Alright. So we've been having some problems handling the Dreamwalker fight on heroic. Since we've only cleared the lower spire, we'll extend next week and chew up Plague and Blood wings before coming back to Dreamwalker. In the meantime, I'd like to ask what people were seeing from their end and see if there's anything more we can do to get further along. At this point I'd like to try the switchup we attempted at the end of tonight, with Zsari doing DPS, two healers in and our resident druid healer out. What do others think?

-Fiad

Honestly, what is killing us is that she's not getting healed hard enough/fast enough overall. We do well until we're overrun (which is what troubled us back in the day with regular, as well) and the best way to fix that is to shorten the fight length. Yes, there are some other details that need polished, but that seems to be the biggest part. If Zsari is having trouble healing the raid in her current form, I would suggest from experience that she gives Holy a try. It only takes a little getting used to the buttons for the most part, but when I swapped to Holy, it was soooo much easier. Alternatively, Zsari could swap with Ren/Druid entirely. Zsari-with-stacks is infinitely better than AnyHealer with none, even if she is still Disc. (This is, of course, assuming that a druid will have an easier time of healing the group.) Ultimately, we're being overrun with adds by or before the half-way point, and that's just not something we can fix with "DPS harder." Our raid does outstanding DPS. This stone's got no blood left.

As far as the Blazing Skeletons go, it comes down to three options: 1. The healer figures out how to handle a few more pulses of Lay Waste, and we go from there as we have. 2. Zahryn figures out how to handle the kiting while taking a few frostbolts every once in a while, as I am off killing blazings and not interrupting/stunlocking/killing mages. Or 3. Laela figures out how to kill the Skeleton in fewer than four pulses. As it stands, I cannot do the stunlocking/interrupting while killing Skeletons. I can do one or the other, and I am fine doing whatever will work better, but there are compromises with either choice. It's just a matter of what will be easiest for the raid to handle.

Healing was definitely an issue because Kor and I both lost stacks at various times (although two of those times were because I died when I came out of the portal, one of those times due to blazing pulses), however our closest attempt ever we did with Eli has DPS and just three healers. I think the right healer combo will actually be to keep Eli as DPS and just have Dulc solo the outside and have me and Kor do portals. We really need the extra DPS up top, and as long as Kor and I can learn not to drop stacks, it seems like it's a tradeoff that is worth it. As far as stack dropping, we'll just have to get better... and we won't die on the outside if the Blazings aren't up too long.

Regarding the blazing, the strategy has to be option 2. Caldar has enough tools to help him with the zombie that it isn't necessarily a wipe if he gets slowed (it certainly could be, but not guaranteed) and we do still have Hep on the mages, who also has a lot of stuns and interrupts. Hep actually has more options than a rogue, and doesn't need combo points to use stuns, either. So, really, Caldar wouldn't be getting hit even if Taius had briefly peeled off for a Blazing because Hep can theoretically handle the interrupting solo. And remember, once everyone is working on the Blazings, they aren't going to live that long, so it's not going to be that much DPS time away from your priorities. The only reason it is now is because Laela is the only one trying to kill them, so if anyone else does decide to help, that's like 15 seconds away from your main target instead of the 3 it would be if the whole raid was helping.

I honesty didn't realise we were having people sticking to their normal priorities up top or I would have said something much earlier. The priority system is intended for all non-Blazing targets, and Blazing should still be #1 priority for all DPS up top except Caldar. A frostbolt getting off is bad, but one or two of them is not an automatic wipe (but even then, Hep is still on them, so they shouldn't even get off that). 4+ pulses of a Blazing skeleton is a wipe, every time. That many pulses is dangerous even on normal, and the Blazing do more damage with the ability on heroic form. I've never ever heard of a raid using just one DPSer on the Blazing and I am pretty sure that is not because we are uniquely creative but because it's a really bad idea.

I've done the fight as melee many times (in fact, the 2/3 of my hard mode kills on Dreamwalker have been as melee, and probably have also spent several combined hours between all my raids working on it), so I know how frustrating it is to be switching targets constantly and to have so much running from one side all the way to the other side. It is a real pain in the ass to be sure -- and its why I hate the fight as anything other than a portal healer -- but it's a necessary evil. We can't afford to not have our two melee DPS helping on the Blazings.

To add some on to what Tziva said, more than 2 pulses of Lay waste is bad. The less the healers have to heal the raid the faster the dragon heals. Lay waste was causing to big issues. First the outside healer is wasting too much mana healing. Second the portal healers were getting one shot when they popped out of the portals because of the lay waste. Simple fact is if a healer loses stacks, it's a wipe. Too many pulses of blazing, it's a wipe.

With your set up, you have options to keep your kiter up. the mage has tools like blink. The other thing not mentioned is the Eli can dispel magic on him. He is the only one who has to have it, so she can just make a macro and dispel him then kill the blazing skeleton. also centralizing people except the kiter makes healing a hundred times easier. The less damage the raid takes, the more the outside healer can help heal the dragon. Even the few times on 10 mans as well as 25 man, most my outside healing is still on the dragon. if I spend more time healing the raid, it's a wipe. Lay waste is a raid killer and must be priority for everyone not a tank or kiter. Healers can not lose stacks for any reason what so ever or you may as well spontaneously die right then. You can get away with it on normal to a degree but not heroic.

So in theory frostbolt is not a big issue compared to lay waste. You can easily protect the kiter between his tools and dispel magic. The skeleton must die asap. Healers must keep up stacks. Those two basic things are required to handle this on heroic.

Looking at the parse, we lost people for a very wide variety of reasons (which is to be expected as we're still learning), but the Blazings definitely were a big theme, causing a lot of deaths and contributing in even more. For example, assumign I'm reading the log right, we lost Caldar about as many times to the Blazing Skeletons as we did to the zombies. Considering its his first night kiting zombies and that takes a lot of practice, I'd expect that to be his top killer, but they were pretty even. But anyway, lots of people died from that damage or had that damage hurt them significantly before something else finished them off.

On another note, one thing I noticed looking at us portal healers (this is mostly info for Kor):

We both know intellectually that we need to heal ourselves from the clouds but I think we may not be (or at least weren't for some of the attemtps) doing so enough or correctly because it definitely contributed to some issues. The following info may be common sense or things you already knew, but I think maybe we aren't doing it since we're so focused on other stuff: First off, we can heal ourselves while inside the portal -- we don't need to wait until we're outside. Second off, we can use instants and heal ourselves while we swim, without any time lost. Third, because of our crazy stacks, these normally weak instant abilities will probably heal us to full. One riptide on myself while swimming gives me more upfront healing than I even have health pool, and that's not even counting the HoT portion which will keep ticking once outside.

When it was three of us going in, we weren't each getting enough clouds for them to hurt us significantly (almost ignorable). However, once the third healer started staying out and we were getting better at not fighting for clouds, and we were getting higher stacks and therefore more damage, and the damage actually became relevant. So our health was a lot lower when we came out on the later attempts, which didn't help us survive those Blazing pulses. In one instance, Kor even died to the falling damage from dropping out of the portals, because he was so low from the clouds themselves.

TL;DR: Holy Shock (or Riptide or HoT if you're another class) yourself simultaneously while you swim to clouds inside the portals.

We just need general practice at keeping our stacks up, at kiting the zombies, at managing the interrupts, etc, etc, etc. A lot of that will come as we get smoother with things... but I also think we do need to shift DPS back to those Blazing Skeletons.

My problem with Zsari switching to Holy is that Zsari-p hates Holy with violent passion, and as a bonus I'm healing a fair amount in Pie and they need me Disc when I'm healing. So it would cost me gold and the kind of misery that would probably burn me out on raiding -- I've raided too much this expansion as is, and while it's more of a problem generally with Pie (I adore 9man), it is an issue I have to consider. If I could bring in another healer for the fight I'd suggest that, but Zsari is the best geared, and #2 gearwise (Eli) isn't as useful, being a paladin.

That said, I'll gladly pewpew and dispel Zahryn.

>.> I'll be back on Wednesday to help? *guilt*

Ok, So after we clear the Plague and blood wings we'll be coming back to Dreamwalker(H) tonight. I'll go over the strategy verbally once we get there, but I think we should try Eli as DPS, one healer out and two in. It was something I wanted to try last week, but we only got one go at it and I do want to see what we get back from it. While it will make the fight longer, I'd like to see if the albeit-minimal benefits of replenishment and extra DPS can be of use to us as a whole for this fight.

Additionally, we'll be tanking the mages and A-bombs relatively tightly together to help in allowing AOE and heals to be better utilized. (I know dragging a mage around is a real pain, but I do want to try a bit more) If we can keep our non-portal people close together and away from zombie aspolsions I think we could really tighten up and get further along (regardless of a 3 or 4 healer setup).

So, like I said we'll go over it again verbally before we try her again. IN the meantime, be safe and have fun and I'll see you all at 8 server.

-Theo