Head Games

Quest Giver: Kurzel — orc female, found inside Drak’Tharon Keep’s spider room after completing Search and Rescue

Objective: Use Kurzel’s Blouse Scrap on the corpse of Novos the Summoner, then deliver the Ichor-Stained Cloth to Mack Fearsen at Granite Springs.

Quick Facts

• Level: 73
• Type: Dungeon (Drak’Tharon Keep)
• Prerequisite: Search and Rescue
• Follow-up: None. This is the end of the chain.

Full Chain

1. Scourgekabob (Prigmon, Granite Springs) — 30-second errand
2. Seared Scourge (Mack Fearsen) — burn Scourge trolls outside DTK
3. Search and Rescue (Mack Fearsen) — find Kurzel in dungeon spider room
4. Head Games (Kurzel, inside dungeon) — use cloth on Novos’s corpse

Getting to Granite Springs: Alliance players reach Granite Springs via Troll Season! (breadcrumb from Lt. Dumont at Amberpine Lodge, available after Replenishing the Storehouse). Horde players arrive via Good Troll Hunting (breadcrumb from Sergeant Thurkin at Conquest Hold).

Both are optional breadcrumbs; neither is a hard prerequisite. Scourgekabob itself requires Vial of Visions (Drakuru chain step 2) to be available.

Walkthrough

Step 1: Accept Quest from Kurzel

After freeing Kurzel from a webbed cocoon during Search and Rescue, she tears a strip from her blouse and hands it to you as a quest item. This happens in the spider room between the Warlord’s Terrace and the Temple of the Forgotten, AFTER the first boss Trollgore. You must accept Head Games here before continuing deeper into the dungeon.

Step 2: Defeat Novos the Summoner

Novos is the second boss. The fight has two phases:

• Phase 1 (Add waves): Novos shields himself with an Arcane Field (completely immune to damage). Undead adds pour down the staircase while Crystal Handlers spawn periodically. Kill 4 Crystal Handlers to break his shield. Do NOT stand near Novos during this phase; his Arcane Field deals heavy Arcane damage per second and slows movement by 50%.
• Phase 2 (Active boss): Shield drops and Novos becomes attackable. He casts Blizzard (move out), Frostbolt (random targets), Wrath of Misery (Shadow DoT curse), and summons Risen Shadowcasters. He has no aggro table and targets randomly, similar to Shade of Aran. Burn him down.

Step 3: USE THE BLOUSE SCRAP IMMEDIATELY

This is where most players fail this quest.

After Novos dies, immediately right-click Kurzel’s Blouse Scrap and use it on his corpse. The corpse despawns quickly. You may have to re-run the entire dungeon if you looted and moved on without using the item.

• You must stand directly on top of the corpse. If you get an “Invalid Target” error, move closer.
• In a group: coordinate so everyone loots first, then quest holders use the scrap. But do not wait long.
• The item transforms into Ichor-Stained Cloth in your bags.

Step 4: Turn In to Mack at Granite Springs

Return to Mack Fearsen at Granite Springs [16.8, 48.2] in Grizzly Hills. Not inside the dungeon, and not in Ghostlands (some addons direct players to the wrong Mack NPC in Ghostlands; this is a known bug).

Efficiency Note: If you also have Cleansing Drak’Tharon, continue through King Dred and The Prophet Tharon’ja to the brazier behind the final boss platform. Both dungeon quests can be completed in a single run if you plan ahead.

Lore Context

Kurzel’s plan is psychological manipulation, not science. She tells you to dip the cloth in Novos’s remains and bring it back to Mack so “the boys have stewed in their guilt for a while.” Then she’ll show up alive and teach them a lesson about abandoning her. It’s a prank disguised as a quest. Her turn-in instructions (“return it to Mack back at the camp”) are deliberately designed to make Mack think she’s dead.

Mack’s reaction sells it perfectly. He weeps uncontrollably upon seeing the ichor-stained cloth, assumes Kurzel died, and declares he’s going to write a song about her. The same drunk who sent you to find her because he was “in no shape to do it myself” is now sobbing into his grog.

Novos the Summoner has one of the more disturbing origin stories among WotLK bosses. He was a Cult of the Damned opportunist who carved his own still-beating heart from his chest and presented it to his Scourge master seconds before dying. His master was so impressed by the initiative that he remade Novos as a lich. Self-mutilation as a career move.

Reward item names continue the guilt theme from Kurzel’s scheme: Shameful Cuffs (cloth), Scorned Bands (leather), Accused Wristguards (mail), Disavowed Bracers (plate). Every item name references blame, shame, or rejection, matching what Mack’s crew should feel for abandoning Kurzel.

Compare these to the Cleansing Drak’Tharon rewards (Shroud of Temptation, Enticing Sabatons, Shackles of Dark Whispers, Shoulders of the Seducer), which carry a seduction/corruption theme for the Drakuru betrayal quest.

Easter Egg

• The quest name references the 1979 Foreigner song “Head Games.” Given that Mack responds by wanting to write a song, and the quest is literally about playing mind games with him, the connection seems intentional.

Achievement Note

• While Head Games itself has no associated achievement, the Novos fight has one: Oh Novos! (Heroic) requires defeating Novos without allowing any Crystal Handler to complete a cast of Flash of Darkness. This is a coordination-intensive achievement that requires fast target switching.

Explore Grizzly Hills’ hidden easter eggs, lore mysteries, and connections across Warcraft history in Vikstone’s Grizzly Hills Chronicles, along with the complete quest storyline.