Ok, time for part 2 of my post series on tree!healing in Ulduar! Today, I will be tackling the Antechamber- Kologarn, the Assembly of Iron (AKA the Iron Council) and Auriaya (The Crazy Cat Lady).
First up to bat- Kologarn, the Bridge Boss.

Dude, we're going to walk on your face...
First off, let me add that it is ALWAYS better to let the new people run up the steps first… after all, who didn’t scream/ gasp when they first saw him rise up from the mists like ‘RAWR!’
I digress…
Kologarn’s fight is all about predictable damage. When you first see him, you’ll see his huge head, massive torso, and his gunshow- two HUGE arms, aptly labeled Left Arm and Right Arm. Upon entering range, he will proceed to threaten your raid and start walloping on them. Kologarn has several abilities:
1. Eye Beams- he rages so much that it manifests in the form of Eye Beams. These will narrow onto a target at range (its easy to tell if you’ve got them or not) and they do a crapload of damage.
2. Stone Grip- occasionally throughout the raid, he will snatch people off of the ground with his Right Arm and crush them.
3. Oblivion- a little more often, Kolo will use his Left Arm and sweep it over the raid, causing massive raid damage.
4. Ground Punch- I don’t know that its actually called this, but he’ll slam his Left Hand on whoever is right in front of him, interrupting spellcasting and locking out casting trees.
5. Paralyzing Breath- if there are no raid members for him to beat on in melee, he will breathe on the ranged and wipe the raid.
6. He also stacks a damage increase/ armor decrease (not sure) debuff on the tanks.
Ok, now that we see where the damage is coming from, lets talk strategy. The raid should be arranged thusly- melee in the front and slightly to the right, MT in front, ranged spread out across the back of the room. The middle of the room should be totally empty to allow the safe kiting of Eye Beams, which will need to be moved safely away from the raid and not hit the target- that’s not hard, as the Eye Beams are slow. Melee DPS will focus on the Right Arm and destroy it- when you destroy the Arm, he will take a hit to the body equal to the health of the arm. However, when the Right Arm dies, it will spawn Rubble- smaller earth elementals that will need to be picked up by an OT and AoE’d down. When the Right Arm dies, melee switches focus to the body until the Right Arm spawns again. The Left Arm should be left alone until his health is low enough that destroying it will kill him. There will need to be at least 2 OTs- one for the Rubble, and one to taunt off of the MT when his damage/ armor debuffs get too high. The MT/OT on Kolo will taunt off of each other until he’s killed. Casters should stay away from melee range at all costs, because his Ground Slam attack will interrupt your spells. Also not that the Eye Beams will not target melee.
Tree!Druids! You should be standing with the melee! :gasp of breath: And , no, I’m not kidding. Why, might you ask? I’ll tell you- HoTs are instant cast, and your best friend in this fight. Toss them on anything that moves, and some things that don’t. You will not have to worry about tanking Eye Beams, and you won’t get locked out of your healing tree. Save your Wild Growth for after he uses Oblivion, and tell your healing lead that if they stick you on the tank, they’re wrong. Trees shine in this fight with their ability to throw down a lot of healing in a short period of time. For those guys you don’t get with Wild Growth, toss Rejuvs. Simple fight to heal! And good luck- he drops the Ironmender, one of the best offhand frills out there for trees!
The Assembly of Iron:

The Assembly of Iron
What’s better than fighting one huge boss? Fighting one huge boss, and 2 small ones! They’re kinda like the Billy Goats Gruff only… made of iron. And WAAAY meaner. This encounter involves 3 bosses attacking at the same time. Each one has different abilities, and gain new abilities when one of their group is killed. This strat will be for Normal Mode IC, vice Hard Mode. Kill order is Steelbreaker – Runemaster Molgeim – Stormcaller Brundir
Steelbreaker: This is the MASSIVE guy in the middle, the first one who needs to be killed. He comes equipped with one fairly nasty ability- Fusion Punch. Its the Hail Mary of all punches. It wallops the MT and will need to be dispelled by either a pally or a priest, because it will rock a tank’s world… in a bad way.
Runemaster Molgeim: This is the vrykul guy, and the second on the kill list. His abilities include:
1. Shield- or something like that. A red, glowing shield appears around him. It can be (and should be) spellstolen by a mage.
2. Rune of Power- Increases damage dealt by 50%. Its a smallish blue rune circle on the floor- hard to miss. He’ll cast it on Steelbreaker, which means he needs to be moved out of it fast- before Fusion Punch.
3. Death Rune- No joke. Its big. Its green. And it will kill your whole raid. He only drops these after Steelbreaker is down, so be thankful.
Stormcaller Brundir: This is the small Iron Dwarf that dies last for Normal Mode. He comes with his own, special variety of abilities:
1. Overload- really? Not that hard. Decently long cast time, big DBM emote, just get out of range of him or he’ll one shot you.
2. Chain Lightning- Shaman wish their CL hit this hard. Its just like their spell only, ya know… it hurts more. Spread out to minimize damage.
3. Lightning Whirl- Brundir spins around really fast and lobs balls of lightning at the raid. Can hit people across the room, and interruptable.
4. Lightning Tendrils- ok, you remember those big guys before Kologarn? The ones that would jump, stun half the raid, then deposit a glowing ball of lightning doom on you? Think that, only a dwarf instead of a ball. He’ll rise up off of the ground and randomly stalk a raid member. As soon as he does this, RUN! Turn around and get away from him, as the tendrils do massive damage and are almost certain death if you’re caught in them.
Just watch out for each boss’s individual abilities, and kill them in order. Trees, you will most likely be on raid (SHOCK!) and while there is a bit of raid damage, its the tanks on Steelbreaker and Molgeim who need the most love. Tossing HoTs on them if their healers are having trouble is a good idea, the’ll love you for it.
Auriaya:
This boss is all about… the pull. Not kidding. If you survive the pull, you’ve got it. Auriaya, and her 4 kitteh companions (2 in 10 man) patrol in a semi circle around the room at the base of the stairs behind Kologarn’s broken corpse. She has a few special abilities:
1. Fear- yes, its annoying. But she does it.
2. Sonic Screech- cone of damage aimes in front of her. Damage is divided equally amongst everyone in front of her.
3. Activate Feral Defender- this is another cat she summons in addition to the 4 she already has with her. Its health has to be monitored closely because, upon death, it will spawn a void zone under its corpse.
4. Sentinel Blast- an AoE shadow spell that does a crapload of Shadow damage and increases your Shadow Damage taken by 100% for 5 seconds. Long cast time, NEEDs to be interrupted.
The strat: Have the raid either in the hidey hole next to the stairs leading down, or on the stairs (your choice) and have the cats marked. The cats need to be tanked away from each other, as they buff each other when they are too close. Have a DK drop DnD (or a hunter drop Snake Trap) at the bottom of the stairs that Auriaya pats closest to and back off. My guild runs enough OTs to take care of all 4 cats while the MT (typically a DK) handles Auriaya. Have hunters Misdirect onto the OTs and pull. Cats will Pounce, doing large amounts of damage to their target, so they need to be healed and healed FAST- I recommend stacking Lifeblooms on all of the tanks just before the pull. Kill the cats, and move onto Auriaya. When she summons the Feral Defender, have DPS concentrate on him until he is almost dead- he will pounce around the raid and also summon a swarm of mobs, which will need to be AoE’d down. Call out low health on the Defender, and move when he dies. Stay in front of Auriaya. Interrupt Sentinel Blast. Profit. Get lewtz.
Trees! Typical raid healing strategies apply here- judicious usage of Wild Growth and Rejuv are all you really need, plus the occasional Swiftmend.
That is all for this installment of my post series. Remember- Angry Healers! Letting You Die of Your Own Stupid since 2009!

TREEPUNCH!
FOR THE HORDE!
~Pyo