Gogu1983
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Joined: 02 May 2009
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Location: Timisoara
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 Posted: 02/06/2009 01:52 Post subject: SSC |
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Fathom-Lord Karathress
Abilities
Fathom-Lord Karathress
Cataclysmic Bolt: Targets random mana user, deals 50% of target's max HP in shadow damage (increased by The Beast Within), a brief knockdown and a stun. Resistible binary spell. 6 second cooldown. Targets only players with mana bars.
Melee: rather low at first, increases to ~6,000 on plate after gaining "The Beast Within"
Sear Nova: ~3,000 fire damage melee range AoE, cast every 20–60 seconds
Blessing of the Tides: If Karathress reaches 75% health while any of the three adds is still alive, he gains Blessing of the Tides, increasing both cast time and attack speed by 66% for each add still alive (= triple damage output with 3 adds up)
Enrage : 10 minutes enrage timer
Fathom-Guard Sharkkis
855,000 HP
Melee: normally only moderate damage (until The Beast Within, see below)
Multishot : ~2000-3000 damage on three players
Leeching Throw: similar to Viper Sting this randomly targeted attack burns mana and health at a rate of 525 per tick for 12 seconds
Hurl Trident: hits a random target for ~1500
Summon Pet: Sharkkis summons a non-CCable pet, either an elemental (Fathom Lurker) or a beast (Fathom Sporebat). The pet deals simliar amounts of melee damage as Sharkkis himself. The elemental pet explodes when killed, the beast doesn't. The Sporebat has a knockback reducing the tank's threat on it.
The Beast Within: from time to time, Sharkkis turns red for 18 sec. increasing his damage by 30% and the pet damage by 50%
Fathom-Guard Tidalvess
840,000 HP
Shaman Abilities: Tidalvess has Windfury Weapon and a Frost Shock for 5400-6600 Frost damage.
Totems: He can summon one for the following totems:
Spitfire Totem - 25.000 health, 1 min duration, periodically attack up to 5 players within 45 yards for 2550-3450 Fire damage ignoring line of sight
Poison Cleansing Totem - 4000 health, removes 1 poison effect from Tidalvess every 5 seconds
Earthbind Totem - lasts 45 sec., periodically micșorează movement speed of nearby players to 50% of natural
Fathom-Guard Caribdis
885,000 HP
Water Bolt Volley: 45 yard AoE dealing 2775-3225 Frost damage, resistible
Healing Wave: Single target heal unrestricted by LoS or range, cast on any mob or herself, heals 20-30% of the target's exhaustiv HP. Interruptible, 15s cooldown
Tidal Surge: every 10–15 seconds, 10 yard AoE stun (players are frozen in an ice block) for 3 seconds. No aggro reset, resistible
The Whirlwind: From time to time, a whirlwind spawns near Caribdis, which moves all over the whole room. It deals no damage, but lifts players up in the air for about 3–9 seconds and gives a debuff which increases cast time
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Raid composition
2 main tanks
2-3 offtanks (e.g. feral druids or DPS warriors in tank gear)
7-8 healers
8-10 ranged damage dealers
2-5 melee damage dealers
The group with the Tidalvess (Shaman) tank should contain a shaman, who keeps Grounding Totem up at all times, to negate Tidalvess' Frost Shock.
Due to the mechanics of Fathom-Lord's Cataclysmic Bolt, paladin tanks are not advisable for this fight. Damage caused by this ability to a tank with ~18-20k health is very difficult to heal through and can easily cause a wipe for entire raid.
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Kill Order
Since Blessing of the Tides is a rather evil buff for the boss, it's reasonable to kill the adds first. The priest is the easiest add to control and should be killed last. Whether the shaman or hunter has to be killed first is a matter of choice. The hunter drains mana, the shaman deals the most damage - if the two main tanks both have good gear, it may be better to kill the hunter first. The following kill order minimizes the damage taken by the raid:
Tidalvess (Shaman add)
Sharkkis (Hunter add)
Caribdis (Priest add)
Karathress (boss)
Every time an add dies, Karathress gains a new ability (similar to the Anubisath Mobs in the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj):
When the shaman's dead, Karathress starts to drop the same "Spitfire Totem" as the Shaman
After Sharkkis the hunter dies, Karathress permanently gains "The Beast Within", greatly increasing his melee damage output
From Caribdis the priest, Karathress gains "Tidal Surge" (10 yard AoE ice block freeze every 15–20 seconds)
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Positioning
First the entire room and the patrol in the next passageway must be cleared. Tanks list:
Karathress - best geared main tank
Tidalvess - 2nd main tank
Sharkkis - offtank
Sharkkis pet - offtank (possibly the same as the Sharkkis offtank, if well geared)
Caribdis - warrior offtank
The shaman and the priest both have a 45 yard AoE spell. After the shaman's dead, Karathress gains that ability from the shaman. Thus the best setup would be to have the boss, the shaman and the priest all 45 yards apart from everybody else. Unfortunately such a setup has not been found so far, so usually the priest add gets a small group in one corner, the boss is tanked near his initial position, while the hunter and the shaman are killed away from the other mobs.
On the pull, Misdirection is best used on the Shaman add (to prevent him from taking out the Karathress tank with a damage burst), on all other mobs it's optional.
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Spitfire Totem
During the whole fight, the spitfire totem is a major source of raid damage. While adds are still up, it's absolutely necessary to bring it down ASAP when it spawns. All ranged damage dealers should have a macro to quickly target it i.e. /target Spitfire Totem. When only Karathress remains, it's possible to ignore the totem and simply heal through the damage.
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Caribdis Group
One warrior off-tank, a rogue and a shaman healer is the smallest group able to control Caribdis. Adding a warlock, a mage or an additional healer makes the job easier, but also slows down the killing of the other adds and/or makes raid survival more difficult.
The purpose of the priest add group is to interrupt all her heals. The rogue should use Mind-numbing Poison. When the two melee classes are frozen, the shaman healer must pay extra attention to be ready and use rank 1 Earth Shock when she starts a heal.
Adding more melee damage dealers to this group is pointless, it only increases the load on the healer. If heals keep getting through, a warlock may keep Curse of Tongues active on her, and if the warrior or rogue die frequently it helps to have a second healer paying attention to this group. The healer's job is easier if this group can stay 45 yards away from all other mobs, so that the random damage spells from the other mobs don't interfere.
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Quotes
Aggro:
Guards, attention! We have visitors ...
Killing a player:
I am rid of you.
Land-dwelling scum!
Killing Caribdis, Sharkkis, or Tidalvess:
More knowledge, more power!
I am more powerful than ever!
Go on, kill them! I'll be the better for it!
Misc:
Alana be'lendor!
Upon Gaining Blessing of the Tides:
Your overconfidence will be your undoing! Guards, lend me your strength!
Death:
Her ... excellency ... awaits!
Hydross the Unstable
Abilities
Summon elementals: Whenever Hydross switches form he summons 4 elementals matching his new form
Immune to taunt
Enrages after 10 minutes
Water form
Melee: 5.5k frost damage base, cannot be blocked, cannot crush
Immune to frost damage
Mark of Hydross: 15 sec cooldown, raid-wide debuff, stacks up to 6 times, increase frost damage by 10, 25, 50, 100, 250, and 500 percent. 30 sec duration, refreshes on each application
Water Tomb: single-target 8 yard AoE, cast every 7 seconds. Stuns all affected players for 4 seconds and deals 4500 frost damage over 5 seconds
Poison form
Melee: 5k nature damage base, cannot be blocked, cannot crush
Immune to nature damage
Mark of Corruption: 15 sec cooldown, raid-wide debuff, stacks up to 6 times, increase nature damage by 10, 25, 50, 100, 250, and 500 percent. 30 sec duration, refreshes on each application
Vile Sludge: Single target debuff, 15 sec cooldown. 4k nature damage over 24 sec, and reduces healing and damage done by 50%.
Elemental Adds
Health: ~50K
Damage: ~6K Frost/Nature base melee damage
Immune to nature/frost damage
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Preparation
Raid Composition
1 main Tank with maxed frost resistance (see Hydross Resistance Gear)
1 main Tank with maxed nature resistance (see Hydross Resistance Gear)
2-4 offtanks with some assortment of nature and frost resistance gear
6-8 healers (preferably at least one shaman)
11-14 damage dealers (any mix of melee and ranged will do)
The frost tank has to take slightly more damage than the nature tank.
Positioning
The melee group needs to move with Hydross, on each phase change a few yards forward and backward. All other raid members should set up distributed, to reduce the effect of Water Tomb. It's also no problem to run through Hydross and set up on his back.
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Starting the Fight
Prior to the pull a small group (one off-tank, a few damage dealers and a healer) need to pull and kill enough of the tainted water elementals on the "assembly line", so that none of them take part in the fight as adds. After the fight has started the tainted water elementals stop spawning.
Hydross starts in his water form. Whenever he leaves the area where he stands initially, he switches to the poison form. When he's moved back into the two beams, he switches back to the water form. Form switching takes place whenever he crosses a "magic boundary" which runs approximately between the two small flags in front of him. Every time he switches form, four adds of the same type as his new form are summoned. If pulled conventionally, Hydross would immediately switch to the poison form and summons adds.
Druid tanks can simply use Feral Charge and start the fight with a full rage bar. If druid is off-tank, main tank taunts aggro from him.
The safest method to avoid this is to use a Lesser Invisibility Potion. The frost tank has to wait until he drops out of combat (because he is in combat due to the assembly line adds being killed), use the potion, walk into melee range and start the fight from there.
Another possibility is to use a combination of Swiftness Potion and Intercept, to reach him fast enough before he crosses the boundary.
As a third safe method, a mage can use Invisibility, walk behind Hydross and Ice Block there. Hydross aggros on the ice blocked mage and the tank has 10 seconds to walk in and pick up Hydross. The drawback is that this uses the cooldowns on both Invisibility and Ice Block.
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Switching Form
Due to the stacking debuff, the damage taken by the tank sooner or later reaches levels where he simply gets one-shotted. Usually 100% damage increase is the limit, in water form this means 22k crits are possible. Thus after 60 seconds (= four debuffs), it's time for the current tank to move backward and pull Hydross over the boundary.
This is a most critical moment, because immediately after a form switch Hydross resets his aggro list and summons four adds. There must be no DoTs on him and all DPS and healing must stop for a few seconds to give the tanks time to gain control of Hydross and the adds. If some raid member on the wrong side of the boundary draws aggro so that Hydross moves back over the boundary, he switches form again and summons four more adds (= wipe).
In water form he should be tanked at his initial position. There's a step running in front of his initial position, which forms an angle. Just down the step near that angle is a good tanking position for the poison form.
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Elemental Adds
Quickly killing the four elemental adds is a key to success in this fight. Good tanking coupled with solid AoE damage is the fastest solution, particularly if the AoE also includes Hydross. The optimal approach to this would be two Paladin tanks, one in Nature and one in Frost resistance gear. Unfortunately raids will rarely ever boast this luxury, therefore most groups will have to find their own solutions to the problem. Druid tanks work well, some combination of AoE and emergency "point" tanking by warriors does the job too. Resist gear is also useful on the add tanks. The faster the adds are killed, the less damage they do (since their damage is increased by the raid-wide debuff too).
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Notes
On the initial phase switch, Hydross should be at 80% or lower. If that's not the case, the raids DPS is probably too low to kill him before he enrages
A hunter's Frost Trap in Hydross's path while switching to poison form slows him for a few seconds and delays the adds spawn, which makes them easier to control
Hunters are also very useful in the Poison tank's group for Aspect of the Wild to help mitigate some of the nature damage
If he's at 15% or lower after a switch, it's possible to use all high damage abilities and trinkets, CC the adds and nuke Hydross to end the fight in that phase
If the entire raid moves to the correct side of the platform, the danger of Hydross aggroing a player on the wrong side and switching forms again is nonexistent
Because patch 3.0.2, a T4-T5 geared level 70 group can do this fight without switching phases until the debuff has stacked to much greater levels, and the tank doesn't need frost/nature resistance (though a hunter formă and paladin aura still help). With our group we killed him after only switching him twice.
The Lurker Below
hases
This encounter alternates between two phases. The Lurker is only active for Phase 1, which lasts 120 seconds. At the start of Phase 2, Lurker submerges and the adds are spawned. After 60 seconds of Phase 2, the Lurker re-emerges and goes back to Phase 1.
Phase 1 Abilities
The Lurker Below, using his ability "Spout".
Melee: Hits tanks for ~4k physical damage.
Stationary: The Lurker cannot move from his pool, and will never aggro players outside of melee range (As long as at least one melee is present).
Water Bolt: 1-second cast, 9-11k damage, random target. Only used if no targets are in melee range, to prevent exploiting.
Whirl: Physical damage to all characters in melee range. 3-4k damage, 5-yard knockback. Occurs every 18 seconds immediately after Spout completes.
Geyser: Randomly attacks any player, causing 3-4k Frost damage to everyone within ~10 yards of the target, as well as a ~10-yard knockback to all affected.
Spout: The Lurker shoots a spray from his mouth at his current target then slowly rotates 360+ degrees in a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction. Characters hit by Spout take repeated ~3.5k frost damage very quickly and are knocked back 60+ yards. Spout does not affect characters who are submerged under the water. Pets are not affected by Spout. Spout occurs every 45 seconds in Phase 1. Lurker also uses Spout immediately after re-emerging from Phase 2.
Phase 2 adds
Six ambushers and three guardians spawn at the start of phase 2. All forms of crowd control, except mind control, work on all adds.
Coilfang Guardian:
70k Health
Melee: 6k-7k on cloth
Arcing Smash: 5k-9k damage in a frontal cone
Hamstring: Atenuează movement speed by 70% for 10 sec
Coilfang Ambusher:
26k Health
Melee: 2k-3k on cloth
Multi-Shot: Ranged attack on up to 3 players for 2-3k damage on cloth
Seem to have no aggro table
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Positioning
The Lurker requires only one tank; having an off-tank makes it safer. The tank should stand in the inner ring with his back to the pillar to help prevent the knockbacks. Everybody else should spread out to minimize damage from Geyser. Melee damage dealers should stand as close to the inner edge of the platform as possible, so that the 5-yard Whirl knockback doesn't drop them into the water. Healers should stand at the outside limit of the ring to make it easy to step back into the water to avoid Spout. Ranged damage dealers can stand on the outer platforms.
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Phase 1
The combat starts with the Lurker on the surface. It's rather straightforward tank and spank, except for Spout and Whirl. Aggro is hardly an issue—as long as there are targets in melee range, the Lurker does not attack ranged targets except for a random Geyser now and then. The Lurker can also be taunted. After two minutes, the Lurker submerges (which also removes all debuffs from him), adds turn up and Phase 2 starts. The Lurker re-emerges 60 seconds later and Phase 1 starts again.
Spout
Spout is the main reason for wipes on this boss; the whole raid has to learn how to avoid it. Boss mods usually give a 3-second warning, and it's best to immediately jump in the water when the warning comes up. Ranged DPS and healers can continue to do their job while in the water by swimming a little deeper to gain line of sight. After the beam has passed, it's safe to return to the platforms. The tank and everybody close to him need to pay attention—the beam starts at the tank and rotates for a little more than 360°. Each spout is closely followed by a Whirl.
Advanced techniques have the melee group run in a circle around the platform to avoid the beam (while still dealing damage). It's also possible to blink through it, or to use Ice Block or Divine Shield. It should be noted, however, that melee can continue to DPS during a spout by jumping forward into the water immediately surrounding Lurker. This will allow them to maintain more consistent DPS than if they are running in a circle, and the damage they take is very minor provided that they jump back out of the water as soon as the spout passes.
Spout does not affect pets.
Whirl
The second problem during Phase 1 is Whirl. If the entire melee group is knocked away from the Lurker, he starts to deal severe ranged damage to the raid. Thus a tank needs to avoid the Whirl, and be back in melee range ASAP.
Boss mods normally give a warning before a Whirl is incoming. The best solution is to have the MT jump into the water closer to the Lurker. In this case, the knockback brings him back onto the platform without ever leaving melee range. Alternatively, it's possible to back out of melee range before a Whirl and quickly move back in right after.
To make the fight safer, additional tanks can try to do the same as the MT. Since the Lurker can be taunted, it's rather easy to control him once a tank is in melee range.
It is possible to have a tank in the water the whole time. This makes him immune to Spout, and he doesn't have to be alert on Whirls. The water inflicts about 380 damage per tick, but the bigger problem is that there may be line-of-sight problems for the healers. To avoid the LOS issue, the MT healers can stay under water, too. One shadow priest in their group is enough to keep their health and mana up. When using this technique, everybody must be alert to exit the water during phase 2.
Whirl deals only about 1k of damage to pets, and no knockback.
Geyser
Sometimes the Lurker will randomly target someone in the raid for Geyser, which deals 2.5k-3.5k frost damage and knockback (10 yards) to the target and those nearby. Spread out to avoid having too many people hit by Geyser.
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Phase 2
Each time the Lurker submerges, he spawns a total of nine adds: two ranged Coilfang Ambushers on each outer platform, and three melee Coilfang Guardians on the inner ring. All these adds can be Crowd Controlled.
Usually, each platform has one group of the raid assigned to clear the Coilfang Ambushers, while the melee group deals with the Coilfang Guardians. Each of the groups should use CC and kill their adds. Mages should note that these mobs cannot be polymorphed until they are standing in their place; trying to sheep them as they are nearing the islet results in an error message. When the platform groups are done with their packs, they need to help on the Guardians.
The Ambushers can basically be tanked by any class (the more armor the better). There is one dangerous effect to be aware of: If an Ambusher gains aggro on a healer (or damage dealer) on another platform, he starts to evade until the healer comes over onto their island. If the Lurker emerges while an Ambusher is still evading, the Lurker despawns.
Similarly, the Guardians can gain aggro on raid members on other platforms, but they simply teleport and attack in this case.
One clipe after submerging, the Lurker comes back whether or not all adds are dead. After re-emerging, he starts out with a sequence of Whirl, Spout and another Whirl. It's very difficult to master this while there's an add around. The best bet is to keep the add CC'd until after the sequence (or even longer).
Alternate strategy #1 for phase 2
New Coilfang Guardians spawn on the transition to phase two only to replace dead Guardians from prior spawns. Thus it's possible to keep the Guardians sheeped (or otherwise CC'd) during the whole fight. Of course, Guardians breaking their CC can mean a one-shot death for the mage, followed by the healers in the raid, so it is important to refresh sheep every 15-20 seconds. The mages should also be soulstoned.
On top of that, hunters can put a freezing trap on the outer platforms, at the points where the Coilfang Ambushers enter. This way the raid has to deal with at most three mobs at the same time, making the healers' job much easier.
Alternate strategy #2 for phase 2
This strategy is similar to Alternate strategy #1. Our raid found that sheeping the Coilfang Guardians resulted in dead mages, so we took on the oppisite approach. We sheeped the Coilfang Ambushers instead and killed the Coilfang Guardians. That kept our mages alive and kept the dps going.
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Rezzing
It is possible to use Levitate or Water Walking while rezzing, but the rez targets may quickly die again from the Scalding Water. A second healer should be ready to immediately get the rezzed players health up again and/or have the priest cast Power Word: Shield on the newly rezzed target before healing them again.
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Tips
As the Scalding Water debuff deals Fire damage, Mages can use Fire Ward to lessen the damage they take during Spouts.
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Bugs
The Lurker can get into a state where he does a constant Spout even though there is no casting bar and he still uses his other abilities. It occurs when the last add dies during a Spout. To not have the bug happen ensure that the final add is killed before or after a Spout, NOT during. This is supposed to be fixed in an upcoming patch. See the blue posts in http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=105971962&pageNo=1&sid=1#0 for more information
There is also a current bug where the melee adds can spawn on the various islands and one- or two-shot the DPSers. This occurs when someone uses a consumable while the adds are moving into position. The aggro generated causes the melee adds to teleport to the island where the aggro originates as they're coming in, and it looks like they're spawning on that island. As long as no one uses any consumables (that includes bandages) until the tanks have aggro on melee they will not bug out.
At the start of the Burning Crusade a bug existed where if the Lurker Below was killed while casting spout, the boss could be looted, and after a Soft Reset it would respawn. Many guilds used/abused this bug to farm the boss repeatedly.
Morogrim Tidewalker
Abilities
3-5k melee damage (8k+ crushing) on tanks, roughly 12k-13k hits on cloth.
Tidal Wave
A 35 yard range attack dealing 3938-5062 frost damage and reducing attack speed by 400%. Frontal arc. The debuff lasts 15 seconds. 2s cast time. Can be resisted (binary spell).
Watery Grave
Teleport 4 players under the waterfalls. ~6000 damage after 6 seconds, and some (about 1.5k) falling damage. ~50 Yard Range from Morogrim Tidewalker. ~ 30 sec cooldown. People close to the watery grave target will also take damage.
Earthquake
3000-4000 damage. 45-60 sec cooldown. 50 yard range.
Summon Murlocs
After each earthquake, Morogrim Tidewalker summons 2 packs of 6 murlocs. They have low HP (~17000) and hit for ~800 on plate. Around 1400 on cloth.
Summon Watery Globules
At 25% Morogrim Tidewalker stops casting Watery Grave but begins summoning Watery Globules. He summons 4, one from each grave spot, they move slowly towards a fixed player and explodes for 4000-6000 damage on impact.
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Preparation
An up-close shot.
1 main tank for Morogrim (he has high burst damage - if a warrior has problems, try a druid)
1 AoE paladin tank (if no paladin 2-3 druids or warriors can do the job too)
7-9 healers, more healers help distributing healer aggro better
12 DPS including a solid AoE group (6 mages/warlocks recommended)
No resistance gear is needed. Raid members with 9k health or more can survive a combination of earthquake and watery grave without being healed - this is nice to have, but not absolutely necessary.
This fight is aggro sensitive, thus Blessing of Salvation and Tranquil Air Totem should be used liberally.
Setup
The raid should stay well away from the waterfalls, so that nobody takes collateral damage from watery graves. A good spot is on top of the stairs to the next room. It's possible to sneak past the boss and pull him from there. Morogrim should be tanked upstairs on the platform. Two healers should be designated to take care of the watery grave victims and set up downstairs, the paladin tank, a "heal aggro" warlock and a healer for the paladin can set up at the bottom of the stairs too.
The raid sets up at the edge of the platform on top of the stairs, so that the ranged damage dealers can switch from Morogrim to the murlocs just by rotating in place.
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Murloc waves
The main problem in this fight is to control the murlocs after the earthquakes. All raid members must be careful not to draw murloc aggro, particularly healers should resist their urge to immediately get the earthquake damage under control. After the tanks have solid aggro, the murlocs are killed by AoE and/or Seed of Corruption.
Paladin Tank
A paladin is the best choice to tank the murlocs, he should need only about 5 seconds to build solid aggro on all murlocs. To maximize the paladins healing aggro, one warlock can be designated as heal target for him. That warlock should Lifetap to keep his health low, and since warlocks can increase the healing they receive, spamming max rank Holy Light with Righteous Fury generates a lot of healing aggro.
Non-Paladin Tank
In this case a few druids and/or warriors have to do the job. To give them more time to build aggro, the murlocs can be slowed down with Frost Trap, Frost Nova and Piercing Howl. The basic principle remains the same.
Healer Tanking
If none of the above two methods work, it's also possible to use the healers as a sort of kiters. The mages and warlocks set up an AoE kill zone north of the stairs. All healers stay directly south of that zone, and spam heal like mad. The murlocs spawning in the north run through the kill zone when trying to reach the healers, and simply die. When all northern murlocs are dead, the healers move through the AoE to the north, so that the southern murloc group meets the same fate.
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Globules
When Morogrim starts to summon these, the raid should just reposition out of globule range (inside the doorway to the next room). Globules damage can be entirely avoided.
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Quotes
Aggro:
Flood of the Deep, take you!
Kills a player:
Only the strong survive.
Struggling only makes it worse.
It is done!
Summoning Murlocs:
By the Tides!
Destroy them my subjects!
Globules:
Soon it will be finished!
There is nowhere to hide!
Death:
Great... currents of... Ageon.
Leotheras the Blind
Abilities
Leotheras alternates between Humanoid Form (~45 sec) and Demon Form (~60 sec) through most of the fight. He wipes threat upon transition between forms.
At 15% health, the two forms split apart and must be handled separately.
Berserk: Leotheras' damage is increased by 500% and attack speed is increased by 150%, wiping the raid very quickly. This occurs 10 minutes after Leotheras becomes active.
Humanoid Form Abilities
Melee: 2500-3000 on plate
Whirlwind:
12 sec duration
Leotheras spins around the room (similar to Sartura in Ahn'Qiraj)
~3000 damage instant (mitigated by armor) plus a 15s bleed for 2500 per 3s tick (no mitigation)
15 sec cooldown
Randomly switches targets during, and resets threat at the end
Demon Form Abilities
Chaos Blast : Leotheras' only attack in this phase, centered on his current target.
2 sec cast
150 fire damage AoE
Applies a 45 sec debuff which increases fire damage taken by 1675 and can stack up to 20 times
Inner Demon
About 25 sec into the Demon Form phase, Leotheras summons Inner Demons for up to five raid members (never for the person with aggro). The inner demons can only be attacked by the person to whom they belong. If Leotheras returns to humanoid form while an Inner Demon is still alive, that person becomes Mind Controlled for 10 minutes (non-removable). Pet classes must make sure their pet does not get the killing blow, the Mind Control is only prevented if the player deals the death blow.
Inner Demon capabilities:
~11,000 health
melee damage: ~1000
spell damage: Shadow Bolt for ~3500 (reflectable)
take increased damage (+65%) from arcane, nature, and holy spells
take slightly reduced damage (-20%) from shadow and fire spells
vulnerable to most forms of CC like daze, stun, disorient, fear and even banish (not recommended)
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Strategy
Suggested Raid Build
7-8 healers: In the worst case there are 5 inner demons on healers, two healers are absolutely needed for the warlock tank
2-3 tanks: One being warlock, one to two for regaining aggro after whirlwind. Paladins are good for quickly pulling Leotheras back to them with Avenger's Shield after the demon phase. Druid tanks are also good, as they can DPS better during the demon phase and kill their Inner Demon much more easily than a Protection Warrior in tank gear.
16-14 DPS classes. Because of the whirlwind ability, ranged DPS have an easier time than melee.
Humanoid Form
Whirlwind
During a Whirlwind, Leotheras targets his victim. If that person runs away fast and far enough, he will deaggro and whirl towards someone else. It is possible to have ALL raid members avoid being hit. If people are hit by Whirlwind, they must be healed. The DoT part can only be removed with Divine Shield, Blessing of Protection, or Ice Block (Stoneform no longer removes it).
The aggro wipe can be overcome with a hunters Misdirection. Other tricks conține having someone place Gnomish Flame Turret/Searing Totem on the tanking spot (Leotheras will aggro this, allowing the MT to get aggro back easily). Bleeds or any other tank DoTs also help them gain aggro immediately when they tick after the aggro wipe. Having a Paladin main tank this encounter is also a good idea because he doesn't have to chase down Leotheras, but can simply throw an Avenger's Shield. Like most raid bosses, Leotheras is immune to taunt.
Demon Form
It's a frequently used tactic to have a demo specced warlock with felhunter and high fire resistance tank this encounter. Nonetheless, it's also possible to tank him conventionally. A combination also works - a normal tank taking the first few attacks can help the warlock tank survive the entire phase.
Tips for warrior tanks
You need to have about 365 fire resistance and about 18K health raid buffed. Flasks of Chromatic Wonder are great for this. Tank him at the edge of his hitbox to protect melee DPS from being hit by the Chaos Blast splash.
The incoming damage will go from zero (no debuffs) to most of your health bar, but if healers are on the ball you should be able to go up to about 12-14 debuffs before being instagibbed. Thunderclap seems to limitează the frequency of attacks which will make you survive longer.
Threat will probably be a problem, especially when you're not taking damage, so using Mighty Rage Potions is a very good idea and will allow your raid to squeeze out more DPS. High stamina DPS gear will also help assuming you can reach the maximum fire resistance, and use Battle Shout until you have about 4 debuffs then switch to Commanding Shout.
Ask a friendly Paladin to cast Divine Intervention on you during the last 15% if your debuffs stack too high, as this will remove them. Ideally do this when you have a full rage bar to allow you to get him back off healers, and click it off quickly before people start dying.
Inner Demon
Whenever a player has to deal with an inner demon, he should be healed by the non-affected healers, even if self healing-capable. DPS classes should find this encounter rather easy. For some classes a few hints may help:
Holy Priest: Simply spamming Smite will effectively kill the Inner Demon with an incredible amount of time left over, almost one of the fastest classes able to kill their demon. Due to the demon taking increased damage from holy, any shadow spells are probably a waste of time. Fearing often causes the demon to run out of DPS range. Any form of healing should not be used except Healthstones, as your priority is to kill your Inner Demon as soon as possible--other healers not Demon'd will take care of you, but feel free to PW:S or Renew before he uses the spell in case you receive it, just waste no time NOT killing your demon. No spell damage gear should be needed.
Holy Paladin: Start by use Avenging Wrath and Seal of Righteousness, then continue with Consecration, Exorcism, Holy Shock and Judgement of Righteousness. Clean up with Hammer of Wrath.
Retribution Paladin: Easy target, just pop Seal of Blood or Seal of Command, use Exorcism and Crusader Strike to crush it and turn back on the boss.
Restoration Druid: Start with Moonfire, break Tree of Life, then continue with Barkskin, followed by spamming Wrath. Barkskin lasts 12 seconds during that time cast about five Wraths. After that start spamming Moonfire since Wrath gets pushback. Also use Insect Swarm if possible.
Restoration Shaman: Keep Lightning Shield active. Do not try to melee DPS the Demon, instead use Chain Lightning and Lightning Bolt. Keep a Searing Totem up. Use Earth Shock to interrupt Shadow Bolts.
Protection Warriors: Warriors should try to be at 100% rage before they can get the demon. This is achieved by simply attacking Leotheras in battle stance in his demon form, using Devastate and Heroic Strike, economize on rage as much as possible. When the inner demon is there, spell reflect the demon's shadow bolt. Wear a mix of DPS and tanking gear for this fight.
Hunters: Pets can be used, but that's a little dangerous (lest the pet gets the kill). It's safe to use the pet until about 20%, then put it on passive. If the pet had growl on auto-cast before, it should still hold aggro until the demon is dead. Hunters who can't use their pet (or prefer to leave it on the boss) can use the hunter dance and should be fine too. You can use Freezing Trap also. If you are in melee range and want to get far from your inner demon, freeze him and step back.
Combat Rogues: These have a particularly easy time with inner demons, they can stay on the boss and simply kill the Demon with Blade Flurry.
Split Phase
At 15%, Leotheras' Demon Form splits from his Humanoid Form, and both forms must be handled together. The Demon Form starts with 100% health, while the Humanoid Form retains its current health. The Humanoid Form abilities are the same as before. The Demon Form still uses Chaos Blast, but no longer spawns the Inner Demons. Upon defeating the Humanoid Form, the Demon Form despawns.
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Quotes
Aggro:
Finally my banishment ends!
Transition to Demon phase:
Be gone trifling elf. I'm in control now.
Insidious Whisper (inner demons):
We all have our demons..
Killing a player (demon form):
I have no equal.
Perish, mortal.
Yes, YES! Ahahah!
Killing a player (blood elf form):
Kill! KILL!
That's right! Yes!
Who's the master now?
15% Leotheras/Demon split:
Leotheras : No! NO! What have you done?! I am the master, do you hear me? I... aaghh... Can't... contain him...
Shadow of Leotheras (demon) : At last I am liberated. It has been too long since I have tasted true freedom!
Death:
You cannot kill me! Fools, I'll be back! I'll...aarghh...
Lady Vashj
Abilities
Lady Vashj can be damaged only in phases 1 and 3. During phase 2 lots of adds spawn, and her shield has to be switched off. Sporebat adds appear in phase 3.
Lady Vashj
Lady Vashj can be taunted.
Phase 1 and 3 abilities:
Basic melee - Normal 3,000, 4,000-6,000 crushing on plate
Shoot - A ranged ability that hits for 4,000-5,500 damage, used on primary target if target is not in melee range
Multi-Shot - A ranged ability that hits a target and 4 surrounding people for 6,500 - 7,500 damage
Shock Blast - Randomly deals about 9000 nature damage to her current target with a 5 sec stun, no aggro drop, can be absorbed by Grounding Totem, binary resist
Entangle - Entangles every target within 15 yards, 10 sec immobilize plus 500 damage per tick. Resistible, not mitigated by armor, but reduced by resilience. Removable by Blessing of Freedom, shapeshifting, and the PVP Trinkets
Static Charge - debuff doing about 2000 damage per tick to its target and anyone within 5 yards for 15 sec. No durability loss if killed by this effect.
Phase 2 ability:
Forked Lightning - Random bolts of lightning that hit for 2,300-2,600 nature damage in a frontal cone. Not resistible.
Enchanted Elemental
Many of these elementals spawn continuously from the water at the foot of the stairs during phase 2.
7700 HP
Immune to frost damage and effects
Immune to snares and crowd control
Slowly moves towards Lady Vashj and increases her damage output by 5% if it reaches her
Tainted Elemental
Every 50 seconds, one Tainted Elemental spawns instead of an enchanted elemental.
7700 HP
Poison Spit - random target, 1885-2115 nature damage plus 8 sec poison debuff for 2000 damage per tick
Immune to frost effects and damage
Does not move
Despawns after 15 seconds
Drops a Tainted Core when killed
Coilfang Elite
Every 45 seconds one Coilfang Elite spawns in the area on top of the stairs.
175000 HP
normal melee ~5k on plate, frontal arc cleave for over 7.5k on plate
Immune to Fear
Tauntable
Coilfang Strider
Every 60 seconds one Coilfang Strider spawns on top of the stairs.
175000 HP
Melee - 4500 - 8000 on tanks, one-shots anything else
Mind Blast - 2313-2687 shadow damage
Panic Aura - 8 yard AoE Fear every tick, 4 sec fear duration, very fast run speed
Tauntable
Toxic Spore Bats
During phase 3, these bats spawn. At first they're few, but their number steadily increases.
6,900 HP
Toxic Spores - Poison cloud AoE 1,500 nature damage per second
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Preparation
The fight consists of three phases: Phase 1 and 3 are the same, except for the spore bat adds in phase 3. Phase 2 is the real test of a raid's ability to work together—every single raid member is important, and has ample opportunity to cause a wipe.
Phase 1 a rather simple tank-and-spank, until she's at 70%.
Phase 2 lasts from 70% to 50%. She summons many adds and hides behind a shield, which has to be removed by turning off four shield generators (using tainted cores). Each generator switched off drops her health by 5%.
Phase 3 starts at 50%. It's similar to phase 1, with the addition of Spore Bats.
Raid composition
2 Tanks
1 Kiter
7-8 Healers
8-11 ranged DPS
4-7 melee DPS
Positioning
Positioning
Positioning is all-important during phase 2. In phase 1 it's only important that the raid spreads out (to minimize damage from her Static Charge). Thus it's advisable to have everybody set up close to their phase 2 positions. The phase 2 positions are:
Tanks and melee in the central area on top of the stairs
Ranged damage dealers in a wide circle atop the stairs, so that each ranged damage dealer has LOS to as much of the stairs as possible, and the top area too
About half of the healers in the inner circle (inside the shield generators), the other half well distributed on top of the stairs
During phase 1, all healers should be in healing range of the MT.
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Phase 1
A standard misdirection pull does the job. She hits rather hard, so the healers should pre-cast. This phase is rather easy, mainly a practice run for phase 3. The main goal is to keep everybody alive. The only problems are caused by her singular attacks.
One Shaman should be in the MT group and permanently keep a Grounding Totem up in order to nullify the Shock Blast
Paladins should put a Blessing of Freedom on the MT if he gets rooted, or on rooted melee dps with Static Charge
No off-tank for this phase is required as Shock Blast and Entangle do not drop aggro
Static Charge victims must stay away from everybody else, and require some healing. If the MT gets it he moves to the middle and all other melee classes should stay away from him.
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Phase 2
At 70%, Vashj runs to the middle of her platform and surrounds herself in a shield that makes her invulnerable. To take down the shield, the raid must deactivate the four Shield Generators around her by using a Tainted Core (from the Tainted Elementals) on each. Four different types of adds spawn during the entire second phase:
Coilfang Elites – tanked and killed by the tanks and melee damage dealers
Coilfang Striders – kited and killed by DoTs. Every class with the ability to cast a DoT should help on this, including healers
Enchanted Elementals – killed by ranged damage dealers
Tainted Elementals – must be killed for their Tainted Cores, which are looted and used to switch Vashj's shield generators off. This task requires teamwork; each raid must develop a tactic to handle it.
There is a brief 40-second lull at the start of phase 2, which allows everybody to get into position. There are 12 stairs; many raids divide them into four sections of 3 stairs each (N, W, S and E), and assign a team of two ranged damage dealers and one healer to each section. The enchanted elementals have rather low HP, and a single damage dealer can kill one easily before it reaches the Lady. Unfortunately they're frost immune, so frost mages must somewhat deviate from their standard practice.
The Coilfang Elites should be quickly grabbed by the tank, and moved to the inner circle. The melee group should kill each before the next one spawns.
Coilfang Striders need to be kited. The usual kite path is a wide circle outside the shield generators. Everyone with the ability to cast a DoT (including the healers) should all put DoTs on the strider whenever it comes in range. Kiting is facilitated by slowing the Strider as much as possible. All classes should use all means available (mages should spam slow, shamans use frost shock, CoEx from Warlocks, Paladins can Hammer it whenever it gets close, and Druids can use Root). Tailors should bring Netherweave Nets and use them liberally, however one must use care not to net a Strider next to a healer or tank (save applied to druids' roots). After patch 3.0.2 it's no longer required to kite them at all if you can get a druid to keep the strider rooted all the time.
Tainted Elementals
When a Tainted Elemental spawns, it is imperative that it be killed as quickly as possible because it despawns after 15 seconds. If more than two despawn, a wipe is highly probable because the extra Elites and Striders are too much.
After the kill, the Tainted Core must be looted. It causes the person carrying it to be paralyzed, but it can be thrown to a friendly target by using it (within LOS, about 60-yard range). The looting player should pass it to somebody up the stairs, and that person passes it to someone close to an active Shield Generator. Voice communication helps a lot in coordinating the handling of the cores.
Different ideas to deal with the Tainted Cores include:
Ranged DPS healers stand at the edge of the platform on top of the stairs, the player looting the core throws it to one of these healers.
One melee damage dealer stays close to a still-active generator, the ranged DPS healer passes the Tainted Core to that melee damage dealer.
Four melee group healers stand each next to a generator (on the inside to be safe from the Strider fear), and the ranged DPS healers pass the core to them.
One melee damage dealer is designated as "Elemental Cleanup," watching out for any normal Elementals that get too close to Vashj. When a Tainted Elemental spawns, the "Elemental Cleanup" announces where it is, runs over to help kill it quickly, and loots the core.
Four melee damage dealers are assigned to one section of the stairs each. They kill Coilfang Elites, but about 8 seconds before a Tainted is due, they run to their assigned section to help with the Tainted Elemental. If the Tainted is in the melee section, they help kill and loot it. If there is no Tainted in their section, they go back to the elites.
The clipă to switch off the last generator should be well-controlled, because the Striders and Coilfang Elites should be as low as possible when phase 3 starts. As a rule of thumb, there should be at most a half-dead Strider, a full Elite, and a nearly dead Elite left over at the start of phase 3 in order to prevent a wipe. It's safe to delay until about 10–12 seconds before the next Strider/Elite spawn. Don't wait longer because the Bigwigs timers can be somewhat inaccurate and the adds are actually "up" some time before they become visible.
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Phase 3
This phase starts with a reset of the aggro table. It's basically Phase 1 with a twist - Spore Bats start to spawn. They come slowly at first, but gradually their number increases to the point where it becomes very hard to avoid the AoE poison. After about four minutes of Phase 3, raid members usually start dying from poison.
At first, all remaining phase 2 adds must be killed. During the first few minutes of Phase 3, a few hunters and warlocks can kill enough Spore Bats so that they don't cause a real problem. When too many Bats spawn, the Spore Bat killers should switch to Vashj. The top of the west stairs is a good position from which to kill the Spore Bats.
In effect, the Spore Bats are sort of an Enrage timer. Knowing how to avoid the poison patches, and having a skilled tank keeping her on the move can make quite a difference to the lethality of this "enrage".
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Class Assignments
Tanks - Stay on Vashj in phase 1 and 3. Take the Coilfang Elites in phase 2 (be quick - they can one-shot clothies).
Melee DPS - Maul Vashj in phases 1 and 3. In phase 2, kill the Coilfang Elites (and - depending on the chosen strategy - watch a stair section for Tainted Elementals).
Ranged DPS - In phase 1 and 3, nuke Vashj. In phase 2, nuke elementals and put DoTs on the Striders.
Healers - There's quite a lot of AoE damage in this fight, so generally all healers should pay attention to everybody in range. In Phases 1 and 3 the main tank needs some extra care (about 5-6 healers), during phase 2 the pressure on the tank is lower, but everybody else takes more damage (and keep an extra eye on the kiter).
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Useful Macros
The simplest macro tries to throw the core at the current target, whispers the receiver that he's got it, and also announces the fact in yell and say. It doesn't deal with errors, so the messages are spammed even if the throw failed.
/use Tainted Core
/y <------- TAINTED CORE TO: %t ! ! !
/s <------- TAINTED CORE TO: %t ! ! !
/script SendChatMessage("!!! YOU HAVE THE CORE !!!", "WHISPER", nil, UnitName("target"));
A more sophisticated approach does not spam /yell and /raid. It whispers the targeted person and tells them if they are too far away (and pings the throwers location on the minimap).
/use Tainted Core
/run f=SendChatMessage w="WHISPER"c="Tainted Core"t="target"u=UnitName(t)if IsItemInRange(c,t)==1 then f("You have the "..c,w,nil,u)f(u.." has "..c,"RAID")else f("Can't throw core at you. Get close!",w,nil,u)Minimap:PingLocation(0,0)end
For netting striders and notifying the current target of the strider (also works for the Pally stun, just replace /use with /cast Hammer of Justice):
/use Netherweave Net
/script SendChatMessage(string.format("Netting %s's Strider!",UnitName("targettarget")),"YELL");
/script SendChatMessage("Netting your Strider!", "whisper",nil,UnitName("TargetTarget"));
To facilitate the targeting and killing of Tainted Elementals, the following macro sets the Tainted Elemental as focus target and casts "Some Spell" on it if it is alive. If it is not alive, it keeps the current target if it is an enemy (healers shouldn't use this if they count on targeting to heal, or they can replace the last line with /targetlasttarget). If the elemental is out of range or LoS, it produces an error messages, but at least the Tainted Elemental is now the focus target so it's easier to find:
/cleartarget
/focus
/targetexact Tainted Elemental
/focus [exists, nodead]
/cast [target=focus, exists, nodead] Some Spell
/targetlastenemy
To cast some spell (usually a DoT) on the Strider, this macro assumes that the kiter remains the same and the kiters name is known:
/assist [target=KiterName, nodead]
/cast <Some>
/targetlasttarget
Similarly, the following can be used to heal the kiter without changing target. The [] treats the spell as a normal spell if the kiter is dead:
/cast [target=KiterName, nodead][] Some Heal spell
The following two macros do the same as those above, except for using focus instead of kiter name. In order to set the kiter as focus, use the macro while pressing <shift>.
DoT the kiter's target:
/clearfocus [modifier:shift]
/clearfocus [target=focus, dead]
/focus [target=focus, dead][target=focus, noexists]
/assist [target=focus, nodead]
/cast Some DoT
/stopmacro [target=focus, dead]
/targetlasttarget
The /stopmacro allows the macro to cast the DoT normally if there's no (or a dead) focus target.
Heal the Kiter:
/clearfocus [modifier:shift]
/clearfocus [target=focus, dead]
/focus [target=focus, dead][target=focus, noexists]
/cast [target=focus, nodead][] Some Heal
As before, the [] allows the heal to cast as normal if the focus is dead.
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Munca in echipa presupune in primul rand sa-ti pierzi jumatate din timp explicandu-le celorlalti de ce nu au dreptate! |
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