How to Beat Archimonde in World of Warcraft

Do you want to beat Archimonde in World of Warcraft?

Up until August 30th, killing Archimonde on Heroic and Mythic difficulty gives players the Remnant of Chaos. This leads you to the Shadow of the Defiler / Dark Waters questline that gives the Reins of the Grove Warden mount.

Archimonde is the final boss of the raid called Hellfire Citadel in Warlords of Draenor 6.2 and the only boss of the Black Gate wing of Hellfire Citadel. Players can access Archimonde using a portal from Destructro’s Rise during normal and higher difficulties after defeating Mannoroth.

If you’re here, you probably plan to do the Hellfire Citadel raid to beat Archimonde in World of Warcraft.

Fortunately, you’ve come to the right place.

Today, we will show you the best strategy to beat Archimonde in World of Warcraft.

Let’s get right into it!

Archimonde Encounter Mechanics

The Archimonde encounter features a complex and multi-phase fight that requires high movement and raid awareness. The fight demands heavy target-switching, as you need to prioritize additional mobs over Archimonde, or you’ll take too much damage.

Archimonde is a 3-phase encounter where you’ll face various ADS (Additional Mobs) and, of course, Archimonde.

Every phase has two separate parts making this raid virtual a 6-phase encounter.

Phase 1 – this phase starts when you pull Archimonde and ends once it reaches 70% health. Once his health goes down to 85%, he gains an extra ability that he’ll take advantage of for the rest of the 1st phase.

Phase 2 – once Archimonde’s health reaches 70%, the second phase should start and will last until you get his life down to 40%. At 55% health, Archimonde gains another ability to use for the rest of phase two.

Phase 3 – the final phase starts when you bring Archimonde’s health down to 40%. This phase will last up to 25% health, and he’ll gain an additional ability once more for the rest of the fight.

Things to Remember

In this section, we’ll give you a brief idea of what to expect for every phase and what you should watch out for across the entire raid.

For Tanks

During phases one and two, use active mitigation to reduce the damage coming from Death Brand and do a tank switch when cast on the tank. In phase three, perform a tank switch after a tank is sent to the Twisting Nether via Nether Banish.

Inside the Nether Realm, you should tank the Shadowed Netherwalker.

For Healers

You should save your healing cooldowns for Shadowfel burst in phase one, Unleashed Torment during phases two and three, and Rain of Chaos / Hellfire in phase three.

For DPS

The Archimonde encounter is all about prioritizing your DPS on vital targets and avoiding as much damage as possible. With this, your ADS kill order should be as follows:

Everyone

Phase 1

Refrain from standing in Doomfire and kite the fire away from the middle.
Move out of ground effects when Allure of Flames gets casted.
Go under those who got knocked up by Shadowfel Burst to split fall damage.
Spread Light of the Naaru to as many teammates as possible. Stand near golden orbs and walk into raid members.
Spread Shadowfel Burst for up to 8 yards.

Phase 2

Try to break the Shackled Torment chains, one member, at a time by running 30 yards away from the souls.
Scatter out during the raid to ensure that Wrought Chaos unnecessarily strikes no one.
Try interrupting Felborn Overfiends’ Flames of Argus.
Avoid being hit by ground effects created by Dreadstalkers’ Consume Magic when the casting time expires.

Phase 3

Choose one healer, one melee DPS, and a few powerful single-target ranged DPS to enter the Nether Banish zone to handle the Twisting Nether.
Kite the Void Star if targeted by it in the Twisting Nether.
Interrupt the Touch of Shadows cast by Shadowed Netherwalkers.
Don’t stand in Nether Tear void zones to give Living Shadows more travel time.
Stay away from Rain of Chaos ground effects.

Raid Difficulties

Heroic

When doing the Archimonde encounter in Heroic difficulty, he gains a new mechanic called Wrought Chaos during phase two.

Wrought Chaos

Debuffs one player in the raid with four stacks and will mark another player with Focused Chaos.

After five seconds, players affected by Wrought Chaos will emit a beam of light towards the player affected by Focus Chaos.
Aside from the target, any player along the light beam path will take massive Fire damage. Wrought Chaos loses a stack and leaps to the Focused Chaos target. A new target will then be affected by Focused Chaos. This is repeated until all stacks are consumed.
An arrow will appear at the base of the Wrought Chaos target’s feet, which indicates the path of the light beam. Players not affected by Focused Chaos should move out of the beam immediately to avoid damage.

Devour Life

Deals heavy damage to the targeted player and reduces their healing by 40% for 45 seconds.
If a Living Shadow casts Devour Life, it instantly gets destroyed.
Allowing Living Shadows to cast Devour Life reduces the DPS requirement of the raid. However, there are serious risks of getting healing penalties, so it should be avoided.

The best way to play this is to stack the raid behind Archimonde and designate a specific area for players affected by Wrought and Focused Chaos to stay. All members of the raid should be aware of this arrangement to avoid taking unnecessary damage.

This ends our guide on how to beat Archimonde in World of Warcraft. If you have questions or other concerns, please leave a comment below, and we’ll do our best to help you out.

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How to Beat Archimonde in World of Warcraft

Archimonde Encounter Mechanics