Stuck on 3.3 heroics

So, I'm in a tough spot. I can roll all three 3.3 5-mans on regular, but can't come close on heroic. I know I'm *way* off because in the best case scenario (where my warlocks start casting at the earliest moment), I still can't destroy Bronjahm's corrupted soul shard before it moves all the way across the floor and heals him damn near to full. I've done better on Ick and Crick and Garfrost, but I'm still not able to get them down more than 50% or so before the wipe.

All my toons have the Triumph shoulders and headpieces, with all gems and enchants. My team still has a few ilvl 200 pieces but mostly it's Conquest, Triumph, and ToC heroic gear.

Is there an obvious reason why I'm so far off? Do I seriously need a minimum of ilvl 219 in all slots to have a fighting chance? Are the people who are taking these down with 5-man gear all tank + shaman teams, or what? It's weird being to a point where I have few obvious gear upgrades to look forward to, but am still against a brick wall on content.

Thanks. My Armory links are on the left.

I run paladin 3x arc welder (arcane mages) and a disc priest.
My mages gear is something like
3x blue heroic gear
7x ilvl 200 epics
and the rest is ilvl 219+

They are able to stomp the new heroics, granted an arc mage geared like that can push 5k dps on a boss fight with just self buffs.

Make sure your using shadow resist buff and frost aura's on appropriate fights, what kind of DPS are you pushing.

My little mixed group did fine in eh ~200 gear, I am pretty cheap and just gave them quest stuff and some leveled leather working / tailored items I made to replace level 70 ZA stuff.

Have you completed these without boxing?

You're gear is similar to mine, maybe better. I managed to kill Bron my first attempt, although I have only been to heroic once. I didn't even realize those little orbs did anything (I did notice he was getting healed though, lol). Anyway, I think if you focus on DPSing Bron and not worry about the orbs you should be ok. Just use your tank to run Bron away from the orbs.

I don't know about warlocks. But for my shamans, if I let Bron eat the orb. I will be OOM on all my shamans before he drops to 30%. I have to drag him a cross the room while letting my elemental shamans take out the orb. With your current gear, I don't think you can just burn him down if you let him have the orb to heal him 20%. He will get 2 orbs before you bring him down to phase 2. 40% heal back.

Kiting him across the room away from the orb is not that hard though. When he drain souls, you just move to 1 side and be ready to kite. Then you go around the room for half a circle. Then the orb should be dead. Keep healing tank and group while you kite.

Ick is just a turtle fight. My first successful beat down on him took me 4min and 20 seconds. I run, cast 1 spell (healer chain heal, dps flameshock + lava burst), then I run again, seriously no casting two spells in a roll. Don't get greedy and try to cast 2 lightning bolts. Even though sometimes you get away with it since Ick cast "pusuit" instead of the god like "poison nova". Not moving out of the poison nova will wipe your team for sure. have your slaves on follow at all times, go around kite him. Use whatever instant heal you have while running.

Garfrost. I didn't find any tricks other than hiding behind the saronite blocks to wait for debuff when he goes for weapon the first time. This fight is more of a gear check to see if you have enough healing and enough dps. Do "move" your slaves if they got stuck behind a saronite block. Make sure all dps can attack the boss after the knock back.

remanz and heffner: Oh, right. I tank him at the opposite end of the room, but I haven't been moving him around. My /assist macros will target the soul shard if it exists ... so I guess I just need to kite him quickly away from the damn thing while the locks take their sweet time killing it, and then they'll return to the boss. Awesome, such a simple tweak should help tons. Thanks. :) That might do it for Bron ... I'll try tonight and cry some more if it doesn't.

genocyde: My locks aren't getting much above 2600 dps in Destro spec. This has been sufficient for everything but the 3.3 heroics. Does that seem low for my gear? 5k sounds unattainably high. I'm open to the idea that I need to work on my /clicks, though they seeeem to be OK ... Chaos Bolt asap, DoTs refresh almost right on the button. Conflagrate is a manual cast on my setup but I'm usually pretty close, etc.

HPAV: I haven't done anything without boxing in WotLK! I know the fights pretty well on normal difficulty ... but of course there may be something in normal that you can shrug off, while in heroic it's strategically critical to deal with it properly. Maybe I should pug the heroics once or twice to find out.

Ya. I am sure you will bring down Bron NP. Make sure in phase 2 you bring everybody in melee range with boss and stop follow on tank (very important if he fears tank, all u toons will follow him to death). he is not hard. Comparing to the angry faces you will be facing next. Devourer_of_Souls, wait until the female face unleash a crazy frontal AOE beam on you. lol. Talk about instant wipe. Some slave movement is needed for that fight.

edit: 2600 dps is a bit low. I think you can tune it to 3k easily. Not the arcane mage 5k OPness though . Hard to believe average 213 gear (4200 gs) can get 5k dps. 3 of those mages, you can bring down bron in about 1min (1million hp).

I just brute-force Bron and ignore the shards since most of the time he seems to call the shards off my melee guys, so it's always a long fight. I just save my cooldowns for the last 30% and keep it slow and steady for the first part. With 3 locks, I imagine you have time to get some pain off with 3x CoD.

Ick I kite the whole time, letting him do his piddly melee damage to my tank while my DPS chews on his butt. I could probably stand still and do the strafe thing, but why screw with what works? Earthshield and Riptide easily negates any damage I take. you could alter my riptide macro for Rejuv or shields. I've got mine up to rolling 3 riptides and I drop Flameshock in instead of purge for mobile fights like this. Again, 3xCoD could work nicely here for you, Dots and pets can do the rest until you get a feel for places where you can stop and get a few casts off.

Garfrost is all about the strafe. Zoom your camera all the way out {allll the way, I had to go into options and set my max camera distance to high for a lot of the new bosses} so you can see what's going on. I can't fight him on the stairs as some people suggest because my DPS tends to lose LoS or get stuck, so I fight him in the middle until the stun, then gather everyone up and take a trip behind a rock or down the stairs to clear the debuff. If you've got DBM, you should get a warning and I think you get a raid icon on the person he's throwing the boulder at. You should be able to see a shadow, just strafe away from it.

I got my Demonology dps up to 3100 last night with a few tweaks, and finally took the time to add Curse of Doom to my rotation. It's painful to change a setup you've used for months, but it was definitely time. '1' is the full DPS /click with Curse of Agony or Elements, '2' is the full DPS /click with CoD. 'alt 1' casts Corruption and 'alt 2' does Shadow Bolt, for trash.

Long story short, Garfrost still pummeled me twice, but it was *very close, and I didn't feel like I had much control over the fight, so it's just a matter of practice at this point. Thanks for the advice, all!

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Originally Posted by Malekyth

I got my Demonology dps up to 3100 last night with a few tweaks, and finally took the time to add Curse of Doom to my rotation. It's painful to change a setup you've used for months, but it was definitely time. '1' is the full DPS /click with Curse of Agony or Elements, '2' is the full DPS /click with CoD. 'alt 1' casts Corruption and 'alt 2' does Shadow Bolt, for trash.

Long story short, Garfrost still pummeled me twice, but it was *very close, and I didn't feel like I had much control over the fight, so it's just a matter of practice at this point. Thanks for the advice, all!

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I've found that I can't use CoD, because nothing lasts for a full minute.