So I successfully acted as the range tank for 25m Blood Princes since our warlocks are fail. I found it actually worked out quite well. I was able to grab huge amounts of aggro on the boss simply bc he is already in kill shot range. Also with disengage and the large amount of instants i was able to pick up the adds and they stayed on me like glue. Deterrence also worked on Keleseth's empowered shadow lances!

My question is if any other hunters tanked him on 25m and any other tricks or talents we could use to do it more efficiently.

Also an added bonus is I was able to just set my pet on a kinetic bomb, and my pet ALONE would keep it from hiting the ground. It was a pretty fun fight.


Mod note: Ongoing list of abilities per boss here.

I'm the tank for my guild on it and I generally don't have any trouble keeping a Nucleus on me full time just by a single auto shot. As such, I also respecced into a 1/55/15 specc to get both Survivalist and some extra 6 yards range which I found helped tremendously for gathering the Nuclei that were either far away, or saving a Kinetic Bomb or what else might need a shot (51 yards on Kill Shot is crazy fun at the end of the fight I found out when shooting a boss on the opposite side of the room much to the delight of my guildies that saw the shot). I generally do several tasks at once and will probably be focusing on doing more damage to the Empowered prince next time as threat is never an issue on Keleseth himself.
As for something else we also set up mages that focused on Kinetic Bombs and whenever they had spare time they would bring a Nucleus to me from the opposite side or so. Tanking with 7-8 of them at once was hilarious.

All in all, I love the fight, especially as a tank in it.

On the topic of hunter's Prince Keleseth tanking (Luponero & Zilir), may I ask whether you are using a dedicated stam/PVP gear to do the tanking? Or, regular 100% PVE gear is sufficient to do the task? Currently we are trying to use a DK to tank Keleseth, but it seems to be a little bit taxing on the tank as melee.

I tanked him in both 25 and 10 man version (10 man post-hotfix with earlier spawning Dark Nucleus), and used pretty much standard PVE-Gear except a Flask of Stoneblood and bracers enchanted with Fur Lining - Shadow Resist (which I normally use for orb duty on heroic Twin Val'kyrs). The only time you are in real danger is when Keleseth is empowered first after Valanar, though the hotfix pretty much made this a non-issue as the Dark Nuclei now start spawning as soon as the princes are engaged (instead of ~15-20 seconds into the fight). Watch out for Taladram's Conjure Empowered Flames in 10 man, it gibbed me a few times because there weren't enough people to soak the fire damage before it reached me (Deterrence works great here).

So, is the resistance granted by the dark nuclei quite enough to tank all the empowered shadow lances (even on 25-man)? Is deterrence needed to tank those lances? Because another poster (Luponero) mentioned that he used deterrence to tank empowered shadow lances (however, the duration is probably only enough to tank 2 of them at most).

Another question is, I am a bit confused on the dark nuclei's aggro table. Some mentioned that it uses regular agggro table (and as such, if someone wants to help bringing the nucleus to you, you have to surpass the carrier's initial aggro). Others mentioned that it is solely based on who hit the nucleus last, and as such 1 autoshot is probably enough to grab the nucleus from the carrier, no matter how big is the carrier's initial aggro.

Another thing is, does MM offer any special benefit to Keleseth tanking. The only thing I can think of is double-deterrence, but even then it is pretty limited. Otherwise, I will change to survival due to: higher HP, lack of JotW during non-invocation phase (fear of OOM), better kill shot (faster aggro boost during non-invocation phase).

You don't need Deterrence to tank the Empowered Shadow Lances (neither 25 nor 10), but it helps mitigating some of the damage spikes, like when you are targetted by the empowered version of Faladram's fire orb. As far as I could tell, the Dark Nuclei followed whomever damaged them last, so tagging them with an Auto or Arcane Shot works most of the time (unless someone DoTs them by accident... if that happens, they will reaggro after every DoT-tick until the DoT runs out).

I agree SV is probably better suited for the job, though frankly, every ranged DPS could tank them without too much effort.

I run with normal gear and a flask. Gives me about 31k+ health. Since you can easily manage to DPS the other bosses at the same time I felt this as the best way to go about it, especially on 10 man. With a disc priest by your side having 30k is not needed, at least when you're fast on getting nuclei, but it certainly helps for the empowered and at any time you might be targetted by an Empowered Fireball.

Although as I said in my earlier post I do have a special specc for it just to get extra range and health, both incredibly useful for the fight. I cannot imagine 3 better spent talent points than 3 in Hawk Eye for tanking this fight.

I tanked Keleseth on 25 and 10 man for my guild, both times I did nothing to change spec or gear. In 25 man I borrowed a tank's stoneblood flask and was sitting at about 29k HP with normal gear on, far more than enough. I easily kept at least 4 or 5 orbs on my the whole fight, and deterrance is always handy if things really go wrong (two deterrances with readiness).

There are difficult to reach orbs, however, and I had dedicated assistants (mages) help bring me out of reach orbs. This may be overkill for some guilds, but I at least found using a different spec or gear set entirely unecessary. Of course, if you already have a PvP or stamina set (say, for soloing raids as BM?), it wouldn't hurt to use it, as my effective damage done was maybe a percent of the raid's damage anyway.

On the subject of kinetic bombs, I hear talk you can put your pet on one full-time. I'm wondering, does it only attack the bomb when it gets near the ground, as if it were out of range when it's in the air? We seemed to have a problem if orbs got attacked too much, they'd hit the ceiling and blow up. If just putting your pet on an orb and forgetting about it for the duration works, I may have found fluffy a new job.

Edit:
Glyph of kill shot works wonders for threat on Keleseth.

yes your pet can solo keep up the kinetic bomb, the pet attacks it when it comes into melee range enough to send it back in the air. Dks and warlock pets do the same. So that will = more dps on the boss, just assign different pets to different orbs and set it and forget it.

As far as spec and talents are concerned. I did what others have done. I ran with normal grear / spec and just used a stoneblood flask. However with the recent changes to the fight it makes tanking it even easier! I would imagine the extra range would be a nice have, but there is no actual need to have talents to tank them.

Quick note on using pets for the kinetic bombs - keep an eye out for when your pet returns to the fight (ie: it's bomb target disappears). You'll have to re-target the next bomb that appears to send your pet onto this new one.

For 10m, you only need 2 pets to keep the kinetic bombs off the floor (as long as no-one dies). Not sure for 25m (as I wasn't counting in our 25m attempts)

I believe I counted 4 up at one time in our 25-Man attempts last week. I am not sure of the duration-per-bomb timer, however.

Keleseth Tanking

Last night in one of our ten mans, our top hunter attempted to tank Keleseth. The info I've found says that three orbs should make you "immune" in a sense to Keleseth, in terms of their damage reduction. The hunter had no problems tanking him when he wasn't empowered, but when he was, the hunter was still taking 26K+ damage from the empowered attack. Not being there, I don't have a log I can link. Is this normal or is there something else going on?

You actually don't need to allocate so many people to the orbs. For my guild, we just split the room in half, and assign a hunter to each half. When the first orb on your side starts to drop you can leave your pet on it. I've been able to juggle between three to four orbs alone.

You actually don't have to do much dps to the orbs, you just need to stop them hitting the ground. So put 4 - 7 shots on the orb, then switch to another orb that is low, and push that one up, then switch again. If an orb is far away, disengage to it. Picking up hawkeye for this helps a lot.

25k is about right if the hunter does not have 5 orbs or more on him. I was able to tank him through an empowered with 5 orbs up. I was taking an average of 6500 a hit with 5 orbs up and his normal ones tickled for < 2k with 5 orbs up. However, keep in mind with 5 orbs up he will be taking 5k every 3 seconds from the orbs.

However, as a side note we just ended up having our druid off-tank and warrior tank the 2 melee for the kill.

World of Logs - Real Time Raid Analysis

The point here is that "people" aren't allocated to the orbs.. pet's are, while the player continues to dps the boss(es) full time.

Thanks for the response. I think the most the hunter ever had on them was 4 so it sounds like it's just an issue of not having enough orbs and then of course understanding the DoT-like damage they'll be taking from the orbs.

To clarify the three orb rule, this was originally stated by guilds on the PTR to encompass the point at which keleseth's orbs are *survivable*.

With three orbs you'll be hit for around 26k shadow bolts, this is barely survivable by most 25 man hunters. If you're less than three, you can't take a hit. Ideally, you want more, the breaking point being around 7, three is merely the bare minimum you MUST have. In theory, you should pick as many up as possible, since even if you have 5, two could run out and you could be "one shot" before you can get more.

Thanks again for the clarifications and the formula. We have a lock do it in 25 man but obviously it's not possible to have a lock tanking him in all of our 10 mans as well.

I moved all these posts out of the Marksman thread. Let's keep the spec threads to things specific to each spec and discuss ICC strats and things here. However let's stick to useful information and not anecdotal "I did this too!" posts.

RE princes:
I've tanked this both on 25 & 10 man on my hunter (before the earlier spawn change) and also on 10 man on my prot warrior. No special gear used on my hunter at all, first time I did it on 10 man we only had two healers and was purely beacon healed. When Keleseth was the second to be empowered (first switch) I required a hand of sac, with 3 healers in 10 man/a second keeping an eye out on 25/just one and the early spawn change, there is no problem whatsoever being kept up by competent healers in normal PvE gear.

I would say tanking it on a prot warrior is a lot safer though, I took very little damage during empower and charge/intervene/intercept around the room was fine for mobility, also theres better cooldowns in case something goes wrong. This seems more a control fight than a dps one to me and on heroic having a proper tank (read war mainly) would prob be more advisable.

Blood queen:
Anyone know how the damage boosts work on this fight? I'm the first to get bitten in my guild and was wondering how much totts/t10 is worth when bitten, is a straight 15% boost on top or is it multiplicative? Assuming the later.

With princes our guild has a warlock tank the 25 man version. However, I tank it in 10 man. I do this wearing normal raid gear and using a dps flask. This gives me approximately 28k buffed hp (I get kings, fort, motw) which is more than enough to tank the bolts as long as you are good about picking up the dark orbs. If I was targettted by the empowered flame or had to run to pick up an orb across the room if I was getting low on orbs (4 or fewer) during empowered shadowbolts I would hit deterrance. Threat is a non issue if you use KS on cd. By setting Keleseth to your focus and using a macro for kill shot you can easily dps the other bosses when not grabbing orbs and maintain high threat.


With blood queen I observed that when I was bitten I had to reapply serpent to get the bite damage modifier. I then had to wait for another 2pc t10 proc and ask for tricks again to maximize my serpent sting. The damage from serpent was exactly double what it would be with the same buffs were present pre bite. For example, pre bite I get a set proc then ask for tricks I apply sting and it crits at 3k per tick, without those buffs it crits for roughly 2250. I am then bitten, it still crits for 3k per tick, I then reapply the sting and now it is critting for ~4500. On my next set proc I ask for tricks again and reapply serpent again and now it is critting at 6k per tick.

I am not sure if this answers the question at all really, but I am just trying to supply some anecdotal evidence fo what I have observed the behavior of serpent sting to be during the blood queen fight. I hope it helps.

Not sure how any of this is even relevant. Unless you have something new to say then don't say it. I wouldn't even be making this post except to answer this below question.



[20:07:04.698] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *2477*
[20:07:07.706] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *1981* (R: 195)
[20:07:08.689] Blood-Queen Lana'thel's Serpent Sting is refreshed by Bowjób
[20:07:08.848] Blood-Queen Lana'thel's Serpent Sting is refreshed by Bowjób
[20:07:10.855] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel 1084
[20:07:12.032] Blood-Queen Lana'thel's Serpent Sting is refreshed by Bowjób
[20:07:13.715] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *1954* (R: 192)
[20:07:14.289] Bowjób afflicted by Essence of the Blood Queen from Rokochan
[20:07:16.848] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *2444*
[20:07:18.884] Blood-Queen Lana'thel's Serpent Sting is refreshed by Bowjób
[20:07:19.068] Blood-Queen Lana'thel's Serpent Sting is refreshed by Bowjób
[20:07:19.766] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *2442* (R: 107)
[20:07:31.751] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *2442* (R: 107)
[20:07:42.747] Bowjób casts Serpent Sting on Blood-Queen Lana'thel
[20:07:43.170] Blood-Queen Lana'thel afflicted by Serpent Sting from Bowjób
[20:07:46.122] Bowjób Serpent Sting Blood-Queen Lana'thel *4256*

Note the damage of Serpent Sting was not increased after I was bit, nor was it increased when I refreshed with Chim. This means that Essence of the Blood Queen, like all other %dmg modifiers, requires Serpent to manually be reapplied.