Heigan the Unclean 10-Man Boss Strategy Guide

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Heigan the Unclean is the 2nd boss of the plague wing in Naxxramas. This encounter was made famous for its “dance” mechanic. This truly unique encounter is fairly easy to master…if you can dance!

Heigan the Unclean Abilities

Phase 1

• Spell Disruption – 20 yard aura around Heigan, increases casting times by 300%.
• Decrepit Fever - Disease applied to a random player, deals 3000 damage every 3 seconds and reduces maximum HP by 50% of all players within a 20 yard radius.
• Eruption – 3 of the 4 quarters of the dancing area will erupt with green slim, dealing 6,000-7,000 damage to players caught around the edges, and dealing 12,000-14,000 damage to players in the middle.

Phase 2

• Plague Cloud – Deals 7,500 damage per second to anyone still standing on the platform after Heigan teleports back up there.
• Eruption – 3 of the 4 quarters of the dancing area will erupt with green slim, dealing 6,000-7,000 damage to players caught around the edges, and dealing 12,000-14,000 damage to players in the middle.

Heigan the Unclean Boss Strategy

Starting the Fight

Healers and ranged DPS will begin the fight by running to the platform that Heigan starts on, melee will simply follow the boss around. Positioning at this point is pretty straight forward. Players on the platform should try to stay at maximum casting range as to avoid the spell disruption aura. Likewise melee players will want to stay right on top of heigan’s model as the phase 1 dance starts.

Phase 1 Dance

The phase 1 “dance” isn’t nearly as difficult as the phase 2. Essentially you’ll have melee following your tank around the room while your ranged DPS and healers stand on top of the platform. As a melee DPS you need to make sure you aren’t hanging over the edge of an eruption wall. You don’t want to eat an eruption and cause your healers further healing.

As a tank you have the most important job on the fight. It’s your responsibility to make sure you move Heigan quickly enough and position him correctly before the next eruption goes off. Check out the phase 2 dance rotation map below, this is the same rotation used in phase 1 eruptions.

Note: Read / View the phase 2 dance strategy below, the same applies for tanking positions in phase 1.

Healing and Cleansing for Phase 1

As a healer this fight really isn’t too bad. The most important thing you want to be watching for is the decrepit fever. You need to dispel this immediately. Obviously a MT with 50% HP doesn’t make much of an MT. He / she could easily be dropped by Heigan.

Phase 2 Beginning

Phase 2 starts when Heigan teleports back to the platform. After a few seconds he will start casting plague cloud on the platform, which is why the entire raid must get to position 1 on the map below. The eruption dance will begin in a few seconds.

Dancing Your Way Through Eruptions

Now, Heigan will engage his eruption rotation. 3 of the 4 pieces of the room will eruption at the same time. The first safe location in the room will be 1, IE 2, 3, and 4 will erupt. After the first eruption the entire raid will move location 2, IE 1, 3, 4 will erupt. Then to 3, 4, 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, 4, etc…The eruption will continue going left to right, then right to left continually for 2 complete rotations.

Note: It’s better to run closer to the platform as it reduces the total distance you must travel between positions due to the room’s curved perimeter.

At this point Heigan will run down from the platfor and go back to your main tank. Ranged and healers should return to the platform and melee DPS will resume Heigan as well. Now you simply resume phase 1 and continue the phase 1 / 2 dance rotation until you’ve killed Heigan.

Sapphiron 10-Man Boss Strategy

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Sapphiron is the 1st boss within the final wing of Naxxramas, Frostwyrm Lair. This ancient blue dragon was once servant to Malygos and the head of his brood until he was struck down by Arthas. Arthas used what was left of his necromantic powers to resurrect Sapphiron as a frost wyrm. Sapphiron, now an implement of chaos for the scourge, guards the final passage way to the very lair of Kel’Thuzad.

Sapphiron Abilities

• 4,250,000 HP
• Frontal Cleave, 180 degrees
• Rear Tail swipe, ~45 degrees
• Phase 1
  • Frost Aura – deals 1200 damage per second to every member of the raid throughout the fight.
  • Life Drain – deals 2200-2800 shadow damage to targeted player and heals Sapphiron for 4400-5600 every 3 seconds. This is a curse, it can be dispelled. Players who get this should immediately call out on vent to be dispelled.
  • Chill aka Blizzard – this blizzard like spell deals 3500-4500 damage every 2 seconds to those standing within it’s AoE. All players need to be aware of the Chill’s position and do what they can do avoid taking any damage from it.
• Phase 2 – every 45 seconds
  • Ice Bolt – puts 2 players in your raid in a block of ice, dealing 5000-7500 damage to the player and players close by in a small AoE. The raid must stand behind these blocks to survive frost breath (see video below).
  • Frost Breath – anyone not behind the blocks of ice will be 1 shot (over 100,000 damage).

Sapphiron Boss Strategy

The Entry and Healer’s Setup – You’ll want to split your raid into 2 groups. Group 1 should go left and group 2 right. Each group will have 1 dedicated healer who will be solo in charge of healing that group. With mediocre gear it’s still possible to duo heal Sappphiron, but difficult. For players just learning the encounter I would suggest using 3 healers, where there 3rd healer’s primary job is healing the main tank.

note: scroll all the way to the bottom for the video tutorial of these steps.

Phase 1 – Generally speaking this phase is a standard tank and spank fight. I’ve mentioned the phase 1 abilities above, so you’ll need to be aware of all of these. Simply keep the AoE heals cooking and don’t let anyone get too low, especially as you’re nearing the phase 2 transition. This transition is when most player’s are going to die due to the potential spike in damage due to the ice bolt.

Positioning and Liar Layout

• Red circle – this is the outer wall of Sapphiron’s lair
• Green circle – this is the interior green circle on the floor, I use this as a point of reference below regarding phase 2
• Blue oval – Sapphiron’s body, note that Sapphiron’s head should be facing towards Kel’Thuzad lair

Phase 2 – This phase begins as Sapphiron flies up into the air. He will go up and ice bolt 2 players at random, these players now act like shields for the frost breath. Players nearby should all gather behind these players, doing so will prevent you from being hit by the frost breath.

Note: it’s helpful to gather up during this phase so you aren’t so spread out that you can’t get behind the ice block shields. My guild collapses around the green ring in the center, staying close, but also spreading out in a circular fashion around it’s perimeter. You need to spread out a bit to avoid the AoE frost impact damage on the ice bolt.

As soon as the ice bolt block is up you should immediately get behind it and healers should be topping off the raid.

Note for DPS Players – As a DPS there isn’t much you need to worry about…but there are a few things.

• Watch out for the frontal cleave, if you get hit by this and aren’t wearing plate you’re probably dead. It’s 180 degree frontal cleave, so make sure you DPS closer to the hind legs.
• Watch out for the tailswipe, simply stay away from the tail, not very difficult.
• Be aware of the blizzard’s positioning in the room and do your best to avoid taking any damage from it. There’s no need to put additional pressure on your healers.

Phase 1 / 2 Continuation – At this point you’re essentially in a loop of the above 2 phases of listed. Phases 1 and 2 will continue until you’ve either killed or wiped to Sapphiron. Simply continue the steps I’ve listed above and you’ll be well on your way to your first Saph kill!

Sapphiron 10-man Video Tutorial

Instructor Razuvious 10-Man Strategy

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Instructor Razuvious is the first boss of the military wing, otherwise known as the death knight wing, in Naxxramas. This encounter is certainly one of the easier fights in Naxxramas as it requires no real tank (which we’ll discuss below).

Instructor Razuvious Abilities

• 3,300,000 hit points
• Disrupting Shout - Hits the entire raid for 4200-4700 damage, cast every 15 seconds.
• Jagged Knife – Hits a raid member at random for 5000 damage with a 10,000 damage physical bleed in addition, cast every 10 seconds.
• Unbalancing Strike – Deals 350% weapon damage and reduces defense by 100 for 6 seconds.

Death Knight Understudy Abilities

• Blood Strike – Deals 50% weapon damage to the target, 4 second cooldown.
• Taunt - Taunts the target, 20 second cooldown.
• Bone Barrier - Reduces damage taken by 75% for 20 seconds, 30 second cooldown.

Instructor Razuvious Boss Strategy

The strategy for Razuvious really is fairly simple. There are 2 “mind control towers” for lack of a better word, that 2 players may use to control the death knight understudy adds. Your 2 controllers should be your tanks, since they likely won’t be doing any real DPS anyway.

These players will use the death knight understudy adds to tank Razuvious. Please note that instructor razuvious cannot be tanked by any normal tank, he hits for 30,000+ on plate, for this reason we’re going to use the adds exclusively.

Controling the Tanking Add

As soon as you take control of the add go ahead and taunt Razuvious and use your bone barrier ability. After you’re bone barrier ability drops go ahead and have your other controller who has the other death knight taunt Razuvious. Much the same, go ahead and use bone barrier. This rotation should continue throughout the fight, where the only real hitch in the road is when you have to drop the controls to re-click and refresh your mind control timer.

Your controllers should be communicating on vent regarding taunts, bone barrier cooldown, and when they are dropping to re-cast the MC ability. You should never both drop MC at the same time, this will without a doubt lead to a player or players dying.

Healing 101 for Razuvious

Much like tanking, healing is fairly straight forward on this fight. Generally, we have one healer focus on keeping the adds HP up while a 2nd healer keeps the raid topped off. There isn’t much raid damage in this fight, so typically one healer can handle it. The healer on the adds should be casting their longest and most efficient heals, there’s no reason to spam quick heals here due to their insane amount of HP.

The only thing that you may need to watch for is the jagged knife ability, this can dish out 15K pretty fast, and if the player is already a bit damage it can easily be a kill. Make sure you keep an eye on raid debuffs for this bleed.

Panic Mode Tanking

In the event you get to the very end of the fight and just don’t have enough HP on the Death Knight understudies you still might be able to get a kill. Have your tank taunt and immediately shield wall. Granted, you don’t have the same health as a Death Knight understudy, but this can often buy you a few seconds for additional DPS.

This should be considered an action of last resort. If you follow the steps I’ve listed above you should be able to clearly Razuvious without any problems.

Maexxna 10-Man Boss Strategy

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Maexxna is the 3rd and final boss of the spider wing in Naxxramas. This spider queen is a very exciting encounter for all class roles and “tosses” players into positions they haven’t ever encountered in World of Warcraft before.

Maexxna Abiilties

• 2,500,000 hit points
• Web Wrap – The first cast goes off 20 seconds after engaging and each subsequent web wraps occur every 40 seconds. This will send a player flying back to the wall, encasing them in a web that deals 2475-3025 nature damage every 2 seconds. The web encasement must be destroyed by other players to free the trapped victim.
• Web Spray – Casts every 40 seconds stunning the entire raid and dealing 1750-2250 damage. This effect lasts for 6 seconds.
• Poison shock – Deals 3500-4500 damage in a frontal cone.
• Necrotic Poison – Reduces healing taken by 75% for 30 seconds. Can be dispelled.
• Frenzy - Increases physical damage by 100%, haste by 50%, and size by 15%. Occurs at 30% health.
• Maexxna Spiderlings – 8 small spiders are spawned 30 seconds are the fight begins and each subsequent spawning occurs every 40 seconds after that. These spiderlings are a good marker for the web spray, which occurs aprx. 10 seconds after the spiders are spawned.

Maexxna Boss Strategy

As you probably already gathered from the sheer number of abilities that Mexxna has in this fight…there’s a lot going on. For this reason this is sometimes a difficult fight to learn, but once you’ve got the basics down it’s a fight you should be able to 1 or 2 shot every time.

Pulling Maexxna and Tanking Maexxna

To pull Maexxna the tank will simply want to run all the way through her model and tank her towards the middle of the room. Make sure she is facing away from the raid to avoid poison shock on the entire raid. Once she is securely being tanked in the middle DPS may engage.

Healing Maexxna, Web Spray, and Web Wrap

As a healer there is going to be a lot of things going on for you. Let’s just go through each one by one so you know what you should always be looking for during each stage of Maexxna.

1. Tank Healing – Healing the tank is pretty standard. Maexxna hits quite hard, so you’ll need to be on your A game. Always be on the lookout for Necrotic Poison and immediately dispel this in the event it’s applied to your tank.
2. Web Wrap – Every 40 seconds you’re going to have to heal the web wrap victim. Generally this only requires a single lesser heal (…or flash of light, flash heal, etc). Have your raid calling out on vent if they get tossed onto the wall so you know who you should be healing and your DPS know who they should be shooting down off the wall.
3. Web Srapy – This is by far the most difficult aspect of the fight. During web spray you obviously can’t cast heals, so you need to do everything you can to make sure that the tank has been pre-cleansed of necrotic poison and is topped off before the web spray goes off. Additionally, if you’ve got any HoTs or other over time heals you can cast use them (HoTs, Earth Shield, shield, etc.).
4. Spiderlings - The spiderlings don’t do a whole lot of damage, but considering the numbers that are spawned you may need to cast a few AoE heals to get caught up on the raid before the web spray goes off.

Tank / Timing Interlude for Healers Benefit

There is one additional tanking aspect you should be aware of. The frenzy at 30% can be pretty brutal, so if at all possible you’ll want to wait till after the web spray ends before bringing Maexxna into frenzy phase. As soon as frenzy begins just burn her down.

If your DPS is strong enough you should be able to kill her now, if not the tank should be ready to pop cooldowns to keep himself alive (last stand, shield wall, etc.) during the web spray if he gets low.

Pointers for DPS

DPS have a pretty easy time in this fight, the only  major thing you need to worry about is the web wrap. Should this ever be cast on you you’ll want to let your raid know. This will enable healers to have you pre-targeted and start getting you topped off and also let your DPS on the wall duty know so they can shoot you down.

You’ll want to assign at least 2 players on “wall duty”, generally these should be ranged players so they don’t have to go as far. You need 2 players watching the wall in the event that one of the wall watchers gets tossed up himself.

The web encasements on the wall only have 6,000 HP, so they will die very quickly.

There isn’t much beyond that, simply keep your DPS up on the boss, stay away from Maexxna’s frontal cone attack, and help burn the spiderlings down as soon as they spawn.

If you can get through all of these steps you’ll be well on your way to a clean Maexxna kill.

Grand Widow Faerlina 10-Man Boss Strategy

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Grand Widow Faerlina is the 2nd boss of the spider wing in Naxxramas. This encounter features 4 adds in addition to the primary boss, Faerlina. For this reason you’ll definitely need both a strong main and off-tank.

Grand Widow Faerlina Abilities

• Poison Bolt Volley – Hits the closest 5 players with a poison that deals 2625-3375 damage and applies a Dot that deals 1480-1720 nature damage every 2 seconds, lasts 8 seconds. This poison is dispellabe.
• Rain of fire – Casts rain of fire on a random location in the room that deals 2775-3225 fire damage every 2 seconds.
• Frenzy – Used every 60-80 seconds. Increases melee damage by 150%, haste by 50%, and size by 50%. To stop the frenzy you must kill a worshiper add.

Worshiper Notes

• 4 Worshipper adds
• These must be off tanked
• Killing a worshiper add will cast widow’s embrace on Faerlina. This will remove her enrage if she is enraged and silence casts / delay the next enrage for 30 seconds.

Grand Widow Faerlina Boss Strategy

There are 3 fairly basic boss elements in this encounter that we’re going to have to deal with.

First, the poison bolt volly. As I mentioned above the poison bolt will hit the closest 5 players within range. You’ll want to make sure your poison dispelers in the raid are aware of this and quickly get the DoT removed.

Secondly, we have the rain of the fire. Nothing too suprising here…don’t stand in the rain of fire / if you’re in the rain of fire move out. The rains are random, so just be on the lookout of the fire and adjust to it’s position.

Thirdly…

Tanking Faerlina & Worshipers

You’ll want to have your main tank on faerlina and your off tank holding aggro on all 4 of the adds. Neither Faerlina or her adds hit all that hard, until the frenzy goes off. If you want to be really careful you’ll need to do the following.

1. Get one worshiper fairly low, under 10%
2. As soon as Faerlina enrages be ready to finish it off so you remove the enrage
3. Following the first enrage get another worshoper low so you may repeat this step for the next enrage

Groups with geared tanks or healers won’t have to be this precise. You could even try for the achievement on Faerlina, which requires you not kill any of the worshiper adds. If you can handle zero adds down then go for it, otherwise simply kill a worshoper each time you need to remove / prevent an enrage.

Position Side Note

Unlike most encounters in Naxx position isn’t a huge issue on this fight. Just spread out around the room so no more than one person gets nailed by a rain of fire. Tank Faerlina towards the middle of the room and off tank the adds up on the stage / platform area.