General Vezax  

General Vezax is the boss that guards the Descent into Madness area in Ulduar.  He is found guarding the prison of Yogg-Saron and is a large Faceless One.  The fight is an interesting and challenging one, especially to casters.  This is one of the fights that requires extreme concentration and attention by everyone in the fight.  

Health 

10 Person Raid: Body – 8,300,000 health

25 Person Raid: Body – 30,800,000 heath 

Abilities 

Aura of Despair – This ability prevents almost all mana regeneration from regular sources and slows melee attack speed by 20%.  Several abilities still provide at least a little mana, such as Aspect of the Viper, Judgements of the Wise, and Spiritual Attunement. 

Mark of the Faceless – This is a debuff that the General will place on a random target that is at least 15 yards away from him.  Once the debuff is on a player, it does 5,000 damage per second for 10 seconds to everyone within 10 yards.  Any time it does damage to a player it heals the General 100,000 health.  In addition, if there are not enough players at least 15 yards away from General Vezax, then he can target players near him, including the tank.  In 25 player raids at least 9 players have to be further than 15 yards away to prevent this, in 10 player raids at least 4 have to be away from the General. 

Searing Flames – This is a fire based spell that is cast by the General that deals a large amount of fire damage to everyone in the room.  It deals roughly 15,000 fire damage (12,000 in 10 player raids) to all players as well as reducing their armor by 75% for 10 seconds.  It takes General Vezax 2 seconds to cast this spell and it is interruptible. 

Shadow Crash – General Vezax periodically fires a shadow missile at a random target at least 15 yards away from him.  When it impacts, it does roughly 12,000 shadow damage (6,000 in 10 player raids) to anyone within 10 yards of the impact point and knocking them back.  One the shadow missile explodes, it will leave a residue that remains on the ground for 20 seconds.  Anyone in this area will gain a number of buffs to their magic ability but lose significant healing ability.  Players gain 100% magic damage, 100% casting speed, and mana cost of all abilities is reduced by 75%.  However, any healing done is reduced by 75%. 

Surge of Darkness – This is a self buff that General Vezax casts that increases his damage by 100% but slows him by 50% for 10 seconds. 

Additional Entities in the fight 

Saronite Vapors – Roughly every 30 seconds a green colored crystal will spawn and move around the room.  The Saronite Vapor crystal has approximately 25,000 health (12,500 in 10 player raids) and needs to be destroyed to fight the General in normal mode.  Once a crystal is destroyed, a green zone will form on the ground where is was killed that grants players a buff / debuff.  The buff / debuff has both positive and negative effects and stacks every 2 seconds and ticks every 2 seconds as well. 

The buff / debuff lasts for 20 seconds. 

Saronite Animus – If you choose to fight General Vezax in hard mode, the eight untouched Saronite Vapors with join into a single Saronite Animus with 12,400,000 health (2,000,000 in 10 player raids).  While active the Animus emits the ability Profound Darkness. This ability causes 750 shadow damage and applies a stacking shadow damage debuff that increases all shadow damage taken by 10% per stack every two seconds until destroyed.  In addition, the Saronite Animus will melee the player with highest threat and hits fairly hard. 

Strategy 

Once the room is cleared of all the extra creatures and you are ready to fight the general, players need to form up and get ready for the fight.  Due to his various abilities, players do not want to be clustered at any point in the fight, so it is easier to start spread out around him.  Once everyone is ready, the tank runs in and engages him, while ranged players move up to roughly 25 yards from him in a semi-circle covering as much space as required. 

[protip]There are two extremely useful macros that players should create.  The first one is for rogues and allows two rogues to coordinate kicks for interrupts.  A simple macro is all that is needed. 

/cast kick

/cast tell <next rogues name>You’re next 

The second macro is for ranged DPS and is to quickly switch to the Saronite Vapor to start DPS.  Again it is very simple. 

/target Saronite Vapor

/cast <your base attack spell of choice>[/protip] 

Once engaged there are a few mechanics of the fight that need to be managed, none are that difficult individually, but all together take a little while to learn.  Let’s deal with the issues that melee and tanks have to worry about first.  The most critical is that the General casts searing flames very often and MUST be interrupted each and every time.  The best way to handle this is with a rogue, or two on a rotation.  Any one that is missed will cause serious mana issues for healers as they attempt to restore everyone’s health. 

The tanks have issues dealing with General Vezax’s Surge of Darkness.  There are several ways to deal with this ability, the easiest being a tank rotation.  Since it is cast once every minute and has a 3 second cast time, 2 tanks can rotate using their cool downs each time.  Another way to deal with the increased damage is for Paladin healers to cast Hand of Salvation on the tank and absorb some of the damage away from them. 

[protip]Even though mana users are at a huge disadvantage in this fight, DPS spell casters can do insane damage by managing their cooldowns and only casting while they have the shadow crash buff.  Due to the increases damage and reduced mana use they can still do more than average damage even though they only cast 20 seconds at a time.  Getting spell casters used to watching for shadow crash buffs and using them properly is one of the keys to winning the fight.[/protip] 

Ranged and mana based players have three main items to deal with.  The first is that they must constantly watch for incoming Shadow Crash missiles.   This by itself is fairly simple as you can see them coming and have more than enough time to avoid them, as long as you are paying attention.  What makes that first simple task not so simple is avoiding them while also avoiding coming within 10 yards of another player.  This is critical since any time you do, either of you could gain the mark from General Vezax and start doing damage to each other and healing him.   

Then comes the main issue that mana based players have to face which is the fact that mana regeneration is essentially zero for the fight.  Almost all mana based players need to conserve mana as much as possible since they will not get a lot back during the fight.  DPS casters especially, need to watch what they are doing and cast only when they have the buff from standing in the black shadow crash puddles. The only real way to get mana back is by watching for Saronite Vapors and killing them, then jumping into the green puddle that they leave and staying in stacking their debuff.  The debuff does damage but also regenerates your mana.  Managing how much damage to take for how much mana to gain is always a juggling act and will depend on your shadow resistance and how much you can heal yourself.  A good starting point is 6 of 7 stacks for healers and 4 or 5 for casters, obviously adjust as needed and to your healers ability and your health. 

The above items make up the core of the fight.  Tanks have to survive big damage spikes every minute, healers need to regenerate mana in green puddles, casters only DPS in black puddles, and melee interrupts searing flames.  All while you keep at least a minimum number of players at range, who have to avoid missiles and each other.   

Sounds simple, doesn’t it?  Don’t worry, the fight isn’t that hard, it comes down to coordination and timing between the group. If you can defeat Mimiron, most groups find this a simpler fight, it just takes a bit of practice.