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What does this information mean?
Background[]
Centuries ago, a clockwork traveler from the Plane of Innovation came to visit the gnomes of Ak'Anon. Meldrath was the first gnome to encounter it. The traveler mistook Meldrath for the king of Ak'Anon, and rather than immediately bringing the clockwork to the gnomish authorities, Meldrath decided to hide it away in the mines. Once secluded, Meldrath opened up the clockwork's shell to discover electrical components and metals never before seen. In a moment of brilliant perversion, Meldrath realized that the clockwork was actually a weapon, one that would need a living soul to fully mature...
Walkthrough[]
Enter from maze of mines inhabited by minotaurs in Steamfont around ( -1390, 86, 1033 ) . In the central room of the maze is a round door. Click it to enter the instance.
- When you first zone in you will find yourself at location A on the upper left corner of the map.
- Speak to Meldrath the Malignant (NPC)
- You will now need to recover the 4 fuel cells. Before each fuel cell can be collected you must kill the named monster guarding the fuel cell. The kill order doesn't matter.
- After each kill Meldrath the Malignant (NPC) will appear to taunt you.
- Kill Gackhammer at location (B) on the map. ( -196, -35, 3 ) . Then collect the Red Fuel Cell.
- Kill Fleshknot at location (C) on the map. ( -183, -30, 212 ) . Then collect the Green Fuel Cell.
- Kill Steelwhip at location (D) on the map. ( -41, -12, 204 ) . Then collect the Yellow Fuel Cell.
- Kill Lockdown at location (E) on the map. ( 12, -11, 118 ) . Then collect the Blue Fuel Cell.
- Find the dormant builderbot at location (F) on the map. ( -130, -23, 119 ) . Give it the dormant builder bot the Red Fuel Cell by hailing it.
- The dormant builderbot will turn into a builderbot and request more fuel cells.
- Give the builderbot fuel cells one at a time by hailing him. After you hail the builderbot it will fly off and begin to construct a portion of the bridge needed to gain access to the zones boss.
- After you have given the builderbot the last fuel cell, climb the bridge to fight Meldrath the Malignant at location (G) on the map. ( -243, -16, 161 ) .
- Meldrath the Malignant is lvl 55 ^^^ heroic and assisted by four lvl 55 ^ heroic skeletons. During the fight Meldrath will summon additional skeletons. See below for a detail description of the strategy.
Strategy[]
A small, but fun heroic instance. You'll have to kill 4 named mobs (B, C, D, E) to acquire fuel cells in different colors (which are clickable items behind each of the named). Each of the named mobs has a special ability you'll usually only find on raid mobs, making them extraordinarily difficult to kill. Note that all of the mobs in this zone (especially the 'ore extractors') will hit a LOT harder than anything you've experienced in the pre-EOF zones. Normal trash mobs sometimes hit for more damage than the heroic's in Sanctum of the Scaleborn, even though they are a full 10 levels lower (some do 1-1.5k per normal hit on my 61 conjuror). However, the loot in this zone is exellent, with treasured items which are a lot better than classic legendaries.
Lockdown, for instance, will teleport his current target to melee range. When trying to pull him from distance, you might well find your main tank pulled out of your healers' range. Lockdown is a caster killer, making him extremely difficult for wizards to solo.
Gackhammer is extremely dangerous as well, especially to lower level groups without high resistances. He will use a front aoe dealing massive damage (usually 1-2k) to anyone in range with a seemingly random cooldown. He has been seen wiping whole groups when using his aoe thrice within ten seconds, but this might just have been a bug. On other occasions, you can take him down without getting hit once. Anyway, keep your casters at max range and have your tank turn him around for you.
Using the fuel cells you can activate the builder bot in the center of the instance (F). He will then create a stairway to the second level of the instance. Once you move up, Meldrath will spawn, shout something about 'you'll never catch me now' and (very, very slowly) run towards a disabled clockwork called The King's Gift. It will then turn into Meldrath the Malignant, the final boss of the zone. Meldrath has two special abilities: First, he will spawn lots of single-up adds during the fight, and secondly, to make things worse, he will cast a group-wide stifle attack which lasts for 5 seconds. The only effective strategy I've seen so far is burning Meldrath down as quickly as possible while having an enchanter mezz the adds. Anyhow, don't expect to take Meldrath down on your first attempt. He is probably the toughest mob you've encountered so far.