utgarde_keepOverview:

Utgarde Keep is located in the middle of the starting zone, Howling Fjord . The Keep is the stronghold of the Vrykul who intend to prove themselves worthy of the Lich King in life so that they may server him in death. The Vrykiul are lead by Ingvar the Plunderer who also happens to be the final boss of Utgarde Keep

Trash Mobs:

The trash mobs of this zone are very manageable and not overly difficult. They are usually in only groups of no more than four and can be handled easily by a moderately equipped/skilled tank.

Healing during the trash mobs is rather elementrary. Just keep earth shield on the tank and chain heal off the main tank to keep the melee toped off.

As for totems make sure to drop totems to enhance the make up of your group (melee vs. caster dps) but make sure to keep mana stream down for yourself. Some of the trash mobs are fire casters so it might be beneficial to drop a fire resist totem, but not absolutely nessecary.  

Prince Keleseth:

Prince Keleseth is the scourge warlock ambassador to the Vrykul. He is found in a large room with his four Vrykul bodyguards.

The pull is very simple. Have the tank range pull the neartest bodygaurd. The four bodyguards will agro but the prince will not. Once the bodyguards are dead the Prince will agro, have the tank interecept him as soon as the last bodyguard is dead.

The Prince’s damage output is nothing to be readily concerned about. He does cast shadow bolts for 2-4k that can be interupted via earth shcok or wind shock, but he does two things that should be noted.

Skeleton Summon: After a minute from getting agro, the Prince will summon four skeletons to aide him. These skeletons usually make a bee line for the healer. Have the tank pick them up and build some agro before you start the AoE. Once all the skeletons are dead, the Prince will summon another batch of skeletons and will do so until he is defeated. If you are having trouble dealing with the adds you can keep one skeleton alive. As long as that one skeleton lives the Pricne will not summon any more.

Ice Tomb: Ice Tomb is an ability that is very similar to ilhoof’s Demonic Chains. During the fight, the Prince will randomly cast Ice Tomb on a group member. During this time, the affected target is entombed in ice and will be incapasitated for 20 seconds and will take roughly 400 damage a tick. Like the demon chains, the tomb can be targeted and destroyed quickly (2000hp).

During this fight it is best to keep the earth shield up on the main tank and chain heal off of them. When someone has been placed in the Ice Tomb you can easy dispatch the tomb yourself with a lighting bolt and an earth shock. Once they are free cast riptide on them and continue your focus on the tank.

There are no specific totems that are required for this fight, but the AoE fire totems are helpful for AoE’ing the skeletons. You could drop grounding totem down to suck up a shadow bollt, but shadow bolt really doesn’t cause enough damage to warrant its use. (note: One thing I need to test is to keep grounding totem down to see if that could suck up the Ice Tomb.)  

Skarvald the Constructor:

When you come upon Skarvald he is in deep conversation with his friend, Dalronn the Controller. You will find that Skarvald is melee ot Dalroon casterness. To make this encounter easier it is best to defeat both of the bosses at the same time, making it similar to the Opera Event: Romulo and Julianne in Karazhan. If one is defeated before the other, the defeated will return in his ghost form and continue on fighting till the other is dead. If you happen to kill one before the other, it isn’t the end of the world, just continue to focus on the one who is still alive and heal through the damage.

Healing this encounter can be handled two ways. Earth shield the tank and chain heal off of him. You could also go with earth shielding the tank and casting riptide on the group while LHW the tank when needed.  Both works just as well as the other.

Ingvar the Plunderer:

Finally, the reason we showed up, the leader of the Vrykrul. The Ingvar encounter has two phases. In his first phase, you will face the mortal Ingvar. During this phase Ingvar has two abilities.

First he has an AoE roar that damages everyone for 2k and interrupts casting (Roar increases his power by 5%). During this point it is best to use Riptide on the tank and then cast two LHW on the lowest health group members and then repeat the riptide/LHW to get everyone back to health ASAP before his next ability.

His other ability is a smashing attack that will damage anyone in his frontal arc. Make sure that the tank is the only person in that arc or things could get messy. Riptide and LHW can be good to keep up the tank’s HP while hopefully using up water shield orbs for more mana regen.

Once you have defeated Ingvar, he is resurrected to Lich King servititude by Annhylde the Caller. You now must defeat Ingvar’s shadow form. During this phase he acts as he did before but his attacks are shadow based and he attacks hit much harder. Make sure to keep earth shield on the tank and either spam chain heal or HW on the tank to help cover the added damage. Make sure to direct your other melee’s to stay out of his frontal arc or his smashing attack will easily kill anyone in it’s way.

Make sure to save bloodlust for the second phase where the added DPS and spell haste will be needed the most.

This fight ends up being a DPS race to down him quickly enough that the roars do not stack to the point of him being unbeatable.

So that’s it, the first 5-man on WotLK. Is it overly difficult? No. Is it fun? Yes. Is it fast? Yes. A normal run will take anywhere from 30 min to an hour depending on gear and wipes, but any extra time in the zone can be filled by taking in the esthetics of this place.