The Curator is the first boss in the WoW Burning Crusade expansion that drops Tier level gear - he drops the T4 gloves. He is located in Karazhan and is a bit more challenging than the other bosses you may have faced so far.
Ideal Group Composition:
1 Main Tank (uncrittable)
3 Healers
6 Strong DPS
It is best if your main tank is mostly in epics with perhaps a few blues. The same goes for your healers and DPS. This is the point at which Karazhan bosses (and trash) get a bit more difficult and hit harder, and also these later bosses require more in depth strategies and coordination. You may get stuck on Curator for a while but don't fret, if you're geared enough to down Curator then you're well off enough for all other bosses in Karazhan except maybe Prince Malchezaar and Nightbane.
NOTE: Be very careful when first entering The Curator's room as he has an extremely large aggro radius.
Before you start the fight, all ranged DPS, casters and healers will line up against the wall in Curator's room. They spread out in a semi-circle around the south edge of the room that Curator paces back and forth in. The tank will then pick up Curator when he paces back towards the raid (a hunter misdirect helps). The main tank will gain aggro on Curator as he tanks him 30 yards away from and facing the raid, right in the middle of the large hall he paces in.
Throughout most of the fight The Curator will send Astral Flares at random members of the raid. These need to be killed immediately and all DPS should be attacking them. Flares spawn every 10 seconds and so you need to be able to kill them very quickly.
After a period of spawning Astral Flares, the Curator will turn blue and use an ability called Evocation to restore his mana. During this phase he will not attack anyone and all damage done to him is increased by 200%. This lasts for 20 seconds at a time. This is when all DPS must focus on Curator. Each time he starts to Evocate though there will still be an Astral Flare left, so we assign two of our DPS to take care of remaining orbs before DPSing Curator directly.
That is the general flow of the fight. DPS kill the adds for a while until he evocates, then pop trinkets/cooldowns and wail on Curator. Then he goes back into Flare mode and everyone needs to kill Astral Flares again. The problem is that you are on a timer as The Curator enrages after 10 minutes and will quickly wipe the raid.
The Curator also uses an ability called Hateful Bolt that deals 5-6k arcane damage to whoever is second on his aggro list. This can be solved by having an affliction lock or other high-threat ranged or caster DPS class with high health periodically attack Curator instead of the Flares. They need to stay 2nd on threat, and that isn't all too difficult when they are the only DPS attacking them. The idea is that they soak the Hateful Bolts so that (for example) a healer or random DPS at low health doesn't get it. Healers will need to know who the Hateful Bolt tank is so that they can keep him at full health. A small amount of Arcane Resistance (say 50-100) is useful on the Hateful Bolt tank, though necessary.
Once you get The Curator down to 15%, he will stop summoning Astral Flares and Evocating. His damage output will also increase and he will use Hateful Bolt more. The healers need to spam heals on both the tank and the Hateful Bolt tank in order to keep them up during this phase. DPS and nuke him down and soon the giant mechanical thing in Karazhan known as The Curator will finally be dead.
Curator Tips & Tricks:
- Priests can take advantage of the increased damage during Evocation by sending in their Shadowfiend. They will most likely be rewarded with a completely full mana bar.
- Astral Flares don't stick around long enough for damage over time effects to be useful, so warlocks should use Shadow Bolt and so on.
- Threat is not a concern in this fight, so there is no need for Blessing of Salvation. Use buffs that increase damage output instead, if possible.
- This is a very mana intensive fight. Make sure that your healers have mana potions and mp5 food.
- Most problems encountered with the Curator will be either due to healers running out of mana part way through the fight, or DPS not killing flares fast enough. The best solution when your guild is having problems with this boss is to leave and then come back with more epics, superior raid specs and more consumables (i.e. flasks).
The Curator is perhaps the first serious boss Karazhan and hence in the new Burning Crusade flavored World of Warcraft. He can be quite a hassle and is a major gear check - you may have to make 10 or 20 attempts before you down him if your raid has substandard members (like Subtlety rogues and other non-raid specs or people in trash blues and greens) before you kill him. If you run into trouble, you may simply need to get some crafted epics made or PvP for some gear and then come back next week.
Check back soon for more World of Warcraft Raid Guides & Walkthroughs!
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