Leotheras the Blind
The Basics
This section contains a basic outline of the fight, and is a must read for everyone, as it contains information you need to know so as not to wipe the raid. If you are interested in knowing the why of the instructions here, or in improving your individual performance, the details are available below.
Leotheras the Blind is a two phase fight (with a short prefight) that alternates between humanoid form and demon form, and then the final 15% which incorporates both phases. Humanoid form phase lasts 45 seconds, and demon form lasts 60 seconds. The fight requires one tank in normal gear, and one tank (usually a warlock) in fire resist gear.
Leotheras is kept banished by three adds, when they are all killed he is freed.
This fight features several threat resets, which are important to pay attention to. He resets threat when he changes form, from humanoid to demon or demon to humanoid. He resets threat at the end of each Whirlwind. Melee DPS must stop DPS on each threat reset. Ranged DPS must stop DPS on each threat reset, except when he transitions to demon form. Starting and stopping DPS on a dime is key in this fight.
The Whirlwind is the major feature of his humanoid phase. It is on a 15 second cooldown from the time that he changes form or after the end of the previous Whirlwind. During this time he is not tankable, but aggros onto people randomly every few seconds, whirling around the room. If you are in melee distance of him, you will probably be hit, and have a nasty bleed put on you. If you are far enough away when he targets you, he won't reach you by the time he targets someone else, so we spread out as much as possible in the room, without going into the tunnels (which will reset him). If too many people get hit by the Whirlwind it will overwhelm the healers and we will wipe. Try not to get hit.
All shamans should drop searing totems at the tanking spot in the center when he whirlwinds. This will help ensure that Leo is aggro'd by the totems and returns to the center to be tanked.
After 45 seconds in humanoid form, he will change to demon form, and begin casting Chaos Blast, which does fire damage and stacks a debuff that increases fire damage. It hits his aggro target and anyone else nearby. Melee need to stop DPS at this point, ranged can continue as long as they stop if they gain aggro. Chaos Blast is very little damage unless it stacks, and having some spread around on the ranged at the start helps prevent getting too many stacked on the warlock tank.
About 20-25 seconds into demon form, Leotheras will cast Insidious Whispers, which summons an Inner Demon for each of up to five raid members. If you get an Inner Demon, you are the only person who can damage it, so you must kill it yourself. This fight is not hugely healing intensive if done properly, so healers and tanks can afford to wear some damage gear to assist. The Inner Demons are vulnerable to holy, nature, and arcane damage. They hit for very little, and while your demon is alive, your sole mission in life is to kill it, somoene else will heal you. If you fail to kill it within the time allotted (about 30 seconds), then you become mind controlled for the duration of the fight, and we have to kill you. Pet classes are allowed to use their pets to help kill their inner demon, but it is vitally important that they don't allow their pets to either get the first or killing blow in on their demons, if it does, they will still get mind controlled.
Leotheras shifts between these two phases until he reaches 15% life, at which point he makes an emo RP speech, and splits into both humanoid and demon form. At this point we have to kill the humaoid form to end the fight, the demon form is attackable but irrelevant except that it must be tanked until Leo dies. For reasons detailed below, we will take Leo to 15% while he is in demon form, but we want to get as close to that as possible before he shifts.
All DPS cooldowns should be kept for the final 15% and used as soon as the call is made to burn him down. Everyone should pile on, even the healers. Keep your head during this 15%, there are still Whirlwinds to deal with, just keep on maintaining execution. We get about 10 seconds of free DPS on him during his speech, remember to stop at that point for the tank to pick him up, and remember that he is likely to Whirlwind very soon thereafter because the timer has been ticking during his speech.
The Details
Leotheras the Blind:
Health: 3.8 million
Enrage timer: 10 minutes
Base damage: dual wielder in humanoid form, main hand 2K to 2.5K physical damage, off hand 1.6K to 1.8K physical damage, weapon speed about 2 seconds for each,
his gear apparently has no hit rating cuz he misses a lot, no regular attack in demon form
Immunities: All crowd control, taunt
Special Abilities:
Humanoid form:
Whirlwind: changes targets every few seconds, about 3K damage when struck, each tick is 2500 damage for 15 seconds, removeable by
BoP
Demon form:
Chaos Blast: 150 fire damage to target and any others nearby, adds a stacking debuff that increases fire damage by 1675, 2 second cast time
Insidious Whisper: summons an Inner Demon for each of up to five raid members, except the current aggro target
Inner Demon:
Health: about 11K
Base Damage: 1K melee
Immunities: can only be damaged by the person they are cast on, and their pets, pets must not get the first or killing blow
Special abilities:
Shadow Bolt: 3.5K shadow damage, will most likely be cast once, perhaps twice
Cause mind control of the player cast on if not killed within about 30 seconds
The Details
Killing your inner demon
While some may suggest a therapist, that is probably going to take more than 30 seconds. Inner demons should be trivial to kill for all DPS classes, although shadow priests may struggle a bit. For tanks and healers, here are some pointers:
Remember they are vulnerable to holy, nature, and arcane damage.
Protection spec warriors have found many ways to kill their inner demon, here is one way. Keep on all tank gear that provides shield block value, for big shield slams. Fill a full rage bar during the first part of demon phase, and use a shield slam/3 devastate rotation in battle or zerk stance. Make sure you keep enough rage to shield reflect, and reflect the bolt when the demon casts it.
"Melee sucks on this fight, we're always running out!" True, but there are ways you can maximize your DPS. Make sure you get a bleed ticking on him before you run out, and run your energy or rage as close to zero as you can. Keep an eye on your timer for when the whirlwind ends, and if he is on the other side of the room, start to run back in when it starts to get close, so you can be in position to DPS as soon as the tank has him in hand. He's very squishy, and melee DPS is huge during the time that he is making his speech at the 15% transition.
"What about that 15% transition, why do we wait until he goes to demon form?" If he transitions when he is in demon form, we can continue to attack him while he is making his speech, if he transitions in human form, he is not attackable during this time. Since we can do about 5-7% before he finishes, transitioning in demon form is a big win. There are some fine points to getting it done well. Many if not most raiders have addons that show percent of mob health. 15% on these meters is actually anywhere from 15 percent to 15.999999%. To trip him over, we have to hit 15% period. Therefore, we want to slow DPS when he hits 16%, and stop entirely the second he hits 15% with these addons. Slow DPS means autoattack only (big rage bars/full energy bars GOOOOOOD!), and wanding. If you don't have an addon that shows you immediately when he ticks over 15%, don't DPS at all when we are creeping up to that point, as you will probably stop too late if you wait for a vent call. Once we have stopped DPS, as soon as he goes to demon form, open up and burn him down. One he starts his speech, we have about ten seconds to DPS him freely, at which point DPS must stop so the tank can get him when he's done, and melee need to get out anyway because the Whirlwind cooldown is nearly up (starts when he transitions).
"When should I use cooldowns for more DPS?" The last 15% of this fight pretty much *is* the fight. Since we have to stop DPS at the end anyway to wait for him to transtion to demon form, the only reason to speed DPS up is to get him into the 15% at the demon transition at 7:45 instead of the one at 9:30 (remember, the enrage timer is 10 minutes). Decent raid DPS will have us waiting for the 7:45 timer anyway, so DPS cooldowns prior to that are not very useful (unless for some reason you need it to kill your inner demon). The best time to use cooldowns is immediately when he transitions to demon form when we are ready to take him into the 15% transition.
"I'm ranged DPS, how do I safely DPS when he is Whirlwinding?" Very carefully. Not getting whirlwinded is more important than DPS'ing, especially before the 15% split. We will be waiting at 15% anyway, so taking silly risks to do more Whirlwind DPS during the first 85% is pointless. During the final 15%, do what you can, but mind the threat wipes, and don't overwhelm the healers by getting unnecessarily dotted up. Instants are your friend. During the final 15%, don't take stupid risks and mind the threat wipes. Raid DPS drops into the toilet if Leotheras is running around with the tank chasing him to get aggro. Less DPS at the appropriate time leads to more DPS overall.
"Why can't I go in the tunnels to avoid Whirlwind?" Because doing so can reset the fight. In fact, if things go badly, we can use this to reset the fight, however he won't reset during the final 15%.
"What about my dots when he resets threat?" Use your timers to your advantange, and remember that during the first 85%, risking pulling aggro to do more DPS is useless. Remember you have a guaranteed 30 seconds from the time that he transitions to humanoid form until he stops whirlwinding, use that to your advantage. Demon phase is exactly 60 seconds long, time your last dot refresh to tick off just before he transitions. Dots from ranged classes when transitioning from humanoid to demon phase are just fine, ranged DPS pulling aggro at this time is okay (and even desired to some extent) as long as you stop when you do to avoid stacking Chaos Blast.
"Stoneform doesn't remove the Whirlwind bleed!" Yeah, I know. Sucks.
BoP, Divine Shield, and Ice Block are the only ways.