Chess Event

Chess Event
Race(s)	Human or Orc
Location	Gamesman's Hall, Karazhan
Karazhan Template:Karazhan

The Chess event in Karazhan must be solved in order to reach Prince Malchezaar. The raid plays a sort of chess match against Medivh.

Although the analogy to chess is usable (Doomguards are "stronger" than Footmen for example), it's not very strict. The pieces from the event behave very differently from real chess pieces, in particular player-controlled pieces autoattack enemy pieces they face, and the Kings are actually the strongest pieces in the game. In order to start the event, a player has to talk to the King piece of their own faction. The objective is to kill the enemy King without losing one's own King. If the game is won, a Dust Covered Chest appears with loot. Many players see this encounter as an easy fight, referring to it as "the free epics".

Afterwards the pieces are reset, and it is possible to play a friendly game within the raid. Whenever a game is going on, there is a silence debuff in the chess room to prevent clearing the trash mobs leading to Prince Malchezaar.

It is possible to reset the event by talking to the Echo of Medivh.

Chess Piece Abilities and Control

After the event begins, raid members can control any currently uncontrolled piece of their own faction by talking to it. Upon taking control of a piece the player character is teleported onto a platform at the side of the chess field. The player gains the "control piece" buff, his viewing perspective changes to that of the controlled piece, and their action bar is replaced. It is possible to release control of a piece by removing the control buff (right click it). This incurs a 15 sec debuff, during which time it is not possible to take control of another piece.

The action bar for controlling a chess piece has the following layout:

1	2	3	4

• 1: Rotate Piece: The same for all pieces, click an adjacent square on the board to face toward it.
• 2: Move: This moves the piece, see piece description for details.
• 3: Special Ability 1: The piece's first unique ability, see piece description for details.
• 4: Special Ability 2: The piece's other unique ability, see piece description for details.

The abilities can either be activated by clicking on the action bar, or by using keys 1 through 4. It's faster to use the key shortcuts, particularly because the movement controls have a timeout. Each chess piece auto-attacks if it faces an enemy. While pieces can move diagonally, they can only face towards four directions. After a diagonal move, pieces turn 45° clockwise to realign themselves.

Movement and rotation share a common cooldown of 5 seconds, and the special abilities have another shared cooldown of 5 seconds. If an ability has a cooldown of more than 5 seconds, the other ability is only affected by the 5 second cooldown.

Chess Event Pieces
Piece	Alliance	Horde	Movement	Ability 1	Ability 2	Notes
King	King Llane	Warchief Blackhand	1 Space any dir.	Sweep / Cleave Deals 4000 damage to 3 frontal adjacent enemy units.	Heroism / Bloodlust Grants 50% increased damage to all allied humanoids on all 8 adjacent spaces, does not affect self. Cooldown 15 secs.	High Health/High Damage. The first side to kill the opponent's King wins.
Queen	Human Conjurer	Orc Warlock	Straight 3 / Diagonal 2	Elemental Blast / Fireball Deals 4000 damage to any single chess piece. Range: Straight 4 / Diagonal 3.	Rain of Fire / Poison Cloud Deal 6000 damage to any hostile chess piece and all adjacent hostile pieces. Cooldown 15 secs. Range: Straight 4 / Diagonal 3	Medium Health/High Damage
Bishop	Human Cleric	Orc Necrolyte	1 Space any dir.	Healing / Shadow Mend Heal a friendly piece for 12,000. Cooldown 20 secs. Range: Half of board.	Holy Lance / Shadow Spear Deals 2000 damage to enemy units standing in a straight line of 3 squares in front.	Low Health/Low Damage. Only Healer.
Knight	Human Charger	Orc Wolf	2 Straight / 1 Diag	Smash / Bite 3000 damage to a target 1 square in front.	Stomp / File:Ability Hunter Pet Wolf.png Howl Reduces damage of all adjacent hostile chess pieces by 50%, last for 10 secs.	Medium Health/Low Damage
Rook	Conjured Water Elemental	Summoned Daemon	1 Space any dir.	Geyser / Hellfire Deals 3000 damage to all adjacent hostile chess pieces.	Water Shield / Fire Shield Reduce damage taken by 50% for 5 sec.	Low Health/Medium Damage
Pawn	Human Footman	Orc Grunt	1 Space any dir.	Heroic Blow / File:Ability Hunter SwiftStrike.png Vicious Strike Deals 1000 damage to a target 1 square in front.	Shield Block / Weapon Deflection Absorbs 500 damage. Lasts 5 secs.	Low Health/Low Damage

Warning: Medivh Cheats!

Medivh cheats at random intervals during the game. Although on paper the effects look tough, in reality they usually have little effect on the course of the event.

• Healing Cheat: Heals Medivhs king (and possibly all the other pieces) to full HP.
• Damage Cheat: Medivh places a fire AoE on a random player controlled piece.
• Berserking Cheat: One of Medivhs units gains increased size, speed and damage.

Strategy

The king is quite strong and thus should be used in an offensive way—he is in fact similar to a DPS tank (be cautious though). A reasonable kill order is to deal with the enemy healers first, then drop the queen, and finally the king. If king and queen work together efficiently, and have good support from the bishops, the combats on the remainder of the board are less important. The friendly healers should move only very little, and concentrate on keeping the king and the queen at top health.

One simple strategy is to have each player chose one non-pawn piece which they want to control later. Then, each player moves the pawn in front of their piece as far as needed, releases control and takes over their "real" piece. As soon as holes in the pawn line appear, attack with the player controlled pieces. This is an excellent strategy for higher-levels trying to complete this event in a five-man or other smaller raid. By having a few players concentrate, at the start, on moving pawns and 'unplayed' pieces forward, these pieces are in range to auto-engage combat.

A more sophisticated strategy has four players initially controlling the four central pawns, and four other players on the king, the queen and both knights. The two remaining raid members should take the bishops. This allows to move the offensive pieces more quickly.

Dust Covered Chest appears after the game is won.

Bugs

• As of patch 2.4, releasing from a piece may cause the player to spawn below the floor of the room, leaving him back in the Curator's hallway. This can prevent the player from looting the chest because running back may take too long before it disappears—use a Warlock summon if possible in this case.
• Taking control of a piece may sometimes result in an near-immediate disconnect. The only way back into the game is to wait some time until the player is removed from the game with a "desertion" like debuff, or by quickly releasing control of the piece before the disconnect actually takes place.

Loot

Dust Covered Chest drops

Battlescar Boots Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Plate Feet 10 Armor +2 Strength or Intellect +2 Stamina +4 Parry   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +3 Parry   Durability 75 / 75 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 6 4 51 Bladed Shoulderpads of the Merciless Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Leather Shoulder 5 Armor +2 Agility or Intellect +3 Stamina +3 Critical Strike +2 Haste   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +3 Critical Strike   Durability 100 / 100 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 6 38 81 Fiend Slayer Boots Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Mail Feet 6 Armor +2 Agility or Intellect +3 Stamina +17 Hit +2 Critical Strike +2 Haste   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +3 Agility   Durability 80 / 80 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 5 19 49 Forestlord Striders Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Leather Feet 4 Armor +2 Agility or Intellect +4 Stamina +2 Versatility   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +4 Spell Power   Durability 80 / 80 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 4 40 67 Girdle of Treachery Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Leather Waist 4 Armor +2 Agility or Intellect +4 Stamina   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +3 Agility   Durability 55 / 55 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 2 91 64 Headdress of the High Potentate Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Cloth Head 3 Armor +3 Intellect +6 Stamina +4 Versatility Durability 100 / 100 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 6 41 9 Heart-Flame Leggings Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Mail Legs 9 Armor +3 Agility or Intellect +5 Stamina   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +4 Intellect   Durability 120 / 120 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 7 2 47 King's Defender Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Unique Sword One-Hand Speed 2.60 3 – 6 Damage (1.7 damage per second) +2 Strength +3 Stamina +2 Dodge +3 Critical Strike +1 Versatility Durability 105 / 105 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 11 62 22 Legplates of the Innocent Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Plate Legs 13 Armor +3 Strength or Intellect +5 Stamina +3 Critical Strike +3 Versatility   Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Prismatic Socket Socket Bonus: +4 Intellect   Durability 120 / 120 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 8 10 51 Mithril Chain of Heroism Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Neck +2 Strength +2 Agility +2 Stamina Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 10 27 77 Ring of Recurrence Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Unique Finger +2 Intellect +2 Stamina +2 Critical Strike Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 6 2 56 Triptych Shield of the Ancients Item Level 32Disenchants into: Not disenchantable Binds when picked up Shield Off Hand 45 Armor +2 Strength +5 Intellect +3 Stamina +2 Versatility Durability 120 / 120 Requires Level 27 Sell Price: 6 59 27 Badge of Justice Binds when picked up Requires Level 70

Quotes

The "Echo" of Medivh speaks at various events during the course of the game:

• Event begins: "Very well. Let the game begin."
• Cheating: "Perhaps a change is in order." "Time for an alternative scenario." "One must not become too complacent."

• Medivh loses a bishop: "A necessary sacrifice."
• Medivh loses a knight: "Yes...of course."
• Medivh loses a pawn: "Hmm." "Interesting." "No matter."
• Medivh loses his queen: "Ahh, I should have known."
• Medivh loses a rook: "A minor concern."

• Player loses a bishop: "The slightest loss of concentration is all it takes."
• Player loses a knight: "Yes...all according to plan."
• Player loses a pawn: "A transparent stratagem." "Let us see." "Ah, the wheels have begun to turn."
• Player loses the queen: "Now it gets interesting."
• Player loses a rook: "Foolish! Very foolish!"

• Player's king is in check: "As it should be."
• Medivh's king is in check: "And so, the end draws near."

• Player is checkmated: "Nothing less than perfection will do."
• Medivh is checkmated: "And so it ends."

External links

Boss Killers 

Boss Slayers Instructional videos on all the KZ bosses.