Faction Champions:
Where to stand –
Where to stand –
In this fight, PvE meets PvP. Your raid will be up against six faction champions (ten in 25 man). There are no threat tables, plenty of CC, and damage spikes popping up any where and everywhere. Where you stand depends on where you’re needed. Go into this fight with a PvP mentality.
What to watch for –
1. DPS! – Unlike true PvP encounters, killing the healers first is actually a bad idea in this fight. Druid heals are easily purged and tree of life prevents them from CCing or dpsing, which makes the Faction Champs' tree a non factor in this fight. The Priest healer has no disc. spells to cast meaning that well timed kicks can lock up their holy spell class for most of the encounter. The Pally healer, while obnoxious with it's bubble and more difficult to lock down than the previous two classes can be contained effectively by a talented rogue. The only exception to the "kill dps first" rule is the Shaman healer Saamul. His heals are too rapid to be adequately interrupted (from my experience) and should therefore be your first kill if he is chosen to fight. The Faction Champs DPS hits hard, CCs like crazy, and has a knack for finding and murdering your fellow healers. Your raid should focus fire on a clothy DPS before moving on to higher armor classes. Also, your raid should take a moment to have it's pets target their pets. Why? Because, unlike this tree, the Faction Champs healers will target and heal pets. Once one or two of their dps go down, this fight becomes very easy to heal, and therefore becomes very easy to win.
2. Healers. – The NPC healers in this fight do NOTHING but heal. They should be interrupted, CC’d, feared, ect… whenever possible, but they should not be focus fired on until the end of the fight. I repeat, the healers in this fight do NOTHING but heal. They will not contribute to dps and they are not a danger in this encounter.
What to watch for –
1. DPS! – Unlike true PvP encounters, killing the healers first is actually a bad idea in this fight. Druid heals are easily purged and tree of life prevents them from CCing or dpsing, which makes the Faction Champs' tree a non factor in this fight. The Priest healer has no disc. spells to cast meaning that well timed kicks can lock up their holy spell class for most of the encounter. The Pally healer, while obnoxious with it's bubble and more difficult to lock down than the previous two classes can be contained effectively by a talented rogue. The only exception to the "kill dps first" rule is the Shaman healer Saamul. His heals are too rapid to be adequately interrupted (from my experience) and should therefore be your first kill if he is chosen to fight. The Faction Champs DPS hits hard, CCs like crazy, and has a knack for finding and murdering your fellow healers. Your raid should focus fire on a clothy DPS before moving on to higher armor classes. Also, your raid should take a moment to have it's pets target their pets. Why? Because, unlike this tree, the Faction Champs healers will target and heal pets. Once one or two of their dps go down, this fight becomes very easy to heal, and therefore becomes very easy to win.
2. Healers. – The NPC healers in this fight do NOTHING but heal. They should be interrupted, CC’d, feared, ect… whenever possible, but they should not be focus fired on until the end of the fight. I repeat, the healers in this fight do NOTHING but heal. They will not contribute to dps and they are not a danger in this encounter.
3. Debuffs. - I hope that all you trees out there have Abolish Poison and Remove Curse mapped to your healing addon. If you don't, you should do just that for this encounter. The Faction Champs Warlock and Rogue will be passing out plenty of curses and poisons for you to despell, and you will be doing your raid an injustice if you're not meeting that challenge (especially if you have no cleansing totems down).
Should I freak –
If your raid leader insists on downing their healers first, then yes, you should freak. You will be silenced, you will be feared, you will be spell kicked, and eventually you will become a favorite target of a lock, rogue, or hunter. Do your best to root, stomp and cyclone your way to survival. If, however, your raid leader takes the easy road and agrees to down their dps first, this fight will be the easiest encounter in the Colosseum.
Should I freak –
If your raid leader insists on downing their healers first, then yes, you should freak. You will be silenced, you will be feared, you will be spell kicked, and eventually you will become a favorite target of a lock, rogue, or hunter. Do your best to root, stomp and cyclone your way to survival. If, however, your raid leader takes the easy road and agrees to down their dps first, this fight will be the easiest encounter in the Colosseum.
Interesting. My RL does insist on downing the healers first .... I will forward him to this blog.
ReplyDeleteIt is pretty rare for us to do this 10 man without at least one wipe :P