Fated Raids Explained: Everything You Need to Know for Raiding in Shadowlands Season 4 (9.2.5) (2024)

Fated Raids are a new feature of Shadowlands Season 4, andare meant to provide a new twist on familiar raids from the expansion that youmay or may not have previously experienced. Learn all about what makes Fated Raidsdifferent, their unique rewards, and the ability to both choose and upgrade yourdesired drops below!.

As part of the experimental nature of Shadowlands Mythic+ Season 4and Shadowlands PvP Season 4, Blizzard has also taken the opportunity totry something new with raiding during the final stretch of the Shadowlandsexpansion in Patch 9.2.5. This new system of Season 4 is known asFated Raids.

Starting with the Dragonflight Pre-Patch, every one of thethree major raids of Shadowlands — along with the world bossreleased during its patch — will be featured as a "Fated" version, withhigher item level loot and a couple of additional mechanics on each fight thatare meant to make things easier if executed correctly. In addition, bosses withina Fated raid will drop Cosmic Flux and reward reputation for a relevantfaction! These Fated Raids areCastle Nathria, Sanctum of Domination, andSepulcher of the First Ones. Do notforget to check out our guides to any of these raids or bosses if you need areminder or have never faced them before!

In addition to being tuned for players with higher item levels, Fated Raidsalso feature a unique affix, similar to Mythic+ dungeons; their effectsare listed below. Keep checking our guides toCastle Nathria, Sanctum of Domination, andSepulcher of the First Ones to see which encounters feature each ofthese new challenges.

• Fated Power: Chaotic Essence
  • A Chaotic Essence will appear and cast Chaotic Destruction until itis interacted with. Once you do, you have 15 seconds to kill as many ChaoticMotes as possible to receive a stacking buff to your group's damage and healingfor the next 25 seconds. This buff caps out at 40 Chaotic Motes.
• Fated Power: Creation Spark
  • Periodically, a player will have a damage-over-time (DoT) effect applied for 30seconds. When this DoT expires, Creation Sparks will fly toward spots on the floor.Players must "catch" these Creation Sparks before they hit the ground to gaina stacking buff to their casting/attack/movement speed and cooldown reduction for20 seconds. Failing to catch a Creation Spark will apply a stacking DoT to the raidfor 20 seconds.
• Fated Power: Protoform Barrier
  • A boss in the encounter will temporarily gain a damage absorption shieldand radiate additional damage until it is removed. Simultaneously, a new enemy willspawn and apply a massive, shared barrier to all enemies in the encounter for 15seconds. Players must attack this new enemy — or heal an additional friendlytarget with this barrier — to break the shield in time. Successfully breakingthe barrier will apply all the damage dealt directly back to the enemies and empowerthe raid with 25% bonus damage and healing for 40 seconds. Failing to break thebarrier in time will instead cause it to explode and apply a powerful DoT to theraid for 8 seconds.
• Fated Power: Reconfiguration Emitter
  • An additional enemy will spawn at times during the encounter and will initiallybe immune to damage as it attempts to cast an ability that damages the entire raid.If this cast is interrupted, a smaller pulse of damage will instead occur. Thelonger this enemy lives, the stronger it will become. However, upon defeat theraid will be empowered with additional secondary stats based on how strong theemitter enemy was allowed to get.

When a raid is Fated the higher item levels awarded from encounters asfollows:

• Fated Raid Finder — 265/272
• Fated Normal — 278/285
• Fated Heroic — 291/297
• Fated Mythic — 304/311

The higher item levels shown for each difficulty are exclusively obtainedon equipment dropped by the final 2-3 bosses of each Fated Raid, and items obtainedfrom the Fated version of each world boss will be only be 285.

Fated Raids will continue to drop Conduits, but will do so at theitem level of Conduits from Sepulcher of the First Ones. This means thatConduits within Fated Raids will appear at the following item levels:

• Fated Raid Finder — 239
• Fated Normal — 252
• Fated Heroic — 265
• Fated Mythic — 278

It should be noted that Conduit item levels are otherwise not going up inSeason 4.

So as to not create an imbalance that heavily favors players who have beenraiding throughout the entirety of the Shadowlands expansion, thereare a few restrictions regarding Fated Raids. Although the item levels of thepieces have increased, it should be noted that Shards of Dominationwill not work in any form within the Fated Sanctum of Dominationraid.

Bonuses from Tier Sets are not active in theDragonflight Pre-Patch, but tiertokens will still only drop in the regular and Fated versions of theSepulcher of the First Ones raid.

Finally, if you are looking to fill out the raiding slots in your weeklyGreat Vault, be aware that you will need to specifically kill bossesfrom that week's Fated Raid for it to count, with the rewards in the vaultbeing chosen from the loot tables of all Fated bosses you have ever defeated.

As of the Dragonflight Pre-Patch, there is no longera rotation between the fated raids. Instead, all raids and world bosses of theShadowlands will simultaneously be in their fated variants.

While a raid is Fated, any unlocked skips (those earned with Sludgefist's Head, Phylactery Shard, or Mourne Fragment) are still usable,allowing players to potentially bypass many of the encounters in the Fated Raidif they desire.

Since Fated Raids initially existed on a rotation (for now),it would prove very frustrating to seek out a particular item you desire if youonly had a few chances in the season. To that end, Blizzard also introduceda way to obtain the exact weapon or trinket you want from any of the raids inShadowlands. However, there is a price to be paid, and regular gold will not beenough. Instead, you will need to seek out Puzzling Cartel Dinars.

To start out, you will need to enter any of the Shadowlands raidswhile they are in their Fated versions. Once inside, you will automatically begiven a quest to first kill 30 Fated Raid bosses on any difficulty,including LFR — defeating the same boss on multiple difficultiesin a week will still only count as one kill, however. This quest hasthree parts — with each part requiring fewer boss kills to complete— and is the only way to obtain Puzzling Cartel Dinar,meaning you can only earn three Dinar across the entire season.

Initially in Season 4, it is expected to take around 5 Fated Raids cleared toachieve all 3 Dinars, though this amount of time will be reduced later. Knowingall this, Use your Dinars wisely!

Once you have earned at least one Puzzling Cartel Dinar, you will wantto visit Ko'ropo, So'turu, and Ta'choso. These three vendorscan be found next to the Great Vault in Oribos and will sellyou any weapon or trinket — or the Soulwarped Seal of Menethil/ Soulwarped Seal of Wrynn for Death Knightsand Priests, respectively — from Fated Raids at theirNormal Fated item level (278/285) for one Dinar each. Although they willnot sell Hunters Rae'shalare, Death's Whisper, this itemwill be dropping at a higher rate from Sylvanas, along with a new setof items to upgrade its item level for players that already own it.With all this in mind, be sure to check out your specialization's gear guide forrecommendations on what to purchase!

As a final bonus, in Fated Raids you also have the opportunity to upgradeyour items to their Heroic or Mythic versions! This is done by receiving cyphersfrom Heroic and Mythic Fated Raid bosses, with one cypher always being given perboss killed. Note that Heroic and Mythic cyphers are separate currencies,but you can upgrade an item immediately from its Normal item level to Mythicwithout first upgrading to Heroic!

Once you have acquired 20 Heroic or Mythic cyphers, you can combine theminto a Cosmic Creation Impetus or Sacred Creation Impetus, respectively,and use one on any item from Fated Raids (including those purchased with Puzzling Cartel Dinar) to upgrade it.

There are special achievements tied to completing all three Fated Raids at acertain difficulty level, each with their own additional reward:

• Normal — ( Fates of the Shadowlands Raids) — Jigglesworth Sr. mount;
• Heroic — ( Heroic: Fates of the Shadowlands Raids) — "Hero of Fate" title;
• Mythic — ( Mythic: Fates of the Shadowlands Raids) — teleports to all three Shadowlands raids:
  • Path of the Sire
  • Path of the Tormented Soul
  • Path of the First Ones

These rewards are still obtainable up until the launch of Dragonflighton November 28th, 2022.

Note that both Ahead of the Curve: The Jailer and Cutting Edge: The Jailerare not obtainable in Season 4. Mounts that drop on Heroic and Mythicdifficulties (including the Fractal Cypher of the Carcinized Zerethsteed fromHeroic The Jailer) will continue to do so at their 100% drop rate untilthe launch of the upcoming Dragonflight expansion.

There are also no hall of fame achievements for Fated Raids(eg: Hall of Fame: The Jailer (Horde))!

Overall, Fated Raids represent an interesting idea for raiding going forward,allowing players the opportunity to see raiding content in an expansion that theymay not have had the chance to try out before increasing item levels made itirrelevant. In addition, the ability to know that you will eventually getthe exact weapon or trinket you want with Puzzling Cartel Dinar and evenbe able to upgrade it as you defeat Heroic and Mythic encounters should removesome of the pain if you are normally unlucky. If this test of the system goeswell, then there may even be a chance for this system to be carried over intothe upcoming Dragonflight expansion!

If you would like to see other changes occurring in Mythic+ or PvP for ShadowlandsSeason 4 or to catch up on the most recent patches of Shadowlands, be sure tocheck out our overviews below.