TOGC Discussion (25-man)
Alrighty, here goes my attempt at a discussion about what I’ve seen of TOGC so far.
My guild has currently made it to Anub’Arak. We haven’t put many attempts in to him, but he’s definitely not like the 10-man or 25-man version, yet again, MUCH HARDER.
Just a note: Make sure you save your normal modes before you do hard modes. We use our normal modes to try new strats. This helps us minimize the waste of an attempt on hard mode.
I’ll rate the fights as I go. Easy, Medium, Hard, INSANE.
Easy: this means predictable damage, no issues topping people off.
Medium: means predictable damage, but could have issues keeping someone alive if they do something stupid.
Hard: lots of damage, some random, some predictable. Difficult to keep everyone topped off.
INSANE: lots of damage, mostly random. Almost guaranteed you can’t keep everyone alive & must prioritize.
Beasts of Northrend
EASY – Gormok the Impaler
- He’s basically still the same. The snobolds come out faster (it seems to me) and both Gormok & snobolds have more health. In a recent hotfix, they did increase his attack speed after a parry, but not a HUGE difference in damage.
Basics: Healers are on Gormok Tanks – 2 will cover raid. Good Healing Comp: 2 Priests (1 disc, 1 holy), 1 Holy Paly, 2 Resto Druids, 1 Resto Shaman. Ya, lots of different comps, we don’t even use this comp, but for Beasts, this is a good comp.
Gormok throws fire out during the raid, this fire has a stackable dot. It will NOT be thrown in melee range, so ranged dps & healers need to watch out. Initial damage was taking roughly 10k ish (again, not going to get into all the numbers). Basically, have the disc priest bubble the person & 2 druids hot them up, this should cover the DOT dmg after the person moves out.
Snobolds will randomly target ANY player. Again, disc priest bubble, shaman keep person topped off (esp. if they’re melee or tank).
He does an AOE stomp in melee range. This is EASILY prep’ed for and healed by priests & shamans (even druids can prep hots). You can see his cast timer (if you use DBM, it warns you). Start POH cast or chain heals.
The only thing that could go wrong for healers in this fight is the impales on the tanks. If the tank takes more than 4 impales – they will most likely die.
Overall, heals are pretty steady & controlled. No frets on a healing standpoint – easy fight.
MEDIUM – Acidmaw & Dreadscale
No hot-fixes yet for this encounter.
Basics: 2 healers split (we’ve been doing Shaman on movable worm, disc priest on stationary) & each keeps the tank topped off with druid support hots. Dreadscale tank (while moving) will get Burning Bile. Acidmaw will shoot out Paralytic Toxin to the raid. If the raid isn’t spread out, MANY people will take this. So healers & DPS alike, need to be spread apart. Run the toxin in to the tank with Burning Bile. You only have about 10 sec before you’re completely paralyzed (NO CASTING). Do not wait. Raid healers MUST keep these people topped off when they get the debuff while they’re running it in to get cleansed.
When the bosses switch rolls, healing can get tricky with burning bile. The tank will get the toxin & be unable to do anything until someone with the bile runs in to him/her. Again, this is PRIORITY to spread out. If the raid does not spread out, people will die from the bile – it does an aoe tick dmg on the target and everyone 5 yrds around them. Raid healers MUST be on their toes. DBM notifies you how many people got hit – if it’s a lot, throw out CDs and FAST heals – usually a ret cd is good at this point.
This is the crux of the fight for healing. DPS does their thing & destroys the 2 targets. If one dies before the other, the other target becomes enraged – this is nothing difficult to heal through, the tank healer that is no longer in need of healing a tank merely switches to the tank that’s still tanking – DUH.
EASY – Icehowl
Changes:
- Increased the amount of time players have to defeat the encounter before Icehowl berserks.
- You have an extra half second to get out of the way of a very angry charging Yeti. Players with high ping rejoice.
- Icehowl will become tauntable. (This particular element isn’t hotfixed quite yet, but should be shortly).
Personally, I’m a little upset about the first change. Icehowl is one of those fights that you have to be PERFECT on so you can get him down quickly. If you’re not perfect, you don’t get him down – that simple. Sadly, blizz is giving in to the people who don’t want to improve themselves & instead just bitch about “how hard” he is. I do agree with the 2nd 2 changes, cuz we were having to do some really crazy things to guarantee we had enough time to get out of his charge. Again, it wasn’t hard once you analyzed the fight, but I think many people just don’t know how to INSTANTLY move.
Icehowl tauntable is another nice thing. This allows tanks to ping pong him back & forth to keep him in the middle (esp after whirlwinds). Keeping him in the middle maximizes your chances of getting out from a charge.
Basics: This is probably one of the easiest bosses to heal. Direct tank dmg – it is a bit at times, but nothing difficult. 2 Tank healers just heal the 1 tank (usually disc priest & holy paly for us). Melee again will take minor dmg from his wirlwind, druid’s hots & priests POHs can easily top them off. The AOE knockback takes people down a bit, but again, if everyone does their job right, VERY easy to heal up while Icehowl is stunned (you can even throw in some dps on IH at that point – I DO!).
The key to this fight (or it was before the fixes) was to make sure he never charged a person & always hit a wall. Priest PIs work well for your high caster dps after he’s stunned (I usually throw it on our warlock or boomer – both top charts!).
Medium – Lord Jaraxxus
Changes:
- Infernal Eruption will now spawn an additional Felflame Infernal the instant the eruption occurs.
- Nether Portal now summons Mistresses of Pain slightly more often.
This boss is the easiest encounter in the instance. I’m glad they buffed him a bit.
Basics: 2 healers on the tank (ok 1 healer is really all you need, but why stress them out). The room should be set-up a bit like Thorim HM. People in pairs or triplets, 15 yards apart. A healer needs to be in each of these groupings, or next to it. Raid healers are responsible for keeping people alive if they have the Legion Flame (granted the person NEEDs to run, but they still take dmg). Usually Bubble & druid hots work well for this.
If a person has Incinerate Flesh – ALL healers need to top that person off. This debuff, if it goes off, will wipe the raid. Incinerate Flesh is a healer PRIORITY – yes over a tank, OMG I know. We have it so the person with the debuff runs to the middle so all healers can reach them, then they just run back. This does allow for risk of getting chained with his chain lighting spell, but again, Incinerate Flesh will wipe the WHOLE raid… not one person.
Shamans & Priests need to purge Jaraxxus and the tank when they can. Jaraxxus gets a damage buff & he typically likes doing his chain lightning right after. The tank will get a magic debuff – priests/paly’s dispel.
Nastiness in the fight (why it’s not an Easy) – Maiden’s Kiss. This is killer for healers. 8 sec lockout is insane. The worst is its castable on more than 1 person, so 2 healers could possibly get the debuff at the same time. NO GOOD. Healers need to communicate for the “oh shit” moments. Other than that, pretty easy fight. Pay attention to your debuffs! This spell only goes off if you use a CASTABLE spell. Instants are still applicable with the debuff up.
Personal Side Note: Since I usually heal disc, I’m very comfortable healing this fight in disc. However, I’ve found that holy works much better for this fight, esp depending on your spec. Speedy bubble is great for Legion flames, emp renew is fantastic for the type of damage done in this fight. Even lightwell has a place in this fight – CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?? Although pain suppression is nice, I’ve found that priest wings & glyph is much more beneficial in those hairy situations. In any case, try it both ways, see what you like more. I personally like the holy aspect of this fight.
HARD – Faction Champions
No changes at this time.
Basics: Priests, go disc. Other than wings, there’s NO reason to be holy. DISC! If you can, spec in to Absolution. You’re main priority in the fight will be bubble, penance, pain suppression & dispel. Let the other healers heal, we got priorities! This is an insane fight to heal if people don’t MOVE. Just like in normal pvp, take advantage of traps, slows & kite those mofo’s around it. Anyone, including healers, cannot get hit, it will almost kill you.
That being said, if everyone kites like they’re supposed to, healing is cinch. Healers that can dispel, decurse, etc should do so. Druids keep hots up, priests keep bubbles & POMs up. Mass dispel regularly. On our successful attempt at downing these guys, I alone had 161 dispels. I did go OOM quite a few times in the fight b/c I didn’t have absolution or glyphs to make my life easier, but… DISPEL! This is a LONG fight – 16 minutes for our kill. We’ve improved our kill time to 10 mins. Keeping rogues on the healers FULL TIME is wonderful! There’s no “enrage” timer, so patience is the key. Realize you will probably use your shadowfiend more than once. Don’t blow a mana pot too early, you may regret it later. Use your Hymns also. For other healers… do your thing? LOL, I really don’t know, kinda crazy fight 
If raiders die, they will mostly die from the get-go. This means being very keen on who’s being targeted & using pain suppression like candy. Priests coordinate the CD rotation. After the first 2 mobs die, then the fight is easy breezy. People are in their routine of kiting, healers are in their routine of healing/dispels, just be sure to not stop or switch things up too much.
HARD – Twin Val’kyrs
Ok, so some may say this fight is INSANE from a healing perspective, but since we haven’t downed it yet & are still learning our strat, I may still feel a bit like it’s crazy. Look on YouTube for vids of this fight, then you’ll know what I’m talking about when I say these things below. we’ve come up with a strat that suited our needs. The fight actually became quite easy. The only hard part about it is the CONSTANT healing required – you can get tunnel vision.
Ideal Healing Comp: 2 druids, 2/3 priests, 1 Shaman, {1 Paly} (switch paly in place of priest, if only 2 priests).
Goalies (as we’ve kindly called them) – 2 resto druids, 2 hunters (best comp), alternate (we only have 1 resto druid in our raid) 1 resto druid, 1 spriest, 2 hunters. Yes, we lose another DPS directly on twin valks, but spriest have lots of damage mitigation.
I really don’t like the above strat, we’ve tried a few and our fave came from Ensidia strat. Take a peak at the video. Their strat allows for minor movement, but mostly people are stationary and play a defensive role. They are next to the portal that gives them the OPPOSITE color, thus when the Twins do their special ability, you can easily switch portals & not lose dps time moving around. Then you simply move back (while you still have the speed bonus) to the correct color minimizing dps down time.
Ok, we didn’t like the strat either, so we made up our own. The strat works for us; very simple & still allows goalies to DPS – so all good!
Healers: Everyone has static damage they’re taking, 2 priests should be able to keep people up from this damage. The randomness comes with the balls of DOOM and 4 dots that will be placed on random members of the raid. The balls are pretty easy to avoid, so long as goalies are picking up what they’re supposed to. The dot requires attention because the dot will either be light or dark & placed on someone of the opposite color, increasing the damage they take from it.
Damage dealt is quite a bit, esp if a raider takes a ball or 2. When the balls are popped they have a 3-5 yrd radius that they “explode” around. This can easily kill a whole group if not avoided properly.
The biggest part of this fight is communication. Split the healers between light & dark evenly so that groups can be covered when healers have to run to get auras & such. When a healer has to switch their aura, they need to communicate that their group needs heals. Even if you can heal on the fly, it helps when someone else is watching your group so you can avoid balls (and not tunnel vision) as you pick up your aura. This fight is not terribly difficult to heal as long as you don’t get behind in healing. The biggest thing that could ruin a healer on this fight is a healer who tries to do too much & loses their group due to not keeping them topped & a ball hits them – or other scenarios like that.
Your group is your life. You MUST, MUST keep them above 50%. If that group takes a ball, fault of them or not, the healer is to blame if someone dies. The group should be able to take 2-3 balls in a row without dieing. It could get dicey, but no deaths. DO YOUR JOB! Don’t do someone else’s job unless they die or ask for help.
HARD – Anub’Arak
I don’t know much about this fight on 25-man HM. But here’s what I do know. 3 tanks are needed for the adds/anub. 1 healer can cover the Anub-Tank. a healer for EACH add tank is required (we usually put paly on mt & he helps ot heal – then a shaman & disc priest on ots). They can take a lot of dmg & will go down quickly if healers aren’t CONSTANTLY healing them, esp if the adds are too close & have the haste buff. The tanks for the adds must be sword/board tanks – no druids or dks (preferably – not saying it isn’t possible, but armor is huge). All the times are still the same, just MORE things to deal with. 4 adds come out around ~10 sec in to the fight. Each tank will tank 2 adds, thus healers are needed. 5 people take the penetrating cold debuff – 1-2 healers can easily heal this.
Kite phase (p2) is much like Anub 10-man HM (link to my 10-man strat info). The biggest difference is that you can only use 2 ice’s (because you will have at least 3 burrows from anub) per burrow. This means that there has to be a TON more kiting going on. Paly (self bubble), priest fade, druid shadowmeld, shaman = screwed! These abilities will drop the pursuit on you and put it on someone else, thus theoretically, no need for ice’s at all so long as a shaman’s not prusued… LOL! In all honesty though, kiting needs to be much more strategic. Just like in 10-man, the person kiting needs to be on the OPPOSITE side of the room as everyone else, then they throw up their threat drop & pursuit changes. In essence you’ve extended the pursuit about another 2-3 sec without using the ice patch.
P3 – with adds still being up (& spawning during p3) & the penetrating colds still being an issue, healing can become quite an issue. Here’s what I’ve seen so far. If you keep people consistently above 10% health, the dps is not enough to kill anub quickly. He actually healed beyond 30% with this small amount of health. If people are kept around 5-10% he goes down rather steadily. Not quickly though 
. This is a very stressful fight for healers. Our current set-up is: 2 shamans, 1 paly, 2 priests, 1 resto druid. 1 priest is disc & stays on one of the ot’s (& bubbles those with the dots), the other is holy & keeps people with dots alive. The druid hots anything. Both shamans heal tanks & any melee that get hit by the chain heal. Paly heals main tank & ot’s. Our biggest issue right now is not people dieing from penetrating cold, it’s the tanks dieing because they still take a ton of damage on top of the leeching swarm.
Having a mod like grid or healbot can help you identify people who have the dots quickly & keep them healed. You have to add it to the list of debuffs, but it’s well worth your time to do so. If we were to announce all 5 people each time the dot went out, the raid chatter would be way too much & due to vent lag, many may not get healed. ALL healers should have some sort of mod to identify this debuff immediately.
We’re very close to getting this sucker! I’ve noticed that healing in before p3 is very easy & many healers may “fall asleep at the wheel” when p3 hits. Healers need to keep on their toes at all times. Priests, even if your half mana at the start of p3, just before we go in to p3 throw out your shadow fiend, hymn & call for innervate if you have to. You want to have full mana as p3 starts, if you don’t you could easily get screwed out of healing (even for a second – waiting on gcd). Save your mana pot usage – you should stock up on some frost protection pots & use those in p3 instead. If you get the cold debuff, you can pop that pot to help other healers getting to you to heal.
Our job in p3 is to keep everyone barely alive; just enough so they can still dps & anub dies.
** More to come when I’ve analyzed the fight completely.
PS: yes I’ve seen vids on this fight, but I prefer to see it first hand before I throw out strats. Not every strat works for every guild /raid comp. Perfect example is valks – our strat is not much like others that have been posted so far. However, the strat works well for what we got and how we work together.
BobTurkey said,
September 9, 2009 at 8:51 pm
Nice overview.
Looking forward to seeing the first couple of these bosses soon.