This is probably my second topic on these forums and I'm hoping someone here can help me as well as you all did last time. My guild is currently bashing our heads against loatheb and we seem to be stuck at 2-3% when the 'curse of death' hits and kills everyone (thats the 2nd curse in the enrage iirc). Now people have suggested getting everyone a ony/nef/hakkar buff and going back and killing him. How much of a difference does this actually make? We normally base our strats around the fact we need them to be repeatable and i dont honestly see getting a world buff (on our f**king server at anyrate) each time we kill loatheb to be a viable option. Are there guilds that do this weekly? Or do you think that we're probably just undergeared for the fight?

If you're wondering, we're using;
Shadow pot before entry
1. nothing
2. SPP and bandage
3. nothing
4. bandage
5. whipper/healthstone
6. SPP and bandage
7+ Slowly die.

We have the raid stacked with fire mages and rogues but cant seem to get that last 2 or 3% off him and its getting fairly expensive now with flask/SPP costs adding up. How do you guys feel about the world buff idea? If you reckon its worth it, how do you go about getting it and getting back to naxx without losing it (alliance) and do you guys co-operate with the other guilds on your server to get one at a particular time?

It's a lot cheaper/foolproof to get DM buffs/nef head/etc than flasking your crew of mages. We do a 1 hour prep for our weekly one shots.

Well, the ZG buff doesn't have a cooldown with other ZG buffs the way Nef and Onyxia's head do. That one should be easy enough provided your guild can still stomach a ZG clear. I bet the +15% to all stats for everyone in the raid is enough to pull out another 2-3% DPS easily.

As for getting back to Naxx without losing it, it only takes 10-15 minutes to get from IF to Naxxramas..

Hi Tel :)

We have been trying loatheb too, not as far as you guys but I think you need more dps from somewhere.

In the video I saw which was alliance they kill it at the 4.54 mark which is between the 6th and 7th dooms and they are using the onyxia buff.

You say you are stacking the raid, how many dps and how many healers are you taking, if 1 dps does say 4-6% then 1 extra / less dps will make all the difference.

Hi mate, good to see another Kazzaker on here :)

We're currently running with our standard 15 healer raid, with the healers all in their dps gear, as it stands the rotation is pretty tight (normally about 2 seconds left on debuff as last healer in chain). We're debating switching all healers to much more healing gear, and removing 2 or 3 of them from the raid to replace with dps. I know thats how other guilds have done it, but it feels like the fight was designed to have 'healers' dpsing so thats what we went with.

Anyone else got experiance using that strat? Or do people do it with lower healers but using healing gear?

How many groups do you have getting the fungal spore?

The Darkmoon Faire is up in Mulgore as we speak, you could grab the damage buff (unsure as to the gossip order) and that'd (based on your numbers) tip you over the edge.

10% to all damage is quite unbalanced ;). I think it is 2nd then 1st to get it.

Anyway, the issue with head buffs is someone else could turn in the quest item, so you can't rely on it.

Yeah, we used it last night. DPS classes took it while everyone else chose the health boost.

You don't have that problem with the zg buff or the dm buff. Just preclear a couple of dm instances and hold them open until you are ready rotate your raid through them. Having said that, thats just what I've heard other guilds do, we've never actually done it before and up until last week just flasked our mages. However, we (and therefore I assume a number of other guilds) have just got to the point where we don't need any flasks/outside buffs if we have our A team show up, which helps our guild bank out a bunch.

edit: 10% armour on the MT is hax ^^.

How many healers/dps do you guys run with on loatheb out of interest?

hrm, in that case we might try dropping another healer for a dpser next time. We probably wont be going again till after reset, so will be a few days yet i think thus darkmoon is likely to be down.

We've been having healers in dps gear, but dropping two healers fo 2 dpsers and having healers in healing gear might make the difference.

You just need to try to do everything you can to use as few healers as you can. We always have stoneshields etc up on the main tank. and imp demo up on loatheb.

Other than that just make sure you have an accurate timer on the spores, so everyone knows exactly when to leave for the buff.

Do you wait for the mod / timer to tell you the spawn is up to move, or start moving before it spawn and take it asap?

We just have a simple timer that announces 3 seconds (might be 2) before each spawn with which group is up next, as it usually takes that long to notice the warning and move to the spawn.

we get zg/ony buff every week for loatheb, and then kill gothik (and sometimes thaddius, depending on how our server has been holding up lagwise) afterwards. makes all of them much easier, and saves us a shadow pot per person too (we generally kill him without needing the 3rd pot)

Rend buff, if you're horde. 300 health and a 15% haste makes a BIG difference for melee classes.

Hrm, we were finding healing to be REALLY tight, maybe theres something we're missing...

MT in 6DN, 2WR, elementium bulwark, styleens, gem etc etc... *puzzled face*

Might have to try it with one less healer, and healers in more +heal gear rather +dmg/+str&agi.

Stoneshield pots, an appropriate number of inspiration healers?

Maybe your healers are a little jumpy and are healing a bit early? On Loatheb I always find myself a little fidgety watching the MT's health, waiting for the previous healer's big heal to go off so I know if I need to hurry up and cast mine right away or wait for him to get hit a couple of times, etc. The fact that you say you carry 15 healers and the last person usually has debuff still up is what suggests to me that you're going through rotation a little fast; I've been at the end of our 14 healer rotation for the past couple of weeks and I've always been clear to heal.

As far as gear goes, many of our priests are in fact wearing DPS sets for this fight. I personally don't (because I don't really have any due to various reasons), but I still chain-cast smite and such when able. So long as I beat Elendril's pet in the damage meters, I consider it a success!

Having all of your priests/shaman have inspirationg helps a huge amount due to crit buff the healers should be getting. Having some priests in either 8/8 trans or 4/9 faith would also help ease the load. Just make sure you healers limit their overhealing as much as possible.

the mod is timed to announce such that you leave right on the announce and get there just as the spore spawns. On the first spore this is an issue, but for every subsequent spore, it doesnt matter much for us (cos we only have 7 grps getting the buff), as long as the entire group goes at the same time to minimise downtime