Thorim (10man) Strategy?

About 3 months ago when out guild started heavily raiding ulduar 10, all our dps could accomplish 3.5-4.5k dps, though we also still failed a fights such as thorim, mosly due to agro control, not dps. after a while, we figured how to sort our groups out so the least agro healers and dps were in the arena, which made it much easier for the tank to keep agro, allowing for the dps to kill the adds faster(less agro-reducing and less moving). in the gauntlet, we had our best burst-dps, allowing us to zip through the stairs (IMO the harder part of it) and kill the last boss quickly. as a dk, i was usually put in the gauntlet and as my shammy i was put in the arena (because drood hots agro'd the add before the tank could) it really didn't matter much after that if our dps was under 3k, because we could survive as long as we needed. although this was the case, still, upward of 3k dps is probably optimal, as certain bosses are purely dps races (and healer races), such as hodir. another benefit our guild had, was me and our druid healer could 2-heal many bosses, so we had an extra 3k dps, but overall, 3k dps minimum, 4k+ is awesome and good tanks and healers are really what matter. my main point is that dps is not always the problem, and good tanks and healers are also very important.

Usually about 3.5k on average for the Keepers and beyond is enough for an average group. If you're downing the bosses beforehand without any dramas, you've got sufficient gear for the Keepers. That's not your problem.

The Keepers are very involved fights; they're a real test of your group's coordination and skill. Thorim's particularly tricky to get right, and it took my guild several weeks to get everything in line.

It sounds like your hallway group is making it to the second boss somewhat reliably, so it sounds like it's your arena group that's the problem. Keep an eye on who's dying, ask individually if anyone's not feeling in control of the fight, and maybe shuffle people around a bit. Squishies tend to do better in the hallway, I find, but it depends on your players who is best suited where.

Alternatively, if you're not downing Freya or Hodir, they're worth looking into as well. We found them a good deal easier.

Gear is certainly enough - as you probably know it's very possible to clear Ulduar 10 in blues. So, while better gear certainly helps, blaming gear is really just a convenient excuse. Without knowing more about your raid, it's hard to give suggestions, but here's a few comments:

1. Do you not have enough dps, or is the dps dying? In the former case, try running with 2 healers instead of three. Although it may seem crazy, reducing healers by 1 and increasing dps may actually make encounters go more smoothly, as stuff dies a lot more quickly. This is especially feasible if your tank has enough gear to survive a couple more hits (and possibly enough skill/experience to use his cooldowns wisely). If instead dps is dying, try to figure out why: did they not get heals because healers were stunned/interrupted (make sure the mobs in the tunnels are not on the healers - for arena, kill the non-elite, interrupting mobs quickly)? Or because they were busy with the tanks (why were they taking so much more damage than usual)? Or is it because healers were asleep at the wheel?
2. How are you splitting up your raiders? Tunnel favors ranged/spell-users; arena favors melee, but it's nice to have some AoE for the non-elite mobs (though a rogue's FoK or a DK's D&D are more than enough). We prefer to split casters in tunnel and melee in the arena also for buff purposes, to make sure we maximise our utility from class synergy.
3. Is the kill order the right one? For example, the tunnel tank can ignore the Acolyte: he hits very lightly, and dies immediately if the 3 tunnel dps focus on him. This means the tunnel tank has to control 2 mobs per pack only.
4. How much time does it take for the tunnel group to finish things up? Arena will always fall slightly behind - the key is to make sure there's not too much left alive by the time Thorim comes down. For that to happen, the tunnel tank needs to keep pushing ahead: don't wait until all the mobs are dead before moving to the next group, make sure to use your stuns so you can move ahead and start building aggro on the next group, and once the first boss is down, move up the stairs as quickly as possible, because mobs will keep spawning until you do.

In short, gear is not the issue (though more gear can help). Try to analyse your attempts, and figure out what is the real problem.

Edit: Can one of the two shamans switch to dps? I really don't think you need 3 healers for Thorim hard, especially if your gear is at ToC10 level. Also, I would definitely put the rogue in the arena: interrupts, stuns and FoK spam all help in there, and the first boss' damage shield make him less useful in one part (admittedly small) of the tunnel. Also, I suspect a druid would be better in the arena (more health to cushion MS). Mostly though, you need to a) experiment and find out what works for YOUR group; b) look at combat logs and figure out what's going wrong and correcting the mistakes/weak spots

So, looking at your revised question, this leaps out at me:

Group1: Arena Group Paladin(me) - Tank, Shamman - Healer, Druid - Healer, Paladin - DPS, Hunter

Group2: Gauntlet Group Druid - Tank, Shamman - Healer, Rogue, Hunter, Warlock

That feels like you're splitting your groups all wrong - specifically, that rogue should /really really/ be in the arena. Melee is nigh-useless in the gauntlet, and short cooldown interrupts and Fan of Knives are both fantastic in the arena, not to mention Tricks of the Trade. Similarly, Hunters in the arena can Tranq Shot off the Evokers shield, which is a must to get them down quickly.

Remember, you have six minutes to get to Thorim and activate P2 of the fight so long as you aren't chasing hardmode, so when learning the fight, err on the side of stacking DPS in the arena, and clear the tunnel gauntlet with as minimal a crew as possible. It's more important that the Arena never get overwhelmed.

As you grow more comfortable with the fight and begin to gear up, and you look towards hard mode, you can start shifting that balance more and more towards the tunnel to speed things up, but for the first kill, move the rogue at the very least, and possibly even the second hunter into the arena.

You may also want to consider dropping a healer if your tanks/healers outgear the content but your DPS is a bit behind.

My guild is just getting to the Keepers. We're having problems with Hodir, but Thorim has fallen to us three weeks in a row,, the last two weeks one shot each time.

Our composition is as follows:

Arena - pally tank, shaman healer, mage (me), rogue, dk, hunter.

Tunnel - warrior tank, tree healer, hunter, lock.

We find that keeping the extra DPS in the arena helps to burn down the arena waves faster, and the shaman's chain heal was more effective raid healing in that situation (we group up together in the center; we take more of a hit from the stormhammer, but its worked for us)

What we have found to be a very useful tactic is for me/a mage to spellsteal the shields and rejuvenation spells that the evokers & champions put up. it a) makes them vulnerable to attack, and b) shields one target from attacks so that the healer has less to deal with (espcially since one of the shields when spellstolen lasts for a minute).

I believe that the shields that get put up are also dispellable by a hunters Tranq shot, as well as a priest's dispel.

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