04-24-2013, 11:59 AM
Mel'jarak Nutshell Guide
Okay, we've all done this guy on LFR. He's the bug with all the adds, only some of which can be CC'd. Here's the deal on 10-man.
This is a 2-tank fight with an 8 minute enrage timer.
MEL'JARAK HIMSELF
* Whirling Blade: he casts this every 60 seconds. He'll throw a weapon at a random raid member which acts like a boomerang: it will whirl to that player then back to the boss, damaging everyone in its path.
* Rain of Blades: raid-wide damaging ability that does physical damage to all raid members every half a second for 6 seconds.
* Wind Bomb: After he gets to 75% he'll start casting this regularly. He'll throw a bomb at the location of a raid member which deals Nature damage to anyone within 5 yards of that location. Three seconds after landing it will arm itself, then it will EXPLODE if anyone comes within 6 yards of it, dealing a lot of raid-wide Nature Damage -- possibly enough to wipe the raid. These bombs to NOT despawn. They accumulate in the room, gradually limiting the space players have to move around.
* Recklessness: Every time a group of adds is killed he gains a stack of Recklessness which increases his damage done by 50%, and his damage taken by 33%
CROWD CONTROL OF THE ADDS
Mel'jarak has nine adds divided into three groups of three: three Stra-thik Amber-Trappers, three Kor'thic Elite Blademasters, and three Zar'thik Battle-Menders. Adds of the same type share a health pool, have the same abilities, and die at the same time. Adds can be crowd-controlled, but there's a limit to how many we can CC, depending on how many are up:
* When all 9 are up, we can CC 4.
* After the first group dies and there are 6 up, we can CC 2.
* When the next group dies and there are only three left, we can CC zero.
--> If we exceed these limits, Mel'Jarak will dispel all the CC's.
Crowd Control is the key mechanic here. Most CC works on these guys, like Polymorph or Freezing Trap, but the encounter also provides CC in the form of four weapon racks at the edges of the room. Each rack gives one player a special ability called "Impaling Spear." It stuns the targeted add for 50 seconds. It is broken by direct damage to THAT add, but by damage taken by the other adds of the same type.
Amber-Trappers
* Amber Prison: these guys trap a targeted player and anyone within 2 yards in an Amber Prison. Other players free them by right-clicking it. Once you free someone you get a debuff called Residue which prevents you from freeing other players for 115 seconds.
* Corrosive Resin: debuff placed on a random raid member. It stacks to 5 and deals moderate Nature Damage to that player every second. When the player moves, the stacks are progressively consumed, and each stack consumed leaves behind a void zone called a Corrosive Resin Pool.
Battle-Menders
* Mending: an interruptible heal that these guys cast on random adds. It heals them for 25% of their max health.
* Quickening: dispellable, stackable buff that the Menders place on all the adds which increases their damage done and attack speed.
Blademasters
* Kor'thik Strike: deals a high amount of physical damage to a random raid member. All three Blademasters target the SAME player and attack at the same time. This ability occurs every 40 seconds. It is NOT possible to tell who is going to be hit by this.
STRATEGY
* TANKING: Sevdrith will pick up the boss and a few adds, while Shantow will pick up the remaining adds.
* POSITIONING: We'll spread out in a circle around the boss to minimize damage from Whirling Blade, and to avoid having more than one person caught in Amber Prison. The raid will not stack during this fight. Melee should stand at least 2 yards apart to avoid getting trapped in Amber Prison. One exception: after adds are dead we may want to stack for healing from Rain of Blades, but we'll need to scatter before and after to avoid Whirling Blade.
* Move away from the Wind Bombs. Do not trigger them.
* DPSING: We'll be DPSing the available adds, but we should keep DPS on the boss through cleaves and DoTs.
* CROWD CONTROL as many adds as we can (more on this below)
* OTHER TASKS:
--> For the Battle-Menders, INTERRUPT Mending. Not a single cast should get through.
--> For all the adds, DISPEL Quickening
--> Players with Corrosive Resin should MOVE to shed their stacks, but place the void zones in a way that does not inconvenience the raid. Once you get it, move straight to the edge of the room, then run along the edge.
--> FREE players from Amber Prison. No need for assignments, if you're close, do it. Communicate if you can't due to Residue.
CROWD CONTROL FOR OUR RAID
This encounter is do-able with any combination of CC'd adds. Each combination presents its own difficulties. I recommend the following:
* Crowd-control 1 Amber-Trapper, 2 Battle-Menders, and 1 Blademaster
* Kill the Battle-Mender first. Take all the mobs together for additional AoE damage from Cleaves
* When the Battle-Menders are dead, CC 1 Amber-Trapper and 1 Blademaster
* Kill the Blademasters
* Kill the Amber-Trappers
We can experiment with keeping DPSing the adds to low health, then killing two or three groups in quick succession, in order to preserve CC control and to delay giving Mel'Jarak more stacks. But if this is too overwhelming we can DPS the groups down one at a time.
HEALING CONCERNS
* High tank damage, with increasing damage on Mel'jarak's tank as the fight goes on. When all the adds are dead, the tank will be taking hits of 170,000.
* Regular raid-wide damage from Rain of Blades
* Single-target damage on raid members through Whirling Blade, and when they are affected by the Corrosive Resin debuff
* Bursts of single-target damage from Kor'thik Strike, the size of which depends on how many are CC'd.
* There may be bursts in damage when the mobs get buffed by Quickening
* An accidental Wind Bomb detonation will cause massive damage which will probably cause a wipe.
LEARNING THE FIGHT
The first part of the fight is chaotic. Use healing and defensive cooldowns here as we learn the pull and the first part of the fight. Do not bring Mel'jarak below 75% until the first group of adds is killed so we don't get Wind Bombs. After the first group is dead we should use Dots and Cleaves to get him to 75% so we can start learning the Wind Bombs. We will prioritize staying alive to killing the adds, to better learn the different mechanics. Once the second group is down, we'll have to deal with the third group with NO crowd control. This can be very stressful, especially as the boss is doing even more damage here. Use cooldowns again here.
BLOODLUST
If we have trouble with a particular group of adds, we'll use Bloodlust to get through them. If not, we will use it when all the adds are down to kill the boss faster.
Okay, we've all done this guy on LFR. He's the bug with all the adds, only some of which can be CC'd. Here's the deal on 10-man.
This is a 2-tank fight with an 8 minute enrage timer.
MEL'JARAK HIMSELF
* Whirling Blade: he casts this every 60 seconds. He'll throw a weapon at a random raid member which acts like a boomerang: it will whirl to that player then back to the boss, damaging everyone in its path.
* Rain of Blades: raid-wide damaging ability that does physical damage to all raid members every half a second for 6 seconds.
* Wind Bomb: After he gets to 75% he'll start casting this regularly. He'll throw a bomb at the location of a raid member which deals Nature damage to anyone within 5 yards of that location. Three seconds after landing it will arm itself, then it will EXPLODE if anyone comes within 6 yards of it, dealing a lot of raid-wide Nature Damage -- possibly enough to wipe the raid. These bombs to NOT despawn. They accumulate in the room, gradually limiting the space players have to move around.
* Recklessness: Every time a group of adds is killed he gains a stack of Recklessness which increases his damage done by 50%, and his damage taken by 33%
CROWD CONTROL OF THE ADDS
Mel'jarak has nine adds divided into three groups of three: three Stra-thik Amber-Trappers, three Kor'thic Elite Blademasters, and three Zar'thik Battle-Menders. Adds of the same type share a health pool, have the same abilities, and die at the same time. Adds can be crowd-controlled, but there's a limit to how many we can CC, depending on how many are up:
* When all 9 are up, we can CC 4.
* After the first group dies and there are 6 up, we can CC 2.
* When the next group dies and there are only three left, we can CC zero.
--> If we exceed these limits, Mel'Jarak will dispel all the CC's.
Crowd Control is the key mechanic here. Most CC works on these guys, like Polymorph or Freezing Trap, but the encounter also provides CC in the form of four weapon racks at the edges of the room. Each rack gives one player a special ability called "Impaling Spear." It stuns the targeted add for 50 seconds. It is broken by direct damage to THAT add, but by damage taken by the other adds of the same type.
Amber-Trappers
* Amber Prison: these guys trap a targeted player and anyone within 2 yards in an Amber Prison. Other players free them by right-clicking it. Once you free someone you get a debuff called Residue which prevents you from freeing other players for 115 seconds.
* Corrosive Resin: debuff placed on a random raid member. It stacks to 5 and deals moderate Nature Damage to that player every second. When the player moves, the stacks are progressively consumed, and each stack consumed leaves behind a void zone called a Corrosive Resin Pool.
Battle-Menders
* Mending: an interruptible heal that these guys cast on random adds. It heals them for 25% of their max health.
* Quickening: dispellable, stackable buff that the Menders place on all the adds which increases their damage done and attack speed.
Blademasters
* Kor'thik Strike: deals a high amount of physical damage to a random raid member. All three Blademasters target the SAME player and attack at the same time. This ability occurs every 40 seconds. It is NOT possible to tell who is going to be hit by this.
STRATEGY
* TANKING: Sevdrith will pick up the boss and a few adds, while Shantow will pick up the remaining adds.
* POSITIONING: We'll spread out in a circle around the boss to minimize damage from Whirling Blade, and to avoid having more than one person caught in Amber Prison. The raid will not stack during this fight. Melee should stand at least 2 yards apart to avoid getting trapped in Amber Prison. One exception: after adds are dead we may want to stack for healing from Rain of Blades, but we'll need to scatter before and after to avoid Whirling Blade.
* Move away from the Wind Bombs. Do not trigger them.
* DPSING: We'll be DPSing the available adds, but we should keep DPS on the boss through cleaves and DoTs.
* CROWD CONTROL as many adds as we can (more on this below)
* OTHER TASKS:
--> For the Battle-Menders, INTERRUPT Mending. Not a single cast should get through.
--> For all the adds, DISPEL Quickening
--> Players with Corrosive Resin should MOVE to shed their stacks, but place the void zones in a way that does not inconvenience the raid. Once you get it, move straight to the edge of the room, then run along the edge.
--> FREE players from Amber Prison. No need for assignments, if you're close, do it. Communicate if you can't due to Residue.
CROWD CONTROL FOR OUR RAID
This encounter is do-able with any combination of CC'd adds. Each combination presents its own difficulties. I recommend the following:
* Crowd-control 1 Amber-Trapper, 2 Battle-Menders, and 1 Blademaster
* Kill the Battle-Mender first. Take all the mobs together for additional AoE damage from Cleaves
* When the Battle-Menders are dead, CC 1 Amber-Trapper and 1 Blademaster
* Kill the Blademasters
* Kill the Amber-Trappers
We can experiment with keeping DPSing the adds to low health, then killing two or three groups in quick succession, in order to preserve CC control and to delay giving Mel'Jarak more stacks. But if this is too overwhelming we can DPS the groups down one at a time.
HEALING CONCERNS
* High tank damage, with increasing damage on Mel'jarak's tank as the fight goes on. When all the adds are dead, the tank will be taking hits of 170,000.
* Regular raid-wide damage from Rain of Blades
* Single-target damage on raid members through Whirling Blade, and when they are affected by the Corrosive Resin debuff
* Bursts of single-target damage from Kor'thik Strike, the size of which depends on how many are CC'd.
* There may be bursts in damage when the mobs get buffed by Quickening
* An accidental Wind Bomb detonation will cause massive damage which will probably cause a wipe.
LEARNING THE FIGHT
The first part of the fight is chaotic. Use healing and defensive cooldowns here as we learn the pull and the first part of the fight. Do not bring Mel'jarak below 75% until the first group of adds is killed so we don't get Wind Bombs. After the first group is dead we should use Dots and Cleaves to get him to 75% so we can start learning the Wind Bombs. We will prioritize staying alive to killing the adds, to better learn the different mechanics. Once the second group is down, we'll have to deal with the third group with NO crowd control. This can be very stressful, especially as the boss is doing even more damage here. Use cooldowns again here.
BLOODLUST
If we have trouble with a particular group of adds, we'll use Bloodlust to get through them. If not, we will use it when all the adds are down to kill the boss faster.