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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsBreakfast Topic: Easiest Heroic
by Eliah Hecht 
Mar 23rd 2007 at 8:00AM
So far, I've been into exactly two Heroic-mode dungeons: Slave Pens and Steamvaults. My guild group cleared through Slave Pens fine, although we had a few wipes, all on trash mobs. Badges of Justice were of course had by all, and I got a nice main-hand for my DPS set. Steamvaults was another story: we did OK on the trash, but couldn't down a single boss. I'm also keyed for Caverns of Time heroics, but judging by how annoying Black Morass is on non-heroic, I don't think I'll be opting to turn up the intensity on that one any time soon. When a forum poster asked which Heroic was the easiest,
So far I've only completed two heroic dungeons -- Slave Pens and Mechanar. Slave Pens was definitely much easier for my group than Mechanar was, however, both were fairly challenging. I'm hoping to do some others soon, but right now I'm trying to gain exhaulted with the Sha'tar faction, so running the Tempest Keep dungeons is in my best interest.
Perhaps I'll do a heroics mode Botanica or Arcatraz soon.
How about you guys? Out of the heroics y'all have tried, which was the least bone-crushingly difficult?
Filed under: Breakfast Topics, Instances, Features
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Gavril@Eonar Apr 14th 2008 6:38AM
Heroic Ramparts is one of the easiest with a decent tank and classes that have instant dps. I recommend a mage, enhancement shaman, and a rogue for this one.
Blood Furnace - Not hard, second boss room is a little rough, but that is all that is difficult about it
Shattered Halls - This place is hell for me, but doable, I'm a warrior tank so it is hard to sustain aggro, druid heals are a nono here, bring plenty of cc, a warlock is good if you pull them far, and you'll be just fine.
Slave Pens- Extremely easy, can do in 45 minutes no problem.
Underbog - Also easy, don't worry about this one, pray that it is the daily, quick 6 badges.
Steam Vaults - Can be problematic if you pull wrong, but other than that it is simple.
Mana Tombs- Hardest fight is Pandemonius, but even he is easy if you keep him at the wall and place your ranged dps well.
Auchenai Crypts - Easy unless your healer is a paladin, sorry pallies, this is one place that you'll be left in the dust, druids work wonders, and priests do fine here.
Setthek Halls - Easy, first boss is simple, burn down first two sets of adds, fear last, he should be dead before fear ends, Anzu is actually a difficult fight, but we one shotted him today when we got my druid healer is epic flying quest. Final boss is easy if you position him right, I recommend on the sides of the pillars, easy to get away, then group up near the tank so he can quickly pick up aggro.
Shadow Labyrinth - Easy, just have to keep heals up on the second boss, a good strat for murmur is to run straight past him when you get the touch, and run back, keep directly out of the raised ring when he sonic booms, either east or west of him, and you'll also be fine, won't get his thunderstorm either.
Arcatraz - Hardest fight is the final boss, but still very doable with competent dps, only bring a hunter if he knows his shot rotation.
Botanica - Easy, use normal strats and you'll do fine.
Mechanar - First and last boss are easy if you keep the adds away from the healer, the second boss however, is extremely difficult even for a well geared group. What I recommend is a druid healer, someone who can keep moving and moving because the flames hurt a whole lot. kiting the elementals is good to do in this fight, and keep the tank kiting the boss around away from the flames until she is down.
Magister's Terrace - At first this place is hell, but it becomes extremely easy once you get it down
The first boss is easy as long as you have a good healer, do not bother with downing the crystals, we had very well geared dps and it did no good, I recommend burning him down and healing through it, pally not recommended unless he/she brings their A game.
The second boss is rough on heroic, and you can't make it to him without a good puller, or good aoe. I pull well so aoe isn't necessary, you can pull the wyrms in 6 pulls, or if you make a mistake, two or three, I recommend taking the time to pull them slowly, taking them down slowly is less time consuming than running your dead body back.
For the boss, a mage and rogue would be good to have, or two of either, down the pure energy orbs quickly with these, each getting one side, after two or three have them ice block and cloak of shadows, I usually pick two up myself, but i wouldn't recommend this unless you have 14k+ health unbuffed as a tank, being that two of them gives you a 600 dmg a second debuff.
Boss three -
This is a random setup, your worst nightmare is the resto shaman, MS warrior, rogue and fury warrior, usually this doesn't happen but i've had it happen before. Keep the cc up in this fight, a mage is necessary if the mortal strike warrior is there, sheep the warrior, and lay down saps/traps, whatever you have, there are two demons that can come too, so if you have a warlock he/she can banish the hunter or fire slinging demon, whichever may spawn. Keep the MS warrior cc'd, it is necessary. Kill the priestess first, she heals, then concentrate dps on clothies and non cc'd people. Followed up by ms warrior if he is there, save him for last with a sheep. He hits like a truck and you'll want full concentration on him, he has 1 shotted my healers.
Finally, Kael'Thas. This is a very easy fight if you do it right, extremely difficult if you do not. You need at least one ranged dps for this fight, Kael'thas constantly blasts the tank with fireballs also, so interrupts/warrior tanks are good. Warriors can reflect, dealing him 5-7k per reflect, and they have an interrupt, he should never get the warrior with a fireball should you have one tanking. He will cast a shield with 10k absorb on it should you not take him to 50% fast enough, a warrior tank is good to have in case you make am istake on this, i suggest a raid warning macro announcing it, burn the shield down quickly with all instant dps, and then interrupt his pyroblast, if this fails, a warrior can shield wall and last stand, bringing their health up to a decent bit, the pyro will then only hit for 10k, as opposed to 40,000. Have a ranged dps kite the phoenix that he spawns during the fight as well, constantly moving, the phoenix will die on its own, then you must kill the egg that spawns quickly, or another will come, which can also be kited if you want to concentrate on Kael, which is what we usually do.
at 50% he casts gravity lapse, making everyone airborne, you can move around alot, ranged dps is great here. There will be floating orbs, avoid them they deal 2.5-3k per second they are on you. after about 30 seconds he drops you, you get about 10 seconds to dps, then he floats you again, repeat this and you will succeed in downing him, (amazing loot for a heroic!)
This is hell for a paladin healer by the way, so only bring one with 1800+ healing for this fight, i recommend 2 healers for first try.
redringrico May 25th 2008 5:11PM
now every swinging dick has epics from karazhan or all the unskilled players in all S1 gear who dont realize resilence has anything to do with raids and heroics, it doesn't and they think since they have all welfare epics they can run with the skilled players. S1 is not totally horrible its just that about 25 percent of the stats is resilence and is only good for pvp.
ok so with the vast majority of the aboved two mentioned types of players, I really couldn't tell you which heroics is easiest. I have seen what quite a few of the heroics are like, but with everyone running around in epics now, NOT being able to down a boss is something you don't get anymore.
and I am speaking with a young lvl 70 priest (redringrico) who has only three epics and all blues, and 1 green trinket; for a healing set designed for raids. at the time of this post has just dinged lvl 70 about a week prior.
now if I was matched up with 4 other players in the same boat as me, (we still wipe sometimes on trash) we would not be able to down some of the bosses.
bottom line is I am blind to say which heroic seems easiest, I love Black morass because of the challenge it presents for a healer (holy spec) and how timing is key. but reading previous posts would say this is not the easiest. The only times I wiped on BM is when the group was uninformed what to do and would rush temporus and not spend 5-6 seconds to eat/drink and get organized, or manage one of the trash mobs wrong just before the last boss and get the wipe.
I haven't been with a group in BM yet that has screwed it up during a fight with one of the 3 bosses.
and I have still yet to see the epoch mender drop dammit!
I ran UB last night and it was fairly easy, again with all overpowered epic players, I got killed in two shots from the last boss but they killed it quickly after and ignored the adds. we wiped on trash due to a patrol and the pally ( a know it all type and bossy) who didnt back up to bring the trash away from the pat got us killed, and oddly didnt have anything to say when I called him out and questioned him.
I am going to run heroic blood furnace tonight and prolly BM again and hope for some good healing drops.
Im not sure if there is an easiest Heroic run guys, they all have they're do's and don'ts you know, if the group understands how the instance works it goes pretty smooth and seems easy. I say it depends on your group.
wishix Jun 24th 2008 5:18AM
I used to hate Black Morass, even in normal mode, think it's plainly because most of the runs are with pug. Untill recently we went with our own kara group (which was build pretty recently as well), our main tank, another 3 dps and me as the healer. I'm surprise to find how easy it was. I don't even have to drink/pot/fiend a single time, and we cleared withing 25mins. Now, it has become our fav heroic, since it's fast and quite straight forward.
Other heroics we love to run are sp, mech or bot.
We will still wipe 1-2 times from Hmgt run though. Accidental aggro and such.. Havn't tried shattered halls caused basically we only have 3 hours to play everyday due to work, and would like to run the easilest/fastest instance for the badges. If sp/bm/mgt/mech was the daily heroic of the day, we could easily get 12-13 badges a day :)
mity Mar 23rd 2007 8:13AM
the tempest runs are pretty tricky... i have to agre tho, slave pens is easymode sofar. ive done it 3-4 times, and we even misssed the drids NR buff, didnt have pots, and only 1 healer, and it still went fine on quakky.
steamvault was easy as well, imo. trick is to be abit creative with tactics. we did it with a shadowpreist as only healer, and it went fine. but it requires 5 good players, to do that, both gear and skills.
we did shadowlabs with that same grp, and it was doable, wiped twice on the ogre, and twice on Murmur, but it worked out.
the thing all heroics have in common is. u need a mage. sheep 1, kite 1 or more with frost/fire is imba.
being a hunter, i have a pretty unstabile CC in my freezingtrap. it tends to get a heartbeat resist very quickly, but MD is awsome for CC, and hunter dps is the strongest dps availible for heroic runs, in my extended experience.
magnakaser Mar 23rd 2007 8:19AM
Mechanar is by and far the easiest heroic, the mobs don't hit nearly as hard as other heroics and almost everything can be CC'd. The only thing that could ever give any trouble is the boss with all the fire elemental adds if you get unlucky with who they decide to follow.
Ryan Mar 23rd 2007 8:47AM
@1 lol, you said hunter dps.
dontfront Mar 23rd 2007 8:53AM
underbog if fun if you viciously abuse fear.
homant Mar 23rd 2007 8:51AM
"Eyonix Replied:"
c'mon, we know Tseric only plays Nintendo DS :P
-Gritz
Flit Mar 23rd 2007 9:19AM
Botanica? I haven't been able to down the Boss at the end yet... sounds like I need better gear.
Zuuler Mar 23rd 2007 9:32AM
Wow, hunter dps is the best for heroics.
Warlock by far would be better. With a good healer and some bandages, a lock can maintain dps for a lot longer period of time than any other class.
I haven't made it far enough to try any heroics yet, but I have a theory on a good group.
Druid or warrior MT. Aff or destro lock for main DPS. Demo lock for offtank with felguard (as well of off heal for the offtank). And a paladin healer. The 5th position can be a CC slot based on the dungeon being run. Mage to sheep/3rd lock to seduce/rogue to sap humanoids, or priest to shackle undead. This slot can also off dps or in the case of a priest, off heal in an emergency.
With several talents that reduce threat generated, and soulshatter to drop 50% of your aggro, the lock can keep the mob focused on the MT.
Again, never ran a heroic, and the closest I ever came to this configuration was a dreadsteed run with a warrior MT, a demo lock, a destro lock (me), a priest to heal, and a rogue. That was pre-TBC as well.
Malineros Mar 23rd 2007 10:16AM
We've been to Mana Tombs (figured it would be the quickest way to test a Heroic boss as the first boss is so close to the start)& Black Morass (still not sure why we picked that as I agree with OP on normal = annoying without the group being just right)... Mana Tombs: trash is no problem if you can manage aggro & CC; Pandemonius gave us some trouble, but we kept working it (& had our tank put on a couple cloth pieces with high Shadow Resist) & got him down on try 3 or so; Tavarok (or whatever) was a cakewalk after our struggles on Pand... then it was getting too late to press on, but we were confident we could have managed Shaffar... Black Morass: as mentioned, normal takes a fairly specific group, but Heroic... we took our best group in there (best tank, best healer, best 3 DPS) and simply couldn't keep up... on our 3rd try we dropped the first boss, then promptly wiped after the break on the first elite mob (one of our DPS got too close to him before the tank moved in & got 2-shotted, so we didn't have the power to take him down)... so out of what we've done, Mana Tombs is easier, but I'm really going to press for Slave Pens after what I'm reading here (especially since we need the Vashj key quest there)
ukboarder Mar 26th 2007 2:01AM
lol.."Again, never ran a heroic, and the closest I ever came to this configuration was a dreadsteed run with a warrior MT, a demo lock, a destro lock (me), a priest to heal, and a rogue. That was pre-TBC as well."
So pretty much all that was redundant :)
Mekias Mar 23rd 2007 10:03AM
Yeah, the holy trinity for heroics is tank, healer, and mage.
Argent Mar 23rd 2007 11:02AM
i"d have to say steamvaults is the easiest heroic> ramparts is a close second.
here's a rundown of the heroic instances i've done and my assement of them:
hellfire:
ramparts -- fairly simple, quick instance for 2 badges. hard part is the second boss (the demon with his felhound pets), but a ranged dps zerg gets him pretty effectively.
bloodfurnace:
none of the bosses really are all that hard, but the 2nd boss fight can be very, very tricky and bugged out way too easy if you used MC. the fel guards right before the last boss are the real tough part.
shattered halls:
challenging and kinda long, but actually a very fun instance. the lieutenant at the end of the gauntlet is now a boss (and he fears.) hard part are the 5-6 pulls by the gladiator pens and the final boss is pretty nutty as well.
coilfang:
slavepens -- really pretty easy, but takes a while to do. only tough part are the double defender pulls.
underbog -- never done it.
steamvaults -- quick clear, some challenging trash packs, but for the most part nothing a good group can't handle. first boss is pretty much the hardest fight in there. the other 2 are just tough if you don't have the dps.
auchindoun:
sethekk -- first boss is pretty freakin' hectic, but beyond that, the only mobs that are even remotely challenging are the double guard/ravenguard pulls.
mana tombs -- first boss is all about positioning. hits very, very hard, but can be dealt with by using LoS effectively. rest of the zone is about as annoying as you'd expect it to be.
crypts -- never bothered.
shadow labs -- surprisingly easy zone. only crux is that it takes pretty much forever to clear because of so much trash int here. none fo the bosses are terribly hard. the bigfel guard overseers lost their charge and aren't nearly as painful in heroic as they are in normal. biggest PITA is clearing the trash in the 2nd boss' room. once you do that, the rest of the instance is easy.
CoT:
old hillsbrad -- really all about learnign a good pull setup for the lookouts and such. fairly quick instance and after doing it a few times, it gets pretty easy. hardest thing in there is the first boss, who is just ridiculous.
black morass -- 2nd boss is just utterly bat-effing crazy. haven't done it since the beacon nerf.
tempest keep:
botanica -- never went. i'm told it's pretty easy, if ever so long.
mechenar -- 4 pretty easy badges for sure. not that much trash and some straightforward early bosses make it a pretty good spot to farm, imo. the 4th boss (2nd on normal) with her fire eles (3 of them now) is really rather painful, though. fortunately, you can just skip her if you so desire and go take out the final boss.
arcatraz -- long, long instance. fairly challenging fights at almost every turn (first boss is pretty rough) and the final boss was pretty freaking ridiculous once he split and opted to double mindflay any and all healers.
chimera Mar 23rd 2007 11:04AM
In heroics you DON'T need sustained DPS, you need burst dps and low threat DPS. That's why hunter dps is good. I finished Ramparts, some parts are pretty bad and bugged, and last boss does not drop a badge. Underbog is easy except some of the bog giants. Broggok made us cry in Furnace, that's all so far.
mity Mar 23rd 2007 11:17AM
7 - funny too see ppl claiming a contradictary view, and in same breath stating their experience to be...strat at 60?
like a poster said, hunters can nuke as hard as lox, BUT drop aggro, and keep muking with low thrat, and also misdirect. my grp is a lock, prot war, s preist and mage (arc/fire) and me (mm hunter)
i havent finished 2nd in any run we do, yet.
the lock has 1200 damage, and the mage abt 1k, unbuffed. the spreist has abt 800.
i have abt 2300 rap and 23% crit.
with less synergy and buffs, properly played hunters beat the casters.
its the buffscaling and debuff boss-system in raids that bounce the casters up on dmg in 25 man runs.
and, pets stay upm in 90% of the heroic content. thts the added 15% dps, compared to SSC and Gruul, and all that.
Melf Mar 23rd 2007 12:48PM
My guild farms Mech on our lunchbreaks. On heroic, with a well balanced group, you can easily get a couple Badges in an hour. Plus the Sha'tar rep is a nice added bonus.
Razor_1138 Mar 25th 2007 4:31PM
CoT Old Hillsbrad: OMG 1st boss! Our priest got hit w/ a 10,000dmg Hamstring... not sure why the boss worried about him running away when he 1-shots him. I'd almost say you have to have 2 healers (major/hybrid). And the pats that walk around w/ the dogs..wow, just...WOW. However we did manage to only wipe a few times lighting the huts on fire. I came up with the idea of everyone in ur group picks a hut, I then got on my epic mount to kite the enemies from the huts while they light the huts on fire, only had a few deaths that way. But we couldn't down the 1st boss :( Have fun when ur there:)
flythebike Jun 4th 2007 11:30AM
Gave my first heroic a try this weekend with Ramparts. We cleared it, but wiped a lot. The hardest thing is wrapping your head around the fact that even a raid ready tank (102.4% avoidance + 11.5k hp) can't multi tank mobs without dying. Once you get that hammered into your thinking, and you start to act accordingly, you get into the new flow.
As a pally tank this is tough, you can't just pull everything and AOE it down. Stuff hits plate for 1200 damage, you just have to be so careful.
darice Dec 18th 2007 9:16PM
Did Heroic ramparts last night as Druid tank. 26K armor. We never wiped at all, and I only died once on the 2nd boss near the end of the fight. Probably just the healer focusing on keeping us all alive as I was the only death, and a bit odd for tank in the circumstance.
It was a steady run with careful pulls, got thru in 2 hours. The server threw us all off at one point so should be able to do it in less. I wouldn't say it's necessary easy, did it the week b4 and we kept wiping at the spell caster circle.