The video above is from our guild-first (Chimera) and server-first (Infinity Gate) kill of Nightmare Pilgrim, so it's a little choppy but goes to show some of the mistakes you can make in the fight and how they can be overcome. We actually lose quite a few people during the fight, and end up having some run back and still narrowly make enrage time. Fight appears to be tuned for a mostly Rakata 16 man group (more than 16 people leads to an AOE pulse wipe). A very well organized group in mixed Columi/Rakata might be able to do it with great execution. All raid members must have a Rakata AlphaWave Inhibitor (30 daily comms) or have an Artifice or Armstech make them an Inhibitor. Failure to have an Inhibitor active will lead to instant death to Pilgrim's AOE attacks. Crafted Inhibitors will save you a lot of daily comms, so are preferable if you have someone who will farm up the rare mat (only found in Daily areas) for it.

The hardest mechanic in this fight is the 6:30 enrage timer, which is tight. We actually hit it, and started losing people but just managed to down him anyway. There are two mobs that must die: The Thing From The Stars (Dog), and Nightmare Pilgrim. Dog should die first, and as fast as possible, as I do not know of any necessity of simultaneous death, and it allows you to avoid a lot of dmg from Dog and focus DPS on Pilgrim. Anyone who dies should be combat rezzed, or if that is down release immediately and run back; it isn't far and you can still beat the fight if everyone is on top of it and you lose a person for a little bit due to a run. I'll break down the fight strat by role.

DPS:

DPS has the hardest job in this fight. All DPS should be on Dog to start. Periodic yellow/purple/red/white/whatever AOE circles will appear on the ground. Get out. When Dog starts casting Gore (1sec cast time) all DPS who are fast enough should try to interrupt. Pilgrim will periodically self-shield, about 5 seconds later random raid members will get a Blood Mark debuff. This debuff is the key to the fight. DPS must look at their debuff list to see if they have it, and once a raid member sees the debuff come onto them they should say something. Everyone should then wait 2-3 seconds to make sure they don't have debuff. Blood Marked players will insta-die if they attack Dog, so they must attack Pilgrim for duration of the buff. Non-marked players kill the Dog. New rounds of Blood Mark come out every 90-120sec or so. It is IMPERATIVE you not lose people to Blood Mark, as lost DPS will cause failure on the hard enrage at 6:30. I can not emphasize enough how important it is for DPS to be careful they do not have Blood Mark before so much as auto-attacking Dog. Blood Mark is a little weird and appears to go out once at a time over a space of a few seconds, so after someone gets it an announces, give yourself a few seconds before you consider yourself "safe." 6:30 is long, so all DPS should use their cooldowns/relics/adrenals in the first part of the fight to have them come up again once or twice during the fight.

Tanks (3 or 3 + offtank):

2 tanks on Dog, and one on Nightmare Pilgrim.

Pilgrim Tank: Pilgrim spawns on a patch of brown ground southwest of the clickable boss-spawn, so wait for him there. He has a cleave with range, so face him towards the rock wall. He hits hard, but pretty consistently. He is not interruptable. Periodically, Pilgrim will put yellow/purple AOE circles on the ground, get out but don't turn him towards the raid. Several times during the fight, Pilgrim will knock back the MT and shield himself. TANK MUST CALL OUT FOR DPS TO STOP. Shortly after the shield goes up (5 seconds or so) the Dog will put out a debuff onto random raid members called Blood Mark. If tank doesn't alert DPS to stop in time, someone might accidentally attack with Blood Mark on, and die.

Dog Tanks: Dog I believe has small cleave, face him toward wall and space the two tanks about 90 degrees apart with DPS behind/to Dog's side. Dog doesn't normally hit that hard, but he has Gore, which is an interruptable ability which does tons of damage. Dog also has a debuff he will put on a tank which dramatically increases damage taken, when that debuff comes up you must tank swap. This debuff is separate from the Blood Mark debuff. When Blood Mark goes out, it is possible one, two, or all three tanks will get it (though the last is highly unlikely). If one tank gets it, he should go over to Pilgrim, take aggro on Pilgrim, and have Pilgrim MT switch to Dog (This occurs at 4:19 into the video, and switch back at 4:45 after Mark runs out). If two tanks get it, both move to Pilgrim, and Pilgrim tank moves to Dog -- at this point you need to either have Big Heals and tank cooldowns to keep that one tank alive through debuff (what we did). Alternatively, you may try to use an offtank in mixed gear who steps in to taunt when the remaining Dog tank gets the debuff. Depending on your offtank's gear and spec, this may be easier or harder than healing through the debuff on one tank. Feel out how good your DPS is, and make a judgment call on whether you're better off gambling on getting friendly Blood Marks, or playing it safe and having a solid off-tank ready. If all three tanks get Blood Mark, you probably die as an offtank likely cannot tank through the Dog debuff.

Healers: This is a heal-intensive fight. Pilgrim does high sustained damage, and Dog does spikey damage due to the debuff. In addition there is a significant amount of AOE raid damage that is inevitable. As much as possible have DPS group up for AOE heals, though this means they need to be doubly aware of yellow/purple circles to get out of. Discuss primary vs. emergency healing responsibilities to avoid overhealing tanks. Conserve mana as 6:30 of intense healing is a long fight. Pop cooldowns early so they come up again by the end of the fight. There is enough raid damage and spike damage that all the healers will need to keep an eye on tanks and raid, we didn't find it helpful to try to set up one healer per tank and one for raid healing. Make sure you aren't standing somewhere that a tank switch or tank-evading-aoe will not lead to you getting cleaved by a boss.

I've said it before but I'll say it again: DON'T DPS DOG WHEN YOU HAVE BLOOD MARK. Follow that and you should be fine. Main loot was 3-4 Black Hole pieces and 2 pieces of Campaign gear (unclassed, so anyone can get them). You also get a sweet +50 all stats buff, which is great for progression raiding or trying to get titles in NM KP/EV. The first two times we tried the fight we almost insta-died due to the high amount of raid dmg and people not staying out of fire/interrupting Gore fast enough. Once we figured that out, it only took a couple tries to get it right and get him down. Good luck and good hunting!

Chuggs

Nice write up.

We 2-tanked it and in all of our attempts with two tanks we never had both tanks get marked. Maybe someone aggro pulled if you got 3 tanks all with the debuff? Either that or we just got incredibly lucky.

To 2 tank it we just had one tank take 2 stacks of the debuff and the pilgrim tank taunted and tanked both temporarily while marked with defensive CD's up. Then the other tank taunted back once his stacks dropped.

Nice write up.

 

We 2-tanked it and in all of our attempts with two tanks we never had both tanks get marked. Maybe someone aggro pulled if you got 3 tanks all with the debuff? Either that or we just got incredibly lucky.

 

To 2 tank it we just had one tank take 2 stacks of the debuff and the pilgrim tank taunted and tanked both temporarily while marked with defensive CD's up. Then the other tank taunted back once his stacks dropped.

Good suggestion, it's nice to have other strats that can fit different group compositions.

That's really cool you can do it that way, I wouldn't have really considered double-tanking them due to cleaves and the damage debuff. You must have some super boss healers (who probably hate you ;-) )

does he have a mechanic that prevents more than 16players from attacking him?

Yes, if more than 16 players are on his aggro table he does an AOE pulse that will kill everyone.

*Edit* spectators won't affect this, we had some guy wander over and start watching us, but he didn't attack. I don't knwo if you have to reach a certain level on his aggro table, or if anyone getting on it at all is sufficient, but there is an anti-zerg mechanic so don't plan on bringing over 16.

there is an enrage that happens if you dont down them at the same time.

I haven't seen any evidence of this, when does it trigger? Are you sure you weren't just seeing the 6:30 enrage? If you DPS Pilgrim down too fast without killing Dog, Pilgrim will put up a shield at 8-10% and be invulnerable, forcing you to kill Dog first. So at the very least Dog has to die that much sooner and it is categorically not true they have to die "at the same time" as they physically cannot due to the shield.

Nice guide! For the +50 stats buff, is that permanent? Or is this a timed buff that lasts for a few hours? If its permanent I might have to convince my guild that this is worth doing .

Not permanent I believe it is 5 hours. Great to have for HM EC;)

Nice guide! For the +50 stats buff, is that permanent? Or is this a timed buff that lasts for a few hours? If its permanent I might have to convince my guild that this is worth doing .

I believe the buff lasts five hours, so it's a good lead activity for a night of raiding (if of course you can do it quickly).

Also from what I've seen Pilgrim is the only source of Campaign Boots.

I'm curious as to whether or not whoever gets targeted by the blood mark is affected by some DPS/threat table. For the 4 straight times we tried this fight both my guildy and I got the blood mark *every single time*. I was getting angry over that but whatever.

Anyone else have something like this happen?

I'm curious as to whether or not whoever gets targeted by the blood mark is affected by some DPS/threat table. For the 4 straight times we tried this fight both my guildy and I got the blood mark *every single time*. I was getting angry over that but whatever.

 

Anyone else have something like this happen?

Definitely possible, both myself and the tank I was swapping with got the debuff on a few attempts. I can't remember if I was ever his current target when I got it or not, but that's something to pay more attention to next time. If I find that it's when the other tank has the Thing then it could easily be something where threat #'s 2-6 get it.

I'm curious as to whether or not whoever gets targeted by the blood mark is affected by some DPS/threat table. For the 4 straight times we tried this fight both my guildy and I got the blood mark *every single time*. I was getting angry over that but whatever.

 

Anyone else have something like this happen?

I think that was just bad luck. I've gotten the Mark while tanking Pilgrim, so I was at-or-near the bottom of Dog's threat table at the time. I think 4 marks go out, so you have a 1/4 chance of getting it. Chances of getting it four times in a row are only 1/256 which isn't absurd odds. With 16 people all having a chance of getting it, the odds that SOMEONE in the raid will get it four times in a row is 6%, which is actually pretty darn likely.

Silly question, tonight will be my first night doing NP, so just wondering if I place a DoT on the dog then I get the debuff and it ticks do I get insta killed?

If you have a dot already on the Thing, you're okay if you get the mark afterwards.

HOWEVER, one thing you need to be aware of is if you have a "Damage on Proc" Relic. This is what can happen (in this order):

You cast your dot on Thing

You get mark

Your dot ticks

Relic procs and does damage to Thing

You get one-shotted because of Mark

See, the relic damage is considered a new damage source after you got mark so you can die from it. Same with Marauders and Sentinels. Using their Cloak of Pain (or Sent equiv ability) can cause them to do damage to Thing, and if Mark is on them, they'll one-shot themselves.

Silly question, tonight will be my first night doing NP, so just wondering if I place a DoT on the dog then I get the debuff and it ticks do I get insta killed?

I would also like to add to this question whether or not a Dirty Fighting gunslinger's (or a scoundrel's for that matter) dots that are re-applied by the talent "Nice Try" are counted as a new dot, and therefor kill said slinger.

I'm asking because this is very much the case with HM Zorn and Toth fearful debuff (that problem is easily bypassed by not getting fearful in the first place, but that doesn't seem to be possible when fighting the Nightmare Pilgrim from what I understand).

I think (not killed him yet) a couple of Black hole Pieces + 4 BH commendations.

He also drops the Campaign Boots (this for certain)

I think that was just bad luck. I've gotten the Mark while tanking Pilgrim, so I was at-or-near the bottom of Dog's threat table at the time. I think 4 marks go out, so you have a 1/4 chance of getting it. Chances of getting it four times in a row are only 1/256 which isn't absurd odds. With 16 people all having a chance of getting it, the odds that SOMEONE in the raid will get it four times in a row is 6%, which is actually pretty darn likely.

I don't mean to quibble at all, but since its information that bears on the strategy and tactics, I thought it should be pointed out. The outcome of one statistical roll does not affect the outcome of the next one. They are not cumulative. IE, the chance of getting it 4 times in a row is not 1/256 (or 6%). Each chance is only to itself, so each time you have a 25% chance of getting it. This increases your odds dramatically that you could end up getting it multiple times in a row.