bah :<
maybe this will give me gear good enough to switch to destro
The odd thing about ZA gear is it all seems like t5 ilevel but with t6 stats, i.e., most of the caster pieces have spell damage and haste, but no points left over to add hit or crit. It's odd. Definitely will fill in some gaps for people but probably won't replace t5 stuff. I wish the robe was better. More chance of getting that than Vashj's robe now. ;__;
Which is why the doom and gloom about "Badge/ZA gear means no more SSC gear". It will however lead to slightly higher DPS for groups entering SSC/TK but it doesn't remove the need for +hit.
Thomamelas on
0
ThomamelasOnly one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered Userregular
So how much more difficult is ZA for a DPS than Karazhan? Is it enough to be able to clear Kara and have a few pieces from it, or should you have Kara on farm before you're really ready for Zul'Aman?
It's the next step from Prince/Nightbane. If you can kill them, then you can start ZA. Most of the fights look like they are much less complicated.
Second night of Capernian tanking went much better than the first. I'm pretty sure I found the spot Riz was describing, I had plenty of room to back up when she charged close, and she wasn't too far north if she decided to stop at max range (If she did stop outside of 30 yards, I decided to not press my luck and try to pull her further south, because that often ended in conflagrations yesterday). I only got disoriented from Conflagration once tonight, and only because I had a typo in one of my staff of disintegration use macros.
What's a good way to grab aggro on her at the start of phase 3, though? I settled on shadowburning her as soon as I could target her, and while that grabbed aggro for me, the short range sometimes had me close enough to her that I would catch an arcane explosion (which I'd rather not do). Soon after a hunter would misdirect to me, but even with good reaction times waiting on that had her sprinting a good ways across the room before she started turning back. Damn that bitch runs fast.
We also finally had an attempt where every weapon and advisor died. It was way too slow on account of the netherstrand longbow teleporting into a wall just before it died, and some stupid death shenanigans, but it happened. Kael'thas to 98%, woo!.
What's a good way to grab aggro on her at the start of phase 3, though?
/target Grand Astromancer Capernian
/cast Death Coil
I just stand sort of near her and spam that macro during the rez animations. She gets enough of a head start during the spell's flight that she isn't in melee with me, so she just stops and starts casting when it hits her. I've never failed to pick her up in phase 3. Make sure people know where she'll be tanked so they don't get conflagged getting into their own positions, especially if you need to back her up. And like I said earlier, it's not a big deal if she conflags you in phase 3 because you'll have the staff buff. (Make sure your healer has it too.)
Grats on phase 4. If you can get there now, you'll have no problems on Tuesday!
We had our troubles with Vashj P2 in the start but an analytical approach wins the day.
The nagas and striders should be a joke for any raid at your level of progress. Once we made it very clear to people that cores need to be handled fast the whole fight just came together and P2 went past amazingly fast.
Just don't forget to put at least 2 persons on the bats in the beginning of P3 or you'll get overwhelmed too fast with the poison crap.
There's nothing fundamentally complicated about phase 2. As long as everyone's clear on their responsibilities, the only keys are practice and communication. You need to get to the point where people are able to handle their assignment, and be aware of what's going on around them. Being able to call "leak southeast' and have someone be able to clean up a spare elemental, or "watch it [healer], strider coming behind you" is what'll get you through phase 2.
Eat it You Nasty Pig. on
hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
Silly question about the bear boss: Is his brutal swipe only in troll form? Or does he do it in bear form too? Trying to figure out how I was getting absolutely destroyed tanking him in bear.
I think that's an attack that splits its total damage between two people in front of him. I think you need your other tank there next to you to take half of it.
It's only in the troll form. If he did it in bear form I don't think anyone other than a tier 6 tank could handle that and his bleeds
Also, screw tanking gear for 75 badges a piece. I know you basically have badges thrown at you now, but man, thats insanely steep. Theres nothing my warrior wants from ZA exept for tanking gear for when i sorta OT, but I don't think it would be worth it running it for that many badges.
My lock on the other hand, will gladly devour any gear that place throws her way.
Minerva_SC on
"If a cherry pie filled cape is wrong, I don't want to be right.
I'm dead serious."
Some of our 25 man folks swear on their lives that the eagle trash is horrible, and they struggled mightily and got the boss to 80 percent on their best attempt. This was on the PTR two weeks ago.
Did it get nerfed before it went live? Another guild raid that we consider well below us in terms of skill (and gear) apparently ripped through it earlier tonight with no problems.
Eat it You Nasty Pig. on
hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
did it with a druid tank and a fury war OT (me). Had the holy pally in the raid consecrate while I thunderclapped and the druid swiped. The elites that come from the back hit for only 600 or so, so they're not a problem. Had the mage/lock aoe the birds while the melee killed the 2 main elites the druid tanked. Was rather easy when your clothis aren't being smashed
Minerva_SC on
"If a cherry pie filled cape is wrong, I don't want to be right.
I'm dead serious."
Some of our 25 man folks swear on their lives that the eagle trash is horrible, and they struggled mightily and got the boss to 80 percent on their best attempt. This was on the PTR two weeks ago.
Did it get nerfed before it went live? Another guild raid that we consider well below us in terms of skill (and gear) apparently ripped through it earlier tonight with no problems.
We did it on test and then on live again yesterday, and it definately seemed to be much easier. It looked like the constant waves were toned down a little bit, the eagles and warriors seemed to have fewer hp. We were nowhere near as potted last night as we were on test, and they seemed to be dropping a lot faster, didn't even have to drink through the whole event.
EDIT: Oh, and I don't know about any raid that can only get Eagle to 80%... we did it with 6 melee the first time, and it wasn't exactly easy, since they all ate stacked lightning debuffs constantly (the AE seems to be too big to avoid, and still be in melee range if it targets other melee, boo.) I mean, if people can't figure out to get to the cloud in the center of the giant storm, I guess it would be hard. Akilzon himself didn't seem to be changed much, just as hard/not hard as he was on PTR.
Our group clears Kara easily enough. Regularly one-shots prince, and Nightbane would probably die first attempt most of the time too if our dps could learn to keep their cool through the skeleton phases.
Yet in ZA, nearly every single silence just means the tank dies. What the hell are we doing wrong? Surely a druid that can tank prince phase 2 without any real chance of death should be an acceptable candidate here?
Our group clears Kara easily enough. Regularly one-shots prince, and Nightbane would probably die first attempt most of the time too if our dps could learn to keep their cool through the skeleton phases.
Yet in ZA, nearly every single silence just means the tank dies. What the hell are we doing wrong? Surely a druid that can tank prince phase 2 without any real chance of death should be an acceptable candidate here?
Are we missing something?
The tank? Don't you mean the tanks? Switching to bear form means he has the silence available, and starts using the bleed effects. If bleed effects land on a tank with Mangle, they're going down unless you have like 4-5 healers.
Yes. Obviously we were using two tanks. Of course, the troll form hits like a panzy and we never really lost that tank, so I didnt really think this side of the fight was worth mentioning.
Our problem is that our bear form tank cant seem to live through silence.
Yes. Obviously we were using two tanks. Of course, the troll form hits like a panzy and we never really lost that tank, so I didnt really think this side of the fight was worth mentioning.
Our problem is that our bear form tank cant seem to live through silence.
That was my problem, I was getting absolutely murdered on bear form and it wasn't due to tank transitions.
Eagle trash is boringly easy. We wiped on the boss though because it bugged and respawned on us in a weird way.
Some people in my guild had a problem with ads spawning repeatedly and with fervor after a wipe. A GM told them it was an issue with a mod someone used
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<<
wtf
MulysaSempronius on
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing
Did you get WWS records of the bear form damage? According to the logs I've seen, his regular melee, even in bear form, is fairly weak (it also seems to have dualwield miss rates); it's just the bleeds that make the healers have to spamheal top you off to full as much as possible. That and the Brutal Swipe; if your logs are showing that Brutal Swipe is hitting for like 12-14k and not 6-7k, then it's probably being unreasonably fussy about WHERE you stand in relation to the other tank, exactly on top of them, a little to the front or back depending on personal hitbox size, something like that.
Did you get WWS records of the bear form damage? According to the logs I've seen, his regular melee, even in bear form, is fairly weak (it also seems to have dualwield miss rates); it's just the bleeds that make the healers have to spamheal top you off to full as much as possible. That and the Brutal Swipe; if your logs are showing that Brutal Swipe is hitting for like 12-14k and not 6-7k, then it's probably being unreasonably fussy about WHERE you stand in relation to the other tank, exactly on top of them, a little to the front or back depending on personal hitbox size, something like that.
No. The guy who ussually does the WWS said it wasnt working for ZA or something. I dunno.
Pretty sure we sorted out the brutal swipe issue though. We lost one tank to a 10k+ non-crush hit, and started making sure of that.
Turns out from talking to some of our healers that they just aren't really using standard raid-healing tactics of spamming down-ranked GHeals and interrupting them if not needed. Instead of keeping the tank topped off, they are waiting until he gets low and then blasting a rank 7 GHeal into him. Obviously a badly timed silence here is going to be a problem.
Can you guys see this as being the issue? Still not 100% convinced that this is the only problem, but it sure seems like it might be one of the bigger ones.
The lynx boss is just kind of ridiculous to me, I mean he's doable but it seems like for such a small amount of hp the fight takes way too long. Those totems have too much health, do too much damage, and come up too frequently to really call that fight anywhere near easy. I mean my guild isn't the best geared, and we don't always pay enough attention, but we've downed the easy bosses in ssc, can smoke vr, and generally are the "average" raiding guild. So maybe they're tuneing these encounters to take a lot of wipes and a lot of consumables and all that, but the way I understood it ZA was supposed to be aimed at guilds with our level of progression without having to flask or pop 100 consumables before Zul'Jin.
Ok, after having tried Nalorakk for myself and having some firsthand experience, I ran into the same silence-means-tank-dies problem. We finally fixed it by telling the healers they need to start casting their heals on me as soon as the bear form appears. There's no time to delay there; begin casting and by the time the cast finishes, I've taken plenty of damage. What kept happening is the silence would hit with me at around half health and that ended the attempt. Can't afford to fall behind there. If you fall behind, you don't catch up with bleed damage, and silence means you lose.
http://wowwebstats.com/j34nems21ie3c <-- Last and best attempt of the night (the only one we managed to get through a single full cycle, and we lasted through like 4 or 5).
Of course, as soon as we DO figure it successfully out, and get the boss down to 37%, 2 or 3 people have to go. At least you can loot the map for the quest to help offset repair bills and get yourself a nice 20-slot bag even if Nalorakk is still alive.
You would think "keep the tank topped off this entire phase" is something that healers would learn while doing Malchezzar, if not sooner. I can see like just-hit-70 healers being reactionary instead of proactive but it's not as if you can cruise through all of Karazhan by casting a few flash heals now and then.
Yeah, and what wiped us is one of our healers apparently running out of mana. No heals from them for 13 seconds == dead druid tank (on the troll form, not the bear form; it was a couple Brutal Swipes that round and not enough dodges). I think we have to find a spot where we can sustain the longevity. WWS is showing that, in one transition, I got like 21k worth of overheals before the first DoT landed. While overhealing where necessary is good, not running out of mana is also good. If we had SSC/TK gear we could probably power through it, but we'll have to make do with what gear we have.
Posts
Which is why the doom and gloom about "Badge/ZA gear means no more SSC gear". It will however lead to slightly higher DPS for groups entering SSC/TK but it doesn't remove the need for +hit.
It's the next step from Prince/Nightbane. If you can kill them, then you can start ZA. Most of the fights look like they are much less complicated.
What's a good way to grab aggro on her at the start of phase 3, though? I settled on shadowburning her as soon as I could target her, and while that grabbed aggro for me, the short range sometimes had me close enough to her that I would catch an arcane explosion (which I'd rather not do). Soon after a hunter would misdirect to me, but even with good reaction times waiting on that had her sprinting a good ways across the room before she started turning back. Damn that bitch runs fast.
We also finally had an attempt where every weapon and advisor died. It was way too slow on account of the netherstrand longbow teleporting into a wall just before it died, and some stupid death shenanigans, but it happened. Kael'thas to 98%, woo!.
/target Grand Astromancer Capernian
/cast Death Coil
I just stand sort of near her and spam that macro during the rez animations. She gets enough of a head start during the spell's flight that she isn't in melee with me, so she just stops and starts casting when it hits her. I've never failed to pick her up in phase 3. Make sure people know where she'll be tanked so they don't get conflagged getting into their own positions, especially if you need to back her up. And like I said earlier, it's not a big deal if she conflags you in phase 3 because you'll have the staff buff. (Make sure your healer has it too.)
Grats on phase 4. If you can get there now, you'll have no problems on Tuesday!
Still wiping on Phase 2 of Vashj on November 12th.
Anyone need a holy priest?
The nagas and striders should be a joke for any raid at your level of progress. Once we made it very clear to people that cores need to be handled fast the whole fight just came together and P2 went past amazingly fast.
Just don't forget to put at least 2 persons on the bats in the beginning of P3 or you'll get overwhelmed too fast with the poison crap.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
Back to Kara
Silly question about the bear boss: Is his brutal swipe only in troll form? Or does he do it in bear form too? Trying to figure out how I was getting absolutely destroyed tanking him in bear.
Also, screw tanking gear for 75 badges a piece. I know you basically have badges thrown at you now, but man, thats insanely steep. Theres nothing my warrior wants from ZA exept for tanking gear for when i sorta OT, but I don't think it would be worth it running it for that many badges.
My lock on the other hand, will gladly devour any gear that place throws her way.
I'm dead serious."
Bear boss is just horrible on your nerves. He's not hard, but you're just waiting for that little "Resist" to pop up an say "Hi, you're fucked!".
Try healing through that fucker. Great way to get rid of extra mana pots.
Steam: pazython
Did it get nerfed before it went live? Another guild raid that we consider well below us in terms of skill (and gear) apparently ripped through it earlier tonight with no problems.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
I'm dead serious."
We did it on test and then on live again yesterday, and it definately seemed to be much easier. It looked like the constant waves were toned down a little bit, the eagles and warriors seemed to have fewer hp. We were nowhere near as potted last night as we were on test, and they seemed to be dropping a lot faster, didn't even have to drink through the whole event.
EDIT: Oh, and I don't know about any raid that can only get Eagle to 80%... we did it with 6 melee the first time, and it wasn't exactly easy, since they all ate stacked lightning debuffs constantly (the AE seems to be too big to avoid, and still be in melee range if it targets other melee, boo.) I mean, if people can't figure out to get to the cloud in the center of the giant storm, I guess it would be hard. Akilzon himself didn't seem to be changed much, just as hard/not hard as he was on PTR.
Our group clears Kara easily enough. Regularly one-shots prince, and Nightbane would probably die first attempt most of the time too if our dps could learn to keep their cool through the skeleton phases.
Yet in ZA, nearly every single silence just means the tank dies. What the hell are we doing wrong? Surely a druid that can tank prince phase 2 without any real chance of death should be an acceptable candidate here?
Are we missing something?
"Oh hey look you just took 18k in three seconds good luck on that"
Yeah no
Our problem is that our bear form tank cant seem to live through silence.
That was my problem, I was getting absolutely murdered on bear form and it wasn't due to tank transitions.
>>
<<
wtf
But i'm sure 20 of you guys will tell me how you did it just fine today.
No. The guy who ussually does the WWS said it wasnt working for ZA or something. I dunno.
Pretty sure we sorted out the brutal swipe issue though. We lost one tank to a 10k+ non-crush hit, and started making sure of that.
Turns out from talking to some of our healers that they just aren't really using standard raid-healing tactics of spamming down-ranked GHeals and interrupting them if not needed. Instead of keeping the tank topped off, they are waiting until he gets low and then blasting a rank 7 GHeal into him. Obviously a badly timed silence here is going to be a problem.
Can you guys see this as being the issue? Still not 100% convinced that this is the only problem, but it sure seems like it might be one of the bigger ones.
you want at least one healer doing that, two if you have a squishyish tank
edit: do you have a druid? If so, make sure it's keeping lifebloom on the tank at all times
Time to teach our healers how to suck eggs I guess.
Edit: This is our bear-form tank. Should be ok?
suggest to your priests to throw up renews before the silence hits, and make sure they're using PoM
heal canceling is really important, even more so at the 10 man level where the healers have to trust eachother
I know at least one of our priests is a renew fanatic. Keeps it up 24/7. Not sure about the other one, Ill have to look.
Also PoM. Ill look into that too.
http://wowwebstats.com/j34nems21ie3c <-- Last and best attempt of the night (the only one we managed to get through a single full cycle, and we lasted through like 4 or 5).
Of course, as soon as we DO figure it successfully out, and get the boss down to 37%, 2 or 3 people have to go. At least you can loot the map for the quest to help offset repair bills and get yourself a nice 20-slot bag even if Nalorakk is still alive.