Horrific Visions

[Jimson]

Question for you, fellow warlocks: Have you had better success in HVs as Aff or Destro? I've been running Aff all expansion but it seems to lack the burst you'd like for the end bosses. Feel free to post specs/tips.

[Garretdejiko]

Haven't touched Aff since they took away Souls Harvest.
I've been able to 5/5 as Destro with little to no struggle. I was waiting to upgrade a little further the cloak to try masks, but I think is no longer necessary since I always finish runs with an orb and the cheat death unused.

[Jimson]

Haven't touched Aff since they took away Souls Harvest.
I've been able to 5/5 as Destro with little to no struggle. I was waiting to upgrade a little further the cloak to try masks, but I think is no longer necessary since I always finish runs with an orb and the cheat death unused.

So far I've done +1 mask and failed with +2. Going to try again tonight now that I have enough CVs saved up to burn a couple vessels.

[Malekius]

A mix of Destro and Afflic seemed to work best for me. Destruction for it's aoe burst potential and extra stun with the Infernal helps a lot if I feel like pulling an entire area for an aoe fest (such as the dwarven district in SW), while I switch to Affliction on bosses that I find troublesome to deal with mechanics while also having to pump damage on the move.

Such examples are the 2 bosses on the right side of Orgrimmar. The guy with the spewing corruption and the shield that takes away sanity stops me from pumping chaos bolts on the move, so I rather use Affliction and watch him wither while I move. Same thing for Rexxar. Affliction has brought me enough burst to kill him before his piglets start pushing me around, stopping casts, and casting quills that take away sanity. If I happen to have time for cooldowns as well, I stay as Affliction to finish off Thrall. It's not needed, but again, I like to be able to deal decent decent while moving.

Stormwind I only really use Affliction for Shaw, Umbric and Alleria. Shaw because he still takes damage and I can generate more shards for UA with the eyes, while also being able to put dots normally with my back towards the eyes, and Umbric because we move like a slug in there, and I absolutely adore to cheese the fight. Watching him melt away with all dots on him while being on the first teleport spot is amazing. All I do is put dots, summon darkglare and stand close to where the gate spawns.

edit: These cases I mention with 4 masks being used. I'm still sloppy when it comes to avoiding certain stuff and planning gift of the titans, so I always take all masks with the exception of Long Night. I don't think more gear will help me, just more practice. SW is clearly tougher, since I could only barely finish 5 chests with 4 masks, while I can do 5 chest in Orgrimmar with 3 orbs to still be used if I wanted. The disparity is kind of absurd, honestly.

[burek]

Such examples are the 2 bosses on the right side of Orgrimmar. The guy with the spewing corruption and the shield that takes away sanity stops me from pumping chaos bolts on the move, so I rather use Affliction and watch him wither while I move.

You don't need to move for this boss. His bolts don't go through that big stump in front of him, so if your pet tanks him you can just stand still behind the stump the whole fight.

and Umbric because we move like a slug in there, and I absolutely adore to cheese the fight.

You don't need to move at Umbric either, pets bring him out when he teleports so you can just stand still in the middle the whole time.

I've cleared both visions with 5 masks with the standard destruction spec I use for everything (with mortal coil & vision of perfection major). Voidwalker for pretty much everything except umbric & alleria, felhunter there to interrupt polymorph. Trash mobs with dangerous casts like the dominators can be killed before they cast the stuns.

What I found interesting is that the things people whined about the most are all kind of trivial as a warlock. Umbric - pets bring him out, leaden foot/scorched feet - can't dps while moving so they don't change anything, I wouldn't be running around anyway. In my opinion the hardest thing is rexxar, and making sure you get a gift proc from one of his boars helps a ton.

The biggest tip I could give is to track gift cd and make sure you use it for hard elites, or the ones with otherwise unavoidable sanity damage. For example the beast in mage tower, the caster in trade district, the guy with blight in old town, the guy that throws you and jumps on you in org. They all have plenty of mobs around them so fishing for a gift proc is not an issue. And use k'bab - the time it takes to fish for enough of them is lower than one failed run from lack of sanity.

[Malekius]

You don't need to move for this boss. His bolts don't go through that big stump in front of him, so if your pet tanks him you can just stand still behind the stump the whole fight.

Oh I never realized that the stump could line of sight the cast. I'll give it a try today!

You don't need to move at Umbric either, pets bring him out when he teleports so you can just stand still in the middle the whole time.

I've cleared both visions with 5 masks with the standard destruction spec I use for everything (with mortal coil & vision of perfection major). Voidwalker for pretty much everything except umbric & alleria, felhunter there to interrupt polymorph. Trash mobs with dangerous casts like the dominators can be killed before they cast the stuns.

What I found interesting is that the things people whined about the most are all kind of trivial as a warlock. Umbric - pets bring him out, leaden foot/scorched feet - can't dps while moving so they don't change anything, I wouldn't be running around anyway. In my opinion the hardest thing is rexxar, and making sure you get a gift proc from one of his boars helps a ton.

The biggest tip I could give is to track gift cd and make sure you use it for hard elites, or the ones with otherwise unavoidable sanity damage. For example the beast in mage tower, the caster in trade district, the guy with blight in old town, the guy that throws you and jumps on you in org. They all have plenty of mobs around them so fishing for a gift proc is not an issue. And use k'bab - the time it takes to fish for enough of them is lower than one failed run from lack of sanity.

True, the pet does go ahead unhindered by leaden feet, and we can always have a portal prepared to the other side if he happens to teleport again, but I still like the idea of not having to care at all and just watch him die from dots while I wait for the portal to appear. And yeah, the gift is still something I seriously have to track properly. Having done it properly is what helped me finished the full 4 mask run, and it seriously helped against the first mini-boss in the Trade District, since the constant sanity channel from that guy is a bitch with the Daredevil mask.

I recall my rogue never being hit by it, either due to a combo of interrup-cloak-interrupt, but we only really have one long interrupt, so the gift is ideal.

[Jester Joe]

I've just been running demo honestly.
Tyrant has such a short CD it's up for basically every boss and elite.

Felguard tanks well enough with Demon Skin, although there are some times I've just resummoned it after a pack. It's really helpful how much can be banished too, like on pulls with burrowing tendrils.

Best I've done is 3 masks, but was pretty smooth.

[Malekius]

Many thanks again for the stump tip on that corrupted zone! I managed to complete the Orgrimmar full run with the 5 masks with ease. I also didn't just go bananas pulling without care, I just kept doing trash expecting the titan buff to proc, then I'd be directly ready to do the mini bosses that do a lot of sanity damage. Worked like a charm. Now I gotta pull off the same in Stormwind, then I'm done with the 5 mask runs. I rather just farm with 4 masks, far less stressful.

[Jimson]

Many thanks again for the stump tip on that corrupted zone! I managed to complete the Orgrimmar full run with the 5 masks with ease. I also didn't just go bananas pulling without care, I just kept doing trash expecting the titan buff to proc, then I'd be directly ready to do the mini bosses that do a lot of sanity damage. Worked like a charm. Now I gotta pull off the same in Stormwind, then I'm done with the 5 mask runs. I rather just farm with 4 masks, far less stressful.

Grats man! And seconded on the stump tip. Worked like a charm for me.

[Malekius]

So yesterday after a couple of failed tries, I decided to not overpull and take my time with proper use of the Gift of the Titans for certain areas, and voilá, I managed to complete the full run with 5 masks.

However, I didn't account for the most difficult madness in the visions: Alzheimer.

Apparently I missed/ignore a cage in the Trade District, but I still completed the whole run as normal. So if anything, I know now that I'm capable of doing it in Stormwind as well. Just gotta slap some sense into myself next time by checking if I really opened all of the stupid cages.

ps: the double madness buff in the mage quarter is top notch trolling. Getting stuck inside the Split Personality circle along with the one that fears you if you don't leave the growing circle. Ruined a couple runs completely. I suggest always being in the open when those two are together and about to happen. It makes Old Town especially tougher, since you don't have that much space to maneuver.

- - - Updated - - -

Alright, finally done it today. 5 masks, full run, no cages left unchecked. Management of the Gift of the Titans sure pays off when done right. I managed to finish the run with 2 orbs left, and I didn't even need to use the 1st one. I just used it on Shaw as assurance, and forgot to use it on Alleria, and didn't even trigger the fail safe.

At least in the way I did it, always saving the Gift proc for bosses that took a lot of Sanity (the crawler dude in the mage quarter and the spam drain from trade district), I started as destruction clearing Trade quarter and then Mage quarter, swapping to affliction for Umbric, then just finishing the rest as affliction.

I didn't even have the agony traits, only my usual 3x Wracking and 2x Cascading. Hope you guys manage to get it too!

[Fenzha]

Running them as demo ive been finding my felguard dying to pretty much every pack on 3+ masks. Burning down bosses and elites (apart from Shaw) quickly but the trash is a problem for me usually...

[Jimson]

Potentially stupid question: How do you track and force Gift to proc when you want it to?

[Paarthurnax]

There are a bunch of weakaura's that track both when Gift procs and its internal CD. You can't really "force" Gift to proc but once it's ICD is off cooldown it should proc pretty soon so long as you are hitting things.

[Jimson]

There are a bunch of weakaura's that track both when Gift procs and its internal CD. You can't really "force" Gift to proc but once it's ICD is off cooldown it should proc pretty soon so long as you are hitting things.

So essentially, you track the proc and if it's on CD you wait to engage a boss?

[Paarthurnax]

So essentially, you track the proc and if it's on CD you wait to engage a boss?

Depends on the boss. Some bosses don't need the proc at all others it really helps. I wouldn't say you need to wait on a Gift proc for every boss in SW. Like for example, Darkspeak in the Trade district, and Umbric in the Mage Quarter are much easier if you get Gift procs during the fight.

[Jimson]

Depends on the boss. Some bosses don't need the proc at all others it really helps. I wouldn't say you need to wait on a Gift proc for every boss in SW. Like for example, Darkspeak in the Trade district, and Umbric in the Mage Quarter are much easier if you get Gift procs during the fight.

Yeah, I didn't mean to imply every boss needed it. Thanks for the tip!

[Gaidax]

Solo 5 masks is not terribly hard, pretty much all my fuckups with it are simply due to over-pulling packs with excessive cc.

Once I chilled a bit and started pacing my run, it's no problem anymore. CC heavy packs are usually found in specific spots that eventually you learn, so you can go crazy everywhere else and be careful at those specific spots.

[Opeth69]

few little things that can help, if you are tracking gift you can proc it from critters. If your in 5 mask and get to alleria or a boss and need a way to proc Gift but are going to use an orb for before the pull let your sanity drop to 50% the add that spawns from you can be used to proc gift for the pull, you can use the orb as the add is spawning (a little orb flies out you when its about to spawn) this lets you get gift for bosses easily

[Fullmetal89]

So I tried running them as Demo, because I'm really bored of Destro. I haven't played Demo since Legion, so correct me if I'm wrong. Aren't Felguards incredibly squishy now? I know demon skin is pretty much mandatory for visions but this is ridiculous. I normally run 4 masks on Destro with little to no issues. Got smoked by a group of rogues in Mathias quarter as demo as soon as my felguard died.

[Opeth69]

So I tried running them as Demo, because I'm really bored of Destro. I haven't played Demo since Legion, so correct me if I'm wrong. Aren't Felguards incredibly squishy now? I know demon skin is pretty much mandatory for visions but this is ridiculous. I normally run 4 masks on Destro with little to no issues. Got smoked by a group of rogues in Mathias quarter as demo as soon as my felguard died.

Ive ran 5 mask as destro and demo and found destro easier, I also had problems with felguard dying a lot faster than voidwalker, also vampiric speed is really good in visions if you can get a couple!