[Faction Champions] Preparation for Boss #3

We have wiped on this fight 20-30 times and are no closer to getting it than when we started. We have large groups of players who absolutely despise PVP, and the fight seems little different to a non-PVPer than a typical PVP encounter.

We've tried burn strategies, starting with a healer (druid, when we had it, else priest) followed by priest/shaman then paladin. We've gotten three down once, but usually we don't even get the first mob down, so mob order isn't so important yet. During burn attempts, all the healers and half the DPS cloth are dead by the time the second mob dies. Even during burn attempts we have the melee DPS one-on-one occupied by the tanks, but they still get loose and it only takes once.

So we move more people to CC duties. We have a mage pair with each tank to occasionally sheep adds, letting the tank DR refresh. We have problems overcoming the healing of the non-targets, so we make sure a rogue or DPS warrior is interrupting. Then we're left with too little DPS to even burn the first one down, and we wipe with it at 5-15% health when the first few heals get loose and we can't finish it off.

I've bounced between being a tank, controlling one specific add plus AS + stun on opportunity, to being a cleanse-bot + AS + stun, to switching to heal spec to cleanse + heal.

We one-shotted Koralon on first attempt with no one in raid seeing it before. We can adapt and figure out stuff. We just can't figure out the faction champions fight. It's really frustrating.

To be fair though, there's no adapting and figuring out on Koralon. It's just "don't stand in fire" + (optionally) "have an OT in front of the boss".

If people are dying on your FC pull and you're not able to kill things, someone is failing - either the people who understand the fight and should be telling all the people who don't what they need to do, or the people who are being told what to do and aren't doing it. The former benefit from knowing stuff about pvp (like looking at your lineup last night, I had no idea the pally could be sheeped + feared indefinitely until one of our pvpers said "he's the only magical dispel on their team"), the latter just need to be able to do what they're told - "move away from doomfires" and "run away from thaladred" aren't any different from "move away from bladestorm" and "kite the warrior when he's on you".

I had no idea the pally could be sheeped + feared indefinitely until one of our pvpers said "he's the only magical dispel on their team"),

pretty good idea

Well he wouldn't be in a different comp. The point was that someone giving the instructions needs to notice things like that.

Mabey hex the only decurser? lol

Wow... Faction Champions are nigh impossible without a FoKing Rogue... we couldnt even kill a single champion this time around

We did it without a FoK rogue on heroic mode 10 and 25 normal. Bring more dps.

Klaudandus wrote:Wow... Faction Champions are nigh impossible without a FoKing Rogue... we couldnt even kill a single champion this time around

Not once have we ever used a FoK rogue. It's not balanced around a FoK rogue.

It's balanced around having a good plan, which doesn't even take much thought.

Stick an interrupt on one heal, stick another on another heal, and... well, either a third on the third, or CC it somehow (banish/fear if it's the druid). It's really not complicated.

I don't like this boss

As a prot pally I have no use on this except taunting mobs until they become immune and bop on healer

I really hate when pvp comes into pve

For those having trouble with this "boss" here are some tips:

In 10 man there are 2 healers and in 25man there are 3. I recommend always killing a healer first in 25man, but in 10man if this does not work you should try to burn down 1-2 dps first.
Try to avoid aoe CC breakers, for example using FOK to spread poision that is now ticking on all the mobs and breaking all sheeps is bad.
Its best to assign CC 1 of your raid against 1 of the enemy (synching sveral people to rotate CC on a target is much harder). Pick an ally that can almost completely neutralize that enemy.
Sheeps and fears are 'weak' CC, especially in 25man since the enemy will usually quickly dispel it off (even the warlock's pet), and without additional CC these abilities quickly end up on diminished returns and then the mob is free for too long a time.

CCing enemy melee:
You Deathknights are great at CCing enemy melee. Grip, chains of ice and taunts almost fully lock them out. Assign 1 DK for each melee, and have that DK cc the full fight. Frost presence and tanking gear are useful. Enemy rogues are a bit harder due to cloak and shadowstep.
Prot paladins can also generally work at CCing melee using taunts, snares (AS) , hammer , and seal of justice.
Druids work well also (cyclone, root, bash).
Assign 1-2 of your healing shaman/priests or mages to quickly dispel freedom off enemy melee being kited.
Always assign CC to the melee and healers first. then use leftover CC on the range dps.

CCing enemy healers:
The enemy tree can be easily CCed the whole fight by a single warlock rotating banish and fears.
Feral druids (feral charge, main, bash, cyclone), rogues (kick, gouge, stuns) and protection warriors (shieldbash, stuns, charge) can easily lock down a caster which uses few instant casts (for example paladin). Have one on each enemy healer not being currently nuked.

CCing enemy range dps:
Hunter is a deadly one and should be CCed (or killed early) if possible. This is because physical dps is very lethal to cloth users in your raid. Also he applies 'mortal strike' debuff.
Do some sort of CC on the range dps also. the rare stun, kick, sheep/fear etc all help. Except here you usually dont need to completely lock down the enemy. For example a mage can rotate sheep on the enemy warlock and hunter, one will always be free and one always CCed).

The kill target:
Needs to have a mortal strike or equal debuff.
Needs to be purged/dispeled of all hots/bops etc.
Needs interrupting if it is a healer.
Needs a quick reacting priest (or warrior) assigned to break immunity effects off (when applicable).

Cleansing / decursing your raid:
Prot and Ret paladins should be cleansing your raid a lot. Rets can replace their weaker damage moves with cleanse (rotate 1-2 damage spells then cleanse a bit. repeat).

Other:
Warlocks should swap armor for increased survivability, either the full fight or when being focused by melee.
The pull - AOE fear (from say a warrior), and/or deathgrip the first kill target are good since you want to spread out the enemy team to reduce aoe CC breaking.
In 25man you can CC almost every enemy and still have enough dps. In 10man you might need to rotate some CC (for example
Heroism is best used right at the start.
Resto druids should mix CC / decurse / heal. Hots are not as great as direct heals here
dont "tank" warlock hellfire or warrior whirlwind. stop it or move away quick.

Every class has a lot of "tools" to use here to help out. Often many folks in the raid are just not using them since they are not used to it. Encourage them to check what they can do to help.

a rough Kill priority that i use:
healers: priest/tree > shaman > paladin.
dps: hunter > moonkin > shadowpriest > warlock > mage
melee: rogue > enhac / warrior/ ret > DK
Obviously if you can effectively CC a target and keep him CCed you can skip to the next target.

Threatco wrote:Mabey hex the only decurser? lol

Cyclone works on everything!

There is no easier way to beat this fight than to stack druids. Resto druids are by far the most powerful healer for this, and cyclone is by far the best cc.

Cema wrote:I don't like this boss

As a prot pally I have no use on this except taunting mobs until they become immune and bop on healer

I really hate when pvp comes into pve

Spell interrupts/slows with avenger's shield. Stuns with Hammer of Justice and Seal of Justice (different dimishing returns). And taunts on melee mobs are huge. Plus you can dispel.

Seriously, prot paladins are very well suited to this fight. Once again, you just have to put some thought into it.

I enjoy doing this fight tank specced a lot more than dps specced. So many fun things to do.

Dual specs: they exist for a reason.

As tank, you will be pretty useless on this fight in Heroic, unless you are a warrior. A prot warrior is very effective due to the over 9000 stuns, and additional abilities like silences, disarm, intervene, charge, intercept, hamstring, demo shout, etc. As prot paladin you bring pretty much nothing beside a 3 target silence on 30 sec cd, so you will want to spec something else, or pretend to be a prot healer (also very good in this fight).

I feel as useless as ever when doing this shit as Prot.
If you have a protwarr they should definately stay prot for this. As a pally your more usefull as another specc.
Your even less usefull as prot here on heroic since taunting them to stick onto you doesnt work. We 3 shotted this on heroic, the differance between normal and heroic is hardly any.
Only usefull thing as prot you can do is to start the pull with shieldthrow, to silence the shaman before CCing him, that way no totems.