New 3-Man: North Cotton Farm Guide

[Marithil]

Evendim/Shire- Oatbarton- North Cotton Farm

3- man instance

Location and getting started.

Important information to know is that to be able to run this from the instance join panel you will need to have gone to the gate yourself in Oatbarton, very southern end of Evendim. There is a hunter camp bind point and summoning horn at the bottom of the hill, going towards the gate. Also note that there is a quest started by Barliman Butterbur in the Prancing pony. This quest will take you through all of the new instances and the new 12 man. Once you have the quest, the quest tracker will guide you right to the gate. From the horse point you move north and a bit west to get to the gate. There will be a hill you run up with a small footpath.

Gear: Poison resistance food, poison pots, strong food with power restore, power pots, morale pots, and vitality food never goes wrong.

Class recommendations: A hunter for poison cure, CC and ranged DPS, a cappy is good for moving heals, and buffs that keep power and sustained DPS alive, any kind of tank will do fine but even a hunter will do in a pinch (especially tier 1 difficultly), RK moving DPS attacks are a nice addition to the group as well.

A bit of explanation (since that’s what I do. :p )

A new addition this update is the tiered difficulty types. There is tier 1 and tier 2 and then there is the challenge quest along with it. Tier 2 is hard mode. In my experience with the separate tiers, there is a good difference in boss damage and just overall difficultly. Don’t underestimate it. And pay attention to corruptions!

North Cotton Farm

Tier 1

It’ll start with a couple spider pulls of 3 spiders each. Kill them, and the hobbit will be set free and give you a key. Run up to the door at the top, and wait, when the hobbit is done talking it will open for you when you stand near it. From this point there will be as big of pulls as 4 spiders, one elite per pull. Still not hard. Tank or CC the big spider, kill the others, remove the poisons so you don’t get stunned. You will fight through spider pulls until you move down a hill, and curve up to the left till you reach an open spider web where boss one dwells.

Boss 1 (Spider boss)

This is quite similar to the skumfil fight. Tank the spider against the perimeter, he will drop acid clouds around you so be prepared to back off it so you don’t take 600+ damage a second. Staying against the perimeter seemed to work best. He will sometime throw his back end into the air and spawn an egg. It is vital that you destroy the egg before small spider burst out and heal the boss. Just blow them up as soon as you see them. Remove poisons, stay clear of poison clouds, and kill eggs until he dies. That about does it for him. Loot the chest that spawn in the middle of the room.

After boss 1 you run out and find another group of 3 spiders, if you stay over right as far as you can be, you can actually walk past them without aggro’ing. Then you move onto wolfs. They are just like any of the other pulls. Tank/cc and kill. Groups of 2-4. After you move up far enough you will run into an open door the left. This is boss room 2.

Boss 2 (Cauldron boss)

First off let me say how perfect this fight is for our kin. We finally get to slap down all those annoying hobbits. I recommend you make /slap a shortcut on your skill bar. You can do that by typing in, exactly:

/shortcut # /slap. The # means the skill slot number. I would just use the number 1 and then move the shortcut to where you want it, and replace the skill in your number 1 slot after you moved it.

There are a few things that need to happen in this fight to make it work. First, have your DPS (hunter, Champ, RK, etc.) start the fight. There will be small footpaths that cut the fight area up into 3 areas, each sections perimeter bordered by the footpath . One section being the area squared off by the paths right as you enter the door to your right, then straight above that in the tilled land. Put your tank on the tilled section, and healer on the bottom section right next to the door. The DPS needs to run up to the boss, start it, and walk a few paces back, just in the pathing of the hobbits that will move down the hill, towards the door. The hobbits will come from the 3 doors on the hobbit hole and move straight down towards the entrance, trying to get pies. Every hobbit that comes out needs to be /slap’ed right away, more than 3 get to the pies, you lose and have to restart.

As the fight starts, you have everyone in their spots, the DPS starts the fight then backs off a bit, and someone will get a yellow eye over their head. If you get it, start running in you assigned area. Make it wide enough that you are not hitting your own poison drops and can still move. As the DPS sets in taking down the cauldron, eventually a second person will get the green eye, and they have to keep running around in their areas dropping poison clouds. As the 2 runners do this, they need to be slapping all the hobbits that show up. The player up at the top needs to be always looking at the hobbit doors to see if there is one running down the hill. If they miss the slap, the player on the bottom is responsible to slap it to keep it from eating the pies. The DPS should have the hobbits running right behind them while they DPS so they can help with slaps if they need to. Remember, you have to be pretty close to slap someone in here. There is a time limit on how long you have. You have 5 minuets to beat the cauldron. There will be a bucket that lights up, you may pick it up, and run towards the fire to help stop the flames, giving you more time to finish the 2nd boss. (unless you are doing challenge mode) From here, all you do is destroy the cauldron asap. Thadur runs away for another day, and you get a nice box.

In summary, bring poison food, keep moving in your area if you get the eye, /slap those hobbits silly, and have your one DPS’er go crazy overboard with DPS. (Don’t worry, the cauldron doesn’t fight back.)

Notes: The trick is to have the DPS start the fight because we found if they did, and someone else got the first eye, the DPS never got it, and could just DPS while the other two ran clouds around and slapped hobbits. If the DPS get the eye, just switch locations with someone who doesn’t have it, and do your best to DPS your brains out.

Challenge Quest

The challenge quest is simple; don’t use the bucket of water at all on the fire during the 2nd boss fight. Which means you better have your best DPS ever or you could have some problems as you only have a few minutes to kill the cauldron. I recommend all healers go DPS and heal only when needed. If everyone is doing their job, the only damage should come from staying in clouds, slapping hobbits or doing drive by DPS.

After this boss you will find yourself fighting goblins. Beat on the pot carrying goblin first, the focus on the rest. There will be many poisons, fears, and special poisons. The "strange poison" and the "Debilitating poison". (devious may not be the real name, but I know it starts with a D) Both of these need to be gotten rid of. Strange poison tiers up to a drunken effect, and Debilitating Poison tiers up to a 6 second stun, and this poison happens a lot, so your hunters will be busy. Once you get through these pulls you will have rescued 4/5 hobbits, and be ready for Thadur, the 3rd and final boss.

Boss 3 (Thadur)

He has a few major moves. One is a poison move, he will put an un-curable poison and stun you, also he will drop a cloud of poison that is just like the ones at the cauldron. Stay away from them. 2nd, He has a massive frontal AoE when he says, “I have a gift for those who face me.” Or whatever. Stay close, and run right behind him when he starts that move. The 3rd move is a distributive damage attack where he says something like, “divided you shall fall”. You can also run far out of range and this won't hit you, but it's a long run. Just pull close together and it should only hit for 600-900. We have also found that RK rocks, and pets count as another body to distribute the damage, so it's best to collect on those to help with the damage. He will also give a fear effect that makes you run away in fear. He will also yell, "You shall behold the power of Dark Thorn" then he will lay a poison cloud around him, just move away from him and you'll be fine. The last thing we noticed was a corruption buff he had and would damage us AoE style. Remove the corruption, and the problem goes away. Once you have his skill rotation down, he becomes very easy, and still well worth it. Remember, remove corruptions, and keep behind him when he starts the "I have a gift for you" move.

Tier 2

The big difference in tier 2 is the over damage received, and the effectiveness of Thadur’s attacks. All damage goes up, corruptions get meaner, and the use of Thadur’s skills become more frequent. Stay away from the frontal AoE, that’s the killer. Once you have won, have fun with your 2 shiny boxes.

Tips for Hunters and Wardens (since that’s what I ran with and know.)

Wardens: The whole thing is pretty cut and dry tanking. On the second boss, while you are running around, be very sure you watch for hobbits. I ran determination stance and just popped conviction a ton so I could easily survive poison clouds long enough to throw all my javelins at the cauldron, or slap any hobbit that was in a cloud, to help with challenge mode. The conviction is the only heal the group will ever need on that fight as long as it’s traited 5 deep.

Hunters: Trait however you want except CC line. Not even 1 trait from that line should be on you. You need biggish, sustainable DPS for the 2nd boss, and that usually means huntsman line. Improved fleetness rocks on this fight, and be sure you have press onward ready to go if you need the extra boost of power. If the fight doesn’t go perfectly, you could run into power problems. A good trick with power issues is to pop a power pot early, say when you are down 1000-1500 power, then you can have it cooled down and pop it again later when you need it.

I hope this was informative. I will be posting additions and revisions as I find new information, and new starts as I learn them. Be sure to read the next guide, Stoneheight here:

http://allshallfade.guildlaunch.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=6614411&gid=17132

[Marithil]

This has been updated to include more dynamics we found.

[Golbo]

Saw one more Thadur trick: when he says, ''You shall behold the power of Dark Thorn,'' he unleashes a large AoE poison cloud around him. Skedaddle out of there, everyone, or nasty poison awaits. <cough>

[Marithil]

I forgot to put that one in. Thanks for the reminder.

[Marithil]

Updated again. Should be fully complete now.

[Enna AS]

You rock Mari!

[Marithil]

Thanks. If you plan on doing Stoneheight check that one out too.

[Seshmet1]

I have been tanking this a lot lately with Praxxus.

One thing to note as well.

During the big spider fight...if you run in a triangle pattern during the fight. As it drops clouds you can time those clouds by keeping an eye on the first cloud dropped.

As the latest cloud drops the spider will drop another...

You can also listen for the "sizzle" sound as the spider lets you know you are about to be dropped in the frying pan...unless you move!

[csteelatgburg]

I completed Northcotton for the first time last night but forgot to complete the In Their Absence quest during the instance! If anyone will be running it again soon, let me know and I'll be happy to help.

[Marithil]

I would be happy to run it with you, just say when.