ToC, ICC - 15 Dec 2009

Alrighty, so we finished the leftover Twins and Anub in ToC and then rolled on up to ICC for another go at the new content. Completely new content for Yasmin, so big props on being able to two-heal with Akholy on those two fights. Good stuff. No one died on Anub'arak! A couple of tries to get the Twins down, but it's because DPS were bads and didn't switch to the shield! Adinara and Fook tanked, while Rezolute brought his DK and I DPSed as cat. Novel things for a lot of people.

Then we shimmied over to the Icecrown Citadel and spent six attempts at having our arses handed to us on the first boss. That's after all the wiping on the trash leading up to him! Rezolute brought his pally to help heal the tanks. Our best attempt on the boss was 69% I think :(

There is so much stuff happening in that fight, there's not a lot of time to DPS. Bone spikes, fire, whirlwind, aararghghg

Tomorrow we're just going to do ToC and ICC again, because General trash is boring.

ToC, ICC - 9 Dec 2009

So, even though we were all excited about the patch and the new instance, Fook was the most excited and started drinking at midday, in the sun. The end result: he was too sick to come and raid with us.

Adinara is unfortunately the worst geared of all the raid and so the tanking became very difficult. Rezolute took a break from his exams to come check out the new stuff with us, but it was going rather slowly.

I actually really enjoyed going into the instance fresh, without any prior knowledge. It was fun figuring out the abilities of the bosses. Good spotting on the Servants and their sleepy 'pets', Akholy!

So we've learned so far that the boss whirlwinds, shared 200% dmg amongst two or more closest targets, spreads out lines of fire from him, and uses bone spike on people that needs to be DPSed down. Lots of situational awareness.

ToC didn't really go well at all. Actually, the first encounter was most excellent with no one dying. Jaraxxus was kinda terrible. It's probably the first time that we even wiped on that boss. Took us three attempts. Faction Champions were looking dicey but we pulled through. And for the Twins, I think it was getting really hard for Adinara on the off-shield duty. By then it was 9.30, so we just called it and went to bed.

We can start with the end of ToC on Tuesday.

Ulduar - 8 Dec 2009

Wipe fest on General Vezax, our best attempt was 71%, and many many attempts of not even getting to 90% because we failed on interrupts, shadow crashes, leeches, and cooldowns. Moreover, the combat log bugged out and I don't actually know how many attempts we made. It was a good solid hour and a half though.

Looks like it's going to be a patch tonight, so we'll hit up 10 man Icecrown if it is released tomorrow. If not, a quick ToC and maybe another hit or two on the General.

Next week is our last week of raiding in 2009, so it'd be nice to finish the Ulduar instance and move on to better gear before coming back for some hard mode achievements.

ToC - 2 Dec 2009

Very very good run. First time we cleared ToC with zero wipes, and in under an hour. We also got the Salt and Pepper achievement!

We then went back and killed Mimiron and got the Keepers of Ulduar achievement! (I also got the finished Ulduar achievement as Mimiron was the only 10 man boss I hadn't done previously).

Was good to see most of the loot going to someone, only two pieces got disenchanted.

Next week, Rezolute is not available due to exams. We will need Adinara doing the offtanking. We are up to the trash for General Vezax now, so go read up that strat (written on this site). On Wednesday, Rezolute may or may not come.

And also apparently Icecrown might be released. If it is, we will go and check out the first bosses as the instance will be released in stages, so we might as well. If we wipe horribly, we can go back and finish the ToC before bedtime.

The week after next will be our last week raiding before the holidays. But Rez and I are keen to run some five mans (there will be three new instances in icecrown) and maybe an odd ToC if we can scrape enough replacement members.

Summer break

We're going to be taking a break from raiding for three weeks in December/January.

Last day of raiding will be 16 December 2009, and the first day back will be 12 January 2010.

I'm taking most of that time off work, so I'll probably still be keen to run some things, but some people will not be available.

Ulduar - 1 Dec 2009

Well, it was quite an enjoyable night, but completely success-free.

I believed that Azador would be back, but apparently his internet died again, and Rezolute was called into work at the last minute. We spent about an hour looking for replacements, tried even a pugger on the first attempt but his internet died also!

We finally got Swifty in on his mage.

Then we proceeded with six more attempts without success. We did improve markedly on each attempt though, the final few showed such improvement that no one was dying on the first three phases. Our best and most frustrating attempt was 1%!

Next time, I guess.

Have a look at the combat logs link - they have new "analyze" options in the drop down, all sorts of nifty information.

General Vezax

General Vezax is one of the few bosses in Ulduar that don't change phases. He will remain the same during the entire encounter. His hard hits and the specifics around the mana regeneration during the encounter makes him a test for tanks and casters. Melee DPS have easy time for once.

There are few things to watch out during the fight. People outside melee range might be targeted by Shadow Crashes - these need to be avoided until they land, after which ranged DPS can enter the puddles left behind for extra damage and reduced mana cost. Healers should avoid those at all times.

Mark of the Faceless is the other debuff to watch out for. Anyone affected with it should run away from any nearby players, since they heal Vezax.

Searing Flames should be interrupted every time, and Vezax should be either kited during the Surge of Darkness, or his damage should be countered by a defensive cooldown.

In addition to all this, Vezax's Aura of Despair will eliminate all mana regeneration from the fight. One ranged DPS person will need to destroy the floating Saronite Vapors and mana users will need to stand in the green puddles left behind to replenish mana. Keep in mind, the buff damages the caster as it restores mana, so step out of the pool at 5-6 stacks. Melee DPS won't have such trouble, but their attack speed will be reduced by 20% by the aura.

Abilities

Aura of Despair - Prevents most mana regeneration methods. Melee attack speed is reduced by 20% for all raid members as well.

Shadow Crash - Shoots a shadow missile towards a random target (preferring ranged), inflicting 11,310 to 12,690 Shadow damage to the target and anyone in 10 yd radius. A dark puddle spawns under the area of impact, increasing magical damage by 100%, decreasing casting speed by 100%, healing done and mana cost by 75%.

Mark of the Faceless - Applies a Mark of the Faceless to a random raid member (preferring ranged), causing them to drain 5,000 hit points every 1 second, for 10 seconds, from other nearby players. Vezax will heal for 20 times more health than he has drained (100,000 for every 5,000).

Searing Flames - Inflicts 13,875 to 16,125 Fire damage to everybody in the room, and reduces their armor by 75%. Must be interrupted.

Surge of Darkness - Increases Vezax's damage by 100%, but decreases his movement speed by 55%, for 10 seconds. Cast every 60-70 seconds.

Hard Mode

Saronite Barrier - Reduces all damage taken by 99%. Cast if 6 Saronite Vapors spawn and not a single one of them is destroyed. Vezax will also summon a Saronite Animus. The Barrier disappears when the Animus dies.

Saronite Animus - Casts Profound Darkness frequently, which does 750 Shadow damage to the entire raid and increases the Shadow damage taken by 10%.

If you allow all 6 Saronite Vapors to spawn without killing them, and while Vezax is still alive, a Saronite Animus will spawn. The Animus will make Vezax immune to damage (but he will not cast Searing Flames). The spawning of the Animus is considered the beginning of the hard mode.

Defeating the Animus is the only way to make Vezax vulnerable again.

Substitutes

Azador's internet is still broken and still no word from Adinara.

We'll get Toch to fill in on Tuesday in Ulduar, and Yasmin will come to help out also. Both Toch and Yasmin can't make it on Wednesdays, but I can ask Skullmantis and Woggie to come along to ToC.

Yogg-Saron

Yogg-Saron's encounter is a complete madness. With three phases and everything happening at the same time, this fight can easily take weeks to master.

Anytime prior the engaging the Old God, you can choose 0-4 Keepers to assist you by talking to their images around the Observation Ring. Each Keeper will buff the raid with an aura specific to him or her, and will also have an additional special ability. Harder modes are when you have 3, 2, 1, or no keepers.

During Phase 1, you will face Sara, Yogg-Saron's vrykul avatar, and Faceless adds. Sara will be friendly to the raid and will cast a few spells, which both help and harm you in some way.

The adds explode when they die, so the DPS must stop all damage on the add at 60-30% (depending on how fast the DPS is going), and let the tank run the add to Sara.

The only way to kill her and enter Phase 2 is by killing the Guardians of Yogg-Saron close to her, so their explosion can hit her. Ranged DPS and a healer will need to be near Sara to assist the tank in exploding the adds on top of her. Remaining people should stand by the door and DPS the adds before the tank runs them away.

The adds spawn by themselves from any of the 4-5 moving clouds on the ground, and an additional Guardian spawns every time a player touches one of the clouds. Stay away from the clouds. Make sure to turn up Projected Textures in video options so you can see their complete shape.

A total of 8 adds need to be killed next to Sara in order to start the next phase.

Phase 2 is by far the hardest to execute properly.

The debuff Sanity starts to play a vital role in the fight - it starts at 100 stacks and is reduced by the various spells Sara casts. You can and should replenish it at the Sanity Wells around the room (if you have Freya helping you), which look like green beams of light, because if your Sanity reaches 0, you are permanently mind-controlled by Yogg-Saron and buffed quite a bit. A mind-controlled character needs to be killed, and they cannot be battle-rezed as they will come back up mind-controlled again.

Sara's abilities to watch out for:

Brain Link will connect two people via red/yellow beam. The players will take damage and lose sanity if they are far away from each other (red beam), so make sure you run straight to your partner (yellow beam indicating safe distance). With DBM, one person will get a cross and the other will get a skull. Make sure to go near the other symbol until the symbols go away. Brain Link can be broken by entering a portal, so if you are assigned to the portal, do still zone in. Your link buddy should follow you to the portal and then run back to their spot once you've left.

Malady of the Mind is a fear effect that does damage and lowers Sanity, and also jumps to nearby targets after its 4-seconds effect. Get away from anyone with it.

Psychosis is a simple damage-and-Sanity hitter, you can't avoid it.

Death Rays will target random locations close to Yogg-Saron's body, marking them with green light. Soon after the Beams will shoot at those locations and move a little, inflicting a lot of damage to anyone standing in them. They are small, somewhat slow and generally easy to avoid.

As well as those abilities, Yogg-Saron will periodically summon different kinds of tentacles.

Constrictors will grab a random raid member, inflict damage over time to them and not release them until either one is dead. Healers in a constrictor, can still heal and decurse and should try to heal themselves.

Crushers debuff the entire raid with a -20% damage debuff, which can be interrupted by hitting them with a melee attack. Be mindful, all attacks apply a 1-second stacking debuff that increases the Crushers' damage and haste by 3% - you will need to allow the debuff to fall off, if you are having a tank constantly interrupting the spell.

Corruptors die quickly and debuff the raid with poisons, diseases, magic debuffs and curses, all of which must be removed by players.

On top of all this, portals to Yogg-Saron's brain will open every 90 seconds or so. Only 4 players can enter, as the portals close after somebody uses them. Those players will enter one of Yogg's illusions, where they will have to kill several easy-to-kill tentacles (masked as various objects or NPCs), all the while avoiding to face the skulls around the room.

As soon as all the tentacles inside are dead, Yogg-Saron's brain will be exposed in a nearby chamber - the players will need to DPS him as much as possible, before leaving the room through portals in the brain chamber. Be careful, you will have exactly one minute to clear the illusions and attack the brain - even a second delay in the room above that minute will cause you to be permanently mind-controlled.

If you manage to bring Yogg-Saron's brain to 30%, Phase 3 will begin. This is mostly a burn phase, with a few tricks.

All healers should stand facing away from the boss at all times. Anyone who is going low on Sanity, should face away and replenish in the green pool of sanity, then run back to DPS (step backwards until you're in range to save some sanity).

Occasionally Yogg will cast Lunatic Gaze, which is a spell similar to the one the skulls in the portals use - face him away as quickly as possible to avoid damage and Sanity loss.

Immortal Guardians will also spawn during this phase - they are similar to the ones in Phase 1, except that they don't die normally. You can't DPS them below 1%, and the only way to kill them is to wait for Thorim to finish them off, if you have him available helping you.

If you don't have Thorim, you will need to have a tank keep them at least 20 yards away from the boss, as the Beacon marked for Empowering Shadows will heal the boss, if nearby.

ToC - 25 November 2009

Azador's internet is still broken, Adinara's still on sabbatical, Yasmin's joined a running group on Wednesday and cannot come. We got Skullmantis and Woggie to fill in tonight, both of whom have not done the instance before.

To help out the DPS a little, I switched to DPS and Sharny healed with Akholy. Unfortunately, that wasn't really working as she kept getting hit by snobolds. Trees really do have an upper hand on that fight.

Other than that, Northrend Beasts was really really really bad. We died on worms repeatedly, and when we finally killed the Yeti, most of the DPS were dead.

It's really important to stay spread out through all of the phases of that fight. Especially during worms. They breathe poison/fire in a cone in front of them, and the more people get hit, the more we're running around and not killing them.

We took so long to kill the encounter that we almost hit the enrage timer. This is not an option in hard mode - the bosses come out when THEY think it's time not when we've killed the previous boss as in the normal mode. This is why we need to focus our DPS, to hit snobolds when they're up, kill the worms with minimal running around, and get maximum damage on the yeti during stun phases.

Five attempts on Beasts is really quite shameful, and I would like us not to do that again.

Lord Jaraxxus was fairly ordinary, and other than some people missing their legion flames, it went quite smoothly.

Faction Champions were AMAZING. THE best attempt I have ever seen in normal, hard, 10 man, or 25 man. One shot, everyone on full health, absolutely beautiful. Let's do that again every time :D

Twins were abysmal once again. I realise I've not written up a strat for it, but these fights are comparatively easy. Lightbane is a light creature, she hates dark. So if you have dark aura, you do more damage to her. Darkbane is a dark creature, she is a vampire, grrr arrr, if you have light when you hit her, she goes booo hisss, and gets upset and dies. This is especially important to remember when one of them has a shield up. Only light can break through a dark shield; only dark can break through a light shield. It's like Maths - plus and minus cancel out.

The spanner in the works is when one of them is explody, THEN and only then do you want to be the SAME colour as the explody boss. Think of it as "there is SOOOO much light coming out of Lightbane that to protect myself I need to _absorb_ it instead of _break_ through it". Become one with the light. Or some such.

The final boss was fairly well done, the healing was much smoother than the attempts previously, and no one died. Very proud.

I think the transient 8th and 9th spots in the raid are making it hard for us, and so if we want to progress towards Icecrown Citadel and Hard modes, we need a stable team.

At this point, Az won't be able to do ToGC with us as he's bound to another team for hard modes, Adinara should be coming back next week but might not, and Yas is only helping out because we're short.

If you have some mates that would be keen on a constant team, ask them, and let me know.

ToC Achievements

The Trial of the Crusader has very few bosses, and hence very few achievements. Our last two adventures into the ToC involved six and seven wipes per night. As we see that number go down, there is no reason why we cannot throw in a few achievements before switching to the hard mode (ToGC). The following are the achievements in ToC and their strats:

First Boss Encounter:

• Not One, But Two Jormungars

Defeat Acidmaw and Dreadscale within 10 seconds of each other in 10-player mode. Drop Acidmaw + Dreadscale to about 15% health each. Wait for them to submerge once more. Once they re-emerge from the ground, simply get them down slowly together and then kill them within 10 seconds of each other.

• Upper Back Pain

Defeat Icehowl while at least 2 Snobolds remain alive in 10-player mode. I as a tree have never ever in all my time in ToC 10 and 25 player, never had a snobold on me. Someone on WoWHead is saying the same thing. It appears if you're shapeshifted into anything, you won't get a snobold on you. So if you have problems with snobolds, get yourselves 8-10 pigmy oil, noggenfogger elixirs, etc. Wait until all four snobolds are out, then pick two to die. The first players to get cleared of your snobolds are your healers. The best players to carry snobolds: rogues, warriors, DKs, hunters, ret pallies, and enh shaman.

Really must remove snobolds off of: holy pallies, casting shammies, mages, locks, and boomkin. Take off thorns, ret aura, so the snobolds don't take reflective damage.

Second Boss Encounter:

• Three Sixty Pain Spike

Defeat Lord Jaraxxus while at least two Mistresses of Pain are alive in 10-player mode.

Third Boss Encounter:

• Resilience Will Fix It

Kill the enemy heroes within 60 seconds of each other in 10-player mode. Resilience doesn't actually have any effect in this fight. Pets don't count towards 'enemy heroes'. That means it is a good idea to kill the pets very quickly at the beginning, especially the Felhunter. The Felhunter has only 126K health.

Fourth Boss Encounter:

• Salt and Pepper

Defeat the Twin Val'kyr in 3 minutes or less in 10-player mode. Speed kill. Provided we DPS hard and not stuff up on vortices and shields, it'll get done. All DPS should be doing about 4800 DPS to achieve this.

Last Boss Encounter:

• The Traitor King

Kill 40 Swarm Scarabs within 30 seconds in 10-player mode.

This seems pretty hard, but does not require the boss to be killed. So can wipe after the achievement, and do the encounter normally.

About 10 scarabs spawn each underground phase. Need to distracting shot, crippling or anaesthetic poison and fan of knives. Lots of ice on the ground to slow them down. Everyone has to run away from them, and AoE when 40 have been collected.

Ulduar - 24 Nov 2009

Very exciting night as we finally saw all of the keepers.

We cleared the trash with just 6-8 people as we were waiting for stragglers to log on. Unfortunately, Azador's internet broke as we found out later. Toch substituted as a DPS warrior. A solid kill on Hodir with no one dying for the first time in all our attempts on this boss. Unfortunately, it was our second attempt in the same raid ID as we extended the instance since last week, so no tick in the Champion of Ulduar yet :( Also two minutes slower than the speed kill, will need to work on that next. Remember the loot from the faster kill is the hard mode better loot.

Then we threw in something new and attempted Thorim. One shot him on the first ever attempt, with some people having never seen the boss. Very exciting! Sadly, Akholy died in the Gauntlet, so no tick in the Champion of Ulduar again.

We attempted the 20 minute achievement on Freya. We were doing really well on all the trash, but Freya got the best of us and the elemental adds caused a lot of issues on the first attempt. So we died and had to go again. Sadness.

We then did all the hard trash leading up to Mimiron and put in two attempts on the boss. The first one was extremely solid, we got all the way to phase three without too much trouble, but my lack of direction meant we let too many adds build up and lost the fight. We tried to put in a second attempt after the raid end-time, but died on phase one due to pumpkiness.

I have extended the Raid ID so next time we'll do Mimiron, General, and Yogg; and that's it folks, instance cleared. Can't wait!

Mimiron

Mimiron is one of the more complicated fights in Ulduar. In comparison with the other 3 keeper bosses (Hodir, Thorim, Freya), this boss is extremely difficult.

You battle four of Mimiron's vehicle creations: The Leviathan MK II, which is his personal version of the Flame Leviathan; VX-001, which is a robotic unit; the Aerial Command Unit, which is a flying vehicle; and the ultimate V0-L7R-0N, which is a combination of the previous three.

The challenge of this fight is avoiding the many ways you can die if you are not completely focused.

Phase 1

Mimiron will use his Leviathan MK II to swap between melee and ranged attacks.

Ranged DPS and healers spread out, and not move for the rest of the phase. The boss will shoot a fire ball at one person that will put a DOT on them and they have to be healed through it.

The boss does an ability called Plasma Blast that hits the main tank for 17,600 damage per second unmitigated for 5 seconds. The tank must be spam healed through this. A cooldown rotation is highly recommended for both the tank's cooldowns and any other mitigation cooldowns in the raid, such as Guardian Spirit.

After each plasma blast, the boss will do a shock blast. You can see him casting this ability (blue lightning arcs), and melee and the tank have to run away from him. The ability is a self-centred AOE that will one-shot anyone in range. If the run distance back to the boss and timing are executed perfectly, a tank can keep the boss from moving when they go back in.

Proximity Mines will be a danger to the melee if they don't watch out where they run. Although one mine is not life-threatening, two or more can kill you. Having no one in the raid step on any of the mines throughout the entire fight is an achievement of its own.

Phase 2

At the beginning of phase two, stay away from leftover mines; they will explode by the start of the phase. Spread out around the room, then group up behind the boss when he enters through the central platform (even healers and ranged).

VX-001 is the next vehicle. It's a robotic unit that has no aggro table and shoots Rapid Bursts at random people. Melee DPS should continually run behind the boss each time he turns.

Heat Waves will cause a lot of raid fire damage. The occasional Rocket Strikes will mark a small circle on the ground and fly to it, killing anyone standing over.

Whenever Mimiron begins to cast Winding Up, everybody should stack behind him and move slowly as he rotates, in order to stay behind and avoid the ability called Laser Barrage. Casters and Ranged DPS should stay close to Mimiron to make the avoiding of the laser easier. Anyone caught in front of the boss during this ability will be killed instantly. This ability only goes 180 degrees and only goes in one direction, so just run behind him. Melee should be careful not to stand too far into the boss's center or the barrage may clip them.

Phase 3

An Aerial Command Unit is the third vehicle. It will be attackable only by Ranged DPS. A ranged tank, such as a warlock, will be keeping the boss stationary.

On this phase the tank should be picking up assault bots (which spawn from orange beams of light) and junk bots (which spawn from green beams of light). Assault bots will one-shot a non-tank so it is crucial that they are picked up; junk bots do not hit hard so if one is loose it is not a priority until assault bots are secured. All melee DPS should be on these bots while the command unit is in the air. Assault bots can be stunned, and will also do a channelled spell 'magnetic pull' that stuns the tank. This is interruptable.

Assault bots drop an item called magnetic core. One person will pick these up and put them below the boss. This will pull the boss onto the ground; everybody should DPS him during this time.

All ranged should have a macro '/target Bomb Bot'. Bomb bots will spawn throughout this phase; they run very fast and will likely kill anyone they get to. Ranged must target them as soon as the bots drop through the air. They should be dead within a few seconds of hitting the ground so that they don't get near anybody; if a bomb bot is coming toward you, run away.

Phase 4

After the command unit is down, kill any remaining bots and get into the same positions as in phase 1.

After the Aerial Command Unit is defeated, Mimiron will create his ultimate vehicle - V0-L7R-0N, a combination of all three vehicles he has used so far. Each unit starts at 50% health. Melee are only capable of attacking the bottom and middle. All of these parts must be killed within 5 seconds of each other or they will self-repair.

The different parts keep some of their abilities. MK II keeps Shock Blast and Proximity Mines. VX-001 keeps P3Wx2 Laser Barrage and Rocket Strike, while gaining a more powerful version of his Rapid Burst, called Hand Pulse - a single pulse that damages players between the caster and a random target. Aerial Command Unit will keep Plasma Balls.

Tanking is very sensitive during this phase. It is important to move the boss as little as possible, and to reposition quickly after shock blast. Note that the boss can do shock blast and laser barrage right after each other; this is difficult to handle. During the laser barrage the bottom of the boss can be turned seperately from the middle so that the tank can avoid being hit.

Hard Mode

Mimiron's Hard Mode is activated by pressing the gigantic "DO NOT PUSH" button in the back his room, which triggers an 8-minute self-destruction timer on his chambers.

You will have 8 minutes to kill all 4 Vehicles in order to succeed. Emergency Mode increases Mimiron's health and damage by 30%. He will also set his chambers on fire, and will use a different mechanic during each phase to deal with it:

Fiery Explosions - Mimiron will randomly select 3 players, who will explode soon. A fire will spawn from each explosion (for total of 3 fires). The fires will slowly chase raid members and may switch targets on the way. Used during all phases.

Flame Suppression (Phase 1) - 60 seconds after engaging, Mimiron will flood his chambers and douse all currently spawned fires.

Frost Bomb (Phase 2, Phase 4) - Spawns a Frost Bomb in one of the triptychs of the room. The Frost Bomb will grow for several seconds and then explode, dousing all flames in that triptych and knocking players back.

Thorim

The fight against Thorim is split into two phases. The first one requires you to fight your way to Thorim by fighting multiple types of trash mobs in the Arena and Gauntlet, the second one will let you face Thorim himself.

The first part of the fight is split in three mini-phases (Jormungar > Iron Dwarves > Hallway). Thorim will use a few abilities during the arena event, do not bother attacking him because he is protected by Sheath of Lightning.

You will first encounter a Jormungar Behemoth and a few NPCs from the opposite faction fighting in the Arena. You can not fail, just tank the mobs and AoE them down.

The raid will be split in half, one group (A) having one tank, one healer and two ranged DPS while the other one (B) has all the remaining players (Pref AoE dps).

Gauntlet and Arena events happen at the same time:

Gauntlet

After the mobs die, Thorim will stall babbling in confusion and Group A should pull the lever on the side of the arena and begin running through the gauntlet.

The gauntlet itself is pretty simple, the only thing you need to watch out for is the big mob in the end of the first hallway, he will constantly "explode" the sides of the rooms which deal hefty damage if you stand on the wrong side. You can see which side will explode by looking at the mob's hands, which have fire coming out of them before the explosion comes. Careful while killing the mob too, he has a damage-reflect buff.

The other big mob before the end isn't much of a threat, he places a buff on one of the players which immobilizes and deals damage after a few seconds.

In the last hallway hug the sides unless you want to get stunned for ~20 seconds. Overall, it's very easy and with four players, not a problem at all.

As soon as you reach Thorim at the end of the hallway, he will jump in the Arena where the first part of your raid is, and will engage them.

Arena

While the gauntlet is being done, adds will spawn in the arena where the remaining players are. Basically, it's a big AoE zerg, where you target the sentinels first. Rogues are especially good in the arena, tricks/dismantle/aoe works wonders. Leave your AoE classes and those who can interrupt here. Interrupt heals, dispel HoT's and make sure you focus-burn the Vrykuls.

After Thorim is forced into the arena by the Gauntlet group, Phase 2 will begin.

Casters and Healers should spread out equally around the room, tanks should rotate the boss to avoid anyone being hit while with Unbalancing Strike, and everybody in the raid should get away from the lightning fields Thorim creates between himself and any point on the walls.

They will look like cones of small sparks, which will soon erupt into a Lightning Charge.

Lightning Charge - Charges a 60-degrees cone at random direction with lightning sparks. The cone will cause Lightning Charge after a few seconds, inflicting 17,344 to 20,156 Nature damage to players in it, and increasing Thorim's attack speed by 15% and Nature damage by 10%.

If you zoom out the minimap, you will see there are eight circles on the edges of the room. These are the circles from which the lightning comes out. It will look like two lines of lightning bolts coming from the wall straight to Thorim. A few seconds after that, lightning charge will strike on either side of where the bolts had come out. So move quarter of a circle away from the original line.

Melee DPS try to stay at maximum distance from the tank because chain lightning does a lot of damage. In hard mode, Thorim's chain lightning will start to one shot people after two jumps, so spreading around the room is very important.

Chain Lightning - Inflicts 3,700 to 4,300 Nature damage on its main target and increases its damage by 100% each time it jumps.

Unbalancing Strike - Inflicts 200% weapon damage on the main target and reduces its defense skill by 200 for 15 seconds.

Hard Mode - Sif

If you reach Thorim within 3 minutes, he will not be affected by Touch of Dominion and have 25% more damage and health. Additionally, he will be helped by his wife Sif. Sif cannot be attacked and will have the following spells:

Frostbolt Volley - Inflicts 7,200 to 8,800 Frost damage to all players and reduces their movement speed by 50% for 4 seconds.

Frost Nova - Inflicts 7,069 to 7,931 Frost damage to nearby enemies, immobilizing them for up to 6 seconds. This spell has 2.5 seconds cast time.

Blizzard - A rain of ice moves around the room, dealing 2,188 to 2,812 Frost damage every second, for 10 seconds. Targets caught in the Blizzard have their movement speed reduced by 65%. It cannot be dispelled. It moves around the room. If you get caught in it, the fastest way out is moving towards the centre of the room or walking through it against the movement.

Northrend Beasts

Northrend Beasts is the collective term for the first three boss encounters of the Trial of the Crusader.

Quick Tips:

• Turn shadow quality up a bit. When Gormok the Impaler throws a firebomb it casts a shadow that is easily visible by the targeted raid member. When you see it coming for you, move.
• Stay spread out through all three encounters. Stacking up is NEVER a good idea throughout this encounter.
• There is a hard enrage timer of 15 minutes from when you first engage Gormock the Impaler.

These bosses individually are: Gormok the Impaler (a magnataur), Acidmaw and Dreadscale (a pair of jormungar worms), and Icehowl (a yeti).

Phase 1: Gormok

• two tanks taunt off each other to keep the damage-over-time Impale from stacking too high (more than 3 debuffs)
• raid DPS kill Snobold adds that attach themselves to random players
• ranged and healers spread out to stay out of fire patches and outrange the 15-yard staggering stomp interrupt

For the two tanks, taunting as the Impale debuff is about to wear off can keep the debuff at 2 or less for most of the encounter, with little risk of it restacking on the same tank.

After the first taunt, the tank should let his stack fall off and taunt again. Because of the latency, it is advisable to taunt while you still have four seconds left on the debuff, otherwise the second tank may get an extra debuff that will kill them.

The ranged DPS and healers must avoid fire patches that Gormok puts down. These patches deal fire damage every second in a small radius, and Gormok can put down several in rapid succession -- moving from one patch to another that spawns can occur, and for this reason, the ranged and healers should spread out at least enough to avoid chaining these patches (similar to Napalm on Mimiron).

Lastly, Gormok will throw Snobolds on random players (anyone is a valid target, even a tank). All DPS should kill the Snobold, as several Snobolds on healers can easily incapacitate them and cause problems for the tanks. Gormok's damage can be greatly reduced by disarming him (rogues/prot warriors).

Phase 2: Acidmaw and Dreadscale

The key mechanics to understand about this phase are the interactions between Burning Bile and Paralytic Toxin. Acidmaw applies Paralytic Toxin; Dreadscale applies Burning Bile.

Players with Paralytic Toxin can get it removed by running to players with Burning Bile and taking a tick of fire damage. Burning Bile falls off naturally and cannot be removed.

One tank takes Dreadscale, the other Acidmaw. Dreadscale enters on the right facing the outside door and is mobile; Acidmaw emerges from the ground on the left and is stationary. The two worms burrow periodically, switching which one is mobile and which one is stationary. The mobile worm puts down poison clouds at regular intervals, like Grobbulus, and thus must be moved out to keep it safe for melee and for the tank.

Until the first burrow, the Dreadscale tank will always have Burning Bile, and Acidmaw may attack any cluster of players, giving them Paralytic Toxin. These players need to move to the Dreadscale tank, take a tick of AoE fire damage, and thus clear their debuff, lest they become paralyzed and stunned. This applies to the Acidmaw tank as well, who can run from Acidmaw without fear of losing aggro, even though it is stationary.

After the first burrow, Acidmaw is mobile, and Dreadscale stationary. Dreadscale will now apply Burning Bile not just to his tank but to a random raid member and anyone around him. This creates an AoE damage hazard, as all these players must spread from each other and from other raid members -- they will deal AoE damage to anyone around them and themselves. Note that when one Jormunjar dies, the other enrages, for at least 50% extra damage. It's best to kill them both at the same time (and get the achievement.)

Phase 3: Icehowl

Aside from Icehowl's melee range knockback and periodic tank stun, the main mechanic of this phase is the Massive Crash and charge mechanic. Icehowl knocks the entire raid back to the walls, stunning them Icehowl picks a random target to charge and runs to the opposite side of the room All raid members gain a speed buff to run away from the target area If done right, Icehowl will hit the far wall and stun himself, increasing damage taken for a short period. This is the ideal time to reconvene and pop short cooldowns. Avoiding the charge is critical to minimizing overall damage to the tanks and maintaining control over the phase.

Icecrown Citadel

As Icecrown Citadel will be getting released in stages, nothing is stopping us spending a little of time each week getting familiar with these encounters.

Here's a blue post on the official forums:

Icecrown Citadel is going to be broken up into four distinct sections: The Lower Spire, Plagueworks, Crimson Hall, and Frostwing Halls. We plan on releasing these four sections of Icecrown Citadel over time and not all immediately when patch 3.3.0 goes live.

The first section that opens will include the Lord Marrowgar, Lady Deathwhisper, Icecrown Gunship Battle, and Deathbringer Saurfang encounters. Progress beyond that point will be prevented for several weeks.

Then the Plagueworks will open with Rotface, Festergut, and Professor Putricide becoming available.

After another period of time, the Crimson Hall will open and you can then fight the Blood Princes and Blood-Queen Lana'thel.

The final Frostwing Halls unlock then occurs after that, making Valithria Dreamwalker, Sindragosa, and the Lich King available.

We believe a staggered release of the content will allow players to experience Icecrown Citadel at a sustainable, measured, and ultimately more enjoyable pace. There are other elements that gate access along the way. Players may not attempt any Heroic versions of 10 player encounters until they have defeated the Lich King in a 10 player raid. So players must master every normal difficulty encounter in Icecrown Citadel before attempting Heroic difficulty.

The Lich King may not be attempted until Professor Putricide, Blood-Queen Lana'thel, and Sindragosa are defeated. Furthermore, the Heroic difficulty of The Lich King encounter may not be attempted in any week unless the three aforementioned encounters have been defeated in Heroic difficulty that week.

The Ashen Verdict provides reinforcements and material for players to assault Icecrown Citadel, but this support is not endless. Raids will have a limited number of attempts total each week to defeat the four most difficult encounters in Icecrown Citadel: Professor Putricide, Blood-Queen Lana'thel, Sindragosa, and the Lich King. As these boss encounters are unlocked, the number of attempts available per week will increase. The initial number of attempts provided for defeating Professor Putricide is only five. When Blood-Queen Lana'thel unlocks, the amount of total attempts remaining will increase to 10. Then when Sindragosa and the Lich King unlock, 15 total attempts will be available to defeat all four bosses. After a raid has exhausted their attempts for the week, the Ashen Verdict must withdraw their support and the four most difficult bosses all despawn and become unavailable for the week. The limited attempt system is a feature of both Normal and Heroic difficulty.

There will be no explicit rewards for defeating the Lich King with a specific number of attempts remaining as there was with Trial of the Grand Crusader. There will also not be an achievement to complete Icecrown Citadel without being defeated by a boss encounter, or letting a raid member die. (i.e. A Tribute to Insanity).

In the weeks and months after all twelve encounters are unlocked, additional attempts against the final four boss encounters become available. This represents the Ashen Verdict growing more powerful and gaining a stronger foothold in Icecrown Citadel.

To further help raids, Varian Wrynn and Garrosh Hellscream will begin to provide assistance by inspiring the armies attacking Icecrown Citadel. This is represented as an additional zone wide spell effect applied to all players that will increase their hit points, damage dealt, and healing done. This effect will also increase in effectiveness over time. Players may opt out of the spell's effect if they so wish.

Faction Champions

Not so random after all. This guy did a good behaviour analysis for them. The post here is the summary.

Melee DPS Champions

Melee DPS Faction Champions calculate their threat based on an additive combination of 3 factors. Each of the three appear to share equal priority for determining target, and the threat list constantly updates.

These factors are ARMOR, PROXIMITY, and HEALTH DEFICIT.

ARMOR

Armor is the first factor of targeting priority and refers to the exact armor value displayed on your character tab. The lower the absolute value of armor on a potential target, the higher the threat.

LOWER ARMOR = HIGHER THREAT

Tanks attempting to pick up a target or hold it may wish to put on DPS gear or remove their shield. Players with access to some form of Armor increasing effect such as Inner Fire should pay particular attention to keeping it active at full strength unless they wish to deliberately cause Faction Champions to attack them. Another example is a druid shape-shifting into a higher armor form if focused, such as a feral druid shifting from cat to bear. Warlocks are the class most frequently focus-fired by melee DPS Faction Champions, and their primary threat-signature tool, Demon Armor, was mentioned in the example above.

PROXIMITY

The second piece to the melee DPS Faction Champion threat calculation is proximity; the distance from the Faction Champion to the player. The shorter the distance, the higher the threat.

CLOSER PROXIMITY = HIGHER THREAT

HEALTH DEFICIT

The third and final component of a player's threat signature for a melee DPS Faction Champion is their threat deficit. This is defined in terms of the absolute value of hp that player is below their maximum hp. This is the factor which causes the seemingly random "insta-gibs" where multiple Faction Champions all target the same player at once and deliver a devastating combination of attacks. This generally occurs when someone takes a DoT tick or a low armor value player is clipped by an aoe effect like Bladestorm. It gives the illusion of intelligence by causing them to attempt to target whoever is weakest in your raid.

HIGHER HEALTH DEFICIT (more damage taken) = HIGHER THREAT

The biggest application of this aspect of the threat signature is focusing a large amount of attention to defensively dispelling DoT and Debuff effects from your raid. The better your raid's dispelling, the more controllable the fight will be because there will be no random health deficits all over the place causing unpredictable target switching to occur. DoTs tick for hard enough to be a significant danger to raid members by setting them up for an insta-gib situation where their health deficit threat signature causes multiple Faction Champions to all switch targets to them at once.

The other aspect of this knowledge that can be exploited is that if you are a tank attempting to control a mob, and you can get a melee DPS Faction Champion far enough away from the rest of the raid that you have a proximity threat signature advantage to compensate for your lower armor value threat signature, if the Faction Champion starts attacking you it will tend to remain attacking you because it will be constantly causing a health deficit on you unless outside factors interfere.

Another application of this applies to warlocks, who should be encouraged to not Life Tap unless positioned a significant distance away from dangerous Faction Champions or receiving immediate healing.

SUMMARY

ARMOR VALUE + PROXIMITY + HEALTH DEFICIT = THREAT SIGNATURE

Note: The rules for melee DPS Faction Champions all also apply to the Hunter and both the Hunter pet and the Warlock pet. Both pets are subject to taunt even in Heroic Difficulty.

Ranged DPS Faction Champions

Ranged DPS Faction Champions function on very similar lines to melee DPS Faction Champions, with one difference. Instead of Armor Value being part of their threat calculation, they instead compare Resistance to their school of magic.

RESISTANCE + PROXIMITY + HEALTH DEFICIT = THREAT

RESISTANCE

If you have players which you find are vulnerable to being focused down by casters, have them use a Flask of Lesser Resistance (+50 all resists), which should help significantly to prevent caster Faction Champions from targeting them unless they have a significant proximity and health deficit threat signature.

Healers Faction Champions

Healers heal based on a very easily recognizable principle. They place priority on their healing targets based on the lowest absolute hp among friendly targets. What this means is that out of all Faction Champions with a health deficit, no matter how big, the one with the lowest numerical amount of health will be selected as the target of their healing. This is why it is relatively easy to burn down high health targets at first, but when they reach lower health all enemy healers will pour massive amounts of healing into the target and it will be much more difficult to finish off.

Save your CC diminishing returns on enemy healers for when your kill target is reaching lower levels of health, and then chain them in sequence to solidify a kill. Assign one player, or alternatively all your raid's pets, to constantly DPS the enemy pets. Be sure not to kill them. All heals directed at these pets your interrupters can simply let go through, and save their shocks and kicks for any heals directed at non-pets. This allows you to do a much more effective job at eliminating healing onto your kill target.

LOWER ABSOLUTE HEALTH = HIGHER HEALING PRIORITY

Razorscale

This boss fight consists of both an air phase and a ground phase.

The air phase consists of defending the Expedition dwarves while they repair the harpoon turrets. During this phase, the focus should be on defeating adds, and staying out of Devouring Flame.

The adds come out of the mole machines in waves.

Sentinels (tall guys) have Whirlwind (will kill in one shot) so need to be killed by ranged.

Watcher: Chain lightning (can be interrupted).

Guardian: can save these for when the boss lands and keep them in front of her for an achievement.

As the turrets get repaired one at a time, they can be clicked to fire a harpoon at Razorscale. Once both turrets have been repaired and fired, Razorscale will be forced to the ground where she will remain stunned for several seconds. Everyone should immediately move behind her and DPS should focus on bringing her HP down as much as possible while the tanks hold any remaining adds. After the stun wears off, Razorscale will breathe and then return to the air and begin the air phase again.

Once Razorscale is brought to 50% health, she will land permanently, at which point she will need to be tanked facing away from the group to avoid breaths. The easiest way is to move her around the circle that is drawn on the ground, similar to the way Grobbulus is tanked. It’s imperative that all DPS and healers stay behind (and slightly to the sides) the boss and stay out of the flames. There is an achievement for getting her killed before she flies up the second time.

The fight from this point is very simple, she will continue using Devouring Flame, she will do a knock back to everyone within 35 yards, and inflict the Flame Buffet debuff. During this ground phase, the DPS should go all out in order to defeat Razorscale before the Flame Buffet debuffs cause the tank to be one-shot.

Flame Leviathan

There are two ways to start this encounter.

A) Talk to Brann directly: towers remain disabled. This is the normal mode (0 towers) whether you destroy towers or not.

B) Talk to the Keeper of Norganon: towers are activated. To deactivate a tower, you must destroy it. Leaving all towers intact is the true hard mode.

Vehicle Overview

Note: Equip all your highest iLevel items regardless of spec as vehicles are based on gear iLevels alone. The gear must be put on before entering a vehicle; its health will not change once inside. If necessary, exit and reenter.

Siege Engine Driver - Kites the Flame Leviathan and interrupts spellcasting with Electroshock.

Siege Engine Gunner - Fires down pyrite ammo from the air, kills adds and lights Tar.

Demolisher Driver - Kites the Flame Leviathan and does damage; can light the Choppers' tar on fire. Rams towers and beacons.

Demolisher Gunner - Shoots down and salvages pyrite ammo and refills the demolisher.

Chopper - Plants inflammable tar. Can pick up pyrite and drop it off to near demolishers.

As well as clearing in the area before the boss, you will want to use the Siege Engine gunner to shoot down as many of the flying crate carriers as possible to stock up your Demolishers with Pyrite barrels for the encounter itself. The encounter doesn't begin until you kill the two Collossi, so until you have cleared the trash, destroyed the Hard Mode towers you wanted to, and collected all the Pyrite you might need, don't touch those Collossi. Repair all your vehicles on the repair pad, and then head over to the clearing. There is an achievement for not using the repair pad.

When you are ready to engage the boss, get your whole raid into the formation grounds clearing past the pillars, and kill the Collossi. As soon as they die, the gates behind them will burst open and the Flame Leviathan will come forward.

The Flame Leviathan: Choppers and other vehicles should work together to drag the Leviathan through the lit-up Tar. The Flame Leviathan will target a random Siege Engine or Demolisher and chase them, switching to another Siege Engine/Demolisher every 30 seconds. Players who control these vehicles must kite the Flame Leviathan, preferably thought Tar, and everybody else should be DPSing, as there is no threat table.

Siege Engines should use Electroshock to interrupt Flame Vents.

The Demolishers need to focus fire on him the whole time.

The Choppers need to run around and every time they can, drop tar in front of the boss. Since the Tar is thrown backwards, they should drive a bit in front of the boss and throw it so it directly lands in his path.

Hard Modes

Enabling the Flame Leviathan's Hard Mode involves leaving anywhere between 1 and 4 special towers up during the gauntlet event. Leaving each tower up gives an extra 40% health and a powerful ability to the Flame Leviathan - the more towers left "alive", the deadlier the boss becomes.

Tower of Nature - Leaving this tower up gives Freya's Ward to the Flame Leviathan. Freya's Ward deals 13,500 to 16,500 Nature damage to all nearby enemies, and summons Guardians of Nature to surround the enemy. It also buffs the Leviathan with Tower of Life, which decreases fire damage taken by 10%.

Tower of Flames - Leaving this tower up gives Mimiron's Inferno to the Flame Leviathan. Mimiron's Inferno deals 150,000 Fire damage to all nearby enemies and leaves a flaming blaze behind. It also buffs the Leviathan with Tower of Flames, which increases its fire damage by 50%.

Tower of Frost - Leaving this tower up gives Hodir's Fury to the Flame Leviathan. Hodir's Fury deals 150,000 Frost damage to all nearby enemies and entombs them in ice. It also buffs the Leviathan with an additional 10% health.

Tower of Storms - Leaving this tower up gives Thorim's Hammer to the Flame Leviathan. Thorim's Hammer deals Stormstrike damage to all enemies nearby. Additional damage is taken if directly under the impact location. It also buffs the Leviathan with Tower of Storms, increasing its physical damage by 25%.