Karazhan Cleared!

We finally did it! Prince fell after a few tries; then we tackled Nightbane, expecting wipes, and got him on our third try! Screen shots to follow, once I figure out how to post them. . .

Prince on our first try, wiped us completely; we were surrounded by infernals, and healers were cutoff from the main tank and some melee. The third try was the charm; the infernals dropped across from us, all our healers stayed up, and we got him past his second phase after a really tough fight. Everyone survived his enfeebles and shadow novas; and with a Stoneshield potion and self heals, I got through his second phase without a problem. His second phase is the worst; he begins to inflict melee damage that appears to average around 4500 per hit, and hits much faster than the other phases. As druid, you can go into the fight after hitting a self heal like Rejuvenation; and our druids all innervated others during the fight to conserve mana. That spell alone is worth any amount of dps, because in such a long fight folks invariably run OOM. In our successful fight, I hit Nistagmus with an innervate before I left the door; hit Barkskin and Rejuvenate when Prince turned toward me, but before he aggroes; and then shifted to bear after a Stoneshield potion. You have very little time once he begins to walk towards the right side of the terrace; he runs to you, very quickly, when still outside a 30 yard range. After that is just one long haul, with healers trying to preserve mana, and melee dps trying to survive the enfeeble and shadow novas.

Nightbane was a tremendous fight; but we dropped him! We lost two early attempts; on one, we lost a healer, then another, and that was a quick wipe. Nightbane de-aggroes at 75, 50 and 25%; he flies off, we group together, and adds are summoned while he aoe's the entire group. On the ground there was another AOE called Charred Earth; we lost a healer to it since it does 3000 damage per tick, and one couldnt get out fast enough. On another attempt, after his flight, he landed and I could not pick him up fast enough; he already aggroed to a healer and without a misdirect or a good landing closer to me, he went right to them instead.

On our third try, though, we got it all together; I turned him across the terrace, so no one was effected by his tail swipe. The MT has to move him a bit anyway, if Charred Earth is cast under or near you. The camera angle on the fight for the tank is limited due to your position and his sheer size, so you have to communicate constantly to know where the charred earth is located; it can be near you but blocked from view. The move is slight, however, because if you pivot him too much the group gets tail swiped. A bear form can pick him up with faerie fire and a quick swipe, but you have to be close to his landing spot because he moves quickly once on the ground. A hunter spamming misdirect is essential during the fight to keep him on the tank. You can hit him while still in the air; I can cast faerie fire, and Mindaika said he could throw weapons at him. DPS must not attack, and heals must stop just before he lands; I think druid HOTS, cast during the flight phase, can cause a problem on landing if you cannot aggro him to the tank quick enough.

We lost but one team member; everyone else stayed up. The fight is long, but not as bad as Prince, and the MT must just stay on him throughout his melee phases. He does not hit as hard as Prince; but again, the length of the fight meant that our guest healer Tarian ran out of mana; a druid was able to innervate, so he could keep healing; Sidewiz was able to chip in on healing; and we survived nearly intact. The adds during his flight phase are weak undead that can be disposed of in the time of his flight phase; we finished slightly late only one time, and I was able to leave the adds and pick up Nightbane while the fight was finishing.

Stats after the Nightbane fight were:

DPS
Sagemage 659.9
Berber 656.6
Mindaika 562.2
Sorilea 515.8
Sidewiz 427.6
Thesandman 333.2
Domainatra 156.6

Healers
HPS
Nistagmus 754.7
Tarian 703.8
Dniwek 473.9