WoW Insider's Guide to Maloriak
by Michael Gray 
Jan 4th 2011 at 8:00PM
Maloriak is the third boss in Blackwing Descent.
This is going to be a confusing fight for most raid groups. It's not that any particular dance step is difficult; however, there are a lot of phases and dance steps to remember. Throughout the fight, Maloriak throws vials at your raid. You must react according to the color of the vial, which can make keeping track of this fight a little difficult.
This is going to be a confusing fight for most raid groups. It's not that any particular dance step is difficult; however, there are a lot of phases and dance steps to remember. Throughout the fight, Maloriak throws vials at your raid. You must react according to the color of the vial, which can make keeping track of this fight a little difficult.
General strategy
This boss has two main phases, and the first phase has three different vials to which you must respond. Throughout the fight, Maloriak spawns adds called Aberrations in the back of the room. There are 18 small adds and two large ones. The large ones release during the final phase. You can interrupt Maloriak's attempt to Release Aberrations, allowing you to control the rate at which they appear. However, in phase 2, the boss will release all remaining adds whether you like it or not, so don't wait too long. In general, you want six adds per "vial phase."
As phase 1 proceeds, Maloriak will toss vials into his cauldron. The color of his vials will determine what you should be doing. The colors are red, blue, and green. A green will always be the final phase; there's no way to know which color will get tossed in first. Maloriak cycles through each color twice.
Phase 1
As phase 1 proceeds, Maloriak will toss vials into his cauldron. The color of his vials will determine what you should be doing. The colors are red, blue, and green. A green will always be the final phase; there's no way to know which color will get tossed in first. Maloriak cycles through each color twice.
Phase 1
- Red vial When Maloriak throws a red vial into the cauldron, everyone needs to stack up. Scorching Blast deals damage to everyone in a frontal cone, spread among everyone stacked. Additionally, he will use Consuming Flames. Move away from the rest of the raid group, and return when Consuming Flames is over.
- Blue vial When Maloriak throws a blue vial into the cauldron, he will use Flash Freeze. This will freeze a player in a block of ice and chain to anyone nearby. You must kill the ice tomb to free the player.
- Green vial When Maloriak throws a green vial into the cauldron, slime sprays out from the cauldron and everyone in the room gets Debilitating Slime. The slime increases all damage taken by 100% and suppresses any Growth Catalysts.
Phase 2
When Maloriak reaches 25% health, he will enter phase 2. During the transition, Maloriak will release all of his remaining minions. The two large adds must be tanked by an off tank.
Once he has transitioned into phase 2, there are three new abilities.
Once he has transitioned into phase 2, there are three new abilities.
- Magma Jets release a stream of small fire towards a random enemy. These fissures deal 38,000 to 42,000 fire damage to all enemies within 0 yards. In addition, the fissures leave behind a persistent burning effect that deals 18,850 to 21,150 fire damage to everyone near the randomly targeted raid member. Maloriak will target the affected player before using the ability, so you have time to get out of the way.
- Biting Chill summons an orb that slowly falls to the ground, exploding on impact. Get out of the way.
- Acid Nova deals damage to the entire raid. You must heal this damage.
Other resources
- Psuedonym's guide to Maloriak
- Wowhead loot list and information
Ready Check shares all the strategies and inside information you need to take your raiding to the next level. You might also be interested in our strategy guides to Cataclysm's 5-man instances, and for more healer-centric raiding advice, visit Raid Rx.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
swelt Jan 5th 2011 5:08AM
You say 6 aberrations per phase, which implies 3 phases. Psuedonym's guide which you link recommends 9 aberrations. Is this a matter of choice or an error, and if it's a choice what are the considerations?
Bandwagon Jan 5th 2011 6:09AM
He says 6 adds per VIAL "phase"... there are 3 vial "phases" in Phase 1 (red, blue, and green)...
swelt Jan 5th 2011 7:29AM
OK, let me be more clear...
In phase 1 you have 3 "vial cycles" - red blue green (not necessarily in that order, but green is always last). You can choose how many aberrations he's allowed to release, he releases them in batches of 3. If you let him cast release twice, you'll have 6 aberrations.
When he reaches 25%, he releases any remaining aberrations plus 2 bigger adds. I don't think you want any of the small aberrations left to be released at this point (or you'll need a plan to deal with them).
So this post seems to me to suggest that you go through 3 full 'vial cycles' releasing 6 aberrations per cycle. This is different from the linked guide, and seems to me to be a bit tight with regard the 6 minute enrage timer.
Ashamanxx Jan 5th 2011 9:08AM
re: Bandwagon
If you release 6 adds per vial phase you will end up with all 18 adds out at once (you can't kill the adds before the green vial phase because they have a buff which significantly reduces their damage otherwise - or rather, you could kill those adds but you would spend all your time doing that rather than dps'ing the boss).
re: Swelt
You are correct that you would hit the enrage timer if you tried to go through 3 full vial cycles. I'm not sure if this guide is saying to do 6 adds per vial cycle (you have time for 2 cycles) and just off-tank the last 6 small adds with the 2 big ones.
The way we've done it is with the 9 adds per vial phase, which are then killed during the green vial. We would release the 9 adds on the first 3 casts that he did so the OT would have more time to gather aggro while he kited them around (you may be able to just tank them, though that is hard on healers) and then interrupted each additional cast (there was 2 more I believe, possibly a 3rd) until the green vial phase was over. By the 2nd vial of the 2nd phase, we usually had to stop dps'ing the boss so that we wouldn't push him over, and then we'd just spend time dps'ing the adds until the 2nd green vial, which is the ideal time to push him over and finish off those last adds.
Ashamanxx Jan 5th 2011 9:16AM
I forgot to put in my response that the reason you don't want 18 adds out at once is because you can't tank through that. The adds gain a damage done to them reduction as well as a damage boost when they are in proximity to other adds. That's why you have to manage how many and when they come out.
Make sure your AoE is good and you get all 9 adds killed during the green phase (hello OP Howling Blast!) because otherwise your OT will probably be in trouble. He should be kiting them around when he has 9 before the green phase so he will be fine, but if they don't die and all gain their buffs back he is likely to be in melee range and could be done for.
yoake Mar 10th 2011 10:19AM
As the people above noted Maloriak can have different behavior when casting release aberrations. We found out that Maloriak only casts release aberrations after Arcane Storm. (need some confirmation on this). Just make sure you have a maximum of 9 adds and interrupt any Release Aberrations that are cast afterwards. If that does not work it might have to do with the interrupters not doing their job.
People that have problems with this encounter might want to take a look at: http://25man.com/cata-guides/maloriak/ It is the most detailed guide I have found on the internet and it helped us master the encounter.
yoake Mar 10th 2011 10:34AM
It seems like most people either have problems with: fire shield (Ignacious), Chain lightning (phase 2) or DPS in phase 3.
The best way to deal with the fire shield of Ignacious (called: Aegis of Flame) is to switch all DPS to Ignacious 3 seconds before the cast. The raidleader should call this out on vent. This ensures that the shield is DPS’ed down quickly. There is a very good guide about this and other important facets of ascendant council at: http://25man.com/cata-guides/ascendant-council)
The best way to deal with chain lightning (aka lightning rod in phase 2) is to have everyone stack in the middle and let people with lightning rod move to the sides. Have your raidleader call out the names of people with lightning rod.
The trick for phase 3 is to keep focusing on maximum DPS at the start of phase 3 and survivability at the end of phase 3. Have your ranged DPS stand in the middle and have the boss rotate around the room. Have everyone spread out more the longer phase 3 last to mitigate the increasing damage.
EDIT: As Vaengence noted it is advised to spread out a lot in phase 3. Do not stack up