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Algeth'ar Academy is a dungeon with a lot of massive pulls. It also provides a very open layout, with the ability to tackle the three first bosses in any order.
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I recommend that your group has access to the following dispels:
PoisonPurgeSootheBleedYou should make sure to pick Improved Detox
There is a variety of enemies in this area. Let's start with the mana wyrms. The Arcane Forager will randomly Vicious Lunge players in the group, which creates some damage to heal continuously. They can be controlled and killed quickly to avoid this problem. The Arcane Ravager will use Vicious Ambush and right after Riftbreath. It is possible to cancel Vicious Ambush by hiding behind a structure.
The complexity comes with the elementals, although they have been simplified in season 4. The Spellbound Scepter will try to cast Mystic Blast, which has to be stopped. Meanwhile, the Spellbound Battleaxe will do unholy amount of damage on your tank with Severing Slash, who might need support there, particularly while grouping.
Use your interrupts on the Corrupted Manafiend and their Mana Void and Surge. In the boss arena, there are also some Unruly Textbook who add another mandatory interrupt with Monotonous Lecture.
Volunteer to control the Spellbound Scepter and their Mystic Blast, you have three stops to lock them down (Paralysis, LegSweep and RingOfPeace). Participate as much as possible to the interrupt effort, or this zone could quickly spin out of control!
Vexamus is a very hard boss to heal, and will probably take some time to fully handle.
Vexamus makes for a very hectic fight, with 2 main damage mechanics:
- Mana Bomb will put a massive dot on three players every 32 seconds, the dot will explode to create a dangerous pool on the ground. There was a change so the pool does not tick instantly, so that should hopefully reduce the damage intake.
- Arcane Fissure will push away everybody and spawns swirlies under the feet of the players for a few seconds, forcing them to keep moving, and it happens every time the boss reaches 100 energy. As it is a single hit of damage, your main goal is to have people topped before it fires.
Both mechanics do reasonable damage but are based on different "timers". This will make them overlap at times. It is possible to control this by letting some Arcane Orbs reach the boss and give him 20 energy. This will trade some damage to desync the abilities when they would have overlapped. You can share this knowledge with your team, in general the tank is in the best spot to control this.
You will want to alternate Chiji and SG to heal the Mana Bomb. Make sure to be early with Chi-ji and particular, as you could always be a target and have to run (or roll) out.
Make sure to use and abuse your defensives on this fight, and think of LifeCocoon if someone is about to die from Arcane Fissure (or ExpelHarm if you are the one in danger).
This is a beloved room for our DPS friends, as the massive single pull this room is usually made with leverages the best details numbers you can get.
The Vile Lasher and Hungry Lasher are mostly decorative, simply dodge the Detonation Seeds (there could be many of them).
The Aggravated Skitterfly are the biggest danger, and you should try to control them as much as possible, as poor RNG could have a player get murdered by several simultaneous Darting Sting. Do not hesitate to soothe Agitation if your tank could be in danger.
Spin.
Be careful of the swirlies, do not let them ruin your moment.
A rather fun fight, that will probably highlight who likes to pad the most in your group.
Let's start with your tank. They should be fine with Barkbreaker at most times, but when Burst Forth follows (once every 60 sec), they could be in danger between the physical damage intake and the amount of Lasher Toxin stacks they give them. A poison dispel is nearly mandatory in high keys. Think of using AOE CC on the Hungry Lasher still, as it is the most efficient way to protect your tank.
When it comes to the group damage, the biggest danger is the big add, or Ancient Branch, and their passive Splinterbark damage. Be ready with your cooldowns for this, the boss summons a new one every 60 sec. This is a double-scaling challenge with key levels, since it will take longer to die and tick harder.
Hopefully your DPS will not pad, so that you can use the adds to spin and have an easy time on this fight.
Make sure to dispel your tank and use LegSweep if they are in trouble.
Keep an eye on your tank as Storm Slash hits very very hard with pure magic damage. Other than that, the only trick is that Expel Intruders can be LOS.
Do not hesitate to control the Territorial Eagle as their Peck can put your tank in danger. In the same spirit, make sure to interrupt Call of the Flock from the Alpha Eagle.
A simple fight, but quite the thriller. This is definitely a fight where Not Even Close will come in handy as you are pushing higher key levels!
Crawth is a simple fight in theory. He will do more and more damage with Deafening Screech because of the Sonic Vulnerability it applies every 22 seconds. You get two resets of the debuff (and the timer) by scoring the goal, but each time, you will get more things to dodge (tornadoes and fire). Thus it is mostly about planning EHP tools (Zephyr, Mass Barrier, Defensives) to be able to live more instances of Sonic Vulnerability, and have more time before you need to reset and make the fight harder. Other than that, you only need to ensure people are topped before the screech goes off.
The tank will have their own mini-game of planning defensives with Savage Peck. Help them when you can, this is hitting really hard (although it has been nerfed in season 4).
In practice, this boss is terminally hard and scales like no others.
You should be able to survive Deafening Screech 3 and 4 with DampenHarm and DiffuseMagic respectively before the first reset, and conversely after.
ChiCocoons can contribute to the survival plan on this boss, but you cannot bring much more. LifeCocoon is of course perfect to save someone who is running out of defensives!
The main danger in this area is the Spectral Invoker. You should do your best to stop Astral Bomb and reduce the chaos. You can do the same with Astral Whirlwind from the Algeth'ar Echoknight, although a simpler way is to fight them in the stairs. The Whirlwind has no "z-axis" so you will avoid it if you are slightly higher or lower in the stairs. All that so you can safely handle the Arcane Missiles that have a tendency to pile onto 1 person. Do not hesitate to use strong ST tools.
The Celestial Shield from Ethereal Restorer can be purged in case you miss (or want to save) a stop.
The boss has been slightly modified for season 4, with a new mechanic: Unleash Energy
Echo of Doragose revolves around the Overwhelming Power debuff. Every mechanic applies 1 stack of it, and it explodes at three stacks to create a puddle spawning orbs that you will want to dodge to avoid Energy Eruption.
What's new is that now Unleash Energy will add some more puddles and some unavoidable damage once on pull.
Technically, you could do this whole fight with just some single target damage from the Energy Bomb. Or it could be hell on earth. You have little control, just ensure you at least dodge well!
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