Maia

I want to propose we change from two druids to a druid and a heal rev. I think it could be helpful with the  rifts. Check this out: (they fall apart a little at the end but other than that it's quite smooth.) Should we also try no chronos?

Yikes. 

51 minutes ago, Mold said:

Now that Maia has had the pleasure of pinging me back for negligence.

I have to admit that was pretty satisfying. 😂 

On topic though, I've been light thrower on the Darkness event before and used Condi Soulbeast. I'm not sure if the Condi nerfs made that impractical now, but it used to be doable on Condi.

I'd say two warriors not necessary.

Hmmm. I expected to see a long post here from @Mold with our marching orders for tonight. 

I'm disappointed  

2 hours ago, Twisted said:

I think the home front has stabilized. If anything changes I will be sure to update. Looking forward to continuing W5 and I will be watching videos of upcoming encounters before Wednesday's raid.

One of the few time I RSVP late Mold figures out how to ping me. sheesh! 

44 minutes ago, Mr.Pyropuffin said:

But Bell Choir is the best part of Wintersday!

Yeah, I think so too but Doc tells me most people think it's cancer.

Just a note, the mid strat might be a meme. I rechecked this thread and someone posted this didn't work for them. Could have just been good luck for the OP's group. 

Hmm. Could be easier if the off tank is off the group slightly. For example, lets say we're tanking at circle, if the off tank stands towards square or heart (now that I think about it heart is probably best) the golem should run there. If the group is faced outwards, the golem should? survive long enough for us to push it. We should be able to push faster with 2 LB druids using glyph and point blank shot everytime.

Found this on Reddit.

Since the Surging Souls always come from cardinal directions, it can be useful to always knock the Dead to the NE, NW, SE, and SW to avoid blocking off the edge that the o---o pattern leaves. Markers can help people remember this in the middle of a fight.

Seems like a good idea.

A second thing: 

The walls are not very RNG at all. Everyone overestimates their randomness. In actuality, those nice and easy walls with the holes in the middle spawn every time if the entire raid stays in the middle of the arena. By contrast, the difficult walls with no holes, which are only avoidable at the edges of the arena, those spawn every time if the raid stays closer to the edge of the arena. If the tanks keep the boss near the center, and the raid stays with the boss, you'll only get easy walls. Furthermore, there are 4 guaranteed "safe spots" where the holes are always found on the easy walls. I've enclosed a picture illustrating this. Remember: this only works if you keep the whole raid near the middle and push the golems outside the arena. Moving the raid to the outer edges leads to a snowball effect which almost always results in a wipe. They posted this diagram https://imgur.com/a/oK94n

This sounds too good to be true but maybe we could try it for a few pulls.

I'm thinking both me and Kintari could bring GoT:

Khani (normal healing traits): bring all spirits

Maia/Kintari: (Marksmanship and Skirmishing): GoT, Muddy Terrain, Search and Rescue? 

If we keep Skirmishing we can quick draw LB 4, but that means Khani has full spirit duty. If we go nature magic, we can share out the spirits, but LB 4 will be up less frequently. 

I also think we should think about it as first push and second push rather than primary and backup. I've been looking through more videos and most of them have 2+ pushers. If Kintari and I handle it, the chronos can concentrate on quickness/ alacrity.

43 minutes ago, Mold said:

I may be 15 minutes late!

No problem.

RSVP for Doc by the way.

I hate to beat a dead horse, but I still think the scourge should consider taking sand swell as an "oh shit" button. If we get stuck in a bad place because of wall rng it could save the run. I've been in a few pugs now where the long wall was approaching and we couldn't easily get to a safe spot because of reds. Especially when the platform is at its smallest. I realize our new golem strat should fix this problem, but accidents happen.

Good to know. Someone said that in a pug of mine, but it didn't make much sense.

I was thinking it would be good if we pushed diagonal behind us, sort of behind and out. Could the off chrono try to stand in the back of the group?

52 minutes ago, Twisted said:

I would love to try doing the pushing for option 1 Maia. Not because Id be any better at it but it just seems fun. Maybe we can both take some turns at it. Great breakdown of the steps too, thanks. 

I also think the Scourge/epi process works but it may be even easier to just have a Soulbeast shoot the golem with SB 4,2, aa's if that combo will indeed kill the thing. The shortbow 4 providing cripple and immob seems really good. The dps soulbeast could start AAing the golem as soon as it pops and then hit SB4 once the first KB is done. 

Regardless of what classes we use, I think 2 things are key: The pushing druid needs to anticipate the timing of the add spawns because if it spawns on the group it needs to get bounced right away, otherwise it gets cleaved to fast; and also I think we need to assign a backup pusher, whether that's the second druid (totally viable IMO if we are running 3 healers) or some other class. We were doing that last night with a collective effort but I think it would maybe be better to have 1 person assigned because we are already forfeiting a ton of dps with 5 non dps'ers in the group.

Im also fine with range healing if we want to try option 2. The main issue I have with that strat is putting more on the Chronos who already seem to have enough on their plate for this encounter.

The push timing is definitely tricky. However looking at Molds video again (that's LN I believe) they allow the golem to get pretty close before they push. At least that's what I see when I look at the first few golem spawns.

I totally agree about back up pusher. The fight is hectic and stuff goes wrong. Maybe when we're more experienced we can do without. 

I also like the Soulbeast idea. It would allow us to save Epis for the worms. They re spawn in Challenge Mode I believe.

Looks like Snow Crows used something similar to Option 2. Until it breaks down around 40% 

So I've been thinking about the first boss more. I feel like I didn't have the clearest concept of the two strategies before, but here's what I see now.

Option 1. Druid/scourge management

1. Group stays together, kites boss around circle "track" right outside of white circles on floor

2. When add spawns wait until it runs to the group

3. Druid steps towards middle and hits glyph of tides to push mob outwards

4. Scourge epis

5. Druid (and other helpers if necessary/available) pushes add further out with LB 4 or whatever else they have

I was doing a bad job of doing this consistently last night which made Khani's job very difficult. I will check my footage to see where I was messing up, but I'm pretty sure it was a positioning issue (step 3ish). I'm willing to try again or someone else can take over.

Option 2: Chrono/Berserker management

1. Add spawns

2. Chrono kites it over to the other side of the platform accompanied by the berserker

3. They position and kill the add and run back to the group

4. Druids use long range heals to keep the offtank chrono/berserker up

I brought stone spirit last night. However two Druids will allow us to bring sun as well. Maybe one of the druids brings entangle and escorts the kiters and other brings nature spirit? Kiting Druid could also bring long bow for the knock back.

PS The qT strat looks good to me. See video in chat box.

Fred says probably. He will let us know if he can't make it.

Boo social awkwardness! I want to say I'll rage quit if this is true, but it's a distinct possibility ☹️

Oh yeah. I ought to mention that we definitely shouldn't rely on me to distort greens or smashes. I will try my best, but at this point I haven't practiced enough to get it 100% of the time. If that's okay I'm happy to chrono and get some practice on the distorts in. If someone else wants to take it, I'm okay with that too.

I can chrono if we need. I'll try to practice a little before raid time.

 I'm also willing to stay on a little later tonight for more clears.

RSVP for Doc

3 hours ago, Twisted said:

Ive been upgraded to available as my wife has plans with friends. Most likely closer to 9 though still.

I love an upgrade!

Please leave a comment if 9pm is a better start time. (I know it is for Twisted.)

Pretty sure I'll be there. I'd give it 80%.