The Five Amber Oculus Run

A lot of people don't want to be in Oculus more than they have to, yet they dearly want that Red Proto-Drake Mount from the Glory of the Hero achievement. And a good way to knock out two void achievements at once (Emerald and Ruby) is to do Oculus with all five people riding an Amber Drake.

This strategy, though not overly difficult by any means, does require communication, so you might wish to be on a voice chat program with your group. Also realize it can take a few wipes to get the hang of it. Since these are not Ulduar vehicles and they do not gain any benefit from your gear, there's nothing stopping you from stripping to your skivvies and enjoying repair-free deaths. It's best, as well, if you've done Oculus on normal, first, so you have an idea of what to expect.

The first thing to do is make sure you understand what your Amber Drake can do. They have three moves: Shock Lance, Stop Time, and Temporal Rift. Temporal Rift is not available to you until the third boss dies and you are on to Eregos. Shock Lance is your basic damaging spell. When combined with Shock Charges generated by Temporal Rift, it detonates them, causing extra damage to Eregos. Time Stop freezes all enemies in place with a diminishing return. And Temporal Rift builds up your shock charges so long as while you are channeling it, other drakes (in this case, other Ambers) are doing damage.

Setting up Jobs and Rotations

Alright, so you're ready to go, have all mounted up on your Amber Drakes and are waiting to pull. It's time to assign jobs. You should split the group into two groups. The first group is composed of three Ambers. Their initial job is to channel Temporal Rift at the start of the fight. Channeling Temporal Rift does not pull the boss, so it's definitely doable to have all three channeling before the fight. The second group is composed of two Ambers who will be firing Shock Lance in the beginning. This builds up the other Ambers' Shock Charges. As soon as the other groups' Shock Charges are up to a stack of ten, groups switch jobs, so the ones who were channeling to begin are now firing Shock Lances (thus detonating their charges) and the ones who were firing Lances are now channeling, creating more Charges. As long as this rotation is kept up properly, no one drake should have to fire more than two Lances before switching to channeling.

Now it's time for Stop Time assignments. You will have two drakes assigned to the first active fight phase, and two more for the next active fight phase when he comes out of banish after kiting. The first Stop Time caster should always be one of the drakes in group two, who start with the Shock Lance. This enables the channelers to be channeling before the pull without interruption, and an Amber can pull with a Lance, then use Time Stop, and then resume Lancing. The second Time Stop should be used when he comes out of the first. Be careful not to clip the first Time Stop, as two Time Stops cast on top of each other makes it run short (weird but true).

If this sounds rather complicated, it's all right. I have created a simple time-line that shows Time Stop order. Here are the assignments:

D1 = First Time Stop (Lancer)
D2 = Second Time Stop (Channeler)
D3 = Third Time Stop (Lancer)
D4 = Fourth Time Stop (Channeler)
D5 = Back-up Time Stop (Channeler)

Eregos is Pulled
D1 casts Time Stop
Eregos comes out of Time Stop
D2 casts Time Stop
Eregos comes out of Time Stop
Eregos Banishes
Kite Phase
Eregos returns from Banish
D3 casts Time Stop
Eregos comes out of Time Stop
D4 casts Time Stop
Eregos comes out of Time Stop
Eregos Banishes
Kite Phase
D1 dies
Eregos returns from Banish
D5 casts Time Stop
(and so on)

If Eregos seems to be coming out of the second Time Stop too early and your Ambers are taking massive damage from his enrage, wait a few moments before casting Time Stop until he actually is announced as becoming enraged.

Setting up the Pull and How to Kite

It's best to start the pull from in front of Eregos's path. He flys counter-clockwise, so when he is directly opposite you on the map is the best time to move into position. The Channelers should begin channeling before the pull, and they have good enough range that all three should be able to do so before the first Shock Lance to aggro the boss. This ensures immediately high DPS.

When Eregos banishes, he summons orbs that chase the Drakes and must be kited. They can be outflown so long as you immediately fly away when he banishes. Sticking together also means that there is less of a chance of one drake dragging an orb into others. If you set up the pull as shown in the first diagram (and explained to the side) then the first kiting direction will be counter-clockwise.

The next time, when you engage the boss again, you will be on the opposite side. This is exactly like pulling the boss in terms of starting jobs, though there will be different drakes on Time Stops due to cooldowns. This also means if he banishes himself again, you will need to kite clockwise away from him to get away from the orbs.

It sounds more complicated than it really is. It may take some trial and error, and requires some communication. You will lose drakes during even a successful fight, but it is very doable so long as people focus and understand how to use their mounts and their abilities, and keep to the rotation. And, well, if you took off all your armor, there's no reason to get stressed over repair bills. Just do your best, see what works, and soon you'll be two steps closer to a menacing red mount.