Closing the Eye: a Legion Timewalking Mage Tower Guide for DPS

Welcome to our strategy guide for the Mage Tower challenge Closing the Eye. On this page, we will tell you everything you need to know about the encounter, and how to defeat it. If you are not playing the specs listed below, check out one of our other Mage Tower guides for your spec.

Completing this Mage Tower Challenge will unlock a unique recolor of the Tier 20 Raid Set from Tomb of Sargeras. Completing all 7 of the Mage Tower challenges will unlock the Mage-Bound Spelltome Mount.

If you would like to learn more about what else is available during Legion Timewalking or other mounts available in Patch 9.1/9.1.5, please consult our overviews below.

This Mage Tower challenge will only be available during Legion Timewalking events, the first of which will begin on December 7th, 2021 (December 8th for European, Korean, and Taiwanese realms). The challenge can be attempted as many times as you want, and there is no minimum gear requirement. To begin Closing the Eye, you must be playing one of the following specializations:

• Arms Warrior
• Frost Death Knight
• Havoc Demon Hunter
• Subtlety Rogue
• Survival Hunter

To begin this challenge, you need to visit War Councilor Victoria on the Broken Shore (coords. 45, 62). If you have your Dalaran Hearthstone, you can get there very easily. If you do not have your Dalaran Hearthstone, go to Orgrimmar/Stormwind and take the portal to Azsuna to fly to the Broken Shore.

The effects below will not function within the Timewalking Mage Tower event:

• Any Covenant-related effects (Covenant Ability, Signature Ability, Soulbinds, Conduits)
• Legendary Powers from Shadowlands or Legion (the items will still provide stats, their equip effects will not)
• Legendary items from Questlines ( Ashjra'kamas, Shroud of Resolve, Warlords of Draenor Legendary Rings, Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Rest, Val'anyr, Hammer of Ancient Kings)
• Any Shards of Domination
• Any Battle for Azeroth systems (Azerite Gear, Traits, Essences)
• Any tier set bonuses
• Mists of Pandaria Legendary Meta Gems

You should also keep in mind that all items are scaled to item level 50 in the Mage Tower. This means that your item level is completely irrelevant, and that all that matters is the quality of the items you are bringing. This also means that sockets have exceptional value in Mage Tower Challenges.

Since many specs can do this challenge, we can not offer an individual BiS list for every single spec. However, the sources for nearly all BiS items are the same.

Slot	Item	Source
Helm	Any 2-Socket Helm	Throne of Thunder/Siege of Orgrimmar
Necklace	Heart of Azeroth or Prizerock Neckband (enchant with Enchant Neck - Mark of the Hidden Satyr)	Battle for Azeroth Main Storyline/Legion Archaeology
Shoulders	Any 2-Socket Shoulders (enchant with Greater Tiger Claw Inscription/ Greater Tiger Fang Inscription; Scribes can use upgraded "Secret" versions of these)	Throne of Thunder/Siege of Orgrimmar/Dragon Soul
Cloak	MoP Legendary Cloak (enchant with Enchant Cloak - Minor Power)	No Longer Obtainable - MoP Legendary Cloak Questline
Cloak Alternative	Ashjra'kamas, Shroud of Resolve (enchant with Enchant Cloak - Minor Power)	Patch 8.3 'Through the Darkness' Questline (starts at Magni in the Chamber of Heart)
Chest	Any 3-Socket Chest (enchant with Enchant Chest - Eternal Stats/ Enchant Chest - Glorious Stats depending on iLvl)	Throne of Thunder/Siege of Orgrimmar
Bracers	Any 2-Socket Bracers (enchant with Enchant Bracer - Greater Agility/ Enchant Bracer - Exceptional Strength)	Cataclysm Leatherworking/Blacksmithing
Gloves	Any 2-Socket Gloves/ Vigilance Perch for Hunter (enchant with Enchant Gloves - Major Agility/ Enchant Gloves - Super Strength)	Throne of Thunder/Siege of Orgrimmar/Legion Legendary
Belt	Any 2-Socket Belt	Throne of Thunder/Siege of Orgrimmar or Pandaria Leatherworking/Blacksmithing. Add extra socket with Living Steel Belt Buckle
Legs	Any 3-Socket Legs (enchant with Shadowleather Leg Armor/ Angerhide Leg Armor)	Throne of Thunder/Siege of Orgrimmar or Pandaria Leatherworking/Blacksmithing
Boots	Any 2-Socket Boots/ The Sentinel's Eternal Refuge for Leather (enchant with Enchant Boots - Pandaren's Step/ Enchant Boots - Assassin's Step/ Enchant Boots - Greater Assault)	Throne of Thunder/Dragon Soul/Legion Legendary
Rings	WoD Pre-Legendary Ring (for example, Spellbound Runic Band of Unrelenting Slaughter) (enchant with Accord, or Binding of Haste/Mastery/Crit/Vers depending on iLvl and spec)	WoD Legendary Ring Questline
Rings (alternatives)	Logic Loop of Division and Overclocking Bit Band	Operation: Mechagon
Trinkets	Chipped Soul Prism for all/ Dragonspine Trophy for Hunter/Melee	Supreme Lord Kazzak World Boss/Gruul's Lair
Weapon (STR Melee)	Glorenzelg, High-Blade of the Silver Hand (enchant with Enchant Weapon - Dancing Steel (2h) and Enchant Weapon - Crusader (1h))	Icecrown Citadel
Weapon (AGI Melee)	Hersir's Greatspear (enchant with Enchant Weapon - Dancing Steel)	Icecrown Citadel

There are also potentially better weapons from utilizing Chromie Time, but they require a leveled character on a second account and so are not within the scope of this guide.

If you prefer not to farm old raids for gear, you can use Crafted Dreadful Gladiator's pieces as an alternative. These can be crafted by all the primary gear crafting Professions, and you will want to use the Relic of the Past V Optional Reagent to upgrade their item level when crafting. These items have plentiful sockets, socket bonuses, and can fill gaps in your gear.

• Strength: 1x Sovereign Tanzanite and rest Bold Queen's Garnet
• Agility: 1x Nightmare Tear and rest Delicate Queen's Garnet

• Greater Flask of the Undertow/ Greater Flask of Endless Fathoms

• Potion of Unbridled Fury

• Any Main Stat Feast/Optimal Secondary Stat Food

The fight is split into three primary phases, with 2 intermissions between them.

In this phase, you will fight Archmage Xylem while he is using his Frost-based abilities.

• Interrupt Frostbolt as often as possible. It can be stunned as well.
• Razor Ice will teleport Xylem away and trap the player in ice shards. You can either use movement abilities like Disengage or Heroic Leap to escape, or you can simply kill the Razor Ice to escape. You will take heavy damage from Comet Storm while you are trapped.

Phase 1 ends after 90 seconds.

Archmage Xylem teleports to a random section of the rroom and starts channeling Arcane Annihilation for 40 seconds. He will also become invisible, only indicated by a golden shimmering effect briefly after he teleports. In the meantime, dozens of mirror images of his original model will spawn around the room. Your task is to find and get to the shimmering effect before his cast is over, otherwise you will wipe. Hunters can use Track Humanoids to easily see his location on the minimap at any time. Before the intermission begins, we recommend sticking close to the center of the room so that you will not have a long distance to travel to end the intermission.

Reaching Archmage Xylem's shimmering effect will end the phase and begin Phase 2.

In this phase, you will fight Archmage Xylem while he is using his Arcane- and Shadow-based abilities.

• Interrupt Arcane Barrage as often as possible. It can be stunned as well. If you have decent self-sustain, it can be worth skipping a few interrupts and saving them for when you are low on health.
• Dodge the purple orbs that fly through the air during Shadow Barrage.
• Save an interrupt or a stun in order to stop his Draw Power cast immediately. The longer he channels for, the stronger of a damage buff he will gain.
• Xylem will still randomly teleport around the room. You should simply follow him, and use movement abilities to jump across the purple laser beams to minimize damage taken if you can.

Phase 2 ends after roughly 50 seconds, after which you will get another Intermission, followed by Phase 1.

Once you have repeated the above two phases until Archmage Xylem is at 10% health, Phase 3 will begin. You will have a few seconds to use a Tome and change your setup if required. You will need a mix of single-target and burst AoE for this phase, and you will fight a large Void creature called the Corrupting Shadows.

• Corrupting Shadows continuously spawns pools of Void underneath him. You will want to very slowly kite him around the outer edge of the room to place these pools optimally. You will only have a limited amount of time to kill him before there is no more room left.
• The Corrupting Shadows will regularly channel Seed of Darkness on you. After 8 seconds, you will spawn three Darkness Within adds that will run toward the boss and try to heal him. When the cast goes out, you should move as far away from the boss as possible, on the edge of the platform. Then, you need to slow and kill these mobs as quickly as possible once they have spawned.

This phase is very simple, and is mostly a DPS check of killing the boss before its pools cover the whole platform, and killing the small adds quickly before they heal the boss.

• In Phase 1 and 2, try to keep the boss (and yourself) close to the center of the room. This way, you will have a shorter time to travel during the Intermission, regardless of where he teleports to.
• Do not interrupt if you are at full health, especially in Phase 2 where it is most important to kick Draw Power instantly.
• For Phase 1 and 2, go for a full single-target setup to reach 10% more quickly. For Phase 3, you should try and go for single-target, but be prepared to reach for burst AoE setups if you are not killing the adds quickly enough.