Into Zul'Aman - Eventually.

I'm falling behind on my instance write-ups somewhat, so I'll throw one together about my impressions of Zul'Aman.

ZA feels cramped, both by the standards of Karazhan and it's spiritual predecessor, Zul'Gurrub. The small size is probably due to the fact that it's designed, with practise, to be clearable in two hours on a strict time-trial. I did a full clear in my brief time with Force of Will, but today I'm going to concentrate on the bosses that CD has worked on.

The first boss, Nalorakk is basically the Attumen The Huntsman of the instance. He's a gear check for the tanks and the healers, and if you can't get him down, then you've no business going further. He hits at about the Nightbane/Prince level but has two forms. His troll form does a debuff that increases bleed damage, and his bear form does a massive bleed DoT. You need two tanks to get him, taunting back and forth as he switches shape, since it's almost impossible to survive the DoT for long if you also have the Debuff.

Next up is Akil'Zon the Eagle Avatar. Before him is a punishing gauntlet which proves to be happy Aoetank times for a Paladin. The boss itself is a coordination/DPS check. The group has to be ready to collapse to a single point every 45 secs-1 min when he does an AoE and then spread out again to avoid chain lightning attacks. Of all the bosses in the instance, he's the one I'm most keen to kill with Ulu for his shiny Hamma.

Next up, we've tried Jan'alai, the Dragonhawk Avatar. This is another complex fight, but one where it really helps having a Pally tank. He summons two hatchers that will begin to hatch eggs nearby and flood the raid with Dragonhawks. Whilst they're easy to kill, it's usually best to let them let a few out and AoE tank them. Once the boss reaches 35% health, he will unleash all the remaining Dragonhawks, which can wipe a raid (there are 40 of the feckers in total). CD haven't managed to kill him yet, but we got some good practise in on Monday and I think we'll manage a kill next time we face him.

Special note should be made of the trash towards him. There are non-elite scouts on a fast respawn timer who have to be killed quickly. If they manage to reach drums, they'll summon two nasty elites. This is what happened when we lost focus and got 10-12 of those Elites:



(POV courtesy of our dead OT)

I like a good AoE tank as much as the next insane Pallytank, but this pull lasted about 6 minutes!