Damage ranges and enemies 1 shotting you

[Shiyo]

Hello, I am curious if anyone else has a problem where ilvl bosses in this game will just randomly 1 shot you, regardless of having 30-50% PDT/MDT/block/protect/shell/2k+ defense.

A good example is the t1 escha boss Aglaophotis, who will randomly bloody caress or seedspray for upwards of 2-3k+. Most of the time, he'll do 10-100 damage with it, then randomly 2-3k. That's a HUGE damage range, for absolutely no reason!

It's not a very fun mechanic or anything you can actually play around, you just will randomly die from time to time with no counterplay, baring getting a burtgang and aegis and fulltiming DT gear.

I don't find that very compelling gameplay - actually, I find it downright frustrating and unfun.

Is there anything I can do to stop bosses from doing things like this? Or are bosses literally designed around fulltiming -DT gear with a burt and aegis? Seems a bit silly.

[Olor]

No idea about the specific mob but I've seen that from a few mobs and it's just a bit stupid. But that's how XI rolls these days, super cheese boss tactics.

[Shiyo]

I really don't like it.
There's so many escha NM's I've fought that feel like "time bombs" of if you don't kill it in x time you'll randomly get 1 shot, and the longer the fight goes on the more chances of 1 shotting happening.

This games combat is so amazing, but the boss design makes me go "What is even going on?". I'm sitting here tanking a boss and take 0 damage for a few minutes, then the exact same WS will randomly do over 100% of my health pool in full DT gear. Just..why? That isn't fun.

Why can't damage be consistent? Why can't we just have to constantly be cure bombed and have to make sure we're holding hate through the cure bombing? At least you're pressing buttons. speaking of pressing buttons, bosses that amnesia AND mute make absolutely no sense. Why design abilities that just give you less to do, to the point where when stacked you actually can't do anything besides auto-attack?

[Nyarlko]

Escha NMs all have some sort of gimmick that varies by mob. It's honestly been a while since I didn't steamroll thru T1s, so I don't 100% remember Agla's, but Seedspray is a 3hit attack and could be multihit/critting, it also can give you a nasty def-down debuff.. The attached drain of Bloody Carress is also nasty and not affected by PDT-, or you may be having macro fails that are leaving you in the wrong gear.

NMs in this game all have inherent timebomb/enrage timers due to the way the TP system works. The lower their HP, the less TP they need to perform a move. If you have even 1x delay capped melee on one, it's not impossible to see back-to-back TP moves at low HP. A lot of Escha NMs also have level up gimmicks which can make them simply unkillable if allowed to level up too much. The longer fights go, the more total damage will get dealt to your party, which means the load on your healers will also increase. Faster kill = less incoming dmg = safer kill = win. Stuns help a ton if you are having trouble with certain moves. ^^;;

I too really really loathe amnesia aoes. Pet jobs in particular get hit with a double whammy since pet+master can both get hit, but there's no way to remove it from pets. :/

[Urmom]

Hello, I am curious if anyone else has a problem where ilvl bosses in this game will just randomly 1 shot you, regardless of having 30-50% PDT/MDT/block/protect/shell/2k+ defense.

A good example is the t1 escha boss Aglaophotis, who will randomly bloody caress or seedspray for upwards of 2-3k+. Most of the time, he'll do 10-100 damage with it, then randomly 2-3k. That's a HUGE damage range, for absolutely no reason!

It's not a very fun mechanic or anything you can actually play around, you just will randomly die from time to time with no counterplay, baring getting a burtgang and aegis and fulltiming DT gear.

I don't find that very compelling gameplay - actually, I find it downright frustrating and unfun.

Is there anything I can do to stop bosses from doing things like this? Or are bosses literally designed around fulltiming -DT gear with a burt and aegis? Seems a bit silly.

In the example you gave Aegis would actually hurt you/be part of the reason for those huge range. My guess why it would change so much is how many hits are getting blocked... which with aegis is not going to be a lot. Other things that help is it's high triple attack possibly giving it more hits and seedspray giving you def down also being multi hit phalanx will make a greater than usual difference. Never really noticed seedspray doing that much too me though. And bloody was a little painful but never that bad on run or pup don't think I've done it on pld or non tank jobs though

That said yes they do design a lot of nms to be able to kill non tanks fairly easily which means you should be at a minimum capped in whatever dt it's doing and likely either having aegis or ochain/priwen (situationally dependent and sometimes you need to switch between them as you see mob ready spells and sometimes moves) burt is just icing really. Or use a Run with epeo (on stuff with hard physical dmg regular one should be fine on the more magic orient mobs). Or use pup.

[OmnysValefor]

A big thing for Paladins / Rune Fencers / any tank is not give up too much defensive stats while casting especially since some of the macro pieces available, especially to returning players are non-ilvl so missing the the much higher defense/mdb/vit/int/etc.

It can also be hard to gauge what something regularly hits for these days when you have to wonder if cureskin was in effect.

For instance, I prefer to keep my PLD in 40%+ DT at all times (midcast). When I'm not casting, I'm always -DT capped.

TL;DR: A lot of times people die, it's because they got caught midcast. Not saying that was the case for whoever at this NM, but I see newbie tanks die all the time because of this.

it also can give you a nasty def-down debuff.

This two, never underestimate how harsh defense-down can be (the potency varies from NM to NM)

[PristineChicken]

A big thing for Paladins / Rune Fencers / any tank is not give up too much defensive stats while casting especially since some of the macro pieces available, especially to returning players are non-ilvl so missing the the much higher defense/mdb/vit/int/etc.

It can also be hard to gauge what something regularly hits for these days when you have to wonder if cureskin was in effect.

For instance, I prefer to keep my PLD in 40%+ DT at all times (midcast). When I'm not casting, I'm always -DT capped.

TL;DR: A lot of times people die, it's because they got caught midcast. Not saying that was the case for whoever at this NM, but I see newbie tanks die all the time because of this.



This two, never underestimate how harsh defense-down can be (the potency varies from NM to NM)

A lot of people die because they refuse to wear any defensive gear, period. If they die, it's not their fault for having no -DT on, it's the tank's fault for not being able to prevent AoE damage, the White Mage's fault for not being able to give a 2000 damage cureskin, etc, etc, etc.

This is my biggest problem with people who play this game that is not related to cookie-cutter party/alliance set ups mentality. People who says stuff like "I can't wear -DT gear, it'll lower my DPS!"

My DPS is infinitely higher than yours when you're dead.

[Urmom]

This two, never underestimate how harsh defense-down can be (the potency varies from NM to NM)

Yeah to go with this even the same move can vary depending on the nm or nm vs normal mob. Like normal mob Aegis schism is strong but only -75%. Meanwhile when some Fomor nms use it it's at least -100%. Turns out you take a lot of dmg at 1 def even without full dt against pre/low ilvl stuff lol

[Shiyo]

A big thing for Paladins / Rune Fencers / any tank is not give up too much defensive stats while casting especially since some of the macro pieces available, especially to returning players are non-ilvl so missing the the much higher defense/mdb/vit/int/etc.

It can also be hard to gauge what something regularly hits for these days when you have to wonder if cureskin was in effect.

For instance, I prefer to keep my PLD in 40%+ DT at all times (midcast). When I'm not casting, I'm always -DT capped.

TL;DR: A lot of times people die, it's because they got caught midcast. Not saying that was the case for whoever at this NM, but I see newbie tanks die all the time because of this.



This two, never underestimate how harsh defense-down can be (the potency varies from NM to NM)

I don't think it's fun if you have to fulltime capped DT or you'll randomly die.

I also died with 40% PDT after the WS did literally 0 damage to me(didn't break cureskin) many, many, many times over the course of 2 hours. It would just randomly do more than my max hp or nearly my max and triple attack would kill me before a cure could go off.

That's why I don't understand damage ranges, they shouldn't be so extreme.

[Nyarlko]

Agla has innate DA/TA, so it's possible to see multihit procs on each of the three hits, making it a max of 9x hit ws, plus each hit can crit. >_>;;
Odds are good that you are getting smacked down by rng causing a combination of DA/TA/crits during the move.

...Just a sidenote, but if you were in Escha-Zitah for 2hrs, there is also a very high chance that your vorseals wore off... This is a bad thing, often leading to dirt naps. ^^;;