Shade of Aran thoughts

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » June 22nd, 2007, 7:49 am

Besides the obvious (staying still during Flame Wreath and getting out of the Blizzard/Arcane Explosions) -- there are two things we need to work on to make this fight go smoothly. 1. Get organized with our kick / pummel / bash / counterspell / silencing shots. We're all over the place, granted we only had 3 melee to interrupt -- we could have done it, regardless if we just made sure he was always casting Arcane Missles -- that would give enough time for everyone's cooldown. Unless we have two assigned to interrupting both frost and fire, we need to set up a rotation. Organization means -- saving your rage/energy because you know it's your turn, and you can efficiently kick at the end of the cast rather than spamming until you have rage and maybe getting it. 2. Transition to the "Sons" -- when he spawns the elementals, it's rough because he's also doing his normal blizzard/flame wreath/aoe garbage too. Those guys can hit hard, we need to definately focus fire - - but not at the expense of crossing a flame wreath or staying in a blizzard. We're only DPSing one of them - as one should be banished, another feared the entire time, the third just tanked until despawn. This leaves Shade of Aran up and fire/frost/arcaneing people at the same time -- it's definately the most dangerous point! Perhaps a couple interrupters should stay with him?A couple other suggestions I read -- quaff a frost protection potion right when the adds spawn. This will give you a couple moments to sort out the chaos of which to banish/ff/fear/OT. Gotta make Fargol run Mana Tombs for the Major recipe.

Also, it's said that he doesn't have a threat list so to speak of -- well, he doesn't melee anyone in particular except when all three of his spell schools are shut down -- but I noticed him charging the sides pretty often, perhaps this was to get in range of his next spellcast? I dunno -- but we might want to try an attempt where I'm going full threat.

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » June 22nd, 2007, 8:12 am

Extra info I found for dealing with both his transition and Polymorph: Keep everyone topped off and keep the DPS up until 40%. At 40% he spawns 4 water elementals which can be completely CCed. I reccommend having your tank pick one up, fear and banish 2 if you have a warlock, and rogues can stunlock the last one. Hunters can also trap and priests can fear. They are affected by silence as well. Healing gets a bit intense here but just last for 90 seconds of this and they despawn. Once they despawn it is the same thing as before they spawned and you can just DPS him down. I would reccommend saving cooldowns for after the adds so you can DPS Aran down quicker as your healers should be close to running out of mana. Also if Shade of Aran gets to about 30000 mana he will do an AoE polymorph for about 10 seconds and then pyroblast everyone in the raid for ~7k. You can line of sight this so when he gets close to 30% mana everyone run to the wall and use the bookcases to line of sight him can avoid the sheep and AoE allowing you time to regen. Top everyone off before this so in case someone gets sheeped they don't instantly die from the pyro. If you get hit with the pyro IMMEDIATELY use a potion or get a heal. Before you go into this fight you need to make sure you equip some stam gear and get above 7200 hp with buffs so that if you get hit by the Pyroblast you won't die.

dudepal · Post by **dudepal** » June 22nd, 2007, 12:16 pm

Yeah, the biggest point is definitely the transition. I think if we had another full healer for the fight(no offense myrdinn, but like you said too, it's not a good fight for druids to heal) we could've done it a lot better. Having a priest in each group to throw up some prayer of healings after the pyroblast would work wonders in concert with a tranquility from myrdinn and some spot heals from the 3rd healer. if we can just keep everyone alive after the pyroblast, it'll be a lot easier to deal with the elementals.

Fargol · Post by **Fargol** » June 22nd, 2007, 12:44 pm

Frost pots - Why does it have to be a terrible place to farm it, like the end boss of a dungeon? /cry I do have the greater recipe, though.

Aggro - I'm questioning the no aggro list thing - I felt like I took a lot of hits last night. I mean, I wasn't really counting or looking around, but I recall repeatedly getting hit. 2,3,4 times in a row. I got heals just fine, it was mostly memorable for upsetting me while I was trying to cast

Maybe I can try to rustle up some frost gear, and put a lil of my fire gear on, and fake tank it.

Stamina - This is key. You MUST have at least 8k of health for this fight. No matter what. Every class. Find some greens, old gear you can stick sta gems in, or maybe some PvP gear if you have some honor/arena points laying around. Once last night I was in a blizzard when the poly came, and was taken right out, and I was at less than 50% health. I began bandaging as soon as the blizzard stopped, took the hit, had about 100health, and quickly health potted.

Consumables - just a reminder to come to these raids with plenty (tonnes! lots! way too many!) consumables for yourself. Food buffs, elixirs, health/mana pots. Everyone should buff up for each attempt, and be ready to use health/mana pots liberally throughout the fight. If you know you're going to run out of mana during a fight, pop a mana pot early in the battle, so you can use a second one later in the fight. Yes, all this stuff is expensive, but so are repairs - the more we can do to get the boss down in fewer attempts, the less we have to pay in repairs. But raiding does cost gold - in consumables, getting the best gems/enchants for your gear, etc - but that's the cost of getting awesome epic loot.

Raid replacements - please consult one of the raid leaders (probably dudepal or fargol) before finding replacement that isn't your class. We need to have optimal raid composition for these later, newer fights. (No offence meant to dixie, it was great to try to find a replacement, but we could have seen if Killean/other pally could have come before promising the spot to TJ - heals are ever important on that fight, not to mention the considerable help bally buffs are. (We sorely missed you on wednesday, dixie!! We never realised we'd miss those pally buffs so much) )

Han · Post by **Han** » June 22nd, 2007, 12:56 pm

For the adds, it would be great if we can assign one person to just throw a mark on each one... Doesn't matter what mark, but there is no way we can focus fire without a mark up in that fight. Melee!!!! The thing to remember for melee classes is that your damage is very very crucial to this fight. There should not be a caster in the top 3 or 4 on the meter ideally, since he has such low armor. Try try try to get back into melee range when he is casting flame wreath, and make sure you stop with like a second left in his cast to make sure you don't wipe the raid. Otherwise, you will be sitting there doing nothing for 20 seconds during a wreath, unable to hit him and unable to move. Pots are so useful in this fight, since he will continue to target you if you have low hp's. Save your big cooldowns for after the elementals and beast him down since the healers will be hurting for mana at this point.

Han · Post by **Han** » June 22nd, 2007, 12:57 pm

For the adds, it would be great if we can assign one person to just throw a mark on each one... Doesn't matter what mark, but there is no way we can focus fire without a mark up in that fight. Melee!!!! The thing to remember for melee classes is that your damage is very very crucial to this fight. There should not be a caster in the top 3 or 4 on the meter ideally, since he has such low armor. Try try try to get back into melee range when he is casting flame wreath, and make sure you stop with like a second left in his cast to make sure you don't wipe the raid. Otherwise, you will be sitting there doing nothing for 20 seconds during a wreath, unable to hit him and unable to move. Pots are so useful in this fight, since he will continue to target you if you have low hp's. Save your big cooldowns for after the elementals and beast him down since the healers will be hurting for mana at this point.

Hardwigg · Post by **Hardwigg** » June 22nd, 2007, 2:11 pm

I'm with Fargol in that I noticed Aran turn toward me and kick the shit out of me with frostbolts now and again. He definitely has some aggro mechanics; he picks on me a lot.As far as trapping the adds: I think I tried it last night, but was not successful. What I don't recall is whether the add resisted or was immune.

dixiemartin · Post by **dixiemartin** » June 22nd, 2007, 5:55 pm

Yeah, I was realizing Thursday night that me leaving early is always gonna cause a problem, so I'm probably gonna sit out on weeknight raid nights from now on (at least for a little while). I'm in for Friday/Saturday nights, but I much prefer spending only an hour or two of my meager not-working time gaming on a weeknight. I'm a game-committment-phobe.

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » June 22nd, 2007, 10:08 pm

I was watching a movie where a warlock took care of all 4 adds, banished one -- and just chain feared the other 3. They would get a frostbolt off or two during the time they were unfeared, but then spent the next 10? 15? seconds running around wildly -- it was from his perspective, and he just ran elemental to elemental. Everyone else ignored the adds ...I farmed mats for about 20 Greater Frost protection pots ... they seem to be just about as good as the major. Elemental Water + Dreamfoil + crystal vialFun fight.

late1 · Post by **late1** » June 23rd, 2007, 3:32 am

Elementals:1) The elementals only have 10k hp. Banish one, fear another then focus fire the remaining two down. I assure you they will fall like water drops. AoE Polymorph: Healin through it1) A druid in "tree of life" form will not be polymorphed so have Myrdinn cast lifebloom on as many people as he can before the pyroblast. 2) Following the pyro blast all druids, regardless of spec, should pop out and cast Tranquility to bring up the raid.3) Additionally, pally's can bubble immediately after the polymorph before being struck by the pyroblast and begin healing the raid.Optimal Scenario:Shade doesn't have much hp. Kill him before his mana hits 20% and you won't have to deal w/ the poly at all. It's an aggro free fight so everyone should have maximum buffage (and pots if need be). Melt his face off!Cheers, gl!