This post has been modified to show numbers that are relevant for shadow priests. It is known that the numbers are different for different classes.
Was it an oversight that Raest Magespear has so many hit points? I looked up the number of hit points he had from Legion and compared it with the number of hit points he has in Shadowlands. This is what I found:
- In Legion, Karam Magespear had 66.565 million hit points while Raest had 64.063 million hit points. This means that Raest had about 0.96 times the number of hit points of Karam. Hand from Beyond had 7.095 million hit points which is about 0.11 times the number of hit points of Karam.
- In Shadowlands, Karam Magespear has 49,900 hit points while Raest has 161,100 hit points. This means that Raest has about 3.23 times the number of hit points of Karam. Hand from Beyond has 6,075 hit points which is about 0.12 times the number of hit points of Karam.
The scaling of hit points for Hand from Beyond in comparison to Karam is the same for both Legion and Shadowlands. However, the scaling of hit points for Raest in comparison to Karam is significantly higher in Shadowlands.
Watching old videos of the encounter that are about a month or two into the release of 7.2, shadow priests are averaging about 500 thousand DPS single target on Karam. Watching videos for the current release (and personal experience), shadow priests are averaging about 600 DPS single target on Karam. If you assume the best case scenario of being able to stand still or cast while moving you get the following:
- In Legion, it would be possible to down Karam Magespear within 133 seconds, Raest Magespear within 128 seconds, and Hand from beyond within 14 seconds.
- In Shadowlands, it would be possible to down Karam Magespear within 83 seconds, Raest Magespear within 269 seconds, and Hand from beyond within 10 seconds.
It is important to note that shadow priests in legion had more mobility and CC options than what shadow priests have in Legion. High damage abilities such as Void Torrent were baseline in Legion whereas in Shadowlands you must spec for Void Torrent. This is very likely to increase the amount of time to kill these NPCs in Shadowlands when the other encounter mechanics are taken into account. There are differences in the time it takes to down these NPCs when comparing Legion to Shadowlands, but the interesting thing to look at is how the times relate to each other within each expansion. In Legion, the difference in the amount of time needed to kill Raest in comparison to Karam is a mere 5 seconds. In Shadowlands, the difference in the amount of time needed to kill Raest in comparison to Karam is 186 seconds. If you watch videos of this encounter from the 7.2 release you can usually see that when players try to burst down Raest using drums, potions, and other cooldowns, he drops pretty fast. By the time players get to the last phase, Raest is at 20% health or lower. That is not so much the case in Shadowlands. By the time players get to the last phase, Raest is usually between 40-50%.
The most common reasonable strategy is to kill Karam and then very slowly take down Raest. This would seem fine if it was not for the fact that the mechanics in this fight are that killing Karam causes Raest to go berserk. His movement speed is increased by 150% and damage by 500%. This was likely done to push players to not kill Karam and thus have to continue dealing with his increasing movement speed, his instant death attack, and Hands from Beyond while taking down Raest. This was in fact how it was done in Legion. There is also the fact that killing Raest and leaving Karam alive awards completion of the scenario. This strategy is no longer reasonable due to Raestâs high number of hit points.
The challenge is possible to complete either killing Raest only or killing Karam first then Raest. The point is that the intended strategy of killing only Raest is now significantly more difficult than it was when released in Legion.
