Schooling Scholomance

[MongoJerry]

ADVENTURES OF NERIAD: Schooling Scholomance, part XI, Darkmaster Gandling

Darkmaster Gandling was the silent type who resisted our attempts at negotiation. ("Give us all your belongings and nobody gets hurt!") We switched to plan B: killing him.

A battle with Darkmaster Gandling is a challenge match, and I give all the Blizzard team who worked on it props for fun and creativity. Here's how it works:

1. Darkmaster Gandling on his own is a pretty tough mob. His spells hit hard, he casts some harsh curses, and he can take a pounding himself.

2. At random times, he will teleport random players into one of the six now cleared side chambers. (At least, I haven't found any pattern to when it happens or who it happens to). The gate to the appropriate side chamber then closes and three skeletons spawn in middle of the chamber.

3. The teleported character must kill those three skeletons to open the gate and return to the main battle. Luckily, the three skeletons are merely delaying forces. They all have low health and can be killed very easily. (I'm estimate they have on the order of 700ish health each). It is imperative that teleported characters kill the three skeletons and return to the main battle as quickly as possible.

4. If Darkmaster Gandling loses aggro on the entire party, then he will return to his starting point, regenerate health and mana quickly, and reset himself. Basically, he's won the round, and you have to start over. When players are teleported, Gandling loses aggro on them, so Gandling can win the round even if the party hasn't wiped. For example, if three characters have been teleported away and the other two members of the party get killed by Gandling, then Gandling will have lost aggro on all of the members of the party and the round will be over. This is a major reason among everything else that a teleported player should fight his or her way back as quickly as possible to rejoin the main battle. You want to make sure Gandling maintains aggro on at least someone in the party at all times or else all of your previous efforts will be lost.

Having discussed this in our party and buffed ourselves to the fullest extent, we commenced the attack on Darkmaster Gandling. Now, please keep something in mind. Recall from the first post that this run was conducted on the second day of the patch. Two people were running Scholomance for the first time, and the rest of us had only been there once or twice before -- and always in larger parties. So if what I'm about to describe seems noobish to you who might now be a veteran Scholomance runner, keep in mind that we were all, well, noobs at the time.



We charged forward, employing the usual tactic of the warrior taunting the mob, the priestess healing the warrior, and the other three people trying to deliver as much damage as possible. In short order, I was teleported into the Hall of Secrets and met Larry, Curly, and Moe. I fought to get back into the main battle as quickly as I could while still having something of a mana reserve with which to fight once I got there.

Frankly, I'm not exactly sure what happened during that first round of fighting, since I didn't see much of it or take many screenshots during it. To the best of my memory, I got teleported a couple of times and never even saw the main battle after the first charge. From the chat log, I gather that Gandling had teleported some other people and had killed one or two others. Then, to seal the deal, Kupeludo had fought through and killed the skeletons in his chamber but just as he was about to run out to join the fray, Gandling ran by (getting aggro on Kupeludo) and teleported Neth into the same room. So the door to the chamber closed again, three new skeletons spawned, and Gandling passed through the closed door and killed both Kupeludo and Neth inside the chamber. So, two players were down inside a closed room where they could not be rezed during the fight. The next screenshot I have shows us at the instance entrance, getting ready to jump off the entrance platform and run inside the Viewing Room. Round 1 goes to Darkmaster Gandling.



We gathered again and discussed ways to better handle the encounter. Kupeludo mentioned that Gandling casts a lot of spells, so perhaps our paladin should use a resistance aura. That gave me idea to try using Mana Burn. I have Improved Mana Burn, which reduces its cast time from 3 seconds to 2 seconds, so I can cast Mana Burn pretty frequently. We charged forward and after burning Gandling's mana supply down below half, I was summarily teleported into the Coven.



I fought my way out of the Coven and got teleported almost instantly to the Shadow Vault.



I killed Larry, Curly, and Moe again and just as I was about to leave the room, Kronos also got teleported into the Shadow Vault, an action that caused the gate to close in front of me and three new skeletons to appear. Kronos had to deal with the loading screen, so I had to fight this new group of skeletons alone. I was starting to feel like Sisyphus, the mythological hero doomed to rolling a boulder to the top of a mountain in Hades only to watch the boulder roll back of its own weight upon nearing the summit. (The Myth of Sisyphus). It was during this time that Gandling lost aggro on everyone else as well. I don't know if it was via teleport or deaths, but I do know we had to start over. Luckily, we were able to rez or summon everyone, so no corpse runs were required this time. Round 2 goes to Darkmaster Gandling.



We gathered again and discussed ways to improve our play. We had done a lot better this time, since three-fouths of Gandling's life had been taken down. But he had still won, so there had to be something that we were missing. It was then that the significance of a seemingly innocuous comment made by Neth during the battle sank in.

Neth: theres no way im going to get past 59/59/61 mobs guarding me

Days later, rested, showered, well fed, and in a good mood, I can say without a doubt that Neth is one of the best teammates out there. Putting up with all the false starts and backtracking we had to do along the way shows a lot of character on her part, and I would love to run many more instances with her. But at the time, it being eight in the morning after having stayed up all night, I was ready to find out how Krastinov's Work Bench (a.k.a. The Butcher's Work Bench) could be used on a certain mage.

Kronos and I proceeded to tell Neth and any other group members who had possibly thought the same thing but hadn't mentioned it that the skeletons are merely there to delay players from returning to the main battle. They have reduced health and they don't hit very hard. (Admittedly, they do cast some wacky magic debuffs and curses on you). Anyone, especially a mage, can quickly kill the skeletons and get back to the main battle. It being eight in the morning, Kronos and I said this about six different ways, which was probably five more ways than was necessary. I don't think any of us wanted the fight extended to a fourth round.

Now that that was settled, we were pretty optimistic about the upcoming battle. Also, I was happy to report to the group that Mana Burning really seemed to work, so Kronos said he'd join in with some Mana Siphoning.



Draining Darkmaster Gandling's mana worked beautifully. He was still able to teleport people away, so he probably doesn't need much if any mana to do that. However, with no mana, he couldn't cast his powerful attack spells and instead had to resort to using his comparatively feeble melee attack. He also uses a couple of nasty curses, one of which turns you into a skeleton and reduces your strength, agility, and stamina by a significant amount. Still, while Gandling was at little or no mana, even I as a cursed skeleton priest was able to tank him for quite a while.



Right at the end, Gandling had managed to regen just enough mana to cast a barrage of arcane missles at me while simultaneously teleporting me out of the room. Dang! If only I had Mana Burned him just that one more time. Still, the rest of the party was able to finish him off. Kronos, our warlock, was rezed by Lilisi, our paladin, and I was summoned to the central room. It's a good thing we could do that, because Gandling was my loot, and I doubt his body would've lasted while I made a corpse run back. What did he drop?