Magmaw

[swelt]

Updated bossmods (we use DBM) made this a lot easier this week. There is a fairly decent timer for the Pillar of Flame (except the one immediately after the burn phases) so if you have someone watch that, call out when the pillar is soon and then again when it starts to appear, there's no excuse for people not running immediately and shifting all their attention to destroying the parasites. Other than that, I think the only thing you can do is stress the importance of parasites to the ranged dps. On our learning attempts, I had ranged doing no DPS at all to Magmaw so all they had to do was parasites. Only once they'd mastered that did we go back to them doing dps on magmaw, and then on the strict understanding that it was a secondary priority for them.

On another note, we muscled through with 1 tank this week but it seemed like the 'force tank switch' mechanic might have been buffed. Not only was he leaving a nasty armor debuff on the tank after mangle (nom nom), but he also seemed to drop threat and eat a nearby melee dps (nom nom nom) before being taunted back.

[Pers3us]

On another note, we muscled through with 1 tank this week but it seemed like the 'force tank switch' mechanic might have been buffed. Not only was he leaving a nasty armor debuff on the tank after mangle (nom nom), but he also seemed to drop threat and eat a nearby melee dps (nom nom nom) before being taunted back.

On all of our attempts that armor debuff has always been there, as well as the threat reset after burn phases. Something weird that I have noticed is that when he's doing the animation where he straightens back out after the burn phase, he will melee someone. This is while he's still not able to be targeted, so there's really not much you can do about it besides having everyone but the tank run out right before the burn phase ends.

I've also seen something quite odd. With the 50% armor debuff he usually melees me for about 45-50k, with about 20k blocked, and then he'll rarely do some super-melee attack that hits for 80-85k hit, with about 35k blocked. I don't know if it's a bug, but it's really weird to me. That is a VERY hard hit for him. This is in 10 man by the way.

We actually haven't been able to down him yet on 10 man. Our ranged has a ton of trouble with the parasites. We had a warlock and a shaman as ranged, and even a rogue fan trixing them. Our shaman would go oom from using earthquake, and they just wouldn't die before the next set came out, making it very overwhelming. I would love to know if those classes could be doing something better, as I'd hate to have to replace people just to bring more ranged in for this fight to make it easier.

[Jakhammer]

For those who are having trouble with Parasites (namely killing them timely), think about the existing melee dps and how they are specced. It's advantageous to have a Frost Deathknight specced into Chillblains, use Howling Blast (GLYPHED) and just spam that. It deals massive AoE damage, slows the adds and makes them very controllable. Just make sure the DK stays at ranged. For added benefit, have them kite the parasites using blood presence (make sure to turn it off before dps'ing the boss!!!).

Another tip that was mentioned before - yet worth mentioning again - is to have only ONE ranged out 30 yards (prefer hunter). The pillar will always (based on the 8 attempts we had) appear under him/her. That way you are only dealing with one player's ability to 'not stand in fire'.

Tip: Frost trap covers up the majority of the Pillar of Flame graphic/texture. Use with caution.

[Tsy]

My guild is having the exact opposite problem. We move from Flame Pillars and such just fine, kill the adds ok, but our tank keeps dying because the melee aren't spiking the head fast enough, and our tank is dying due to the Mangle debuff which instagibs you.

Apparently the ability has a 6 second CD? Is there anyone who has personally hopped on top of the worm (I'm a healer and can't do it myself) and can confirm/clarify? Thanks.

[zebrahed]

For those who are having trouble with Parasites (namely killing them timely), think about the existing melee dps and how they are specced. It's advantageous to have a Frost Deathknight specced into Chillblains, use Howling Blast (GLYPHED) and just spam that. It deals massive AoE damage, slows the adds and makes them very controllable. Just make sure the DK stays at ranged. For added benefit, have them kite the parasites using blood presence (make sure to turn it off before dps'ing the boss!!!).

Any Frost DK that doesn't have the HB Glyph is just bad :P But ya, Chillblains is also super useful so far in BWD/BoT. Lots of adds to snare/kite/dps.

The fight should be super easy to do as a DK. Just blood strike the boss twice off the bat to build Death Runes, and you can feel free to burn your other two sets of U/F runes, then frost strike a bit to at least get back an U rune. Get ready to throw down DND at the lava spout location and switch to Blood Presence. HB from range, preferably from the other side of the room, then kite them in a circle until everyone else downs them. You should have time to run back in, and generate two more blood strikes on the boss before the cycle repeats. Not only will you have 100% aggro on every parasite, you'll actually do decent DPS to boot. Keep in mind, that HB is likely to be nerfed on this and Cho'gal alone ;P

Keep out for Ignition, as he'll be about to slump over shortly after, then go back to Frost presence, and DPS as normal.

Also, be sure to utilize ERW and Bloodtap if the DPS is too slow on adds, as HB will snare them, and do a majority of the ranged DPS as well.

My guild is having the exact opposite problem. We move from Flame Pillars and such just fine, kill the adds ok, but our tank keeps dying because the melee aren't spiking the head fast enough, and our tank is dying due to the Mangle debuff which instagibs you.

Apparently the ability has a 6 second CD? Is there anyone who has personally hopped on top of the worm (I'm a healer and can't do it myself) and can confirm/clarify? Thanks.

There can be some confusion at first if people who don't usually do this phase, jump onto him. All you do is jump on, press 1, and then target the spike in front of him. It should take maybe 4 seconds max to do this. If someone is screwing up, have a different person jump onto him, and keep those same people doing it. It really shouldn't be the challenging part of this fight :P As far as a cooldown, there is a small one. You definitely can't continue to spam the chains if you, somehow, screw up connecting it to the front spike.

[gacktt]

Magmaw having that completely idiotic 10 second chain animation delay(when he has 3 chains already applied) before he goes to the burn phase is a real annoyance, HURR DURR 300k MORE ON TANK AND A LAST MINUTE AOE BREATH.

[Aberen]

We tried having only one at ranged last night, first pillar in melee.

[gacktt]

You need 4 ranged to ensure no volcano spawns on melee(10m). Usually have me + 3 healers + 2 dps just besides magmaw doing our stuff, and 4 ranged guys running around killing worms, worms spawned on melee when the lock died for no good reason.

[Daimon]

Is this confirmed like Vexazz shadow crashes that you have to have a minimun # in range for the ability not target melee? The newest change to the fight was pillar of flame not hitting within 15yd in melee range, but idk if that's only with a minimum outside.

[Porthos]

I would also appreciate some clarification on how the Pillar of Flame works if 9 out of the 10 raiders are in melee range. Just sounds way too easy if it will always prefer a ranged target no matter if there's only 1.

[klausi]

@Porthos
Just read two postings above, four people are required.

We (10r) don't switch tanks during melt armor, yes it's an increased damage taken but if you have enough hitpoints to survive two regular hits you should be fine thanks to ticking hots/earthshield/beacon/etc. I only took 3 regular hits for 78k average on our last kill while i blocked all other 29 and there was nothing ordinary about the numbers (roughly 60% block 25% miss 15% hits). Magma Spew won't hit you so there are only those Lava Spews left (hitting for laughable 13kish with 195 fire resistance).

And yes you'll always have to taunt back after the exposed head phase just have your melees wait TWO seconds before reengage him.

[Andenthal]

Some things we learned the hard way in our group:

If healers are standing at absolute max range, they may need to move up a step or 2 to be in range of the tank when he gets "eaten".

Save tank CDs for once you're inside the mouth - not before he eats you.

When melee need to jump on his back to impale him on the spike - sometimes when the first player does it, it takes a second or 2 before it will allow the 2nd player will be able to jump up there. Just keep spamming your click, or whatever. If the 2nd player is delayed, the first player needs to wait a bit to syncronzie the chains, as they need to happen within about a ~5 sec window. Doing this correctly will save a lot of healing on the tank (and possibly a death), and get you to that double damage phase quicker.

We found that it was best to have more players focuing on the worms, rather than trying to have 1 or 2 take care of it. We even had a DK help out with Howling Blast kiting and other ranged abilities (was a very melee heavy group). Basically, if you're having trouble with the adds, someone is probably DPSing the boss when they should be DPSing the adds. Don't let players get away with the "I don't have any AE" excuse. The adds in 10 man mode have ~80k HP IIRC, single target works just fine.

[Porthos]

Appreciate the reply, what you say makes sense. Have just seen several postings in other sites as well as here where folks are leaving just the 1 person in ranged, but this was the only thread where someone mentioned needing 4. Thanks for confirming.

[Ogri]

You need 4 ranged to ensure no volcano spawns on melee(10m). Usually have me + 3 healers + 2 dps just besides magmaw doing our stuff, and 4 ranged guys running around killing worms, worms spawned on melee when the lock died for no good reason.

This is not correct, on our 10 man kill tonight we used a Hunter standing around 25-30 yards at range and the rest of the raid hugging in melee range to one side of his head (except for the tank ofc). I have never seen a flame pillar hit anyone in melee range.

Every single flame pillar hits the hunter who is the only one standing at range, who then drops a frost trap, runs to the raid and helps out with nuking the adds down as they come towards the raid. With the adds down, he runs back to his spot to draw the next pillar.

Works like a charm, the only time the raid has to move at all is if you get Ignition on "your" side, in which case the raid runs over to the other side of the bosses head.

When it comes to spiking the boss, we have two assigned ppl to do it (usually melee DPS), who jumps up, count to 3 and then spikes at the same time. Also works very well.

Dont bother with 2 tanks, if your MT is Heroic/crafted epic gear (which he should be) and your healers are competent, the tank will do just fine.

[jr3L]

Another tip that was mentioned before - yet worth mentioning again - is to have only ONE ranged out 30 yards (prefer hunter). The pillar will always (based on the 8 attempts we had) appear under him/her. That way you are only dealing with one player's ability to 'not stand in fire'.

Tip: Frost trap covers up the majority of the Pillar of Flame graphic/texture. Use with caution.

Can anyone confirm if this is valid or not?

I seen videos do it, but when we tried it, he would still spawn the Pillar on our melee.

Is there something we're overlooking? Is it possible our hunter was too far?

[Xarkar]

Last week my guild killed this guy on 10m, with relative ease once we all figured out a working strat.

This week, we went back, and we were having issues with him. We would be plugging along doing the same thing as before when all of a sudden a melee would get 1 shot and die. I am not really sure whats going on. Do you think its just the magma spit hitting a player that wasnt high enough health?

[am19228]

I've also got a question: My guild keeps wiping on this guy (10 man), and I'm not sure why. The guild thinks its because people are getting hit by the pillar of flame, they say that that gives the adds more hp (they had 118k). But, I haven't read that anywhere else, according to DBM the pillar just does about 25k dmg and maybe some fall dmg. Since only 1 or 2 people are getting hit per attempt I'm not convinced that that's the problem we should be focusing on.

Our other problem was the adds, so our 2 warlocks volunteered to handle them by blowing cooldowns and using hellfire and maybe (not sure) shadowfury. They kill the adds pretty fast, but theyre getting infected too, and a few seconds later two more adds spawn. The guild thinks that its a managable tradeoff, but I suspect that other people are getting infected too. Seems like we always have a couple of adds up, even during the impale phase. All I know for sure is that after a couple of pillars, the whole raid is taking massive damage and healers can't keep up. I've read that infected people damage surrounding players for "a ton of damage", and I'm wondering if THAT is whats killing us.

Thoughts?

[Ogri]

Can anyone confirm if this is valid or not?

I seen videos do it, but when we tried it, he would still spawn the Pillar on our melee.

Is there something we're overlooking? Is it possible our hunter was too far?

Its very likely a case of one of your healers or ranged dps moving just outside of melee range (big boss but small hitbox). Happened to us a couple of times due to ppl not paying attention. Given that your Hunter is actually within range of the boss ofc. We put him at 25-30 yards.

[Ogri]

I've read that infected people damage surrounding players for "a ton of damage", and I'm wondering if THAT is whats killing us.

Thoughts?

You cant ever have the worms actually coming into the raid. The single most important thing in the whole encounter is killing (slow and AoE) the adds before they reach the raid and doing it before the next pillar hits. Have your locks spec/glyph for Shadowfury and/or Demonology and use the Felguard to control the adds.

[Aliena]

Most boss encounters have a minimum number of ranged targets required to avoid ranged abilities targeting melee. The magic number for 10-man is 3, and for 25-man 7. However, my guild has not done this on 10-man nor tried to pile people up in melee, so I can't confirm or deny how Magmaw's mechanism works.