Boss Strategy - Intro

Introduction
Hodir is one of the boss encounters in Ulduar. Players are able to defeat him, but not kill him. His loot is distributed through a frozen chest in his chambers.

Strong healing is the biggest gear requirement of this encounter - if your healers are weakly geared, consider bringing extra to compensate for the large amount of raid damage (and potential spike damage on the main tank).

The encounter requires only one tank - the rest of your raid composition should be DPS classes, evenly mixed between spellcaster classes and melee damage classes. Hunters suffer in this fight due to how the NPC buffs work - if you are trying to maximize your DPS, consider dropping hunters before any other DPS class.

Also, guilds just learning or struggling with the encounter can consider crafting frost resistance gear (the same used for Sapphiron in Naxxramas) to mitigate the area of effect damage present during the fight. The DPS check on the basic fight is not very stringent. Giving up some DPS for frost resistance gear is a good trade while learning the fight for the first time. Frost resistance on the tank is a good idea if your healers are having difficulty with the spike damage from Frozen Blows or if the MT is under geared. It's by no means required, but can help a guild just learning the fight for the first time mitigate one of Hodir's most dangerous abilities.

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Hodir's Abilities
Hodir has 8 million HP. He swings for between 15k and 20k on a well geared tank, and swings with around a 2.3 second swing timer.

- Biting Cold: This is a defining element of the fight. Similar to Keristrasza, the last boss in The Nexus, Hodir creates a stacking frost damage aura on all players in the room. The effects of this aura stack once every 2 seconds, dealing exponentially larger amounts of damage as the stack size increases. The formula is truly exponential: Damage = 200*2^[Stacks], meaning that the damage dealt looks like this:

1 Stack: 400 damage/second
2 Stacks: 800 damage/second
3 Stacks: 1600 damage/second
4 Stacks: 3200 damage/second
5 Stacks: 6400 damage/second
6 Stacks: 12800 damage/second

..and so forth - the ability obviously becomes deadly fast. Unlike Keristrasza's debuff though, Biting Cold requires continuous movement to "shake off" - one jump usually only removes one stack, so if a player lets the debuff stack to a high number, it will take a lot of movement to get rid of all the stacks. Little bits of continuous movement can prevent any stacking at all and so all players should be continuously jumping or moving side to side to avoid damage from this ability.

- Freeze: Hodir occasionally casts a targeted frost nova called Freeze that roots players for 10 seconds or until dispelled. He will randomly cast it on any target within 55 yards. The nova has a 10 yard radius and inflicts about 6,000 damage to all targets it hits. This Freeze will prevent players from moving, meaning that they will have 3-4 stacks of Biting Cold before the Freeze ends unless they are dispelled. This ability is very dangerous and needs to be dealt with quickly - Mass Dispel is helpful along with normal dispel/cleanse spells. Freeze has no fixed cooldown, but seems to be cast every 25-30 seconds.

- Icicle: Hodir constantly causes icicles to fall from the ceiling of the room. When they impact the ground, they deal approximately 14,000 damage to any player within 7 yards of them, and knock all those players back 33 yards. Icicles spawn a snowfall effect above where they are going to land, and a small blue rune effect on their impact point. Players need to watch for these effects and evacuate the landing area so they are not hit by the icicles and knocked all over the room. Icicles initially target a player or friendly NPC - you will never see one land where nobody has been.

- Flash Freeze: Every 50 seconds Hodir will cast Flash Freeze. This ability has a 9 second cast time and freezes the entire floor of the room (and anyone standing on the floor!) into blocks of ice! These blocks have 100,000 HP and need to be destroyed to free the players and NPCs trapped within. In addition, if anyone is still trapped in a Flash Freeze ice block from the previous Flash Freeze, the new Flash Freeze will instantly kill them. While casting Flash Freeze, Hodir will drop 3 Icicles that are identified by a large blue rune effect on the ground (this contrasts with the normal small blue rune for normal Icicles). These icicles create a Snowdrift effect on the ground which will protect players from the Flash Freeze. The entire raid should look for these runes when Hodir begins to cast Flash Freeze and - once the Icicles fall! - move on top of those Snowdrifts to protect themselves from the Flash Freeze effect. Pets need to be recalled to the Snowdrifts also or they will be frozen just like everyone else. The following is a timeline for the Flash Freeze sequence:

1. Hodir begins to cast Flash Freeze. 1-2 seconds into the cast time, three large blue runes appear on the ground. Players should move out of those runes, standing on the edge, as they wait for those Icicles to fall.

2. Six seconds into the Flash Freeze cast time, the special Icicles will impact, dealing normal Icicle damage (with knockback) and creating a large Snowdrift effect on their impact point (these are the same as normal Icicles except for the much larger blue rune effect on the ground).

3. In the remaining 2-3 seconds of the Flash Freeze cast, players should move on top of the Snowdrifts, which will protect them from Flash Freeze when Hodir's cast time finishes.

- Frozen Blows: Immediately after finishing each Flash Freeze cast (i.e. once a minute) Hodir gains a buff called Frozen Blows. This buff has three effects: first, it deals 4,000 frost damage per tick to all players, pets, and NPCs in the room. Second, it reduces Hodir's melee damage by 70%. Third, his melee swings now deal an additional 40,000 frost damage per swing (think of it as an incredibly deadly Frostbrand weapon proc). This means the tank will be taking incredible spike damage at the same time that the entire raid is taking a total of around 40,000 damage per person. Frozen Blows lasts 20 seconds before Hodir returns to normal. This is a very healing intensive portion of the fight, and the most challenging for guilds learning the encounter.

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Your Frozen Allies
The Hodir encounter starts with eight NPCs frozen in Flash Freeze ice blocks in front of Hodir. These allies can be freed by breaking their ice blocks, and consist of two of each type of: priests, moonkin, fire mages, and elemental shamans. Each of the NPCs will attack Hodir, help the raid, and provide incredible raid buffs if used properly. Unfortunately the NPCs do not know how to avoid Flash Freezes and will need to be freed from their ice blocks after every Flash Freeze cast. This is a list of the NPCs and their buffs:


Amira and Veesha Blazeweaver - Fire Mages

Fireball: This is their primary damage spell. It deals 3.5-5k damage and is cast on Hodir.

Melt Ice: This deals 50,000 damage to an ice block over 10 seconds.

Toasty Fire: Creates a fire on the ground that prevents Biting Cold and the Freeze (frost nova) spell from Hodir. Toasty Fire will be extinguished if an Icicle falls on it! The Toasty Fire's aura has a radius of 10 yards and each mage will cast 1-2 fires per 1 minute phase.

Singed: Players who stand near a Toasty Fire and cast spells at Hodir deal an extra 3,000 fire damage per cast. Additionally, Hodir becomes Singed and takes an extra 2% damage from spells for 25 seconds. This debuff stacks up to 30 times, meaning a full stack of Singed will cause Hodir to take +60% damage from all magical effects.


Spiritwalkers Tara and Yona - Elemental Shamans
Lava Burst: This is their primary damage spell. It deals 5-6k damage and is cast on Hodir.

Stormcloud: The Spiritwalkers, when freed, will buff a player in the raid with a Stormcloud. This cloud enables the player to buff up to 6 other players with Storm Power by walking next to them. Each shaman casts one Stormcloud per 1 minute phase.

Storm Power: This buff is given by the player with the Stormcloud buff walking next to (within 4-5 yards of) other players, which will share the buff. This buff increases critical strike damage of the affected players by 135% for 30 seconds.


Battle-Priests Eliza and Gina - Holy Priests
Smite: This is their primary damage spell. It deals 3.5-5k damage and is cast on Hodir.

Dispel: Battle-Priests dispel Freeze (the frost nova effect) from affected players.

Greater Heal: Battle-Priests will heal NPCs below 50% life for 70-100k health.


Tor and Kar Greycloud - MoonkinsWrath: This is their primary damage spell. It deals 3-4k damage and is cast on Hodir.

Starlight: The moonkins will often cast Starlight, creating thin pillars of light at completely random points in the room. They appear to cast 2-3 Starlights each after being freed from each Flash Freeze and continue to cast them throughout each 1-minute increment of the fight. Players standing in the Starlight receive +100% attack and casting haste as long as they stand there. The beams last 60 seconds and have about a 3 yard radius - simply stand in the light to get the buff!

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