Darkspire Raids

[Dark Spire Raid Guide - Courtesy of Gaheris] Posted by Raelinne

Since I'm seeing a lot of Dark Spire raid guide requests both here and on the Gaheris forums, I thought I'd post our current guide here. Updates can be found at our guild website. While this raid is based on a mixed-realm group, the basics are the same for single realms, with or without ToA.

Average raid time is two hours with power fonts and PvE tricks (MCL3, etc.) I've done it in as little as 45 minutes. Without fonts/tricks, I can't really estimate how long it would take. Listed below is a good generic group that you can put together in any realm – I’m not going to get into any specialist groups, like death servant necromancer focus or animist clump groups. While it might be nice to have things like that, every Dark Spire run I’ve done has consisted of a group setup like I have listed below, and we’ve only wiped out a couple of times, mostly to encounter bugs.

• Shield tank
• Shield tank
• AE caster
• AE caster
• Primary healer
• Spec buffer
• Optional (DPS tank is good)
• Optional (archer, pet class, secondary buffer)

Our usual group is a full shield paladin guarding a void eldritch, another shield paladin guarding a mana enchanter, a 40+ healing spec primary healer (druid or healer), a buffbot or two, and whoever else we can find. While I’m sure we could do Dark Spire with just a paladin, void eldy, healer, and buffbot, and then two to four random people (just to increase DPS), it’s not worth the risk.

Hint: It helps if your healer, one tank, and one caster all have Purge 1. The second Cavern Boss will AE mezz, and that can wipe the group.

A few notes:

The shield tanks are crucial to the success of a Dark Spire raid. If you’ve got a pet class with juggernaut, great – save juggernaut for the boss. However, do not allow your pets to run wild. “Passive” is your friend, and keep one finger over the “release pet” button. Don’t bother with crowd control – the first part of the dungeon has such high purple mobs that even full pac healers can end up mana dumping to try to AE stun, and you’re not going to mezz anything because you’re in an AE group.

Dark Spire is divided into three areas - natural caverns, the Spire itself, and the throne room. There are three boss encounters in the cavern and three more in the Spire.

Part One: The Caverns

The natural caverns are entirely purple mobs (and some blue con spiders). The purple mobs are meleers, interrupt casters (thane-type and DoT casters), and archers. They'll come in groups of three with every pull, if you use a caster/archer to pull. Don't body pull - that's a great way to die horribly.

In general, you’re going to have some line-of-sight issues. Spider webs and even rays of light can block your LOS. You may have to zoom in to first person view in order to target the mobs. Before pulling, though, back up. Go slow until you get a feel for it – the AI seems to be programmed to target your healers/support classes, so stay aware, but make sure that your healers know to kite mobs into the PBAE. I can’t emphasize enough how important it is that each shield tank stays with the AE caster he’s guarding, and be aware of blocking arc.

___ healers ____________ tanks/casters ________ puller ______________ mobs ___

1. Healers hang back. 2. Tanks/casters set up a bit farther down the cavern. 3. One puller ranges ahead and hits one single mob once, then runs back to the tanks/casters. 4. Kill everything that charges. Archers/ranged casters get on any archer mobs that hang back. 5. Move ahead a little bit and repeat.

Note that when you get to the larger caverns, you can kill off the mobs near the entrance, then slide along the wall to avoid the rest of the trash. Nothing will BAF (beyond the linked groups of three that you get with each pull), so if you’re careful and control your pets, you should be fine. Trash mobs have a slight chance to drop ROG (we usually get 2-4 pieces of ROG per run) but it’s mostly crap. You’re not missing anything if you leave them alive.

Natural Cavern Bosses

The three bosses in the natural caverns all have pretty much the same tricks, for each realm’s instance. When fighting the boss mobs, do not use the formation shown above. You want your group to be fairly tightly spaced, at least

The first boss will summon adds that are blue/yellow, usually spiders. Have your group form up just at the entrance archway to the boss’ cavern. One person bolts/shoots the boss, and then your AE casters go to town. That should pull the adds off your healers and kill them quickly. This boss will also come with a sub-boss; again, AE casting should take care of this just fine.

Set up for the second boss in the same way. The second boss is a pain in the butt, because it spawns yellow/orange adds out of each person – they’re called Soul Shards or something like that, and they can wipe a raid. Usually before we pull this boss, my void eldritch will drop a ground target in the middle of our group. I’ll bolt the boss once, then immediately start my GTAE cast. By the time it fires, the soul shards have spawned, and the GTAE will pull aggro onto me and off the healer.

The second boss will also AE mezz. If you’re lucky, she’ll follow that up with an AE DoT, which happily breaks the mezz. If you’re unlucky, everything will kill your healer while the rest of the group is mezzed. This is where Purge 1 comes in handy.

The third boss is a pain in the butt. First, you have to clear the entire room where the third boss can be found, because the main boss will summon a sub-boss to kill your group, and will then merrily teleport around the room, kiting your tanks/pets through all the mobs that are still spawned there. So be patient and kill off all the trash mobs first. Remember that you have to move carefully to get LOS to the trash mobs (especially around some of the rays of light that block LOS) and just send one puller to stick to the perimeter of the room and pull back to the entrance.

The third boss starts out neutral. To start the encounter, send in the tank with the highest HP to speak with the boss – you should fully expect the boss/add to almost immediately lifetap for 1300+ HP.

Other than that, this is a straight fight. Kill the add first, since it lifetaps. In Hibernia, the add is a giant lifetapping pig. In Albion, the boss is a chick and the “add” is actually the NPC guy who’s in the first chamber. I can’t remember who it is in Midgard, but it’s the same theory. One main boss who teleports randomly around the room, and a second sub boss who lifetaps.

Note that you MUST kill the third cavern boss in order to open the doors to the Spire.

Part Two: The Spire

Note: There is currently a known bug regarding the doors to the Spire. Some characters may randomly see the doors as being closed. If this is the case, the only way to get them through the doors quickly is to kite adds onto them and let them die, then rez them through the doors. You can try to /appeal as STUCK and ask a CSR to port you, or you can try to relog, but that takes time.

The Spire entrance consists of a ramp that spirals down the wall of the chamber, turning clockwise. There are three platforms that stick out to the right, towards the middle of the chamber. If you stand at the edge of the platform, a caster/archer can target and hit the giant green-con red crystals that are built onto the pillar in the center of the room.

These platforms are interspersed with three trapmaster rooms that are to the left of the ramp, built into the wall of the chamber. You’re going to have to go to each of these spots, in order.

While you’re moving, you’re going to have to deal with a constant stream of red/purple aggro that moves up the ramp. Do not stop to fight these adds. If you try, you’ll die. Just kite them.

1. Enter the spire. Look through the doors. Ahead of you, you’ll see the platform that points to the first crystal. About 2/3 down the hallway is the left-turn that starts the ramp that spirals down.
2. While most of the group runs in and stops at the top of the spire, one caster/archer should run ahead to the end of the platform and kill the crystal.
3. As soon as the crystal is dead, run down and left, into the first trapmaster chamber. Kite the adds. Note that if you run past the trapmaster chamber, you’ll run into the blades trap and die horribly. Try to avoid doing this.
4. Get deep into the trapmaster chamber and AE everything you’ve just kited in, along with the trapmaster.
5. Disarm the trap.
6. Run back out and down the spiral ramp, kiting adds to the platform. Nuke the crystal, then kite the adds to the next trapmaster room. Do not waste time fighting the adds on the platform! Just kite them.
7. Repeat.

Now for the specifics:

The first trapmaster is an easy melee fight. In order to disarm his trap, though, you need to go through the room, right-clicking the obelisks to destroy them. The obelisks will either damage you (about 20%) or they’ll give you a crystal. Once you get the crystal in your inventory, you can go to the large trap crystal in the back of the chamber and right-click it to disarm the blades trap.

The second trapmaster boss is a caster who hangs out at the back of his chamber. When you kite the mobs down the spiral and into his chamber, he’ll spawn a flying gargoyle – a Mender. It is critical to kill the mender! If you can’t stun the Mender (shield slam is your friend here), you’ll have to chase it out into the spire and follow it up or down the ramp. If the Mender escapes, it will repair the crystals you’ve been destroying and make them unkillable, which means you’ll have to deal with a constant stream of adds. After you kill the Mender, it’s easy enough to kill the trapmaster. Note that this boss also buff-shears, so check your buffs before leaving this room.

The third trapmaster boss is another melee fighter. When he gets low on health, he’ll spawn a Runner that must be killed. Get your casters/meleers off the trapmaster and onto the Runner. If the Runner escapes, he’ll run down the spiral, around the central chamber, and across the bridge, forcing you to deal with a bridge defense force. Kill the Runner, then get back onto the boss. Whoever loots the boss will get a crystal in their inventory. If you get the crystal, go right click on the trap crystal inside the trapmaster’s chamber.

Then take a break.

Now you’re up to the middle of the spire. Head down the spiral to the base of the cavern, then around to the right, until you reach the bridge. If you’ve done everything right to this point and killed the Runner in trapmaster room 3, you should see a bridge with open gates and no mobs. If the Runner escaped, the gates will be closed and there will be a defense force that you have to kill.

Note: You may be affected by the same “closed gate” bug that I described earlier. It’s tougher to handle this one, but you can try to kite Knightsguard Valens onto anyone who’s stuck. More on that in a moment.

When you cross the bridge, you’ll be tempted to head up the spire to the right. The ramp will spiral around and to the top of the spire. However, don’t. Hiding off to the left, around the base of the spire, is Knightsguard Valens and a gargoyle named something like Valens’ Sentry.

Kill the Sentry first. If the Sentry gets away, you’re in for a huge pain in the butt. More flying gargoyles will spawn, and they’ll attack you as you try to run up the ramp, grabbing hold of you and dropping you onto the bridge. This is a repeat of Harpy Air from ML2. Just kill the Sentry, then kill Valens. If you’ve got to kite Valens onto someone who’s stuck on the bridge with the “closed gate” bug, you’ll have to be careful about aggro – you may have to wait long enough for Valens to de-aggro, especially if you’ve got paladins twisting heal chant.

If you’ve done everything right to this point, after Valens and his Sentry are dead, you’ll have a free and clear run up the ramp. Ignore any pets that are standing around on the ramp – they won’t attack you unless you attack them first.

If something’s gone wrong, just make your way up the ramp. You’ll have to cope with Gargoyle Air or random adds on the ramp, so fight your way to the top as best you can.

Once you reach the top, you’ll see the dungeon’s main boss – Morrigan, Gullveig, or Morgana, depending on the realm. Kill your pets. This goes for all pets – spiritmaster pets, underhills, bonedancer pets, necromancer pets. If you’re a pet caster, just stand back and let the rest of the group handle this. Trust me. Pets here are bad.

Once the pets are dead, the rest of the group should attack her. She really doesn’t do anything too deadly, though it’s entertaining to watch her turn people into obelisks. When you get her to around 20% hit points, she’ll teleport away, and a shimmering red curtain of light will appear. Step through until you port across the chasm, into the hallway leading to the throne room. Congratulations, you’re at the final encounter.

Part Three: The Throne Room

When you teleport through, feel free to take a break to regen mana, redo resists, and summon pets. The final encounter won’t start until you charge forward to the throne room.

As soon as one person crosses the invisible threshold between the hallway and the throne room itself, all the bosses will spawn and a red curtain will appear, sealing off the throne room so you can’t exit. Anyone entering will be instantly teleported right before the throne.

Be prepared to unleash havoc on the dungeon boss, and ignore everyone else. Note that the dungeon boss is not the chick you fought at the top of the spire. It’s her boyfriend – Dub in Hibernia, Fafnir in Midgard, Mordred in Albion. Use AE to peel the red/purple spawns off the healers, but otherwise, concentrate all of your attacks on the boyfriend. Once he dies, everything despawns, and you win Dark Spire.