- This article is about the strategy for defeating Deathbringer Saurfang in Icecrown Citadel. For his character biography, see Dranosh Saurfang.
 Deathbringer Saurfang | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | |||||||||
| Gender | Male | ||||||||
| Race | Orc (Undead) | ||||||||
| Location | Deathbringer's Rise, Icecrown Citadel | ||||||||
| Status | Killable | ||||||||
| |||||||||
Deathbringer Saurfang is the fourth boss in the Icecrown Citadel raid. He is described as being the Lich King's most powerful death knight.[1] It's mainly a DPS race with an interesting twist (Blood Power).
After falling to Frostmourne at the Battle of Angrathar the Wrathgate, Dranosh Saurfang was raised in undeath by the Lich King and brought to Icecrown Citadel. Imbued with the power of the Scourge, the Deathbringer bars the way of any attackers trying to enter the Upper Spire.
25-man Abilities
Blood Link — Saurfang gains Blood Power from damage he inflicts with abilities and summoned creatures. Also increases his Energy by 1 each time Blood Link triggers.
- Blood Power — Saurfang grows 1% larger and deals 1% more damage for each point of Blood Power he has.
- Blood Nova — Blood explodes outward from a random enemy target, inflicting 10,000 Physical damage to nearby enemies.
- Boiling Blood — Boils the blood of an enemy, inflicting 9,500 Physical damage every 3 seconds for 24 seconds.
- Call Blood Beast — Saurfang calls forth 5 blood beasts every 40 seconds.
- Frenzy — Saurfang goes into a frenzy, increasing his attack speed by 30%.
- Mark of the Fallen Champion — Causes Deathbringer Saurfang's melee attacks to splash to this target, inflicting 5,700 to 6,300 additional Physical damage. If the target dies while under this effect Saurfang is healed for 5% of his total health. Cannot be dispelled or removed by any means, including death.
- Rune of Blood — Saurfang leeches health when he performs melee attacks on targets marked with Rune of Blood. Leeches 5,100 to 6,900 health from an enemy target and heals Saurfang for 10 times that amount. Lasts for 20 seconds.
Blood Beast
- Resistant Skin — The skin of this creature is highly resistant. Damage from area of effect attacks is reduced by 95% and damage from Diseases is reduced by 70%.
Hard Mode
- Scent of Blood — Saurfang's Blood Beasts catch the scent of blood, reducing all nearby enemies movement speed by 80% and increasing their damage by 300% for 10 seconds.
10-man Abilities
- Blood Link — Saurfang gains Blood Power from damage he inflicts with abilities and summoned creatures. Also increases his Energy by 1 each time Blood Link triggers.
- Blood Power — Saurfang grows 1% larger and deals 1% more damage for each point of Blood Power he has.
- Blood Nova — Blood explodes outward from a random enemy target, inflicting 10,000 Physical damage to nearby enemies.
- Boiling Blood — Boils the blood of an enemy, inflicting 9,500 Physical damage every 3 seconds for 24 seconds.
- Call Blood Beast — Saurfang calls forth 2 blood beasts every 40 seconds.
- Frenzy — Saurfang goes into a frenzy, increasing his attack speed by 30%.
- Mark of the Fallen Champion — Causes Deathbringer Saurfang's melee attacks to splash to this target, inflicting 5,700 to 6,300 additional Physical damage. If the target dies while under this effect Saurfang is healed for 5% of his total health. Cannot be dispelled or removed by any means, including death.
- Rune of Blood — Saurfang leeches health when he performs melee attacks on targets marked with Rune of Blood. Leeches 5,100 to 6,900 health from an enemy target and heals Saurfang for 10 times that amount. Lasts for 20 seconds.
Blood Beast
- Resistant Skin — The skin of this creature is highly resistant. Damage from area of effect attacks is reduced by 95% and damage from Diseases is reduced by 70%.
Strategy
Since the Blood Power mechanic is new, some of the strategy for this fight includes rumor and guesswork. Details on maths and some speculation can be found in the Discussion section. Saurfang does hard enrage after 8 minutes. At 30% there's a soft enrage (Frenzy), DPS cooldowns are normally saved for that point (although some raids have success using them early, and thus delaying the first Mark as long as possible).
Mages can use 
[Amplify Magic] during this fight, as all of the damage is Physical.
Blood Power
Saurfang starts with 0 Blood Power. He can accumulate up to 100 in his Energy bar (akin to death knights). He gains Blood Power whenever one of his special attacks hits or ticks. When Blood Power reaches 100, he casts Mark of the Fallen Champion on a random raid member, resetting his Blood Power to 0.
Due to this mechanic, it's imperative to limit the amount of Blood Power he gains. The first Mark should be cast not before Saurfang is at 60% health or lower.
Tanking
Saurfang should be tanked right where he spawns. His melee damage is not high. Tanks must pay attention though that Saurfang doesn't gain Blood Power from Rune of Blood. If a tank gets it, another tank must quickly taunt and take over. The debuff lasts 20 seconds.
Setup
The melee group should stand right on Saurfang. All other raid members need to keep at least 12 yards away from everybody else (because of Blood Nova). Ranged damage dealers can stand closer to the boss, while healers should be furthest away. Healers need to be well spread out, so that all raid members are in range of several healers.
Blood Nova is a DoT which also causes other raid members within 12 yards of the affected player to take damage. This additional damage causes Saurfang to gain extra Blood Power, which is very bad.
Blood Beasts
Blood Beasts spawn every 35 seconds. In 25-player, Saurfang summons five in a pentagon shape: one in front of him, two at his sides, and two behind. In 10-player, he summons two: one left, one right. Because Saurfang gains Blood Power whenever a Blood Beasts successfully deal melee damage to any player, they must be slowed and kited between ranged damage dealers while melee must stay away from them.
When Blood Beasts are about to spawn, melee must stop using all multi-target abilities, such as 
[Heart Strike], 
[Hammer of the Righteous], or 
[Divine Storm]. It is, also, wise to try to avoid any AoE prior and at the moment of spawning, in order to avoid eventual drawing of aggro to melee group that is on the boss.
Blood Beasts are immune to crowd-control effects such as polymorph and fear, and they are also resistant to AoE. They can (and should) be rooted, snared, or stunned. Do not root them near any raid members (especially right off the bat while they are still in range of the melee group), or else they simply melee these players (and on heroic, will one-shot whomever they touch).
Any class with a root, snare, or stun ability should use this macro whenever the Blood Beasts spawn:
#showtooltip /tar Blood /cast (Name of ability) /tar Death
This immediately casts your ability and keeps you targetting Saurfang, minimizing DPS loss.
Since the Beasts typically go for those healers who are generating the most threat, healers should stand away from the boss and let ranged can pick up the beasts. Ranged DPS should target the beast furthest away, and as soon as the beast gains aggro, switch away to another one. Ping-ponged between different ranged DPS prevents anyone from being hit in melee.. Tanks can also help by taunting Beasts which are far away from melee, but close to their aggro target. If a Beast gets close to its aggro target, that target must run away and start kiting—don't let them hit anybody.
If the raid is too melee heavy, it is possible to stunlock one Beast and kill it with melee, while the other beasts are kited by ranged.
Boiling Blood
Saurfang casts Boiling Blood on random raid members. This can simply be healed through, although every tick grants Blood Power. It cannot be dispelled or removed. 
[Blessing of Protection] will remove this debuff, though it is usually only needed in Hard Mode.
Mark of the Fallen Champion
Whenever Saurfang gains 100 Blood Power, he casts Mark of the Fallen Champion on a random raid member. This does heavy damage (about 6k per second in 25 player). Additionally, when a player with a Mark dies, Saurfang is healed for about 5%. The Mark persists through death—do not combat rez a player that dies from it.
A good healer can handle about two active Marks of the Champion (if focusing exclusively on the Mark targets). Two active Marks in 10 player generally lead to a wipe, in 25 players more than 8 Marks is probably too much.
It may be a viable tactic to let the Mark of the Fallen Champion victims die. It's much easier to deal an extra 5% damage to Saurfang than to heal the Mark victim and deal with the increased frequency of future Marks. There are diminishing returns however, as living DPS are required to take down the Blood Beasts.
Class-specific tactics
The following class specific abilities can (and should) be used vs. Blood Beasts:
[Frost Trap], 
[Shadowfury], 
[Earthbind Totem], 
[Thunderstorm] (without [Glyph of Thunderstorm]), 
[Entangling Roots], 
[Typhoon] (without 
[Glyph of Typhoon], 
[Frost Nova], 
[Chains of Ice], 
[Hammer of Justice].
Shamans 
[Chain Lightning] does not count as AoE versus Blood Beasts, so an elemental shaman can pull up to four of the beasts with one cast (if glyphed and no charge hits Saurfang). Similarly, with talents, [Earthbind Totem] can root several beasts at once.
A Hunter dropping [Frost Trap] (WITHOUT 
[Entrapment]) or an Unholy specced Death Knight with 
[Desecration] can help as ranged get more time to beat them down.
Holy Paladins additionally may stand in the back center and activate 
[Righteous Fury]. This will pull initial aggro on the mobs. Combined with Frost trap, typhoon, thunderstorm and other abilites the blood beasts die in a more controlled fashion.
Prot Paladins with talent points in [Improved Hammer of Justice] can use [Hammer of Justice] on one Blood Beast every time they spawn since the cooldown will match the spawn time.
Rogues can greatly reduce the damage they take by constantly using Feint, as Mark damage counts as AoE (3365.8 dps form 4124.7 dps tested 15/3/2010)
Heroic Mode
The primary differences of Heroic mode are Blood Beasts catching the scent of blood 5 seconds after spawning which reduces the movement speed of the entire raid by 80% for 10 seconds, and Saurfang healing for 20% HP upon a mark of the fallen champion death. His blood power gain is also much faster compared to normal (Beasts give 5 Blood Power per melee hit. Rune of Blood gives 3 Blood Power per hit). Blood Beasts will also hit hard enough to one shot any non tank.
On a first kill, prepare for at least two marks on 10-man and six marks on 25-man. (The number of marks you get will naturally decrease as you get better geared and/or when zone-wide buff increases). You will want to assign one dedicated healer per mark. If healers are struggling towards the end of the fight, they can stop healing one of the tanks because of the mechanics of Rune of Blood.
Alternate Strategy
An alternate strategy for defeating Deathbringer Saurfang known on its home server as the "Greyskull Gambit" is to simply tank the blood beasts having the dps bring each beast down from the left to the right. Loose beasts are deathgripped or taunted back to the melee. This can be used in either 10 or 25 man versions of the encounter.
Loot
Normal mode
Heroic mode
Quotes
- Intro as Alliance
- Deathbringer Saurfang yells: For every Horde soldier that you killed, for every Alliance dog that fell, the Lich King's armies grew. Even now the Val'kyr work to raise your fallen... As Scourge.
- Deathbringer Saurfang yells: Things are about to get much worse. Come, taste the power that the Lich King has bestowed upon me!
- Muradin Bronzebeard yells: A lone orc, against the might of the Alliance? Charge!
- Deathbringer Saurfang yells: Hahahaha! Dwarves.
- Deathbringer Saurfang immobilises Muradin and his guards.
- Intro as Horde
- High Overlord Saurfang yells: Kor'kron, move out! Champions, watch your backs. The Scourge have been...
- Deathbringer Saurfang yells: Join me, father. Join me and we will crush this world in the name of the Scourge -- for the glory of the Lich King!
- High Overlord Saurfang says: My boy died at the Wrath Gate. I am here only to collect his body.
- Deathbringer Saurfang yells: Stubborn and old. What chance do you have? I am stronger, and more powerful than you ever were.
- High Overlord Saurfang says: We named him Dranosh. It means "Heart of Draenor" in orcish. I would not let the warlocks take him. My boy would be safe, hidden away by the elders of Garadar.
- High Overlord Saurfang says: I made a promise to his mother before she died; that I would cross the Dark Portal alone - whether I lived or died, my son would be safe. Untainted...
- High Overlord Saurfang says: Today, I fulfill that promise.
- High Overlord Saurfang charges!
- Deathbringer Saurfang yells: Pathetic old orc. Come then heroes. Come and face the might of the Scourge!
- Aggro
- BY THE MIGHT OF THE LICH KING!
- Casting Mark of the Fallen Champion
- The ground runs red with your blood!
- Summoning Blood Beasts
- Feast, my minions!
- Killing a player
- You are nothing!
- Your soul will find no redemption here!
- Berserk
- I have become...DEATH!
- Death
- I... Am... Released.
- Outro as Alliance
- Muradin Bronzebeard gasps for air.
- Muradin Bronzebeard says: That was Saurfang's boy - the Horde commander at the Wrath Gate. Such a tragic end...
- Muradin Bronzebeard says: What in the... There, in the distance!
- A Horde Zeppelin flies up to the rise
- Muradin Bronzebeard yells: Soldiers, fall in! Looks like the Horde are comin' in to take another shot!
- The Zeppelin docks, and High Overlord Saurfang hops out, confronting the Alliance soldiers and Muradin
- Muradin Bronzebeard says: Don't force my hand, orc. We can't let you pass.
- High Overlord Saurfang says: Behind you lies the body of my only son. Nothing will keep me from him.
- Muradin Bronzebeard says: He... I can't do it. Get back on your ship and we'll spare your life.
- A mage portal from Stormwind appears between the two and Varian Wrynn and Jaina Proudmoore emerge
- King Varian Wrynn says: Stand down, Muradin. Let a grieving father pass.
- High Overlord Saurfang walks over to his son and kneels before his son's body.
- High Overlord Saurfang says: [Orcish] No'ku kil zil'nok ha tar.
- Higher Overlord Saurfang picks up the body of his son and walks over towards Varian
- High Overlord Saurfang says: I will not forget this kindess. I thank you, highness.
- King Varian Wrynn says says: I... I was not at the Wrathgate. But the soldiers who survived told me much of what happened. Your son fought with honor. He died a hero's death. He deserves a hero's burial.
- Lady Jaina Proudmoore cries.
- King Varian Wrynn says says: Jaina, why are you crying?
- Lady Jaina Proudmoore says: It was nothing, your majesty. Just... I'm proud of my king.
- King Varian Wrynn says says: Muradin, secure the deck and prepare our soldiers for an assault on the Upper Citadel. I'll send out another regiment from Stormwind.
- Muradin Bronzebeard says says: Let's get the move then. Move out!
- Outro as Horde
- High Overlord Saurfang coughs.
- High Overlord Saurfang weeps over the corpse of his son.
- High Overlord Saurfang says: You will have a proper ceremony in Nagrand next to the pyres of your mother and ancestors.
- High Overlord Saurfang says: Honor, young heroes... no matter how dire the battle... Never forsake it!
Videos
10-player Normal encounter
10-player Heroic encounter
25-player Normal encounter
25-player Heroic encounter
Additional videos
10-Player
YouTube Tofu Council (Blackrock-US) 10-player, text-in-video guide YouTube Renaissance (Anachronos-EU) 10-player, text-in-video guide YouTube Night Shift (Undermine-US) 10-player, alternate method showing tank picking up Blood Beasts, no kiting YouTube Shadows Embrace 10-player, tank PoV25-Player
YouTube Lost Society (Shattered Halls-Eu) 25-player, audible in-game audio and Vent with text guide/ strategy for the encounter. YouTube Shattered Oath (Emerald Dream-US) 25-player, audible in-game audio and Vent; no music. YouTube Active Gaming (Silvermoon-EU) narrated guide. YouTube Renaissance (Anachronos-EU) 25-player, no text/narrative; metal music soundtrack overlay. YouTube Forlorn Legacy (Windrunner-US) 25-player, music soundtrack. YouTube Wolves of War (Draka-US) 25-player heroic mode, in-game audio and Vent. Player communication provides information on some strategy on dealing with Mark targets.25-Player Heroic
YouTube Lost Society (Shattered Halls-Eu) 25-player heroic, text-in-video guide with audible vent YouTube Virulence (Kilrogg-US) 25 player heroic, music soundtrack.Trivia
- The Horde Intro is reminiscent of the famous Star Wars dialogue between Luke and Darth Vader, except that the roles of the evil father and the good son are reversed.
- His berserk quote is reminiscent of the infamous "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." This passage from the Bhagavad Gita (Hindu scriptures), was most famously quoted by Robert Oppenheimer, designer of the nuclear bomb, when the bomb was detonated in its first successful test.
Related achievements
| 10-player mode | 25-player mode | Objective |
|---|---|---|
 [I've Gone and Made a Mess (10 player)]
|
[I've Gone and Made a Mess (25 player)]
|
Defeat the Deathbringer before Mark of the Fallen Champion is cast three/five times |
 [Storming the Citadel (10 player)] ( Heroic)
|
[Storming the Citadel (25 player)] ( Heroic)
|
Defeat the first four bosses in Icecrown Citadel |
Gallery
- Deathbringer Saurfang.JPG
PTR model
After the Deathbringer is killed, Varok Saurfang comes to claim his son's body
Patch changes
- Template:Patched
- Template:Patched
- Patch 3.3.2 (2010-02-01): Deathbringer Saurfang will no longer gain blood power from Mark of the Fallen Champion. In addition, mitigation abilities such as [Power Word: Shield] will no longer prevent blood power generation.
- Template:Patched
- Patch 3.3.0 (2009-12-08): Added.
References
External links
Bosskillers Full strategy guide with diagrams WoWJuju Stats, abilities and strategy for Deathbringer Saurfang. Todowow Guía del Fansite oficial Español