8.3 releases on January 14th, and with it comes a bunch of game-changing mechanics, zones, and scenarios. Although 8.3 took a while to get here, it brings a huge amount of content. It can be a bit much to process all at once, so this guide will give a TL;DR of all the new stuff coming in Visions of N’zoth, along with general tips along the way for raiders who want to maximize their efficiency when the new raid becomes available.

Patch/Raid Release Schedule

January 14 – Visions of N’zoth Goes Live
January 21 – Normal and Heroic Difficulties
January 28 – Mythic Ny’alotha, Raid Finder Wing 1 (Vision of Destiny)
February 11 – Raid Finder Wing 2 (Halls of Devotion)
February 25 – Raid Finder Wing 3 (Gift of Flesh)
March 10 – Raid Finder Wing 4 (The Waking Dream)

New Legendary Cloak – Ashjra’kamas

When you’re going through the 8.3 questline, you will eventually get a 470 ilvl legendary cloak, Ashjra’kamas. This cloak will most definitely be an upgrade of whatever you have on, and it gives two major bonuses; corruption resistance and reduced sanity drain. The corruption resistance helps you negate the negative effects on corruption gear (more on that later), and the sanity drain reduction helps in Horrific and Lesser Visions of N’zoth. To upgrade the cloak, you have to complete certain sections in Horrific Visions based on how much your cloak has leveled up. When you start off with your cloak, you’ll want to always make sure you kill the “major” boss in the Horrific Vision in every run. If you don’t kill the major boss, even if you defeated bosses in side zones, you will NOT get the items to upgrade your cloak. When your cloak reaches rank 6, it gains an active effect that allows you to remove all corruption debuffs on you currently and for the next 6 seconds. Rank 12 gives a mainstat proc.

More information on the legendary cloak can be found in Wowhead’s legendary cloak guide.

Corruption: The Titanforge Replacement

Items in patch 8.3 will not be able to titanforge, but will instead become “corrupted” (except for trinkets, which cannot be corrupted). The system works like a double-edged sword; while you can get powerful bonuses and perks, the cost is debuffs that can be too much to handle if your corruption is to high. An example of a corrupted piece of gear is below.

While the effect is powerful, there is a hefty chunk of corruption on this item.

While the effect the item gives may be powerful, it does add a hefty amount of corruption to your character. When you have any sort of corruption on your character, you can get slowed anytime you take damage. Having more than 20 corruption can give you the previous effect and spawn a zone around you that damages you while you’re in it. Having more than 40 corruption gives you both previous effects and can spawn an add that will chase you and deal damage if your caught. These effects get worse and worse the more corruption you have. For example, the amount of the slow debuff is equal to {Corruption + 10}. There are some ways to gain corruption resistance: one way is through the corruption resistance on the legendary cloak. Some other ways are the 3 new azerite essences coming in 8.3, which can give 10 corruption resistance. This is an unique effect, which means only one essence can give you the corruption resistance. If you want to cleanse a corrupted item, there will be a quest once you get your first corrupted item that will allow you to cleanse both the positive and negative corruption effect on the weapon from MOTHER.

More information on corruption can be found at Wowhead’s article here.

Uldum and Vale of the Eternal Blossom Invasions

Similar to faction incursions introduced in 8.1, Uldum and the Vale of Eternal Blossom will undergo regular “Titan” invasions. The zones undergo two types of invasions that swap with each other every week. N’zoth will choose to invade a zone for the whole week, while the other zone goes through 2 different invasions that change on Friday. For example, N’zoth may be invading the Vale while Uldum gets invaded by the Aqir, and then switch to the Amathet on Friday. There is a fill in the bar quest for each zone, along with dailies that give coalescing visions, a currency that allows you to buy vessels to play horrific visions. You need a vessel each time you do a horrific vision. Completing the N’zoth invasion bar will give you a 440 corrupted item piece, azerite, a vessel of horrific vision, and other goodies. Completing an invasion in the other zone gives less azerite and goodies, but still give 5,500 coalescing visions (a vessel of horrific visions costs 10,000 coalescing visions). Since the non-N’zoth incursions reset on Friday, doing both bar quests give 11,000 coalescing visions, which is enough to buy a vessel. You can fly in Uldum and the Vale, so it shouldn’t be too hard to navigate. In the zone N’zoth is invading, there will be a lesser vision and a daily next to you (it will show up on your map). You can only access the lesser visions once a day, but completely the daily will reward with you 1,000 coalescing visions (or 2,000 if it’s your first lesser vision daily of the week).

More information on invasions can be found at Wowhead’s Nzoth assaults guide.

Horrific Visions

Horrific Visions are the new 1-5 player scenario in 8.3, which are the main source to upgrade your cloak. The visions swap between Orgrimmar and Stormwind every week. In these Horrific Visions you have a sanity bar, and when it runs out you will be kicked out of the Vision. If you die, you are immediately kicked out of the vision. The first vision you do will most likely destroy you, but you will then be able to unlock the Titan Research Archive for these visions:

Titan Research is crucial if you want to progress far in the Horrific Vision.

The upgrades cost corrupted mementos, another currency coming 8.3 (there is no upgrade time; once you buy it you have it). The first upgrade you get will allow you to spawn 3 orbs per vision that will allow you to fully regain your sanity in them over 10 seconds. As you get more and more of these upgrades it will become easier and easier to progress in the vision. For the first few visions, it is EXTREMELY important you kill the final boss (Thrall/Alleria) no matter what. These bosses give the items needed to upgrade your legendary cloak the first couple of times; if you get cocky and don’t get to kill the final boss, you WILL be behind on your cloak progression.

More information on Horrific Visions can be found in the Wowhead Horrific Visions overview.

Raid, M+, and World Quest Loot Changes

Operation: Mechagon is coming to Mythic+ as two separate dungeons: one with the first 4 bosses and the other with the last 4 bosses. This is big for loot tables as some items from Mechagon, like the cloth bracers, are going to be BiS items for specs like Fire Mage. The first clear you do of either wing of the dungeon in M+ will also give you progress towards Vision of Perfection, which should make it easier to grind out. Other things to note for M+ are that you can no longer get cloaks in the weekly chest (since you’ll have the legendary cloak), and that the item you get in your weekly cache will always be corrupted (unless it is a trinket). The end of run rewards scale up to 465 (from a level 15 key) and the weekly cache rewards scale up to 475 (from a level 15 key), which is equal to mythic Ny’alotha loot.

As for Ny’alotha, some of the weapons from the raid will already have corruption on them, removing some of the RNG from the weapons you could get in the raid. Not every boss in the raid also drops azerite gear; below is a list of bosses that drop azerite gear from each of their respective armor types. Blizzard has also mentioned how, at least for most specializations, most of the azerite gear from the raid should have your BiS traits.

World quests and regular dungeons are also getting a small loot buff; regular world quests scale up to 415 and emissary caches will scale up to 445 (the item level of normal Ny’alotha). Normal dungeons now give 400 item level loot, heroic dungeons 415 ilvl, and mythic dungeons 430 ilvl.

Heart of Azeroth Updates

There are 3 new essences per role: One is through Horrific Visions, one is through lesser visions and Uldum Accord rep., and the other is from Ny’alotha. The special catch with these essences is that if you have one of them equipped, even if it’s in a minor slot, you gain 10 corruption resistance. The resistance can be only be acquired from one essence, however, since it is a unique effect. Below is a list of all the new traits per role:

8.3 Questline:

Horrific Visions Essences:

Ny’alotha Raid Essence:

Along with the new essences, the Heart of Azeroth can be upgraded to level 80. At level 71 and 80  there are new perseverance traits (which grant 3% stamina) and a new minor essence trait slot at level 75. Once your Heart of Azeroth is level 80, you can still fill the bar to increase it’s item level and buff your essences. Some essences, such as Nazjatar and Mechagon reputation essences, are also having their requirements and costs nerfed.

More information on the new essences can be found in Wowhead’s Essence Overview.

Professions

There aren’t really many changes to professions coming in 8.3. The new crafted gear uses the same mats from Nazjatar, and has a system similar to the abyssal focus from the Eternal Palace. New fishing and food materials help make food which only help out in Horrific Visions, although the boosts they give can be pretty helpful. As a result, people will want to bring their own personal foods to the raids since there’s no new foods and for most specs, secondary stats are more important than primary stats. It will also be tougher to grind out what’s needed for group feasts, as there will be fewer people farming spare crates in Mechagon. The new crafted items do require more mats from Nazjatar, so it may be good to get grinding now.

Last Minute Preparations

Still unsure of what to do before 8.3? Here are some tips that could give you the boost when the patch comes out:

  • Make sure to spend all your Titan Residuum since it resets when season 4 comes out (January 21st). Alternatively, all Residuum is turning into Silver with 8.3, so you can always bank it for small amounts of cash.
  • Save your Island Expeditions treasure maps in order to get a better chance at azerite or residuum missions from the mission table.
  • If you have a crafting profession, grind out Nazjatar materials now in order to save time and money later.
  • Stock up on healing potions, flasks, and food since the price will probably skyrocket when the patch comes out.

Links to Other Resources

Below are links to other Wowhead guides which give more explanation to some of the things discussed in this article:

Class and Essence Changes – placeholder

Raid Loot Guide – placeholder

Socket Information – 8.3 Gouged Eye of N’zoth: Adding Sockets to Your Gear – Details and Restrictions

Corrupted Memento Farming – placeholder

Coalescing Vision Farming – placeholder