In the computer game Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, the Doom Guard serve as the Demon Lord Archimonde the Defiler's personal escorts. They wield a combination of destructive magic and brute force and are often called upon to perform various tasks for the Burning Legion, but their loyalties lie with Archimonde alone. Doom Guards can also be summoned by Pit Lords.
Nature and history[ | ]
These gigantic monstrosities wield fierce Chaos Blades and are almost immune to all types of magic. They are not particularly intelligent but their brute strength and love of carnage more than compensate for this deficiency. The Doom Guards are relentless in their attacks and are exceptionally fierce, capable of defeating large armies with their tenacity and incredible cruelty. Doom Guards are able to attack both land and air units, and when engaging groups of aerial combatants their attacks are far more devastating, draining the life force of all hostile air units.
After their master's death, it is believed that some of the Doom Guards broke from the fold and are working as mercenaries. However, they are probably in the minority, as there are still many Doom Guards at the Burning Legion's beck and call.
Warcraft III[ | ]
In Warcraft III, Doom Guard are massive and very powerful fighters, appearing similar to Beastmen and Balrogs. It is often suggested that Doom Guards were initially suppose to be called Balrogs, like similar enemies found in the Diablo series; indeed Doom Guards are named Balrogs in "Blizzard's Tower Defense" bonus map that comes with Frozen Throne expansion.
They can be summoned either by a Demonic Figurine or from the sacrifice of a foe or friend by the spell 'Doom', cast by the Pit Lords.
At level 8, they are one of the most powerful non-hero units. They do large amount of chaos damage and absorb much punishment. In addition, they have a wide range of powerful magic spells and abilities; the force of their War Stomp is sufficient to stun all nearby foes, while they are also capable of crippling foes, raining fire from the sky, and dispelling enemy magic.
World of Warcraft[ | ]
In the World of Warcraft game, Warlocks at level 60 can summon a Doom Guard through use of either the Ritual of Doom or the Curse of Doom spell.
Curse of Doom deals 3200 damage after 60 seconds. If this damage kills the creature, it has a small chance of summoning a Doom Guard directly on top of the warlock; the Doom Guard then proceeds to attack the warlock. It must be enslaved using the Enslave Demon spell, which consumes a soul shard even if it is resisted and is often interrupted by War Stomp.
The Ritual of Doom requires a Demonic Figurine and a full group to summon. When it is finished channeling, it consumes the reagent and a random party member's life. Before it was fixed, it could even kill the summoning warlock, so this is the least preferred and most dangerous of the two methods. Even after the cost and time required for this summoning, it still must be enslaved using Enslave Demon and thus consumes a soul shard.
After much criticism of the strength of these creatures and their counterpart the Infernal, the creature's damage and armor were increased by substantial amounts in patch 1.9 of World of Warcraft. Estimations currently show a 30% increase in damage and a 10% increase in toughness.