Rukhmar Detailed Strategy Guide (2024)

Table of Contents

• +1. General Information
  • 1.1. Enrage Timer
  • 1.2. Loot
• 2. Spawn Patterns
• 3. Overview of the Fight
• 4. Abilities
• 5. Strategy
• 6. When to Use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp
• 7. Corpse Running/Avoiding Wipes
• 8. Learning the Fight
• 9. Concluding Remarks

Introduction

This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of theencounter with Rukhmar in Draenor. It is targeted at anyonewho desires to understand the fight mechanics.

This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.1.2.

Rukhmar is a world boss in Draenor. This is the most complex worldboss encounter of the expansion, requiring your raid to deal with a multitudeof abilities, as well as with constant raid damage. Your raid members' abilityto kite adds is also important.

We do not know if Rukhmar has a hard enrage timer, and there donot appear to be any soft enrage mechanics present in the encounter. That said,given the fact that there is constant raid-wide damage throughout the fight,it is possible that healers will eventually run out of mana if the fight goeson for too long.

To be added.

Rukhmar spawns in the north-western part of the Spires of Arak.Specifically, you can find her exactly west of the Skyreach mountain. Whileshe is a flying mob, when engaged (from one of the cliffs near whichshe flies), she lands and engages your raid.

We are unsure of what the respawn timer of this boss is, but it most likelyfollows other world bosses in having a longer timer.

It is also worth mentioning that the tagging system for world bosses isfaction-wide. That is to say, as long as the boss is engagedby someone on your faction, all other members of your faction are eligiblefor loot if they engage the boss, regardless of whether or not they aregrouped together.

The fight against Rukhmar revolves mostly around properly dealing with thePhoenix adds that spawn throughout the fight. These addsfixate on raid members, and explode when they reach their target. When they arekilled (or after exploding), they turn into Piles of Ash that can be reignitedthroughout the fight by certain mechanics, which in turn resurrects thePhoenixes. Your raid will need to minimise the number of such occurrences.

Aside from this, your raid will have to contend with the damage thatRukhmar deals, as well as with avoiding certain abilities.

In addition to the summoning of adds, which is a central part of the fight,and which we discuss in the second part of this section, Rukhmar has a fewabilities that she uses against your raid.

• Sharp Beak is an ability that Rukhmar uses against her tank.This deals a high amount of damage, and applies a stack of the Pierced Armor debuff, which increases the damage of subsequentSharp Beak attacks. This ability (and the debuff) require a tank switch.
• Solar Breath is a frontal cone breath attack that Rukhmar uses. Itdeals a very high amount of Fire damage.
• Loose Quills is an ability that Rukhmar uses regularly. She fliesup into the air, and damages random raid members and any allies within 8 yardsof them for a very high amount of Fire damage.
• Solar Radiation is an ability that Rukhmar uses every 15 secondsthroughout the entire duration of the fight. It deals a very high amount ofraid-wide Fire damage.

In addition to these abilities, whenever Rukhmar loses a certain amount ofhealth (we are unsure exactly how much), she casts Blood Feather.Feathers fall from her, at the locations of random raid members, dealingextremely high Fire damage in a 5-yard radius, and spawning a Fixated Phoenixadd. As the name implies, this Phoenix fixates on a random raid member, andchases them. If the Phoenix reaches its target, or if it is killed before itcan do so, it explodes, dealing a high amount of damage in a small radius, andturning into a Pile of Ash. These Fixated Phoenixes cannot be tanked.

Piles of Ash do not do anything, and normally remain inactive for the entirefight. However, if a feather from Blood Feather explodes at the location of aPile of Ash, or if a Fixated Phoenix explodes near one, the Pile of Ash willbecome active, and it will turn into a Fixated Phoenix that will choose a newtarget and chase them around all over again.

Your raid should be spread out in a semi-circle around Rukhmar (in such away that no one except her tank is located in front of her). We will summarisethe strategy before going into more details.

• Tanks will have to regularly perform a tank switch in order to deal with Sharp Beak, and the Pierced Armor debuff that it applies. Theywill also have to have defensive cooldowns available for Solar Breath,since it cannot be avoided.
• Healers will have to keep the raid alive through the regular damagecaused by Solar Radiation and Loose Quills, as well as keepingtanks alive through Solar Breath.
• DPS players will have to kill any Fixated Phoenixes, making sure that thesedo not die when they are too close to Piles of Ash.
• All players will have to avoid damage from Blood Feather, spreadout when Loose Quills is cast to minimise damage, as well as makingsure not to be caught if they are fixated upon by a Phoenix.

Regarding tanking, it goes without saying that the tank that is notcurrently tanking Rukhmar should not be in front of her when Solar Breath isbeing cast.

Throughout the fight, all raid members will have to be very mindful of theirpositioning. No one should ever be standing on top of a Pile of Ash, becausethis could easily be ignited if the player is targeted by Blood Feather. In any case, whenever players are targeted byBlood Feathers, they will have to move away immediately to avoid beingdamaged by the feather's explosion.

When Rukhmar flies into the air in preparation for Loose Quills,players will have to spread out 8 yards or more apart, so that no the raid doesnot take any unnecessary damage.

We recommend using Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp atthe start of the fight, when all players have their DPS cooldowns available.

Because the fight does not take place in an instanced environment, it ispossible for dead raid members to release spirit and run back to the place wherethey died and resurrect. This is a good way for your raid to replenish itsnumbers. Keep in mind the following things:

• After 2 resurrections in quick succession, you will have to wait for 2 minutesbefore you can resurrect again.
• When you resurrect, you come back with 50% of your maximum health. It isbest that healers are prepared ahead of time to heal you.
• It is best to group up (in ghost form) and resurrect at the same time,rather than each one individually. This gives you a better chance torecover.

If a large portion of your raid dies, remaining raid members should attemptto delay a wipe for as long as possible, to give the dead raid members achance to run back.

Aside from the various gear checks imposed by the fight (most notably inthe form of the high raid-wide and tank damage), the key to defeating theboss is being able to efficiently handle the Phoenixes, namely making sure notto reignite any Pillars of Ash. This is something that might take a fewattempts to master (or, given the fact that anyone at all can participate inthe attempts on the boss, a few weeks for players to become accustomed to theability).

This concludes our raid guide for Rukhmar. We hope you havefound it helpful. Please do not hesitate to post any feedback you may have onour forums.