This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the encounter with Maloriak in Blackwing Descent. It is mostly targeted to DPS who desire to have a short but detailed overview of what is expected of them during that fight.

This guide applies to patch 4.3 of World of Warcraft.

The encounter against Maloriak requires DPS players to properly stack, spread, and attack adds at specific times. The fight is concluded by a short but rather intense burn phase.

The encounter with Maloriak can be broken down in two phases: the Main Phase, during which Maloriak performs a variety of abilities with which the raid must successfully deal, and the Nuke Phase, triggered by pushing Maloriak below 25% health, and which is basically a DPS race to kill him before he wipes the raid.

The Main Phase represents the complicated part of the encounter and is itself broken down in a cycle of 3 sub-phases: Red Phase, Blue Phase, and Green Phase. This cycle repeats until it is interrupted by Maloriak reaching 25% health. Because of the enrage timer, and the fixed duration of the cycle, your raid will only have time to complete 2 cycles before having to push Maloriak into the Nuke Phase.

The Red and Blue phases of the Main Phase can come in any order, so the Main Phase cycle is always either of:

• Blue Phase, Red Phase, then Green Phase;
• Red Phase, Blue Phase, then Green Phase.

During the Blue and Red Phases, you will DPS Maloriak. During the Green Phase, you will AoE-down adds that will have been released during the Blue and Red Phases.

1. Main Phase↑top

During the main phase, Maloriak has a set of abilities that he will always cast. In addition, each sub-phase (Blue, Red, or Green), temporarily grants him new abilities.

The Blue/Red/Green Phase cycle has a fixed duration of approximately 2 minutes and 35 seconds:

1. 15 seconds: transition period, no additional abilities;
2. 47 seconds: Blue Phase or Red Phase;
3. 47 seconds: Red Phase or Blue Phase (depending on what the first sub-phase was);
4. 21 seconds: Green Phase;
5. 15 seconds: transition period, no additional abilities;

At the beginning of each sub-phase, Maloriak throws a vial (blue, red, or green, depending on the sub-phase) into his cauldron. Then he walks towards the cauldron to drink the resulting potion. This takes about 6 seconds, during which Maloriak is harmless and casts no ability.

The 15-second transitions at the beginning and the end of a cycle mean that there is a 30-second transition period between the first cycle and the second cycle.

1.1. Abilities

Below, you will find the list of abilities that Maloriak will retain throughout the Main Phase. The timer on each of these 3 abilities is tied to the timer on the 2 other.

• Release Aberrations releases 3 adds which need to be picked up by the off-tank(s). It sometimes needs to be interrupted to control the number of adds released. Maloriak continues casting this ability even when all the adds have been released. By then, the ability does nothing.
• Arcane Storm does raid-wide damage and needs to be interrupted.
• Remedy (10-man/25-man) is a self-buff that Maloriak casts and that must either be dispelled or spellstolen.

The succession of abilities will be as follows:

• Arcane Storm and Release Aberrations (in any order);
• Arcane Storm, Release Aberrations (in any order), and Remedy;
• Arcane Storm and Release Aberrations (in any order);
• Arcane Storm, Release Aberrations (in any order), and Remedy;
• and so on.

1.2. Strategy

Throughout the Main Phase, one or two DPS will be dedicated to interrupting Arcane Storm.

A total of 18 Aberrations can spawn in total. The idea is to release 9 of them per cycle, not more, not less. It is usually the job of the DPS players to handle their release. The first cast of Release Aberrations should always be interrupted. The next 3 casts should be allowed to finish. Then, all subsequent casts until the Green Phase should be interrupted again.

Aberrations have their own tank(s). DPS players can help them by periodically slowing down or rooting the Aberrations.

Remedy (10-man/25-man) needs to be dispelled as soon as possible. If you have a Mage in your group, let them spellsteal it for additional mana regeneration.

Outside of a Blue, Red, or Green Phase, there is no particular positioning constraint during the Main Phase.

1.3. Blue Phase

During this phase, you should attack Maloriak. Also, ranged players need to be spread out 5 yards apart while melee players can stack up, but they sometimes need to move out of the group. These constraints are due to 2 new abilities that Maloriak gains:

• Flash Freeze is only cast at ranged raid members, one player at a time. This ability is the reason why players at range need to be spread out 5 yards. Anyone encased in ice by this ability should be freed as soon as possible.
• Biting Chill is only cast at raid members in melee range of Maloriak (1 raid member in 10-man difficulty and 2 in 25-man difficulty) and deals Frost damage to the affected player and nearby allies every second for 10 seconds. For this reason, anyone affected by it needs to move away until the ability has worn out. This ability can target the tank and the off-tank.

1.4. Red Phase

During this phase, you need to position yourself in front of the boss, behind the tank. Occasionally, you might have to move to the sides. All this is due to the 2 new abilities that Maloriak gains:

• Scorching Blast (10-man/25-man) is an attack that targets a conic area in front of Maloriak, spreading the damage evenly among everyone inside the area. This ability is cast 2 to 3 times per Red Phase.
• Consuming Flames (10-man/25-man) is a debuff applied on a random raid member. It is cast 3 to 4 times per Red Phase and greatly increases the damage dealt to this player by Scorching Blast, forcing this player to move out of the conic area in front of Maloriak. This ability also deals damage which needs to be healed through.

1.5. Green Phase

During this phase, Maloriak's cauldron will cause every unit in the room, Maloriak and the raid members included, to be debuffed with Debilitating Slime.

Debilitating Slime also removes a damage reduction buff that was applied on the Aberrations, giving the raid 15 seconds (the duration of Debilitating Slime) to kill them.

Therefore, your goal during the Green Phase is to AoE down the adds.

Be aware that if you are standing close to the cauldron at the beginning of the phase, you will be knocked back towards the entrance of the room.

1.6. Tips and Tricks

Biting Chill and Consuming Flames (10-man/25-man) can be removed by using Divine Shield for Paladins, Ice Block for Mages, or Cloak of Shadows for Rogues.

During the Green Phase, Warlocks should use Bane of Havoc on Maloriak, while Mages should cast Combustion on him and spread the dot to the adds with Fire Blast (if Impact is up).

It is generally a good idea to slow down the Aberrations so that they hit the tank less. Cone of Cold, Frost Nova, Ice Trap, Ring of Frost, etc. come in handy for this purpose.

Warlocks can use Curse of Tongues on Maloriak to make it easier to interrupt Arcane Storm and Release Aberrations.

2. Nuke Phase↑top

This phase is a simple DPS race with only a few mechanics that are easy to dodge. It is triggered immediately after Maloriak's health reaches 25%, regardless of whether Maloriak is in a Blue, Red, or Green Phase.

2.1. Abilities

During this phase, Maloriak only retains Remedy (10-man/25-man) from the Nuke Phase. It must still be dispelled or spellstolen.

In addition to Remedy, Maloriak has the following abilities of concern for DPS players:

• Absolute Zero is cast every 10 seconds in 10-man difficulty and every 7 to 10 seconds in 25-man difficulty. It summons an ice orb which deals damage to nearby players.
• Magma Jets is cast every 10 seconds and is a heavily damaging attack that can wipe the raid if not handled properly. Despite what the tooltip says, the attack is basically a line of fire that Maloriak creates in front of him.

2.2. Strategy

Simply Nuke Maloriak down while avoiding to stand in front of Maloriak and to come too close to the ice orbs from Absolute Zero.

Two bigger adds called Prime Subjects are released during this phase, but they should be handled by an off-tank and are of no concern to DPS.

3. Heroic Mode↑top

The main addition of the Heroic version of this encounter is a new sub-phase of the main phase, which we call the Dark Phase. The remainder of the encounter is largely the same: Maloriak must still be pushed below 25% shortly after the second Green Phase.

In addition to the Dark Phase, which we describe in the next section, most abilities deal more damage.

3.1. Dark Phase

The Dark Phase is the first sub-phase of the Main Phase in Heroic difficulty. It means that the possible cycles of sub-phases are the following:

• Dark Phase, Blue Phase, Red Phase, and Green Phase;
• Dark Phase, Red Phase, Blue Phase, and Green Phase.

The Dark Phase has a fixed duration of approximately 95 seconds, during which the raid must kill adds.

During the Dark Phase, Maloriak does not cast any of his usual Main Phase abilities: Arcane Storm, Release Aberrations, or Remedy (10-man/25-man).

At the beginning of the phase, Maloriak summons 5 Vile Swills, which look like dark oozes. Each of them has 1.61M health in 10-man difficulty and 5.62M health in 25-man difficulty.

Dark Sludge is cast by the Vile Swills at random members. It creates a dark puddle on the ground that deals 15,000 Shadow damage twice per second. It is hard to obtain a precise frequency for the apparitions of new puddles, but it is in the order of magnitude of 1 new puddle every second. The damage from two or more overlapping puddles will stack, meaning that each puddle will deal its damage separately to players standing at the intersecting area of the puddles.

All you have to do is to AoE down the adds (which the off-tanks will move around the room) and stay out of the puddle they create.

If your class has very inefficient AoE abilities, you can stay on Maloriak. Be very careful not to overaggro, as Maloriak cannot be taunted during the Dark Phase.