Hour of Twilight Dungeon Guide: Bosses, Route and Tips

Overview

Hour of Twilight is the last of the three Cataclysm patch 4.3 Caverns of Time dungeons. You escort Thrall and the Dragon Soul across the Dragonblight to Wyrmrest Temple, and Thrall fights beside you on every boss. The journal lists the dungeon as Heroic only. Most of what goes wrong here comes from ignoring what Thrall is doing for you.

• Everyone: use Thrall's tools. Break him out of ice on Arcurion, stand in his fire totem on Asira, and stand in his water shield on Benedictus.
• Tank: on Asira, point her at the group so you stand between the marked casters and her knives.
• Healer: dispel the stacking shear debuffs on Benedictus quickly, and save your big group heal for the Arcurion 30% burn.
• DPS: on Asira, hold your biggest hits for when her blade shield goes up, because small hits do nothing.

Trash and route

The run is linear and you follow Thrall the whole way.

1. You arrive in the Crystal Vice canyon. Ice elementals ambush the group in waves while Thrall moves along the path. Clear the ambushes, and Arcurion shows himself at the canyon exit.
2. After Arcurion, head through Galakrond's Rest. A gauntlet of Twilight's Hammer cultists (assassins, bruisers, rangers, shadow-walkers and thugs) stands between you and the red drakes that fly you toward Wyrmrest. Asira Dawnslayer ambushes the group there and kills one of the drakes on her way in.
3. When Asira dies, Thrall revives the drake and flies ahead. Take the drakes to Wyrmrest Temple, where faceless ones and slimes come up along the Path of the Titans from the Maw of Destruction. The Flailing Tentacles there vanish on their own shortly after they appear and cannot be attacked, so ignore them. Clear the faceless ones and Archbishop Benedictus leads you into the temple for the final fight.

Treat the cultist gauntlet with some respect on a fresh group. Pull one pack at a time and let the tank collect everything before you open up.

Arcurion

Abilities

• Hand of Frost: a frost hit on Arcurion's current target. It is steady tank damage.
• Chains of Frost: a frost wave that damages and roots everyone in a wide radius around him.
• Icy Boulder: Frozen Servitors on the canyon walls throw boulders at random players. The boulders land on marked spots on the ground.
• Icy Tomb: Arcurion freezes Thrall in a block of ice. Thrall is the one keeping the servitors in check, so the tomb has to be broken.
• Torrent of Frost: at 30% health Arcurion starts dealing frost damage every second to the whole group and slowing everyone.

Tank

Hold Arcurion where the group can see the ground markers clearly and keep him still. When Chains of Frost roots you, you can usually just keep tanking. If you get a boulder marker yourself, step out and bring him with you.

Healer

Chains of Frost is magic. A mass dispel, or freedom effects from paladins and hunters, takes pressure off you when several people are rooted at once. The real test is the 30% mark. Torrent of Frost ticks on everyone until the boss dies, so keep your strongest group healing cooldown for it and ask the group to stack so your area heals reach everyone.

DPS

When Thrall is frozen, switch to the Icy Tomb right away. If he stays frozen the servitors pile up and the boulders come much faster. Groups with very high damage can push Arcurion to 30% instead, which frees Thrall automatically, but only do this if you are sure you can get there quickly. Always step out of boulder markers. At 30%, Thrall casts a Bloodlust on the group that works even if you already had one this fight, so this is the moment to use everything you have and finish the fight.

Asira Dawnslayer

Abilities

• Mark of Silence: Asira marks the group's spellcasters. When a marked player casts, she throws a knife toward them.
• Throw Knife: the knife hits the first player in its path. If that player carries Mark of Silence, they are also silenced for 2.5 seconds.
• Choking Smoke Bomb: a smoke cloud around Asira that nobody can target into or out of. It also deals nature damage over time.
• Blade Barrier: at low health Asira turns any hit below a certain size into 1 damage. A big enough hit breaks it.
• Lesser Blade Barrier: a weaker barrier she puts up after the first one breaks. It works the same way with a lower threshold.
• Thrall helps with Lava Burst and Rising Fire Totem. The totem stacks up the damage and maximum health of players standing near it. He also heals himself with Healing Wave.

Tank

Face Asira toward the group. That puts you between her and the marked casters, so her knives hit you and you are not silenced. When she drops Choking Smoke Bomb, pull her out of the cloud immediately so everyone can target her again.

Healer

You are a spellcaster, so expect to be marked. Before you cast, put the tank or another unmarked player between you and Asira. Getting silenced at the wrong moment is how this fight goes wrong. Stand in Thrall's fire totem whenever you can. The extra health makes everyone easier to keep alive.

DPS

Marked casters should use the same trick as the healer and keep a body between themselves and Asira. Stay in the Rising Fire Totem, because its stacks also raise your damage. Once Blade Barrier goes up, filler attacks are wasted. Use your largest single hits to break it, then do the same for Lesser Blade Barrier. The longer you have stood in the totem, the easier this gets.

Archbishop Benedictus

Abilities

Stage one, the Holy Light:

• Righteous Shear: a stacking debuff on a random player. Each stack makes holy damage splash onto anyone nearby.
• Purifying Light: three orbs rise above Benedictus and fly at players, each exploding as a Purifying Blast.
• Wave of Virtue: a wave of holy energy sweeps the platform, damaging and knocking back the group.

Stage two, at 60% health: Benedictus casts Twilight Epiphany, shows his true form and traps Thrall in a Twilight Prison.

• Twilight Shear: the shadow version of Righteous Shear.
• Corrupting Twilight: three shadow orbs that explode as Twilight Blast.
• Wave of Twilight: the shadow version of the wave, with the same knockback.

Thrall's help in stage one:

• Chain Lightning: Thrall destroys orbs of Purifying Light.
• Water Shell: protects players from Wave of Virtue and increases their damage.
• Cleansing Spirit: Thrall removes one stack of a magic effect.

Tank

Keep Benedictus in a stable spot so the group can move between him, the orbs and Thrall's shield without running far. In stage two you lose Thrall, so watch the shadow orbs yourself and step away from the player with Twilight Shear.

Healer

Dispel the shear debuffs early. Righteous Shear and Twilight Shear both get worse with every stack, and players carrying them damage everyone nearby. Thrall's Cleansing Spirit helps a little, but do not rely on it. In stage two nobody shields the group from Wave of Twilight, so keep everyone topped before each wave.

DPS

In stage one, Thrall uses Chain Lightning on two of the three Purifying Light orbs, so you only have to dodge one. When Wave of Virtue is cast, everyone runs into Thrall's Water Shell no matter where the wave is heading, because the shell also adds damage. In stage two the three Corrupting Twilight orbs are yours to deal with. Dodge them, or have a ranged player destroy them. There is no shell for Wave of Twilight, so position to take the knockback safely. If you have the debuff, move away from your allies.

Loot highlights

Every boss drops epic gear, and Benedictus has the largest loot table of the three.

• Arcurion Legguards: named leg armor from Arcurion.
• Iceward Cloak: a cloak from Arcurion.
• Dawnslayer Helm: Asira's named helm.
• Cloak of Subtle Light: a second cloak option, from Asira.
• Mandible of the Old Ones: from Asira's loot list.
• Rosary of Light and Veil of Lies: from Archbishop Benedictus.
• Dragonsmaw Blaster and Treachery's Bite: also from Benedictus.
• Benedictus also has several shoulder pieces on his table, including Betrayer's Pauldrons, Desecrated Shoulderguards, Mantle of False Virtue, Pauldrons of Conviction and Pauldrons of the Dragonblight.

Clearing the dungeon counts toward Heroic: Hour of Twilight.

Common mistakes

• Leaving Thrall in the Icy Tomb on Arcurion, so the boulders keep speeding up.
• Using big cooldowns early on Arcurion and having nothing left for Torrent of Frost and Thrall's Bloodlust at 30%.
• Casting while marked on Asira with nobody between you and her. A silenced healer is the usual cause of a wipe.
• Leaving Asira inside her own smoke cloud, where nobody can target her.
• Using small hits on Blade Barrier when one big hit would break it.
• Ignoring Thrall's Water Shell during Wave of Virtue and losing both the protection and the damage bonus.
• Letting shear stacks run on Benedictus instead of dispelling them early.

Mechanics checked against: warcraft.wiki.gg, warcraft.wiki.gg, warcraft.wiki.gg, warcraft.wiki.gg, warcraft.wiki.gg. Ability names and spell IDs come from TheWoWDB's own client datamine.