Brawler's Guild - Dark Summoner

[Damien 1,514]

This thread is for comments about our Brawler's Guild - Dark Summoner guide. Make sure to post if you have some class advice to share!

[Guest Sajakain]

For melee, this fight can be a real pain. I am a Fury Warrior currently on this boss (Rank 7; Boss 2). The fight itself (on paper) seems really easy.

The Dark Summoner has a barrier that makes him immune to damage. He has a melee attack, a cast attack, and he summons ghosts.

The fight is done in the dark and you have a beam of light shining from the front of your character. This beam of light stuns the summoned ghosts for 2 - 3 seconds. Killing a ghost temporarily removes the barrier from the Dark Summoner enabling him to be attacked.

With this information you can pretty much guess the fight:

- Use the light to stun and kill the ghosts.

- When a ghost dies, pop CDs and burn the Dark Summoner.

- Rinse and repeat until Dark Summoner dies.

The bad thing is that the ghosts spawn faster than necessary and they have a huge melee range (5 - 10 yards). If a ghosts hits you it's game over. (530K+ melee hit).

As I said, it's a tought fight as melee. I have yet to defeat the Dark Summoner myself. I have seen it done (Death Knight) though so it is not impossible to do.

[Myius 0]

Done this few days ago as elemental shaman. Few things that i remember being really usefull:

Talents:

-Stone bulwark totem as rank 1 talent. Summoner hit's pretty hard his bolts do about 70-90k(more/less), and his mele is not that low either so i used this when i was bursting with cd's up to not waste globals on interrupts/frost shocks.

-Frozen power as rank 2 talent. As mentioned bosses dmg is not so low so used this talent to keep distance from boss as much as possible.

think these 2 talents were vital rest is mostly "standard" elemental talents (elemental blast, echo of elements and either astral guidance or healing tide totem).

Glyphs:

I'd reccomend using : glyph of flame shock, unleashed lightning and frost shock. Flame shock and unleashed lightning are pretty much a "standard" glyphs for any elemental shaman in brawlers arena, as for frost shock you want to minimize use of frost shock so it's a good idea to increase duration of snare.

Fight:

- it is pretty important to use you wind shear and grounding totem to mitigate dmg from shadow bolts.

- try to keep boss in the middle of room while he's snared by frost shock/earthbind totem.

- when ghost spawns move into such position that boss is between you and ghost. When ghost reaches boss stun him by using light and "circle around boss". When you have 2 ghosts close to boss you can throw some chain lightnings to get more Rolling thunder procs but it's optional.

- Ghosts tend to spawn near walls/in corners so watch out not to get too close to the walls.

Will edit this post if i remember anything else.

[Hainiu 0]

Defeated today as a Windwalker Monk after many, many wipe. Spec choices:

• Spec into Diffuse Magic to offset damage from the Summoner's Shadowbolts.
• Do not glyph into Blackout Kick as you'll need the healing effect.
• Glyph of Afterlife is an excellent choice since the ghost adds do in fact drop Healing Spheres.
• Glyph of Sparring is also a good choice to deflect Shadowbolts.

I used Expel Harm shortly before the queue and used it again once I teleported into the arena for 3-4 Chi so I could use Touch of Death on the first ghost. After the first ghost is dead, I popped all cooldowns and started wailing on the Dark Summoner until the next ghost spawned which I switched to and killed. It's important to interrupt the Shadowbolt as frequently as possible as it deals quite a substantial amount of damage (the Dark Summoner cannot be stunned so don't bother with Fists of Fury). When switching to an add, I popped either Fortifying Brew, Diffuse Magic or Touch of Karma to offset any Shadowbolts cast during that brief interval where I'm killing the add.

The key to this fight is simply add management. You have to ensure any live adds are caught in the beam of light. I tried to ensure that I had no more than 1 add up at any given time, except towards the last 20% stretch when I just focused on keeping the adds in the light and burning down the boss.

An important note, as the adds can be summoned behind you, do not stand with your back to the wall. I'm unsure of whether it's currently a bug or not, but I've occasionally had ghosts spawn exceptionally close to me (either immediately behind or top of my character). It's aggravating as you have little chance to move before they melee you and one-shot you.

[Guest simu]

I managed to do this today as Death knight today. It was a pain until I started to use Soul Reaper on the ghosts as they were about to die, giving me a 50% haste buff for 5 sec.

Some other pointers, not necessarily death knight specific.

• Talents/skills that proc stuff of kills works on ghosts, make good use of it to have enough dps to kill summoner.
• It is possible to death grip ghosts as DK, but make sure they're already targeted by the light, otherwise you will get one-shot.
• It is possible to survive a hit from the ghosts, albeit barely. However, if you're tank specced, enjoy that vengeance buff.

[Sajakain 104]

I am still working on this boss. (I will kill him today if it's the last thing I do before passing out).

Some things I've noted:

• Ghosts can spawn anywhere in the arena. (My last pull had the ghost spawn right ontop of the Dark Summoner!)
• The enrage timer is realtiively short compared to other encounters.
• If you're melee, save your CD's for that first burn window. This is the "sweet spot" that you're going to get most of your DPS.
• Not 100% sure but it appears that ghosts are spawned more frequently as the fight goes on.

I've talented into Mass Spell Reflect (useful with no shields), Avatar, Disrupting Shout, and Gag Order just for this boss. I've gotten close a few times. My deaths have been either to random ghosts hitting (when I thought they were stunned) or the enrage.

[Guest Slexstar]

For hunters best for SV or MM as BM pet will be useless as i have seen and as i am a hunter still trying to kill this one best way to do so is Barrage and multishot in SV pet on passive use Ice trap all time and kill 1 add then boss and repeat this for when he summons a shield

1 hit from add will kill you.

[Guest Jthoven]

I'm still working on this fight on my paladin, and I can say this: O M F G this is NOT easy for us. We have only judgments and crusader strikes to build holy power, less you get a lot of exo proc's ( I don't) so we have a very hard time managing the population of these adds. I have yet been able to make it to an enrage timer, simply because too many ghosts get all over the arena and i cant get them all in one group together.

[Rigapples 0]

As a Rogue, the mechanics of this fight are terrible.

The boss shadowbolts very hard and cannot be stunned, so kicking every 15 seconds is our only recourse to try and survive for a significant amount of time. Even with Recuperate Rolling + Leeching Poison, we just can't outheal without interrupting a lot of his casts.

Since we have to kill Ghosts, we are constantly switching our target (and therefore not on boss) and the shadowbolts are very short cast times. I have attempted using MNP to try and ease this pain, but it doesn't not seem to work (or at least is not a noticeable difference.)

The ghosts melee range is EXTREMELY long (10yards+). Also, the light beam stun mechanic is flaky. Very often I will be pointing right at a ghost, walk up to it, and ti will Melee me anyways and instantly kill me. This can get very frustrating. Ghosts can also spawn on you, inside the boss, behind you, or to one of your immediate sides while you are kiting and stunning the other ghosts. This makes movement very difficult and a lot of it relies on RNG.

You can try as combat and cleave ghosts down while hitting the boss, but I found doing that seems to not beat the enrage timer for me. (Ilvl 487, however only LFR Gara'Jal fists with Windsong in that spec for me.)

Assassination I am easily ahead of the enrage, but the target switching seems to catch me in the "ghost was stunned but melee'd anyway" but during my transitions. Best attempt was 10% in this spec.

If the light mechanic was a little more responsive I think this fight would be MUCH easier. However, the light sort of "skips around" when you make turns with the mouse, and it seems like walking also makes the light not function (hence why when I approach a ghost while walking straight, I get melee'd by it often.)

Extremely hard fight for melee. It can be done, but seems unforgivingly biased against us due to long melee range and glitchy (imo) mechanics.

[Sajakain 104]

Alright. I finally killed this guy as a Single-Minded Fury Warrior. I will skip all the drama of this grind and tell you exactly how I got it done.

========================

Glyphs:

• Glyph of Bull Rush
• Glyph of Furious Sundering
• Glyph of Rude Interruption

Required Talents:

• Mass Spell Reflection
• Disrupting Shout

Optional / Suggested Talents:

• Dragon Roar - Of the three Tier 4 talent choices this one will hit the hardest.
• Avatar - I chose this due to the instant damage increase rather than the bleed damage of Bloodbath

========================

The Strategy:

You want to jump on this guy right when he spawns and apply 3 stacks of Weakened Armor. Due to your Glyph of Furious Sundering this will be a free debuff you can apply before the first ghost spawns. You also want to take this time to set the Dark Summoner as your focus. I recommend doing it via keybind / macro while you're applying your debuff. Lastly, you want to use Mass Spell Reflection to avoid the damage from the Dark Summoner's Shadowbolt ability.

When the first ghost spawns, stun it with the light and make sure it's stunned. (I have had several deaths because I thought the ghost was stunned when the light was on it and it actually wasn't.)

Start your normal rotation but (if you can afford to) leave out Colossus Smash and Dragon Roar. You want these for the Dark Summoner.

When the first ghost is ~ 50% HP you want to pop all your cooldowns. I did this simply via keybind and an Avatar macro. The macro was this:

#showtooltip Avatar

/use Lessons of the Darkmaster

/use Potion of Brawler's Might

/cast Avatar

For reference, here are those two items: Lessons of the Darkmaster / Potion of Brawler's Might. The potion can be bought from Quackenbush.

With your CD's popped (Skull Banner + Recklessness + Avatar Macro) your ghost should die with a simple Bloodthirst and Heroic Strike. During this time of killing the ghost you will want to use Disrupting Shout to interrupt the Dark Summoner's Shadowbolt ability.)

__________

Alright. Now with your CD's rolling you want to start your rotation. Line up the boss and the next ghost and make sure you have a comfortable amount of rage (25 - 50), throw out your Colossus Smash, and start burning him with your normal Fury Rotation. Towards the end of your Colossus Smash Debuff you will want to throw in your Dragon Roar if you didn't use it on the ghost.

Ideally this should get the boss down to around 30% - 50% HP. The less the better.

Important Note: During the intial start of this burn you may be able to get in a Pummel and take full advantage of Glyph of Rude Interruption (by interrupting Dark Summoner's Shadowbolt). If you can do this then, obviously..... do it.

__________

From here it is a rinse and repeat phase with a bit of RNG. Some key points you want to remember to keep in effect:

• Put as much damage on the boss when his Dark Protection is down. (Accomplished by killing a ghost).
• When possible, use Pummel, Disrupting Shout or Mass Spell Reflection to negate Shadowbolt
• Use defense when necessary: Die by the Sword. (I am a dwarf so I also was able to use Stoneform
• Manage your ghosts. Do not let them overwhelm you if at all possible. The exception to this is that you may have 3 - 5 of them towards the end of the fight. I had to kite them by spamming the "stun flashlight" over them, get into melee range to cast Execute, and then get back out to restun.
• If you can, try to save Colossus Smash for the Dark Summoner. The 6 seconds of negating his armor is glorious!
• When killing ghosts, take advantage of Glyph of Bull Rush and the extra rage it gives. It may mean an extra ability just to get it down quicker. Just remember to make sure the ghost is stunned before you charge in!
• The ghosts are CC-able with fear. (Intimidating Shout). If the situation presents itself; take advantage of it. The best time is sub 20% when you're close to a kill. You do not want an additional 1 - 2 ghosts to deal with mid fight.
• Take advantage of "buff groups" (as my realm calls them). It's simply a raid group. While some buffs will be dropped when you enter the arena, most won't. A stat is a stat and anything will help.
• Bring personal buff food and flasks. Black Pepper Ribs and Shrimp for maximum strength. Eternal Blossom Fish and Charbroiled Tiger Steak are alternate sources but have less strength. For your flask you will want to use Flask of Winter's Bite
• When you kill a ghost it will grant you a Victory Rush proc. Use it to heal and throw that little extra damage toward your next target.

========================

I hope this guide for Fury Warriors helped. If I remember anything else or if you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask me. I will be glad to answer them! When it was all said and done, the fight was a little bumpy. Ultimately I do believe it can come down to gear and DPS. There's a "fine line" and if you don't cross that threshold then you're more open to RNG being against you.

========================

Edit Reasons: Added additional tips to remember.

Edited January 2, 2013 by Sajakain

[Krazyito 521]

Alright. I finally killed this guy as a Single-Minded Fury Warrior. I will skip all the drama of this grind and tell you exactly how I got it done.

I love your post <3. Too bad I don't play a warrior and can't put this into practice =P

[Guest Tiq]

Saja's guide is dead on.

I got him down last night as TG Fury in 2 ghost cycles.

Couple additional pieces of advice: turn on nameplates ('V' is default) - this will help you see ghosts.

Killing a ghost procs Victory Rush (I glyphed it for a bigger heal).

I didn't pre-pot this one so I would have a dps pot avail during the first burn phase.

(I also got very lucky with ghosts spawning directly behind the boss which made positioning easy).

gl

[Sajakain 104]

Killing a ghost procs Victory Rush (I glyphed it for a bigger heal).

I forgot to add this tidbit. I will, as it was extremely useful even though I also taletned Second Wind. Either case: Congratulations on your kill!

[Vlad 411]

Hey guys. We added a written guide and a video guide. The original post has been updated with the link :)

[Guest Marius]

For frost mages who keep their cool, this is a fairly simple fight seen as Ring of Frost etc. will work on the ghosts. Frozen Orb is invaluable.

Took me about 50 tries, but I tend to panic in these situations

Ilvl 482, did around 60k dps on the fight where he went down.

Felt so satisfying to finally get him. Then I ran into Battletron......

[Guest Meinchow]

Hey well i spent a few days on this as a monk dps at ilvl 482 and i finally cracked it and was killing him everytime but 3 or four times i was beaten by the enrage, but heres how i did it once i picked up my dps a touch,

1 - as summoner walks into centre of ring pop agility flask from vendor, then upon moving to the first ghost i popped the haste increase i gain from herbalism but this is not necassary.

2 - while halfway through the ghost pop your talent to summon xuen, after the ghost is dead kill the boss with all cd's including tigers brew and energising brew.

3- each time he summons a second ghost kill the one closest to you but never use touch of death save this till the end.

4 - on the second burn phase pop touch of karma.

Throughout the fight be sure to use chi wave and expel harm to keep hp up but also when in burn phases pop both brew abilities you have as using the talent healing elixirs these are vital in maintaining hit points.

Hope i helped because i know just how little info for monks there is on this boss.

[Fel 42]

Affliction, ilvl 488:

Soul Leech, Soul Link, Grim of Sac

This one was quite easy as an affliction lock. SB:SS to any ghost and it will die (or near to) on it's own by the time the DoTs have expired. I focused down the first two ghosts, pausing to swap to the boss and pop CDs/throw a few MGs after each died. From then on I spent most of the time on the boss, as the ghosts would die from my DoTs regularly enough on their own.

Just kited them all in circles, think 3 ghosts were alive by the end. Couple close calls avoiding them but not so close I couldnt repeat it I think.

-A

[Guest Yummyumm]

From Rank 1 to 7 this boss definitely was the most...challenging is the wrong word...annoying?, embarassing?, unforgiving?...let's just say the boss is a pain in the ass. Even tried tanking him and some ghost as Brewmaster using defensive CDs. Got him to enrage 2-3 times while cleaving the ghost with Keg Smash. This way I could constantly damage the boss. Killed him as Windwalker in the end.

Problems:

- Ghosts are not immediately stunned when they are hit by the light. Wait until you see that they are definitely stunned.

- You have to directly hit them with the light. It seemed to me that they are not being stunned of they are at the edge of the beam.

- Don't try pooling ghosts. It is to complecated to try positioning them.

- If you get stuck in a corner, don't try to roll past a ghost, even if it is stunned. Got oneshot 2-3 times.

- Be careful how to position yourself and the boss. Lost Xuen several times to newly spawned ghosts.

- What worked best for me: Burn first ghost, pop Xuen and burn boss, watch where the second ghost spawns and wait for it to get near you, stun it and burn it down, no matter if you still have time left on the boss, continue DPSing the boss, watch where the third ghost spawns, if you are sure that you can kill the boss before immunity turn the boss that the ghost will run into your beam, otherwise switch to ghost, stun and burn it, continue as before. Inbetween kick as many of his casts as possible, use EH and CW on CD, Touch of Karma is great if you drop low

Good luck to you guys. Now working on Rank 8

[Orladel 0]

WOW Finally killed this guy...

I'm a bit undergear with a 480 ilvl (due to main spec as tank) with 2-3 PvP items. I was around 60k dps, with prepot + army. Second pot was used on healing pot.

As 2h Frost DK, I recommend to use :

- Glyph of Dark Succor It procs right after killing a Ghost, which allow us to survive a bit more.

- Glyph of Dark Simulacrum For a 80k damage at 20RP every 30s thanks to shadow bolt (which is great !). On this point if you have enough hp to "tank"shadow bolt, then copy the spell and cast it back. If you're not sure, use it with your AMS. the RP cost will be returned.

I took Asphyxiate which is in fact for a free kick of shadow bolt with shorter cooldown than Strangulate

I managed to kill lots of ghosts, as i said i'm not a top dps, so i needed more than 2 or 3 ghosts.

Reminder : if you're not absolutely sure you will kill him during these next few seconds where he doesn't have his shield, don't be greedy, take down another ghost. Got killed 4-5 times cause of my stupidity x/

Edited March 8, 2013 by Orladel

[Guest Carmina]

For rogues, use glyph of deadly momentum & the recupe glyph. Deadly momentum is what got the kill for my rogue friend as assassination.

[Guest Oui]

To supplement the Hunter class advice section....

Spirit Bond is the clear winner over Exhilaration for this fight. It has 4 times the healing per time if Exhilaration is used on CD (not to mention the short duration of the fight), and the high damage being mitigated/recovered is output relatively constantly, negating the situational utility argument the on-demand heal [barely] has going for it.

Also, don't forget the Gorilla pet family special move, Pummel (I think), as an extra interrupt on the boss. Bears' Demoralizing Roar may also be helpful if you find yourself dying to boss damage and not the enrage.

[Tarazet 144]

I cannot do this fight as a Feral or Guardian Druid. 510 ilvl and there's just too much fucking RNG.

[MoacaBogdan 23]

Shadow Priest:

Dark Binding, Mind Spike

Solace, Power Infusion, Halo

Actually preety simple as a ranged, i just stayed in the middle of the arena as much as possible. As soon as 1st ghost spawns, kill it, then blow pot/PI on the boss. Keep camera at max distance so you can see the ghosts as soon as they spawn and focus it down fast using spike/spike/blast combo.

Had to kill 3 ghosts to finish him off, 3rd one spawned dangerously close to the center and almost got me.

[Guest Shadesofgery]

As shadow this fight is impossible. you literally have 2 seconds on boss after killing one ghost before the next one spawns. I dont know how you did it Moaca but at ilvl 520 I have not had the boss under 50% evan through 6 ghost cycles

[Auyssaelre 5]

As a feral druid this fight is a PAIN. So much going on first of all. I lined up the ghosts and ended up not surviving because of his Frostbolts. Closest that I got him to death was 57%. The ghosts do spawn faster as the fight goes on which is also an irritation. Seems for me lining up the ghosts isn't working well.