Sephirot EX Discussion

[Avarice]

Noticed a lack of a thread on discussion the new primal.

Fight's pretty fun, but there's one move in Extreme that's confusing me, and that's Ba'at. This is the 4 randomly targeted attacks in the second phase, following the first completion of the color-based mechanics. Can't figure out what the damage is attributed to. We've had people far away from Sephirot take both minimal (6-7k) damage and 24k damage, with repeated results even up in his face, so we don't think it's range based.

[AlastorTGN]

Any guides up out there?

[Black]

here a video for the kill ~

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyyVduC3K24

[Avarice]

Figured it out; Ba'at when you do not have the color-coded attacks going on does increased damage if you get hit by anyone else's Ba'at other than your own.

[Shenrien]

So, Bismark enrage race adds.

[Lujei]

On a scale of Garuda to Thordan, how hard would you place it?

I haven't had a chance to sink my teeth into it yet, but I had fun with normal mode right when the servers went up and no one had any idea what they were doing.

[Kipling]

We just killed it. It's harder than Thordan, for sure. You could make a lot of mistakes in Thordan and still kill it NP. This fight drains your mana because it's so AoE intensive. Even being slightly off for knockbacks is a huge set of issues for survivability for all of the huge damage that goes out.

It feels like Titan-extreme with Thordan EX difficulty +1.

[fluffmode]

DPS checks are pretty tight if you fuck up. We had 2 deaths and cleared right around enrage timer. Clear video below

[Kipling]

SCH PoV:

[Rocl]

SCH PoV:

You abandoned AST again already?

[Kipling]

SCH is always going to be the safer and better choice as my co-healer is a WHM.

Yes I did.

[Kiarax]

Figured it out; Ba'at when you do not have the color-coded attacks going on does increased damage if you get hit by anyone else's Ba'at other than your own.

Unless I have the names of moves mistaken isn't that just the move that does more to tanks? The tank ones do like 25k whilst everyone elses do a lot less. If you're topped up you should be able to just eat it raw. If anyone else is near the tank though it'll do the 25k to them too.

[Yugl]

I am going to try to use basic terms or familiar terms unless the mechanic is unique. If you have not participated in previous primal fights, you may not understand some of the terminology used. Numbered attacks occur once in the fight. Bulleted portions imply a rotation/loop. For straightforward mechanics, I typically handle those in the glossary. This guide is intended to help you recognize and overcome combinations of attacks. A guide that tries to micromanage every part of this encounter instead of suggesting general strategies is too restrictive when you can employ various positioning tactics. Grammatical/Spelling errors expected (No revision).

Glossary

Spoiler: show

Sephirot

1. Ascension - Lifts the player into the air to avoid Pillar of Severity
2. Chesed (Not Cheesed!) - This is a tank buster without a cast bar. You will know it is happening when Sephirot charges a punch at the main tank.
3. Da'at - Carnage Zero from A4. Damage proportional to threat.
4. Earth Shaker - Same as T13 except no puddle and the damage is inversely proportional to your proximity to Sephirot
5. Ein Sof - Spawns orbs that grow (Vuln stack + damage when inside the orb)
6. Ein Sof Ohr - Sephirot ultimate attack
7. Fiendish Rage - Dragon's Rage (3+ req.)
8. Fiendish Wail - Triggers Gevurah Chesed towers
9. Force Field - Grants players physical/magic susceptibility/resistance
10. Gevurah Chesed - Magic damage (Identified as Turquoise/Spirit) to one half of the field. Physical damage (Identified as Orange/Life Force) on the other half of the field.
11. Life Force - Orange ground attack (See Gevurah Chesed)
12. Malkuth - Knockback originating from the North side of the arena
13. Pillar of Mercy - Damage + knockback originating from the blue ground marker. Standing in thee blue ground marker will inflict 99,999 damage.
14. Pillar of Severity - Arena-wide knockback (See Ascension)
15. Ratzon - Spawns a large purple circle on one player and small green circles on up to five players
16. Spirit - Turquoise ground attack (See Gevurah Chesed)
17. Tiferet - AoE damage
18. Triple Trial - Cleave
19. Yesod - A twister-like mechanic where your position is registered when the arena flashes yellow. Does damage and inflicts damage down status effect

Cochima
Empty Hand - Cleave that inflicts magic damage resistance down
Genisis - Raid-wide damage. Inflicts 10,000 damage.


Binah
Genesis - Raid-wide damage. Inflicts 2000 damage.
Solid Stone - Single-target magic damage

Storm of Words
Revelation - Damage and Knockback. Only happens if you do not defeat Storm of Words before the cast completes

Phase One

1. Cleave
2. AoE Damage 2x
3. Cleave

• Ein Sof 4x + AoE + Fiendish Rage 2x
• AoE Damage 2x
• Chesed
• Cleave
• Ein Sof 1x + AoE + Ratzon 6x + Ain
• AoE Damage 2x
• Tank Buster
• Cleave

Ein Sof 4x + Fiendish Rage 2x

Unlike normal mode, two Fiendish Rage markers spawn. You need at least three people to soak the damage. At the same time, four Ein Sof spawn in the formation of a "T-turn" from tetris. Pull the boss to the bottom of this T-turn and face him towards the edge of the arena. The healers and OT should stack to the back right. The DPS should stack to the back left.



Ein Sof 1x + Ratzon 6x + Ain

Face Sephirot towards the lone Ein Sof that spawns. The rest of the party should stack with the main tank to bait the Ain in the same direction. When the Ratzon markers appear, run behind Sephirot and spread to avoid overlap. You can assign positions similar to Shiva circles if it helps (ex: Assign one melee to the close right flank and a healer to the far right flank).



Phase Two

1. Adds spawn
2. Ein Sof Ohr

Spawn order and position (Three Binah spawn in a single set):
http://i.imgur.com/Y5gzuCz.png

During this phase, Sephirot will build limit break that increases the damage of his ultimate (Ein Sof Ohr). Adds spawn on a timer/as you defeat them, but Binah sets #3 and #4 can spawn together if your DPS is high enough. Cochima inflicts magic resistance down on the tank they cleave. Binah hit with magic damage (Solid Stone). Therefore, the tank holding Cochima should not hold Binah. When you defeat Cochima or Binah, they use "Genesis" which is unmitigatable AoE damage (Aside from shields). Binah Genesis hits for 2000 damage and Cochima Genesis hits for 10,000 damage. This phase is about DPS control and AoE healing. Use Assize and Indomitability when Cochima uses Genesis. DPS should avoid defeating several Binah and Cochima simultaneously. Additionally, avoid defeating Cochima immediately after a cleave. In fact, it is often safer to just wait for the healers to top people before defeating adds.

Phase Three

• Yesod
• Force Field
• Gevurah Chesed
• Fiendish Wail
• Da'at + Ein Sof
• Fiendish Wail
• Gevurah Chesed
• Earth Shaker + Yesod
• Da'at
• Fiendish Wail
• Gevurah Chesed (AoE DMG)
• Pillar of Mercy + Yesod + Ein Sof
• Pillar of Mercy 2x + Ein Sof
• Earth Shaker
• Da'at + Yesod
• Fiendish Wail
• Gevurah Chesed (AoE DMG)
• Malkuth (Knockback from the North side of the map)
• Adds (Storm of Words + Binah 4x)
• Gevurah Chesed (AoE DMG)
• Fiendish Wail + Yasod
• Gevurah Chesed (AoE DMG)
• Yasod
• Impact of Hod
• Ascension + Pillar of Severity

This phase is very technical in terms of what is happening, but what you actually have to do is not very technical; it just requires a bit of memorization and attention. For the duration of the italized portion, you will either have an orange or turquoise debuff. One gives physical vuln/magic resistance and the other gives magic vuln/physical resistance. Don't worry about memorizing what each gives; that's just trivia. Just know how each debuffs interacts with each mechanic.

Force Field
Begin this phase stacked together. When you see Yesod (Yellow flash), the party should move from the stack point. Yesod is a twister-like mechanic where the game registers your position and delivers a hidden AoE to your current position (In the normal version, you actually see the ground effect). When he uses Force Field, he grants party members an orange or turquoise debuff.

If you have the orange debuff:

1. Stand on the orange side for Gevurah Chesed
2. You are responsible for covering Fiendish Wail (T13 towers). Two players should call out which towers they will take. They should take these towers again after Da'at, so avoid going to the southern region to dodge orbs (Ein Sof).
3. You must avoid Da'at damage by having someone with the turquoise debuff take your tether.

If you have the green debuff:

• Stand on the turquoise side of Gevurah Chesed
• You must avoid taking Fiendish Wall damage (T13 towers). In other words, you do no cover damage.
• You must intercept Da'at tethers. To do this, stack at the front of Sephirot and run onto the tether. It is a good idea for all turquoise players to run back and forth until they have intercepted all four tethers even if they currently have a tether.

Earth Shaker + Yesod





Earth Shakers target one healer and one DPS. Send them to their respective positions according to the image (Sephirot North). Wait for the Yesod indicator and move in the direction shown by the arrows. Pick whichever method you prefer. The benefit of the left side image is that you can stack near the back (While remaining in the respective orange/turquoise spot) for timed AoE heals and the shaker spots are close. The benefit of the right side image is that you have greater uptime. Either is viable. The video shows the strategy for the left side image.

Da'at
From now on, Da'ats act like Carnage Zero from A4. They seem to do damage proportional to maximum HP based on exceedingly high tank damage. Since it inflicts splash damage, players should spread apart.

Fiendish Wail
Without the defense from Force Field orange buff, towers now deal significantly more damage. Assign tanks to cover each tower.

Gevurah Chesed
Without the debuff from Force Field, this attack deals more neutral damage (Neither color will be lethal, but you will take more damage than if you had the same corresponding color). Consider this a general AoE damage attack at this point.

Pillar of Mercy + Yesod + Ein Sof
The game here is to get knocked back without falling over the edge, running into an Ein Sof, or Yesod. To do that, bait the Yesod inside the blue marker (Since you cannot be there when the hit lands anyways) and move southeast when the yellow animation happens. The next blue marker is west, so just position yourself between two puddles. The third is east, so just skirt around the blue marker and position yourself before the puddle about to disappear. Check the video for a clear picture of what you should do. It's literally the same movement each time.



Adds phase until Pillar of Severity

This part of the fight is exactly like normal mode except that you have alternating Gevurah Chesed, Yesod, and Fiendish Wail thrown in.

Tanks: When you hold adds, make sure to stand near the edge of the T13 tower. You want to do this so you can bait the Yesod to one end of the tower as you run to the other side of the tower. This lets you remain in the tower full time.

DPS: Yesod will happen as you are attacking Storm of Word. I recommend that you all stack on the east side of the add and move to the west when Yesod animation occurs. LB3ing the add is optional for the first one. You might be pressed to LB2/3 the second Storm of Word if your DPS is not high enough. When you attack the Binah, be careful not to detonate multiple until the raid is topped off. You typically have time between Gevurah Chesed to wait for heals and burn adds. Just as the add phase was a mix between DPS check and control, so too is this portion of the encounter.

Healers: Generally, you want to stand at the center of the arena and only move to dodge Yesod. For healers, this portion of the fight is pretty much the same as normal mode with additional AoE damage. Just pay attention to Yesod while healing.



Overall, the best thing you can do for this fight is to telegraph where you will be later on. For example, Gevurah Chesed into Pillar of Mercy is easier if you have people stack where they need to bait the Yesod during the cast time of Gevurah Chesed. Why? It means less movement and that lets your healers do timed heals. If you have to move after healing the Gevurah, it is more difficult to bait the Yesod into Pillars of Might. The same is true of Gevurah into Malkuth. You know you need to stand in front of Sephirot for the knockback, so why not stack there for AoE heals to begin with? The same is true of Gevurah into Earth Shakers (See the pattern here?). You know you need to be far back to bait the Yesod and position the Earth shakers, so why not move close to the back when Gevurah is charging up? It is also a good idea to assign tanks as "left" or "right" for phase three. This will let them know which tower to take, which adds to take, and which side to take during Earth shakers. It's very convenient.

[Fievel]

God damn I love you Yugl

[Akiyama]

Thanks Yugl!

[Alisha]

how the hell are people doing this fight as whm/sch? I tried that way but the aoe output is too much so we went whm/ast

[sackings]

try eos. i dont need it anymore but for learning the add phase at the end its useful

[Kipling]

Wait what? What's the issue with WHM/SCH? lol

Edit: Yeah I use Eos.

[Avarice]

Unless I have the names of moves mistaken isn't that just the move that does more to tanks? The tank ones do like 25k whilst everyone elses do a lot less. If you're topped up you should be able to just eat it raw. If anyone else is near the tank though it'll do the 25k to them too.

I only skimmed Yugl's post so I didn't see if he addressed it, but after looking through ACT we figured out that Ba'at is threat-related. Whoever is at the top of the hate list takes the biggest damage (20k+ unmitigated) and then it quickly scales down from there. If the MT dies, gets rezzed, and then forgets to provoke (which can happen since he doesn't auto-attack), then whichever DPS is at the top of the hate list is going to get splatted if they get picked.

[Akiyama]

I only skimmed Yugl's post so I didn't see if he addressed it, but after looking through ACT we figured out that Ba'at is threat-related. Whoever is at the top of the hate list takes the biggest damage (20k+ unmitigated) and then it quickly scales down from there. If the MT dies, gets rezzed, and then forgets to provoke (which can happen since he doesn't auto-attack), then whichever DPS is at the top of the hate list is going to get splatted if they get picked.

Happened to us tonight. Tank died, I was next on the list, I got rekt.