Two Bosses Enter: Eck the Ferocious vs. Tribunal of Ages
by Lisa Poisso 
Oct 8th 2009 at 2:00PM
Hold onto your hats, boys and girls -- this week's a wild one in the Two Bosses Thunderdome. Gather 'round in amazement as Eck the Ferocious tackles the Tribunal of Ages encounter from Halls of Stone. Been held back by that challenge a time or two yourself, eh? You're not alone. First-bracket boss Anomalus found himself shut out by the Tribunal, as well, falling short by less than 3% of the Thunderdome vote.
Eck's first-bracket victory over Amanitar was slightly more energetic, with Eck bounding to a 6% margin over his opponent.
Time for a quick review of the Two Bosses Thunderdome ground rules:
- This match takes place inside the Tribunal of Ages in the Halls of Stone. Why is Eck here? Because it's a fantasy deathmatch, of course. (Work with it, people, work with it.)
- In this scenario, we'll retain the basic mechanic of the Tribunal of Ages encounter. Brann Bronzebeard's survival still determines the success or failure of the mission. Eck is therefore challenged with holding the Tribunal at bay long enough for Bronzebeard to complete his task. (If you can prefer to come up with some other figure to stand in for Bronzebeard, feel free to exercise your creativity in the comments.)
- Assume that foes share similar levels, health pools and a comparative overall damage output.
- Don't get caught up in game mechanics and what player characters might do in each encounter.
- Style and scale are your main considerations.
In Corner One: Eck the Ferocious of GundrakEck is a tenacious little fellow who drops aggro and bounds about during battle. His flash point: a nasty enrage that increases his attack speed by 150% and all damage he deals by 500% -- ouch!
Read more about battling Eck the Ferocious. Review comments from players who've fought the ferocious gorloc, and review his first-bracket deathmatch against Amanitar.
In Corner Two: The Tribunal of Ages, Halls of Stone
Abedneum: Warning! Life form pattern not recognized. Archival processing terminated. Continued interference will result in targeted response.
Kaddrak: Security breach in progress. Analysis of historical archives transferred to lower priority queue. Countermeasures engaged.
Marnak: Threat index threshold exceeded. Celestial archive aborted. Security level heightened.
Abedneum: Critical threat index. Void analysis diverted. Initiating sanitization protocol.
During the Tribunal of Ages encounter, adventurers must protect Dwarven explorer Brann Bronzebeard long enough that he can access a database to retrieve information required to complete the Halls of Stone quest. Hindering Brann and his helpers are the three stone faces of the Tribunal, Kaddrak, Abedneum and Marnak, plus wave after wave of foes including Dark Rune Protectors, Dark Rune Stormcallers and an Iron Golem Custodian.
Kaddrak Marnak
Abedneum
Dark Rune Protector
Dark Rune Stormcaller
Iron Golem Custodian
Read a description of the Tribunal of Ages event and review comments from players who've completed the related achievement. Review the Tribunal's first-bracket shut-out of Anomalus.
The smackdown
Two Boss matchups are about substance and style, not strict game play and mechanics. For the sake of this death match, you'll have to be accommodating to Eck's presence in the Halls of Stone. We'll retain the basic mechanic of the Tribunal of Ages encounter -- you can substitute some other figure for Brann Bronzebeard, if you feel so moved. Bronzebeard's survival will determine the success or failure of the mission. In order to successfully emerge the victor in this Two Bosses death match, then, Eck is challenged with holding Bronzebeard's foes at bay long enough for him to complete his task.
Don't get swept up into thinking about how players would react -- there are no players in the Thunderdome. No game-mechanic nitpicking! Vote for the spirit of the battle as set forth above. Set aside differences in opponents' health pools, game level and actual damage output.
Who wins, and why? We'll see you down below in the comments. Can you come up with a convincing scenario that will sway other readers to your point of view?
| Eck wins (Bronzebeard completes his task) | |
|---|---|
| Tribunal wins (Eck dies, or, Bronzebeard dies or fails to complete his task) | |
| Tie (something else happens) |
Who rocks Wrath's five-man world? Cast your vote in this match of Round Two of the five-man Wrath of the Lich King season. Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Fan stuff, Features, Lore, Bosses, Two Bosses Enter
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Gridneo Oct 8th 2009 2:07PM
Does anybody actually read this stuff?
Clay Levering Oct 8th 2009 2:09PM
Eck obviously - the bounding between the adds would be the killer, and then when they were all packed he'd go Hulk-Smash on them and finish it off.
Gareth Oct 9th 2009 3:35AM
Eck wins easily.
Think about it, the event starts slowly, so well before the real damage starts adding up Eck will be into his 500% dps 150% attack speed for the hard part of the fight.
Combine that with springing around that will make it easy to avoid the laser beam and I think he'd run it easier then a well geared group of 5.
Alanid Oct 8th 2009 2:09PM
I can't see how Eck would survive against so many powerful foes, sorry Eck, giving this one to the Tribunal with all of it's damage, dot's, debuff's, and stuns.
Bosswally Oct 8th 2009 2:13PM
murlocs rule
RogueJedi86 Oct 8th 2009 2:14PM
Eck's a Gorloc, not a Murloc.
Bosswally Oct 8th 2009 2:18PM
same difference a Gorloc is just a smart murloc
Kaeri Oct 8th 2009 2:31PM
A Gorloc is what happens when you feed a Murloc after midnight.
Rehtu Oct 8th 2009 2:15PM
Eck wins this one by a long shot. He jumps around to every single mob, as we know he does to us, and keeps all their attention away from bronzebeard. By jumping around to everyone he keeps out of the way of both the laser and the bubbles. There is no way the damage of the glare and the mobs can take him out alone. Even if he does manage to get stunned by a golem, he has his ridiculous enrage, which will destroy all the mobs in a flash.
Fuzzbutt Oct 8th 2009 2:19PM
There's no way Eck beats Tribunal. The Tribunal is beaming him down while the dwarves are attacking him. He also can't keep all the dwarves at bay; they'd surely kill Brann down before the tribunal even activates the sterilization procedure. Tribunal, no contest.
Magnett Oct 8th 2009 2:23PM
Remember: the tribunal fight lasts several minutes. Even though you'll never (hopefully) see this spell while actually fighting Eck: http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=55816, it would be extremely helpful here.
It depends on how the enrage timer would work: if it starts at the beginning of the event, considering Brann takes ages to get to the actual fight scene it'd be a pretty clear win for Eck. Otherwise...
Assuming Eck could outlive the weak light beams constantly thrown at him and the Shadow Word Pains, he could leap from Dwarf to Dwarf to escape the shadow AoE or the laser beam. The damage from the Tribunal itself would therefore be negligible, and after a minute or two Eck would enrage, pretty much decimating every wave. He actually has a pretty high amount of health for a simple heroic boss, so assuming he has the brains to move out of the fire, it's a clear win for him. Even if an add got past him and attacked Brann, he'd eventually leap towards it and kill it quickly in his enraged state.
jared.daniels Oct 8th 2009 2:24PM
Bronzebeard begins his computer hacking, and Eck stands to protect him. The original head deals minimal damage, enough for Eck to shrug off. Adds begin to slowly move into the area, at which point Eck leaps to the first one in the line, and uses Eck Spit to AoE them down. This trend continues 'til the ads begin to move in faster, at which point he simply springs back to bronzebeard to gather the adds he missed.
The large AoE damage Debuff is easily missed, due to Eck's massive jump. The ads begin to come faster and more furious, at which Eck's answer is to buff up his damage by 500%, round them all up and AoE once more.
Rinse and repeat by Eck, evading pew pew lazers and AoE shadow debuffs with springs and aggro dumps. Eck's AoE is the winner here. At the end, the Tribunal forfeits it's information Bronzebeard, at which point Eck goes "?" and bounds away.
lefauve Oct 8th 2009 2:28PM
Eck can make the Tribunal smell so bad Bronzebeard would just wanna take a shower rather than complete his task.
Adam Oct 8th 2009 2:28PM
This one's easy - Eck would turn around and eat Brann, thereby failing the mission...
...but succeeding at lunch.
Nolls74 Oct 8th 2009 5:06PM
this.
sgtkwol Oct 8th 2009 2:30PM
What if Brann beats Eck before the tribunal arrives, and smells ferocious, so that the tribunal does not attack, who won.
Siaperas Oct 8th 2009 2:31PM
I feel sorry for Brann. He's needs to get by the tribunal, and while he works his magic he has Eck for his protection. Eck is like a giant, ADD chihuahua who was fed 18 shots of espresso before tasked to protect Brann.
Right off the bat, Eck runs up to Brann and spews all over him to give him that extra stink to help him do his job. Then he bounds over to one of the faces on the wall, and tries to chew on it. He then gets disenterested and run back to Brann to chew on him. Then Bran points at the iron dwarves who are right next him, and Eck spews. Now everything smells ferocious. Brann's getting flash blacks of the hangover after Magni's coronation party, and he remembers that dwarf hunter he woke up next to....with the beard. Then Brann spews.
Now the iron dwarves and smell like ferocious, beer-scented, salted yeti cheese, and they're wondering if the benefits of working for Loken are really worth all of this, when Eck decides they're his kind of delicious and starts eating them. More iron dwarves come running in and Brann's looking at them, as he tries to keep the remainder of his lunch down. Meanwhile, Eck happily pounces off to try to give one of the half-chewed iron dwarves to glowing face on the wall. Angry that the face won't eat it, he tries to bury the carcasses under the face, only to find he can't dig there.
More iron dwarves run in and see the last ones standing there in bewilderment. Eck happily hops over to them and proceeds to chew them apart and spew all over them. Brann tries to get back to work as Eck leaves turns his back on some the iron dwarves to greet his hat wearing friend. Eck eats Brann's hat, and tries to vigorously hump his leg.
Brann pushes Eck off him, and says, "That's it! I've had enough!" He storms out of the Tribunal room, knocking out any iron dwarf or runed sentinal that gets in his way. Eck stays behind happily trying to "play" with his new friends. Since Brann fails to get what he came for, Tribunal wins.
Sanguinarius Oct 9th 2009 6:17AM
"Eck is like a giant, ADD chihuahua who was fed 18 shots of espresso before tasked to protect Brann."
I'd actually PAY blizz to see a cinematic of this fight happen.
dkslatten Oct 8th 2009 2:33PM
I have a feeling Eck would just eat Bronzebeard and leave...
Eck has no reason to stick around and help a dwarf.
After that, there would be no adds, because bronzebeard didnt disturb the computer.
Easy meal for Eck, and the tribunal would probably laugh at the fact that Eck did the work for them.
Maymer Oct 8th 2009 2:37PM
Eck would ultimately be undone by his most horrifying ability..random aggro drop
After a long night of drinking, Brann Bronzebeard wondered into Gundrak after a pair of adventurers empty it of its chambers and bosses, but forgetting one final foe: Eck (Seriously, how do we keep forgetting this guy?). AFter using some intimidating and clever dwarven tactics (meaning getting totally smashed, dancing around alot, then calling in some explosives) Brann was able to tame the untameable Eck as his bodyguard. Realizing that it was only a matter of time before Blizzard would nerf his pet into nothing, Brann decided to gather some information in the Halls of Stones. That takes care of why the heck Eck is protecting Brann.
As Eck contimplates eating his captor, he and Brann find themselves stumbling into a temple of epic size and girth. Brann, not figuring out the thousands of other times that when one finds a Titan temple, it is best left ALONE, decides to poke around. He and Eck discover a long hallway that leads into a circular room filled with 3 faces that stare right into their souls. Brann looks in awe and wonderment, realizing that the console that lay at the back of the room was an information treasure trove, decides to uncover the lost secrets and mysteries of the Titans. However, as he and Eck begin to tinker with the machine, a deep, metalic voice rasps the quite halls with a chilling command. "Warning! Life form pattern not recognized. Archival processing terminated. Continued interference will result in targeted response." Of course, Brann decides that this giant machine that was built by the Titans must just be joking. I mean seriously, what powerful relic have the Titans ever made before? Then the message "Security breach in progress. Analysis of historical archives transferred to lower priority queue. Countermeasures engaged."
Eck is put on guard as Brann decides to instead of high tail it out of there and arrive with strong armed warriors and fighters, decides that Eck can easily hold out on his own.
Eck sees the first iron dwarves rush forward toward Brann with every intent of massacring the intruder. Eck is quick however, and lets loose a vile stream of Bile that splatters and burns the dwarves into nothing. But more and more continue to come. Eck bounces around too and fro, biting in two the enemies, with no single enemy in mind for his glorious destruction.
However, The Tribunal is not allowing itself to sit around idly, allowing some invader to plum its secrets. The Tribunal erupts with energy, laying waste to the surrounding enviroment with a Glare attack.
Eck springs out of the way just in time. However, as he leapts to his safety, Brann is not so quick to dodge the oncoming onslaught of iron dwarves.
Brann is quickly attacked without mercy, as every blow given brings the dwarf ever so closer to death. Eck charges, ripping apart the intruders. However, he quickly loses focus as he spots more iron dwarves approaching the entrance.
Forgetting Brann, Eck bounds toward them, completely oblivious to the peril and pain Brann is in. Eck turns around in time to see one iron dwarf that slipped through his defenses, prepparing to finish off Brann with a final blow. Eck prepares to charge into the enemy...Only to realize that he has been caught in a Dark Matter beam.
Eck watches helplessly as Brann is finished off with a killing blow. Eck frantically tries to run for the exit, but is quickly surrounded by his enemies. They pummel and cut him, leaving a hobbled mess. Eck tries to crawl with what little strength he has left, but to no avail. He manages to glance towards the stone cold faces of the Tribunal. The cold metalic faces show no emotion. Just caculating certainty, as one face begins to glow red with energy.
Eck screams in pain, feeling the last of his energy leave him. He watches as the last thing he will ever see beams into his huddled body. There was no scream. There was no time. The Titan construct had spoken. There was only fire. Then, nothing.