If you get in too deep when you're fighting VanCleef, or just on the ship in general, there is a sanctuary that you can get to and wait for everything to retreat so you can regroup. There is a large wheel-like thing on the side of the ship about half-way up (you can't miss it). Jump in top of it, and nothing in this area can get to you even the caster-pirates will run back and forth, and eventually give up.

Horde can do Deadmines too... Shamans are possible

Vancleef isn't too hard if done well. You'll have encountered harder bosses and areas in the instance, such as the large tauren captain who stuns, and the upper deck with Cookie and his friends. Apart from the rogues, he isn't too hard to kill. Just be prepared.
A mage can polymorph one, a rogue can sap one. Make sure your party is on the deck, as standing below can mean you can't cast as your target is not in view. The tank should attack Vancleef, with DPS backup. Perhaps get one party member to run around, with the 2 bodyguards following, while the other 4 bring down the boss. When VC is dead, it is easy to mop up the others.
A party of about level 20+ should not find killing this too difficult, provided your party is well-balanced (tank, healer, DPS) and can co-operate well.

Vancleef drops some really good loot, such as the famed Cruel Barb, a green polearm, and other good loot. He also drops a letter, starting a very large quest series which leads onto a reward - The Seal of Wrynn, a ring which will last you until about level 50!

Be sure to do this quest, whatever race you are. These items will last you for many levels. Even if you're horde, don't be put off, you can still get to DM if you're careful. Sadly, you can't do the quest.

Just finished this quest last night. I found it to be very worth the work. We breezed through it last night and put on a near flawless performance with no deaths at all.

25 priest, 25 mage, 21 druid, 21 rogue, 21 hunter

As the druid, I was the tank for the big fights. For everything except the bosses I was in cat form and we just dps'd everything till it died. When we aproached the bosses I would pull the boss with fairefire, switch to bear form and tank him while the rest of the group kills the goons.

I pulled the mobs when we got to the boat. Using fairy fire is very effective to pull small groups and predebuffs the mob being pulled.

Tubby: wait for him to walk away from his guards, then pull, you'll single him every time. After he dies, deal with his guards.

Shredder: Pull all guards before attempting the Shredder. For the guards at the far door, wait for the Shredder to path back up the ramp. Once all the guards are cleared you pull the Shredder and beat it down. When he dies the operator pops out and you have to kill him too.

Engineer Room: Clear around the cog all the goblins, when you get to the door the boss is acompanied by 2 guards. One of the guards can be pulled away from the Boss adn the other guard. Pull him and kill him. When engaging the Boss, you can either sheep the guard and kill the boss, or just kill the guard while the Tank occupies the boss.

First Mate: Once the dock is cleared it's very important how you pull the first mate and his rogue buddies. The tank will inch up till he agro's the stealthed rogues, this will also pull the first mate. The mobs on the deck will not agro! We had a mage so one rogue got turned into a sheep. The Tank should always stay on the main boss. The rest of the party needs to kill the remaining rogue, then kill the sheep, then dps the Boss. For the first mate he will stun the party 2 during the fight. As far as I can see it is not resistable, but he runs back to his chest and pulls some stuff out. Nothing big, just some dramatics, when you're unstunned keep dpsing him down.

Clearing the ship: Clearing the first deck is basically the same as clearing the rest of the instance zone. Once you get to the first ramp, everyone stays on the first deck while the puller brings the mobs down to the group. If you try and crawl up to the top deck, then once you get to the first grp on the top, you will agro the captain any all the other mobs on the ship. If you pull them indivdually then you'll be fine. I waited till the captain rounded the back of the ship, not sure if it makes a difference and I didn't want to take that chance :)

Captain: Once the top deck is cleared, everyone can move up the ramps and along the deck to where the ent to the deck is. You can pull the captain or inch up to him the way you did with the first mate. Either way you pull him you'll get his two guards with him. Tank him the same way you tanked the first mate.

VanCleef: VanCleef is located in the main cabin. You can see him if you peer in, but don't get too close until you're ready for him. You'll pull VC the same way you pulled the First Mate, he will have two rogue guards materialize when he's agro'd. Deal with them the same way you dealt with the First Mate's rogues. WARNING: shortly into the fight 2 more rogues will show up! We had the first two rogues dead before the second ones showed up so it wasn't a big deal, just a little surprise. We finished VC off before dealing with the rogues. But you can continue having the tank hold off VC while the rest of the group finishes the rogues. The Hunter's pet off tanked one of the new rogues so it wasn't on the priest.

It's important that you have a tank who can taunt so that the boss doesn't pull off and start pounding down the rest of the party. With a decent tank and a compitent healer, there should be no problems keeping everyone alive during the boss fights. We wiped the first night we tried just as the instance was respawning so we didn't attempt it again, but the second night we went in we used this strategy and came out of it feeling it was very easily done.

Hope this helps!

Jonais 22 Druid Darkspear
Kishan 13 Hunter Doomhammer

Shouldn't take your group more than an hour and a half to do this entire instance. I'll lay out some working strategies as best I can.

In the corridors, which is most of the zone, you just need to watch what/how you pull. I've pulled the entire dungeon as a level 22 Hunter and never gotten more than one add. You really need someone with a ranged attack to pull. If it's a caster who shouldn't be tanking, they need to use their lowest level spell to pull with, so they don't cause much initial aggro. If it HAS to be a paladin or druid, then they need to pull the mob and back up quite a bit. Runners in here will get you adds, which cause wipes.

The first boss is an ogre. He walks up and down a path. If you've never done this before, watch him a couple times, and pull him when he's farthest from the door to avoid adds. There is a patrol after him, which will need to be neutralized before going through teh door.

The next boss is the Shredder, and it's pilot (Sneed?). This is fairly simple, as the shredder also has a set path. Pull him just as he begins walking up the hill, but make sure all the goblins around the wood are dead. The second and final patrol is here.

Next, you go down another corridor and into the Foundry. This is where most groups wipe. It is IMPERATIVE that your puller pay attention to the pathing of the goblins. Often they won't follow, but instead they will begin shooting. You will have to back out of their gun range to force them away from their friends to prevent adds. A single add in this area is difficult for a low level group, and can cause a wipe quite quickly. Also, the goblins in this area seem to have a high aggro range. Gilnik? is the boss of this area, over next to the door. He's not really too tough.

Next up is another corridor which ends with a cannon pointed at the door. You'll need blasting powder from a room nearby to activate the cannon. This leads to the docks. The docks are easy until you get to the ramp leading up to the ship. There will be 2 stealthed rogues at the bottom of the ramp, and Smite, the Tauren, at the top. The main tank should engage Smite at the wide area before the turn to the plank, while the rest of the group deals with the rogues even further back. The healer should be at maximum range from the warrior to avoid Smite's stun. The reason for being farther away from the ramp is so that Smite will have to cover distance to run to his chest to switch his weapons, allowing more time for the stun to wear off. Once the rogues are dealt with, the rest of the group can engage Smite.

At the top of the ramp, going right will lead to Captain Greenskin and Van Cleef. Going left will lead to Cookie, the murlock cook, and the exit. Just keep pulling slowly and keep the mobs being engaged far enough away from any potential adds. Once you reach the top platform, watch out for Greenskin. He patrols the top deck where VC is, but he will assist mobs on the platform below, so wait on him to patrol around to the other side before pulling. Once everything else is dead, pull Greenskin when he reaches the plank which leads to the top deck. He usually has 2 or 3 mobs linked to him, so this fight can be rough. Once Greenskin is down, it's time for VC.

VC has 2 rogue friends who will assist him in the fight. When he reaches half life, 2 more will spawn. Use the same strategy as with Smite, with the MT on VC while the rest of the group deals with the adds. VC doesn't have an AOE stun like Smite though, but he's tougher and has more DPS, so the healer will likely need to keep attention on the MT. As a 22 Hunter, I was able to use my pet to tank VC while I healed it, while the rest of the group dealt with the adds. This helped the healer both on mana and on aggro, though in the end the pet finally died when I ran OOM, and VC proceeded to kill me. The group succeeded in finishing him off, and a rez later and we headed for the zone.

Experience really helps a lot here. Once you reach the docks, if a wipe seems imminent, jump in the water, as the pirates can't swim. Ironic, ain't it?

Edited, Thu Apr 21 00:15:18 2005

for all u people who are extremely naive

5 quest total for deadmines

1.VC quest from defias brotherhood- links to another quest into stockades

2.red silk bandanas quest - from person on top of the tower of westfall in sentinal hill

3.goblin in dwarven district rear in stormwind giving u underground assault

4.thistnistles badge from dwarf in the bar right of the southern entrance in dwarven district

5.collecting memory miner union cards (pick up from purple area before instance from the undead) get it from thistnistle guy at dwarven district, same guy

these are all 5 quests i took with me, i did the last 4, vc i went back to do wen i had a better group. take all 5 with u wen u do it

ok, this instance is fun as heck, i've done it about 6 times.

there are several doors you go thru to proceed to the next portion, each door is brotected by a boss.

Ogre, sneed and his shredder machine, a Big goblin.

the ogre is easy, just hack and slash.

the shredder machine is simple also, just remember, sneed jump out of machine when it dies, he is hidden within the graphics of the dead shredder, so if ya getting hit, pull him out of the graphics of the dead machine.

goblin will have a few buddies with him, healer be on the ball.

the main thing to remember about the doors, when ya proceed thru them, 3 defilias spawn behind ya, wizards, taskmaster. So as you start fighting into the next section, watch your backs.

when ya get into the pirate area, the first RAMP you get to will have a tauren, SMITE. he has some invisible rogues with him (3), the key to this fight will be your main tank tanking the Bull, with everyone else killing the rogues. When you get Smite down to about 75%, he stunns everyone and if the rogues are NOT dead, they will get free shots at ya for about 8-10 seconds (this can kill most lower lvl 20's).

once all the rogues dead, everyone focus on Smite.

Another named on the way up is the captain, he is a goblin, and has an posse of 3-4 with him, again, have MT focus on captain while everyone else kills the adds.

when Ya get to VC himself, he has 3-4 invised rogues with him, MT on VC, everyone else on the rogues. Someone should keep an eye on your primary healer and be prepaired to pull 2-3 rogues off the healer (or heal the healer).

about halfway thru the fight, 2-3 more rogues apear and assist VC, so everyone but MT off VC and kill the rogues again. when they all dead, everyone back on VC.

if someone dies AND someone loots VC, KEEP THE LOOT BOX OPEN until the rezzed person can loot (if they need the head)