Protectors of the Endless Detailed Strategy Guide (Heroic Mode included)
Table of Contents
Introduction
This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the encounter with Protectors of the Endless in Terrace of Endless Spring. It is targeted at anyone who desires to understand the fight mechanics.
This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.1.2.
The Protectors of the Endless is the first encounter in the Terrace of Endless Spring. This is a council-type fight, where you will have to face three different bosses, simultaneously. As each boss is killed, the other bosses gain new abilities. Therefore, the order in which you kill the bosses will affect your strategy.
The encounter is very demanding for your healers, but also places considerably strain on all raid members to avoid mechanics properly.
General Information
Health Values
Difficulty | Protector Kaolan | Elder Regail | Elder Asani | Minion of Fear |
---|---|---|---|---|
10-man | 93M | 60M | 60M | Heroic-only |
10-man Heroic | 160M | 91M | 91M | 1.26M |
25-man | 279M | 181M | 181M | Heroic-only |
25-man Heroic | 483M | 274M | 274M | 3.8M |
LFR | 157M | 102M | 102M | Heroic-only |
Enrage Timer
The enrage timer for this encounter is 8 minutes and 30 seconds.
Raid Composition
Difficulty | Tanks | Healers | DPS |
---|---|---|---|
10-man | 2 | 2-3 | 5-6 |
10-man Heroic | 2 | 2-3 | 5-6 |
25-man | 2 | 5-7 | 16-18 |
25-man Heroic | 2 | 5-6 | 17-18 |
LFR | 2 | 5-6 | 17-18 |
Loot
The loot of the Protectors of the Endless features a hard mode that is different than Heroic mode and that consists in killing the three bosses in a specific order. Doing so will cause the bosses to drop items with the same name, but with better stats. The items are tagged Elite in Normal mode and Heroic Elite in Heroic mode.
Armor
Item Name | Armor | Slot | Main Stats |
---|---|---|---|
Cuffs of the Corrupted Waters (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Cloth | Wrists | Intellect/Spirit |
Legguards of Failing Purification (Elite, Heroic Elite) | Leather | Legs | Agility |
Asani's Uncleansed Sandals (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Leather | Feet | Intellect |
Lightning Prisoner's Boots (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Feet | Intellect | |
Waterborne Shoulderguards (Elite, Heroic Elite) | Shoulders | Agility | |
Casque of Expelled Corruption (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Plate | Head | Intellect |
Deepwater Greatboots (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Plate | Feet | Strength/Parry |
Bracers of Defiled Earth (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Plate | Wrists | Strength/Mastery |
Weapon
Item Name | Type | Main Stats |
---|---|---|
Regail's Crackling Dagger (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Dagger | Intellect |
Ring
Item Name | Type | Main Stats |
---|---|---|
Cloak of Overwhelming Corruption (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Cloak | Intellect |
Watersoul Signet (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Finger | Intellect/Spirit |
Regail's Band of the Endless (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Finger | Agility |
Shackle of Eversparks (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Amulet | Strength |
Kaolan's Withering Necklace (LFR, Heroic, Elite, Heroic Elite) | Amulet | Strength/Dodge |
Overview of the Fight
The Protectors of the Endless encounter is a council-type encounter, during which you will fight three jinyu bosses: Protector Kaolan, Elder Regail, and Elder Asani. Theoretically (from the point of view of the in-game Dungeon Journal), this is a single phase fight. However, for the purpose of this guide, we will treat it as a three-phase encounter.
Phase One starts when the encounter is engaged, at which time your raid will face all three bosses at the same time. While in this state, the bosses use a limited number of abilities. They have individual health pools, and can all be damaged and killed. This phase ends when one of the bosses is killed.
Phase Two begins when there are only two bosses left alive. This causes the remaining two bosses to be healed to full health. Moreover, they each gain a new ability (which they use in addition to the abilities that they were using up to that point), and their damage is increased by 25% for the remainder of the encounter. This phase ends when one of the remaining two bosses is killed.
Phase Three begins when there is only one boss left alive. This causes the last remaining boss to once again be healed to full health. He also gains yet another ability, and gains another 25% increase to his damage done.
The order in which you kill the bosses is up to you. This means that there are three different possibilities for Phase Two, and three different possibilities for Phase Three. We will cover all of these possibilities in the guide.
A Few Words on Kill Orders
The order in which you kill the bosses will determine the difficulty of the encounter, and possibly the loot that you get when defeating the encounter (killing Protector Kaolan should yield superior loot).
Also, in order to complete the achievement related to the encounter, Power Overwhelming (detailed in a specific section), you will need to defeat the encounter 3 times (at least), each time killing a different boss last.
In the table below, we will say a few words about each of the kill orders.
Kill Order(s) | Comments |
---|---|
|
Killing the bosses in this order is the easiest way to complete the encounter. |
|
This kill order is the easiest way to complete the Elder Regail defeated last objective of Power Overwhelming. |
|
This kill order will possibly yield better loot (as we believe that killing Kaolan last gives access to the Elite loot of this encounter) and will help you complete the Protector Kaolan defeated last objective of Power Overwhelming. |
|
There is never really a good reason to kill Asani first, since this boss is overall less problematic than both of the other two in any circumstance. Therefore, you should avoid this kill order. |
|
This kill order makes the encounter harder (because you Kaolan is not killed last), but has no benefit (such as better loot), because the easiest boss is killed last. |
|
This kill order is the most difficult. Unless it turns out that it yields even better loot than the Elder Regail, Elder Asani, and Protector Kaolan kill order, there should be no reason to use it. |
We would make the mention that, even though killing Protector Kaolan last is the hardest way to tackle the encounter, it is entirely accessible and not particularly difficult.
Phase One: Three Bosses
During this phase, you will have to fight all three bosses at once. The phase ends when one of them is killed.
Abilities
We will present you with a short overview of the abilities you need to deal with during this phase, before detailing them in the subsequent sections.
Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Touch of Sha | Protector Kaolan | Raid-wide damaging DoT that cannot be dispelled and lasts until Kaolan dies |
Lightning Bolt | Elder Regail | Interruptible single-target nuke |
Lightning Prison | Elder Regail | Dispellable debuff that stuns random targets and damages players within 7 yards of them |
Water Bolt | Elder Asani | Interruptible nuke that targets random raid members and deals damage in a 3-yard radius |
Cleansing Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of water that slowly descends at the location of a boss, healing them when it reaches the ground |
Protector Kaolan
In addition to his quite powerful melee attacks, Protector Kaolan uses a single ability during Phase One.
Touch of Sha is a debuff that Kaolan regularly places on a random raid member. This is a DoT that deals a moderate amount of Shadow damage to the target every 3 seconds. The peculiarity of this ability is that the debuffs cannot be dispelled, and last until Kaolan is killed. Kaolan casts the debuff roughly every 20 seconds. If Kaolan lives long enough, all of your raid members will be affected by the debuff.
Elder Regail
Lightning Bolt is regularly cast by Elder Regail at his current target. This is an interruptible spell that deals a large amount of Nature damage.
Lightning Prison is Regail's other ability. Regail places a debuff on a number of random raid members (2 in 10-man and 5 in 25-man). The debuff stuns the players, and deals a moderate amount of Nature damage every second to them and any other players within 7 yards of them, for 8 seconds. The debuff can be dispelled, freeing the players and ceasing the damage.
Elder Asani
Water Bolt is regularly cast by Elder Asani at a random player's location. It deals a high amount of Nature damage to all players within 3 yards of the point of impact. This spell is interruptible.
Cleansing Waters is Asani's other ability. This summons a globe of water at the location of one of the protectors. The globe slowly falls to the ground, and when it finally reaches the ground, it creates a small healing zone that heals all bosses within 3 yards of it by 5% of their maximum health every second. It also causes the bosses to receive 50% increased healing for 30 seconds. This second effect can be dispelled.
Strategy
The strategy for this phase can be summarised relatively easily.
- Have one tank take Protector Kaolan, and the other tank take Elder Regail and Elder Asani.
- DPS and kill the desired boss.
- Interrupt Water Bolt and Lightning Bolt whenever possible.
- Stay spread out to avoid damage splashing from Water Bolt or Lightning Prison.
- Dispel players affected by Lightning Prison.
- If Elder Asani ever summons a globe of Cleansing Waters at the location of one of the bosses, move that boss away from the orb.
- Heal the damage that raid members are taking from Touch of Sha.
While this list is rather comprehensive, we will go into some more details in the sections below.
We remind you that once the first boss is killed, the other two will be healed to full health. Therefore, there is no reason to try to cleave or multi DoT the bosses.
Positioning
Throughout the fight, your raid will want to be spread out at least 7 yards apart. Doing so will minimise the number of players hit by any Water Bolts that go uninterrupted, as well as the number of players that take damage from Lightning Prison.
Dealing with Abilities
Every 20 seconds, Protector Kaolan will place Touch of Sha on a random raid member. Eventually, if Kaolan lives long enough, this debuff will affect your entire raid. This constitutes the source of a rather large amount of damage that the raid takes.
There is nothing to be done about this ability, and your healers must simply be prepared to heal the damage.
In addition to this, the healers must also be prepared to dispel any players affected by Lightning Prison.
The tanks must be prepared to move the bosses away from any globes of Cleansing Waters that spawn near them. It is important to keep in mind that, due to their frequent spell casting, it is not easy to move Elder Regail and Elder Asani. They will need to be interrupted in order for them to be guaranteed to move with the tank.
Finally, it is important to interrupt as many Water Bolts and Lightning Bolts as possible. Aside from these two spells, Regail and Asani do not melee very often, so having both of them on a single tank should not pose problems.
Phase Two: Two Bosses
When the first boss is killed, the remaining two bosses are healed to full health, and their damage done is permanently increased by 25%. In addition to this, the remaining two bosses gain additional abilities.
Abilities
We will present you with a short overview of the abilities that bosses gain in this phase, before detailing them in the subsequent sections.
Phase Two Extra Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Defiled Ground | Protector Kaolan | Damaging void zone spawned at the location of a random raid member, which persists until the end of the fight |
Lightning Storm | Elder Regail | Ground-AoE that affects several areas of the floor in succession, dealing very high damage |
Corrupted Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of that buffs the bosses' melee and casting speed by 50% while alive. It can be killed, and doing so buffs raid members within 15 yards with 25% increased melee and casting speed for 20 seconds. |
Elder Regail
Lightning Storm is Elder Regail's new ability. Roughly every 50 seconds, Regail creates 5 waves of lightning strikes. The first wave strikes at Elder Regail's location, and then successive waves strike in a ring around him at 20, 40, 60, and 80 yards. Each strike deals a very high amount of Nature damage to all players within 10 yards of the Lightning Storm's impact.
Elder Asani
Corrupted Waters is Elder Asani's new ability. This causes him to spawn a globe of Corrupted Waters. The globe can be attacked and killed. While the globe is alive, it buffs all the bosses alive at that point, granting them 50% increased melee and casting speed. When the globe is killed, all players within 15 yards of it gain a buff called Purified, which grants 25% increased melee, ranged and spell casting speed for 20 seconds.
Protector Kaolan
Defiled Ground is Protector Kaolan's new ability. This causes him to place a small void zone at the location of a random raid member. The void zone persists until the end of the encounter, and deals a high amount of Shadow damage every second to any players standing in it. Standing in the Defiled Ground also stacks a debuff on players, which increases the damage that they take from the void zone by 10% per stack, lasting for 75 seconds.
Strategy for Regail and Asani
We remind you that during this phase, you will have to deal with the following abilities.
Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Lightning Bolt | Elder Regail | Interruptible single-target nuke |
Lightning Prison | Elder Regail | Dispellable debuff that stuns random targets and damages players within 7 yards of them |
Lightning Storm | Elder Regail | Ground-AoE that affects several areas of the floor in succession, dealing very high damage |
Water Bolt | Elder Asani | Interruptible nuke that targets random raid members and deals damage in a 3-yard radius |
Cleansing Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of water that slowly descends at the location of a boss, healing them when it reaches the ground |
Corrupted Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of that buffs the bosses' melee and casting speed by 50% while alive. It can be killed, and doing so buffs raid members within 15 yards with 25% increased melee and casting speed for 20 seconds. |
Reduced Raid Damage
If you have chosen to leave Elder Regail and Elder Asani alive, then the debuff that Protector Kaolan applied to your raid members during Phase One will have disappeared on his death, greatly reducing the amount of raid damage taken.
Positioning
Your raid must remain spread out in order to minimise the damage taken from Water Bolt and Lightning Prison.
Additionally, everyone should attempt to position themselves at such distances from Elder Regail as to allow quick movement between the areas on the ground affected by Lightning Storm. This is because the only way to avoid it is to be close to a border between two zones (such as the 20-yard one and the 40-yard one), and to quickly move back and forward to avoid the damage.
Other Concerns
You will still need to dispel players affected by Lightning Prison, and interrupt as many spell casts of Water Bolt and Lightning Bolt as possible.
In addition to this, your raid will need to deal with the globes of Corrupted Waters. When a globe spawns, all the players who wish to benefit from the Purified buff (so, everyone in your raid, in theory), should move within 15 yards of the globe. During this time, DPS players should bring the globe to low health, and it should be killed as soon as everyone is close enough to benefit from it. As soon as the globe is dead, you should spread back out. Watching boss mod timers will help to avoid stacking up right when Lightning Prison is being cast.
Keep in mind also that, while the globe of Corrupted Waters is active, the bosses will attack and cast faster (also making their spells difficult to interrupt).
Finally, you must remember to move the bosses away from the globes of Cleansing Waters that Asani spawns.
Kill Order
You should kill Regail, and leave Asani alive for the next phase. This will make Phase Three easy, since you will benefit from the Purified buff during it, making it go by much faster.
Alternatively, you can kill Asani, and leave Regail alive for the next phase. If you are doing this, you should bring Asani to low health and wait with killing him until he spawns a new globe of Corrupted Waters. Doing so will allow your raid to benefit from the Purified buff for a full 20 seconds during Phase Three of the fight, arguably the most difficult phase. This order is required if you are trying to complete the step of the Power Overwhelming achievement that requires you kill Regail last.
Strategy for Kaolan and Asani
We remind you that during this phase you will have to deal with the following abilities.
Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Touch of Sha | Protector Kaolan | Raid-wide damaging DoT that cannot be dispelled and lasts until Kaolan dies |
Defiled Ground | Protector Kaolan | Damaging void zone spawned at the location of a random raid member, which persists until the end of the fight |
Water Bolt | Elder Asani | Interruptible nuke that targets random raid members and deals damage in a 3-yard radius |
Cleansing Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of water that slowly descends at the location of a boss, healing them when it reaches the ground |
Corrupted Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of that buffs the bosses' melee and casting speed by 50% while alive. It can be killed, and doing so buffs raid members within 15 yards with 25% increased melee and casting speed for 20 seconds. |
Raid Damage from Touch of Sha
With this combination of bosses, raid damage will be very high. By this point of the fight, most raid members will already have been affected by Touch of Sha, and the damage that Kaolan deals with this ability will have been increased by 25%.
The Touch of Sha ability does not stack on raid members, so once everyone in the raid is afflicted by the debuff, new casts of the ability essentially stop doing anything.
Positioning
Your raid must remain spread out during this phase, to minimise the damage taken from Water Bolt. Your raid should also try to be in roughly the same area of the room, so that the void zones from Defiled Ground do not cover too much space.
Dealing with Abilities
In addition to the high raid damage, your raid will have to contend with Protector Kaolan's other ability, Defiled Ground. This acts as a soft enrage mechanics, since the void zones created by Kaolan in this way last indefinitely, meaning that your raid will eventually run out of room. Keep in mind, however, that the room where you fight the bosses is enormous, so it is unlikely that this will prove to be a real problem.
Your raid will need to deal with the globes of Corrupted Waters. When a globe spawns, all the players who wish to benefit from the Purified buff (so, everyone in your raid, in theory), should move within 15 yards of the globe. During this time, DPS players should bring the globe to low health, and it should be killed as soon as everyone is close enough to benefit from it. As soon as the globe is dead, you should spread back out.
Keep in mind also that, while the globe of Corrupted Waters is active, the bosses will attack and cast faster (also making their spells difficult to interrupt).
Finally, you must remember to move the bosses away from the globes of Cleansing Waters that Asani spawns.
Kill Order
With this combination of bosses you should always be killing Elder Asani, and leaving Protector Kaolan alive for the last phase. You should bring Asani to low health and wait with killing him until he spawns a new globe of Corrupted Waters. Doing so will allow your raid to benefit from the Purified buff for a full 20 seconds during Phase Three of the fight, arguably the most difficult phase.
Strategy for Regail and Kaolan
As we have mentioned before, this combination should not be attempted. The reason for this is that you should never kill Elder Asani first, because the increased damage your raid gains from the Purified buff that he provides is very useful.
Should you wish to kill Protector Kaolan last, you should begin by killing Elder Regail, and should you wish you kill Elder Regail first, you should begin by killing Protector Kaolan.
Phase Three: One Boss
Phase Three begins when you have killed one of the two bosses present in Phase Two. The remaining boss will be healed to full health and he will gain another 25% increase to his damage done, until the end of the fight.
Abilities
We will present you with a short overview of the abilities you need to deal with during this phase, before detailing them in the subsequent sections.
Phase Three Extra Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Overwhelming Corruption |
|
A stacking raid debuff that deals increasing Shadow damage, lasting until the end of the fight |
Expel Corruption | Protector Kaolan | Orb spawned by Kaolan at his location, which deals AoE damage in a 30-yard radius, and persists until the end of the fight |
Elders Asani and Regail
Overwhelming Corruption is Elder Asani and Elder Regail's new ability.
Overwhelming Corruption deals Shadow damage to all raid members every 3 seconds, each time applying a stacking debuff that increases the damage taken from Overwhelming Corruption by 5%.
Protector Kaolan
Expel Corruption is Protector Kaolan's new ability. Every 40 seconds, Kaolan will summon an orb at his location, which pulses AoE Shadow damage every 1.5 seconds in a 30-yard radius, and lasts until the end of the fight. The damage is highest at the location of the orb, and it decreases the farther out within the 30-yard area players are. Kaolan can simply be moved away from the orb to avoid the damage entirely.
Strategy for Regail
Before detailing the strategy, we would like to remind you of the abilities that Elder Regail uses during this phase.
Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Lightning Bolt | Elder Regail | Interruptible single-target nuke |
Lightning Prison | Elder Regail | Dispellable debuff that stuns random targets and damages players within 7 yards of them |
Lightning Storm | Elder Regail | Ground-AoE that affects several areas of the floor in succession, dealing very high damage |
Overwhelming Corruption | Elder Regail | A stacking raid debuff that deals increasing Shadow damage, lasting until the end of the fight |
Lightning Bolt should still be interrupted whenever possible.
Your raid should remain spread out, so as to minimise the damage taken from Lightning Prison, and the debuffs from Lightning Prison should be dispelled.
You will still have to avoid the damage from Lightning Storm (even more so than before, since its increased damage makes it absolutely lethal).
Your healers will have to be prepared for the increasing raid damage from Overwhelming Corruption.
This is a standard burn phase during which you should use all offensive and defensive cooldowns at your disposal to finish off the boss before the raid damage overwhelms your healers.
Strategy for Asani
Before detailing the strategy, we would like to remind you of the abilities that Elder Asani uses during this phase.
Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Water Bolt | Elder Asani | Interruptible nuke that targets random raid members and deals damage in a 3-yard radius |
Cleansing Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of water that slowly descends at the location of a boss, healing them when it reaches the ground |
Corrupted Waters | Elder Asani | A globe of that buffs the bosses' melee and casting speed by 50% while alive. It can be killed, and doing so buffs raid members within 15 yards with 25% increased melee and casting speed for 20 seconds. |
Overwhelming Corruption | Elder Asani | A stacking raid debuff that deals increasing Shadow damage, lasting until the end of the fight |
Water Bolt still requires your raid to remain mildly spread out. It should be interrupted whenever possible.
The globes of Corrupted Waters and Cleansing Waters should be dealt with in the same way as up to this point, by killing the globe of Corrupted Waters, and moving the boss away from the globe of Cleansing Waters respectively.
As with Regail, the healers will simply have to heal the increasing raid damage that the raid will take from Overwhelming Corruption.
Strategy for Kaolan
Before detailing the strategy, we would like to remind you of the abilities that Protector Kaolan uses during this phase.
Ability | Boss | Description |
---|---|---|
Touch of Sha | Protector Kaolan | Raid-wide damaging DoT that cannot be dispelled and lasts until Kaolan dies |
Defiled Ground | Protector Kaolan | Damaging void zone spawned at the location of a random raid member, which persists until the end of the fight |
Expel Corruption | Protector Kaolan | Orb spawned by Kaolan at his location, which deals AoE damage in a 30-yard radius, and persists until the end of the fight |
Your entire raid will now be taking rather brutal amounts of raid damage every 3 seconds from the Touch of Sha debuff.
Additionally, the space you have to work with will be ever-decreasing due to the increasing number of Defiled Ground void zones.
Finally, due to Expel Corruption, more and more of the platform will be covered in damaging areas, reducing the amount of space you have as the phase goes on.
As with the other bosses, this is a DPS burn phase that you should save all your cooldowns for.
When to Use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp
We recommend using Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp during Phase Three. This will be the most taxing phase of the fight, regardless of which of the three bosses you end up leaving alive.
Learning the Fight
Depending on which kill order you are progressing on, your raid will have certain abilities that they do not have to contend with at all.
The most common situation will be getting used to each boss' Phase One abilities, and with the abilities of Elder Regail and Elder Asani during Phases Two and Three.
Phase One will present you with relatively familiar mechanics, and as long as your raid is spread out and is able to interrupt Lightning Bolt and Water Bolt often, this phase should be easy to comprehend. The exact tuning of the Touch of Sha ability, and your raid's overall healing will determine the difficulty of the phase.
Phase Two is where things get more complicated, and we believe the main challenge for your raid to overcome will be properly avoiding Lightning Storm. Your raid members will have to become accustomed to where the borders between the affected areas of this ability are, and stand next to them, which makes avoiding the damage quite trivial.
Phase Three abilities, as well as Kaolan's Touch of Sha (should he be kept alive for longer) are simply throughput-checking mechanics, where there is not much to learn.
Achievement: Power Overwhelming
The Power Overwhelming achievement is part of the Glory of the Pandaria Raider meta achievement. The achievement requires that you defeat the encounter at least three times, in such a way that each of the three protectors is killed last. In other words, you must defeat the encounter on its easy, medium, and hard combinations.
We recommend the following kill orders for achieving this.
- Easy: Protector Kaolan, Elder Regail, Elder Asani.
- Medium: Protector Kaolan, Elder Asani, Elder Regail.
- Hard: Elder Regail, Elder Asani, Protector Kaolan.
Regarding the hard combination, we advise killing Regail first so that you can benefit longer from the Purified buff that Asani's Corrupted Waters provides. In fact, you should bring Asani to low health and kill him only after he has just spawned a globe of Corrupted Waters. This way, you will benefit from Purified for the first 20 seconds of the Kaolan phase.
Heroic Mode
The Heroic mode for the Protectors of the Endless encounter presents a single meaningful change from Normal mode, although this is enough to make the fight considerably harder.
Differences From Normal Mode
In addition to the increased damage from all boss abilities, and the increased health of the bosses, there is one additional ability.
Every 15 seconds (for the entire duration of the fight), an add called a Minion of Fear will spawn on Lei Shi's platform and move towards the lowest health boss. The add does nothing except walk to the boss. It can be slowed, and it has low health.
If a Minion of Fear is killed, the nearest 2 players in 10-man, and the nearest 5 players in 25-man receive a stack of a debuff called Corrupted Essence. This is a beneficial debuff, which increases the players' damage done by 10% per stack, for 2 minutes. If the debuff reaches 10 stacks on any player, it disappears and deals a large amount of raid-wide Shadow damage.
If a Minion of Fear reaches its target instead of being killed, that boss receives a stack of a buff called Greater Corrupted Essence, which increases their damage done by 10% per stack, for 3 minutes. If the buff reaches 5 stacks, it disappears and deals 700,000 Shadow damage to all players in the raid, and also horrifies them for 3 seconds (essentially incapacitating them). This is guaranteed to be a wipe.
Strategy
The strategy for the fight does not change from Normal mode, as far as dealing with the three bosses is concerned. However, your raid will have to deal with the Minions of Fear appropriately.
Each Minion of Fear must be killed before reaching its target. Moreover, you must be careful in controlling which players are closest to the Minion of Fear when it dies. There are several ways of doing this, and you are free to improvise, but we will propose what we deem to be the best strategy.
Essentially, you want to divide your raid into 5 groups. Ideally, the first 3 groups should contain your highest DPS players, in order (the very highest in group 1, and so on), while groups 4 and 5 will contain your healers and tanks. Then, you must employ a rotation for handling the debuff.
- Have Group 1 take 3 stacks of the debuff, by making sure that they are the closest ones to the dying Minions of Fear.
- Have Group 2 take 3 stacks of the debuff.
- Have Group 3 take 2 stacks of the debuff.
- Have Group 4 take 2 stacks of the debuff.
- Have Group 1 take another 2 stacks.
- Have Group 2 take another 2 stacks.
- Have Group 3 take another 3 stacks.
- Have Group 4 take another 3 stacks.
- From this point on, simply have Groups 1-4 take another 2 stacks each, until each player in these groups has 9 stacks. Then, have group 5 take 9 stacks, and by this point, your raid should have killed the bosses, or, if not, you can re-start the rotation.
The reason for doing it this way is to firstly ensure that your highest DPS players spend the most time possible with the highest possible DPS increase. Secondly, you always have to make sure that no group drops their stacks before they absolutely have to (so you can't just have Group 1 take 9 stacks, because that means they would have to drop all of them immediately since they have no way to refresh them).
The rest of the fight will go on exactly as in Normal mode.
As far as the order in which to kill the bosses, we advise an easy kill order of Kaolan > Regail > Asani for your first Heroic kills. If you wish to obtain the Heroic Elite gear, then you will have to kill Kaolan last. Nothing changes, in this case, as far as the Heroic strategy is concerned. Simply follow the usual Elite kill order, all while dealing with the Minions of Fear as we explained above.
Concluding Remarks
This concludes our raid guide for the Protectors of the Endless. We hope you have found our guide helpful, and we remind you that we always award great consideration to your feedback, both on our forums or by e-mail.
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