Intro

Cover image for this article sourced from Wowhead

Timer - 34 Minutes

For its return, the Theater of Pain has seen some upgraded visuals and reworked encounters, but overall plays mostly the same. It is, as of writing, a relatively easy key and a prime choice for your weekly vault.

A full melee group may face issue at several points throughout the instance, and I would generally advise a balanced composition. There are not many dangerous debuffs present here, and thus no real need for dispels from anything other than your healer.

There are several choices available in terms of routing, but overall the pull sizes are not large and the dungeon is rare in that single-target is very good throughout the instance, due to the high boss and mini-boss count.

This guide is focused on providing a complete understanding of the dungeon at a base level of +10, and the warnings I provide will focus around such. There is still plenty of knowledge to be gained here even for more advanced players, and everything here still applies to lower keys, but you should approach comprehension with this in mind.

Trash to An Affront of Challengers

There are quite literally four enemies in your path to the first boss. You may choose to play them separately or together, or even with the first boss.

Raging Bloodhorn - This mob does fairly high melee damage and casts Raging Tantrum, an un-interruptible cast that enrages them and does moderate AoE damage. It can be interrupted however by soothing it during the cast.
Battlefield Ritualist - These will simply cast Necrotic Bolt, which does moderate damage.
Unyielding Contender - These will cast Unyielding Fervor, enraging them. These melee fairly hard, and this cast exacerbates this.

An Affront of Challengers

This encounter has seen a small rework, but plays largely the same. You will want to kill them all fairly close together, as each one that dies grants the others a damage buff and increased energy.

Dessia the Decapitator

Mortal Strike - A tankbuster that she occasionally casts that deals a large amount of damage and puts a 50% healing reduction on the tank for 5 seconds.
Mighty Smash - At 100 energy, Dessia does a moderate blast of AoE to the group, also slowing everyone by 30%.
She also melees quite hard.

Paceran the Virulent

Decaying Breath - A frontal cone towards a random player with a fairly large reach. Does lethal damage to anyone caught.
Noxious Spores - At 100 energy, Paceran will channel this, causing Spores to erupt beneath players’ feet after a moment, dealing lethal damage if hit. This will also leave a pool behind for the rest of the encounter.

Sathel the Accursed

Necromantic Bolt - A spammable, interruptible cast that deals moderate damage.
Withering Touch - Sathel will inflict this upon a random player quite frequently, causing them to take light damage over 8 seconds.
Searing Death - At 100 energy, Sathel afflicts 3 players with this, causing them to take high damage that splashes to anyone nearby.

Strategy

This is a fairly simple encounter that boils down to dodge and kick.
You should lust on pull and tank the boss where it stands, as it is too troublesome to attempt to move it in the beginning.
In terms of ultimate abilities, it goes Mighty Smash->Noxious Spores->Searing Death.
Shortly after the Mighty Smash, you should consider your positioning and begin moving to a location where you can bait the Spores.
There will be a total of 4 Spores to dodge, and you should take care not to overmove so that you can place them fairly close together.
Note that you can have Searing Death and Withering Touch, and you should defensive accordingly at this time.
You should mainly cleave during this, but adjust your damage if one boss is higher than the others.

Trash to Xav the Unfallen

You can choose any wing you desire, but I recommend this one first to line lust up nicely. This wing has 3 mini-bosses with various abilities. You can control which ones you fight by watching their RP and timing it so that you activate the mini-boss you want as it attacks the unwanted mini-boss, but this requires some practice to do consistently.

Shambling Arbalest - This is a ranged archer mob that does not move its position easily. It will occasionally cast Shamble, repositioning, but otherwise will spam its ranged auto attack. It will also cast Jagged Quarrel, a bleed that deals a high amount of damage.
Ossified Conscript - a standard melee mob that does nothing but hit the tank.

First Mini-boss

Shared Ability - They will both cast Whirlwind, which after a short cast does lethal damage to anyone within its radius.

Whirlwind
Dokigg the Brutalizer - This mini-boss is much easier than the other one, especially in terms of doing it with the pack around it. It will cast Savage Flurry at the tank, doing a large amount of damage in a channel, but easily handled with a defensive CD. Its other cast is Earthcrusher, which deals a large amount of damage to the entire group and cleaves if they are too close.
Nekthara the Mangler - This mini-boss is much more difficult to do, especially in terms of doing it with the pack around it. It will cast Whirling Blade, placing a swirling blade on 2 players that does slightly move from its location and will last for a fairly long duration, and Interrupting Roar, which does high group-wide damage and interrupts any casts when it completes.
Whirling Blade

Second Mini-boss

Harugia the Bloodthirsty - These mini-bosses are fairly equal and you will play both by themselves. This one will cast Ricocheting Blade, which does a large burst of damage to the targeted player and will ricochet to anyone nearby, and Bloodthirsty Charge, which selects a random player and charges their location, dealing lethal damage to anyone caught.
Ricocheting Blade
Bloodthirsty Charge

The pack on the bridge has the Shambling Arbalests and Ossified Conscripts from earlier, as well as an Ancient Captain.

Ancient Captain - This has a passive called Commanding Presence, which is an aura that increases nearby allies damage by 25% and reduces their AoE damage taken by 75%. It will also cast Shield Bash on the tank, doing moderate damage to them. Lastly, it will also cast Demoralizing Shout, an interruptible cast that reduces the party’s damage dealt by 50%.

Third Mini-boss

Both of these are quite rough, with Advent Nevermore being a little easier.

Rek the Hardened - This mob will melee fairly hard and cast Whirlwind, Swift Strikes, and Unbalancing Blow. Whirlwind is the same as the previous mini-boss—an AoE around them that you must run out of. Unbalancing Blow deals a large amount of damage to the tank and makes them unable to block, parry, or dodge for its duration, and Swift Strikes increase Rek’s attack speed for its duration, and causes their attacks to cleave to two additional targets (this can hit ranged players regardless of positioning).
Advent Nevermore - This mob will cast Ricocheting Blade, which functions the same as Harugia, and Seismic Stomp, which is a short cast that deals a large amount of AoE damage. Note that there are frequent overlaps of Ricocheting Blade into a Seismic Stomp, which can easily combo a player without any defensives.

Xav the Unfallen

This boss is unchanged from its Shadowlands iteration, and still as annoying as it was then.

Oppressive Banner - Xav will spawn a banner with moderate health at a random location. While it is alive, the banner will apply a stacking slow to the entire party.
Brutal Combo - Xav will channel this on his current target, dealing a large amount of damage to them over its duration.
Might of Maldraxxus - Xav will leap the middle of the arena, doing a series of abilities that deal lethal damage to anyone caught. The abilities are: Massive Cleave, a frontal that takes up half the arena; Crushing Slam, a line frontal towards a random target; Deafening Crash, which deals damage in a radius around him and also interrupts any casts at its completion.
Blood and Glory - Xav will pick two DPS, throwing them down below and making them hostile to each other. Whoever is victorious will receive a 10% damage buff, while the loser receives a 10% damage dealt reduction.

Strategy

The tank should drag the boss to each Oppressive Banner spawn to cleave it down as soon as possible. The tank and healer should also try to save damage for when Blood and Glory occurs to destroy that banner before the next Might of Maldraxxus, since they will only have 1 DPS assisting tem.
The Brutal Combo can do quite a bit of damage, and the tank should have something for each one.
Both players should try to end Blood and Glory as soon as possible. CC should not be used—if there was no agreement made beforehand, simply try to kill the other player as quickly as possible. You will both be briefly immune to the boss’s abilities upon being sent back up.
Any movement abilities are best saved for the Might of Maldraxxus.

Trash to Kul’tharok

There are a variety of options available in terms of where to path during this area and how much trash to clear, but I recommend just doing the simplest path.

Shackled Soul - These cast Bind Soul, a channel on a random player that does quite high damage and slows their target. These can be quite irritating when done in a large pull, and you can review the way to pull these in the Skips section
Portal Guardian - These cast Shadow Vulnerability, causing a random player to take a light burst of damage, but increasing shadow damage taken, then cast Soulstorm, dealing a large amount of shadow damage to the entire group. Upon death, these drop an orb which can be picked up and deposited to choose what platform to be taken to next.
Bone Magus - These will spam cast Grave Spike, which deals a moderate amount of damage, and also cast Bone Spear. Both are interruptible, and Bone Spear deals near lethal damage and must be interrupted.
Soulforged Bonereaver - These are a lieutenant mob and will cast Bone Spikes, spawning swirlies under players’ feet over several seconds that must be dodged, or they take lethal damage. They also cast Bonestorm, spinning around and moving slowly towards random players, dealing high damage to anyone caught.
Bone Spikes
Bonestorm
Maniacal Soulbinder - These will spam Necrotic Bolt, an interruptible cast that deals moderate damage, and also cast Soul Volley, which does high damage to the entire group if not kicked. High priority.
Nefarious Darkspeaker - These will alternate between Spirit Frost and melee on the tank, dealing light damage. They will afflict a random player with Curse of Desolation, a dispellable curse that causes the player to drop swirlies at their feet that fear anything hit and deal a moderate amount of damage. Their most dangerous cast is Death Winds, a cast that faces towards a random player and launches a tornado that deals high damage and knocks back anyone hit, likely sending them to their death.
Death Winds

Kul’tharok

This encounter has been completely re-designed and is wildly different from its Shadowlands iteration.

Necrotic Bolt - An interruptible cast that the boss will use whenever the tank leaves melee.
Death Spiral - Kul’tharok will spawn several orbs that rotate about the encounter space, dealing high damage to anyone they touch.
Necrotic Eruption - Kul’tharok will track the tank before firing a beam at them, dealing high damage to anyone hit. The tank cannot dodge this and should be careful of their positioning.
Well of Darkness - The boss will afflict a random player with this debuff, causing them to take damage and pulse damage to anyone nearby.
Draw Soul - At full energy, Kul’tharok will pull the soul out of each player, spawning a Lost Soul that will attempt to reach the boss. These can be CC’ed and damaged, and if they reach the boss they will deal a large amount of damage to the group.

Strategy

Everyone should find a spot where the orbs don’t seem to line up very often so they can simply dodge forward and backward.
The tank should stand opposite of the group and stand still when targeted by Necrotic Eruption. Melee should steer clear of this.
For the Draw Soul, there should be an agreed upon location in which to stack these, and all players should stack there (including the tank). You may have debuffs still, so remain wary of that. At that point, these souls should be burned down and cc’ed as needed.

Trash to Gorechop

Blighted Sludge Spewer - These will hop about with Leaping Thrash, dealing light damage and jumping to the furthest player, and cast Disgusting Burst upon death, dealing lethal damage to anyone caught. These will also cast Withering DIscharge, a moderate cast that deals massive damage to the entire group and afflicts them with Withering Blight, reducing their damage and healing done by 20%, stacking.
Disgusting Refuse - These will also hop about with Leaping Thrash, and cast Disgusting Burst upon death.
Disgusting Burst
Diseased Horror - These will cast Decaying Strike, a light damage strike that inflicts Decaying Blight upon their target, causing them to lose 5% max HP, and cast Meat Shield, an interruptible cast that provides them a large shield.
Putrid Butcher - These just melee and cast Devour Flesh, a 2.5 second cast that deals moderate damage and heals the Butcher for 300% of the damage done.
Rancid Gasbag - You should strive not to pull either of the two patrolling Gasbags, after the first bridge, as they can be easily skipped, but you will be forced to fight the one just before Gorechop. You can see how to do this in the Skips section. It has two abilities. One is a passive that does moderate rot to the entire group, called Disease Cloud, and the other is a “frontal-backal” called Vile Eruption, disorienting and dealing moderate damage to anyone hit.
Vile Eruption

Gorechop

Hateful Strike - Gorechop uses this on his current target, dealing a large amount of damage to them. This requires something every time.
Tenderizing Smash - Gorechop will pull in any players further than melee range from him, then stand still and cast for a few moments before pulverizing anything nearby for lethal damage and knocking them back.
Meat Hooks - Two rows of Meat Hooks will move from one side of the room to the other, hooking and stunning anyone caught for high damage. There will be two gaps in each row to dodge through.
Each Meat Hooks set will spawn Oozing Leftovers. These cast Leaping Thrash, jumping to random players and cleaving anyone nearby, and will slowly lose 3% of their health every second. Upon death, they leave behind an Oozing Pool that deals damage and slows anyone caught in it.

Strategy

The tank should generally keep the boss in the middle of the room, and players should try to stay with the boss to keep the adds from going all over the place.
The tank will want to try their best to put the boss in a good spot for each Tenderizing Smash, so that if anyone is pulled they are not pulled into a disadvantageous position.
The Leftovers should be burned down as fast as possible, and players should be wary of their pools they leave when the Meat Hooks come in.

Mordretha

Reaping Scythe - Mordretha uses this on her current target, dealing a large amount of mixed Shadow and Physical damage.
Dark Devastation - Mordretha targets a random player, preparing a large beam of necrotic energy that then rotates clockwise or counter-clockwise, dealing lethal damage to anyone struck.
Manifest Death - Mordretha haunts all players, afflicting them with a light DoT. When this DoT expires, it deals damage in a radius around them, spawning a Deathwalker that casts Death Bolt until defeated. Death Bolt is interruptible but does very high damage, and the add is vulnerable to stops. These are high priority.
Grasping Rift - Mordretha summons a rift that pulls players towards it, stunning them and dealing high damage to them if they are caught by its center.
Echoes of Carnage - Upon reaching 50% health, Mordretha starts a long cast and then transforms the battlefield, attracting echoes of the dead. These echoes either manifest in the form of four ghostly chargers, who inflict lethal damage to anyone in their path and knock them back, or manifest as ghostly combatants who deal lethal damage to anyone caught in their radius after a few moments. The party will also take moderate rot from this effect until the encounter’s end.
Echoes Transition
Echoes Combatants
Echoes Chargers

Strategy

Either lust on pull with CDs or lust after 50%. Either is fine.
Players should not stand too far from the boss, as this will make dodging the Dark Devastation much more difficult.
The group should try to pre-spread for the Manifest Death and stay close together so that AoE stops can be used on the Deathwalkers. Players must focus on kicking their own add and these are extremely high priority.
Occasionally, Grasping Rift and Manifest Death will align, which is the best time to use personals.
Mordretha resets her ability queue when she phases, so if possible, it is best to push her just before or after a Grasping Rift cast.
During the final phase, the boss should be tanked on one edge of the arena, and the group should also play there in order to more easily dodge the Echoes.
Special care should be taken for the Dark Devastation that overlaps with Echoes charging through, as this can very easily kill someone.

Routing and Lust Recommendations

You should Lust the following:

First Boss (preferably with the Ragehorn pulled as well).
Third Boss
Mordretha

Here is a route for PUGs and early season. You will need a way to skip the first pack to do the Ragehorn + Boss Pull. If you do not have a way to do so, you should just split the pull up. Also, I’m 99.99% confident this route gets 100%, and think the website is a little off on percentage. If not, then you can just kill the skipped pack before/after Mordretha.

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Skips

You can skip the very first pack with any effect like Mind Soothe, Imprison, Sap or similar effects by using it on the leftmost Unyielding Contender and hugging the side, but making sure not to touch the crowd and get bounced back into the mobs. NYI.
The two patrolling Gasbags can be skipped by waiting for them to path away from the exit, as seen below:
You can pull all the souls backward into the hallway, or forward into the room with the Soul Guardian. This is a poor job by me here (a little slow), but you can see the basic idea, as you don’t want to fight with stuff raining down:

Profession or Dungeon Buffs

Banners are removed as of current writing and there is no replacement I am aware of.

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