How long did it take people to learn Heigan-dance?

Warpony · 09/25/06, 9:45 AM

Just a quick question...

Since we're killing spiderwing + noth + instructor quickly i thought we'd have a go at Heigan...

I MT him and all goes "okey"...

Then comes the dance...

Oh...My...God... Then comes the dance.

I'm not making myself out to be the best player ever, but seriously, this is too easy to ever die on. I had watched like 2 movies beforehand, and in all honesty, in our 7 attempts last night i NEVER died during the dance. I got hit once by 1 splash, and then never again.

My frustration comes from my beloved guildies... Our survival count was something like this (after first teleport):

2
4
4
5
6
18
17

I'm simply wondering... Did large portions of your guilds fair as terribly? For some reason i thought we'd have like 2-3 tries, then noone would die... Obviously i was blatantly wrong.

Oki, it's going in the right direction, but im seriously wondering about those 20+ ppl whos NEVER survived a dance... Are they just incompetent or will they learn it?

If people can't learn in 7 tries, should we just keep going? I'm kinda dissapointed in having to wipe over and over just cause people can't move their character around.

So, if you don't mind, share your experience with the dance and if you used any special "tips" for your guildies.

Kalman · 09/25/06, 9:48 AM

Personally, after 6 tries I'm *this* close to survival. I missed learning attempts, so I only get one or two tries a week and then everyone laughs at my corpse. Again.

During slow phase, remember that (especially as a rogue) standing behind Heigan may not be safe - get to his side then go back to the back during the drag and dump energy.

During fast phase, remember that if you're going to eat an explosion, it needs to be an explosion on the leading edge, not the trailing - eat one trailing and you WILL eat the next one.

Greybone · 09/25/06, 9:49 AM

I finally survived on my third try, on my first I just sucked and on the second I went down from the platform prematurely. woo!
It's not that hard, but it requires people to understand how it works - especially that they have to be in front of everyone else due to the lag. If you run with everyone, they're probably way ahead of you, and you'll die.

Offcourse consumables help too for the first attempts for people :)

Kaubel · 09/25/06, 9:51 AM

Tell them to move out further from the platform. A lot of people stopped dying, myself included, once we moved out a bit.

The top path is bad. The bottom path is muey bueno.

♦ Praetorian · 09/25/06, 9:58 AM

There are some people who still die as often as not. And then we have people who never die. Thankfully I'm one of the latter or I think I'd lose all credibility with my guildmates. :(

For some people they just fall into it naturally. Others have some mistake, or some misconception, that always gets them killed. The most common causes of death in my opinion are being too slow to start moving (most deaths happen in the first 1-->2 transition) and overshooting into Zone 1 or Zone 4 at either end and then not being able to make it back in time.

Personally I found Elune Stones to be training wheels for this fight. Mark the safe spots just barely into zone 1/4 with beams of light and that will solve 90% of your overshooting problems. After that, it's just people hesitating or running too close to the platform where the zones are narrower, and so forth.

Copernicus · 09/25/06, 9:59 AM

Because of the way positioning and information gets transmitted, it's really easy to see why people are failing at the dance. Basicly...

Splash --pingdelay--> client --pingdelay--> character moves

If someone reacts instantly to seeing the splash and moves into the safe zone, it will still take twice their ping delay to move. I often see people get clipped as they're moving out, get all the way to the next safe spot, then die because the game finally caught up with their client. It's comparable to getting clipped by the frogger spawns. Client/server interaction is just ugly for such tight positioning.

Combined with the disconnections in the spawn room causing a guranteed wipe, and Heigan is 90% a test of client/server interaction.

Edit: Kaubel, your picture isn't showing up for non-EJ members I think.

TL-Seria · 09/25/06, 10:04 AM

After maybe 8 kills, it's always the same people that die. it's like rolling your tongue, either you can do it or you need someone to push your wheelchair between bosses.

♦ Praetorian · 09/25/06, 10:04 AM

Fixed.

Also, this:

Combined with the disconnections in the spawn room causing a guranteed wipe, and Heigan is 90% a test of client/server interaction.

Yes, this is the single worst thing about Heigan. Why the hell do the tunnel spawns have to pulse the zone into combat? I don't get it.

• Wodin · 09/25/06, 10:05 AM

Took me probably 6 kills to finally truly 100% never die.

I've discovered that for whatever reason that slight inebriation really does help too - you twitch and hesitate less.

Malan · 09/25/06, 10:09 AM

Does anyone else experience a progressively higher ping the closer to Heigan's room you get? I experience this nowhere else in the game. In Noth's room, ping is 90ms. By the time I get Heigan's doorway I'm at 1000ms and have too much lag to survive the lava dance.

berg · 09/25/06, 10:13 AM

No matter how good your ping is, on your end it should appear as though the entire raid is trailing behind you. If you see yourself moving with the pack, you are probably dead.

On the 2 ends I try to stop very close to the edge so that I can readjust and get my timing situated the way I am comfortable with so that I can just run through the 2 middle portions without stopping.

Also have your healers dps on the non dancing part. Healing burden is sooo low on this fight.

Edit: I must say though I feel bad for the poor SoR priests on this fight. It is so painfully obvious when they newb it up. Nothing worse than a giant angelic duncecap to broadcast your shame.

Ra · 09/25/06, 10:31 AM

Originally Posted by Wodin

Took me probably 6 kills to finally truly 100% never die.

I've discovered that for whatever reason that slight inebriation really does help too - you twitch and hesitate less.

Apparently Wodin has never had the teleport 20s before fast dance with paladin/druid/someotherworthlessclass

But pretty sure my guild still has the same 15 people die and the other 25 do the encounter by themselves after two transitions.

Warpony · 09/25/06, 10:36 AM

Kaubel: I've violated your picture and blatantly stole it, hope thats oki ;)

I made these two drawings based on it and i hope it'll help my next-to-retarded guild to learn this :p

Thanks for tips people, guess we'll keep trying :)

kais[bo] · 09/25/06, 10:40 AM

while talking about client/server interaction:
one important thing is to know how wow server/character movement updates work. to see it for yourself: mount up and autorun into a building and keep running, don't press any keys and see how long you stay mounted. then do the same but keep pressing strafe while you run in. you will see suddenly you get dismounted immediatly.
your position only updates about every 2.5s on the server IF you do not press a key. if you press any movement key, it updates right away. a lot of pepole auto run and get hit by bursts and then claim they were in the safe zone. they were, but not for the server. make sure your guys use the strafe keys or just let the forward key go and press it again.
the same is true for bombing on thaddius. you need to press/release keys so that the server updates your position and you do not hit ppl with your polarity while you are far ahead on your screen.

Elendril · 09/25/06, 10:44 AM

literally all you have to do is strafe. i keep autoshotting and multishotting during the dance and have still taken damage once in the past two months, which was blatantly due to lag :-P