Grauberg the second time around (Alfard, Azdaja)

Maintenance forced our LS event back a bit, but people logged on pretty fast once servers were up so we still managed to get the NM's we set out for. Those NM's being Amphitrite, Alfard and Azdaja. The triple-A threat! We fought them in that order because it seemed that was the order of difficulty as well.

Zone Boss
Not much to be said about Melo Melo and Amphitrite. It's the same old story of people healing the mob because they're not being careful. This time we DID go for the Atma, because I thought it'd help people do weaponskills for weaknesses without needing a TP mob. It's still a risk, since if you end up doing anything OTHER than proc'ing weaknesses, it'll only get in your way. Melo Melo's atma actually sounds good, but I suspect a very low proc rate. Also, I'm secretly hoping that the damage you absorb is unadjusted by PDT and Phalanx, but that's probably too much to ask for. Some upgrade stuff dropped as well as the RDM sword.

Ningishzida + Alfard
Nothing good dropped! Ok, now that that's out of the way... The info on wiki was right. Tanking from the back guarantees that it will only use Serpentine Tail. While spectating it seemed like it would turn to face tanks everytime after Serpentine Tail. At first I thought this was built-in AI, but then when Nerve Gas went off 3 times and tanks died. I ended up tanking and another reason why it may have turned became apparent. The tail attack has a knockback which will send it running after you and in so doing turn around. So, next time we should try to position it so that tanks can back themselves into a corner while still in range and exactly behind Alfard. If turning around is indeed only caused by it running after you, then this should mean that as long as nobody else pulls hate, the risk of Nerve Gas will be minimized.


Deelgeed + Azdaja
Deelgeed has an Atma! I did not know that going in. Superior Accuracy+ will be nice when I level up WAR with my gimp G.axe skill. Azdaja lived up to its promise of being a tough sob. The plan was to have 3 lines of players like we should have had during Uleguerand fights (Pantokrator+Apademak). The front line consisted of a NIN and a MNK tank. With hate reset two tanks is the minimum. The second line consisted of a WHM, RDM and a BRD support. The final backline consisted of people to wake the second line up from Sleep + everyone else. The role of waking mages was important and it went ok-ish, but with better execution it would probably have meant the tanks survived longer. However, as it was the tanks went down due to a combination of slept support players and Doom. The Wyrm was only down to about 80%-90%. That's when two other DD's and I stepped up and attempted to tank it for the remainder.

Not too long ago I made a decent evasion setup for my Samurai. The motivation was the Urd solo, where my evasion rate was high. Followed by Lamprey Lord fights, where it was not high at all. I realised my evasion skill rating on SAM wasn't so bad, but it needed complimenting. The increasing returns of evasion support this line of thinking. This was the reason why I "for shits and giggles" decided to stack Cloak and Dagger and Siren Shadow atmas. Both have Major Evasion+. Stacked and combined with my evasion gear Azdaja missed... a LOT. I was very surprised at what I was seeing. I was subbing WAR for weaponskills, but with Third Eye I hardly took any regular hits. Of course such a thing can't be relied upon while killing Azdaja because it can dispel the Atmas. It dispelled Atmas on the tanks, but for w/e reason it never did so again.

The three melee tanked it with brave support from weakened mages all the way down to ~20% at which point I died. I HP'd and came back to find it at ~10%. At this point, despite having decent success holding it before, I decided to take it down asap. There were quite a few weakened people around and a single voke got its attention, meaning there hadn't been anyone alive on it for very long. Fanatic's drink, 2hr x2 thanks to a revitalizer did a good chunk of damage. Together with some damage from someone else (I don't recall) it died pretty fast. In the end only 3 or 4 people missed out on the kill and Atma.


The Atma off this seems off-putting at first, due to its innate self-inflicted DoT. However, looking back at the Azdaja fight itself, it seems like it could be useful here for waking people up. The major Damge taken-% is an obvious treat for its big AoE wing attack. Since all its attacks appear to be darkness based and the Dispel magic spell is also dark based, you COULD assume that the dispel effect of its baleful Roar is darkness based. If so, there are two Darkness resist Atmas available that could be stacked to resist its wing, the dispel, the sleep and doom. Before we even bother to try this we need the T3 VNM in Grauberg though.