Akil’zon Strategy Guide (Zul’Aman)

akil'zon strategy guide (zul'aman) tbc classic
  • Author: Pride
  • Date: April 12, 2022
  • Updated: April 28, 2022
  • Expansion: TBC Classic
tbc classic raid guide

Zul’Aman Raid Guide

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Zul’Aman Loot

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Akil’zon

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Nalorakk

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Jan’alai

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Halazzi

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Hex Lord Malacrass

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Zul’jin

Akil’zon, the Eagle Avatar, is one of the 4 Loa bosses that players will fight in the Zul’Aman raid.

He will typically be the first boss that players fight in Zul’Aman, which is fitting as he is among the easiest bosses from a mechanics standpoint. Defeating Akil’zon adds 10 minutes to the timed challenge event.

This guide will offer a detailed, step-by-step tutorial on how to put a stop to Akil’zon and his electric shenanigans.

Role Summaries

  • Make sure you’re on Akil’zon’s platform when he is engaged, not on the stairs — you will be locked out if you’re on the stairs
  • Immediately as the fight starts, spread out so you’re at least 13 yards away from every other player
  • If you get knocked into the air by Gust of Wind, use Levitate, Blink, Cat Form, Divine Shield, etc to negate the fall damage
  • When your raid boss addon (DBM, etc) shows that Akil’zon’s Electrical Storm is coming up, stack with other players in the middle of the arena
  • Make sure you’re standing within 10 yards of the player targeted by Electrical Storm — you are protected from the storm while around them
  • After the Electrical Storm ends, move back to your previous position, at least 13 yards away from other players
  • Use a Master Healthstone to survive if your healers are getting overwhelmed by the raid damage
  • Use your personal DPS cooldowns during Heroism / Bloodlust for maximum DPS
  • As much as possible, try to stay away from other melee so you don’t constantly zap each other with Static Disruption
  • If your raid doesn’t stack in time for Electrical Storm, you won’t be able to DPS Akil’zon during the storm — don’t die trying to do so
  • Kill the Soaring Eagles if your healers are struggling to keep your raid alive
  • Use your personal DPS cooldowns during Heroism / Bloodlust for maximum DPS
  • Don’t be at your maximum range from Akil’zon, just far enough from other players so you don’t zap each other with Static Disruption
  • Kill the Soaring Eagles if your healers are struggling to keep your raid alive — it’ll be a lot easier for you than melee DPS
  • Shadow Priests, Warlocks: Be very careful of your self-damage during this fight, try to do it when your healers can heal you
  • The main tank will generally not take a lot of damage during this fight, but watch out for Call Lightning
  • The melee DPS will inevitably take more damage from Static Disruption and need more healing
  • Watch out for people getting knocked into the air by Gust of Wind, they will take heavy fall damage upon landing
  • Call out if you are getting overwhelmed by the raid damage, so that DPS players know they should kill the Soaring Eagles, reducing damage
  • Akil’zon doesn’t hit particularly hard outside of Call Lightning — you can focus on DPS / threat gear & consumables for this fight
  • Help your healers out by using defensive cooldowns if they’re struggling to keep the raid alive
  • You will need to stack with the rest of the raid during Electrical Storm, the same as everyone else

Abilities

Deals 3800 to 4200 Nature damage to Akil’zon’s current target. Most tanks will not be too bothered by this amount of damage, but if your main tank doesn’t have the strongest gear, you could consider buffing their Nature Resistance with Nature Resistance Totem or Aspect of the WIld in order to mitigate the incoming damage a little.

Cast every 15 to 20 seconds, but Akil’zon cannot cast this spell while channeling Electrical Storm.

Akil’zon targets a random player in the raid. That player, and all players within 12 yards of them, will take 3500 Nature damage and be afflicted with a debuff that increases their Nature damage taken by 25% for 20 seconds. The debuff can stack up to 10 times, for a total of 250% increased Nature damage, which will cause just about anyone to die to the next Static Disruption.

This spell will be one of the 2 main mechanics you have to deal with in this encounter, besides Electrical Storm. Make sure no players are within 12 yards of each other, by using the “/range 12” command on a raid boss addon such as DeadlyBossMods.

Cast every 5 to 15 seconds, but Akil’zon will not use this spell while channeling Electrical Storm.

Akil’zon targets a random player in the raid (besides the main tank) and knocks them high into the air. That player will take a high amount of fall damage when they land — typically 5000 to 8000. Spells like Levitate, Blink, Cat Form, Divine Shield, etc that mitigate fall damage can be very helpful in preventing deaths here.

Cast every 15 to 30 seconds, but Akil’zon will not use this spell while channeling Electrical Storm.

Akil’zon targets a random player in the raid, raises them into the air and stuns them for 8 seconds. That player is the “eye of the storm” — players further than 10 yards from them will be zapped by the thunderstorm that envelops the arena, taking 800 damage per second, which increases by 800 per tick, with the final tick dealing 6400 Nature damage to them. Players within 10 yards of the targeted player are protected and take no damage.

It will be imperative that your raid starts moving towards one another when Electrical Storm’ may be cast. There’s a small chance that your entire raid gets hit by Static Disruption by stacking early, but that will be a lot easier to deal with than Electrical Storm’s ramping damage.

Cast every 45 to 60 seconds, and as it is a channeled skill, Akil’zon will not use any other abilities for the 8 seconds he channels Electrical Storm. Furthermore, he will typically not use any other spells for 10-15 (besides summon Soaring Eagles) seconds after using Electrical Storm, giving players time to heal back and move back to their previous position.

Every ~60 seconds — so immediately after Electrical Storm — Akil’zon will summon 8 Soaring Eagles. These eagles are level 70, have only 3800 HP and will pick random targets to attack with their Eagle Swoop ability, which is more annoying than it is dangerous most of the time.

However, over time your raid may find themselves being overwhelmed by the amount of eagles flying around damaging your party, so if your group doesn’t have high enough damage to kill Akil’zon quickly, or if your healers are struggling to keep you alive, you may want to just kill them.

The Soaring Eagle picks a random player and charges towards them, dealing 1721 to to 1999 Physical damage to them. As the damage is Physical, it will be reduced by armor, so most players will barely even notice the damage — but the fact that it slows down casting will be annoying for caster DPS and healers.

Raid Composition & Preparation

There’s a decent amount of raid damage coming out during this fight, so if your group has a Warlock, it can help if every raid member has a Master Healthstone for emergencies, such as an unfortunately timed Gust of Wind.

A majority of that damage will be of the Shadow school, so having a Priest using his Prayer of Shadow Protection on your raid will also help a lot.

Furthermore, most of Akil’zon’s damage will be Nature, so it can help if your Hunters and Shamans use Aspect of the WIld & Nature Resistance Totem respectively in order to mitigate some of it. This will only really be necessary if your healers are struggling to keep your raid alive, however.

This fight is one of the more healing intensive fights in all of Zul’Aman. Most of the damage coming in will be dealt to your raid however, so a single Restoration Shaman or Holy Priest can keep your raid up with their powerful AoE healing spells. However, it’s recommended that you have at least 2 healers here, while groups with weaker DPS may even want to run 3 healers, so each individual healer’s mana isn’t strained as much.

Akil’zon himself doesn’t deal very high damage, besides the occasional Call Lightning. Thus your healers can focus on raid healing most of the time and only swap to healing the tank as necessary. Restoration Druids will thus be exceptional in this fight, thanks to their ability to keep healing-over-time effects on the main tank, while also healing other players as they take damage. Holy Paladins meanwhile won’t have the best time, due to their lack of AoE heal spells.

It can help if your healers use +healing consumables for this fight, such as Elixir of Healing Power and Golden Fish Sticks. There’s a lot of damage to heal here, and that extra little bit of healing power can make a small difference.

Caster DPS players have a slight disadvantage in this fight, due to suffering constant spell pushback from the Soaring Eagles and various other AoE effects in this fight. Having multiple melee DPS players on the other hand will cause them to take excessive damage from Static Disruption, so stacking melee won’t be the best idea either. A balance of melee & ranged DPS is thus recommended, though Hunters are exceptional here.

Having higher raid DPS can help you kill Akil’zon before his Soaring Eagles overwhelm you, thus allowing you to ignore them. To that end, it can be very helpful if your DPS players use appropriate flasks, buff food and other consumables for this fight, to help kill him a bit faster.

Only 1 tank is needed for this fight, and their class doesn’t matter much. Feral Druids have a small advantage thanks to their higher HP pool allowing them to shrug off Call Lightning, but that’s not really enough to recommend them over the other tank classes — they all get the job done fine.

Akil’zon’s damage is pretty low, so if your tanks have reasonable gear, they could elect to use DPS / threat consumables for this fight. This in turn can help kill him a bit faster, thus preventing your raid from getting overwhelmed by Soaring Eagles, if your raid is electing to ignore them.

The Pull

After clearing the mobs before the stairs leading up to Akil’zon’s platform, your raid will be ready to fight him.

akilzon 0

Buff up, regenerate your mana etc and you’re good to go. Once you’re ready, have your Hunters use Misdirection on the tank and pull. If your group doesn’t have any Hunters, the main tank can just run in — Akil’zon will typically not use any abilities right at the start, so it’s safe for them to do so.

Note that like most Zul’Aman bosses, Akil’zon’s platform will be locked up the moment you engage him. Therefore, your raid should all make sure to be on the platform when you’re pulling — don’t be on the stairs, or you’ll be locked out of his arena and thus be unable to help your raid. His aggro range isn’t particularly high, so it’s safe to move up between the braziers while buffing.

The Fight

Akil’zon’s encounter is fairly straight-forward — it consists of a dance between 2 different positions. The moment you engage him, your entire group should spread out around his arena, making sure they are at least 13 yards away from other players — /range 13 with a raid boss addon like a DBM can help there.

akilzon 1 2

You can spread out in any way you see fit. The only thing that can help a little bit is if your healers are around the middle of the arena, so they can reach everyone with their healing spells without having to move around. Akil’zon will even be extra nice and typically not use any of his abilities for the first 10 seconds, giving all of you ample time to spread out.

These first 10 seconds will be the best time for your raid to use Heroism / Bloodlust, along with each DPS player’s personal DPS cooldowns. Later on you’ll have to move in order to deal with Electrical Storm and suffer spell pushback from the Soaring Eagles, reducing your damage output.

10 seconds in, he’ll start casting his regular abilities: Static Disruption, Call Lightning and Gust of Wind, likely in that order. There’s very low damage coming out at this point, so your healers should have no problem dealing with the incoming damage, provided everyone has been spreading out correctly.

About 40 seconds in, your raid will want to stack up in the middle of the platform, as shown in the picture below.

akilzon 2 2

Some groups will elect to only stack up when it starts raining, signifying the beginning of Akil’zon’s Electrical Storm. This will result in the player who becomes the eye of the storm to potentially be very far away, forcing several players to have to run a long distance, while your melee DPS cannot attack Akil’zon for the Electrical Storm‘s duration. Thus it will be beneficial for groups with melee DPS to stack up early, though that in turn may result in your raid getting hit by Static Disruption — which will generally not be a huge problem for your healers to heal off, as no other raid damage is coming out at this time.

If your raid stacked up correctly, you should suffer no casualties to the Electrical Storm. Everyone now has about 10 seconds to go back to their previous spots, as Akil’zon won’t use any abilities immediately after the storm, besides one: summoning his Soaring Eagles, which will always follow after the storm. If your raid managed to get Akil’zon below 70% HP at this time, you likely have enough DPS to just ignore the eagles. If he’s higher than 70% HP however, or if your healers are struggling with keeping your raid alive, you may want to kill them, making the rest of the raid a bit easier.

And that is the entirety of the Akil’zon encounter — you have now seen all of his mechanics, and after the Electrical Storm, the fight essentially starts from scratch again. It generally becomes a battle of attrition, as your healers’ mana gets worn down over time — but if you manage to get through the Electrical Storm without losing players, you are likely not going to struggle with his other mechanics. Simply pay attention to your raid boss addon, like DeadlyBossMods, showing you when the next Electrical Storm is coming, stack up in time, and beat this oversized bird!

Congratulations on defeating Akil’zon! His death will extend your timed challenge timer by 10 minutes, which is a great start for your foray into Zul’Aman!

 

About the Author

Pride

Classic WoW is my jam, with a passion for PvP. Most know me as Baranor, the ret paladin guy, but I'm secretly a druid main, don't tell anyone. In my free time I play Switch games, particularly JRPGs. Some day I'll be making my own games and I humbly hope you play those too!
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