I just ran in storymode, in the 10% burn phase, everybody stack at kephess, except the tank out there running the circles. It seems doing it this way kephess won't drop big circles all over the place for you and you can actually dps on him pretty well with the aoe heal.

 

Is this strategy also working in hard mode?

We have our ranged DPS also running circles, but yes same basic strategy. Melee stack up directly under Kephess while tanks and ranged run around avoid circles. It is worth mentioning - if you are timing this well you should be able to drop a tower and clear all remaining nanites when Kephess is at 11% - and you should be able to almost kill him before it wears off (or at least get him into the 3% area).

My groups also keep a few of the more mobile classes at range, and have not had much of an issue. Like the above poster said, as long as you time the last Nanite tower to drop around 11% you should be golden. The more people you can afford to keep at range, the safer your "melee burn" group is. Assuming you don't have two operative/scoundrel healers, put at least one in melee range, along with any melee, and possibly a range DPS or two (depending on group comp). Leave everyone else at range to do high mobility rotations.

 

As a DF Gunslinger I am able to pop my defensive cooldowns and "tank" 2 or 3 circles while channeling right after the boss comes out of his knockdown from the tower, then just kite circles while using instants for the last few % with no problem.

 

Edit: But to answer your question more directly, yes. The mechanic is still the same, if not slightly harder.

Edited October 25, 2012 by Synavix