The setting
It was going to be a boring Monday evening. I caught up with all the blogs and other good reads that I’ve missed during my short break isolated from the hive mind that is the Internet. I figured I’d finish up the Heroes 5
My good friend Dave, the misguided Enhancement and Restoration Shaman that he is, pops into my vent channel and says to me in a voice that would have made any car salesman proud, “Hey Matt! Boy do I have a proposal for you!”
“No Dave,” I replied, “I’m not taking over your Gruul’s instance with those scrubs you wiped endlessly on.”
“Ah, but I’m talking about raiding Sunwell. We could use a few healers to help us out. Do you have any plans for the evening?”
I need to build up my tolerance. I can handle telemarketers and solicitors just fine. But a shot at Sunwell trash? My knees went weak at the thought of wiping in a raid instance that I’ve never done yet.
Odd, yes. I’m sure you’re used to it by now.
The setup
- 2 Tanks
- 8 Healers
- 15 DPS
The strategy calls for 3 tanks. The Guild I did it with (thanks Artifice!) performed with only 2 tanks. I don’t want to explain the fight in too much detail. Suffice it to say, it’s a bit on the complicated side. But after a few wipes and attempts, you get a feel for it quite easily. Think of the encounter as Romulo and Julianne on Ecstasy. There’s an inner demon that Kalecgos is working on and he needs help. Tanks are needed for the big dragon himself in the real world and on the inner demon in Kalecgos’ inner brain. Every once in a while, someone in the raid gets portal’d into his head and a portal appears at random around the area. The raid is divided into four groups. When a player gets portal’d in, his group has to follow him in there and help him out and burn the inner demon.
Like R & J, both the dragon and the demon need to be burned down together as close as possible. Once either of them hit 10%, they both enrage. As their health drops, their enrage gets that much stronger.
Thankfully, both the demon and the dragon are tauntable. Our tanks alternated as much as possible inside and outside to hold aggro on both bosses. The inside guy needs to be distracted as much as possible since he will be tanked by the human Kalecgos. If he dies, it’s game over.
My role as a CoH Priest is an easy one: Maintain raid health as best as I can. The four groups our raid was divided into had two healers each. One of them was on the tank, the other was on the group itself.
Things you want to hear over vent
Here’s a few key phrases that I heard as we were going through the encounter:
- *tank name* taunting down low – A tank signaling that he’s in position inside and ready to open up on the demon.
- *tank name* taunting high – A tank signaling that he’s got aggro on Kalecgos and any healers on the surface need to keep an eye on him.
- Name, portal, group number – Indicates who has been portaled and what group number should be going in.
- Portal, location – Says where the portal is so that the group that needs to go in knows where to run to.
- Decurse – Person’s been cursed and needs it removed after a few ticks. The curse itself doesn’t actually fall off. It resets to 0 and jumps to another player.
Last points
If you’re having some problems, consider packing a Violet Badge. The boss does apply a random AoE debuff. Remember that this debuff is binary. Either you resist it or you don’t. There is no partial. I left mine in the bank but several DPS players had theirs equipped and I think it had a positive effect on healing.
We killed Kalecgos after 8 or so attempts. We were very close each time averaging around 9% or less before the raid buckled.
Two Bracers of the Forgotten Conqueror
One Bracer of the Forgotten Vanquisher
One Legplates of the Holy Juggernaut
Remember when you’re doing the daily bombing run on the island? Ever wondered who would win the fight between Brut and that blue guy in the sky?
Note: The following images may not be for the faint hearted.
Hey Matt,
Did you find that you came close to losing Kalecgos in Demon Realm with only two tanks?
Omg! Gratz!!!!!!!!
My guild has been on Kalecgos for over 5 weeks (1 or 2 day each week, because we are doing BT and Hyjal too) and we’ve got him to 40%.
Healing on this fight is very tense =/. As a CoH priest I am always assigned to heal my group.
Do you have any healing tip for this fight?
WowGirls last blog post..Midsummer Fire Festival
Yes we did come close to losing Kalcegos in the Demon realm on all our attempts
I think all of our wipes were due to poor communication on who should be taking the portals or a tank dying due to lack of healing.
For instance the Melee group (which I was a part of) did not know a healer was actually part of our group. So when he got hit we didn’t take the portal and we ended up with a huge stack of Arcane debuffs and a lack of DPS on the demon
Overall it was alot of fun though. Brutallus after was like OMG
WoWGirl: Not a whole lot. I deliberately equipped my Vial this time around just to have an emergency “oh crap heal” button. I’ve had to use it fairly often. It’s a pure communications fight and everyone needs to be aware of which tank is up high or down low at all times. As a Priest, keep your Renews and your Shields up on whichever tank you can reach whether its dragon or demon tanks. It’s pretty simple and basic stuff. I’m not sure what else more I can add really since I was spamming my group as much as possible.
When it’s your turn to go into the portal, make sure you top up your tank as much as you can before diving in.
I can’t tell what’s supposed to be happening in the screens of the fight between Brutallus and Madrigosa, though Fel Myst tells the result better.
Medross last blog post..What’s YOUR End Game?
No This Doc Holiday was once a Counter strike player who turned to wow. Currently I raid in Matticus’s guild as a Ret Pally named KimboSlice
@Doc, I’ve seen you post a couple of times ..
I know a Docco who raids on a US server, despite being Australian .. No chance that’s you at all?
@Wowgirl, I find that winding up a prayer just before the AOE arcane debuff goes off, you’re allowing yourself to either help with raid healing, or help keeping a tank alive. The only other advice that I can give is to be aware of who is / isn’t inside demon realm, also .. who has been outside of demon realm for the longest (as they will have the most debuffs and be taking the most damage from the Arcane aoe.
Matt you made 9 dkp, and Doc made 14. Keep building it up for some phat sunwell lewts. Haste legs and polearm for all – not to mention bracers. 😉
For the record, Matt pulled that conversation between him and myself out of his ass, I don’t say such things.
I did it for dramatic effect.
By the way Matt, who was ahead of who in healing until one of the who had to respec Enhance? Just reminding you that you owe me dinner… or at least a box lunch.
ahh yep,
this lad used to rock the name Doc Holiday in Quake3 before turning to wow as far as I’m aware.
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Kalecgos is hands down the most healing intense fight in the game that I’ve seen. Every healer needs to be on the ball, constantly healing, and paying attention to who is inside / outside. We’re up for attempts on him tonight, hopefully he go down in a couple.
The last few raids we’ve been getting really close, even killing the dragon when demon was at 11 / 12% a few times 🙁 🙁 🙁
At first I thought, wow Kalecgos is a very cool and complex fight. Now I just hate this fight with a passion. This fight is probrably the “hardest” fight for us now, and we wipe more on Kalec than Brut/Felmyst/Twins combined haha. Too many bad things can go wrong with the fight.
The fight with Madrigosa and Brut, I fraps the fight awhile ago and posted it up here if you wanna take a look at it: http://spicytunas.com/2008/04/video-madrigosa-vs-brutallus/
Tunas last blog post..Frost Mage PvE: Moroes
I like how Mallet and Kimboslice were on top of the list for Sunwell but everyone else gets looked over. Damn WoW elitests!