As a Tank having been through SL enough to know every pull in my sleep, I prefer to pull everything myself but the BUDC’s in room 2. I learned early on I can’t pull those things without bringing the the rest of the damn room with her. So some other lucky sap gets to do it and I pick her up as the clothie/hunter runs screaming past :).

That boss is def. my fav. boss in the game. “Fun Time” is the best. See, I secretly hope everytime we get MC’d that I go after that DPS crazy Lock in the party and 2 shot him, lmao If no lock, then the Annoying Blue Shaman and his little totems are #2 on my aggro list! I sometimes try to drag out that fight longer than necessary, just to get a shot at someone ESPECIALLY if it’s a guild run, lmao. I’m a naughty, naughty, naughty Tank!

The advice about putting a trap next to the healer is a good one for that fight. I lurve my healers, especially when they keep healin me!

The Vorpil fight can be a Pita if you are ‘Puggin. I’ve found, at least on my server, most Pug groups can’t execute the North/South Kite strat very well, because most of them can’t keep the hell up with me when I’m kiting him. Someone ALWAYS forgets which way we are going and runs the other way. Gah.

I generally use the ‘two hills strat’ instead and let the DPS blast away while having 1 person on adds. Kind of the same thing as sticking him in the corner as mentioned above. Plus, I’m a lazy bastard as well as having an evil streak, so I’d rather not have to kite that sucker back and forth, dodging all the adds that the ‘add killer’ somehow missed. (I was horrible at Frogger and am horrible at the ‘Dodge the Blueberries with Vorpil taking chunks out of me’ game.)

My preferred Strat: Beginning: Tank him on his platform, give me a second or three to get aggro, then pour it on boys! 1st Port: take him all the way up the big hill to the right, massive DPS!. 2nd port: take him to the top of the little hill to the left. 3rd port: Well, if we don’t have him down by now, we ain’t gettin him down. The groups I’ve run with usually have him down either before 2nd port or right after. After that, the adds get too many, even with an add killer workin’ on them.

For Murmer, once I got the fight down, it’s cake. I feel bad for that poor group I was in when it was my first time though. Wipe city x many. Poor chumps. That was one repair bill that I never want to see again. Now I just postion myself at an angle to him, pull back the camera aspect and sidestep my way out of the circle a couple times and bam, down he goes. The fight definitely has a rythm to it and once you find it, shouldn’t be a problem.

Though I still don’t know why my guildies have a Raid Warning for that fight when Murmur starts his ‘gathering strength from the air’ “RUN RUN RUN YOU SOB, RUN RUN”. (yeah it was a guild group my first time, lmao, I still can’t live it down.)

Some people just can’t appreciate the finer arts of Tanking I guess

Also, your party may try to convince you that leaving the mobs in the far corner of the first room alive is a good plan, when it is in fact a terrible one. It’s free rep, and I’ve wound up getting ganked by those bastards more than once during a Blackheart fight (the alternative is to only come in just as Fun Time has ended, which is a pain in the ass and unnecessarily gimps your group).

You sure about that? We ran it last Sunday and it worked then.

Blackheart drops the Cloak of the Inciter. Again, no agility, but gives other important stats. CSR is great for the Survival Hunter. Put a +agi ench on this bad boy and you’re geared! This cloak is geared toward any DPS class.

The Instrauctor on the right side of the “Big Pull Room” is actually pretty easy to get. Move up to the front of the room (leave the rest of the party in the cooridor) just in front of the pillar in the front right. The Instructor paths around these mobs and you have about a 5 second window where she paths forward away from the mobs. Arcane shot her and kite her around the pillar and straight up the aisle. Dont forget to kiss the bride when your done.

As far as the Insighter fight…good luck. Like Damh said, drop a trap at your healer’s feet and tell them to stay on it. Things to keep in mind in doing this though is as soon as you lay a trap have everyone as far away from the healer as possible and try to stay bunched up a bit. This will keep party members from going for the frozen healer during the “fun time”. Also, staying in close range to another group member before the mass MC will have a higher chance of you just meleeing a party member rather then shooting (one of the few times that youre allowed to melee). If you die, dont just sit there. Release and run back (make sure the rest of the party does so as well), cause this is a long fight and I have died up to 3 times on this fight and still downed him. One last thing…blow all your cooldowns, especially TBW/BW when its up!!! Nothing spells death for a group when you forget to blow TBW before the MC and this boss does it for you. Oh and for God’s sake, make sure your pet is on Passive, otherwise he’ll defend you during the MC (he should be on passive anyway).

It’s all downhill from this fight on. The trash pulls are nothing new and the boss fights arent too bad. Third boss is cake if you have the DPS, otherwise, this can be a frustrating event.

Murmor is actually one of my favorite fights. It’s one of the few fights in the game where we can honestly sit back, drink a beverage and take in the scenery. Make sure you stay behind the berm and blast your shot rotation. If you get the debuff thing (cant recall what its called) run back to the little hut right by where your healer will most likely be. Stand under the hut and wait for the explosion. This saves you from taking any fall damage. After this run back and commence your rotation. If your group decides to pull your tank out for the sonic boom, send your pet back in (dash or dive is an asset here) as soon as its done. This will lower the chance he pulls someone into him if no one is tanking him. After he’s down, get you phat lewtz and drink a beer.

Things to remember for any run:
Bring plenty of Ammo, water and food - this is a long instance.
Please please please dont forget to repair.
Keep you pet on passive and growl off if your not responsible for off-tanking.
Lay your traps early and heed Damh’s advice for trapping (trap away from the fight and and dont forget about him).

Good luck Taudok, and dont forget to post up how it went.

- Misfit