Thoughts and Opinions on Heroic MgT

Hi All,

I've gotten more comfortable with normal MgT in the past few days and I am starting to be confident enough in my knowledge of the pulls to consider hitting heroic. I don't generally like to waste people's time, so I wanted to get some opinions how to handle certain aspects of the dungeon on heroic. My main concerns are the viability of AoE tanking, the use of resistance gear and skipping pulls.

AoE Tanking

I have 14K unbuffed HP, 14K armor and am unhittable in most situations. I have had a good amount of success AoE tanking a few heroics (SP, Mech, Bot, etc), but the fact that very few of the mobs will actually be trying to melee me worries me from 2 points of view.

1) Can I expect to hold aggro on a Magister, Warlock and the Naga Sorceress with any regularity?

2) Given that few mobs will try to melee me, all of my sexy mitigation and avoidance goes to waste. Is 14K hp enough to survive an influx of frostbolts and fireballs?

Resistance Gear

Given #2 above, does anyone consider the use of resistance gear? The most dangerous spells seem to be the fire-based spells used by the warlocks and the imps. Would it be worth it to give up some defensive stats to almost negate an entire school of damage?

I can pop FR aura (which would cause an issue with my damage return), equip my Fel Barrier and a few FR pieces to get to 200+ FR. In turn, I would take more damage from the Mage Guards and the Blood Knights.

Skipping Pulls

In normal, I feel pretty comfortable skipping a number of pulls. As the mobs go down pretty quickly, I find that there is little opportunity for things to get crazy. As such, there is little moving around and little chance of aggro-ing extra groups. Can the same assumption be made for Heroic?

Any opnions that you could provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Basically the numbers get bigger.
Expect using at least 1 cc in every pull. Having a blood knight, a physician and a mage guard free in the same pull might end bad. Mind Control and Enslave demon are really, really powerful in this instance. Enslave a succubus and watch her soloing a mob while ccing another at the same time. Same goes for MC and a bloodknight/warlock/mage guard.


Holding aggro is the smallest of your issues: Just make sure your targets are being consecrated. Abuse your stun and Arcane Torrent if you have it. Almost every pull can be pulled with LoS so getting stuff in range isn't hard unless your dps is stupid.
15k unbuffed and I did the whole place without resist gear at all. If any, the aura will be more than enough. Stop the magisters' casting early/Tongues them and you don't really have to worry about their haste.


The only pulls I don't recommend skipping are the ones in the room before Delrissa, as you'll often use some kind of fear and the mobs may run there.
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Quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur (Anything said in Latin seems deep)

AoE tanking. It doesn't work as effectively as in typical heroic instances. The biggest problems are obvious, (a.) more damage taken, since avoidance doesn't seem to help much against casters, and (b.) holding aggro (but that will depend on your spell damage - if it is high, your consecrate should suffice). Also, you will have to watch your use of consecrate, since you will likely be CC at least one mob. In sum, it mostly works, the biggest problem is taking more damage, and getting all mobs within consecrate without breaking some form or another of CC. You have to get used to when to use it, and when not to use it. It is not the same as normal/heroic instances, so really, unless you are full Tier6+ gear, it might not be advisable. As already mentioned, Mind Control works very well in here. So, a shadow priest is very good in this instance. I just did it with 2 in a group - and they could almost do single groups without me =) The only risk, of course, is that Mind Control sometimes breaks, and basically you are sacrificing a DPSer - and a Chaotic start.

There is really only one or two groups you can skip, and they are obvious. So, don't bother trying for shortcuts - I figure it is always easier to just clear stuff, and have fear as an option (to use against them), before they use it against you.

Resistance doesn't seem to work for much. I carried in my 365 FR gear, but it was not really useful. Sometimes, I use my shield from heroic manatombs, but that is about it, and the fR aura on last boss. You can dispell the Fire Dots from the warlocks, and half the time the mobs (and bosses) cast frost spells, so any type of resist doesn't really seem to be valuable. I was disappointed to find that the last boss' fire spell cannot be partially resisted, so you take full damage, even with resist gear - and half the type he does cast frost damage. Obviously, his pyroblast - bubble ftw. =)

I have now run it 2 times, and each time have cut my time in half =) (3 hours, 1.5 hours). I should be able to get it to around 45-1h without a problem. Still a problematic wipe here and there.

I find it a rather fun instance though. =)

I'd recommend bringing 2 CC, sheeps best but sap-sheep works well.

For the rest... it's just the normal with bigger numbers.

But really, 2 CC or if u get 2x melee on 3rd boss, you are going to cry.
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I just finished my 4th successful run of heroic MgT (my mace and trinket both dropped!). I had one unsuccessful run that ended on the third boss due to add composition. Here are my experiences.

You Hp should be fine for this, I'm actually a little under that myself. I'm currently sitting at about 340 spell damage unbuffed and I ALWAYS use a superior wizard oil for heroics along with food putting me up to 400ish. I have no problem holding aggro on the mobs as long as I can use consecrate. Most important thing is to make sure that your CC gets them before dropping the first one, I find this is hardest with hunters.

You will be taking a lot of damage so what I usually do is Judge the first dps target and then switch to a mage or lock. If my hp starts to slip too low for my comfort I stun the high dps mob. If you are a blood elf arcane torrent is incredibly powerful here as both the locks and the mages are weak with their melee and an aoe interrupt plus 3sec silence is enough for two heals to land.

I have never used resistance gear outside of my aura.

If I had a choice my perfect group would be
Tankadin
Rogue
Mage
Lock
Resto Shammy

Here are some tips for the run.

First as I'm sure you've noticed all the packs are randomized. I'm betting there is a minimum number of each mob that will spawn in the dungeon (so you can always get the daily done in one run).

First room. This is IMPORTANT. Clear the first two mobs and maybe the pat. Get all the way on the left side of the instance and look down into the couryard. Scout the adds for the third boss. If you get both the shaman (dranai) and the MS warrior (naga) then you should go reset and get another mix. After you have finished scouting you can skip on of the packs (either the right or left whatever has easier composition).

First Boss hits harder than normal and the crystals have more life. You should be able to get by this part without much trouble.

Second boss is a real pain on heroic. If you can coordinate it pull him right after you kill the packs of mana wyrms, this gives you 25% damage boost for the first 25sec and this is a total dps race. I usually spam consecrates until I pick up two of the debuffs, this eases the complexity on your healer (esp if you have a pally healer) and also you can bubble them off. If you dps is right on he should be enraging (aoe all the time) about the time foreberance wears off from the wings I popped on the pull. Just bubble up since he doesn't need to be tanked enraged and heal/throw hammers.

After the few robots, you'll be in a couryard. You can safely skip the two packs on the right.

For the third boss it's a LOT harder than normal, they will heal for a lot more so locking down the heals is crucial. CC the shaman/MS warrior if you have either of them. I prefer sap for the MS warrior because he like to intercept the mage casting sheep and then two shot him. The hunter/engineer and demons so you can banish them and fear them as a pally. I don't clear the back of this room just the front half and then pull them there. It helps to be in the open so no one looses LOS from the healer. I use a hybrid gearset for this using my high spell damage tanking peices along with my healing gear. Generally after the pull and the inital stun/arcane torrent to get the priest down I spend almost all of my time healing/dispelling. BoP is your best friend here.

Finally the last trash pull in Kael's room is hard. I Normally I like to LOS them around the corner but I've found here that if I just pull them and leave the lock/mage/naga (or whatever ranged classes you get) shooting from afar. Then when my HP dips down low I can step to the side and LOS pull them giving my healer a few seconds to land a heal.

Nothing is really different on kael besides he will do more damage and sometimes cast pyroblast. Bubble and live through the pyro. I've usually only lay one consecrate on the pull until the pheonix has spawned. if you lay more you may pick up the pheonix (who needs to be kited) and it results in a wipe (unless your healer is grossly overgeared). During gravity lapse I just heal, hopefully your dps should be high enough to get him down after the first one.

Hope this helps. Excuse my bad spelling and grammar.
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I've only run this on heroic once so far and we called it just after the 2nd boss. We had so many wipes on Vexallus it was just beyond a joke. We were taking it slow and burning the adds but our healer was just going OOM. In the end we had our DPS warr grab his arcane resist gear and I threw on my healing gear and off healed. Even with this, we still wiped a heap of times, and I really just couldn't figure out why.
Gonna give this another run through tonight and see how it turns out. I really want my damn trinket!
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Yae, 70 Paladin, Aman'thul Horde

I have to admit, I've only done this once on heroic, but the biggest things that helped me were:

Use Line of Sight, and let things come to you. There are two pulls that I can think of where I couldn't use Line of Sight to pull the casters to me, and into my consecrate. CC is still pretty useful (even short term CC, like sap, especially with the change to AS). Make sure your group understands that it needs to wait for the pull to get to you as well (besides ccers like mages and hunters), otherwise you'll be running around and losing control of mobs left and right. Nothing wipes a group faster than a confused tank.

A pet for the second boss. We took this boss extremely slowly, and had a warlock take the adds with his voidwalker. We stop dps every 15% after 85%, and then once the warlock resummoned his pet, begin again and let the pet take the next set. It goes slowly, but it's a bit more safe. At 20%, just go crazy and hope you have enough dps to knock him down.

For the third boss, I switched over to my aoe grinding gear - much higher spell damage, but with less armor/survivability/hps. Since you won't necessarily be holding aggro the whole fight, the reduced hps aren't too bad. You can also switch to healing gear and help out that way (also a great way to help get through the Kael fight, just bring a libram, weapon and shield, since those can be switched midfight).

Fire resist gear on Kael helped immensley - I think if my dps had been more on top of interrupting his fireballs (those hit hard!) it would have gone more smoothly though.

Divine Shield is a godsend for his Pyroblast.

Once I've run it a few more times, I think I'll have a better picture of it though.
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Yinramu- Hyjal

For me, the most comfortable kill has been killing ALL the adds, stacking debuffs up to 6-7, bubbling out of them and continuing. By the time the debuffs stack up to 4-5 again, he goes into overload and gets finished quickly.

The advantage is that mostly I have been taking damage, and aggro etc. was never an issue.

Extermi

I currently sit at around 15200 hits unbuffed, and AOE tanking on heroic is very possible (+428 spell damage in my MT gear, though might need to up this as a bear OT caught me on Gruul last night ).

Basic plan should be:

1) CC Mage Guard / 1 DPS nukes imp if its up
2) Kill Maiden (or enslave, enslave is best option)
3) Blood Knight (Heals)
4) Physician / Magister (physician heals it seems, Magisters kick up damage)
5) Warlock / Witch
6) Smuggler

Mage guards should be cc'd at all times, they do a knock down thats nasty and can spell lock the healer it seems, basically if this guy is up the damage you can take is silly as the healer cannot reliably guarantee a heal landing, their bubble ability is pretty useless as you can always re-los pull back round the corner to move the casters.

Maidens are nasty, they seduce and hit hard, nuke em fast as a bad seduce on the healer is pretty much a wipe barring LoH or bubble.

Blood knights don't hit hard, but they do heal often, nuke em fast and hard, hammer them to stop the heals.

Rest are just casters, taunt them onto you, move and drop a consecration on them, etc. Simple fact is you can normally take the damage and can play with los to save yourself here, be proactive and kill the threats first, then you can split as needed, an enslaved maiden can solo almost any other mob. The smuggler should be last target, his aoe is weak and he will come back to you if the dps ignore him, stay far from the dps to ensure he does minimal damage in the fight.

The robots, stick back beyond 30 yards and the aoe seems to run out of range hitting only you and the melee.

Bosses are easy tbh:

Boss 1: Ignore the crystal and nuke him, he will tend to fill 60-70% of his mana even if you nuke the crystal, save yourself time and spend that dps on the boss, he dies faster meaning fewer aoe's. Dispel the drains (cleanse).

Boss 2: You can do the "nuke" plan no matter your healer, but frankly its a stupid plan for most groups in T4ish gear. With a paladin healer take it slow, take 2 adds, heal that player, take 2 adds every 15%, minimal dps, plan about 25s / pair of ads. At 20% blow cooldowns and nuke through the aoe. A spirit priest you do a similar plan, but alternate the killers of the adds (mages iceblock after 4 adds). On a CoH priest you can just nuke through it all.

Boss 3:
CC Nage
Nuke Priestess
Deal with rest

Naga is nasty (fear, stun, etc), priestess should be interrupted and killed fast.

Boss 4:
Nuke to around 55%, dispose of phoenix, bubble pyro, nuke past 50%. At this point stop healing the tank (only gets heal during the ground phase), and keep up the dps. Tank should attempt to heal others as much as possible (fol = 2 ticks of the air phase roughly even in prot gear ).
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Ahh, but you have heard of me.

http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Lightbringer&n=elyria

U can actually also skip the left or right pack just after u killed the first 2 mobs and the patrol in the instance. Just stick left or right and u don't aggro them.
Ofcourse everything is losable. I did 1 run so far with 0 CC whatsoever and it hurts quite a bit but it all depends on your healer really. If he can outheal the damage and there's interrupts on at least the blood knight and u have a shammy or so to purge buffs u can make it.