Monday, November 17, 2008

The Nexus (Now With Spoilers)

Hidden away in the Coldarra, on the western edge of Borean Tundra, The Nexus is the 2nd instance in Northrend. I've only run it a couple of times now, and I think we were still overgeared for it and didn't bother with CC, aside from the first boss.

The theme of the route that I've taken both times, is "To the left, To the Left" Just stay left and you'll head around in a circle and get all the bosses down, get all your quests done, and get some uber loots our Kara/Badge geared pally healer got 2 upgrades I believe.

I'll spare you the major trash details on this one, aside from a few minor things... There are lots more healers in this instance than in Utgarde. Deal with them first, it will make your life easier. There's a book on the ground you can pick up to complete a quest en route.

Now, onto the First Boss.

The first boss, is one of those annoying mages. Her main attack is a small aoe Firebomb, which can be pretty annoying if you brought along more than 1 melee dps (and your healer is a Paladin). Then she tosses you around in the air, you will come back into melee range while she's tossing you around, so be spamming that Shield Slam button (or Devastate, or whatever else you may want to use).

Moving onto the second boss, within the trash you'll want to kill the Vortex's first when they are in your pulls.

Once you get to the second boss, the same thing applies, every 25% (I think) health he'll spawn a vortex, dps needs to switch over and kill it (not sit there pounding on the immune-to-damage boss like the Rogue in my first group did). Once the vortex is down, go back to the boss.

This is also where you complete one of the quests for the Nexus, so find the clicky item in your inventory and click it!

Moving onto the 3rd boss....

This trash the others are the dryads in the 3-4 pulls - they like to cast Tranquility, which should be interrupted asap. The big Tree's (which complete the 3rd quest here) hit hard. Really hard. Think Bog Lords in heroic Underbog. The little flower guys, they respawn every 90 seconds until the 3rd boss is down, so move quickly, and tell your casters to drink where you just killed, not 30 yards behind you.

The 3rd boss is a gigantic big huge rock guy. Kill him. Enjoy. Splat. Just don't stand on his wonderful little mountains he spawns all over, because they will shoot you way up in the air and you'll take a bunch of damage. (Think Ahune) No fun for anyone.

Once he's down, head due south (notice, you're all the way on the north end of the instance now), and you'll have 2 or 3 pulls before you're back in the middle of the zone.

Walk to the center and you'll see the dragon there. Kill the pat that's wandering around her, and you're onto the final fight.

She is a movement fight, to the point where if you stand still you get a damaging debuff that stacks. So, its shoot, move, shoot, move... for everyone in the party. Yes, even you Mr Hunter.

Cleanse is huge in this fight, as people get trapped in ice chains which does a lot of damage as well as applying the debuff.

I tend to kite her in a circle around the middle platform, so her head is always facing outward a bit, that leaves the space in the middle for the ranged to go and move around in, as well as a smaller circle for the melee to stay and beat on her (her tail also does a swipe, so they want to be on the side of her)

EDIT: I learned something new about her. You can JUMP to clear the debuff. So, yes, fire up some House of Pain, and Jump Around between your casts/actions/swings.

And that, my friends... is the Nexus! Anyone else have any tips? Ideas? Love?

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