Molten Core

Overview

The Molten Core is a 40 man raid instance located in Blackrock Mountain. You can access it via the green portal in Blackrock Depths just between the 7 Dwarves and Lyceum or you can do a quest from an elf on the way to BRD to attune you to the core. Once attuned you jump through the window into the lava next to the elf. You must be in a raid for the portal to work.

Map

Map with mob positions, from Conquest's site.

Beastiary

Trash Mobs

Molten Giant
These are big slow time wasting fights. You have a pair (they always come with another Giant or Destroyer) of big giants that you need to tank and slowly burn down. We like to keep 1 tank on each giant and 2-3 priests on each tank. If you are a priest and do not know who to heal ask in the healer chat channel (/basinpriest on tich) or you frequently heal the warrior that is on the same side of the raid tab as yourself. For example if the Maintank is in Group 1 and the Offtank is in Group 2 then the healers for the MT are in groups 1,3,5,7 and for the OT are in groups 2,4,6,8. Shamans/Pallies and Druids can keep the dps alive since the giants have a melee area aoe. When pulling we assign each offtank a hunter that pulls the giant right to him so he can taunt it off. Once the warrior has aggro on the giant the hunter can FD and change to dps gear if needed. DPS classes just need to wait for their dps call and assist for the right target. These are always a static spawn with a 24 hour respawn timer. {You probably should discuss the differences in tanking a Molten Giant and a Molten Destroyer. Molten Giant has a knock back attack that can send the warrior beyond aggro range, and cause the Molten Giant to choose the next target in his hate list. We tag team tank Molten Giants so that another warrior is 2nd on the hate list rather than a healer. Molten Destroyers have a knock down attack and do not need double coverage. - Kandrathe}

Lava Annihilator
This is your basic melee mob with a twist. It uses the random target system to determine a 2nd person to attack, and then it returns to the person on the top of it's hate list. Basically it means its just about impossible to tank and will target new people constantly. To minimize the need to chase it all over the place everyone should pile onto it in melee range and just heal who needs healing. Tanks should feel free to taunt whenever it is up just so they can eat a few hits before it switches again. These are Always a static spawn and have a 150 minute respawn timer. Any Annihilator has a chance to spawn as a Firelord and vice versa. Like other rock elementals in MC it is susceptible to Banish and Freezing Trap. Typically, we start dps right away.

Firelord
Firelords come either singly, or occasionally in pairs. Their signature move is throwing out a lava spawn at regular intervals. DPS needs to switch to the spawns when this happens, particularly on dual firelord pulls, so that the spawns go down quickly, otherwise they split into more spawns. For dual pulls, we often assign even groups to one lord and spawns, and odd groups to the other. Firelords are positioned close to each other, so that mages' blizzards will hit both lords and spawns. DPS typically starts when the first spawn pops out with no dps call.

Lava Spawn
See Firelord above.

Lava Surger
Very similar to Lava Annihilator, and the same tactics are used. When he surges, everyone near him at the time plus the person he charges will get hit with a ~800-1000 damage and get knocked back a few yards. The affect is much like bowling pins. These are on a timer of 28 minutes, and stop respawning when Garr is killed.

Ancient Core Hound
Hounds spawn in several varieties - they can have one of the following AoE curses (info stolen from Conquest website): Short duration stun, -200 fire resist debuff , 50% spell and melee slow, Short duration confuse, 30% less health, 50% less int/spirit. They have a fire breath effect that is cone-based, so the MT usually pulls the hound, and turns them to face away from the raid. Respawn on these is ~18 minutes, and they stop respawning when Magmadar is killed. Wait for dps call.

Flame Imp
The imps are non-elite, with a very fast timer, and are typically AoEd. Not all packs need to be fought, and we "sneak" around some of the northern packs. Be careful when fighting in Lucifron's room that you don't get too close to the entrance where the imps are, it is easy to pull/be feared into the imps, which usually causes a wipe.

Core Hound
There are 5 packs of 5 core hounds in the Lucifron/Magdamar room. We assign 5 tanks (pallies/druids if not enough warriors). All the tanks pull their mob, and face them inwards to protect non-tanks from the Core Hounds serated bite attack (they spawn in a circle, and that's roughly how they are still positioned when we fight them). The hounds need to all be killed within 10 seconds, or they respawn at full health. We set up CTRA windows for all of the tanks so everyone can see the health of all 5 mobs, and classes with AoE use that whenever possible. Single target damage dealers need to be on the ball with switching targets if one mob is ahead or behind of the others in terms of damage taken.

Molten Destroyer
We fight these the same as the Molten Giants {or, not. See my note above - Kandrathe}. He has a stomp attack which is an AE knockdown and stun. This makes getting initial agro fairly difficult and causes a lot of damage to rogues and other people in range.

Lava Packs
Kill the Firewalker first, offtank the Flameguard. Banish the Reaver and Elemental. We have a hunter pet pull the pack or a Pally with shield. Warlocks banish, and the two flamers are tanked. Have warlocks pre-target a reaver or elemental for banish. After the pull, we sic hunter pets on the warlocks' banished targets with growl active {Kandrathe: I use growl manually only to conserve focus and taunt long enough to distract), to eat the damage dealt between banish breaking and getting the mob re-banished. {Should add more here about the dangerous debuffs and the important role of decursing.}

- Firewalker
This should be the first mob killed in the lava packs. He curses with a -200 FR debuff, and chain throws 3K fireballs.

- Flameguard
Has AoE damage and a stackable AC debuff, second target to be killed.

- Lava Elemental
Banishable. Has a cone-shaped stun and dot, third target.

- Lava Reaver
Banishable, has a vicious melee and cleave attack and the last to be killed.

Bosses

Lucifron
First MC boss, and the boss whose death sets the raid lockout timer. Luci is humanoid, and comes with 2 humanoids adds, Flamewalker Protectors, who are assigned to offtanks. The offtanks are positioned at the back of the cave, while the MT tanks Luci near the south end of his patrol route, so that Luci's AoE doesn't hit the rest of the raid while they are fighting the adds.
The adds have a MC that needs to be dispelled ASAP, so your rogues don't kill your healers. The raid assists the MA, and takes down the adds one at a time.
Lucifron has a curse that increases mana cost of abilities by 100%, need to get this off the healers as quickly as possible. He also has an AoE that goes off every 30 seconds that does 2000 damage after 10 seconds, so any dps class that isn't high on healing priority needs to bandage or otherwise keep their HPs above 2000 during this fight.

Magmadar
Mag comes with no adds. In order to fight him, you need to have hunters with tranquilizing shot, which Luci drops. This is used on Mag when he goes into a frenzy, to bring him back to normal. Hunters will communicate with each other on rotation and let the others know when a shot misses, so the next hunter can take their shot.
Mag's other abilities include an AoE fear every 30 seconds or so (hunters try to stay at max range to avoid this), so dwarf priests are useful to ward the MT. He also spits fire at random targets, and the fire stays on the ground as an AoE, so be sure to step out of it if he spits at you. Also, he has a cone-shaped fire damage.

Gehennes
Similar to Luci, Gehennes is humanoid and comes with 2 humanoids adds, who are OT'd and killed first. Gehennes curses with a 75% less healing curse which can be dispelled, throws shadow bolts, and has an AoE fire spell - if you're in the fire, get out of it!

Garr
Garr is an elemental and comes with 8 adds. With each add killed, Garr becomes more powerful, so keep as many banished as possible, and assign warriors to OT the others. When the warrior-tanked adds are killed, move on to Garr, then mop up the banished adds. We stick hunter pets on the banished adds, to eat the damage they do before they can be rebanished.
Garr also likes to explode his adds periodically when you're fighting him, so the adds should be far away from Garr and the rest of the raid, otherwise the melee fighting Garr will be caught in the explosion of the add. Garr has a slow effect, and I'm not sure what else he does.

Baron Geddon
Geddon is pulled to Garr's room. Previously, this was accomplished with a pet pull, but with the changes in aggro, a paladin may be the best way for alliance to pull him, with a hunter taking him off the pally midway and bringing him back to Garr's room. The MT waits for him in the center of the room, and the raid stays close together. Each group should stay close to their mage for decursing. A couple of spots are chosen as the bomb spots, stay away from these spots unless you are the bomb.
The Baron has a curse that burns mana, taking 400 mana per second and turning it into 400 damage per second. Classes without mana are not affected. There is also a strong AoE that all melee should run out of as soon as it starts. Backing up isn't fast enough, turn around and run away.
But, the most memorable attack of the Baron is the bomb! Basically, a random person on his aggro list is chosen to be the bomb. After 10 seconds, the person will be blown up into the air. If the initial damage doesn't kill you, the fall usually will, so abilities like slow fall are good here. If you are the bomb, you MUST run to one of the areas without people, otherwise you'll kill your allies and they won't be very happy with you. CTRA includes a message on your screen "YOU ARE THE BOMB", as well as a whisper from the raid leader that you are the bomb.

Shazzrah
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Sulfuron Harbinger
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Majordomo Executus
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Golemagg the Incinerator
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Ragnaros
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Core Rager
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Firesworn
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Firewalker
Garr spawned add

Flamewaker
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Flamewaker Elite
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Flamewaker Healer
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Flamewaker Priest
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Flamewaker Protector
See Lucifron information.

Son of Flame
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Zone Guide

Good Camps:

Materials:

Key Quests in this zone:

MC, Horde:

Hunters:

Note: This synopsis is based on encounters up to Majordomo, and will not, (yet), cover pulls on the way to Ragnaros.

Hunters actually have a purpose in MC besides being (inferior) DPS in most other instances, our job is to pull mobs to the MT, and to peel mobs off the MT to off-tanks so the MT doesn’t get swarmed.

Things to do before and in the raid:

- Join the hunter channel (basinhunter on Tich, aim2please on SR), this is the channel the hunters, MT and Off-tanks communicate.

- If you get assigned to an Off-tank, communicate in regard to where to peel to, and let him know you're his designated peeler.

- The main puller and secondary puller should run up and be ready for the next pull as fast as possible after a kill, if one of the hunters is dead I prefer to assign a third Hunter to sub, and take the task of the current dead hunter(s).

- On peels, the only target getting Hunters Marked, is the one that’s going down first. Most often peeled by the secondary puller.

- Get “Wardrobe-mod”, (unless you use a better mod, in which case link it), even experienced pullers will die frequently, and you will notice that the repair bill will be steep if you pull in your primary gear, in addition to the possibility of rendering yourself useless in the raid due to broken gun/bow. (I use a secondary bow/gun for pulling). Most classes find “Wardrobe” to be cumbersome, due to the fact that you have to be out of combat to be able to use it, as hunters we have the possibility to FD, and get out of combat, so you will be able to change gear mid battle.

Pulls:

Solo pulls: Lava Annihilators, 'Surgers, Fire lords and Core Hounds.

Usually the Core hound can be pulled by the MT, but if needed the hunter may be asked to pull it. Freezing trap will work on Annihilators/Surgers, which makes it possible to buy some time getting back to the MT.

Some of these pulls may require a peel, (Distracting Shot), from a second hunter, depending on how far away the mob is, this is especially important on the way to Lucifron/Magmadar, where there are 3 Annihilators/Surgers, a Firelord and a Core Hound that needs to be pulled from the bridge area. (Note! The last pull here, is a Surger which should be pulled on his way to the right, if you try to pull him on his way to the left, you will get imps).

Giants:

These come in pairs, either Giant/Giant(G/G), Giant/Destroyer(G/D) or Destroyer/Destroyer (D/D), these guys have an AoE stomp, so expect to die a lot . Our way of doing most of these pulls is that the secondary puller, marks his target and when the main puller has pulled, peels him off to the off-tank. The main puller runs to the MT, usually a bit aways from the raid. As we do it, the destroyer always goes to the MT if G/D. If dual, G/G or D/D, the puller gets the closest one, and the furthest away one gets marked and peeled to the off-tank. If the Destroyer is the furthest away one on G/D’s, I, personally, prefer to let the secondary puller pull, and have the main puller peel to the MT, (according to Vlo this is not necessary though ;)).

Note! In Garr’s part of the instance there will be two D/D pairs with a random spawn mob in front of each pair, these pulls can be very hard, in regard to not getting all 3 in the same pull. Usually a safe way will be to have the secondary hunter to FD on half distance, and be ready to peel the mob if the pull is successful here.

Other multipulls:

Through the tunnel from Garr to Baron Geddon and Shazzrah, you will have to pull some packs consisting of Flameguard, Flamewalker and two ‘Reavers, (gets banished), to clear the way for "clean" boss pulls. Lately we’ve been doing pet pulls on these “tunnel pulls”, as it’s very hard to get a successful peel off in there, and have the time to run back. Having Dash/Dive is helpful. (Baron Geddon and Shazzrah is pulled the same way).

These packs will also be on the way to Sulforon and Golemagg. Usually we pull either the Flamewalker or the Flameguard, (whichever is easiest to pull), and peel the other one. The Flamewalker goes to the MT, and the Flameguard to the off-tank.

Boss encounters:

Lucifron/Gehennas:

Requires 3 hunters, one to pull closest guard, one to peel the second guard and one to peel Lucy/Gehennas himself. Note! The peeling of the boss should be done as fast as possible after the initial pull!

Magmadar:

This encounter requires Tranquility shot, a special attack you learn by a book that drops off Lucifron. Mag will every 15 seconds or so, go into a frenzied state, where he will cause more dmg to the MT, this state must be shut down as fast as possible with Tranq. (Timer is 20 seconds). The way Basin on Tich do it, is that we pair up hunters, where the players in each pair fire at the same time when he gets into frenzy, the hit rate is like 90% with an average decked character, so it’s very unlikely that both will miss. If the tank has him facing the end of the cave the sides are a good way to stand. Hunters with improved range will have no problem firing from outside his fear range.

Requirements:

- Magmadar mod. (Gives you a warning when he gets into frenzy, and when his fear will be released).

- Macroes for /Basinhunter; “<charactername> Hit” and ”<charactername> missed”.

- Isolate your "combat spell hits" in combat log for this encounter, as it's important that you can easily see if you hit/missed to send the hit/miss macro to /basinhunter channel.

Garr:

Pending on the amount of Warlocks for banish, Hunters get assigned to off-tanks, where each team gets assigned to a location in the cave by the raid leader, and peels the assigned “guard” to the off tank, freezing traps will buy some time here too.

Baron Geddon/Shazzrah:

DPS duty, besides pet pulling. (Note! The hunter pet-pulling, should stay in the middle of the room with the MT, and stay there until he’s sure the MT has aggro).

Sulforon/Golemagg/Majordomo:

Peel assigned guards to off-tanks.

A bit unsure if this should be moved to the hunter section of the Wiki, (feel free to do so).

Sjur