Toravon: Strategy for the latest Wintergrasp boss
by Matt Low 
Feb 10th 2010 at 8:00PM
Toravon is the latest boss to appear within the Vault of Archavon, however we're not quite sure if he is the last of the VoA bosses to be seen in this expansion. The boss is fairly simple conceptually, but don't take him too lightly. I'll walk you through what you need to know to get score some sweet tier 10 PvE gear and equivilent PvP gear.
Gear Drops
He drops tier 10 level gloves and legs along with PvP gear (like belt and boots). Unlike his brothers, he drops 3 items on 25 instead of 2. And yes, he does drop Emblems of Frost. Its a fairly simple encounter for an equipped raid group. There aren't any fires to stay out of or anything. You'll need 2 tanks and at least 4-5 healers (on 10 man, you can get away with 2).
Tanks
Tanks will need to switch off of each other to shake the Frostbite debuff. It can stack up to 100 times and each application places a DoT which hits for about 1000 every couple of seconds. Your tanks can switch when they feel the debuff is getting high.
Frozen Orbs
No, this isn't the crafting reagent. Toravon will summon up 3 Frozen Orbs (1 on 10 man), and they can hurt if not taken care of. Its like a Whirlwind effect that goes around at random. It'll nail anyone within 8 yards of it and it needs to be targeted and destroyed. Ranged players can take care of it. But if there are any that spawn near the melee, go ahead and switch over to finish it off. They start off as glowing rings on the ground before the actual orb spawns.
Other abilities
He'll freeze players and root them to the ground with an ice spell called Freezing Ground. Its a magic and can be dispelled. Make an effort to shake off this debuff especially when there are Frozen Orbs flying around frozen players.
Lastly, watch out for the Whiteout. This ability won't fix your mistakes exactly or anything, but every time it's cast it will continue to increase the amount of frost damage your raid takes. You can think of it as a sort of soft enrage.
Quick tips
Frost Resistance aura or a Frost Resistance totem will help mitigate some of the damage coming through. Even if your raid has neither, the encounter is fairly easy enough to get through. Don't worry, you're not going to need any frost resist gear.
Patch 3.3 is the last major patch of Wrath of the Lich King. With the new Icecrown Citadel 5-man dungeons and 10/25-man raid arriving soon, patch 3.3 will deal the final blow to Arthas. WoW.com's Guide to Patch 3.3 will keep you updated with all the latest patch news.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
Yomamma Feb 10th 2010 8:09PM
He's a fairly easy boss. Dps Boss...burn adds...dps boss. Nothing too it.
The sad part about Vault is every group now breaks up after he's downed. I really believe they should separate these guys and put them each on their own lockout. I have several alts who could use the gear from the lower bosses, but can't get in a raid because my gearscore isn't high enough for Toravon. I'm still trying to figure out Blizzards logic there.
Vladeon Feb 10th 2010 8:17PM
sounds like you need to join a raiding guild.
One of the great things about VoA is that you can bring along some of your nearly-geared alts and go through all of the bosses there and potentially come away with a few really nice upgrades. unfortunately the only people that you'll convince to go through the entire thing, even though it only takes a max of 40 min., is your guild.
Serra Feb 10th 2010 8:22PM
This happens a lot to on my server. Blizz should make a weekly quest in WG that sends you to collect essense of the elements that drops from each boss and give players a big reward, thinking maybe huge ammount of money, a chance on a mount, an extra frost badge.
This would keep a lot of people killing all the bosses at least
Adeany Feb 10th 2010 9:36PM
@Serra there already is a chance at a mount from killing every boss.
Sagacyte Feb 11th 2010 7:58AM
@serra that's actually a pretty good idea. however, we would then be flooded with the dreaded "LFM VoA quest /w achievement & 5k+ gs" that plagues every other raid.
infection Feb 11th 2010 9:09AM
i am in a raiding guild, but since the alliance have voa maybe once a week, how do you expect the guild to make voa a priority at raid times?
Boz Feb 11th 2010 3:14PM
You're unlikely to get any PUG group - particularly 25-man - to do a full clear of VoA if you down Toravon first. The best thing you can do is start your own group and make it clear that you're doing Toravon LAST, that way everyone sticks around.
martamius Feb 10th 2010 8:16PM
I was kicked out of a 25-man raid for this right after I got in for 'not being geared'. I'm a warlock in full T9.0 gear, fully gemmed and enchanted. What gear is expected to be able to do this?
devilsei Feb 10th 2010 8:20PM
Eh, probably got unlucky and ended up in one of those "uberpr**k" groups. Ya know, the kind that require 9k dps for Naxx 10.
Wild Colors Feb 10th 2010 8:25PM
Especially after the recent nerfs to the orbs and to whiteout, t9 is plenty for this boss. It was a bit tricky (and tended to required additional healers and a heavy tilt towards ranged dps) before the nerfs, because the orbs were a bit dangerous. Now you really can just stand in them (though I wouldn't recommend it for clothies).
Serra Feb 10th 2010 8:32PM
I lead a pug VoA 25 this afternoon with help of some friends, I just announced in trade channel and invited any whyspers I received without checking anything. I didnt ask for gear score or gear checking, just to be reasonable geared for the place. The only people I checked was 2 healers, but only to see if I would need to find an extra one or we are good to go (they were so awesome geared that I just got the first dps I saw).
We simple one shot Toravon without any death
Carson Feb 10th 2010 8:47PM
Ten bucks says the raid leader was also a warlock, looking to reduce the competition for any potential drops.
Camo Feb 11th 2010 12:43AM
@Serra:
Yes that's after the nerfs. As Wild Colors said it wasn't that easy before on 25s.
What makes me a bit.. hmm.. jealous is that he drops two pieces of tier 10 on 10s.
The total of 155 frosties is huge compared to the invested time to collect the badges.
If you manage to get your two pieces, you're looking at 8 weeks of random heroics day after day and the weekly raid.
And now imagine you're the single lucky mage from my 25 pug that got both in the first week.
ProTech Feb 11th 2010 7:58AM
My first pug on VoA25 was on the day it was released. The raid leader required 5k+ gearscore from everyone, and we wasn't able to kill him. We wiped a lot from the orbs, they did insane amount of damage, and if two get close to you you were dead. I was able to defeat him with a guild run later that week. Our guild is running ICC25, so we had lot of good geared people. I didn't know that blizzard nerfed him.
Daethar Feb 11th 2010 9:55AM
My first run on VoA25 was also on the day it was released. It was half guild, half pugs. Many of the pugs and some from the guild had less than 5k gearscore.
People had either read the fight or attempted it on 10 man, I didn't even notice he died because I was kiting a frozen orb away from other dpsers at the time. I think we had one melee death from unluckily being stuck in between 2 orbs, but that's it.
10 man has always been a problem, because healing really makes or breaks it. The first day running it with 3 healers, we wiped because of not enough dps. Yesterday running it with 2 healers just wasn't working, so we grabbed an extra one when a dps had to leave and it was cake. Probably the easier 10 man difficulty was due to nerfs, but I'm not complaining.
Joey Feb 11th 2010 11:04AM
I love that WoW has become more accessible to middling players like myself, however the resulting reliance upon gearscore really puts me off. I don't do great DPS at my 4500 GS but I'm usually tops in heroics and middle of the pack in the few opportunities I get to raid. Additionally I learn boss mechanics very quickly and I rarely die - even on new encounters.
However there's no chance I'd ever get to pug a boss like this because a number somehow represents my entire worth to the group. And that's fine if I'm being pushed out of groups because higher geared players applied. After all, I suppose we need some arbitrary way to measure skill. But I've actually been refused spots in shorthanded runs because I didn't meet the required gear and achievement checks.
Brainded Feb 11th 2010 12:52PM
@ProTech
Gear Score =/= skill
Eregos ftw! Feb 11th 2010 1:43PM
@wildcolors: It got nerfed? Great! I did it the day of it's release and we barely could finish it. Did it with a tank, 4 dps, and a healer up. (25 man) And me with only a 4.9k gs! (I was the healer up :)
N-train Feb 10th 2010 8:22PM
This fight is much more of a gear check than a hard mechanics fight. And even then, the gear check is pretty soft, and good healers can outweigh lower dps (and vise versa).
Assuming everyone has solid enough gear (t9 and emblem gear seems fine) then its almost as easy as Archavon.
One note however, while it is quite doable with 2 tanks on 25, I'd recommend 3 if only to make the healing just a bit easier. With 3 tanks (as opposed to 2), you can switch more frequently and keep your stacks much lower, though I'm sure a well geared group would have no real problem with 2.
Bernee Feb 10th 2010 9:36PM
I noticed that in VoA, the harder the boss, the further in the back they are.