The Highlord's Return Tips

[Soulwell]

You are an 815 equipped guardian with luffas and can't beat it and you call me below average? How amusing.

Kruul despawning when entering p2 has been a thing since the start, it happens quite often. Yes, it is a bug. Considering P1 is an actual joke now it is a very small inconvenience.

I mean I've tried it maybe 15 times and yes you're still below average.

[Kendros]

Gotta love getting to p2 and everything instantly despawn and lose the shard and the attempt.

[Yoosung]

Ok I just did this at a 905 Guardian Druid and it was not fun or did it feel like I was fulfilling some sort of class/role fantasy. It's just insanely overtuned and you need some luck to be honest. Just to let you know it took me 200+ attempts to get this and 140 of those being pre-nerf attempts. You do need a combination of either Skysec, Luffa, and Ekko. Also, I had 42 traits (the double thrash golden trait) before I even attempted this so I am unsure if it's doable without it. Before the nerf I only got to phase 2 a handful of times and this second go round after the nerfs I was getting to phase 2 90% of the time and it was me basically learning phase 2.

Some tips:

1) Don't freak out. I know it can be overwhelming with everything trying to knock you off. Just keep strafing in a pattern so you don't get knocked off by the infernals.
2) You must moonfire the eyes immediately. They have almost no HP now so 1 moonfire is usually good enough to kill them.
3) Make focus macros for Inquistor so you can just go interrupt him no matter what your target.
4) Phase 2 keep up Mark (RIP 7.2.5) all the time for the jumps and Iron Fur when he's about annihilate you.
5) For the annihilates try to delay them for as long as possible. What I did was Bash -> Incap -> Orb for each one. I basically saved the orbs just to try to delay this as much as possible.
6) If you're getting killed by the 4th annihilate and you're not <8-10% you probably do not have the DPS. Try equipping some DPS trinkets (I had Horn of Valor 905 and Arcanocrystal 880). Also, BL drums help a lot here as well.
7) Try camping near a orb cause you'll probably be in a situation where you need to use one asap.

Hope this helps and good luck fellow tanks.

[Lumidar]

901 Prot pally and i can't get passed phase 1... either get knocked off or get overwhelmed with adds. i JUST kill the first set of arcane adds when the second spawn... i don't see where i can muster enough DPS... and i am using dps flask, food and potion of power.

[Deleted]

Vengeance one done with this setup ==>
Talents : http://prntscr.com/ew3z3e
Gear : http://prnt.sc/ew42y9

Fight duration 4:20 mins

Bloodlust P2 double old war
0 light orbs used during P1

Shorter P1 is easier it goes P2.

The key is to dps everytime you lose the "DnD" debuff in P1 even with adds. Don't try to wait for a perfect setup or anything, dps the boss in P1 like a truck, you will keep your orbs and reduce the amount of abyssals in P2. Interrupt as much as you can the anihilate in P2 with orbs : it will buy you a lot of time. P2 isn't supposed to last longer than 1:40 ~ 55.

[Deleted]

Vengeance one done with this setup ==>
Talents : http://prntscr.com/ew3z3e
Gear : http://prnt.sc/ew42y9

Fight duration 4:20 mins

Bloodlust P2 double old war
0 light orbs used during P1

Shorter P1 is easier it goes P2.

The key is to dps everytime you lose the "DnD" debuff in P1 even with adds. Don't try to wait for a perfect setup or anything, dps the boss in P1 like a truck, you will keep your orbs and reduce the amount of abyssals in P2. Interrupt as much as you can the anihilate in P2 with orbs : it will buy you a lot of time. P2 isn't supposed to last longer than 1:40 ~ 55.

He got lucky with the RNG, sometimes the kruul dosen't spawn for me at all, which is waste of shard. Too many bugs which is disappointing

[Deleted]

He got lucky with the RNG, sometimes the kruul dosen't spawn for me at all, which is waste of shard. Too many bugs which is disappointing

There is almost no rng when the fight is short enough, if your P1 last 4 mins P2 will be harcore as fuck

[Deleted]

Just completed it as Guardian Druid. I ran Survival the Fittest for an easier time in P1. You can use one SI and 3 Barkskins in P1 which helps not having to use the orbs to much. Also helps a great deal in P2.

Legendaries: Legs+Luffa

*To avoid having the boss despawn in last phase, make sure you have at least one add alive or the game will tag you as out of combat and despawn the boss.
*ALWAYS bash him on his next cast after his FIRST jump. Abilities will line up really nice and you will be able to bash one more time in the phase.

DPS check is extreme, i died with 500k left on the boss but dots ticked him down before he managed to kill the npcs.

900Ilvl

//Starmile

[Tygerman]

I just completed this on my Prot Warrior less than a minute ago, so I'd like to give some pointers that helped me out. I'll start with my character's stats:

ilvl 899 Equipped - 44 Artifact traits - Can post a screenshot of gear if requested (Actually I'll just include a screenshot now: http://i.imgur.com/z5wFqRb.jpg?2 this was during the screen transition after the scenario)
Legendaries used: Bracers + Belt (At this moment this combination yields the best results)
Talents used: 2-1-1-2-1-3-1 (I made a @Focus macro for Storm Bolt so I could stun Variss/Kruul easily while running and avoiding infernals)
Food used: Bear Tartare (Provided a lot of movement speed which helped a lot, especially during Kruul phase)
Strength flask used of course

Now for the actual tips:

Phase 1 is pretty much the same across most tanks, only take about 4 stacks of debuff, when horrors spawn, tank them just outside the circle so your thunderclap/revenge/AoE in general can still hit Variss. Take care of eyes immediately if you can, but if you're comfortable with having some up, go ahead. They disappear when Kruul lands.
Use orbs sparingly, because you want to transition with 3 orbs up if you can.

For Phase 2, I can only give Warrior-specific tips. The most important one is something that I've already seen in this thread, but its worth mentioning:
Spell Reflect the Twisted Reflection cast. This is important for two reasons:
1. It heals you for a decent amount, while you're taking the obscene amount of damage from green pools on the ground.
2. You don't have to be near Kruul at all to interrupt it, just let it go through with Spell Reflection up since you'll most likely be getting pushed around and avoiding infernals.
Bonus: Annihilate is a physical attack, so it can be blocked/Neltharion's Fury'd
I also used my 2nd potion + Drums of Fury as soon as Kruul became attackable

Kruul only casts 2 things; Twisted Reflection, which we covered, and Annihilate. Annihilate is sort of like the soft enrage of the fight, because it has a stacking debuff and makes you take more damage from it. The goal is to kill Kruul within 3 casts of Annihilate, 4 casts if you use cooldowns to survive the 3rd one (because it does 12mil damage without defensives). You use the orbs to interrupt his Annihilate casts since they cannot be interrupted otherwise.

My strategy for this was to let Kruul cast his first Annihilate for free, make sure to have Spell Reflection ready for each cast of Twisted Reflection (which is easy because he doesn't cast it often). During his 2nd Annihilate cast I keep myself near an orb and pop it right before he finishes his cast. After the disorient, Kruul will immediately cast Annihilate again, at which point I use Storm Bolt to stun him for even longer and get some more damage on him. Kruul will again cast his 2nd Annihilate, which you can let go through but have shield block up at least to reduce some of the damage. Do the same with his 3rd Annihilate cast, delay it with orbs + Storm bolt if its up, but make sure you're ready for it when it finally goes through, Shield Wall should be used for this moment. By the time Kruul gets to his 4th Annihilate cast, he should be dead.

That's all I can think of and I hope it helps some of you out. It can be done!

[Stallion]

Do the same with his 3rd Annihilate cast, delay it with orbs + Storm bolt if its up, but make sure you're ready for it when it finally goes through, Shield Wall should be used for this moment.

I always survive the third one easily with Neltharion's Fury. It's actually a much safer CD for the third one because a crit block alone (0.24 dmg taken) is already stronger than a normal block with shield wall on top (0.62*0.6 = 0.3720 dmg taken). Kudos for doing it with 899. Even when I played perfectly and easily survived all Annihilates and lived for like 50% longer than the world first vid, I couldn't get him lower than 3%.

The fact that his hit box is as large as that of a murloc means he's untouchable when standing (or even worse: when being stunned) in the green pitches. That costs me so much uptime on him. And it's not like you have a choice when to interrupts his Annihilate. If he casts it while inside a green zone, it's basically over as you can just stand there and spectate while he's stunned inside, dragging the fight on while you lose on orbs, Annihilate stacks and BL uptime.

P2 just feels like a huge fucking RNG fest. It all depends on when he casts what, if there are infernals that block you from reaching certain spots. If orbs spawn on green zones or not, if the orb that you plan on using next, is the oldest one and just despawns before you need it..., if even enough orbs spawn..., if purple lines spawn really bad for you...
Also there have been tries where I had him at 6% with only 2 green zones up and tries where I had him at 8% with 5 green zones, making it impossible to reach orbs without kiting the boss into green zones and getting a shit ton of dmg by collecting them.
Basically the stars just have to align or there's no way it can be completed.

[Tygerman]

I always survive the third one easily with Neltharion's Fury. It's actually a much safer CD for the third one because a crit block alone (0.24 dmg taken) is already stronger than a normal block with shield wall on top (0.62*0.6 = 0.3720 dmg taken). Kudos for doing it with 899. Even when I played perfectly and easily survived all Annihilates and lived for like 50% longer than the world first vid, I couldn't get him lower than 3%.

The fact that his hit box is as large as that of a murloc means he's untouchable when standing (or even worse: when being stunned) in the green pitches. That costs me so much uptime on him. And it's not like you have a choice when to interrupts his Annihilate. If he casts it while inside a green zone, it's basically over as you can just stand there and spectate while he's stunned inside, dragging the fight on while you lose on orbs, Annihilate stacks and BL uptime.

P2 just feels like a huge fucking RNG fest. It all depends on when he casts what, if there are infernals that block you from reaching certain spots. If orbs spawn on green zones or not, if the orb that you plan on using next, is the oldest one and just despawns before you need it..., if even enough orbs spawn..., if purple lines spawn really bad for you...
Also there have been tries where I had him at 6% with only 2 green zones up and tries where I had him at 8% with 5 green zones, making it impossible to reach orbs without kiting the boss into green zones and getting a shit ton of dmg by collecting them.
Basically the stars just have to align or there's no way it can be completed.

YES, his hitbox was very frustrating for sure, but I ended up not caring much once I figured out I could reflect his spell cast. That's also what I mainly saved Storm Bolt for, in case he decided to stay in his green pool and cast Annihilate. Also I can agree with just using Nelth's for the 3rd Annihilate, I was just being SUPER careful though because, if you're doing things appropriately, when you get past the 3rd cast you're really close to killing him already.

[Krazzorx]

Hmm, I strongly disagree with that. The reward for completing this challenge is very straight forward for all tanking classes: A weapon appearance. In my opinion, Blizzard should have balanced it to the best of their abilities. Sadly, it feels like they didn't even try. I personally am sick of certain tanks being favored over others, and not just in this challenge.

The problem is that the challenge doesn't have much to do with skill. The mechanics of this encounter are very simple, but the raw numbers become overwhelming, because Blizzard just throws more and more stuff on the screen. Tanks who don't have the correct gear (or didn't choose the "correct" class) can't keep up, but they can simply keep trying until they eventually get lucky for a long enough period of time, because there is a lot of RNG in this encounter.

I am an item level 900 BDK and I had Kruul down to 8 million hp. I WILL eventually complete this challenge, but not because I am a good player, but simply because I will have tried often enough to get really, really lucky once. I won't feel accomplished at that point, i will feel relieved.

The weapon itself is different though for each spec. Compared to say, gladiator mounts where everyone gets the same one.

[cashballer]

Anyone done the druid one without a range-increasing legendary? First phase just takes so long when I play it safe that it's not worth the headache of getting punted off the platform unexpectedly after 10 minutes. That was pre-nerf though so maybe I'll try it again.

[crabcore1]

I can do phase 1 in about 3:20 with prydaz/dual determination, kind of sketchy though, have to be super aware of stacks and make careful decisions if it's worth the risk to refresh thrash and accidentally going over the threshold. I think the range increasing legendaries are just as big of a deal if not bigger in P2; dealing with the boss moving so slow getting that extra uptime feels like it'd be a large boost towards hitting the damage check in the last phase.

[Zandrin]

Completed this as a blood DK. Sorry, no video, but I wanted to share what I learned in detail in case it helps others (regardless of class). There is a lot of RNG to this fight. This is the strategy I used that I found to be most consistent, and that I was able to use to regularly reach Kruul until I could get phase 2 just right.

Setup:
====

ilvl: 911 equipped + str flask + haste food + augment rune

Can be done a bit lower, but being 910+ really helps. Under 900 as blood, your execution would have to border on perfection.

Legendaries: Sephuz's Secret + Aggramar's Stride.

I found that the speed boost helped me a lot with periodic eye/infernal knockbacks, the sweeping P2 beams, getting to orbs in time on P2, having good positioning, controlling eyes, etc. If you don't have these or don't like that approach, bracers, shoulders, and belt are all strong and viable.

Trinkets: Claw of the Crystalline Skorpid + Horn of Valor

Your best DPS trinkets, really. These were the best I had available, although I wish I had a good Memento of Angerboda on hand for this. Horn or another strong activated stat boost is really good for burst when you DRW + Old War + Drums in P2. Stat sticks or Arcanocrystal are fine too if you don't have anything better.

Talents: 3/1/1/2/2/3/1

Bonestorm for burning down the arcane adds and infernals quickly. Tremble Before Me is very good here and will interrupt a lot of casts.

Opening
=====

I started every pull by walking behind Inquisitor Variss (where Kruul is standing when the RP starts) right on the very edge of the platform. Prepot old war and death grip him to the very edge and pop DRW, trinkets, etc. You need to burn really hard here while the fight is clean. I was going as high as 9-10 stacks before stepping out of his aura, then from outside using an asphyxiate stun and/or vamp blood then AMS and hitting the adds to heal (spawn time seemed to vary) to avoid getting one shot by his casts.

Phase 1 Tips
========

* This is a DPS race. Love it or hate it, but it is. The longer your pulls are, the harder the fight is to control. When I started consistently reaching P2, my DRW was still on cooldown, meaning P1 was ending somewhere in the 2:00 - 2:30 range most of the time.

* Fight him on the very edge of the platform. Death grip him there at the start. This will greatly reduce the RNG placement of the eyes, and many will spawn either right on top of him or very close by and die for free to your blood boil. I know this sounds counterintuitive and scary because the eyes and infernals both knock you off the platform, but it's better to live dangerously and get good at dodging infernal hits than to have more eyes up spawning in a circle around you.

* Make a focus interrupt (or equivalent) macro and focus Variss at the start. Don't try to interrupt every drain life and twisted reflection in this fight manually. There is already way too much you have to pay attention to.

* Quickly get back into melee range of Variss to DPS again every time your debuff stacks drop. Try not to go higher than 4-5 stacks unless you know you can survive.

* Don't fear the infernals. Early on, they will frequently knock you off the platform. You will get better at watching for their knockback attack, and can try sometimes to put your back to a wall if you must. When you're getting good at the fight, you'll be able to stand right in melee with Variss while infernals are there and move to dodge their slams (thank you, Aggramar's Stride).

* Healing aggro will pull the arcane adds. Death strike something or use blood drinker on Variss as soon as new adds start moving to get their attention.

* DO NOT USE ANY OF VELEN'S ORBS! This is important. If you're playing well, you don't need any in P1, and you need them really badly in P2.

* Do not go far out of your way to kill eyes. If he's on the edge, many will spawn close enough that you can stand on the edge of Variss' aura and hit both him and the eye with blood boil. If it's too far away for that, either grip him on top of it, or ignore it. Killing them all is a waste of time.

* The infernals will die over time. Only attack them directly if you need something to death strike to stay alive. I found that when I positioned on the edge, many infernals went to Velen and they didn't pose any real threat to him. He off-tanked many of them for me.

* Be efficient with your attacks hitting Variss. When you're out of his aura dropping stacks, be on the very edge of it when you blood boil, and use blood drinker on Variss on cooldown.

* Use bone storm nearly on cooldown to clear arcane adds. Try to have a bone storm coincide with your phase transition.

* Do not use asphyxiate, gorefiend's grasp, or (for BEs) arcane torrent late in P1. You need them in P2.

* Try to transition cleanly with a bone storm. The dream is to transition Variss while you're on top of him bone storming his adds down and have just Kruul and an infernal or two up to start P2.

Phase 2 Tips
========

* This is, again, a DPS race. You need very high uptime on Kruul. You need to stay up in his face as much as possible (green stuff on the ground is the hardest part of this). Time spent kiting keeps you alive, but doesn't ultimately help you win. You can only stop so many annihilates and the longer the fight is, the more chance the NPCs die to the adds.

* Kite Kruul toward/around Velen's orbs. You're going to need them. Jump over or sidestep the pusher beams.

* Set Kruul as focus as soon as he lands for easy interrupts. If he gets his heal cast off, it's basically a wipe.

* Asphyxiate the first annihilate, and use it on cooldown to stop any annihilate you can after that.

* I was able to eat one annihilate safely, and I believe a second one (BARELY) without a cooldown. If you have two stacks and can't stop a third annihilate from hitting you, start rotating major cooldowns as you see fit.

* Try not to get annihilate stacks at all. asphyxiate the first one, then start using Velen's orbs to interrupt them and keep control of the adds. I used the orbs freely to "bridge the gap" for 45 seconds until I could asphyxiate again, then started using major CDs to survive any remaining annihilates and watched for any new orbs.

* When you start using orbs, this is the best time to burn. Your DRW should be coming back up. Have a button to use old war + trinket activation + drums for lust, pop DRW, and shred him.

* Have goblin gliders and a hot key for them. You can cast them mid-air to recover if a stray infernal knocks you off the platform, or (this happened to me) if the pusher beams knock you away while jumping from an orb that you desperately need to activate, you can quickly activate a glider to snag it.

* You probably only get one gorefiend's grasp off in P2. Use it when you must clean up the adds, during drums/old war if possible. On my kill, the adds built up while I was using Velen's orbs, and I gripped them all together on top of Kruul after DRW and bone stormed them all down. You may need to use gorefiend's to pull mobs off Velen and save him. If you're a BE, arcane torrent is also amazing to stop Velen or Kor'vas from dying to the arcane adds' channel. Blood boil first to get aggro so they follow you after the interrupt.

* The NPCs will die...a lot. It's frustrating. Just keep calm. At least when they die, you don't lose your augment rune/food!

* Take a break. This took me more attempts than it should have because I tried to soldier through for hours. Relax. Have a drink. Take a short break every 5-10 pulls to keep your sanity...determined or not, you'll play better. My first pull of the week when mage tower went up I got him to 3.5m health and didn't get that close again until I made myself take a break 2 hours later.

Don't give up! It's difficult, especially for blood in its current state, and the RNG sucks but you can do it!

[topmaymay]

i've had the whole encounter despawn on me ~5 times now. About 20 pulls in and this shit is pretty frustrating but doable on the right pull with good RNG.

[Deleted]

* The NPCs will die...a lot. It's frustrating. Just keep calm. At least when they die, you don't lose your augment rune/food!

This is the reason why I'm not motivated to try anymore until Blizzard improves this or until I outgear the scenario. It's so god damn boring to have to do phase 1 over and over again, just to have the damn NPCs die in phase 2 all the time.

[Zandrin]

This is the reason why I'm not motivated to try anymore until Blizzard improves this or until I outgear the scenario. It's so god damn boring to have to do phase 1 over and over again, just to have the damn NPCs die in phase 2 all the time.

Yeah. It's definitely the most frustrating part, and difficult to control well while doing everything else correctly. Definitely takes the right mix of luck and perseverance.

[Deleted]

12 % on the second phase... Not sure why I bring myself to doing this poor excuse for a tank challenge when I don't even like the artefact appearance... At this point I just want to complete it so I never have to even think about it ever again.

[Deleted]

When Blizzard announced SOLO challenges, I expected to be... you know... SOLO when trying to complete them. I didn't expect to be put into a 3-man co-op mission with inept NPCs. Velen and Kor'vas just suck.