Thorngrin the Tender

Thorngrin the Tender is the third boss of The Botanica wing of the Tempest Keep instance in Netherstorm.

Summary

 * Sacrifice: Occasionally 'sacrifices' a party member, draining their health over time and healing himself. Can only hit players who are in line of sight, and Thorngrin will not use this ability on his current target (so, unless your tank loses aggro, they will never be Sacrificed). 0.5 sec cast.  This ticks for about 750 per second (about 5K total; it is partially resistable via Shadow resistance).  Since patch 2.1 this will also teleport the player to Thorngrin's original location and stuns them for the duration of the Sacrifice.


 * Hellfire: Channels hellfire at his feet like Baron Geddon, causing 1.3k damage every second. Can be outranged by the tank. Thorngrin does not use his melee attack while channeling this ability.


 * Enrage: Occasionally enrages, increasing attack speed by 75% and physical damage by 110%. Thorngrin hits *extremely* hard while Enraged.

Fight
Before engaging Thorngrin, his room must be cleared. There are two pulls of four demons and a Channeler; although it seems like they pull together, you can actually pull the demons separately if you wait until the Channeler walks forward towards Thorngrin (just wait until the buff wears off of them, or you'll be in a world of hurt.)

There are also two stealthed satyrs who patrol in the next room (as you go towards Laj). They should be killed before fighting Thorngrin, as you can easily aggro them by mistake if they have patrolled close to the boss.

Abilities

 * Sacrifice: Thorngrin will occasionally 'sacrifice' a party member (very similar to Zevrim Thornhoof in DM East). This will not target the tank.  This teleports the party member up onto the platform where Thorngrin is initially standing, stuns them for 6 seconds, and drains ~750 health per second (giving an equal amount of health to the boss).  The stun/drain cannot be dispelled, but you can heal or shield them as normal.  Healing range can be a problem; healers might want to stand close to the platform so they can heal anyone who is sacrificed while low on health.  Party members should generally bandage themselves or drink a potion after being sacrificed, so the healers can concentrate on the tank.  It may be possible to avoid having the healer be sacrificed by positioning them so they are out of LOS of the boss.  Note that this ability does Shadow damage, so anything that increases Shadow resistance will help decrease the damage taken.


 * Hellfire: Thorngrin will occasionally channel a "Hellfire" AoE (very similar to the Warlock spell). This deals ~1500 fire damage per tick in normal mode.  It has a HUGE animation, but the actual range of it is not nearly as large, and it is fairly easy to get out of.  Melee DPS should move out of range ASAP and bandage up.  Your tank can stay in if he/she has lots of HP and/or FR gear and/or Fire Protection potions; it's only 4-5 ticks of damage.  On Heroic the tank will probably need to back out as well, unless you have extremely good healing. It is VERY important for ranged DPS to stop attack as well during the Hellfire, otherwise you are very likely to pull aggro.


 * Enrage: Thorngrin will periodically Enrage, becoming very large and glowing red. This increases his melee DPS substantially, and he will probably one-shot any non-plate-wearing party member.  Healers will need to spam fast heals, and/or things like Power Word: Shield to keep the tank alive.  You will pretty much need maximum HPS (e.g. spammed Flash Heal) to keep the tank up unless you have good gear or multiple healers.  Keeping HoTs up on the tank can help.  The Enrage only lasts about 8–10 seconds.

Alternate LOS Strategy
The goal of this strategy is to keep everyone in the party out of line of sight, so that Thorngrin never uses his Sacrifice. Tank should wear DPS and fire resist gear, hybrid classes should go heal mode. Rogues can take a nap. The party stands in the hallway outside the demons' room. The tank pulls Thorngrin up the ramp, positioning him just outside of line of sight, west of the doorway. The tank stands in the doorway, in line of sight of healers. Tank supplies almost all the DPS on this fight; ranged AoE classes can drop AoE in the doorway and hit Thorngrin with it. Just heal through the Hellfires and Enrages.

If the positioning is right, Thorngrin will occasionally turn to party members and try to cast Sacrifice, but will never be able to.

Straight Tanking (Heroic)
This method works best with 3 ranged DPS. Tank the boss in the middle of the room so his AoE is out of the range of the first step of the stairs where the boss spawned. Have your DPS and healer standing on the step. During the fight the tank need to watch when the boss randomly chooses a party member to Sacrifice. After the sacrifice is started, the boss will randomly aggro on another DPS/healer; that is when the tank needs to use the taunt ability to bring the boss back to the middle of the room before he does his AoE (the tank stays inside the AoE). If the taunt is a bit late, DPS can move back up the boss' stairs a bit to avoid the AoE. Resume original position after AoE. Sacrifice is not a big problem with this method, but requires the tank to be precise on when to use his taunt.

Quotes
Aggro: Hellfire: Yells: Sacrifice: Killing a player: Death:
 * What aggravation is this? You will die!
 * Scream while you burn!
 * I'll incinerate you!
 * I revel in your pain!
 * You seek a prize, eh? How about death?
 * Your life will be mine!
 * I hate to say I told you so...
 * You won't... get far.