5-Man instances for the Time-Challenged (spoilers)

[Darian]

So, it was a horrific Sunday for some of Carpe Aurum's finest. Novaa and Psybie were on the five-man Scholo run from hell (four hours, nothing accomplished), and Onan and Altrius were on an even worse five-man LBRS run (four and a half hours just to get to the spiders). That, in addition to some posts from recently capped 60s here in the Lounge bemoaning the difficulty and time demands of the end-game 5-man instances, got me thinking about the way instances get run for quest completion as opposed to loot runs.

All too often, people head into an instance trying to complete as many quests as they can, with the idea that clearing the dungeon is the goal, and getting quests done is a side-effect of doing so. While this works pretty well in all the pre-60 instances except Uldaman and BRD, when it comes to the 60-level dungeons... it just flat doesn't work, because you run into time constraints on respawn. The reason people have 10-hour Scholo runs is because it can easily take 10 hours to run Scholo trying to do all the quests at once -- but they don't realize that you can go into Scholo three times to complete all the quests there with each run only taking a couple of hours, and mostly avoiding respawn!

Additionally... a lot of people just don't have the time to devote to uber-long instance runs. Targeting quests rather than trying to bust the whole instance is a great way to get things accomplished for those folks (as well as making it much easier to get people to give you a hand if their time is limited).

With that in mind, I'm going to try and take a cut at a sensible breakdown of each instance from BRD onward (NB: from the Alliance perspective only; Horde folks are encouraged to take a crack at this as well), splitting each one into trips which are reasonable and can be accomplished in a couple of hours, assuming competent groups. The idea is to avoid non-quest-related side trips, and take advantage of the ability to bypass irrelevant content when possible. I welcome any and all kvetching, criticism, and alternate ideas.

[Darian]

Alliance BRD for the time-challenged:

The following quest can be partially completed on any runs into BRD. If you go into BRD thinking "I want to get this quest done" when you haven't even started it yet, you're doomed to disappointment; if a full 5-man group enters the instance without anyone having started the quest, odds are you won't even complete it with a full clear. Just let this quest sit in your log and be patient, and you'll eventually finish it.

The Good Stuff

The following collection objectives can be accomplished on any runs into BRD, either 5-man or raid, and again should not be considered "I haven't started and I want to get this done" items.

dark iron ore collections, both for general mining and for Wheel of the Black March (Warlock only)
relic coffer keys, required for The Heart of the Mountain

Also, remember that you actually want to die in BRD and run back rather than being resurrected at least once, so that you can pick up Dark Iron Legacy from the ghost of Franclorn Forgewright. If you haven't managed to end up dead yet, then commit suicide and go talk to him.

Your first trip into BRD should ideally be for the sole purpose of completing the following quests. It's basically just a quick initial insertion which shouldn't even take a group of 54-55s more than an hour to complete. Your main goal here is simply to clear out enough of the prison to reach the relevant jail cells, and to take out the Grand Inquisitor so that someone has the prison key. You're not worried about getting any further than the relevant jail cells.

Overmaster Pyron (outside instance)
Kharan Mighthammer
Marshal Windsor/Abandoned Hope

After this, A Crumpled Up Note is almost guaranteed to drop for you the next time you enter the instance (or even within Blackrock Mountain but outside the instance). This isn't a major concern, however, because you're not going to need it for the next wave. All of these quests are on the "arena" side of Shadowforge City. They ARE accessible via the Bar, but it's easier to do them going the other way, plus this is your opportunity to complete the non-quest Ring of Law event. This run can be done in two hours, assuming you dash across the center of the prison hub rather than wasting a bunch of time fighting your way around the north ring. If you're with someone who already has the Shadowforge Key, you can even skip that so long as you have a competent mage who can AoE the snot out of the arena spectators. You skip most of the prison, and all of the Bar side.

Dark Iron Legacy
Incendius
The Heart of the Mountain

Having acquired your Shadowforge Key, there's now no reason to worry about the prison again until it's time to actually worry about the prison. ;) Your next trip in should be aimed at getting to the Bar (no need to go further on this trip), with a side trip before heading that way to take out Bael'Gar for A Taste of Flame. Count on a couple of hours.

A Taste of Flame
A Shred of Hope
acquiring the Repair Bot schematic if you have any 300 engineers
Ribbly Screwspigot
The Love Potion (first trip, to get the quest)
Hurley Blackbreath

At this point, you're almost done with BRD. Just a few more details to take care of. First, another trip to the Bar area; 60-90 minutes again with a good group. Any miners with a skill of 285 or higher should REALLY make sure they have 10 Truesilver Bars, 20 Gold Bars, and 2 Star Rubies on them in order to talk to Gloom'rel before the Test of the Seven event; that's how you learn to smelt dark iron. On this run, you'll skip the prison entirely, you'll skip Angerforge, and you can skip most of the Manufactory (just clearing enough space so that you can dash through to the Bar). You'll also only have one fight inside the Bar (Phalanx).

The Love Potion (second trip, to turn in the quest)
learn to smelt dark iron (can be done in raid, but as long as you're here...)
The Fate of the Kingdom
Attunement to the Core (can be done in raid instead, but skipping it here only saves about 10-15 minutes)

And finally... the last necessary 5-man trip to BRD. This one's also 60-90 minutes with a good group.

Jail Break!

If you haven't completed the collect quests at the top of this post by this point... something's wrong. ;)

[Darian]

Alliance Scholomance for the time-challenged:

I'm going to lay this out frankly: Scholomance in 5-man is not the horror story you've been led to believe it is. It's mostly a matter of (legally) skipping content. For instance, there's no reason at all to go after Jandice or Kirtonos in a five-man run until you're doing their quests; save that for a raid. Likewise, you don't have to concern yourself with Rattlegore and the later part of the dungeon when you're doing Jandice and Kirtonos. You shouldn't ever even worry about doing Gandling in a five-man unless you just want the challenge. So on, so forth. Besides, there are reasons to do this in multiple runs; you have to leave the instance to continue quest lines.

The following quest begins IN Scholomance as a result of a drop off plagued hatchlings. I'm not sure if this drops in raid or not. The only reward is a slight increase in Argent Dawn faction, and as such is probably not worth worrying about, but I list it for completeness' sake.

Healthy Dragon Scale (repeatable)

Another big problem with 5-manning Scholo is people who think they need to do all four deeds at once -- or don't realize that it's perfectly okay to do them out of "order." Your first 5-man run to Scholo is very much like your third, and can be done in a couple of hours easily. You bypass Kirtonos, Jandice, Vectus, Ras, all but one of the Six Rooms before Gandling, and Gandling. Basically, you clear to Rattlegore (picking up the Deed to Tarren Mill from the table just before the Ossuary), then immediately head to the Butcher's room, kill him, burn the Sarkhoff's remains, and get out. Assuming you don't screw something up, Plagued Hatchlings should be completed here (allowing you to pick up a five-man quest in Stratholme), as there happen to be 20 hatchlings in the Ossuary, and you need to kill 20 of them.

Barov Family Fortune (Deed to Tarren Mill)
Plagued Hatchlings
Doctor Theolen Krastinov, the Butcher

Having gotten the Butcher out of the way, you're able to pick up Krastinov's Bag of Horrors from the Sarkhoffs, meaning it's time to go back in again. Getting the Deed to Southshore is a minor pain, but it's the only time you'll have to go through the time-consuming and deadly effort of clearing most of the Reliquary. Since the other two items on the agenda for this run are fairly quick, this is the perfect time to do it. After doing it, head for Jandice, kill her, and then head back outside the instance to speak to the Sarkhoffs again; they'll give you the Blood of Innocents with which to summon Kirtonos. Finish him off, and leave the instance again. Done properly and with minimal death, you should complete this in well under two hours -- more than enough time to avoid respawn on the way out of the instance. After this, you may as well take a break rather than heading right back in; although you may be able to beat respawn and get back to the Ossuary to continue further, if you wipe afterward you will NOT beat respawn. Part of the benefit of splitting things like this is that on the next stage, if you wipe, you WILL beat respawn coming back in.

Barov Family Fortune (deed to Southshore)
Krastinov's Bag of Horrors (Jandice)
Kirtonos the Herald

Having completed Kirtonos the Herald, you can now interact with all the dead people outside the instance in Caer Darrow. This opens up the The Lich, Ras Frostwhisper series. Before continuing, you should run that chain, including completing Menethil's Gift in Stratholme. Easy enough to do in a Baron run, and it's raidable, so no issues there.

Special aside: The Paladin epic mount quest concludes in Rattlegore's room. I'm not including it in the normal chain here, because the best party makeup for that specific quest actually involves having four paladins in the group, which makes it sort of unfeasible for normal group composition. Still...

Judgement and Redemption (Paladin only)

This is the most hazardous stage, but by having gotten rid of most of the other stuff, you can probably get at least two tries at Alexei by beating respawn. This is another two-hour run if all goes well, but a competent group shouldn't even come close to a wipe at any point other than the fight with Alexei. The encounter with Vectus is pathetically simple, especially with a mage in the party. Ras is another matter, as turning him into a human can be tricky. You'll find the Deed to Brill in Ras's room, and the Deed to Caer Darrow next to Alexei.

Dawn's Gambit (Vectus)
The Lich, Ras Frostwhisper
Barov Family Fortune (Deed to Southshore)
Barov Family Fortune (Deed to Caer Darrow)

Boom. You're done 5-manning Scholomance.

(Special thanks and credit to MongoJerry, without whose Schooling Scholomance series I never would have remembered which deed was which... :o )

[Darian]

Alliance Stratholme for the time-challenged:

Stratholme is pretty simple and straightforward for 5-manning, actually; it only requires two five-man runs to complete, but... you may have to do more to knock out the collect quests, as they're notoriously stingy with drops. However, since those drops are scattered all throughout the "outdoor" portions of the instance, they're really not that big a deal. Just complete the Scarlet side main quests, then you can go back in and farm trash mobs to complete the collects. However, you need to do that before the Baron side 5-man quest opens up. Those quests, for reference:

Houses of the Holy (actually raidable, I believe)
The Flesh Does Not Lie
Collecton of Goods (Paladin only, requires same holy water as Houses of the Holy)

Scarlet side: All the quests which require a 5-man run on the Scarlet side can be done in one run easily. The run can be done in under two hours by not screwing around with Postmaster Malown (he's raidable), and by avoiding the side trip to Cannonmaster Willey. The latter, however, will require 5-man runs for blacksmiths; I recommend doing those separately, however, as the detour to the Cannonade can destroy a 5-man run's ability to complete the other quests in a timely manner. Just get to Fras, then get to the Bastion, then blitz through to the Archivist. The Scarlet side quests do not NEED to be completed prior to the Baron side quests, but I list them first because completing Scarlet Strat (either in raid or in 5-man) leads to Above and Beyond.

The Great Fras Siabi
Medallion of Faith
Of Love and Family
The Archivist

Second run for blacksmiths:

Corruption
Sweet Serenity

Baron side: Before you head off on a 5-man Baron run, be sure that you've already completed The Flesh Does Not Lie and acquired the head of Balnazzar. I can't speak to how long a 5-man Baron run takes yet, not having done it, but we've done it with 7 people in less than two hours.

The Active Agent
turn in Medallion of Faith
Above and Beyond
Aurius' Reckoning

Like I said, pretty straightforward.

[Darian]

Alliance LBRS for the time-challenged:

I haven't five-manned LBRS yet, but I've raided it enough to have at least a reasonable idea of how long it would take to do these groupings. If anyone's got a better read on timing, let me know.

The following quest requires collecting Spire Spider eggs, and it requires fifteen of them. You'll probably need to collect a few each time you pass through the Spider area, so this is not a "complete all at once" quest.

En-Ay-Es-Tee-Why

Your first run through should take care of the following quests. You'll bypass Omokk, most of the trolls, and you won't go any further than the spiders (affording the opportunity to collect eggs). I'm guessing this would be under a 90-minute run. Recommendation: get a Warlock buddy and a couple of other folks to park at Flame Crest, then hearth out after acquiring Mother's Milk. Join their group after hearthing and get summoned to Flame Crest to turn the quest in. Any other method of trying to get that quest done is probably going to be frustrating.

Bijou's Belongings (acquire and collect item)
Hot Fiery Death/Unfired Plate Gauntlets (Blacksmith only)
Mother's Milk

Having acquired Bijou's stuff, you now need to talk to her again. Unfortunately, you still don't have the quest to kill the boss mobs; fortunately, that means you can still skip Omokk, and you won't even get past the trolls this run. Since you can get out of Dodge after taking down Vosh'gajin, this one's actually a pretty quick dash; it should probably only take about an hour.

Bijou's Belongings (turn in)
Message to Maxwell (accept)
The Final Tablets (Vosh'gajin)
Snakestone of the Shadow Huntress (Vosh'gajin, Blacksmith only)

After this, you'll need to head to Morgan's Vigil and have a chat with Maxwell, after which you'll have the big daddy quest of the instance. You'll still probably want to divide it up, and take advantage of the ability to skip half the instance on the following run. This segment is probably around 90 minutes. Make sure you grab a roughshod pike on this trip, even though you're not using it yet; you won't be passing by the rack next time. And be sure to loot Omokk's head as well.

Maxwell's Mission (Omokk)
Maxwell's Mission (Voone)
The Final Tablets (Voone)

Here's where you get to save a bundle of time. After the second large pull of the instance, you're able to jump off a ledge which takes you straight to the Orc gauntlet -- allowing you to skip the entire upper floor leading to Omokk, as well as the entire Troll stronghold. In a 5-man group, this is saving you up to 90 minutes of unnecessary clearing. Plow through the Orcs and Spiders (grabbing eggs if you need them), hit the Ogre event, then Halycon, and finally the Overlord. This is probably a two-hour run.

Urok Doomhowl
Put Her Down (Halycon)
Kibler's Exotic Pets
Maxwell's Mission (Wyrmthalak)

And having taken care of that, you've cleared the five-man quests from LBRS. Anything else you need to do here, including acquiring any gems for the UBRS key which you haven't already run across, can be done in raid. I'm not sure if you need to go into 5-man configuration to turn in the key quest at its conclusion, but if so, that's not even difficult, as you only have to get through 21 mobs to get to the quest mob.

[vor_lord]

This is extremely useful information, many thanks!

[Drasca]

Houses of the Holy (actually raidable, I believe)
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Indeed raid-able. Simply holy water collection quest from Argent Dawn at LHC. Grab holy water from supply crates found all around stratholme. Nice reward for casters too, crown of the penitent 20 int, 6 mana per 5 seconds.

[LochnarITB]

Very good info. Very well laid out. Very disheartening for this capped PvE explorer type player. Yep, I'm on my rant again. (Darian, it is not a rant against you but against the company and game I love just enough more than I hate.)

This reinforces my contention that Blizzard's love of mega-instances limits the end game for all players, especially the casual gamer. This is a virtual tour guide for players going in. It takes away from the joy of discovery and figuring out problems on your own. If someone wanted to discover this for themselves, they would have to find a dedicated group that wanted to discover along with them. They would then have to make many trips, doing much of the same thing over and over, to learn what is needed and what can finally be ignored.

This is very limiting for all capped players. Except for when you were out PvPing, when is the last time you took your capped toon out exploring? If you can remember, I would bet it was on a trip to farm materials for getting better equipment to run instances or PvP. The world for PvE becomes very small. It becomes DM/Scholo/Strat/LBRS/UBRS/MC/Onyxia, to be done over and over again to get better gear to do it better over and over again...

Dire Maul seems (I have limited experience with it) to be a good compromise that I wish Blizzard would consider doing more of. You are lead into the east side because it is the only way to get in (actually you can get in slightly further on but some people wouldn't find that). Each piece can actually be done in reasonable time. You will come out with a key that allows you to go into later portions (north, west and the door out in Feralas) without needing to repeat what you have already done. This makes it far easier to take small exploration chunks of an instance.

Why do I continue to play? Because it is the best computer game ever. It holds the potential to be so much better! Lochnar will, hopefully, go into these instances with fellow Lurkers, and be taken on the tours, because he is the toon I enjoy most and the only choice becomes to play in instances or not play him at all. I hate hearing him crying from that dark closet in which I lock him.

Again, Darian, good info. Well done. Thank you. It will be very handy for people organizing groups to go in and get things done. I would like to see posts like this pinned so people can continue to access them and not have them drop off the bottom of the front page.

[edit] player ≠ toon
[edit2] crying in that dark closet I lock him into :wacko: bad even by my standards

[Darian]

This reinforces my contention that Blizzard's love of mega-instances limits the end game for all players, especially the casual gamer.  This is a virtual tour guide for players going in.  It takes away from the joy of discovery and figuring out problems on your own.  If someone wanted to discover this for themselves, they would have to find a dedicated group that wanted to discover along with them.  They would then have to make many trips, doing much of the same thing over and over, to learn what is needed and what can finally be ignored.

I hear ya, Loch, and I really sympathize with you. The way the end-game instances are set up, you really have three options:

1) Go in blind and figure it all out on your own. Expect to have to go into the instance probably at least a half-dozen times, using up 4-5 hours a trip at the start, and only losing time-per-trip toward the end because you have figured out what you can skip.

2) Follow what I posted here, which I deliberately wrote up in such a way that it sort of tells you WHAT to do, but not so much how to do it.

3) Tag along with someone who already knows exactly what to do, which takes all pretense of "exploration" out of the picture. Unfortunately for me, that's exactly how Strat, Scholo, and LBRS played out for me. (BRD, we still went in and took our chances with; I have never run BRD without being the party leader.)

Except for when you were out PvPing, when is the last time you took your capped player out exploring?

Dire Maul, East and North. And arguably West, given the horrible run Skan, Arethor, Grizelle and I went on with someone who supposedly knew what they were doing, but instead ended up with us basically clearing the entire damned instance twice...

Dire Maul seems (I have limited experience with it) to be a good compromise... ...This makes it far easier to take small exploration chunks of an instance.

Amen. I have always held that if you're going to have lengthy instances, you should have the equivalent of "save points" within the instance. In some places they did an incredible job with this. Maraudon is perfectly set up, in my opinion. Do the purple side, do the orange side, bam, you have the key to do the end of the instance, and none of those segments really takes more than a couple of hours. Scarlet Monastery is similar; none of the individual arms of the Monastery really requires more than 90 minutes. Unfortunately, they either didn't do it with the end-game instances, or almost worse, did it, but made the segments too damned long. Sure, LBRS and UBRS are the same instance, and it was sure nice of them to break them into two pieces; finish LBRS and get the key, and then you can do the "rest" of the instance. But the sheer length of both instances sort of clues you in as to why everyone considers them to be two separate instances even though they aren't.

Again, Darian, good info.  Well done.  Thank you.  It will be very handy for people organizing groups to go in and get things done.  I would like to see posts like this pinned so people can continue to access them and not have them drop off the bottom of the front page.
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No, thank you. ;)

That's my hope; I really don't want to see people giving up the game in frustration because they want to get these things done but can't because there's just no time... not when there's a reasonable and non-explotative way to get it done.

[Grimjack]

Thank you Darian.

You are absolutely correct, the main difficulty for a casual ( Or time-restrained ) player, is to divide these instances into easily digested chunks.
It is very hard to find likeminded people, during same time intervall and on same quests. Thus is born the raid for loot groups I see.

grimjack

[Treesh]

That's my hope; I really don't want to see people giving up the game in frustration because they want to get these things done but can't because there's just no time... not when there's a reasonable and non-explotative way to get it done.
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But some of us don't like to skip mobs and leave them there, even if it isn't exploitive, simply because we've had issues with those skipped junk mobs/skippable mobs causing some problems if we wipe or have to fall back a bit or if just one person has to make a corpse run. Things go wrong and having those trash mobs still around can complicate it. Of course, clearing all of those mobs also takes time too and is a hinderance to the casual player as well. Unfortunately, Blizzard isn't going to be changing their end game attitude anytime soon and that's starting to kill even me wanting to play my smaller characters. Why put all that time into them if I know they're going to end up the same place as my 60? Hitting 60 with a character was the worst thing I've ever done in this game. :( I was happy with all my characters and was still having fun with all of them before Aleri capped. Now just about all the enjoyment is sucked out of my malts because in the back of my mind, I know eventually more of them will get to 60 and then they'll be ghosts of themselves - dead, unable to progress (no, I really don't count getting new items as progression. I thought I'd be able to, but no), but still with quests in their quest log. Feh. Anyway, I guess there was my little rant for the day.

Thanks for the walkthroughs anyway Darian. :)

[Darian]

But some of us don't like to skip mobs and leave them there, even if it isn't exploitive, simply because we've had issues with those skipped junk mobs/skippable mobs causing some problems if we wipe or have to fall back a bit or if just one person has to make a corpse run.[right][snapback]79949[/snapback][/right]

I think you might be misunderstanding what I mean by "skipping content" here. For the record, any place in the breakdowns where I'm saying "skip these mobs," it's completely safe to skip, and arguably it's part of the actual design. For instance, if you're doing LBRS and you have no reason to go kill Omokk, then there's absolutely nothing anyone in your party can do outside of gross stupidity which will ever cause Omokk and the other mobs in his wing to aggro you. If you go into BRD and use the Shadowforge Key to make a Bar run, there's no way the mobs in the prison are any risk to you. There's no chance the mobs over by the relic coffers are going to come eat you.

The best early-instance analogies I can come up with off the top of my head are Ironaya in Uldaman, or just doing the upstairs (or downstairs) in Sunken Temple, or doing Zul'Farrak and opting to skip the prisoner escape event or the main boss or the path through the scarabs and the lootable graves. You're not leaving mobs laying around that are a risk to you; you're just not doing that part of the instance on that run.

(And I'll point out that I have not suggested things like jumping off the bridge in Scholomance and bypassing the mobs in the first three rooms; although that is "doable," it doesn't fit in with the design of the instance. No matter what, when you do Scholo, you're expected to clear those rooms to get to the path you intend to take in the end.)

Now, if your vision of "doing an instance" is to do the whole thing no matter what (which IS a perfectly valid vision, so I'd certainly never criticize it), then this is no good to you at all, as it totally defeats what makes doing an instance fun for you. But if it's merely a matter of wanting to experience everything and not having enough time to bite off these big chunks, then it's helpful. And... it may be goofy, but I posted these breakdowns because every time I see one of you post that you're leaving the game or getting discouraged because the end-game is too time-consuming or frustrating, my heart breaks a little bit, even if I don't normally play with you.

Thanks for the walkthroughs anyway Darian. :)

You're welcome. :D

EDIT: fixed stupid coding error :whistling:

[Treesh]

I think you might be misunderstanding what I mean by "skipping content" here.  For the record, any place in the breakdowns where I'm saying "skip these mobs," it's completely safe to skip, and arguably it's part of the actual design. 
<snip>

(And I'll point out that I have not suggested things like jumping off the bridge in Scholomance and bypassing the mobs in the first three rooms; although that is "doable," it doesn't fit in with the design of the instance.&nbsp; No matter what, when you do Scholo, you're expected to clear those rooms to get to the path you intend to take in the end.)[right][snapback]79958[/snapback][/right]

My comment was more of a general one than directed specifically towards what you posted. Sorry for causing that confusion. It's more based on the DM Tribute runs I've been attempting lately where "hug this wall and skip all these mobs even though we don't run the risk of aggroing a guard if we do stop to kill this group" is the usual tactic. Again, I should have been clearer on that, but I was in rant mode. ;)

Now, if your vision of "doing an instance" is to do the whole thing no matter what (which IS a perfectly valid vision, so I'd certainly never criticize it), then this is no good to you at all, as it totally defeats what makes doing an instance fun for you.&nbsp; But if it's merely a matter of wanting to experience everything and not having enough time to bite off these big chunks, then it's helpful.&nbsp; And... it may be goofy, but I posted these breakdowns because every time I see one of you post that you're leaving the game or getting discouraged because the end-game is too time-consuming or frustrating, my heart breaks a little bit, even if I don't normally play with you.
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That was one of the things I enjoyed about the pre-60 instances, even the really big ones. I like doing full clears. It was a habit I picked up from D1 and Hellfire and carried it all the way through D2 and LoD and it stuck with me in WoW a bit as well. It's been mostly beaten out of me for WoW by now (at least in regards to having one character do it all for one faction), but it's still in the back of my head to map everything and do full clears and that just isn't possible in the end instances and do it in a reasonable amount of time. Add in that frequently I just cannot sit in my chair for long periods of time before there is massive physical discomfort (some days it's not even 15 minutes before I have to stand) and these end instances get even worse. Of course, thanks to my desk being rather tall, I can stand and still be reasonably effective in a group. ;) I do have a tendency to hit more wrong keys when I'm standing, but at least I don't have to make everyone wait for me before moving on. :D