Heroic Spine

[tussilago]

New stats:

22.64 mastery
17.36 crit
23.61 haste

970k a go on dummy unbuffed. Should be a good test come Sunday.

Still have to find the perfect macro...

Seems you sacrifice too much haste to get that mastery.

I went with:
17.13 mastery
17.89 crit
30.38 haste

Did 1.8-2.2 mil dmg / Tendon in the raid.

Made sure I had some orbs by putting SW:P and MFing while Amalgamation is about to explode. So went with:
AA+Trinket
MB
SF
MSx3
MF->Instant MB
MSx3
MF->Instant MB
MS...

Here I'm responsible for breaking a stun or such, so depends on how well we timed them.

With this amount of crit, I had SF up for the nukes, assuming I went a bit more MF-heavy should crits not show.

[Luminee]

I'm pretty sure you mean different values, I think didimissone meant haste without Shadowform and you, tussilago, with.
Although I don't know how you reach those mastery levels, at 3202 haste, 900 crit I can only reach ~15 Mastery.

[didimissone]

Dont forget that i will be getting DI + FM (but i'll be losing PI ... damm holy priest :P ) and that we have at least one staff with the haste buff. Not sure how they stack in the fight through.

Took my values from the armory of course:

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/t ... e/advanced

Oh i'm also missing a mastery enchant on gloves ... so that would put me just over 2700 mastery rating.

[Aescu]

Hi,

after reading all this I'm surprised that the tendons are not long enough there to make full dotting worth it.
But thanks for the inspiration and I'll try later the MS MB tactic and buy bottled wishes before.

-Aescu

[Daisy]

the MS/MB rotation is higher burst than normal dots, that's why we use it whenever available/convenient midfight.
I haven't been beaten on tendons over the course of the fight once by any class/spec in our guild.

[Cryptal]

I came up with something interesting for tentacle dps yesterday.
Before the tentacle spawns I am ready with 5 stacks of evangelism and 3 orbs. As soon as it spawns:

AA + Bottled wishes (I have them both in one macro) - I actually precast this one 0.5-1 sec before the tentacle spawns
MB
MSx3
MF2
MB
MSx3
MF2
MB
MS
SWDx2

I am getting between 1.1 and 1.4mil dps with 403 ilvl and no legendary

That's how much I can fit into it. I need to be very quick to cast SWDx2. Sometimes I only have time for 1 :(

[Setenza]

I had my first attempt at this fight just last night. Although we wiped a lot, we did make *some* progress. 2 out of 3 plates ain't too bad, I guess.

My question, though, has to do with: "What's the best thing to do when you're dealing with the Amalgamations and Bloods?"

And particularly after the 1st plate has been up the first time.

I know I need to Flay like crazy to get Shadowfiend off of its cooldown. But which do you all prefer to target? The Amalgamation or the Bloods?

Perhaps I was wrong in doing so, but I was mostly Flaying the Bloods. Yes, I put DoTs on each Amalgamation once or twice, and hit them with a Mind Blast or two, but I was mostly Flaying the Bloods; for no other reason than to reduce the clutter. Well, and to get the 9 puddles, too. ;-)

On the one hand, I can see the potential advantage of Flaying solely on the Amalgamation. With no switching of targets, there's no interruption of casting Mind Flay... which means having Shadowfiend ready sooner.

But on the other hand, focusing all my DPS (even if it is mostly just SW:P and MF) on the Amalgamation means that the tank will likely be moving him into position (to lift up the plate) sooner... and perhaps that plate flys off before my Shadowfiend is ready.

Yes, there were a few times I didn't have Shadowfiend available for the 2nd lift... and a lonely feeling it is, too. ;-P

Suggestions?

[Sin]

Target the amalgamation.

Less time between lifts is better for your healers. You will also have your SF sooner if you have 5% crit on the amalgamation (depends on your raid comp).

One person is enough to manage bloods. And having your SF up will make a huge difference (if you struggle with the tendon or try to 1 shot it). Don't bother to dot/MB if you won't have SF up. Every GCD counts.

[Setenza]

Thanks for responding. I'll give it a try the next time we're in there.

Although I don't believe I'm getting a 5% Crit buff with our raid composition, I was at the target dummy today--timing how long it took me to get SF off cooldown by just casting MF (and nothing else). After 6 or 7 tries of simulating my "tendon rotation," I started the stopwatch as I began mind flaying over and over. My SF was up-n-ready anywhere from 1 minute flat (ready before Archangel & Bottled Wishes, even!) to 1 minute 20 seconds. At about 1 minute 10 seconds, it was pretty much a "tie" between SF and AA cooldowns.

At idle, my Crit is at 14.32%. It goes up a little more as WoU stacks up, and it gets an occasional boost from Power Torrent and Lightweave proccing. In a raid, I would obviously be well fed and flasked, too... which, with the additional Crit (from Int), ought to help reduce the cooldown on SF a little more as well.
Hopefully, anyway... ;-)

[terrytriceps]

hey there guys, I've been asked to go shadow for spine hc, normally holy/disc, changed just because of our raid comp, I'll link my armoury below, Ive been practising the rotation mentioned by zusi on a dummy as our next raid is 3 days away, I'm having a bit of an issue with my burst dps, within the 18 seconds I've been timing myself I can only pull about 800k dmg, is this relitavely low for my gear? can I expect to pull more in raid with buffs (I'd have either DI or Elemental Buff during raid.

ARMOURY:
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/saurfang/Betrthenandy/simple