Za'qul, Harbinger of Ny'alotha Strategy Guide in The Eternal Palace Raid

The fight against Za'qul is a complex four-phase encounter during which the raid will have to handle a large number of abilities and mechanics across multiple realms. Overall, this fight is considerably more complex than any of the 6 other fights up to this point in The Eternal Palace, and will require a much more refined execution from your raid.

Overall, this fight is very complex. Fortunately, the complexity of the encounter increases progressively as the raid moves through the different phases, with Phase Four incorporating most of the abilities and mechanics used previously.

A few abilities (the shared abilities described later on) are present throughout multiple parts of the fight, and should be handled in generally the same way. We will first look at these abilities, and then we will handle the strategy for each phase, one at a time, since this is the natural progression your raid will follow as well.

Throughout the fight, your tanks must deal with Mind Tether. Simply put, at the pull, at the start of Phase Two, and at the start of Phase Four, the two tanks should be the closest two players to the boss. This will ensure that Mind Tether will link the two tanks to one another for the remainder of each phase (to the best of our current knowledge, Mind Tether is not re-cast at the start of Phase Three).

Once the two tanks have Mind Tether, they should attempt to stay within 12 yards of one another, in order to keep the amount of damage they reflect to one another to a minimum.

There are no other tank-swap mechanics in the fight, and in theory the same tank can tank the boss throughout the fight, with the other tank simply being there to occasionally pick up adds and soak the reflected damage from Mind Tether.

The Dark Beyond area that surrounds the room should be avoided at all times, since standing in it deals very high damage. Players normally have no reason to enter it, but there are several abilities in the fight that knock back, so players must pay attention not to be knocked back into the Dark Beyond.

Furthermore, Dread, which is cast throughout most of the fight, fears players, and healers must pay special attention in case a feared player wanders into the Dark Beyond.

Dread is used in Phases One, Two, and Three, and should generally always be handled in the same way. The players who are debuffed by Dread will need to be dispelled by the healers in a staggered fashion, since each dispel (or expiration of the 10-second DoT) results in a lot of raid-wide damage.

The actual damage Dread deals to its target is not too bad, so leaving a player until late to dispel them is not a concern, although as Dread players are also feared, they may stray into the Dark Beyond or some other void zone and take additional damage.

Crushing Grasp is present throughout the fight, and players will simply have to get used to dodging this tentacle whenever the ability is happening.

The blue portal from which the tentacle will spawn is always located at the side of the room, and the tentacle will always slam across the center of the room, so with a bit of practice, this should become fairly easy to see and dodge at all times.

Phase One is the simplest of all phases in this encounter, and it helps establish a few baseline tasks for your raid.

Your raid will have to handle all of the above-mentioned shared abilities, in addition to dealing with Portal of Madness.

All 3 Horrific Summoners that spawn from the Portal of Madness must be killed before they finish their cast of Dark Tear, or else the raid-wide damage will cause a wipe. DPS players should simply focus these adds when they spawn.

The resulting Horrific Visions are not a priority, as they have no abilities and their melee attacks are not particularly threatening. The recommended strategy is to bring these adds to melee range of the boss (the off-tank can try to do this, but they should make sure not to move more than 12 yards away from the main tank) and then cleave them down.

Keep in mind that the void zones created by Portal of Madness (from which the Summoners spawn) do deal damage if you stand in them, so avoid them.

Once the boss reaches 85% health, Phase Two will begin.

In Phase Two, the raid will have to still handle Mind Tether, as well as Crushing Grasp tentacles and Dread. These will be handled exactly as before, and Portal of Madness adds will no longer spawn during this phase.

The entire raid will now be in the Fear Realm, and raid damage will increase throughout this phase, as Hysteria stacks on all players. This cannot be avoided or mitigated in any way, and it is up to the healers to keep up with the damage (healing cooldowns may be required towards the end of the phase). Avoiding other sources of damage and maximising DPS to get through the phase as quickly as possible will also help.

Importantly, the raid will have to handle Maddening Eruption and Manifest Nightmares throughout this phase.

Maddening Eruption must be handled by moving Za'qul into this void zone before it detonates. This will ensure that the raid does not take damage from the detonation, and also debuffs the boss to take 30% increased damage for 20 seconds. The tank will need to stay inside the void zone with the boss (unless the boss's model will allow such precise positioning that the tank can stay outside while the boss is in), and as such should be prepared to take the void zone explosion damage as well.

Players who are affected by Manifest Nightmares must stay away from other raid members, and must be careful of where they leave the void zones that each tick creates. We recommend placing these void zones near the center of the room, since this is the area where the Crushing Grasp tentacles always hit, and which players will want to move away from towards the edges of the room to avoid.

Moreover, to optimize the location of the Nightmare Pool void zones, players should attempt to overlap them, or, failing that, to leave a gap between so players can move through if needed. Since these void zones persist for the rest of the fight and can deal damage to players who are in the Delirium Realm (during Phases Three and Four), even though these players cannot actually see the void zones, it is a good idea for the raid to have consistent placement of these void zones throughout multiple attempts, so everyone can get a feel for where they are even if they cannot always see them.

The Horrific Vision adds that spawn when Manifest Nightmares expires are not really a concern, and should just be picked up by the tanks and eventually cleaved down.

At 70% health, the boss will enter Phase Three, but for most of the raid, the fight will continue just like it did up to this point. All mechanics should be handled exactly as during Phase Two, and only the Delirium's Descent ability will be new.

DPS players (ideally those benefit most from increased Haste) should soak the Delirium's Descent void zones (1 player per void zone), as this will transport them from the Fear Realm into the Delirium Realm. There are a few considerations here.

• The boss creates the Delirium's Descent void zones somewhere in front of him, so the tank must make sure to face the boss away from the Dark Beyond.
• The DPS players who enter the Delirium Realm can attack one another (since they are all hostile), but should avoid doing so and should instead focus entirely on damaging Za'qul.
• Eventually, all the players who enter the Delirium Realm will "die" (see last bullet point below), as they cannot be healed from the other realms, and as they will take increasing damage from Hysteria (even if they manage to avoid all other damage).
  • The Nightmare Pools from the normal/Fear realms will damage players who are in the Delirium Realm, although they will not be able to see them, so avoiding them is more a matter of having a good understanding of where the safe areas are (our recommendation above was to place these void zones near the center of the room, which should leave the edges clear).
  • Dread can target players in the Delirium Realm, and this will likely kill everyone in that realm.
  • In Heroic mode, players inside the Delirium Realm will also have to avoid the Tentacle Slam ability.
• When players "die" in the Delirium Realm, they will be brought back into the Fear Realm on 50% health and stunned by Shattered Psyche. Healers should dispel this and heal these players up as soon as possible.

Phase Four starts when the boss reaches 50% health, with the entire raid being transported out of the Fear Realm into the normal realm. This will allow the stacks of Hysteria to drop off, providing much-needed relief for the healers.

The raid will still be dealing with Mind Tether and Crushing Grasp exactly as before. The Phase One Horrific Summoners are back, but now they are immune to damage unless done by players in the Fear Realm, which can regularly be entered.

Moreover, the boss now regularly shields himself and begins casting Dark Pulse, which must be interrupted by breaking through his damage-absorption shield. The last change is that the Dread ability that was used up until now is changed to Manic Dread, which leaves behind void zones at the place where players are dispelled and enable players to access the Delirium Realm.

The strategy for this phase is as follows.

• Most of the raid will spend most of the time in the normal realm, dealing with the boss's abilities there and with the Horrific Visions.
• Selected DPS players (again, who benefit from increased Haste) should enter the Delirium Realm by standing in the Caustic Delirium void zones for 5 seconds in preparation for the boss's Dark Pulse cast.
  • Once inside the Delirium Realm, they must do as much damage as possible to the boss in order to break through his 5% of maximum health damage absorption shield.
  • All Delirium Realm strategy considerations from Phase Three still apply here.
  • When players have broken through the shield, they should exit the Delirium Realm by interacting with First Arcanist Thalyssra's Reality Portal.
• Once the boss's Dark Pulse cast has been broken, players will need to use the Fear Realm Portals present next to the Horrific Summoners to enter the Fear Realm and kill the Summoners before their casts of Dark Tear can complete.
  • Exactly how many players must enter the Fear Realm will depend on several factors, but it is a good idea to send a mix of DPS and healers in to ensure that no one dies.
  • Once the Summoners are dead, players should exit the Fear Realm by interacting with First Arcanist Thalyssra's Reality Portal.

As all of this goes on, players will need to continue DPSing Za'qul himself in order to finally kill him.

We are not certain what the best time to use Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp is, but it is going to be either Phase Three (to accelerate the transition to Phase Four and rid the raid of the high stacks of Hysteria) or Phase Four (which is the most complex and probably the most demanding part of the fight).

• Make sure to be closest to the other tank on the pull and at the start of Phases Two and Four, so that Mind Tether links the two tanks.
• Make sure to be within 12 yards of each other whenever possible to keep the Mind Tether damage as low as possible.
• Do not tank the boss directly in the center of the room (since this is where the Crushing Grasp tentacle will often hit).
• Pick up the Horrific Vision adds and bring them in melee range so the DPS can cleave them.
• During Phases Two and Three, pull the boss into the Maddening Eruption void zones to soak them and ensure that the boss is debuffed by them.
• During Phase Four, face the boss towards the inside of the room so that the Caustic Delirium void zones do not spawn in the Dark Beyond.

• Avoid entering the Dark Beyond around the outer edges of the room.
• Avoid getting hit by the Crushing Grasp tentacle.
• Dispel players affected by Dread in a staggered way, and heal up the raid-wide damage.
• Do not stand in the Portal of Madness void zones.
• Focus the Horrific Summoners and cleave down the Horrific Visions.

• Avoid entering the Dark Beyond around the outer edges of the room.
• Avoid getting hit by the Crushing Grasp tentacle.
• Dispel players affected by Dread in a staggered way, and heal up the raid-wide damage.
• Heal the increasing raid-wide damage from Hysteria.
• Move away from allies affected by Manifest Nightmares. If affected by Manifest Nightmares, drop the resulting void zones in the center of the room, either overlapping them or leaving gaps between them.
• Do not stand in the Maddening Eruption void zone.
• During Phase Three, assigned DPS players enter the Delirium Realm by standing in Delirium's Descent void zones.
• During Phase Three, healers must make sure to heal up and dispel players who exit the Delirium Realm.

• Avoid entering the Dark Beyond around the outer edges of the room.
• Avoid getting hit by the Crushing Grasp tentacle.
• Dispel players affected by Manic Dread in a staggered way, and heal up the raid-wide damage.
• Assigned DPS players enter the Delirium Realm by standing in Caustic Delirium void zones in order to break the boss's damage absorption shield and interrupt Dark Pulse.
• Assigned healers and DPS players use the Fear's Gate portals to enter the Fear Realm and focus the Horrific Summoners.

The fight against Za'qul is a 4-phase encounter. The boss enters a new phase at various health thresholds, as detailed below.

• Phase One: 100-85% health
• Phase Two: 85-70% health
• Phase Three: 70-50% health
• Phase Four: 50-0% health

Phases Two and Three each have a "realm" associated with them. During Phase Two, the entire raid is transported to the Fear Realm, whereas during Phase Three, some players will be transported to the Delirium Realm (while the rest of the raid stays in the Fear Realm).

Phase One takes place entirely in the "normal" realm, while in Phase Four, the raid will interact with all 3 realms. We explain all of this below!

Before we look at each phase, we should mention a few abilities that are used in all phases of the fight.

Throughout the fight, the outer ring of the fighting area is covered in a Dark Beyond. This is a permanent area that deals high Shadow damage to players standing in it every second.

Dread is a 10-second DoT that the boss applies to random raid members throughout the fight (each cast applies it to several players at once). The DoT deals small amount of Shadow damage every second to the player, fearing them for the duration, and also dealing a high amount of raid-wide Shadow damage when it expires or is dispelled.

Mind Tether is an ability that concerns the tanks. At the start of the fight, as well as the start of Phases Two and Four, the boss will "link" his current target to the player closest to them, causing them to each reflect (copy) 50% of the damage they take to the other player as Shadow damage.

If the two tethered players are farther than 12 yards apart, the amount of reflected damage is increased.

If there is no player in the same realm as the tank when this is cast (so, if the ability cannot link the current tank to anyone else), then the tank is stunned by Snapped for 10 seconds.

Crushing Grasp spawns a portal at the side of the fighting area, and from this portal a large tentacle appears and slams across the entire length of the room twice, a few seconds later.

The tentacle always hits across the room, in a straight line, and getting hit by it deals very high Shadow damage and knocks players back.

Phase One lasts from the start of the fight until the boss reaches 85% health. During this phase, the boss uses a number of abilities against the raid.

During this phase, the boss will use all of the shared abilities described above, as well as one new ability, Portal of Madness.

When the boss casts Portal of Madness, it will create 3 void zones at various locations in the room. Standing in a Portal of Madness void zone will deal a massive amount Shadow damage to the player and fear them for 6 seconds.

A Horrific Summoner add will spawn from each Portal of Madness. These Summoners do not melee and do not need to be tanked. They channel a cast of Dark Tear for 120 seconds. If this cast ends, the entire raid will take lethal damage.

During the Dark Tear cast, a stream of Horrific Vision adds spawn from each portal. These adds have no abilities, but must be tanked and eventually killed.

On Heroic mode, the Horrific Vision adds spawn with 30 stacks of a buff called Gathering Nightmare. Each stack of this buff increases their damage taken by 5% and movement speed by 2%, and the adds lose 1 stack every 2 seconds. If the buff expires, the Horrific Vision adds are transformed into Unleashed Nightmare adds, which deal more damage and debuff their current target with stacks of Hysteria, a 25-second Shadow damage DoT.

Phase Two begins when the boss reaches 85% health, and it lasts until 70% health.

Throughout this phase, the boss will continue to use the shared abilities mentioned above. Portal of Madness from Phase One will no longer be cast.

At the start of Phase Two, the entire raid is moved to the Fear Realm. This brings with it a stacking Shadow damage DoT called Hysteria, which will stack on all raid members inside the Fear Realm every 15 seconds.

In addition to this, the boss uses two new abilities during Phase Two.

Maddening Eruption is a void zone that Za'qul regularly creates during Phase Two. While active, this void zone does nothing, but roughly 20 seconds after spawning, it explodes, dealing high raid-wide Shadow damage.

If Za'qul is within the void zone when it expires, then only raid members who are within the void zone take damage, and the boss receives the Punctured Darkness debuff for 20 seconds, which increases damage taken by 30%.

Manifest Nightmares debuffs 2 random raid members with a 6-second DoT that deals Shadow damage to them and any other allies within 7 yards. Moreover, each time the DoT ticks, it leaves behind a Nightmare Pool void zone for roughly 30 seconds, which deals Shadow damage to players standing in it. When Manifest Nightmares expires, it spawns a Horrific Vision add.

Phase Three begins when the boss reaches 70% health, and lasts until 50% health.

During Phase Three, the boss will use all the same abilities from Phase Two, and all raid members will remain in the Fear Realm (with Hysteria continuing to stack).

Additionally, the boss will allow some raid members to enter the Delirium Realm during this phase, as we explain below.

Throughout Phase Three, the boss will cast Delirium's Descent. This creates 3 void zones in an area in front of the boss which explode after 8 seconds, dealing a small amount of raid-wide Shadow damage. If, however, a player is located in a void zone when it explodes, it will not deal raid damage and instead transport that player to the Delirium Realm. Each void zone can only transport one player.

While in the Delirium Realm several things happen.

• Hysteria stacks on players every 6 seconds, up from 15 in the Fear Realm.
• Players in the Delirium Realm are hostile to each other.
• Players in the Delirium Realm can attack the boss and adds, but they cannot see or interact with any raid members not in the Delirium Realm.
• Players in the Delirium Realm have 80% increased Haste.
• Players who die in the Delirium Realm do not really die, but are instead brought back to the Fear Realm on 50% health with a 6-second dispellable stun called Shattered Psyche.
• Players in the Delirium Realm can be hit by Crushing Grasp, targeted by the boss's Dread, and damaged by standing in the Nightmare Pool void zones. In Heroic mode, they can also be hit by the Tentacle Slam ability.

Phase Four starts when the boss reaches 50% health, and lasts until the boss is killed.

When the phase starts, all players are brought back from the Fear Realm and Delirium Realm into the normal realm by First Arcanist Thalyssra, an NPC that will remain in the fighting area until the end of the fight. She will have a Reality Portal next to her (visible and accessible regardless of which realm raid members are in) which players can use at any time throughout Phase Four to return to the normal realm.

Throughout Phase Four, the majority of the raid will mostly be in the normal realm, but it is possible (and indeed necessary) for some players to enter both the Fear Realm and the Delirium Realm.

Za'qul will continue to use the shared abilities during this phase, with the mention that Dread becomes Manic Dread (explained directly below). In addition to this, the bosses uses two new abilities: Dark Passage (an ability similar to the Phase One Portal of Madness ability) and Dark Pulse.

Manic Dread works exactly like Dread, except that when it expires or is dispelled, it leaves behind a damaging Caustic Delirium void zone. Standing in this void zone deals increasingly high Shadow damage every second, and after a player has been standing inside this void zone for 5 seconds, they are transported into the Delirium Realm and the void zone disappears.

The Delirium Realm works exactly the same during this phase as during Phase Three.

Players can enter the Fear Realm by using the extra action button present when they are near the Fear's Gate portals that appear when the boss casts Dark Passage (explained below).

This transports the player to the Fear Realm (which works exactly the same as during Phases Two and Three). This includes the Maddening Eruption and Manifest Nightmares Phase Two abilities. Specifically, all raid members can take damage from the Nightmare Pool void zones, but only players within the Fear Realm can see them, and the boss can still be debuffed by standing in the Maddening Eruption void zone (in addition to soaking its damage), but again, only players who are inside the Fear Realm can see this void zone.

Za'qul has an Energy bar during Phase Four, which indicates when he will cast Dark Pulse. The boss will place a damage absorption shield (5% of his maximum health) on himself and then begin the 18-second cast time of Dark Pulse. If the cast succeeds, all raid members (regardless of which realm they are in) will take a very high amount of Shadow damage.

If the damage absorption shield is broken, then the boss will automatically be stunned for 1.5 seconds by Mind Fracture, which also interrupts the Dark Pulse cast.

Much like Portal of Madness during Phase One, the boss will cast Dark Passage in Phase Four. This works almost exactly the same as Portal of Madness, with two differences.

• The Horrific Summoners are protected by a Shroud of Fear buff, which means they can only be damaged by players who are inside the Fear Realm.
  • As mentioned above, next to each Summoner there is a Fear's Gate portal that players can use to enter the Fear Realm.
• The explosion that happens if the Summoners finish their 2-minute Dark Tear cast deals damage to players in all realms.

Heroic mode brings two differences over LFR/Normal.

The first concerns the Horrific Vision adds, which in Heroic mode spawn with 30 stacks of a buff called Gathering Nightmare. Each stack of this buff increases their damage taken by 5% and movement speed by 2%, and the adds lose 1 stack every 2 seconds. If the buff expires, the Horrific Vision adds are transformed into Unleashed Nightmare adds, which deal more damage and debuff their current target with stacks of Hysteria, a 25-second Shadow damage DoT.

The second change concerns the Delirium Realm (so Phases Three and Four). A tentacle will regularly appear inside the Delirium Realm and shortly afterwards it will slam the ground, dealing very high Shadow damage to players who are hit, also stunning them for 2 seconds.

Item>	Type	Slot
Dream's End	Axe	One Hand
Sever, Edge of Madness	Warglaives	One Hand
Vestments of Creeping Terror	Cloth Armor	Chest
Bindings of the Herald	Cloth Armor	Wrists
Gardbrace of Fractured Reality	Mail Armor	Shoulders
Shackles of Dissonance	Mail Armor	Wrists
Shroud of Unmooring Whispers	Leather Armor	Head
Pauldrons of Za'qul	Plate Armor	Shoulders
Dark Passenger's Breastplate	Plate Armor	Chest
Cloak of Ill Tidings	Accessory	Back
Chain of Suffering	Accessory	Trinket
Vision of Demise	Accessory	Trinket
Za'qul's Portal Key	Accessory	Trinket
Nameless Octopode	Pet

For more information, please refer to our Eternal Palace Loot and Essence guide.