Boss Tactics: Shade of Aran
Aran.jpg

Encounter Flow

Encounter Setup: Shade of Aran wanders in the middle of his room.

  • Shade of Aran randomly attacks any target using his various direct abilities.
  • Every 30-35 seconds, Shade of Aran uses one of his special abilities - Arcane Explosion, Blizzard or Flame Wreath.
  • Shade of Aran reaches 40% health - He summons 4 Water Elementals at the borders of the room. They dispawn 90 seconds later.
  • Shade of Aran reaches 20% mana - He mass polymorphs the entire raid, drinks to replenish his mana, then mass pyroblasts the raid. If this occurs more than once, Aran will simply drink a potion the second time for mana.
  • Fight takes 12 minutes - Shade of Aran is transformed into Shadow of Aran, ultimately causing a wipe.

Abilities

Shade of Aran

Immunities: Has no threat table. Mind Numbing Poison, Curse of Tongues, and Silence.

  1. Frostbolt: 3 second cast, dealing 4.4k frost damage and slowing the target.
  2. Fireball: 3 second cast, dealing 4.4k fire damage.
  3. Arcane Missiles: 5 seconds channeling, dealing 1500 arcane damage per second.
  4. Chains of Ice: Chance on hit with Frostbolt, rooting the target for 10 seconds. Dispellable.
  5. Counterspell: 10 yard area of effect, interrupting all spells, but does not silence the target.
  6. Arcane Explosion: Pulls the entire raid to the center of the room, applying a slow debuff on everyone (dispellable), followed by a 10 second cast Arcane Explosion dealing 9k-11k arcane damage in a 20 yard radius.
  7. Blizzard: A blizzard AoE dealing 1.3k-1.7k frost damage every 2 seconds and slowing movement speed by 65% circles clockwise at the rim of the room (making the center safe). Dispawns after a full cycle. A blue tornado indicates the starting point of the Blizzard.
  8. Flame Wreath: 5 second cast, engulfing 3 random players with flames, that last 20 seconds. If any of the three move, 3k-4k fire damage will be dealt to the entire raid.
  9. Mass Pyroblast: Aran polymorphs the entire raid, sits down to drink, then casts a Mass Pyroblast dealing 7k-7.5k fire damage to everyone. The polymorph is not dispellable and affects characters that are normally immune to it.

Water Elemental

  1. Frostbolt: 1.5 second cast, dealing 1k-2k frost damage.

Roles

Healers
Holy or Restoration. At least two.
Elemental Crowd Control
Warlock, Priest or Warrior.
Interrupters
Feral Druid, Mage, Rogue, Shaman, Warrior or Warlock with Felhound.

Strategy

  1. Throughout the fight, Aran will pick random targets and cast spells against them.
    1. All non-healers should use DPS gear and attack Aran.
    2. Pets should be used as they can be targeted by Aran, minimizing damage dealt to players.
    3. Hunters can use their Snake Trap to increase the number of possible targets, thus mitigating raid damage.
  2. Interrupting -
    1. Option 1: Increasing Aran's mana usage.
      1. Interrupters should stop all Arcane Missiles, as soon as they are cast.
      2. Mass Polymorph will occur before the Water Elementals spawn.
    2. Option 2: Reducing Aran's mana usage.
      1. Interrupters should stop all Frostbolts and Fireballs, at the last moment possible.
      2. If the raid DPS is high enough, Water Elementals will spawn before Aran will cast his Mass Polymorph.
      3. This option should be used if the first one causes the elementals and the polymorph to occur simultaneously.
    3. Once Mass Polymorph is cast, interrupters should stop every spell.
  3. Aran's special abilities -
    1. Arcane Explosion: All raid members should run away from Aran, toward the library's walls.
    2. Blizzard: Ranged raid members should pay attention to the Blizzard's location, and avoid it. If possible, ranged should move towards the center.
    3. Flame Wreath: The debuffed raid members should not move, shapeshift or accept a resurrection if dead.
  4. Handling the Elementals -
    1. Option 1: Elementals are taken down quickly by the raid.
    2. Option 2: Elemental Crowd Control is used by either banishing or chain-fearing them until they dispawn.
    3. It is very important that no elemental remains active before the Polymorph phase, or they will break Aran's Crowd Control, resulting in less health regeneration before the Pyroblast, which might kill the uncontrolled character.
  5. Surviving the Mass Pyroblast -
    1. Just as the polymorph breaks, players should shield themselves by any mean possible (e.g. Divine Shield, Ice Block, Fel Blossom, Power Word: Shield…). If the player is far enough from Aran, this can be done before being hit.
    2. Once the pyroblast damages the raid, it is very important to heal the next player being targeted by Aran (either by the healers or by some consumable).

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