Herald of the Titans in Cataclysm

At the end of Wrath of the Lich King I was part of the one and only group on my realm that was going for “Herald of the Titans” achievement. This achievement requires you to kill Algalon (the heroic-mode only boss in Ulduar) only wearing gear of equivalent item level of the gear that drops in 10-man Ulduar. And once you do that, you get the title; Herald of the Titans.

After many months of gearing up ourselves and countless other people who would join for a bit, only to disappear soon after, we finally had a team of people in full gear, ready to destroy Algalon. Since in those days you only had an hour per week to put in attempts on Algalon, it took us quite a few weeks…. and I was very lucky, I managed to get the achievement just a short while before the shattering.

Still obtainable

Later on during Cataclysm I learned that the “Herald of the Titans”-achievement would still be obtainable, even in Cataclysm. As long as all the participating characters were level 80. After finding this out I decided to try to make a new team for it and get it again, since it was so awesome the first time.

And sure enough, after about 2 months of setting up a team and gearing it up, we had a full team of 11 people and with that team we went into Ulduar and smacked Algalon in the face! (We also went back the week after and did it again for that last 11th person of course)

Requirements

To achieve Herald of the Titans, you need to:

Defeat Algalon the Observer in 10-player mode at level 80* without anyone in the raid wearing any equipment with an item level higher than is available in 10-player Ulduar.

* This means ALL the participants in the raid need to be level 80

Clarification on item levels:

• Armor items must have item level 226 or lower (this includes relics, sigils etc.)
• Weapons must have item level 232 or lower (main hand, off-hand, shields, wands, ranged weapons)
• The gear doesn’t have to drop in Ulduar, it can come from anywhere as long as it meets the item level requirements. This includes PvP gear and even BoA gear.

Gear enhancement:

• Cataclysm enchants and gems require higher item levels than what you can use in Ulduar so you’ll need to use Wrath of the Lich King enchants and gems. Crafting professions self-enchants (such as Tailoring’s cloak enchant) do not require high item levels and will work just fine.
• All types (epic, blue) of Wrath of the Lich King gems and enchants work.
• Reforging is allowed and recommended. Most classes will want to reforge into Mastery since it scales so ridiculously well at level 80.

Consumables:

• Both Cataclysm flasks and food works just fine and is strongly recommended since it’ll provide all of you with huge stat increases (+390 useful stat, +90 stamina).
• Bring some seafood magnifique and a cauldron. If none of the level 80s can make them, you can have someone else put down the feast/cauldron just outside the raid for all of you. Just make sure that the person is in the raid when he or she puts down the feast/cauldron.

Tips

General:

• First of all, don’t forget to lock your character’s XP once it has reached level 80. You don’t want to accidentally level up and get to level 81…
• I highly recommend getting the Ulduar part for DBM or BigWigs, whatever boss mod you use.
• You no longer need a key to enter Algalon’s room.
• Algalon doesn’t disappear after an hour of the first attempt on him anymore, so no need to rush it.

Gearing:

• Gearing up can be fast or slow, whatever you and your group likes. If you want to take it slow then all you need to do is to run Ulduar continously for a while. You should be able to get all the gear you need from there. But if you like to speed it up a bit, and if you like to get your hands on some better items then it is highly recommended to grind for some Justice Point gear and to do the Icecrown Citadel dungeons and Trial of the Champion, often.
• The fastest way of grinding Justice Points is by doing the level 80 Cataclysm normal dungeons.
• The ilvl 200 Darkmoon Card: Greatness trinket is best in slot for all dpsers and healers due to the way stat values changed with Cataclysm.

Where the loot comes from:

• Justice Points
• WotlK dungeon tier: ilvl 200
• Naxx tier: ilvl 213
• Ulduar tier: ilvl 226
• Trial of the Champion
• Normal mode: ilvl 200
• Heroic mode: ilvl 219
• Icecrown Citadel dungeons (Forge of Souls, Pit of Saron & Halls of Reflection)
• Normal mode: ilvl 219
• Heroic mode: ilvl 232
  (only weapons linked since they are the only interesting items here)

And lastly, don’t forget that this is a time-commitment for at least a few weeks up to a few months. Make sure you have people you can rely on to show up to raids in your team or you’ll be cursed to deal with replacements over and over and over again…

Cheers,
Gav