did something about Matron get broken with this hotfix?

[Pooshonmyshoos]

We had more issues with this fight than we did last week, and while it was still a 1shot, it was a lot uglier than anyone would have wanted. We used three tomes, at 70%, 40%, and 20%, and basically, with the stacks going up faster and her health going down quicker, cooldowns for the tanks weren't back up for the third tome click. The adds came out and, to use the phrase someone said earlier, 'wafflestomped' our tank. Other than that, healing did not seem more difficult (still used 2 healers), adds were not acting up or attacking random targets, etc. The only difference in the fight seemed to be having to adjust to things happening quicker, and whatever that might mean for cooldowns being used, both DPS and Healing.

The point that a previous poster makes about canceling the reflective command buff is a good one. It's an elegant solution to a problem that no one should really have anymore anyway. With her lower health, reflects aren't really necessary anymore, even for raids that don't have that high dps. You don't even need to watch to see if she got a reflect stack or not. Just tap your canceling macro when you see Revolting Ichor being casted, wether its there or not, you'll be safe.

Some people have mentioned adds attacking random targets before. It was posted in a previous post but bares repeating. Threat and aggro are two very different things. You can have higher threat than a tank, without stealing aggro. It's only when you reach a certain percentage (correct me if I'm wrong but I believe it's 110% for Rift), of threat, that you actually pull aggro. What this means is that if a Tank taunts, he receives the threat of the highest threat target at the time. Then he begins to build threat. If the previous tank or target is still generating threat, and after the three seconds of guaranteed aggro, goes above that 110% mark, he will pull aggro back. If he keeps generating threat, but doesn't go over 110%, he will not pull aggro, WHILE STILL HAVING HIGHER THREAT. Now, when the adds come out, they aggro to the person with the highest THREAT on the boss. This means that they can go after the previous tank, or a dps, even if that person doesn't currently have aggro on the boss.

I r Pro wafflestomper!

[Angelamongus]

We had more issues with this fight than we did last week, and while it was still a 1shot, it was a lot uglier than anyone would have wanted. We used three tomes, at 70%, 40%, and 20%, and basically, with the stacks going up faster and her health going down quicker, cooldowns for the tanks weren't back up for the third tome click. The adds came out and, to use the phrase someone said earlier, 'wafflestomped' our tank. Other than that, healing did not seem more difficult (still used 2 healers), adds were not acting up or attacking random targets, etc. The only difference in the fight seemed to be having to adjust to things happening quicker, and whatever that might mean for cooldowns being used, both DPS and Healing.

The point that a previous poster makes about canceling the reflective command buff is a good one. It's an elegant solution to a problem that no one should really have anymore anyway. With her lower health, reflects aren't really necessary anymore, even for raids that don't have that high dps. You don't even need to watch to see if she got a reflect stack or not. Just tap your canceling macro when you see Revolting Ichor being casted, wether its there or not, you'll be safe.

Some people have mentioned adds attacking random targets before. It was posted in a previous post but bares repeating. Threat and aggro are two very different things. You can have higher threat than a tank, without stealing aggro. It's only when you reach a certain percentage (correct me if I'm wrong but I believe it's 110% for Rift), of threat, that you actually pull aggro. What this means is that if a Tank taunts, he receives the threat of the highest threat target at the time. Then he begins to build threat. If the previous tank or target is still generating threat, and after the three seconds of guaranteed aggro, goes above that 110% mark, he will pull aggro back. If he keeps generating threat, but doesn't go over 110%, he will not pull aggro, WHILE STILL HAVING HIGHER THREAT. Now, when the adds come out, they aggro to the person with the highest THREAT on the boss. This means that they can go after the previous tank, or a dps, even if that person doesn't currently have aggro on the boss.

Two things that make this statement completely wrong. Let me first Tell you that I am the MT of my guild and have been tanking in games for a very long time so I get the mechanics more than a lot of people prolly.

1.) Tanks on Matron taunt the boss every 1 stack, she almost appears to be immune to the DR on taunts, seen her go immune like 2-3 times in the entire times we have ever tanked her. So ..with that knowledge that every 11 seconds or so the other tank is taunting and recieving the full threat of the other tank causes a massive threat build up so fast that even without threat meters I can safely assume no one is close in aggro. And ussually 99 times out of a 100 there is a tank switch RIGHT before the tome is poped, Just to force the coordination of who is tanking what at time adds spawn.

2.) Even by your own standards your threat on the adds don't make since. The adds INHERIT Matrons Threat Period. So even if when the adds Spawn and somone was close to the tank in Threat (Btw the Threshold is 130% for both melee and caster in Rift) you need 130% threat to PULL aggro. Which means when the adds spawn if someone was at 128% on matrons threat and the tank was at 100%... The adds would still inherit the fact that the tank Still had AGGRO on her and therefore the adds. Even if the adds picked up that same threat list. They would be behave in the sameway matron does and not switch that aggro until someone did threat on them or matron above that mark, and if they did they would naturally pull aggro on the Matron as well.

3.) that said we have seen this random gib a few times. And what we have come up with as well as many on the forums. Its server lag. When the Adds spawn they take time to generate the Threat that is supposed to be applied to them, sometimes they sit there for 1 sec or so then spam the tank. Sometimes they head for someone and without tanks doing anything do a U turn and head right back. Which is why we have our dps as FAR away as possible. This does not change threat to those players but allows time for the adds to actually pick up the threat in time to turn back away from the dps and head back for the tanks.

Hope this helps with some issues of understanding aggro a bit and the adds on this fight. Good luck to everyone on Matron!

[Ahov]

Regarding the above posts: I have noticed an issue with taunts against Matron. Sometimes we will be very deep into the fight and my taunt causes Matron to change her target to me, but then immediately switches to the previous tank or a DPS. This sudden threat loss is confusing and goes against the logic of her being taunt immune, so I'm not sure what caused it other than a bug.

[EmmaFrost]

Regarding the above posts: I have noticed an issue with taunts against Matron. Sometimes we will be very deep into the fight and my taunt causes Matron to change her target to me, but then immediately switches to the previous tank or a DPS. This sudden threat loss is confusing and goes against the logic of her being taunt immune, so I'm not sure what caused it other than a bug.

I vaguely recall this happening once for us during our last kill. It's something we don't see every fight though. I will reply later if it happened tonight *going to do clear of current progression*.

Side note: Anyone else notice that clerics are taking less damage than warriors on this fight? My parses have myself at roughly 2-3k damage taken under our warrior on Ichors and just slightly under for physical damage taken. I know this can change based of stacks etc. However our max hit *both being at a max of 2 stacks* has him higher than I. Wondering if anyone else has noticed this.

[Ahov]

I vaguely recall this happening once for us during our last kill. It's something we don't see every fight though. I will reply later if it happened tonight *going to do clear of current progression*.

Side note: Anyone else notice that clerics are taking less damage than warriors on this fight? My parses have myself at roughly 2-3k damage taken under our warrior on Ichors and just slightly under for physical damage taken. I know this can change based of stacks etc. However our max hit *both being at a max of 2 stacks* has him higher than I. Wondering if anyone else has noticed this.

Clerics should be taking much more damage from the ichors. If your warriors are getting hit harder they aren't running the proper spec for the fight (vk/pally/reaver variant). There could also be a difference in death resistance.

[Ahov]

I vaguely recall this happening once for us during our last kill. It's something we don't see every fight though. I will reply later if it happened tonight *going to do clear of current progression*.

Side note: Anyone else notice that clerics are taking less damage than warriors on this fight? My parses have myself at roughly 2-3k damage taken under our warrior on Ichors and just slightly under for physical damage taken. I know this can change based of stacks etc. However our max hit *both being at a max of 2 stacks* has him higher than I. Wondering if anyone else has noticed this.

On a side note, I'm glad you guys progressed more. However, I'm 100% sure it had nothing to do with RNG or luck like some people like to claim. Keep it up

[Jelleh]

Clerics should be taking much more damage from the ichors. If your warriors are getting hit harder they aren't running the proper spec for the fight (vk/pally/reaver variant). There could also be a difference in death resistance.

The cleric had next to no death resistance, and the warrior was in the 51 VK spec for the Matron fight (unsure what the difference is). The warrior also had a full death resist sigil. All our cleric used was a vial.

[Ahov]

The cleric had next to no death resistance, and the warrior was in the highest mitigation spec for the Matron fight (unsure what that is but I know they were using it, as it was spoken about over vent). The warrior also had a full death resist sigil. All our cleric used was a vial.

Again, it's going to be dependent on what that spec was. In general terms "highest mitigation spec" can mean several different things to different warriors who either lack understanding of how the specs work or just are ignorant to certain passive talents. I know I've run into a ton of warrior tanks (raid-geared, even) who still think 51vk is the top magic mitigation spec, when that's just not true.

[Jelleh]

On a side note, I'm glad you guys progressed more. However, I'm 100% sure it had nothing to do with RNG or luck like some people like to claim. Keep it up

Ironic that we should start to progress more when we don't have to carry you. ;)

Nice to see you're still failing to tank Matron btw.

Using "IT MUST BE A BUG" as a crutch is just as bad as "Using RNG as a crutch"

[EmmaFrost]

Again, it's going to be dependent on what that spec was. In general terms "highest mitigation spec" can mean several different things to different warriors who either lack understanding of how the specs work or just are ignorant to certain passive talents. I know I've run into a ton of warrior tanks (raid-geared, even) who still think 51vk is the top magic mitigation spec, when that's just not true.

We had him running the 51 VK Build. I know that is not the top magic resist, but because we only have our tank take icors (we reflect hidous blasts) it ends up with a lot more overall physical damage so we went with him using 51 VK.

I'm just curious if anyone else is noticing this issue, on other bosses I take more damage so it seems to imply it's a bug with how ichor damage is being done. Curious to see if anyone else has similar results.

Side note: Jelleh/Ahov lets keep flames out of this post. We didn't end our experience with a happy note, that's done. I wish you the best of luck in your new guild Ahov.

[Ahov]

Ironic that we should start to progress more when we don't have to carry you. ;)

Nice to see you're still failing to tank Matron btw.

Using "IT MUST BE A BUG" as a crutch is just as bad as "Using RNG as a crutch"

Sure, like people missing reflects and then saying it must be a bug. I see your logic

[Ahov]

Hehe....thought I would add @ Jelleh: The Viking of Disapproval looks in your direction.

[Insideyou]

2.) Even by your own standards your threat on the adds don't make since. The adds INHERIT Matrons Threat Period. So even if when the adds Spawn and somone was close to the tank in Threat (Btw the Threshold is 130% for both melee and caster in Rift) you need 130% threat to PULL aggro. Which means when the adds spawn if someone was at 128% on matrons threat and the tank was at 100%... The adds would still inherit the fact that the tank Still had AGGRO on her and therefore the adds. Even if the adds picked up that same threat list. They would be behave in the sameway matron does and not switch that aggro until someone did threat on them or matron above that mark, and if they did they would naturally pull aggro on the Matron as well.

You are overlooking one incredibly important thing here, and while I am glad you corrected me on the threshold being 130%, that is the only correct thing about this reply. I will use an example to show you why you are wrong.

Tank A has Matron and 100% threat. DPS A is a warrior and has 120% threat (and since he is below 130% is chugging away normally without a care in the world). Your tome clicker hits the tome, and you decide it's a good time to tank switch. Tank B taunts Matron and receives the threat of DPS A. Tank B now has 100% threat, DPS A has 100% threat, and Tank A has 83.33% threat. Tank B and DPS A continue to generate threat on Matron. In a few seconds, DPS A, being the beastly dpser that he is (also, Tank B stuck his thumb up his butt for the last 3 seconds), is at 110% threat, while Tank B is still at 100% threat (obviously since threat is calculated in relation to the person tanking). And now the adds spawn. One thing happens immediately: The adds inherit the THREAT of the Matron tank, period. You chose to highlight INHERIT, when you should have highlighted THREAT. Now what you failed to take into consideration is that there is no tank on the adds right now. They aren't being tanked by someone, there is nothing to base your 130% of X calculation off of. They inherited the THREAT of the highest person, which in this case is DPS A. Because while Tank B is tanking still, and DPS A has not pulled MATRON off of him because he is not yet at 130% of the Tank's threat to Matron, DPS A actually has the highest amount of threat on Matron. So, while you seem to think that DPS A should not get aggro on the adds, because he hasn't pulled aggro on Matron, this is actually incorrect. There is no 130% for him to reach, because there is no 100%, since there is no tank on the adds yet. And since at their spawn he has the highest threat, he becomes the tank. Of course, if the adds are taunted, it's a different story, but good luck taunting 30 adds in a split second. So, the person with the highest threat, not the person with aggro, becomes the beneficiary of 30 cute little baby Matrons, and instantly goes splat.

And since you've been a tank for many years like you say, and through many MMOs, you should be aware of boss mechanics that affect the person with highest, or second highest threat. You must have faced in the past mechanics were the raid is specifically told: "Hey, hold back on dps, you have to make sure that a second tank is second on threat, not you, because the boss does X ability to the second highest threat and it will kill you." I can't think of any off the top of my head, but this definitely came up in WoW at least a few times. Another one is aggro dumps: "Hey, this boss dumps aggro, make sure a second tank is second on threat, not a dps, otherwise it will aggro to the dps when it dumps threat". MMO history is riddled with mechanics like this...and Matron is just one more.

Now...could there be a bug on this fight, or server lag, or SOMETHING that is causing people to be killed by adds, even if they're not highest on threat, of course there might be. But let's at least consider this basic mechanic before we go cry BUG BUG, IT'S BUGGED.

[Jelleh]

Sure, like people missing reflects and then saying it must be a bug. I see your logic

Okay, I apologise for lashing out at you, but to be fair it seemed like you insulted us when you replied to Poison.

Now, I will respond to you respectfully and say that if it's a missed reflected, then why does the stack go up and literally not even a global cooldown later it goes back down? It can't be a missed reflect because the mages' macro goes off and their reflect goes on cooldown, they also noted that the reflect happened and the stack went up, and then went down.
I know you'd love to think it's our guilld's incompentency but every time Synapse reflected AND it happened (because it didn't happen every time), he would call it out on vent in confusion. Unless your recruitment PM to Synapse was an utter lie, you yourself know he's a very good mage.

[Vayra]

Reflect checks do come before resistance. In both your cases it's far more likely the person who was supposed to reflect that hideous blast missed their timing and instead waited to apply it after hideous got cast.

Nope, resist checks are done before reflects. I keep very careful track of the tank buffs and the tank had the Reflective Command buff up when Hideous Blast was cast, took no damage, stacks did not go up and then the boss got healed on the next Ichor cast since the buff was still active. Not that a single heal matters much, it's still fairly easy to kill her even with 20odd stacks near the end (we've even killed her after 2 heals and 30 stacks, those ichors hurt).