Heroic Horridon - Need Help!

[indero]

Our group is having a very difficult time on H Horridon and we could use some tips/advice from the experienced raiding public. If you have any advice on how we can down this boss I would really appreciate it!

Logs are two posts below - thanks Deja Thoris!

Here is our group make up and where we're having difficulty...

Tanks:
Prot Paly
Blood DK

DPS:
Warlock
Warlock
Mage
Ele Shammy
DK

Heals:
HPaly
RShaman (offspec dps, but usually main healer)
DPriest (offspec dps)

Average ilvl of the group is roughly 525

We have a tough time with the 3rd/4th doors and last phase. We seem to have a lot of insta deaths and when we make it the last phase we always seem to have a healer/tank go down which makes it impossible.

We've tried having me (shamy) DPS and priest heal, but the results are similar. Sham/Paly have a ton more mana by the 4th door compared to priest/paly. But Priest/Paly do great with bubbles/atonement healing. We seem to have a few less people insta die when I heal, but I could be biased .

If I didn't answer any questions you may have please let me know. 50+ wipes on this boss and we're sick of it!

Criticism is greatly appreciated.

[Arkhangelsk]

Are you two or three healing? You list three healers, but then you talk about healers in pairs. If you're two healing, try going with three healers instead. My raid group put in quite a few attempts with two healers, but we switched to three just to try it and it ended up working much better for us. This will depend on your DPS though I guess.

You didn't say what your strat is for the 3rd and 4th door, so I'll just outline what we do.

For the 3rd door, we have our DPS and healers stack up together (away from the tanks) so that the Risen adds will be close together for AoE. When the first Frozen Warlord jumps down from the stands, the DPS quickly focus him down. He usually dies shortly after the next two Frozen Warlords arrive. I pick up the Frozen Warlords and tank them away from the group. At that point, all DPS focuses on the Risen adds until the Dinomancer hops down. When the Dinomancer lands, DPS focus him down until he drops the orb. Afterwards, they burn the remaining Risen adds, and then kill the two Frozen Warlords that I'm tanking. Usually the Frozen Warlords die as adds appear at the 4th door.

For the 4th door, we task our resto shaman with interrupting the Flamecasters when they walk out of the gate. Usually after they're interrupted they'll move in range of your add tank, and he can pick them up. Their fireball hits pretty hard, so it's important that the tank grabs them. We focus down the first Warbear that jumps down. We make sure that only one shaman is off of his bear at a time. When the shaman is dismounted, he begins putting a curse (I don't remember the name) on random raid members that damages them when they attack. This needs to be dispelled very quickly or it will kill someone. Anybody in your raid who can decurse should be decursing on this door. When the set of two warbears jumps down from the stands, our Horridon tank grabs one, and I pull the other into the big group of adds. Again, you only want one shaman off of his bear at a time. Usually we'll finish cleaning up the adds 10 seconds or so before Jalak comes out.

Something that helps me quite a bit as the add tank is to have all of our RDPS and healers between me and the next door at all times. This forces the adds to run by me to get to them, so I don't have to spend a lot of time running around trying to pick them up. I'm assuming your Blood DK is on adds; if he's having trouble with aggro, tell him to try glyphing Dancing Rune Weapon. I use this on pretty much every door right as the two large adds jump down, and it keeps everything glued to me. If a bear starts wailing on your DPS on the 4th door you're in some trouble.

Oh, and make sure your disc priest is using Spirit Shell on every Dire Call.

If the instant deaths are from the Direhorn Spirits I can't help much there because I pretty much never have one.

Hopefully this is somewhat helpful. If you get logs I'll try to take a look and be more specific.

[Deja Thoris]

http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/6d2l58cxpanduwmk/

I'm only going to comment on the "instadeaths"

When Jalak lands there can be / will be a bestial cry and a direcall that line up or at least come damn close together. EVERYBODY needs to use personals for this, especially the tanks. It's a scary part of the fight. If your disc priest is there make sure spirit shell is up.

After this its really just a matter of people using personals for the direcalls, they can oneshot people if not topped up when the boss rampages. The tanks have to have their AM up on triple puncture. The pally tank should reset on 4 stacks.


And Edit: Despite the advice above mine which is solid, I'm dead against 3 healing this. Adds live longer, more shit happens etc. Ewww!!!

[bigbad]

We've 3healed it this week but it's definitely harder then 2healing as adds die slower. We had problems with tanks dying without our disc priest absorbs in the last phase. Our first few kills were holy pally/disc.

On the 3rd door make sure to nuke the dinomancer right away, frost orbs are avoidable so if people die from that tell them to not be bad. On the 4th door make sure no fireball casts go off we have warrior/ele shammy on em recon for you 2/3 ranged would be easier and avoid totems and have curses dispelled asap by mage/shammy.
Surviving the wargod shouldn't be an issue with a well timed barrier if direcall comes after that it's just keeping up the tanks good luck

[Deleted]

On the 4th door I have our Shaman pop his earth elemental. Granted it doesn't live THAT long it takes so much damage off the tank on the adds. Just make sure you don't have 2 shamans up, so kill 1 bear at a time, then shaman. As also mentioned make sure you rotate CD's for when Wargod lands for the cries.

[indero]

Arkhangelsk - we 2 heal the fight. We tried three healing but we thought it was more difficult to heal compared to two healers. Adds didn't die nearly as fast. We basically do your exact strat on then 3rd/4th doors. Decurses aren't a problem with 2 shamans and a Mage - although the totems hit pretty hard and sometimes drop people, especially after a dire call goes out.

Deja Thoris - Thanks for posting our Logs! (And Jalak advice)

Meffs - we have two shamys - does it help a lot to pop the earth elementals? Stagger when we drop them?

Just an FYI from an advice stand point - We'll probably be healing with the sham/paly for this fight going forward.

Can anyone comment on how our dps is? If that's the main problem then that's good - we'll just work on a couple other heroics/normals to get more gear.

Thanks for the help!

[Deleted]

Seems that on your longest tries you always had NPCs running rampant (especially bears), and Flamecasters not being interrupted reliably.

[Deja Thoris]

Can anyone comment on how our dps is? If that's the main problem then that's good - we'll just work on a couple other heroics/normals to get more gear.

The dps check for this fight is getting thru a door without being overwhelmed by adds. Since you are getting to the last phase, dps isn't necc the problem. It's control. Control the adds properly and move properly on doors 3+4. if you go into the last phase with everyone alive and get Jalak down then you have to keep the tanks (or just one of them) alive long enough to score the kill. People tend to see the big scary dino turn all red and angry and panic. Just keep your composure :P

[Voidgazer]

We just downed H Horridon yesterday, but I'll try to help according to my abilities.

Can anyone comment on how our dps is? If that's the main problem then that's good - we'll just work on a couple other heroics/normals to get more gear.

I'd say your DPS is pretty low. Especially your warlocks, can't say much for other classes myself, but our tanks also tend to have high DPS on this fight. I'm pulling 100k DPS more than your warlocks, and my ilvl is considerably lower, so I highly doubt that gearing is a porblem here.

First of all, as for any heroic or "progress" boss fight for your guild, you should not leave any encounter mechanic to chance. Have everyone know where to run out with the charge, assign specific target interrupts for specific players, raid CD rotation, etc. Everything should be planned in advance to prevent hesitation and wrong decisions during the fight itself. Because during the fight your raid group will have to concetrate on execution, not thinking about what to do next.

Speaking of execution. Every player should know his or her class well. Which I think your raid has problems with. Have your raid members read up specific tips for the encoutner, research other players' builds, logs and kill videos. And if they do not want to improve... that raises a question: why are they even in your group?

Also, some damage sources during the fight are completely avoidable. Yes, I mean the notorius "don't stand in the fire" tip. It might sound obvious, but have your raid members pay attention to sand traps, poison pools, frost orbs and totems. They should not take ANY damage from those abilities.

I know, everything I said so far is just general tips for virtually any boss fight in WoW, but seriously, have everyone in your group wary of all the encounter aspects. You can't do it half-assed.

Anyway, for more specific tips. We had problems during the execute phase where lots of people were dying to a dire call. Fortunately we had our disc prist to stack SS on everyone prior to the roar. Our second healer is a holy pal which also helps with absorption I guess. Regardless, have everyone in your rade aware of the dire call timer and be fully healed or ready to flush their personal defensive CDs.
Oh, one more thing. During the 4th gate, try to not have multiple shamans running around, focus the bears and shamans one by one. Also, be sure to down the flame casters quickly, since if enough of them manage to gather, they can one shot a player with their fireballs. This especially considers ranged DPS since they'll probably be the ones taking care of flame casters and taking aggro from the tank.

[Deleted]

Meffs - we have two shamys - does it help a lot to pop the earth elementals? Stagger when we drop them?

The two doors from my experience we have the most trouble with are the last 2, the 3rd one because of the mortal strike from the big adds (Warlords whatever they are called, can't remember) and the Bears + Shamans on the 4th. Give your tank on the adds on the 3rd door an external CD (pain sup, whatever you have) when the Dinomancer drops.

For the 4th I'd drop the elemental when all the bears are up then drop the 2nd after the 1st is dead. Make sure to get interrupts on the flame casters, they can be missed sometimes when there is a lot going on.

[Radio]

Try to make sure your ranged/healers aren't standing too close to where bears/warlords are expected to spawn either. Last night on H Horridon farm our mage was standing directly under one of the Bear spawns and she was one shot IMMEDIATELY, not even enough time to save her with a taunt.

[hossam]

you have good setup and more then enough to kill horridon without any problems and the prot paladin can also help dispelling at gate 2 +3 ,
and if u have problem u can use BL at gate 3 or 4 the hardest one for u and u can use army on other gate to help abit

[Deja Thoris]

We just downed H Horridon yesterday, but I'll try to help according to my abilities.

I'd say your DPS is pretty low. Especially your warlocks, can't say much for other classes myself, but our tanks also tend to have high DPS on this fight. I'm pulling 100k DPS more than your warlocks, and my ilvl is considerably lower, so I highly doubt that gearing is a porblem here.

Did you ever consider that you get to do a couple of minutes damage on a boss taking extra damage while they don't?

If you are going to make comparisons, don't make stupid ones.

[Xami]

The DPS are low indeed. I think our guild is about the same progress (downed Horridon just this lockout) and the DPS average is around 180-200k including the tanks. This is with 2 healing. Higher DPS means less damage from various add abilities. The Warlocks should be pulling 200k+ at all times with this gear. Destro especially can go nuts on AoE while focusing single target at the same time, with the added bonus of being able to completely ignore the spirit with FnB. Have your melee and tank take care of most interrupts.

The deaths seem to be mostly due to various mechanics - not getting out of double swipe, not having SotR up for triple puncture, taking too much damage from the plague, taking damage from Frozen Orb, etc etc. Don't hesitate to keep moving to avoid Frozen Orbs. Have your tank Purify others.

One thing that came up more than once is Rending Charge. It hurts a lot so use HoP to clear these as necessary, since you don't seem to be doing the solo Horridon tank strategy.

[Hucio]

Arkhangelsk - we 2 heal the fight. We tried three healing but we thought it was more difficult to heal compared to two healers. Adds didn't die nearly as fast. We basically do your exact strat on then 3rd/4th doors. Decurses aren't a problem with 2 shamans and a Mage - although the totems hit pretty hard and sometimes drop people, especially after a dire call goes out.

Deja Thoris - Thanks for posting our Logs! (And Jalak advice)

Meffs - we have two shamys - does it help a lot to pop the earth elementals? Stagger when we drop them?

Just an FYI from an advice stand point - We'll probably be healing with the sham/paly for this fight going forward.

Can anyone comment on how our dps is? If that's the main problem then that's good - we'll just work on a couple other heroics/normals to get more gear.

Thanks for the help!

Disc priest is too strong for this fight to ignore. It helps with dps a lot (on fight which is truely dps check with ability to interrupt, dispell and move from fire). Just make sure that the priest from the second gate just dps the boss(bonus damage = bonus healing) and do the spirit shells and pw:s before dire calls. Raid should be stacked close to an add tank. Ask melee to pick up the orbs. Ranged should have their dots rolling on the boss for most of the time. Dont be afraid to use BL on 3rd or 4th gate.
On 4th it is better to kill just 1 bear and 1 shaman afterwards, and focus on smaller adds, those firebolts hits hard as hell. When the gate is closed and smaller adds are close to death then you can switch to bears again.

On 3rd gate using army of the death can be a good idea but its not that important if you can manage the dispells. 3rd and 4th gate actually the ones whre the dps should use their offensive cd.

[Voidgazer]

Did you ever consider that you get to do a couple of minutes damage on a boss taking extra damage while they don't?

If you are going to make comparisons, don't make stupid ones.

Did I hit a nerve or something? I'm sitting above 200k DPS pretty much throughout the whole fight. I only climb 60k more during the execute phase.

[Deja Thoris]

Did I hit a nerve or something? I'm sitting above 200k DPS pretty much throughout the whole fight. I only climb 60k more during the execute phase.

Yes you did, stupid posts irk me. They pass the dps check when they get thru gates in time. When people die to mechanics, telling them up to dps isn't useful information.

It's typical of half the responses on this forum.
Die to triple puncture? Moar dps!
Fail to kick a turtle at the correct time? Moar dps!
Fail at moving in the durumu maze? Moar dps!

I wish people would start tailoring their advice to fit the problem rather than just offering generic rubbish that boils down to "lol I do more dps than that!"
Theres logs, give character specific advice, posting for the sake of posting, meh.

[Voidgazer]

Yes you did, stupid posts irk me.

Well then you must have trouble looking at your own posts, since insulting people who give you advice is very stupid itself.

They pass the dps check when they get thru gates in time. When people die to mechanics

Except these mechanics do not magically appear by themsevles during the fgiht. Most of those debuffs and other damage sources are produced by the adds. You die to those mechanics if you get overwhelmed by the adds. Which in its own turn means, guess what, insufficient DPS.
Do not exaggerate things, of course I'm not saying DPS is a universal solution to any problem, but Horridon IS a very DPS intensive fight. Your healers won't be able to keep the raid on full health indefinitely during the execute phase too. Tanks not doing enough damage to the boss throughout the fight might result in constant 5% wipes. You're not passing the DPS check YET.

Theres logs, give character specific advice

From a destro lock PoV on this fight, I'd highly recommed taking Mannoroth's Fury, since it greatly helps with downing the adds. Also I take Grimoire of Service, because when your Direhorn spawns, you can send your pet to attack it, and forget about it for the rest of the fight. I've read that using a melee pet could result in it despawning at some point, so I use the Imp as main pet for this fight.

[Deja Thoris]

Well then you must have trouble looking at your own posts, since insulting people who give you advice is very stupid itself.

I've never insulted people who give me advice. I merely called out someone who gave others generic / unhelpful advice.

Theres a sticky on how to make a proper "help me" thread. There needs to be one for people aspiring to help too since generic "moar dps" or "don't stand in the fire" responses aren't helpful. Anyway, enough derailing from me.

[Sonnillon]

Please take you arguments, which are not related to topic into PMs.