User:Serillian/Sha of Terror

Sha of Terror is the final boss of Temple of Qri'vexx as a Heroic-only encounter. He is the creature responsible for corrupting late Empress Qri'vexx and her predecessor Shek'zeer. He has been revived from the growing problems from the Qri'vexxi Temple, with growing fear of the Empress recklessly throwing her brood to their deaths.

Background
Several months after the Sha of Fear has met his end, a small fragment of his essence remained. Through this essence, he has remained in the world, looking for a chance to regain his full form once again. He recently has been drawn to the Dread Wastes where a new brood of mantid, the Qri'thik, has taken a foothold within the dark lands. The Qri'thik, however, have a violent nature and this very violence drove the empress to the breaking point of fear in which she believes her children will eventually overthrow her and disband the Qri'thik overall. Due to this, the Sha has sought to make the Empress's mind his home, feeding off of her fear which causes her to impart her fear into the minds of her closest servants and minions alike (with the threat of death should failure occur). Over time, the Empress's fear grew and with fear's growth, so did the Sha and now he has regained his power and form. He now lurks deep within inaccessible caverns of the Empress's temple home. Should the Empress ultimately fall, the Sha will loosen himself from her soul and unleash his fury on his victims.

Encounter Abilities
The Sha, in all his glory, goes berserk after 10 minutes. This causes him to cast Siphon Fear, stripping the fearful souls of all players that instantly kills them.



Phase One: Fear's Respite
At the beginning of the battle, the Sha of Terror starts at 25% of maximum health. This is due to him being violently ripped from the body of Empress Qri'vexx following her death. This Phase ends at 5% health.









Phase Two: Your Fear Controls You!
Once the Sha reaches 5% health, he unleashes his full power and nearly destroys the entire cavern floor, save for a few areas that soon becomes platforms to battle the sha on. He is then restored to 100% health and enters the next Phase at 60% health.













The Dreadwater Lives!






Phase Three: Horror Grips Your Soul!
At 60% health, the Sha grows increasingly annoyed with his "mortal playthings" and attempts to end his toying with his enemies. The Sha begins to attack the platform with the most players on it while casting Siphon Fear on anyone present on the other platform.













Parasitic Minion
These corrosive creatures are spawned from players affected by Parasitic Corrosion. They are as horrific as the Sha himself.





The Dreadwater Lives Again!






Phase Four: Terror Incarnate
At 20% health, the Sha of Terror attempts to drain the fearful souls of his enemies, ending the battle once and for all. War Hero Gri'mak arrives to lend aid against the Sha, attempting to protect against the horrific Sha. This phase ends at the Sha's defeat.

















War Hero Gri'mak
In the nick of time, War Hero Gri'mak arrives to protect players against the terrifying Sha.







Strategy
This encounter possesses a 10-minute enrage timer. This requires a decent amount of sustained DPS due to the fact that there are adds summoned over the course of the fight.

Throughout the entire fight, all players have a Rising Fear meter that grows at the same rate for all players and once it reaches 100%, the Sha will cast Siphon Fear, instantly wiping the raid. There is no way of reducing the meter other than by progressing to the next Phase. Therefore, players must quickly, but cautiously make it from one Phase to the next to prevent Siphon Fear from wiping the raid.

Phase One
At the beginning of the Phase, players can move freely about the cavern while fighting the Sha. He starts at 25% health, so this will be the quickest Phase to get past while the Rising Fear meter is low. Nonetheless, caution should be taken from the start of the fight to the finish. The Sha also has the least amount of abilities in this Phase.

The Sha has a permanent buff on himself that allows him to gain extra attacks through his Thrashing Strikes. Every three melee swings will grant him a stack of Thrashing Swipes which inflicts 150% damage to all players 8-yards in front of him. This effect can stack up to 5 times which means even more damage will be dealt when the Sha executes this ability at high stacks. Tank cooldowns would suffice in surviving the attack but during the final Phase where the Sha increases in damage more cooldowns will be needed to outlive the high cleave damage.

The Sha will often cast Burst Volley which is targeted towards several players and hits them for a hefty yet healable amount of damage. This attack also has an AoE side effect along with it so spreading out would be wise during this Phase. The Sha will also cast Sha Boulders from his location that expands outward in a circle pattern that continues until they hit a player or the cavern wall. If this hits a player, a huge amount of damage will be dealt to the player and anyone else in a small radius. This damage can be survived provided the player is at or near maximum health. However, if the boulder hits the cavern wall, then a wipe is initiated as the boulder explodes with raid-wiping damage. Because of these effects, several players should be chosen to "soak" the boulders each time they are summoned. For safety precautions, melee should run out and give the boulders some time to leave the Sha before going back in to DPS. Tanks will have to simply side step the boulders to stay in melee range for the Sha as he does not move and will end up casting Siphon Fear thus wiping the raid. 5 boulders are released on 10-man difficulty and 10 are released for 25-man difficulty. Due to this, anyone in melee range should move out (except for the tanks, who can take one or two boulders) to prevent them from getting taking a hit from a boulder and causing nearby players to take the high damage as well. Players can also damage the boulders to slow it down and reduce the damage it deals by up to 25%. Players can damage the boulders before soaking it to lower the damage to a less threatening amount. This Phase ends at 5% health so players will only need to damage 20% of his health in this Phase.

Phase Two
At the beginning of this Phase, the Sha will cast Cavern Collapse, which reveals a massive part of the area that is prone to be destroyed. Players must and should run to the same platform before the 10 second channel is over otherwise they will fall and die in the Dreadwater Whirlpool. If players are all on the same platform following the Cavern Collapse, then the Sha will begin attack that platform and once again remains stationary so a tank needs to be in melee range at all costs.

The Sha keeps his Thrashing abilities which causes him to perform a powerful cleave to all players in front of him. Melee dps should attack him from his maximum hitbox range. During this Phase, the Sha uses new abilities but most importantly, the Rising Fear meter reduces by 50%. This gives players more time to get past this Phase before the meter reaches 100%.

During this phase, the Sha will constantly use Dreadwater Surge which is sent towards all players on the platform for a high amount of damage. This attack would kill nearly the entire raid save for the tanks. However, this attack is avoidable by standing near the very edges of the platform. Tanks can move to the edges to avoid the damage and quickly return to the Sha's melee range. Following the blast, the entire platform will be covered by Dreadwater Liquid that affects everyone on the platform. This deals a high amount of damage, high enough to wipe the raid if it wasn't for sustained healing and cooldown usage. Players are advised to move as less as possible during the liquid, as the doubled movement speed provided by the liquid threatens to knock players off the platform.

Dreadwater Elemental
When the Sha reaches 80% health, he summons a strong add known as the Dreadwater Elemental. This add present a constant threat to the raid and should be killed quickly before attacking the sha again. Players can still put up DoTs on the boss and can even use cleaving abilities to hit both the Sha and the Elemental. The elemental is susceptible to most crowd control methods (Banish and Bind Elemental won't work) but cannot be interrupted. Because of this, when the add casts its deadly Dreadwater Nova that has the potential to wipe the raid due to it having no cooldown, it must be stunned or under some other form of crowd control (it cannot be interrupted). If this attack goes through, all players will be affected by another form of Dreadwater Liquid which this time deals a high amount of damage while making them take increased damage from the add. If the add manages to strike a player affected by the water debuff, it will be healed for a high amount of the damage dealt. The elemental must be stunned or incapacitated whenever the Dreadwater Nova's cast is incoming in order to prevent the burst of damage dealt and the following DoT.

The add will also cast Dreadwater Crush on its tank, inflicting massive damage to them and knocks them down. While the damage itself is survivable provided cooldowns are in place, the knock down component can prove fatal whenever the Sha casts Dreadwater Surge which could prevent them from moving out of the way in time.

Once the Sha reaches 60% health, he begins to cast Destroy Platform after which the Sha completely destroys the platform and kills anyone still on that platform. Once again, when this ability occurs, players should all run to the same platform (they will gain the Wings of Gri'mak effect during this part of the encounter) so that the Sha can focus on the new platform full of players.

Phase Three
When this Phase begins, the Sha continues using his Thrashing abilities so melee and tanks should position themselves appropriately. This Phase ends at 20% health. When fighting the Sha on the second platform, he begins to use Dreadwater Geyser quite often so players must be on the lookout for when the Geyser is going out. For this Phase, player may want to stack up (ranged and healers that is) so that the geysers are all the same location. When the geysers are spawned, all players can simply step away from the affected area. This attack also prefers ranged over melee but if melee is targeted, they too can move away from the affected area (if there are more than one melee DPS, they can stay grouped up and move away from the geyser when it is targeted at them).

Players should remained stacked to counter the Geyser and Overhead Slam, a fatal strike that will spawn Dreadwater Liquid at the location of the impact area. This effect increases in size over the course of this Phase, effectively reducing the available moving space the longer this Phase takes. The Dreadwater effect deals a high amount of damage to those standing in the affected area. Simply stay out of the area and the Dreadwater will present a minor threat.

The Sha will also attack the raid with Parasitic Corrosion on 1 player (3 for 25-man) that deals moderate damage. Upon expiration, two adds called Parasitic Minions spawn from the affected player(s). These adds are quite dangerous in that simple melee attacks will apply the debuff that spawns them. Because of this, the affected players must move away from the rest of the raid and give others a time to kill the add when it spawns. Slows and stuns help defeat the minion before it can get a melee attack off. Players must also stay away from the minions (only ranged dps should kill them) as they explode for high damage and applies the Parasitic Corrosion debuff as well. Unaffected players should have AoE in place when the adds spawn so they will target someone else instead of those they spawn from.

Dreadwater Horror
As with the previous Phase, halfway through the Phase (80% for Phase 2; Phase 3 for 40%), the Sha will spawn another Dreadwater boss add: the Dreadwater Horror. The add is more resilient than the Dreadwater Elemental in that it is immune to all crowd control effects but can be interrupted. Its Dreadwater Bolt can and should be interrupted to prevent it from hitting anyone as it deals increasing damage with each successful cast. The add will also cast Toxic Dreadwater at the expense of 10% of its health to deal moderate AoE damage and applying a tough DoT on everyone. This effect cannot be avoided so players must heal through the damage.

Once again, at 20% health, the Sha performs Destroy Platform again and players have 8 seconds to get off the platform before the platform is destroyed. Following the platform's destruction, the last Phase begins.

Phase Four
During the final Phase, the Sha attempts to kill the raid with Terrorizing Annihilation but he is interrupted by War Hero Gri'mak who interrupts the instakill cast and stuns the Sha with Amber Orb. The 20 second-stun allows players to position themselves for the Phase and to get a headstart on the Sha before he resumes his attacks. Gri'mak then assists players in killing the Sha, deal high dps on his own.

The Sha of Terror once more continues using his Thrashing abilities on the tanks (and anyone else unfortunate enough to stand in the Sha's path between him and the tank). For the remainder of the fight, the Sha begins to increase in damage through Fear's Power. The Sha will frequently cast Dreadwater Burst on the raid which serves as raid damage that increases due to Fear's Power. Simply heal through the damage at the beginning for the phase and start using cooldowns near the end. Be sure to spread out when this attack goes out but stack up on Gri'mak when he casts Barrier of Gri'mak to counter the Dreadful Breath of the Sha. This attack will threaten to kill players as the Fear's Power buff grows in strength and the barrier will not be enough to survive the damage near the end of the fight.

The adds summoned during this Phase are the Volatile Sha that targets several players (3 on 10-man and 5 for 25-man) and heads for them relentlessly. The targeted players will be incapacitated until the Sha reaches them or they die. Gri'mak assists with Swift Blade Strike by killing one (two for 25-man) of the Volatile Sha. Players will have to kill the other adds before they reach their target, which causes them to suicide with Volatile Nova. Due to this, the adds should be killed as quickly as possible so slows and stuns work wonders here.

One of the last attacks used by the Sha is Crushing Fist targeted towards a random player, dealing fatal damage and destroying that part of the platform. This attack occurs more often, coming more faster which in turn reduces the amount of available moving space during the final Phase. While Gri'mak helps in burning the boss down, players need to keep up with their high DPS in order to kill the boss before they run out of room because of Crushing Fist.

Quotes

 * Intro
 * yell


 * Aggro
 * yell


 * Sha Boulders
 * yell


 * Phase 1 End (Cavern Collapse)
 * yell


 * Phase 2 Start
 * yell


 * Dreadwater Elemental
 * yell


 * Phase 2 End (Destroy Platform)
 * yell


 * Phase 3 Start
 * yell


 * Dreadwater Horror
 * yell


 * Phase 3 End (Destroy Platform)
 * yell


 * Phase 4 Start (Terrorizing Annihilation)
 * yell
 * yell
 * yell


 * Volatile Sha
 * yell
 * yell


 * Dreadful Breath
 * yell
 * yell


 * Siphon Fear (No one in Melee Range)
 * yell


 * Player killed
 * yell
 * yell
 * yell


 * Berserk (Siphon Fear/Rising Fear Full)
 * yell


 * Death
 * yell
 * emote
 * yell
 * yell
 * yell

Achievements

 * Heroic: Sha of Terror - Prevail against terror itself by defeating the Sha of Terror in the Temple of Qri'vexx.
 * Simple Survival - Defeat the Sha of Terror in Temple of Qri'vexx while killing more than or at least 3 Dreadwater Elementals by using Sha of Terror to use Destroy Platform for safety in second phase.
 * Facing Your Fears - Destroy the Sha of Terror in Temple of Qri'vexx on the first attempt without letting any raid members die.