Socrethar the Eternal Detailed Strategy Guide (Heroic+Mythic Modes included)

Table of Contents

• +1. General Information
  • 1.1. LFR Difficulty
  • 1.2. Normal, Heroic, and Mythic Difficulty
  • 1.3. Enrage Timer
• 2. Overview of the Fight
• +3. Summing Things Up
  • 3.1. Tanks
  • 3.2. Healers
  • 3.3. DPS
  • 3.4. Everyone
• +4. Phase One
  • 4.1. Abilities
  • 4.2. Strategy
    • 4.2.1. Tanking and Positioning
    • 4.2.2. Handling the Soulbound Construct
• +5. Phase Two
  • 5.1. Abilities
    • 5.1.1. Soul of Socrethar
    • 5.1.2. Adds
    • 5.1.3. Soulbound Construct
  • 5.2. Strategy
    • 5.2.1. Managing the Soulbound Construct
    • 5.2.2. Overall Strategy
• 6. When to Use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp
• 7. When to use Legendary Rings
• 8. Learning the Fight
• +9. Mythic Mode
  • 9.1. Differences From Normal/Heroic Mode
  • 9.2. Strategy
    • 9.2.1. Positioning
• +10. Loot
  • 10.1. Armor
  • 10.2. Weapons
  • 10.3. Amulets, Cloaks, Rings, and Trinkets
• 11. Concluding Remarks
• 12. Changelog

Introduction

This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the encounter with Socrethar the Eternal in Hellfire Citadel. It is targeted at anyone who desires to understand the fight mechanics.

This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.2.

Socrethar the Eternal is a boss in the Hellfire Citadel raid instance. During the fight, your raid will have to handle a special unit that can sometimes be controlled by players. Positioning and controlling this unit correctly is key to your raid's success.

This guide is written and maintained by Azortharion, a top Hunter with 6 years of raiding experience, who currently raids in Ðanish Terrace, a world top 20 guild.

For the Looking for Raid version of the fight, we provide you with a special LFR guide. This will tell you everything you need to know in order to complete the encounter, in a quick and concise way.

This main part of this guide covers both the Normal and Heroic versions of the encounter, as far as mechanics and general strategy is concerned. The only difference between these two modes is found in the tuning, with Heroic being more difficult.

When we speak of extreme situations (such as the difficulty of a soft enrage timer, or damage from a certain source being too high to survive), we mostly refer to Heroic mode.

In addition to this, we have a specific Mythic mode section, where we present all the differences between Normal/Heroic and Mythic, as well as the strategy to defeat the Mythic encounter.

The hard enrage timer for this encounter is 10 minutes and 40 seconds.

Socrethar the Eternal is a two-phase encounter during which the two phases alternate over and over again until your raid finally kills the main boss of the encounter, the Soul of Socrethar.

During Phase One, your raid faces a single mob, the Soulbound Construct, and the Soul of Socrethar is not active during this part of the fight. Phase One ends when the Soulbound Construct is killed.

Phase Two begins when the Soulbound Construct dies. The Soul of Socrethar becomes active, and a number of adds also attack your raid. During this phase, a raid member can take control of the killed Soulbound Construct (which is then revived with part of its health restored), and use it against the enemy mobs. Phase Two ends when this player-controlled Soulbound Construct dies. At this point, Phase One restarts and the Soulbound Construct is fully restored and it once again becomes hostile.

This cycle continues until the Soul of Socrethar dies or your raid wipes. Since the Soul of Socrethar can only be attacked during Phase Two, this is the only time during which your raid can finish the fight.

In this section, we will very briefly summarise what the players belonging to each of the three roles have to do during this fight. This is by no means meant to provide sufficient information to master the encounter, and it is only supposed to give you a very rough idea of what to watch out for.

• During Phase One, perform a tank switch on the Soulbound Construct when the Shattered Defenses debuff stacks too high.
• During Phase Two, have one tank handle all of the mobs, while the other tank takes control of the Soulbound Construct when it is brought to 0 health. This tank must keep the Construct away from the Haunting Souls, and use the Construct's abilities as follows:
  • use Felblaze Charge void zones to obstruct the movement of the adds that spawn from portals;
  • use Volatile Fel Orb to damage the same adds;
  • use Fel Prisons to prevent Haunting Souls from making it to their targets;
  • spam Reverberating Blow on the Soul of Socrethar.
• On Mythic mode, watch out for the extra stacks of Shattered Defenses applied by Reverberating Blow. If your raid is not using 3 tanks, you will need to be very careful not to die.

• During Phase Two
  • Avoid being struck by fixating Haunting Souls, by letting a DPS intercept them for you.
  • Dispel Shadow Word: Agony from the Sargerei Shadowcaller's current tank when it reaches too many stacks.
• On Mythic mode, beware of the raid damage caused by Apocalyptic Felburst.

• During Phase One, if someone is caught in a Fel Prison, DPS down the Crystalline Fel Prison.
• During Phase Two, intercept Haunting Souls that are targeting healers.
• On Mythic mode, DPS the Voracious Soulstalkers.

• During Phase One
  • Avoid standing in Fel Prison void zones.
  • Avoid standing in Felblaze Charge void zones.
  • Rotate one tank and two melee DPS standing closest to the Soulbound Construct, every time Reverberating Blow is cast.
• During Phase Two
  • Interrupt Exert Dominance, Shadow Bolt Volley, and Shadow Word: Agony in that order of priority.
  • If targeted with Gift of the Man'ari, stand 8 yards away from others until the debuff expires.
• On Mythic mode
  • Move away from the spawning location of the Voracious Soulstalkers (unless you are specifically assigned to kite them).
  • Move away from the green marker that indicates where the Apocalyptic Felburst will land.

During Phase One, the raid has to face only the Soulbound Construct. When the Soulbound Construct dies, the phase ends and Phase Two begins.

Each time Phase Two ends, Phase One starts again, and it is identical each time. Since the Soul of Socrethar cannot be attacked during Phase One, the fight cannot be completed at this time (your raid must wait to enter Phase Two again for this to happen).

The Soulbound Construct uses a number of abilities against your raid.

• Reverberating Blow is a frontal cone ability that the Soulbound Construct occasionally uses. It deals heavy Physical damage and applies 3 stacks of Shattered Defenses to the 3 closest targets in front of it. Both the damage and the stacks of Shattered Defenses are split evenly among these 3 targets.
  • Shattered Defenses is a stacking debuff that increases damage taken from Reverberating Blow by 200% per stack for 45 seconds. Since tanks can be affected by this debuff, this ability requires a tank switch.
• Fel Prison is an ability that the Soulbound Construct occasionally uses. It drops a void zone on the ground at a random location near the raid. Any raid members that come in contact with the void zone are imprisoned for 30 seconds inside a Crystalline Fel Prison. During this time, they cannot perform any actions and their damage taken is reduced by 99%. The Crystalline Fel Prison is a stationary mob with no abilities which must be destroyed for the player trapped inside to be freed. If the Crystalline Fel Prison has not been destroyed after 30 seconds, the player inside will be freed anyway. The Fel Prison void zones expire after a given amount of time, but we are not yet sure exactly how long this is.
• Volatile Fel Orb is an ability that the Soulbound Construct regularly uses. It targets a player and summons an orb that chases them. If the orb reaches its target, or if it comes in contact with any other raid member, it detonates and deals moderate Fire damage in a 5-yard radius. The Fel Orb does not disappear until it hits a target.
• Felblaze Charge is an ability that the Soulbound Construct regularly uses. It charges at a random raid member, leaving a void zone on the ground at that raid member's location. Players who stand in this void zone take moderate Fire damage every second, and have their movement speed reduced by 75%.
• Overwhelming Power is an ability that the Soulbound Construct regularly uses. It deals moderate Fire damage to all raid members every 1 second for 3 seconds.

The strategy for Phase One is very straightforward. Your raid only has to contend with a single mob, the Soulbound Construct.

A tank switch must be performed a tank switch when the Soulbound Construct has applied 2-3 stacks of Shattered Defenses to its current tank.

As far as positioning is concerned, we recommend that the entire raid spreads out lightly in one side of the room. This positioning offers two advantages (explained in more detail below), namely that it concentrates all the Felblaze Charge void zones in one side of the room, and that it allows a large amount of free space for the raid members fixated on by the Volatile Fel Orbs to run in.

In order to handle Reverberating Blow (which deals high damage and debuffs 3 players at a time with Shattered Defenses, making the next Reverberating Blow effectively lethal), we advise using 3 teams of two players each, in addition to the current tank, to soak the Reverberating Blows in an alternating fashion.

Each team should be comprised of one tank and 2 DPS players. Before Reverberating Blow is cast, the assigned team should move into position (in front of and closest to the Soulbound Construct) to soak it.

When the Soulbound Construct drops the Fel Prison void zones, it is extremely important that they are avoided, as it requires a lot of group resources to free just a single player from a prison.

When a raid member is targeted by the Volatile Fel Orb, they must run away from any other raid members and then allowing the orb to reach them and explode. The damage from this explosion should not damage anyone else, and the damage it deals to the target should simply be healed.

When the Soulbound Construct uses Felblaze Charge, raid members must avoid standing in the void zone it leaves behind.

Finally, Overwhelming Power must simply be healed through.

During Phase Two, your raid has to face the Soul of Socrethar, as well as a number of adds. As soon as the Soulbound Construct is killed at the start of Phase One, a raid member can right click it to take control of it. When this happens, the Construct becomes a vehicle under the control of the player, and some of its health is restored (we are not sure exactly how much health this revived Construct has, but it is between 50% and 100%).

The player controlling the Construct can use some of its Phase One abilities against the hostile mobs, and Phase Two ends when the player-controlled Construct dies. This will unavoidably happen, as its health depletes steadily over time, and there are also two abilities that can cause damage to it. Moreover, the player-controlled Soulbound Construct cannot be healed in any way.

When Phase Two ends, Phase One begins anew, and this cycle continues until the Soul of Socrethar is killed.

The Soul of Socrethar uses the following abilities against your raid.

• Exert Dominance is an interruptible ability that the Soul of Socrethar occasionally casts on the Soulbound Construct. It deals instant damage equivalent to a percentage of the Soulbound Construct's health (5% in Normal mode and 10% in Heroic mode).
• Apocalypse is an ability that the Soul of Socrethar occasionally uses. It deals moderate Shadow damage to all raid members every 2 seconds for 10 seconds.

Throughout Phase Two, adds spawn from portals that appear at random locations along the outside of the room.

• Sargerei Dominators
  • Fel Barrier is a passive ability that is active while the Sargerei Dominator is alive. It is an immunity shield that prevents all damage done to the Soul of Socrethar, and which also makes it uninterruptible. The Fel Barrier fades as soon as the Dominator is killed.
  • Gift of the Man'ari is a debuff that the Sargerei Dominator occasionally applies to a random raid member. It deals heavy Fire damage every 3 seconds for 2 minutes to the targeted raid member and to all raid members within 10 yards of that target.
• Sargerei Shadowcallers
  • Shadow Word: Agony is an interruptible, dispellable, and stacking debuff that the Sargerei Shadowcaller regularly applies to its tank. It deals low Shadow damage every 2 seconds for 20 seconds, but it stacks quickly, meaning that its damage ramps up.
  • Shadow Bolt Volley is an interruptible ability that the Sargerei Shadowcaller occasionally uses. It deals moderate Shadow damage to all raid members.
• Haunting Souls fixate on random raid members as soon as they spawn, chasing them. If a Haunting Soul reaches its target, it explodes, dies, and applies Virulent Haunt to everyone in an 8-yard radius.
  • Virulent Haunt is a ticking Shadow-damage debuff. It deals moderate Shadow damage every second for 8 seconds, fearing the target for the same duration.
  • Soul Dispersion causes the Haunting Soul to deal massive damage to the Soulbound Construct, if it comes within 5 yards of it.

During Phase Two, the Soulbound Construct can be controlled by a raid member (by right-clicking it), turning it into a vehicle. The player controlling the Construct has access to 4 of the abilities that the Construct uses in Phase One ( Reverberating Blow, Fel Prison, Volatile Fel Orb, and Felblaze Charge). These abilities work in exactly the same way as during Phase One, except that they affect the enemy mobs, and not raid members.

It is worth noting that you cannot in any way heal the player-controlled Soulbound Construct.

The strategy for Phase Two revolves around correct management of the Soulbound Construct. A raid member should take control of it as soon as possible; we advise the tank with the lowest damage done to perform this task (since two tanks are not needed during Phase Two).

In the following subsections we will explain how the Soulbound Construct should be used, and what the rest of the raid should do in the meantime.

Below, we list the tasks that must be performed by the player controlling the Soulbound Construct, in order of priority.

1. Place Felblaze Charges in front of the portals from which adds spawn, in order to significantly slow down their movement towards the raid. This applies in particular to Haunting Souls.
2. Cast Volatile Fel Orb on new adds that spawn. Since the adds all spawn in a movement speed reduction void zone if there is a Felblaze Charge near the portals, a single Volatile Fel Orb deals damage to them all at once. Thus, the player controlling the Soulbound Construct can deal a massive amount of damage to these adds.
3. Cast Fel Prisons on escaped targets, Haunting Souls in particular. Keep in mind that targets take almost no damage while trapped by the Fel Prison, so use it sparsely.
4. Spam Reverberating Blow on the Soul of Socrethar.

Additionally, the player controlling the Soulbound Construct must be careful not to let Haunting Souls get too close to the construct, as they deal massive damage to it with their Soul Dispersion.

The rest of your raid will spend Phase Two doing as much damage to the Soul of Socrethar as possible, all while handling the various abilities used against them.

As far as handling the Soul of Socrethar is concerned, there are two things to mention. Its casts of Exert Dominance must be interrupted without exception, since your raid's goal is to keep the Soulbound Construct alive for as long as possible, in order to prolong the phase.

The Soul of Socrethar also casts Apocalypse, which must simply be healed through.

Your raid will have to quickly kill the Sargerei Dominators, in order to remove the Fel Barrier from the Soul of Socrethar, since your raid cannot interrupt the Soul of Socrethar during this time, otherwise. This allows him to cast Exert Dominance freely, damaging the Soulbound Construct and shortening Phase Two.

When raid members are targeted by Gift of the Man'ari they must move away from other raid members to avoid splashing the damage onto them. This must be done for the entire 2-minute duration of the debuff.

For Shadow Word: Agony, we recommend not interrupting it unless you have got an abundance of interrupts available. Instead, it should be dispelled when it reaches an uncomfortable number of stacks. The exact amount of stacks depends on your tank's and healers' prowess.

We also recommend interrupting Shadow Bolt Volley as much as possible, but without letting Exert Dominance casts go through in the meantime (if needed, Shadow Bolt Volley can go through).

When fixated on by the Haunting Soul, raid members should run away from their allies. If a DPS player is targeted, they should allow themselves to be struck once they have gotten comfortably far from other players. If a healer is targeted, a DPS player should try to intercept the chasing Soul by standing in front of it, in order to prevent it from reaching the healer, which would render them useless for 8 seconds (due to the fear component of a player being hit by the Haunting Soul.

We recommend using Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp at the start of the encounter, since this is when all players will have their DPS cooldowns available, and especially because there are no other, more suitable moments during the encounter.

Contrary to how it may appear, there is no benefit to saving Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp until Phase Two, in order to attack the Soul of Socrethar directly. This is because you gain an equal benefit from using it during Phase One, as doing so accelerates the phase and brings Phase Two about sooner. It would only have been beneficial to save these cooldownd for Phase Two if the phase changes had been on a fixed timer.

DPS players should use their Legendary Ring roughly on cooldown, while saving usages for when Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp is used, and for when the Sargerei Dominator spawns.

Healers should use their Legendary Rings for Reverberating Blow in Phase One, and for Apocalypse in Phase Two. In Mythic mode, the healer Legendary Rings should be used for Apocalyptic Felburst, due to its high raid-wide damage.

Tanks should use their Legendary Ring when the Shattered Defenses debuff stacks too high. In general, though, since one of the tanks will be bound to the Soulbound Construct for most of the fight, tank Legendary Ring usage is not as important on this encounter.

The most central part to learning the Socrethar the Eternal encounter is for the assigned tank to master the Soulbound Construct. This will result in significantly increased boss damage and add control, which makes the fight much easier to execute. If this tank fails their assignment, the fight is almost impossible, since it is very easy to get overwhelmed with adds.

Therefore, it is worth investing time in allowing a tank to have successive attempts inside the Soulbound Construct in order to master its abilities (rather than quickly changing the assigned tank for fear that they are not learning quickly enough).

The Mythic mode of the Socrethar the Eternal encounter is very similar to the Normal/Heroic modes, with the primary difference lying in the initial phase where a number of new abilities are introduced.

Aside from everything dealing more damage and all the mobs having more health, the Mythic version of this encounter introduces a number of other changes.

The Soulbound Construct gains a new ability called Apocalyptic Felburst, which he uses against your raid in Phase One, and which the player controlling the Construct can also use, during Phase Two. Apocalyptic Felburst marks an area on the ground with a green effect, and a few seconds later, a large orb falls at that location. This deals lethal damage to players standing on the marked location, and it also deals raid-wide Fire damage, which is lower the farther away players are from the orb.

Likewise, during Phase One, there is a new type of adds, the Voracious Soulstalkers. The first one spawns about 20 seconds into the fight, and additional ones spawn 1 minute apart. Voracious Soulstalkers spawn at the location of a random raid member, and fixate on the closest raid member to them after they spawn. Once they are fixated on a player, the Soulstalkers will chase them until they are stunned or until they reach 50% health, in which cases they will choose a new target. While chasing their target, the Voracious Soulstalkers constantly cast Devour in front of them, dealing lethal damage to any affected players. The Soulstalkers' movement speed increases progressively as they chase their fixate target.

When the Voracious Soulstalkers reach 50% health, in addition to changing target, they also heal up to full health at the end of a 3.5-second, uninterruptible cast ( Soul Regeneration). Finally, it is worth noting that the Voracious Soulstalkers take 300% increased damage from the Soulbound Construct, and that they can be trapped inside Fel Prisons.

Finally, Reverberating Blow applies 6 stacks of Shattered Defenses, up from 3 in Normal/Heroic mode.

The strategy for the Socrethar the Eternal encounter does not change significantly on Mythic mode, but the new mechanics must all be dealt with.

For positioning in Phase One, we recommend having the raid create two world markers, some distance apart. The raid starts by stacking up by at either one of them, with the boss slightly further away. From here, raid members can move forward to soak the Volatile Fel Orbs. The entire raid should move to the other world marker when Fel Prison and Apocalyptic Felburst are cast, as well as when and Voracious Soulstalker adds are about to spawn (they mark the location where they will spawn by a purple zone, so it is easy to notice). If the other world marker is occupied by a lasting Fel Prison, we recommend that you move in front of it instead, and so forth.

Phase Two positioning is unchanged from Normal/Heroic mode.

In order to deal with the increased number of stacks applied by Reverberating Blow, you can use 3 tanks. This allows each tank to solo a Reverberating Blow, and it means that Shattered Defenses will drop off from the first tank by the time of the fourth cast of Reverberating Blow. This makes handling the ability very manageable. Alternatively, you can use two tanks, but this will require healing cooldowns and it is more dangerous.

For handling the Voracious Soulstalker adds, we recommend assigning a mobile kiter to each one. This player must make sure to be the closest one to the spawning add at the time of the spawn, so that the Soulstalker fixates on them. The raid should DPS the adds down to 50% health to trigger their self-heal. When the cast is close to finishing, the add should be stunned, ideally for a long duration by something like Hammer of Justice, and killed off.

Alternatively, the Voracious Soulstalkers can be kited into existing Fel Prisons, and never broken out. When the Fel Prisons expire naturally (after 30 seconds), the Soulstalkers should be kited into new Fel Prisons. This removes them from the fight without requiring damage done to them, but it is arguably not as reliable nor as safe for the kiter.

Finally, we recommend using Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp when the first Sargerei Dominator spawns. It is extremely important that they die as quickly as possible, due to Exert Dominance dealing massive damage to the Soulbound Construct on Mythic.

In this section, you will find the loot table for Socrethar the Eternal. The section is divided in 3 subsections: armor, weapons, and the rest (neck, back, finger, and trinket items).

Item Name	Armor	Slot	Secondary Stats
Hood of Unhealthy Fixation — LFR	Cloth	Head	Mastery Critical Strike
Pristine Man'ari Cuffs (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Wrists	Versatility Haste
Socrethar's Ceremonial Cuffs — LFR	Cloth	Wrists	Haste Multistrike
Deathrattle Gloves (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Hands	Mastery Haste
Gloves of the Arcanic Conclave (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Hands	Multistrike Critical Strike
Pious Handwraps (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloth	Hands	Haste Critical Strike
Shoulderpads of Wrought Destruction — LFR	Leather	Shoulders	Critical Strike Mastery
Tunic of the Soulbinder (Heroic, Mythic)	Leather	Chest	Multistrike Critical Strike
Constructbreaker's Chestguard — LFR	Leather	Chest	Critical Strike Multistrike
Fistwraps of the Hurricane's Eye (Heroic, Mythic)	Leather	Hands	Multistrike Haste
Felblade Gloves (Heroic, Mythic)	Leather	Hands	Multistrike Haste
Oathclaw Gauntlets (Heroic, Mythic)	Leather	Hands	Critical Strike Multistrike
Chain Wristguards of the Stricken (Heroic, Mythic)	Mail	Wrists	Critical Strike Mastery
Gloves of the Savage Hunt (Heroic, Mythic)	Mail	Hands	Mastery Haste
Gauntlets of the Living Mountain (Heroic, Mythic)	Mail	Hands	Haste Multistrike
Crystal-Buckle Belt — LFR	Mail	Waist	Versatility Mastery
Casque of Foul Concentration (Heroic, Mythic)	Plate	Head	Multistrike Mastery
Automated Shoulderplates — LFR	Plate	Shoulders	Critical Strike Haste
Gauntlets of Iron Wrath (Heroic, Mythic)	Plate	Hands	Haste Mastery
Demongaze Gauntlets (Heroic, Mythic)	Plate	Hands	Critical Strike Haste
Gauntlets of the Ceaseless Vigil (Heroic, Mythic)	Plate	Hands	Haste Critical Strike
Wristplates of Bound Agony — LFR	Plate	Waist	Critical Strike Mastery

Item Name	Type	Main Stats	Secondary Stats
Saber of Twisted Virtue (Heroic, Mythic)	1H Sword	Intellect	Multistrike Mastery
Toxin-Tipped Bolt Launcher — LFR	Crossbow	Agility	Multistrike Critical Strike
Felcrystal Impaler (Heroic, Mythic)	Crossbow	Agility	Critical Strike Mastery
Felgore Double Blade — LFR	1H Sword	Strength	Critical Strike Multistrike
Felstricken Sha'tari Crystalsword (Heroic, Mythic)	1H Sword	Strength	Critical Strike Mastery
Decaying Draenic Shield — LFR	Shield	Strength	Versatility Mastery
Soulwarped Tower Shield (Heroic, Mythic)	Shield	Strength	Haste Mastery

Item Name	Type	Main Stats	Secondary Stats
Tenacious Dominator's Gorget — LFR	Amulet	Strength	Critical Strike Mastery
Contained Fel Orb Locket (Heroic, Mythic)	Amulet	Agility Strength	Bonus Armor Mastery
Haunting Nightmare Cloak — LFR	Cloak	Intellect	Spirit Haste
Drape of Beckoned Souls (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloak	Intellect	Spirit Haste
Soulbinder's Greatcloak (Heroic, Mythic)	Cloak	Strength	Haste Multistrike
Seal of the Traitorous Councilor (Heroic, Mythic)	Ring	Intellect	Haste Critical Strike
Demonic Phylactery (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket	Haste Intellect	Mana cost reduction
Soul Capacitor (Heroic, Mythic)	Trinket	Agility	Damage on proc
Howling Soul Gem — LFR	Trinket	Agility Haste

This concludes our raid guide for Socrethar the Eternal. We hope you have found it helpful. Please do not hesitate to post any feedback you may have on our forums.

• 16 Aug. 2015: Added Mythic mode strategy.
• 29 Jul. 2015: Added link to LFR guide.
• 09 Jul. 2015: Added hard enrage timer.
• 25 Jun. 2015: Made a few clarifications following our experience of the fight on live realms (the fact that Volatile Fel Orbs last indefinitely, most notably).

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