Balance Druid DPS Sanctum of Domination Raid Guide — Dragonflight 10.2.5

During the Dragonflight Pre-Patch, Castle Nathria, Sanctum of Domination, and Sepulcher of the First Ones will be simultaneously featured as Fated Raids. During this time encounters within each specific raid will include an additional mechanic and items will drop at increased item levels. If you would like to learn more general information about the Fated Raids system as a whole, please see our overview below. Otherwise, continue to use this page for specialization-specific tips.

With the Dragonflight Pre-Patch, all three raids will be available on Fated Mode at the same time. Given the state of the Pre-Patch, we recommend using the Venthyr Covenant for all content as it synergizes best with the new talent tree as well as the loss of the tier bonus which was much better for Night Fae.

The Venthyr Covenant can be paired with Primordial Arcanic Pulsar and Unity. The following talents are the framework of most talent layouts in this raid. Note that you can directly import the trees below into the game with the following string:

• BYGAGX1kx6Mci9Zl2t+S+sRoPCAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAoAQiICJJESSQCgWCJJhWCiDkDAlkWIESDgA

These are the basic single target talents and general talents for most raid encounters. You can also go down the Restoration section of the tree for bosses that you can help healing on.

Typhoon, Hibernate, Remove Corruption, and Cyclone can be used on situational bosses and should be grabbed if it is a part of your strategy.

The following talents can be removed if you need multi-target talents:

• Astral Communion
• Waning Twilight
• Umbral Embrace
• Balance of All Things

These talents can be substituted in if you are prioritizing multi-target:

• Wild Mushroom
• Fungal Growth
• Aetherial Kindling
• Circle of Life and Death

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against The Tarragrue.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

Before combat starts, you will be able to get 4 Anima Powers from the trash before the boss. Balance Druid have notably powerful options depending on your Covenant and choose the ones that look strongest in terms of throughput.

The Tarragrue can enrage and that can be dispelled via Soothe so watch your timers to take care of it right away. Use our advanced utility to reach safe zones and kite the boss if you are targeted during the last 10%.

Very similar to Heroic Mode. Take good Anima Powers and follow the same strategies. Oddly Intangible Key can allow you to plant through almost every mechanic.

For more information, please refer to our The Tarragrue guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against The Eye of the Jailer.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

Use Stellar Drift for mobility as well as for cleaving where you can. Either Covenant signature ability can be used to bypass Annihilating Glare for a bit of a damage gain when possible.

Mythic Eye of the Jailer is pretty similar to the Heroic Mode version. Stellar Drift can be timed to get value from cleave and Annihilating Glare. Stampeding Roar is useful for the long movement requirements of this boss.

In the intermission, you can normally cleave each add with the additional range from Stellar Drift if you are not DPSing them down individually. It is a little more difficult to navigate the center of the room just beware of separately marked players and their mechanics.

For more information, please refer to our The Eye of the Jailer guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against The Nine.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

This is a basic council-style encounter with some good 2-target cleave. Try to save Fury of Elune when the bosses are stacked up for full value and you can easily Starfall for bonus mobility and free cleave.

Phase Two is single-target; use your high mobility and tankiness to help do soaks out at ranged.

The first three bosses of this raid are all pretty easy and similar to the Heroic encounter. Just utilize your Balance Druid mobility to help with soaks as you are one of the best candidates for that.

For more information, please refer to our The Nine guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Remnant of Ner'zhul.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

Always save Astral Power to help burst down Orbs of Torment, as they deal increasing damage the longer they are alive. You do not necessarily need to use Starfall to cleave a second target but there are multiple void zone and dance-like abilities where the added utility of Stellar Drift can shine.

This fight has plenty of hectic movement between Malevolence knockbacks and the extra Suffering casts. Try to maximize Starfall for orb cleave and those mechanics. You can reliably dodge the knockback from Malevolence with Wild Charge; just do not mess up or you will fall off.

Save defensives for each Shatter or other dangerous combo mechanics while there are three orbs out.

For more information, please refer to our Remnant of Ner'zhul guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Soulrender Dormazain.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

This is a single-target-focused fight with waves of add spawns that can be displaced and interrupted. You can use Typhoon to help with positioning if needed but try not to hit the whole group off the boss. Save Fury of Elune for when the adds are collected ontop of the boss.

Balance Druid utility can shine on this fight as you can utilize Stampeding Roar to help with raid mobility during Tormented Eruptions as well as offering a quick chain break with Wild Charge and Dash.

Mythic Soulrender can be a choice between add damage or boss damage depending on your group composition. However you always want to quickly focus down Mawsworn Overlord which is the main mechanic of the fight. Regardless of what you are focusing on, hold your first set of cooldowns for the first add set and, if you will not lose a usage, any add set you can line your cooldowsn up with.

There is some good utility usage for Balance Druids on this boss. Typhoon can be used to knock enemies away from a spawning Overlord which is indicated by a white beam of light at a location. Remaining adds can be Solar Beamed in place. Stampeding Roar is obviously powerful for this type of encounter.

For more information, please refer to our Soulrender Dormazain guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Painsmith Raznal.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

Even as a nearly pure single-target boss, you can utilize Stellar Drift for the pretty constant movement on this boss. Save Astral Power for each Spiked Balls phase as it is important to quickly burn those down.

An easy way to handle spikes is to run through them as they go down. Even though they are still visible, you can run over them during their retracting animation.

With current timings, you want to Cooldown on pull and whenever possible as long as you have it up for phase three to burn down the boss.

In the intermission, you can use Heart of the Wild to help offheal if it is not too distracting to run and throw out some Rejuvenations. Plan a good time for your Stampeding Roar to be used.

Double Door of Shadows from Theotar the Mad Duke is a great quality of life Soulbind for this boss as it can be used each time you have chains if necessary. If you have Shadowsteel Chains, use Barkskin to safely survive the follow up raid damage especially with stacks of Lingering Flames

For more information, please refer to our Painsmith Raznal guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Guardian of the First Ones.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

This is a pretty stationary single-target fight that deals a ton of damage to you through multiple abilities. Use defensives liberally but most importantly when targeted with Threat Neutralization as you will not be stacked for heals.

On pull try to position well in the event that you get any Threat Neutralizations as the Mythic mechanic has you bring those onto the Energy Core you will be using. Other than that, he is very similar to the Heroic encounter. If you are Venthyr, use your second cooldown in line with other buffs as you will only get two no matter what.

For more information, please refer to our Guardian of the First Ones guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Fatescribe Roh-Kalo.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

This is a single-target-focused boss with some small add waves and priority targets mixed in. The larger adds should be single-target-focused using Starsurge and the smaller adds should be Solar Beamed and burst down using Fury of Elune where applicable.

Try to stay close to the boss at all times as that will generally be the safe spot from the various mechanics. Use your Covenant abilities or Wild Charge to quickly get out with each Call of Eternity.

Damage cooldowns are pretty irrelevant on this encounter, use them at the start of each phase and with Bloodlust if possible.

Defensively, you can use Guardian Affinity with Heart of the Wild for additional tankiness and Frenzied Regeneration charges if you get stuck on a bad rune during the intermission or Phase three.

For more information, please refer to our Fatescribe Roh-Kalo guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Kel'Thuzad.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

Kel'Thuzad is a great Balance Druid fight making good use from their spread multi-target abilities. Starfall is great on this fight to damage all the different types of adds between the phases and when combined with Stellar Drift can also make for a good utility tool inside the phylactery, which will have to be done three times.

Solar Beam is a good blanket silence on the far adds and spells like Typhoon, Ursol's Vortex, and Mass Entanglement can be used to help control the Frostbound Devoted.

Balance Druids of either viable Covenant make great use of their kit inside the phylactery. Venthyr has insane burst for each phase to make the DPS check and Night Fae have extra mobility to better navigate the phase. If you are in the first two downstairs groups, you should save your cooldowns for that and if you are in the third, make a judgement call as to if you can save them for the next boss phase.

While downstairs, always save Astral Power for Foul Winds which will be very difficult to navigate without. On the second phylactery, this happens almost immediately so be prepared. On the final phylactery, stay toward the edge and run inward after the Glacial Winds cast.

Upstairs is just more add management but is still similar to the Heroic version. Solar Beam remains a very powerful tool for both Soul Reavers and Soul Shards depending on which part of the fight you are on.

For more information, please refer to our Kel'Thuzad guide.

We advise you to use the following Legendaries against Sylvanas Windrunner.

1. Primordial Arcanic Pulsar
2. Unity

If you are Venthyr you will have to deal with the boss porting away before every Veil of Darkness cast. Try to have some plan to handle this normally by done casting Remove Corruption. Your first cooldowns can be delayed by about ten seconds on pull to line up with the first wave of arrows. Always try to position yourself to hit all the arrows as they can be spread a wide distance apart.

In the second phase, use Stampeding Roar to get through the phase quickly. Focus down the orbs cast by Mawsworn Summoners before they explode, otherwise focus on the Mawsworn Souljudge as they put a nasty debuff on your raid. Your second cooldown set can be used on the first boss damage portion of this phase. Try to use your cooldowns as immediately as possible as to not line up burst poorly with a veil cast.

When moving from platform to platform, plan your Astral Power usage to always have a Starfall at the start of each platform or at least very quickly after applying DoTs. Do NOT cooldown the boss as Venthyr on the second boss damage phase as you will not get full use.

In the final phase you can send cooldowns immediately as long as you make note of the Veil of Darkness timer as she will go immune during that period. Dance in and out of boss range to bait her individual mechanics and use Barkskin if targeted by a Wailing Arrow and even combine it with Bear Form for additional tankiness.

On Mythic mode, your second set of cooldowns can be used on the intermission arrow set if needed. You can pre-ramp Ravenous Frenzy while the boss is immune by spamming Remove Corruption or any other active global.

Phase Two has several dangerous add types that must be handled in different ways. Souljudges are a high priority with a damage reduction aura and a massive debuff. Mawsworn Summoners cast curses that can be decursed by druids and spawn a second type of orb that needs to be interrupted. The Mawforged Colossus is a single mob on the left platform. Save a Starfall to move during the Veil of Darkness and Expulsion cast.

In the second phase you will normally be cooldowning the second add platform which will contain either a Mawforged Colossus or a Souljudge and Summoner combination. If you are cooldowning the Souljudge platform here, see if it is possible to avoid using decurse as you are a large portion of the damage on this platform.

The last phase of this boss is not too difficult and not too different for at least Balance Druid priorities. You still cooldown immediately and with lust and you still defensive Wailing Arrows. When targeted with Death Knives make a quick movement and plant quickly to avoid clipping others. Wild Growth is a good use of your globals during the downtime that the boss is untargetable and casting Veil.