I went as Unholy Tank spec:
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deathknight=0000000000000000000000000000050100000000000000000000000235200331000103253051003133151
I thought about trying Frost tanking, but Unholy's magic mitigation tools (Anti Magic Zone specifically) seemed like something I'd want. Plus, Unholy is more enjoyable and I'm more familiar with it. My gear was all Borean Tundra quest rewards, so I had high stamina and decent armor but almost zero defense or avoidance ratings. It worked out fine though, I got no complaints about threat or damage taken. I think everyone in my group had some BT/Hyjal experience, so we were a reasonably competent bunch and were able to knock out the instance easily.
The Nexus is a pretty short instance with very manageable trash pulls, generally 3-4 elites. Most of the instance was done without any CC, using only one Sap when we could.
The instance has a circular design, so you can choose where you start. However, going left towards Grand Magus Telestra is probably the best bet. Most of her trash is 3 mobs, and you can use a lot of CC because they're humanoids. This is basically a "warm up wing". The Grand Magus herself tosses a lot of spells, but is mostly tank and spank. Anti-Magic Shell and Zone were pretty useful here. At 50% she splits into 3 images that have to be burnt down, and then goes back to tank and spank.
Second you'll enter the Interdimensional Rift room, populated with Blue Dragons fighting against arcane anomalies. This room has several Interdimensional Rift mobs that periodically release non-elite arcane elementals. With strong AoE tanking this room is pretty trivial (hell, probably fairly trivial without, too). After a room of trash clearing you face Anomalus. Periodically Anomalus will become invincible and create an Interdimensional Rift, and just like the others in the instance this rift can release Arcane Elementals. After you kill the rift you go back to Anomalus, and rinse and repeat until he dies.
Finally, you come to the gauntlet that leads to Ormorok the Tree-Shaper. You have the option to start here, but just because it's a gauntlet it might not be a good place to start with a group you may not be familiar with. It's relatively low-pressure, there are some non elite flowers around the gauntlet on maybe a 1 minute respawn timer. There are a few 4 pack patrols of 2 dryads and 2 treants, as well as some large Ancient trees representing the token "large, hard hitting mob" of the instance. Once again, strong AoE tanking prevails here, but a Paladin or DK are far from necessary to succeed. Once you get through the gauntlet you arrive at Ormorok's platform. He's very straightforward, his one trick is periodically shooting out an icy spike wall in all 4 directions that explode after a few seconds. It's easily avoidable.
Once Ormorok dies, the flowers all die and quit respawning, so you can safely make your way back to the front of the instance for the last boss, Keristrasza. You'll want to clear out any pats around her if you haven't already, then activate the three controlling orbs and she'll engage almost immediately. Her big trick is a debuff that stacks only when you're standing still. Obviously it's an annoyance for healers and casters, but as the tank I just back-petaled the boss around her circular room. She'll do frontal cone frost breath with a knock back, so you have to try to keep her positioned safely. Her only other trick is to case a 10 second Chains of Ice root, which will make her debuff stack up if it's not dispelled, so a dispelling class can really help make this fight easy.
All in all, it's a great and short instance. Considering you can get four quests for the zone if you knock out the pre-quests in Coldarra, there's really no reason not to pay it a visit while leveling. I leave you with this obligatory last boss kill shot:
- Andtaxes
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