The Setting:The raid enters to find the dragon is slumbering on the rise of the hill. He's chained to the hillside, held tightly down. Loud snoring can be heard, and the air above the dragon has a general "Aurora Borealis" thing going. The raid does its thing, collecting Death Lotus, and subsequently throwing them into the well. The INSTANT this happens, the dragon jerks his head awake, and bellows out a challenge:
"The audacity you display, your wanton disregard for nature itself is appalling! Your repeated attempts to harness the power of the Emerald Dream were laughable in their foolishness; your grasp of the powers you wish to unleash unimaginable to lesser beings such as you! Unchain me that I might show you the power you wish to reign in first hand!"
"The audacity you display, your wanton disregard for nature itself is appalling! Your repeated attempts to harness the power of the Emerald Dream were laughable in their foolishness; your grasp of the powers you wish to unleash unimaginable to lesser beings such as you! Unchain me that I might show you the power you wish to reign in first hand!"
The blight spreads from the well, and the dragon's struggles continue to grow more and more frantic. When at last the blight reaches his location on the hill, he finally bursts loose and rears back on his hind legs.
"FOOLS! I will be done with you! Ysera herself cannot calm the rage growing inside me! Perhaps I shall let you live, if only to make you suffer through endless nightmares of my design!"
The Encounter:
The dragon awakens, and engages. It's a basic dragon tank and spank for phase 1. This lets everyone get into their rotations, and begin the fight. Most dragon phase 1s are like this. Nightbane, Onyxia, Sartharion, the world dragons. People know what to expect when a dragon trains onto a tank, and that sets up a nice sense of familiarity that people can appreciate for the first 20 seconds or so of the encounter. Every single second of every single fight doesn't need to kick you in the nuts or shock you. Sometimes it's good to expect something to happen, and have it actually turn out that you're right.
There are other green dragons out in the world that can be killed, and they share some common "green dragon rules".
Wowwiki:
All four dragons share the Sleep, Noxious Breath, Tail Sweep and Mark of Nature abilities. Each time a dragon loses 25 ± 5% of its life, they perform a unique ability.
If I remember correctly, Emeriss, Lethon, and Taerar have clouds that float around sleeping people for 4 seconds. My encounter favors the clouds, as well, as it fits with the rest of the fight. They can give a stacking debuff that slows casting & attack speed by 20% and if the debuff reaches 5 stacks, then you sleep it off for 6 seconds. Basically, watch the cleave, don't get tail whipped, melee DPS attack the hind legs, dispel the drowsy debuff or just avoid the gas clouds altogether.
Phase 2 is where things get interesting, though, as the tables are turned, the dragon beats its wings, and throws out a huge cloud of sleep dust that can't be avoided.
"I grow weary of your foolish games! Let us see how *YOU* enjoy the prospect of being harassed by a swarm of tiresome insects, rawr!"
The whole raid slumbers, and phasing kicks in. Our screen briefly fades to black, and when we 'awaken', we find we're suddenly a member of the green dragon flight, with a 25 (or 10) man raid attacking us. Technologically speaking, this has been done in various 5 man dungeon bosses, so the mechanic is there. It just hasn't been done for the effect of turning us into dragons with 25 man raids beating on us. Threat tables are ignored for simplicity, and we take out the healers, dps, and tanks (likely in that order). Spawned copies of the raid probably won't play them very effectively as it is (priest healers casting smite or meleeing, whatever), so this phase is pretty simple, actually. Once you manage to wipe the raid, you regain control of your character. Any damage you suffered during the dragon phase is transferred to the players themselves (percentage based), and you have a chance to bandage while you wait for the rest of the raid to finish. The whole phase is timed, and anyone that can't overcome the odds dies, or is infected by some sort of 'overcome with nightmares' debuff... maybe a green whelp erupts from their body, killing them? Maybe the eruption doesn't kill them, but just hurts really bad. After the time limit is up, the Green stops channeling the nightmare phase, and the tanks pick her up again for phase 3 (phase 1 over again). This happens at 75, 50, 25% HP, or less frequently if desired (maybe 66, 33%).
"I grow weary of your foolish games! Let us see how *YOU* enjoy the prospect of being harassed by a swarm of tiresome insects, rawr!"
The whole raid slumbers, and phasing kicks in. Our screen briefly fades to black, and when we 'awaken', we find we're suddenly a member of the green dragon flight, with a 25 (or 10) man raid attacking us. Technologically speaking, this has been done in various 5 man dungeon bosses, so the mechanic is there. It just hasn't been done for the effect of turning us into dragons with 25 man raids beating on us. Threat tables are ignored for simplicity, and we take out the healers, dps, and tanks (likely in that order). Spawned copies of the raid probably won't play them very effectively as it is (priest healers casting smite or meleeing, whatever), so this phase is pretty simple, actually. Once you manage to wipe the raid, you regain control of your character. Any damage you suffered during the dragon phase is transferred to the players themselves (percentage based), and you have a chance to bandage while you wait for the rest of the raid to finish. The whole phase is timed, and anyone that can't overcome the odds dies, or is infected by some sort of 'overcome with nightmares' debuff... maybe a green whelp erupts from their body, killing them? Maybe the eruption doesn't kill them, but just hurts really bad. After the time limit is up, the Green stops channeling the nightmare phase, and the tanks pick her up again for phase 3 (phase 1 over again). This happens at 75, 50, 25% HP, or less frequently if desired (maybe 66, 33%).
That's the basic rundown of the fight mechanic, but obviously there will need to be more flavor abilities thrown in to mix up the fight, depending on how difficult the actual dream phase is.
Playing with the green flight mechanics would be fun, and you could poke a few jabs in for good measure... druids trying to sleep a whelp actually enrages them (or empowers them), and Dreamless Sleep Potions (Potion of Nightmares?) snap you to number one on the threat table (emote: HOW DARE YOU SLEEP, BUT FORSAKE YOUR DREAMS?! / YOU FOOLISHLY DARE TO SLEEP IN MY PRESENCE?!).
Clever use of phasing could make an interesting fight as well. We could have adds spawning randomly throughout the encounter, and slip a raid member into a phase without them realizing it, and make a raid member targettable (and visible to everyone else) as a whelp. Having the rogue on whelp duty begin beating on someone and the raid freaking out saying THAT ISN'T A WHELP DIPSHIT, IT'S FRED, GOD DAMMIT would make for classic encounters. Not a direct mind control that takes control AWAY form the player, but to make it appear on their screen that the shaman standing next to them is a whelp, and they go to Mutilate poor Fred three times in the face before realizing that it isn't a whelp after all.
Clever use of phasing could make an interesting fight as well. We could have adds spawning randomly throughout the encounter, and slip a raid member into a phase without them realizing it, and make a raid member targettable (and visible to everyone else) as a whelp. Having the rogue on whelp duty begin beating on someone and the raid freaking out saying THAT ISN'T A WHELP DIPSHIT, IT'S FRED, GOD DAMMIT would make for classic encounters. Not a direct mind control that takes control AWAY form the player, but to make it appear on their screen that the shaman standing next to them is a whelp, and they go to Mutilate poor Fred three times in the face before realizing that it isn't a whelp after all.
That would be some phasing I could get behind and appreciate. :)
(link to original post on my blog)
