Anzu and Utilizing the Spirits; a Healing Guide

So, you've got yourself the epic flight form quest, and you're off to Heroic Sethekk. Or, in my case, a fellow druid has, and you have offered to heal. This is excellent; a druid is the most efficient healer for the Raven Lord fight due to certain peculiarities.

It is not a difficult fight by any means, and can easily be done in your first try as long as everyone is on top of their game.

Anzu has two phases.

In Phase One, he is, mostly, a tank-and-spank. I would suggest being out of tree form unless you have a mage or moonkin who is capable and willing to multi-task; there is a dangerous ability Anzu has called "Spell Bomb." Spell Bomb is a curse which causes the target it affects to be mana burned for a high amount of mana and health whenever the person who is affected by it casts a spell. The only safe spell to use while affected is Decursing spells. Since this ability is not available in tree form, it is better to conserve mana by staying out of tree rather than switching in and out.

Besides Spell Bomb, Anzu has several other abilities. One is called "Cyclone of Feathers," which should be interrupted whenever it is cast. It is much the same as a druid cyclone, and it affects random members of the group (besides the tank). This can be extremely detrimental.

Another spell is Paralyzing Screech. While this has a cast time of five seconds, it is not able to be interrupted. This will stun the entire group for six seconds, so it is imperative that you keep HoTs stacked on the tank before this happens. Your Lifebloom will, more likely than not, expire in this time, so be aware it will have to be restacked.

At 66% and 33% life, Anzu will Banish himself and summon a group of non-elite crows. It is imperative at this time that you keep any AoE dps up, though the whole group will likely be taking damage. Anzu will still cast Spell Bomb at this stage, so this is another thing to watch out for. An addon like Decursive is very helpful in quickly identifying and eliminating the debuffs.

But wait, that sounds like a normal boss fight, not much more intricate than others. You said there was something peculiar about it that made druid casters great healers for this boss. And that I did!

When Anzu is summoned, three friendly NPC's are summoned with him. They are three bird spirits: Hawk Spirit, Eagle Spirit, and Falcon Spirit. These Spirits are arranged in a triangle around Anzu, and it's imperative you're within range of all of them. Standing in the middle of the room becomes a Good Idea.

Why is it important, though? Well, the spirits at the time of summoning are "stone" and require druid HoTs to wake them. As long as a HoT is ticking on them they will be awake and provide certain buffs to the party, or debuffs to the enemy. These are as follows:

Hawk - Players receive 500 less damage from attacks
Eagle - All enemies in the room receive 300 periodic damage (300 damage per second)
Falcon - 25% increase to movement speed, melee haste and casting haste

The most important Spirit to keep up at all times is the arguably the Hawk. This will make your healing job easier, as you will have to split your focus between keeping HoTs on your Spirits, your party, and decursing.

The Eagle is most important in Phase 2, but Anzu has a smaller health pool than many heroic bosses, so it is still worth the druid HoT otherwise.

Falcon is useful in all cases, and, with the change of spell haste lowering the GCD, may be more beneficial for druids in the long run.

There are several accepted macros for making this much easier. They are:

/target Eagle Spirit
/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)
/targetlasttarget

/target Hawk Spirit
/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)
/targetlasttarget

/target Falcon Spirit
/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)
/targetlasttarget

OR

/target [button:1] Hawk Spirit
/target [button:3] Eagle Spirit
/target [button:2] Falcon Spirit
/cast Rejuvenation(Rank 1)
/targetlasttarget

The first allows for a set of three buttons you can click depending on which Spirit you wish to target, and then it will return to your last target so you have no downtime in healing your party. The second allows for one macro which changes targets based upon which mouse button is used to click it. Left mouse is 1, right mouse is 2, middle is 3.

Unfortunately, past the end of your epic mount quest, there is not much to look forward to in drops from Anzu for a resto druid. There is a socketable leather dps belt, and there is the rare and coveted mount, but otherwise it is merely for the sake of another badge and some drops for your party members. Which isn't a bad thing, no?