Might Tuesday Patch Summary [ToT Raid]

Figured I'd do a quick summary of the three raid days as of the 5.2 patch landing. The patch went out Tuesday, as did the raid instance, Throne of Thunder. Several of us had been on the PTR, so there wasn't too much issue in the first section or with the trash pulls. 

Unfortunately I didn't have the foresight to keep my twitch stream or fraps files from the trash. The basics of the information you need to know about the infamous bridge trash is to pull one ghost back at a time. Let your debuff fall off before you pull the next ghost. Hunters are excellent for going ahead and misdirecting one of these back to the group, because if we get the attention of the second one we can just feign it off. The first mob will still go to the raid, but the second one will reset. Not sure how effective this would be on the first bridge since the wind blows sideways, but it works great for the second bridge. Disengage back on if you ever get blown off by a spirit. 

First boss is JIN'ROHK

I was playing as BEAST MASTERY

Summary of the fight is to stand on the edge of the pools as they expand. Run the orbs out if they're targeted on you. Don't run an orb over a fissure. Don't let an orb hit you while in a pool. Stack in the center for healing cooldowns during storm. There's nothing hunter specific here, just a straight single target burn. You'll notice my Skada is off. Stampede was causing lag issues with combat log parsers on the first day. 

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Second boss is HORRIDON

I was playing as SURVIVAL

This is sort of a five phase fight. The first four involve off-tanking Horridon while dealing with gates that spawn mobs. Basically, you're AoEing a lot, not standing in bad things, prioritizing proper adds to die first then burning the boss at the end. Each gate will spawn a few little adds, a few larger adds and a Dinomancer. Order is in reverse: Dinomancer > larger adds > little adds. Each large add spawns some sort of bad thing to stand in. First gate is sand traps, don't be in those. Second gate are casters that cause poison bombs, don't stand in those and kill the summoned casters as a priority. Dinomancer's only need to be at 50% to drop their orb of control. Third gate summons ice orbs that rotate in a small radius, don't get hit by those. Fourth gate drops lightning nova totems - know the radius and get away before it goes off. If charge is on you, spin the boss so that it won't hit anyone (or wherever you're told to). 

It's a long fight. Horridon will get a damage debuff as each gate is closed. Basically, you won't do as much damage to Horridon at the start as you will later, but because the fight is so long there's no need to save cooldowns. Use them where appropriate, either on adds or Horridon.

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Third boss is THE COUNCIL OF ELDERS

I was playing as BEAST MASTERY

I was put on single target duty to whittle away Kazra'jin while the rest of the raid played management with the possesses and interrupts. This was not effective as Kazra's charge was unfriendly to Wolf's melee nature. Recommend a different class for this strategy. Don't have a lot of comments for this one as I mainly just tunnelled. It was extremely easy on normal after PTR experience. Swap to Loa's as required, or to new burn targets as called. You can help with interrupts if you pick up Silencing Shot. 

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Fourth boss is TORTOS

I was playing as SURVIVAL

Tortos can pose a problem if you're not ready for him. If no shell is kicked during Stone Breath, it's a wipe. Getting hit by a stalactite will also probably kill you. Note that you still take damage from them if you're within 20 yards, so just being outside of the graphic won't mean that you'll be safe. The damage is significantly less, but if you can avoid it you should. Hunters have good mobility. Ice trap under Tortos' mug will give an initial slow to the turtles. Highly suggest using Misdirect on the bat off-tank every time a bat wave comes out  - they spawn from the ceiling, so multishot them before they split up to hit healers with healing aggro. Don't just stand in the middle of the room, spread out. Binding Shot may prove useful.