The Gruul fight is all about Stamina and Damage. You have to survive the shit he puts out into the raid and you have to kill him before he becomes untankable.

I believe that your best bet on this fight is to have gear that keeps you in range of 10K hitpoints but still capable of 85% of your max raid damage.

It is a tall order, I know, but if you are sub-10K you are going to find surviving the cave-ins and shatters nearly impossible. I am in a better position as a warlock - so not everyone has it this easy. But if you have some PVP gear - bring it along and try it if you find yourself dead in the first couple shatters of the fight.

To put things in perspective, I commonly find myself in range of 1-2 full-health people after a slam - all of us about 10 yards from each other. This is unavoidable and will happen regardless of how hard you try not to let it happen. Then the shatter comes, both of them die and I am left with 2K hit points.

Food for thought.

I am scared now and want my mommy....

Also if you have Deadly boss mods installed it will tell you how close you are to someone else and when the cave ins happen. It is really an awesome mod. Also for all the pvpers it gives you timers.

Khros is right that Gruul requires a lot of stam. But it's good to keep in mind all of the +Stamina buffs you'll receive from other raid members, and all of the +Stam buffs you can give yourself.

Here are some easy ways that you can boost your Stamina for the Gruul fight, listed in order of ease.

1) Drink an unstable flask. The officers will be handing these out before the fight. They each provide a +Stam boost along with a class-specific boost. http://www.wowhead.com/?search=unstable+flask

2) Bring plenty of Spicy Crawdad. You get a +30 stam boost from this food. If you can't cook, buy some off the AH. Or buy Furious Crawdad and have someone who can cook make the food for you.

3) Get your boots enchanted with Fortitude, for +12 Stam. Frenial can do this enchant and the mats are cheap, just 12 Arcane Dust. A very easy way to boost your stamina.

4) Any empty blue gem slots can be filled with Solid Star of Elune. They aren't that expensive & give you another +12 Stamina

Also, in case positioning is becoming a problem because of all the lovely shatters, using a positioning chart can come in handy. http://ctscreens.net/5603 What this shows you is the number of a position everyone can take and that way they know where to be before and after a shatter. Just a suggestion :) (If only Gruul was really Hasslehoff :( )

(If only Gruul was really Hasslehoff :( )

We would totally own Hasslehoff in the face.

That diagram looks much less hectic than I've ever seen Gruul being. Does that imply that melee players should run for the walls and hide before Shatter hits or that they should try to make it to those spots after they land?

The diagram looks similar to http://www.bosskillers.com/cgi-bin/bbguild/index.cgi?action=view_guide&guide_id=7

(The guide is good too. Has some things like: if three DPSers die, go ahead and wipe the raid.)

That diagram looks much less hectic than I've ever seen Gruul being. Does that imply that melee players should run for the walls and hide before Shatter hits or that they should try to make it to those spots after they land?


Melee should try to get to those spots after they land. Unless they don't have Cloak of Shadows. Now, that diagram looks organized as hell but as for what it looks like in raid? Ha! But for the most part, melee shouldn't worry about numbers and should just make sure they avoid others as they run to a safe spot. DBM is also great for showing who is near you. Awesome because then you can definitely tell who has been touching your ass. ;)

Does anyone know if bigwigs has a proximity warning like DBM?

Does anyone know if bigwigs has a proximity warning like DBM?

It does. Works exactly the same.

In one of the videos and on the guide, you'll see several 'safe' places next to line of sight obstacles. If it's decided in advance who gets those, those people can run there as soon as the Ground Slam cast begins (if someone calls it out).

From the Bosskillers guide:

Using the enemy cast bar, players can see "Ground Slam" being cast, and can quickly move behind a stone or a pillar. This will ensure that in most cases they will be punted either into the wall or the obstacle they are hiding behind. Up to 6 players can hide behind the different obstacles in the lair during a Shatter. It is important to assign these spots to players before the encounter begins, and it is also important that other players are aware of their position. Players behind them will be hidden from view, but not protected from Shatter damage.

As far as who gets pillars, I dunno. But to have a guaranteed safe six characters might be beneficial.

In one of the videos and on the guide, you'll see several 'safe' places next to line of sight obstacles. If it's decided in advance who gets those, those people can run there as soon as the Ground Slam cast begins (if someone calls it out).

From the Bosskillers guide:


As far as who gets pillars, I dunno. But to have a guaranteed safe six characters might be beneficial.

For ranged people with very bad FPS, those safe places are really the difference between life and death.

Awesome because then you can definitely tell who has been touching your ass. ;)

There's a very good chance it was me.

I wanted to mention one more suggestion for the Gruul fight - namely, we should group as many healers in with me and any other Paladin that happens to have Improved Concentration Aura. By doing this, we can reduce the duration of Reverberation by 30% for all those in my group (me included).

According to WoWWiki:
"Reverberation: Occasional zone-wide silence for 4 seconds. Not dispellable. Can be reduced by anti-silence abilities."

Here is the description of Improved Concentration Aura:
"Increases the effect of your Concentration Aura by an additional 15% and reduces the duration of any Silence or Interrupt effect used against an affected group member by 30%. The duration reduction does not stack with any other effects."

Finally, I've also taken Aura Mastery which will allow my Improved Concentration Aura to extent out to 40 yards instead of the usual 30.

Another thing we have to make clear is the postions assinged are for people to return to after the shatter and not after the Slam.

There is only one postion to run to after the Slam before the shatter and that is away from everyone else.

Once the Shatter is over quickly return to your assigned spots to get back withing range of your group and healer.

In one of the Slams last time I got thrown into the middle, I tried to run back out to my position before the shatter and met Dalwin running back in to get to his centre postion and we lit each other up for 18k of dmg.

It was funny to see the damage we all did to each other from the reports Gleja and Beam posted.

After you get thrown, just run to wherever looks safe. After the shatter, THEN run back to your position.

My favorite thing that ever happened in Gruul was this one time we had a shatter, and my proximity warning was fine, and poor Slow had someone in his, so he used blink. The blink carried him right on top of me at the last second and we likewise exploded each other.

It was hilarious. We called it the blink bomb and spent pretty much the rest of the run laughing about it.

Yea Blink is definetly not recommened unless you are so stuck that not using it would lead to certain death.

My favorite thing that ever happened in Gruul was this one time we had a shatter, and my proximity warning was fine, and poor Slow had someone in his, so he used blink. The blink carried him right on top of me at the last second and we likewise exploded each other.

It was hilarious. We called it the blink bomb and spent pretty much the rest of the run laughing about it.

Uhm, that makes 2 Paladins Slowman has killed using the blink bomb. Is there a badge for that?

I get paid to do that....