Thursday, November 25, 2010

Glory of the Icecrown Raider (10man) Guide

Having recently finished this achievement and attained my Bloodbathed Frostbrood Vanquisher, I thought why not share my experiences and tips. This guide assumes that your raid is familiar with normal mode strategies. So without further adieu:

Lord Marrowgar
Heroic mode
Lord Marrowgar is the first boss you will encounter in ICC. On heroic mode he will cast Bonespike on a random raid member, even when he actvivates his second special ability, the moving Whirlwind that is Bonestorm.
During the encounter make sure any Bonespikes are DPSed down as quick as possible, and avoid the Bonestorm as much as possible. A common strategy is to place each of the tanks in the far corners of the room, whilst the rest of the raid stack in the middle to have Marrowgar bounce between the 2 tanks.

Boned! Achievement
This achievement should be done in normal mode. Theidea here is to kill him faster than he takes to cast a 4th Bonespike. This fight on normal mode can be solo-tanked if you have a well geared tank, and it certainly can be 2 healed, which will allow you to take 7 dps, more than enough to kill him quickly.


Lady Deathwhisper
Heroic Mode
In heroic mode Lady Deathwhisper will call her adds in Phase 1, and 1 further add in regular intervals during Phase 2. She will regularly empower one of her adds, as well as regularly mind control one of the raid members (even in phase 2). She will also regularly cast Death and Decay in both Phases.
As in normal mode DPS down her mana-shield, and down any adds when they appear. Also ensure that any Mind-controlled raid member is quickly CCed as they can cause havoc if left unchecked. Try and bring the shield down once a set of adds are downed and before a new set is spawned. Once phase 2 begins all DPS must drop their threat as she is not tauntable. Hunters in rogues should misdirect and then Feign death and Vanish when the threat disappears. One tank will now tank the boss while the other is responsible for picking up and tanking the spawned add. The first main tank should also drag her to the entrance of the room as this where the new add will spawn from, making it easier to pick it up. As in normal mode the tanks will still need to switch when she puts her debuff on the current main tank. Assign 1 dps on add duty while the rest bring her down.

Full House Achievement
The idea here is to kill her whislst you have at least 5 DIFFERENT adds up. This is best achieved with a normal fanatic and adherent, a reanimated fanatic and adherent, and a deformed fanatic. Ideally you want 3 tanks for this; in phase one, 2 of the tanks will pick up all the spawned mobs whilst the 3rd tank will pull off and tank any adds that are to be kept alive. The DPS should not kill any adds until you have the first few adds changing. Once you have a reanimated add kill any remaining of the same kind i.e if you have a reanimated fanatic kill any remaining fanatics. Once you have A deformed fanatic, any tank that is not tanking the adds to be kept alive, will peel off and kite it but ensure you don't kill it. The remaining tank will now be the lone tank picking up any new spawning adds. Once you have both reanimated adds and a deformed you can pull off the 2 unchanged adds. Kill any remaining adds and time it that shield goes down before any new adds. The Boss tank and the tank kiting the deformed fanatic will now be responsible for switching targets when she casts her debuff.

Gunship Battle
Heroic Mode
It is loot ship either way and as long as gunners take out the rocketeers in the back of the ship and the spawning adds are dealt with swiftly you should not have a problem.

I'm on a Boat Achievement
This again best done on normal but possible on heroic. Simply rotate the jumping DPS and tank after 2 jumps. Healers should be able to stand on the edge of the Alliance ship to heal the jumping tank and therefore don't need to jump.

Deathbringer Saurfang
Heroic Mode
In my mind this will be the first real gear check on heroic. You will need high DPS, good heals and durable tanks. This fight isn't very different from normal mode, except that the Blood Beasts now enrage and put a slow on whoever they target, making kiting them extremely difficult. Therefore they need to be downed quickly. Employ as many instant slows as are possible such as stunners from melee classes, Frost traps from hunters, Earthbind totems from Shamans and Blowbacks from Druids. Hunters especially are the most useful here with traps and a well timed Disengage. Heroism/Blood lust should be saved for his soft enrage a 30%. All classes need to avoid damage as much as possible as his Blood Power will fill up a lot faster than on normal mode.

I've Gone and Made a Mess Achievement
This is again possible on both difficulties but considerably more difficult on heroic mode but also effectively guaranteed on heroic as anything more than 3 Marks of the Fallen Champion will be too difficult for the healers to handle. Either way the key is take as little damage as possible to slow the amount of Blood Power Saurfang absorbs.


Festergut
Heroic Mode
Besides having more health and doing more damage on heroic, Putricide will now also regularly throw Malleable Goos at random targets. If hit you will take damage and your casting will be slowed by 75%. Before starting this fight I suggest going into the Deadly Boss mods options for this fight and enable the Malleable Goo announce to raid option. Do this fight as you normally would, but move out if malleable goo is cast where you are standing. A common strategy for melee is having all of them stack one of Festergut's legs and simply move to the other leg when Malleable Goo is targeting melee.

Flu Shot Shortage Achievement
This is best done on normal mode. The idea here is to DPS him down withh all raid members only having 2 stacks of Innoculation. To achieve this you will have the first 2 spore targets stay away from all other raid members so only they themselve will get Innoculated. During the next round of Spores, should the two spore targets of the first round not be targeted, they will move away and miss inocculation, whilst the rest of the group needs to get innocculated. Should either one be trageted again this round they will need to share it with the rest of the group and hope they are not selected in the third and final round. You need to DPS Festergut down before a fourth round of Innoculations. A decently geared group can attempt to two heal ths fight to get an extra DPS.

Rotface
Heroic mode
This fight, like Festergut, is very similar to normal mode, with only one new ability added to the encounter; Putricide will now cast Vile Gas on a random target at range. This includes the tank that is kiting the Ooze. To combat this, all ranged will need to spread around the room to avoid puking on other raid members. Should the kiting tank be targeted by Vile Gas either a hunter or the main tank need to taunt the Big Ooze of the kiting tank (preferably the hunters as the main tank has enough on his plate). The kiting tank must then taunt the ooze back quickly.

Dances with Oozes Achievement
For this achievement, you must kill Rotface without any Oozes growing to four stacks. This is actually pretty easy.  Simply keep joining 2 Oozes to create 2-stack Big Oozes. Again, 2-heal this to gain an extra dps and burn him down faster.

Professor Putricide
Heroic Mode
In this encounter you'll find two changes from normal mode. First, throughout the fight, Putricide will cast Unbound Plague on a random raid member. This debuff will do increasing shadow damage which each tick per second and lasts 1 minute. The damage per tick doubles each tick i.e the first tick will be 200 damage, then 400, then 800 etc. To remove this debuff it needs to be passed on to another raid member, which is done by simply standing close to them. Make sure you don't have several players standing too close to the affected player, as the debuff will then continuously jump between them. This is bad because once the debuff jumps from a player that player will have debuff that increases Shadow damage taken by 250% and can stack multiple times.
The second change is, that instead of a raid wide stun between phase changes, Putricide will instead cast both a Gas cloud and a Volatile Ooze at the same time.
The best way to this fight is to have your ranged DPs and healers stand in a diagonal line in the middle of the room. We often use the markings on the floor as a guideline. The tank will pick up the boss and pull him into one corner. This line will determine the sequence of Unbound Plague. The fight begins just as in normal mode. The other tank will change into Abomination, but will not use the slow effect on any adds in the first phase. When Putricide casts Unbound Plague, the affected Player will hold the Plague for a minimum of 8 seconds and up to 12 seconds before passing it on to the next player in line. Once it reaches the end of the line, 1 of the melee will step away from the boss and pick up the plague. if you have more than 1 melee, the next melee player must run to the previous melee target away from the boss.
When a volatile ooze is spawned it is of the utmost importance that all range and melee classes collapse on any target affected by Volatile adhesive to mitigate the damage from the explosion. It is vital that the player who currently holds the Plague stay away from any adhesive target, as you will get the Plague jumping amongst all the collapsing players. It is also vital that all players return to their original spot in line once the Volatile ooze is downed.
Make sure that you control your dps in a way that you shift the fight into the next phase WITHOUT having any adds up, as having 3 Oozes up is difficult to cope with. During phase change the Abomination will throw a slow on the Gas cloud, while ALL DPS burn down the Ooze, whilst sticking to the above strategy in dealing with the Plague. Once in Phase 2 Putricide will now also be throwing Malleable Goos around so watch out for those. After the second Phase change the raid will need to remain spread and continue to pass the Plague around whilst burning Putricide down. Be aware that once Putricide is down, the Plague will remain and needs to be passed around for the remainder of its duration.

Nausea, Heartburn, Indigestion... Achievement
For this Achievement you will need to defeat Putricide without using the Abominations slowing ability Regurgitating Ooze on any of the adds. 2-heal it to free up an extra dps to burn the adds down quicker, especially the Gas cloud.

Blood Council
Heroic Mode
In heroic mode ther is one new mechanic to the fight. Whenever a player moves for more than a second he will gain a debuff that will last 10 seconds and tick every second for shadow damage. This buff will stack the more you move. Because of the Shadow resistance buff provided by the Dark nuclei, only the tank dealing with Keleseth and the nuclei should be moving. All other players should keep movement to a minimum and avoid being thrown about by any vortexes. In this difficulty it is of utmost importance to have the ranged spread around the room as to always have someone in range of any Kinetic Orbs. One exploding orb can take out almost an entire raid. Note that hunter pets are perfect to keep kinetic orbs up. It is also very important that when Taldaram is active and his Empowered Flame is cast the targeted player runs away from it without stacking the Shadow debuff past 5 stacks. other players should attempt to get as much into the path of the fireball as possible without stacking their debuff to high, but to reduce the damage caused by the fireball. A fully charged Empowered Flame will one-shot any player. This fight is extremely healing intensive and it is recommended to use 3 healers.

The Orb Whisperer Achievement
This fight is all about raid awareness, as it requires you to down the 3 princes without any player being hit for more than 20000 damage. This means making sure that all kinetic orbs are kept in the air, as much damage as possible is mitigated from the Empowered Flame, and all vortexes are avoided as much as possible.

Blood Queen Lana'thel
Heroic Mode
Apart from having a larger health pool and dealing more damage this fight is no different from normal mode. Survival is key and the raid cannot afford the loss of any DPS to either death or mind-control. Ensure that you highest DPS are bitten first.

Once Bitten, Twice Shy Achievement
This achievement simpy requires you to kill the Blood Queen at least twice; once whilst being bitten and once without. Your heroic kill will count towards this achievement.

Dreamwalker Valithria
Heroic Mode
The difference to normal mode here is that adds will actually cause further damage to Valithria. Also adds will spawn a lot faster and Blistering Zombies will move a lot faster, making kiting a lot more difficult. Further, whilst entering the dreamstate thorugh the portals the healers will take damage. The remainder of the fight is effectilvey the same as normal mode with almost no room for error. ideally this should be 3 healed, with 2 healers going into the portals, and 1 healer staying out to take care of the raid. It is imperative for success, that the 2 healers don't lose their healing stacks gained from inside the portals. It is very important that Archmage Frostbolts are interrupted as much as possible, as slowed healers can miss their portal and then lose their stacks.

Portal Jockey Achievement
This achievement requires good awareness and good communication. You need to heal Valithria to full health, whilst ensuring every single portal is being used. Before the fight assign your 2 healers and a dps that will be jumping into the portals every round. Communicate early with your raid when portals pop up and if any of the portal jumpers are slowed from the Archmages and their Frostbolts.

Sindragosa
Heroic Mode
In this encounter Unchained Magic will now release a 30% damage, 20 yard radius AoE when it drops off. Also all damage is increased, and Frost Bombs are no longer survivable.In Phase 3 Mystic Buffets become lethal if stacked higher than 5 (earlier for low health classes). The fight should be attempted the same way as on normal mode, with the only difference being any players affected by Unchained Magic through Phase 1 will need to move away from the raid until the debuff drops off. It is imperative that everybody stacks behind Iceblocks during Air phase, you do not want to lose any players here. In Phase 3 stack the raid on the back leg, the first targetedplayer for Iceblock will then move to the front leg and get iceblocked. The remaining raid will then stack behind the Iceblock until their Mystic Buffet debuff wears off completely. It is recommended to wait until a second Iceblock is cast (which in turn shall now be placed at the back leg), before downing the first. The dance between iceblocks needs to be perfect for downing this boss. The fight is extremely healing intensive and if you find yourself struggling it is recommended to wear a 2-piece frost resist set.

Alternate strategy
It is possible to simply Zerg her down. For this however you will need a well geared group of 1 durable tank (2-piece frost resist gear recommended), 2 well-geared healers (we are talking at least some 25-man heroic pieces required), and 7 DPS, each needing at least 10-13k dps. Simply burn her down through Phase 1 but make sure you time so all dps and the tank have their cooldowns available once she hits phase 2. When phase 2 activates hit heroism/Bloodlust and all your cooldowns and burst her down. RNG will play a part in downing her, as any healer getting iceblocked in Phase 2 will spell certain failure.

All you can Eat Achievement
This is actually a lot easier then people think. Instead of dancing in phase 2 just burn her down. Ideally bring 1 tank, 1healer and 8 dps and hope the healer doesn't get iceblocked. It should be possible with 2 healers and 7 DPS. You will need to burn her down before any player stacks their Mystic Buffet up to 6.

The Lich King
Been Waiting a Long Time For This Achievement
The strategy to kill him and gain this achievement does not differ a great deal from normal. The only difference is that in phase 1 you wait before DPSing the Lich King until Necrotic Plague has stacked up to 30, simply ensure that you always have adds up for the Necrotic Plague to jump to. Have the Off-tank tank all Shambling Horrors and Drudge Ghouls. The rest of the fight is the same as normal mode.


Enjoy your new flying mount and congratulations. Please feel free to share any strategies and comments you might have for these fights.

Keep on hunting,

Serebihm

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