nailbat.us

Besides the usual suite of tank and off-tank and raid damage, there are two things that are really important in this fight: positioning, and reacting quickly to what forces you to change positions. I'll cover each of them below the image that shows where people start (taken from bosskillers).



This is how you start. This is by no means where you'll end - you'll need to make sure you're a reasonable distance from each other because there are plenty of things that will force you to move around, then find a new position.

1. The bite - On 10-man, the second air phase coincides with the time needed to find your bite target. That means it's imperative that you both bite someone _and live through the bloodbolt whirl_. This is difficult, yes - but if the healers stay still and bomb heals during the bloodbolt, and no one stands too close to each other, you should be fine. Should be.

2. Pact of the Darkfallen (AKA "The High Five" or "The Red Line"). The reason we leave the middle open is because that's the high-five zone. When we're in 25-man and have three of them, it's even more important to keep it open and to keep the debuffed people healed. Follow the line, and if you're near the line you should step back a bit (in 25-man, just meet in the middle - don't try and follow the line, since that'll just get confusing).

3. Legion Flame You do not want to make a U shape with your flame - run out to the wall, stay along the wall, and _when you stop leaving flame_, run back in and find your spot. It's tempting to run into the next open position in the circle, but all that does is trap people. Make a direct line to the wall, then start moving along the wall.

4. Air phase terror - This is the most important one to worry about and the cause of the most wipes. The cooldown on air phase is 2 minutes, and this makes it perfect for wearing a pvp trinket or using your Human racial - you get more active time to spread yourselves out again - healers should stay still as long as they can to keep the heals up, as it's VERY easy to lose people to Bloodbolt Whirl at this point. Everyone is responsible for themselves, of course, but healers have the hardest job here, so it's good to have them stand still until she lands, at which point you start phase 1 again.

5. Air phase terror + bite - Actually, it's THIS combination that causes the most wipes. At this point, the melee will run up to the tanks (in 10-man) and bite them, while the DPS will be biting a healer (usually). This makes for very very difficult healing, and this is what cooldowns like Paladin sac, Paladin bubble, shield wall, shadow ward, etc. will be useful for. Do everything you can to keep yourself alive while biting your next vampire target, and the 8-vampire phase SHOULD be a breeze.

Let me know if there are any questions about the diagram above and about other kinds of movement.

I had never done this fight before last night and I was probably the source of several of the wipes. I did understand my various jobs after attempt 4 or so.

One thing that happened to a couple of us was the bite wouldn't go off as planned. I was in range of Cliff, the button was "active" (the letter "1" was red before I got in range, but turned white when I was in range), and I was spamming it - but the bite wouldn't go off. Perhaps it was a UI issue (I use Dominoes) but I think you basically have to be right on top of the other person, and even then there was a report that it still wouldn't go off.

The other little hiccup was that you should wait a moment when you high five someone. Sometimes when you high five and quickly disperse, the red lightning would keep going. So be sure to stay together for a second.

The PVP trinket was a great idea. It helps with the most random element of the fight (the horror/brood whirl combo).

Here's the best strategy for Blood Queen Lana'thel:

Don't bring Logos.

Bump - this is your reminder! 25-man. Hard!

Should probably also stress that if things go the worst possible way when you're a vamp, you get feared, you can't find you designated snack to bite and the timer is counting down - bite someone who can survive before the timer runs out! Timer runs out you get mind-controlled, we A. have to kill you, B. lost a biter, C. are almost certainly looking at a wipe unless it's the last round of bites. It's of course best if you bite the right person, but if you can't find the right person fast enough just bite someone who won't die (i.e. isn't very low on health). That way we can still continue the attempt and have a shot at winning.

My biggest issue on Tuesday was not knowing who to bite once I had been bitten, and by the time I'd glanced at my SUF and picked someone, I'd missed the timer. Tips or ideas on keeping track of that?

Thunderfly wrote:My biggest issue on Tuesday was not knowing who to bite once I had been bitten, and by the time I'd glanced at my SUF and picked someone, I'd missed the timer. Tips or ideas on keeping track of that?

Impromptu, I called dibs on who I was going to bite when I still had maybe 30 seconds to go. A couple quick glances to Grid (or other raid display) to know who to click on to target them, and then a check of where they were- even for melee, the designated snack might be running off trailing flames or something. Then, I didn't wait for the debuff to wear off and the bite timer to start- about 2-3 seconds till, I had them targeted, standing near them, all ready to pounce the moment I could. I don't think there's any benefit to holding off the bite, since you're not doing much with your action bar replaced, and the other person can start doing more dps as soon as they're bit.

I found this add-on that I think could be incredibly useful for coordinating bite order. It only works for Raid Leaders, but sends tells to the relevant parties on who to bite, based on various configurable options in the add-on. I saw it in action at lunch time today and I think this could really tidy that part up for us.

http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addo ... queen.aspx

Thunderfly wrote:I found this add-on that I think could be incredibly useful for coordinating bite order. It only works for Raid Leaders, but sends tells to the relevant parties on who to bite, based on various configurable options in the add-on. I saw it in action at lunch time today and I think this could really tidy that part up for us.

http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addo ... queen.aspx

Hmmm, thanks James, I think I will install this add-on and give it a try, it looks rather neat.

So in general, what was the feeling about the Blood Queen add-on? I know it's very very hectic during that fight, so the raid warning spam gets lost a lot. I saw it pretty well, but the main tank doesn't move during that fight, so I never had to worry about pact of the darkfallen or swarming shadows.

And, if the add-on isn't working out, what would work best? A clear assignment of who bites whom? I can start ranking our DPS based on historical logs and start making a flow chart for people, if that's a method that works better (an engineer friend of mine on MTadin suggested that system).