Proto-Ultima Quick Question

[Byrd]

So we took on our first Proto-Ultima in about six months last night. We've beat him several times before, but last night we got our asses handed to us.

We talked about a handful of things afterwards, and the ffxi wiki page is actually pretty good on it. (http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/Central_Te ... _4th_Floor). We think we have a good grasp of what went wrong and how we can reduce it in the future.

I noticed last night that he only did Dissipation (AoE Terror + Dispel) at pretty close to exactly 80, 60, 40 and 20 percent. Each of these (in particular the last one) caused some havoc, the last one caused us to lose two of three tanks and started the inevitable spiral of death.

My question is, does he always only do Dissipation at "Phase Changes" at 80, 60, 40 and 20%? Or was it just coincidence that he did them at roughly the same interval?

If consistent, it would be a lot easier to anticipate these changes and start the zerg rush immediately after doing the final Dissipation.

And is Citadel Buster a TP move? Seems to me it's not.

[Exoduso]

I believe he does, and Citadel Buster is easy... all you gotta do is make everyone put macros on themselves, so they only see Ultima casting the spell when its on THEM, then they can just call it when they see it and stay close to Ultima, while everyone else runs away and gets away so that person is the only one who does... pretty easy to control it that way.

And shouldn't this be moved to the FFXI discussion?

[Jeryhn]

My question is, does he always only do Dissipation at "Phase Changes" at 80, 60, 40 and 20%? Or was it just coincidence that he did them at roughly the same interval?

No, Proto-Ultima does do Dissipation at set times. In fact, if you prepare correctly, you can stun it and not get Dissipated at all, or just run all your black mages out of range for some stunning power so it doesn't rape your tanks during Terror.

The correct HP% amounts that Ultima uses Dissipation at is 79, 59, 39, 19 by the way..

And is Citadel Buster a TP move? Seems to me it's not.

It's a TP move, and will consume Ultima's TP, but it's an event-based attack based on time, and Ultima doesn't need to be at 100 TP to use it.

Dissipation is similar. It's a TP attack, but doesn't require Ultima to be at 100 TP, and its trigger is its current HP%. Similar to Bahamut's Flare attacks.

[Suiram]

To clarify a little, since the game displays HP% as the integer component of the HP%, I think it's probably best to describe it (and Bahamut's Summoning/Flares) as being triggered at the point where 80% turns to 79% etc--which is to say dropping to or below the actual 80%, not the range between 80% and 81% that displays as 80% in TParty. Just bringing this up because it's somewhat annoying at Bahamut when everyone says "80%" and people hold off and it sits there doing nothing because it's actually at like 80.3% until someone finally brings it down. It's also useful in this case because Dissipation is pretty quick so you want to be sure you're watching at the appropriate times.

[Scythiroth]

It's pretty easy to stay in casting range (well, not for WHM) and still be able to not get hit by Dissipation, as long as hate doesn't shift as he readies it. I think the last 2 Ultimas I've done, not a single one hit me (didn't even die on the last one somehow lol).

[Keltiks]

Question: Has Citidel Buster been confirmed as light damage? I am trying to decide between using a -magic % reduction build vs. a light resistance build and I can't decide what would be best. Any tanks out there have some input on what they think would work best for surviving CB?

Option A:
24% Magic Damage Reduction
23 Light Resist

Option B:
21% Magic Damage Reduction
58 Light Resist

Option C:
7% Magic Damage Reduction
96 Light Resist

[Daahan]

Have your BLMs and other mages stand out of range. It's really easy.

After it uses Dissipation, have people ready to stun. Your problem is solved.

[Jeryhn]

Question: Has Citidel Buster been confirmed as light damage? I am trying to decide between using a -magic % reduction build vs. a light resistance build and I can't decide what would be best. Any tanks out there have some input on what they think would work best for surviving CB?

This is easy, go with Magic Damage -%.

Reason being, Citadel Buster does do light damage, but it often causes a hate reset as well (will usually draw someone in right after it performs the Buster). A Light Defense setup could theoretically reduce it to almost nothing through resistance, but it could also do absolutely nothing at all and you'll just get killed by Citadel Buster. At least with a Magic Damage -% setup you'll reduce enough damage to survive and get cured up to re-generate hate.

Also, there is no Barlight spell (yes, there is Light Carol) and Temenos is in constant double-light weather. Most Barspell setups require you to be in the realm of 180-220ish to be effective against HNM class monsters. It's more likely Ultima won't experience a resist on Citadel Buster.

[Alastaire]

If your stunners are any good it's easy to Stun Dissipation, you know when it's coming, and you watch for it, you'll never get hit by it.

[Pergo]

I think Kaeko's LJ can answer pretty much any question there is about Proto-Ultima.

http://kanican.livejournal.com/

Theres 2 separate posts about Ultima.