Want to know how you can beat C’thun in World of Warcraft?
The Temple of Ahn’Qiraj is a 40-man raid dungeon in World of Warcraft. It’s located in the Ahn’Qiraj: The Fallen Kingdom and was released with patch 1.9 during the massive server-dependent event Gates of Ahn’Qiraj.
In this raid, you’ll encounter C’thun as the final boss.
C’Thun is the Old God of madness and chaos, one of the four ancient and powerful creatures who ruled Azeroth before being defeated and imprisoned by servants of the titans. C’Thun resides within the city of Ahn’Qiraj and is the one who created the qiraji.
Years later, while the Lich King launched attacks on Stormwind City, Cho’gall attempted to free his master, C’Thun, from its prison beneath the earth. C’Thun empowered the ogre, deforming his body which became monstrous.
Unfortunately, Med’an used the New Council of Tirisfal’s power to collapse the Temple of Ahn’Qiraj to stop the ritual.
In this guide, we’ll show you the best strategy to beat C’Thun in the Temple of Ahn’Qiraj dungeon in World of Warcraft.
Let’s get started!
C’Thun Encounter Strategy
Phase One:
The initial phase of this encounter is characterized by an alternation between the Eye releasing Eye Beams for 50 seconds followed by 35 seconds of Dark Glare. There are also rare instances of claw and eye tentacles spawning.
When you enter C’Thun’s chamber, the best strategy is to shield one of your raid members with high nature resistance and let him enter the room before the rest of the group. This will cause the initial eye beams to hit the high nature resist player, allowing the rest of your raid to get into position.
Using a hunter would be ideal for this, with their +60 Nature Resist from their aura and ability to feign death. If you ever decide to enter the room all at once, a large portion of your group will likely die from the chained eye beam.
Eye Beam
Eye of C’Thun casts one eye beam every 3 seconds and deals 2625 to 3375 Nature DMG. If other players are standing within roughly 10 yards, the beam will instantly chain and hit nearby allies, dealing 1.5x the damage it dealt the previous enemy.
When this effect jumps past three times, it can be fatal for the rest of the raid.
Eye Beam can also strike all 40 players at once, so one of the vital keys for your success is to simply spread out. Using a mod that measures your distance from other members is advisable.
Unfortunately, the initial target of the beam is random, so you won’t be able to predict where it will hit.
Dark Glare
Once the ‘Red Phase’ starts, the Eye of C’Thun will turn toward a new target and change its color, and a cloud will form in its pupil, indicating the beam being prepared to fire. Dark Glare appears as three large stacked red beams and outspreads from the Eye.
This deals 43,750 to 56,250 Shadow DMG to any player hit by the beams. The Eye of C’Thun will also slowly rotate 180 degrees while channeling this attack.
You can dodge Dark Glare using blink abilities, but it pierces through small pillars in the room and can’t be LOS’d. Dark Glare can also be partially resisted, but even blocking 75% of its damage would still total to a minimum of 10,938 DMG.
Eye Tentacles
After every 45 seconds, eight small eye tentacles will spawn at the edge of the expanse radiating from C’Thun. It inflicts knockback DMG to anyone standing within 10 yards and has 2,289 HP.
Eye Tentacles randomly target players with strong Mind Flay spells that snares the target and deal 750 DMG per second and last for 10 seconds.
Since Mind Flay is a binary spell, its damage can’t be resisted and must be interrupted while being cast. Eye Tentacles are susceptible to many CC abilities like interrupts, stuns, and disorients.
Claw Tentacles
Claw Tentacles can spawn under random players in an overwhelming frequency during the initial phase. These tentacles are LVL 60 and have 1,526 HP. While their melee damage is weak, they are capable of causing high raid DMG through their rupture.
Both Hamstring and ground rupture attacks make them deadly during dark Glare, specifically when a random spawn knocks players back into the Glare.
Phase Two:
The second phase of this encounter starts when you kill the Eye of C’Thun. If there are no tentacles left, players are briefly taken out of combat. During this phase, C’Thun is empowered with Carapace, which reduces all DMG taken by 99%.
To destroy this shield, you must weaken C’Thun first.
Eye Tentacles
In the second phase, Eye Tentacles will continue to spawn but with a reduced spawn timer. This means Eye Tentacles will generate more often during phase two. However, the main key for this stage is to cover the area around C’Thun each time Eye Tentacles spawn.
Again, you should assign a small team for each Eye Tentacle that spawns and remember to stand out of range of their ground eruption to avoid getting knocked back.
Giant Claw Tentacles
Every minute, with a 30-second offset from Giant Eye Tentacle spawn times, C’Thun will summon a Giant Claw Tentacle at a random player’s feet, knocking back all nearby players for serious nature damage.
These Giant Tentacles are LVL 60 as well but with 91,560 HP. It will help if you assign a dedicated tank for them due to their high melee damage.
In addition, Giant Claw Tentacles also have a Thrash ability, giving them the potential to one-shot non-tank players. If no one is in range, they will go underground and appear on a new target with full HP.
You should defeat these tentacles before another set spawns to reduce the chance of this happening.
Giant Eye Tentacles
Once every 60 seconds, C’Thun will summon a Giant Eye Tentacle. They also perform Ground Ruptures when they appear and have the same melee DMG with Giant Claw Tentacles.
Giant Eye Tentacles also cast the same Eye Beam present in the Eye of C’Thun during the first phase. These tentacles are also LVL 60 with 36,624 HP and have no cap on the number of tentacles that spawn simultaneously.
As for their smaller versions, they are vulnerable to crowd controls such as stuns and disorients. Since you will be more closely packed when bringing down small and giant tentacles, your raid will be more vulnerable to Eye Beams.
In this case, your top priority is to stun-lock and kill Giant Eye Tentacles.
C’Thun Encounter Loot
Upon completing the C’Thun encounter in the Temple of Ahn’Qiraj, you’ll receive either of the following:
- Carapace of the Old God
- Husk of the Old God
- Base of Atiesh
- Belt of Never Ending Agony
- Cloak of Clarity
- Cloak of the Devoured
- Dark Edge of Insanity
- Dark Storm Gauntlets
- Death’s Sting
- Eye of C’Thun
- Eyestalk Waist Cord
That sums up our guide on how to beat C’Thun in World of Warcraft. If you have questions, please leave a comment below, and we’ll do our best to help you out.
