Heroic Lich King Strategy Notepad

[Rofldat]

"Summary" on what to do with LK:
p1
-Spread out ranged people(4?)
-Whenever a person is marked for Shadow Trap, that person alone move to another ranged location that's not occupied(the AE looks to be about 10yrd)
-Otherwise normal

p2
-range people kill Valkyr once they flies up(tank should taunt them as they go up, since supposedly they follow normal threat and this should keep them off the healers/less durable DPS)

p3
-range people kill spirits in frost mourne
-stay away from bombs on the ground(based on Paragon's guide, they spawn on a player location, so either everyone follow a single person around, or spread out a lot)
-we might actually have to kill Vile Spirits now, since I expect 2 ghosts = lethal

[Kulldam]

"Summary" on what to do with LK:
p1
-Spread out ranged people(4?)
-Whenever a person is marked for Shadow Trap, that person alone move to another ranged location that's not occupied(the AE looks to be about 10yrd)
-Otherwise normal

We'll have to test this, but as the only player outside of melee range I got both the Shadow Trap casts on me during our "attempt" last night. If there's not a minimum at range requirement, our raid can stay still if we can force the trap onto my position every time.

p2
-range people kill Valkyr once they flies up

I think this is incorrect. We kill them as normal until they hit 50% and fly above, after that they aren't killed (not sure if they're unattackable, but I suspect even if they are, you want DPS focusing on Lich King to beat the timer). The tank taunt is a good plan though and probably something I can do as the OT on this fight.

p3
-range people kill spirits in frost mourne
-stay away from bombs on the ground(based on Paragon's guide, they spawn on a player location, so either everyone follow a single person around, or spread out a lot)
-we might actually have to kill Vile Spirits now, since I expect 2 ghosts = lethal

The Paragon method seems very solid (keeping raid together to make avoiding explosion easier), and I imagine you are right about Vile Spirit damage -- we'll see. If not killing them is not an option, we can try a soak method (spawning them on far side of the room and soaking damage with bubble/OT/etc.) or just have ranged kill as many as possible and pray if that doesn't work. I can't imagine we'll be able to make the Berserk timer without all possible raid buffs, so Ugra will have to stay enhance which means only two ranged DPS, which may be iffy on doing any real Vile Spirit damage, but we shall see.

[Kulldam]

Since we are only focusing on Lich King now, I decided it was appropriate to make the rest of our Icecrown Notepad thread public to help others out. Consequently, these posts and this thread remain private for our continued work on Lich King.

[Kulldam]

A few more detailed notes on Heroic: Lich King:

Phase 3 Timing

Time (into Phase 3)	Event	Raid Action
0:00	Remorseless Winter Ends	Keep LK near ledge, Range/Caster semi-circle spread toward middle of room
0:07	Outer Ledge Shatter
0:15	Harvest Soul (entire raid)
0:20	Frostmourne Phase Starts (ported in)	Stack on marked player, follow player while tab killing Wicked Spirits
1:05	Frostmourne Phase Ends (ported out)	Immediately spread and run outward from raid to avoid Defile
1:07	Defile cast begins
1:15	Vile Spirits #1 Cast Starts	Move LK and raid toward other side of room
1:21	Vile Spirits #1 Cast Ends
1:31	Vile Spirits #1 Agro Raid	Tank/Cooldown #1 to soak
1:45	Vile Spirits #2 Cast Starts	Move LK and raid toward other side of room
1:51	Vile Spirits #2 Cast Ends
2:00	Harvest Soul (entire raid)
2:05	Frostmourne Phase Starts (ported in)	Stack on marked player, follow player while tab killing Wicked Spirits
2:50	Frostmourne Phase Ends (ported out)	Immediately spread and run outward from raid to avoid Defile
2:52	Defile cast begins
2:57	Vile Spirits #2 Agro Raid	Tank/Cooldown #2 to soak (1:28 since #1)
3:02	Vile Spirits #3 Cast Starts	Move LK and raid toward other side of room
3:08	Vile Spirits #3 Cast Ends
3:16	Vile Spirits #3 Agro Raid	Tank/Cooldown #3 to soak (1:47 since #1, 0:19 since #2)
3:31	Vile Spirits #4 Cast Starts	Move LK and raid toward other side of room
3:37	Vile Spirits #4 Cast Ends
3:45	Harvest Soul (entire raid)
3:50	Frostmourne Phase Starts (ported in)	Stack on marked player, follow player while tab killing Wicked Spirits
4:35	Frostmourne Phase Ends (ported out)	Immediately spread and run outward from raid to avoid Defile
4:37	Defile cast begins
4:40	Vile Spirits #4 Agro Raid	Tank/Cooldown #4 to soak (3:09 since #1, 1:43 since #2, 1:24 since #3)
4:46	Vile Spirits #5 Cast Starts	Move LK and raid toward other side of room
4:52	Vile Spirits #5 Cast Ends
5:00	Vile Spirits #5 Agro Raid	Tank/Cooldown #5 to soak (3:20 since #1, 2:03 since #2, 1:44 since #3, 0:20 since #4)
...	...	...

I've simplified the Vile Spirit Soak/Tank Cooldown timing to more real world numbers (as they seem to average out) as follows:

Time	Prior Secs	Cooldown #
1:30	90	1
2:55	85	2
3:15	20	3
4:40	85	4
5:00	20	5
6:25	85	4
6:45	20	5
8:10	85	4
8:30	20	5

We therefore need a cooldown pattern that allows for a cooldown every 52 seconds. Possible abilities we have available:

Spell	Cooldown (sec)	Reduction	Duration (sec)
Pain Suppression	180	40%	8
Shield Wall	120	40%	12
Divine Shield	150	100%	12
Divine Guardian	120	20%	6
Divine Protection	120	50%	12
Hand of Sacrifice	60	30%	10

Note that Divine Shield is really 300 sec, but Khrash has a 4 min cooldown and Thaw a 5 min, so I compromised at 2:30 min. Since it's not a damage reducer, I didn't list it, but Last Stand can also be used for a 120 sec, 30% health cooldown (which would mean being able to soak a wave with heal spam coming in). Now, the problem with mapping this ahead of time is Khrash may need his cooldown available for Soul Reaper, especially given that I may be soaking during a cast and cannot intervene without blowing up the raid.

Therefore, I tried to come up with a static, repeatable cooldown rotation we could use for every set of Vile Spirits we need to soak during Phase 3:

Time Lapsed	Ability	Time Since Last Use
0:01:30	Shield Wall	N/A
0:02:55	Divine Shield	N/A
0:03:15	Last Stand+Divine Guardian+Hand of Sacrifice	N/A
0:04:40	Shield Wall	0:03:10
0:05:00	Pain Suppression	N/A
0:06:25	Last Stand+Divine Guardian+Hand of Sacrifice	0:03:10
0:06:45	Shield Wall	0:02:05
0:08:10	Divine Shield	0:05:15
0:08:30	Last Stand+Divine Guardian+Hand of Sacrifice	0:02:05
0:09:55	Shield Wall	0:03:10
0:10:15	Pain Suppression	0:05:15
0:11:40	Last Stand+Divine Guardian+Hand of Sacrifice	0:03:10
0:12:00	Shield Wall	0:02:05
0:13:25	Divine Shield	0:05:15

Obviously there's no way the phase will last that long, but as you can see the basic idea is to rotate 4 abilities from 3 people, but on only two "tanks". We start with me Shield Walling, then Thawfore Divine Shield soaks the next set, then I Last Stand+Tier 4-piece the next set, then Shield Wall again, then Pain Suppression from Fides on me, then Last Stand, then Shield Wall, etc.

The idea is basically rotate my two short cooldown abilities (Shield Wall & Last Stand) with Thaw or Fides' longer cooldown ability. This staggers the long cooldown uses enough that there's always 5:15 between each use, so there won't be any trouble with overlap from the actual cooldowns (3 min and 5 min, respectively). Same with my abilities, both at 2 mins and shorter stagger is 2:05.

With this method, the real question is how much damage will I take without a reducer during the full time of soaking (usually takes 10-12 seconds to soak all Viles during a phase) when I only have Last Stand + 4-Piece? Both Vile Spirits & Wicked Spirits cast Spirit Burst, but that's before reducers or resistances, so I suspect with Last Stand I'll be able to soak 3 instantaneous hits before needing any heals.

I also added Divine Guardian to the rotation during the times I Last Stand, so that will give me 6 seconds of 20% reduction, but obviously since it required Khrash to use Divine Sacrifice, it may be worth having Khrash's Divine Sac macro for this fight instant remove the actual buff from him so he doesn't take spike damage from my incoming damage and get bursted by the Lich King.

The other question, is can Hand of Sacrifice be freely used on a target that just got Divine Sacrifice/Guardian? The only limitation text indicated on Hand of Sacrifice is no other Hand spell, so if that works, Thawfore can use Hand of Sac on me during the Last Stand rotations, and if staggered 5-6 seconds into the soaking, that should be 20% from Guardian into 30% from Hand of Sacrifice, which would be plenty with ~82k health pool I think.

---

Other stuff about Phase 3:

• Wicked Spirits are the spirits floating around inside Frostmourne room when the raid gets ported in.
• Like Vile Spirits, they will explode for 30k Shadow damage if they get into melee range with anyone.
• Unlike Vile Spirits, however, Wicked Spirits only have 4,000 health and therefore must be killed by tab target spamming casters (I imagine Flame Shock, Diseases, Living Bomb, etc. would work great here) as we move around the room avoiding falling bombs.
• As the first time table shows, Defile is always cast immediately upon exiting the Frostmourne room, which is why positioning before Harvest Soul is cast is so important. Raid members should be ready to immediately start moving away from each other as they exit Frostmourne (think of melee DPS during Blood Princes when Empowered Shock Vortex is cast).

[Kulldam]

More notes on Heroic: Lich King:

For Phase 1, after really thinking over the numbers, I'm really starting to believe our Phase 1 Necrotic Plague management is unideal.

Now, as you can see, the Heroic version of Necrotic does 75,000 per stack. We also know from logs that Lich King casts a new Necrotic Plague on a random raid member every 30 seconds. And of course, mechanically, one new stack is created every time it jumps to a new target from running full duration (15 sec) or being dispelled from a single-stack target (i.e. a random raid member).

Normally, we would focus on getting as many Ghouls on me as possible because, it stands to reason, that getting the stack high enough to kill a Ghoul (378k HP) within two ticks rather than 3, will increase the damage that Shambling Horrors take eventually. The formula for this would of course be:

378000 <= 75000 * 2 * x
or
x = 2.52 stacks
or
CEIL(x) = 3 stacks

Now if we assume 13% spell damage from Rofl, then that's actually slightly lower stack requirement, of:

378000 <= (75000 * 1.13) * 2 * x
or
x = 2.23 stacks
or
CEIL(x) = 3 stacks

Also for a single-tick Ghoul kill without 13%:

378000 <= 75000 * x
or
x = 5.04 stacks
or
CEIL(x) = 6 stacks

And with 13%:

378000 <= (75000 * 1.13) * x
or
x = 4.46 stacks
or
CEIL(x) = 5 stacks

So for Ghoul killing, until we reach 5 stacks, the 13% magic debuff doesn't matter.

That said, what I want to focus on is: How much damage are we wasting by trying to push the stack higher on Ghouls rather than forcing it onto Horrors?

Lets look at a timeline to make it easier. This first timeline shows one of the two possible best-case scenarios we get get from our normal strategy, which kills the first Horror at the soonest possible moment in the timeline (the 90 second tick).

time	stack size	target	damage this tick	damage to Horror#1	Horror#1 Health
0	1	Player	75000	0	3000000
5	1	Ghoul#1	75000		3000000
10	1	Ghoul#1	75000		3000000
15	1	Ghoul#1	75000		3000000
20	2	Ghoul#2	150000		3000000
25	2	Ghoul#2	150000		3000000
30	2	Ghoul#2	150000		3000000
35	4	Ghoul#3	300000		3000000
40	4	Ghoul#3	300000		3000000
45	5	Ghoul#4	375000		3000000
50	5	Ghoul#4	375000		3000000
55	6	Ghoul#5	450000		3000000
60	7	Horror#1	525000		3000000
65	8	Horror#1	600000	600000	2400000
70	8	Horror#1	600000	600000	1800000
75	9	Ghoul#6	675000		1800000
80	10	Horror#1	750000	750000	1050000
85	10	Horror#1	750000	750000	300000
90	10	Horror#1	750000	750000	-450000

The other best case scenario has the same outcome, but involves waiting for one more Ghoul (that is, wait till the Ghoul#6 death) to start jumping to the Horror. In either case, the earliest possible moment we can ever get the first Horror dead is the 90 second mark, if the Plague jumps at the exact right moment to the exact right targets (which it will almost never do).

Therefore, I wanted to see how this compared to a controlled system, whereby the OT is tanking only a single Horror and a single Ghoul (when the 15 sec duration is about to run out on the Horror and it needs to jump), and we get some interesting results.

First, this is the timetable for that scenario without any debuffs (matching the above without 13% debuff as well).

time	stack size	target	damage this tick	damage to Horror#1	Horror#1 Health	damage to Horror#2	Horror#2 Health
0	1	Player	75000	0	3000000
5	1	Horror#1	75000	75000	2925000
10	1	Horror#1	75000	75000	2850000
15	1	Horror#1	75000	75000	2775000
20	2	Ghoul	150000		2775000
25	2	Ghoul	150000		2775000
30	2	Ghoul	150000		2775000
35	4	Horror#1	300000	300000	2475000
40	4	Horror#1	300000	300000	2175000
45	4	Horror#1	300000	300000	1875000
50	5	Ghoul	375000		1875000
55	5	Ghoul	375000		1875000
60	6	Horror#1	450000	450000	1425000		3000000
65	7	Horror#1	525000	525000	900000		3000000
70	7	Horror#1	525000	525000	375000		3000000
75	8	Horror#2	600000		375000	600000	2400000
80	8	Horror#2	600000		375000	600000	1800000
85	8	Horror#2	600000		375000	600000	1200000
90	9	Horror#1	675000	675000	-300000		1200000
95	11	Horror#2	825000		-300000	825000	375000
100	11	Horror#2	825000		-300000	825000	-450000
105	12	Ghoul	900000		-300000		-450000

This shows that the first Horror dies the exact same tick as the best-case scenario from our normal setup, but this would be basically guaranteed since it doesn't rely on jump randomness. I also decided to see what a difference the 13% debuff from Rofl makes, and that is seen below:

time	stack size	target	damage this tick	damage to Horror#1	Horror#1 Health	damage to Horror#2	Horror#2 Health
0	1	Player	84750	0	3000000
5	1	Horror#1	84750	84750	2915250
10	1	Horror#1	84750	84750	2830500
15	1	Horror#1	84750	84750	2745750
20	2	Ghoul	169500		2745750
25	2	Ghoul	169500		2745750
30	2	Ghoul	169500		2745750
35	4	Horror#1	339000	339000	2406750
40	4	Horror#1	339000	339000	2067750
45	4	Horror#1	339000	339000	1728750
50	5	Ghoul	423750		1728750
55	6	Horror#1	508500	508500	1220250		3000000
60	6	Horror#1	508500	508500	711750		3000000
65	7	Horror#1	593250	593250	118500		3000000
70	8	Horror#2	678000		118500	678000	2322000
75	8	Horror#2	678000		118500	678000	1644000
80	8	Horror#2	678000		118500	678000	966000
85	9	Horror#1	762750	762750	-644250		966000
90	10	Horror#2	847500		-644250	847500	118500
95	11	Horror#2	932250		-644250	932250	-813750
100	12	Ghoul	1017000		-644250		-813750

Interestingly, because of the exponential growth of Necrotic damage, the 13% debuff does very little in the grand scheme and only shaves off 5 seconds (a single tick) of kill time from Horror #1. More surprisingly, the same is true for Horror #2, even though the stack size is so much larger, again the timing of ticks is such that it doesn't fall precisely in line with a straight 13% boost.

Now, that doesn't mean it's not worth having the 13% debuff from Rofl, especially on Ghouls, since that also means extra damage from his DoTs which might mean a Ghoul or two dies a tick early, which could shave off 5 or even 10 seconds of kill time on the first Horror.

As mentioned, what I like about this method is that it makes the entire process much more controlled, as players with Necrotic will simply run behind the single Horror being tanked to the side and not into a massive ball of ghouls, which will allow us to force the Necrotic onto the Horror each time it jumps from either a Ghoul or a player.

Anyway, we'll have to try it in practice and see, but I think this will be a lot stronger than the chaotic method we're used to and should allow us to kill the first Horror as fast as possible every attempt, allowing us to ensure better survival during those ~30 seconds where I'll have two Horrors on me. It also will allow me to easily spot where Necrotic stacks are going (since I'll have 1-2 Horrors and 1 Ghoul on me at most) and therefore see when I have a full 15 sec stack on a Horror and I can therefore freely kite for a bit to help healers.

[Kilwenn]

I know that DPS on LK is a high priority, but so is your survival. I can spec Slow to help out and Rofl can CoI if needed to make kiting easier.

Also, I wanted to get some input from healers on mana. Is mana OK or do you feel you need Replenishment?

[Katheon]

Another option would be since we are now 2 healing would be to move 1 of the melee with you to help on the shamblers like suggested befor. Not sure who you would want to move for that I would do it but with you on shamblers we have no Sunders on Lich King so I've been trying to keep expose armor up on him nonstop to maximize extra damage there but we pushed him into phase befor with 5 DPS just we were using different trap pattern so with this new design might work better. Just a thought.

[Fideslol]

I know that DPS on LK is a high priority, but so is your survival. I can spec Slow to help out and Rofl can CoI if needed to make kiting easier.

Also, I wanted to get some input from healers on mana. Is mana OK or do you feel you need Replenishment?

With two healers (myself and Kheelan) we have replenishment. And, I cannot speak for Kheelan, I am personally happier with my mana using two healers and having replenishment as opposed to losing replenishment for a third healer.

[Katheon]

Thoughts on phase 2. The Valk needs quick snaring and so I was thinking on it seeing as how I carry a small arsenal of weapons for spec variations all enchanted and ready I might try setting up a slow MH dagger with crippling poison and have a weapon swap macro in place for this phase if it you help on keep constant snares going and Im spec for increased dagger/fist damage so I should only be taking minimal DPS loss for a short time losing the instant poison.

[Rofldat]

Thoughts on phase 2. The Valk needs quick snaring and so I was thinking on it seeing as how I carry a small arsenal of weapons for spec variations all enchanted and ready I might try setting up a slow MH dagger with crippling poison and have a weapon swap macro in place for this phase if it you help on keep constant snares going and Im spec for increased dagger/fist damage so I should only be taking minimal DPS loss for a short time losing the instant poison.

Why not just use a dagger swap in OH(I think it's just equip to 17 instead of 16 iirc) and Shiv the valkyr? You should suffer less of a DPS loss and it's guaranteed to get that cippling on the valk.

And I noticed that after the valkyr flew up, the bolts they cast also heal them(life drain bolt basicly), so I think that confirms that the Valkyr in p2 is not to be bothered with at all after they flies up.

It might also helps to have 2 people be ready to slow the Valk, because using CoI hurts my DPS on the Valk by a large amount if I am to keep the 50% slow up(I'd have to use it every 5s, so I will already be using all my frost rune on CoI alone, and can't use Scourge Strike at all)

Since Kath alreayd volunteered above, other people that can slow(without taking as big of a DPS loss as me, I think) would be:
-Gale(Frost Shock every 8s)
-Kilwenn(Frostbolt, Frostfire bolt)


And I get a feeling there's some more things we could optimize on our p1 strat, but I can't place my mind on it...