Saturday, March 8, 2008

Heroic Sethekk Halls

Auchindon
Heroic Sethekk Halls
requires lower city rep honored - Auchenai Key


Sethekk Halls seems to be the most popular stealth run, or at least the most well known. When I ask new Druids or Rogues to come on a stealth run, they all seem to expect to be doing Sethekk.

This was probably because it was a popular instance to farm for nethers before it was nerfed. Due to its close location to Shattrah, the fact it was relatively quick to stealth to the last boss, close graveyard, no clearing needed and only needing 3 stealthers, made it an easy farming instance.

Blizz caught on to the amount this instance was being farmed and nerfed it by giving the first boss Darkweaver Syth the “stealth seeing eye” meaning you had to engage the first boss rather then just stealthing past him, I use the word “engage”, as rogues and druids have found a way to get past him without actually downing him. It is still possible farm Talon King Ikiss for nethers with as few as 2 druids, I’m still waiting for gear to reach the level where he will be soloable, with the way gear upgrades have been going, I wouldn’t be surprised if this happens sooner rather than later.

This is one of the harder instances to stealth through, with a couple of bottlenecks where it is common for stealthers to agro mobs, I highly recommend some stealth gear for this, but I have seen rogues make it through with no MoD and no stealth gear (although they get vanish and distract) Druids with less than 365 stealth points may need a helping hand.

Stealthing up to the first boss the first bottleneck seems to always be the 2 guards in the first big room, the best way I have found to get past is to go behind the guard on the right, stick to the wall edge closer towards him, and if he turns towards you, wait till he turns back then slip past.

Stealthing from the next room into the corridor, watch out for the bird pat, I advise marking this bird pat with a symbol as he flies into the first boss room where you will be setting up.

When stealthing into the first bosses room (Darkweaver Syth), you must be careful as the boss can see through stealth, do not past the concrete slab that has candelabras on it, as soon as you stealth inside the doorway of the room, go to the side, wait for the bird pat to pass then u can quickly destealth and eat/drink and gear up, NE’s can shadowmeld and this is enough for the bird to path past, although he may stop for a second.

If you can't safely setup here, get 1 rogue to agro the boss, while the group runs into the room on the side, once in the room, the rogue can vanish safely near the room then stealth in, if the rogue is not able to vanish near the room, then they can vanish into the far room or at the back entrance safely, and wait for the fight to start before joining in.

In the room, party members can safely destealth, buff eat and drink.
In heroic mode I’ve done this boss with as few as 3 stealthers gear levels being
Bear tank – 30k ac 16khp
Rogue geared up to Kara level
Healer with 1800 heal

The boss summons adds when he is at approximately 90% 50% 30% health.

The tank should pull the boss away from the front entrance as the bird pat will be pathing there, and we dont want him to join the fight, the boss hits relatively softly, so is easy to heal through until he summons his elementals.

DPS should focus fire on the elementals and kill the first 2 waves, when the 3rd wave is summoned, DPS should focus fire on the boss as he goes down relatively quickly after the 3rd summon.

Stealthing up to the last boss (Talon King Ikiss) the next bottleneck for stealthers is the group of birds. I swear they’ve slightly repositioned the birds on the left since last year so I find the best way to get past is by stealthing along the right. Even with +stealth gear some stealthers find it tough to get past, if you find your having a bit of trouble getting past this bottleneck get a rogue to distract, the bird on the middle right seems to cause the most problems.

As a druid I have found it much easier to get past by using “sooth animal” that’s right I’ve actually found a consistent use for “sooth animal” you can safely destealth between the bird flock and the guards at the door, wait about 8 seconds (for your stealth cd) then cast soothe animal on the middle bird on the right closest to the cliff. Soothe animal takes 1.5 seconds to cast and lasts for 15 seconds. Remember soothe animal can sometimes be resisted and if this happens it would agro the entire flock, although this hasn’t happened to me yet.

Stealth through Anzu's room to the last boss, the last set of mobs before the boss go to the right, and try to jump on the side of the wall as you stealth past, sometimes I find this mob can agro, if he does, run around to the corner of the room and die on the mound of bones, as others in your party can safely destealth here to jump or BR you.

Stealth into the exit, in here you can safely regear, buff, drink etc.

Talon King Ikiss is not a hard boss, I’ve managed to 2 man him without much problems before.

The tank should tank towards the back of the room, use the back pillars to avoid his arcane explosion, as using the front pillars you may accidently agro the mobs there.

Talon King Ikiss’s physical dmg on the tank should not put too much of a strain on the healer, he does an arcane volley that hits all party members even through los for about 1500 dmg, the main damage you have to watch out for is his Arcane Explosion, he will generally blink before he does this and start casting, as soon as he blinks, run behind the pillar as this AoE is losable. He also puts a slow on party members, so if he blinks and you are slowed druids remember you can shift out of slows and rogues have a few tricks with Cloak of Shadows, improved sprint, gnomes can use escape artist.

Once the boss casts Arcane Explosion, this acts as an agro wipe, so the tank should make sure he picks up agro on the boss, and the dps should wait until the tank regains agro.

Ikiss will also occasionally sheep the 2nd target on the agro list, this gives the target a heal, this shouldn’t be an issue if the healer is sheeped as they can shift out of it, or due to hot healing, the hots should be able to cover until the sheep wears off.

Once Ikiss is dead the back door will open, giving a quick run to the exit, it also gives easier access to Anzu’s room in case of wipe while doing Anzu.

To be able to summon Anzu a druid must be on or completed their swift flight form quest.

Anzu's room must be cleared in order to do this boss, profit wise for a stealth run, the time is probably not worth it, but if your farming the mount, or trying to complete the druid quest, a party of rogues/druids can definitely do this.

It is recommended you kill the group of mobs in Ikiss’s room, and use Ikiss’s room to pull the rest of the mobs into to kill.

A few of the mob’s in Anzu’s room fear, so pulling each group into Anzu’s room cuts down on the chance of being feared into another group of mobs.

For the pulls sap 2 targets and get the tank to sleep the bird, so if the bird comes out of sleep he will go for the tank rather than the healer.

After the room is clear you can summon Anzu, the healer should have some macro’s made to target the statues and cast rank 1 rejuv on them, keeping the statues rejuved gives extra buffs to the party.

Macro’s as follows

/target Eagle Spirit/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)/targetlasttarget

/target Hawk Spirit/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)/targetlasttarget

/target Falcon Spirit/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)/targetlasttarget

Anzu is generally a tank and spank fight, at 66% and 33% he will banish himself and a flock of birds will fly out which must be dps’d asap, once the birds are down or after 1 minute Anzu will unbanish and the tank and spank continues.

Anzu should be done with a full group, even clearing Anzu’s room is a headaches and because of the multi mob pulls I really wouldn’t want to do it without 2 rogues.

If you’re lucky the mount will drop! I feel it’s one of the coolest looking mounts in the game, but be aware the drop rate is really low 1-2% and you will be rolling against 4 others if it does.

Sethekk also has a number of mines, I know one of these is minable with a low risk of aggroing mobs, and that’s the one in the first room, usually I will ask the miners to leave it till the end when we stealth out. There is also one chest that can appear in the first room, but I’m not sure if it’s worth the risk/reward for the pull.

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