Van Cleef Achievement, post 4.0.6

[Aerron]

Has anyone else noticed they've changed this with the patch?

- Fire appears immediately on the ground under the rail. No more "over the rail" method.

- The aggro radius for the Foe Reaper is larger. Before I had a small area we could run into and grab quick heals before engaging. No longer.

- Spiders are no longer trivial. They hit a bit harder now.

Anyone done this since the patch? What changes did you have to make to the traditional strat?

[Asur]

I've gotten the achievement post patch and its really not that bad. We take the long way around just to be safe and the mini boss is killed before the spiders become an issue. I pull Foe Reaper to the safe spot near the door and tank him per usual. Something to try is to have an Engineer come along with you with a seaforium charge to blow open the door rather than waiting to get to the boat, saves about 10-15 seconds iirc.

[Vathral2]

Here are a couple of ideas that I have learned:

You can still actually jump down and do it the traditional way, even though you will probably take a tick of fire if you don't do the jump off the rail perfectly. The difference is that you aren't going to be engaging the ogre by the door, but rather, you are able to taunt him by the teleporter, and tank him there with your group pretty much immediately, still buying you plenty of time.

Helix remains relatively unchanged with a group that is good at dps, so I wouldn't concern myself there.

For the next part, one trick you can do, instead of relying on an engineer, you can have a blacksmith make you an Obsidium skeleton key before you even enter the instance, and after killing Helix, tell your entire group to take the teleporter to the ship, and you can simply open the door with your key (whether you are a blacksmith or not, and the key is instant cast too, unlike lockpick and seaforium bombs) and then pull foe reaper while skipping the gauntlet!

The last part, I have learned to bring a shaman or warlock for this, but you can do it just as quickly just wiping back and running in as the timer is still active. When the fourth part starts, if you have a warlock/shaman, soulstone a player, run to the top where vanessa is, and intentionally kill your group by letting the worgens kill the first NPC. When they kill her, the event ends, Vanessa automatically respawns at the top, the ss'd person can pop up, or the shaman can ankh, pull the boss, and grats achievement!

You can also do this part by letting the worgens kill the NPC, then releasing, running back in, taking the port, and you can still VERY easily make the timer. I've done this in under 3 minutes many times using this strategy, makes this by far one of the easiest achievements, just takes a little preparation.

Good luck!

[djlar]

Mmm aren't the BS keys only usable by BS?

We had a rogue or engineer to open the door from the other side strat.

However we took a bit too long on the werewolf run.. we failed..

Can you tan Vancleef before saving the 3 NPCs?

[Aerron]

Can you tan Vancleef before saving the 3 NPCs?

No, she's not a valid target until the nightmare elixir wears off. That said, there is another strat to this achievement we discovered was valid.

Once the robot boss was down, we ran past the worgen as they killed their respective people. Our priest was soul-stoned and we ran as far as we could. When the first group of Worgen killed their person, we all died, but the priest was able to stand back up, ran the rest of the way to the top and pulled her. Achievement counted for everyone in the group.

[rodos]

Mmm aren't the BS keys only usable by BS?

It appears that Obsidium Skeleton Key do not require BS to use. I did not know this. I know what's going up on the AH tonight.