http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMGm-4VRKQ0

Here is the video that i liked the most of the probably 15 I watched. Every kill is almost identical on how they kill it.

A few things people need to pay attention to: Not getting hit by the charges - Prioritizing the drakes - positioning in phase 2 - and movement- Once we get comfortable with the movement and positioning in phase 1 the dps will take care of itself. Please watch and study these videos and be ready to kill this guy this week!!!

From all the videos I've watched, here are the important takeaways:

The melee adds are almost always both tanked on one side, directly under a drake. The Slayer has no directional requirement, though it's best to keep it slightly to the side of the melee dps themselves so as to avoid charge overlapping melee dps. The Dreadblade need to be tanked slightly to the side as well, but faced to the outside of the boat so as to avoid cleave. In almost all cases, both are tanked just slightly towards the rear of the boat from the drake.

I can't really tell from the videos' context in most cases, but it appears that the drake is the #1 priority on the melee side, with cleaves going to the melee adds, and that all ranged (who aren't multi-dotting) are focused on the opposing side drake. Melee cleave goes to the melee adds, and then whichever melee add is lower is prioritized.

Almost all videos have groups of 3+ soakers soaking the barrages. This helps in case one gets to a barrage late the other 2 won't die instantly. It also reduces the overall damage to each person. In most cases this is 2 ranged DPS + 1 healer, or 1 ranged + 2 healers, so the healer(s) can pre-HOT or have heals pre-casting while the barrage hits.

In almost every video, groups intentionally allow some barrages through to the ship. In some cases this is because it's too far for a soak group to reliably get to. In a lot of cases it's when an Onslaught is incoming (it's imperative you avoid barrage on your way to Onslaught or the debuff could make Onslaught kill you).

Fire. Get away from it. It spreads, so make sure you have some buffer room. You may have to run through it to Onslaught, so make sure you're healed up beforehand.

Phase 2:
No matter where on the ship it's arranged, the imperative detail about phase 2 is positioning.

Goriona needs to be tanked so she faces off the edge of the ship. All melee need to be stacked on one side of her, on her rear quarter. Blackhorn needs to be tanked right beside this melee group, slightly outside of Goriona. All ranged need to stack directly on one point, just /barely/ outside the range of Disrupting Shout. Shockwave needs to be announced before it goes off, and all ranged must move IMMEDIATELY (preferably in one direction) and re-stack.

Goriona is the top priority for DPS, but melee cleave can do extra damage to Blackhorn.

Once Blackhorn enrages, it becomes critical for healer rotations to be used to keep everyone alive through Shouts, and tank damage becomes enormous.

We had some good attempts, and some not-so-good attempts on Thursday.

We had some issues with DPS prioritizing the correct targets. DPS Priority is Drake > Dreadblade > Slayer.

In some instances we had issues with melee getting cleaved. Tanks got progressively better at positioning the adds, but a large portion of the responsibility for avoiding cleave will now rest of melee themselves, especially when adds are running back from a charge and need to be positioned.

Which brings us to charges. They happen so frequently, it's hard to call them out continuously and maintain DPS (I personally had several attempts where I screwed myself up by trying to DPS with my PTT key (Ctrl) down... resulting in no DPS). It's going to be mostly on the ranged and healers to watch for the charge paths and avoid them as much as possible. This becomes critical immediately after a raid-soak Onslaught, as the charge is consistently straight at the Onslaught soak group.

Onslaughts: After some initial issues, we've started to settle well into a 3-soak/raid soak rotation. Each odd-numbers Onslaught is soaked with just Fire mages and at least one shadow priest who is nearby with Dispersion available. All even-numbered Onslaughts are tanked by the entire raid.

P2: Phase 2 we mainly just need practice on. Positioning is roughly that Gariona faces transverse across the front of the boat, facing left. Melee are stacked tight on her left rear leg. Blackhorn is tanked near the melee group so cleave off Gariona can hit him, and the Blackhorn tank is close enough for tank swaps, but not in Gariona's breath cone. We're currently using one healer separate from the main group, and the remainder of the healers and ranged stacked tightly 10-11yd from Blackhorn.

When Shockwave comes up, we need to get into a better habit of calling the target. Ranged group needs to have a pre-determined direction they're going to run in, so they can run to the edge of the Shockwave (Important Note: DO NOT JUMP out of Shockwave) and maintain the stack, running in the opposite direction in subsequent shockwaves.

We're very close. We need to fine-tune a couple of our mechanics, and improve our overall awareness a bit and we'll have this kill.