Destruction on Thok HC

[Deleted]

As the title implies, I'm looking for what some fellow locks are doing on Thok HC as destruction, since I'm underperforming DPS-wise on the fight, due to not getting casts off except conflagrate, or going totally oom from rain of fire / fel flame spam on higher stacks. It seems once acceleration stacks reach to about 8-9 I can no longer do most regular hardcasts (definitely no chaosbolts or not backdrafted incinerates). Once stacks reach 15 we start a devotion aura chain, so I use second dark soul and start unloading chaos bolts. If devotion aura overlap is missed by a second, you end up getting locked out, so possibly moving second dark soul to the kite phase. Once our devotion chain is off, I'm again reverting to rain of fire / felflaming until the start of the next kite phase.

When bats come out, f&b aoe-ing them is fairly hard for me to not get locked out (we do not have a devotion aura for that part). What do others do there?

Currently mastery > crit > haste reforged, thinking of going mastery > haste > crit or even haste > mastery > crit just to be able to get casts of quicker.

Due to the constant damage I am running with unending resolve glyphed, so can't use it to prevent cast interruption.

One final problem: my pet keeps dieing once boss reaches higher stacks. Been running with soul link + improved imp for helping with dispels and it just gets killed from soul link damage.

Any tips welcome, including glyphs / talents that differ from what I'm used to taking.

[Deleted]

Why is demo or aff not an option?

[Deleted]

First of all the time between roars never goes lower than 2.4 seconds. You can always get out an incinerate or chaos bolt when using backdraft. Just be mindful of the gcd if you cast an instant after that.

And yes pets are a problem here with soul link so perhaps take sac pact instead.

Secondly, you should be using the glyph of unending resolve to lower the cooldown to 2 minutes. It prevents you from being interrupted. Use it around 8 stacks and it will be up again for when the bats appear.

[Deleted]

Why is demo or aff not an option?

I raidlead, and usually autopilot through destruction rotation while watching raidframes, people's handling of mechanics and doing callouts over vent. Destruction tends to lend itself better to an autopilot-spec (at least for me).

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And yes pets are a problem here with soul link so perhaps take sac pact instead.

Thanks for the tips, do you personally still go for supremacy or sac your pet for more hp if you're not taking soul link?

[Deleted]

Depends if you want the dispel or not. If you struggle with timing your casts between roars you may find better results with a pet that does passive damage.

[Deleted]

- GoSac
- glyphed UR (2 min CD)
- glyphed Havoc
- AD

Open fight as normal, make optimal use of Aura Mastery and UR (trinket procs + CB). During the kite phase use your second DS (prefereably just before it reaches 2 stacks) while positioning yourself in such a way that you will not get fixated:

"Basically Thok selects the furthest target inside a parameter distance, and this threshold distance gets further and further which each fixate. The first fixate picks the furthest person within about 20 yards. The distance increases by about 20 yards each fixate, so for the second fixate he picks the furthest player within 40 yards, and for the third the furthest player within 60 yards, etc."

This should also have the added bonus that your portal won't disappear because you had to kite. You should have to move very little (with the exception of the last two fixates). At about 25% on the Jailor Havoc the boss and start casting on the Jailor, make sure to get at least 3 SBurns off (optionally tell your melee to stop dps on Jailor below 20% for more SBurns).

In the bat phase use another DS (remember we have AD!) and start AoEing the bats with UR. Havoc the boss and cleave six SBurns onto the boss. The rest of the fight is just making optimal use of UR, DS and Aura Masteries while SBurning the boss through the Jailor every kite phase. Keep in mind that it is perfectly possible to cast a backdrafted CB between the screeches and nonbackdrafted Incinerates as well.

[Deleted]

Thank you Thorakh, massively helpful input.

[Deleted]

Put your pet in ground aoe healing effects and it will live just fine.

[Struggle]

Put your pet in ground aoe healing effects and it will live just fine.

Is it worth it though to have to maneuver your pet? I've yet to do heroics but have cleared normal SoO and it seems Soul Link in general is a really meh talent, which would be an exponentiated opinion doing the bosses with more damage going on. I find Dark Bargain to be vastly more useful.

[Deleted]

Is it worth it though to have to maneuver your pet? I've yet to do heroics but have cleared normal SoO and it seems Soul Link in general is a really meh talent, which would be an exponentiated opinion doing the bosses with more damage going on. I find Dark Bargain to be vastly more useful.

I've always used soul link on every hc boss so far (10/14HC atm). Always-on 20% damage reduction is very powerful. Thok is the only boss that does so much constant damage that your pet will die quite rapidly if it's not getting sufficient healing.

Dark Bargain is a good tool to live through otherwise lethal abilities (lei shen hc solo-soaking comes to mind)

[Deleted]

Is it worth it though to have to maneuver your pet? I've yet to do heroics but have cleared normal SoO and it seems Soul Link in general is a really meh talent, which would be an exponentiated opinion doing the bosses with more damage going on. I find Dark Bargain to be vastly more useful.

Soul link is amazing right now. Coupled with the glyph of eternal resolve you have 30% passive damage reduction as well as converting a portion of your damage into passive healing, it's awesome.

For destruction I play GoSac so prefer SacPact over soul link, as the shields you get are pretty meaty and it's only a one minute cooldown.

Dark Bargain is actually pretty terrible right now, there isn't a single fight I've found a need for it. Can you elaborate on which fights/situations you find dark bargain useful?

Only thing I can imagine is finding yourself in an oh shit situation and needing to immune some damage, but in reality you shouldn't be finding yourself in those positions anyway.

[Baconeggcheese]

I played Gosac destruction this past tuesday for funsies on thok with around 5000 haste and pulled 330k dps which was actually quite a bit more than I did as aff. Definitely doable just a little less auto-pilot on that fight.

Thorakh's post covers most stuff just wanted to add some stuff. Rotationally under high stacks outside of devo and unending resolve I stuck to a spell -> felflame / conflag rotation which seems to do the trick. He casts every 1.7 seconds at that point (1 second gcd, .7 second cast) so you could either wait the few miliseconds for him to cast AND then the reaction time it takes you to press the button or just fill with a felflame or conflagrate.

So basically I would do something like:

Icinerate -> conflag
chaosbolt(if gonna ember cap) -> fel flame
incinerate -> fel flame
etc

I'm unsure of your raids positioning but for us the boss moves FAR too much for you to stay within the required distance to not get fixated and also remain casting at him so I *always* take KJC on that fight. I can't recommend KJC enough unless your raid is somehow keeping the boss from moving less than 40ish yards. In our raid we also just 2nd pot and infernal the bats so the extra DS from AD is pretty unnecessary. I'm kind of an AD fanboy and use it on most fights, I just find it counter productive on this fight. I personally spend the entire kite phase chasing the boss across the room and when he starts to speed up I kick in burning rush and for the last fixate I attempt to rocket boots to keep up with him and the ONLY times I can stand still during that and remain in range / within the non-fixate safe spot is when he stops to re-fixate someone else.

Anyway GL!

[Deleted]

Dark Bargain is actually pretty terrible right now, there isn't a single fight I've found a need for it. Can you elaborate on which fights/situations you find dark bargain useful?

Blackfuse.
SacPact is great (almost op) if you can use it with 70% hp or more, but its no life saver when shit hits the fan. On blackfuse Dark Bargain saves your life, it doesnt matter whether your at 70% hp or 10%. Since there are only 2 critical moments during the fight (at least with our tactic) which are more than 3minutes apart DB is the obvious choice imho. In like 4 out of 5 situations SacPact would safe you too, but since theres absolutely no need for a 1minute cooldown i choose DB.

But yes, i use DB very rarely in PvE. In ToT only to solo soak Static Shock and in SoO on Blackfuse. On every other fight SacPact or Soul Link are the better choice.


b2t: Thorak covers almost everything, im just not a big fan of AD as destruction on Thok. I often end up chasing him across the room after 6 or 7 fixates and at the beginning i want to stay near him (but not too far away from my portal...) to not get the fixate.

[Deleted]

- GoSac
- glyphed UR (2 min CD)
- glyphed Havoc
- AD

Open fight as normal, make optimal use of Aura Mastery and UR (trinket procs + CB). During the kite phase use your second DS (prefereably just before it reaches 2 stacks) while positioning yourself in such a way that you will not get fixated:

"Basically Thok selects the furthest target inside a parameter distance, and this threshold distance gets further and further which each fixate. The first fixate picks the furthest person within about 20 yards. The distance increases by about 20 yards each fixate, so for the second fixate he picks the furthest player within 40 yards, and for the third the furthest player within 60 yards, etc."

This should also have the added bonus that your portal won't disappear because you had to kite. You should have to move very little (with the exception of the last two fixates). At about 25% on the Jailor Havoc the boss and start casting on the Jailor, make sure to get at least 3 SBurns off (optionally tell your melee to stop dps on Jailor below 20% for more SBurns).

In the bat phase use another DS (remember we have AD!) and start AoEing the bats with UR. Havoc the boss and cleave six SBurns onto the boss. The rest of the fight is just making optimal use of UR, DS and Aura Masteries while SBurning the boss through the Jailor every kite phase. Keep in mind that it is perfectly possible to cast a backdrafted CB between the screeches and nonbackdrafted Incinerates as well.

thanks for those hints. we just downed him yesterday and even tho I didnt play that flawless i pulled a decent ~280k dps which ranked top 50. room for improvement but its totally viable to play destro on thok hc!

[Deleted]

Use the glyph lowering the damage reduction and cd of your Unending Resolve. Not the passive 10%.
You want the interrupt shield for late in the first P1 and it will(should/could/maybe) then be available again once bats come out during the second P1. Here you pop it to AOE freely.
Use Sac Pact and GoSupp Imp if you must, otherwise GoSacrifice is better (Am I not right, destro pros?). You can have a felflame (or Conflagrate or Rain of Fire) -> Incinerate (or Backdraft Chaos Bolt) running even when he's at 20 stacks. It's just about timing it.

[JIMM-]

remove glyph of eternal resolve
use glyph of unending resolve

[Werst]

I'd save your second glyph'd UR for the bats...they are most likely to be the raid wipe compared to anything else and once your UR is over you can hopefully set up some havoc/sburn cleave from the bats to the boss. That said I caved and went aff and ended up doing less than when I was destro a couple weeks ago with less gear so the spec is certainly viable if not preferable depending on your familiarity. Double bolt/havoc to the jailer is nice, imp dispels will make your RL/healers happy, and though its a dps loss ember tap + imp hot can save your life when healing gets iffy. Plus you never have to lifetap which is a survival bonus in itself. Glyph of unending resolve is definitely a must have for the fight.

[Deleted]

Dark Bargain is actually pretty terrible right now, there isn't a single fight I've found a need for it. Can you elaborate on which fights/situations you find dark bargain useful?

I Use DB for solo soaking aims on heroic paragons of klaxxi.

[Deleted]

I raidlead, and usually autopilot through destruction rotation while watching raidframes, people's handling of mechanics and doing callouts over vent. Destruction tends to lend itself better to an autopilot-spec (at least for me).

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Thanks for the tips, do you personally still go for supremacy or sac your pet for more hp if you're not taking soul link?

On Thok HC, you will have to focus harder to keep destructions rotation up through interupt than Afflictions :P so I don't really see your logic, duo to the large ammount of interupts.

[JV Chequer]

I don't see any point of going destro for Thok.

Even on 10man, there are other ppl to take care of bats, and the dps only on boss it's not wrong when u need it to kill the damn Dino monster.

You can go destro for Thok, but it's for sure it's hard to have a good dps that way.