WoW Forever Hyjal Summit Raid Guide: 13 Bosses, Tier Sets, Prep

Hyjal Summit is the middle raid of World of Warcraft: Forever's opening trio — twenty players and thirteen bosses at the top of Mount Hyjal, near the World Tree Nordrassil. It is not the Burning Crusade raid of the same name: it's a new instance with its own encounters, and it's where Blizzard says Forever's new tier sets come from. It opens on 9 December 2026. This guide covers the confirmed outline, the wiki's thirteen names, the zone and reputations around it, a 20-player roster and how to plan a thirteen-boss lockout.

Hyjal Summit at a glance

Everything in the first seven rows is Blizzard's. The boss names are the wiki's, drawn from game files, and should be read as a list rather than a route.

The route: guardian, ruins, summit

Blizzard gives Hyjal Summit a shape before it gives it mechanics. The raid opens with a fight against an ancient guardian; after that, groups can choose between multiple routes across ruins above and below ground on the way to the final encounters. That's a different feel from a straight corridor: two groups in the same guild may well kill bosses in different orders.

What this means for planning: agree as a raid which route you'll take on night one, so nobody wanders off towards the other set of bosses — and keep notes of which bosses sit on which route once you've seen them, because that information isn't public yet.

The thirteen names

The wiki lists thirteen encounters. This is a datamined/wiki list and the kill order is unconfirmed — with branching routes there may not even be one fixed order. No abilities have been published.

1. BandalarFirst on the list — possibly the guardian.
2. Time-Lost BattalionWiki position 2.
3. Old GloomlurkerWiki position 3.
4. Kathris the HauntedWiki position 4.
5. Elder MinderelWiki position 5.
6. Council of ThornsListed as a council encounter.
7. The Wild KingWiki position 7.
8. Ancient of DecayWiki position 8.
9. Sylvesteris DusksongWiki position 9.
10. Gharalis the AbyssalWiki position 10.
11. Anara ChillwindWiki position 11.
12. Tracker StillwindWiki position 12.
13. Nythus the DreamboundLast on the list — the wiki's end boss.

Killing all thirteen earns one account-wide Legacy Point, the Raids-category challenge for Hyjal Summit — and because it requires every boss, it rewards clearing both routes.

Mount Hyjal, the zone around it

Before you raid the summit you'll spend time on the mountain. Mount Hyjal is a level-60 zone in Forever, and the wiki says you reach it on foot from Winterspring, heading east through Darkwhisper Gorge — the same mountain also hides Barrow Deeps. Press coverage from BlizzCon described Hyjal as having "reputations to grind", and the client files bear that out:

Our reputations guide tracks the Forever factions as their rewards are confirmed. If Guardians of Hyjal turns out to feed the tier or legendary chain, every week you started early counts.

Tier sets and the legendary

Hyjal Summit is where Forever's raid gear story starts. At BlizzCon, Blizzard said the raid brings new tier sets, and that a legendary reward is tied to Hyjal Summit and Barrow Deeps. Neither the set pieces nor the legendary have been revealed in a Blizzard post since. Set names for every class have circulated from beta files, but they come from a single datamined source, so we won't list them as fact.

One thing is clear even without loot tables: Blizzard says GDKP raids aren't allowed in Forever, so plan loot council, DKP or rolls — not gold auctions.

A 20-player roster

Blizzard hasn't said how many tanks or healers Hyjal Summit needs, and neither has any guide we trust, so the split below is BoostPirate's starting point, not a published rule:

Four groups of five map neatly onto two ten-player Barrow Deeps teams, which is how many guilds will run the week: two Barrow Deeps groups on one night, Hyjal Summit together on the next. Put a Paladin and a Shaman in different groups so both factions' buffs reach everyone — Blizzard lowered Warrior Battle Shout's attack power because both factions now have Paladin and Shaman buffs. Tanks have more threat to work with since Blessing of Salvation was removed and tank stances were buffed; see the tank guide. Remember that groups only form inside one ruleset and one faction.

Planning a thirteen-boss week

Thirteen bosses is a lot for a first lockout, especially when nobody has seen the fights. Here is how we'd split the first week, without pretending to know which bosses sit on which route:

Two practical points. First, Forever has no automatic group finder and no summoning stones, so a 20-player raid needs a meeting point and ideally a Warlock for summons. Second, Blizzard's development notes say it doesn't plan big tuning changes before the raids open except for bugs and serious outliers — the classes you've levelled are the classes you'll raid with on 9 December.

Getting ready

The full list — gear sources, consumables, world-buff rules and reputations — is in our raid-ready checklist.

After Hyjal: the 2027 roadmap

Blizzard's 2026–2027 roadmap graphic puts the raid unlock on 9 December in winter, alongside the Hardcore launch. Spring brings two new raids — one 10-player, one 20-player — with two new dungeons, a new legendary questline and a PvP season refresh; summer brings a revamped iconic raid and another new raid. Blizzard hasn't named any of them, and the graphic itself says content and timing are subject to change. Molten Core isn't part of the launch — Forever's story is set before it. For a guild, the pattern matters more than the names: a 10-player and a 20-player raid again, so the roster you build for Barrow Deeps and Hyjal Summit now is the roster you'll take into spring.

Help for raid night

Short of players for a 20-player night? Forever raid runs take pre-orders for Hyjal Summit on 9 December with you on your own character, and the hourly booster can put time into reputations or farming before then. The Onyxia's Lair guide and the Forever raids overview cover the other raids. Piloted orders mean sharing your login, which Blizzard's terms don't allow; prices are live in the box above and you pay only after you approve.