[10] Algalon

Note that there is a good thread on Phase Punch strategy here:
viewtopic.php?f=30&t=23919

Here are my logs for our attempts:
http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/rt-H ... boss=32871

Got our first attempts at Algalon last night and it's a fun fight. I really like it. I have a few things to point out, though, and several questions to ask:

Things to point out:

Algalon is tagged as "neutral," so the fight doesn't begin until you hit him. Feel free to move all the way into the room as you buff.
Be sure you're the one that hits him. Basically after you hit him once, he'll become untargetable as the room readjusts for a few seconds, and then he begins attacking. He runs quite fast, so he may kill a DPS if the DPS hits him first.
Your Judgement spell is probably the best to pull with because that 20% slow is pretty important.

...and now, for my many questions:

From what I could tell, there are four stars (which when killed, turn into black holes) spawned and three Living Constellations. Is it critical that all stars be killed and all constellations be dragged into holes before each Big Bang?

Why not have all ranged focus on (the same) stars so they can be downed faster? WoWWiki just recommends 1-2 DPS do it.

If someone HoSacs the tank and then jumps in a black hole, will he still share damage?
What about DivSac?

How many Big Bangs will we have to deal with? How long should we be spending in Phase 1?

How much time should we need in Phase 2?

How much damage should be done with each "cycle" (ending with Big Bang)?

Does reaching Phase 2 feel like the intense concentration is over with a basic Bloodlust > burn, or does it actually become tougher?

What strength of cooldown should I need (I have 35k HP unbuffed) to survive?
Would another paladin's HoSac be enough? What about a glyphed HoSalv?

The strategy discussed in the other thread (switch so that one tank eats all Big Bangs) interested me. We have two tanks, but the OT is a DPS Warrior in whatever Prot pieces he's got that nobody wanted. They can keep him up, but they specifically mentioned that he takes noticeably more damage than me. What tradeoff would be best that would allow for him to be tanking, well, as little as possible?

Is it worth using FR aura for Cosmic Smashes over Devo aura for the armor?

WoWWiki mentions that one person can kite Living Constellations into holes. Is that a good idea? If we have a DK grip one into a hole, a hunter grab another (he said their Misdirecting Shot works), and the other picked up by someone else, would that be better? Or is that too much DPS lost on the boss?

Is the enrage timer a strong factor?

With my raid makeup that day:
- Prot Paladin (Me)
- Somewhat undergeared Prot Warrior
- DPS DK
- Disc Priest
- Other Healers and DPS that have no potentially helpful CDs
What kind of cooldown rotation do you think should be used?

I apologize in advance for so many questions, but the limited videos can't cover everything and I'm sure as guilds progress that these questions will come up soon anyway. Fun fight, though. I'm a little disappointed with the one hour lockout, but it was a bit refreshing to have my raid "on the ball" for a full straight hour with no AFKs, frequently alt tabbing, etc.

I havent killed yet, but I got to 30% just before 3rd big bang - so if my calculations are right, you should only get 3 big bangs for a kill (20% it stops happening). I havent tested whether HoSac works or not, if it does it'd be quite risky for the pala (around 80k dmg, 30% of that to him), unless he bubbles.

I run with 1 holy pala 1 disc priest 1 holy priest - I eat al lthe big bangs, first big bang I use shieldwall + Pain Supression. Second one i use salv + guardian spirit. Shieldwall alone will make you survive big bang, - I have around 46k hp buffed and I usually end up taking a round 35k dmg (you need to be topped up before the healers enter black holes). Salv alone will not make you survive tho, thats why I added Guardian spirit in that combo.

Use devotion aura, his melee dmg is far more frightening - if you get your hand on a shaman make him use FR totem. With regards to shutting blackholes, we shut the first one with mage and hunter, then after that just the hunter alone. Living constellations are kited by me (I tank first half of each phase, we switch at 3 stacks of punch), so I have around 20 secs to close some adds up. I usually manage to close 2 adds before Big bang comes - bare in mind after big bang, black holes are still there, and remaining adds are still there, and you can still close them during teh actual big bang cast. Depending on blackhole positions, you may even kill all 3 adds before big bang finishes. But if you dont, get your off tank to do it while you are tanking the new phase. Most videos uses a healer to do the add kiting (resto druid), but we dont have access to one, and I dont want to waste a DPS to do it. We tried using our priests to do add kiting, but we find that as soon as they kite, the raid dies to dmg coz he cant heal while moving.

I suggest getting a better geared OT, even my OT warrior is reported to take considerable more dmg than me, and he is like almsot full U25 geared. He often dies that causes us to wipe....

In sub 20%, if I researched right, 4 add spawns every 30 seconds after initial spawn.... and I think tanking 8 would be a bit troublesome, I guess you are aiming to nuke last 20% within 50 seconds?

From what I could tell, there are four stars (which when killed, turn into black holes) spawned and three Living Constellations. Is it critical that all stars be killed and all constellations be dragged into holes before each Big Bang?

yes. Ideally, all 4 stars should die before the big bang and 3 of them get closed by dragging constallations into them, leaving one black hole that the raid all goes down.

Why not have all ranged focus on (the same) stars so they can be downed faster? WoWWiki just recommends 1-2 DPS do it.

because you will fall behind on the enrage timer.

If someone HoSacs the tank and then jumps in a black hole, will he still share damage?
What about DivSac?

Yes.
Yes.

How many Big Bangs will we have to deal with? How long should we be spending in Phase 1?

3 big bangs. the 4th big is the hard-enrage. he should be at 20% to transition to p2 right as the 3rd big bang goes off or shortly after. there is some speculation that if you get him to 20% before he casts the 3rd big bang it will skip that big bang, but no guild has had the dps to be able to accomplish that yet to my knowledge.

How much damage should be done with each "cycle" (ending with Big Bang)?

27%

Does reaching Phase 2 feel like the intense concentration is over with a basic Bloodlust > burn, or does it actually become tougher?

I'll tell you when i reach phase 2.
Most guilds Lust right as the fight starts because thats the best DPS contribution and times with pre-potting, all trinket ICDs being up, initial DPS cooldown use, and everyone being alive and fully buffed.

What strength of cooldown should I need (I have 35k HP unbuffed) to survive?
Would another paladin's HoSac be enough? What about a glyphed HoSalv?

A shield wall at the very least. Guardian Spirit is a better option because it will mean you'll be at full hp after the big bang, whereas using a shield wall will mean you are at <20% during the transition of the raid all coming back up and can easily die right there.

Is it worth using FR aura for Cosmic Smashes over Devo aura for the armor?

no. Cosmic Smash should never do more than like 800 damage to anyone.

WoWWiki mentions that one person can kite Living Constellations into holes. Is that a good idea? If we have a DK grip one into a hole, a hunter grab another (he said their Misdirecting Shot works), and the other picked up by someone else, would that be better? Or is that too much DPS lost on the boss?

thats too much DPS lost on the boss.
Also death grip wont work because the DK will either death grip it past the black hole, or accidentally go down the black hole himself.
The best way to do it is for the tank not currently tanking to stand on the opposite side of a black hole and taunt a constallation. If you have a tree druid they will probably have aggro from healing, and can just move around kiting them in to black holes, which works out very well for when tank transitions are going on and tanks are too busy.

Is the enrage timer a strong factor?

yes.

With my raid makeup that day:
- Prot Paladin (Me)
- Somewhat undergeared Prot Warrior
- DPS DK
- Disc Priest
- Other Healers and DPS that have no potentially helpful CDs
What kind of cooldown rotation do you think should be used?

You shield wall the first BB.
Priest Dispersions for the second one and you taunt off him when you come back up. (make sure hes standing far away from algalon)
You shield wall the third.

I havent killed yet, but I got to 30% just before 3rd big bang - so if my calculations are right, you should only get 3 big bangs for a kill (20% it stops happening). I havent tested whether HoSac works or not, if it does it'd be quite risky for the pala (around 80k dmg, 30% of that to him), unless he bubbles.

You cant bubble. Big Bang goes through bubble, as well as all other immunities, and bubble also removes you from the black hole realm as soon as you use it.

I'll assume you mis-read my Disc Priest as a Shadow one. Shouldn't Pain Suppression be enough, though? Well, I'd have HoSalv too so I guess I can use that. I know my Warrior offtank (who again isn't that geared) Shield Wall + Shield Block (+4pc)'d the Big Bang from full health and died, but that Shield Block bonus won't affect physical damage (Big Bang is) and Shield Wall is only 40% to our 50% from DP.

Assuming a worst-case Big Bang of 88687 damage:
RF is 6%
ShotT is 3%
Divine Plea glyph is 3%

This should drop it to:
78,439 damage

Pain Suppression is 40% of that, so that should bring it to:
...47k. Yeah, I'll have to HoSalv that with PS. That should bring it down under 40k which will be easily survivable. That does explain how the Warrior died so easily last night, though.

I'll assume you mis-read my Disc Priest as a Shadow one. Shouldn't Pain Suppression be enough, though?

edit: lol im dumb.

Joanadark wrote:

I'll assume you mis-read my Disc Priest as a Shadow one. Shouldn't Pain Suppression be enough, though?

I didnt misread.
Our strat in 25-man is for a Disc and a Holy priest to alternate Dispersion for ALL the big bangs. It has significant advantages over pain supping the tank, and also allows you to reactively use Pain Supp as a normal cooldown on the tank

Are you talking about the shadow priest 51 point talent, dispersion or something else?

Jasari wrote:

Joanadark wrote:

I'll assume you mis-read my Disc Priest as a Shadow one. Shouldn't Pain Suppression be enough, though?

I didnt misread.
Our strat in 25-man is for a Disc and a Holy priest to alternate Dispersion for ALL the big bangs. It has significant advantages over pain supping the tank, and also allows you to reactively use Pain Supp as a normal cooldown on the tank

Are you talking about the shadow priest 51 point talent, dispersion or something else?

I can't imagine that he's thinking of something else, but I have a feeling he's getting something mixed up.

Are you sure they aernt shadow priests - if you spec dispersion you are pretty much a shadow priest....

How does a holy or disc priest cast dispersion when it's a 51 shadow talent? o.O

Wow, yeah, my fault. They were shadow priests for the fight. They are normally healy so i was confused.

In that case, your best bet is Pain supp through.

Joanadark wrote:

I havent killed yet, but I got to 30% just before 3rd big bang - so if my calculations are right, you should only get 3 big bangs for a kill (20% it stops happening). I havent tested whether HoSac works or not, if it does it'd be quite risky for the pala (around 80k dmg, 30% of that to him), unless he bubbles.

You cant bubble. Big Bang goes through bubble, as well as all other immunities, and bubble also removes you from the black hole realm as soon as you use it.

This is really important, b/c it also applies to hand of sac and divine sac. Since you cant go down as a bubble its impossible to use these as mitigation.

Also a quick note from ours, we found it much easier if the tank who isn't tanking to close black holes since their damage is negligible. Also I have the greatest piece of advice possible on this boss, though it may seem obvious. Try and stack your raid for this fight as much as you can within the people available to you and for the love of god get the same ppl doing the same thing.

Weve had 3 weeks of at least 3 new ppl b/c of various reasons (comp dieing, ppl having to miss the raid, getting hacked, stopping raiding, etc) and this has set us back more than I can tell. You spend what 20 min of attempts getting your healers used to the damage output every week, a person having to learn how to kill stars the most effectively, tanks knowing the rotation. It's frustrating b/c if we had 2 hours instead of one I can guarantee we would get this kill in one week but one hour isn't enough time to reteach and progress.

Well I was true to my word, 2 weeks with the same ppl doing the same job = a kill.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RzulM8nNEU

Only mistake is the dk taunts a split second too early on the first transition so it makes the 2nd transition more interesting.

Markoh wrote:Weve had 3 weeks of at least 3 new ppl b/c of various reasons (comp dieing, ppl having to miss the raid, getting hacked, stopping raiding, etc) and this has set us back more than I can tell. You spend what 20 min of attempts getting your healers used to the damage output every week, a person having to learn how to kill stars the most effectively, tanks knowing the rotation. It's frustrating b/c if we had 2 hours instead of one I can guarantee we would get this kill in one week but one hour isn't enough time to reteach and progress.

Sums up the fight. Chop and changed 5 members in 2 seperate raid instances for attempts.

Do you bother blowing your oh sh!t buttons at the start of the fight btw (Shield wall) or is it not up when it comes to your turn to tank through a big bang? I'm just trying every concievable way of reducing dmg...even using Salv since this is like a illidan fight in terms of blocking for mad threat....although I find Algalon consumes all by block charges occasionally before Holy shield is off CD again :@

Wouldn't it be possible to have a pally hand of sac the pally tank and then shield wall, since the hand of sac only does 100 percent of his health, so it would only do 50 percent of his health after he shield walled? I dont know if there's any damage in the black hole, just throwing this out there.