Khlysti

We use the heal rotation built in to the LaVendetta Loatheb boss mob. Haven't had any problems with it in our kills, and lets me freely set the order as I wish.

 

Dayne

We dropped Loatheb for the first time last night, and it was left to each individual to figure out their best method for survival based on the dry runs we did in weeks previous. After a few runs with shadow pots to make sure we could last the entire 5 minutes, we went and got world buffs.

I used the method outlined in the OP, and it works wonderfully, I was in no danger of dying from the dooms at any point during the fight, and it was a sub 5 kill (barely). I also went ahead and used a nature pot to make damn sure my bandaging had no chance of getting interrupted.

 

Malan

You trust your guild members a hell of a lot more than I do. I would have have half the raid dead at Doom #2 if I did that.

Shitting up every single thread on EJ since '06

 

Dayne

Oh, make no mistake, there was a fair bit of theorycrafting before we ever got into Loatheb, so it wasn't just a 'figure it out for yourself'. Several folks had their own ideas of what would work, and in the end, we all just did what worked best for us. To make sure it would work, we did 3 runs with no dps buffs but using survivability consumables (Shadow pots, bandages, whipper root, etc) to make sure we could last the 5 minutes. The folks who died early in the first two shots identified what they did wrong, fixed their mistake, and we lasted through the third attempt.

The method in the OP certainly maximizes survivability, but some classes can get away with using much, much less. For example, Loatheb is a fight that the other MT tanks on. After we had a fire mage leave before the 'real' attempt, I went ahead and spec'd back to Fury for Loatheb only. Bloodthirst is somewhat overpowered if you can get all 5 charges in before the cooldown refreshes, since the heal portion crits as well... it mitigates an awful lot of damage from the doom. I'm sure other classes have their own tricks as well that could reduce their consumable usage.

It's alot better if folks just come in and do their job right without oversight from management. If people screw up, yell at 'em, eventually they'll stop.

IMHO, the method outlined in the OP is the best way to guarentee survivability, but it's also the most expensive.

 

Malan

Our guild has the unfortunate habit of people leaving raids early pretty frequently. I barely trust the attention span of some healers to last long enough through a boss fight, let alone to set up a macro when told to do so. (For point of reference, last night I had to spend 10 minutes explaining how to make a macro for the healers to auto-target the MT, cast Heal, and then re-target loatheb for DPS)

I like the mods that show the cooldowns for the healer's Corrupted Mind as well so that if things go wrong I can say "Oh look, Timmy fucked us in the ass by healing 10 seconds late on Rotation 1, so there was a gap on rotation 2." But yah, may end up having to go the route of the macros. Its just slow to build the list I think, I'd prefer something I could point/click to set up rapidly.

Shitting up every single thread on EJ since '06

 

Khlysti

La Vendetta lets you set up this list:


Only screenshot I could find was just after our first kill (hence the deaths) but gives CD remaining on debuff, you can see who left a badly timed gap, everyone can see the full order so if someone D/Cs they know to come in slightly early etc.

To set it up you click the setup option and boxes appear to the right of each healer entry, simply put a number in each with '1' as first. Also sends whispers 2 people in advance to warn to 'heal soon' and when the guy before you heals to 'heal now'.

 

Malan

Ok I'll pick it up. Does it also spam a warning in a channel like "Mystral Healed ===> Platonas go now!" ?

Shitting up every single thread on EJ since '06

 

Khlysti

By default you can set it to send to /ra or /rw, could change the lua files to any custom channels you want to though.

Equally you can have it send no spam at all (setting we use).

 

GSpot

Just wondering, can you use the Ultra-Flash Shadow Reflector to avoid this spell once?

 

Kruthal

Never done the fight, but if it works as the Fire Reflector trinket does, then no. My Fire Reflector hasn't reflected a single fire-spell from a boss ever, and I activate it each and every fight I wear FR-gear, as I have a macro to activate trinkets off cooldowns (I run with ToA and ToEP) and then shoot Shadowbolt.

 

discofiend

We had a couple rogues last time figure out that they could use no shadow protection pots or healing pots and live. They used bandages and health stones, but that was it.

key to doing it was, as i understand...

2 piece bonescythe bonus
stam food and good stam gear
making sure that they were not in the poison range when it ticked so that blessing of light healed them a lot

their damage was subpar, but it was "decent". Our guild has never used world buffs of any sort on loatheb, and in 6 kills has failed one time (due to a healer mess up early on which allowed us to reset with only 3 people dying, so only 3 shadow pots were wasted). This is one fight i feel that we do very well, and I'm consistently impressed with the way our rogues approach some things.

 

GSpot

Question #2, have people tried using well geared shadow priests to heal the MT (and melee dps) using VE?

I would think that if they time the VE curse correctly it can be reapplied to be up nearly 100% of the time. And with improved VE + the improved spell critical chance (for the VE) - I'm thinking that a Shadow Priest should have no problem pumping out enough damage for 5 minutes to heal through the imminent dooms and get some extra healing in on the MT at the same time.

 

• Falk

*Revivify*

Freakishly random thought, but it hit me today:-

Has anyone ever thought of using/tested http://www.thottbot.com/?i=52390 with Loatheb? Seems to me it'd be useful as an automated lightwell pinch hitter for random shit happening in the raid.

 

sp00n

Exceptional bad timing of course. :p
On the other side, the maximum life time would be 30 seconds, so I don't think it would be *that* useful. Depends on how much it is actually healing though, couldn't find anything in the combatlog.


Another issue, is there some kind of mod that announces what consumable you have to use on what doom? I've tried La Vendette, but for whatever reason it wouldn't show the announces, only the message for yourself appeared.

I was thinking of something like the following, seems quite simple, but I am not very familiar with LUA and I don't know if I could code such until tonight.

 

Plea

I used 2 small shadowpots, and a nature pot this week. Replaced one trinket with lifegiving gem too, and died to a poison tick right after loatheb died. If I had used last stand and/or shield walled a doom, itd be perfectly fine. All with 2h ms, and 5k base hp.

 

Lank

So if you had say, an extra 2 healers, could they be assigned to group heals? Ie. PoH or Tranq.
I guess thats so long as you have the dps to kill him.
But one additional priest or alternating Tranq on a druid could save ~5*4*5 (100) seconds worth of bandage time aswell as doing some dps.

 

Trindade

As far as I am aware, VE will proc the healing debuff, and will be dispelled by loatheb at his 30 second self cleanse.

 

• Arawethion

A Priest using VE won't be in tank rotation, so it just doesn't add to being better than another DPS.

Not everyone always has the class distribution they want, though. If you have a Shadow Priest, stick him with the Warlocks; it should bring up their DPS a good bit. The DPS of the Shadow Priest himself will be terrible, though. Mind Flay doesn't benefit from the spore debuff, so he'll barely be better than the Smite-spammers.

Answers to Moonkin questions:
0) Read the TTT/use the spreadsheet: http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t66856-moonkin_pve_dps/
1) Maintain high DoT uptime. Use WiseEclipse.
2) Nothing beats 2T8.
3) Yes, sometimes you cast many Wraths and no Eclipse procs. Deal with it.

 

Lank

I'm saying if you have already too many healers, they could be used for AE heals on their group, or switched through groups within the raid - or the MT group.. Saving bandage time and increasing dps overall.

 

tiberion02

we use a Shadowpriest in the MT group.


Its AMAZING.

http://www.ctprofiles.net/1600925
As you can see, our resident shadow priest has 540ish +damage gear, which is good, BUT hes a troll, so it kinda balances out.

He averages around 40k healing per loatheb, where the other 13 healers are in the rotation and doing only about 18-22k healing. He does a ton of healing, and a respectable amount of DPS at the same time. Thats insane. The constant HoT on the tank is a real nice breather in a fight where the Main Tank is rarely @100% health. Additionally, if your a warlock heavy guild, you can squeeze a decent dps increase with the shadow damage debuff.

Wouldnt trade a good shadowpriest on Loatheb for anything.

Borderlands: tiberion02, add me.

 

Necronis

I like our system, instead of a mod telling us to do it, one of our guild officers "gently" suggests we use potions/bandages when we should. Really, though.. Hamlet's system is the best.

http://ctprofiles.net/76408

 

• Arawethion

On the original topic, by the way, of proper consumable usage. I've made comments on most Loatheb threads whenever people mentioned funny consumable orders; I may as well put the full explanation here (mostly copied from what I put on guild forums a lot time ago). I'd hate the thought of people wiping earlier than they needed to be.

If you're new to the fight and not using Absorb Bandage Absorb Bandage Healthstone Bandage Absorb, read below.

(Yeah, this is sort of an "I'm right; listen to me" thing. I get that way when simple math is involved.)

---------------

Ok, so obviously you absorb Doom 1 with a GSPP. After that, you have two options for your other two GSPP's: Absorb Dooms 2 and 6, or Dooms 3 and 7.

If 2 and 6:
You can bandage after Dooms 3, 5, and 7. This leaves 4 for a Healthstone. You'll be dead before you can Healthstone again at Doom 9. Also, using a Bandage after Doom 7 might not be a good plan--the next Doom is coming just 15 seconds later.

If 3 and 7:
You can bandage after Dooms 2, 4, and 6. This leaves 5 for a Healthstone. In reality, though, you can use the Healthstone any time you want, since it's not sharing a cooldown with anything yet. When Doom 5 hits you at 4:10, you don't need to use it right away. If Doom 6 is going to kill you at 4:40, use the Healthstone right before -- this is the earliest you'll need to use it.

So, you can use a second (first) Healthstone between 2:10 and 2:30 or so, without endangering your future cooldown cycle. This will cover any damage you've taken beyond the first Shadow pot. But, since the most that can "Leak" through a Shadow Pot is 600, a Whipper Root Tuber is good enough. Sometimes even an NDB, which could be nice for mana.

-------------------

Doom does 2550 Shadow damage. A GSPP absorbs 1950-3250. Average 2600, then, and probably linearly distributed.

So, for a Mage (chosen because we take the worst damage pattern--no unusual advantages):

2:10 -- Minimum HP: -600. Average: +50. Maximum: +700 (full HP with 700 worth of Shadow Protection left).
2:11 -- use WRT or NDB. Min: 0. Avg: +50. Max: +700.
2:40 -- Min: -2550. Avg: -2500. Max: -1850.
2:41 -- Bandage. Min: -550. Avg: -500. Max: 0. Drink GSPP.
3:10 -- Min: -1150. Avg: -500+50. Max: +700.
3:40 -- Min: -3700. Avg: -3000. Max: -1850.
3:41 -- Bandage. Min: -1700. Avg: -1000. Max: 0.
4:10 -- Min: -4250. Avg: -3550. Max: -2550.
4:11 -- Major Healthstone (2/2). Min: -2810. Avg: -2110. Max: -390. ("Avg" = 50% of a HS crit. Whatever.)
4:40 -- Min: -5360. Avg: -4300. Max: -2940.
4:41 -- Bandage. Min: -3360. Avg: 2300. Max: -940. Drink GSPP.
5:10 -- Min: -3960. Avg: -2300+50. Max: -940+700.
5:25 -- Min: -6510. Avg: -4800. Max: -2790.
5:40 -- Max: -5340.

With Loatheb buffs, 5361 HP should not be hard for any class. Use that as a hard minimum, and nobody will die at the "danger point" of Doom 6. You can get by with even less, due to Troll's Blood. Barring mistakes, everyone should surivive Doom 7.

Anyone with 5900 HP and a Troll's Blood will survive Doom 8. I see no reason not to expect your raid to almost fully survive this.

Doom 9 will take out a bunch of people. The "luck factor" required to survive Doom 9 depends on you buffed you are, but some people will survive. Shield Wall and the remaining healers will let your tank run until Doom 10 for the lucky DPS to try to eke out a kill.

Answers to Moonkin questions:
0) Read the TTT/use the spreadsheet: http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t66856-moonkin_pve_dps/
1) Maintain high DoT uptime. Use WiseEclipse.
2) Nothing beats 2T8.
3) Yes, sometimes you cast many Wraths and no Eclipse procs. Deal with it.

 

Tharos

We tried using a VE priest on Loatheb. At first glance its decent, he was the one with the most effective healing. The damage the shadow priest did wasn't great since only mindblast can crit so pure for DPS i would have brought someone else. The big problem with the shadow priest though was the amount of debuff slots he needs to effectively heal those 30 seconds. To get the most out of it he would use 4:
- Vampiric Embrace
- Shadow Vulnerability
- Shadow word Pain
- Mindflay

This was what made us decide not to use a shadow priest with VE healing on this fight but just let him throw a heal and smite/mindblast.

Tharos | There are no stupid questions, just stupid people

 

Malan

Arawethion's rotation is terrific for keeping your raid up. This week we had all 3 world buffs and 2 of our fury warriors pulled aggro right at the start just from white damage auto attacking (they were in the 2nd spore group, so this was in the first 20 sec of the fight) one of them died from that, and then died again during execute range because he'd lost all his health buffs. We barely made the kill, but the great thing about this rotation was that every single person in the raid was alive at Doom 8, about 25 of us died on Doom 9, and the last 10 DPS brought loatheb down before Doom 10. (which then killed everyone except the MT when it ticked 2 seconds after the kill)

Shitting up every single thread on EJ since '06

 

• Falk

We've been using the Absorb Absorb Bandage Healthstone Bandage Absorb rotation, and it works for us- 2 bandages as opposed to 3 saves 8 seconds (more for melee) of DPS time, and not having to do anything further after the 4:00 doom allows us to, ad verbatim, "BURN HIS ASS GOGO" without any further distractions typically within the execute range- our fury warriors rape the living daylights out of him starting around 4:20ish.

Third kill two days ago was without any world buffs (raid/guild leader was curious as to whether we could do it - fully flasked casters though, so it was expensive shit; we expected to start attempts on Gothik after that) 4 dead at 5:00, 9 dead when he dropped. Very very scary shit. :S