Tips for stepping up to higher M+ keys?

[Fonduset]

Most of the time i play with the same group of people. I am a lot better than them, but they are a lovely bunch of people.

The biggest issue with them and anything above a +10 is that they under estimate fortified/tyrannical. Trash needs to be interrupted and bosses need to be done near perfect.

This means actively remembering what trash does what, and the same with bosses.

A lot of newbies and casuals just need to actively remember abilities, mechanics and give the 3rd affix the respect it deserves. Especially if going for keystone master

[Battlebeard]

Gear is the least significant part of the equation. Doing high pluses is more about being precise and consistent with stun/interrupt rotations and all kind of cheesing tactics, rather than doing larger individual DPS/HPS numbers. As a tank, good pulls make or break the run (knowing how to min-max pulls is a huge deal). On the one hand, you want to tailor your pulls for the classes in your party, and it makes the biggest difference in terms of DPS they can provide. On the other hand, you also want to pull huge but safe, what can your healer handle? As a healer, you really want to be prepared and very reliable, as one wrong use of GCD can wipe you.

You probably need some kind of "skill in the blood" as a starting point, but you can significantly improve over time. There is a lot of generic things you can learn from other people in pugs (or even just from watching streams to see how the top people pull or cheese something), without even going into a stable-group min-max territory.

I think you misunderstood.

My point was, a good player, who can handle interupts flawlessly in a +5, can also do a +30 flawlessly, the only thing that can stop him/her is eventually gear.

[ID811717]

On fortified week the trash health multiplier on +15 is 100%+355.70%=455.70%.
On fortified week the trash health multiplier on +25 is 100%+1081.97%=1181.97%.

That's nearly a difference of 3 times, and simply a better gear is not sufficient to compensate for it (players in +15 vs. +25 will have a comparable limit on their DPS).

Instead, players need to develop better strategies to speed up the run. You start skipping some packs (rogue shroud, or invis pots, or tank suicide-pulls a trash pack away to let the party run past and then gets mass-ressed by healer). Some other packs you mass-pull, chain stun/silence and nuke down. And for some other packs, tank speeds through them with skystep potion and kites through half the dungeon, while the DPS players are killing them (either because the damage is too large and tank cannot afford to take it, or because specific ranged mobs do not cast any abilities while their primary threat target is out of range). And then there are some packs that you simply glitch (e.g. pull both packs at the start of DHT into a spot from which the cats would not jump on random party members).

There is no reason to do these pulls and tricks on low keys (+15), and it might not even be possible to practice them on low keys (trash deals less damage, and dies a lot quicker: anything that requires a single interrupt on +15 would need to become a long chain of stuns and interrupts on +22). So there is no way to compare +5 and +30 (or +10 and +25) in terms of mechanics. Quite to the contrary, the main difference is in mechanics, because the high keys force you to play differently. For the same reason, hardcore mythic raiders are not necessarily welcome in high M+ without having relevant experience. Their gear can be top notch, and they could probably become top M+ players after a lot of grinding, but the grinding is required to learn the mechanics of how to handle each of the many crazy pulls.

[Temp name]

I made the jump from doing 13-15s to 17-18s by getting a guild group together, and then just going at it. We had a healer who knew the dungeons already and he made sure we didn't do too stupid things

[Deleted]

a good player, who can handle interupts flawlessly in a +5, can also do a +30 flawlessly, the only thing that can stop him/her is eventually gear.

Except the interrupt rotation for a +15 actually exists, while there is none in +5. Above +15 timing interrupts with others is NEEDED. You don't learn that in any +5. Your argument is flawed.

[Battlebeard]

Except the interrupt rotation for a +15 actually exists, while there is none in +5. Above +15 timing interrupts with others is NEEDED. You don't learn that in any +5. Your argument is flawed.

Okey, fine, I took it too far. But lets say 15+ and foward is the same. If you manage +15, you can technically manage +35 as well.

[dfinberg]

Okey, fine, I took it too far. But lets say 15+ and foward is the same. If you manage +15, you can technically manage +35 as well.

I don't run super high keys like others here, but I think that's way overstating it. I run pug 15's all the time, and people are still standing in crap, even on the runs that are +2's. Avalanches in NL for example. With a decent healer you can manage to heal up people who do that without it being a real issue, but as you get toward 17/18 all that stuff is a one-shot. Even just positioning so that your healer gets good AoE heals is something small that can really help.

For actual advice, read the questionablyepic mythic plus guides, those are a really good start. They won't teach you the super advanced tricks, but it's very helpful.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Been watching several of the M+ Invitational videos. Man those finals were nailbiters! Especially that Upper Kara!
Anyway, what stands out to me is the coordination and execution. Near flawless interrupts, battle rezzes, stuns, cc on the fly... Shrouding past mobs without having to stop and discuss it first and no one derping it up. Mind controlling mobs to drag around the dungeon doing even more damage. Using the occasional RP gating to clear more trash %. I don't know about the rest of you, but I find these videos quite inspiring. Makes me eager to form a consistent team and get good at this stuff.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

What we have done so far:

• Assembled a regular 5 team to run M+ twice a week: BrM, Resto Druid, Rogue, Warrior, and Warlock.
• Started collecting guides for each dungeon, including M+ Invitational and "Thorough Tank" videos.
• Before running higher keys, we are doing walkthroughs together on M-1 to discuss pulls and who will do what.

Yeah, I know, some of you are better than us and don't need to do any of this
Maybe we won't either, after we've progressed/practiced more. But this seems to be helping us get there, for now.

Bosses we struggled most on this week were Medivh (flame wreath!) and Hyrja.
Combination of tyrannical and grievous really challenged us on these two.

[Khebul]

Okey, fine, I took it too far. But lets say 15+ and foward is the same. If you manage +15, you can technically manage +35 as well.

No. Dungeon difficulty is inseparable from the gear the party has, and you simply cannot obtain good enough gear this expansion to make +35 doable.

[HuxNeva]

Okey, fine, I took it too far. But lets say 15+ and foward is the same. If you manage +15, you can technically manage +35 as well.

Why do you say this? Do you mean that the dungeon itself stays the same? I realy don't get your point.
Things that can just be healed trough or just survived on a 15 will oneshot you even on an 18. Packs that can be pulled without cc on 15 will require unbroken cc and LoS dodges on 18 to survive. DPS will have to switch from max throughput to dmg reduction legendaries and avoidance gear.
'Technically' they are worlds apart.

[Deleted]

Why do you say this? (...)
'Technically' they are worlds apart.

Because he doesn't have a clue and an imagination connected with logical thinking. He also lost his argument in a very related thread here as well and claimed to have left the forum finally.

[Illusions]

What we have done so far:

• Assembled a regular 5 team to run M+ twice a week: BrM, Resto Druid, Rogue, Warrior, and Warlock.
• Started collecting guides for each dungeon, including M+ Invitational and "Thorough Tank" videos.
• Before running higher keys, we are doing walkthroughs together on M-1 to discuss pulls and who will do what.

Yeah, I know, some of you are better than us and don't need to do any of this
Maybe we won't either, after we've progressed/practiced more. But this seems to be helping us get there, for now.

Bosses we struggled most on this week were Medivh (flame wreath!) and Hyrja.
Combination of tyrannical and grievous really challenged us on these two.

Don't know how useful my input will be, I've only run +17s as max level, but done them through PuGs.
But I feel like M1 walkthroughs are a bit redundant, you don't get the affixes, you don't get the strength or gravity of interrupts. Sure you may know what to interrupt when, but do you really need a walkthrough then? I'd rather go for higher M+ for walkthroughs. I feel like some of the affixes can really change the flow.

That being said, I don't think +17 or so is hard to PuG as long as everyone in your group is alright. I had one DHT +16 recently, where the healer was trash and needed to tranq on first pack, so it was a clear giveaway of how terrible he was, and he couldn't keep us up on first boss. The next healer never struggled. Having an idea of how well your group performs allows you to push higher, and it's usually the Tank (you) and Healer's job. Sometimes, you might want to go heavier on melee for Upper Kara on tyrannical weeks, when you need to interrupt more. I made the mistake of running with a friend (both Boomkins) and getting a third caster, so we never had enough interrupts for Aran and we ended up dying hard. But the comp doesn't seem too bad there? I don't know much else about compositions - who does high AoE damage and who doesn't, but you should be fine, I think.

Even without a fixed group, pugging higher keys should be doable with all the gear and netherlight crucibles available. Nearing +20 and that's where I'd look for a set group myself. Practising M1s for M+20s is a bit silly, though, IMO you can only practise so much for it, as the strength of the mobs alone won't make your group use their defensives and offensives on trash packs. M+10 or even M+15 (for weekly) are both easy enough to be a practise, while hard enough to be good practise.

When pugging, I don't have the time (nor care) about wowprogress, so I've filtered trash people out with ilvl only. It doesn't always work, but any 960+ ought to have a brain cell if they've gotten so far. Might be worth considering if you need to fill a spot and can't wowprogress someone (can't write accented letters or idk).

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Don't know how useful my input will be, I've only run +17s as max level, but done them through PuGs.
But I feel like M1 walkthroughs are a bit redundant, you don't get the affixes, you don't get the strength or gravity of interrupts. Sure you may know what to interrupt when, but do you really need a walkthrough then? I'd rather go for higher M+ for walkthroughs. I feel like some of the affixes can really change the flow.

That being said, I don't think +17 or so is hard to PuG as long as everyone in your group is alright. I had one DHT +16 recently, where the healer was trash and needed to tranq on first pack, so it was a clear giveaway of how terrible he was, and he couldn't keep us up on first boss. The next healer never struggled. Having an idea of how well your group performs allows you to push higher, and it's usually the Tank (you) and Healer's job. Sometimes, you might want to go heavier on melee for Upper Kara on tyrannical weeks, when you need to interrupt more. I made the mistake of running with a friend (both Boomkins) and getting a third caster, so we never had enough interrupts for Aran and we ended up dying hard. But the comp doesn't seem too bad there? I don't know much else about compositions - who does high AoE damage and who doesn't, but you should be fine, I think.

Even without a fixed group, pugging higher keys should be doable with all the gear and netherlight crucibles available. Nearing +20 and that's where I'd look for a set group myself. Practising M1s for M+20s is a bit silly, though, IMO you can only practise so much for it, as the strength of the mobs alone won't make your group use their defensives and offensives on trash packs. M+10 or even M+15 (for weekly) are both easy enough to be a practise, while hard enough to be good practise.

When pugging, I don't have the time (nor care) about wowprogress, so I've filtered trash people out with ilvl only. It doesn't always work, but any 960+ ought to have a brain cell if they've gotten so far. Might be worth considering if you need to fill a spot and can't wowprogress someone (can't write accented letters or idk).

Thanks for your thoughts! We aren't doing the M-1s for practice, we are just walking through while talking in discord about how we will do pull, who will interrupt/stun/cc, where we will shroud past, etc. Doing this immediately before doing a higher key has helped make it clear in everyone's mind and allowed us to move faster while on the clock.

I figure after we've run together a few times, we will all know how we usually do it, and all we'll have left to talk about is anything we want to change because affixes.

[Illusions]

Fair enough, that works, I suppose.

I'm not sure how necessary all this preparation is for +17s, though. This all sounds like you should move to +20s really soon, rather than wasting time with +17s. I've pugged them in time with randoms without voice comm or any tactics beforehand, it's quite doable. So, a target to aim for when you next get together?

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Fair enough, that works, I suppose.

I'm not sure how necessary all this preparation is for +17s, though. This all sounds like you should move to +20s really soon, rather than wasting time with +17s. I've pugged them in time with randoms without voice comm or any tactics beforehand, it's quite doable. So, a target to aim for when you next get together?

Maybe not the next time, but hopefully soon. Personally, I need to improve my knowledge of exactly which trash mobs need interrupting for what; I have bluffed my way through lots of M+ without really knowing, just interrupting and stunning when it felt right, but not knowing exactly which spell I was watching for.

We haven't run with our full team yet; that should start right after the holidays. Four of us (with one pug) ran a smooth Nelth 15 last week, but one-chested as I was playing it safe because bolstering. We went to 16 HoV and started well, one-shotting Heimdal and all the early trash, but struggled with tyrannical Hyrja. I understand there is a trick to tanking her so she doesn't do empowered abilities? I need to find that and learn it.

[Kakera]

Don't pug. Community is cancer.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Don't pug. Community is cancer.

I find pugs to be hit or miss. Most of my M+ running mates started as pugs; if a run goes well I add folks as friends.
But some pugs are painful and I always look for friends before I go the pug route.

[Illusions]

Most of my pugs have been great. You can lower the chance of getting a mouthbreather by wowprogressing everyone / requesting high m+ score, but I've not had a need for those.

But yeah, good luck for you, then! Regarding interrupts, that's usually what I do in lower M+s like m+15, since most of the trash abilities don't do enough damage to kill you 90% of the times. It's in even higher keys where they actually matter and you need to interrupt/stun everything, or you'd be oneshot. Story from that, a friend did some higher key EoA and got one-shot from one of the early naga packs, and I was confused as to I didn't even know the normal casts did much dmg! Though they still did it in time, so it's not like there isn't any margin for error.

[Evilmoo]

First of all get a team.
Everything above 17 is more about teamplay than individual skill. Knowing your tank CD preferences, communicating well on discord / skype w/e is a key to beating the timer.
I've only done 19 but it was vaaaastly different experience and playstyle than a random pug 15.