The How and Why of Raid Research!

There are two methods for which one may prepare for a raid encounter: researching the fight(s) a.k.a. doing your homework or pulling to  learn on the fly.  In the end each team will most likely do a combination of the two to succeed.  Every raid leader has a different view and approach to learning new bosses. We’ll take a look at both in this article. You can decide for yourself which method is most conducive to your leadership and learning style.

RESEARCH: overviewResearching a fight is much like doing the research for a term paper; it takes time, dedication, and a little bit of know-how. A good researcher is one that takes the time to review the encounter from multiple sites  as well as multiple perspectives. Just knowing your role will not  suffice as a successful raid leader. You need to be able to collaborate with everyone in the raid. You should know what a raider can or cannot do at  any given point. (available cooldowns, dps bursts, etc) If your team is as dedicated as you to the research this may not be necessary but the Raid Leader is usually someone who’s a bit more driven than the members that occupy his/her team. This is especially true in what I call the other 90%. It’s inevitable that some Hard-Mode asshat is going to comment on this guide and say “Raid leaders shouldn’t have to do research for scrubs” or something just as denigrating but this is the pragmatic approach to raiding with great people on a limited schedule.  RL > WoW for most of us.

RESEARCH: sourcesWhen researching a fight, you should use multiple sources. No single guide is the “100% all-you-need-to-know” guide. You need to read various strategies, watch multiple videos, forum posts, etc. A strat that works for one team isn’t always the best strategy for YOUR team.  Even after doing this amount of homework you have to be able to decide how your group will approach the encounter.   Here are a few decent starting points for your research:

ElitistJerks.com (link)
Maintankadin (link)
Youtube.com “Fattboss [boss name here]”
MMO-champion.com (link)

RESEARCH: my teamMost fights are broken down into phases with some pretty predictable raid-wide damage, tank spike damage, interesting debuffs, specific tasks your dps must master, etc. So first thing I like to do is know what is available to me to mitigate the damage mechanics.

What are my available raid walls? [link]
What are my available CDs for tanks (either by the healers or from the tanks themselves)?
What CDs do the DPS have that can help the healers mitigate x mechanic?

Now I can make a quick map for one of the spots in the fights that we, or most guilds, are wiping to. If everything comes down to P2 then let’s come up with a timeline of cooldowns and get everyone on board. Using Beth’tilac HM is a good example where properly rotating cooldowns was the only way to kill her pre-nerf at least. Here’s the map I put together for my taunt phases. Anal? Yes. Effective? Hell yeah.  Time consuming? 20 mins or so.

1st Taunt (Jay)
.00 Holy Shield STARTS [20% damage reduction]
.10 HP ENDS
.10 Divine Protection STARTS [20% damage reduction]
.20 DP ENDS & 4pc bonus parry STARTS + Tinket 1 [50% dodge + parry]
.30 Holy Shield starts [20% damage reduction] + 4pc ENDS .40 HP ENDS + Trinket 1 ENDS
.40 Tinket  2 [40% dodge + parry]
.60 Trinket 2 ENDS

3rd Taunt (Jay)
.00 Holy Shield STARTS [20% damage reduction]  + Pain Suppression [40% damage redux]
.08 Pain Suppression END
.10 HP ENDS
.10 Divine Protection STARTS [20% damage reduction] + GaK [50% damage redux]
.20 DP ENDS & 4pc bonus parry STARTS + Tinket 1 [50% dodge + parry]
.22 GaK ends
.22 SANC + Bubble [30% less damage] 12 seconds
.30 Holy Shield starts [20% damage reduction] + 4pc ENDS .40 HP ENDS + Trinket 1 ENDS
.40 Tinket  2 [40% dodge + parry] – Bubble on command
.60 Trinket 2 ENDS

(Please don’t go crazy on the example. It is exactly that, an example)

RESEARCH: communicationIn my team we use an email address like X@adultswimguild.net to talk back and forth throughout the work day. We’ll post interesting crap we find on forums for X phase or ability, things we can talent into to help X ability, etc. Because we’re all adults and have limited raiding time when we’re home we enjoy getting the research done on our lunch break or throughout the day (depending on our job type J )

RESEARCH: the planBy the time the night rolls around to try the boss we’re all pretty much in the loop on what we’re going to try first, who’s doing what, and what other plans we may attempt. This really takes a big chunk of time and puts it back into raiding. We do a quick overview and then just start pulling and practicing.

RESEARCH: consIt can be pretty time consuming.
No amount of personal research is going to help someone who stands in fire.
You can’t guarantee others have done their class -> boss homework or are reading your emails.
Nothing can replace a few wipes on a new boss to “see” how it all works.

How we handle progression bosses and where research fits into the mixWe’ve found great success in the following method to the Research vs Practice argument.

Raid Night #1:
Clear all the bosses you can for a night. Save some time to pull the progression boss at least a few times. Even if no one has done in-depth research and you just give the “jist” of the fight over vent before the pull its worth it to see it a few times. This ensures that when you and your team ARE doing your research that you can put the information you’re gathering into context.

Next day:  You do your research. You collaborate, ask questions of each other, and send links back and forth. And from all of this you devise your initial plan of attack.

Raid night: You go over the plan you’ve all talked about quickly on vent. Ask for questions and start pulling.  (You plan, although it will probably change, is a great starting point)

Hope this helps  ~  Demonicles & Frontallobe of Mal’ganis