Talk:The Curator

Gear
How good of gear would a prot warrior need for this encounter?


 * You need fairly good gear, Curator hits like a truck, but you don't need all that much strategy - all you need to do is tank 'n spank, but like I said, he hits like a semi, so you'll want some decent stamina, armor, and block - and a Paladin with devotion aura or a shaman with rockskin totem isnt a bad idea either. ~ Peregrine
 * Good blue gear should be sufficient. Stillfresh 13:50, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

There is a comment about AR gear being good for tanks. In my experience, MT should be in stam, armor, block gear. Flare tanks (if any) should be feral druids in dps gear or prot warrior with shield. Hateful Bolt tanks should have AR gear to save healers mana, but it is not required. Agree/Disagree? Odarus 14:30, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
 * The only real argument is over whether you should use AR at all for this fight. I myself prefer it, most on the Wow Raid & Dungeons forum think it's for "noobs." Stillfresh 15:05, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Strategies for a low-DPS group
Any suggestions on how to deal with this thing with low DPS group, meaning one mage/lock, tops, and rest of DPS classes being hunters, rogues or catform druids? Our experiences from two last runs when we've hit Curator with only one mage and lock (+ two tanks, one for Curator, one for adds), and 3-4 healers, is always this:

We can deal with the adds up to first evocation just fine. However, we can only *Barely* kill an add before the next one spawns. When Curator evocates, we'll usually spend at least 10 secs killing the last flare (the one that spawned just at the start of evocate), missing a lot of dps on the Curator.

After a couple of cycles DPS starts to suffer due to lack of mana, so does healing. Quaffing potions like crazy does not really help in the end. We've tried to spare healer mana by going in different positionings (all clumped/all scattered/two groups), to no avail.

Do anyone have experiences of handling this with a low-dps group? Perhaps tanking the last flare to somewhere away from the raid? Any suggestions? (Besides getting everybody a 300 AR+ gear).

(Yes, we downed curator easily when we had 2 mages instead of 1. However, since this is not a situation we can always achieve, help would be good).


 * I'm afraid that The Curator is a DPS/Gear check. If you don't damage the Flares fast enough, you can't win.  Bring more damage-dealers, get better gear, or use more consumables.  Also, your hunters should be your top damage-dealers for this fight.  If they aren't, send them to the official Hunter class forum and have them ask how to increase their damage output. To add to this, don't use two tanks.  Just one.  Don't use four healers (just two or three).  Warlocks should be using Searing Pain on the Flares.  Kathucka 21:42, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

If you are downing the flares in < 10secs, theoretically, you should be pass the gear-check part of the curator. I would assume you have a couple of issues(I have no idea just throwing out some ideas)

1. Your dps takes too long to switch from the last flare to curator.

2. Your dps takes too long to switch from the curator to the first flare, backup ensues.

I disagree with the "you have to kill the last flare in 10 secs." You have 20 secs with that bad boy, dance with him, take him out to coffee do whatever you want. Just have him down after that 20 secs is over. So instead of all your dps on the last flare, just keep one or two on it (the minimum amount to have it down in 20secs). That way all the other dps is doing 3x damage to curator. It also makes the dps switch from the curator to the first flare faster because most activatables are done. I don't actually know why the dps switches faster from the curator to the first flare with this method, but they seem to. Like previously stated, curator is a gear-check. The difference between your group and other higher dps groups is the ability to catch-up. If you fall behind, you will die. It is however doable from the sounds of your group make-up. Odarus 11:46 5, Oct 2007 (UTC)

Why Cheating on Evocation is a bad idea
Someone is sure to object to my comment about cheating on Evocation: That is, switching over to The Curator before the last Flare is down. Here's the math that explains this:

Assume seven damage-dealers, each capable of dealing 300 DPS.

Scenario 1: All damage-dealers finish off the last flare, then all switch over to attack The Curator.

Result 1: The Flare dies in 5.7, and the damage-dealers hit The Curator for 14.3 seconds, doing 300 x 3 x 14.3 x 7 = 90,000 damage on The Curator. The Flare gets off five hits for roughly 11,250. The healers get roughly 10 seconds to regenerate mana.

Scenario 2: Five damage-dealers hit The Curator for all 20 seconds. Two damage-dealers stay on the Flare for all 20 seconds, at which point it dies.

Result: 300 x 3 x 20 x 5 = 90,000 damage on The Curator. The Flare gets off 19 hits, for roughly 42,750 damage. The healers get no chance to regenerate mana.

In other words, the damage on The Curator is almost exactly the same either way. The only differences are that, if you cheat, the Flare gets to do 31,500 free damage and the healers don't get a break to regenerate mana.

Kill the last Flare before you touch The Curator. It's just like focus fire on any other multi-target encounter. It just works much better that way.

Kathucka 17:35, 10 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I think your analysis is a little simplistic. What if you just have your warlock(s) DoT up the flare, then DoT and DD the Curator?  That would seem to maximize your DPS.  Also, depending on if you're using a flare tank, the flare may deal little damage whatsoever. Stillfresh 16:19, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

This analysis ignores a) positioning time for melee DPS, and b) debuff set-up times. I don't want my melee to waste 3-5 seconds of Evocation time running from a dead flare over to the Curator. Further, I want people to begin throwing DoTs and debuffs on the curator 3-5 seconds before Evocation actually starts so that they are effective and ticking throughout the Evocation. For example, I'd rather my warlocks spend the 3 seconds before Evocation casting UA and Corruption than spend the first 3 seconds doing no damage.

Scenario 3: Flare-tank drags the last flare away from Curator, all DPS is on Curator the full 20 seconds.

Result 3: 300 x 3 x 20 x 7 = 126,000 damage on The Curator. The flare gets off 25 hits, and there will be 2 flares out for about 6 seconds. Make the healers earn their epics, and drop the Curator in fewer cycles.

Cartec 17:09, 8 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Correct, my analysis is simplistic. That's because I wanted to make the math easy to understand.  The point still stands.  For raids new to this encounter, it's essential to kill the last Flare before hitting The Curator. Having two Flares up after Evocation will wipe any raid that is new to this encounter.  Once your raid has enough gear, of course, they can do this however they like.  However, this page is not written for experienced raids.


 * Absolutely: Warlocks, etc., should be dropping their DoTs and debuffs on The Curator after the ninth flare dies, and before the tenth one comes up.  Once the tenth one is up, though, kill it.


 * If your melee requires three seconds to run back to The Curator, something is wrong. Everyone should be right on top of The Curator, so the Flare is there.  Once the Flare dies, the melee should attack The Curator instantly.


 * "Making the healers earn their epics" is a silly concept. It means, "Make the healers' job harder, but blame them if we wipe."  Most people would prefer to avoid the wipe and the blaming.


 * Don't get me wrong. If your raid can survive having two Flares up after Evocation and never get two Flares again, go for it!  That means that you are majorly overgeared for this encounter, and have no risk of wiping. You should be looking to get through the fight as quickly as possible, and ignoring the last Flare is a fine way to do it.


 * However, when I've been on this fight with weaker raids (alts, puggers, etc.) and someone got greedy, that extra Flare caused a wipe, and more than once. For those sorts of raids, it's important to maintain discipline, take out that last Flare, and then smack The Curator.


 * Kathucka 17:52, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

20 seconds is a lot longer than 10 seconds. The idea behind the "cheating" tactic is to minimize the amount of times characters must switch targets. For every second someone is clicking trying to find they next target, they are doing minimal to no dps. This is exaggerated with groups with lot of melee damage. Even with a macro, there is some time associated with most damage dealers switching targets.

Healing - If you cheat, it means 2 characters are getting damaged throughout the 20 seconds and I understand the point about mana regen, but with a couple of HoT's usually get those characters through that. If you don't have a druid or priest, assign one healer to heal through this stage.

More to the point - We really are talking about the same problem - two flares at once. If there are ever two flares up at once, an average group can wipe. The "cheating" was a way to counteract pug slowness. It puts the responsibility of downing the last flare on 1-2 ppl instead of a bunch of random people. The problem most groups face is not that they have flare 10 and flare 1 up at the same time, it is that they have flare 1 and flare 2 up at the same time. This is due to slow switching from curator to the first flare. Cheating is a way to let puggers go wild for 17-20 secs and then have them switch. Puggers love dps meters and will try to squeeze all the dps they can out of the evocate. Giving them 17-20secs gives them enough time to blow their activatables and tire themselves out. Which I think makes them more likely to switch. In the end, it is more about what group you have and what works. Just remember that locks, SPriests, and rogues need time on a target to maximize their dps.

Overall, more switches = more room for error. I would suggest trying it multiple ways. Each boss doesn't really have one way to down him. What works for one group won't work for another. Your math although simplistic shows ideally if you have 10 ppl who instantaneously switch and deal constant damage that cheating is a bad ideal. Unfortunately, switching is slow for some and damage is not constant. Cheating is less about topping the dps charts and more about downing the boss. For some people it works for others it doesn't. It is not fundamentally flawed. It is just a different way to approach the boss.

Two people should be able to down a flare in 20 seconds even if one is a tank. The idea is that you still down the last flare you just do it with the minimal amount of dps as possible to limit the number of people doing double switches.

Odarus 16:44, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Point taken about switching targets. Even with a macro, switching will slow down damage somewhat, especially with characters like Shadow Priests that have a stacking debuff or with characters that use combo points.


 * So, I'm just going to have to fall back on personal experience, here. When leading a marginal raid (with puggers, alts, newbies, etc.), I have always had better results when I could enforce discipline and take down that last Flare before touching The Curator.  The healers for these raids are generally having issues at this point, and giving them that break really helps because they can top everyone off and regain some mana.  When people jump on The Curator early, someone frequently dies shortly thereafter, and then there's a wipe.  Execution is also simpler, because, other than blowing cooldowns, you're doing the same thing you're doing to every other Flare.


 * When I go in with an elite crew, I just let the DPS do whatever the hell they want, because it's going to be a one-shot no matter what, and people like to see big numbers on the damage meters.


 * If you find some technique that works consistently for your raid, fine. If the big scary monster dies, then you weren't wrong to do it your way.  This is just based on what I've seen work and fail for my raids.  Kathucka 21:38, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I couldn't agree with you more. Along that note, do you think the Miscellaneous advice is starting to creep on the long side? I wouldn't mind a little clean up into Class Specific advice and useful macros (figured I would ask because it would be a rather large change). Also, some advice is just overall how to progress raiding wise, should we cut it or leave it in? I am specifically referring to the waiting until the gear is to a certain point to try this fight. I think a lot of people don't realize sometimes progress isn't halted by knowing the fight, it is halted by gear. Odarus 16:48, 16 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Cleaner organization is always a good idea. The tips there are pretty much all good, as they all helpfully address common issues.  The tips about bringing better gear/spec/consumables are important to have in this particular article, because The Curator is a painful gear check, and a lot of people don't realize this.  The tip about the mana consumables is probably overdone.  The warlock, hunter, and group heal tips are non-obvious to some raiders, and very useful.  The macro, in particular, is golden.  Finally, emphasis on killing the Flares above all is helpful, although perhaps getting a little redundant at that point.  Kathucka 22:23, 17 October 2007 (UTC)


 * For a brand new guild's first encounter with Curator, they should probably take the most simple route and kill the final flare. Otherwise, it's not really required. Usually my Kara runs tend to ignore the last add COMPLETELY, meaning no "tank" grabs the add. It just flies around, and Curator dies in a single evocation, unless it's like an alt run, then he gets to probably 25%. True, if the previous scenario occurs, then two adds will be up at the same time, straining healing, but at that point, it's truly nothing. Again, new Kara raids should probably kill the final flare. --Furi

Hateful Bolt
There's apparently still a lot of controversy about how the Hateful Bolts work. In my experience, Hateful Bolts were not based on current HP alone, however it seems the matter is still in dispute. Stillfresh 12:15, 11 April 2007 (EDT)


 * I see no evidence that hateful bolts are based on any hp considerations. From my experience it is entirely based on the second highest threat and the page should be changed (back) to reflect that. Harne 16:36, 2 May 2007 (EDT)


 * I dunno... it does appear hateful bolts miss the bolt tank when his health drops low. This item remains very contentous in the forums. Stillfresh 17:39, 4 May 2007 (EDT)

I can confirm this, if the third person on the threat list (typically the MT healer) has a higher hp% than the second, then they will get the bolt. This commonly happens later in the fight, when the healers are working harder and the hatebolt tank may not be getting back up to full hp before he casts another. My suggestion is to have a healer dedicated to healing the hatebolt tank when not healing the spark dps. The MT healer should always focus on that, as a couple of unlucky crushing blows can be tough to stop if you're attention is divided. Eragorn 09:58, 31 May 2007 (EDT)


 * I can confirm that the Hateful Bolt behavior checks threat first, before checking low-health condition. We had a Warlock for soaking the H Bolts, with highest health behind the MT.  On one attempt, we tried having the Warlock focus on Flares instead of Curator.  This resulted in Curator casting H Bolt on other targets, rather than the Warlock. My best guess: Curator picks 2nd-threat player for H Bolt target.  If their health is below some threshold, Curator moves down the threat list. --Phaze 17:17, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I concur, I may change the article to reflect this in the future. Stillfresh 19:33, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I strongly disagree with the threat based hateful bolt thinking and have evidence to prove that it is health based. Here is a link to our last Curator fight: http://visceral-guild.com/wws/wws-20070619-2320/thecurator.html


 * The shadow priest, Kigor, was DPSing Curator the entire fight, even when flares were up. He took zero hateful bolts from Curator. I (Gramblok) was on flare duty and only DPSed Curator during evocates. I also have the most health in the group aside from the MT and I took the most damage from Curator after the MT. You can see from our log I ate exactly half of the 18 hateful bolts cast. Thezorn 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * We have observed the very same, we tried to make a shadow priest (~10k HP) soak up the hateful bolts, so she kept building threat on him. But even though our warlock (~13k HP) was behind her on threat, he kept getting the bolts.Tifi 19:39, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

You're probably having an issue with healing the bolt tank fast enough, especially if they are relying on self healing. We can keep almost 100% of the bolts on even a low-health bolt tank, when over 50% of the raid has higher health than him. Stillfresh 18:40, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I just amended the Hateful Bolt section to what seems to be a consensus among other resources (e.g. the linked Bosskillers page), which concurs with my experience as a Hateful tank. As the new revision states, the trick is to make sure that your tank renews his place on the aggro table after each evocate, but that the actual place on the the threat table is irrelevant as long as he is not on top (i.e. tanking). Stillfresh, I would guess that the 50% of the raid with more health than your tank weren't DPSing Curator after the Evocate, and consequently weren't on his fresh aggro table. --HoberShort 18:25, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Page reverted, don't do that again. No, the raid was indeed DPSing the Curator after the Evocate.  It's painfully easy to show maximum health has little to nothing with who receives the bolts.  The page was changed to the state you found it in after several demonstrations that max health did not determine the bolt tank. Stillfresh 18:39, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

To try and put this issue to sleep once and for all, I did an experiment on our most recent Curator run:

Warlock (Bolt-Tank) (10400 hp, AR gear) DPSes the Curator the entire time. Warlock (Me) (10450 hp, all +dmg) DPSes the Curator only with DoTs. Shadow Priest (10500 hp, all +dmg) DPSes the Curator the entire time.

End result? About 50% of the shadow bolts went to me, about 35% to the shadow priest.

Bolts when I was out-DPSing the other two, after a Curator evocation.

I'm going to consider the threat mechanism to be a Prime List clear after each Evocation, bolt on highest aggro target after the tank. It seems pretty conclusive that target max health has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Stillfresh 17:11, 25 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Not to beat a dead horse here, but I have never seen someone die from a hateful bolt. That is not to say I haven't seen someone die from being hit by a hateful bolt and a flare at the same.  But during one run the healers got confused and stopped healing me (the bolt-tank) and after several bolts my hp dropped below 2k.  The the curator hateful bolted a healer until they healed me up.  It appears at least to me to be a threat list primed after each evocate with some logic to not bolt people extremely low on health unless all other raid members are low on health also.  With good healers and a high AR player bolt-tanking, the health stuff doesn't come into play.  Odarus 19:25, 10 Sept 2007 (UTC)

You are correct, it does in fact appear to be as you described. However, I'm not the one arguing it wasn't. The argument was that the Curator selects the highest health target on his aggro list (excluding tank, after Evocation, which resets this list) for the bolts. As I've shown, it's a straight threat thing, max health isn't involved. The Curator appears to never bolt a target which could die from the bolt due to low health, however. Health is involved there. Stillfresh 14:51, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Positioning
Someone added a positioning section, but the concentrated method is extremely mana intensive. If you want to be nice to your healers don't have them sit in the melee zone. I have seen groups do this, but it was typically when their healers were much more geared than the dps. Overall, not a great strategy. Also, it risks death when the person who gets hateful bolted is next to a flare. I left it in because I know it does work for some groups.

The goal of the strategy is to keep the melee zone stationary so to maximize dps from melee dps. I have seen much better and more reliable results with a flare tank. Since most groups have 2 tanks anyways, putting one on the curator and one responsible to front-load threat on each flare isn't a horrible idea. Also, salving the dps makes it easier for the flare tank to maintain threat. This works well when the flare tank is well-gear and skilled.

Another note on a flare tank, if you have a well-geared hunter/Boomkin and a well-geared flare tank, they can down a flare in <20secs. Having all the dps switch to curator except for these two players when curator starts evocation can allow more damage to the curator. Hunters/Boomkins were selected because Curator is immune to arcane, reducing the dps these classes can burst.

In the end, groups with low dps can't down him. Groups with medium/high dps have a couple of options: If their healers are awesome, do the concentrated method. If their tanks are awesome, do the flare tank method. If their dpsers are awesome, do anything you want. If the flares are going down <5secs, there isn't really anything to worry about. Odarus 11:13, 5 October 2007 (UTC)


 * The concentrated method isn't any harder on the healers because, if you have any melee chasing after a Flare, the Flare is going to hit three targets anyway. Clustering up, on the other hand does make things much easier on the healers, because the Flares die much more quickly.  Hunters can work a lot faster with a bunched-up group, because they don't have to constantly adjust to get proper range.  After my raid wiped a couple times on Curator with a group that was more than capable of downing it, I saw the damage meter results, which were absolute crap for melee and hunters, who usually do much better.  I came in on a third attempt and saw that they were spreading out like idiots.  I yelled at them until they bunched up as ordered, the Flares started dying fast, and we got a kill in on that attempt.


 * This page is written for new raids that need to know how to win for their first time. For those raids, the problem, every time, is that they can't kill the Flares fast enough.  Bunching up helps kill Flares faster.  Spreading out causes Flares to die more slowly.  Advocating spreading out as anything but a strange alternate method would not help raiders new to this encounter.


 * Plus, Chain Heal works much, much better in a tight cluster.


 * The need for max damage on the Flares is also why using a Flare Tank or a Bolt Tank is a bad idea for most raids new to this encounter. Sure, those techniques work once your DPS has enough gear to down the Flares quickly anyway, but any raid who uses those techniques could have beaten this encounter earlier without them.


 * To re-iterate: Spreading out causes wipes for raids new to this fight, and is usually a bad idea!


 * Kathucka 23:48, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I know the concentrated method works for some groups and why it works. The main problem I always saw with it was when melee dps can't out threat a salved hunter. The melee zone moves and no one is doing their optimal dps. Also, healers didn't really know who was getting bolted and/or who was just taking damage from flares which lead to over heals (so hense my mana intensive comment). Being separated seemed to help healers figure out who to heal. Chain healing seems to work just fine as well since there are usually 3 people by the flare anyways.

Flare Tank or a Bolt Tank are good ideas. I think you really misunderstand the concepts behind them and how they are supposed to work with different types of groups. The first time I downed curator was with a pug in which no one had ever downed him. We used a Bolt Tank and a Flare Tank.

Flare Tank's job - Flare tanks job is to hold the flare in place (similar in concept to the concentration method which you like). The main issue is if hunters do more threat than the rest of the group, even salved. If hunters continually pull from melee while salved, people are running and not doing optimal dps. A flare tank can be ANYONE who can front-load threat (even just by doing damage) to make the flare stationary.

Bolt Tank's job - Stay alive and have a lot of life. Hateful bolt tanks don't have to be on curator the entire time. We have had a SPriest, hunter, lock, druid and rogue Hateful bolt tank all with success. The main idea is that someone hits the curator now and again to be second on the threat list with a lot of life so that the healers know who to heal. If that person has a little AR gear it helps too. (I already know the balance act between AR and dps)

The main difference between a Flare tank and the concentrated method is that tanks are used to front loading threat and that only one person is being hit by the flare (plus your melee dps)

To re-iterate: different groups down bosses in different ways. What works for one group doesn't always work for another. If clumping isn't working try spreading out, if spreading out doesn't work try clumping. It is a give and take with each new group you try it with.Odarus 17:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Hunters get aggro from Flares because the Flares start off with threat toward one PC in the raid. Salvation doesn't help with this.  This is a problem, because it forces the Hunter in to Melee, forces the melee DPS to chase down the Flare, and forces the ranged DPS to turn around.


 * The solution, fortunately, is simple. The hunter just feigns death.  If anyone has touched the Flare, it runs back to the clumped group.  If the Hunter gets another Flare before the Feign Death cooldown is up, he needs to run over to the group.  If he's quick enough, he can use his pet to tag the Flare with Growl and hold it in place.  Anyone else but a pet....  Well, you really want everyone unloading on that Flare as soon as possible.  You don't want to wait on a Flare tank to build threat.


 * As for bolt tanks, yeah. I know.  They reduce incoming damage from Hateful Bolts by sending them to someone who has arcane resistance.  They are a great idea for raids with high DPS and low healing.  However, for beginning raids, the problem is always that they can't get the Flares down fast enough.  Consider that a hateful bolt tank with 50% arcane damage reduction will reduce damage on the raid by roughly 260 DPS (assuming 10-second cooldown...I think it's actually slower).  Killing each Flare just one second faster with zero arcane resist will reduce raid damage taken by 225 DPS (assuming three hits).  So, having a bolt tank means that the healers have to output 35 HPS less.  Given the potential for screw-ups on the Flares, it's just not worth it for any raid that has marginal DPS.  You want the Flares dead as fast as possible.


 * As for healers knowing who to heal? Unless they're on the tank, they should heal whoever is low on health.  Hateful bolt will go to a new target instead of directly killing someone.  Hopefully, all healers have a GUI setup that shows the health of everyone in the raid.


 * And to reiterate: Our shaman healers report that the concentrated setup works much, much better.  Given the results I've seen, I believe them.


 * Oh, and hunters should never have salvation unless you have so many paladins that they already have every single other blessing. Ever. Kathucka 22:04, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Bolt Tanks are nice when you have someone with some AR gear that doesn't sacrifice much dps. If you can swap out your high stam gear with med stam gear and some AR as a dps, its not a bad idea. Either way, it should be mentioned as an approach because it does help groups progress pass curator especially group trying to swap out healers for more dps. Partial resists on HBs can save a healer's mana pool and if you are trying to heal curator with 1-2 healers to maximize dps, its a nice thing to have. If you are attempting this with 3+ adequately geared healers, ignore bolt tanks altogether.

As for salving hunters, if you say never you are probably a hunter and I respect that position. Salving hunters should only be done on hunters who routinely pull threat from the melee. This happens when the hunter front loads more damage than the melee dps. FD is amazing don't get me wrong. The only draw back is the 30sec CD(1 per 3 flares). Salvation does not help with the initial threat, FD is designed for that. Salv helps for when the hunter multishots and arcane shots after a couple of seconds and still gets the flare on them. The run forward into the melee zone, although a good idea, dramatically decreases the hunter's dps. As you said before, every little dps helps.

As for salving hunters in general, it is a bad idea on most boss fights. If you have FD in your rotation, you should be fine. The only time I would ever suggest salv is when FD CD needs to be saved for some reason. Here IMO, FD should be saved for if a flare initially targets you. This is why salving CAN (not always) be a good idea.

As for the have your pet growl and it will pin the flare in place idea, it just doesn't work well. The reason is growl for a hunter's pet is not a taunt. It is an attack that does 0 damage and a lot of threat. Growling does enough threat to out do the initial threat, but does not help much when the hunter has done 4k damage on the target. However, it is an alternative if your FD cooldown is out and the flare initially targets you. I personally prefer MDing someone in the melee zone, but I love MD too much.

In the end here is the problem with this entire line of discussion, I say this is an idea that has helped group pass curator, you come back with that didn't help our group. I acknowledge that as true. You are somehow offended that I take salv and say that it is sometimes a good idea for hunters to do to help ensure that the flare stays in the melee zone. If you don't take salv, it doesn't mean you are a bad hunter. I am not saying to force a hunter to take salv. All I am saying is that sometimes salving ranged dps is a good idea if they are pulling from the melee. Salvation isn't the end of the world if you have 2+ pallies. (Difference with ally/horde seems to be ally is pally heavy, horde is shaman heavy {intentionally not getting into other differences such as avg age})

We are saying more in common than most people reading this think. Basically, flares must go down ASAP. The best way for that to happen is to establish a melee zone for the flares to die. There are many different ways to do this (clumping together, flare tank, etc). Doing this maximizes melee dps and ranged dps. If the flare begins to move out of the melee zone, move them back into it sacrificing as little dps as possible (Fade, FD, invis, move to melee zone, etc). If you have 3+ melee dps, clumping together is a good idea (because arc is limited to 3ppl). Distributed is much more difficult, but in the end saves healers mana if the melee zone can still be established and < 3ppl are in it. Odarus 16:17, 16 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah, we agree that if it works for your raid: go ahead.  Just some details for you:  Raid-buffed hunter pets can generate 3000 threat with a single Growl (Blessing of Might really really helps).  This is in addition to whatever threat they cause with damage.  By the time anyone passes that, the Flare is dead.  The trick is clicking that Growl button fast enough, because you can't leave it on autocast, for fear of annoying the Curator himself.  As for Feign Death:  It has a 30-second cooldown, and Flares come every 10 seconds.  So, Feign Death is usually available when you need it.  Kathucka 22:57, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

The distributed/concentrated method debate goes on and on and truthfully, I don't see it ending anytime soon. As many of you know I am a distributed fanboy so take what I say as extremely biased (hense it not being place in the article). Concentrated method is not always the best selection for new groups. Push-back for casters can be a major problem for their dps. Also for some groups it is just not possible for everyone to be clumped (hunters have deadzones). There has been numerous talks about the issue on this page and everyone agrees with establishing a melee zone, but there still is some talk about the best way to do that. I am not trying to fuel the flame of debate, all I am saying is this is something that has been thought out and what is in the article (hopefully) is the most helpful information we can give people. Has there been any thought about a page on how to handle a gear check? (Better gear, consumables, different group composition) I just think a little bit too much of general "how do I progress past a gear check" has crept into the article. Odarus 14:54, 2 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I think we have to agree that there are two ways to do it, and leave both of them in there. The readers can decide which to use, or even try both.  It's certainly been my experience that noob groups do better with a concentrated setup, and I've heard that from other sources, too.  It's because noob raids can't kill the Flares without using their melee.  It wouldn't hurt to add a few words explaining that a distributed setup reduces caster pushback, though.  Speaking as a hunter, I prefer a concentrated setup.  The Flare doesn't move nearly as much, so I don't have to adjust my range.  Moving to adjust my range hurts my DPS a lot more than feigning death once in awhile when a Flare goes for me.


 * As for a gear check page...great idea! Go for it .Kathucka 23:10, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Batox editing problems
Ok, Batox, I understand what you were trying to do. However, your updates are rife with problems. The article is now longer and full of problematic English. The following are always bad ideas:


 * Sentence fragments.
 * Run-on sentences.
 * Future tense in this kind of article (the word "will" should never show up).
 * Wordiness ("the fact that" is always wrong)
 * Singular/plural disagreements
 * Unhelpful detail (like calculations and discussion of curse selection)

Other problems:


 * There's no "probably" about it. Flares are born with threat on some non-tank character.  It seems to be somewhere between 1000 and 1500.
 * Leave links to things like "Evocation" in place, even if there's no corresponding article. Those red links are invitations to create the article.
 * Leave in the information about hateful bolt targeting. It's useful and well-understood.
 * Leave the tip about multi-target heals. Those make a big difference.
 * Don't put information about threat and re-setting the fight in the same paragraph. The reset really belongs in the tips section.
 * Much too much discussion on positioning.

Some of your edits are helpful. On balance, though, they aren't worth the problems you've also introduced. I'm too lazy to fix all your problems myself, and I'm not mean enough to remove your work by just reverting them all...yet. Therefore, you go ahead and fix all the problems yourself. If you don't, I'll just revert it in a day or two, and put the Sky2042 edits back in.

Kathucka 18:24, 25 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Are you going to watch this thing? Because in my opinion, this article is one of the largest pain-in-the-butts on WowWiki in terms of people putting bad information, adding extraneous crap, or just deleting stuff out of it wholesale.  Frankly, I'm tired of babysitting the damn thing. Stillfresh 14:51, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Ok, Batox hasn't fixed the problems he introduced, so I reverted the whole thing, worked the excellent Sky2042 edits back in, and scrubbed out a whole lot of wordiness, poor organization, and bad grammar. It's too bad, because some of the Batox changes really are improvements.

No, Stillfresh, I'm not going to babysit it for long...and for the same reasons as you. Kathucka 18:50, 30 October 2007 (UTC)


 * @Kathuka: About the language, well I'm sorry. I'm not a native english speaker, I'm aware of the problems, and I try to keep the points you mentioned in mind. Still... well, ok. I find the "other problems" more interesting, particularly this point: "There's no "probably" about it. Flares are born with threat on some non-tank character.  It seems to be somewhere between 1000 and 1500." Aha. No "probably" but "it seems to be somewhere between" - it may again be my poor grasp of the foreign language, but I can't find a lot of a difference there. Additionally, when I first added this concept (about the flares having initial aggro), I was challenged for a proof. It's impossible to prove, only the devs know. Agro could as well be fixed for a random interval - we cannot know (and the discussion is pointless, but what's the terrible problem with "probably")?.


 * I find the link to the mage ability evocation misleading, actually a kind of disinformation. What the curator's doing is in no way related to the mechanics of a mage evocation, save for the one point that it regenerates mana. I don't like links to trivial or misleading information. I also don't think it's in any way useful or desirable to create an extra article for every weird ability some mob may have (like that link to "arcane sear").


 * Multi-target heals are mentioned in the setup section. I find it interesting that you do find details about curse selection unhelpful, whereas a trivial tip about heal selection seems to be important. Suffice it to say that I had on one occasion a short exchange with a warlock which curse to use, but I had never to tell a healer to use their best and most efficient mass heal.


 * The DPS calculation which you removed is IMO a very strong argument for newbie groups to understand why they should set up concentrated. I really don't understand why you removed this. --Batox 21:16, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Batox - It sounds like you have some good questions. I'll explain.

Your wording was, "The Flares probably spawn with initial threat on their first chosen target." As it was phrased, it implies the possibility that the flares are born with zero threat. This is not true. The proof that this is not true is simple. They have an initial target as soon as they spawn, and you have to hit them pretty hard before they switch targets. They switch instantly if you do hit them with enough threat (my pet's Growl does this easily). That's proof. And yes, this might also be a language issue.

Note that it is possible to determine the exact threat, but it would take the cooperation of the raid, many attempts (and wipes), and a lot of time (a few days, I would guess). See the documentation in the KLH Threat Meter package to see how to do this.

Your point about the link to Evocation is valid. Really, though, it's a problem with the game and the Evocation article, not the Curator article. There should be a disambiguation page that links to the monster ability and the mage ability. A similar situation exists for Blind, now that Moroes and rogues have different versions. It would be useful if you set up such a thing (hint, hint).

Not playing a healer much, I'm not sure about the issue with Chain Heal and Prayer of Mending. However, I've been on several raids new to this encounter where the healers spontaneously exclaimed, "Wow! Chain Heal works great on this guy!" (Same for Prayer of Mending.) We wiped. The healers switched to the recommended kind of heal. We won. The healers exclaimed. The Wowhead comment board has more of the same. Those two spells clearly make a big difference for this specific encounter, so they are worth mentioning. Now, you'd think that all healers would already know this from the Black Morass and Maiden of Virtue, but apparently not.

As for the Curse selection issue.... I assume that a Warlock would drop Curse of Doom so that it would go off right after Evocation starts, then drop an appropriate curse as soon as Doom goes off. You wouldn't want Curse of Elements up during the Flare Phase, because the mages are mostly going to be attacking the Flares, not The Curator, right? Once the Curse of Doom goes off, the warlock is going to put up whatever would be appropriate (Elements if you have lots of mages, Recklessness if you have lots of physical DPS, Agony if you have a selfish warlock, etc.) That's standard stuff that's not specific to The Curator, so it doesn't really belong here. Now, if there is something specific to this encounter about Curse selection, that's different, and you should say so. However, other than Curse of Doom, curse selection is pretty standard for this guy, as far as I know. Now, if Curse of Elements really is better to have up during the Flare phase, that's different. Doom is standard procedure. If it's a bad idea, prove it, present the proof here, and then change the article.

Your DPS calculation is a strong argument. However, WowWiki articles are not appropriate places for discussion, analysis, or argument. The discussion pages (like this one!) are appropriate places. That's why I removed it. Feel free to put the calculations here.

Finally, understand that the language issue was the biggest one. It was simply much easier to get rid of the language problems by reverting the whole article than going through and fixing all the problems one-by-one.

Here are some reasonable goals for articles:
 * Correct.
 * Unambiguous.
 * Excruciatingly proper grammar, diction, spelling, and terminology.
 * Minimal redundancy.
 * No argument or discussion, just facts and advice.
 * Nothing controversial or unusual. Just well-established information and common strategies.
 * Short, especially with no excess wordiness.
 * Relevant to the topic in the title.
 * For strategy articles, useful to players new to the encounter.
 * Strict, neat organization.

These are goals, not standards. For example, this particular article is currently blatantly redundant, as it mentions that The Curator is a gear check three different ways, and exhorts readers to kill the Flares quickly four times. Given that these are the two most important points to know about this fight, it's probably worth a little redundancy to force those points on the reader. Kathucka 18:25, 2 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your insightful reply. Still I'm not conviced that the flares are born with initial threat - as I said they could as well have fixed aggro for a random amount of time. I do agree that initial threat is the most simple and consistent explanation for their behavior, I added this to the article myself. But this is a minor issue.


 * IMO the other points are somewhat related - redundancy, speculation and discussion. It's very difficult to find the right spot between "advice" and "facts". Is my DPS calculation "advice", "unusual" or "discussion"? And why? I'd rate it as technical advice, and so would I rate your analysis of warlock curses. You seem to dislike both, but (from your personal experience) rate the healer tips as "advice". It's basically impossible to find a proper assessment function for this type of decision. And I don't understand why we shouldn't put "unusual" information here? The concentrated setup here is a perfect case of "unusual" - only very few groups do it this way, still it's right. "Unusual" (as opposed to "well-established" and "common") is perfectly ok for me, as long as it's *right*.


 * My take is to rather put more information into WoWwiki than less, while still trying to keep it short, free of speculation and concise. In reality I think we have the issue between "Manual" and "Guide". A manual contains the bare bones information on how things work, a guide explains, gives examples and offers solutions. I understand your (and Stillfreshs) remarks that you dislike developments towards "Guide". Should WoWwiki really just be a "Manual", and no "Guide"? --Batox 14:02, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Flares are born with threat on a target. If they are hit with enough threat from another source, they switch targets, and they do it instantly. I do this all the time with (pet) Growl. It gets Flares instantly, every time. There is no "fixed" aggro on these guys. I'm not sure what more proof you need. No less-complicated theory explains this. "Born with threat" does explain it. Occam's Razor applies here.

Manual vs. Guide is an art, not a science.

Use of the concentrated setup is not unusual. See the assorted forums. It comes up all the time. I agree that correctness is more important than prevalence (c.f. assorted misguided beliefs about Deep Breath). Kathucka 23:03, 6 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Regarding your November 10 edits: Much better.  I was able to fix the problems you introduced instead of simply reverting everything, thus leaving in your edits that were actually improvements.  Note that the "Strategy" heading has three phases as sub-headings, so "Overview" is not appropriate.  Also note that the warnings about the distributed positioning don't warrant their own section.  They belong with the other discussion of the distributed positioning.  Kathucka 21:07, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Regarding 12 December edit: While some of the edits are nice little improvements, there are enough problems that the end result is inferior to the previous version of the article. It would take me too long to fix all the problems, so I'll just revert them. Batox can do it again without the problems if he feels they are important enough:


 * It's "The Curator" with a capital "The". The "The" is part of its name, and a proper noun.
 * There are four possible phases. Really.  Stop removing that.  Really.
 * Need to leave in reference to triple damage during evocation.
 * Separate section for Astral Flare is a great idea. I may put that back in after revert.
 * Melee attack and Hateful bolt are completely separate things, and require separate paragraphs. Don't combine them.
 * "As before" implies a chronological sequence that is not present in the given discussion.
 * Note about melee characters losing DPS while running around is good.

Kathucka 18:19, 12 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Ok, I reverted the big edit to get rid of the problems, and I'm putting back in the good Batox changes. Kathucka 18:34, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Not immune to starfire?
Ff claims that The Curator is not immune to Starfire, an arcane spell.

Given that it is immune even to Hunter's Mark, which is arcane but does no damage, I suspect that Ff is wrong. However, I don't have a 70 druid and can't test. Does anyone know? If he's wrong, can someone revert, please?

Note that the Flares are certainly not immune, but that's another story.


 * I have not personally witnessed this, but my friend, a moonkin druid, one day corrected me when I said Curator was immune to arcane such as Starfire. --Furi


 * Curator is immune to all Arcane damage. —Pzychotix (talk &middot; contr) 15:21, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Talk page needs an archival
Anyone around who knows how to do that? It's gotten massive. Stillfresh 20:50, 14 December 2007 (UTC)


 * I have seen bigger.-- 22:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah, you wanna see LONG talk pages, have a look at The Lich King or Illidan. ~My rage bar is blue and I start the fight pissed - Peregrine 02:49, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

astral flare, chain lightning hits 3 people tops?
Can someone confirm or not whether chain lightning from Astral flares will only hit 3 people tops?


 * Yes, 3 tops. —Pzychotix (talk &middot; contr) 15:21, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

About Controversial Strategies
For anyone thinking about editing this article, please keep in mind that there are multiple strategies that work on The Curator. Once you can kill the Flares fast enough, pretty much anything works. There are several variations on the basic strategies that work and are commonly used. Because they are common and they work for some raids, this article mentions them. Because they are all variations on "kill the Flares quickly", this article keeps them short. Therefore:


 * Do not delete a reference to a commonly used strategy, even if you think it is a bad idea.
 * Do not expand greatly on any variant strategy. Keep it short.
 * Do not put in detailed arguments about why one strategy is better than another.

The common variant strategies are as follows:


 * Use a Flare tank.
 * Use a Hateful Bolt soaker.
 * Use Arcane Resistance.
 * Spread out.
 * Bunch up.
 * Bring only two healers.
 * Attack The Curator when there is a Flare left alive.

Gear Check (tm)
Ever since this phrase was first coined (in relation to Patchwerk, I believe), it's been horribly abused by being assigned to any boss people found difficult to fight. The Curator is in no way a gear check. As stated above, he can be tanked in blues. The flares can be easily dpsed down by any group of competent dps classes. Healing requirements are not unusually harsh - this fight is capable of being handled by 2 healers in (decent) pre-KZ gear.

Like Shade of Aran, this fight is different than many, and more than anything requires awareness and competence. Dps needs to be on the ball downing flares. Healers must pay attention to where damage is being taken, healing the raid while not letting the tank die. (The tank can take a coffee break.) However, the amount of dps needed is only moderate - it simply has to be effectively applied. Likewise for healing.

Flowers 19:43, 28 January 2008 (UTC)


 * He also used to be harder back when karazhan was first opened. So he might have been a gear check in the past. 20:50, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

A gear check is a fight that requires a certain level of gear to beat. If you have a different definition, you had better give it.

The Curator requires enough gear to output enough DPS to kill each Flare before the next one spawns. That's a hard requirement. Meet the requirement or you lose.

Yes, the DPS requirement is moderate. Yes, you can meet it in blue gear. However, it is still there. It's also higher than the DPS requirement of any fight that comes before it.

Therefore, The Curator is a gear check. Q.E.D.

Yes, there are bigger gear checks. However, saying that the Curator fight isn't a gear check is like saying that mice aren't mammals because, after all, bears have more fur.

Kathucka 23:22, 27 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Given the definition, I would suggest that pretty much every boss in the game is a gear check.  23:32, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

In general, I tend to think of "gear check" referring to fights that don't really have much in the way of strategy, and thus any halfway competent group can beat them, IF they have the proper level of gear. The first trash pull in the Sunwell Plateau (a Sunblade Protector), for example, can be seen as a gear check because it's a single pull with little to the fight beyond tanking, DPSing, and healing. The Curator fight has enough stuff beyond that that I would consider it more of a tactical fight than a gear check one. -- Dark T Zeratul 00:08, 28 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, Netherspite isn't really a gear check. You can't get to Netherspite without beating The Curator, and, if you have enough gear to beat The Curator, you have more than enough for Netherspite.  So, if you pass the Curator gear check, you're fine for Netherspite.  Prince Malchezaar and maybe Nightbane require more gear to beat, so they are also gear checks.


 * Now, this is just my opinion, but the tactics for The Curator are really unimportant. All that really matters in this fight is how much damage you can lay down on the Flares.  All the other tricks and complexities really don't end up amounting to much.  If you kill the Flares fast enough, you win.  If you don't, you lose.  With that, it turns out to be a pretty simple fight.  Kathucka 23:31, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, this has been bugging me. How about a more detailed definition of "Gear Check?" A fight is a gear check if it requires a certain amount of gear to beat, and that level of gear is higher, or at least different, than what is required simply to get to the fight. So, Curator, Ragnaros, Vael, Patchwerk, Prince, Hydross, etc., would all qualify. Does that work?

Note that this means that a fight can be both a gear check and a skill check. Jan'alai, for example, falls firmly into this category, as you need enough skill to manage the Dragonhawk eggs according to a plan, dodge fire bombs, reduce damage from fire breath, and so forth. You also need enough gear to get all those dragonhawks and the boss himself down before the hard enrage, enough healing to keep everyone up through widespread damage, and two tanks tough enough to take a lot of abuse. Gruul falls in this category, too, because you have to dodge cave-ins, reduce Shatter effects, manage off-tank threat, and heal a lot. The gear check comes in because you need enough DPS to drop him before he grows to much, enough gear on the tanks to survive heavy abuse, and enough healing to carry the raid through all the abuse.

Patchwerk, on the other hand, is a pure gear check. All he does is to hit the tank and the off tank, hard. Chess Event is a pure skill check, as you could do it naked.

Kathucka 19:27, 1 April 2008 (UTC)