Beginning Ulduar - Guide to the Iron Army Gauntlet and Vehicles

2009-04-21

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Overview

Recently the World of Warcraft patch 3.1, Secrets of Ulduar, introduced an entirely new, 14 boss 10 and 25 man raid instance called Ulduar. This massive new zone is tuned for players already clearing current content (Obsidian Sanctum, Eye of Eternity, Naxxramas) and is home of the new Tier 8 and 8.5 armor sets.

The first thing a raid will encounter in Ulduar is the massive Iron Army, positioned strategically to prevent you and your team from breaking into Ulduar proper. The only way through this army is to use siege and attack vehicles lovingly provided by Brann Bronzebeard and his “research” team. Once you have defeated the army, the great Flame Leviathan will burst through the gates, initiating the first boss encounter of the raid.

Vehicle Specifics

Three types of vehicles are available to your raid, and you can get an overview of their purpose and abilities from the NPCs near each type in the staging area, when you first enter the instance. Two of each vehicle type are available on Normal and 5 of each are available on Heroic. Every raid member must be in a vehicle, either as a driver or passenger.

Siege Engine: Driver - Rams structures, uses a knock-back and silence attack, and can boost speed.

Siege Engine: Passenger - Shoots ground targets, uses anti-air missiles for helicopters and to catch oil slicks on fire. Can put up a weak shield to absorb some damage.

Demolisher: Driver - Launches long-range fireballs and special pyrite barrel attacks. Can also Ram. Launches a loaded passenger (necessary for Flame Leviathan fight).

Demolisher: Passenger - Picks up pyrite ammo, uses anti-air missiles for helicopters and to catch oil slicks on fire, and can load self into launcher.

Chopper - Plants oil slicks under enemies to be lit on fire and has a frontal cone attack. Can quickly retrieve players, who can then directly return to demolishers to be launched.

For the sake of both the battle against the iron army, and against Flame Leviathan, it is important that your team fill up the Demolishers first. These are the most important units in the FL fight. After Demolishers are filled, next priority is Siege Engines (1 driver, 1 turret operator), then Choppers.

The Fight

Flame Leviathan Strategy

The battle with the Iron Army is initiated by speaking with Brann Bronzebeard in the staging area. Once the raid is ready, you will exit en masse and immediately engage. The battle is, essentially, a gauntlet. You will fight simple ground units, air units in the form of gyrocopters, as well as large Iron Colossus’ that need to be interrupted by Siege Engines. Pyrite Barrels need to be picked up by demolisher passengers when dropped. For the Iron Army battle, use basic attacks that don’t use special ammo. Destroying structures is also a top priority. When you get near the gates of Ulduar, to the end of the gauntlet, there will be a large green pad on the ground that will repair your vehicles. Proceed forward and clear out the remaining trash, then the Flame Leviathan will burst through the gates and engage.

Flame Leviathan Strategy

The Flame Leviathan is relatively simple, since no assignments for tanking, healing, etc need to be given. The whole raid needs to be aware of how the fight plays out prior to engaging so that they can work together to bring down the boss. Throughout the fight, FL will randomly select a Demolisher or Siege Engine and chase it. The driver must kite the boss along a set path (determined by each individual raid group) until FL switches targets. Use any speed boosts at your disposal to gain distance on the boss if you are kiting. When not kiting, all other units must deal constant damage. Choppers must always have tar down along the boss’ path.

Demolisher passengers need to load themselves into the launcher shortly after the fight has begun. The Demolisher driver will then be able to launch them onto the Flame Leviathan (don’t miss!) where they must DPS down the two turrets. You must launch, at minimum, 1 healer and 1 DPS, or two hybrids that can self-heal. Once the turrets are destroyed, FL will be stunned and the players will be launched off of his back and parachute down.

Tar must be ignited underneath Flame Leviathan during the stun, and all units must deal their hardest DPS. This includes Demolishers switching to Pyrite Barrels. Choppers also need to ferry the cannon fodder around, picking up players that were kicked off his back and returning them to Demolishers. After the stun wears off, turrets will repair, he will start chasing another Siege vehicle, and the fight will continue as before.

Rinse and repeat until dead.

This post is part of the series: WoW Ulduar Boss Guides

Check out this article series for strategies to take down the bosses of Ulduar in World of Warcraft.