Molten Core
Overview
The Molten Core is a 40 man raid instance located in Blackrock Mountain.
Horde Molten Core Guide - Read this before coming to the tich raids.
Attunement
You can access MC two ways, either through BRD, or, after completion of the Attunement to the Core quest, you can enter without having to clear another instance, which is the method you'll use when raiding MC.
To get the attunement quest, talk to the high elf Lothos Riftwalker. He is located at the bottom of the chains in the center of BRM. The necessary core fragment is located in BRD, just prior to the Lyceum, as noted in this map, item 22. You should be able to grab the core fragment from just beside the (green) raid portal. The fastest way to get attuned is with a 10-man party, but you can complete it while questing in BRD with a 5-man team as well.
Once you're attuned, the window beside Lothos will take you to MC, provided you're also in a raid group.
Map
Map with mob positions, from Conquest's site.
Quests
Key Quests in this zone: There is a quest line that starts with this quest, all quests given by Duke Hydraxis in Azshara. Upon completion of the fourth quest in the line, Hands of the Enemy, you will be able to get the Aqual Quintessence that you use to spawn Majordomo. There is also a choice of 2 ring rewards for this quest, both of which have 15 Fire Resist on them. The quest lines are the same for Horde and Alliance.
Loot
Preparation
Gear
Molten Core is an endgame instance, and requires a certain level of tanking, dps, healing, and general survival in order to complete it successfully. In general, participants in MC are expected to be geared in either their blue class sets from Strat/Scholo/UBRS, or comparable gear (i.e. Dire Maul gear can be a great substitute for set gear).
Fire Resist Gear
In general, the only people who need FR gear pre-Ragnaros is tanks. But once the raid hits Ragnaros, everyone should be geared in as much FR as they reasonably can. Values that have been tossed around as general benchmarks for FR gear is to try and get over 250 if you're a tank, 150-200 if you're a rogue, and 100-150 if you're anyone else on the raid. Note that this gear also helps for Onyxia, and later on in BWL, so it's a good investment.
Consumables
Consumables are an easy way to get a stat boost, or to stay alive that little bit longer. Usually, unless the materials are cheap, you'll want to save them for the tougher fights, like Onyxia and Ragnaros.
Food
Food is a great way to buff yourself, and all it takes is a little time farming or fishing the ingredients. Following are some foods that can be useful in MC:
- Tender Wolf Steaks, 12 Sta and Spi, meat drops off of lvl 40-50 wolves in Tanaris, Hinterlands, Ferelas, etc.
- Nightfin Soup, restores 8 mana every 5 seconds
- Grilled Squid, 10 Agi (only available in Winter)
- Poached Sunscale Salmon, restores 6 health every 5 seconds
- Runn Tum Tuber Surprise, 10 Int (requires rare ingredients from Dire Maul)
Potions
Some potions to consider:
- Major Rejuvenation Potion
- Major Healing Potion
- Major Mana Potion
- Combat Healing Potion Available from PvP vendor with Officer Rank
- Combat Mana Potion Available from PvP vendor with Officer Rank
- Greater Fire Protection Potion
- Fire Protection Potion
- Elixir of the Mongoose
Felwood Consumables
The Felwood Consumables are fantastic, because they don't share the potion cooldown, so you can take a Whipper Root Tuber and then quaff a Healing Potion right away if you need to.
This map shows the locations of the spawns.
There are 3 different items:
- Purple: Whipper Root Tuber, restores 700 to 900 health
- Yellow: Windblossom Berries, 10 Stamina
- Red: Night Dragon's Breath, restores 394 to 456 mana and 394 to 456 health
Note that the plants can spawn as cleansed, or as corrupted. If they are corrupted, you need Cenarion Plant Salve to cleanse them before you can harvest them. The salve is a quest reward from an NPC south of the Emerald sanctuary. You can either carry a Cenarion Beacon and collect items from killing mobs in Felwood, or you can collect items from using gathering professions in Felwood.
Blasted Lands Buffs
Just east of Dreadmaul Hold in the Blasted Lands is a camp of High Elves, who give quests for various buffs. The big drawback of these buffs is that they are unique, so you can only carry one at a time, but the buffs are a significant boost and are active for one hour (barring death), so are well worth using somewhere like MC. The buffs all share a cooldown, so only one may be active at a time.
- Lung Juice Cocktail, 50 Stamina
- R.O.I.D.S., 50 Strength
- Ground Scorpok Assay, 50 Agility
- Cerebral Cortex Compound, 50 Intellect
- Gizzard Gum, 50 Spirit
Winterspring Jujus (Horde-only)
The horde can visit Witch Doctor Mau'ari in Orgrimmar in order to receive a necklace that will allow them to collect E'ko in Winterspring. Various E'ko can be turned in for different Jujus, some of which are listed below.
- Juju Ember, 15 Fire Resist, from Shardtooth E'ko
- Juju Guile, 30 Intellect, from Wildkin E'ko
- Juju Power, 30 Strength, from Winterfall E'ko
Signing Up
Tichondrius
(note: information grabbed from the Tichondrius MC page, check here for the most up to date info!)
Sign up threads will be posted in the Tichondrius Scheduling Forum up to a week before the planned time of the raid. At the moment, Molten Core raids consist of two days; day 1 runs from Lucifron - Golemagg, including Lucifron, Magmadar, Gehennas, Garr, Baron Gedon, Shazzrah, Sulfuron and Golemagg. Our best time for this run is currently four and a half hours, but we haven't taken longer than five. Day 1 is the most friendly to new players to MC as it includes a lot of different boss fights which experienced players know very well. We don't wipe ever (well, not often anyway).
Day 2 includes Majordomo Executus and Ragnaros and will run for about 3-3.5 hours. Ragnaros is still a really tough fight for us. To kill him, we need everyone to have as much fire resist gear as possible and come prepared with appropriate consumables, including at least five greater fire protection potions. See Tin's fantastic post under the preparation section of this guide for other important consumables. the difficulty of the Rag fight and the need for appropriate gear and preparation is reflected in the invite rules, posted below.
The invite rules can be found in this stickied thread in the Tichondrius Scheduling Forum. Any additional requirements will be mentioned in the actual sign up thread.
Stormrage
The Basin on Stormrage is part of the Avarice alliance, and we run raids together. Signups are posted on the Events Board of the Carpe Aurum forums.
We don't have a set roster of what bosses we complete in a run, since we're still progressing in MC. If you're in doubt as to whether we're starting a fresh instance or continuing from a previous run, ask the raid leader for that run.
Mods in use by Avarice are mostly Psybie's mods, listed here. You can view our Point system here.
General Tips
If in doubt, ask questions
Lots of players have been to MC many times, and have most likely asked the same questions you want to ask. Ask in party chat, ask in your class channel, ask in raid chat, ask on teamspeak in that order.
Make sure you have joined your class channel, since that's the best source of information for new (and not-so-new) players. Many strategies call for specific actions by each class, and the class channel is how you find out what you're supposed to be doing.
Main assist, main tank, offtank
The mainassist is the person who chooses the target for the raid to attack and is most likely a rogue or a warrior. Everyone should have an assist macro setup (/assist mainassist's name) and should use this macro to select targets instead of manually targetting mobs. The maintank will tank bosses and single mob pulls, while the offtanks tank any additional mobs beyond the first.
Note that the Main Assist will not always call dps on every mob - it's your responsibility to know whether to wait for a call or whether you can start nuking right away. Check the mob listings below for this information.
Be aware of your surroundings
A major source of annoyance for the raid is people walking backwards into pulls they don't need to make. It wastes time and can end up wiping the raid. Pay attention to where you are standing. If you need to back up, back up to where you came from, not into some new area.
Listen to Teamspeak
Most important instructions will be given on TeamSpeak. Listen attentively at all times. We do chat and goof off in TS sometimes, but when a pull is being organized, or strategy is being discussed, please keep the chatter in your class channel, and out of TS.
Be on time
Your spot in the raid is held until the time that's posted in the signup thread. If you're late, your spot will be filled. Tough cookies!
Read up on strategy before the raid
You can find MC info all over the internet, including this page. Reading up before the raid will minimize the instructions that are needed, and it will be much easier for you to understand what's going on if you've read the strategy before.
Repair
Repair and stock up on reagents before the run! Durability and reagent supply can be checked by raidleaders using raidassist. Don't be caught out!
Sticky Situations
Wipes happen. Here are some things to keep in mind when things start to go south:
(Alliance-only)
- If someone has been Divine Interventioned, there will be a bluish bubble surrounding them and they won't be able to move. They are most likely a rezzing class, with a paladin dead at their feet. The raid has 20 seconds or so to die off so the monsters can reset and they can pop out of DI, no longer in combat.
- Soulstone: if a warlock is available, he or she will usually soulstone one of the paladins in a raid. This allows the paladin to pop up for no more than two minutes or so after he dies, and he can then begin rezzing other rezzers. They then rez more rezzers and so on, until all the rezzers are up and they can begin rezzing. This is a purple-reddish orb-like buff icon, but may be difficult to see, so it's usual for people to ask after a wipe, 'Anyone soulstoned?'
If the raid is wiping, please be careful not to die too close to Molten Core monsters or in places you can't be reached without aggroing monsters, as it makes it difficult to rez you. If you are in such a circumstance, you may have to release and run back. Also, there may be ressers who are trying to stay out of combat, far enough away that the mobs won't aggro them, and they can stay alive throughout the wipe. Don't run towards them, run away from them if possible. If the "wipe it" command is given, run to the mobs, in a safe place, and die.
Beastiary
Trash Mobs
Molten Giant
Molten Giants come in pairs, with another Giant or a Destroyer. Molten Giants have 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. They also have an AoE that will hit players in melee range.
There will be a dps call on these mobs. They are always a static spawn with a 24 hour respawn timer.
Tichondrius notes
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.
Stormrage notes
We put 2 warriors on the Molten Giants so that another tank is 2nd on the hate list rather than a healer.
Molten Destroyer
Molten Destroyers are virtually identical to Molten Giants, except that they don't have the knockback-aggro wipe effect that Giants have. 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.
Stormrage notes
Only one tank is needed, since the aggro isn't wiped with the knockback.
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 with no dps call.
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.
Since Lave Surgers do keep an aggro table you can fight them with only the melee attackers around them so that when it surgers only the melee attackers get hit with the AoE pulse. The target of the surge will still take damage, but the surger will go back to whoever has aggro on it. Surgers can actually be tanked like giants with an occasional surge then run back to the tank.
==== Firelord ==== (adds: Lava Spawn)
Firelords come either singly, or occasionally in pairs. They cast a magic debuff that needs to be dispelled, but 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. 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.
Stormrage notes
For dual pulls, we often assign even groups to one lord and spawns, and odd groups to the other.
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. 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.
Stormrage notes
Not all packs need to be fought, and we "sneak" around some of the northern packs.
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. Wait until all 5 bodies have disappeared before moving on to the next pack. Core Packs can reignite other Packs, as well as their own.
Tichondrius notes
Each dog is tanked by one warrior, whose target is assigned using the target management ( /tm ) system built into raidassist. One priest will be assigned to each warrior, which is plenty of healing. The corehounds will be pulled and spread in a rough circlular formation facing outwards, each hound like the spoke of a wheel. The main assist will target each hound in turn, switching the raid's target as soon as the hound hits 20% health. Once all five dogs are at 20% the call will be made on teamspeak to bring the mobs together and for aoe attacks to begin. If everything goes to plan the dogs will all die within a couple of seconds of each other. It is critical that all damage dealers pay attention and switch targets as soon as the main assist calls for this to happen.
Stormrage notes
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. We don't use a 20% rule, we just have the single target dps switch targets depending on which mob needs more damage to stay in line with the others, so the dps really needs to be on the ball.
Lava Packs
Lava Packs (fun packs) are the most difficult trash mobs in MC. They are composed of three of the mob types below. Kill the Firewalker first, offtank the Flameguard. The debuffs cast by the Firewalkers and Flameguards can really ramp up the damage received by the raid, so decursing is very important in these fights.
- Firewalker
This should be the first mob killed in the lava packs. He curses with an AoE -200 FR debuff, and chain throws 3K fireballs, called fireblossom.
- Flameguard
Second target to be killed. They have frontal AoE damage and a stackable AC debuff, so they should be faced away from the raid.
- Lava Elementals / Lava Reaver
Lava packs will include one Lava Reaver, or two Lava Elementals. They are banishable, and have the same abilities: a cone-shaped stun and dot, and a melee cleave attack.
Tichondrius notes
On the pull, two tanks will be positioned with a good separation between each one. Hunters will pull the firewalker and flameguard to seperate tanks. The two are kept seperate to prevent people catching both of the debuffs. Warlocks will banish the lava elementals or reaver. The raid kills the firewalker then the flameguard, then as the reavers and elementals come out of banish they are dispatched.
All damage and spells except for the reaver/elemental melee attack and cleave is fire damage, so everyone should be wearing as much fire resistance as possible.
Stormrage notes
Banish the Reaver/Elementals. Warlocks pre-target their mobs for banish, and we have a hunter pet pull the pack or a Pally with shield. Hunters pull the Firewalker and Flameguard to the MT and OT, while the warlocks banish. After the pull, we sic hunter pets on the warlocks' banished targets and use growl (auto-cast or manually) so that the pets eat the damage dealt between banish breaking and getting the mob re-banished.
Bosses
Lucifron
- Adds: 2 Flamewaker Protectors
Lucifron is the first MC boss, and the boss whose death sets the raid lockout timer. He is humanoid, and comes with 2 humanoids adds, Flamewalker Protectors, who have a Mind Control spell. The MC should be dispelled ASAP, otherwise your rogues/warriors will kill your healers.
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.
Stormrage notes
The adds are assigned to offtanks, and hunters pull to the offtanks, who are positioned at the back of the cave, while the MT tanks Luci near the south end of his patrol route. This positioning is so Luci's AoE doesn't hit the rest of the raid while they are fighting the adds. The raid assists the MA, and takes down the adds one at a time.
Because of the MC it is a good idea to have a "free roaming" warrior to pick up the guard if the off tank gets MC'd. The guards like to MC their tank and then run into the DPS or healers.
Magmadar
Mag comes with no adds. In order to fight him, you need to have hunters with tranquilizing shot, which Lucifron 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. This mod might help.
Mag's other abilities include an AoE fear every 30 seconds or so (hunters try to stay at max range to avoid this). 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.
Because of his frenzy and fear if a shot misses and too many healers get feared the MT can go down quickly to him. It is a very good idea to have at least one more tank who is in defensive stance doing a slow aggro build. This also helps the situation where the MT misses a stance dance or fear ward.
Stormrage notes
If a dwarf priest is available, fear ward can be used to ward the tank against Magmadar's fear.
Gehennes
- Adds: 2 Flamewalkers
Similar to Lucifron, Gehennes is humanoid and comes with 2 humanoid adds, who are offtanked 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!
Gehennes' guards have an AoE stun and a cone shaped cleave attack. They need to be seperated enough to keep their stun and cleave from hitting the other guard's tank.
Garr
- Adds: 8 Firesworn
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.
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 will remove buffs from players periodically. Generally by the end of the battle everyone is sitting at their base stats. The explosion of the adds will do around 3200 damage and then you will get fall damage as well. The adds will explode when they die or when Garr blows one up. Everyone should back away from them when they are low on health and let ranged DPS kill them, much like the green ghouls in Scholomance.
Stormrage notes
We stick hunter pets on the banished adds, to eat the damage they do before they can be rebanished, so the OOC resser should see if he/she can ressurect pets when they die in this fight.
Baron Geddon
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.
Geddon is pure fire damage so the higher your FR the better. His AoE pulse attack does more damage with each pulse but Geddon does not move while he is pulsing. So all melee, including the MT need to run when he starts this attack.
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. Mages can ice block to remove the bomb, paladins can shield. Power Word Shield will absorb bomb damage. If the MT gets bombed the healers simply must pour on the heals and keep them alive.
Stormrage notes
Geddon is pulled to Garr's room, using a pet-pull. 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.
Shazzrah
Shazzrah will curse you to take more arcane damage and has a very large radius Arcane Explosion. His physical damage is not much more than any other Molten Core mob so tanks with high arcane resist help on him.
Shazzrah's unique ability is a blink and aggro wipe. He will randomly blink to a target and do his AE attack. Groups should be spaced so that only one party is effected by his attack when he blinks. Since he wipes his aggro table on blink all DPS must stop so that the MT can re-establish aggro. Off tanks are position by the groups to try and get quick aggro on him and bring him back to the middle of the room.
If you have aggro, run to the middle of the room to get him back to the MT. The MT should try to keep any form of DoT on Shazzrah that they can. Other DoT's should be avoided as they will cause him to run amok in the group until the MT can get aggro again. Curse of Doom is generally OK because it is a one shot deal.
Stormrage notes
Like Geddon, Shazzrah is pulled to Garr's room with a pet-pull.
Sulfuron Harbinger
- Adds: 4 Flamewalker Healers
Sulfuron Harbinger comes with four priests. The priests can heal Sulfuron, themselves, or each other. Also, they can cast two different DOTs. Both DOTs are magic dispellable. Sulfuron can use demoralizing shout, perform an AE knockdown, and has a buff to increase his damage and attack speed, which is dispellable.
The heals can be interrupted by shield bash and counterspell. Mortal Strike will help reduce their heals.
Stormrage notes
Sulfuron and three of the adds will be tanked. A mage will put Detect Magic on Sulfuron so a priest can see when to dispel Sulfuron. The remaining add is pulled far away and burned down by the raid. Once it is down, the next add is pulled over to the raid and burned down. After all adds are down, everyone get on Sulfuron.
Golemagg the Incinerator
- Adds: 2 Core Ragers
Golemagg's adds can't be killed, their life will regen if you get them to 50%. So, the dogs are off-tanked, and damage goes to Golemagg. Golemagg enrages at around 10%, melee should exit at that point and he will be burned down.
Majordomo Executus
- Adds: 4 Flamewalker Elites, 4 Flamewalker Priests
See the quest section above for information on how to get the water that is used to summon Majordomo. You need to use the water on the burning runes found near the location of every boss in MC other than Lucifron and Geddon.
Majorodomo Executus comes with four elites and four priests. Before the fight, four mages will be assigned a priest to polymorph. Five tank/healer teams will be formed for the four elites and Majordomo.
At the start of the fight, mages sheep their targets (healers) and keep them sheeped. Tanks get their targets (elites) locked down. Once we are settled, DPS will be called on the first target, and the MA will continue to call targets throughout the fight.
Once four of the adds are killed, the remaining adds become immune to polymorph. Once all of the adds are dead, Executus will submit.
Majordomo has an ability where he will teleport you into magma. Jump out to minimize the damage. The adds can pop up either a shield that reflects magic or a damage shield. Pay attention and do damage at the appropriate time.
Tichondrius notes
Kill order:
- sheep the healers (re-sheeping as necessary)
- kill two of the elites
- reduce the remaining two wariors to 20% health
- break sheep on one healer and kill it
- break sheep on second healer and take it to 20%
- tanks break sheep on the other two healers and establish aggro
- kill the three mobs at 20% health (two elites and one healer) fast
- kill the remaining healer
Stormrage notes
Kill order: one elite, 3 healers, one healer, 3 elites.
We keep 2 warriors on Domo, since he will periodically lose aggro. We also keep 2 hunters where he is being tanked. These hunters keep their pets on Domo with growl on, and when Domo loses aggro, the hunters lay into him with distracting shot and whatever else they can, in order to bring him back to where he is tanked.
Ragnaros
Adds: Periodic waves of 8 Sons of Flame
In order to spawn Ragnaros, you must make Majordomo submit. Domo will then go to Rag's area, and by speaking with him, you can get him to summon Ragnaros. Ragnaros will then kill Domo in one swipe. Splat! If you've wiped before, Rag's aggro radius is pretty small, so you should be able to do your positioning before aggroing him for your next attempt.
Ragnaros will periodically submerge (after 3 minutes), and spawn the Sons of Flame. These are lvl 60 elite elementals. They can be banished and freeze trapped. After 1.5 minutes (or after all the sons are dead, whichever comes first), Rag will emerge again, and the cycle continues.
Ragnaros' skills: Much of Ragnaros' damage is fire, but there is physical damage as well.
- Wrath of Ragnaros: AoE melee knockback, lowers aggro on the MT. Rag does this attack every 25 seconds, and after the first one, you'll get a notice in CTRA warning you that it's coming. Melee should back out of range of this attack (back away further than just out of melee range).
- Fire Explosions: Ragnaros will throw a fireball that knocks back those around the target. Spread out to avoid this knockback effect.
- Elemental Fire: a debuff for whoever has Rag's aggro, does 4800 fire dmg over 8 seconds.
- Lava Splash: the lava will splash about, and damage melee players. Can be resisted with good FR.
- Magma Blast: when Rag has no targets in melee range, he'll hit someone for 6000 damage at range, so be sure to have someone in melee at all times.
- Melt Weapon: weapons will take high damage from Ragnaros.
Sons of Flame skills: The Sons do fire damage only.
- Mana Burn Aura: all mana users should stay as far away as possible.
Tichondrius notes
Stormrage notes
Detailed strategy, including placement for Rag is listed here.