[General] Shamans in Hellfire Citadel

[Pandacho 286]

This thread is for all Shaman specs tips, tricks and discussions in how to best handle the various boss fights throughout Hellfire Citadel. Feel free to contribute or discuss encounter-specific anything.

 
Hellfire Assault
Iron Reaver
Kormrok
Hellfire High Council
Kilrogg Deadeye
Gorefiend
Shadow-Lord Iskar
Fel Lord Zakuun
Socrethar the Eternal
Xhul'horac
Tyrant Velhari
Mannoroth
Archimonde

 

 

Hellfire Assault (top)

 

[Resto] [Heroic]

 

Well, my best advice for a resto shaman on this fight: respec to dps

It is a very easy fight in terms of healing, the raid rarely drops below 70%HP if doing the mechanics right. This encounter could be easily healed with 3 healers for 20 people on Heroic and a resto shaman is the worst performer here (would barely benefit from Mastery).

If you are healing this fight:

1. Go full Haste - 2-3 times of raid wide damage from Metamorphosis could be easily healed with your HTT and Ascendance CDs.

2. Use all your utility totems to help the raid - stuns, spell reflects, Spirit Link when having 2-4 Felcasters metamorphose together and cast uninterruptable Felfire Volleys.

3. Use your Fire Elemental and dps the boss on the start of the fight.

4. Dispel Conducted Shock Pulse asap: its damage is trivial but you can’t afford people being stunned for 6 sec (especially when this happens on top of the bombs)

 

This fight is really easy in terms of healing and if your raid is not using the tactic ‘gather everything and AoE it on top DPS’, resto shamans wouldn’t shine

 

[utility]

 

Archigos: Grounding totem can absorb the entire Volley of Metamorphosed Felcaster.

 

Iron Reaver (top)

 

[utility]

Iron Reaver targets healers specifically with his Barrage ability (at least on Normal and Heroic). Assign all the healers to stay on the one side of boss while all the dps on the other side. Still don't forget /range 8.

Handling Barrage in this way will save you a lot of healing.

 

[Resto] [Heroic]

 

Very intensive Ground Phase.

I highly recommend you to stay full time in melee range and to ask your ranged dps to come closer - it helps a lot to avoid Barrage damage and move from Blitz. Do not chase people hit and dragged by Blitz, there's a big chance that you'll end in the same position.

Use your raid CDs on Pounding. Do not wait for it to start - drop HTT or cast Ascendance 1-2 sec before. The damage is very intensive and entering Pounding with 50-60% HP could leave you behind on healing and cause unexpected deaths from multiplied abilities.

Do not bother with Healing Rain because normally you should stay 8 yards apart from each other in order to not get hit by somebody’s Unstable Orb.

Do not hesitate to burn your mana with Chain Heals here - you will have plenty of time to regen it in Air Phase.

When the Air Phase starts, wait for the first Artillery targets announcement and Immolation. After it you’ll have enough time to channel your mana pot.

Help to dps Firebombs - there’s not much to heal in this phase while killing the bombs in time is very important.

 

 

Kormrok (top)

 

[Resto] [Heroic]

 

You can dps in the first 20-30 sec of the fight - not much to heal during this period. HST, Riptides and Healing Rain on the melee camp would be enough.

Use your raid CDs during Pound cast. Our 3 min CDs align pretty nice with every Pound cast.

I would advise to use SLT on Grasping Hands. In addition, in this fight I’m using Int pot instead of mana pot for the healing boost during Grasping Hands/Pound combination.

 

[Enhancement]

 

demonardvark: When the hands are about to be cast run to the outside of your raid group and face in. You can spread your flame shock to most of the hands and fire nova for huge dps gains (and freeing your raid group sooner).

 

 

Hellfire High Council (top)

 

[Resto] [Heroic]

 

I would advise to use both dispel glyphs here (double dispel and healing on dispel)

Do not dispel Mark of the Necromancer before it comes to 3 stacks and even here wait 5-6 sec before dispelling. In this case the amount of players affected by the debuff would be minimal.

Use your CDs during Wailing Horror and Windwalk. SLT would be nice if you raid is using ‘stack loosely in the middle’ tactic.

 

 

Kilrogg Deadeye (top)

 

 

[Resto] [Heroic]

 

For this fight I’m using Ancestral Guidance when going to Death Realm. It aligns perfectly with the number of people and Realm CD.

In this case I can use HTT and Ascendance outside for Death Throes casts.

Two things to mention:

- Keep an eye on your buff stacks in Death Realm. In the second you get 20 stacks - jump into the fire, die and get out. You can’t get more than 20 stacks of buff so there’s no reason to stay there.

- When you get out from Death Realm, run immediately to melee camp and stay there for all the Death Throes casts while you have the buff: you will not be hit by missiles and your Defying Death buff absorbs 1m of damage done.

 

[ele/enh]

 

Derienn: Frozen Power talent and the Glyph of Frost Shock were really useful for holding Salivating Bloodthirsters in place on Kilrogg.

 

Gorefiend (top)

 

[Resto] [Heroic]

 

Well, you should use all the CDs during Feast of Souls. No need to use them all together, start from HTT - it would heal people while they are gathering up. Use both SLT during other healers CDs - it will help to redistribute the healing.

If you need to channel a pot, do it right after the end of Feast of Souls but I would advise for a regular mana potion for this fight - too much stuff could disturb your channeling.

Inside the stomach:

You definitely should heal the Tortured Essences on Heroic. And it’s not because of their AoE but because of the raid wide Slow debuff. Too much health they’ll have > more time to kill them > people are slowed and can’t run out with Touch of Doom or kite the Constructs.

I was using VuhDo target frame to heal them but it started to bug and disappear in the start of the fight so I wrote a macro that targets an add, put a raid mark on them, cast Riptide and two Healing Waves. It’s enough to heal the add to full or at least to 90% HP.

Normally you should be able to heal 3 Essences and HoT the 4th.

Macro:

/target Tortured Essence

/script if GetRaidTargetIndex("target")==nil then SetRaidTargetIcon("target",1) end

/castsequence reset=1.8 Riptide, Healing Wave, Healing Wave

 

 

Shadow-Lord Iskar (top)

 

[utility]

Your raid could benefit from a shaman grabbing the Eye on the start of the fight. Wolf + Unleashed speed buff could speed up the things and prevent the damage from Uncontrolled Radiance. It's not a 'must' - any class can grab the Eye with the speed buff but I would say that healers are optimal for this task - we have nothing to do on the start of the fight.

 

[Resto]

The only times to use our raid CDs are the Focused Blast casts. Drop SLT on the last seconds (it's a 12 sec cast so do not use SLT too early) and use HTT for the first Blast and Asc for the second.

Theoretically you can use a CD if things went ugly with Fel Chakram or Fel Bomb going off in raid but they are mistakes in handling the fight, so you shouldn't plan raid CDs for this kind of damage.

 

I would advise for healers to use Iskar Assist addon on this fight if handling Phantasmal Winds and Fel Bomb dispels only with Action Button is problematic for you.

Tick off everything in Options except of Phantasmal Winds and Fel Bomb debuffs.

 

Throw the Eye to another healer on 6 stacks of Radiance of Anzu debuff on Heroic (irrelevant on Normal).

 

No need to target heal people with Phantasmal Wounds debuff on Normal and Heroic - the damage is pretty trivial and is healed up mostly by HoTs and AoE healing.

 

Fel Lord Zakuun (top)

 

[Resto][Heroic]

The fight is very short (3-4 min) so you will have only one possibility to use your raid CDs.

Theoretically it's better to use a Holy Pala with AW or / and a Resto Druid with ToL or HotW during P2 (Disarmed) and to keep HTT and Asc for the last phase (P3: Enrage).

 

You have to direct heal Befouled targets - every stack of it absorbs about 100K healing on Heroic (about 300K total), so a couple of Riptided crit Healing Surges would be enough. Do not hesitate to use Healing Surge - it does some awesome crits for 100-125K HP and the fight is so short to go OOM.

 

 

Socrethar the Eternal (top)

 

[utility]

 

You can help with Exert Dominance, Shadow Word: Agony, Shadow Bolt Volley interrupts if your raid doesn't have an assigned rotation.

 

Bethie: Grounding totem works against Shadow Bolt Volley on Socrethar.

 

[Resto][Heroic]

 

Nothing specific we can do during P1 - it's all about damage mitigation on tanks - not a Resto Shamans call.

 

During P2 we should use all our CDs (SLT, HTT, Asc) for Apocalypse casts. I found out that the first Apocalypse damage is pretty trivial and could be healed with SLT and normal healing only. If it's the same for you, keep HTT for the later ones.

 

Dispels: use a Glyph of Cleansing Waters for this fight. Do not dispel Shadow Word: Agony immediately if its target doesn't have the Gift of the Man'ari debuff. Ask dps and interrupt by yourself Shadow Word: Agony casts if too many of them are going off because in this case you will just burn all your mana for dispels and go OOM.

 

Xhul'horac (top)

 

[utility]

During P2 and P3, Grounding Totem is perfect to soak Void Surge cast with subsequent Creeping Void patch.

A WeakAura to track the Void Surge cast:

dSJadaGAqrTEaP2fK02uKzcimxqjZwOBcO0TvOtd1oLI9I2nvTFj6NakggvACqWLfTmfmyPYWvkheuPNQ6ye15isleISuavTyjOLRKhcQyvuXJLspNWFbyQsAYcMoLlcQY0KQEMI66KSriQTkb2Ss12LqFeuWLaK8zG(oOiJeuOXcOYOHqJhuvNeuQBbjUgK68eXkbeDyq(nPMYSYpYh4dSYVR92XaDYMEx(wDuVyLnde5PEPsNLh6DN7hCLIgn3rb9eBMzJln(awSfHKut4B8oooLDfOXHYURwGzzNJJtjq644u2buBLDooo8qTgw7fSYlmOLXkVqR8b(Rv(aS(wgJcy9m3WEqyasKALaaYzeqJUieQAqq(GgWykeqGjlKpObi0kFGirJgpuiGnS2dfbylmiyUeSsJhMvcdVlHhoWRPcpGNhh4boevXYouk7kqJdLDxTat(vcI1(QKTK3s4B8WeoyisKNqyYvk6zxP9YsNLrpWDu6759QX6cdcMlbBK5rmXGiAez0tdsr72ppn5IwEEabUJs)eVeGzFxKgBKNC5JAOaR8gum9gR8JQOHzLgnELibK(wTYB5chis8krcOncjeej(fuBYk)OkAywPrJp9TAL3YfoWlJGRlFBesiyLxG9GXK)WiCbw42qJpG33XTQOjHv(rv0WSsJg)shtw5hvrdZknA04TfgemxSYBs2s(Sy6nEXwgJWoWlJW088mVYNftVXB4XmWhulidR98d8zX0B8WrpwiKv2beAqELibi2Yye2bIeVsKaeA1QnvESXc5fA1QnvESXVfHKKlEp0yYxGghk7UAbM0OXl4hqvgvxuLh4lYg5(bzAKa 

 

[Resto][Heroic]

Use your raid CDs in the last phase (P4: Tearing Apart). The damage here is very high and getting higher during the phase because of Overwhelming Chaos debuff. The raid will take healvy damage from its AoE part every 10 sec., so it would be the best time for the raid CDs.

 

Tyrant Velhari (top)

 

Mannoroth (top)

 

[utility]

 

Bethie: Grounding totem works against imps on Mannoroth.

 

Archimonde (top)

[Derienn 5]

[DPS] Frozen Power talent and the Glyph of Frost Shock were really useful for holding Salivating Bloodthirsters in place on Kilrogg.

[Pandacho 286]

Frozen Power talent and the glyph of Frost Shock were really useful for holding Salivating Bloodthirsters in place on Kilrogg.

Can you please add a spec tag  ([enh] / [ele] / [resto] ) to the post? I assume that you are talking about Enh but still ^^

[Bethie 0]

Grounding totems works against Shadow Bolt Volley on Socrethar encounter and against imps on Mannoroth.

[Feldar 0]

Resto Shaman - Tyrant Velhari:

 

want to cheese tyrant velhari like all the top rankings do? 

Go full healing tide totem spec. Take primal elementalist, Elemental mastery, Strong on use trinket.

Pop everything including ascendance at ~ 43% (or a few % earlier if that will give you bloodlust/trinket/ring buff) Congratz you do 100k+ hps that fight

 

Maybe ancestral guidance and cloudburst totem will increase the healing done even more, conductivity probably to good though for this fight.

 

DO NOT TRY THIS DURING PROGRESS

Edited July 11, 2015 by Feldar

[Pandacho 286]

Resto Shaman - Tyrant Velhari:

 

want to cheese tyrant velhari like all the top rankings do? 

Go full healing tide totem spec. Take primal elementalist, Elemental mastery, Strong on use trinket.

Pop everything including ascendance at ~ 43% (or a few % earlier if that will give you bloodlust/trinket/ring buff) Congratz you do 100k+ hps that fight

 

Maybe ancestral guidance and cloudburst totem will increase the healing done even more, conductivity probably to good though for this fight.

 

DO NOT TRY THIS DURING PROGRESS

 

I really would like to ask you, guys, to post helpful comments in terms of right healing and utility usage. 

You can definitely try whatever you want with your raid group if they are fine with it, but

we are not here to teach people how to cheat healing meters but to help to make right choices in healing approach.

Pumping meters at any costs is not helpful to your raid and to your fellow healers by any means but only satisfies personal ego.

Thanks in advance.

[Feldar 0]

Sorry @pandacho, you're right I shouldn't have posted that

Let me give some actual usefull tips:

 

Resto Shaman:

 

The Resto Shaman talents/glyphs in general are very standard.

level 15: Astral Shift

level 30: Earthgrab totem is the least useless talent here for HFC

level 45: Totemic projection

level 60: Echo of Elements (unless you wont use your 2 spirit link totems, go AS)

level 75: Rushing Streams

level 90: Elemental Blast

level 100: High Tide

 

Glyphs:

Glyph of healing stream

Glyph of healing wave
Glyph of Spiritwalker's Focus

 

Specific fights where it might be good to change talents/glyphs and uncommon abilities:

 

Iron Reaver:

Glyph "Chaining" at this fight everyone is spread and glyph of chaining will improve the effectivity of your chain healing a lot. 

 

Drop Echo of Elements, Spirit link totem isn't very usefull this fight. Take Elemental mastery if you think your healing tide needs a little bit more output during poundings, or take Ancestral Swiftness if you prefer the overal output more.

Take Call of Elements just to have a few extra healing stream totems during this fight.

 

Hellfire High Council:

Conductivity is a good option if your raid stacks up and barely moves during that fight. Rushing streams will still be close.
Do you have mana problems, take conductivity. You got mana to spare? take rushing streams and cast healing rain a bit more often.

 

Killrog Deadeye:

If your guild is doing 2 groups into the "Vision of Death" make sure to convince your raidleader that you, the Resto Shaman, should be in 1 of those groups. They are arguably the best healer to get that buff and are great at keeping the people alive in there.

 

Ancestral Guidance: If you are struggling to keep the 3 man group alive during visions of death for the full duration then this is the perfect talent for you. It heals 3 people and the cooldown lines up perfectly with the Vision of Death rotation. If you ever wanted to use this talent, this is the fight.

 

Gorefiend:

Primal Elementalist: This fight is mostly about the "Feast of Souls" phases. You will get 2 Feast phases of 1 minute each, perfect for this talent!

 

Unleashed Fury: Might be an option if you are struggling with healing the adds inside his belly, Tried it but for me it felt like overkill 1 shot healing those adds. Maybe more important at mythic, well see.

 

Tyrant Velhari:

Conductivity: Very usefull as the melee is always stacked up and later on the people that get the "Font of Corruption" debuff as well. In p2 people drop really low and you want to keep everyone full HP wich IMO healing rain does a really good job at.

 

Cloudburst Totem: Honestly i haven't tried this yet, hell i havn't even tried this talent in ages. But it sounds incredibly good in p2 to me. Pop a cloudburst totem 10-15 seconds before "Edict of Condemnation" is going to hit. The healing saved in the cloudburst totem will stack up incredibly fast because of the healing with your mastery. Release it, or click the totem away when the damage from edict comes in. This might very well save you a big healing cooldown like Spirit link or Barrier.

This is just a theory though.

 

Xhul'horac + Archimonde

Capacitor Totem: Pop a cap totem 2 seconds before the imps are about to spawn, place it in the middle of the imps with Totemic projection for some nice CC on the adds. For both bosses you can do it once every 2 imp spawns.

 

 

PS: won't it be a little bit messy having 3 specs in 1 post? 

Edited July 12, 2015 by Feldar

[demonardvark 556]

Enhancement: On kromrok when the hands are about to be cast run to the outside of your raid group and face in. You can spread your flame shock to most of the hands and fire nova for huge dps gains (and freeing your raid group sooner). 

[Archigos 0]

Grounding totems works against Shadow Bolt Volley on Socrethar encounter and against imps on Mannoroth.

I also use this on HF Assault when we get a meta or God forbid a double meta since it can absorb the entire volley.

[Pandacho 286]

Updated for first 6 bosses.

[Aerox 0]

Off the top of my head:

 

[ele]  Iskar

 

Glyph of Chain lightning works really well with the add pack during his flight phase. All of the lightning shield charges will give you a strong combo of AoE and single target damage.

 

 

[ele] Kilrogg

 

Taking the Glyph of Frost Shock and the Frozen power talent can help you lock down the Bloodthirsters (especially if both appear at the same time).

 

[ele] Gorefiend

 

Glyph of Frost Shock and or Frozen power can help you control the skeleton spirits in his stomach. Outside the stomach it can still slow them. Thunderstorm can also knock them back while inside.

 

You can take Elemental Mastery and the Elemental totem talents to help maximize your burst during the "Feast of Souls" phase.

 

Hope this helps!

 

[Kelthory 0]

Hey Guys, found this https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nx4Wgz9DkZGS4FJvLsX2kk_A-MFtynNOXeLk2vn5rbo/edit?pli=1at the world wide web. Its useful or crap? 

Edited September 7, 2015 by Kelthory

[Sausejfingrs 0]

you should run windwalk totem on gorefiend as it is really good for dealing with the tortured essences that get through and is op for mythic as not only does it remove the slow debuff but for some reason it also negates the damage of the shadow bolts.

 

Id also change your macro on gorefiend to be healing surge over healing wave as you shouldnt take any damage inside and you mastery will give you stronger heals with surge, this is what makes shamans the strongest class in this phased zone than any other healer.

 

On Fel lord, I run double links for the disarmed phase (mythic) which i use for the seeds. seed (1) link, followed almost directly by HTT which should line up almost perfectly with the second seed. link no.2 is for seed (3) with ascendance.

 

On Archi (Heroic) I like to run double link again as it can be handy to make up for double shadowfel bursts mistakes if people dont spread and it can also be used for shackled torment and it allows for all 3 shackles to break simultaneously, maximising all hps and dps alike

[Skewes 0]

About Tyrant (as it's empty up there)

 

At P1 I usually drop an HTT for the first Tempest, as it helps getting everyone topped and there's time enough for HTT cooldown until the last phase when I really need it.

 

Conductivity helps a lot since everyone is stacked almost all fight, and I try to sustain it with Healing Wave to save some mana.

 

P2 is, for me, stacked with everyone else, using SLT to help on the Big Hammer thing and unexpected damages, and if it's too ugly, I pop an ascendance...what's really strong since it's everyone stacked on rain.

 

IMO, Shamans have to help interrupting Add casts so life's won't be locked down too low.

 

Also, pay close attention to health bars when they are locked low, because you won't want to spend unnecessary chain heals here. I usually try only to Riptide anyone who takes damage and maybe keep a Riptide on tanks too, since they're always taking the damage. 

 

Last phase:

Glyph of Spiritwalker's Grace will help a lot on last phase.

That's where I use my HTT.

Last phase for me is putting the rain ahead of the tanks and DPS's (since they're walking through the room, usually following a pre-defined path)

 

Spiritwalkers is specially usefull if I still have ascendance, since I will have to be running a lot and repositioning the rain and also spamming chain heals, after some seconds inside this phase, when I feel the healths are going down, is where I drop HTT to help support everyones life. SLT is hard to position here, but I try to if I have some on cooldown using the totem placement talent.

 

As I see it, Tyr needs heavy healing at the end, the rest is pretty easy with a good comp.

 

Good luck! :)