out. I guess I was around i900-ish. That should be relatively easy to get to on alts.
These days you probably have videoguides and shit, so you don't have to do lot of repeats figuring out how the encounters work. Just do some youtubing for each and you should be fine.

Feral was really easy, the guardian was annoyingly random, sometimes those healing globes would spawn on you and ruin the whole thing. It's just a huge Thrash spam simulation, so you kinda needed Luffa's for it. I guess boosting to i930 or so would negate that.
The Resto one though... that was actually hard. I have still nightmares about that mid-phase healing. Took so long to reset and fight back.

[Deleted]

I did the druid challenges on my main when they came out. I guess I was around i900-ish. That should be relatively easy to get to on alts.
These days you probably have videoguides and shit, so you don't have to do lot of repeats figuring out how the encounters work. Just do some youtubing for each and you should be fine.

Feral was really easy, the guardian was annoyingly random, sometimes those healing globes would spawn on you and ruin the whole thing. It's just a huge Thrash spam simulation, so you kinda needed Luffa's for it. I guess boosting to i930 or so would negate that.
The Resto one though... that was actually hard. I have still nightmares about that mid-phase healing. Took so long to reset and fight back.

The Kruul/Guardian/Tank challenge can get difficult even with 950'ish ilevel, since the difficulty of it comes from all the randomness. Main issue is the adds going for Velen.

[Deleted]

I did the druid challenges on my main when they came out. I guess I was around i900-ish. That should be relatively easy to get to on alts.
These days you probably have videoguides and shit, so you don't have to do lot of repeats figuring out how the encounters work. Just do some youtubing for each and you should be fine.

Feral was really easy, the guardian was annoyingly random, sometimes those healing globes would spawn on you and ruin the whole thing. It's just a huge Thrash spam simulation, so you kinda needed Luffa's for it. I guess boosting to i930 or so would negate that.
The Resto one though... that was actually hard. I have still nightmares about that mid-phase healing. Took so long to reset and fight back.

I steamrolled Twins at item level of about 915 in 3 tries (after knowing the encounter from all other characters, I only had to get used to Moonkin which I don't play much) and right afterwards also Agatha (abusing all available consumables and Command center buffs). For Guardian, I geared up to about 930 item level, did not get neither Luffa nor Ekowraith and went with tanking boots and talent ring legendaries and the strategy I knew from other tanks. Now, I only have to get through Resto - at least I got the healing belt now, and Prydaz. This should do the trick.

BTW, gearing up is easy now. I do a bunch of emissaries (Argus ones and Broken Shore), additional only on characters which lack something, kill great invasion point bosses, use argunite to replace the worst slots (start with relics usually), and run LFR if I really have the time. Usually, it boils down to 1 character on a weekend. This is all, and it's more than enough. My lowest item level for completion was somewhere around 905 (main character, optimal legendaries, Agatha) up to 935 (for classes like the warrior which I only dabble in occasionally). Of all my 12 alts which I have used for the challenges, I comfortably got to a sufficient item level with this approach. You can also spend some gold on crafted items from Argus.

- - - Updated - - -

The Kruul/Guardian/Tank challenge can get difficult even with 950'ish ilevel, since the difficulty of it comes from all the randomness. Main issue is the adds going for Velen.

This is true, but you can greatly shorten the overall duration and thus minimise the amout of randomness. My successful brewmaster challenge only lasted a bit longer than 3 minutes, and would have been even faster if the CD of invoke Niuzao would not be that long. Yes, I optimised the gear for DPS and struggled a bit in surviving Kruul long enough for Niuzao to come off CD.

[Deleted]

Now, I only have to get through Resto - at least I got the healing belt now, and Prydaz. This should do the trick.

The most annoying part of that is Phase 5 - the NPC's you have to heal don't appear in your healing frames, so you need bind mouseover etc. And it's soo easy to fuck up, because they don't become targettable at first. At low ilvls you really had to get the timing of CD's right there. I accidentally clicked "past" their nameplate and lost a second or two correcting it and that was a wipe... soooo many times.. gnnh.. Getting back to Phase 5 takes 15-20 minutes again. The rest of it is easy going, but that one phase - and the time it took to reset and re-try...

It's was super frustrating.

[Selah]

Speaking from personal experience, with all of them done except tanks and holy priests (been doing them by challenge type, starting with imp mother) I'm going to say that if you're 930 or higher they will be trivial once you learn the mechanics. They can be done as low as 880 but it gets to be a bit painful. Leggos are not required on any of them (yes even affliction, you can cheese that one and it gets nice and easy from there) but are nice if for nothing else than being big ol' stat sticks.

Gearing right now is super easy, here's how I've been doing it.
-Run greater invasion points with bonus roll tokens, takes 10 minutes per character roughly, don't even really have to pay attention
-Watch Argus world quests for relics
-Run Antorus LFR, but only run specific bosses that'll help fill your lower gear slots
-Use Veiled Argunite to fill your lowest ilvl gear that's below 910
-Watch weekly events, sometimes the rewards are good for gearing

[Gleem]

OP, I have a legitimate and very serious question to ask you. Are you actually any good at this game? Legitimately, what is your skill level in PvE content? Because, while there are a couple legendaries that allow certain specs to cheese a given fight, generally you need to be competent at the game. If you're not at least a mediocre heroic level raider, you simply won't be able to do all these challenges. You need to be a good healer to get the healing challenges done. You need to be a good tank to get some of the tanking challenges done. And you need to be capable of doing at least mediocre DPS while handling mechanics to get most of the DPS challenges done.

Agatha: Feral, Outlaw, Unholy, Fury, Fire, Elemental
Can you prioritize targets, dodge environmental mechanics, minor kiting, and cleave? If no, either use all the listed cheese (extra elixers, trinkets you don't have, other broken shore building buffs) to scrape by. It's the easiest challenge, but you either need very high dps, or at least the ability to do a few basic mechanics, or you simply won't kill it.

Archmage Xylem: Survival, subtlety, Havoc, Frost (dk), Arms
Can you adequately use escape mechanics? Can you dodge environmental mechanics? Can you (slowly) kite? Can you short burst cleave? Can you either abuse your class's immunities and movement CDs or time movement and small burst single target? If no, you simply won't manage to kill this encounter. I found Havoc trivial, and yet still see people without these basic skills fail the challenge even when horribly overgearing.

Sigryn: Arcane, Assassination, Retribution, Enhancement, Demonology
Can you handle environmental mechanics that require quick reaction, minor kiting, small burst windows, and crowd controlling? Can you handle all of them simultaneously while doing at least mediocre DPS? If not, you're just going to die. This fight is pure mechanics, and your DPS literally doesn't matter so long as you can do ~400k while handling mechanics and about 600 during the burst window. But you need to be able to predict and control the flow of combat. This is the most "puzzle-like" fight, and you need to understand each mechanic, when it will happen, and how to react to it. There's no RNG here. Everything is predictable, and it's pure execution. I've done this horrendously undergeared because I simply know the fight that well.

Tugar: Discipline, Windwalker, Beast Mastery, Destruction
Can you properly priority interrupt while keeping track of positioning? Can you do minor burst or cleave? If no, you're going to fail. This fight is mostly about proper interrupting, even when handling other things (like adds or positioning for mechanics). Missing one interrupt you can usually recover, but two is death.

Twins: Shadow, Affliction, Marksmanship, Balance, Frost (mage)
Can you kite? Can you maintain kiting? Can you handle mechanics while kiting? Can you burst DPS while kiting? If you can't do literally everything a fight needs you to while also kiting, you're going to die. Different specs have a harder or easier time with this based on their kite mechanics, but the key point is kiting kiting kiting. Getting hit a couple of times by your kite mob means you died. Period. But you need to be able to handle all other mechanics while maintaining that kiting, or you die. If you are extremely well geared and VERY good at DPS, you can trivialize the fight through sheer brute force of damage, but otherwise you need to kite. I also know you didn't say you wanted to do Affliction, so this won't really relate to you specifically, but Affliction is an incredibly difficult challenge without having a very specific legendary. Personally I think Affliction without the ring is the hardest challenge without the legendary, but trivial with it.

Kruul: Protection (paladin and warrior), Blood, Brewmaster, Guardian, Vengeance
You seriously need to be a good tank. Outgearing this requires far more gear than you'll have access to. Brewmaster and Guardian can mostly trivialize the fight by utilizing a specific legendary (and Vengeance is simply a joke because of absurd DPS potential and self healing), but every other tank needs to be exceptional at DPS and tanking both. You need to be on point with positioning, facing, reaction, some kiting, snap threat, debuff management, interrupting, kiting, and proper utilization of tanking cooldowns. Based on what you've said in this thread, I honestly do not think you will manage to do the Protection Paladin challenge, even though you highly prioritize it. It is, in my opinion, the hardest tank challenge by far. The only thing I've personally found harder was Affliction sans legendary, and the healing challenge.

Lord Erdis: Holy (priest and paladin), Restoration (shaman and druid), Mistweaver
The healing challenge is incredibly difficult, and requires you to be an exceptional healer. I know people that are good healers that still struggle at a 960+ ilvl because this challenge is entirely based around how good of a healer you are. Positioning is incredibly important. You still need to handle a variety of different mechanics. You must be able to healer DPS at times. You need to be skilled at escapes, defensives, cooldown management, mana management, positioning, timing, triage (I can not stress triage enough. You need to know who can survive what on what health and who can't to prioritize heals), interrupting, purging, dispelling, CC... It's everything the DPS and tank challenges are combined with the addition of healing. And, in true healer challenge, the biggest issue is your group of NPCs is incompetent, and you have to carry them. There's no cheese here. There's no outgearing. Be a good healer, or you don't win.

All that said, a 930 ilvl is exceptionally easy to get. Just get the relinquished gear from Argus. Do LFR at least once to get the welfare ring. Do enough weekly stuff on each character for one second legendary simply for the high ilvl stats. You will need standard consumables (pots, flasks, drums). I highly advice enough practice time on each spec to play at basic competency levels (know general "Easy" spec and rotations), familiarity with their utility, and at least 52 points (1 point in concordance) on their weapons. For healers and tanks, you need to actually be good at healing and tanking. And, as listed above, you need to know each fight and be good at handling the mechanic types present in each fight.

This information is less about helping you complete a given spec's challenge, and more giving you realistic expectations of what you, the player, need to understand to do a given fight, and what you might need to improve on as far as skills go to complete each challenge.

[thisisuseless]

If you can't handle "make a focus CC macro and not get stomped by valks" you're beyond help.

Is there a quota of smarm and social ineptitude on this forum?

Based on what you've said in this thread, I honestly do not think you will manage to do the Protection Paladin challenge, even though you highly prioritize it. It is, in my opinion, the hardest tank challenge by far. The only thing I've personally found harder was Affliction sans legendary, and the healing challenge.

Prot paladin is my main and the only class in the game I like. That is the only reason I will do the prot paladin one as the appearance is UGLY.

As for your sneer, the only thing I have said on this forum is the unvarnished truth that this is a poorly-designed/implemented waste of time (it is, as are all of the "innovations" in legion). You know nothing else about me, though that hasn't stopped you.

I will give you a life lesson, so listen close: This game does not give your life purpose. You have accomplished nothing by playing it. Nothing you have done in it speaks to you as a person positively. Acting like this game is more than a silly diversion is immensely unhealthy for body and soul, and it is a problem that needs fixing.

I have saved every substantive and worthwhile post in this thread in a separate document just in case this thread gets deleted. Yours has not made the list as it is neither substantive or worthwhile, it is just you trying to puff yourself up (and frankly, not doing a good job of it). It is common to try to belittle others to make oneself feel better, but usually people try to use things more weighty than an ephemeral game recently with content used to increase "time played" and nothing more.

BTW, gearing up is easy now. I do a bunch of emissaries (Argus ones and Broken Shore), additional only on characters which lack something, kill great invasion point bosses, use argunite to replace the worst slots (start with relics usually), and run LFR if I really have the time. Usually, it boils down to 1 character on a weekend. This is all, and it's more than enough. My lowest item level for completion was somewhere around 905 (main character, optimal legendaries, Agatha) up to 935 (for classes like the warrior which I only dabble in occasionally). Of all my 12 alts which I have used for the challenges, I comfortably got to a sufficient item level with this approach. You can also spend some gold on crafted items from Argus.

This is helpful, thank you.

The most annoying part of that is Phase 5 - the NPC's you have to heal don't appear in your healing frames, so you need bind mouseover etc. And it's soo easy to fuck up, because they don't become targettable at first. At low ilvls you really had to get the timing of CD's right there. I accidentally clicked "past" their nameplate and lost a second or two correcting it and that was a wipe... soooo many times.. gnnh.. Getting back to Phase 5 takes 15-20 minutes again. The rest of it is easy going, but that one phase - and the time it took to reset and re-try...

It's was super frustrating.

Luckily I don't play resto and that staff appearance is just evil so I don't want anything to do with it.