Here is the next narrated guide for Heroic Mogu’shan Vaults: Feng the Accursed! I’ve written out most of the stuff I mention in the video, but I elaborated more on some things.
Differences between Heroic and Normal
The primary difference between heroic and normal is the addition of a fourth phase: shield phase. You can also choose which phase he will enter next, based on the closest weapon he has not yet siphoned when he reaches 75, 50, and 25% health.
If you’re responsible for Shroud of Reversal, you must use your captured ability within 20 seconds or it will disappear. This is different than normal mode, where you have an unlimited amount of time to use the ability.
The boss deals 5% more damage after every phase.
Preparation
The majority of life-threatening tank damage is magical DoTs and magical AoE, so stack magic mitigating abilities, talents, and glyphs. The boss still melees, but it’s not a frightening amount of damage.
For the more difficult phases, it helps to do a few practice pulls and start the fight in one of those phases. We did this with arcane, shadow, and nature and it helped us learn each phase really well.
As the Shroud of Reversal Tank, I used this macro to cast my special ability on the correct targets.
/target [nomod] NameOfOtherTank /target [mod:shift] NameOfLightningFistDps /click ExtraActionButton1
The first target is for most phases to copy the DoTs, and the second target is used during the Nature Fist phase.
Arcane Staff Phase
We started with this phase because his damage increases after each phase, and this phase deals the most damage. He also seemed to spawn two Arcane Resonance debuffs when we tried this phase second, which was pretty bad.
Tank swaps should happen after / during each Arcane Velocity. The current tank will have around three stacks of the DoT after each swap.
For the tank special abilities, we used Nullification Barrier on the first and third Arcane Velocities. We used raid cooldowns for the second and fourth. Shroud of Reversal was cast on the other tank to pick up the DoT and use it on the boss for extra dps. Keep in mind that neither of these abilities can be used while tanking because they are channeled.
We position the boss next to the shield so that we won’t have to pull him there later. Shield phase has some sensitive positioning requirements and moving the boss there early simplifies that.
Shadow Shield Phase
This is the new phase. The boss occasionally throws his shield in front of him and slightly to his left, then adds spawn on top of all raiders. The adds slowly head toward the shield. Should they reach it, they heal the boss for 10% each. Obviously, your raid should not let any adds reach the shield.
The positioning here is important because you don’t want the boss to throw his shield up against the guard rail because that gives your raid less distance. We faced him toward the arcane staff area, which you can hopefully see in the video.
Nullification Barrier: Used on first and third Siphoning Shield. If cast on top of the shield, the adds despawn and your raid doesn’t have to worry about them.
On the second and fourth shield siphon, the raid has to run away as soon as they see the shield go out so that the adds spawn as far away as possible, thus giving you the most room to AoE them down in time. The adds can be snared and stunned, but they will teleport to the shield after a set amount of time so they still need to be killed quickly. Tank dps helps a lot on these guys.
Tank swaps on this phase should happen whenever your DoTs fall off, or when your co-tank has three stacks. If you taunt strictly when he uses the specials, you risk getting four or even five stacks of the debuff. The one exception is that the shroud tank must taunt before the barrier tank heads out to drop the barrier on top of the shield, even if the shroud tank still has stacks of the debuff. However, we never had problems with the boss refreshing those stacks and they would always fall off before a new one was applied.
Shroud of Reversal: Use on the co-tank to capture the DoT, then use the DoT on the boss.
Nature Fist Phase
Nullification Barrier: Used on first and third Epicenter. Try to start the channel a few seconds after the Epicenter begins. The duration of the barrier isn’t long enough to cover the whole Epicenter, and it’s typically easier for healers to recover from damage that happens at the beginning than damage that happens at the end.
Shroud of Reversal: Used on a damage dealer that intentionally runs out and gets hit by Lightning Fists. Once you capture Lightning Fists, use it to interrupt the second and fourth Epicenters. The damage dealer should avoid cooldowns that prevent the debuff from landing as that may interfere with the tank’s ability to capture it, but they should use damage reduction abilities. It’s not too hard for them to survive as long as they’re topped off.
In Heroic mode, the boss casts multiple Lightning Fists and he doesn’t just aim at the current tank. These can be easily avoided if everyone stands in melee range.
Fire Spear Phase
We used Heroism at the beginning of this phase. It’s an easy phase if you can cut down the number of Draw Flame casts to two or three. This phase is exactly the same as it is in normal mode, just more damage.
Nullification Barrier: Used on first (and third, if you get one) Draw Flame. Place on the boss as he casts to prevent him from getting any wildfire buffs.
Shroud of Reversal: Used on the other tank to capture the debuff for extra dps.
The tank swap should happen after / during every Draw Flame. You will probably get three stacks of the debuff, though it’s possible to get more at the beginning because you have to wait for the swap a little longer.
For the un-Barriered Draw Flame (you should only get one), the raid should use nearly every defensive cooldown at their disposal because you won’t need them later. Everyone should stand in front of the boss while he’s casting to avoid the wildfire as it races toward him.
Brewmaster Specific Stuff
Glyph of Guard is very useful, especially if you save guard for when you have two or three stacks of any of the DoTs.
Diffuse Magic is the best level 75 talent because you can use it relatively often and it nearly eliminates all damage you take from the DoTs for a time.
Rushing Jade Wind is incredibly useful during the shield phase. While Xuen might grant you more damage throughout the fight, the damage requirement to AoE the shadow adds in shield phase is far higher than the damage requirement for the rest of the fight. You can deal some serious AoE damage with RJW, Breath of Fire, and Spinning Crane Kick.
While we’re on the subject of shield phase adds, you should try to squeeze in Breath of Fire, even at the expensive of defense, to burn those adds down quickly. You’ll have high vengeance already, and as a tank you excel at burst AoE, so this is a time to make that offense vs. defense decision the devs keep talking about.