Black Morass (normal)
The Dark Portal Event (as it is officially known) is the bane of many players fresh from the grind to level 70. The Infinite Dragonflight, bent on altering the present, have sought to interfere with Medivh’s opening of the Dark Portal. Sent back into time, you and your friends are the only hope of preserving temporal stability. Into the Black Morass you must venture, an extension of the Swamp of Sorrows that would later become the Blasted Lands.
Unlike a normal dungeon, Black Morass (BM) takes place in a single location, with monsters pouring out of time-release portals. These servants of the Infinite Dragonflight are dead-set on killing Medivh, who is trying to open the Dark Portal and only has so much power in his shield before it collapses and he is overrun.
Where IS the damn place?
It’s easy to miss BM and its sister instance, Escape from Durnholde (or Old Hillsbrad). Both are in the Caverns of Time, which is along the eastern shore of Tanaris. What separates these instances from their Outland brethren is that neither of them are very traditional. Both are highly scripted and revolve around questlines specific to them. In Durnholde you’re tasked with the escape of Thrall and in BM the defense of Medivh. In order to access BM, you must first complete Durnholde, as turning in the quest from there unlocks the BM quest.
Pertinent Quests
[70] The Black Morass – Andormu
After completing the Durnhold quest, Andormu informs you that another moment in time requires your attention: the opening of the dark portal by Medivh. This quest lets you enter the instance portal and is turned it to a NPC right inside the door.
[70] The Opening of the Dark Portal – Sa’at
You receive this quest upon entering the BM instance. In it, you must defend Medivh from the Infinite Dragonflight intrusion while he attempts to open the Dark Portal to allow the orcs of Draenor to enter Azeroth. In order to assist you, Sa’at gives each player a “Chronobeacon,” which, when used, summons a bronze dragon that will briefly help you. If you use one on a boss, the boss with despawn it after a few seconds. If you do manage to protect Medivh long enough for the portal to be opened, return to Sa’at for further instructions.
[70] Hero of the Brood – Sa’at
With your heroism proven, Sa’at sends you back to Andormu to choose from a series of rings and receive a massive amount of Keepers of Time reputation.
[70] The Master’s Touch – Khadgar
Now that you’ve had a key to Karazhan crafted, you must have the blessing of its master, Medivh. The only problem is, Medivh is long dead. By traveling back in time to the opening of the dark portal you can find him though and hopefully obtain his blessing which will allow you to enter the eerie halls of his tower.
[70] Return to Khadgar – Medivh
With Medivh’s blessing and a new key in your hands, you must return to Khadgar to inform him of what occurred in the Black Morass.
How this place works
As stated before, the Black Morass is a totally different kind of instance. Rather than advancing through a series of rooms, you stay in the same place as monsters spawn around you. Before approaching Medivh, make sure to clear out all the beasts that are wandering around in the area indicated above, as you don’t want them adding during the actual event. Once you approach Medivh a counter will appear at the top of the screen (if it does not, you may not have the world PvP details enabled in your settings, enable them and it should appear) that shows the strength of Medvih’s shield and how many portals (of 18) are open. At this point, portals will begin opening regardless of whether or not the guardian of the previous portal has been defeated, so make sure before you speak to Medivh you’re fully buffed and ready to go. Each portal will spawn a single elite that must be defeated before the portal closes. At the same time, non-elite mobs will start coming out of the portal and making a bee-line for Medivh. You need to have one party member (any more and you probably won’t be able to take out the elites fast enough) whose whole job is the manage these non-elites, preferably a mage or warlock, but any class can do it with experience. Every 6th portal a boss with spawn (so portal 6/12/18). After the boss is defeated there will be a long break before the next portal opens, so you can drink up, go to the bathroom, or blink. After each boss the time between each portal speeds up a little, so be ready for things to get a bit harder, especially from portal 7 to 11.
The key to keeping this instance under control is managing the adds and burning down the elites as quickly as possible. Having two portals up can spell doom for even an experienced and well-geared party, but if you start to fall behind you can always use your chronobeacon to take care of the adds while the add-control person helps out killing the elites.
Trash Mobs
Rift Lord – The easiest of the rift guardians. They’ve got a mortal strike and a thunderclap, but not much else. Expect some pretty hefty damage to go out, but only on the main tank (assuming they’re doing their job).
Rift Keeper – These guys come in 2 varieties, mage and warlock. The mage variant casts intermittent frostbolts, occasionally choosing to throw out a pyroblast on a seemingly random target, which can be spell reflected for hilarious results. In addition to all this they can also blast wave for about 2k fire damage. They can do this whenever they want, even right after a pyroblast, so be ready for spike damage at all times. They also polymorph the second highest person on their aggro table, which shouldn’t be a big deal, even if the healer gets polymorphed, as they hit rather weakly and most of their attacks can be reflected. The warlock variety melee harder and have an AoE shadowbolt volley which hits for about 1.5-2k damage on everybody within 30 feet or so. They also put a curse on the tank that increases all spell damage taken by 100%. Lastly they fear the closest person in aggro and range to them regularly.
Bosses
Chrono Lord Deja – On portal 6 this super-sized drakonid will spawn. Adds will still be coming out of the portal, so make sure somebody is taking care of them, as this boss doesn’t requires the same level of DPS that the second boss does. He melees rather heavily and has a few different abilities, but is generally a tank and spank type of encounter.
Time Lapse – This is a regularly cast debuff on the MT that reduces attack, casting, and movement speed by 60%. It’s a magic debuff so just dispel it if you can, otherwise don’t worry too much about it.
Arcane Discharge – Inflicts 2-2.5k arcane damage to everybody in 45 yards. Much like other level 70 instance bosses, party healing is required. If you’re having a hard time keeping up with this, bring an off-healer like a paladin or a shaman to help out keeping the rest of the party up.
AoE Knockback – Occasionally he’ll knock back everybody in range, but stay on the tank. Just a nuisance more than anything.
Temporus – On portal 12, a black shimmering drake will appear. This boss can prove to be a serious problem for many groups due to his stacking debuff that reduces the healing taken on the MT. There are two ways to deal with this: first, you can simply bring an off-tank. If the MT gets too many stacks, he can back of building aggro and let the off-tank steal Temporus from him. This is difficult to manage, but if you can get good it trading aggro, it’s a valuable skill for raiding. The other way to deal with this is to use Temporus’ knockback to your advantage. Because the debuff has a short duration and must be renewed regularly, if you get knocked back while at 5-10 sec. on the debuff, you can kite Temporus just long enough for the debuff to reset. Once you have the mortal wound ability controlled, the rest of the encounter is a simple tank and spank. Because this fight can quickly get out of control without high DPS, make sure to use chronobeacon rotations to control the adds so every party member can focus on the boss.
Mortal Wound – A stacking debuff that can only be dodged / parried / miss. Each application reduces healing by 10% and can stack up to (and beyond) 100% healing reduction. Increases in occurrence with the hasten buff.
Hasten – Increases attack speed by 200%. This is signaled by a whirring jet engine sound and a charge graphic at Temporus’ base. Because this increases the speed of mortal wound debuff application, it is vital that this be dispelled / shield slamed / purged immediately. With this self-buff up, it’s nearly impossible to beat out the mortal wound debuffs.
Aeonus – The final boss of Black Morass is a giant black dragon that runs directly for Medivh after emerging from his portal. Feel free to let him beat on Medivh’s shield while you get ready for the encounter, he damages it rather slowly and assuming it’s at 50% or higher you should have plenty of time to drink up and get ready for this challenging boss. Like the other bosses in this instance, Aeonus is a pretty simple tank and spank. Like most dragons, he has a breath attack, so make sure to tank him facing away from the party, lest they also get blasted by his frontal cone breath. Adds don’t spawn during this final fight, but any chronobeacons that are used will be rather swiftly dispelled by Aeonus, so don’t expect anything from them.
Time Stop – The most complicated of Aeonus’ abilities. Occasionally he will stop time for 4 seconds, preventing all players from acting at all during the duration. He will continue to act and can even use his breath attack and frenzy while the healers are incapacitated. In order to counter this, try and keep the MT topped off at all times, just in case a time stop does land. In addition, keep as many HoTs on the MT as possible, as these will continue to tick during the time stop. This ability can also be resisted, so if you’re lucky you can skip a whole rotation.
Sand Breath – Aeonus’ breath weapon that hits in a frontal cone for about 3k damage with an additional 100% attack speed debuff. Face Aeonus away from the party to prevent unnecessary damage from this ability. Not much of a problem on its own, this ability becomes a bigger issue when it is chained with frenzy or time stop, resulting in massive spike damage.
Frenzy – Occasionally Aeonus will go into a frenzy, increasing his attack speed temporarily. If you happen to have a Molten Core experienced hunter in your party, tranquilizing shot will remove the frenzy. Otherwise you just have to heal through it and be ready for a unlucky frenzy / time stop combo.
Once Aeonus is defeated, the assault on Medivh ends and his plans to open the dark portal comes to fruition. Speak to Medivh and be ready for a cool looking event. Don’t forget to speak with Sa’at on the way out to turn in the main quest for the instance for a rather hefty reputation bonus with the Keepers of Time.
