I was wondering if anyone here did this originally early on in the release of Legion when it was still difficult because I was wondering how it compares to the newly released Timewalking version.
I’ve tried to do it probably 20-30 times but have only managed to get phase 1 to about 70% health before I wipe. I’ve read about a few people farming certain gear to make the challenge easier and buying a bunch of consumables but I don’t want to do that because I just play casually every now and then. Is this doable for a casual player?
This is not possible for a casual. Reading guides and watching videos and farming old gear. I’ve probably got 20 hours with this mage tower (reading, videos, farming old gear, attempts etc)
I’ve stayed up to 1am almost every night doing this. I’ve watched every guide on YouTube. Read the forums. I’m at 150 attempts. Best attempt is 15% final phase. I Have almost BIS gear. I work full time job and have 3 kids and have been lacking sleep to get this done.
I got the cat form in legion. I didn’t attempt bear form and I’ve regretted it ever since. So this is my chance to do it now.
I’ve never played wow this much in a long time but i really want this.
It needs another nerf to boss HP. I personally think this mage tower should be completed by a large player base. It shouldn’t be as exclusive as it is. The art is nice. The mount is cool. Blizz should let more people enjoy it.
Or have two difficulties. A heroic version and mythic version. Give the mythic people a title as well.
This is absolutely possible for anyone, casual or not. No disrespect to Shyfts, but it’s not the amount of time you put in, but HOW you use your time. Functionally, the fight is the same EVERY single time and there are so many vods to utilize. It’s also been nerfed!
The biggest thing is identifying what specifically you die to whenever you wipe, and not dying to that again.
Functionally, while gear may add +/-5% damage here and there, it will almost never matter in terms of you killing or not (minus trinkets that can be a HUGE help). At the end of the day it’s just a priority system.
If you can press every button they do in a video when they press it (and understand WHY) then you can absolutely do this challenge!
Velen dying in phase 2 is much more common now after the nether spawn change.
I’m not a mythic raider. I’m not even a normal raider. I have KSM but it wasn’t even hard i pugged KSM. On my monk. That’s the hardest things I’ve ever done in wow is KSM. So I feel like I’m a more experienced casual but casual non the less.
You think a person who isn’t KSM never done a heroic or mythic or hit 1800 in rated pvp could do this guardian challenge?
Why not? I think you’re selling yourself short. The scaling puts it so that everyone’s damage is roughly the same.
You’ve put in a ton of research and that’s good: But at the end of the day, those guys in the videos you’re watching have exactly the same buttons you do, and since it’s a scripted pve encounter, you can press those exact same buttons in the exact same spots and get a kill! It just takes practice. I’ve helped people who haven’t even cleared normal raid clear this challenge. It’s absolutely doable, man! You just gotta not die to the same thing twice (as much as you can help it)
So this for example, you always always always have roar AND typhoon for p2, so as long as you are ready for the NH cast, you have two stops for it AND can use an orb if you need!
In Legion it took me 50 wipes; I didn’t have luffas either.
I’m close to 100 now, and I’m only breaking Kruul in the 20% Hp range.
There is a clear issue with gearing, and the fight in general.
Almost all kills are showing being in boomkin form a good portion of the fight; its not really a “tank” fight, its a dps fight.
The obscure trinkets and gear set hodge podges are also an issue.
There is a clear BiS and scaling issue with the dmg of the gear, and pots; unbridled fury is insane.
Sure, anyone CAN do it in ANY gear, but there is a clear gap in what other who have done it are using.
I’ve done alot of content in game, solo challenges, pvp, currently an AotC raider for the past few tiers (raid leading) so I may not be the best, but not the worst either.
This is by far the most obnoxious and irritating “challenge” I’ve done.
And, unless I get a wild hair (no pun), and mats for consumables drop a dramatic amount, I can not see myself investing 300 wipes on a reskin.
This is pretty comparable to on-release legion back in NH gear.
That’s good! you’re getting to kruul, which means you can do the fight! What’s killing you?
There’s not. I did it in full shadowlands gear, and so did I think MOST people.
Disagree. This is not a TANK challenge, it’s a GUARDIAN druid challenge. If it was tuned in such a way that you never needed to cat or moonkin weave for extra damage, then people who DID do that would have the freest and easiest “challenge” possible. It’s about doing the most damage your class can do AS a tank and optimizing your globals. Not about being a bear.
yeah absolutely, but it’s TUNED for shadowlands gear, so all farming that other stuff does is make it easier!
This doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with prior XP, though. There are R1 gladiators and multi CE/WF raiders who struggle with these challenges, and there are people who literally min/max world quests that can complete them. As a raid leader, I’m sure you’re familiar with identifying mistakes in your raid and working to correct them; Just treat this as a raid. WHERE do you die, and WHAT is killing you?
How can you prevent that?
Are you dying to annihilate? Are you getting knocked off?
-is it infernals or eyes?
–Are you instantly moonfiring the eyes in p1? Can you push p1 faster to have fewer infernals?
—What’s your defensive rotation for annihilates?
Not to sound arrogant, but yes I CAN do it, I just think the way it needs to be done is silly and doesn’t feel like a challenge.
Yes, its a guardian druid challenge, but guardian druids are tanks.
Tanks mitigate damage, aggro adds, position mobs, and avoid aoes.
There is very little of that in this fight so where its a tank feeling fight.
It feels more dps oriented especially needing to be in a dps affinity most of the time.
The only real mitigation is the Annihilates, which is mostly a scripted c/d rotation and enrage timer; which again its a dps check. Also, the faster you get thru ph1, less infernals.
But, my hold backs are Velen being made of glass (and a few pulls show him dying at 22%, no adds, no casts, fight just stopped at him with 22% HP).
Also, there is no room for recovery if you go outside the scripted strats.
Sure, I get knocked off, adds gets a cast off, I derp because I’m not perfect, but with what this is I feel like I shouldn’t have to be 100% perfect. Or if they would come out and say you have to be, I’d take that and be fine with it then I wouldn’t argue.
Again, thats my fault but the it goes back to risk vs reward.
Honestly, if they want this, or the tower in general, to be a challenge give us a gear set and abilities upon entering and not allow food/pots/flasks so everyone has the same chance. Not who Kept some weird trinket from 4 expansions ago, or can dump 300k into the AH, or gets lucky on a loot drop from a legacy raid.
I disagree wholeheartedly. The entire part of p2 is mitigating annihilates. You actively need to aggro the horrors and keep them off velen. Positioning is SUPER important so you dont get knocked off, yet are close enough to reach the orbs and tank for velen if needed. Obviously avoiding smashes, pools, lines are happening too. This encounter has everything you’ll run into while tanking. Also, Literally EVERY bit of challenging content requires every team to min/max there damage. You may not have noticed it from a tank pov, but damage is always always always incredibly important INCLUDING tank damage.
Again, that’s pretty true of most raid/M+ encounters. There’s some leeway in raids because it’s 20 people and its a lot less likely that 20 people make 0 mistakes than 1 person.
That’s just it, though. It is a solo challenge. You DO have to play very well and not mess up on the binary lose checks!
Agreed. Fine with this!
Disagree. Consumables are part of EVERY SINGLE part of wow - pvp. EVERYTHING is ALWAYS tuned around food/pot/flask etc. That’s just part of the game.
That’s not blizzard’s fault at all. THat’s 10000% the community jacking up the prices, blizzard has ZERO control over that.
Mitigating the annihilates is scripted and the real mitigation of the fight. So I don’t have any issue with that, in any other raid encounter you have to use better c/ds than others to live…thats fine and part of being a tank.
The counter-argument is this encounter has everything you run into a dps as well.
And goes back to most are doing a goo portion of it in balance. I’m sure there have been, but I have yet to see someone do it in feral, or resto. And if they have they’re the exception, not the rule.
Playing very well is a difference in being perfect,
If playing very well was acceptable, more people would be getting this.
Consumables are mostly optional, sure it optimizes but its not really a make or break; save for save world first raiding or lvl 25 mythic+.
Consumables here feel make or break and the requirements are very specific.
I agree, supply/demand is what it is, but it is party Blizz’s fault for putting it out there like this.
We can agree to disagree over this.
Which it can be done sure, and I don’t want to demean anyone who has done it, or discourage anyone who will do it.
I just think the fight could use some work, because in its current state the risk vs reward isn’t there for me.
I had about 160k on my main (which I hardly play anymore) and spent like 140k on new gear/enchants and a few consumables. Don’t know if it helped or not but I’ve gotten Variss down to about 50% now. I also bought a new mouse lol because my current one is kinda bad with tracking and will freeze up occasionally.
Nah, gear makes a big difference. The fight isn’t that difficult, there’s thin margins for error but once you learn the dance it’s straight-forward.
I can watch 252 streamers on YT doing it with BiS trinkets and full SoD sockets and it’s noticeably easier for them. Mostly because it is a DPS race. They should have tuned it lower, or given us consistent scaling. One or the other.
Yes. You can EASILY beat it doing roughly 800 dmg. I did it pre-nerf with just shadowlands gear. Just dont waste globals
yeah absolutely. I pushed p1 with 1 infernal again with no trinkets. So if you have cyclo or extra stuff it just makes it easier! but its tuned WITHOUT that stuff, so it’s only giving you an edge to make the content easier.
ya thats a ton. Just farm them yourself tho. Can get 100 pots in an hour easy!
Do you have logs or a video or anything, s/s of gear?
Not to discredit you, but just to see it.
Thats some whoa-baby playing if you’re able to get thru ph1 with no trinkets or anything, per-nerf at that.
I also disagree its tuned without this stuff, because if it is then thats another issue since I have yet to see anyone show they didn’t use something.
And like I said earlier, we can agree to disagree over this, the fight is off regardless of who and how it gets done.
Nah, I didn’t record it, but i promise I just used shadowlands pvp gear, because it’s all I had. CBA farming extra stuff. Quite a few people did that, too.
and no, its just HOTW moonkin weaving!
Well then thats impressive and you’re better than I am, and a lot of people of that matter. So grats.
But like I said, with my experience and community feedback the fight is off and feels more pay-to-win via mats, and a dps race (which you’ve inadvertently agreed with). Those who don’t use them seem to be the exception, not the rule. And following this, seems to be very, very, very few, with no evidence to back it up.
I also think most people thought this time around the mage tower was going to be easier than it was at launch. Why did we think that? Because it was originally Only 2 weeks available. Why else? Because blizz has said it’s designed for shadowlands gear to scale down.
If that’s the case the they really only intended this to be for .5% of the wow population. Bc almost everybody has used gimmicks to do it and still died but NPC killed kruul.
Also, they’re giving recolor a if things that already exist. It required zero effort from anyone to make this mage tower in comparable to the original release.
I mean the original releas gave the greatest looking weapons wow has ever released, and the greatest feral forms wow ever released. It was WORTH IT. Every gold. I wish others could have the feral skin that i have bc it’s just gorgeous. I want others to have it. But they literally can’t. It’s crazy.
how are materials P2win? They’re literally set and decided by the community and you can farm them yourself. They only cost any kind of gold if you dont want to farm them.
It’s everything! Damge, mechanics AND survivability/cc! Every challenge is like this
Blizz said every single time that it was intended to be a solo challenge similar to mage tower on release.
If you don’t want to put in the work to be successful, then that’s okay. But blaming gear/blizzard won’t make it accessible. You CAN control how you play and farm better gear if you feel you need it and aren’t confident to play for ~8min without mistakes!
