Hard mode is... hard.

All of the five man instances in the Outlands allow you to choose a difficulty level before zoning in: Normal or Hard. Lower 60's instances on hard mode get bumped up to level 70 difficulty. Instances that were already level 70 difficulty get bumped up to unrelenting assbeat mode.

Take Shadow Labyrinths, for example. The first boss, Ambassador Hellmaw, gets upgraded to a level 72 monster with a room-wide AE fear and Chromaggus' poison breath. At 67, you'd better have a bank full of +hit gear, if you want on this ride.



It was a painstakingly long fight, but we finally whittled him down and killed him. In a solid level 70 group, he would probably be a joke, but at 67 he's a challenge. Upgrading a tier 2 helm makes it worth the trouble though:



The Badge of Justice is a token used to purchase any of these items.

The second boss was a completely different story.



That's Blackheart the Inciter. Anyone want to take a guess why he's just standing there watching us, laughing? I guess I'd laugh too, if I were able to mind control five people at once and have them kill each other while I watched.

Nerf Pit Commanders

Tavarok

Crystal Prison: 60 yd range. Stun + -10% hp/s for 5 seconds.
Earthquake: Area effect, 45 yd range. Stun + 1-1.2k for 3 seconds.

A tough fight with such a low average level (and retard melee shaman), but worth the effort:

The Black Stalker

Sounds like a cheesy USA Up All Night movie title, staring Wesley Snipes. His redeeming quality:



The Black Stalker's redeeming quality, I mean. Wesley Snipes has none.

Ghaz'an

Ghaz'an (second boss in the Underbog) is an example of the great encounters we're seeing in five man instances now. Directional breath attack with debuff and tail whip that knocks you off the raised fight area. Not a hard fight if everyone knows what to do, but very difficult to charge in blindly and win.

And, the rewards justify the difficulty:

Mana Tombs > Us.

The first boss of the first wing of Auchiduon, Pandemonius.

After five attempts, our best result was 19%. 750/hit damage shield + 4,500 damage double bolts = pain.

He was probably only a show stopper due to our group's low average level, but still a huge step up from The Underbog, which we rolled through easily.

It's never fun getting completely shut down (in tier 2 gear, no less), but you've got to love the trend toward challenging bosses in these expansion instances. We've seen many five man fights so far with all of the elements of what a full 40 man raid would encounter pre-expansion.

I can't wait to see the raid encounters in TBC.