Tower of Orthanc discussion [Archive]

Awerth

13 Dec 2011, 23:37

I have noticed many things, but our next run I would like to become a crash test dummy on the wargs, I think there is a trigger to the slash attack they do and I think we should spend a little time working out how they work.

Points noticed:-
Acid wing
To gain acces to this wing, it is the left at the first crossroads then up the platform and through the door.

Room 1 2x Twisted Warg + 3x Twisted Orc
Room 2 3x Twisted Warg + 3 x Twisted Orc

Acid overflow standing in it gives 450 (-mitigation) AoE damage which goes when you move out of the flowing acid.
Poison pools are basically the same as the overflows they are a constant though while the overflows come on and off.
Line of sight, issue for the first trash pull.

Mobs

Twisted Orc elite master (82,833)
Damaging attacks
he Twisted Orc scored a hit with a weak melee attack on Awerth for 342 Common damage to Morale.
The Twisted Orc scored a hit with Punch on Awerth for 1,323 Common damage to Morale.
The Twisted Orc scored a hit with Slash on Awerth for 2,117 Common damage to Morale. 1st death
The Twisted Orc scored a hit with Slash on Awerth for 3,147 Common damage to Morale. 2nd death
The Twisted Orc scored a hit with Slash on Awerth for 4,721 Common damage to Morale. 3rd death

Adaption
Seem to be relatively quick to kill

Twisted Warg nemesis (165,665)
Damaging attacks
The Twisted Warg scored a hit with Rend on Awerth for 597 Common damage to Morale.
The Twisted Warg scored a hit with Bite on Awerth for 1,384 Common damage to Morale.
The Twisted Warg scored a hit with Swipe on Awerth for 2,235 Common damage to Morale.

Adaptive immunity
Frenzied if they can not feast on flesh. (this seemed to be a key point and maybe a hidden damage stacking value is added to the amount of time they are not hitting someone)

Slugs signature (insert health)
Skill "Explosion" on contact with characters, explode is AoE damage and can hit for 6k (crit) on light armours
Spawns from each room 3 at a time during the fighting phase
Fast moving
Perhaps cc would work best as they disappear once mobs are dead

Boss (1,500,000 health)
First move damages everyone roughly 1/5th morale loss?
Straight tank Phase
Summons adds (see below)
If adds are not dead in certain time (insert time) poison water level rises
Poison water seems bugged as we had absorb for the damage
Disease bomb dot, 1,680 damage if not removed
Poison stackable dot 580 damage every 4 seconds
Average hit from boss (insert number)

Adds

Trolls signature (insert health)
Two appear each wave
Frontal AoE

Dragonet
Did not see much of these just trash them

Avanc,
Did not see much of these

More information need on adaptive immunity and Frenzied state

Mob buffs, what we know

Each cc skill can only be used once before the mob becomes immune to that type of stun, there did seem to be a point where the immunity wore off.

Not much known about the frenzied state on wargs

Suggestions

One hunter comes yellow trained for this wing along side lore master and burglar and therefore you can rotate stuns on all wargs .

Raedwulf

14 Dec 2011, 08:09

I was going to do a skeleton of this, but you seem to have covered most of it.

Bits you've missed:
The Sewer is first entrance on the left, up a scaffold, down a pipe!
As with OD, the pattern seems to be two trash fights ==> boss.
First fight - 2 wargs, 4 orcs second - 3 wargs 3 orcs; intermittent incoming slugs in both (I think the numbers on the first fight are correct).
Orcs are around 45-50k (I think); wargs over 100.
In the second encounter, you cannot fight from the ledge. The moment the mobs trigger, you get urinated on from above. Which was both unexpected & an original (and better) way of persuading people to not exploit. I seem to remember it's a bit stronger - I was taking about 406 each time.

Bits you got wrong
Adaptive immunity is the reason I said they're intelligent. It's not each skill; it's each cc type, I think. Root, stun, daze, fear. So if an LM Herb Lores them, they're thereafter immune to HNT Rain of Thorns, etc.
Wargs third attack is called Swipe. Could be distributed damage, although that's usually specified in the combat log, isn't it? If it is, then Swipe isn't. I got hit for 6.5K at one point, which might have been boosted by a Frenzy.
Slash, I think, was one of the orcs' specials.
Acid damage is not a DoT, as far as I recall. It's simply an AoE - once you're out, it stops. Also damage in the first two encounters is @450 less mitigation (I was taking 386 on a squishy).
Salamanders are called Avanc, same as in Dunbog. Might as well use the right name, it's faster to say, faster to type, and what people see in game.
Can't remember the name, but Dreadwings were always bats before. The other mobs are dragonets, aren't they?
Slugs do NOT explode on contact with players, per se. It maybe be a short range melee attack, but it's definitely an attack (capitalised as Explosion in the log). It's not a response to being hit, and they can't be one-shotted.

Other bits...
Not sure why we were absorbing in the boss fight; couldn't see a buff to account for it. It may be a Tier 1 effect.
Alternatively it may have something to do with that green bar. I know you said you know something about it, but no-one else does, so hush! ;) The green bar, in the new Event Tracker window (appears at the top to the left of middle), partially fills each time the acid falls.
At a guess I'd say when it fills on T1, the absorption of acid damage stops and / or he gets a new attack.

Tactics / suggestions
We've two basic choices at the start of each trash fight. Either go for the wargs, or go for the orcs. Trying to kill the wargs first meant we wiped without killing anything. Killing the orcs first meant we got through the encounters eventually as there was less incoming damage. In the first fight, mobs are relatively closely grouped. Deep Lore on an LM could be useful - adds 5 targets to Herb Lore; I could only root 3 last night. In the second, they're more widely spaced & you can only hit 2 or 3 on the right at once.

CC will need to be managed carefully in order not to be wasted. Definitely one LM & Hunter in Yellow line would be useful, possibly also a BRG. Also - remember your debuffs! Anything you can do that cuts incoming damage (such as Fire Lore or Gust of Wind) takes precedence over anything else you can do; anything that slows attack speed or otherwise debuffs, especially if it's an AoE debuff (Sign of Power: Command) comes next. Debuffing damage is more important because, however infrequently they attack, a 6K hit can wipe a squishy, especially a slightly damaged squishy.

I may think of some more later!

Awerth

14 Dec 2011, 17:18

updated what i have put so far, with correct mob health, and some strange damage amounts. Have tried to discuss these on the turbine forum to see if there is a bug with them but to no sucess so far.

Ayalinda

15 Dec 2011, 11:40

Right I am pretty damn sure this doesn't go against our rule of we beat the content, as I made the observation myself in game (i.e no internet use, advice on global etc, just me reading things in game), but I'm going to put it in spoiler tags just in case.

I was looking at the new raid sets, and noted that to equip the new pieces you need deeds completed. The deed names give some big clues to the wings, and it looks like each one may revolve around a particular type of tactical damage. So the one we were in last time was the acid wing. Seems pretty obvious now. Just brining it up because even though turbine seem to have largely combined the tactical damage types into just tactical mitigation, it may be worth thinking about tweeking your setup for the different wings. Minstrels for example have the frost and flame tale, which may be worth using on the appropriate wing. I think DP buffs affect a single type as well.

Raedwulf

22 Dec 2011, 23:56

OK. Go in, go right. Run in the door, and you're in the Steamworks. Deep-claws, which could be a bit mean, except that we batter them fast & they die; Uruk Taskmasters who are mob "Captains" improving their allies survivability and with the CC learning buff; trolls who can hit pretty hard but are, otherwise,mostly just trolls. So we kill deep claws, uruks, and trolls in that order. Three lots, contrary to Turbine's current practice, and then the boss. We didn't do it perfectly, but despite a few deaths, we got to the boss in plenty of time to have several attempts. Minor note - the aggro range on these is huge, as is not the case with the rest of RoI! I triggered the first trash fight whilst miles away. It was not the Raid Leader's night for various reasons that I won't bore you with...

The boss (after listening to Saruman drivel & then walk slowly off...) is a dirty big troll with some interesting attributes... We got him about half dead several times. For the rest of it, I'll let the rest of you contribute... However, of the two wings we've seen so far, I am inclined to concentrate on The Steamworks. It's much, much quicker to get to the boss, and a better feeling of progression when you're learning about the boss that will give you something useful, rather than dying a lot on the trash!

ReDGryffyN

23 Dec 2011, 09:49

I will add some specifics later as I forgot my notes and now I am at work !
Anyway the three trash pulls were in my opinion not too bad at all, certainly not more difficult than some of the OD ones, some mechanics to be wary off as Raed mentioned, the two trolls pull is the hardest but our one tank Awerth! coped well! Certainly feel that in pretty short time we can breeze through these three pulls.

Trollboy was another matter but again there are new mechanics to learn and understand and we got part way there. Lots of discusion on new double bars that you see in this fight. Took a while for me to realise that there are in fact two mechanics here, the top bar records static level and the bottom steam.

It seems whoever is aggroed? (<--tbc) hitting the troll sees a static top bar buff growing which increments every 6 seconds? and also increments down using the same timings. We need confirmation from Awerth on how this bar can be controlled or not or is it as someone mentioned a one way tick upwards? can it be reduced by losing aggro for example ?
Anyway eventually when reaching a high/max level results in the massive amount of damage which was thought to be AOE not sure if it is distributed, my combat log said it was not.
The other bar the lower steam bar it seems everyone gets (we found that it seemed that not all members got the same effect level so some may be on steam 3 whilst other on 2 etc) and this again increments up and down (Maximum 15) (on a 40s timer either way), the mechanisms of which we are not sure of. I played about with my graphic settings here and did feel it was happening possibly depending on where you were standing? with areas seeming ot have steam coming up through the floor grates?
The steam level is a BAD thing as I found out being hit at Steam 11 level ! The incoming tactical damage buff is insane and at level 15 hits +900% . However there is a boost to the raid as well with boosts to melee, tactical and ranged damage. Would be good I guess to get a tier or two on you but no more so if we could control this we get a big boost to our DPS and IMHO this is a DPS race.

http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/toosteam1.png

I think this was the log event for this effect

Kâlbak scored a critical hit with Smack on Redgriffin for 13,336 Lightning damage to Morale.

The other big hit was the one derived from the static buff getting to its critical level my log showed this

Kâlbak scored a hit with Static Shock on Redgriffin for 15,956 Lightning damage to Morale.

Need to confirm the range of this attack as Raed I think thought it was actually not that far maybe even only 5m? So getting out of range would be a good idea when the tank says run! The issue here I feel is that even a high morale tank may not survive this hit so that would lead me to think that the effect should be able to be controlled/removed/reduced in some way.

In addition there were summoned? Storm Elhudan who did a distributed damage effect on you so we decided to bunch up for this as their morale was quite high at 82,833 morale. Depending on how many of us managed to group up, varied the damage you each received, here are two extremes from my log

The Storm-elhudan scored a hit with Explosion - Distributed on Redgriffin for 1,811 Lightning damage to Morale.
The Storm-elhudan scored a hit with Explosion - Distributed on Redgriffin for 9,497 Lightning damage to Morale.

There was also a lightning effect (not sure how this was triggered) that shot a bolt of lightning at one member and if in close proximity? the lightning spread to other members up to a maximum of 4? players. The effect of this is that you actually did damage to your fellow raid members whilst linked with them so had to walk far away to remove this effect.

From my log

Redgriffin scored a hit with Chain Lightning on Awtorras for 1,704 Lightning damage to Morale.

Agree with Ayalinda on previous raid run Tactical Mitigation would be a huge boost to all plus I feel as much as possible boosting morale pools. So Tolerance and Fidelity virtues may be good choices for these raids for the mitigation boost

Will post more later!

ReD

Awerth

23 Dec 2011, 19:22

A few things to add about boss.
Static shock buff ticks down after 6 seconds it ticks up on what I think is a 50% reflect on the agrod tank, I say 50% chance as it did not go up on every hit I made.
Once it reaches lvl 15 a bolt of lightning hits the tank and the others around the tank for 9k damage.

Steam lvl is not 100% bad, it may increase the damage done to you, but it increases the amount of damage to the boss to, so it's a double edge sword

Still to work out how steam builds

Ayalinda

30 Dec 2011, 23:47

It wouldn't have been possible tonight because we didn't have a Runekeeper, but would it be possible for the RK to cast Do not fall to storm on the tank just before the big hit comes down I can't remember the cooldown/induction? That would mean we wouldn't need to keep switching Aggro which seemed to harm our DPS. Switching around may not be as bad if we have more than 1 guardian, but I was having trouble healing our champs/cappys either through nasty crits or not getting them in range fast enough.

Awerth

31 Dec 2011, 04:19

nope would be no good as all hits are lightning you couldnt time it right.

Raedwulf

31 Dec 2011, 09:01

There would seem to be two ways of doing the Steamworks boss, a bit like there were with the troll Twins in DN. First, you can aggro switch. The Static Shock ticks up & down every 6 seconds, it's that simple, so it's possible to aggro-switch. However, my feeling is we need two tanks for this. We tried this last night with 1 GDN and either 1 dps CHM or 1 CPT on 4Y (me), which makes Grave Wound a Force Attack skill. We learnt plenty, but not only did neither work, neither were as successful as our first attempt. Neither Off-tank was really set up for defence & when the big hits started coming up as Steam rose... Two GDNs would find it much easier to switch aggro, and are by definition set up for defence with very high health. A blue-line CHM might also be able to do it.

Method Two, for when you have a single tank, is the tank takes the Static Shock every time. That means the tank needs maximum health & maximum Tactical defences. It also makes it a flat-out dps race, because the Steam will get the tank eventually, even though Steam also ramps up OUR damage too. They should make two calls - "Shock 8" & "Shock 9". The first call tells the healers they need to make sure the tank is on maximum health in @12s time. The second call tells everyone else to get the hell away. The tooltip on Static Shock says "If this reaches ten, you will explode and damage everyone around you", so it is, quite specifically, focused on the tank. Where we went wrong last night on the first try was on the first shock, where one CHM & the BRG decided they could be clever & get one last hit in (or so it seemed to me! ;)), and then didn't get away in time. Two in-combat resses blown early in the fight that would have been very useful later on. As it was, we got Big Fat Bob down to about 330K, which is over 3/4 dead & our best effort in two attempts.

Other stuff we learnt... "Shock {name}" is the chatbox call that precedes the chain lightning. We knew that, but we now know that it's the job of the named person to get away from BFB to break the chian, otherwise it leaps from player to player.

"Storms come" is another call, but I had too much other stuff to notice what actually happened. Is that the precursor to an Elhudan appearing? Balling up definitely takes the sting out of these. Target mark a Hunter with the Sun, because they don't tend to move if they can help it, and then everyone runs to them. EVERYONE! Well, bar the tank... ;)

We're still not quite certain how Steam ticks up & down. We know it does it every 40s, and can go up or down. I can't prove it, because I don't have a screenshot of the tooltip, but I think it goes on way or the other every 40s, and which way it goes depends solely on where you are when it ticks.

There was one other thing... but I've forgotten what it was. Anyone?

Awerth

31 Dec 2011, 12:02

Last time i was with you, i managed to get the steam to up 3 times within about 5 seconds, though I have no idea how I did it.

ReDGryffyN

31 Dec 2011, 13:28

From my perspective as Tank this time.

Agreed the first run was the most successful and I think even with just one tank, surviving the static shock is very doable, in that first run having checked my combat logs I was hit 4 times by it and survived them all as they only hit me for between 6K and 8K. Obviously getting everyone else who maybe in melee away in time is key as they may be one shotted depending on their mitigations.

We also put out more DPS on that first run as we did not have other players performing aggro swapping duties and hence gained their DPS as well.

The later runs whilst I was not defeated by static attacks due to the swapping we did lack DPS then and the steam levels built to large numbers! and that started wiping the raid. In fact it was the steam levels that provided the orc with some big numbers way outweighing the static shock numbers. My combat log shows me getting hit with

Smacks of 12K, smashes of 8K and swipes of 6k so once steam has built up that % increase in damage is a big issue

I also noted for some reason on the later fights the storm elhudan seemed to like the tanks and migrated our way a lot, it was a cause of one of my deaths with a 16K hit distributed just to me :)

A new effect was also seen which looked like four lightning bolts radiating from the troll at NSEW positions from him, my combat log has I think those down as polarity hits for about 2K each x2 each time, not sure of the trigger whether it is morale based as we had not seen them before on the first run I dont believe.

So I agree with Raed we either go one tank and go balls out DPS as the static hits can be survived making sure we ball up for the Storm elhudan and keep at 45 degrees to the orc for his polartiy hits, then we should be golden? The shock (name) as stated is pre warned to you so moving away is a priority then

Having tanks aggro swap may have benefits so long as DPS is not gimped because of it.

What I think needs more understanding is steam and how it builds or fades as for me that is the key to the fight.

In one fight I had the orc in the back left corner and for quite a while neither me or Skiporin has any steam at all then it started to build so maybe the steam we see coming up from the floor is variable or moving around or whatever?

Also for the static shock AND the steam bit whilst the mechanism seems to be 6s and 40s for an increase or decrease I am sure I saw some faster increases than that on both at times. One static shock hit me at level 7 and must have jumped to 10 prior to the hit. I also saw steam go up from 2 to 5 in a matter of a few seconds

ReD

KOFACME

Beorthond

31 Dec 2011, 19:16

My view on the Steam is that it only decreases with the 40s timer. On more then 1 occasion I got rapid increases of Steam within 10-20 seconds. And only had decreases after the full countdown (though only when I was basically doing nothing).
As Red said, the Steam tends to start to apply after a while in the fight (maybe 1-2 minutes). Whether we tanked near the middle or on the edge of the room didn't seem to have a big effect (at least what I've seen). But I'm not really convinced that the Steam has to do with proximity to BFB. But I might need a few more tries to figure that one out.
1 more observation from my side is that when I went full out DPS first attempt I went up in Steam levels way more rapid then on my later heal attempts.

Next time we'll know more!
Beor

ReDGryffyN

03 Jan 2012, 11:46

Some extra bits and pieces follwing the latest raid.

Trash (Steamworks)

Regarding the 3 trash pulls, we lost a few rezzes here so more work on perfecting the pulls/stuns etc would help, does make them interesting though!

Big Fat Bob (Steamworks boss) - Lightning Wing

He died on the second attempt, I think he was down to 158K? the first try. We went for the single tank DPS/Nuke version and it did work but I think we still need more attempts to prove this is a repeatable tactic.
At the point of actually killing him my steam level was at 10 so I reckon we were close to getting more of us killed/raid wipe than perhaps was obvious as we finished him off with only 3 dead out of the 12 of us.
Keeping Awerth topped up moralewise as much as possible helped with the static shock hits.
We did better with the Storm Elhudan I thought better bunching up, I did put noble mark on a couple at times to try and pull them away from the tank and I know the Hunters DPS'd at them to bring them to the group.
The lightning strike - well moving as far away as possible does not stop the lightning but running at 90 degrees or so to the rest of your raid is a good idea as you can end up with the lightning just on you which is a lot better :)

The other lightning mechanic does throw bolts out from 4 directions and can hit for 2-3K per time, (it is noted as polarity in your combat logs), you might get a couple of hits on you per time if you dont move, it can be avoided by being at the 45 degree positions from the boss rather than the perpendicular ones.

Re the Steam well I still feel it is tied to the floor and the steam that we can see coming up from the grates but can not prove it as yet. This is for me the potential raid wiper for the run and needs more understanding. I think if everyone could note their own steam levels during the fight and where they are standing etc and see what affects the up and down perhaps then we can learn more of the mechanic ?

Finally on the Captain class for this fight.

I changed out my HoH capstone and lost my self heal so I could slot Banner of Hope and Oathbreakers. I wanted to use the traited banner of hope to max boost everyones max morale and having OB available (and potentially able to be used twice in the boss fight) was useful, OB can also be useful for some of the trash pulls when it gets hairy!
So my healing was reduced a tad and having no self heal meant I used more morale pots etc but overall I think the changes were better. I do feel IDOME and Fellowship brother are both too good to miss out on for these end game fights.

Loot was very disappointing, 2 Average teal pieces :( (but I guess as it was T1 perhaps that is the norm. When you compare the effort / difficulty in this wing compared to the one I mention next it does seem out of proportion)

Experimentaiton Pit - Acid Wing

We went straight into this wing and to be honest it went very well. The trash pulls were from my perspecetive harder than the boss fight, good CC is needed for the trash and the boss was well a bit easy. Deal with the adds when they come in and back on the boss. Watch out for a DoT and pot it and down he went.

Edit:- Looking at a pic I took you also get a effect bar (single one for me visible this time) which shows Acidic Waters level, I forgot to check the buff/debuff so not sure of what level/effect etc but on my buffbars it showed as a time.

Loot was again very disappointing, 2 Average Teal pieces but a Symbol did drop. As above though this wing went very quickly and was easier than Steamworks, so maybe effort/reward balance is right?

Sarumans Laboratory - Fire and Frost Wing

Flush with our 2 T1's we went (eventually) to the lab. Not clear running around Isengard where you are supposed to find the next wing but....

Again trash pulls went very well with good CC ! and before you knew it we were at the boss(es)

Once the pensioner has shuffled from the scene the fight starts.

We did not get this one beat but in reality after one run we ran out of time but first thoughts.

Seems that this might be like the two trees in OD where you get a buff from the boss you hit and that looks bad for damage from the other as I saw 100% on me! So we get one Giant Fire Boss and a Frost one
Fire and Frost grims get summoned (morale based or timer or both?) which were a bit weird as I only got to one twice and both times they absorbed my hits, when we did eventually die there seemed to be 5 or 6 of the critters so perhaps if you dont kill them more arrive?
Cant comment more than that on this one, hopefully the next runs will nail this part of it.

Overall though a good and fun evening, thanks to you all.

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

03 Jan 2012, 12:53

Just to confirm, I popped in with my alt the other day (who has no locks), and the lab is available from the very start.

I never saw steam coming from the floor. It was mentioned this might have something to do with graphics settings (I've treated myself to a shiny rig recently so have everything set to max). Can I confirm we need to dial things down to see the steam, or was I being blind? Is this another case of switching post processing effects off?

ReDGryffyN

03 Jan 2012, 13:20

I have my post processing on but ramp the graphics quality down to high or medium and then I can see steam which to be honest is more mist like!

I will take some screenies next time which hopefully will show it.

EDIT

Found this one at the point of victory as it turns out!

http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOSW1.jpg

Out of interest I have just noticed looking at this pic there are differences with the type of grating Some have larger profiles (holes) and some smaller PLUS there are what look like metal and wood ? planks going across some of them, might be a clue also not sure!

Of course it is just a theory that this is linked with the buff/debuff it might be complete tosh! :)

ReD

KOFACME

Raedwulf

03 Jan 2012, 16:53

I did mention the differences in the gratings during the raid. More experimentation is needed - one kill does not make a farm. The big problem is the difficulty in persuading him to move, so it may be that we need to have the tank yelling from one of those planked areas, and see what that does to the Steam level...

(And can I just point out that Red appears to be trying to smarm up to the Alliance Leader in that photo. It won't work you know, Red. The guy's an Evil Bastard... ;))

Raedwulf

03 Jan 2012, 17:24

And I've just nipped in to the raid on T2 on the no-lock Ang. The Callenges are singularly uninformative - "Find the Bearer of the Ring of... whatever" & "Join Saruman on the peak of Orthanc". I can't believe that's all there is to the challenges, but the Challenges, as deeds, are separate from the deeds for completing each wing on T1 and T2, so maybe it is. No rewards are listed in the quest, so it must just be the seals (16) that you get from the deed.

Mobs are standard across the first 3 zones in terms of health from the look of it. In the Pit, where we have numbers already recorded for T1, they are 10% healthier, as expected (and presumably 10% extra everything else). Nemesis (Wargs & Trolls) are 165 / 182K depending on tier; Elite Masters (Uruks, Ruffians, Twisted Orcs) are 82 / 91K; Elites (only the Deep Claws in the Steamworks so far) are ?33K? / 37K.

Awerth

03 Jan 2012, 17:29

I only know of the last boss challenge and that's due to. Developer posting it on the forum, they each become active as you face the boss, are you therefore thinking of tier 2 already?

ReDGryffyN

03 Jan 2012, 17:38

I did mention the differences in the gratings during the raid.

(And can I just point out that Red appears to be trying to smarm up to the Alliance Leader in that photo. It won't work you know, Red. The guy's an Evil Bastard... ;))

Smarming up to the Alliance Leader I guess would also be inclusive of hearing him already mention the differences in the gratings :)

As for the picture......pure fluke I assure you ! :)

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

03 Jan 2012, 18:39

As Awerth says I expect it will be like other challenges where it tells you the challenge only when you get to the boss. With regards to seals from the challenge, quoting the developers diary;
"Q: Why do some quests not have any currency rewards listed in them?
A: The way we award currency is sometimes managed by the instance as opposed to the quest. The perfect example is the new Orthanc Raid. The challenge quests have no currency rewards listed in them, but when you finish them you will be awarded a sizable number of Seals. We hope to make this information clearer in the future."

Raedwulf

05 Jan 2012, 08:14

The Laboratory is straightforward enough on Tier 1. Trash is Brute Trolls, half-orc White Hand Ruffians, and Twisted Warriors (which I assume are Dunlendings, technically). It is possible to do this cleanly, as we did on Sunday, or to make a mess of it, as we did on Wednesday!

Trolls have Adaptation & big AoE attacks that will make a mess of the softer parts of the raid. Whatever else happens, keep them out of the group. Ruffians can be freely cced and are leader-types, providing buffs & healing. Warriors are just trash elites with the usual bloodlust / frenzy attribute.

Killing order is Warriors, Trolls, Ruffians, for preference. Get rid of the trash, cc the Ruffians because you can't reliably cc the trolls, essentially. There are three pulls before the bosses. First pull is 2 trolls, 3 Ruffians; second is 3 Ruffians, 4 Warriors; third is 2 Trolls, 3 Ruffians, 5 Warriors (numbers might be off by one on the last couple of pulls).

The bosses, two of them, are two half health (i.e. @700K) "giant" Dunlendings. They are supposed to start off normal sized and then use the power of their Frost and Flame rings to super-size themselves. Although there are some slightly irritating special attacks in this fight, including being thrown pretty much the full length of the room at times, the only significant one is their ability to summon Frost & Fire Grims repsectively. The reason for sticking with only one type of Grim is that hitting the boss rapidly build up a debuff that increases the damage you take from the opposite damage type. In other words, hitting the Frost boss ultimately gives you +100% damage from flame, and vice versa.

It's very simple fight. Group 1 kills one boss and any associated Grim that he summons; Group 2 kills the other. One tank stays on each boss (a Blue-line CHM is perfectly adequate, as Tsu proved); whenever a Grim appears, the appropriate group kills it ASAP. Eventually one boss falls over, and that group can then transfer their attentions to the other Grims and boss. Remember that debuff ONLY matters if you TAKE damage of the opposing type. If you do, just get out of the fight and wait to be healed before diving back in. This is not a dps race, it's endurance - simply don't die, and one boss will be worn down eventually, after which it's child's play.

ReDGryffyN

05 Jan 2012, 09:06

Only parts I would add on the Fire and Frost wing are:-

The grims seem to appear on a 1 minute cycle. the visual warning for this is the boss will say either "The fire burns within me or The frost courses through my veins"

The bosses have a corrupted rage that can tier up if not removed in 8 seconds, this adds to the power of his hits, the visual warning for this corruption apart from the icon is the boss will say "My power builds"

The bosses get a morale boost occassionally which lasts for 30 seconds called protection. This appears to be a morale bubble rated at 150K which you can hit and reduce and whilst this bubble is up the bosses core morale is not affected. After 30s it expires and you can get back to damaging the boss. I guess in theory you could burn through the bubble but as this is not a DPS race I am not sure of the benefit so probably best to save your power for 30 seconds. the visual warning for this apart from the icon is the boss will say "The Ancients Shield Me"

The throw accross the room is called a yank and I could not see any warning or pre trigger for it so maybe random.

PS

Found 3 pics of our 3 clears :)

http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOL.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOA.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOFF.jpg

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

05 Jan 2012, 09:24

The last thing which I don't think anyone mentioned, is that the grims will start absorbing attacks occasionally, and you need to hit them with some sort of CC to cause them to start taking damage again.

Ayalinda

05 Jan 2012, 09:28

On the shadow wing

On the boss, 2 things noted were;

1)We had a you are in the light buff/debuff. It didn't modify stats in any way, and I couldn't find anywhere not in the dark, so it may be a tier2 thing only?

2) The attack which killed us I think was called "choking fumes" , and did 2000ish damage every few seconds for quite a while. I think I saw lots of clouds around the room, which you probably need to get out of.

Awerth

05 Jan 2012, 11:54

The shadow wing is the one boss i knew about before we did them, going to keep stum until I get to go in there, but it is fairly easy.

Ayalinda

05 Jan 2012, 12:07

I have to say I think the trash is generally harder than the bosses it seems. On both the acid wing and the frost and flame wing when we worked out the strategy not a single person died.

Raedwulf

05 Jan 2012, 14:36

I'm not anticipating anything especially hard about the Shadow wing, no. Bear in mind that we had one go when tired, with only 10 people. We did OK for a while but about 5 people suddenly died in the space of as many seconds & that was that.

Frankly after the inital "Waaaah!" T1 is pretty straightforward, and I imagine Saruman won't be that much of a stumbling block. It'll be T2 & T2 Challenges that'll be hard... :evil:

Ayalinda

05 Jan 2012, 14:45

The hardest thing about the T1 raid is getting in apparently! I have to say I really like the T1, T2, challenge structure turbine have started to adopt, means we can feel like we're making good progress, without turning it into a farm to quickly.

Anyway to the question I wanted to ask. How do locks and tiers work? Could you do the first 3 wings on tier 1 one day, unlocking the last 2 wings, then do those on tier 2 on the second day?

Tsureknath

06 Jan 2012, 09:28

The throw accross the room is called a yank and I could not see any warning or pre trigger for it so maybe random.

Not sure if Im correct (I will need to double check) but from a tanks pov I noticed that the kick (or throw, or whatever that is) across the room, comes shortly after a stackable corruption is removed. So be prepared to get quickly back into the mayhem.

The last thing which I don't think anyone mentioned, is that the grims will start absorbing attacks occasionally, and you need to hit them with some sort of CC to cause them to start taking damage again.

For that, a champions horn works perfectly. 1k-ish damage and 3 sec stun at the same time. So if a champion is tanking, the rest of the group shouldnt bother at all with the grim's cc. When it starts absorbing, a simple horn would do the job and restore its damaging state.

ReDGryffyN

06 Jan 2012, 11:39

Yes Tsu, I certainly had a feeling that the Yank was a second or two after a corruption removal but like you, I could not be 100% sure it was every time or just because of it and nothing else. Pretty decent kick though isn't it! :)

Re the Grims, I think unless I am mistaken the Grims needed to be CC'd twice ? You could damage them straight off then after a while 2/3 moraleish? they absorbed then after CC we could damage again to approx 1/3 health? second CC and dead :) If someone could confirm this please ?

ReD

KOFACME

Shalathra

06 Jan 2012, 12:16

Grim must be CC'd twice like you said Red, but a tanking Champ can save his horn for one or even both of the CCs needed

Ayalinda

06 Jan 2012, 12:30

The Minstrel fear skill works well as well. instant cast, 30s cooldown, so can be used once per grim. Probably more of a backup as Mini's don't spend all the time targeting the Grim, but I hit it a few times when it wasn't removed straight away.

Awerth

06 Jan 2012, 16:46

Bash and shield smash both work too, meaning guard can do both if timed right..

Ayalinda

15 Jan 2012, 22:58

Well we are making progress. The shadow wing wasn't to bad, the boss has 5 mechanics, the first is a debuff which causes you to take extra damage and can't b/p/e so need to switch tanks if he puts it on your tank. He drops fear pools, which do damage when you stand in them, he fills the room with gas which damage you when you move and finnaly the area in the light shrinks as the fight goes on, if you get caught out side the light, you become rooted (so you can't get back in the light) and you can be 1 shotted. The final ability is to call roots which pin you until they are killed.

Onto Sauman, no trash on the pinnacle. There are 5 rings, which you need to take to start the fight, each has 3 abilities. One buff, one attack/debuff and a special ability. Saruman summons 5 clones of himself, one of each element.
In order we kill them (I think):
Shadow: Heals through corruptions.
Acid: Puts a DOT on someone(?)
Lightning: Does distributed damage.
Flame: Powerful melee attacks.
Ice: reflects damage (?)
Phase 1 wasn't to bad, and we did it without any losses the last 2 times.
Once you takedown the close you go out of combat. You then need to be where you picked up your ring, and use the special ability when it becomes available. He then moves to phase 2 where 5 more clones are called with increased damage.

Awerth

15 Jan 2012, 23:48

What caused the wipe? Who tanked what?

ReDGryffyN

16 Jan 2012, 08:28

It was a fun run!

Shadow wing boss took just the second attempt to beat him down, mechanics as I saw it as Aya stated, the melee group and ranged/healers group worked well. There were also at the later stages of the fight what looked like summoned roots that as far as I could see mostly liking the ranged/healing group and Raed in particular but they did not seem to cause them any major issues as that group took it down. Melee group work as a unit to keep repositioning the boss (when able to move) to keep out of the purple clouds.

Saruman was great to finally see. I was not a ring holder so can not comment on this much but the ring holders get what I heard to be a new mini graphic ? showing them the abilities of the rings which have 3 each ?

5 Mini-Me's appear and our tactics were to get the tank to ball them all up whilst we all focus on one to take him down, again I think Aya has the order of killing them as I remember, I think the Acid one was called Venom and the Ice one Frost, flame one Fire?

Shadow was definitely the one to take down first as he buffed/healed the others. We did this successfully and then had to repeat the whole thing again as we did not then realise that the ring bearers had to use the rings against the real pensioner whilst standing on their respective ring spots.

I guess we then completed the first phase.

We then had a further 5 Mini-Me's appear again but this was a little different as Saruman incanted some strange words (weird language) and the top of the tower floor erupted into an "effect" like frost/icy or fire or lightning etc making it difficult at times to see the adds or each other! Not sure the overall effect to us was on these effects but the adds were a lot harder to kill, I think we managed to kill the shadow before we wiped and called it a night.

Questions for the ring bearers.....

Can you use the rings during that second fight at all against the adds ?
Anyone see any buffs that the "effects" gave?

Healing during this second phase was quite tough, at times I was spam healing Culler our tank and basically doing all melee healing / buffs.

Good fun and a good night!

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

16 Jan 2012, 10:09

So in the second incarnation the clones see to have aquired new attacks the one I noticed clearly was the lightning attack which sends arcs out in 4 directions The enviro*ental look of the arena didn't have any effect so I susect it is a visual clue to what attack is going to *e used

Tsureknath

16 Jan 2012, 10:54

Some points I noticed and thoughts:

a) Regarding the Shadow wing: all the above seem just correct. I only want to add that at some point during the end of the fight (and Im guessing last phase of it) the guy started to self-heal while he was standing in his purple cloud (I think using a corruption) but the heal expired when moved out of it. So that's also something we need to pay attention to.

b) About the old man fight: First phase seemed pretty straightforward, at least after we figured out which Saruman does what. But. When I had aggro on acid/poison (the green one anyways) Saruman I also had a non-removable effect on me. A big acid dot. When Culler took aggro, the dot was removed from me and Im guessing it went right on to him. So the acid Saruman should really be on the main tank at all times cause that's who takes the most heals.

About the second phase: everything seemed just a bit harder and the logical assumption is that the fight will get even more harder at the next one. What I saw during second phase, is that people where just taking huge damage from various sources from the very first seconds of the phase. I noticed that during the begining of each of our attempts, there was a different "universal" effect on the group, obviously coming from one of the Sarumans or aligning to the skills of one of the Sarumans.

I think at our third attempt, fight started with acid Saruman loving me. I didnt really have time to react cause I died in like 5 seconds but I noticed a green dot on me. No idea if that was removable. I'm guessing not, so it must be something like the frost dot from Sari Surma first boss, where all the healing should be directed to the person who gets it. And since there was an acid "universal" buff (or debuff, whatever) to the group, I believe we should expect something similar (i.e. a nasty effect on someone) from each of the other Sarumans when the "universal" buff aligns to them. Thunderbolts, like Aya said, when the room has the lightning "buff", something similar when we have the fire one, etc etc etc...

Lastly, I have no idea how the rings should be used or if they can be used many times during the fight (with a cooldown of course) but I think that if someone is going to use it, it should be done early in the fight, when lost of bad things are happening. Above that, like I already mentioned, we should obviously expect the fight to get harder as it is progressing. Thus, Im guessing a single tank getting hit by a number of clones and probably the old fool himself, might have some trouble surviving the process no matter the amount of healz...

Cheers,
Tsu

EDIT: the non-removable dot from Acid Saruman during first phase and the acid dot that killed Tsu within a few seconds during the second phase, were two different special attacks. The first one was definetely permanent but survivable, even with Revealing Mark as healing source and some periodic heals.

Awerth

16 Jan 2012, 11:30

Duel tanking of saruman sounds logical from what you put there, if I read that right two clones give dots, frost and acid ? Therefore a tank should have one of each of these?

Tsureknath

16 Jan 2012, 12:47

Im not really sure about the Frost one Awerth. But if he also gives a dot (anyone can confirm?), then probably he must be split from Acid. The most problematic though, seemed to be Shadow, Acid and Lightning. Shadow should be the priority all the times cause its the Saruman-party healer.

Then -in my opinion- if the Acid dot is THAT nasty to kill a 10k morale champion with high mitigations in a few seconds, then obviously it wont be much more pleasant to anyone else. So maybe it should be the next priority, cause the heals will not always be available 100% due to many sources of damage flying all over the place.

Lightning Saruman definately sends thunderbolts, but at this point I can't tell if there is a pattern. If they are random, then the call between Acid and Lightning for the second target will be really close. If the bolts are avoidable somehow, then I suppose he could be targeted after Acid.

I suppose a few test runs will confirm the special attacks of the first two phases, so we can progress the fight accordingly. But the more I think of the fight, a second tank (a "real" one -as in another 20k Guardian :Y and not poor Tsu "playing" tankie :O) seems to be a safe path to follow.

Cheers,
Tsu

Culler

16 Jan 2012, 13:29

A couple of extra points/comments/questions

Shadow wing

The debuff to the tank clears very quickly after someone else takes aggro... In all cases it expired quicker than the duration of a champion force taunt meaning proper aggro switching is not really required. Perhaps the T2 version will require proper switching.

A few times we had a black pool put down on top of a purple pool meaning we had to stand still and suck up the damage from the pool. I think this was ok to heal through on T1 but will probably be nastier on T2 and should be avoidable with rapid movement after a purple cloud goes down.

Is there any pattern to who was getting rooted? For example was it always the furthest person away from the boss? Do melee's get rooted too?

Saruman

I think others have got the basics of the 'Sarumen' right. The acid Saruman puts an incurable DoT on the person with aggro (I think it remains constant and doesnt tier up or anything). The fire guy just hits hardish 1k-2k. Shadow does the healing corruptions which I think he can put on any of the other Sarumen. Lightning does a distributed damage attack (didnt seem that hard). Frost, I'm not too sure about.. I forgot to enable my combat log but will do next time.

I think a kill order of shadow first, and frost last for the first phase makes sense.

In the second phase they seem to get more powerful and we will probably have to work on positioning more. We saw lots of lightning bolts so I think the attack could now be AoE as opposed to distributed but we will have to be confirmed.

This will almost certainly be a 2 tank fight as firstly one tank cannot stand up to the beating as they become more powerful and secondly because it will allow far more flexibility in terms of positioning. Assuming 2 tanks I suggest we try to split them up as follows.

Tank 1: ligtning, frost, fire, tank 2: shadow, acid.

See if we can position tank 1 such that the rest of the group can avoid the the ligtning and then take down shadow and acid first and go from there.

Awerth

16 Jan 2012, 13:49

Once you takedown the close you go out of combat. You then need to be where you picked up your ring, and use the special ability when it becomes available. He then moves to phase 2 where 5 more clones are called with increased damage.

what are the positioning of the rings?

Ayalinda

16 Jan 2012, 14:08

The fight occurs on the to* of orthanc It's a circular area (which you can fall off of) The rings are on alters equally s*aced in a ring 2/3 out When you take a ring the alter goes however there are still circles on the ground the Old guy stands in the center still with his silence aura The whole area isn't that large easily crossed in a few seconds

Tsureknath

16 Jan 2012, 14:09

what are the positioning of the rings?

At a nice circular pattern, so probably theres not really a point for melees to be ring-holders. as people need to get fast to position.

ReDGryffyN

16 Jan 2012, 14:34

Will post some piccies later when I am home which will help a little with it etc and have not had time to look at my combat log yet so hopefully more information later. I do know I was killed by a polarised hit from the lightning bolts (that we have also seen from Big Fat Bob) but these hit me for 5K twice so definitely to be avoided!

Also from a Captains point of view :-

it might be worth me going full HoH until we know the fight more but for those that know it will mean losing either IDOME or Oathbreakers so tough call!

Get a swap emblem with time of need cooldown and morale cost reduction maxed plus slot composure and you get a defeat response every 150 seconds at no morale cost, great for keeping war cry up or for an extra rallying cry if needed.

Loved the fight though

ReD

KOFACME

Raedwulf

16 Jan 2012, 15:48

Mostly reiterating what other people have said...

Shadow Wing is a doddle on T1, now that we understand the mechanics. Don't move in the black cloud; move out of the purple; switch tank when the purple eye comes on; that is the descending order of priority (and the info on several tooltips is less than accurate). The Fear Cloud Wall seems to stop outside of the square formed by the two columns closest with the throne, so the entire raid needs to be within that area by the end of the fight. At the start of the fight the Main should drag the boss as far to the left as possible, then steadily move him back towards the throne as he drops purple clouds. Simple, straightforward.

Codger Wing . The kill sequence on the clones is always going to begin Shadow-bringer; Venom-keeper. At the moment, I favour Storm-maker, Frost-maker, Fire-lord (those are the correct names). Reasoning is this:

Shadow-bringer - doesn't just put the corruption heal on the others, he also appears to throw in 6 figure spike heals. On the first attempt, whoever it was we were killing went from mid-100K to 260-ish (practically fully healed) twice.

Venom-keeper - the DoT. 'Nuff said.

Storm-maker - distributed damage makes him more dangerous than the Fireman.

Frost-master - this is the one ring I didn't pick up (I should have grabbed it to screenshot when we finished; silly me!). I gather from Noti, that he has something to do with suppressing FMs and the Adaptation buffs that they all have. There is certainly an argument for taking him before Lightning, possibly even before Venom.

Fire-lord - doesn't seem to be any big deal with this guy, he just does (manageable) dps.

The tower is an open space which you can fall off of (ably demonstrated by Culler! :+). My guess is that in the final phase, Saruman has a pull or push attack that will kick you over the edge if you are not A) meleeing him, or B) in line with one of the pinnacles. There are 5 rings, one for each of the 5 bosses in the four preceding wings. Fire is directly in front as you enter; going clockwise from there, Acid, Shadow, Frost, Lightning.

Each ring grants 3 powers. The first power on all rings is resisting Saruman's efforts to take the ring's power back. This is only active at the end of each phase, when you go out of combat (see below). Of the other two powers, each may be used once in each phase. Once the cd has run down, the power remains inert until you have resisted Saruman using Power 1 (I think).

Fire grants +100% damage, & +25% crit & devastate chance and devastate magnitude for P2; Ring of Fire is a jet of flame for 16K damage, P3.
Acid grants a 100% damage reduction with a 250K power bonus; P3 reduces AV & Resistances to 0.
Shadow P2 gives a 50% chance to receive a 100% heal to all fellowship member within 10m if the player who receives the buff is hit. P3 text is "Wield the power of Shadow to assault Saruman by creating a corrupt weakness to exploit". When removed (10s duration) the darkness will deal moderate damage.
Frost P2 Applies a damage preventing bubble granting 250,000 temporary Morale. +2400% Percieved Threat. P3 text: Wield the power of frost to assault Saruman by suppressing adaptations (30 m range, 8s duration). All learned forms of Adaptation are suppressed.
Lightning grants -75% on all skill inductions & attack duration (so put it on a Hunter). A big distributed lightning attack (64K) is P3.

The general scheme seems to be P1 = resist Saruman; P2 = a big buff of 12s duration which can only be applied to a ringless player; P3 - a big attack (in some form).

To begin the fight, assign squishies, where possible, to pick up the rings. Take all rings except Fire. Ball up around the Fire player. Take the Fire ring & the first 5 clones appear.

Round One
Kill in the given order. It's that simple. We may experiment with pushing Mr. Frosty up the kill order, but I see no reason not to start with Shadow & finish with Fire. When only Fire is left, all ring holders should be on, or near to, the original altar positions. When the last one is dead & we drop out of combat, Minstrels / RKs need to ress fast if there are any dead, starting with any dead ring-holders. When Saruman throws a paddy, use P1 to resist him. P1 is only usable if you are standing in the coloured circle for the ring you are holding.

What happens if you fail to do this? If you fail to activate all of the rings, you will repeat the phase you just did all over again. If you succeed in resisting on all rings, you pass into phase two. We don't know what partial success does, because it didn't happen. My guess is either it's get them all done or fail & repeat, or get some done & you won't get those clones returning on the repeat. Not important on Phase One, where we ought always to succeed, but might be important on Phase Two, if some of the ring-holders are dead...

Round Two
Round One all over again, except the clones now have real attacks. Saruman also starts speaking, and what he says determines the terrain effect. I only caught one statement "Naur dan i gothrim!" Which roughly translates to "Firemaker, see the enemy host!" and precedes a lava overlay. The terrain does nothing but, I suspect, the overall debuff that is happening is also set by this. I didn't have time to examine these yesterday.

{Edit:} I have a screenshot of Attuned to Acid and Attuned to Fire. These are buffs that sit on the appropriate clone. Curiously enough, the Acid was screenied when the lava was down; the Fire when the acid cloud was up. In each case the buff is -20% damage, +20% incoming damage. My guess is that if I screenie the Fire-lord when the lava is down, I'll be seeing +20% damage, -20% incoming damage, etc. Which would mean that we burn down Shadow ASAP as before, but then avoid the clone of the element that is down. In other words, go for the Venom-keeper unless the acid cloud is up, in which case go for the next one on the list. One presumes that the master Saruman will only call up the terrain of surviving clones, which could make the last one a bit of a toughie!

The lightning attack that was killing people is Polarity, the same as comes from BFB, and comes down from the Storm Stones set into the pinnacles. These are out of range, so there's no killing them.

Round Three
We didn't get there, but I would expect this to be Saruman himself finally activating, with all attendant powers & nastiness, plus knockbacks / OD Balrog style pulls to throw you off the Tower...

Culler

16 Jan 2012, 16:27

A couple more things I thought of:

Shadow Wing: Boss started to heal at around 200k... We just blew through it but I think it may have been becuase he was stood in a purple pool.

Codger: I think his drama sequence is sufficiently long in-between phases to get any ring bearers rezed and in position. Minstrel will need to throw off an AoE rez right after we leave combat however. As i think positioning will be important it may be useful to assign off-tanks (captains or champs) to help round up the sarumen when they run in before taking them over to the tanks who can challenge them off them. They seem to have a long range and are difficult to position sometimes... Especially as you cant move too close to Saruman or you lose all your aggro skills from the silence.

All in all this is shaping up to be a really fun fight!

Ayalinda

16 Jan 2012, 17:40

Indeed, I suggest at least one mini slots Graceful Demeanour (if they don't already) for the decreased induction on enlivening grace

Raedwulf

16 Jan 2012, 19:06

Huzzah! I'm back! With a mostly rebuilt PC (the gfx card was faulty, so I'm still running on the old one until a replacement turns up). Anyway, you may want to re-read my post at the foot of P.5. Now that I have the screenies, I've updated the ring info (except for Frost), and I also discovered a couple of interesting Phase 2 buff screenshots.

The only other thing to add is that Farmer Maggot (the Shadow boss with the ox skull on his nut) inflicts one other debuff called Black of Night. This does -25% run speed & +50% attack duration / skill inductions. I'm not clear whether this is from one of the clouds or the Isengard Root (which is preceded by the cry "The tendrils of the night hold you, {name}!). I think it's not the latter, since that inflicts Perfect Root (which cannot be broken by damage); my guess would be it's the Choking Fumes (so you get damaged and run slowly - nice double whammy!).

ReDGryffyN

16 Jan 2012, 19:10

From my combat log:-

My two deaths, these hits occured very close together, the Storm maker does distributed damage as well as normal

1st death

Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Morale Damage on Redgriffin for 1,179 Acid damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,616 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,616 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Morale Damage on Redgriffin for 1,193 Acid damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker incapacitated you.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning - Distributed on Redgriffin for 3,739 Lightning damage to Morale.

2nd death

Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,889 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,889 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning - Distributed on Redgriffin for 4,045 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,830 Lightning damage to Morale.
The Polarity incapacitated you.

Other non lethal high hits from:-

Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Morale Damage on Redgriffin for 2,695 Acid damage to Morale.
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Morale Damage on Redgriffin for 2,718 Acid damage to Morale.

Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning Arc on Redgriffin for 3,027 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning Arc on Redgriffin for 3,027 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning Arc on Redgriffin for 3,448 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a devastating hit with Lightning Arc on Redgriffin for 4,063 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a devastating hit with Lightning Arc on Redgriffin for 4,179 Lightning damage to Morale

I looked at the damage from the Shadow Bringer, Frost Master and Fire Lord and their damage to me was far far less.

and some piccies!

http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00226.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00227.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00228.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00230.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00231.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00232.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00237.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00241.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00242.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00243.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00244.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ScreenShot00253.jpg

Finally found on my screenies four (I guess there may be 5) of Sarumans spoken phrases for Phase 2

Heleg etholo
Naur dan i gothrim
Thawnen dosto a nago
Elruin im estor

ReD

KOFACME

Notiane

16 Jan 2012, 19:23

Quick update, to be implemented in post #50, on the frost ring:

frost P2 Applies a damage preventing bubble granting 250,000 temporary Morale. +2400% Percieved Threat. P3 text: Wield the power of frost to assault Saruman by suppressing adaptations (30 m range, 8s duration)

Raedwulf

16 Jan 2012, 20:14

#50 updated, thanks Noti.

Heleg is ice (dunno what they reckon etholo means), so this'll presage Mr Frosty's moment.
Naur dan I've already given - the Fire-lord.
Thaw is corrupt or rotten, so Corrupted something and tooth / teeth, possibly. From the mention of corruption & the sequence of my 2 Attuned screenies, I strongly suspect this is before the acid cloud / Venom-keeper time.
Elruin could be "fiery star", im is I, estor dunno, but estolad is encampment (with -lad meaning plains). Best guess is fiery star would imply lightning.

I would expect there to be something involving gwath (shadow) or mor (dark) for the Shadow-bringer.

ReDGryffyN

17 Jan 2012, 09:52

Awerth

17 Jan 2012, 13:14

new patch release notes are out, looks like they have sorted the tooltip issues, and now made steam more visable, along with being able to target the nodes in the lightning wing...

ReDGryffyN

17 Jan 2012, 15:01

and prob stop the absorbing in the acid boss fight, so that might be more challenging now
All good I reckon

ReD

KOFACME

Raedwulf

17 Jan 2012, 16:55

I suspect the absorbing is actually a property of being on the higher ground. I did notice in the last run that if you wander off it when the acid rises you do take damage. So it's not a T1 property that it doesn't work.

Hmmm... though having just taken a squint at the patch notes... See, it hasn't been "randomly" absorbing. If you're on the higher ground, it's always been absorbing. So I guess we won't know for sure what they mean until this weekend's run.

Raedwulf

17 Jan 2012, 19:34

I've grabbed new screenies of all the Rings & updated the details in #50. The changes are minor mostly.

Ayalinda

22 Jan 2012, 22:04

Newly bugged acid wing. Move and jump when the acid rises. Bloody stupid, but seems to be the only way to stay alive.

Raedwulf

23 Jan 2012, 06:59

That's not bugged. That's what the dialogue on the tooltip implies. Acidic Waters - If you do not continue moving and stay out of the water, the acid will eat you alive Another stupid attack in a long line of stupid attacks that Turbine have come up with. Moving around in acid would make it worse, not better!

Ayalinda

23 Jan 2012, 08:18

bloody stupid. They should have done it that you need to stand on a hillock out of the water, and as the fight progresses the waters get higher so there are fewer safe hillocks, until there is nowhere safe. Anyway we have a working method. I shall just have to suppress the science rage that happens every time I think how stupid this is.

Awerth

23 Jan 2012, 12:09

The stupid thing is that the amount of time before you die is so small, if we hadn't read it before when it was bugged, you wouldnt have time to read it before you go pop.
Not that we remembered from before...

Culler

23 Jan 2012, 13:26

Despite the problems with the boss I didnt think we handled the trash very well at all. Will need to have a think about what we can do to improve things

ReDGryffyN

23 Jan 2012, 15:14

Can you remind me on the locks for this please?

Do Acid/Fire+Frost/Lightning wings have to be done before Shadow?

In other words my Captain did Fire+Frost and Lightning on Friday but did not do Acid last night, so will he still be able to enter Shadow Wing?

ReD

KOFACME

Awerth

23 Jan 2012, 15:32

yes, lock transfer from leader to the rest of the raid, first 3 wings are acid, lightning and fire+ice, next lock is shadow then saruman. we are now on shadow so locks for the first 3 dont matter, only a shadow lock or a saruman lock would not let you join :)

Maconabo

24 Jan 2012, 22:25

One thing I notice about t1 is that none of the fake saruman has conj immunity, which means a guard with ttk can really be spamming off fellowship manouvers.

Also a RK or two would be very usefull for their do not fall to skills.

Maconabo

24 Jan 2012, 22:43

Fire grants +100% damage, & +25% crit & devastate chance and devastate magnitude for P2; Ring of Fire is a jet of flame for 16K damage, P3.
Acid grants a 100% damage reduction with a 250K power bonus; P3 reduces AV & Resistances to 0.
Shadow P2 gives a 50% chance to receive a 100% heal to all fellowship member within 10m if the player who receives the buff is hit. P3 text is "Wield the power of Shadow to assault Saruman by creating a corrupt weakness to exploit". When removed (10s duration) the darkness will deal moderate damage.
Frost P2 Applies a damage preventing bubble granting 250,000 temporary Morale. +2400% Percieved Threat. P3 text: Wield the power of frost to assault Saruman by suppressing adaptations (30 m range, 8s duration). All learned forms of Adaptation are suppressed.
Lightning grants -75% on all skill inductions & attack duration (so put it on a Hunter). A big distributed lightning attack (64K) is P3.

Very important to give thought of when and where to use these rings.

I thnk atleast two tanks is impostant and Acid dude should be off tanked away from everything else.
So, one tank takes three. second tank takes acid. and the group burns shadow guy.

Tiermond

25 Jan 2012, 06:43

Each fake saruman can have an fm done on it once before they get immunity from adaptation, likewise they can be cc'd once with each of root/daze/stun/fear.

Culler

25 Jan 2012, 11:07

I thought the FM immunity was 3 mins but not permanent. Perhaps it is the stun/knockdown which they develop immunity to effictively making them FM immune.

I think that during the 2nd phase the adds get buffed depending on which of the pretty graphics we have enveloping the tower at the time. It seems like one of the acid attacks is very nasty and gives the person a DoT which can only be cured by overhealing that person... This will require focus healing from captain, minstrels and loremasters in order to deal with this quickly and get it removed... Really good mechanic if you ask me as nice to have to focus and co-ordinate healing from time to time. Anyway it is a nasty DoT, especially if the 'acid phase' is active as it doubles the DoT making it much harder to cure by over-healing... This is what happened to Awerth on the final run which caused us to wipe.

Other than that positioning of the lightning guy seems troublesome... On one hand we need people to be able to soak up the distributed damage but on the other hand we need to have them avoiding polarity... I think if you have the boss faced towards 12 o'clock (lets say) then the lightning will be directed to 1:30, 4:30, 7:30 and 10:30... This should provide safe spots for the tank at 12 and the rest at 6.... There is no AoE as such but attacking from behind will still be helpful.

We struggled a bit in terms of getting the Sarumen under control when they spawn with a couple of the light classes going down... We need to get better at dealing with the initial confusion and make sure we are moving (if necessary) in order to avoid damage, give the tanks time to build aggro and get everything positioned and under control. Use potions, bubbles and anything you need to stay alive... Its not a DPS race as far as I can tell but of course the sooner we start killing stuff the easier it becomes. I might also suggest it is worthwhile people stacking morale for this fight too... I reckon a minimum 9k buffed is a good target for most classes. If you are 'morale light' slot valour and zeal, also the crafted braclets with a shed load of morale are very nice for morale stacking.... You can always switched back to your regular ones once we have 'weathered the storm' and got everything under control.

I think increased familarity with the fight will help, we still have a way to go but hopefully we can make solid progress in the next few weeks.

ReDGryffyN

25 Jan 2012, 13:02

Some observations from my side:-

"Understanding and Communication" are the two key areas for this fight and with that the more we do it the better both will come.

Having said that though I thought our communication and understanding was at times poor and deteriorated towards the end.

Phase 1 is almost a cake walk and does/will give the raid a chance to warm up and get familiar with the rings etc but it should now also be used as a practice for the latter phases. Having two tanks is good IMHO and splitting up the Sarumen into a 2 and a 3 is also good and we need to ensure that the tanks have enough time to collect their targets and build threat on them. If necessary have Captains and other heavy armour classes grab any errant ones and drag them to the respective tanks. having 3 of the Sarumen one side of the tower and the other 2 opposite would be ideal.
Locking down the Sarumen is key before we start any major DPS, too many times I saw Sarumen being dragged across the tower by Hunter DPS and then tanks struggling then to grab them back.
Again avoid any major heals initially to avoid threat generation.

I thought afterwards that the light/medium armour classes could ball up together equidistant between the 2 tanks and remain there for the duration until rings were needed to be shown to Saruman.

In summary before the start everyone should therefore know where they are moving too and what their role is which helps with the understanding part, again good to practice this in Phase 1

Re the Rings, We should use them! and understand beforehand what target the ring bearers are going to have bearing in mind the type of ring they own and its associated powers. They can be used on non ring bearers so knowing who does not have them is also key. I have highlighted below the Phase 2 benefits.

Fire grants +100% damage, & +25% crit & devastate chance and devastate magnitude for P2; Ring of Fire is a jet of flame for 16K damage, P3.

Acid grants a 100% damage reduction with a 250K power bonus; P3 reduces AV & Resistances to 0

Shadow P2 gives a 50% chance to receive a 100% heal to all fellowship member within 10m if the player who receives the buff is hit. P3 text is "Wield the power of Shadow to assault Saruman by creating a corrupt weakness to exploit". When removed (10s duration) the darkness will deal moderate damage.

Frost P2 Applies a damage preventing bubble granting 250,000 temporary Morale. +2400% Percieved Threat. P3 text: Wield the power of frost to assault Saruman by suppressing adaptations (30 m range, 8s duration). All learned forms of Adaptation are suppressed.

Lightning grants -75% on all skill inductions & attack duration A big distributed lightning attack (64K) is P3

Just reading these gives me loads of ideas as to who would benefit from them say for Phase 2

Fire - Champ / Hunter (But be careful not to give this straight away or the threat could be too much too soon)
Acid - Looks very powerful if I read it right 100% damage reduction ? Looks like an immunity to all damage? What about DOT's? Tank?
Shadow - Looks like a good one for whoever gets the acid DOT perhaps
Frost - Good for a Tank
Lightning - Hunter?

One question here do they stack? Can you use more than one on the same person ?

Phase 2 I think is like Phase 1 but with added buffs based on the floor effect plus the acid DOT and the Polarity and Distributed Lightning stuff.

Not sure how to deal with the lightning damage yet, I got killed again with this last night by a 5K hit or so, someone else got 7K and these were not the distributed type or from polarity. I was not aware if this was a buffed damage output when the floor was electrified or not, I must be more observant!

Phase 3 - Yes we did see it briefly! I forgot to ramp down my graphics settings so was not aware of what someone saw regarding a cloud (Purple/Green??) but will check the combat log tonight to see if I was taking any new damage from it.

Overall though it is a very enjoyable and challenging fight and one that will require as I have said better understanding and communication to allow us to progress.

I agree with Culler regarding the stacking of morale. As a Captain I have traited the hope banner to give more of a boost and composure to give an extra rallying cry every 150 seconds, still not sure if I need to revert back to full HoH inc capstone for this one as we learn the fight. Doing so will lose IDOME, OB or Fellowship brother which all still have a place at the table already! If pushed to lose one it would be OB, not sure it is that "essential" for the Saruman fight.

ReD

KOFACME

Awerth

25 Jan 2012, 13:14

Poison dot is a pain, needing to be fully healed up for it to go, while a tanking 3 of them seemed difficult..
FM immunity was 3 minutes one of the things I checked.
The lightning guy I would suggest ranged killing him and an 45 degree angle from the back of him
And Yes ReD when the floor changes to the type of the saruman that saruman gets +100% damage to all its skills even DoTs.

Order of killing should really be

Shadow.
Acid
Lightning
Fire
Frosty as he is the weakest damage wise

Shadows heal is a corruption on the other Sarumans and can be removed

The acid guy a bit more detail
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Acid on Awerth for 428 Acid damage to Morale.
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Melting Acid on Awerth.
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Bleed on Awerth for 260 Acid damage to Morale.
P2
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Morale Damage on Awerth for 1,328 Acid damage to Morale. This is the damage over time must heal to full one!
Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Devouring Acid on Awerth for 446 Acid damage to Morale.

lightning guy

Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning Arc on Awerth for 2,122 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning - Distributed on Awerth for 4,244 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning - Distributed on Awerth for 530 Lightning damage to Morale.
P2
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Awerth for 1,855 Lightning damage to Morale. Hits every second while you stand in it!

Eyes have gone now looking at all the combat log... Need a break

Culler

25 Jan 2012, 13:40

If healing corruption can be removed why kill shadow first?... As long as we keep the one we are killing de-corrupted we would probably be best getting down one of the 2 nasties (lightning and acid IMO) first. Just an idea...

Why do you suggest having just ranged on the lightning? Presumably we need melee in there (maybe some ranged too) to soak up the distributed damaged better?

I will have a look over my combat log tonight. After a quick skim last night and based on my other finding i dont think stacking resist rating is very useful for raiding as I am not seeing any resists on any of the skills, DoTs or clouds that the bosses do. You cant even resist the acid tick in the watcher fight anymore.

Had a play with this last night. First impressions are that it is pure awesome

http://lotrointerface.com/downloads/info502-CombatAnalysis.html

Awerth

25 Jan 2012, 13:51

hehe I have that plugin just never turned it on :) except soloing Helecham :) I was thinking about the reason to take down shadow first, and there is a point in taking the nasty ones down first, but as with all games you always kill the healing ones first :)

Ayalinda

25 Jan 2012, 13:53

I thought he also had a big heal that wasn't corruption based. see Raed's post #50

Awerth

25 Jan 2012, 13:57

~I knew there was a reason :)

ReDGryffyN

25 Jan 2012, 14:24

And Yes ReD when the floor changes to the type of the saruman that saruman gets +100% damage to all its skills even DoTs.

Order of killing should really be

Shadow.
Acid
Lightning
Fire
Frosty as he is the weakest damage wise

I have a slightly different offering perhaps we should change the order slightly?

Shadow
Lightning
Acid
Fire
Frost

The lightning seems to hit hard (possibly hardest?) as single person damage and having a 100% ramp up to his damage looks like a one shotter!

Acid could be dealt with by making sure we deal with the green cross promptly (with possible ring use as mentioned above)

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

25 Jan 2012, 14:29

I thought I only saw polarity fire off when we were in the lightning enviroment. I may be wrong.

ReDGryffyN

25 Jan 2012, 14:40

There are as far as I have seen 3 types of attacks from Lightning guy:--

Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,889 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Polarity on Redgriffin for 2,889 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning - Distributed on Redgriffin for 4,045 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a devastating hit with Lightning Arc on Redgriffin for 4,063 Lightning damage to Morale.

The polarity one I did not see in phase 1 (not 100% sure) but only Phase 2 onwards.

He also has a single target arc hit and a distributed damage as well.

ReD

KOFACME

Maconabo

25 Jan 2012, 15:47

Saruman the Shadow-bringer has the unique ability to apply the following (stacking) healing buff on other forms of Saruman:

vile Replenishment Heals 2,271 Morale every 3 seconds.

He`ll also get adaption fom being cc`d.

This one doesnt do any nasty attacks , so it doesnt matter too much about where, or by whom he is `tanked`. This would give the tanks a chance to round up and build threatz on the nastier adds.

I say Nuke their healers first ! :P

Raedwulf

25 Jan 2012, 17:14

I thought he also had a big heal that wasn't corruption based. see Raed's post #50

Yes, reminder: Post 50 is quite important! (http://www.beorningas.com/forum/showpost.php?p=27411&postcount=50) Remembering it would have saved quite a bit of posting by various people. ;) I'll repost it when there's enough changes needed to warrant editing it (assuming I haven't written a guide by then...).

ReDGryffyN

26 Jan 2012, 13:56

Final few comments made mainly from reviewing my combat log.

NB

We did actually kill the Sarumen in the order Shadow, Storm, Venom, Fire and Frost

Saruman 1st Attempt

Phase 1

Kill Order

Shadow
Storm
Venom
Fire
Frost

1 death Hal by storm.

We got Lightning arc and distributed damage in this phase (polarity was phases 2 and 3)

Phase 2

Kill Order

Shadow
Storm
Venom
Fire
Frost

4 Deaths all by Venom on Warryn, Yri, Culler and Mac, plus 2 by misadventure (they know who they were! :)....)

Phase 3

Achieved Shadow kill only

Raid wipe, Venom Polarity and Storm were the culprits. I got hit with a DOT ? almost from the off

I had 30K worth of these interspersed with manic healing of me and myself to no avail

Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Morale Damage on Redgriffin for 1,019 Acid damage to Morale.

Also saw one of these for the first time

Saruman the Venom-keeper scored a hit with Devouring Acid on Redgriffin for 563 Acid damage to Morale.

Saruman 2nd Attempt

Phase 1

Kill Order

Shadow
Storm
Venom
Fire
Frost

No deaths! :)

Phase 2

Only managed to kill shadow, :(

Me, Mac and Hal all got killed at the same time by Storm, not distributed but lightning arc

Awerth got done by the venom again, all bar Tier (polarity) got done by the Storm

Saruman 3rd and Final Attempt

Phase 1

Kill Order

Shadow
Storm
Venom
Fire
Frost

No deaths again! :)

Phase 2

Kill Order

Shadow
Storm
Venom
Fire
Frost

one death Sybil by Venom

Phase 3

Killed only the shadow

Raid wipe.

Lost Nim almost straight away with polarity, lost others to Storm, polarity and at the end the last few with venom, overall was a very quick wipe

I remember on this last fight Awerth had the nasty DOT and we had to heal him to max to get rid of it and I was spamming WoC but was not enough to save him or indeed myself!

For the record I used my fire ring benefits everytime on Yri

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

27 Jan 2012, 09:29

We got through the first 3 wings last night. All 3 bosses down without issue.

We ran a slightly different tactic for the acid wing Trash. For the first pull we had tank 1 pick up a warg, Noti then rooted a couple of Orcs and Hal cc the other warg. We dealt with the other 2 orcs first. Then the other 2 orc when they escaped the root. When Hal had cycled through his cc's so the warg was fully adapted, the Culler and Hal swapped wargs.

This seemed to work well and meant we didn't have 2 Wargs arriving at the fight at the same time. Pull 2, I messed up at the start, causing the opening root on the 2 wargs we were CCing to be lifted causing us to wipe. In theory with Tsu tanking 1 warg, while Culler tanks orcs, we have 80s until we have the 2 other wargs arriving, at which point we cc the 1st giving another 80s to finish off the orcs, start on Culler's warg, who will pick up the 3rd Warg.

Finnaly Hunter CC is a definite possibility, as Hal showed, I think there is less room for error, but is useful as they have all 3 long CC's (I don't think there are any stuns that last for more than a few seconds)

Culler

27 Jan 2012, 10:09

I think burgs can stun 3 targets for 8 seconds if they are close together. Champs crafted horn can stun (5 or 7?) targets up to 10 seconds with a legacy and a long cool down (20 mins?), again if they are close together. LMs have a longish stun too (test of will?)... So yeah stuns generally dont last long as they cant be broken but an extra 8-10 seconds could make a difference...

Only other thing I observed which may have already been commented on is that the that the trolls in the lightning wing do distributed damage so there is no point in tank trying to pick them up if they get lose and take them away from the group.

I think last night worked really well with hunter CC to be honest as they have the trinity of a root, daze and fear. Hopefully things will get smoother with every run at which point T2 will bring us back down to earth.

I have come up with a genius idea. The trouble with trying to tank the wargs once all their CC immunity has been blown, is the debuff which can make even the most sturdy tank get hit hard. As it is the debuff that makes them hit hard we could try enraging (1 or maybe 2) of them once we are unable to CC them. This should hopefully mean that the person who with the debuffs should not be getting hit. Well, it will happen from time to time but it should just be 1 attack and with most at 9k morale buffed they can probably take a few hits... Furthermore, at this stage, we will be spread out to deal with the threat of the slugs... This means the wargs will spend more time running between targets and less time doing damage.

What do you reckon?

Awerth

27 Jan 2012, 13:21

Trolls in Lightning wing if they get loose, you can pick them up, just dont let them get near you :)

Ayalinda

27 Jan 2012, 13:24

They also don't have adaptation, so it should be pretty easy to keep them perma mezzed until it is time to deal with them

Awerth

27 Jan 2012, 14:27

They also don't have adaptation, so it should be pretty easy to keep them perma mezzed until it is time to deal with them

At the moment they dont :) have a walk into tier 2 and see what you see :)

ReDGryffyN

27 Jan 2012, 16:13

Had a play with this last night. First impressions are that it is pure awesome

http://lotrointerface.com/downloads/info502-CombatAnalysis.html

Dowloaded it and had a brief play, will have a better look tonight, now I know how you were quoting my healing figures to me!!

Any tips on the plugin?

ReD

KOFACME

Culler

27 Jan 2012, 16:37

Dowloaded it and had a brief play, will have a better look tonight, now I know how you were quoting my healing figures to me!!

Any tips on the plugin?

ReD

KOFACME

Not really, it's fairly intuative, just play around with it and you'll get the hang of it. You can minimise the window so that it only occupies a few pixels and if you right/left click on the 'i' symbol next to where it says 'send to chat' you can have the other window always visible, hidden, or hidden but visible with mouseover.

Is can sort each encounter separately based on going in and out of combat or for fights like draigoch just by mob name. You can expand each mob or fellowship memeber to see what skills they are using to heal, damage you, or give you power as well as your own damage output.

Really fun to have when raiding as it helps pass the time during bio-break or while looting etc.

Awerth

27 Jan 2012, 17:01

http://a3.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc7/303777_10150321526580209_569560208_7950742_1956204 612_n.jpg

should show you the general idea of it

Ayalinda

30 Jan 2012, 13:41

Right Saruman!

Phase 1:
5 Sarumans. Not much else.

Phase 2:
5 Sarumans. Acid DOT, need to heal someone to full to remove it.

Phase 3:
5 Sarumans, Wounds/Diseases/Poisons and Fears. Remove ASAP, fear in particularly bad. I believe someone took screenshots of the 4 effects.

Phase 4:
5 Sarumans, Sarumans drop clouds, get out of them. Saruman himself activates and begins to blast people with various attacks.

Phase 5:
10 Sarumans: As above.

I think the various effects continue once they have been introduced (so you still get the acid DOT in later stages), but they become less frequent. It also seems that things get stronger as the phase progresses (to balance there being fewer mobs), as we didn't seem to be healing less as the phase went on.

For reference we had 2 minis and a healing traited RK going flat out from phase 2 onwards. I know at least 1 cpt did mainly healing also.

Culler

30 Jan 2012, 14:15

Some of the effects seem to remain once they have been introduced, others come and go for a phase at a time (perhaps they always remian in T2). Anyway, this is from memory so sorry if I say anything wrong.

Acid DoT (the one that needs over-healing) only seems to be in phase 2 (maybe 3 too? pretty sure it went away in 4 and 5)

I am almost 100% sure that the potable debuffs are only present in phase 3 (I took screenshots will post later)

Phase 4 introduces purple clouds (damage) and green clouds (healing circles). The purple clouds remain for the final phase, I do not think we get healing circles in the final phase (again could be wrong on this)

Phase 5 introduces 5 additional Sarumen. Purple clouds remain. Frostie gives people knockback eyes? (I never got one). Fire and Acid are much the same as they are in phase 1 except with 4 of them hitting me and 2 acid dots I will take a fair whack of damage.

I think in one of the phases (possibly 3 or 4) acid started to do an AoE aura as I saw some of the DPSers taking damage when stood close... I'm really not 100% on this and may have just imagined it. Either way it didnt seem too bad but maybe something for healers to watch out for in terms of positioning. I will try to confirm next time.

Will have to wait for Awerth regarding how frost/lightning change in the different phases to come up with an optimal kill order. Does ligtning become more less potent in 4 and 5 while frost becomes more potent? I'm pretty sure polarity stopped at some point and I cant remember if frost did anything nasty in P4 or not.

Really good boss fight... Now I just want to nail it!

Tsureknath

30 Jan 2012, 14:45

For reference we had 2 minis and a healing traited RK going flat out from phase 2 onwards. I know at least 1 cpt did mainly healing also.

I think that a good setup for Saruman fight would be something like this: 2 minnies / 2 HOH captains (IDOME, HOH, Fellow Bro) 1 RK as a backup healer also spamming his amazing damage prevention thingies (possible mixture of dps / heal traits?) 2 guardians, 2 champions (last phase went smooth with me and skip dividing annoying Sarumen away from group) 3 more ranged dps (I think when clouds start to be all over the place having not to move around in a battle like this seems a great asset.

P.S. from a champions POV: do not harm your dps for this fight, thinking "I need to survive the dots and other stuff". A morale pool of around 10k (buffed) seemed more than enough if your mitigation is high. Plus you practically got 5 healers backing you up. So, since 5 people are practically providing 0 dps, you need to compensate.

Continuous Blood Rage worked amazingly great for me in all ToO fights and especially this last one. A single Revealing Mark is enough to keep your morale maxed up as if there was no damage dot. Trait Deep Strikes, Flurry, forget AoE traits, except perhaps Stalwart Blade for the pip. Trait Bracing Attack for the extra morale. A combination of 5Red/2Blue I think will be most suitable. The 2 blue bonus provides the extra threat for challenge, cause Sarumen tend to really ignore shouts... As for the second blue trait after Bracing, pick one of the two: if you got power problems (I don't) trait Vigour of Champions. If not, choose Call of the Wild. Extra threat for the off-off-tanking (;)) plus extra defense due to the decreased cd of Sudden Defense.

Awerth

30 Jan 2012, 15:29

Frosty does AoE damage aimed at the main group ( he turns to face the most people then lets rip!) at phase 4-5, lightning only does the distrubted damage during phase 4 but in phase 4 does frontal AoE lightning beam (reminded me of R-Type laser beam :) ) in phase 5 along with a throw you off the side move, so if your tanking him always face Saruman (center) as the clone will pull you over his head and across most of the tower...Frostys AoE is also a route which can be nasty when the clouds are down.. other to that they are not too bad!
and polarity is not in phase 3,4 or 5 at all only phase 2 has it. You are correct with potable DoTs are only in phase 3, phase 4 was the I have no fecking where to stand phase, with acid clouds and shadow clouds being thrown everywhere by saruman.

ReDGryffyN

30 Jan 2012, 15:35

The last and successful run of all 5 phases I had timed at approx 39mins according to combat stats during which time ............

Healing Out 866,000
Power Out 83,668
Damage Out 312,000
Damage In 247,100

My damage output was severely restricted in Phases 4 and 5 and they consisted mostly of inspire and valiant strike as I was having to concentrate so much on spam healing. Where I could I went through my chains to get Blade of Elendil up and taking every opportunity for War Cry inc one from Time of Need every 2 and a half minutes.

I was set up as Tsu said, Full HoH, IDOME and Fellowship Brother as they are the best 3 I feel for Saruman. Captains Hope is also a good one from the Blue HOH line for the extra buff to everyones base morale.

I think Beo was very similary specced so we had 2 HoH captains, giving us also both 20% morale return and 10% extra damage from them.

Until we get the fight more controlled ( I think we did very well having for many of us never seen Phases 4 or 5 before) the healing was beneficial, sure we lost DPS but that will come as we get better with the fight and can trait differently.

For me getting the first 2 of the 5 and the first 4 of the 10 of the Sarumen down is key to this fight as the quicker we get them down the more contriolled the fight becomes. Using all your cooldowns for these early Sarumen plus the ring skills is a recommendation from me.

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

30 Jan 2012, 16:33

I'm not a big fan of RK as off healers, managing your attunement is a pain, and you lock out all your best skills. It might be possible if your a bit more skilled than me :s

Culler

30 Jan 2012, 17:10

I only got 3 of the 4 potable debuffs... Seems I missed the wound 1 although judging from the others it is probably also very nasty and will need removing.

http://i41.tinypic.com/wkk32o.jpg

EDIT: the fear one is a terror attack so you run around with no control over yourself... *Waits for Raedwulf's "no change there then" comment.*

Raedwulf

31 Jan 2012, 08:24

Actually, I thought you were immune to those on account of being too dim to be frightened? :P

Culler

31 Jan 2012, 10:08

Frosty does AoE damage aimed at the main group ( he turns to face the most people then lets rip!) at phase 4-5, lightning only does the distrubted damage during phase 4 but in phase 4 does frontal AoE lightning beam (reminded me of R-Type laser beam :) ) in phase 5 along with a throw you off the side move,

Can you clarify this to make sure I have understood

So we get Frosty's AoE in phase 4 and 5?

Lightning does distributed damage in 4 but not phase 5?

In phase 5 lightning does a frontal AoE?

Is the 'throw you off the side' move caused by either frost or lightning and can thus be stopped by killing them or is it caused by the central Saruman thus perisiting throughout the final phase?

Ayalinda

31 Jan 2012, 10:32

My understanding is the same as yours, although there is frontal AOE in phase 4&5 from Lightning.

How did we deal with lightnings Distributed damage in phase 4? I don't remember balling up, did you just suck it up Awerth?

The throw is a lightning Saruman power so when we kill them it stops.

Haleabor

31 Jan 2012, 12:43

I've seen lots of discussion on the Sarumans, but not much about the Ring use.

Has anyone considered how these can be used tactically to mitigate the boss attacks etc?

Hal

ReDGryffyN

31 Jan 2012, 12:56

Hal,

Bumping from an earlier post...............

Re the Rings, We should use them! and understand beforehand what target the ring bearers are going to have bearing in mind the type of ring they own and its associated powers. They can be used on non ring bearers so knowing who does not have them is also key. I have highlighted below the Phase 2 benefits.

Fire grants +100% damage, & +25% crit & devastate chance and devastate magnitude for P2; Ring of Fire is a jet of flame for 16K damage, P3.

Acid grants a 100% damage reduction with a 250K power bonus; P3 reduces AV & Resistances to 0

Shadow P2 gives a 50% chance to receive a 100% heal to all fellowship member within 10m if the player who receives the buff is hit. P3 text is "Wield the power of Shadow to assault Saruman by creating a corrupt weakness to exploit". When removed (10s duration) the darkness will deal moderate damage.

Frost P2 Applies a damage preventing bubble granting 250,000 temporary Morale. +2400% Percieved Threat. P3 text: Wield the power of frost to assault Saruman by suppressing adaptations (30 m range, 8s duration). All learned forms of Adaptation are suppressed.

Lightning grants -75% on all skill inductions & attack duration A big distributed lightning attack (64K) is P3

Just reading these gives me loads of ideas as to who would benefit from them say for Phase 2

Fire - Champ / Hunter (But be careful not to give this straight away or the threat could be too much too soon)
Acid - Looks very powerful if I read it right 100% damage reduction ? Looks like an immunity to all damage? What about DOT's? Tank?
Shadow - Looks like a good one for whoever gets the acid DOT perhaps
Frost - Good for a Tank
Lightning - Hunter?

One question here do they stack? Can you use more than one on the same person ?

New comments:-

For phase 2 you get the P2 benefits, and they are more around boosts to the non ring bearers and can be used once for every phase onwards. (2-5)

For phase 3 (and for the later 2 phases) P3 effects can ALSO be used and these appear more to be damaging toward a Saruman of your choice. (Not the main man btw) (3-5)

So you can use P2 and P3 skills once per phase from Phase 3.

I have suggested some uses for P2 but what about P3?

Anyone want to throw some ideas in for both?

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

31 Jan 2012, 12:57

I tended to use mine quite early.

I took lightning ring, which is the -induction time, - attack duration. The offensive power was the distributed damage attack.

Basically both of mine cause damage, so I used them when the first mob was down to about 1/2 health, figuring using them early is good as the longer you wait, the less mobs we have, so the easier it is to control the fight, however using them to early and your going to make life difficult for the tanks who are still securing their aggro.

Tsureknath

31 Jan 2012, 17:18

Fire grants +100% damage, & +25% crit & devastate chance and devastate magnitude for P2; Ring of Fire is a jet of flame for 16K damage, P3.
Fire - Champ / Hunter (But be careful not to give this straight away or the threat could be too much too soon)

Anyone want to throw some ideas in for both?

Yes. Please gimme fire O+:Y
Seriously, this could help the champion both damage and threat-wise. When I pick that early shadow Saruman, threat is what I want after all.

ReDGryffyN

01 Feb 2012, 09:03

Some smaller thoughts about the fight after last night.

Minstrels "Song of Aid" played at the beginning of each phase would be good as a Guardian can then hit Litany of Defiance (challenge can be fired off straight away as soon as the mobs appear and can be tageted) for example (and then shiled taunt) and put a ToT on mobs, and possible Minstrels throw call to greatness on the grds and we should be golden. I did not slot Guardians Threat (nor Culler I believe) but not sure of that would help at the beginning of the fight or not, might be worth trying.

Re the punt, if it is going to randomnly (< true?) target someone so fast its going to be an issue, assuming I saw it straight away where do I run ? (Someone mentioned running to Saruman in the centre?) and what happens to the Saruman in the meantime if I have not locked them down ?.

It may be that I have to hit challenge as soon as I can target a Saruman and then back into a door (if one Saruman goes walkies then he will have to wait a sec!)...do the song of aid etc then to help lock the first 3 and then work on getting the 4th guy back.

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

01 Feb 2012, 09:24

I think the punt is only used on the person with Lightning Aggro, and you get pulled over the mobs head, so ideally you want your back to the wall with the lightning Sarumans between you and Saruman himself. Fingers crossed we get a group together for tonight and we can discuss a full strategy for the start of phase 5.

Ayalinda

01 Feb 2012, 10:25

Also hint for RK's remember to hit TBWNW and TFWNP whenever they come up, your pretty unlucky if you get hit with wound/poison twice in 1 minute, so if we have 2RK, we should 1/2 the number of effects in phase 3.

Notiane

01 Feb 2012, 10:31

Best strategy to avoid what went wrong last time (imho) is to have the one who has agro he is not supposed to have run back to the assigned tank. Maybe even assign a temporary tank (captains? champs?) to each and every clone?

Culler

01 Feb 2012, 10:57

Song of aid at the start of the fight would be a big help in term of opening up guardian reactives. Would allow us to use litany on one group, run to the next and then use shield taunt and save challenge for emergencies or if we get a resist.

I will stress what I said last night that the it really is best if the healers can hang off from healing for as long as possible... The natural thing for a healer to do is when combat starts is to either, in the case of a minstrel, get their ballad buffs up and in the case of a RK start to attune themselves. Only trouble is that one major ballad or one small HoT will give you aggro on any target that has yet to be hit by the tanks or has suffered a resist. Once we have mobs where they are not supposed to be then we have problems.

Again we need to get through the first 4 stages without anyone dying and certainly have IHW + LS off CD... of course we should not need such skills but there is no reason to not have them at our disposal if we are careful.

The only other thing I could suggest is to have both minstrels throw off fellowships heart at the start of the phase immediately followed by feign death.... FH should hopefully heal us through anything for the first 30 seconds and if the minstrel feign death will not mess up the aggro. IHW + LS could be saved for when this wears off if needed.

*Edit* I'm not sure but I think with good positioning challenege the drakness may allow each guardian to hit both of his groups of Sarumen with one skills... May be worth slotting over TtK... Will try tonight.

Ayalinda

01 Feb 2012, 11:02

well after phase 3, we don't drop out of combat, so I stay at 9 attunment. But call to greatness (tanks) --> song of aid sounds like a good plan. SOA should give the cappies their rallying cries to help us out.

Ayalinda

01 Feb 2012, 11:39

Oh and they are vunerable to cc (with adapations) so we could have a couple pinned that way to give the tanks more time to pick them up.

Culler

01 Feb 2012, 11:43

Oh and they are vunerable to cc (with adapations) so we could have a couple pinned that way to give the tanks more time to pick them up.

A root on a couple of groups sound like a good plan, at least until we can get them rounded up.

ReDGryffyN

01 Feb 2012, 13:27

Challenge the Darkness could work would have to watch the large (12m?) range of it so we dont pull each others mobs too.
I am also thinking of slotting Guardians Threat in lieu of bash.

CC could work but the Sarumen seem to move immediately they spawn so not much room for error before they are rooted in the middle rather than where the guardian would prefer them,

However all worth a try but I guess we need to pick the best one(s) to start with as we may not have too many tries

ReD

KOFACME

Awerth

01 Feb 2012, 13:43

Erm you can use literny without being hit, the remove wound now opens it up to you.. My suggestion thou is stand inbetween the two you have to keep hold of(lsparky-you-frosty or Flamer-you-Acid), select one as it spawns ( when they spawn they are green and therefore immune to taunts..this could be your problem.) hit the remove wound while its still green, then literny as soon as you see it go red, followed by the rest of the AoE taunts, always make sure with sparky you are facing the middle in phase 5, and in phase 2 you have sparky inbetween you and the squishies( who should all be together)

ReDGryffyN

01 Feb 2012, 13:51

Agreed but Song of Aid gives everyone a benefit and I can save the wound removal for later depending on what I need from the block event trigger.

I have been standing between the two / four as you suggest and as soon as I am able (when red) hit challenge on one of them first, as stated in previous posts it does hit all (inc when there are 4) but last night one of the four decides to carry on walking towards the other group immediately :(

Is it Sparky that causes the punt then? so if I am facing him I will be pulled over his head and should land still in the tower?

ReD

KOFACME

PS We should enable a chat window in this forum!!

Awerth

01 Feb 2012, 13:53

Yep, its sparky, Frosty will walk away from you, there is nothing you can do about it, he targets the majority of the group with an AoE attack then comes back, as long as he is targetting you I would not worry about him :)

Ayalinda

01 Feb 2012, 14:04

Don't suppose there is any indication of frosty about to use his AOE, looks like a prime time to use do not fall to frost (alas don't have a frost rune stone at the moment, as I'm spamming satchels trying to get some decent healing legacies, where art thou Writ of health and mending verse healing...)

Awerth

01 Feb 2012, 14:06

when he turns away from tank is the only indication, he does nothing else :)

Ayalinda

01 Feb 2012, 23:02

Well we got to phase 5 again. The tanks did a good job of getting stuff under control. Our problem this time was squish attrition, we were loosing far to many, burning through our IC rezzes, there were multiple occasions where we had to tread water waiting for cooldown.

I can't stress how important it is to move out of the fear pools quickly, and to a lesser extent the acid pools. Also make sure your virtues are in order, I think its a good idea to slot some tactical mitigation from there. That's another thing all damage is tactical.

Other than that in phase 5, I suggest we get 2 off tanks to take the 2 shadow sarumans, we need to hammer them with interrupts, otherwise they will continually heal each other.

Awerth

01 Feb 2012, 23:14

Shadow could be given to a main tank and the other shadow off tanked by a champ, they don't do much damage so I no problem for a guard to have as another friend.

Culler

02 Feb 2012, 00:12

As it turned out tonight in phase 5, I was tanking 2 acids, 1 shadow and 1 fire. Carranor had the extra fire but as he had the two frosts under control and its the acids guys that do the most damage with the DoTs everything was more or less going well. I had a 30s interupt which seemed to be enough to keep shadow interupted however I did miss one at the start while I was getting things positioned.

As Ayalinda said we are making far too many mistakes in phases 2-4 such that we are in a sorry state when phase 5 arrives. Only thing I can suggest is people staking more morale to give us more margin for error and prevent deaths. You will have to lose some of your primary stats etc. but as the saying goes dead people contribute nothing.

Jeliasko

02 Feb 2012, 00:30

Several points that I found interesting;
1. Seems the Sarumans are more vulnerable to common and fire dmg than anything else (even the fire Saruman, go figure the logic...) - so hunters and stuff can stack up on fire oils and stuff.
2. Keeping shadow Sarumans away from each other seems to have little value (in fact it just prevents AoE damaging both) - the thing is to interupt them, not separate them.
3. I noticed CC works on the Sarumans and seems to reset /the CC rotation thing/ in each phase shift. Is it not wise to think about using CC to manage beggining of phase 5 - we can for example:
- have a CC rotation on 1 shadow Saruman, while we kill the 2nd one and then the rest;
- have 2 freeps CC 2 acid Sarumans while champs and the rest burn down the shadow ones - then each champ picks an acid Saruman and so on... different classes can switch their CC skills between targets;
- perhaps we can even fear the damn things, which will probably give us just enough time to clear some space for ourselves.
4. Sticking both tanks in one group with a captain boosting their defences seemed to go fine... both had it well under control, even with 3/4 Sarumans hitting them (granted, we are blessed with good tanks and... ahem... good captain... even the other healers helped :P )... I again suggest thinking about massing the dps in a dedicated second group, where the captain can buff their offence and realy improve our dps.
5. The fear/acid pools seem to hurt you a little bit beyond their visual boundaries - you may think you are out, but you are most certainly not! They seem to be better visible on higher graphics settings, though this second tid-bit needs more testing. THREY are our MAIN killer, so stay out of them - on the plus side, once we get more space by clearing Sarumans, things will get easier towards the end, not harder!
6. I have reasonable information regading the enemy in tier 2... it is not much harder than in tier one :P (at least the Saruman fight is not)... Bear in mind, this comes from the people who said Saddam has nukes, so make of it what you will... The real challenge will be completing it with noone dying!

ReDGryffyN

02 Feb 2012, 08:25

That's a real shame I was confident you could have him!

I did wish you luck but you may have missed my tells/messages in game, I did not get home til after 9:15pm UK time so was as expected way too late.

Next time Codger gets it!

ReD

KOFACME

ReDGryffyN

02 Feb 2012, 08:31

Also make sure your virtues are in order, I think its a good idea to slot some tactical mitigation from there. That's another thing all damage is tactical.
.

A good item for some that lack some mitigations is the old Lvl 55 pocket item Golden Spear-Head which is available from classic skirmish vendors for 104 marks and 32 medallions. It has

+1062 Tactical Mitigation
+1062 Physical Mitigation
+1044 Resistance Rating
+332 Evade Rating

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

02 Feb 2012, 09:13

Thanks for that Red. Saw your tells but was a bit busy at the time, then it slipped my mind ;)

Tsureknath

02 Feb 2012, 09:41

2. Keeping shadow Sarumans away from each other seems to have little value (in fact it just prevents AoE damaging both) - the thing is to interupt them, not separate them.

- have a CC rotation on 1 shadow Saruman, while we kill the 2nd one and then the rest;

The reason we keep the two most annoying Sarumans away from each other is to have a bigger margin for error. Keeping them together, yes it would be better for aoe damage, but this aint a dps race. At the same time though, we would risk having the whole melee group (both champions and captains) get stuck/rooted into a shadow/acid pool or be blasted with fire/lightning shit. Keeping things as safe as we can I think its the way to go here. Its like the "real" battle strategies. Never have all your troops in a single spot if you can do otherwise...

A good item for some that lack some mitigations is the old Lvl 55 pocket item Golden Spear-Head which is available from classic skirmish vendors for 104 marks and 32 medallions. It has

+1062 Tactical Mitigation
+1062 Physical Mitigation
+1044 Resistance Rating
+332 Evade Rating

ReD

KOFACME

This is not just good for a specific battle. This shit is excellent anyways if you got enough morale and enough of your main stat. This is what I use all the time in my tanking build. And it works perfectly.

Lastly, I will agree with Aya and Culler about the light armour thingie. Last night, when Cyed logged the first thing I told him at the kin chat was "too many light armour tonight..." and he can confirm :P

Don't get me wrong of course. All 3 light armour classes are way too good at what they do (plus the fact that they are keeping stupid champs alive...) but in chaotic battles like this you need to have your shit together and be focused 100%. Most deaths we had weren't because of critical hits or too much aggro. I was watching people stand into shadow/acid pools and executing skills while there were constant "out of the <name> pool" warnings at TS. And that means that they were just not paying enough attention. No matter what skill you execute, or how low morale someone has, if you are a healer and pool spawns underneath your feet, move. If you die, the rest die too.

Get your morale up even by 300-400 points. That could make a difference. Think of it as if you could survive one more pulse into the shadow pool. Virtues could do the trick too. No matter virtue you normally use, it wont make a difference in this fight, if its not Valour or Zeal of course :Y Lose some will, or some might or agility or whatever and stack up morale/mitigation. Loyalty, Fidelity, Tolerance, Honour etc are all good.

As far as the start of the last phase is concerned: If I have a revealing mark on the shadow Saruman I hit, Im confident I can deal with him alone. So, if we dont have a second champion, Im thinking maybe I could burn the one down slowly and having a reliable interrupt on him, while the rest of the dps group can deal with the other one while keeping him interrupted with less reliable but more skills than a single Clobber (captains kick, a stun or whatever others there are 8-)). That could balance things out at the beginning. If two shadows are down, I think by now we have enough knowledge of the fight to have an easy-ish victory.

Jeliasko

02 Feb 2012, 09:58

But why not simply use CC rotation to help us out, be smart rather than brute!?!

Tsureknath

02 Feb 2012, 10:27

But why not simply use CC rotation to help us out, be smart rather than brute!?!

Because, as I have seen in our runs there, the more this fight lasts, the more problems arise due to the percentage of something nasty happens to a tank or healer. Like I said, this is far from a dps race, but if you can deal with something swiftly and effectively, its better to do it. Trying to cc one mob in the middle of other nine ones is just an absolute waste of time and resources as far as Im concerned.

Plus, I'm not talking about the possibility of a resist, of a cc break or even more possibly the fact that if the second shadow is not perfectly cc'ed on the spot, he will definitely go on a walkabout and then he will need to be cc'ed in a place where he shouldn't be. Like mezzed in front of a guardian throwing aoe skills. Or rooted by a root skill that also affects a Saruman that needs to be tanked and not staying cc'ed until the skill expires/breaks and then that Saruman decides to randomly "love" one of our healers.

So, I think that the smart thing here is to deal with what we know we can deal in a more efficient and fast way, reducing the possibility for errors. But that's just me anyways 8-)

Ayalinda

02 Feb 2012, 10:40

My feeling is that if we have 2 champions they can each take one shadow and keep it clobbered. I think the CC is more useful for helping the Tanks gather everything else up, keeping them in one place, stopping them from hitting the squishies.

Culler

02 Feb 2012, 12:40

On a positive note we have had a large number of Beorningas members see all 5 phases of the fight. Everyone is going to make mistakes the first few times in there in terms of standing in stuff, not potting debuffs etc. Familarity and practice will get us to where we need to be and should hopefully set us in good stead for T2.

ReDGryffyN

03 Feb 2012, 14:51

FIRE and FROST - Tier 1

Finally got time to post a few thoughts about last night...........

OK, an off night for sure but some basics stood out and might be worth stating them again. (Please note some of these points include me too! :) )

PRE - FIGHT

Unlocking the Raid - Not exactly the most difficult thing to do but even though its mentioned in the sign up part, people still forget and have to go and visit the door etc.
On the same track, Teamspeak, again mentioned in the sign up preamble, don't forget to join AND make sure you can hear at least (I know some are not as confident or gobby as the rest!) but communication is for me one of the KEYS for these fights and any raid. We had people who could not hear or we could not hear speak, makes it uneccesarily tougher.
Consumables - need to make sure you have enough of them all, again in the pre-amble, probably more an issue as you bring out your alts and maybe they dont have the same amounts as your mains.
Do you know your role? , when ready checked and not sure stop and ask, follow the RAT and pay attention to potable effects...........

THE TRASH

The trash pulls were painful and we are mostly all to blame for them but we can learn and improve for future as we know we can get through this wing with little issue. Hence why you lucky souls will be T2ing it on Sunday!

BOSSES

I checked some of my old screenies as I was bothered by the thoughts/conclusions about morale differential between the two goons. What I saw on one of our earlier wins in here was a 160K difference in morale and one was killed (Frost) whilst the other one was still at 160K and we all helped out killing it. We had 1 grim spawn each time as well.

Not sure what is causing the double grims (Question was there ever more than 2? at once have we seen 3 or more ?)

One thing was that we had a few peeps venturing in front of the bosses and that meant they were hit with AOE which I think is frontal. I would like to see the tanks back themselves right up to a wall so that noone can get in front of the bad boy very easily or by mistake

Corruptions! I was spamming my skill which is on a 10s timer for removal but we needed at times other removers to assist as the extra damage he gets by the corruption is very large, I will post a screenie of them later and they STACK!

Not sure if the non or late removal of them was also a cause or contributory factor to the yanks we were getting but we had much more than I remember before.

Grims, spawn every 60s under the feet of the bad boys at the same time, so ranged need to pull it out and get it killed, 2 in 60 seconds is also doable. Trying to kill it where it spawns runs the risk of the AOE if you venture forward too much. (Could reduce the risk of this if tanks back up to a wall) and maybe you could kill it where it is.

Anyway these are my thoughts so if any of you have any more please post, don't fear the reader! We all make mistakes but with sharing of knowledge we can attempt to avoid them next time!

The Codger WILL get it!!

ReD

KOFACME

Culler

03 Feb 2012, 15:56

I suspect there might be something we are missing in this fight that caught us out last night. Maybe previously we have been doing something right but not realised it, whereas yesterday we were doing something that caused the problems. No idea what but one would expect there to be more to the fight that kill add, hit boss, kill add, hit boss etc. maybe it coukld be something that can be trivialised by good play in the case of T1 but we should try to find out.

Tanks should call out corruptions if they see them.. That is what I always do when I'm tanking and I dont think my sting will get it off in time.

ReDGryffyN

08 Feb 2012, 10:18

Re Last nights attempt

I thought we did very well considering the fact we had to repeat for the DC of Beo and then on the second and last attempt we had to try and 11 man it without a second Captain with Beo not able to stay connected to Lotro.

Phase 5 was better but not a huge amount from my side, :(

Ok I did not get punted/pulled over the edge in the first 5 seconds this time or at all BUT

I did get the eye in the first 5 seconds again having only just hit challenge (which hit all 4) and walking to the frosties for a vexing blow, I had no chance then to return to the other two and use Litany via wound removal as the EYE appeared.

As suggested I immediately walked towards the central Saruman and he then pushed me away over to the edge but not over it, of course I got silenced and that meant no challenge, no fray and no engage available. One Frosty then goes walkabout and I run around bashing and vexing for all I am worth to get the other 3 in check and BANG second eye.

Rinse repeat and then 15-20 seconds later a 3rd eye.

In the end I was taking a lot of damage and trying to survive and get the Sarumen on me and got hit with 2 Distributed Lightning hits (just on me!) for 5K each. which with everything else was just enough to kill me.

So not sure what else to try here, someone suggested standing with my back to a door for the eye but what does that do?

I quote a couple of pointers from Awerth which I did follow

Apologies again for my failure........

ReD

KOFACME

Yep, its sparky, Frosty will walk away from you, there is nothing you can do about it, he targets the majority of the group with an AoE attack then comes back, as long as he is targetting you I would not worry about him

always make sure with sparky you are facing the middle in phase 5, and in phase 2 you have sparky inbetween you and the squishies( who should all be together)

Ayalinda

08 Feb 2012, 10:34

I think we just need more practice, which is a little difficult as it's 4 wings and a 30min fight to get to the bit we're struggling with.

I was impressed with how the first 4 stages went, a couple of people went down, but we still had a good number of in combat rezzes left by phase 5, not considering we were a captain down.

Carranor

08 Feb 2012, 12:44

I think the hardest part of the fight is for the guards to get two groups of 4 under control. the one time that we got to the end of it was when this happened, the last two times has been have been harder because there has been a 3 5 split to the tanks.

When I did it with Gerranor as soon as the mobs spawned I hit Challenge the darkness, unfortunately I was a little to close to one of Cullers and so I picked up 5. I got the eye early on in quick succession and ran to the centre, but due to CTD I had the mobs stuck to me, I was also in threat stance for the beginning, this was going ok and I could take the damage from 5 and Culler happily did a dance with his three, but it was a lot of extra work for the healer to keep me up, and I am sure culler could have take one back with engage.

Last night near reds health was fine until I got hit with a 6k+ strike, then he dropped to below just below10k as I started to put more hots on him he fell like a stone 5k Lightning hits tend to do that, so there I think there was a touch of unlucky, if I had not died, Reds health would have been higher and able to take the big hits. I think the hardest part of Phase 5 is getting the shadows under control.

Shalathra

08 Feb 2012, 12:51

My thoughts on last night’s fight:
1st go: Not much to say, everything was going smoothly until Beo started crashing
2nd go: I took the Fire ring. I used the +bonuses on Tsu at the beginning of each wave and the 10K dmg on the Shadow Saru. Tsu suggested traiting deep on the red line (including the cap) for the extra dps when needed. I added 2 traits from the blue line, the +bracing attack heal and Dire Need CD for the extra heal. Next time I’ll probably go 4 Red 3 Blue since I used the Cap on the 3 first waves but when I tried it on the 4th one the dmg/sec was distracting the healer (I could be wrong since we were 1 CPT short). On the fifth wave as Red already posted he couldn’t get his share of Sarumen and I ended up being ganged by 3 of them.

Ayalinda

08 Feb 2012, 13:05

As a healer I'm not really finding the continuous damage too bad (it amused me Raed kept saying who needed heals just before my induction completed ;) ) The shakier ground is there is a fair bit of spike damage, the frost AOE, polarity, distributed lightning attacks the flame blast. Which can take of over 1/2 of a squishies morale.

Not sure how Carranor was healing, but when I've been on my RK I generally keep my WoH tiered up on Tanks and champions (knowing how they like CBR) being the people who need constant healing as opposed to spike healing.

Shalathra

08 Feb 2012, 13:13

knowing how they like CBR

that's Tsu, not every Champ O+

But 250dmg/sec in a little too much and it will surely demand some time for healing

Tsureknath

08 Feb 2012, 13:14

I think the biggest problem we are facing is the shortage of time. 4 wings plus a 1,5h fight is a lot of time and I'm not even mentioning all the delays and dc's. I agree that practice makes better, but as far as I'm concerned I think that the 4 first phases of Saruman should be auto-piloted by now with no excuses. There are no other surprises, the roles are distinguished, every class has specific thinks to do etc etc etc. After all, last effort, as you said, was pretty cool and fast (not taking into account all the waiting for the dc monsters to come back to life).

Phase 5 will need more stuff... I don't know if this is gonna help, but we could sit down and make a phase 5 walk-through for every single class and role. I'm even willing to start it myself with the the limited knowledge I have.

At this guide, one could find things like, where to stand at the start of the phase. Things like, when ranged dps'ers should start dpsing the Shadow bloke (which is after the champion has aggro), things like what skills should be used at the first 4-5 hellish seconds by every class. Also, how and when the rings should be used, and most important -in my opinion- we could plan a few escape routes for every class if things don't start as they should. I'm giving a short example about that last one:

You are a champion. You are meant to challenge Shadow #2, which is the one not at RAT (perhaps a second RAT could be set at phase 5 on the second champion) and then interrupt him/remove corruptions alongside dpsing him. If for any reason, another couple of Sarumen start hitting you at the first seconds, while the guardian is silenced and thus cannot challenge follow the next steps:
1. Bubble yourself with True Heroics and move away from any squishes. The more heals you need, the less controllable fight is getting
2. Hit Fervent Rage + Adamant so that you can give guardian a few seconds to challenge.
3) While waiting for these 5-10 seconds a. dont use high dps skills, you don't want high threat b. use Harmstring for armour, and save all Fervour possible, at step 4, you will need the Fervour c. use only Feral Strikes for possible corruptions on Shadow.
4) If after the 10ish seconds of steps 2 and 3 the other Sarumen are still on you, move towards the guardian of your group. Guardian of that group will need epic healing or possible ring bubble if its available. You should have 4+ Fervour. Hit Ebbing Ire on the Guardian to dump all aggro.
5) Shadow is on guardian. Keep interrupting/removing corruptions.
6) Challenge Shadow and move back to position A while replenishing morale, power, cd's, Fervour etc. Make sure you dps enough to get aggro. Use high threat skills as Ferocious strikes or auto-crit Relentless.
7) Live through the day, tell the tale and send uncle Tsu an apple-pie.

P.S. This is just an example, not that I have seen a chimp trying to tank 3 Sarumen in Fervour... :twisted:
P.S 2. I have absolutely no problem with surviving through CBR. This means that I keep track when I can have it on and not randomly run around hitting things while I take 231 damage per second. If a Revealing mark is not on your target then yes, you might have a few problems, but then again, that's why traited Bracing Attack is meant to be used the moment its cd is expired. Also, use your small bubble. It should be legacied down to 1 min cd. With a Revealing Mark on the target, CBR is a perfect tool for the whole raid. Not many skils provide +20% dps and combat state immunity. And Im sure my healers can confirm that they are not even noticing it.

Culler

08 Feb 2012, 13:20

The 'tactic' I used last night was as follows.... I stood almost on top of where one group would spawn and the nano-second I saw them begin to appear I hit ignore the pain which means I can fire off litany on that group just after they become active. I then then legged it over to the second group and used shield taunt and an AoE vexing blow on them before going back to the first group and used a couple of shield attacks.... Once I was happy they were under control I would work on positioning them... Of course just a single reists and you'll have one running in to the healers.

Ayalinda

08 Feb 2012, 13:42

Well as a Minstrel I go
1) 3 healing ballads in the inter phase (no out of combat).
2) Symphony of the hopeful heart after using my ring. (please do stand in it if you can :p)
3) As sarumans spawn. Call to Greatness on my tank --> song of aid until I need to heal someone.
4) Hit FH/TS if required.

If I do get threat (which I haven't yet remember lute strings) Hammerhand --> song of soothing (I never slot the trait so hammerhand will allow you to get the induction off).

As a Runekeeper
1) Keep my WoH tiered up through the inter phase.
2) Wondorous forshadowing + TWDNKU as Sarumans are spawning.
3) Improved rousing words (low threat)
4) Essay of Exaltation.
If I get threat hit Distracting winds, if that doesn't help go Word of Exaltation go towards tanks.

ReDGryffyN

08 Feb 2012, 14:39

I have to agree, the first 4 phases should be straightforward for those that have experienced it more than once, we have managed no deaths in the first 3 phases, 2 in Phase 4 and 4 in Phase 5 during the successful (non creditied :( run) So we could and should get to Phase 5 with most rezes etc still available plus all the important end game skills like IHW/LS , FH etc

What we need is a stable Phase 5 and a strategy for it but as Tsu says we are spending a lot of time getting to Saruman so the chances to practice our strategy are limited.

Aya is also right we need to be punctual and ready to raid ideally at 7:30 or whatever the agreed start time is, what with the lotro lottery for joining and the other crashes and swaps no swaps going on we can lose what could be the time required for an extra run (assumes we can remain focussed for that other run :).. )

Re the strategy, We do have it in bits between us so should be able to come up with a recommended one for all classes.

For me Phase 5 has two key initial phases,

FIRST getting the 10 Sarumen under control, which in our current thinking is 4 for each tank, one Shadow RAT DPS target (inc interrupts and corruption removal) the other Off tanked having corruptions removed and interrupted)

SECOND (very closely after FIRST), is to DPS down FAST the shadows.

So whilst this is not a DPS race per se I believe it is for the first initial part.i.e regarding the Shadows.
Getting two down fast especially the shadows will already make the rest of the fights easier.

Re Tanking Frost / Lightning.

Awerth and Gerranor have had success with these, I alas have not so their inisight is inavaluable.

I feel as Gerranor stated CTD and Threat stance could be a workable solution, did Gerranor tank with a door to his back ?
Any further input on this would be great.

Other

I feel that should Frosty or one of the Lightnings get loose could LM's put frost lore on him which if I read correctly (<spot the LM nub :)...) reduces damage output from him by 20% or 25% if traited, this might help with any tactical damage or AOE damage he deals out whilst he is being brought back under control ? (Apologeis if this is already being done on our Sarumen!)

Some of our big skills could be used within the first 30s to a minute of this fight so that we can weather the initial storm.

IHW/LS, FH, and even OB could be used to keep everyone up and burn down the 1st two Shadows. All DPS boosters could be utilised war-cry, telling mark etc and all debuffs used on the bosses, frost lore, disable etc etc

In other words go for a BIG start? :)

EDIT

Oh and don't forget the rings!!

ReD

KOFACME

Culler

08 Feb 2012, 16:20

Only thing I can suggest if you are going to throw off FH at the start, please feign death immediately afterwards. No one should die while FH is up in fact it would probably heal people through the puddles more or less. As soon as FH is about to wear off IHW+LS from the captain. If we havent got everything under control by the time that wears off then we are in trouble!

ReDGryffyN

09 Feb 2012, 11:54

Have had chance to check my combat log and my memory is only partially correct

On the positive side it WAS our best effort Phases 1-4.(and remember we were 11 not 12) We had one death in Phase 3 and one death in Phase 4, interestingly the death in Phase 4 was for DNT? Any idea what that was, Carranor was the recipient.

For Phase 5 here are my first entries

Redgryffyn scored a hit with Improved Challenge on Saruman.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Improved Challenge on Saruman the Storm-maker.
Redgryffyn scored a critical hit with Improved Challenge on Saruman the Storm-maker.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Improved Challenge on Saruman the Frost-master.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Improved Challenge on Saruman the Frost-master.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Yank on Redgryffyn for 437 Lightning damage to Morale.
Redgryffyn reflected 23 Lightning damage to the Morale of Saruman the Storm-maker.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Yank on Redgryffyn for 437 Lightning damage to Morale.

My challenge hit all 5 (traited for 5) but I was immediately hit with an eye and then went towards Saruman straight away, then got the Yank which pushed me back towards the edge., now silenced I got another eye immediately, this was not a good start as 2 of my 4 Sarumen went walkies.

I got hit with the eye a further 5 times and survived them all from a yank point of view but for me it is not a workable solution for a tank due to the silencing. For other non tank classes that may get the eye then this might be a fine solution

Having said that my bad memory tells me that the silence can be cured by muster courage of a Captain but don't quote me on that!

So getting the four locked down right at the start is key so CTD and Threat stance will be slotted for next time.

One other option would be to mez a pair (Lightning would be my choice as it is them that give the eye anyway) right at the start, then the tank would have no problem grabbing two and then when ready grabbing the other two.

I will also try standing with my back to the doors as others have said this is beneficial, can anyone confirm why?

Anyway just some thoughts.

ReD

KOFACME

Awerth

09 Feb 2012, 18:36

You can work around the silence as a guard,block-bash-shield taunt-shield smash is not an effected by silence chain as far as i am aware. Only challenge and liternay are as they are shouts.

ReDGryffyN

09 Feb 2012, 19:36

FTE and Engage are also affected but for sure other skills are free shield based etc, they are all fine.

ReD

KOFACME

Beorthond

13 Feb 2012, 17:32

Yup Red, the silence can be MC-ed by a cappie.
So it might be an idea to position the cappie in the lighting-tanker group close to him to cure the silence asap. Then he can use all shouts he wants to whenever he likes.

Culler

13 Feb 2012, 18:55

Anything listed as a cry will be effected by silence i.e.

challenge, challenge the darkness, litany, shield-taunt, catch a breath, engage, fray the edge

Notiane

15 Feb 2012, 15:06

Is the silence effect a fear? Because it isn't listed as suchs, so I'm not convinced Muster Courage cures it. However, loremasters can cure silences with SoP: Righteousness, so the silence can be cured anyway. Also, SoP:R has a 5second cooldown (3 if traited) where MC can only be used once a minute (minute and a half?)

---edit---

Silly I never noticed it being a fear, but yes, it is...

---edit 2---

how are going to MC when you're silenced? MC is a vocal skill?

Beorthond

15 Feb 2012, 16:44

Well, it has a 'Fear'-border. And it is too much of a coincidende for something else to cure the silence whenerver I tried (yet still possible ofc ;)).
But I will check next time to be 100% sure. Already 95% sure though :)

Beorthond

20 Feb 2012, 18:39

I can always use MC cause I don't rush through the middle to get to other Sarumen :D I just go around the main man and keep my skills open.

ReDGryffyN

22 Feb 2012, 09:29

Well well!!

Big congratulations for finally getting the old codger pensioner down. Took two attempts but also for a while was close on the first, even with a bad 3/5 split betwwen guardians. (Sry Culler!)

Last run was a better 4/4 split and having 2 champs also for the shadows was great.

Have not had time to look at my combat logs but will do later, I have linked below some pictures, don't think any of these are any spoliers

First one is just to confirm the silence from the central Saruman can be cleared by muster courage (and it was thanks guys!)

http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS1.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS2.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS3.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS4.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS5.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS6.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS7.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS8.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS9.jpg
http://redgryphon.www.idnet.com/Lotro/ToOS10.jpg

As Aya said the loot was very bad so did not bother to screenie it, in fact I think Aya had trouble giving some of it away. I guess T2 is where the fat loot is. I guess at least the full armour sets for most now get unlocked

Finally as a Guard on the Storm/Frost Sarumen in Phase 5

I played around in the early stages with Litany / Shield Taunt (via ignore the pain ) vs Challenge and the former had more of a success holding onto the Sarumen, I gues the ToT is a better tool?
Even on the final phase it did lock all 4 (both times) but on the first attempt one Frost went walkies and never came back, on the second attempt he went away briefly but this time came straight back. Once I got all 4 locked down from my side with the help of all of you it was fairly straight forward as I feel these 4 are the easier of the four to hold.
I got the eye 29!! times (from my combat logs) but by making sure my back was to the doors each time I got punted/yanked mostly sideways towards another door so could run straight back into the Sarumen. The eye therefore with this tactic caused no issues at all. I know others also got the eye at times too
Finally I did slot threat stance and Challenge the Darkness but only used CTD once and then it was by accident (sry Culler again!), I moved it to a better place on my quickslots but then did not use it again even for Phase 5 as I did not need to.
Threat stance probably helped initially for the startt of each phase but I did eventually swap it over to block once I had the Sarumen.
I was not perfect but feel at least I did enough to help the team!

Well done again to all!

ReD

KOFACME

Ayalinda

22 Feb 2012, 09:44

The list of loot is actually in screenshot ToOS9 in Red's fellowship chat. There was a pretty nice loremaster sword (Noti knows how nice), an a light helm which seemed to be a goodish for the moors, and some bland medium armour, looked like a warden DPS piece to me having might at +90ish and Vitality +30ish, very strange piece of armour.

ReDGryffyN

22 Feb 2012, 10:50

First lines from my combat log from the second run.

Redgryffyn applied a benefit with Ignore the Pain on Redgryffyn.
Carranor applied a heal with Writ of Health - Tier 2 to Redgryffyn restoring 270 points to Morale.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Litany of Defiance on Saruman the Frost-master.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Litany of Defiance on Saruman the Frost-master.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Litany of Defiance on Saruman the Storm-maker.
Redgryffyn scored a devastating hit with Litany of Defiance on Saruman the Storm-maker.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Yank on Redgryffyn for 437 Lightning damage to Morale.
Carranor applied a benefit with Improved Prelude to Hope on Redgryffyn.
Redgryffyn missed trying to use Shield-taunt on Saruman the Storm-Maker.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Shield-taunt on Saruman.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Shield-taunt on Saruman the Frost-master.
Redgryffyn scored a hit with Shield-taunt on Saruman the Storm-maker.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Yank on Redgryffyn for 437 Lightning damage to Morale.
Carranor applied a heal with Prelude to Hope to Redgryffyn restoring 110 points to Morale.
Saruman the Fire-lord scored a critical hit with Fire on Redgryffyn for 1,219 Fire damage to Morale.
Saruman the Frost-master tried to use Strong Frost on Redgryffyn but he blocked the attempt.
Carranor applied a heal with Writ of Health - Tier 2 to Redgryffyn restoring 266 points to Morale.
Tsureknath has released Saruman the Shadow-bringer from being immobilized!
Notiane has released Saruman the Frost-master from being immobilized!
Saruman the Frost-master tried to use Strong Frost on Redgryffyn but he parried the attempt.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a critical hit with Lightning on Redgryffyn for 1,201 Lightning damage to Morale.
Saruman the Storm-maker scored a hit with Lightning Arc on Redgryffyn for 2,100 Lightning damage to Morale.

Only probably interesting to Culler! or Not!

ReD

KOFACME

ReDGryffyN

29 Feb 2012, 09:59

Another successful Saruman run yesterday so was wondering if any players had any more tips/ input to the fight, especially Phase 5? This might help other players or players alts to better understand their roles in this fight?

I think the way we are tackling phase 5 is fine, kill order etc is all good but knowing some of the key skills/debuffs/buffs certain classes use at some points would be good to share.

For me the first 1-2 minutes of Phase 5 is pivotal to a successful fight and all that can be done to down the 1st Shadow and then second should be paramount in our minds.

Once the shadows are down and the 1st acid, generally its a lot lot easier.

One thing I would like to say though is that we have done very well getting this bad boy down a couple of times now and I know many kins etc are still struggling with it so we should be proud of what we have done and how we have gone about doing it. Credit to you all.

ReD

KOFACME

Shalathra

29 Feb 2012, 10:19

My thought on last night’s run:

Stages 1-4 are easy IF we watch out for the curable effects (good job last night, many people were calling names and helping out) BUT crucial cause we don’t want to lose any CDs in that part of the fight
Stage 5. As ReD said, the first few seconds are chaotic and if things smooth out we can then focus on getting the many colored Sarumen down.
We tried tanking the 2 Shadows nearby so that the Champs could AoE them. Tsu and Conrar kept clobbering them so that they wouldn’t heal each other.
AoE: Can we AoE or heart out if the fight (ofc after the tanks have had some time to build agro)?
CBR: As Culler noticed both me and Tsu are CBR traited :evil:. Tsu has already posted Champs can go 5R in traits for the cap BUT if you will tank a Shadow use the last 2 slots for Blue traits. CBR has a CD of 1 sec and if the fight’s going well the damage output of the champs is greatly improved , just keep in mind the initial cost and watch that little green bar and switch it off when low.

Culler

29 Feb 2012, 10:28

I thought CBR was only +10% damage? How big is the DoT?

Tsureknath

29 Feb 2012, 10:40

Champion-wise, phase 5 is quite simple. Assuming that 2 champions are around to get one of each Shadow bozo, the things that you must have in mind are these:
a) Do NOT aggro anything else during the first seconds meaning no raging blade, blade wall, rend etc etc.
b) Use your survival skills first, dps comes second. You need to assist your healer by NOT needing heals because you are reckless. (Ok, this will be tough for some... _O-) So use the 2 bubbles, Hamstring for armour, Adamant, actually whatever helps you feel comfortable during the tough start of the fight. Also, make proactive use of the morale/power pots. Dont wait until you are halfway down...

After that, you can start the dps rotation. Single target dps, with some Rends would be enough. Thats why I trait CBR plus 2 blue traits that help with survival/aggro (Braced Against Defeat / Call of the Wild)
NOTE: Do NOT use Clobber as part of the dps rotation. You need it for the interrupt. Every time you don't interrupt Shadow Saruman, the wipe is one step closer. Also, this fight is Feral Strikes friendly, cause you also need to remove the healing corruption that comes and goes on the Shadow Saruman.

Other than that, if you survive the first seconds, and you have enough aggro on the Saruman, you obviously need to nuke the shit out of him.
NOTE: As we saw on the first two successful runs, positioning of the 2 Shadow lads is irrelevant. Its actually better to keep them together and aoe both after each champion has built up aggro on his Shadow.

On a side note, like Red said above and I'm guessing everyone that's been part of the successful runs will probably understand by now, first moments of phase 5 is all that matters. So, use proactively ALL your cd's and also use the ring abilities. Fellowship's Heart, In Harms Way/ Last Stand etc, Guardians Pledge etc. I think its better to use them and have a chance to control the fight than try and turn the tables after the whole thing gets tougher.

Finally, I personally feel that the critical moment of the whole fight, is getting down the first Shadow Saruman during phase 5. If he gets down, you stop caring about possible heals and the whole thing gets easier. So, whatever buff/debuff there is and can lead to more dps, is most welcome during the very first seconds. Captain-wise, I know how troubling it is to pick 3 legendaries for this fight, but double Oathbrakers would have made it a lot easier...

Tsureknath

29 Feb 2012, 11:08

I thought CBR was only +10% damage? How big is the DoT?

CBR works as follows: Cost: 10% of the overall morale. You get: permanent +10% damage output, combat state immunity, +50 to all resists except disease. Also, initially you get a -139 damage per second bleed which increases every 15 seconds until it reaches -279 damage per second. As a bonus for your bleed you get +2% damage increase every 15 seconds up to an extra +10%. So overall, after a few seconds you have +20% damage output and a nasty bleed to deal with.

As my experience says, since there's no incoming healing debuff anymore and champs can be healed normally while in CBR, a single Revealing Mark on target is enough to make the bleed irrelevant. The only heals that you will need after this, will have nothing to do with CBR itself. Of course, its up to the champions experience to understand when a -279 bleed does not improve the overall situation. So I'm actually switching it off when i run around trying to position myself out of fear clouds, or get aggro on a loose Shadow Saruman, or after I have to find my next target. Also, obviously I need to switch it off, when I get smacked and I start using my survival skills which means that I dont dps anything thus I dont get Revealing Mark's morale return.

Notiane

29 Feb 2012, 12:17

the Tower fight for a loremaster.

Going in as the only LM in the raid, I took a full debuff trait line, 5 yellow with capstone, with 2 blues (Healer and Improved Inner flame) For yellows I took Power and Wisdom (better power draw) improved SoP:C and 3x The Study of ... Lore. I think it would be better to drop 1 Study (of fire lore) and replace that with Deep Lore (adding 5 targets to debuffs)

What I did:

-Position my Raven half way between a ring and Saruman, using the 'stay' command, and make sure the full platform is covered in his radius. (I feel the tact. mit. buff is worth more then anything else)
-Debuff everything as best you can. I started by using the ring (morale bubble, 2400% percieved treat) on Culler(tank 1), knowing he'd not be in trouble soon, then throw all debuffs on Red (tank 2)
-Ancient Craft on RaT. Tar and Warding Circle also add some group dps. SoP:C and Gust of Wind can be applied to Tank 1's targets.
-CC cycles on Sarumans. Depending on phases, but Fire and Lightning are hard hitters. I try to mez one, even if it's broken soon after, it prevents a few seconds of damage, and Test of Will (5 second stun) on the other. Try and remember what you stunned, and mez it next time, and vice versa. In general: preventing damage is our job!
-Share power... Don't get me started... I vote ALL captains slot Now for Wrath. (that the power with rallying cry, right?)
-Spot heal. Beacon of Hope is obvious. Improved Inner Flame is pretty darn good when 3 or 4 fellowship members are low on morale, or when your healer is trying to over heal that nasty dot . (Light of Hope as the 2nd blue trait may well be just as good)

Speculations! As of phase 3 the real Saruman becomes active. I have been debuffing him through the more or less random extra target on the debuffs, and at some points noticed the nastieness not coming as fast as expected. Once again, speculation, but it may have been that Frost Lore (slowing inductions) had something to do with that.

Galmir

29 Mar 2012, 18:13

I didn't know that Hamstring adds to your Armour Tsu, good to know that :Y
I also sometimes use Hedge in Fervour as it opens Parry/Evade (and I have Eldar's grace). Did not need this last night though.

I've never felt comfortable with CBR. Maybe I don't understand it really (no real affinity with the gamble).
I guess I make up with less morale (I don't worry about the bleed) and have higher might for it (or maybe I don't, who knows; my Phys Mastery in Fervor is now +108%... is that decent?). I was hitting ~7k strike on occasion last night. That is good in my book but maybe you get better with CBR? Be good to know.

I was ~8k buffed last night in full DPS gear. I didn't have any issues with my morale. I died when I got a total freeze and cud not use my bubble skills (happened more than once last night) but other than that just the bubble and brace were sufficient for me.
My virtues are mainly all for Resistance, Phys mit and Tact mit (apart from Zeal).
I have support and heal on champ rune (mainly).

You are right about the 'Shadow bozos', that is the thing to worry about. I was fine with the 2nd one in P5 on Glory and after the 1st one went down, I popped back into Fervor to nuke him.

I run 4Berserker & 3 Wirlwind.
I felt that is worked well last night as the group were bunching the 'bozos' for AOE.
This helped fill my fervor bar on most blade-walls and the thing holding my back was CDs.

Raedwulf

29 Mar 2012, 19:54

The Tower fight for a loremaster.

Going in as the only LM in the raid...

I did it completely differently from Noti. Well, what else would you expect? Noti's both a terrific LM, and a Yellow (not that I'm suggesting anything here, *snicker*) expert. ;)

Standard raid raid set up for me is 2R, 3B, 2Y. The Blues are those that make me a useful secondary healer; the Yellows always include PaW because power-battery is still the one thing that no-one else can do. Slightly surprisingly, perhaps, I took the Study of Frost Lore as the 2nd yellow, figuring that there'd be a lot of tactical damage & slowing inductions would be a good idea. The 2R was the usual 2R. If you need to ask, you're no bloody good! ;)

I had trouble with Muriell in the first couple of attempts, not least because her captain had a different assist on her than did Miluineth's. I say trouble; I never had trouble keeping the raid powered, but StP went to Muriell about 4 times as often as to Milu. After I commented, some changes were made, both by Muriell & her CPT; in our successful attempt, she was less onerous to support.

Overall, I've no specific advice. It's the usual manic round of "do everything". Noti & I long ago agreed that the LM & BRG are the two most complex classes in the game. The more that time goes on, the more I think that, actually, it's the LM. Debuff, heal, do damage, mana-battery, etcetera ad nauseam. And Saruman T1 is a testing fight.

I tended to spend single target debuffs on the Acid Sarumen whilst they were alive. If they're not nasty, why are they the first kill after the Shadow healers? Beyond that, you'll cut your cloth to suit your syle, and you have so many options that whatever is your strength, you will be of material assistance to the party. As a solo LM, as long as you avoid the most obvious pitfalls (like trying to be a dpser when, frankly, that is not your role, or forgetting to slot PAAI), you'll always be invaluable & you'll always be welcome.

For Saruman, just make sure you're on top of your game... ;)

Ayalinda

30 Mar 2012, 09:48

Well I've healed as both a Mini and an RK now.

For a Mini I go 4B/3Y raid setup (Life-Singer, Silver Tongue, Focused Performance, Improved Raise the Spirit & Smooth Voice, Glorious Anthem, Absolute Pitch.) Although 3B/4Y (Flow of Harmony instead of Silver Tongue) is my other raid setup. I am not convinced by either of the capstones, 5B is making the deeply meh SoS slightly better at the cost of basically locking you down to a single useful anthem active. 5Y is slightly more attractive, but for heavy healing situation I'm not convinced. In the fight you mainly play wack a mole with the health bars, while keeping up as many anthems as possible. (Also don't use your Coda, at the moment is been rebroken and will strip all anthems not just your own. Just rely on your awesome LM's for power).

Runekeeper healing is a bit different, I trait 7B dropping Linnod of Peace. I helped the DPS the first phase and the back end of the second phase. I made a lot of use of "Do not fall to XXX" going Lightning in the second phase (to dodge polarity) and frost 3-5 to prevent the big frost AOE than does around 3000 damage. "Their weapons shall not harm us" is invaluable in phase 3 (Traited 4B will block all 4 effects). Phase 3 onwards start stacking DNFTD and you can have it on 4-5 people by the end of the fight. I tended to focus more on the tanks when there are 2 minis in the group, they are much better at spike healing so throw a WoE and trust in them to deal with it. Although Wondrous Foreshadowing + Epic for the Ages, will put nearly anyone on full health, useful for the overheal phase. Oh and if you remember to slot You Shall Fall to Our Wrath (whistle...) keep you "Fall to XXX" on the RAT target it nearly gave me a heart attack but I think its worth unslotting martial training for.