Raid boss Guide: Chronomatic Anomaly (Nighthold)

As usually, these tactics are my own and does not mean they are the most optimal.

Background

As the power to fuel an entire civilization courses from the earth, the cavern at the base of the Nightwell has become a maelstrom of raw energy. Born from this chaotic flux, the Chronomatic Anomaly is an embodiment of the power of the Eye of Aman’thul. As it lashes out with energy attacks, the bursts of energy warp the very flow of time.

 

Overview

When you enter this area, you will see a big boss walking around a really big well called Nightwell.

There are 4 main things involved in this fight.
- The change of time
- The boss
- The big Nightwell in the middle.
- The Elemental add.

You will fight a boss that can change time with the help of a well in the center of the platform.
The time changes are normal, fast and slow and that affects both players and enemies.
The abilities the boss and add do are affected by it, so beware of debuffs and cast times when interrupts are needed.
Players movement speed, cast time, attack speed etc are also affected.
The boss has a main ability that can wipe the raid, Power Overwhelmed by making the Nightwell pulse out damage to the entire raid. This can only be stopped by picking up a rift that a special elemental add drops when it dies.

 

Positioning

Tank the boss between the 2 markers.
Markers denote the place the Elemental add may spawn.
Elemental add will spawn either on left or right side.

When Elemental add is out, tank boss next to the Elemental add.
As soon as elemental add is dead. Move the boss back again.

 

Abilities and Tactics

Passage of time

During the entire fight, the boss controls time. There are 3 types of time in this fight:

  • Normal
  • Slow
  • Fast

The time affects players AND enemies as well. Casting, movement, attack speeds and also when enemies put debuffs on you. Always pay attention on what time it is.

 

Waning Time Particle (Elemental add)

Boss summons an elemental add called Waning Time Particle. (On Mythic it is 2 on each side of the well)

He has 3 abilities

  • Chronomate
    Arcane damage to its target.
  • Warp Nightwell
    Arcane Damage to all players through the Nightwell (an arcane wave comes out from the well).
    Each time this happens, it increases in damage.
    On Heroic and Mythic: When the Elemental add is at 30% health, it is immune to interrupts.
  • Temportal Rift
    When the add dies, 2 things will happen:
  • A rift will spawn (glowing orb on the ground)
  • 4 Fragmented Particles (4 smaller adds) spawns on the same location.

If the Rift is picked up, that player will take damage over time.
That player will also get a new ability called Temporal Smash.
Temporal Smash stops the boss from using his ability “Power Overwhelming” and also takes 30% more damage for 15 seconds.
The Temporal Smash ability happens automatically when the person is close to the boss when he does Power Overwhelmed.

Tactic Elemental add (Waining Time Patrticle)

The add spawns on close to the Nightwell.
A white cloud spawns before the add comes out so you have time to move there before it spawns.

Main Tank
Tank the boss next to the big Elemental add.

Off-tank
Tank the Elemental add
Pick up the Rift and use defensive CD if needed until boss does Power Overwhelmed.

Dps
All dps focus on the Elemental add.
When it dies, AoE down the small adds fast.

Raid
Interrupt every Warp Nightwell. Best way is to have a rotation on players that interrupts.

Heroic and Mythic: Healers
At 30% HP the raid will start taking a lot of damage from the add since it will be immune to interrupts. Healers needs to beware and heal the raid.

Power Overwhelmed

The boss interacts with the Nightwell to make it pulse out Arcane damage to all players periodically.
Each pulse increase the damage of the next pulse by 15%.

Tactic Power Overwhelmed

Boss does this ability after Elemental add is dead (can happen that he does it when elemental add is still alive).
Make sure that off-tank has the rift and is close to boss so that Power Overwhelmed will be interrupted.

This can only be interrupted with Temporal Smash which you get from a rift that drops when an Elemental add (Waning Time Particle) dies. Happens automatically when the person is close to the boss when he does Power Overwhelmed. See above for more info.

Dps
After Power Overwhelmed is interrupted, use dps cooldowns and burn down the boss since he takes 30% more damage.

Healers
Be ready to use healing cooldowns if the add is not dead yet when boss does Power Overwhelmed.

 

Temporal Orbs

Loads of Orbs starts moving out from the Nightwell
Each Orb does high Arcane damage to all players it hits.

Tactic Temporal Orbs

Several orbs will come out from the Nightwell

Start by standing further away from the middle, so the orbs have a wider distance between them and easier to dodge.

Passage of time affects the speed of the Orbs.

Chronometric Particles

Boss puts a stacking debuff on tank that does Arcane damage every 2 seconds.
If the tank has more than 9 stacks, it becomes overloaded and the tank will die and cause an explosion that does very high damage to all players.  

Tactic: Chronometric Particles

Tanks
The debuff is affected by Passage of time.
Tank swap will differ depending on if it is normal, slow or fast time.
Normal time: Tank swap at 5 stacks.
Slow: Tank swap at 8 stacks.
Fast: Tank swap at 3 stacks.

 

Time Release

Boss puts a debuff on a random player that has an amount of heal absorption.
When time runs out on the debuff, it will do damage to all players based on how much heal absorption is left on that player.

Tactic: Time Release

This ability is affected of Passage of Time (Normal, fast slow). In this case it regards to how often the boss will do this and also on how many players.
Fast: less targets are affected but boss does it more often.
Slow: More targets are affected but boss does it less.

Healers
Spam heal the player that gets this debuff until it is gone.

Burst of Time

Boss shoots orbs on target locations.
The impact does Arcane damage to players within 6 yards.

Tactic: Burst of Time

Stay spread from each other.
You will see on the ground where the orb will land.
Beware that this is affected of Passage of time (Normal, fast, slow). In this case, it affects the time it takes before impact.

Time Bomb 

Boss puts a debuff on random player (except tanks).
After some seconds, the debuff expires and does high Arcane damage on all players.
The damage on other players is less, the further away the targeted player is from the raid.

Tactic: Time Bomb

Beware of the timer on the debuff because it is affected of Passage of Time (normal, slow, fast).
If you get this debuff, run far away from raid and wait until it expires, then run back in again.
In general, run towards the outer wall away from middle, since the raid will be closer to middle.

When to use Bloodlust/Timewarp/Heroism

Use it when first Elemental add (Waning Time Particle) is at 30% health.
Kill the Elemental add, then small add fast then use the rest of the time on boss, when he takes 30% more damage after Temporal Smash.  

 

6 Jan 2017