Strategy's to fighting Tiamat/ khimaira

[Grey Jorildyn]

Once you get accustomed to how Tiamat is and people get over that initial "panic" phase of "OMGTIAMAT!!!", any good tanks should be able to produce enough hate to allow ridiculous amounts of SA'd WSs per landing. Within my LS we find 2-3 SMN is usually good enough damage with around 7-8 SA'ing melees to use WS per landing. We also DoT Tiamat until 20% ish. We use Requiem VI (w/flute), Bio II/III (air) w/ Dark Shot, Dia II/III (ground) w/Light Shot, Poison II, and if the Black Mages can, they keep two of the elemental DoT spells on. Don't ask me which because I am not a BLM, I just leave it up to them to choose them. In essence you can destroy Tiamat's regen capabiliy and do consistent heavy damage if your tanks are well prepared for this fight. Having the Samurai use TA+WS when SA isn't up but Meditate is adds good damage too with Overwhelm merits.

When Tiamat flies, swap the Samurais out for the same amount of Blue Mages for SA+Cannonball if possible. Be careful with claim errors though, although this should not be a problem if your tanks are consistently acting on Tiamat and holding high hate. We run two Black Mages full-time for stun (or at least that's what we used to use em for only), and they should be nuking when they can as long as they're not camping the Stun button (this applies to both ground and air).

So far the fastest we've been able to take her down is 36mins without any deaths or Spike Flails whatsoever. I think the best strategies evolve over time. Start out with mostly SMN and a few TA just to get a feel for the fight. Next time try adding the Blue Mages for flights. After that, increase the SA/TA and lower the SMN in main alliance. After that try full-party swapping SAM and BLU. Lastly, add the DoTs. Over time your tanks should be able to adjust to the hate management as it is slowly becoming more difficult with the above recommendations. Of course you can just completely manaburn Tiamat, but it's kinda boring and uneventful when done right. You can probably kill it in 20-30mins that way, but there's no challenge. Do what is best according to how your leaders feel and how your linkshell is setup.

Good luck on your dargons.

[Ashira]

for Tiamat - when do you equip the fire resist gear? is it while he is in the Air? or just for when he casts Firaga?

When its in the air. Firaga on the ground should be stunned.

Fixed.

We don't even bring SMNs to Tiamat anymore, just BLM nuke in the air. Depends how many people we get out there, but one particular fight that we got a bunch out there we learned that Tia is coded similarly to Wyrm; she will land after 3000 dmg (~9-10% of her HP, whereas 3000 dmg is like, 33% of Wyrm's HP iirc). If you don't do 3000 dmg, she'll land after about 2 mins in the air; watch for a Firaga cast around the 2 minute mark, she'll land after that. On Touchdown, TP resets.

Our tank PT is NIN/DRKx2, BRDx2 (one will need a Crumhorn +1), WHM with at the least AF2 pants (full Shell V, full Barmerits, and full Enhancing gear (AF2 shoes, torque, earring, Merci cape) helps), RDM (not usually the /DRK if we can help it). Double March/Mambo (sometimes Mambo/Ballad, when MP needed) on the ground, Double March, Fire Carol, and whatever.. Ballad, Paeon, in the air.

BLMs best bet is to nuke in Elemental setups full time, except with Elemental Seal obviously. Use Ltng. Threnody and Thunder spells; someone can go crazy with Flood II on each flight if you really want, I guess (or a NIN can use a Suiton). She's a little weird though; nukes in general are really inconsistent. Some people swear by mostly elemental setups but swapping in Houppelande for Weskit for the INT boost (which I meant to try last time but I forgot (and also forgot a lot of gear >.>).

[Kaeko]

It's not 3000 HP to land a Wyrm, it's around 8500-9500HP I think. You can land it easily with 4 good BLMs in ES gear on full MP pools.

The most 'idiot-proof' way you can do Tiamat is by only using DD that direction controls its TP on the ground. Ground TP moves are nasty due to Horrid Roar (which will ruin your day) and other moves like Spike Flail that can happen suddenly as a fluke. The keys to doing this fight in a simple, repetitive, minimalist, boring manner centers on 3 things...

1) Using a tank combo consisting of 'new-age' tanking models (RDM/NIN, NIN/DRK, PLD/NIN). Pick and choose they all use the same songs basically... My/Ashira's group likes NIN/DRK, but you can't go wrong with any mix of them if played well.

2) Fire resist gear for air - you need to get a good fire resist set on the tank to do this the 'idiot-proof' way. It takes a bit of preparation but it makes the fight so much smoother. Make sure a BRD has crumhorn +1/+2. WHM hopefully has AF2 legs for the +20 barspell, but it's acceptable not to have it.

3) TP limitation - there are 2 rules to Wyrms a) Wyrms have no TP regen ever b) Touchdown resets TP. If you learn these 2 simple rules to fighting wyrms, you will have a much easier time. Many/all Tiamat strategies focus on these 2 points - people use SMN because SMN BPs grant 0 TP (aka a perfect damage to TP ratio of infinity). The popular BLM manaburn in the air strat relies on the fact that whatever TP is fed to Tiamat in the air, it will be reset to 0 once it lands due to touchdown. Both methods negate Tiamat's strongest moves - Spiked Flail and Horrid Roar. If you do this, you could tank Tiamat from the back of you wanted - it's not like it can Flail without TP. "Speed fights" that involve use of BLU and melee also work extremely well, but these TP moves become possible - they sacrifice a little safety for better speed.

If you want to find the best way to kill these, you need to try them out yourself. Do not focus on how others choose to do it necessarily - focus on the mechanics of the mob itself; what moves are dangerous? What moves can wipe you? What can be controlled and what cannot be controlled? I think that's a lot better than jacking someone's strat and not knowing why they do it that way.

One thing I will say... If you fight Tiamat your first time, you will probably not have perfect hate and hate will go to mages etc. If it lands and starts running, DO NOT PANIC. Again, touchdown resets TP, it's not flailing anyone unless someone feeds it TP or enough people get hit. Flying wyrms are harder to flail than fafhogg because of this touchdown TP reset rule.

[Grey Jorildyn]

Touchdown doesn't actually reset TP; it's a TP move. It's a peeve of mine, hearing this over and over because it's a misconception.

[Kaeko]

Touchdown doesn't actually reset TP; it's a TP move. It's a peeve of mine, hearing this over and over because it's a misconception.

I guess you could say all TP moves reset TP. Since it's a TP move, it's technically correct imo

I originally called it a TP reset when this came out because Touchdown is odd and doesn't require TP to use.

[Grey Jorildyn]

Touchdown doesn't actually reset TP; it's a TP move. It's a peeve of mine, hearing this over and over because it's a misconception.

I guess you could say all TP moves reset TP. Since it's a TP move, it's technically correct imo

I originally called it a TP reset when this came out because Touchdown is odd and doesn't require TP to use.

It is a tad strange in that sense, not needing TP and all. Something like Tenebrous Mist resets TP to a player, that's a little different though, technically, than TP being consumed to use a WS. Touchdown is a forced TP move so it's somewhat different, I'd think. However, does TP effects it's damage? The world may never know...

[Kaeko]

Touchdown doesn't actually reset TP; it's a TP move. It's a peeve of mine, hearing this over and over because it's a misconception.

I guess you could say all TP moves reset TP. Since it's a TP move, it's technically correct imo

I originally called it a TP reset when this came out because Touchdown is odd and doesn't require TP to use.

It is a tad strange in that sense, not needing TP and all. Something like Tenebrous Mist resets TP to a player, that's a little different though, technically, than TP being consumed to use a WS. Touchdown is a forced TP move so it's somewhat different, I'd think. However, does TP effects it's damage? The world may never know...

I usually don't really care how stuff like this works exactly, just enough to know how to abuse it or take advantage of it. Tiamat used to be such a hard mob to so many groups, but after just learning 1-2 new things about it it really became so much easier. The fact it basically prevents itself from using its best abilities is kind of funny in a way.

[Jakiss]

fulm starts at 35% btw

[Naramaska]

3) TP limitation - there are 2 rules to Wyrms a) Wyrms have no TP regen ever

See....I used to think this as well, but a few Tiamats ago, I distinctly remember sleeping her for whatever reason, and upon waking she dropped a Horrid Roar on me. I don't think they have enough TP regen to TP every landing sub-25%, but it could be juuuust enough to push them over the edge if they get a few SA+WS's on them.


Of course, I could have been delusional. It was like a 4-5AM kill. But it definately roared after waking.

[Alibeemac]

3) TP limitation - there are 2 rules to Wyrms a) Wyrms have no TP regen ever

See....I used to think this as well, but a few Tiamats ago, I distinctly remember sleeping her for whatever reason, and upon waking she dropped a Horrid Roar on me. I don't think they have enough TP regen to TP every landing sub-25%, but it could be juuuust enough to push them over the edge if they get a few SA+WS's on them.


Of course, I could have been delusional. It was like a 4-5AM kill. But it definately roared after waking.

She only Roars you Nara cause she knows how we all love to see you go emo

[Therin]

Don't do either of them with SMN dmg onry unless you want to take 4 hours and piss off everyone getting ToD. They'll try harder to claim it next time just so they don't have to sit through that again.

People like you . . . wow, lol. Unless you're just ridiculously exaggerating, you should know that three BLMs as main damage on Tiamat can take it down in under 2 hours - I've also done Khimaira with nothing but 2 SMNs and DoT as damage (8-people total) and it died in under an hour. Khimaira has about 60,000 HP. That's 120 BPs. 60 minutes tops, with 2 SMNs, and that's not even factoring in damage from DoT and assuming you're averaging a horribly low 500 per BP and BPing with no -delay gear at all.

[Kazen]

Don't do either of them with SMN dmg onry unless you want to take 4 hours and piss off everyone getting ToD. They'll try harder to claim it next time just so they don't have to sit through that again.

Our last Khim was smn damage only, fight took about 19-20 minutes. Tank pt + 2 smn pts.

[Obilisk]

this isnt as much of a fight/ but another question about tiamat; how do LSes normally go about camping the longer spawns? obviously you cant have someone camping every hour of the day right?

[Naramaska]

this isnt as much of a fight/ but another question about tiamat; how do LSes normally go about camping the longer spawns? obviously you cant have someone camping every hour of the day right?

Depends on the server. On some she'll be up walking around untill an LS sends someone to see if she's up, on others it's like camping Fafhogg with 50+ people all standing there mashing for claim before she even spawns. Best bet is just do what the rest of your server does and DON'T ESCALATE IT BEYOND THAT. Otherwise you will end up with Tiamat's Aery, which sucks.

[Obilisk]

this isnt as much of a fight/ but another question about tiamat; how do LSes normally go about camping the longer spawns? obviously you cant have someone camping every hour of the day right?

Depends on the server. On some she'll be up walking around untill an LS sends someone to see if she's up, on others it's like camping Fafhogg with 50+ people all standing there mashing for claim before she even spawns. Best bet is just do what the rest of your server does and DON'T ESCALATE IT BEYOND THAT. Otherwise you will end up with Tiamat's Aery, which sucks.

im pretty sure she is camped on siren, so, do you just have teams of people staying there 24 hours a day?

[Alibeemac]

this isnt as much of a fight/ but another question about tiamat; how do LSes normally go about camping the longer spawns? obviously you cant have someone camping every hour of the day right?

Depends on the server. On some she'll be up walking around untill an LS sends someone to see if she's up, on others it's like camping Fafhogg with 50+ people all standing there mashing for claim before she even spawns. Best bet is just do what the rest of your server does and DON'T ESCALATE IT BEYOND THAT. Otherwise you will end up with Tiamat's Aery, which sucks.

im pretty sure she is camped on siren, so, do you just have teams of people staying there 24 hours a day?

Mostly we have mules there on permanent watch from first window same as other LS's. Sometimes we have people camping for 20+hrs it just depends on the mood of people and how badly someone wants the drop since we have a 'you camp, your drop rule'. A lot of the time we have people log their chars out there for quick claim if it pops. People get AIM'd to log on if they are around etc. Something that is becoming more common is a holding party from LS's out there consisting of a tank, healer and brd. All you need to claim Tiamat effectively is a Tank, WHM, BRD. Altho we did claim once with PLD and BLM lol and slept it while people were running there. I personally have sat at Khimaira for around 15hrs once and swore I never would again. Khim popped last window and rest of our ls was emo after that as we gradually built up from 1-20 people camping as it got closer to last window. Luckily we did claim it but of course the usual no drop on weapons.

[vagus]

Mmmm. Tiamat is my second favourte HNM to fight, behind Nidhogg. Heh.

Pld/nin and Nin/drk are best tank combination imo. Just make sure hate is shared and ninja doesn't use sleep because Tiamat can and will build a resitance to it. Your goal for the ninja is to get atleast 300 Fire Resist (includes Carol & Barfire) for when he's in the air. If Tiamat decides to move when he's on the ground. Don't attemp to fix his position till he's in the air.

It's pretty straight forward once u get tanking down. Nuke in the air with all your blms. Sub in DD & Smn for when he's on the ground. The last 10% take real care of hate. Lots of roars and Tia just gets mad. Lol. Try to avoid any type of DD / SMN at all costs and just nuke it to death in the air. Reason you don't want to nuke on the ground is to generate too much hate & TP and cause Tiamat to move. Being a blm usually for Tiamat i usually go Water IV -> Burst II -> Flood II -> Thunder IV -> and an aspir in between. If i'm lucky and conserve MP kicks in i'll get another nuke off. This should do around 1400-200 depending on your gear. I suggest as much Elemental Magic Skill Gear as possible. I'll take your advice Ashy and try INT body next time.

Get a good rdm/drk and get him on stun duty. Stun Firaga III and stun to help the tanks when he' lands. No point in the tanks keeping shadows when he's in the air. As for the adds. Elementals can be nuked by blms or kited out of the stone. Same goes for the bombs and corse. Btw, anyone can kite the mobs, there slow as hell. If u have the man power, kill them for TP, otherwise just move them to the Caves zone.

For all you thf's out there going for kill shot. Beware of Tiamat's Counterattack. Lol.

[Atlasion]

For all you thf's out there going for kill shot. Beware of Tiamat's Counterattack. Lol.

This makes me laugh every time.

[Ashira]

Pld/nin and Nin/drk are best tank combination imo. Just make sure hate is shared and ninja doesn't use sleep because Tiamat can and will build a resitance to it.

It's pretty straight forward once u get tanking down. Nuke in the air with all your blms. Sub in DD & Smn for when he's on the ground. The last 10% take real care of hate. Lots of roars and Tia just gets mad. Lol.

etc etc etc the whole post made me lol ;P

sorry vag, just.. lol ;P

[Breemer]

how acceptable is it for melee to fight khim? (before and after fulmination, tho i dont suppose after is all that of a good idea) just about everything has some horrid tp move so its either smn & blm onry or melee only run in to SC