The Nexus And Druids
My first successful run into The Nexus on Coldarra, in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, was a good time! We had a full group with two players who had run the Nexus many times before and three first timers. The line up included a level 80 Death Knight as Main Tank and a level 75 Resto Shammy on heals. With myself as a level 71 Boomkin, a level 71 Survival Hunter and a level 71 Frost Mage all on DPS we were able to burn through it pretty fast and with minimal problems. I was on off heals and the Hunters Bear pet was a handy off tank for those side pulls. Overall a good group for our needs.
Before going in for the first time see if you can pick up the couple of quests for inside. You can get these from the camp in Coldarra by the Griffin handler. There is one where you've got to find a book for some research and another where you've got to collect 5 shards. Get those quests, jump in a Nexus group and get in there!
The graphics are nice inside with a whole underground ice cave theme that goes along well with the lore for the new expansion. Upon entering you've got a decent area to setup and buff without worry of patrols. There will be a few wandering level 71-72 Elites at first, a ways off, that you can pull at will. Also you'll be looking at an Elite Boss named Keristrasza frozen in a big block of ice. Leave him alone for now. There are three under bosses you'll want to take out prior to waking this guy up.
As you progress from the entryway, through the first set of hallways that form a diamond shape, there are only a few solo wandering mob's to worry about. Once you wander out of the hallways, however things get a bit more crowded. Like many instances this is a multi level arrangement but it's pretty easy to get around. One reminder on pets and Trees here. You'll find yourself jumping down from platforms and levels. Pets and Druid Trees don't like to jump and tend to run around to the spot. This will cause problems in the Nexus and gets worse the further in you go. Mind your pets!
The biggest pull we had was around 5 or 6 mobs at once and pretty easy to handle with the group we had. The patrol patterns are not overly complicated so there won't be too many surprises if you you're your eyes open. We had a total of two small accidental aggros which, for three first timers, was not too bad. Keeping the Research quest in mind you'll find a book in the hallway full of mobs encased in ice. You'll know it when you see it. I found the book roughly halfway down that hallway.
Here's a quick run down on our experiences with the four bosses in The Nexus...
In this run we had no problem with Ormorok the Tree Shapper. He has a nasty little AoE where he shouts "Bleed!" and ice shards shoot up from the ground all over the place however he went down fast for us. Once down he dropped some Cleated Ice Boots which sport some nice stats.
The fight with Grand Mage Telestra was a different matter. I think this was one of only two times in the whole run that I dropped out of DPS and helped the Shammy heal. I also had to rez the Shammy at one point as well. By far the hardest fight in there for us. Telestras' got the crazy octopus thing where she grabs two or three of four of the party with magic chains and throws you back and forth around the chamber.
The third under boss, Anomolus, is sort of a pain. He's not that hard however there are add's to worry about and he'll go immune periodically for several seconds. His immunity occurs when he shrinks from his full size down to a small glowing ball of white light. He did however drop the Tome of the Lore Keepers which is a nice little off-hand piece.
The boss man? Old Keristrasza himself? Pretty nasty really. You've got to take out a few "guard" mobs first then his big ice cube melts and he starts going nuts. I learned after the fight it's a good idea to keep moving when around this guy. He's got a cone style cold attack, a cold based chain root spell and several DoT's that do some serious damage. In fact, even thought the Telestra fight was the hardest for our group, the fight with Keristrasza caused us the most overall damage. We almost lost a couple of party members during this one however, with some frantic backup healing, we got through it.
So first impression? With one death and four blue drops, some great experience and a fun group I thought it was great. Overall a lot of fun and I was glad to have two higher level's in the group for the first run!
About the Author:Bill spends way too much time running his Druid around the Battlegrounds and adding to his website at WoWDruid.com. Bill shares tips and tricks on running Druids in the World of Warcraft.
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