The Holiday Boss is... Hard?

So far I have done the new holiday boss about 12 times on various characters and I've come to the conclusion that the holiday boss should have an item level requirement on it.

Basically it is an easy fight.  In two of my guild only groups yesterday we downed it after he exposed himself once.  That is how the fight is supposed to go or at the least that is how I expect it to go.

In two of the pugs I did it was okay once and hell another time.  First time was on my hunter with a full pug.  He appeared twice, we got him the second time.  The healer had a bit of a rough patch when he first disappeared and the adds started up again but I have healed it so I know that can be an issue, it is the only real healing challenge there if you do not go to a third phase.

I was the only one that did anything remotely resembling actual DPS. But if you have one solid DPS and the other two are not drooling idiots that can at least move when they need to and do some sort of mildly reasonable DPS you will be fine.

The other, was me healing.  Sometimes I hate when I am not in dungeons on my hunter.  I feel so helpless.  When I am on my hunter and the DPS sucks I know I can handle almost anything on my own.  I'll just step up my game a little and actually pay attention and blow some cooldowns and we will be fine.

When I am not on my hunter I am at the whim of the horrible horrible players that seem to spread through this game like the black plague.  Being I am not there to DPS I am leaving it all up to people that probably can not figure out how to tie their shoes, lets face it, tying your shoes is considerably harder then doing a basic DPS rotation in a random.  I am not talking good DPS here either, just something that resembles them trying.

Next time you see someone doing 2K just imagine them walking around tripping and falling on their face everywhere they go.  It will at least put a smile on your face for a second.

So back to the point.  We go at it, on the first boss phase I pop heroism and they only get the boss down to 67%.  Heroism and still you can only do 1/3rd damage?  Oh crap, this is going three phases.

Have you healed this one yet?  If you make it to a third phase of adds you better be way overgeared because by that point it gets hard.  Really hard.

I healed us through the second phase and we get to the boss again.  They get it down to 40%.  Doing some quick math in my head I am starting to think this is going to take four add phases.  I am not sure I can even heal through three.  Not sure many can.  Third add phase is worse then most raid fights from what I heard.  I had never been to a third phase yet, quite honestly I did not think it was possible to get a group that bad.

Third add phase starts and I am spamming all I have.  Using all the tricks in my bag and a few I didn't even know I could do just to try to keep us alive.  I lost one DPS but we made it to the boss phase again and quite honestly I was a little proud of myself with that.  That third add phase is brutal.

We did not get it down, forth add phase I was now almost oom so we did not last long at all.

We walk back and the tank says we need the DPS to move to the boss when the boss is up, forget finishing the adds.  I agree with the tank and say that they should not worry about the adds, just the boss when the boss is exposed.

One of the DPS drops.  Sad part is that it was our highest DPS that dropped.  This is not going to go well.  We are left with a boomkin doing 2800 DPS and a mage doing 3200 DPS.  The tank was doing 6K and the other DPS that dropped was doing 5K.

Yes, those numbers are for a current 85 heroic and are not me remembering the past of a wrath heroic, when toward the end of the expansion, those numbers would have been bad numbers too.

We get a DK.  He is somewhat geared so this might be good.  The 3200 mage is geared too however.  I did it three times on my mage alt who I leveled to 85 and stopped playing meaning all he has is quest gear and I have done 5K, 6K and 7K in my three attempts in 318 gear.  So it is a learn to play issue as far as I see it.

I do understand that this fight sees lower numbers, my hunter can not break 13K on that fight.  Admittedly I am not trying my hardest being it is just a dungeon but I can break 18K without trying to hard in heroics normally, no cooldowns at all.  So I know that this fight surely does lower your DPS some.

Is lowering it to 2800 really acceptable however?

We go again, I hit heroism on the first boss phase and we get the boss to 50% this time.  Again with the quick math, this is going three again.  I healed it to that point before so maybe we can do it this time.

The one good thing is that the DK was doing 12K.  Some badly needed DPS.  The bad thing was he was also pulling aggro and taking a bit of a beating here and there.  This would really play into making it to a third phase.  Not going to happen unless I get really lucky because I am having to spam heal two people as if they where tanks.  That drains some mana there and the third phase is going to be brutal.

No worries, no need to even care about the third phase.  Adds pop out at the start of the third phase and they all come right for me.  Killing me instantly.  So it is a wipe either way.

Third try we go at it again, more of the same, I do not get add bit in the third phase but start running on fumes and can barely keep anyone up.  We are just seconds from the boss being exposed again when people start dropping because I have no mana left. Oh well, wipe time, lets try again.

The tank gives the DPS some rightful shit about their numbers again, not to the DK, he is doing great and he even protected me the last time, that is the reason the adds did not eat me this time around.  The DK was good.  The other two... not so much.

The mage took the hint and dropped group but the boomkin said he was doing fine for his gear.  2800 is fine for 318 gear?  Fine at level 70 maybe, not at level 85.  Of course I did not say that, but I thought it.

We get a new mage.  He makes food, I like when mages do that.  I don't because I can't be bothered.  Not to mention if you need to ever eat in an instance like that you are doing something wrong.  It is a one boss fight.

We down the boss on the second appearance this time.  Even the druid stepped up their game doing a whooping 3100 DPS this time.

After all my attempts I have come to the conclusion that the item level needed for this dungeon should be around 338ish, maybe 340.

Any time you get into it with a healer lower then 338 it is quite possible you will wipe on the second add phase but skill will get them by.  Third add phase will be completely impossible but then again it was near impossible for my high geared healer too.  Either way, the fight should never get to a third add phase.

Also, DPS is a little lower on this fight as I mentioned before, I can accept that.  But with less then a 338 item level most players have no chance at making it to the 6K mark on a fight like this.  Just because I did it on my mage does not mean most will. 

The way I figure it, 6K per DPS is the absolute least you should have in this fight.  Adding a 338 item level requirement for this would be nice.  Really nice.

Do you think the holiday boss should have an item level requirement?

I mean, it is a holiday boss, shouldn't it be something all 85s regardless of skill or gear should have a chance to do?

If so, then it needs to be toned down some.  There is no way a group of people in all 318 gear can do that boss.  Not possible.

Okay, it is possible.  One of my guild runs yesterday we took all alts and we downed it and only one of the 5 of us were even geared enough for a heroic.  That is beside the point however.  We are a guild, we work together all the time, we know how to play together, how to react off of each other, what to expect from each other.  We can do things at a lower gear level because we are used to playing together.

Pugs are pugs.  These people can not be expected to have that kind of group cohesion.

I think an item level requirement is needed, or nerf the adds phase some, just so we can keep these 2K DPS idiots out of it or at least make it easier on them.  Which in turn makes it easier on me because then I will not need to wipe because of them.

I like that they made the holiday boss into a boss and not a pushover but lets face it, Blizzard has to do something about allowing these people into randoms.  If they will not do something, we need to start doing something. 

Report bad players for griefing.  Willfully being bad is griefing.