This is for most people the hardest boss to fight in the fractals. So here is what I learned about how to fight him.
Pre-Battle
The most foolproof way to jump the final gap (so as not to fall into the lava) is to run along the metal track in addition to jumping. That way if you mess up you wont fall into the lava and have to go into the ‘danger zone’
If you fall into the lava on the final jump, then run around in circles on the land part so as not to take any damage from standing still. No need to aggro the boss or force your team into a confrontation before they are ready
Standard Battle Tactics
Always move when possible. If you’re still, you take extra burning damage. Its even okay to back up and run forward in relatively the same area as long as your character keeps moving.
One person will always have the Fire Shaman’s aggro. This person will be susceptible to fireball attacks that cause burning, and agony (on Lvl.10+). These attacks can be dodged more easily if you are further from the shaman when he uses them.
Projectile reflection will protect against the Shaman’s fireball attack as well as the projectiles that Lava Elementals shoot.
Beating the bubble
When the shaman bubbles up. He will gain a ‘bubble’ buff with a certain amount of charges (30 I think). During this time, the shaman should be your primary target, every hit will remove a charge you should use as many rapid-attacks as possible to quickly drain the charges on his bubble. Do not fight the lava elementals until his bubble is broken.
The shaman, while bubbled will slowly move towards the nearest captive. If he gets close enough before the bubble is destroyed he will kill the captive and thus heal himself.
To give yourself time to kill him before he reaches a captive, make sure you spend most of the battle kiting him towards the center of the combat area. If he is close to the edges (where the captive are) when he does bubble, then you may not be able to remove his bubble quickly enough to prevent him from healing.
Lava Elementals
Remember to do things in this order when these guys appear: Focus on the Shaman’s bubble -> Then Kill all the Lava Elementals -> THEN revive defeated teammates.
Reviving Defeated Teammates
One person will always draw the aggro of the boss, and he loves dropping lava fonts on whoever has the aggro. If you have the aggro, then stay away from defeated party members and the people reviving them.
Whoever doesnt have the aggro, go revive. If possible, drop an AoE heal or regenerate on whoever is reviving to help mitigate the ‘standing’ still damage that the teammate might take while reviving.
In this battle plan you have not mentioned his agony attack which you will see from level 10 and up. for levels lower than 10 the attack will just be a fire ball, but at 10+ the fire ball will also contain agony.
You can dodge it, however, the further your away from the boss the easier it is to see it coming, and the fire ball is quite fast. It is something that will make it more difficult for you to get close to him when he is close to go into his bubble. Especially alongside all the fire elemental’s spawning.
If you have a guardian you can lay down a wall of reflection, have the team stand behind anywhere (even way behind if you need to spread out) and it’ll reflect the agony projectiles
Another tip is to keep strafing left and right, that’s a guaranteed way to dodge his agony attack as long as you have some distance. It also keeps you moving to prevent the burning effect.
His bubble does not make him immune to CC I believe. So players should look to be using those on him as he tries to move.
Also the elementals attacks are all projectiles, so you can reflect those too.
For my ele I usually
meteor shower when the boss is at 76% hp (first bubble is at 75%)
switch to earth and pop magnetic shield as the elementals spawn (I am now safe)
Throw down the crippling line
switch to air, throw down the static field, switch to water throw down the ice field
back to fire, mop up any bubble stacks he has and the elementals
Carry signet of earth too for an extra immobilize if he’s still moving after that.
What build do you run though? A far tankier build is more useful attacking the bubble, as it cares not about your damage. Whereas a far more DPS build lets you 1-2shot lava elementals sometimes.
As a guardian, for this fight I generally pick up the trait that create an absorption bubble when you start to rez a team mate. I find it pretty usefull against this boss.
Depends on whether or not you’re willing to risk him healing (and gaining 25% HP) and dragging out the fight, or risk extra teammates going down due to damage from the adds.
In my experience though, as long as you knock his bubble down, and take down the lava eles then you have plenty of time to revive teammates, since it’s not too crazily hard for someone to kite him while the other revives. Sure you need a good amount of burst healing to keep up with the temporary amount of high incoming damage from the lava eles, but its perfectly survivable if you can knock his bubble out quickly.
One alternative strategy might be for a party member or 2 to use all of their rapid burst attacks to knock down his bubble charges then switch to culling out the lava eles, while a teammate or two continues to attack him and knock his bubble out before he heals. This would mean that your guys dont spend a long amount of time slowly plinking away at his bubble while getting assaulted by all the lava eles. However all rapid fire attacks should go to the shaman while he is bubbled.
Have a guardian run into the center of the Lava Elementals – pop the skill that AoE pulls enemies towards him (forget the name). Elementalist drops 2-3 AoE’s on that pack. Lava Elementals are no more
Playing on Tarnished Coast
Playing a various Stormspire alt – if it’s Stormspire, it’s probably me
Guilds: Elder Prophets [EP], Principality of New Katulus (PiNK)
To be honest the best success I have ever had with this Shaman boss is to:
1) have the team go to one of the corners where one of the enslaved peeps are right before the Lava minons spawn.
2) once the lava minon spawn, the team holds the line with AOE and pushbacks while range is DPS the bosses bubble down
3) From start of the lava spawns the whole group is moving around the edge with all the lava minons clumped together getting AOE’d down to towards the next enslaved peep. REMEMBER stay around the edge, don’t want to be running through the lava spawns.
4) If anyone goes down, DO NOT REVIVE THEM – It is their own job to kill a lava spawns to pop back up so help them by killing the spawn with the lowest life
5) Rinse repeat – easy peezy
At later levels when more elementals spawn its usually better to kill off some of them first. They’ll wipe the group very fast unless youve got a tanky/healy group.
If you have a warrior or 2 its even easier. Just have them run “Fear me!” and fear the shaman when he gets close to the captive. that should give you more than enough time to finish off the elementals without having to worry about the shamans attacks as well.
What build do you run though? A far tankier build is more useful attacking the bubble, as it cares not about your damage. Whereas a far more DPS build lets you 1-2shot lava elementals sometimes.
im a ranger and i run a glass cannon build with a few points spread out into other traits.
i bring and use 3 sets of different armor to my fractal runs.
At later levels when more elementals spawn its usually better to kill off some of them first. They’ll wipe the group very fast unless youve got a tanky/healy group.
this is the reason why we keep the shaman in his bubble for as long as possible imo.
and this is one of the people in my fractal groups shaman run at lvl 43.
What build do you run though? A far tankier build is more useful attacking the bubble, as it cares not about your damage. Whereas a far more DPS build lets you 1-2shot lava elementals sometimes.
im a ranger and i run a glass cannon build with a few points spread out into other traits.
i bring and use 3 sets of different armor to my fractal runs.
At later levels when more elementals spawn its usually better to kill off some of them first. They’ll wipe the group very fast unless youve got a tanky/healy group.
this is the reason why we keep the shaman in his bubble for as long as possible imo.
and this is one of the people in my fractal groups shaman run at lvl 43.
See, for glass cannon, you can kill the elementals long before it becomes a problem. I run a much tankier ele build, so for me by the time I actually kill each elemental, I could have dropped 5+ stacks of the bosses shield. (well, unless a guardian bunches them up oh so nicely for me)
Well, you have a good point about culling some lava eles quickly. However you can see in that video they do not completely ignore his shielded state to attack eles but rather put most of their attacks on the bubble and some of their attacks on the eles until the bubble is dispelled at which point they bunch up into one group so as to make the eles move in a single predictable direction and nuke them with AoE.
You also forgot to mention the buff the boss gets after his shield gets broken.
I believe it’s called “Berserk” and it increases his damage quite heavily. Best to avoid taking any damage, especially since you’re probably at melee range after destroying his shield. His attacks can easily one shot if he does his Air-to-ground AOE
This is by far the hardest fractal once you get into the 20’s. The shaman boss is nearly impossible for pugs. I feel like half my team dies during ele phase. Of the 2 remaining, 1 person kites, another tries to res, but the kiter gets agony and dies before even 1 person can be resed. (we always pop his bubble, then kill eles. killing eles is when people die.)
