Barad Guldur is a 12-man Mirkwood instance found in Dol Guldur.

To start, get at least 120 radiance, either from the full six-piece +20 Dar Narbugund set or the three-piece +25 Mirkwood set along with the three-piece +15 Moria set.

The Entrance

There are two imposing Nemesis suits of armour that you must face, one of burning armour, one of shadowy armour. They both have 98,800 morale. They both have two corruptions which expire when out of combat for 9 seconds or, if removed, reapply themselves after 6 seconds. This is not the "twin" challenge.

The Amoured Flame-axe

See also Armoured Flame-axe

The Armoured Shadow-mace

See also Armoured Shadow-mace

The Gauntlet

Now you get to face the Gauntlet. I hope you've been running the skirmish and at least have a good mental picture of how the halls are configured. The foes here respawn fairly quickly. If anyone dies and releases, you will have to redo the Gauntlet to get them back up to you.

The primary concern is the Uruks who have a 3.5k melee AoE. You will only fight one to start, but you will soon have a second coming from behind. Move as close to the next group as you can while fighting the previous group so as to minimize the chance of getting an add fom behind (but don't get too close so you don't get an add from the front). Watch out for the wargs and carry poison/wound pots -- stun immunity on those tanking a warg is essential because since SoM mobs have become smart enough to situationally sometimes attack someone else while the primary aggro target is stunned. You will need at least two tanks, to tank two Uruks ahead of and behind the party, so that any one person is only taking a single 3.5k melee AoE at a time.

You will eventually get to the stairs to Durchest's room. This is a good time to "rest" (as much as you can while fighting).

Guldur Fell-hunter (Warg)

Elite Warg Beast with 49,400 morale.

• Poor Defense
  • Melee Defense
  • Ranged Defense
  • Tactical Defense
• Average Defense
  • Cry
  • Physical
  • Song
  • Tactical
• Fair Defense
  • Ancient Dwarf
  • Beleriand
  • Common
  • Fire
  • Frost
  • Light
  • Lightning
  • Shadow
  • Westernesse

Dúrchest

See also Dúrchest

Special Abilities

1. Heal buffs: Each player character death gives Dúrchest a stackable heal buff that he can save to use at a later time. When he gets down to around 100k morale, he will use a buff to give himself an additional 190k morale.
2. Increased gloom: Each two adds that spawn will increase boss gloom by 10 points, from an initial 180 gloom to a final max of 230 gloom.
3. Increased abilities: Some adds have a special ability that they will give Dúrchest.
4. Corruptions: Dúrchest regenerates corruptions all through the fight which need to be removed.
5. -Threat and Cleave: Durchest will try to cleave his target when in melee range. This is a frontal cone melee-range AoE with a max of three targets that will start his -threat debuff. Being hit with cleave will start a timer which will steadily increase your -threat if he continues to cleave you. Dúrchest has a total of 210% that he can parcel out to up to three different targets. Dúrchest's -threat timer has roughly the same mechanic as the Turtle's single target DoT (albeit it can be shared amongst up to three people).
   • Two decoys: Two people should aggro Dúrchest, turning him away from the rest of the party and letting their -aggro start to build up, while keeping Durchest faced away from the rest of the party. Once their aggro starts to get high enough (perhaps 30%-50%), the main tank should move in front of Dúrchest and begin aggroing him. If the two original people stay in front of Dúrchest within melee range while the main tank stays back out of range of Cleave, then they build up to -100% aggro and the main tank will only have -10% aggro. Once this happens the main tank is free to close with Dúrchest as he will not have any additional -threat to give out.
   • Tank swapping: One tank should run in and aggro Dúrchest, turning him away from the rest of the party. The other tank should go behind Dúrchest. When the front tank gets to about about -50% incoming threat, he should swap places with the back tank (by copying aggro via Engage or transferring aggro). The -threat debuff will drop off the person who moves behind Dúrchest when they are no longer within the cleave area.

Adds

10 gloom will be added to the area on every other spawn, from a beginning gloom of 180 up to 230. The first add will spawn by the west door, then each spawn will alternate doors after that. Each add has 39k morale and a special ability that it will give Dúrchest. The first five adds are on timers while the final five are spawned by extinguishing torches on the back wall. The final five can be summoned in any desired order (one particular mob for each torch), so that the special abilities which they may give Dúrchest can be added on in a desired order. Killing the final five adds is the first part of the Challenge for Dúrchest's fight (killing him is the final part). The adds can be summoned at any stage in Dúrchest's fight -- right at the beginning if you so desire, or when Dúrchest is down to 10k morale if you so desire.

1. Armoured Black-axe (West door): Gives Impending Doom (increased damage on each death, player character or add). This increases by 17.5% up to a max of 175% increased damage.
2. Armoured Flame-mace (East door): Inferno will now be cast on a random target when an add dies. Inferno is a distributed damage fire attack.
3. Armoured Shadow-axe (West door): Seed of Shadow cast about twice a minute on a random player. This is a removable fear debuff which, if allowed to tick down does AoE damage.
4. Armoured Black-mace (East door)
5. Armoured Black-axe (West door)

The final five adds can be summoned in any order at any time during the fight. They will continue to come from alternating doors (the first will come from the East door, then the West, etc.) and some have a special ability that it will give to Dúrchest:

• Armoured Shadow-mace (far left lever): A second Seed of Shadow cycle is started, so there will be roughly four every minute.
• Armoured Black-sword (middle-left lever)
• Armoured Storm-axe (middle lever): Dúrchest will randomly give out a large Static Shock AoE from now on when an add dies.
• Armoured Black-sword (middle-right lever)
• Armoured Flame-sword (far right lever)

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Dúrchest to the Twins

Make sure to have a hunter who can track beasts (trait required) to track wargs (Guldur Fell-beasts). They can pounce for 4k damage, so attack them while they're stealthed. The sorcerers (Umbarrim Sorcerer) have a tough corruption and put a blue eye over a person's head -- this person needs to run away from the group, as it will basically rain down damage on anyone nearby and leave a poisonous puddle where it fired off.

The Twins of Fire and Shadow

The two twins of Fire (Morgaraf) and Shadow (Cargaraf). In the normal chest, you'll find the Dark Emblem of Hand, which is bartered for the +30 gloves. Hard mode is to kill Cargaraf and Morgaraf within 10 seconds of each other and within the Challenge chest is the Dark Emblem of Spirit which is bartered for the +30 helmet. Both twins primarily do tactical-based damage, aligned with their own element.

Any pottable fears need to removed immediately and anyone with eyes over their head needs to step away from the group.

Cargaraf

See also Cargaraf

Debuffs and Special Attacks

If you get a fear on you, GET IT OFF. It comes from Cargaraf and is called Shadow of Doubt. It comes out in progressively stronger versions as the fight goes on and ultimately will do -100% incoming healing, -5k morale applied on expiration, etc., it's a nasty fear, although it does make your skills 60% cheaper and you do more damage while you have it, unless the tooltip is bugged, so if a non-aggro target gets this, it might be worth keeping it for a few seconds just for the increased damage and lower power costs, but do remember the penalties.

The Away With You skill can one-shot anyone in melee range, so Cargaraf must either be ranged tanked or kited.

Morgaraf

See also Morgaraf

Morgaraf will put a fire DoT on his target. Much like Nornúan (the Turtle), Morgaraf will continually reapply his DoT, increasing its potency. A person needs to be out of combat for approximately 45 seconds for the DoT to expire.

Debuffs and Special Attacks

The Nazgul and his Fell Steed

See also Lieutenant of Dol Guldur Walkthrough

So, he starts with about 500k morale on his fell beast. He'll give yellow eyes, which means you're the target of the fell beast. If it bites you, the Nazgul and his beast are healed for 10k morale. Every so often he flies up and pees liquid LSD on the concrete beneath you. If you step in it, you'll start tripping, like all crazy like, man, like it's a bad trip, all feared and shadow damage. Don't do drugs, stay away from the pee pools.

Around 150k morale, the Nazgul dismounts. The fell beast keeps the same amount of morale while the Nazgul starts off fresh. Hard mode is to kill the Nazgul right now, before you kill the fell beast. The Nazgul has a circular unremovale corruption -- removing it just goes to the next one down on the list, the bottom one goes to the top. So, remove it if you don't like the corruption it's on and want to change it.

On easy mode, the legs drop here. On hard mode, the shoulder piece drops in addition to the legs.

• Choking Shadows corruption (real life half moon icon)
  • Slowing Shadows debuff (blue icon)
  • -30% incoming healing
  • +30% attack duration
  • -30% ranged damage
• Oppresive Shadows corruption (black shadow man on yellow background)
  • Draining Shadows debuff (red icon)
  • -20% run speed
  • -20% tactical damage
  • Also puts some sort of really big Shadow DoT up on you
• Shadowy Abyss corruption (black splotch on purple background)
  • Corrupting Shadows debuff (yellow icon)
  • +10% power cost
  • +10% all skill inductions
  • -10% melee damage

Every time someone dies, the Nazgul gets a buff and a 10k morale add is summoned. Don't die.

There you go. :)