Oi! Finally completed a Tier 10 Delve during the weekend and unlocked the “??” Difficulty in Zek’vir’s Lair. Now currently I’ve attempted ?? Zek’vir 11 times. So far I’ve got him down to about 94% before he healed himself (all my stuns were on cool down). So far I’ve tried:
Voidwalker, the classic, he actually did worse than my Wrathguard.
Wrathguard Taunting, while it gets pretty far, he can’t tank much before needing heals. And if I pause to heal I lose time on bringing down cocoons and dodging the big frontal.
Brann DPS. It was kind of interesting, but Brann loses crazy health, and I need his heals.
Not taunting at all, Same as 3, Brann just gets chased, or me.
Now I know that demonic portal can remove the spit, which renders that mechanic useless which is good, leaves stuns for the regeneration. But I major problems are:
weak demon: He could tank Zek’vir ? but can’t hold a candle to Zek’vir ?? and Bran doesn’t dish out enough medicine to compensate.
Web Terrors: I can get the cocoons down to about 10% before they pop. The Terrors are death sentences, which I may be able to fear, but I’ll have to be fast to balance everything else.
Regeneration: I can stun fine, but with Cocoons, dodging and what not, I’m out of stuns by the time he does it. While Portal helps with the spittle, the portal has a 30 second cool down and the longest I’ve survived in this fight is a minute!
Currently:
Brann is 42 with the Curios which heals you when you pop a defensive and the resizer one.
I’m Item Level 607 and getting through a tier 10 was an hour long hellscape. I don’t think I’m entirely ready. IL wise, which I can reach if I stay consistent. No need to push tier 9s and 10s now if they give the same stuff as 8s as far as I know.
So, aside from all that, what’re your tips? I need that Void Dirigible! I was thinking maybe I should just let the big beetle hit me instead; I let him hit me several times and he didn’t really dent me too much, his frontals killed me. (i was ready to wipe) so maybe him focusing on me is best?
UPDATE: 10/14/2024: Got him down to 85%, just need to figure out what to do with Web Terror.
UPDATE: 10/14/2024 2: 90% but, figured out I can bring down Web Terrors fast enough, But Brann has to take on Zek’vir and went unconscious. Getting close to something.
UPDATE: 10/14/2024 3: Haven’t gotten to 85% in a while, 34 attempts, will try one more time. But, it’s clear, since cocoons are such a problem I need more damage. That way it isn’t such a sacrifice to stare away from Zek’vir.
UPDATE: 10/15/2024: 83% this fight is just not possible for me if I have to worry about stupid Web Terrors and is stupid regeneration and his stupid waves… I even have a full tier set now thanks to the vault!
Without knowing a thing about warlocks or your spec, it sounds like your DPS is low if you’re struggling with cocoon damage. The cocoons are the hardest mechanic for Normal difficulty (or were several hotfixes ago) but they’re not even much of a gear check for Hard Zekvir presently.
I can’t speak to how you will have to deal with the other mechanics, but I think you mean ‘interrupt’ when you say ‘stun’.
My successful Zekvir runs as a melee have used the curio that taunts when you fall below a level of health, since it helps keep the cones directed away from what I’m doing.
I was able to get Zekvir ?? down on this paladin (as ret) at ilvl 613 and Brann at 50 (as a healer).
This fight is def a marathon and not a sprint (tho its very much a sprint when those cocoons come out). I found myself saving all CDs and trinkets for the cocoons. i.e, I’d cycle wings / wake of ashes and my on-use trinkets for each cocoon that popped up. If one of those popped tho - I’d stun it (via hammer of justice) and burst it down ASAP.
Brann as a healer is the best imo just cause he help you keep your health up. Also he’ll be able to randomly dispel.
For me - once I found a way to cheese the debuff and brust down the adds - it was just a matter of learning the dance. Also saving all kicks for the heal - never kick anything other than the heal.
On the ret note, I usually found wake sufficient, though I pair it with Radiant Glory (either Crusade or Wrath works) for extra insurance. I only used trinkets when conal positioning forced me to have to spend more time than usual away from the egg. I recommend Herald over Templar; Templar has better burst DPS and movement, but Herald’s casual healing helps keep yourself and Brann up with less stress.
I def found myself over killing it for sure - didn’t want that crab to pop at all - I know some times I found myself popping ashes too soon (on zekvir) and not the caccoon - so I kinda just forced myself to think about cycling through abilities … if that makes sense.
You know, If he feels like it. …Every once and a while at the very least, anyway. You know what? He’s just not feeling up to it today why don’t you just come back tomorrow?
Brann is just a vending machine, if you are relying on him for anything other than that you are going to have a bad time.
Honestly, after Brann throwing his potions across the room instead of at my feet coupling that with his general weaponized incompetence, I’m almost tempted to say that Brann is the actual boss of this encounter not Zekvir.
it does, for sure. I always knew I had to stop and take a break on attempts when I reverted to trying to interrupt the spittle instead of freedoming it off.
God. I am so jealous of the people that got to do Zekvir ? with God-Brann those first few days. I made my attempts on Zekvir ? during his hardest week, post-Brann nerf pre-Zekvir nerf.
I only got successful once I completely ignored him aside from potion dancing, though I’ll cleave his eggs for extra DPS.
Very much so - his actions add onto some of the RNG of this fight (which is annoying)
I’d very much rather have him as heals than DPS - cause the random dispell is better (to me at least) than a random kick. As DPS he never kicked the heal it seemed like, and it always felt bad when he did and I over lapped - or that one time I thought that maybe, JUST maybe he’d get the heal while I was off on the other side dealing with a cocoon (spoiler - he didn’t).
Oh - also - if you aren’t doing it already - make sure that you’re treating this like a raid boss. Make sure to flask up, eat for food buff, and use mana oil (or whatever) on your weapon.
Also make sure you have some enchantments, even if they’re the 1- or 2-star versions. Every little thing helps.
Yeah. I have the same problem with my BDK, and even my Hunter. If I have to stop to interrupt, it’s game-over on the egg. Plus, melee on my hunter is about 1.5m. If I do the egg, I get wrecked on melee damage alone.
Best suggestion I’ve seen is to farm Heroic raids and M+ Dungeons until you have iLevel of 626.
It’s not an ideal answer, and I’m really disappointed that’s how it works. In an expansion that go so much right, Blizzard really missed the mark on this Delve this fight, M+, and Delve balancing in general.
His melee hits aren’t the end of the world unlike everything else he does so if you have to run felhunter it shouldn’t necessarily be impossible. Also he spends enough time channeling things that you get little mini-breaks often to reposition/find brann’s potions, etc. I made a habit of just always running over all 3 as soon as they appear which works for me but there is a reddit post and an icy veins guide on staggering them so you have 100% uptime on dwarven medicine.
And as you mentioned, cocoons are priority. Try to figure out a way to always have some shards banked, a CD ready or something to nuke them. You can take as long as you need with Zek. If you still can’t then yeah a few ilvls will make it possible.
Set Zekvir to your focus target (have to redo every time you die)
macro: #showtooltip
/use [@focus] INTERRUPTNAME
never take DPS off the egg again, at least as long as Zekvir is in range. Keeping him in melee with you as much as possible by watching timers on his abilities with DBM and juking positioning is very helpful for a lot of reasons.
Ret is a very burst-heavy spec, so it’s possible to do his eggs even on Hard Mode much lower than that. I can’t speak to other specs, but I’d always favor anything that’s got 10s burst on a half-minute timer over sustained damage for this fight. Hopefully that helps.
Don’t use your voidwalker. It’s a trap. You want felhunter for the interrupts.
The whole fight is sequenced so you can start to predict what he is going to do. Stay in melee range until he frontals. Then move out to avoid the web.
Demonic portal to clear spittle. Brann should also clear one as a healer, just make sure you don’t overlap.
Only interrupt his heal. It’s not a bad fight for a warlock. Honestly, it is probably a little tough at 607.
I’m at ilvl 605 and while I can handle the main mechanics just fine I still get oneshot by his random auto attack crits for like 70% of my hp.
Like I said, his main gimmicks are totally doable, and you can plan around easily enough, but getting crit out of nowhere from white damage you simply cannot.
That’s why I’ve decided to shelve my warlock for a bit and gear my pally up instead.