FAZ 56 – “It’s Go Time!”

by | Sep 5, 2018 | For Azeroth | 0 comments

This week Manny and Joce had a chance to try out Normal Uldir and Warfronts and give their thoughts, as well as cover Warcraft news, the story of Drustvar, and the strategy for clearing mythic Waycrest Manor. Enjoy!

As always, don’t forget to write in to fazpodcast@gmail.com, or let us know your thoughts over on Discord at bit.ly/fazdiscord. You can support the show at patreon.com/FAZ

Reddit AMA

John Staats, former Blizzard 3D designer hosted an AMA where he took questions about his time with the World of Warcraft.

Interesting / Noteworthy points:

  • The designers had begun to build more dungeons and raids than were needed and were limited by the number of upgrades that could be given to players!
  • Hooks for player housing were built into the game. Stormwind had a green player housing portal until the Cata redesign.
  • The level design being made so far ahead of the gameplay. Jump in wailing caverns, mushroom maze. BRD being made before they knew how many people would be in a party to explore it.
  • Reddit AMA Thread
  • Wowhead Recap
  • Kickstarter

Welcome to the Endgame

The floodgates of content are upon us! The full suite of features are now live in BfA; however, bugs abound.

World Quest Exploits

It was discovered on live that players could game the system to put themselves in a state where WQs could be completed repeatedly and still provide the full rewards. Blizzard has patched the issue and has now taken action against players flagrantly abusing this bug.

Auction House Changes

The August 27th hotfixes included some changes to the auction house. An increased listing fee has been added per stack to a number of trade goods.

Community Resources/Add-ons

Waycrest Manor

Having discovered the source of the Heartsbane Coven, adventurers now breach into the halls of Waycrest Manor. Waycrest Manor is a 5 boss dungeon with normal, heroic, mythic and mythic keystone difficulties. This guide will cover mechanics for the mythic bosses. Some mechanics discussed will be less impactful or absent on lower difficulties.

The are several routes that can be taken through the manor and different routes will be available to you. The path which you take through the manor will change the order in which you encounter the first 3 bosses.

Raal, the Gluttonous

For the purposes of this guide, we will assume that a path to the right of the central stairwell is open to you and so you are sent in the direction of Raal, the Gluttonous.

Raal is a stationary boss which must be tanked at all times to avoid his Consume All ability which deals heavy party wide damage when no player is in melee range of the boss. The Tank should face Raal away from the rest of the party and avoid his 3 hit Tenderize combo by side stepping the ability while remaining in melee range. After finishing the Tenderize combo, the boss will spawn Wasting Servants from the doors at the ends of the room. The servants will move towards the boss were they will be consumed to give Raal a stacking 5% damage increase. Use CC and burn down the adds before the reach the boss.

Dps and healers should avoid his Rotten Expulsion ability which will be cast in the direction of a random party member who is not the tank. This ability will leave pools of goo that deal fast ticking damage to anyone standing in them and will spawn a Bile Oozling add. Once the add spawns, it should be taunted by the tank and killed quickly. Upon its death, the Oozling will explode dealing damage to any player directly on it.

Soulbound Goliath

The Soulbound Goliath is a tank focused fight that focuses on managing the stacks of Soul Harvest so that the boss does not overwhelm the group. Soul Harvest is a stacking damage buff which cannot be dispelled through normal means. Eventually, the boss will gain enough stacks to overwhelm any defense that a tank could muster.

To remove the buff, the boss must be kited over the patches of fire that are left behind by the lightning strikes in the area. When the boss stands in the fire, it will lose all stacks of Soul Harvest but will gain Burning Brush for 6 seconds. Burning Brush will deal a short period of ticking fire damage to the party which can kill players at low health. In addition to the ticking damage, the boss will spawn several Burning Soul adds which will fixate on random players and chase them around for 10 seconds before despawning. If a Burning Soul reaches a player it will melee them for heavy damage. Simply stay away from the adds so as not to contribute additional damage while the party is recovering from the Burning Brush damage. Personal CDs are recommended during this time as the healer will also be attempting to avoid a set of Burning Souls at this time.

Occasionally the boss will use its Crush ability to deal a spike of damage to the tank at high stacks of Soul Harvest this can be a devastating blow. Ensure that some sort of mitigation is used against the ability.

Heartsbane Triad

This encounter is another council fight with 3 bosses who do not share a health pool and have an issue sharing their treasured Focusing Iris. The focusing Iris will be passed between the sisters, bestowing each boss an aura effect; a new ability; and, slowly giving them energy. If any of the sisters reach 100 energy, the will cast Dire Ritual which can one-shot an entire group almost single-handedly. The good side is that possessing the iris removes the Ironbark shield that reduces all damage the boss takes by 99%. Therefore do not bother with AoE or cleave dps unless it directly increases your single target damage on the active sister.

The first sister to hold the Focusing Iris is Sister Solena. With the power of the Iris, she gains the Aura of Apathy which reduces healing you party does by 50%. She will spam cast Soul Bolt at random players dealing moderate damage. This cast can be interrupted to lower the damage to the party. Solena will also mind control a party member through her Soul Manipulation spell. Reducing the victim to 50% or less health will break the mind control. While a player is mind controlled Sister Solena gains Soul Armour which reduces the damage she takes by 99%.

Sister Briar will gain the ability Jagged Nettles spell when in possession of the Focusing Iris. This ability will apply a DoT to a random player that can only be removed when that player is back above 90% health. Using a defensive to help mitigate the DoT or self-heals will help your healer out. Briar gains the Aura of Thorns ability which deals damage back to her attackers.

Finally, when Sister Malady gains the iris it bestows upon her the Aura of Dread which applies a stacking DoT. This DoT can be removed by movement and not by any other means. Move every so often to keep your stacks low. She will also apply a curse to all players called Unstable Runic Mark. After 6 seconds the curse will explode damaging the player and any other party member within 6 yards of that player. Players should spread out avoid splashing damage to other party members.

Lord and Lady Waycrest

Finally, after clearing the first 3 bosses of the manor, dark spirits will fly through the air. This directs you to the closest path down towards the next boss. The fight consists of repeatedly wearing down Lord Waycrest until Lady Waycrest joins the battle and you can end the happy couple.

Lord Waycrest has 2 main abilities. The tank will need to effectively mitigate the Wasting Strike attack and the DoT that it leaves behind. While the other players will need to move away from the random target of the Virulent Pathogen ability which will apply a 5 second DoT that also slows its victims’ movement speed. Once it expires or is dispelled any other party member in the area will be given the Virulent Pathogen and a patch of Contagious Remains will be placed on the ground. Once you drop the Virulent Pathogen you will need to move out of the area in order to avoid having the disease reapplied.

Lady Waycrest will start outside the encounter area and will randomly attack players with her Wracking Chord ability and spawn void zones with her Discordant Cadenza ability. The party will need to avoid the exploding void zones left by Discordant Cadenza while ensuring that they stay apart from players with the Virulent Pathogen.

The first two times Lord Waycrest drops below 30% health, Lady Waycrest will sacrifice 30% of her health to restore Lord Waycrest back to full health. The third time, she will sacrifice another 30% of her health bringing herself to 10% health remaining and enter the encounter area. With each restoration, Lord Waycrest will gain a stacking buff that increases his damage and haste. With her now in the encounter area, her casts of Wracking Chord can be interrupted and you can put an end to the Mother of the Heartbane Coven and her husband for good.

Gorak Tul

The power behind the Lady Waycrest Gorak Tul is a single phase encounter that focuses on add control. He will cast Darkened Lightning which is in essence a chain lightning that should be interrupted whenever possible. He will also frequently cast Summon Deathtouched Slaver which will summon an add that will jump to the furthest ranged player and hit all players nearby. Stay spread to reduce the damage to the party and burn these adds down. The most dangerous ability is the Slaver’s Death Lens. This is an uninterruptible cast that will deal 70% of a player maximum health over 5 seconds. Using crowd control can disrupt this ability.

Even when dead these adds are not fully defeated. Gorak will gain energy throughout the fight. Upon reaching 100 energy he will cast Dred Essence, healing any active Slaver to full health and reviving all dead slavers. Throughout the fight, Vials of Alchemical Fire will spawn. This will provide an extra action button and that ability can permanently remove a slain Deathtouched Slayer.

With Gorak Tul defeated, (for now), you have completed Waycrest Manor!

 

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