In WoW: The War Within, the Silken Court is a three-phase fight featuring two bosses: Skeinspinner Takazj, and Anub'arash. It's the seventh and penultimate boss encounter in Nerub-ar Palace, the first Raid in Season 1 of the expansion, and it's proven to be one of the hardest fights in the Raid for many groups – even on LFR and Normal difficulties.

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This guide is an in-depth explanation of the fight, including details on every ability, how to prepare your Raid for the Silken Court, the basics for each boss phase, and how to correctly follow each boss mechanic. The fight requires a lot of coordination from everyone in your group, and knowing mechanics is more important than pumping out high DPS.

Silken Court Overview & Raid Preparation

There are three phases in the Silken Court boss fight, with two intermissions (after Phase 1 and Phase 2). All three main phases feature both bosses, who share a health pool, but each intermission centers on each boss individually.

  • Phase One: Anub'arash and Skeinspinner. Ends when the shared boss HP pool reaches 50% or after two minutes.
  • Phase One Intermission: Skeinspinner only. Ends when the boss' Shield is destroyed.
  • Phase Two: Anub'arash and Skeinspinner. Ends when the shared boss HP pool reaches 25% or after two minutes.
  • Phase Two Intermission: Anub'arash only. Ends when the boss' Shield is destroyed.
  • Phase Three: Anub'arash and Skeinspinner using all mechanics encountered so far.

There are a lot of mechanics to learn for this fight, and it's a good idea to prepare ahead of time if you want to beat the Silken Court. Before pulling the bosses, assign members of your group to these roles.

  • Web Bomb Partners: Choose up to three pairs of players who will be responsible for using Binding Webs to stop Anub'arash's charge attack in all three main Phases. These should be classes that are very mobile and defensive – most Cloth-wearing classes are not suitable. You need one of these in Normal, and two in Heroic, with a possible third just for insurance.
  • Alternate Dispellers: Though Healers will be primarily responsible for Dispelling the Stinging Swarm debuff on time, other Priests and classes with magic dispel abilities should help so they can focus on Healing.

It's also not a bad idea to tell your DPS that can Pull other players to their location to keep an eye out for group members who can't get out of certain mechanics, like if the Caster pulls the raid onto one of the melee boss' Spike Storm rings.

You do not need to worry about setting up Raid groups for this fight, but be certain that you get at least one Binding Webs across Anub'arash's charge path. If you are assigned this role, stick close to your partner, and communicate with them when it's time to get Webbed and block the Reckless Charge move.

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Silken Court TWW Boss Guide – Phase By Phase

Phase One

WoW TWW Silken Court Guide ANubarash Charge Nerubar Palace

Phase One features a few mechanics from each boss that need to be followed. Don't stand in each other's Poison Bolt circles, kill Adds as soon as they appear, and correctly execute the Web Bomb mechanic to breeze through this first part.

Skeinspinner: Poison Bolt

  • Caster boss applies a dispellable DoT to the Tank, then jumps to a new location
    • Simply Dispel the DoT off of the Tank

Skeinspinner: Web Bombs

  • Caster boss launches Web Bombs on random players that leave behind Web Pools, which slow and tether players together
    • Stack ranged DPS and casters to the side of the room to lure the Web Bomb locations out of the way of the center ring. This will make it easier to form a Binding Web to block the melee boss later on
    • If you have been marked for one of the group's Web Pairs, walk onto a web with your partner to become tethered to them when the melee boss reaches 90% Energy. This gives enough time to form the web without taking too much damage from the DoT the web creates

Skeinspinner: Venomous Rain

  • Caster boss highlights an area around all players and drops a poisonous bomb on them, dealing damage and applying a DoT
    • Don't panic, just make sure you aren't directly standing in anyone else's circle. It's OK if the circles themselves overlap, your character's model cannot

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Anub'arash: Piercing Strikes

  • Melee boss deals heavy damage to the Tank and doubles the damage of Piercing Strikes for 30 seconds
    • Tanks need to swap every time this is cast, as it can one-shot you with one stack active

Anub'arash: Call of the Swarm

  • Melee boss summons a handful of Scarabs around the room which hone in on random players and apply a stacking damage debuff
    • DPS players, especially Ranged, must switch to these adds as soon as they spawn
    • If you have been targeted, kite the Scarab to the bosses so they can be AoE'd down, or use your class' CC abilities to prevent them from hitting you

Anub'arash: Impaling Eruption

  • Melee boss casts a huge cone over a slice of the arena, which Impales and damages players who are hit, who must then be freed
    • Save your movement abilities to get out of the way of this ability when it comes out.

Anub'arash: Reckless Charge

  • Melee boss will burrow underground and re-appear on one side of the arena with a large charge bar in front of him. After about five seconds he will launch forward, dealing immense, Raid-killing damage to everyone in the group if the charge is not interrupted.
    • Web Pairs should start Tethering together at about 90% energy, then walk to the center of the room before the Charge happens to get set up. Don't walk too far away from your partner or the tether will break.
    • Each member of the Web Pair should stand on either side of the melee boss' charge path, so that he runs into the web that connects you. You must not stand directly in the path.
    • If successful, the boss will stop immediately upon hitting the web and be stunned for about 10 seconds.
    • On Heroic difficulty, the only major change in this encounter is that you need two pairs of tethered players to break the charge, not one. Make sure two pairs of players have Web Bomb bindings active when Abun'arash goes to charge.

Phase One Intermission: Skeinspinner Only

WoW TWW Silken Court Guide Nerubar Palace Intermission 1

In this phase, Anub'arash burrows underground, while the Skeinspinner takes center stage. The P1 intermission ends when the boss' Shield is destroyed.

Skeinspinner: Shatter Existence

  • Caster boss will gain a shield and start channeling, dealing immense damage to cones around the room in a certain order, and increasing her damage output the longer that her shield remains active
    • To avoid being hit by these blasts, stand next to the first slice that appears, then walk into it as soon as it explodes.
    • Use DPS cooldowns to clear her shield significantly faster and get to Phase Two

Phase Two

WoW TWW Silken Court Guide Nerubar Palace Phase 2

Phase Two is largely the same as Phase One, but now the melee boss will not use Reckless Charge. You don't need to worry about the Binding Web mechanic for this phase – instead, you'll have to deal with three new Skeinspinner abilities, plus everything else in P1.

Anub'arash: Stinging Swarm

  • Melee boss will cast Stinging Swarm on three players at random, inflicting a permanent DoT that can be dispelled, but will jump to either the nearest player or the caster boss and deal large Raid-wide damage
    • Players with Stinging Swarm must immediately run to the caster boss in the middle of the room and yell their character name plus "dispel", or bring attention to themselves some other way
    • Priests with Mass Dispel are useful here because once all three players are grouped up, they can all transfer the Stinging Swarm in one cast, but any class with a Dispel can do this
    • If you don't have Stinging Swarm, get away from the caster boss to prevent it from accidentally jumping to you upon Dispel

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Skeinspinner: Cataclysmic Entropy

  • Caster boss teleports to the middle of the arena and begins to channel a Raid-killing explosion.
    • The only way to Interrupt this cast is to Dispel three players with the Stinging Swarm debuff while they are standing right next to her. This debuff jumps to the nearest player or the Skeinspinner.
    • Backup Dispellers should be ready to help Healers transfer Stinging Swarm to the Caster boss correctly

Skeinspinner: Strands of Reality

  • Caster boss channels a large cone across the room, knocking players hit backward and dealing immense damage
    • Like with the melee boss' own cone attack, save your movement abilities to get out of the way of this AoE quickly

Skeinspinner: Web Vortex

  • Caster boss pulls all players to its location, tethering everyone and slowing them while channeling an explosion that players have to get out of quickly
    • This can't be avoided, but you can walk out of the AoE with plenty of time left, even when slowed.
    • Break your Tether as soon as you can to prevent taking uneccesary damage. There is no Charge in Phase 2, so nobody needs to remain Tethered.

Phase Two Intermission

WoW TWW Silken Court Guide Intermission 2

In this phase, the Skeinspinner beams away while the Raid focuses on Anub'arash. Just like in P1, The P2 intermission ends when the boss' Shield is destroyed.

Anub'arash: Spike Storm

  • Melee boss will surround the room with a huge swarm and channel enormous Rings around the arena, dealing enormous damage and Impaling anyone inside the area when it goes off.
    • It's more important to dodge the spike rings than to deal damage to the boss in this phase – getting Impaled means taking two DPS away from reducing his shield as someone will have to tab off to free you
    • Until the shield breaks, the boss will deal Raid-wide damage that ramps up in intensity, which has to be healed through.

Phase Three

Phase three borrows mechanics from all other phases, including the first phase's Reckless Charge, but not Web Bombs.

Instead, when the caster boss pulls everyone in and binds them together with webs, it's imperative that at least one Tether remains unbroken. You do not get another source of webs in this phase, and you will be randomly paired with someone else, so stick with your random partner if your Raid group tells you to keep your Tether or not.

Keep in mind that on Heroic difficulty, you still need two tethers, not one, to break Anub'arash's charge in Phase 3.

Aside from that, just avoid swirlies and conal attacks, Dispel the Stinging Swarm debuffs when affected players are near the caster boss, Tank Swap with every Piercing Strike, and you will beat the Silken Court.

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World of Warcraft The War Within
World of Warcraft: The War Within
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Released
August 26, 2024
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WHERE TO PLAY

DIGITAL
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Base Game
World of Warcraft
Developer(s)
Blizzard
Franchise
Warcraft
Platform(s)
PC