The Nine Strategy Guide for Sanctum of Domination
The Nine is the third boss of the Sanctum of Domination raid in Patch 9.1 of Shadowlands.
On this page, you will find the strategy guide video from Ready Check Pull, as well as their written strategy guide and the encounter journal from the game.
Ready Check Pull Video
Strategy Guide: Quick Version
Throughout the fight:
- React to the Call of the Val'kyr mechanics: dodge lines on the ground, spread with circles on players, group soak the blue swirly on a player, soak the small purple circles on the ground, or move the bosses out of the big bubble.
In Phase One:
- Damage the two bosses at the same rate so they are both low for phase two.
- Tanks taunt swap on Kyra at as low stacks of Unending Strike as possible.
- Interrupt Signe's Song of Dissolution channel as soon as possible. Her other cast is much less important ( Soulful Blast).
- Tank, interrupt, and kill the add that spawns occasionally. Death Grip into Solar Beam is a really good combo for this add.
- Run away from Kyra when she pulls you in ( Wings of Rage), and run toward Signe when she pushes you away ( Reverberating Refrain).
In Phase Two:
- When you get the Fragments of Destiny debuff, move off to the side of the raid with the other people that have the debuff, get dispelled by the healers, and then move away once you have been dispelled. The goal is to get all of the debuffs onto one person to remove them from the fight.
- Tanks taunt swap on Skyja at as low stacks of Pierce Soul as possible.
- And on heroic, players with the Link Essence debuff should avoid helping with soak mechanics, because they copy damage taken to each other.
Strategy Guide: Full Guide
This fight has two phases. You start out fighting two of the three bosses, and when either of them gets to 10% health, or 15% on heroic, the third boss spawns. Save Bloodlust/ Heroism for when the third boss spawns, so that you can quickly finish off the other two bosses and start working on the slightly more difficult phase.
Phase One
- On pull, the tanks should bring the two bosses together and keep them together as much as possible for better cleave damage.
- The tanks also need to taunt swap on Kyra whenever the stacks of her Unending Strike debuff fall off the other tank. It increases their damage taken and also does a ton of raid damage per stack.
- The other boss, Signe, has two interruptible casts. She spam casts Soulful Blast, which should be interrupted as often as possible, although it is not the biggest deal because it only damages the tanks. But more importantly she also regularly channels Song of Dissolution, which needs to be interrupted as soon as possible. It stacks a huge DoT on the raid really quickly, so we recommend assigning one or two players with short interrupt cooldowns to focus solely on this cast.
- Kyra occasionally spawns an add near a random player. This add needs to be tanked and interrupted, because each cast heals itself to full and does damage to the entire raid ( Siphon Vitality). Having a Death Knight immediately Death Grip the add into melee and then having a Balance Druid use Solar Beam on it is a really good combination to deal with it efficiently.
- And the bosses also do a push or pull at max energy. If you are getting pushed away, run towards the boss and if you are getting pulled in, run away from the boss. Otherwise, you take big damage at the end of the push/pull. Stampeding Roar and Wind Rush Totem are really good for these moments.
The other mechanics in Phase One happen when the third boss that is flying around casts Call of the Val'kyr, which she also continues to do in Phase Two. There are 6 different telegraphed mechanics that can happen after this cast:
- Lines on the ground to dodge ( Agatha's Eternal Blade).
- A big swirly on a random player to group soak ( Arthura's Crushing Gaze).
- Big circles on a couple random players to spread out with ( Daschla's Mighty Impact).
- Little circles on a bunch of random players to spread out with ( Brynja's Mournful Dirge).
- Small circles on the ground to soak ( Aradne's Falling Strike).
- And a huge bubble on the ground to move the bosses out of, because it shields them from damage ( Annhylde's Bright Aegis).
These mechanics are easy enough to deal with on their own, but you often have to deal with several of them at the same time, and even more on heroic.
Try to damage the first two bosses at the same rate, so that you can quickly finish both of them off when the third boss, Skyja, comes down to fight in Phase Two.
Phase Two
- Skyja’s main ability is a debuff that she puts on a few random players, Fragments of Destiny. These debuffs do a ton of DoT damage, and dispelling them just causes them to jump to the next closest player. The only way to actually get rid of them is by forcing them all onto one player, which removes the debuffs and creates an ice patch on the ground. There are a couple ways you can make this happen, but the simplest way is by having the people who get the debuff move close together off to the side of the raid where the healers dispel them individually until the debuffs end up on one person. Each person just has to be quick to get to the dispel spot and move away once they do not have the debuff, and it will work out just fine. There is some opportunity for a Mass Dispel strategy with these debuffs, so feel free to experiment with that if you want to get fancy, but it is not necessary.
- The tanks need to taunt swap on Skyja as well, whenever the previous stacks of the Pierce Soul debuff fall off the other tank. It just decreases movement speed and healing received.
- On heroic, she occasionally casts Word of Recall, which repeats the previous Call of the Val'kyr combination of mechanics, but makes them all happen at the same time.
- And also on heroic, she occasionally puts a debuff on a few random players called Link Essence. These players will copy any damage they take to each other, which means they need to be closely watched by the healers and they should not help with any of the soaking mechanics.
Optional Achievement
The Nine's encounter features an optional achievement: To the Nines. Completing this achievement and every other optional achievement found within the Sanctum of Domination's encounters will reward you with the Glory of the Dominant Raider meta-achievement, along with the Bracer of Hrestimorak to teach you the unique Hand of Hrestimorak mount. To learn more about how to complete this encounter's achievement or any of the others in the raid, please visit our meta-achievement guide below.
Encounter Journal
We have encounter journal pages for each of the four difficulties, which you can access by clicking the links below.
Changelog
- 30 Jun. 2021: Guide added.
This guide has been written by Zaxachi, a top US mythic raider currently in xD. He is a co-founder of Ready Check Pull, a top-tier WoW resource and YouTube channel. You can watch his stream on Twitch, join the Ready Check Pull Discord, and follow Ready Check Pull on Twitter.
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