Blood-Queen10 Down

February 1, 2010

Blood-Queen10 Down

Blood-Queen Lana’thel is initially quite challenging but with some careful planning, it can be entirely trivialized. The two most important things to plan out: bite order and positioning. Healer perspective at the end.

Bite Order

Lana’thel will bite whoever is third on aggro and considering you want your top dps to be bitten, this part is usually easy to organize. Usually you won’t have more than 2 dps contesting each other for 3rd in aggro (if you do you should probably tell one of them to slow it down until the first bite), so whoever is bit first can simply bite the other top dps. Each bit person will continue to need to bite every 75 seconds and will have about 12 seconds to do so.

The key here is to recognize who you will be biting next and to bite them with only 2 seconds remaining! Why wait so long? Because you’re going to wipe if you need to bite someone during her fear/air phase. Luckily after 4 people have been bitten, the next 4 bites don’t need to wait until the very last second. You shouldn’t need to bite again after that (likely wipe). The first two-thirds will be quite daunting, but once all dps have been bitten you’ll see her life total go down at a ridiculous rate (aggro free).

Raid positioning

This is even more critical due to the mechanics of the fight. Ranged will need to stand about 10 yards apart but close enough that your raid healers won’t want to wring your neck (that’s right, you hunters/warlocks/mages who always seem to want to stand a good 20 yards from the nearest person — I hate you :P).

Melee will need to stand apart in a semi-circle around the boss so that they don’t hit each other with purple flames. Ranged will need to stand in a semi-circle around the inner circle on the floor. Purple flames should always be lead to the walls of the room. The red links are best dealt with by having both people run to the middle of the circle, if you tell them to run to each other, the inherent game lag can cause them to run past each other and take more damage than necessary.

During the fight

Her fears can be broken by conventional means. We had a Shaman in each party and Tremor Totems save lives. Without a good fear break, things like running through purple flames only to be her first Bloodbolt victim was just awful.

Ranged need to be flexible about positioning. Especially after the fear and a red beam, You could find yourself on the other end of the circle — there’s really no need to play musical chairs here and run to your old spot unless you’re crowded in.

Bloodlust once four dps have been bitten (make sure not to lust before an air phase).

Healing!

Three healers is more than recommended, at least until you perfect positioning and run enough 25man content to over-gear the fight. Having 1 dedicated tank healer and 2 dedicated raid healers worked well. Of course when a healer gets the red beam/purple flames the other healers should react accordingly. Once again Paladins and Shamans get the short end of the stick as the raid mechanics require lots of movement, try to save your instant CDs for when you have to move and heal.

As a Shaman, you will notice her AoE damage strips you of your Water Shield charges incredibly quickly. You will also want Healing Focus + Conc. Aura up. I’ve found the fight is quick enough that I do not need to keep 100% uptime on the Water Shield, especially since the overall damage is severe enough (moreso at the start) I will not always have free GCDs to refresh it. Use your judgement as there are times when there will be lulls in damage.

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