After several hours of trying to kill Zekvir on ?? difficulty I am at the point where I believe it is next to impossible to kill as BM hunter right now. Here are my findings from over 5 hours of attempts, costing over 20k in repairs and I have lost count of the number of attempts. It has to be around 175-200, maybe more.
My hunter is 616 ilvl with 4 piece tier set using Brann at level 53 as healer, Combat Curio and Amorphous Relic equipped. I have tried several different Brann abilities, all level 4, but this set up seems the best.
Getting Zekvir to the transition is fairly simple in principle, yet it is so buggy and full of rng that even knowing what you are doing it can be hit and miss getting him to 60%. My first complaint, I have my pet with growl turned off because it gets one shot every single time it has aggro, so I am having to tank. Seriously, why am I having to tank a mob as a RANGED CLASS??! The whole idea of BM is to have my pet hold aggro, I heal it, nuke at range. I do NOT want to be playing melee on my hunter. So I lust on pull with BL pet, launch into Zek and probably every 10th pull, sometimes less, my pet still grabs aggro and dies. Instantly on the backfoot having to rez my pet, losing valuable damage time. Yes, this isn’t a race, but having to unnecessarily rez my pet is very frustrating. Whilst also dodging the first Claw Smash.
So you go about dodging the various abilities Zek casts. Claw Smash, Angler’s Web, Enfeebling Spittle, Horrendous Roar and Call Web Terror where you have to switch to the add to nuke it down. Oh, did I mention that during this you are also taking melee hits anywhere from 1.2 million up to over 4 million, sometimes successive hits of 3 in a row? Yeah, fun. So you are very reliant on Brann dropping dwarven medicine, although he sometimes just can’t be bothered or just plain lobs them nowhere near you. Enfeebling Spittle once cast leaves the dot on you, but I can disengage to remove it, leaving me probably every 4th to 5th attempt with an instant Claw Smash to deal with. Seeing as it is a cone, and I am now in Narnia, it invariably will killl me. Same with Angler’s Web. There is also the challenge of seeing where Zek is spawning the Web Terror cocoon, because with his massive body in my face it is not always easy to see the indicator he casts to show where to move to. Oh, and whilst trying to nuke the egg you also have to swap back to Zek on occasion to interrupt the heal being cast. Know what else is fun? Trying to tab back to the adds coccon quickly to make sure the spider doesn’t hatch but instead finding you have Branns egg in your sights instead!!
So you reach 60%, and inexplicably Blizz decided to give Zek a 99% damage reduction for 10 seconds whilst he casts Black Blood. Why??!! Why couldn’ty this have been a nuke phase where he actually takes increased damage? And even if it was, there are so many attempts where you are still nuking the Web Terror’s egg you would miss out anyway, because for some reason Zek will summon one even when he dips below 60% when he fells like it. And this is where the real “fun” begins.
We now have Unending Spines to avoid, his heal now grants 25% of his max health if you miss it, and Infinite Horror replaces Horrendous Roar. Oh, and there are now portals that spawn which fire out balls of death when he casts his fear. Yes, they one shot you, and also your pet and Brann!! My best attempt was sub 10% but the RNG is so bad in this fight I just can’t get the kill. If you manage to avoid the smash, nuke the cocoon, dispel the nasty dot and interrupt the heal you will ALWAYS end up either rezzing your pet or Brann or BOTH, whilst trying to avoid all his abilities, huge melee hits and balls of death. And if Brann is out for the count you have no Dwarven Medicine, so are popping healing pots or self heals if you have it up.
It is the most frustrating, most badly tuned, absolute MESS of a fight with abilities that will happen in any order at all. Sometimes you will avoid a Claw Smash, followed by Angler’s Web ,quickly followed by another Claw Smash?! Seriously? Then there are the bugs like Brann grabbing aggro and running out of a locked door and resetting the boss. I absolutely hate Brann now, you have ruined him as a character for me Blizz with the nerfs you gave him. Because yeah, before the nerfs he was Godmode Brann who would solo tank Zek whilst people avoided the abilities and nuked him down. Not really the challenge it is now or was meant to be, but free achi for those that were fortunate to fight him early. Now? Broken. And Brann hits like a wet noodle, doesn’t even do 10% of the overall damage on every attempt, and has so much inconsistency to what he does that you end up cursing him. And yeah, the usual suspects will say “skill issue” or “it’s supposed to be a season long challenge”, but how geared do you expect someone to have to be? People that don’t raid or M+ will be around 620 ilvl max if they aren’t farming higher crests, so why is it tuned for people at 630+?? It needs fixing. And yeah, I tried another class for those that will pop up with that stupid suggestion, because why should I have to kill it on a different class??! Prot paladin just cannot get the add down with 620 ilvl and 4 piece tier, and Ret is not something I play often so I am not great at the rotation.
TLDR. Zek is broken, this isn’t fun after so many failed attempts and feels like the only way I will get the kill is pure RNG when the heavens align. Perhaps another 10 ilvl will get me over the line, but should I need to be nearing 630 to kill Zek?
