This is a single-phase encounter with several standard fight mechanics. Oh, and soccer. Yes I said soccer, I’m American. You need to play soccer to defeat this boss. You’ll also see the Sea Witch you killed last raid being tortured in the middle of the room, so that’s kind of cool after 200-300 wipes to her. We’ll break out the soccer mechanic by itself, as there’s a lot of pieces to it.
Xanesh Abilities
Abyssal Strike
Big smack on the tank, deals 285k Shadow damage. Also applies a 1 minute debuff causing you to take 25% increased damage from subsequent Abyssal Stikes, stacks
Soul Flay
Creates a red glowing Soul copy of several players, denoted with a red targeting circle underneath. After 10s, the Souls explode and deal 578k Shadow damage to the affected players. You can only see YOUR Soul, and only take damage from YOUR Soul. Move outside the targeting circle to avoid insta-death
Ritual Obelisk
Xanesh creates several Obelisks at random locations around the room. Standing in the swirlie around an Obelisk deals 71k SHadow damage every 1.5s and slows you by 50%
6-8 Obelisks spawn each time this ability occurs, with the previous ones despawning
Azshara Being Tortured
Torment
AoE ability, deals 286k Shadow damage if you stand in it
Covers most of the room, radiating out from Azshara, with multiple safe zone cones
Cast 3 times in a row, can get dicey trying to dodge all 3. Speed buffs are helpful
Anguish
The raid takes a static 21k Shadow damage every 2s for the entire fight. That’s it, that’s the mechanic. Blizzard thought healers would get bored.
Soccer!
Void Ritual
Begins at 0:52, 2:12, 3:32, 4:52, 6:13, give or take about 2 seconds
Xanesh creates 3 orange soak circles simultaneously in a triangle around herself. Each must be soaked by 1 person
If all 3 circles do not get soaked, the whole raid takes 1 million damage. RIP
After soaking, you get a 40s debuff called Voidwoken
You deal 99% less damage, get to play soccer
After you finish soccer, you gain a debuff called Void-Touched, take 13k Shadow damage every 1s and cannot participate in soccer again for 3 minutes (Duration from PTR, not listed in Journal)
Here’s a screenshot showing Obelisks and the soak circles for Void Ritual
Void Orb
After Void Ritual completes, two void portals spawn on opposite ends of the room. One will have a very visible extra glowing effect
The glowing portal is where the Void Orb (soccer ball) spawns
Anyone without Voidwoken who hits the orb takes 143k Shadow damage and are knocked back
If the ball hits an Obelisk, Azshara, or an outer wall of the platform, it explodes and triggers Dark Collapse
214k Shadow damage to the whole raid
Buffs boss with Dark Ascension, increases damage taken by subsequent Dark Collapses by 500% for the rest of the fight
Also causes Xanesh to attack 50% faster for 30 seconds
Strategy
Lust on pull
Tanks taunt every 1-2 stacks of Abyssal Strike
Move away from your Soul Flay when affected by it. Try to get 8 yards outside the red targeting circle
You may want to use raid CDs for these. On PTR, roughly 40% of the raid was targeted each time, so this is a large burst of damage on a large chunk of the raid
Don’t stand under Obelisks
Watch your feet during Torment. The 3 casts happen relatively quickly in succession and can be tight to dodge, so use movement abilities as needed
Voidwoken Players Job
The only players who can interact with the Void Orb without being knocked back are the 3 Voidwoken players
When you come in contact with the Orb while Voidwoken, it bounces off you in the direction YOUR CHARACTER is facing
Your job is to kick the ball into the opposite portal, without letting it hit an Obelisk, Azshara, or a wall
While come in contact with the ball, you gain 1 stack of Imminent Doom, lasts 6 seconds
If you reach 5 stacks, you die, so don’t do that
So basically, ball spawns on one end of the room, the other portal (goal) spawns on the other side
Your job is to play soccer with your 2 best friends, avoid the defenders (Obelisks, Azshara), keep the ball in bounds (don’t touch wall), and score a goal (portal)
When the ball hits the portal, it disappears harmlessly and you win. Now start nuking the boss again
Dark Ascension basically allows for 1 mistake in soccer during the fight, but a 2nd one causes a wipe
Most of this fight just comes down to soccer. It’ll take multiple pulls for people to get used to it, and some people will be better at it than others
Let everyone try during your first few pulls. Once you’ve identified your stronger soccer players, assign them to do this
We recommend putting area markers in the corners of the room, and having your soccer players communicate where they’re kicking the ball using the markers. This’ll help reduce confusion and keep your team on the same page
On PTR, it seemed like the portals, while always on exact opposite sides of the room, spawned in corners in a random order
We found it easiest to try and only ever kick the ball at right angles, parallel to the edges of the room, and staying near the edges of the room. This reduced the chances of hitting an Obelisk or a non-Voidwoken player, and all but eliminated any change of hitting Azshara
Score goals, don’t stand in bad things, nuke boss, ggs
Positioning
You’ll want to tank the boss near where the circle around Azshara is. See the below screenshot.
