What this page is
The Wowutils plan for The Coiled Altar: Guide for how to approach Cooldown Planning, and the jobs covered in the assignment planner. It is assumed that you already know the basics of the fight. For full boss guides, see the links in Full mechanics.
It covers
- CD Planning and Personal Defensives
- The Wowutils Assignments
- Raid-night quick reference
It skips
- Basic boss strategy
- Tank/Dps stuff
- The stuff other guides already cover
The Coiled Altar runs four stages: Zul'jan, Hex Lord Malacrass, the Soul Bind intermission, then Coiled Union with both at once to the kill. Orbs pulse rot on the raid and burst into stacking ruptures whenever Sever pops them, Hex Lord's stage is a flat rot floor with no hits, and Soul Bind is one long heavy window. Raid DR stacks on the orb detonation that ends Zul'jan's stage and on the grouped stomps in Soul Bind. In Coiled Union the deaths come from soaks and bombs, so personals matter most there.
- 1Zul'jan (0:00): A Sever about every 20 seconds pops the orbs the carriers bring. Fangs opens the pull and returns about 1:25 in, and the axe comes twice. The stage ends with every leftover orb detonating at once.
- 2Hex Lord (~2:55): Hex Lord joins and his aura sets a flat rot floor until Soul Bind. No raid hits: the two Nightfall absorbs are the spots for this stage's healing cooldowns.
- 3Soul Bind (~6:20): A 35 second intermission of fragment soaks. Spirit Erasure is one long window, and it spikes wherever the stomps bunch up.
- 4Coiled Union (~7:00 to the kill): Both bosses at once: the orbs and Blighted Sever ruptures return alongside the Nightfall absorbs, Defilement, Grim Guillotine and the adds. The orbs pile up toward the kill.
Orbs on the floor pulse damage through Zul'jan and Coiled Union, and Hex Lord's aura does the same through his whole stage. Together they do more damage than all the hits combined, so throughput matters between them.
Every Sever pops the orbs near the tank into a stacking raidwide burst, and the second Fangs lands on top of one. These are the regular raid cooldown windows.
The orb detonation when Zul'jan's stage ends and the grouped fragment stomps in Soul Bind. Hold raid DR for both and stack it.
Personal defensives
Ability timeline
Your Cooldown Plan
Zul'jan channels, pulsing damage on the whole raid while the altar spews poison pools that swell and then shrink. Once on the pull and once about 1:25 in. A third cast means the stage ran long enough that it is basically a wipe.
Every Sever destroys the orbs brought to the tank, and each one bursts into a 10 second damage over time on the whole raid. The stacks add up per orb, so the more orbs a Sever pops, the harder it hits. Blighted Sever does the same in Coiled Union.
- A rupture lasts about 10 seconds, so a short cooldown covers a whole one. The heaviest regular one in Zul'jan's stage sits in the stretch after the second Fangs.
- When Zul'jan's stage ends, every orb still on the floor detonates at once, a few seconds before Hex Lord joins. It is the biggest rupture of the fight: stack in a ground DR and use personals.
- Coiled Union: the first Blighted Sever pops the most orbs of the stage and lands with the first Nightfall, so it takes a raid DR. The fourth lands with the second Nightfall and wants one too.
While Hex Lord's Eternal Nightfall shield holds, every player gains stacking healing absorbs, with extra stacks near the impact points. Breaking the shield ends it. Twice in Hex Lord's stage and twice in Coiled Union.
During Soul Bind, fragments of Hex Lord burst out of Zul'jan and have to be stepped on before they reach him. Every fragment stepped on hits the whole raid. Mythic: each one also makes the raid take more damage from the next one for a moment, and it stacks, so fragments stepped close together compound.
Hex Lord's aura pulses damage on the whole raid every couple of seconds for his entire stage. Together with the Soulcoilers' blasts it is all the damage his stage does: there are no raid hits in it.
Zul'jan channels for 8 seconds and puts a large healing absorb on every player, while the altar spews ground that absorbs more healing from anyone standing in it. Opens Coiled Union and repeats about every 1:40.
Other boss mechanics
Coalesced VenomRaid DOTThe orbs. Every orb left on the floor pulses damage on the whole raid, so the rot climbs with each one alive, and Toxic Deluge keeps dropping new ones. Carriers move them to the tank so Sever can pop them, trading rot for a rupture. Late in Coiled Union the orbs pile up and the rot keeps climbing to the kill, so leftover cooldowns are well spent there.
see Assignments →
GloombombSpreadMarks several players who explode after 5 seconds, hitting everyone near them. Spread for it, and raid movement cooldowns help the marked players get out. Anyone hit is left Gravebound and has to collect their soul fragments.
Grim GuillotineGroup SoakCoiled Union's Guillotine: the same soak and move out, and the soakers also take a healing absorb. Mythic: three per stage, and the soak debuff from earlier soaks still counts.
see Assignments →
GuillotineGroup SoakZul'jan throws his axe at a player and the damage is split among everyone near them, so the soak group stacks on the target, then moves out before the axe erupts. Raid movement cooldowns fit here, and the first one comes on the back of a rupture, so it is worth a raid DR. Mythic: the soak debuff never expires and stacks, so soak groups alternate.
see Assignments →
Retaliatory MaliceEventEach Spiteful Soulcoiler blasts random players for as long as it lives. Part of Hex Lord's steady damage rather than a spike, and it returns with the adds in Coiled Union.
The jobs we settle on for The Coiled Altar, and the reasoning behind each. Slot players on the planner; this page is the why.
P1 orb carriers - Positions marked on raidplan. Reminder show for 5 seconds before and after the orbs spawn.
We deliberately don't re-teach the pull here. For first-timers, exact add pathing, and the complete ability list, these cover it better than we would.
A mechanics video for this boss is coming soon.
Hand-picked sources for this boss are coming soon.