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This article is taken from a survey I ran to our main raiders as to what they did during a raid. It may help new raiders understand how the group dymanics of a raid work and what part your character plays in it..
Wytchess: Warlock
Basic things that are worth knowing are:-
Where do you stand in a battle?
Generally as a ranged clothie DPS I stand either behind the boss or to the side of it if it is a dragon, ( I hate tail swips!). If there is a draeni-shadowpriest, or boomkin about I like to be in buff range of them. Else Runa's draeni-shaman mana totem are a great place to be near to. Buff give me increased hit and damage.
What is the key strengths/weaknesses?
Strengths.. If I open up with full DPS a lock can do serious damage, But the locks main advantage is the utility to weaken the targets armour for the melee guys or buff the damage up for a caster heavy group at the expense of personal DPS. Locks can only have one curse running at anyone time on a target so you have to pick between the 3 choices depending on what the rest of the group are up to.
DoTs ( damage over time spells).. Desto locks use about 4, Afflick locks use 7 at a time..You can dump a full set of DoTs and then go after some trash while the Dots tick away.. Lock are great on killing bosses.
Weaknesses : is their personal defence. They have little they can do if a group sets upon them. Curse of exhaustion slow the target up so they can run away from it, fears send it running away, (but it might bring more friends back!!!). When locks, die they die fast. I doubt healers get much time to help them.
Locks lack the killer spellpunch of a mage so are not so good on distributed trash mobs.. (we take too long to kill them so it is better to curse them all to assist the melee guys. rather than shadow bolt them)
What are you main tactics in a battle.
Locks curse cannot be broken by the rest of the group..(handy!!) so.
Healers adds: Curse of tongues slows down their casting speed
Demon/elemental adds: Banish takes them out of the fight for 30 seconds..IMPORTANT!! while out of combat THEY ARE IMMUNE TO DAMAGE!!!!
Warriors adds: I generally spam DoTs on them then DPS them one at a time..
critter mobs: Let tank gather them up, then curse of agony on one, Rain of Fire AoE the group.
Bosses: Try to keep all my Dots up 100% of the time, fill the gaps with shadow bolts,
What are your priorities for healing, killing assisting others?
DoT bosses, kills adds, then back to boss to top up DoTs.
If I see a healer if trouble outside the tanks range, go all out dps on them to pull them away. then deathcoil fear them when they get close to me. Hopefully a plate wearer can pick up the add, or it dies first.
What do you do if you are attacked by an add, or pull aggro from a tank?
I have a death coil fear that can send 1 add away, howl of terror fear than can send a group running away, both have a risk of attracting other adds..
Generally I run towards the tank, pop a healthstone and hope the tank can get the add off me.
Has your character got a special skill that others might not be aware of/ understand?
Soulstones healthstones and ritual of summoning ( more in another message to follow)and Doomguard, also known as.. "you have got to be kidding if you want to use that in here!!!!" ( more to follow on doom family spells and curses)
If your character is about to die, what do you do?
Generally, if I am out of healthstones and my fears are on cooldown my only hope is to siphon life out of the add to delay my death in the hope that the add will die, get pulled away from me or I will get a heal. I do not use the fear spell in groups. It nearly always pulls adds.
Raid locks generally dont have 2 of their 4 available defences, so cannot slow the target down to kite it(curse of exhaustion) and no instance howl of terror fear.
If you have a pet/minion, what is the pet up to ?
Generally use an imp on defensive.. he give the group a stamina buff and can do nice ranged damage.
If we have a caster heavy group I will use felhound ( intellect buff + removes magic damages effects from one group member)
If you have traps/stuns/bombs... how can others help and benifit the group?
see banish...
pets succubus can charm a human add, ( damage breaks the charm). Felhunter can silence a caster or shut down one of his spell trees. ========================================================= Gritpipe: Feral druid tank How I tank as a feral druid
Where do you stand in a battle?
In front of the mobs. As a general principle, I try to face them away from the group so that any breath weapons or cleaves are just hitting me, and also so that I can see them running for the healer more easily. My camera will always be pointing towards the healers.
What is the key strengths/weaknesses?
Compared with other tanks, I have more health and armour, so I'm good against big, hard hitting melee mobs. I have little in the way of antimagic, but my health helps against that too. However, I don't have a block, so I take more damage against large groups of adds and againt very fast hitting mobs than pallies or warrior tanks. Feral druids are the only tanks without a 360 degree aoe threat generator, and we're relatively poor at generating snap aggro, so still need a few seconds to build threat in a way that other tanks don't now andpositioning can be an issue.
What are you main tactics in a battle.
Pull with feral faerie fire or charge if I want the mobs to stay where they are or there are casters.
For aoe pulls, I spam swipe every gcd and maul every auto-attack. The problem here is with positioning (swipe only hits in a 180 degree arc) and so I have to pay attention to where the mobs are.
For single pulls/bosses. Mangle every time it's off cooldown, build a stack of 5 lacerates and keep it refreshed. Maul every autoattack. Keep feral faerie fire (armour debuff) and demoralising roar (AP debuff)up. Berserk as soon as everything else is on an even keel and then whenever it's off cooldown. Swipe if I've nothing else to be doing.
Barkskin is linked to mangle and swipe by macros and so should always be on cooldown.
Growl to taunt any runners off the healers and dps, but sometimes a feral charge and a mangle or two is needed to get their attention.
I've got a few emergency buttons, Survival instincts gives me 25% more health to get me through a rough patch, Frenzied Regeneration converts rage to health, and I've got potions, healthstones and the herbalism HoT.
What are your priorities for healing, killing assisting others?
Hold aggro. Battle res or innervate as necessary if there are any gaps in the fighting.
If your character is about to die, what do you do?
Pop my panic button cool-downs. Scream at Aylae and/or Runa on Skype.
Kitty dps tactics to come in a future installment. ============================================================ Rúna Resto Shaman
Where do you stand in a battle?
Behind everyone. If not fighting in very small space where I have to be able to see the tank for the heals.
What is the key strengths/weaknesses?
Compared to other healing classes shamans are best at strong group heals and totems are the best tools available in the game (my opinion). We aren’t at our best at single target healing but our crit heals should compensate for something..
What are you main tactics in a battle.
If there are a lot of melee dps I try to cast chain heal as often as possible and thus keeping everyone on melee range alive.
Lesser Healing Wave Spam, with improved shields I consume one water shield orb everytime I crit with a heal, so casting my fastest single target heal constantly and refreshing my water shield when ever I can is what this spamming is all about.
Everyone knows that shamans live for crits (if not make a shaman and experience it personally) Healing wave is the biggest heal we got and when it crits you’ll be seeing crits like none you’ve ever seen (unless you’re a paladin tank and have critted with lay on hands).
Eearth Shield is always on the main tank since it’s our best protection to the tank, it doesn’t lower the damage and it doesn’t affect how well the tank gets aggro, it’s just one way for shamans to heal the tank even when not casting anything (either because of LoS or OOM)
Riptide, the only instant cast heal AND the only HoT spell shamans have in their healing arsenal. It is possible to keep Riptide ticking all the time but taking the advantage of it’s other ability: if the first target of chain heal has riptide ticking then chain heal will crit by consuming riptide. Valuable raid combination heal.
What are your priorities for healing, killing assisting others?
Keep the tank alive no matter what. Heal the next one taking the most damage or group either melee (easiest target for chain heal since they are always together) or ranged. For example the last fight in Utgarde Keep.
If your character is about to die, what do you do?
Cast Riptide on me.
Make sure you can Reincarnate and still be able to heal the group thru the fight without causing a wipe. ============================================================ Akeia, Beast Mastery Hunter
Where do you stand in a battle?
As Hunter's are a ranged class I usually stand at the back, sometimes near to the healer where i can put down an explosive trap or aoe adds with Volley if there are any. Sometimes I might run forward to put a trap where mob is and then just run back, far enough so I can shoot.
What is the key strengths/weaknesses?
-Can wear mail armor that goes good for defense if a mob comes at you, can feign death if got aggro on it , to get the aggro back to the tank, but it may result getting the mob to the healer if it's unlucky.
-The range is good for fighting mobs, like the last boss in Utgarde Keep, but can be nasty like with the Loken, where you should keep close distance.
-CC
What are you main tactics in a battle.
- To stand as far it's possible to be able to shoot, try to help the healer with the adds if they come up/
- If a mob is a caster and the tank is busy with other mobs, i shoot a frost trap at him to immobilize it.
Basically I pop up macros , then look at the cooldowns and shoot arcane shot, multi-shot, viper sting and kill shot, when they are ready.
What are your priorities for healing, killing assisting others?
First to kill the first marked-to-be-killed target , then the second , then, every other target in the battle.
To help healer when he/she is attacked, at least to try it when Runa or Ayl screams in skype they are attacked.
What do you do if you are attacked by an add, or pull aggro from a tank?
Feign death or just finish the add if i can see I can make it without loosing big amount of health or dying.
Also I run to the tank with all the adds and aggro, for the tank to take it off me.
Has your character got a special skill that others might not be aware of/ understand?
It's called "Master's Call" -your pet will rush to your target and remove all existing movement impairing effects or stuns on the target, and cause them to be immune to them for 4 seconds. It can be used while you are stunned.
I never use the skill , because all the times i`ve done it my pet has been too far away to be called when killing a mob and during that time the movement thing will be off already or it is not in the line of sight. However I might try it on Maexxna , maybe it works.
If your character is about to die, what do you do?
Try to feign death if it's not a DoT , or if it is, i just hope for the healer to heal me in time or use bandages ( very rare though).
If you have a pet/minion, what is the pet up to ?
Yes, it's name is Blaze and he is a dps kitty, Ferocity talent tree. Basically he just kills, kills and kills, apart of times when he's dead from aoe or dot. ( That doesn't happen often with the help of a very good healer that doesn't heal only players but pets too ^^)
If you have traps/stuns/bombs... how can others help and benifit the group?
Explosive trap - burns enemies in definite area surrounding it for a definite time, useful for little mob-adds that die very fast. Good to place near the healer, but you have to be careful since it draws aggro on you. Depends on the situation.
Frost trap - Frost Trap can be used to slow units multiple times since you can always lead the mob over the ice slick to easily reapply the snare. This makes kiting mobs, especially multiple mobs, in circles much easier.
Freezing arrow - Trapping caster/ranged mobs, in the middle of a fight when you need to trap/retrap a mob some distance away. This , however needs a perfect timing between tank and hunter so their both can time when tank pulls and hunter shoots the trap.
Snake trap - The snakes have 3 rogue-style poisons:
* Crippling Poison: Enemy movement speed is reduced by 50%.
* Mind-Numbing Poison: Enemy spell-casting speed is decreased by 50%.
* Deadly Poison: Enemy gets 15 nature damage over 12 seconds. Stacks up to 5 times.
(-from WoWWiki ) ==================================================== Aylae, Treeform Druid healer Where do you stand in a battle?
I normally stand a bit behind everyone else. If I am not standing on top of grit that is.
What is the key strengths/weaknesses?
For me? Hmm..well I dont like to heal a lot of people at the same time. I work better when I can only heal the tank.
What are you main tactics in a battle.
Just to heal and not make to much aggro, if possible. I try to wait some time before I start healing if that is possible.
What are your priorities for healing, killing assisting others?
Priorites are the tank and the best dps. If I have to choose that is! 
What do you do if you are attacked by an add, or pull aggro from a tank?
I shadowmeld! 
Has your character got a special skill that others might not be aware of/ understand?
Hmm, not really..
If your character is about to die, what do you do?
Shadowmeld if possible. Or run out.
============================================================== blueblade, warrior protection (off tank)
Where do you stand in a battle?
i stand at the front of the group normally near grit.
What is the key strengths/weaknesses?
my key strengths are i can wear plate armour which is always nice. having i high def rating is also needs about 540 (mine still isn't that good im one trinklet away from it ...grrr)
i do have 360 threat thancks to thunderclap. i am personally good at tanking one target but not good at tanking large groups of mobs.
my key weeknesses are im not the most experienced at tanking (im getting better tho =P). i only have one instant threat move which can be annoying as i can't always pull agro off people as quickly as i would have liked. i dont think im the best at getting agro from evil caster mobs (any advice would be good on how to pulls casters to me would be good...)
What are you main tactics in a battle?
my main tactics is not to die =)... well maybe not. its to keep agro from mobs (unless grit is tanking it obviously) off every1 else in the group. this should allow all dps to max out on damage.
i normally am tanking the adds a boss summons.... 
What are your priorities for healing, killing assisting others?
i try to make sure i help keep agro off all other members in the raid (exp. the healers). hopefully then we will surivive as grit is good at tanking the main boss.
What do you do if you are attacked by an add, or pull aggro from a tank?
well i sometimes pull the bosses of grit as i use a 6 yard masive threat pull making everything around attack me if there is a large mob of adds i need to tank. i just move the boss in range of grit then all is good again.
Has your character got a special skill that others might not be aware of/ understand?
i can fear if needed but is only a low priority move if group is in trouble.
i have last stand which gives me 20% extra health for 30 seconds then i loose it after so plz heal me when i use it .. thanks =)
i can use commanding shout which will give the group about 2200 health (but this will over power the imp buff)
If your character is about to die, what do you do?
if i am about to die i use last stand and hope to be healed... =P |
