Race to World First Day 10: Queen Ansurek’s multiplying acolytes

Today’s Race to World First looks a lot like yesterday’s, with the same four guilds progressing on Queen Ansurek, though Echo and Liquid swapped places with Team Liquid currently in the lead. While two guilds continue to work on Silken Court, no new guilds have gotten to Ansurek. That means the race remains between Liquid, Echo, Huoguo Hero, and Method.

Guilds are all making progress but no one is closing in on a kill just yet, though Liquid has gotten Ansurek down to 30.12% and Echo is just behind at 33.25%. The health percentages can be a bit deceptive, though, because Ansurek goes through phases at specific times, not health percentages. She has a shield that needs to be broken through during the intermission, and she’s immune for all of phase 2 as the raid jumps to new platforms and fights through adds, so there are challenges that go beyond the size of her health bar.

Both Liquid and Echo are getting into phase 3 right now, where the number of acolyte adds are proving to be a significant problem. First three acolytes spawn, then four acolytes spawn, then five acolytes — and possibly another six after that. (For comparison, there are only two on Heroic.) Each acolyte drops an orb on death that must be picked up and taken through a portal before it’s destroyed by Ansurek’s nova ability. But picking up the orb applies a dot that can’t be removed — in Heroic it’s removed when you go through the portal, but in Mythic it has to run its duration. Not only is this a ton of damage to heal through, but also players can’t pick up more than one because grabbing another will mean certain death. With only 20 players in Mythic raids, there’s only so many orbs a group can handle.

Huoguo Hero and Method are both getting to phase 2, with Huoguo Hero currently in the lead. However, these two guilds have been neck and neck for several days, and with a difference of 0.03% between them, either guild could pull ahead at any time. (Typically they switch places as soon as I hit publish on these recap posts.) Neither have whittled down Ansurek’s health very much in the past day, but again, health isn’t necessarily a linear representation of progress.

Behind these top guilds, another four are working on Silken Court: 佶天鸿 (Jitianhong), ZboX, FatSharkYes, and End Myth. But this fight proved a significant challenge for other guilds and with Jitianhong and ZboX only getting these bosses just under 50%, it will probably take another day (or more) before they join everyone else on Queen Ansurek.

Now, let’s take a look at exactly how things stand in the Race to World First for Nerub’ar Palace,

The state of the race

Current Nerub-ar Palace rankings

1. Team Liquid (7/8) with 30.12% on Ansurek after 254 pulls
2. Echo (7/8) with 33.25% on Ansurek after 221 pulls
3. 火鍋英雄 (Huoguo Hero) (7/8) with 63.55 66% on Ansurek after 164 pulls
4. Method (7/8) with 65.5 63.58% on Ansurek after 152 pulls
5. 佶天鸿 (Jitianhong) (6/8) with 47% on Silken Court after 123 pulls

Bosses killed: Ulgrax, Bloodbound Horror, Sikran, Rasha’nan, Ovi’nax, Ky’veza, Silken Court

Want to watch along with us? Here are the streams to follow to watch the Race to World First live. Or check our written coverage of day 1, day 2, day 3, day 4, day 5, day 6, day 7, day 8, and day 9.