Pandemonium Warden - The aftermath theories.

[Deftscythe]

Or we just don't know the proper strategy to limit his amount of form shifts.
Don't think we'll ever find it out though.

Like I said, only two seem likely to me. With how straight-forward the fight is, there being some gimmick doesn't fit as far as I'm concerned.

[Spira]

First of all, I just read the whole thing and I'd really like to thank Ruke and BtL for contributing to the information that we will be using extensively to 'solving' PW.
Hope you guys get well soon. Great effort.

The things we do know from his fight:

- Total of 20 forms, and what each form is capable of
- PW can finally be damaged on the last form, meaning there is still a possibility of killing PW if a strong LS can somehow throw 20+ hours at it.

Personally, i still feel that there is a 'trick' to defeating PW (just as there is supposedly a 'trick' to defeating AV which apparently involves 2hr usage but no one can actually figure out anyway)... which I will probably still put my hopes in, unless I assume that SE is just being plain stupid - for which a pretty convincing case is being built upon..

anyway, the thing that bothers me...

the title theory was apparently tested by another LS, but to what extent? While they may have found the NM didn't skip to its final form, did they still attempt to battle it nonetheless to see if it could work in a different way?

People seem to suggest that PW is now a 6 stage fight

stage 1: Salvage Bosses (4 x chariots)
stage 2: Besieged Uniques (hammerer/hussar/acrolith)
stage 3: Serpent Generals (5 x generals)
stage 4: Beastmen Kings (Gulool Jaja/Medusa/Gurfurlur)
stage 5: High Level NMs (Vampyr/Hydra/Cerb/Khim)
stage 6: Pandemonium Warden (Dvergr)

the stage order doesn't seem to be fixed since 1 LS had Medusa popping before the Besieged or Generals or something...

so really.. my question is: it may be true that the title theory doesn't work per se, but what if it (or some other theory per chance) allows you to move through stages more quickly (like 1 NM per stage as Ruke was suggesting would have made more sense) and possibly skip on some of the harder NMs.. was this possibility ever tested?

I've no evidence to support such a claim, but if such a tier structure exists, then it might make sense given that some of the NMs in the list of things that PW can transform into don't have titles, such as Gadalar and the Vampyr.. and if you could just pick 1 of the NMs in each stage with titles, I think for stage 5, the defacto NM would be the Vampyr which doesn't seem that bad because no one from BtL made any significant comments about it compared to the 3 HNMs...

that said, PW would still be a bitch, but when you can get to the bitch 12 hours faster than BtL did, you'd probably have more enthusiasm to kill him at that point, and he'd seem a little more worth the time and effort. so I really dunno.

[bercus]

What event did you guys do before you attempted PW?

[RKenshin]

No events, we cleared off the weekend just for the PW fight.

Usually we have a Friday night event, and then on Saturday we have Einherjar followed right after by Dynamis. All of which were canceled for this event, which was planned to start at 3 PM on the Saturday.

A small handful of people took pictures and killed a quick few low level ZNMs before we started to gather, but other than that it was completely free.

[Hank]

I wonder if beseiged would have anything to do with PW. We know that certain mobs pop when it's happening, what if a certain type of beseiged would nullify that type's set of monsters from popping? An attack from Mamools would cause the Hussars, Gulool Ja Ja, and Cerberus from popping, etc. Maybe even the generals, since they would 'technically' be elsewhere. When we popped it, I believe a beseiged had just ended right before we popped. As we were gathering it was just starting, but it's possible it took us more than an hour to actually pop him.

Excuse me if this has been mentioned previously, the thought came into my head and I thought I'd throw it into the think tank in case it hadn't.

[miokomioko]

What the hell is a Pandemonium Gate and why are you taking the key for it from some old painter and pissing off some ridiculous undead cow by pushing it into some mossy ground? I'm assuming he doesn't but does Sanraku even shed any light onto the purpose of killing Pandemonium Warden or hint to his strength/absurdity?

[LD]

Demon Cow.

[Spira]

Demon Cow.

*cue Diablo 2 hell cow level joke*

[Quicklet]

This is the result of a dev team that for whatever goddamn reason thinks it's okay to make gimmick fights/spawns that you practically have to stumble upon the trick to realize the point of.

There is probably some trick involving the lamps in some form or another. Considering all the shit SE got from AV, I highly doubt they'd really be naive enough to make a mob that's intended to be so utterly ridiculous, assuming that the encounter isn't bugged. Assuming there actually is some special mechanic that you're supposed to figure out, which is a big if to be honest but it's the only way I could see this fight being worth going through, I don't think the fight should take longer than 4-6 hours the first time once it's being done "correctly."

Speculation on specifics won't really do anything, though, and my only suggestion is that if you're going to bother spending the pop items to pop this, instead of trying to slog through all 20 forms, it might be more productive to just dick around with different abilities/spells/items and see if you get anything funny to happen. Because other than for that reason, I don't see it being worth the time to bother with until there's some kind of response from the devs.

[huckster]

Can you pop another Warden when another one is already popped? Maybe when u trade another set of triggers it'll pop the next form? I'm sure that 18h+ fight was not SE's intention. There must be another way to do this.

[arshesney]

They don't even test their shit, I'm willing to bet that their whole PW test was popping "ATNM Test" and say: "Ok, it works". Then they simply swapped the gob with the actual PW.

That or Atomos has Pause and save points.

Great job to BtL, you guys really deserved a win.

[Titanss]

I think I figured out how to save.

[MisterBob]

They don't even test their shit, I'm willing to bet that their whole PW test was popping "ATNM Test" and say: "Ok, it works". Then they simply swapped the gob with the actual PW.

That or Atomos has Pause and save points.

Great job to BtL, you guys really deserved a win.

ATNM Test was at a completely different ??? in the wrong zone. Stupid on SE's part? Yes, but it doesn't mean that it popped in the place of Pandemonium.

[Bozo]

I don't think this was mentioned but the Bomb lamps that spawn with Cerberus actually slowly decrease HP on their own and self destruct without even touching them. We killed I think all but two which self destructed themselves. When you kill them, they also self destruct as their last move if allowed. They also act in the nature of BB, using hellstorm and vulcanic impact.

Might be a silly question but, did you happen to try putting the bombs near Cerberus when they self destructed? Might be a pretty goofy idea but when they self destruct it could have knocked some of Cerberus's hp off? Ok yeah that is a little crazy but this is an 18 hour fight were talking about. :\

What the hell is a Pandemonium Gate and why are you taking the key for it from some old painter and pissing off some ridiculous undead cow by pushing it into some mossy ground? I'm assuming he doesn't but does Sanraku even shed any light onto the purpose of killing Pandemonium Warden or hint to his strength/absurdity?

LOL

[Eldelphia]

Well the fight sounded like hell and I think you guys did an amazing job of going for as long as you did. Obviously it's really interesting for us to read about.

Complete speculation: did the person popping PW have any current seals? There are 18 seals in total, wonder if the possibilities are linked to those. Obviously this may be as useless as Ebon panels but if you had a full set of seals again - wonder if it would make a difference?

[arshesney]

ATNM Test was at a completely different ??? in the wrong zone. Stupid on SE's part? Yes, but it doesn't mean that it popped in the place of Pandemonium.

Yes, but it popped with PW item, I think they just put it in a convenient place to test the popping system.
Point is that if they didn't try popping it in the right location (lazyness, deadlines, etc) they didn't even think about fighting it.

I see it as "lulz let's create a monster with 20 forms!", or "lulz, here's a mob with all 2hrs!". And it is kinda sad.

[RKenshin]

Can you pop another Warden when another one is already popped? Maybe when u trade another set of triggers it'll pop the next form? I'm sure that 18h+ fight was not SE's intention. There must be another way to do this.

No, the ??? disappears after you pop him. It stays gone until after he dies.

Might be a silly question but, did you happen to try putting the bombs near Cerberus when they self destructed? Might be a pretty goofy idea but when they self destruct it could have knocked some of Cerberus's hp off? Ok yeah that is a little crazy but this is an 18 hour fight were talking about. :\



LOL

Bombs exploded near Cerb, didn't do anything. Cerb is also the last form so shortening the fight at that point doesn't make much of a difference.

I feel like Cerb will always be the last fight as well, we speculated this before even getting there. Gate of Hades leads to Pandemonium (the city), or something like that... I'm not as familiar with mythology but people that are familiar with it were saying it made a lot of sense to end like that, before we even saw it happen.

Complete speculation: did the person popping PW have any current seals? There are 18 seals in total, wonder if the possibilities are linked to those. Obviously this may be as useless as Ebon panels but if you had a full set of seals again - wonder if it would make a difference?

Nope, didn't have any other seals to my knowledge.

[Alistaire]

Can you pop another Warden when another one is already popped? Maybe when u trade another set of triggers it'll pop the next form? I'm sure that 18h+ fight was not SE's intention. There must be another way to do this.

This right after the interview where Sundi says AV can be an 18 hr fight? lawl

[Seraphise]

Did you guys try skillchaining/MBing, they've really been pushing for it to be the main way things are killed (arthro). Wouldn't be suprised if day element has something to do in this fight, maybe not significant, but something.

[tylerderdin4]

well i was there to spectate and saw astral flow, plus tried to help adds but AGA owns all and they spam that regularly btw. But i give BTL all the credit for valiant effort on their behalf. hope u guys n gals feel better and completely sucks but oh well now next time can do better and much more seraph support too.