Karazhan is the badge engine of early TBC: a full clear pays 22 Badges of Justice. But badges-per-HOUR varies threefold between groups, and the difference is almost never player skill. It is routing and discipline.
Where the time actually goes
- Opera and Moroes trash: the two densest trash stretches. Groups that assign crowd control BEFORE the pull clear them in half the time of groups that improvise per pack.
- The Curator corridor: a disciplined group chain-pulls it; a nervous one drinks after every pack and burns fifteen minutes.
- Chess and Prince prep: free badge checkpoints. Any group that wipes on Chess has deeper problems.
The efficient route
Attumen, Moroes, Maiden, Opera, Curator, Shade, Chess, Prince: the badge-optimal core. Netherspite and Illhoof are optional add-ons; skip them on farm nights unless someone needs specific loot, and add Nightbane only with a group that knows the fear timing.
Badges per hour, honestly
A rehearsed guild run finishes the core in under two hours: roughly 11 badges per hour plus loot. A middling pug takes three and a half with a wipe or two: closer to 6 per hour. Across a month of lockouts that gap compounds into a full badge vendor purchase.
Compressing your own runs
Assign CC marks in advance, pre-pot on bosses even in farm content, and set a drink discipline (mana breaks on a timer, not on request). If your weekly Kara is a coin flip of pug quality, a carried clear is the badge-farming shortcut: fixed duration, full 22 badges, zero wipe-night variance. However you run it, the tower rewards preparation more than gear.