Sartharion and his lackeys took the initiative before Halion, but why do we even go down there?

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No in game lore, no quest saying "go check out what's happening under my very feet in the Obsidian Sanctum" from Korialstrasz, nothing. Why is it, then, that we are killing these poor black dragons in their own sanctum? For some raiders "for purps" or "for achievements" might be enough, but not for me. Seeing as how a lot of lore comes from sources outside of WoW, what I am about to post can easily be considered spoilers for books, other warcraft games, or even in game quests. Read on if you wish.


Now that I have that covered, lets get into the goods. Satharion is a pretty much a lieutenant in Deathwing's army. His task is to over see the production, safe keeping, and hatching of Twilight Dragon Eggs. These eggs are a part of Deathwing's overall attempt to make a super-dragonflight using the DNA of all the other dragon flights and/or powerful magic or artifacts. The first taste that players got of this was Cromaggus and the Cromatic dragonkin that were in Blackwing Lair.. While Cromaggus isn't technically a dragon but rather a core hound infused with blood from all 5 original flights, it shows the extent to which Deathwing and the Blackdragon flight will go to try to make any form of super beasts.

Next we skip foward to the Netherwing Dragonflight we encountered in Outland. While I am not entirely sure that these were made on purpose,they are still a very important part of the creation of the Twilight Dragonflight. The Netherwing are the result of Deathwing's eggs being on Outland during it's sundering and the infusion of magical energy the eggs received from it. These were quickly enslaved by the Dragonmaw Orcs under the orders of Illidan, however Sintharia (in the guise of Lady Sinestra) convinced them that Deathwing might not eat them all if they betrayed Illidan and used the Netherwing for her purposes. Using the remaining shards of the Demon Soul, Balacgos's Bane (A cube that the blue dragon Balacgos used to keep unused arcane magic out of the hands of early Azerothians,) eggs from all 5 flights, and the Nether dragon Zzeraku, Sintharia formed the first Twilight Dragon, Dragonax (devourer in Draconic.) More dragon eggs were made, but eventually Korialstrasz, Rhonin, Kalecgos, Zzeraku, Vereesa Windrunner, and the Draenei priestess Iridi fought and killed Dragonax, who, in the magical explosion that killed him, also ended up killing Sintharia. The damage had been done already, the twilight eggs were delivered to Sartharion where he took them and started to raise them as his own. The Twilight Dragonflight was born.

Achievements:

Besting the Black Dragonflight

To earn this achievement simple kill Sartharion and his drakes. It can easily be combined with...

Less is More
For this achievement you need to kill Sartharion and all his drakes with either 8 people in 10 player or 20 people in 25 man raids.

Twilight Assist/Duo/Zone
This achievement is easily done in ICC10/25 gear as it is possible to "zerg" the encounter. For Assist/Duo/Zone you need to kill Sartharion with 1/2/3 drake(s) up respectively. Each drake gives Sartharion a buff.

Power of Tenebron - All players take 100% more Shadow damage. Tenebron lands 30 seconds into the encounter.
Power of Shadron - All Players take 100% more Fire damage. Shadron lands 75 seconds into the encounter.
Power of Vesperon - All players have 25% less health. Vesperon lands 120 seconds into the encounter.
Sartharion also casts "Will of Sartharion" increasing the drakes and his health by 25%.

The goal of the Zerg is to kill Sartharion before Shadron lands as Shadron's special will make Sartharion immune to damage. To do this you will need 1 main tank, 1 (2 is allowable in 25 man) healer, and the rest DPS all pulling in the minumum of 4.5k with larger DPS obviously better. A shaman for Bloodlust is also highly preferred.

To start the encounter you will need to run around and pick up all adds, making sure to NOT kill any drakes if you want to Zerg it (and seeing as how having 1 drake up and 3 drakes up gives Sartharion the same amount of health, I don't see why you wouldn't.) Once all adds are dead, buff your entire group then have a mage/rogue/hunter aggro Sartharion and reset him. As soon as this happens everyone must run in and get under where Sartharion will spawn. As soon as he reapears, give the tank half a second to get aggro (Tricks of the Trade or Misdirect is highly recommended here) then pop Bloodlust and trinkets. Tenebran should land slightly after the first firewall hits, so make sure your tank picks him up AND avoids the fire wall. If even 1 person gets hit by firewall your attempt could very well be over. DPS will need to stack as close as they can to Sartharion to help keep the adds from getting hit by firewalls and to allow the healer to target low health characters. If everything goes well Sartharion should be dead before Shadron lands. If not, wipe it and reset. Check your DPS, make sure BL was called soon enough, everyone knew what to do, etc. Two rare mounts drop from doing Sartharion with all 3 drakes up (normally referred to as OS3d Zerg.)

Reins of the Black Drake drops from 10 man and is a 280% speed mount.
Reins of the Twilight Drake drops from 25 man and is also a 280% speed mount.

Gonna Go When the Volcano Blows
Ironically this is now one of the harder achievements to get due to it's random factor. In order to qualify as not "getting hit by Lava Strike" you have to avoid the lava pellets that are falling from the sky during the encounter. While you can do this by having the camera pointed upwards and constantly moving, the easiest method, though cheapest and sure to get quite a few people mad at you, is to strip your toon naked before a regular Sartharion 0 drake kill and then jump into the lava as soon as it starts. If you can die before a fire pellet hits you, then you will get the achievement once Sartharion is dead. While I don't recommend doing it this way, it is an easy way to do it and if you can convince a few friends to go back and kill Sartharion for gold (I was able to 10 man him in 25 man using Ulduar gear) then they might also be willing to let you die during the fight.

Well, that pretty much covers it for Sartharion and the Obsidium Sanctum. Feel free to request more help on the forums, or even recommend an article for me to cover next.