Warmaster Blackhorn

Warmaster Blackhorn
Race	Tauren (Humanoid)
Level	?? Boss
Affiliation(s)	Twilight's Hammer cult
Location	The Skyfire, Dragon Soul
The Dragon Soul
	Template:The Dragon Soul

Warmaster Blackhorn is the sixth boss to appear in the Dragon Soul raid.^[1]

World first heroic kill on 25-man achieved 8.12.2011 by Vodka - US-Alterac Mountains

Background

Though once vast in number, only a few dozen twilight dragons now remain. Astride these hardened survivors are the last vestiges of the Twilight's Hammer's army: the elite drake riders of Deathwing's personal escort. Led by the insidious Warmaster Blackhorn, they move with unholy purpose, driven to protect their dark master.^[2]

Abilities

Stage One: Dragonriders, Attack!

Flying alongside the Skyfire and surveying the scene while his massive twilight drake lobs balls of destruction at the gunship, Warmaster Blackhorn gives the order for his elite dragonriders to swoop into battle.

The Skyfire — Sky Captain Swayze helms this massive gunship equipped with numerous cannons and a pair of harpoon guns for its defense. The gunship is sturdy but not indestructible, and if it sustains too much damage the pursuit of Deathwing will come to an untimely end.
- Harpoon Guns — Alliance engineers equipped the Skyfire with two repurposed harpoon guns, seized during its prior service in Northrend. Harpoon gunners spear the enemy's Assault Drakes and reel them in to bring them within reach of ranged attackes on the deck. The drakes strain against the line, eventually breaking free and returning to a safe distance. After a pause to reload, the harpoon gunners then spear their target anew. In Looking for Raid Difficulty, the drakes do not break free from the Harpoons.
- Deck Fire — As the Skyfire takes damage, destructive fires break out on the ship and spread rapidly across its deck. Crewmembers rush to extinguish these blazes and keep them in check. Any player standing within a fire suffers 45000 Fire damage per second.
Goriona — The massive twilight drake that is the mount of Warmaster Blackhorn himself.
- Twilight Onslaught — Goriona unleashes a massive blast of dark energy at a random location on the deck of the Skyfire. Twilight Onslaught deals 800000 ^{[note 1]} Shadow damage, divided evenly among all players within its 10 yard radius and the Skyfire. If the attack strikes the deck of the Skyfire without hitting any player, the gunship suffers the full damage.
- Broadside — Goriona periodically unleashes a vicious barrage of fireballs that slam into the side of the Skyfire, causing the ship to suffer damage equal to 20% of its remaining structural integrity.
Twilight Assault Drake — These Drakes strafe across the deck of the ship, deposit their fierce riders onto the deck, and then retreat to a safe distance to bombard the gunship.
- Twilight Barrage — The twilight drakes launch bursts of dark energy at a random location on the deck of the Skyfire. Twilight Barrage deals 200000^{[note 2]} Shadow damage, divided evenly among all players within its 5 yard radius and the Skyfire. If the attack strikes the deck of the Skyfire without hitting any player, the gunship itself suffers the full damage instead.
Twilight Elite Dreadblade
- Blade Rush — The Dreadblade charges at the location of a random distant player, inflicting 100000^{[note 3]} Physical damage to all players in its path.
- Degeneration — The Dreadblade carves a swath of destruction with its dark sword. The sword inflicts 40000^{[note 4]} Shadow damage to enemies in a frontal cone, and 3000^{[note 5]} Shadow damage every 2 sec for 1 min. This effect stacks.
Twilight Elite Slayer
- Blade Rush — The Elite Slayer charges at the location of a random distant player, inflicting 100000^{[note 3]} Physical damage to all players in its path.
- Brutal Strike — The Slayer strikes a vicious blow with its jagged sword. The strike inflicts 150^{[note 6]} Physical damage, and 3000^{[note 7]} Physical damage every 2 sec for 1 min. This effect stacks.
Twilight Sapper — Sleek infiltrator drakes airdrop goblins strapped with powerful explosives onto the deck of the ship. These Sappers will rush to breach the gunship bridge and detonate their destructive payload. Twilight Sappers does not appear on Raid Finder difficulty.
- Detonate — Upon reaching the Skyfire's bridge, the Sapper detonates his explosives The blast inflicts 250000 Fire damage to players within 8 yards, damages the Skyfire for 20% of its total durability, and kills the Sapper.

Stage Two: Looks Like I'm Doing This Myself

Once the Skyfire's defenders defeat three waves of dragonriders, Warmaster Blackhorn leaps down onto the deck of the gunship.

Warmaster Blackhorn
- Devastate — Blackhorn sunders his current target's armor, inflicting 120% weapon damage and reducing the player's armor by 20% for 30 sec. This effect stacks.
- Disrupting Roar — Warmaster Blackhorn screams fiercely, inflicting 50000^{[note 8]} Physical damage to all enemies on the gunship. The shout also interrupts spellcasting for players within 10 yards for 8 sec.
- Shockwave — Blackhorn strikes the ground, unleashing a wave of force that inflicts 100000^{[note 9]} Physical damage to enemies in a 80 yard frontal cone and stuns them for 4 sec.
- Vengeance — As Warmaster Blackhorn takes damage during the course of the fight, he inflicts 1% more damage for each percentage of his missing health.
- Siphon Vitality — When severely injured, Warmaster Blackhorn drains health directly from Goriona. The health drain inflicts damage equal to 20% of Goriona's remaining health, and heals Blackhorn accordingly.
Goriona — After depositing her master on the deck of the Skyfire, Goriona hovers along the Skyfire and rains destruction down on the players. Once Goriona has suffered sufficient damage, she will break off and flee, abandoning her master on the Skyfire.
- Twilight Flames — Goriona launches a blast of dark energy at the location of a random player, inflicting 40000^{[note 10]} Shadow damage on impact to players in a 8 yard radius. Twilight Flames lingers on the deck of the Skyfire, inflicting 30000^{[note 11]} Shadow damage to players within 7 yards every 1 sec for 30 sec.
- Twilight Breath — Goriona unleashes a torrent of dark flame, inflicting 85000^{[note 12]} Shadow damage in a 45 yard cone in front of the caster.
- Consuming Shroud — Goriona envelops an enemy target in twilight energy, absorbing the next 100000^{[note 13]} healing received. When Consuming Shroud absorbs incoming healing, unleashed energy will deal damage equal to the healing absorbed to all allies. Dying while afflicted by Consuming Shroud will release all remaining energy at once.

Notes

^ Raid Finder: 1300000, 10-man heroic: 1200000, 25-man: 2000000, 25-man heroic: 3000000
^ Raid Finder: 129999, 10/25-man heroic: 300000
^ ^a ^b Raid Finder: 65000, 10/25-man heroic: 150000
^ Raid Finder: 52000, 10-man heroic: 60000, 25-man: 80000, 25-man heroic: 120000
^ Raid Finder: 3900, 10-man heroic: 4500, 25-man: 6000, 25-man heroic: 9000
^ Raid Finder: 97
^ Raid Finder: 3900, 10-man heroic: 4500, 25-man: 6000, 25-man heroic: 9000
^ Raid Finder: 42250, 10-man heroic: 75000, 25-man: 65000, 25-man heroic: 97500
^ Raid Finder: 65000
^ Raid Finder: 56000, 10/25-man heroic: 60000
^ Raid Finder: 19500, 10/25-man heroic: 45000
^ 25-man: 125000
^ 25-man: 150000

Strategy

Warmaster Blackhorn is a two phase encounter, the first phase has the raid deal with three different types of adds, while the second phase has the raid deal with the Warmaster himself. This raid encounter is very similar to the Gunship Encounter in Icecrown Citadel (Which earned both of them the nickname, Lootship).

Phase One

This phase is all about handling adds, the first adds are the Twilight Elite Slayer and Twilight Elite Dreadblade duo, These need to be picked up by the tanks, melee should pay attention to avoid their cleaving, and all DoT classes should dot them up, Melee should apply the own DoT's/Bleeds and then proceed to focus one down, then the other, the raid needs to becareful of the adds when they do their skill Blade Rush, where they will pick a ranged player and do around 100,000 damage to anyone in the path of the Add. Range should Focus killing the second add, which will be a wave of two Twilight Assault Drakes, however it may become neccessary for range to help with the Twilight Elite duo, as both these adds will spawn again for a total of six Elites and six Dragons, and the priority is to make sure the are only ever two elites alive at one given time. Should also be noted that the tanks should take turns in holding one Slayer add, then a Dreadblade, and so forth so that the debuff the Adds do will fall off from each other (And be replaced by the other debuff, rather then having it stacked up). While the Twilight Drakes are alive, they will cause small purple swirls on the ground, which is where they will fire a Twilight Barrage, which will hit around 200,000 damage, which will then be spread out between players that are nearby, if no player is nearby, it will hit the ship. Not all of the Twilight Barrages need to be soaked, so have a few range split into groups of 2-3 and have then soak some of them, but to ensure that they survive, do not soak if your not at full health. The last add that will spawn is a Twilight Sapper, which is basically a little Goblin, when this add spawns, it will turn invisible for few seconds, once it reappears, it needs to be killed quickly, above any other adds, as if it reaches the ship it will take a fifth of the Gunship's health away. the Sapper can be Stunned, Slowed and Moved (such as Deathgrip), and will die fairly quickly, they will keep spawning until phase one is over. Periodically through out the fight, Goriona will cast Twilight Onslaught which will look like a Twilight Barrage, but larger, in which all the raid minus the tanks need to stack in for it, as it will do very high damage, split across the raid, in the case of having to soak a Twilight Barrage or the Onslaught, the Twilight Onslaught has the higher priority to the point the Barrage should be ignored.

Phase 2

Once all the Drakes are dead, Phase two will commence and Blackhorn will board the ship, while Goriona will continue to be a pain from above, During this phase, all range DPS should focus on Goriona while the Melee focus on Blackhorn, Goriona while alive will drop Twilight Flames on the Deck of the Gunship, and like all fire, you should not stand in it. While Blackhorn is active he will put a debuff on the tank, in which tanks should take turns in taunting and holding the boss. The two main abilities Blackhorn will do to hamper the raid is Disrupting Roar, which will do AoE damage to the whole raid, and if it interupts a cast, will silence the player for 8 seconds, the second is Shockwave, which will do a lots of damage to anyone within his AoE Cone and Stun then for four seconds, this is avoidable and should be avoided at all costs, as the lower his health gets, the more damage he does, which makes this skill have the possibility of instant killing any non tanks near the end of the fight.

Overall Warmaster Blackhorn is one of the easier raid encounters and with proper positioning and raid cool downs near the end of the encounter, should be an easy kill.

Loot

Warmaster Blackhorn's drops

Raid Finder (ilvl 384)	Normal (ilvl 397)	Heroic (ilvl 410)
Crown of the Corrupted Conqueror (Raid Finder)	[Crown of the Corrupted Conqueror]	Crown of the Corrupted Conqueror (heroic)
Crown of the Corrupted Protector (Raid Finder)	[Crown of the Corrupted Protector]	Crown of the Corrupted Protector (heroic)
Crown of the Corrupted Vanquisher (Raid Finder)	[Crown of the Corrupted Vanquisher]	Crown of the Corrupted Vanquisher (heroic)
Ataraxis, Cudgel of the Warmaster (Raid Finder)	[Ataraxis, Cudgel of the Warmaster]	Ataraxis, Cudgel of the Warmaster (heroic)
Visage of the Destroyer (Raid Finder)	[Visage of the Destroyer]	Visage of the Destroyer (heroic)
Blackhorn's Mighty Bulwark (Raid Finder)	[Blackhorn's Mighty Bulwark]	Blackhorn's Mighty Bulwark (heroic)
Timepiece of the Bronze Flight (Raid Finder)	[Timepiece of the Bronze Flight]	Timepiece of the Bronze Flight (heroic)
Shadow Wing Armbands (Raid Finder)	[Shadow Wing Armbands]	Shadow Wing Armbands (heroic)
Belt of the Beloved Companion (Raid Finder)	[Belt of the Beloved Companion]	Belt of the Beloved Companion (heroic)
Goriona's Collar (Raid Finder)	[Goriona's Collar]	Goriona's Collar (heroic)
Janglespur Jackboots (Raid Finder)	[Janglespur Jackboots]	Janglespur Jackboots (heroic)
Starcatcher Compass (Raid Finder)	[Starcatcher Compass]	Starcatcher Compass (heroic)
	[Essence of Destruction]	[Essence of Destruction]

Shared drops

Item	Type
[Breathstealer Band] (LFR · H)	Strength ring
[Hardheart Ring] (LFR · H)	Tank ring
[Infinite Loop] (LFR · H)	Caster DPS ring
[Seal of Primordial Shadow] (LFR · H)	Agility ring
[Signet of Suturing] (LFR · H)	Spirit ring
[Bone-Link Fetish] (LFR · H)	Strength trinket
[Cunning of the Cruel] (LFR · H)	Caster DPS trinket
[Indomitable Pride] (LFR · H)	Tank trinket
[Vial of Shadows] (LFR · H)	Agility trinket
[Windward Heart] (LFR · H)	Healer trinket
[Chest of the Corrupted Conqueror]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Chest of the Corrupted Protector]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Chest of the Corrupted Vanquisher]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Crown of the Corrupted Conqueror]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Crown of the Corrupted Protector]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Crown of the Corrupted Vanquisher]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Gauntlets of the Corrupted Conqueror]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Gauntlets of the Corrupted Protector]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Gauntlets of the Corrupted Vanquisher]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Leggings of the Corrupted Conqueror]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Leggings of the Corrupted Protector]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Leggings of the Corrupted Vanquisher]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Shoulders of the Corrupted Conqueror]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Shoulders of the Corrupted Protector]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)
[Shoulders of the Corrupted Vanquisher]	Armor token (Raid Finder only)