Halfus Wyrmbreaker

[Deleted]

Okay we're trying this for the first time and our tanks are just getting completely destroyed (debuff stacking way too fast). Apparently we have a bad setup with the drakes/adds? We don't have any Whelps, we have Nether Scion, Slate Dragon & Storm Rider. We've tried activating Slate first & Storm first.. Both outcomes were the same.. Death.

Our raid setup consists of 2 tanks/3 healers/5 DPS - Prot Paladin & Warrior tanking, Holy Pala/Resto Druid/Holy Priest healing.

Is there any certain way to get around this?

[Shartadin]

That is a pretty terrible combination. You need to activate both Nether Scion (to get rid of his frenzy) and Storm Rider RIGHT away. Nether Scion is mandatory because Halfus' damage is unmanageable with frenzy (especially with you having to tank swap for the MS debuff - also note that removing the frenzy will lower how fast it stacks, since its applied on attack), and Storm Rider is mandatory because otherwise the shadow nova is not interruptible and the raid damage will wipe you in a matter of seconds. Your Halfus tank can probably hold Halfus and the Nether Scion while you kill the Storm Rider which your offtank holds. Make sure you keep two interrupts on Halfus though (non-paladin tank on Halfus is pretty much required to have the tank be one of the interrupts).

After that, I'm not sure. You need to release the Slate Dragon at some point because of the 50% damage taken debuff he gets a stack of for each released drake is the way you beat the enrage timer. It also makes his Furious Roar easier to live through if you get rid of the MS debuff, and I'm not 100% sure if that goes away when you release the Slate Dragon or when you kill him.

No matter what you do afterwards, you MUST release the Nether Scion and Storm Rider IMMEDIATELY. I'm sure of that much. Still working on this one myself.

[Deleted]

That is a pretty terrible combination. You need to activate both Nether Scion (to get rid of his frenzy) and Storm Rider RIGHT away. Nether Scion is mandatory because Halfus' damage is unmanageable with frenzy (especially with you having to tank swap for the MS debuff - also note that removing the frenzy will lower how fast it stacks, since its applied on attack), and Storm Rider is mandatory because otherwise the shadow nova is not interruptible and the raid damage will wipe you in a matter of seconds. Your Halfus tank can probably hold Halfus and the Nether Scion while you kill the Storm Rider which your offtank holds. Make sure you keep two interrupts on Halfus though (non-paladin tank on Halfus is pretty much required to have the tank be one of the interrupts).

After that, I'm not sure. You need to release the Slate Dragon at some point because of the 50% damage taken debuff he gets a stack of for each released drake is the way you beat the enrage timer. It also makes his Furious Roar easier to live through if you get rid of the MS debuff, and I'm not 100% sure if that goes away when you release the Slate Dragon or when you kill him.

No matter what you do afterwards, you MUST release the Nether Scion and Storm Rider IMMEDIATELY. I'm sure of that much. Still working on this one myself.

Ok thanks, about to pull it again. Will let you know what happens D:

[Browniee]

We're pretty much in this rut aswell. We facerolled it yesterday before the reset, and now are looking at a compleatly different set up. We're giving the above tactic a go, however it's rather tough ^^

[Rhodikus]

Pop the Storm rider first, burn it down to around 50%, then pop another dragon, lust and finish off the 50% dragon, then the other, tanks should be rotating cooldowns while the drakes are up

If you have a mage, when you get the boss to 50%, get them to blink on the third furious roar to get out of the stun, to interupt the shadow nova, as that nova is a raid wiper >.<, Make sure you have constant interrupts on boss for that

[Shartadin]

Pop the Storm rider first, burn it down to around 50%, then pop another dragon, lust and finish off the 50% dragon, then the other, tanks should be rotating cooldowns while the drakes are up

If you have a mage, when you get the boss to 50%, get them to blink on the third furious roar to get out of the stun, to interupt the shadow nova, as that nova is a raid wiper >.<, Make sure you have constant interrupts on boss for that

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Shadow Nova stop entirely once the Storm Rider is dead, or no?

[Deleted]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Shadow Nova stop entirely once the Storm Rider is dead, or no?

Okay we just downed it after a few attempts.. On the pull the healing is really intense on the tanks (we're using 3 healers as well). We activated Nether Scion & Storm Rider first (We realised after a few attempts that you don't need to activate Slate dragon and it's a complete waste of time DPSing it). We zerged Nether as fast as possible and then the same with Storm.. After that it was easy healing tbh. Even with his knock down ability which lasts 4-5 seconds. Cheers for the advice ^^

[Torture]

We got the 3 you HAVE to activate immediately (time warden, shadow one and psion) and it caused a lot of wipes.

In the end I tanked the boss and the shadow thing, with a rogue helping on interupts. A durid tanked the other 2 drakes.

We killed the 2 drakes on the durid first, then he pulled the drake off me and we killed that too (allowing the durid to go kitty), then we killed the boss. I can't tell you how close to the enrage timer we got as I had no working timer, but from about 14% downwards the whole raid was expecting it to kick in and wipe us at any moment!

[Deleted]

We got the 3 you HAVE to activate immediately (time warden, shadow one and psion) and it caused a lot of wipes.

In the end I tanked the boss and the shadow thing, with a rogue helping on interupts. A durid tanked the other 2 drakes.

We killed the 2 drakes on the durid first, then he pulled the drake off me and we killed that too (allowing the durid to go kitty), then we killed the boss. I can't tell you how close to the enrage timer we got as I had no working timer, but from about 14% downwards the whole raid was expecting it to kick in and wipe us at any moment!

Wow, same realm as me :P what are the odds. But yeah we found our setup quite tough >< The tanks took insane amounts of damage for the first 2-3 minutes.. After that you could of probably hit random buttons and still healed it fine :P

[Deleted]

Hello,
We were trying the same setup yesterday and had many wipes, but didn't set on both drakes. At what debuff do you change tanks and if the Nether is on, how much time (approximately) does it take to get those debuffs?

Another question - last week we had a setup: Nether Scion, Storm Raider and Time one. Shadow Nova + instant Fireballs were killing us like a damn hell. What did you do (if you had the same setup) to beat them?

[Samyaaza]

Popped Slate dragon first to get rid of the frenzy (DK tank on dragon). I prot warrior pulled Halfus with heroic throw then jumped away (heroic leap) and intervene to buy like 6-8 seconds, on 10 stacks I popped SW on 14 I popped last stand, when I was on half HP with 15 stacks and 8 sec of laste stand I've asked for Hand of Protection to remove debuffs and immediately canceled it (I recommend using macro so it won't be on you more for than split second), by this time dragon is somewhere at 10-20% we pop Storm (to make shadow nova interruptable) at 5-10% I switch to dragon, DK on boss, we switch every 6-7 stacks (that's approximately when debuffs reset on tanks), when dragon is dead we use BL and burn boss down.

-We tanked them on top of each other for cleaves and shizzle the whole time.
-When boss gets to 50% and starts using the roar thing, it's good for casters to use Free action potion since apparently your casts continue throughout the knockback

[Deleted]

Hey, I've got a related question so I'll just steal some attention from the OP here, hope it's okey!

We tried Halfus yesterday believing it was the same as the videos we've seen in the beta but soon found out it was completely changed. He starts with three buffs and we figured we could remove one by activate the associated drake right? But we tried different drakes and simply activating em didn't do anything, he still attacked at 100% increased and knocked us back continually. The raid damage was immense, we were doing a two healer setup and me and the other healer were doing about 16k hps each during the first minute that we manage to stay alive.

My question then boils down to these:
1. Which dragon is associated with removing what buff?
2. Is activating that dragon enough to remove it or does the dragon need to be tanked close to the boss or even killed before it is removed?

Thanks in advance,
Algor.

[Samyaaza]

Hey, I've got a related question so I'll just steal some attention from the OP here, hope it's okey!

We tried Halfus yesterday believing it was the same as the videos we've seen in the beta but soon found out it was completely changed. He starts with three buffs and we figured we could remove one by activate the associated drake right? But we tried different drakes and simply activating em didn't do anything, he still attacked at 100% increased and knocked us back continually. The raid damage was immense, we were doing a two healer setup and me and the other healer were doing about 16k hps each during the first minute that we manage to stay alive.

My question then boils down to these:
1. Which dragon is associated with removing what buff?
2. Is activating that dragon enough to remove it or does the dragon need to be tanked close to the boss or even killed before it is removed?

Thanks in advance,
Algor.

Taken from wowpedia.org

The Nether Scion
Pre-fight, applies a frenzy buff to Halfus Wyrmbreaker (+100% attack speed). When freed, reduces raid damage dealt, but will also cancel out Wyrmbreaker's frenzy attack.
The Time Warden
Slows down the speed of the protodrake's fireballs, but, but also roots players.
The Slate Dragon
Gives Wyrmbreaker his Malevolent Strikes ability, which causes a stacking healing debuff. Once freed, periodically stuns the whole raid for 15 seconds and does the same to Halfus.
The Orphaned Emerald Whelps
Reduces raid and boss damage dealt by 50%.
The Storm Rider
Gives Wyrmbreaker a Shadow Nova ability which deals AoE damage and knocks people back.

- In order to remove/hinder his abilities engaging associated dragon in combat is enough

i.e.
(engage)
Nether Scion- Makes him swing at you 100% slower
Time Warden- Makes small fire patches on the ground for you to see where meteor(fireball) hits, else it's instant - unavoidable.
Slate Dragon- Stuns the boss (occasionally), didn't really notice anyone from raid being stunned.
Whelps- Reduces dmg dealt by both boss and raid (didn't have those though)
Storm dragon- Makes Shadow Nova interruptable (around 2 sec cast).

[Starcatch]

"The Storm Rider
Gives Wyrmbreaker a Shadow Nova ability which deals AoE damage and knocks people back."
Whats he point of releasing this one ? if it gives a ability to boss.

[Deleted]

Actually, the boss has this ability from the beginning of the fight if you have Storm Rider. Before you release it, its casting time is 0.5 sec what makes it uninterruptable. When you release him, casting time increases to approximately 2 secs, so you can interrupt it.

BTW: There's no need for non-paladin tank on a boss if you have rogue in a group. Combat rogues can interrupt all the casts with Kick and Throwing Specialization. I am using that and it works, although Throwing Specialization works with a delay so you have to stand as close as possible to throw and use Deadly Throw as soon as he starts to cast Shadow Nova.

[Deleted]

Halfus can surely slaughter you with the wrong setup. Yesterday we had Time Warden and Whelps asleep, just like you, OP.

We've downed him twice now, and both times we felt that freeing the Storm Dragon was mandatory. Our healers found it impossible to heal through the Shadow Nova. Problem was we both did the stacking debuff and hit us tanks at 100% attack speed; we stacked 10 debuffs in less than 15 seconds which is completely unmanagable, since the debuff has a 30 second duration.

Our solution was to have me (Protection Warrior) pull Halfus and pull him towards the Nether Scion, which our Pally tank freed. Our Hunter also freed the Storm Rider and MDed him to the Pally. The raid immediately popped Heroism and nuked the Nether Scion. Our Shaman was now able to interrupt the novas with a focus macro, and tank swapping was managable. (When I had 10 stacks, the Pally taunted Halfus and I taunted the Nether Scion. The Paladin then cleared his stacks at 15+ with Divine Shield and took another ~10 before we switched again. As my stacks wore off, I taunted the Storm Rider and we burnt it.)

Then all we had to do once the dragons were down was to survive his aoe shout, which was cake with 3 healers.

---------- Post added 2010-12-16 at 10:01 AM ----------

"The Storm Rider
Gives Wyrmbreaker a Shadow Nova ability which deals AoE damage and knocks people back."
Whats he point of releasing this one ? if it gives a ability to boss.

There are 5 dragons. Every week, 2 dragons are asleep, which 2 are chosen by server RNG. I'm not entirely sure what all dragons do yet, but last week the Slate Dragon was asleep, rendering him unusable. Since he was asleep, the boss didn't have his stacking debuff. If the Storm Rider is asleep, the boss won't use his Shadow Nova.

If the Storm Rider isn't asleep, the boss has a 0,3 second cast raid wide knockback nova every 6 seconds. If you free the Storm Rider, the cast time is increased to 1,5 seconds.

[Deleted]

Halfus can surely slaughter you with the wrong setup. Yesterday we had Time Warden and Whelps asleep, just like you, OP.

We've downed him twice now, and both times we felt that freeing the Storm Dragon was mandatory. Our healers found it impossible to heal through the Shadow Nova. Problem was we both did the stacking debuff and hit us tanks at 100% attack speed; we stacked 10 debuffs in less than 15 seconds which is completely unmanagable, since the debuff has a 30 second duration.

Our solution was to have me (Protection Warrior) pull Halfus and pull him towards the Nether Scion, which our Pally tank freed. Our Hunter also freed the Storm Rider and MDed him to the Pally. The raid immediately popped Heroism and nuked the Nether Scion. Our Shaman was now able to interrupt the novas with a focus macro, and tank swapping was managable. (When I had 10 stacks, the Pally taunted Halfus and I taunted the Nether Scion. The Paladin then cleared his stacks at 15+ with Divine Shield and took another ~10 before we switched again. As my stacks wore off, I taunted the Storm Rider and we burnt it.)

Then all we had to do once the dragons were down was to survive his aoe shout, which was cake with 3 healers.

---------- Post added 2010-12-16 at 10:01 AM ----------



There are 5 dragons. Every week, 2 dragons are asleep, which 2 are chosen by server RNG. I'm not entirely sure what all dragons do yet, but last week the Slate Dragon was asleep, rendering him unusable. Since he was asleep, the boss didn't have his stacking debuff. If the Storm Rider is asleep, the boss won't use his Shadow Nova.

If the Storm Rider isn't asleep, the boss has a 0,3 second cast raid wide knockback nova every 6 seconds. If you free the Storm Rider, the cast time is increased to 1,5 seconds.

Thanks man, that should help, going to give it a try tonight!

[Deleted]

Halfus can surely slaughter you with the wrong setup. Yesterday we had Time Warden and Whelps asleep, just like you, OP.

We've downed him twice now, and both times we felt that freeing the Storm Dragon was mandatory. Our healers found it impossible to heal through the Shadow Nova. Problem was we both did the stacking debuff and hit us tanks at 100% attack speed; we stacked 10 debuffs in less than 15 seconds which is completely unmanagable, since the debuff has a 30 second duration.

Our solution was to have me (Protection Warrior) pull Halfus and pull him towards the Nether Scion, which our Pally tank freed. Our Hunter also freed the Storm Rider and MDed him to the Pally. The raid immediately popped Heroism and nuked the Nether Scion. Our Shaman was now able to interrupt the novas with a focus macro, and tank swapping was managable. (When I had 10 stacks, the Pally taunted Halfus and I taunted the Nether Scion. The Paladin then cleared his stacks at 15+ with Divine Shield and took another ~10 before we switched again. As my stacks wore off, I taunted the Storm Rider and we burnt it.)

Then all we had to do once the dragons were down was to survive his aoe shout, which was cake with 3 healers.

Have you killed Nether Scion or Storm Rider first?
Another question: who tanked what? Boss+drake on one tank and another drake on second or two drakes on one and boss on the second tank?

[Warhunt]

He actually goes through every facet of their tactic in his post, which you have quoted 0_o

[Deleted]

Maybe about the first one, true.
But "pally freed Nether Scion" doesn't mean he tanked him, considering that prot warrior pull Halfus towards this drake...