Suggestions Wanted: Getting a Sub-4 Hour MC Clear

Ashuko · 08/01/06, 1:07 PM

Our current makeup:

1. We're up to Vael in BWL.

2. Can take Rags to 13-14% before Sons spawn.

3. We chain pull (new mob incoming at 30% on the old mob).

4. We take awhile still to explain fights. Can this be largely eliminated except for Garr?

5. The point: we're taking 6 hours to do MC from Luci-Rags.

Ugh.

Assuming that our loot system (zero sum) will always take us about 30-45 (3-5 minutes per boss) minutes per run, what are some tips/tricks you would suggest? Specifics, please.

Elendril · 08/01/06, 1:10 PM

why do you have to explain any fights? don't people know what they're supposed to do?

put targets on mobs and assign tanks while you're pulling trash. even if you have to explain things to some people, you don't have to wait until you're standing in front of the boss to do it.

hamlet_the_lesser · 08/01/06, 1:11 PM

first off if there is anytime between pulls then you are wasting time. It takes a bit for people to just plop down and drink but just keep reminding them to drink during pulls and let others cover for you.

If you are not bring half a new raid each MC then dont waste time on explaining the fights. If they havent learned by now perhaps they need replacing. The best reason to have class leads is for people that are new to have someone they can direct questions to.

Distribute loot while moving. If you are MLing everything then you can send gear across the instance so people can be killing more mobs while you deal with the loot. If you are doing FFA have only those interested in gear to be sitting there or have people come back for the loot.

Setup groups for the next boss during trash.

Just doing that will cut alot of your time. You should be doing MC in a maximum of 5 hours but push for 4 hours.

♦ Praetorian · 08/01/06, 3:53 PM

Originally Posted by Ashuko

Assuming that our loot system (zero sum) will always take us about 30-45 (3-5 minutes per boss) minutes per run, what are some tips/tricks you would suggest? Specifics, please.

Keep clearing while loot gets figured out. The corpse isn't going anywhere.

Ashuko · 08/01/06, 3:57 PM

Originally Posted by Praetorian

Originally Posted by Ashuko

Assuming that our loot system (zero sum) will always take us about 30-45 (3-5 minutes per boss) minutes per run, what are some tips/tricks you would suggest? Specifics, please.

Keep clearing while loot gets figured out. The corpse isn't going anywhere.

Yep, this is something I'm encouraging. Basically regroup and start pulling as soon as the boss drops and loot is linked - the classes that want the loot can help clear - just have the eventual winners run back to pick up their loot.

I've been thinking about the fights, and I have the feeling that the only fights that actually require "setup" time are Garr and Domo. Every other boss should be a "run up and fight" kinda deal.

Elendril · 08/01/06, 4:01 PM

Originally Posted by Ashuko

Originally Posted by Praetorian

Originally Posted by Ashuko

Assuming that our loot system (zero sum) will always take us about 30-45 (3-5 minutes per boss) minutes per run, what are some tips/tricks you would suggest? Specifics, please.

Keep clearing while loot gets figured out. The corpse isn't going anywhere.

Yep, this is something I'm encouraging. Basically regroup and start pulling as soon as the boss drops and loot is linked - the classes that want the loot can help clear - just have the eventual winners run back to pick up their loot.

I've been thinking about the fights, and I have the feeling that the only fights that actually require "setup" time are Garr and Domo. Every other boss should be a "run up and fight" kinda deal.

with the new raid icons, you can set up targets for garr while you'res till clearing trash. really doesn't need setup time at all.

♦ Praetorian · 08/01/06, 4:03 PM

Pretty much. I assign hunters to peel and offtanks to tank Lucifron and Gehennas's adds as we're finishing the last pull prior to them; same for Golemagg's adds, etc. Garr and Majordomo could be done the same way, but in practice I do stop and take a minute to make sure everyone has a unique target and is on the same page.

Zoltan · 08/01/06, 4:03 PM

Originally Posted by Ashuko

Our current makeup:
1. We're up to Vael in BWL.
2. Can take Rags to 13-14% before Sons spawn.
3. We chain pull (new mob incoming at 30% on the old mob).
4. We take awhile still to explain fights. Can this be largely eliminated except for Garr?
5. The point: we're taking 6 hours to do MC from Luci-Rags.

I must be missing something here. Our DPS was much worse (Rag to about 25% before Sons), we didnt chain pull (at least not intentionally) as aggresively (usually new mob incoming just after old one's dead) and full MC clear was about 4.5-5h for us (judging by damage meters - it was with at least 10% of raid slacking seriously). We skipped the tactics before bosses, tho (how long does it take for you?). We wasted most time on loot distribution and recoveries after wipes (those 4.5h runs were with no wipes). It probably helped that we didnt really assign tank targets (except for Garr), each tank always tanked same mob (left/right giant, core hound packs etc).

Ashuko · 08/01/06, 4:08 PM

Originally Posted by Zoltan

Originally Posted by Ashuko

Our current makeup:
1. We're up to Vael in BWL.
2. Can take Rags to 13-14% before Sons spawn.
3. We chain pull (new mob incoming at 30% on the old mob).
4. We take awhile still to explain fights. Can this be largely eliminated except for Garr?
5. The point: we're taking 6 hours to do MC from Luci-Rags.

I must be missing something here.

You're not missing something. I think we just spend an inordinate amount of time explaining things. Your point is well taken...if tank #1 is always taking the "left" add and tank #2 always takes the "right" add, you can simplify things by quite a bit.

As far as putting icons on the adds on Garr - I guess someone can just stand and do that while the rest of the raid is clearing up to him. Duh. Save 3-5 minutes right there...assign the targets while still killing trash (just tell "Bobby" that he's got the diamond, etc) and you should be good.

Might get that fight down to 60 seconds of making sure there are no noob problems like double targets.

Isstai · 08/01/06, 4:08 PM

It's an interesting one this as we've just gone through the whole "speed up MC" process.

We were doing Mc in just over 4 hours and over the last few weeks I've managed to get this down to just under 3 hours without any real rush.

The main thing we;ve changed:

1. Chain pulling. We don't go as hardcore as multiple tanking sets, we just use two tanks, and have a hunter pulling for us. This hunter will grab the next thing when the current stuff is about to go down. The aim being that the next mob is reaching the raid as the previous one dies. That's not pulling as it dies, but being in the raid as it dies.

2. Looting. This used to take us AGES. The whole raid would stand around. Who knows why really, it just carried over from when we were learning. What we do now is that only the ML, those interested in the loot, and the designated DEer of the run stay at the corpse. Everyone else moves on. This way only around 5 people or so will still be around wasting time.

3. Boss explanations. We're a big guild, with around 80 active raiders on our DKP listings, we're not massively hardcore. And we've been recruiting a fair bit as people leave. So this meant teaching the whole guild stuff can take a while. But now we've stopped bothing to explain a we'll just carry the few who don't understand. They will ask in their class/group channel for a quick overview if they need it. As a raid leader during the final pull I'll be sorting out groups, tank windows, and dumping raid icons up (Garr clearly being the worst for this). Then when the mobs are down, I'm assigning out targets and duties. Sometimes this will be done during the last trash pull.

4. Skipping groups. We don't do this to the extreme. The main one is Shazzrah. We kill Garr, then clear two lave packs. Then pull Geddon to Garrs room. Next kill a couple more packs and pull Shazzrah to Garrs room. This will leave two lava packs and a dog next to shazzrah that never get killed. Then to get passed we pull the other dog and a pack using a hunter pet and sneak passed the other stuff.

Our DPS is stunning but we're more progressed than you are (killed Nef for the first time two weeks ago). We're not at all hardcore, and as I've said have a pretty big raid group, but going to a 3 hour run hasn't been hard at all.

The main thing you mention, do not accept that looting takes 40 minutes of a run, that's insane.

sevenlives · 08/01/06, 4:18 PM

I was running a guild through MC back in april-july of last year, we had 0 bwl gear (the zone just released. and we sucked ass on Razergore). Ill give you our mages and rogues were incredible, just ask ret, they have like half of them, but we were running 3-4 hour MC clears. We didnt explain any fights while we did our runs, but we had tons of standing around before bosses like garr, geddon and shazz (positioning in a circle) and domo. We realistically could have pushed under 3 hours if we had just let our players do their jobs instead of covering all our bases. None of those fights are currently hard, and if your healers know which tanks to heal, your tanks know what to pick up and where to position it, then you shouldnt have any reason for a 6 hour clear. The hardest part of the zone is the flame packs, and you should have solid fr (150+) on all your melee by now anyway since you are on vael, which trivializes the packs anyway.

Oh, our loot took about 40-60 minutes as well. Our dps got rag to 40-50% by first submerge, never more than that, but we didnt have higher spell ranks, terrible luck with dps drops, no fury warriors, no mage talent reviews, no combat dagger rogues, etc.

Papajan · 08/01/06, 4:19 PM

I remember we used to port out to IF after Mag to avoid re-clearing the imps, but of course there would always be a few people that took their time in getting back to MC. Clearing through the imps backwards was much faster. I don't even know if you're alliance, but little changes here and there can make all the difference.

Anyway, here are some ideas, most of which we've done at some point:
-FFA looting on core hounds will help out a lot of you make sure to skin them all
-Having separate tactical and looting leaders might help a bit. The loot person can make sure to pick up all BoEs/etc while the raid is moving on
-Avoid deaths. Playing defensively will boost your dps and speed up the raid if people are dying to carelessness or whatever
-Have a good puller. Set someone up with RaidStatus if you use CTRA to monitor healer/dps mana and have them chain pull until they need to stop. I've noticed that our clear times can vary a lot just based on the puller.
-Maybe run DamageMeters. I don't like some of the things that DamageMeters encourage, but if you give people a short-term reason to push their dps further, that will probably help
-Cut back on hybrid class healing on trash. I'm sure a priest or druid would love to take a break from healing now and then to do some damage. Generally, trash mobs don't require 15 healers. (Assuming 5 slots per class) If one of them happens to be a priest with shadow weaving or a druid with either aura, that'll help a lot too.
-Get an Ony buff 15 minutes before the raid if you can. It'll do wonders for your dps. Hakkar or Rend buffs would be nice too I'm sure.
-If your tanks are quick and alert, pull core hound packs without assigning targets first. That would probably shave off 30s from each pull.

Dwargue · 08/01/06, 4:19 PM

how much time are you spending on loot distribution.

how much time are you waiting for your afk'ers to come back from RL stuff?

i have a feeling if you add those numbers up, and take them off of your total MC run, you'll be well under your targetted goal.

Monsanto · 08/01/06, 4:25 PM

People probably start going afk during the flame packs that you see after Garr. That trash is probably the most miserable in the game, after the post-Twin Emps trash.

• Hamlet · 08/01/06, 4:33 PM

Just pull Garr. It will work itself out naturally.