Stonecore - Priestess

[Rachmaninoff]

Last night was my first attempt at Stonecore. The first 3 bosses were pretty straightforward and I picked it up pretty quick. Then came the last boss. As a little bit of background, I just started playing again after a 3 month break. I was only 83 with 90k hp buffed and it was the third time I've done an instance this expansion. I know my spec isn't perfect but I haven't had much time to play. And this was an ok pug group, thankfully there was a great healer.

First I pulled 2/3 of the adds, which unknown to me was a bad idea. Once I did pull her I think I hit her for a few seconds, then she starts throwing me around. I hit her a few more time, then comes the push back throwing me back 20+ yards or so. After that she lifts up into the air. I think she threw a void zone down

Insert adds. The first wave of adds isn't too bad. She's still up in the air and is tossing rocks. Insert second wave of adds. At this point my consecrate was down and (correct me if I'm wrong) the only aoe abilities I have are hammer and wrath.

As I'm trying to gain aggro on these adds, she comes down and lays a void. I'm trying to keep threat. As the adds are almost dead she starts to toss me around again. Insert another wave of adds. Another void. Pushback. Try to gain aggro on adds. She starts to fly away again. More Adds. Kill the adds. More Adds. She comes down and we kill her... Its a pain in the ass....

This was on normal... I only had 2 attempts and I should have been using more CD's than I was. I'm pretty conservative about them. But as far as positioning I was trying to figure out where I should move her. At first I had her near the anvil where she was standing and I was trying to get a feel for what was happening. The second attempt I had moved her to the middle of the area. I also noticed during that attempt that if we stand to the far wall the adds dent to meet at about a point which helps for aoe rather than them all running around beating everyone.

I know this isn't 100% accurate but you get the idea. Its a pain in the ass of a fight especially because of the adds. Please make suggestions and improvements. Also what is different in heroic? Are the basic mechanics the same? Any debuffs? ect.

[sculder]

if you can get your group to drop the void zones in the center of the room, you can force the adds to walk into them, which has the same effect on them as it does to you. This _drastically_ simplifies the fight, especially on heroic. If executed correctly, you won't have any adds to pick up.

As for force grip, it's interruptible, so you or your dps should try to interrupt every one.

[Belloc]

Your group needs to stack up in the middle-ish of the room so that void zones will spawn there. When a void zone spawns, move to the side so that the next will spawn there. Basically, the idea is to create a wall of void zones so that the adds have to run through them. When adds are incoming, simply repositioning will kill all the adds.

Also, as was already stated, interrupt force grip and dodge the meteors (dust clouds on the ground).

[Gracerath]

The force grip thing she does where she slams you up and down a few times is totally interruptible. I'm finding that it is rather annoying in groups lately that I appear to be the only one that knows how to use my interrupt.

[bldavis]

this boss makes this dungoen

as much as i hate her, i love her too just as i grew to love the confessor in toc5 and hor in wrath
they are bosses (or dungeons) that are a HUGE pita, but i enjoy they challenge, as long as my grioup is up for it too (see my frustrations post for more)

[Kelaan]

As I'm trying to gain aggro on these adds, she comes down and lays a void. I'm trying to keep threat. As the adds are almost dead she starts to toss me around again.... Please make suggestions and improvements.

No idea how it's different in heroic, as I'm not there yet.

I found the adds mildly stressful, but not bad. When they spawn, I run away from her and smack them with a HotR + HW, or HotR+Cons, or AS->HotR->tab-and-go-nuts. If you tag both groups with a Hammer, they will group up on you and then your Cons will be just fine. I also prioritize AS in those cases. I should have Inquisition up, I suspect. I also seem to have DPS who wait a bit for me to get them positioned and stuck to me before they go nuts with AOE, but in general the fight seems to devolve into a zerg near the end. The key for me is to be on the right side (as you face the platform) relative to the rest of the group, so that the adds see me first.

I hear the Grip can be interrupted. I've never been able to while tanking, but others seem to have. The second time I ran the place, I wasn't gripped in a void zone NEARLY as often as the first time.

[Belloc]

Unless you're talking about the 60 adds at the start, the adds that spawn during the encounter aren't meant to be tanked. Doing so is not doing the fight properly. Use the void zones!

[Forgrim]

the second group of adds that spawn after the priestess is in throwing rocks mode usually has no void zones left when they come out.

I haven't done this fight in heroic, and i'm dreading it since in PUGs, this fight is hellish since no one seems to understand that the void zones can kill the enemies too.

[inthedrops]

the second group of adds that spawn after the priestess is in throwing rocks mode usually has no void zones left when they come out.

I've had this happen once, but not others. There's probably some mechanic we're missing causing it. It was pretty annoying when it happened as there were a LOT of adds while we waited for another to come out.

[Belloc]

The void zones shrink when they eat adds. I'm kind of thinking that the rate of shrinkage isn't always consistently proportional to the adds. So... if a void zone eats a bunch of adds, but not all of them, you might cause additional shrinkage when the rest of the adds get eaten later, resulting in smaller/no void zones for a brief period.

There's also the possibility that you're DPSing the boss fast enough to cause a phase change (I'm assuming phase changes are health related, like most bosses) before a key void zone can be spawned.

[Forgrim]

I'm almost certain the phase change is time based considering i've beaten her with both 2 and 3 phase changes.

[pyrile]

this fight is not as hard as it seems..

kill the 3 groups in front of her, you can do so without engaging the boss, do yourself a huge favor, mark the boss with a raid icon, blue square works great but any will do. I usually have a dps start the fight and then I just taunt off that person, I just stay with the group and focus mainly on tanking the adds, while occasionally taunting the boss. the priority is the incoming adds and avoiding the void zones, just rinse n repeat.

one final note. try not to kill the boss while she is floating above her platform as if you do she can fall through the platform and be un lootable.

[Blackharon]

The force grip thing she does where she slams you up and down a few times is totally interruptible. I'm finding that it is rather annoying in groups lately that I appear to be the only one that knows how to use my interrupt.

So much this. HoO where no one but me interrupting is a PitA

[Forgrim]

Can't interrupt myself if i'm being vader slammed all over the place.

[Zeruvar]

I find stonecore to be annoying at first heroic run then enjoyable soon as u get used to it.
All the different ways each boss can one shot you is entertaining (frustrating too at first)

Since ur asking about priestess, for normal we never really did anything just stood out of voidzones and stone drops. Adds died more from aoe than using the void zones.

For heroics, im all for the standing in the middle of the map so that whenever she drops a void zone, you just move to the side and repeat it until she returns to the altar, you would then have a wall of voidzones for adds to run into while u just hang back and dodge rocks. Dps will have to interrupt he grasps, but if they miss one you could use divine shield to cancel one, or pray u get a heal so u can barely survive on and pop CDs when shes done.