Bayern Munich increased the pressure on Werder Bremen coach Robin Dutt as they cruised to a 6-0 victory over the bottom-placed Bundesliga club.
The game was over as a contest come half-time with Philipp Lahm, Xabi Alonso, Thomas Muller and Mario Gotze all on target before the interval.
Bayern were then able to conserve their energy in view of Tuesday's trip to Roma in the Champions League, still adding a fifth goal through Lahm and a sixth from Gotze.
As a result, the tension is now growing on Dutt, whose side have yet to win this season.
Cologne piled further misery on Borussia Dortmund with a 2-1 win at the Mungersdorfer Stadion which leaves Jurgen Klopp's men languishing in 14th place.
Kevin Vogt and Simon Zoller scored the goals for the Goats with Ciro Immobile's second-half equaliser not enough for the Westphalians, who continue to disappoint in the Bundesliga this year.
As has been the case all season, Dortmund created enough chances to win it, but a mistake by Roman Weidenfeller proved costly as they dropped points again ahead of what they will hope will be a tonic in the Champions League in midweek.
Klopp had Ilkay Gundogan back in his team for the first time in 14 months, while both Marco Reus and Henrikh Mkhitaryan returned from injuries, but Erik Durm suffered a thigh problem in the warm-up.
Borussia Monchengladbach underlined their status as the main challengers to Bayern this season as they ended Hannover's perfect home record with a 3-0 win at the Niedersachsenstadion.
Two goals from Max Kruse and one from Granit Xhaka secured the victory for Lucien Favre's men, who have yet to lose this season in 13 competitive matches. As a result, the Foals cemented second spot, four points adrift of Bayern.
Roberto Di Matteo's tenure as Schalke manager got off to the perfect start as the Royal Blues recorded a 2-0 victory over Hertha Berlin at Veltins-Arena.
Klaas-Jan Huntelaar gave Schalke the lead on 19 minutes before Julian Draxler made sure of the points with a 65th-minute strike.
Stuttgart came from three goals down to snatch a 3-3 draw at home to Bayer Leverkusen and continue their recent revival.
Two goals from Son Heung-min and a Karim Bellarabi strike seemed to have done enough damage with the Stuttgart fans seeing an all-too familiar sight at half-time with their team seemingly beaten.
However, Armin Veh's men refused to throw in the towel and goals from Timo Werner, Florian Klein and Martin Harnik saw them come back to claim a point at the Mercedes-Benz Arena, and win back some of the dissenting fans.
Freiburg are still waiting for their first Bundesliga win of the season after they fell to a 2-1 defeat at home to high-flying Wolfsburg.
An early Daniel Caligiuri goal took the wind from Freiburg's sails and his second goal of the game in the 66th minute left Christian Streich's men staring their third defeat of the season in the face.
Sebastian Kerk grabbed a consolation for the hosts in time added on, but it was too little too late as they remained third from bottom with just five points from eight matches.
Mainz extended their unbeaten run to a club record eight games with a 2-1 win over Augsburg at the Coface Arena.
Two goals in three first-half minutes from Jonas Hofmann and Jairo were enough to break down the Bavarians and send Kasper Hjulmand's men up to third without a single defeat in the Bundesliga all season.
Mainz have not now lost since being eliminated from the DFB-Pokal in August -- a new club record run of eight matches.