Difference between revisions of "Late Night ZA Tichondrius"

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== Schedule ==
 
== Schedule ==
Tuesday or Wednesday following <Grim Basin Stare> progression raid. If no progression raid is scheduled, we will zone in at 9PM. Group invites will start at 8:30PM and summoning at 8:45PM. All times are server time.
+
Thursday @ 6:30 (potential for Monday @ 6:30 down the road)
  
 +
== Loot rules ==
 +
All loot from timed events will use greed/need to eliminate wasted time between bosses. All timed chest loot will be skipped till either the timed event is completed or failed. The NPC that spawns the chest does not despawn. A designated DE'er will always roll greed for boss loot.
  
== Loot rules ==
 
All loot is to be passed and decided after boss is dead and everyone is rezzed. At this time, there is no limit to how much loot you can walk away from the raid with, but please consider passing if you have already looted
 
  
 
== Raid Preparation ==
 
== Raid Preparation ==
Please bring plenty of consumables. We may not run wet, but if we decide too, make sure you have them on you. Don't make Big Brother come out with [http://www.capitalcentury.com/bigstick.jpg THE big stick] if we do go wet.
+
Food and weapon buffs will be expected. Elixirs or flasks for timed portion of run is also expected. Elixirs may be favorable (cheaper) since any wipe will most likely result in failed timed run.
 +
 
  
 
== The Roster ==
 
== The Roster ==
 
=== Core Roster ===
 
 
{| border="1" cellpadding="8" |
 
{| border="1" cellpadding="8" |
| '''ForumID''' || '''Character''' || '''Class''' || '''Role''' || ''' ''' || ''' ''' || ''' ''' || ''' ''' || ''' ''' || ''' '''
+
| '''ForumID''' || '''Character''' || '''Class''' || '''Role'''
 
|-  
 
|-  
|olon97||olond||druid||MT|| || || || || ||
+
| ||Rmblebeetuna||druid||MT
 
|-  
 
|-  
|champain||champain (need final confirmation)||warrior||OT/DPS|| || || || || ||
+
|UnderLoK||Detroitr||druid||OT/DPS
 
|-  
 
|-  
|mooshie||mooshie||druid||healer|| || || || || ||
+
| ||Anticles||druid||healer
 
|-  
 
|-  
|jacer||myca||pally||healer|| || || || || ||
+
| ||Illiander||paladin||healer
 
|-  
 
|-  
|cyrass||cyrass||shaman||healer|| || || || || ||  
+
| ||Rascalshadow||shadow priest||DPS
 
|-  
 
|-  
|symog||symog||mage||DPS|| || || || || ||
+
|symog||symog||mage||DPS
 
|-  
 
|-  
|abysmal||abysmal||priest||DPS|| || || || || ||
+
|||Silben||warlock||DPS
 
|-  
 
|-  
|confessor||boomkin||druid||DPS|| || || || || ||
+
|||???||rogue||DPS
 
|-  
 
|-  
|gravely||gravely||rogue||run and hide from Thaldred|| || || || || ||  
+
|||Azualis||hunter||DPS
 
|-
 
|-
|tin||shootin||hunter||DPS|| || || || || ||
+
|Shockster||Shockster||shaman||healer/DPS
 
|-
 
|-
 
  |}
 
  |}
  
=== The Bench ===
+
== Attendance ==
TBD
+
Please post here and pm the group if you will be unavailable for any raids.
 +
 
 +
 
 +
== Strategies ==
 +
 
 +
[http://pillage.uber.com/ZulAman Humorous site with very good information on Zul'Aman]
 +
 
 +
[http://elitistjerks.com/f15/t17039-ej_forum_community_zulaman_testing/ Ripped from EJ forum]
 +
 
 +
[http://www.wowhead.com/?zone=3805/ Zul'Aman @ Wowhead]
 +
 
 +
[http://www.wowwiki.com/Zul'Aman Zul'Aman @ WoWWiki]
 +
 
 +
[http://www.bosskillers.com/cgi-bin/bbguild/index.cgi?action=view_guide&guide_id=223 Zul'Aman @ Bosskillers]
 +
 
 +
=== THE TIMED RUN ===
 +
 
 +
[http://elitistjerks.com/f15/t20104-za_timed_run/ EJ thread on the Timed Run]
 +
 
 +
==== The ZA timed run ====
 +
 
 +
Some days you get the bear, other days the bear gets you. This thread is aimed at helping people achieve the former more than the latter.
 +
 
 +
There is a thread about the ZA zone in general which contains useful advice about the timed run, but I thought it would be helpful to have a thread specifically for the timed run with a basic strategy plus hints and tips for beating the timer.
 +
 
 +
This thread assumes a working knowledge of the zone and bosses so doesn’t describe these in detail. The tactics and hints in this thread come from my guild’s experience with the timed run (after a lot of pain our first bear was this week!) plus reading of all the advice in the general ZA thread.
  
  
== Attendance ==
+
===== Basics =====
Please post here and pm the group if you will be unavailable for any raids.
+
 
 +
Killing the bear boss adds 15 minutes, killing the eagle boss adds 10 minutes. No extra time is added for the dragonhawk or lynx bosses.
 +
 
 +
Don't release any prisoners or loot any chests until the end - it just wastes time. If the boss is killed then the prisoners will not be harmed, even if you miss the overall timer. As soon as a boss dies, grab the badge and move on. I would recommend leaving group loot on and rolling need/greed as necessary – that way you can allocate loot while moving on to the next area. To be honest if you really need the boss loot then you probably aren’t going to get the bear mount anyway.
 +
 
 +
Keep moving - time standing around is time wasted. Don't need to wait for everyone to be full mana before pulling - pretty much chain pull and everyone needs to keep up, use mana pots if necessary. But be sensible about this – dying to a premature pull will probably fail the timer – occasionally waiting for 15 seconds won’t unless it becomes a habit.
  
== Mailing list and calendar ==
+
Consumables are good! Dual elixirs will probably work as well as a flask, because if people die then the timer will probably be missed anyway. Oils and food are cheap and useful.
TBD
 
  
 +
The whole raid needs to know what they are expected to do before the run starts. Giving strat talks while on the timer is pretty much a guaranteed fail.
  
== Ingame chat channel ==
 
TBD
 
  
 +
===== Group makup =====
  
== Availability ==
+
How you play is much more important than what group you enter the zone with. That said there are a few (hopefully helpful) words of advice.
TBD
 
  
 +
The instance is very much easier with a paladin tank and at least 2 AEers. There are a lot of places where mobs can be AEd to save time. However the timer can be certainly beaten without a paladin tank, but it’s that little bit harder.
  
== Strategies ==
+
A second tank is required (warrior or druid is fine). A dps specced tank can fill the role of the second tank.
  
[http://elitistjerks.com/f15/t17039-ej_forum_community_zulaman_testing/ Ripped from EJ forum]
+
Two healers are required, and preferably no more than 2. Adding a third healer probably slows you down by about 4-7 minutes so unless you are cruising through with 10 minutes to spare (in which case you don’t need to be reading this!) it will probably cause you to fail.
  
[http://www.wowhead.com/?zone=3805/ Zul'Aman @ Wowhead]
+
Heavy dps is required. There’s a lot of killing to be done between you and that bear of your dreams and T4 gear isn’t really going to get the job done, no matter how hard you try.
  
[http://www.wowwiki.com/Zul%27Aman/ Zul'Aman @ WoWWiki]
+
A shadowpriest is good for mana regain and VE to help with healing (and for fortitude), although unless you have a paladin for salvation, they may need to watch their threat to some extent.
  
===[http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=23576/ Nalorakk <Bear Avatar>]===
 
  
A 2 Phase fight:
+
=====Kill order=====
  
First phase - Human form:
+
The best order is bear, dragonhawk, eagle, lynx. The main disadvantage of this order is that if you don’t get it right then you could easily only get 2 chests by failing to kill the eagle in time.
  
He does a random charge.
+
A very good alternative order is eagle, bear, dragonhawk, lynx which should guarantee 3 chests with reasonable play, although it probably wastes about a minute compared to the ideal order.
Mangle - Increases damage done by bleeds by 100%.
 
  
Second phase - Bear form:
+
Edit: At least that's my experience of the zone. Others feel that the alternative eagle, bear, dragonhawk, lynx route is better - some of the Lynx trash can be skipped by this route as well by hugging the wall near the Hex Lord entrance. See posts below for more details and decide which route is best for you.
  
Applies 2 different bleed effects.
+
Including clearing trash, the bear should take about 10 minutes, dragonhawk 12 minutes, Eagle 8 minutes, Lynx 15 minutes (this can be tight for Lynx so ideally you want to pick some extra time on previous bosses). These times aren’t set in stone, but are good targets to aim for.
Raid wide Silence - 4-5 seconds long, does approx 1k damage.
 
  
Phase 1 is simply tank and spank. Make sure to heal the random person charged.
 
  
Phase 2 have the 2nd tank taunt the boss and be careful of the cleave so make sure the raid is not next to where the 2nd tank is bringing the boss.
+
=====Bear Trash=====
  
When he goes back to human form, have the first tank taunt it, repeat until he is dead.
+
There is a pack of 2 roamers before you really start the bear trash. These can be avoided, but there is a definite risk of them aggroing as you fight the trash. Probably it is safer to kill these.
  
 +
Once you move up, the bear avatar will run off and send some trash towards you. Kill these and pull the first pack of bears. Avoid the other packs of bears by hugging the wall as you move onwards.
  
After this boss you can take your pick at targetting any of the 3 next Avatars first but in terms of difficulty they are listed below.
+
After that it is really just a matter of clearing the rest of the trash to the boss. Make sure to tank the bear riders apart from each other.
  
For the time quest the kill order would logically be: Bear, Eagle, Dragonhawk, Lynx, Malacrass and finally Zul'Jin.
 
  
 +
=====Bear=====
  
===[http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=23574/ Akil'zon <Eagle Avatar>]===
+
Pretty easy tank'n'spank. Killing the boss adds 15 minutes to the timer. With the added time, you should have 25 minutes left after the boss dies.
  
Roughly every 60 seconds he will cast the his Storm on a random person with an emote. This player is raised up in the air and a cloud appears above them, simply everyone find this person and run under him and you will take no damage. The boss channels this spell so feel free to keep attacking at ranged unless you are lucky enough to have him target a melee next to him, just be carteful not to over-aggro the MT.
 
  
This is a basic tank and spank fight with a small twist. Also during the storm have ranged/casters target the eagles in the air and dot/attack them to give you more time on dpsing the boss, the melee just concentrate on the boss himself. A very easy fight, might take a wipe or 2 to understand what is going on.
+
=====Dragonhawk trash=====
  
 +
Make sure to kill the scouts before they reach the drums – having adds summoned wastes a lot of time. Don’t engage them when they are close to the drums.
  
===[http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=23577/ Halazzi <Lynx Avatar>]===
+
Kill flamecasters first as they do a lot of damage. Make sure to interrupt them and either spellsteal or dispel their haste buff.
  
This boss has a tiny amount of hp, roughly 600k. This is a 2 phase encounter that rotates (similar to Nightbane) every 25%.
+
If there is more than one flamecaster in a pack then it can be a good idea to mind control one. This helps reduce raid damage, and also kill the adds a lot faster. Somewhat risky however as an early MC break can get messy. Whether you want to take this risk will probably depend how close you expect to be on the overall timer.
  
Phase 1 -
+
Avoid aggroing the pack set back on the right (near the start), and avoid aggroing any on the stairs. The last dragonhawk pack can be avoided by waiting until they roam out of the way. This is generally better than killing them. The very last pack of mobs should be fought on the stairs to avoid aggroing the roamers.
  
He hits quite hard and also does a Mother Shahraz type of ability like Saber Lash that if it hits more than 1 person the damage received by each person is much less than if it were to hit only 1. Once you get him to 75 % he will go into phase 2.
 
  
Phase 2 -
+
=====Dragonhawk=====
  
During this phase he will transform back into his Shaman form and spawn a Spirit of the Lynx that has approx 200k hp. Also during this phase he will drop a nasty totem known as: Corrupted Lightning Totem that does chain lightning for approx 5k, maybe some nat res is not a bad idea, but not a necessity. The last ability of this phase is a Flame Shock that he will do randomly to 1 target.
+
The standard strategy is to let the hatchers fully open one side, paladin tank + AE the adds down. Rise and repeat for the other side then spank down the boss. A non-tank paladin can tank the adds okay. It can be done fairly well with a non-paladin tank as well, it’s just that bit more difficult. If you have a shadow priest then he should stay on the boss, but all other dps should help on adds.
  
Basically tank and spank in phase 1. When phase 2 occurs, 1 tank stays on the Shaman and the other tank takes the Spirit. You need to dps down the Spirit as fast as possible so you will not stay in phase 2, too long because of the nasty totems.
+
An alternative option is to leave both hatchers alive and kill them after they each hatch 2-3 eggs. This should generate less adds overall.
  
Kill the totems when they spawn (similar to Tidvalas during the Fathom Lord Karathress encounter in SSC), cleanse people if needed. Rinse and repeat till dead.
+
Try not to all stand in one place as this will mean that flame breath hits the whole raid.
  
 +
You should have 13 minutes left when the boss dies. After the dragonhawk, jump down and then head left through the water to the outside of the bear area and then right to the eagle area. Basically don’t aggro the 2 roamers outside the Hex Lord’s area.
  
===[http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=23578/ Jan'alai <Dragonhawk Avatar>]===
 
  
Jan'alai has 2 major abilities, and at 35%ish hatches his remaining eggs(explained later)
+
=====Eagle trash=====
- He has a 5 minute enrage that is rather unimportant, as it barely increases his damage.
 
  
1 - A "Flame breath" type cone that has a long range but a small width, this does about 4-5k to people in a single line and adds up fast (believe to be random target). It is important to minimize its damage by spreading out appropriatly.
+
The aim here is to pull the tempest as soon as you can manage it without dying because pulling the tempest stops adds being generated.
  
2 - He will periodically teleport the entire raid to him, put up "flame walls" on the outer ring of his area so you cannot escape. He will then begin spawning "time bombs" randomly throughout his area. After approximatly 10 seconds they will blow up dealing 3-5k(?) dmg in a 5 yard area, so you need to find a spot that is safe and does not have fire bombs on it. This ability seems to be on a random timer as sometimes he will forget about it and other times he will spam it.
+
Just keep moving as fast as you can (without dying), and as soon as you have a clear shot to the tempest, pull him.
  
Throughout the fight he calls 2 "Hatchers"(Low HP) which run to the side and begin hatching eggs into dragonhawks at an increasing rate. You need to Kill 1 Hatcher as soon as possible and go give the 2nd one a hug, tanking and killing the dragonhawks he spawns (we would normally do about 5-7 hawks at a time and just draw out the fight).
 
When you are comfortable with the amount of hawks spawned, kil the hatcher and mop up the remaining hawks. This is the hardest part of the fight as you will have to heal alot of raid damage due to the small area of the egg platforms and the damage his fire breath does, you should assign at least one healer to go with the group that willl kill eggs, preferably one that is good at raid healing (CoH priest, resto shaman etc). The other difficult part of this fight is his ability to port and put up fire walls to the egg spawns while the hatchers are busy hatching eggs, causing you to get zerged so be careful!
 
  
The dragonhawks individually have a stacking flame buffet, and a fire damage based proc on top of their normal melee which is about 1k~ on leather.
+
=====Eagle=====
  
The tactics to this boss are really, really simple
+
Spread out most of the time to minimise chain lightning damage.
1) Minimize his fire breath damage when he isnt spawning hatchers
 
2) When hatchers spawn kill one, send the group to kill dragonhawks spawned by the other one.
 
3) Dont die to the fire bomb minigame.
 
4) Make sure you hatch almost ALL of the eggs before 35% (yes this means light dps for the entire fight), or you will be horribly zerged.
 
5) Profit
 
  
 +
Group up on the tank before the storm to ensure that the melees can continue to dps during the storm. You might take a bit of extra chain lightning damage doing this, but it shouldn’t be fatal.
  
===[http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=24363/ Hex Lord Malacrass (incomplete info)]===
+
Generally it is easier to simply ignore the adds and continue to dps the boss. If you have enough dps to have a chance of clearing the instance within the timer, then you should be able to kill the boss before the adds get out of hand.
  
He starts with 4 random adds. Possible known adds:
+
With the extra time you should have 15 minutes left when the boss dies.
  
Ogre - Melee add, Sheep him.
 
Imp - Fireball Spam, possible banish or kill quickly.
 
Dragonkin - Flamebreath & Thunderclap, sleep him/kill quickly, if you get this add, preferrably killing is a good option.
 
Undead - melee and instant casts, shackle him.
 
Blood Elf - Heals. Interupt heals/Kill quickly.
 
Serpent - Posion bolts. Sleep it / kill quickly, like the Dragonkin, killing it is preferred due to your druid does not have to shapeshift.
 
  
People seem to kill 1 or 2 of the adds before focusing on the boss.
+
=====Lynx Trash=====
  
Malacrass:
+
Several packs of trash on the Lynx boss can be avoided by chosing a cunning route. From outside the eagle boss, run along the top of the waterfall towards the Lynx area.
  
Does a nasty dot that lasts for approx 15 sec and deals roughly 300-400dmg per tick.
+
You will come across a static pack of cats (including an elder Lynx) which need to be cleared. After they are dead, make sure the roamers ahead are out of the way and then run along to the side of the hut on your left. There is a window on the hut – jump through this into the hut and then jump out of the window on the other side of the hut. From there run behind the hut ahead of you and then head right (you will be going along the bottom of the stairs which exit the Lynx boss room).
  
During the fight randomly he will Soul Drain 1 random person, he will take on 2-3 abilites of that persons class. He will continue to use these new abilities till he Soul Drains another victim and repeats a new cycle of attacks.
+
Keep going until you get to the winding path along the river - kill the troll with the 2 croc pets (don’t aggro the neutral crocs) and proceed onwards. By doing this you have skipped 2-3 packs which helps a lot with the timer.
  
Every minute or so he will drain everyone of their power by 1% and giving it to himself, thus increasing his size and his damage by 10%.
+
The rest of the clear is pretty straightforward, although there is quite a bit to clear. Make sure to dispel any of your raid who get mind controlled because a dps class can kill people pretty quickly.
  
Tank and spank and deal with the new abilities he may gain.
 
  
Possible Soul Drains:
+
=====Lynx boss=====
  
Druid- Thorns & Lifebloom (big heal!!!)
+
Every 25% the boss splits into a full heath boss and full health spirit cat. When either of these reach 20% health they merge together into the boss again.
Hunter- Traps
 
Mage- Frost Nova & Firebolt/Frostbolt
 
Paladin- Consecrate & Holy Light
 
Priest- Heal & Mind Control.
 
Rogue- SnD & Blind.
 
Shaman- Fire Nova Totem & Healing Wave
 
Warlock- ? ?
 
Warrior- Whirlwind & Spell reflect.
 
  
 +
When he splits, it is better to kill the spirit cat rather than the main boss. This is because the cat has about half the health of the main boss.
  
===Zul'jin - The Final Boss===
+
You will need to have 4-5 minutes on the timer to kill the boss before the prisoner is killed.
  
This is already mentioned by Hephaustus and Renew, credits to both, it is bang on and solid so no need to write our own.
 
  
Every phase change he does do a threat wipe, when he turns into an Eagle you do not need to worry about a threat list though as explained below. He changes phases every 20%.
+
=====Other Notes=====
  
Phase 1:
+
Laugh and cry as the gnome you just rescued runs around like a buzzing bee and produces a bear mount from a tiny bag.
Watch out for his whirlwind (melee range). He also casts a debuff similar to the one in Slave Pens that does a dd and then ticks until the player is topped off. Seems like it was only around 2500-3000 damage, so if you are good at assist healing you can downrank accordingly to top them off just enough so they do not take any ticks.
 
  
Phase 2:
+
It has been said that the bear is fat and ugly, has a stupid mask and its legs are on fire.
As soon as he starts this phase you will notice everyone gets a Paralysis debuff. Dispell it off the main tank and yourself, then other healers if time (or the tank doesn't need a heal). DPS etc do not need it dispelled. After 5 seconds of having the debuff, you will become stunned and take a little damage, assign someone to top people off before the next. He can hit decently hard, so keep the tank topped.
 
  
Phase 3:
+
However this is only said by jealous, bearless people. The bear is in fact muscular, threatening, outfitted in exquisitely crafted armor and walking with the fire of the gods.
Stay away from the tornados that spawn and move around the room. They knock you back and deal around 1k damage. If you are a caster (yes healers included) everytime you cast you will get hit for about 1250 damage. The key thing to do in this phase is not get cornered by tornados and stay alive. Heal over time spells really make this phase much easier. Melee need to try and burn him down as quick as they can as they get no punishment for doing damage.
 
  
Phase 4:
+
You can bash the gong at the start pretty fast in skeleton form!
Lynx form he melees fairly weak all around. He also will fixate upon a random player in the raid and melee them. Intervene near the end of the 10 second or so phase to help out squishy people. Also does a weak version of the whirlwind Leotheras / end boss of Shattered Halls. I think it also places a debuff on people that will make them take more damage, it's either this or the fixate. Watch debuffs and note that that person will need extra heals.
 
  
Phase 5:
+
If anyone has other ideas and strategies for getting the bear, then this thread is the place for them.
As stated above, you will get a buffet like debuff put on you every so often. He will choose random people throughout the raid and place a beam of fire on them. If they are not topped they will probably die due to the debuff. It's a simple phase if people are good at staying out of void zones.
 
  
  
== Progress to date ==
+
[[Category:World of Warcraft]]
None yet
 

Latest revision as of 14:32, 18 May 2011

***ALL INFORMATION HERE IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE***

Schedule

Thursday @ 6:30 (potential for Monday @ 6:30 down the road)

Loot rules

All loot from timed events will use greed/need to eliminate wasted time between bosses. All timed chest loot will be skipped till either the timed event is completed or failed. The NPC that spawns the chest does not despawn. A designated DE'er will always roll greed for boss loot.


Raid Preparation

Food and weapon buffs will be expected. Elixirs or flasks for timed portion of run is also expected. Elixirs may be favorable (cheaper) since any wipe will most likely result in failed timed run.


The Roster

ForumID Character Class Role
Rmblebeetuna druid MT
UnderLoK Detroitr druid OT/DPS
Anticles druid healer
Illiander paladin healer
Rascalshadow shadow priest DPS
symog symog mage DPS
Silben warlock DPS
??? rogue DPS
Azualis hunter DPS
Shockster Shockster shaman healer/DPS

Attendance

Please post here and pm the group if you will be unavailable for any raids.


Strategies

Humorous site with very good information on Zul'Aman

Ripped from EJ forum

Zul'Aman @ Wowhead

Zul'Aman @ WoWWiki

Zul'Aman @ Bosskillers

THE TIMED RUN

EJ thread on the Timed Run

The ZA timed run

Some days you get the bear, other days the bear gets you. This thread is aimed at helping people achieve the former more than the latter.

There is a thread about the ZA zone in general which contains useful advice about the timed run, but I thought it would be helpful to have a thread specifically for the timed run with a basic strategy plus hints and tips for beating the timer.

This thread assumes a working knowledge of the zone and bosses so doesn’t describe these in detail. The tactics and hints in this thread come from my guild’s experience with the timed run (after a lot of pain our first bear was this week!) plus reading of all the advice in the general ZA thread.


Basics

Killing the bear boss adds 15 minutes, killing the eagle boss adds 10 minutes. No extra time is added for the dragonhawk or lynx bosses.

Don't release any prisoners or loot any chests until the end - it just wastes time. If the boss is killed then the prisoners will not be harmed, even if you miss the overall timer. As soon as a boss dies, grab the badge and move on. I would recommend leaving group loot on and rolling need/greed as necessary – that way you can allocate loot while moving on to the next area. To be honest if you really need the boss loot then you probably aren’t going to get the bear mount anyway.

Keep moving - time standing around is time wasted. Don't need to wait for everyone to be full mana before pulling - pretty much chain pull and everyone needs to keep up, use mana pots if necessary. But be sensible about this – dying to a premature pull will probably fail the timer – occasionally waiting for 15 seconds won’t unless it becomes a habit.

Consumables are good! Dual elixirs will probably work as well as a flask, because if people die then the timer will probably be missed anyway. Oils and food are cheap and useful.

The whole raid needs to know what they are expected to do before the run starts. Giving strat talks while on the timer is pretty much a guaranteed fail.


Group makup

How you play is much more important than what group you enter the zone with. That said there are a few (hopefully helpful) words of advice.

The instance is very much easier with a paladin tank and at least 2 AEers. There are a lot of places where mobs can be AEd to save time. However the timer can be certainly beaten without a paladin tank, but it’s that little bit harder.

A second tank is required (warrior or druid is fine). A dps specced tank can fill the role of the second tank.

Two healers are required, and preferably no more than 2. Adding a third healer probably slows you down by about 4-7 minutes so unless you are cruising through with 10 minutes to spare (in which case you don’t need to be reading this!) it will probably cause you to fail.

Heavy dps is required. There’s a lot of killing to be done between you and that bear of your dreams and T4 gear isn’t really going to get the job done, no matter how hard you try.

A shadowpriest is good for mana regain and VE to help with healing (and for fortitude), although unless you have a paladin for salvation, they may need to watch their threat to some extent.


Kill order

The best order is bear, dragonhawk, eagle, lynx. The main disadvantage of this order is that if you don’t get it right then you could easily only get 2 chests by failing to kill the eagle in time.

A very good alternative order is eagle, bear, dragonhawk, lynx which should guarantee 3 chests with reasonable play, although it probably wastes about a minute compared to the ideal order.

Edit: At least that's my experience of the zone. Others feel that the alternative eagle, bear, dragonhawk, lynx route is better - some of the Lynx trash can be skipped by this route as well by hugging the wall near the Hex Lord entrance. See posts below for more details and decide which route is best for you.

Including clearing trash, the bear should take about 10 minutes, dragonhawk 12 minutes, Eagle 8 minutes, Lynx 15 minutes (this can be tight for Lynx so ideally you want to pick some extra time on previous bosses). These times aren’t set in stone, but are good targets to aim for.


Bear Trash

There is a pack of 2 roamers before you really start the bear trash. These can be avoided, but there is a definite risk of them aggroing as you fight the trash. Probably it is safer to kill these.

Once you move up, the bear avatar will run off and send some trash towards you. Kill these and pull the first pack of bears. Avoid the other packs of bears by hugging the wall as you move onwards.

After that it is really just a matter of clearing the rest of the trash to the boss. Make sure to tank the bear riders apart from each other.


Bear

Pretty easy tank'n'spank. Killing the boss adds 15 minutes to the timer. With the added time, you should have 25 minutes left after the boss dies.


Dragonhawk trash

Make sure to kill the scouts before they reach the drums – having adds summoned wastes a lot of time. Don’t engage them when they are close to the drums.

Kill flamecasters first as they do a lot of damage. Make sure to interrupt them and either spellsteal or dispel their haste buff.

If there is more than one flamecaster in a pack then it can be a good idea to mind control one. This helps reduce raid damage, and also kill the adds a lot faster. Somewhat risky however as an early MC break can get messy. Whether you want to take this risk will probably depend how close you expect to be on the overall timer.

Avoid aggroing the pack set back on the right (near the start), and avoid aggroing any on the stairs. The last dragonhawk pack can be avoided by waiting until they roam out of the way. This is generally better than killing them. The very last pack of mobs should be fought on the stairs to avoid aggroing the roamers.


Dragonhawk

The standard strategy is to let the hatchers fully open one side, paladin tank + AE the adds down. Rise and repeat for the other side then spank down the boss. A non-tank paladin can tank the adds okay. It can be done fairly well with a non-paladin tank as well, it’s just that bit more difficult. If you have a shadow priest then he should stay on the boss, but all other dps should help on adds.

An alternative option is to leave both hatchers alive and kill them after they each hatch 2-3 eggs. This should generate less adds overall.

Try not to all stand in one place as this will mean that flame breath hits the whole raid.

You should have 13 minutes left when the boss dies. After the dragonhawk, jump down and then head left through the water to the outside of the bear area and then right to the eagle area. Basically don’t aggro the 2 roamers outside the Hex Lord’s area.


Eagle trash

The aim here is to pull the tempest as soon as you can manage it without dying because pulling the tempest stops adds being generated.

Just keep moving as fast as you can (without dying), and as soon as you have a clear shot to the tempest, pull him.


Eagle

Spread out most of the time to minimise chain lightning damage.

Group up on the tank before the storm to ensure that the melees can continue to dps during the storm. You might take a bit of extra chain lightning damage doing this, but it shouldn’t be fatal.

Generally it is easier to simply ignore the adds and continue to dps the boss. If you have enough dps to have a chance of clearing the instance within the timer, then you should be able to kill the boss before the adds get out of hand.

With the extra time you should have 15 minutes left when the boss dies.


Lynx Trash

Several packs of trash on the Lynx boss can be avoided by chosing a cunning route. From outside the eagle boss, run along the top of the waterfall towards the Lynx area.

You will come across a static pack of cats (including an elder Lynx) which need to be cleared. After they are dead, make sure the roamers ahead are out of the way and then run along to the side of the hut on your left. There is a window on the hut – jump through this into the hut and then jump out of the window on the other side of the hut. From there run behind the hut ahead of you and then head right (you will be going along the bottom of the stairs which exit the Lynx boss room).

Keep going until you get to the winding path along the river - kill the troll with the 2 croc pets (don’t aggro the neutral crocs) and proceed onwards. By doing this you have skipped 2-3 packs which helps a lot with the timer.

The rest of the clear is pretty straightforward, although there is quite a bit to clear. Make sure to dispel any of your raid who get mind controlled because a dps class can kill people pretty quickly.


Lynx boss

Every 25% the boss splits into a full heath boss and full health spirit cat. When either of these reach 20% health they merge together into the boss again.

When he splits, it is better to kill the spirit cat rather than the main boss. This is because the cat has about half the health of the main boss.

You will need to have 4-5 minutes on the timer to kill the boss before the prisoner is killed.


Other Notes

Laugh and cry as the gnome you just rescued runs around like a buzzing bee and produces a bear mount from a tiny bag.

It has been said that the bear is fat and ugly, has a stupid mask and its legs are on fire.

However this is only said by jealous, bearless people. The bear is in fact muscular, threatening, outfitted in exquisitely crafted armor and walking with the fire of the gods.

You can bash the gong at the start pretty fast in skeleton form!

If anyone has other ideas and strategies for getting the bear, then this thread is the place for them.