MMO Champion: Clear my Raid Instance **UPDATE** 3rd Boss is up

[Yoen]

Hello everybody =)

This thread is kind of funny and your bosses are really great. Thumbs up dear Detective

I killed some time and made up a strat against the third boss.
I hope you'll get it as I'm neither an english native speaker nor good at explaining ~.~

Shadowstream - Priest <Bund der Hoffnung>

First of all the setup

The special abilities of this encounter let you draw conclusions about the Setup:

*As the Adds can not( or nearly impossible due to the static Aura) be kited you will need at least 4 Tanks
* To match the Dps needed in Ceberus P2 (106,7k dps) you will have to take at least 17 Dps. (Some of the other posters did already the calculation, I won't repeat it)
*Some strats seem to be doable with three healers, but I personally disagree with that sort of Setup because of the inevitable Frozen-Aura Debuff you will have to cope with because of the "Shield of absolute Zero"

-->17 Dps
-->4 Tanks
-->4 Healers

Next I divide the fight into the differnet phases
The fight is devided into 3 parts:

*The Addphase ( basicly the same strat four times after another) - this is the most difficult phase as you will have to coordinate all your tanks and dps to beat the enrage timer ( 2min)
*Cerberus P1 - this is just a cakewalk as you will have no dmg income to the raid and no difficult positioning
*Cerberus P2 - Dps-nuke. As my setup has enough dps this will be doable (last aprox.15 sec )

In my strat I will burn down one add after another as the dps needed to burn down two adds simultaniously would be to difficult due to the Shield-respawning.
Cerberus himself will allways be kited by two hunters by aggroping-ponging.
As a conclusion every add will have to be downed in a maximum of 30 seconds and the strategy will be allways the same.

Secondly the positioning:




-The 4 Adds are tanked by the 4 Tanks, which obviously are healed by the 4 Healers.
-The yellow dot represents the ranged camp with the healers, which is in range of every add.
-The orange bar between the ranged camp and Add >1< represents the kitepath of Cerberus. The hole fight Cerberus (until part 3) will be kited along this 20yard long way. As you can see the red circles represent the Hellfire Aura of the boss which should allways affect the tanks of Add 1 and 4 and either affect Add-Tank 2 or 3 ( or both in the middle). This way the dmg of the Frozen Aura is reduced to a minimum.
- I chose this form of geometry because it grants the advantage of having a shorter distance between the kitepath and the add designated to be killed.

This leads to the 3rd point: The Add-Phase

First lets look at the Dps-Income on the Raid:
#No Raidmember except the tanks should get any dmg as they allways are affected by Hellfire Aura
#The Tanks will take an average of 5,33k dps by the adds
#Cerberus is kited along a path of 20 yards: This way will take around 4,2 sec for moving from one end to the
other
#This leads to the conclusion that either the Addtank 2 or 3 will be without the Aura for exactly 4 seconds
(starting at the middle going up to one end ( 2 secs) and then back) . This will result in an average of an
additional 1k dps in the tanks (The debuff is up 1 second therefore just ticking one time)

With each Healer pulling of 7k hps the maximum of 6,4k dps on the tank will be absolutely healable.

After being at position the fight begins with the killing of the Add >1< in the east of the room.
As said before the raid has exatly 30 seconds to kill this add so lets look at the 5 steps of killing the add:
1)The Dps on Add >1< consist of 1 Tank ( 2k dps) and 15 Dps'ers ( 15x6k = 90k)
The first shield absorbs 900k dmg and should be down after 10 seconds leading us to the trickiest part of the
whole fight:
2)This will require an image:



The kiting of the add requires a detailed strategy:
- Cerberus will be taunted by the Tank of Add >1< at the right moment
- The "right moment" is exactly wenn Cerberus is in the middle of his kitepath, as there all Frozen Aura Debuffs of
Addtank 2 and 3 will be purged. Otherwise they would stack up to high during this phase.
- The distance between the middle of the path an the addtank is exactly 15 yards ( 3,16 seconds).
This allows the Tank to taunt Cerberus about 3 seconds before Molten Shield is destroyed. If at this point
Cerberus is at another position of the kitepath he will need a maximum of 4 seconds to be in the middle of the
path.
- As the molten shield breaks the add is shackled by a priest and in the worst case 4,16 seconds later the tank
will be able to pull Cerberus around the shackled add ( this will take another 3 seconds assuming the path
around the add is again 15 yards) - As clarification: Look at my picture, the red line leading form Cerberus
kitepath to the add and around it is the path absolved until now
- Before crossing the Path of fire the tank stops kiting (beginning of the yellow line) and waits for the hunter in the south getting aggro from the boss, which will lead to the circle being complete, the second shield to be broken and Cerberus going back along the yellow line to his kitepath.
- The tank of Add >1< will after having lost the aggro of the boss immediatly make a step at the side to let the boss pass through and then go back to his old position to tank his add.
- As the add will move towards the tank, he might be in the range of anothers pet Static shock Aura. To avoid this all other add tanks will move away from Add >1< by 5 yards during this step

3)Now as we have beaten the most difficult part I will summarize the next three steps as they are up to the
same thing
- While Shield of Frostfire is up your dps on the add will decrease by 6k.
- The third shild should be down after (200k / 86k =)~2,5 seconds
- The add himself with his 650k hp and the ghost with 200k hp should be killed after another (850k / 92k) =
~9,25 seconds

Lets count together:
1) 10 seconds
2) 4,16+3+1 seconds( hunter getting aggro)
3) 2,5+ 9,25 seconds

--> Total amount of 29,91 seconds in the worst case

As for the rest of the part 1:

- The Add >2< ( and afterwards 3 and 4)will be kited to the position of Add >1< as this is close to Cerberus.
While kiting the adds to the position no time is lost due to the first shield being up 10 seconds as the dps
switch instant to the target
- The same strategy is repeated 3 times

Leading us to Part 2

Part 2 is a cakewalk nobody gets damage as the hunter proceed kiting and the dps while guard a good distance in the aggrometer ( no time limit this phase)

At any given time the raid reaches Part 3
- Cerberus is now kited by one of the two Hunter in a circle around the raid ( which he should of course not finish
in time)
- Cerberus will kill the whole raid in ~15 seconds in order to nuke the last 1600k hp the raid will need a total of
106.67k dps
- 17 Dps + 4 Tanks --> 110k Dps

--> Congratz you killed successfully Cerberus and his 4 companions.
You will have around 5 seconds of looting before the Frozen Aura of the room will kill the whole raid as the
Hellfire Aura fades with the defeat of the boss

*Some things I was thinking about concerning my strat:
- During Step 2) of the Addphase the three Tanks of Addtanks 2,3 and 4 will get a the Frozen Aura Debuff
Assuming this phase will take 3 seconds of getting out of the aura, 3 seconds of kiting around and 3 seconds
of getting back into the aura you have a total amount of 9 seconds without the Hellfire aura. This is a dmg
spike on the tanks that will lead in the Debuff staking up to 3 times. In this phase the healers will grpheal the
raid to pull of 8k hps on the tanks which will lead in the the dmg being survivable:

Seconds / Stacks / Dps income / Hps / net hp-lose
0-3 0 5,4k 8k 0
4-6 1 9,4k 8k 4,8k ( --> 40,2k hp left)
7-9 2 13,4k 8k 21k ( -->19,2k hp left)

Now the tanks will be healed up again

- I did not involve Melee Dps in my paintings, but assuming they allways stay at the back of the add being killed they don't get any dmg by the frozen Aura.

- During step 2) in the Addphase Cerberus will leave along the red path and the yellow path his Path of fire
The circle around the add will despawn instantly and the yellow path together with the rest of the red path and
the orange kitepath build a triangle provoking another catastrophe, thus despawning also --> this action is
repeatable

Wow that was alot of time killed.
I apologize for my bad english but I hope you could follow my explanations.


Wating for more Bosses to come

Shadowstream

[brolly]

Detective should get Daelo's Job @ Blizzard

[LeChuck]

4 tanks
4 healers
17 DPS

The tactic is quite simple, just involving a Ranged DPS kiting the boss on a circunference. The positions are the same as the pull, except the boss which will have to be positioned for proper kiting.
A rotation would take 14-15 seconds, and each tank would be covered by aura 44% of the time (7,8-8,4s frozen, 6,1 to 6,6s warm)


EDIT: Did some theorycrafting and it seems a single healer can't keep a tank up for more than 20 seconds if he's allowed to take as little as 2 stacks of frozen. So this tactic won't work.

I'm assuming some numbers here:
- Cerebrus aura range = static shock range
- Tank can tank a pet from 5yd distance
- A ranged can't run around with the boss circling any shorter than 10yd radius.

P.S. - I can do a perfectly working tactic based on this image with 4 tanks 7 healers 14 dps (84k DPS), killing 1 dog and sacrificing a 25% hp Cerberus (and the raid) for the ghost in more or less 95 seconds (i could even use more healers since i have a 25 seconds margin), yet i believe some people have posted tactics capable of accomplishing this. If you consider this a valid tactic for killing the boss normal mode consider him dead.

P.S. 2 - A variant with 6 tanks 7 healers without kiting boss would also be very possible, it all relies on killing a low hp Cerberus with a ghost before enrage hits.

[Bellomourn]

Amazing fights

Daelo... Watch your back..

[Deleted]

P.S. - I can do a perfectly working tactic based on this image with 4 tanks 7 healers 14 dps (84k DPS), killing 1 dog and sacrificing a 25% hp Cerberus (and the raid) for the ghost in more or less 95 seconds (i could even use more healers since i have a 25 seconds margin), yet i believe some people have posted tactics capable of accomplishing this. If you consider this a valid tactic for killing the boss normal mode consider him dead.

P.S. 2 - A variant with 6 tanks 7 healers without kiting boss would also be very possible, it all relies on killing a low hp Cerberus with a ghost before enrage hits.

no-go. detective has said in unmistakable words that you need to kill all 4 pets before the main boss. killing the boss with the ghost frost blast is not possible.

[Deleted]

i'm going to do one last attempt. i will just give the setup, no numbers because i am not entirely focused.

my guild is Mad Ninja Scientists, and i am a paladin.

the adds stand in an equalsided triangle. the 4th add, along with the boss, stands in the center. the 3 corner adds are at 30 yards from the center add.

you need 1 tank on each add. the boss is tanked by melee DPS. the buff wears off at 7.5 swings after the boss is damaged. the boss deals 1.25K DPS, the fire 2.5K per stack. so theoretically, if each DPS takes 2 stacks, they can be kept up by 3 healers spamming raid heals (need to do some more math on this one). 2 stacks for the first, and an extra 8 stacks means 5 melee DPS that tank the boss. there is no rule that prevents the healers from healing 9 targets at the same time.

so 4 tanks, 3 healers and 5 tank/dps. this leaves 13 DPS spots open for the adds. we start at the center add. you need to kill each add in 30 seconds or less, else you enrage and wipe. the outer shield is 900K, which takes 13 DPS around 11.5 seconds to burn through. the inner shield is 200K, but you are effectively a DPS short. this takes the effective 12 DPS 3 second to burn. the add has 850K effective HP. this takes 10.89 seconds to burn through. so you have (30-11.5-3-10.89) 4.61 seconds to destroy the middle shield. but, while you destroy the middle shield, your DPS can already start to burn down another add's shield, so you actually have around 16 seconds to do so.

run speed for the boss is (6y/s*0.75) 4.5 yards per second. this means the boss can travel 72 yards. how are these spent? assume the triangle is aimed up, with the boss between the center tank and the tip. the DPS kite him in a circle around the add, counterclockwise. assuming you kite him in a 5 yard wide circle (edge to center), the boss travels 31.4 feet. a 10 yard path is 62.8 yards. right before the catastrophe, the add is stunned and the tank runs out.

so, burn down shield one, tankDPS kite boss while DPSDPS burns down a shield, catastrophe, add is unshielded, killed, ghost killed, and then one corner add is brought to where the first add stood.

once all adds are dead, the boss is kited around in a circle with all DPS and tanks standing OUTSIDE the circle. the DPS burn him down to 20% and then it has been explained over and over how it happens.

oh, and again i asked: did my tanks downgrade gear? holy trinity hardmode, they had 55K, now only 45K.

looking forward to boss 4.

[patrin]

people like you make me embarrassed to play this game.

[Deleted]

people like you make me embarrassed to play this game.

why? because i do clever use of game mechanics by tanking the boss with melee DPS? because i try a strange way of beating a boss i did not design? all i am doing is theorycrafting.

[Kalakukko]

This thread is really something MMO-Champ needs, it has been really entertaining to follow the progress of Detective's design and the actual strategies people come up with.

HUGE thumbs up to Detective!

[Varek]

only one way to kill Cerberus and the 4 adds.

call animal control and then file a big, hefty lawsuit in Hades' face.

[roxor999]

Couldn't you think of a more original name for the third boss.

[Fuzza]

Amazing Thread! Thumbs up to Detective, and amazing work those of you who cleared bosses/tried. Really awesome read.

[Tolar]

If a Ghost reaches the Altar of the Masters, a large explosion occurs, dealing 2 million Ice damage to everything in the room.

Is this damage negated by the Hellfire aura as well?

[FrOsTSh0cK]

If a Ghost reaches the Altar of the Masters, a large explosion occurs, dealing 2 million Ice damage to everything in the room.

Is this damage negated by the Hellfire aura as well?

bump as i would like to know this aswell.

[Detective]

Bah! I've briefly read about Valithria Dreamwalker and it's a bit similar to the 4th Boss I've still yet to put up (Spirit of Redemption), Dammit!

Anyways, sorry for the stupidly long delay people, I've been away (I still am) and I've only recently been on lurking to check how the new encounters are looking for ICC. Anyways, it's good to see this hasn't completely died and I do feel bad for neglecting this. Well ever since reading about this new green dragon boss, I think I need to get the 4th encounter up ASAP. I haven't read the thread so apologies if I haven't answered any questions or checked strats. Expect more of Detective after this weekend.

[Hethor]

Alright guys, I've got this. No worries.

Edit2: Just read I needed to put which guild I was "representing" and my class xD.
Guild: Nine Princes
Class: Priest

3 tanks, 5 healers, 17 DPS (added in the edit).

The first 30 seconds:
The DPS do a total of 2040000 damage. (That's 17*4000*30).
The tanks then do 180000 damage. (3*2000*30).
This then leaves the boss at 2780000 health. (5000000 - 2220000 = 2780000). This means that a new spawn comes up with 3614000 health. (2780000 * 1.3).

All the DPS minus the tank swaps to the new add. They bring it down to 1454000 health. (3614000 - [17*4000*30 + 2*2000*30]). This means the SECOND add will spawn with 1890200 health. (Now we're at the minute mark - that leaves 1:45 left).

The second add will be DPS'd down to ~5% health. So it will have 94510 health. This takes, with 17 DPS and 1 tank - 1795690 damage. This takes (rounding up) 26 seconds. The tank then stops DPS on this boss. Assuming a raid setup - they would stand around for the last four seconds waiting for the next add.

Now the healers are going crazy. Because they have the third add up in the aura - not easy to deal with. But I presume it's doable split between two tanks. The new add will spawn with health based on the second add. Which means it'll have 94510*1.3 = 122863 health. This is stupid easy to deal with and is killed by the DPS and tank in 1.8 seconds - let's go with 2 seconds.

Now we have two adds left back up. There's the add with 94510 health where the tank has stopped DPSing and the one we left alone who has 18902000 health left. We have spent 1 minute and 32 seconds in the fight so far.

All DPS quickly swaps to the first add that still has 1890200 health. They have 28 seconds left on it. The 2000 DPS tank has been going crazy for the past minute. So it's done another 120000 damage to it - leaving it at 1770200 health. Meaning then that the DPS [Note: The formula I'm using here is (17)(4000)x - 2000x = HEALTH] will take 25 seconds to kill it. We're now at 1 minute and 57 seconds. At this point I recommend the DPS stand around for the next 3 seconds, and we DPS down the newest add at the 2 minute mark - again taking health based off of the 94510 health add we left up at 5%. This means it takes another 2 seconds to down. 2 minutes and 2 seconds have gone by.

NOW the DPS go back to patchwerk's sister. They have another 28 seconds left to DPS it down. Again, since we left it, the tank has had another minute and 30 seconds to go crazy, 90 seconds, means (2000)(90) = 180000 damage, which leaves the boss at 2600000 health when the DPS get to it. The 17 DPS then have 28 seconds to do damage [(17)(4000)(28) + 2000(28)] = 1960000 health done. Leaving the main boss left at 640000 health. AMG close. It's now been 2 minutes and 30 seconds we're cutting it close. The DPS turns around, kills the new add in, once more, 2 seconds.

Back to the boss, we have 13 seconds left. Oh god. DPS goes nuts and they can get through the 640000 health in 9.1 seconds. Let's again, presume the worst and go with 10 seconds. That means there are 3 seconds left. Oh shitshitshit. DPS turns around and hits the 94510 health boss as hard as possible dealing that amount of damage in.... 1.35 seconds. Assuming 2, we have 1 second left on the enrage timer.

We loot, and then we all go take a shower because we're ALL covered in sweat and panting heavily.

Seeing as how I got called out for positioning, I'll put in where everything should be at each phase =P. (Before, I just assumed it would be obvious to pull everything as far away as possible - but I can explain it more in depth as to what I was thinking in my head before this happened). Also as to why it was down to the very last second - I was assuming raid-like behavior where we are unable to stop at exactly 1000 health, and just assumed at 5% and we stand around for 4 seconds and 7 seconds at one point to account for movement in melee =P.

The pull:
Tank gets either a misdirect or generates an infinite amount of aggro and pulls the boss to this corner here....

All the DPS spread out around right behind her. DPSing their hearts out as I described earlier. When the second add spawns, the second tank then drags the second boss...


Right here. This doesn't overlap the mobs, then. AMG PEW PEW. DPS goes crazy on the second add then the third add spawns and the third tank then picks it up and puts her riighhtt.....
there.

Again, they swap to the second dood. Bam, bam, bam. Yadda yadda yadda. Then, the third guy spawns right at the spawn point and dies almost immediately. It's taunted by the second tank but dies before it can do anything of harm. (Plus, 1000% additional damage of 1500 is still 16500, even assuming a crit - it's 33000 - which doesn't happen). So I'm not going to bother to draw that out on GIMP 'cause I'm lazy.

When the DPS swap to the first add and kill her, the add tank just moves over to the original position of the first add so the SPAWNED add will no longer overlap (again - one overlap doesn't kill anybody). It'll look a little like....


Then the strategy continues until we win.


Dude. That was an intense boss. Props to you - I can't wait for the rest =P.

Props to you.. Coming up with the most intense strat i've ever seen .

[Tekloth]

Tekloth the Rogue from Ninjapartio (DarksorrowEU) reporting in!

I haven't bothered tryiyng to come up with any real strategies as to how to defeat the entire encounter, but I think that I've figured out how to destroy the Shield of Absolute Zero though.

Catastrophe: When a trail of fire (created by "Path of Fire") intersects itself, the space inside will explode into a supernova of Fire, capable of burning through even freezing temperatures of -274° Celsius. Catastrophe deals 35 million Fire damage to any player caught inside.

Here's a pictorial example of how "Catastrophe" works:



Once a "Catastrophe" occurs, the previous trail will disappear and Cerberus will begin a new trail if/when it moves..

Strains of Ice: Cerberus moves at 75% of normal run speed.



<Cerberus' Pets>


Shield of Absolute Zero
A shield so cold it has reached unimaginable temperatures of Absolute Zero. Whilst this shield is up it is
Immune to all forms of damage.
Once broken, the shield will manifest again after 45 seconds.

This lead me to the conclusion that the only way to break the shield would be to have the pet INSIDE a Catastrophe when it occurs.

Now to figure out the rest of the fight....

Molten Shield
A powerful shield that absorbs even the most hellish of fires. The shield absorbs 900k damage
and whilst the shield is up, the Pet is immune to all forms of snares, stuns and CC's.
Once broken, the shield will manifest again after 75 seconds.

Hm, for this shield to be effectively burnt down given the 2 minute enrage timer on all 4 adds going on at the same time I'd take it that kiting the pets through Cerberus' Path of Fire would be a viable option?

[Deleted]

3'rd boss still up? c'mon, nerf already.

[Deleted]

Tekloth the Rogue from Ninjapartio (DarksorrowEU) reporting in!

I haven't bothered tryiyng to come up with any real strategies as to how to defeat the entire encounter, but I think that I've figured out how to destroy the Shield of Absolute Zero though.

This lead me to the conclusion that the only way to break the shield would be to have the pet INSIDE a Catastrophe when it occurs.

Now to figure out the rest of the fight....

Hm, for this shield to be effectively burnt down given the 2 minute enrage timer on all 4 adds going on at the same time I'd take it that kiting the pets through Cerberus' Path of Fire would be a viable option?

the math has been done already.

you have 30 seconds to burn down each add. each add has 1750K HP standard, and 200K HP with a DPS less. this means with 6K DPS, you have 180K damage per DPS player over that time. this means you need at least 12 DPS on the adds. however, you need 17 DPS to get through the boss's burn phase. without 17 DPS, you can't reach the goal.

so you need 4 tanks, 3 healers and 17 DPS. 1 tank per add. a tank either needs 1 fulltime healer or 3 raidhealers.

[Galdiran]

Holy crap this is so freakin' awesome I just stumbled upon this thread....and its epic.
Those are some intense boss fights that I would LOVE to see ingame...
Props man, some sick stuff there!