H Valiona/Theralion

[Triadragon]

Hey guys, we have H VT killed, but it took a bunch of attempts and I'd like to get some clarification on an issue:

We originally planned on sending our sub rogue who's correctly specced and glyphed to the twilight realm, but he kept having issues with staying down there long enough (would go down on the first dazzling and have to come out awy before the first deep breath), and our mage/holy pally team kept failing as well.

As a result, when we got our kill, I (fury warr) would go down during dazzling destructions by myself, and be able to stay down there for consistently 45-50 stacks and clearing out all the adds before having to pop out right as the deep breaths were going off, the spriest would then dispersion and hop into the second or third deep breath and quickly kill 4-6 adds before coming out. The second dazzling I'd then hop back in, take it to 45-50 and kill the majority, if not all the adds, then hop out, and win.

Our problem was that the spriest wasn't able to consistently stay alive after hopping in during deep breaths due to comp lag/downsies, so we changed it up where he'd hop in the first dazzling, and be able to handle the adds fine, then plan on me(fury warr) going in during deep breaths. We found quickly that it was a 50/50 chance where sometimes the breath would 1 shot me, while other time's it would barely hurt. Every single time I went in, I had shield wall up + sac + hots, and I think a multitude of ways of getting in. These included standing in the breath as it came down, waiting for the fire to be on the ground before going in, waiting for the breath to be completely over and valiona flying to her next breath location, and even hopping into the fire right as it was disappearing. No matter what though, it still seemed to be completely random when I'd die to the breath and when i'd stay alive. Already I know what you're thinking, that I hit the orbs inside once I ported in, but after review of the combat logs, that's not the case, the damage from the breath was the killing damage every time.

My question to you guys then, am I missing something here about staying alive through the breath? Yes yes I know you can say get a better rogue or mage or pally or something along those lines, it's just that 1) I'm on gorefiend where good players have a lower drop rate than MH glaive and 2) our raid comp is pretty set with the following options, and viable/geared offspecs:

Prot Pally
Prot Pally (Ret OS)

Holy Pally
Holy Priest
Resto Shaman (Enhance OS)

Fury Warr (Prot MS)
Frost DK (Blood OS)
MM Hunter (Surv OS)
MM Hunter (Surv OS)
Arcane Mage (Fire OS)
Arcane Mage (Fire OS)
Rogue (Subtley OS)
Spriest (Disc OS)
Boomkin

Thanks for the help!

[Deleted]

I wish I had an answer for you, but the exact same problem plagued our sub rogue until he got good enough to live through the entire fight without coming out. I know exactly what you're talking about, and my theory on it was that if you take 1 tick of the breath it ports you down, a 2nd tick one shots you (since breath in twilight phase 1 shots you iirc) so the only way to do it is to port down and then get out of it asap before you take any additional damage. However I think that theory was disproved on one of our attempts, at the end of the day we just ignored the issue and our rogue got better at the fight.

All I can say is good luck. Maybe try and experiment with not going down at that moment and just wait for the next tank 5 stack to port you down, and have both you and spriest port down at the same time so as to catch up on lost time.

[Triadragon]

Agree, I also tried to quickly sidestep in and sidestep out, or even jumping from a safe spot into the fire and moving immediately out, but seems competely random /cry

[Cirque]

We ended up timing heals for the Twilight visitor with the tank shifting in the zone (Twilight Shift debuff). Everyone who's on the tank during that gets ported with him/her. Another thing we'd occassionally do was sending a healer instead of the rogue getting out depending on his cooldowns, the raid healing necessary, amount of adds up, etc. Maybe this is worth a short if you're having issues with the fire (which, in our experience, also was completely random on whether it ports or kills you. I tried different things on normal (where fire isn't THAT deadly), but could find no reliable way to get in every time without fail).

[Deleted]

Hola!

How do you handle the stacking debuff on the tank ?

[Wilderness]

There are so many other ways to go down on this fight I don't see why you'd do it on a breath - the extra damage you take just seems unnecessary and would cut into your time down there. Just go down with dazzling or with the tank. I do see that you have a Pally tank (you aren't actually 2 tanking this are you?) so perhaps you are bubbling the first set of stacks off but if that's the case then don't bubble the first set so that you can go down, just bubble later stacks or save it for Blackout.

Also, a Blood DK can stay alive for a long time and do well in the shadow realm as well if you want to go that route. AMS and self-heals are pretty sick for that.

[Triadragon]

There are so many other ways to go down on this fight I don't see why you'd do it on a breath - the extra damage you take just seems unnecessary and would cut into your time down there. Just go down with dazzling or with the tank. I do see that you have a Pally tank (you aren't actually 2 tanking this are you?) so perhaps you are bubbling the first set of stacks off but if that's the case then don't bubble the first set so that you can go down, just bubble later stacks or save it for Blackout.

Also, a Blood DK can stay alive for a long time and do well in the shadow realm as well if you want to go that route. AMS and self-heals are pretty sick for that.

Originally I would go prot and single tank, and heroic leap outside immediately but our two other paladins felt left out, so we had to let them tank it. One doesn't have an offspec at all (gorefiend, go figure) and the other has a pvp ret set so it's not much use there either. We've been letting them both bubble their stacks and taunt, and they don't go downstairs at all until the boss is sub 20%. Maybe we can instead just have me go down with them instead of bubbling and that'll make the transition easier, thanks for the advice.

[Knee]

just have an arc mage do bottom with a healer

[Dimgo]

Make sure the priest is using his shadow resist thing, because auras doesnt work in twilight (i guess)

[Triadragon]

...and our mage/holy pally team kept failing as well...

Yeah spent a bunch of wipes yelling at bad mages :P

[Knee]

the easeist way to do it is with an arcane mage. arcane mages 1shot those guys wit 4 stacks and the ab cast time is near 1s.

what you do is

First port - dazzling destruction mage + healer goes down. cleans up
2nd port - mage iceblocks off stacks and goes down again with a 2nd healer
3rd port - if you get a 3rd port that means your dps isnt good enough to do it in the first place

[Deleted]

This is a bit off-topic but it seems like you're gimping yourself just so you can cater to your paladins' feelings. I'm a prot pally and I solo tank the fight, I'm sure a prot war can solo tank it with even more ease. Using 2 prot pallies just seems like crazy overkill and loss of DPS. But then the same can be said about having and deliberately not using a Sub rogue... I actually feel bad for you.

[Triadragon]

Haha thanks, and yes I tend to gimp myself personally to make the raid work sometimes. I'm a little different since I make my MS and OS work, but since I'm the raid leader I have to figure out the best situation to do these bosses, and with the current raiders in my guild, and the talent on the server, you kind of have to deal with the downsies most of the time (6/13 and I believe we're 3rd server hordeside which makes you want to /cry). If I were to take both prot pallies out, the dps replacement we bring in for them either would either keep dying to mechanics, or following mechanics, and pulling terribad numbers. Plus, the tanks then get butthurt since they won't have the chance to roll on VT loot, and start searching for other guilds where they're actually utilized. /sighQQ

[Cirque]

Well, I guess I can really understand you feelings there Triadragon, having led raids in WOTLK on a server pretty much similar to yours. However, in the end everyone must understand that the guild is more important than their personal feelings about being left out. If they do not want to have a viable OS for the progress you're doing, they shouldn't be complaining, really.

Anyway, two tanks is well doable, it's how we've been doing it (I forgot the exact reason why, but we did), so yeah, whatever makes it work for your raid I'd say!

You should try to not rage at your failing mage+din, it takes a while to get used to especially if they're not top quality, give them a few (hours) of wipes the time. They'll get the hang of it. Sometimes, progress means you're waiting for someone with a specific task to get the task done properly.

Good luck

[Triadragon]

Last update: Had the rogue get more xp and we finished it with 1 tank easymode. Thanks all