Gazlowe Mission Guide

This guide focuses on the Heroic Gazlowe encounter in The Barrens but also works for the normal version.

Minis in Gazlowe’s army

• Chain Lightning - Storm’s Reach
• Dark Iron Miner - Gold Mine
• Gargoyle - Wing Buffet
• Goblin Sappers - Rocket Boots
• Quilboar - Tunnel Vision
• S.A.F.E. Pilot - Gnomish Cloaking Device
• Warsong Raider - Razing Focus

Other minis and map mechanics

The Gazlowe encounter is defined by Rocket Towers, Goblin Sappers, and S.A.F.E. Pilots.

There are not many encounters with Rocket Towers, and Blizzard has changed their functionality many times. Currently, they are one of the only sources of Piercing damage in the game, i.e. damage that cannot be mitigated by any type of armor.

Gazlowe has Goblin Sappers in his deck, and a single Goblin Sapper also spawns on the top of the left lane every 30 seconds starting at 3:20 (3:20, 2:50, 2:20 and so on). In Normal, the spawn interval is 60 seconds.

Gazlowe also has S.A.F.E. Pilot in his deck, but there are also many timed S.A.F.E. Pilot crashes in the encounter.

• S.A.F.E. Pilot will crash on the right lane at 3:10 and then every 60 seconds (2:10, 1:10, 0:10). (Normal: 3:00 and then every 90 seconds)
• S.A.F.E. Pilot will crash on the left lane at 2:45 and then every 60 seconds (1:45, 0:45). (Normal: 2:30 and then every 90 seconds)

Gazlowe starts the encounter with a Warsong Raider (Razing Focus in Heroic) and a Goblin Sapper (Rocket Boots in Heroic). These starting minis do not respawn.

Gazlowe:

• 5200 health
• Rocket: 220 Piercing Damage, 3.0 seconds attack speed, 14 range, 4 radius

General strategy

Take the Towers to keep your base safe, and then attack Gazlowe.

Note that Warsong Raiders, Goblin Sappers, and Gargoyle are all going straight for your base and will not stop to fight you minis. To fight against them, use Defias Bandits that can stun them and Polymorph that can prevent damage for a while. Bat Rider is also good because the flame pools can kill Sappers while the Bat Rider is fighting agaisnt something else and the Sapper tries to walk past.

Gargoyle is the only flying mini Gazlowe has, so you don’t want to run too many anti-air minis. I often use only Pyromancer and help it out with Polymorph as needed.

The best tank for the encounter has changed often as Blizzard has changed the damage type of Rocket Towers. Swole Troll is a good, cheap compromise now that the Towers are piercing.