Blackpatch

The racial leaders (and important NPCs) have always interested me as raid bosses, although I've never killed any of them. I'd like to know more about their abilities. So far I know the following:

Fandral Staghelm does an AOE roots for ~300/tick and summons treants (on what timer?) but I hear that his melee is fairly weak.

Tyrande does Starfall which is apparently devastating but I don't know how long it goes, what it hits for, etc. and I don't know anything else about the fight.

Jaina summons water elementals and throws nasty Frostbolts. Does she also Frost Nova, Blink, or use any fire spells?

I don't know anything about Bolvar Fordragon or Magni Bronzebeard, and for that matter, I don't even know whether the human leader is Fordragon or the Archbishop.

I don't know anything about High Tinker Mekkatorque, other than that he has a flamethrower.

I don't know anything about Thrall or Vol'jin.

I know that Cairne has a charge, a knockback, and a warstomp, but I don't know whether his charge or his warstomp is the knockback.

I know that Sylvanas is like a souped-up version of Nathanos Blightcaller, but I don't know whether she has any other abilities.

I don't know anything about Varimathras.

I don't know anything about Rexxar and Misha.

I'd really appreciate any further information, or suggestions about exceptionally powerful NPCs that I've missed.

CONSERVE YOUR RAGE AND LUST

 

• frmorrison

Tinker is an Engineer, his attack is an AE Dragon Flame Gun. I would assume he uses bombs as well.

You can see Bolvar Fordragon's attacks during the Onynia Key Quest chain, he has AE Stun, Shield Wall, and Cleave.


Magni Bronzebread has a speical abilty of summoning 100s of Alliance and guards very quickly (he is by the AH and bank). I know he has a Ironfoe-like weapon (he does thrash).

Gambling: The sure way of getting nothing for something.

 

• sekdar

Thrall has a chain lightning that can be completely nullified by tanking him away from the raid.

Vol'jin hexes people and has an absolutely massive amount of HP. It seems his sole purpose is as a speedbump for a raid group trying to kill Thrall, allowing the horde time to zerg the raid to death. :)

Vol'jin can be bypassed, though.

 

• Thrillho

Rexxar's special ability is that when you are working on the Horde Onyxia Keychain, and you have an UBRS group ready and waiting for you so you can get the blood, he will despawn automatically, causing you hours of frustration as you wander Desolace, talking to yourself in General and LocalDefense.

 

Steelfleece

Magni has a big knockback and uses avatar(Mountain King ability from WC3).

Fordragon doesn't have any heals, but he has shield wall, cleave, and an aoe version of hammer of justice called "Highlord's Justice." Archbishop takes a lot less time to kill but Renews himself for big heals(dispellable) and can use holy-based aoe's.

affect –verb (used with object) 1. to act on; produce an effect or change in
effect –noun 1. something that is produced by an agency or cause; result; consequence
Know the difference.

 

Copernicus

Cairne used to have the special ability of being kiteable to outside Thunder Bluff and being close to the WSG zone-in.

Ah, memories...

 

Kharzaljim

Cairne also had the ability to generate lots of server forum hate towards alliance guilds that would pull him out of TB and, every two hours, kill him with less than 10 raiders in their constant quest for repair money.

For serious, though, Cairne had (has? don't know any more) three abilities. Charge (also the KB,) Warstomp, and they eventually added MS to make him more interesting. Last I remember, the Charge/KB does fairly ridiculous distance, and can kill you easily if you don't get your back towards a hill. Works like surgers, picks farthest. I think the Warstomp hit for ~1.5k, and I have no idea on the MS.

Sylvanas summons stuff I think? I seem to remember her blinking around, also. Used to be able to pull Sylvanas without Varimathras, but I somewhat doubt they'll let you do that any more?

If using "he or she" seems awkward to you, try using a neutral gender term. Some people use s/he, others find that clumsy, and try using variations on pronunciation, such has zer or zier. Unfortunately, English doesn't really have the concept for neutral genders, so there's no real consensus yet. But that leaves room for one to be built.

 

• sekdar

Fordragon has Lay on Hands and it will heal him to full right before he dies, but 90% of the time he never gets to use it because it's on cooldown from some scrub who was doing the Onyxia quest line a bit earlier.

edit: Unless they changed him. I don't remember him ever having Shield Wall... quite possible they may have swapped his abilities.

 

Taeme

Saurfang, while not truly a racial leader, just brutally destroys you in a tide of wreckless awesome.

But seriously, do the alliance have anyone like Saurfang for just destroying people? I remember people used to fight him with mark of stupid before he was buffed, but that trend died pretty fast after that.

you're the one that decided to trust me

 

Steelfleece

Never once seen him use Lay on Hands, and we killed him several times before the DK system went in(but after the original honor system went in). So if they changed him it was a really long time ago.

affect –verb (used with object) 1. to act on; produce an effect or change in
effect –noun 1. something that is produced by an agency or cause; result; consequence
Know the difference.

 

• Greybone

Just start in feralas, and follow his path north - I've done the quest chain on 3 characters with zero problems finding him :)

Also, this thread reminds me how much I miss world pvp :(

 

Fendryl

Jaina also randomly teleports people out into the harbor.

 

Brilliance

I think the guy outside Stormwind, on the right side as you enter is his counterpart.

The time we did an Org raid (As it was ending we went off and bum rushed the town to kill the Auctioneer's) a Rogue tried to MC cap him. His "rage" hit him for some obscene amount of damage.

 

Ceidwad

Rexxar sunders, thrashes, and knocks away. I don't remember Misha doing anything noticeable. I have them at 470k and 160k health.

Cairne weighs in at 775k.

Hope this is the sort of info you were after.

 

Deris

Jaina is a beast. :(

 

◊ Drauk

You do know its Furor :) ?

Fun is for casuals

 

Razzberry

The one with the delicious, delicious ice cream? :P

 

Imoan

Theres a video going around of a rogue using saurfang to lay waste to everyone at the mailbox in orgrimmar. His stormwind counterpart is fun, as he does all of his damage (4-5digits) with his fists alone. Saurfang is far superior however, due to his intercept and cleave abilities :o

Edit: http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=14291

 

stauros

Does anyone know if there's any type of cooldown on Bronzebeard's knockback? Also, does anyone have a good grasp on its mechancis? In fighting him, it seems like we've seen it both wipe everyone's aggro around him, as well as at times (more often) just wipe the main tank's aggro. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

 

Emeraude

Wow, what a necro.

Oh well, might as well contribute since these are worth a mount now!

Varimathras no longer joins Sylvanas in the fight post 3.0, he just simply observes as your raid attempts to kill her.

Archbishop Benedictus of Stormwind(Who once staged a coup and took control of the city! :P) is no longer a boss mob, he's simply level 60 Elite.

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Volrath50

Jaina's ugly. On a pretty quick timer, she will teleport the main tank out of the tower, forcing a long runback. If you don't have enough tanks to keep the rotation going, she then proceeds to kill the raid. It was traumatic.

"As surely as I live forever, when I sharpen my flashing sword and my hand grasps it in judgement, I will take vengeance on my adversaries and repay those who hate me."

 

◊ arison

An alliance of two guilds on Windrunner (Forlorn Legacy and Premonition, two raids, ~50 people) has killed Thrall, Theron, and Sylvanas post-3.0. I have no experience of them before 3.0, but here's what we saw in our attempts. Thrall and Theron are basically tank and spanks without apparently any special abilities (maybe he lightnings, maybe he summons wolves, but it is inconsequential). Sylvanas is a bit more annoying as tanking her is tricky because of the shadowstep. She can be easily ranged tanked by a hunter, but apparently when she steps, she smacks the highest threat melee first, often killing them (which, if tanked by a warrior, would be the warrior, who would survive).

Cairne is definitely obnoxious. He constantly drops threat, resulting in an instagib of whoever he decides to kill. We went to him for practice after Thrall (which meant the Horde were aware something was up and had a somewhat organized response, making it a bit trickier) so we didn't make particularly serious attempts. I expect him to die soon.

Since the bosses are level 83 effectively, they are quite hard to hit. I was at around 230 hit rating as a hunter and had a shaman for aura and ended up around a 3-4% miss rate. Casters struggle quite a bit. Hunters definitely are going to be your top DPS on these bosses, but plan ahead to have extra hit. Also don't bother with stings, Chimera Shot, etc -- the resist rate is just too high. Spam Steady Shot. Warriors and Rogues seemed to do pretty well, too.

These bosses definitely are the only challenges in the game right now. Our server is very Alliance heavy and not PVP, so I'm sure on more hard core servers the fights are even more challenging... and more fun!

 

Valerys

Tried Tyrande a few days ago. Her Starfall is aoe and hits for 2k+ every couple of seconds, melee has to run out of it fast. Her melee hit crushed me (ret paladin in dps plate) for 14k, don't know how it translates for tanks.

 

Nakari

Velen: By far the easiest of the Alliance leaders. Can and should be ranged tanked by a Hunter, his only ability seems to be a Smite that hits for around 4k. Be careful not to pull the nearby battlemasters.

Tyrande: Harder than Velen, but not at Wrynn/Magni level. Healers should be careful as this is the only alliance boss that does significant damage to others than the tank(s) (unless you stand in Wrynn's whirlwind) while still doing some serious burst damage to the tank.

Magni: Has Avatar (+armor/damage) and Knock Away, which seems to reduce the tank's aggro to zero. He's tauntable, so bring lots of tanks.

Varian Wrynn: His most dangerous ability is a whirlwind which just destroys melees (and hunter pets ). Hits fairly hard in melee as well.

Some general tips:

• Fights take a very long time, as all bosses have more than 5 million HP and DPS is vastly reduced due to the level difference of 13 (all faction leaders are level 83 internally).
• Bring all the Hunters you can find. Hunters don't suffer from glancing blows, dodges, parries or partial resists (except with Chimera, Explosive and Serpent Sting), so they'll do by far the most damage.
• Priority of non-Hunters should be dealing with enemy players and guard respawn.
• Tanks should have enough defense to be uncrittable (-7,6% chance to be crit), otherwise the burst can be a little extreme.

 

KamPa

Sylvanas can also occasionally evade after blinking into stairs/columns. While that's hardly 'leader ability', it can be a real pain. Didn't seem to happen when we tanked her somewhere on the bottom, but she did it twice on top. There's also lvl81 elite Battlemaster who is pretty dangerous, with 6k whirlwind and raid wide fear - will have to kill her upon entering, but she shouldn't agro after respawning, if you don't get too close.

Cairne needs a lot of tanks chain taunting - he does drop threat on multiple tanks, not just MT. Eventually he will start gibbing random people anyway, since there are constant resists. Keeping a healer OOC - Shadowmeld does the trick - and ressing them is pretty much needed. Might want to move those high in threat away from raid, as he cleaves and has AOE stun. Also hits quite hard, which can kill some undergeared tank right after taunt.