boss

Healing Naxxramas – Thaddius (10 man)

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Thaddius is the idiot check boss of Naxx. There might be others (wait ‘til I get to Heigan), but I do think this one really separates those that can and those that can’t. You’ll find out why momentarily (but keep the first boss of Heroic Mechanar at the back of your mind).

Engage

When you enter the room, you have to engage two mini bosses before you can engage Thaddius. Fuegen and Stalagg need to go down together within seconds of the other dying. Unlike the original Naxx, you don’t have to stack melee players on one side and range on the other. The raid needs to be split fairly equally with 5 on one side and 5 on the other. It’s going to be hard to do with 5 total DPS (assuming 2 tanks and 3 healers) so I recommend pairing your top 2 DPS players together and the bottom 3 DPS players together. If necessary, adjust on the fly and rotate a DPS from one side to the other to help play catch up.

The two tanks (literally) will fly back and forth and switch between Fuegen and Stalagg respectively. I think when the Tesla Coil portion of the fight activates, the tank switches. Healers have to be aware of which tank is presently on the side that they are on. I suggest using a range finder of some sort. Aggro shouldn’t be a problem. One healer on both sides should be enough (although you’ll have an extra one, so use your discretion there). AoE healing will be the order of the day. Try to ensure everyone is near full as much as possible.

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Once you kill the 2 constructs, here’s the challenging part. You have to run and actually jump from the ledge onto the platform below! If you decide to fall off, then you’ll miss the platform entirely and hit the sludge water below (just turn around and head towards the entrance as there is a ramp that will allow you to try again).

Now you’re onto Thaddius himself.

He uses an ability called Polarity Shift.

  • Polarity Shift: Places either a Negative Charge or Positive Charge to all nearby enemy targets. Players near other players with the same Charge type increases each their damage dealt. Players near other players with the opposite Charge type deal damage to nearby raid members.

thad-4And that right there is the gimmick for the fight. I like to designate left side as positive and right side for negative. You don’t have to stray too far out. Melee players with opposite charges can remain 180° from each other and still stay within striking range of the boss.

Your raid leader should be extremely vocal:

“Polarity shift soon!”

“Polarity shift, MOVE MOVE MOVE!”

Some players fail at checking their debuffs and can potentially wipe the raid. As the raid leader, I strongly recommend that you hold their hand through this as it is not worth the frustration.

Healing

thad-2 Healing is a walkover on this boss. AoE heals and single target heals on the tank should the order of the day. Your AoE healers will be able to cover both groups no matter which side they are on. Keep a single target healer on the tank at all costs. He does like to randomly fry players with lightning. It’s nothing a healer can’t handle, however.

One last thing

DO NOT LOOT YOUR ITEMS AFTER THE BOSS DIES! Wait for your charges to wear off before doing so or else you’ll be in for a very nasty (and shocking) surprise.

Healing Naxxramas – Grobbulus (10 man)

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Welcome to Grobbulus! You’’ll run into him right after Patchwerk in the Abomination wing. Once the room’s been cleared out, get ready to grab Grobby!

Abilities

He puts a disease on players at random called Mutating Injection. It’s very important that it does not get dispelled! There’s a boss in Blood Furnace (the big floating Eye) that drops poison clouds all around the room. This boss also drops poison clouds. If the disease on you gets dispelled or if it wears off, then you drop a poison cloud.

Slime Spray is another ability of his which hits for a decent sized amount. Any players who are affected will spawn slimes. DPS needs to kill slimes when they spawn!

  • Poison Cloud: Deals a moderate amount of damage

So how do you handle it?

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The Process

Tell your tank to pull Grobby in a clockwise direction. Don’t move him too fast. You don’t want to rush him around because it takes time for poison clouds to wear off.

Your DPS and healers will be standing in the middle and shooting outwards. Melee players will be standing behind Grobby as he is being tanked. Don’t forget to kill Slimes as they spawn!

If you get hit with a Mutating Injection, run and stay behind Grobbulus until it wears off. The main idea here is to keep the poison clouds on the exterior of the room thereby leaving the middle area relatively clean. Once diseased players are in a safe position, then all you need to do is Cleanse or Dispel them. The debuff will wear off and a poison cloud will expand where they were standing. Make sure they run back after the debuff wears off.

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Healing

I suggest using a 2 healer on tank, 1 on raid setup. Grobbulus does not hit really hard and the damage should be manageable. The concern here is the amount of players absorbing AoE damage from Poison clouds. As long as they are alert and aware of where they are relative to the clouds, they should have no major issues.

Other Notes

Grobbulus’ abilities are Nature based. Consider using Aspect of the Wild or other Nature Resistance abilities (Totems?). I do not know how effective using the resist is but it could help the raid stay alive longer than normal and buy more time. I haven’t had a chance to test Nature Resist. But it isn’t a necessity.

Healing Naxxramas – Grand Widow Faerlina (10 man)

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Faerlina is the second boss you’ll run into within the Arachnid quarter (Spider wing). She is flanked by 4 mobs. Do not kill them all at once. They need to be tanked in the side or just let loose running around.

Abilities

Faerlina will go into a Frenzy after every minute has elapsed from the last dispel (or a minute after the fight begins). She will hit the tank extremely hard and he will not be able to survive for more than a few seconds. The only way to dispel Frenzy is to bring one of her mobs on top of her and kill it. Only then can the effect be dispelled.

Stay mobile and keep moving. Watch out for Rain of Fire.

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So there’s a two stage encounter. The first stage is a simple tank and spank while keeping the mobs away from her. They are absolutely needed in order to remove frenzy. If you kill one by accident, then the time you have to kill her goes down. You can DPS them but don’t over do it. I suggest using mild AoE to bring them down to approximately 20% or single targeting them.

In this case, notice how we established icons on all of the different mobs. We did it so we could coordinate the kill order (“Triangle first, move square out, ease off of X”).

Healing

One healer on the main tank, one healer on the raid, the last one floats. The moment she goes into a frenzy, drop everything you’re doing and get on the MT right away. Priests, use mitigation spells as quick as you can. Actually, I’d advise your tank to use one of his panic buttons (trinket, talent, skill, whatever) right away until they get the hang of this fight.

After that, repeat what you just did. Wait until she frenzies, drag a mob over, kill it. Rinse, repeat.

However, you are on the clock. Once the last mob dies and she enrages there is no way for you to dispel it. When I did it, she went down between number 3 and number 4.

Myth: It Doesn’t Matter As Long as the Boss Dies

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does-matter

It’s time for a good, old fashioned rant.

“It doesn’t matter, as long as the boss dies.”

Oh, but it does matter. It matters a lot.

It matters if you AFK trash.
It matters if you wipe on a farm-content boss.
It matters if people die unnecessarily.
It matters if the fight drags on for double its usual length.
And it matters because “as long as the boss dies” is the dumbest quote EVER.

Think about it. I understand the need for bio breaks, and taking an announced absence is a perfectly legitimate way to get a drink of water, relieve yourself, and be that much more focused when you return. But when you have a couple of raiders who consistently AFK their way through everything that doesn’t drop loot, it adds stress and resentment to the pressure cooker that is a raid. It’s lazy and inconsiderate. Worse, it sets a terrible example for not just new recruits but everyone else in the guild.

Anyone who’s ever wiped on a “Farm” boss can tell you that it is infinitely frustrating when that happens due to sloppy mistakes and lack of attention. It wastes valuable time, leads to full-on burnout, and can make a guild feel stunted and unsuccessful. Slacking off here can cause major problems, and even if the boss dies on the third try, that’s 30 minutes to an hour of 25 people’s time. Not to mention repair bills, wasted consumables, and loss of morale and momentum.

Okay, so say you didn’t wipe. Say the fight just lasted 12 minutes instead of 7. That’s only 5 minutes extra (Nevermind that it’s really 5×25.) Wrong. When fights double in length, the impact is the same as a wipe, just on a smaller scale. Consumables, cooldowns, and resources are STILL wasted, and more likely than not, players will die needlessly. Not to mention that’s 5 minutes worth of Arrows and Bullets. And you now have a raid-mentality that knows it’s in for a rough night, since the bosses aren’t dying smoothly. Beyond that, if you’re a guild in the position of both farming content AND making progression runs, the sooner you can get the old content finished the more time you can spend on the new stuff. Eating up minutes and hours when you have 14 bosses to get through before you can even get to the fun stuff is “srs biz”.

More than anything, I hate that this quote as it seems to embody the ultimate in epic-greedy laziness. As if there’s no difference between the boss dying in an unspectacular way vs. dying efficiently, with everyone putting out 100%. The reality is at the other extreme – the only thing the two events have in common is the dropping of loot. And if loot, rather than progression and improvement is your focus, I want you the hell out of my raid, out of my guild, off my server, and away from my game. Go play EverQuest with Jimmy.

Luv,
Wyn