Omnotron Defense System Healer Strategy Guide
Table of Contents
Introduction
This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the encounter with Omnotron Defense System in Blackwing Descent. It is mostly targeted to healers who desire to have a short but detailed overview of what is expected of them during that fight.
This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.1.2.
As a healer, this fight will present you with two types of damage: predictable and steady on the one hand and sudden and unexpected on the other. Having a good understanding of the mechanics will allow you to significantly boost your performance.
Overview of the fight
This fight is a council type encounter, where you will be faced with four construct bosses, who from this point on will be called "trons", two of which will be active at any one time (with the exception of the pull, when only one will be active).
Each of the trons possesses three abilities, and the challenging aspect of this encounter lies in your raid's reactivity to the combinations of trons and therefore mechanics. Because of this fact, no long-winded strategy must be mastered and your raid's success will come simply from all raid members being sufficiently alert.
Mechanics and required action
Before discussing the various mechanics of each tron, a few mentions must be made about the expected amounts of tank damage. The trons' melee attacks follow a very stable pattern so under normal circumstances tank damage should be easy to predict. In addition to this, trons will often stop their melee attacks to cast various abilities, so the tank damage will be lessened.
Overall, the tank damage is not high and should not cause problems, outside of one potentially dangerous event, namely if your tank is targeted by specific boss abilities such as Acquiring Target. In this case he will need extra healing and it is advised that a defensive cooldown is used.
Magmatron
Magmatron's Incineration Security Measure may look daunting at first look, but healers new to this encounter should not be alarmed. While the damage that it does is indeed high and unavoidable, and will likely bring your raid members' health bars quite low, it is not generally followed by any kind of raid damage provided that your raid follows appropriate tactics, so you will have ample time to heal the raid up using slow and efficient heals.
Naturally, problems can occur often if mistakes are made, and reducing the amount of healing needed is always a good thing, so use of cooldowns, such as Devotion Aura, or cooldowns from tanks may be used to mitigate the damage. It is worth knowing that Incineration Security Measure is cast 3 times while Magmatron is active.
The predictable nature of this spell means it should never catch healers off-guard and as such they should aim to have the raid topped-off before the damage begins.
Acquiring Target is an ability which requires special attention from healers as whoever is targeted will most likely die if they do not receive any healing. Depending on the health of the targeted person at the moment when the spell is cast, it may be needed to make use of emergency heals or cooldowns such as Hand of Sacrifice or Pain Suppression. Healers should also be prepared to deal with unexpected and generally avoidable damage that may occur when this ability hits secondary targets.
Acquiring Target is cast twice each time that Magmatron is active.
It is of worth noting that the damage from Acquiring Target can be fully avoided (indeed, the tron will simply stop casting the spell) through use of invulnerabilities and its damage can and should be greatly reduced through use of other damage reduction cooldowns. Below you will find a list of abilities useful against Acquiring Target.
Complete damage removal:
- Divine Shield for Paladins.
Significant damage reduction:
- Divine Protection for Paladins;
- Survival Instincts or Barkskin for Druids.
Toxitron
Toxitron's Chemical Bomb is of no real concern to healers and as such no details will be provided.
The adds spawned by Toxitron's Poison Protocol are also of no real concern to healers as the damage that they do on impact is usually deadly.
Electron
Both of Electron's abilities are cause for concern for healers because their damage, if poorly handled by the raid, can quickly spiral out of control.
Healers should be prepared to heal any number of raid members when someone is targeted with Lightning Conductor in the event that they fail to move away from others in time.
For the entire duration of Electron's activity there is potential for a lot of unnecessary damage splashing from Electrical Discharge that healers should be prepared to heal.
Arcanotron
Arcanotron's Power Generator is perhaps the most important mechanic of this encounter from a healer point of view and making good use of it is essential to ensure that you have enough mana to last you the whole fight. Whenever Arcanotron casts this, all healers should aim to move inside the vortex and remain there for the entire duration, as the extra mana regeneration will prove highly beneficial. There is only one situation where you should avoid moving inside the vortex (or remaining inside if you are already there), namely if you are targeted by Electron's Lightning Conductor.
Arcanotron frequently casts an interruptible nuke called Arcane Annihilator. Healers cannot do very much about uninterrupted Arcane Annihilator casts, as there is no way to know beforehand who will be hit, so their healing should be entirely reactive. It's advised to have raid members at sufficient health levels so that an uninterrupted Arcane Annihilator will never kill them.
Final considerations
The only particularly healing intensive combination is Magmatron and Electron, though in general any time Magmatron is active the amount of healing needed is rather high. There are combinations when the healing required is low and it allows some breathing room for healers, such as Toxitron and Arcanotron.
As can be seen, there is hardly any moment during this encounter when healers shouldn't aim to have the raid topped off, because any number of unexpected abilities may damage raiders further and cause deaths. Overall this encounter is not difficult from a healing standpoint and the success of the healers is often in the hands of the entire raid due to the importance of avoiding damage.
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