Perhaps the last great challenge of Nudists. Fighting Spectral Agony in cramped quarters is proving deadly, and we can barely make it past the first few mobs. So lets talk about how to beat it.
With 1 piece of infused armor, Spectral Agony inflicts 49 damage per second and 13 pips of health degen (capped at -10, but it will also couneract up to +3 regen). After life barrier, we're looking at about 25 damage per second, which is very taxing on the healers on top of the degen.
In Iron Mines I used Shield of Absorption and Shielding Hands on a single tank to get us through most of that mess, and between that and Zed spamming heals it was enough to handle the job most of the time. Occasionally we'd lose a person or two but we typically had the option of falling back as needed.
It was when that nice aggro got disrupted, such as the when the inquisitor rushed past us, that things became problematic. SH/SoA is only going to protect once person, and I can't do much when 3 or more people are hit by spectral agony at the same time.
I still think camping the king is the best place for the team to be, but that can be tempered with some variation. For one, often the mobs collect in a wave before they march upstairs to attack; the tank could run out and pull the first few mobs up, allowing us to fight them alone before their reinforcement arrives. Also this doesn't preclude some people running off to fire the catapults, as long as they can stay out of the way of enemies heading to the gate. Additionally when I've done this succsessfully, the backline doesn't sit right with the king who seems to draw aggro, but rather in the central area just in front of him. Tanks meanwhile run down to meet enemies on the staircases.
It's also frequent to be attacked on two sides, making at least two tanks in THK an idea. The thing that must be kept in mind though, is that spectral agony doesn't care how high your armor or blocking is, and we only have one set of SoA/SH. We either need more casters supplementing with these monk prots, or tanks need to protect themselves. There are also skills like Stoneflesh Aura which a tank can use for self-protection. Because there are a fair number of strip effects though, whichever enchant protection is used must be covered with several other enchantments. (This in turn could power Mystic Regeneration to combat degen.) That means thinking about energy management too.
The enemies in THK, as far as I know, come at a predictable pre-scripted rate. That means an important prong of defense is having enough offense to quickly finish one group before another comes in. As fun as Searing Flames might be, a DoT AoE bar is probably more energy-efficient and effective as a lone elementalist. Normal Mode monsters will sit in sandstorms and savannah/searing/tenai heats for nearly their full furations, and THK is even better with the narrow staircases they have to climb. The recharges of these skills can be sped up with a glyph of swiftness if desired.
Necros should consider going /rit for Mighty was Vorizon. This gives you a 50 energy pool which our healers are already abusing, but it's even more potent with necromancers, as it gives them leeway to store the random +10/12s that come in from kills. Another trouble with the curse necro template is that it's very effective at supporting physical damagers, which our team is usually lacking in; the best they can do for support elemental teams for example is the recently buffed Weaken Armor.
Without splinter support, I don't think candy cane barrages are the best use of ranger damage. Instead they'd probably do more with degeneration effects (which won't hurt the Jade armors sadly...) Pets are also infused tanks, which could be handy for further distracting the enemy. THK also opens up a very delcious option of placing traps on the staircases, whether it's just a one-of like Barbed to keep them away from the backline, or an all-out trapper build that spams traps and recovers energy as quickly as possible, and then a tank gathers and lures the enemies together onto the well-placed hotbeds.
Given the lack of moving I also want to stay spirits can be very powerful in THK, but they will die quickly if exposed, so our positioning is everything if we brought them. Zed seems to be stuck with healing duties anyway given the lack of healer volunteers (as usual![[Image: rolleye.gif]](http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/images/smilies/rolleye.gif)
)
With 1 piece of infused armor, Spectral Agony inflicts 49 damage per second and 13 pips of health degen (capped at -10, but it will also couneract up to +3 regen). After life barrier, we're looking at about 25 damage per second, which is very taxing on the healers on top of the degen.
In Iron Mines I used Shield of Absorption and Shielding Hands on a single tank to get us through most of that mess, and between that and Zed spamming heals it was enough to handle the job most of the time. Occasionally we'd lose a person or two but we typically had the option of falling back as needed.
It was when that nice aggro got disrupted, such as the when the inquisitor rushed past us, that things became problematic. SH/SoA is only going to protect once person, and I can't do much when 3 or more people are hit by spectral agony at the same time.
I still think camping the king is the best place for the team to be, but that can be tempered with some variation. For one, often the mobs collect in a wave before they march upstairs to attack; the tank could run out and pull the first few mobs up, allowing us to fight them alone before their reinforcement arrives. Also this doesn't preclude some people running off to fire the catapults, as long as they can stay out of the way of enemies heading to the gate. Additionally when I've done this succsessfully, the backline doesn't sit right with the king who seems to draw aggro, but rather in the central area just in front of him. Tanks meanwhile run down to meet enemies on the staircases.
It's also frequent to be attacked on two sides, making at least two tanks in THK an idea. The thing that must be kept in mind though, is that spectral agony doesn't care how high your armor or blocking is, and we only have one set of SoA/SH. We either need more casters supplementing with these monk prots, or tanks need to protect themselves. There are also skills like Stoneflesh Aura which a tank can use for self-protection. Because there are a fair number of strip effects though, whichever enchant protection is used must be covered with several other enchantments. (This in turn could power Mystic Regeneration to combat degen.) That means thinking about energy management too.
The enemies in THK, as far as I know, come at a predictable pre-scripted rate. That means an important prong of defense is having enough offense to quickly finish one group before another comes in. As fun as Searing Flames might be, a DoT AoE bar is probably more energy-efficient and effective as a lone elementalist. Normal Mode monsters will sit in sandstorms and savannah/searing/tenai heats for nearly their full furations, and THK is even better with the narrow staircases they have to climb. The recharges of these skills can be sped up with a glyph of swiftness if desired.
Necros should consider going /rit for Mighty was Vorizon. This gives you a 50 energy pool which our healers are already abusing, but it's even more potent with necromancers, as it gives them leeway to store the random +10/12s that come in from kills. Another trouble with the curse necro template is that it's very effective at supporting physical damagers, which our team is usually lacking in; the best they can do for support elemental teams for example is the recently buffed Weaken Armor.
Without splinter support, I don't think candy cane barrages are the best use of ranger damage. Instead they'd probably do more with degeneration effects (which won't hurt the Jade armors sadly...) Pets are also infused tanks, which could be handy for further distracting the enemy. THK also opens up a very delcious option of placing traps on the staircases, whether it's just a one-of like Barbed to keep them away from the backline, or an all-out trapper build that spams traps and recovers energy as quickly as possible, and then a tank gathers and lures the enemies together onto the well-placed hotbeds.
Given the lack of moving I also want to stay spirits can be very powerful in THK, but they will die quickly if exposed, so our positioning is everything if we brought them. Zed seems to be stuck with healing duties anyway given the lack of healer volunteers (as usual
)
![[Image: tongue.gif]](http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/images/smilies/tongue.gif)