Derigar/Tarinas
05 Jul 2008, 16:45
This is designed for people who want to know their specific role in the rift better (their role within this group anyway). If you are new to the rift and want to know what to expect, the best way to use this guide is to read the introduction to a section, then read your specific role in that fight. For reference, if you are along on day 1, you'll need to know everything up to and including Zogtark, for day 2, you'll need to know the rest of the guide.
Standard rules (assume true unless you hear otherwise)
For LM’s, the leader will assign a shape to each of you, remember it so you know which is your target to stun, this saves a lot of time as it doesn’t need to be explained continuously who is stunning what.
Ignore all orders not from the leader, fairly commonplace for someone to shout orders who isn’t the leader and really has no idea what they are talking about)
No using in-combat resses unless specifically told to, sucks to say it, but its true; some classes are expendable on bosses, wasting a res on them when it could be saved for a minstrel/LM could cause the attempt to fail)
Always follow the raid assist target (often shortened to RAT)
Troll/Troll keeper
Very common up until the second boss has been beaten. The troll attacks random players with AoE attacks until the troll master is killed, with the amount of damage he does increasing the further away from the troll master he is. So the best trick is to keep ‘balled up’ throughout, although keeping the squishy characters behind the troll will reduce their damage. Troll becomes a pushover once the keeper is dead.
Tanks: preferably 2, one sticks to Troll and one to Troll keeper. Although the one on the troll won’t be holding agro until the keeper dies, this stops him from going for the minstrels once the keeper is killed
Minstrels: Be prepared to heal a lot, AoE attacks that can easily hit for 2000 damage can really push you during this section, if you can apply the anthem of the free people before the fight, good, otherwise stick to being a heal bot for this fight as you won’t have much time for anything else
Others: If you’re attacking, go for keeper first, helps if LM/burg can put some debuffs on the troll to lessen the strain on the minstrels
Note, discussing alternative tactics for these guys, will edit if we discover they are better
Slave/Slave Master
Grouping these as they are typically found together. Slave is an Elite Master healer, can heal the enemies considerably. The slave master is without a doubt the biggest threat in the first part of the rift, perhaps in the rift in general. He has the ability to activate a buff on himself and anyone within about 10m of him that increases their damage output by 300%, which will wipe you if there are more than two or three hillmen (standard elite enemies) within range. Slave starts the green glowy thing when she is starting to heal, slave master says something like ‘I will put an end to you vermin!’ and has multiple thin lines moving towards him when he is starting the buff
Minstrels: Be careful healing too early as you can easily end up with 3 or 4 elites hitting you
LM: Most important role, two preferred. One LM on slave, one on slave master, keep them stunned throughout the fight
Burglar: backup stun for either LM, addle or riddle slave/slave master if you see them going into their animations
Champion: avoid AoE if master/slave are in range, otherwise be on the lookout for the animations on the enemies or signs that the LM’s are unable to do their job for whatever reason so you can clobber as needed to buy them some time.
Guardian: Usual business, tank as much as you can, be wary of the minstrels getting swarmed
Hunter: hit stuff, pull agro off of the minstrels if needed
Barz – Boots gem
First boss, probably 2nd toughest in the rift in general. The reason he is battled before Zurm is that the one you don’t kill first gets a new attack and the last thing we need is Barz with his extra attack. Barz himself is pretty easy, only two things you need to know about the big guy himself; he has two attacks he uses based on something he says (note that as sound can be buggy, check the text chat window and have standard chat turned on)
“NO POWER IS STRONGER THAN BARZ” - Barz will choose a target at random, often stunning them, run towards them, hit them once or twice (often draining power as well) then run back to whoever has agro (the tank). The trick is that if he is coming from you, don’t run away; stand your ground or move towards him. One risk is that he occasionally uses his second attack immediately after this one, which as you will see in a second, is very bad if he is in the middle of everyone
“I’LL GNAW YOUR BONES!” - The PUG killer. After saying this, you have about 5 seconds to get about 7m away from Barz (although just run about 20m to be safe) before he releases an AoE attack that does something like 2000 damage a second for 10 seconds. You can probably survive one hit, but really, you shouldn’t be hit by this at all.
Waves of adds come when Barz has the following morale
90k – a troll and troll keeper
70-75k – slave and hillmen
45k – slave, slave master, hillmen and pale folk
Guardian: One guardian chosen as main tank, his job is to keep Barz entertained away from the group (to avoid his ‘gnaw your bones’ attack catching people unaware). When a wave of adds appears, you stop attacking and run him round the room in a circle (just to the side of Barz is a sort of bridge, you run over this, then around the side back to the start and repeat, just go around and around until the others have killed all the enemies. Second guardian should just be tanking as many things as possible during the waves of adds
Hunter: Don’t attack Barz at first, let the guardian build up some agro, then just auto-attack for a bit before going into the skills. Typically worth using quickshot in endurance stance early on to build up a pool of anti-aggro. No using traps or rooting skills as this can interfere with the slave master.
Burglar: backup stunner for LM’s, debuff the troll to lessen strain on minstrels, throw an enrage on anything attacking the minstrel to peel it off, fairly standard fare.
Champion: Pretty much the same as the above description for how to handle the enemies with one exception. In the third wave you need to get the attention of the slave master as quickly as possible, clobbering as needed to stop the buff from going up and lure the enemy to the back of the room where (hopefully) no-one else should be. Keep him here until the LM can get him stunned
LM: Usual stuff, one LM on the slave in second and third waves, the other helping out with stuns when needed. For the third wave, the LM not on the slave needs to stun the slave master after the champ has taken it away from the group. Be aware that if the slave master does start to put the buff on, stun on the spot, anything to keep the animation from completing, then let the champ carry on taking him to the back of the room. You keep the slave stunned for the remainder of the fight (i.e., Barz will be killed before you kill the slave master). Also be prepared to anti-stun people who are defeated and therefore are hope wiped.
Minstrels: One focusing primarily on healing the main tank (usually situated in the square of girders by Barz). You won’t have to worry too much about healing the main tank during the waves of adds as he’ll just be kiting him around the room, just worry about minimising the agro you generate while keeping people alive. Remember to save Rally! for a target the leader chooses and not the first thing that dies.
Captain: Nothing specific, muster courage helps if a lot of people die to stop the fear cowering, otherwise keep the banners up and just kill stuff.
Zurm (aka Dave) – Boots gem
Second boss, like Barz except the main tank will keep his agro less. He has a few attacks, nothing as bad as Barz though. He has a ranged attack which targets the person with the second highest amount of agro, which is typically the same person for the entire fight. This attack stuns the target, so be aware of this. He has an attack that knocks players back and another that seemingly causes him to attack someone randomly a bit like Barz. To be honest, i don’t know these attacks too well because they are so unimportant, they hit for low damage and even the most underwhelmingly equipped member of your group could survive a hit or two from these attacks. Other than this, its the same as the Barz fight without fear of the “I’LL GNAW YOUR BONES!” attack. Same waves of adds at the same levels of morale, same rules apply for taking care of them. Only a few changes to the above strategy for Barz
LM: Should really try to keep the main tank and minstrel anti-stunned constantly. When you find out who is second on Dave's hate list and hence getting the ranged attacks, make sure they are anti-stunned as well.
Guardian : The main tank on Dave can throw on engage, this causes him to instantly go back to the tank instead of running to the ranged target and cause chaos in the middle of the group.
Zurm to Fruz
On the way to the next boss there are waves of Nemesis class enemies that run through the corridor every few minutes. As you enter the room, take the quests, move to the corner and wait for the enemies to come, then run as a group.
Fruz – Gloves gem
Probably the easiest boss in the rift. As you enter, move to the bottom left corner to avoid activating the boss (when he activates, the door closes and can lock people out of the fight). Waves of adds come down from the stairs (normal enemies once a minute), if any of them reach Fruz, they heal him for 1500 morale every 2 seconds, which is bad. If the fight takes too long (usually from a lot of adds reaching Fruz, he will start using very heavy hitting attacks randomly that can hit for close to 3000 damage.
Guardian: One as main tank, keep Fruz in the bottom right hand corner (where the chest is)
Minstrels: Heal away, probably best to stay near the corner where the group gathers before the fight
LM: Throw tar down by the stairs, stun/root adds as needed to give others time to kill them, if you need power, drain Fruz dry. Anti-stun main tank, also possibly the minstrels if you have time
Hunters/Champion: Primarily kill the adds, swap back to DPSing Fruz in-between the waves
Burglar: Debuff Fruz, then pretty much do whatever is needed (hit Fruz or kill adds)
Captain: DPS Fruz
Fruz to Zogtark
Next section, when you come to the collapsed wall that leads into the big open room full of drakes, everyone keeps back from the wall and the main tank runs in, he’ll grab the attention of a bundle of enemies and bring them all back, the group kills them, then the guard goes out for me, repeat until most of the enemies are gone or its just the drakes left.
Zogtark– leggings gem
Another easy one, as long as you handle the drakes correctly. As you approach the drakes, a bunch of worms appear. After you kill these and start working on the drakes, the boss activates and comes over to join the fun. When the drakes get down to 20k morale, typically around the time the boss activates, they start moving towards the platform that Zogtark was standing on (note: they do not attack anyone the way), if they get there, they fly into the air and start raining down fireballs on everyone that deal 1500+ per hit. They land periodically after being in the air for a while. Kill them, then kill the boss.
Guardians: At the start, run over and start tanking a drake each, keep this up until the boss activates. At this stage, the one declared as main tank will get his agro and run to the corner of the room far away from the others (where the drake was fighting those orcs earlier). This should keep you out of range of the drakes fireballs so you can tank the boss in peace. Second guardian will tank the drakes if they haven’t started moving towards the flying spot, otherwise just generate agro so hopefully the drakes will fireball you rather than the others.
Hunters: Your time to shine. After killing the worms, DPS the marked drake in the hope of killing one before it has the chance to fly off. When one (or both) take off, you are still in range to hit them, so go all out and take them down.
LM: Crowd control on the worms initially, then tar/slow the target drake as much as you can to try and kill him before he takes off.
Burglar: Backup stunner, use DiTE on the drake (AoE to get both is preferred) to slow, otherwise you are useless until the drakes are killed (no using enrage on the drake, that causes a whole load of issues).
Minstrels: Each minstrel is assigned a guardian to heal, the one assigned to the main tank will run off with him when he starts tanking the boss, only coming back to heal others if the other minstrel is struggling to heal the rest of the group alone.
Others: Follow the raid assist window to kill the worms as quickly as possible. Once they are down, target the marked drake with everything you have to try and take him down before he reaches the spot where he takes off. If you suceed, then swap to the other one. When either one or two of them take off, champions should use their bow to keep fighting while captains should heal if needed and ensure all the buffs are still up. After this, go DPS Zogtark.
Zogtark to Narnulubat
On the way to the next boss you have to be aware of a few things. The bridge is hot, it does about 200 damage every 3 seconds so avoid staying on it for too long. When you reach the next platform, stay behind the leader who will lead you to the right of the platform. The reason for this are the fumeroles. These are Elite Master volcanoes that are immune to cry type attacks and activate when you approach them. If you agro 2 it can easily wipe the group. This is because they summon urfons, little balls of fire that cause fire damage from just being near them and reflect 100% of the damage you deal them back to you, so too many of these can kill you just by you trying to kill them.
Champion: clobber clobber clobber that fumerole non-stop, this stops the urfons from appearing
LM/Burglar: Stun the waves of orcs that come by. Burgs can traited enrage them to drag them into melee afterwards if its needed, although the hunters should be enough.
Others: Kill the fumerole as fast as possible. No-one run off to fight the orcs as you will kill the group
Narnulubat – Chest gem
Can be a tough fight for the minstrels as this guy can really hit hard unlike the other bosses. Group splits into three groups, one to keep Narnulubat busy, another group to kill the darklings (this group is split in two again, one to cover the left side darklings, the other to kill the right side darklings) – they are evil slugs that are trying to reach the middle of the room at which point them transform into Elite summoned world eaters Note: never ever stun/mes/root/tar the darklings, this causes very bad things to happen – usually them teleporting straight to the hole and transforming into elite enemies. The third group goes around killing the seers, these guys don’t actually fight back, they just have a lot of morale so take a while to kill. After they are dead, darklings come out two at a time, so becomes a bit harder.
Guardians: One as main tank keeping Narnulubat occupied, the other DPSing the seers. Avoid damaging Narnulubat too much while tanking him as like the urfons, he reflects back 100% of the damage you deal him, which just makes it harder for the minstrel to keep you alive (especially as this guy hits extremely hard compared to pretty much all the other rift bosses).
LM: One LM watching the main tank continuously for wounds, these need to be removed fast or the minstrel will not be able to keep up with healing the tank. The other needs to watch the darkling killing groups to keep them powered and help them kill if needed. When the seers are dead, join one of the darkling killing groups for the remainder of the fight, only stopping to restore power to the group or remove wounds from the main tank.
Minstrels: One healing main tank and nothing else (yes, he really does take this much damage), the other heals everyone else and occasionally helps healing the main tank as no-one else really takes that much damage.
Champion/Captain: Typically you’ll be killing the darklings (darkling killing groups usually made up of 2 characters in each, both Captains and two others)
Stone Biter/Shadow Eater - no gem
Nemesis and Arch-Nemesis pair, darklings as well. Same as last group, darklings need to be killed before they get a chance to transform. Trick is they need to be killed as close to each other as possible or they summon 2 elite enemies every 5 or so seconds.
Guardians: 2 preferred, but just 2 tanks are needed. One assigned to each boss, the nemesis boss is kept in the room he starts while the other is taken away to the corner of the room next to the waterfall (chosen so both tanks are in range of the healers). When the group is not attacking your target, try to keep damage output low as controlling their morale is important in this fight
Hunter: DPS the Arch-Nemesis down to about 10k morale, at this point, switch to the Nemesis and take him down to about 5k, then back to the AN until he is at 5k, then bounce back and forward so you kill them both at about the same time
Champion: DPS enemies, keep an eye out for darklings. When one of the bosses (i forget which) gets a shadowy aura around him, clobber him, this attack drains power from the group so needs to be stopped quickly.
Burglar/LM: Stun any extra enemies that come along, LM keep the minstrels and guardians powered up, apart from this DPS
Captain: DPS, switch to darklings immediately when you see them
Minstrels: Each assigned a tank that is their main focus for healing, most other characters shouldn’t need healing but just be aware of their morale.
Thrang – Helmet gem
Due to the length of this fight, i decided it would be best to split it up into sections to make it easier to understand what happens at each various stage. This is easily the most complex fight in the rift so far and rivals Barz for second toughest boss overall (i think we can all agree there would be something very wrong if the rog wasn't the toughest boss down here). I'd recommend rearranging the fellowships so the people in the left hole are in one group and the people in the right hole are in another group as this makes healing a whole lot easier (this will make sense later)
Stage 1: The first 4 waves of adds
When the fight starts and someone is off taking care of Eimyr, 4 waves of enemies will come down the staircases, usually evenly split down both, but fairly randomly they may all go down one side, likely linked to someone generating agro before they get to the stairs. Only point I'd emphasise is to make sure on the 4th wave (you'll know its the last wave in this section as its the only one with summoners in it) is that once the last summoner dies, stage 2 of the fight begins, regardless of the number of worms out so make sure you kill them first
Guardian: One of you needs to move across to the island left of the staircases and keep Eimyr here with your back to the wall so you do not get knocked into the lava in the middle of the room. If he gets too far away from you, he will start throwing rocks at the party which can instantly kill people. Also, if he gets onto the staircase he can apparently wipe the entire raid instantly, so just keep him on the island with you. The second guardian (or off-tank) needs to just agro the waves of enemies and keep them off the minstrels
Minstrels: One follows the main tank and keeps him healed up, the other heals the rest of the group (they take pretty low damage if the enemies are cc'd properly). Again, just try to keep your agro low, keep anthem of compassion up as much as possible and use song of soothing whenever you have the opportunity. Also keep note of how many enemies are left so you don't heal just a second or two after a new wave appears, as this can get you killed.
LM: Generally as the enemies come down both staircases, you want one watching each staircase stunning the appropriate targets in each wave (ranged units in the first wave, elite masters in the second and third and most importantly the summoners in the fourth wave). Also watch out for the power of the main tank, feel free to drain Eimyr if needed as he has something like 18'000 power. When you are down to the last summoner, if he successfully
Burglar: Backup stunner for the LM's, other than that just use tricks (AoE DiTE is probably the best due to numbers). Addle summoners where possible, DPS in-between
The rest: DPS the active enemies, making sure to avoid breaking stuns, especially in the fourth wave. If the last summoner summons a worm, immediately stop hitting him, let the LM restun him and you switch to the worm, kill it, then go back to killing the summoner. Worth the champ using clobber to try to interrupt the summon, but it does happen quickly so is easy to miss if you're not spamming the skill.
Stage 2: The 5th wave of adds - the shamans
The group splits up into the two holes by the stairs here to stop the shamans from healing each other up to full morale. The staircases are referred to as left and right from the perspective of being on the floor looking up at the entrance to the room.
http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/8826/stairsqi2.png
Minstrels : one goes to the left hole, one to the right. The one in the left hole will have a hard time keeping the guardians healed and not taking agro, so make sure you use song of soothing whenever you get a chance. If you are at the back, you shouldn't get hit by Thrang's arrows. After the people in the right hole kill their shaman and the off-tank brings the next one over, remember that the minstrel in the right hole has someone new to heal.
Guardians: Both to the left hole (or one guard, one captain/champ) when you get the agro of 3 of the 4 shamans between you (do this as fast as possible and be aware especially at the start of this fight that the minstrels have a high chance of taking the agro off of you). The main tank needs to keep agro on two of the shamans while the off-tank only needs to keep agro on one. When the people on the other side have defeated their shaman, you have to tank the shaman over to their hole (make sure he is following you). When he is dead, run with the rest of the people in your hole over to the left hole to kill the last two shaman
LM: One in the left hole, one in the right hole. The one in the left hole needs to watch the power level of the minstrel and the guardians closely, both LM's also need to watch out for a nasty wound Thrang does which deals 500 damage every 3 seconds and remove it quickly
The rest: Go to the right hole and DPS the shaman to death, wait for the off-tank to bring the second shaman over to you then kill that one. After this, leave the hole and go join the people in the left hole to kill the last two shaman
Stage 3: Thrang
Stage 2 is the real tricky part of this fight, its fairly simple after that, albeit long. Once the last shaman dies, everyone run out of the hole and onto the island on your right (jumping over the lava) with your backs to the wall. Theres no point attacking Thrang until the protection buff he has is gone, as it negates 99% of the damage done to him (heart-seeker for example will hit for under 100 damage)
LM: Essential to keep the main tank anti-stunned for the entire fight, other than that just watch the power levels of the minstrels in particular as this fight has a habit of dragging on for a long time. No using Tar or slowing skills as the fight is based on Thrang being able to keep up with the main tank
Guardians: The main tank needs to drag Thrang to a fumerole. 5 seconds after getting into range it will explode, deal 1500 damage and stun anyone in range. This explosion allows the raid to do damage to Thrang for 15 seconds, so just stand still hitting him for a bit to allow the melee units to get in close to attack. After this, move on to the next fumerole and repeat until he is dead (about 10-15 minutes)
Minstrels: One of you primarily heal the main tank while the other heals the group and helps out on the main tank if needed. Both watch your power levels as this is a long fight with heavy healing required. If the main healer takes agro from Thrang, then the two minstrels need to swap roles and the main minstrel needs to use song of soothing/anthem of compassion immediately.
Burglar: Same as the rest (so make sure you read that part as well), just making a note about FM's. If you are going to open one, unless you are extremely low on power, make it YYYYYY and only use it when Thrang is vulnerable to keep the effect even if Thrang gets his protection back.
The rest: Stand back from the fumeroles/Thrang until a fumerole explodes next to Thrang and he gets the vulnerable symbol by his name, which looks like an arrow through a foot (Achilles heel :) ). When you see this, and only when you see this, you can attack him. Melee units need to watch out for getting close to an exploding fumerole which will deal over 1500 damage to anyone nearby and stun you, also Thrang has an AoE stun attack you should be aware of. If you are low on morale, just back off for a bit and let the minstrels heal you before charging back in. Avoid slowing skills or auto-attacking when Thrang is protected as this can make him miss the exploding fumerole and in general it just makes everything take much longer. Needless to say, if you don't need to get close to Thrang, then stay right back with the minstrels
Standard rules (assume true unless you hear otherwise)
For LM’s, the leader will assign a shape to each of you, remember it so you know which is your target to stun, this saves a lot of time as it doesn’t need to be explained continuously who is stunning what.
Ignore all orders not from the leader, fairly commonplace for someone to shout orders who isn’t the leader and really has no idea what they are talking about)
No using in-combat resses unless specifically told to, sucks to say it, but its true; some classes are expendable on bosses, wasting a res on them when it could be saved for a minstrel/LM could cause the attempt to fail)
Always follow the raid assist target (often shortened to RAT)
Troll/Troll keeper
Very common up until the second boss has been beaten. The troll attacks random players with AoE attacks until the troll master is killed, with the amount of damage he does increasing the further away from the troll master he is. So the best trick is to keep ‘balled up’ throughout, although keeping the squishy characters behind the troll will reduce their damage. Troll becomes a pushover once the keeper is dead.
Tanks: preferably 2, one sticks to Troll and one to Troll keeper. Although the one on the troll won’t be holding agro until the keeper dies, this stops him from going for the minstrels once the keeper is killed
Minstrels: Be prepared to heal a lot, AoE attacks that can easily hit for 2000 damage can really push you during this section, if you can apply the anthem of the free people before the fight, good, otherwise stick to being a heal bot for this fight as you won’t have much time for anything else
Others: If you’re attacking, go for keeper first, helps if LM/burg can put some debuffs on the troll to lessen the strain on the minstrels
Note, discussing alternative tactics for these guys, will edit if we discover they are better
Slave/Slave Master
Grouping these as they are typically found together. Slave is an Elite Master healer, can heal the enemies considerably. The slave master is without a doubt the biggest threat in the first part of the rift, perhaps in the rift in general. He has the ability to activate a buff on himself and anyone within about 10m of him that increases their damage output by 300%, which will wipe you if there are more than two or three hillmen (standard elite enemies) within range. Slave starts the green glowy thing when she is starting to heal, slave master says something like ‘I will put an end to you vermin!’ and has multiple thin lines moving towards him when he is starting the buff
Minstrels: Be careful healing too early as you can easily end up with 3 or 4 elites hitting you
LM: Most important role, two preferred. One LM on slave, one on slave master, keep them stunned throughout the fight
Burglar: backup stun for either LM, addle or riddle slave/slave master if you see them going into their animations
Champion: avoid AoE if master/slave are in range, otherwise be on the lookout for the animations on the enemies or signs that the LM’s are unable to do their job for whatever reason so you can clobber as needed to buy them some time.
Guardian: Usual business, tank as much as you can, be wary of the minstrels getting swarmed
Hunter: hit stuff, pull agro off of the minstrels if needed
Barz – Boots gem
First boss, probably 2nd toughest in the rift in general. The reason he is battled before Zurm is that the one you don’t kill first gets a new attack and the last thing we need is Barz with his extra attack. Barz himself is pretty easy, only two things you need to know about the big guy himself; he has two attacks he uses based on something he says (note that as sound can be buggy, check the text chat window and have standard chat turned on)
“NO POWER IS STRONGER THAN BARZ” - Barz will choose a target at random, often stunning them, run towards them, hit them once or twice (often draining power as well) then run back to whoever has agro (the tank). The trick is that if he is coming from you, don’t run away; stand your ground or move towards him. One risk is that he occasionally uses his second attack immediately after this one, which as you will see in a second, is very bad if he is in the middle of everyone
“I’LL GNAW YOUR BONES!” - The PUG killer. After saying this, you have about 5 seconds to get about 7m away from Barz (although just run about 20m to be safe) before he releases an AoE attack that does something like 2000 damage a second for 10 seconds. You can probably survive one hit, but really, you shouldn’t be hit by this at all.
Waves of adds come when Barz has the following morale
90k – a troll and troll keeper
70-75k – slave and hillmen
45k – slave, slave master, hillmen and pale folk
Guardian: One guardian chosen as main tank, his job is to keep Barz entertained away from the group (to avoid his ‘gnaw your bones’ attack catching people unaware). When a wave of adds appears, you stop attacking and run him round the room in a circle (just to the side of Barz is a sort of bridge, you run over this, then around the side back to the start and repeat, just go around and around until the others have killed all the enemies. Second guardian should just be tanking as many things as possible during the waves of adds
Hunter: Don’t attack Barz at first, let the guardian build up some agro, then just auto-attack for a bit before going into the skills. Typically worth using quickshot in endurance stance early on to build up a pool of anti-aggro. No using traps or rooting skills as this can interfere with the slave master.
Burglar: backup stunner for LM’s, debuff the troll to lessen strain on minstrels, throw an enrage on anything attacking the minstrel to peel it off, fairly standard fare.
Champion: Pretty much the same as the above description for how to handle the enemies with one exception. In the third wave you need to get the attention of the slave master as quickly as possible, clobbering as needed to stop the buff from going up and lure the enemy to the back of the room where (hopefully) no-one else should be. Keep him here until the LM can get him stunned
LM: Usual stuff, one LM on the slave in second and third waves, the other helping out with stuns when needed. For the third wave, the LM not on the slave needs to stun the slave master after the champ has taken it away from the group. Be aware that if the slave master does start to put the buff on, stun on the spot, anything to keep the animation from completing, then let the champ carry on taking him to the back of the room. You keep the slave stunned for the remainder of the fight (i.e., Barz will be killed before you kill the slave master). Also be prepared to anti-stun people who are defeated and therefore are hope wiped.
Minstrels: One focusing primarily on healing the main tank (usually situated in the square of girders by Barz). You won’t have to worry too much about healing the main tank during the waves of adds as he’ll just be kiting him around the room, just worry about minimising the agro you generate while keeping people alive. Remember to save Rally! for a target the leader chooses and not the first thing that dies.
Captain: Nothing specific, muster courage helps if a lot of people die to stop the fear cowering, otherwise keep the banners up and just kill stuff.
Zurm (aka Dave) – Boots gem
Second boss, like Barz except the main tank will keep his agro less. He has a few attacks, nothing as bad as Barz though. He has a ranged attack which targets the person with the second highest amount of agro, which is typically the same person for the entire fight. This attack stuns the target, so be aware of this. He has an attack that knocks players back and another that seemingly causes him to attack someone randomly a bit like Barz. To be honest, i don’t know these attacks too well because they are so unimportant, they hit for low damage and even the most underwhelmingly equipped member of your group could survive a hit or two from these attacks. Other than this, its the same as the Barz fight without fear of the “I’LL GNAW YOUR BONES!” attack. Same waves of adds at the same levels of morale, same rules apply for taking care of them. Only a few changes to the above strategy for Barz
LM: Should really try to keep the main tank and minstrel anti-stunned constantly. When you find out who is second on Dave's hate list and hence getting the ranged attacks, make sure they are anti-stunned as well.
Guardian : The main tank on Dave can throw on engage, this causes him to instantly go back to the tank instead of running to the ranged target and cause chaos in the middle of the group.
Zurm to Fruz
On the way to the next boss there are waves of Nemesis class enemies that run through the corridor every few minutes. As you enter the room, take the quests, move to the corner and wait for the enemies to come, then run as a group.
Fruz – Gloves gem
Probably the easiest boss in the rift. As you enter, move to the bottom left corner to avoid activating the boss (when he activates, the door closes and can lock people out of the fight). Waves of adds come down from the stairs (normal enemies once a minute), if any of them reach Fruz, they heal him for 1500 morale every 2 seconds, which is bad. If the fight takes too long (usually from a lot of adds reaching Fruz, he will start using very heavy hitting attacks randomly that can hit for close to 3000 damage.
Guardian: One as main tank, keep Fruz in the bottom right hand corner (where the chest is)
Minstrels: Heal away, probably best to stay near the corner where the group gathers before the fight
LM: Throw tar down by the stairs, stun/root adds as needed to give others time to kill them, if you need power, drain Fruz dry. Anti-stun main tank, also possibly the minstrels if you have time
Hunters/Champion: Primarily kill the adds, swap back to DPSing Fruz in-between the waves
Burglar: Debuff Fruz, then pretty much do whatever is needed (hit Fruz or kill adds)
Captain: DPS Fruz
Fruz to Zogtark
Next section, when you come to the collapsed wall that leads into the big open room full of drakes, everyone keeps back from the wall and the main tank runs in, he’ll grab the attention of a bundle of enemies and bring them all back, the group kills them, then the guard goes out for me, repeat until most of the enemies are gone or its just the drakes left.
Zogtark– leggings gem
Another easy one, as long as you handle the drakes correctly. As you approach the drakes, a bunch of worms appear. After you kill these and start working on the drakes, the boss activates and comes over to join the fun. When the drakes get down to 20k morale, typically around the time the boss activates, they start moving towards the platform that Zogtark was standing on (note: they do not attack anyone the way), if they get there, they fly into the air and start raining down fireballs on everyone that deal 1500+ per hit. They land periodically after being in the air for a while. Kill them, then kill the boss.
Guardians: At the start, run over and start tanking a drake each, keep this up until the boss activates. At this stage, the one declared as main tank will get his agro and run to the corner of the room far away from the others (where the drake was fighting those orcs earlier). This should keep you out of range of the drakes fireballs so you can tank the boss in peace. Second guardian will tank the drakes if they haven’t started moving towards the flying spot, otherwise just generate agro so hopefully the drakes will fireball you rather than the others.
Hunters: Your time to shine. After killing the worms, DPS the marked drake in the hope of killing one before it has the chance to fly off. When one (or both) take off, you are still in range to hit them, so go all out and take them down.
LM: Crowd control on the worms initially, then tar/slow the target drake as much as you can to try and kill him before he takes off.
Burglar: Backup stunner, use DiTE on the drake (AoE to get both is preferred) to slow, otherwise you are useless until the drakes are killed (no using enrage on the drake, that causes a whole load of issues).
Minstrels: Each minstrel is assigned a guardian to heal, the one assigned to the main tank will run off with him when he starts tanking the boss, only coming back to heal others if the other minstrel is struggling to heal the rest of the group alone.
Others: Follow the raid assist window to kill the worms as quickly as possible. Once they are down, target the marked drake with everything you have to try and take him down before he reaches the spot where he takes off. If you suceed, then swap to the other one. When either one or two of them take off, champions should use their bow to keep fighting while captains should heal if needed and ensure all the buffs are still up. After this, go DPS Zogtark.
Zogtark to Narnulubat
On the way to the next boss you have to be aware of a few things. The bridge is hot, it does about 200 damage every 3 seconds so avoid staying on it for too long. When you reach the next platform, stay behind the leader who will lead you to the right of the platform. The reason for this are the fumeroles. These are Elite Master volcanoes that are immune to cry type attacks and activate when you approach them. If you agro 2 it can easily wipe the group. This is because they summon urfons, little balls of fire that cause fire damage from just being near them and reflect 100% of the damage you deal them back to you, so too many of these can kill you just by you trying to kill them.
Champion: clobber clobber clobber that fumerole non-stop, this stops the urfons from appearing
LM/Burglar: Stun the waves of orcs that come by. Burgs can traited enrage them to drag them into melee afterwards if its needed, although the hunters should be enough.
Others: Kill the fumerole as fast as possible. No-one run off to fight the orcs as you will kill the group
Narnulubat – Chest gem
Can be a tough fight for the minstrels as this guy can really hit hard unlike the other bosses. Group splits into three groups, one to keep Narnulubat busy, another group to kill the darklings (this group is split in two again, one to cover the left side darklings, the other to kill the right side darklings) – they are evil slugs that are trying to reach the middle of the room at which point them transform into Elite summoned world eaters Note: never ever stun/mes/root/tar the darklings, this causes very bad things to happen – usually them teleporting straight to the hole and transforming into elite enemies. The third group goes around killing the seers, these guys don’t actually fight back, they just have a lot of morale so take a while to kill. After they are dead, darklings come out two at a time, so becomes a bit harder.
Guardians: One as main tank keeping Narnulubat occupied, the other DPSing the seers. Avoid damaging Narnulubat too much while tanking him as like the urfons, he reflects back 100% of the damage you deal him, which just makes it harder for the minstrel to keep you alive (especially as this guy hits extremely hard compared to pretty much all the other rift bosses).
LM: One LM watching the main tank continuously for wounds, these need to be removed fast or the minstrel will not be able to keep up with healing the tank. The other needs to watch the darkling killing groups to keep them powered and help them kill if needed. When the seers are dead, join one of the darkling killing groups for the remainder of the fight, only stopping to restore power to the group or remove wounds from the main tank.
Minstrels: One healing main tank and nothing else (yes, he really does take this much damage), the other heals everyone else and occasionally helps healing the main tank as no-one else really takes that much damage.
Champion/Captain: Typically you’ll be killing the darklings (darkling killing groups usually made up of 2 characters in each, both Captains and two others)
Stone Biter/Shadow Eater - no gem
Nemesis and Arch-Nemesis pair, darklings as well. Same as last group, darklings need to be killed before they get a chance to transform. Trick is they need to be killed as close to each other as possible or they summon 2 elite enemies every 5 or so seconds.
Guardians: 2 preferred, but just 2 tanks are needed. One assigned to each boss, the nemesis boss is kept in the room he starts while the other is taken away to the corner of the room next to the waterfall (chosen so both tanks are in range of the healers). When the group is not attacking your target, try to keep damage output low as controlling their morale is important in this fight
Hunter: DPS the Arch-Nemesis down to about 10k morale, at this point, switch to the Nemesis and take him down to about 5k, then back to the AN until he is at 5k, then bounce back and forward so you kill them both at about the same time
Champion: DPS enemies, keep an eye out for darklings. When one of the bosses (i forget which) gets a shadowy aura around him, clobber him, this attack drains power from the group so needs to be stopped quickly.
Burglar/LM: Stun any extra enemies that come along, LM keep the minstrels and guardians powered up, apart from this DPS
Captain: DPS, switch to darklings immediately when you see them
Minstrels: Each assigned a tank that is their main focus for healing, most other characters shouldn’t need healing but just be aware of their morale.
Thrang – Helmet gem
Due to the length of this fight, i decided it would be best to split it up into sections to make it easier to understand what happens at each various stage. This is easily the most complex fight in the rift so far and rivals Barz for second toughest boss overall (i think we can all agree there would be something very wrong if the rog wasn't the toughest boss down here). I'd recommend rearranging the fellowships so the people in the left hole are in one group and the people in the right hole are in another group as this makes healing a whole lot easier (this will make sense later)
Stage 1: The first 4 waves of adds
When the fight starts and someone is off taking care of Eimyr, 4 waves of enemies will come down the staircases, usually evenly split down both, but fairly randomly they may all go down one side, likely linked to someone generating agro before they get to the stairs. Only point I'd emphasise is to make sure on the 4th wave (you'll know its the last wave in this section as its the only one with summoners in it) is that once the last summoner dies, stage 2 of the fight begins, regardless of the number of worms out so make sure you kill them first
Guardian: One of you needs to move across to the island left of the staircases and keep Eimyr here with your back to the wall so you do not get knocked into the lava in the middle of the room. If he gets too far away from you, he will start throwing rocks at the party which can instantly kill people. Also, if he gets onto the staircase he can apparently wipe the entire raid instantly, so just keep him on the island with you. The second guardian (or off-tank) needs to just agro the waves of enemies and keep them off the minstrels
Minstrels: One follows the main tank and keeps him healed up, the other heals the rest of the group (they take pretty low damage if the enemies are cc'd properly). Again, just try to keep your agro low, keep anthem of compassion up as much as possible and use song of soothing whenever you have the opportunity. Also keep note of how many enemies are left so you don't heal just a second or two after a new wave appears, as this can get you killed.
LM: Generally as the enemies come down both staircases, you want one watching each staircase stunning the appropriate targets in each wave (ranged units in the first wave, elite masters in the second and third and most importantly the summoners in the fourth wave). Also watch out for the power of the main tank, feel free to drain Eimyr if needed as he has something like 18'000 power. When you are down to the last summoner, if he successfully
Burglar: Backup stunner for the LM's, other than that just use tricks (AoE DiTE is probably the best due to numbers). Addle summoners where possible, DPS in-between
The rest: DPS the active enemies, making sure to avoid breaking stuns, especially in the fourth wave. If the last summoner summons a worm, immediately stop hitting him, let the LM restun him and you switch to the worm, kill it, then go back to killing the summoner. Worth the champ using clobber to try to interrupt the summon, but it does happen quickly so is easy to miss if you're not spamming the skill.
Stage 2: The 5th wave of adds - the shamans
The group splits up into the two holes by the stairs here to stop the shamans from healing each other up to full morale. The staircases are referred to as left and right from the perspective of being on the floor looking up at the entrance to the room.
http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/8826/stairsqi2.png
Minstrels : one goes to the left hole, one to the right. The one in the left hole will have a hard time keeping the guardians healed and not taking agro, so make sure you use song of soothing whenever you get a chance. If you are at the back, you shouldn't get hit by Thrang's arrows. After the people in the right hole kill their shaman and the off-tank brings the next one over, remember that the minstrel in the right hole has someone new to heal.
Guardians: Both to the left hole (or one guard, one captain/champ) when you get the agro of 3 of the 4 shamans between you (do this as fast as possible and be aware especially at the start of this fight that the minstrels have a high chance of taking the agro off of you). The main tank needs to keep agro on two of the shamans while the off-tank only needs to keep agro on one. When the people on the other side have defeated their shaman, you have to tank the shaman over to their hole (make sure he is following you). When he is dead, run with the rest of the people in your hole over to the left hole to kill the last two shaman
LM: One in the left hole, one in the right hole. The one in the left hole needs to watch the power level of the minstrel and the guardians closely, both LM's also need to watch out for a nasty wound Thrang does which deals 500 damage every 3 seconds and remove it quickly
The rest: Go to the right hole and DPS the shaman to death, wait for the off-tank to bring the second shaman over to you then kill that one. After this, leave the hole and go join the people in the left hole to kill the last two shaman
Stage 3: Thrang
Stage 2 is the real tricky part of this fight, its fairly simple after that, albeit long. Once the last shaman dies, everyone run out of the hole and onto the island on your right (jumping over the lava) with your backs to the wall. Theres no point attacking Thrang until the protection buff he has is gone, as it negates 99% of the damage done to him (heart-seeker for example will hit for under 100 damage)
LM: Essential to keep the main tank anti-stunned for the entire fight, other than that just watch the power levels of the minstrels in particular as this fight has a habit of dragging on for a long time. No using Tar or slowing skills as the fight is based on Thrang being able to keep up with the main tank
Guardians: The main tank needs to drag Thrang to a fumerole. 5 seconds after getting into range it will explode, deal 1500 damage and stun anyone in range. This explosion allows the raid to do damage to Thrang for 15 seconds, so just stand still hitting him for a bit to allow the melee units to get in close to attack. After this, move on to the next fumerole and repeat until he is dead (about 10-15 minutes)
Minstrels: One of you primarily heal the main tank while the other heals the group and helps out on the main tank if needed. Both watch your power levels as this is a long fight with heavy healing required. If the main healer takes agro from Thrang, then the two minstrels need to swap roles and the main minstrel needs to use song of soothing/anthem of compassion immediately.
Burglar: Same as the rest (so make sure you read that part as well), just making a note about FM's. If you are going to open one, unless you are extremely low on power, make it YYYYYY and only use it when Thrang is vulnerable to keep the effect even if Thrang gets his protection back.
The rest: Stand back from the fumeroles/Thrang until a fumerole explodes next to Thrang and he gets the vulnerable symbol by his name, which looks like an arrow through a foot (Achilles heel :) ). When you see this, and only when you see this, you can attack him. Melee units need to watch out for getting close to an exploding fumerole which will deal over 1500 damage to anyone nearby and stun you, also Thrang has an AoE stun attack you should be aware of. If you are low on morale, just back off for a bit and let the minstrels heal you before charging back in. Avoid slowing skills or auto-attacking when Thrang is protected as this can make him miss the exploding fumerole and in general it just makes everything take much longer. Needless to say, if you don't need to get close to Thrang, then stay right back with the minstrels