Tanks and getting into HM Titan

[Kenji1134]

So, I am just going to go out on a limb and say it... We need some kind of workaround for getting Tanks into HM Titan for the relic quest.
As I understand it, you need to do the primal fights on the job associated with your relic quest to get the update. But the vast, VAST majority of groups (that have a decent chance to win) only bring 1 tank. And most of them have their tank picked out.
This creates a huge bottleneck for tanks on the relic quest, since you'll see groups of 4-5 dps, 2-3 healers, and 1 tank... One.

Granted, if you have 4 excellent dps and 2 excellent healers, you can get away with using a 2nd tank as a dps, but that does not happen very often. So, long story short, us tanks are kind of screwed on this fight.
To make things worse, we've got "Full DL + X AF+2, experienced in phase 3-5" tanks spamming in Rev's Toll for HM Titan, effectively pushing out those of us who have not had the time to grind out 30-40-50 CM runs over the past few weeks... All of this artificial competition for that one spot, plus the difficulty of the Titan fight itself... its making the relic quest very... aggravating, and just not in the least bit fun. Not for a tank anyway.

[Tanaya]

Make your own party.

Or, you can be a badass and make a 5-Tanks, 1 DPS, 2 Healers party like my server. They actually got past the heart phase.

[Koltik]

Make your own party.

Pretty much this. The odds of you finding a PUG as a tank are slim; making one yourself, that's another story.

[JormungandrVanagandr]

Make your own party.

Or, you can be a badass and make a 5-Tanks, 1 DPS, 2 Healers party like my server. They actually got past the heart phase.

I'm on your server and I was in that group. We had a blast while we were doing it because we didn't expect it to go so well. The problem is convincing other people to do the same because it isn't you know...THE OMGAWESOMEDOCUMENTEDSTRATEGY that is the only one that works. Ever.

Funnily enough, every single time the attempts failed it was because the DPS screwed up.

We came back again with 4 tanks and 2 melee DPS and never once did we get past the heart. I think that says a lot about that fight, the required DPS and the average quality of players.

[Faction]

You can do acceptable dps as a paladin or warrior on this fight, you just have to convince a group to let you do it.

[Illya]

You can do acceptable dps as a paladin or warrior on this fight, you just have to convince a group to let you do it.

I tried this tonight with a party of FC mates. I threw together a bunch of AK chain gear which I had laying around from too many AK runs, but I didn't have any DPS accessories. I was parsing 100-105 DPS while the well-geared SMN in the party parsed in the 170's. Running 1 tank, 3 healers, 4 DPS (including me), our party did not have enough DPS to pass the heart phase even with LB2.

I could grind CM speedruns and deck myself out with all DPS accessories and maybe a few pieces of DL chain but the thought of doing a dozen or more CM speedruns just to have the DPS to pass this one fight after which I'll probably never DPS again with WAR makes my soul hurt.

[CurlyBruce]

I was parsing 100-105 DPS while the well-geared SMN in the party parsed in the 170's. Running 1 tank, 3 healers, 4 DPS (including me), our party did not have enough DPS to pass the heart phase even with LB2.

You should be parsing higher than that easily, at least 130-140. Also grab an extra DPS and nix the third healer, you don't need a third healer for Titan. 2 Healers is plenty for keeping the tank alive and the only move the DPS should be hit by is Tumult. DL Chain gear can't be equipped by Warrior/Paladin anymore its Dragoon exclusive now, but the Heavy DL set has 2 more STR and more Crit than the DRG set anyway. DL accessories are also dirt cheap and easy to obtain while functioning on multiple jobs, so that could easily bump your DPS by a bit. And if you don't already have it, I highly suggest getting Garuda Axe.

[Illya]

You should be parsing higher than that easily, at least 130-140. Also grab an extra DPS and nix the third healer, you don't need a third healer for Titan. 2 Healers is plenty for keeping the tank alive and the only move the DPS should be hit by is Tumult. DL Chain gear can't be equipped by Warrior/Paladin anymore its Dragoon exclusive now, but the Heavy DL set has 2 more STR and more Crit than the DRG set anyway. DL accessories are also dirt cheap and easy to obtain while functioning on multiple jobs, so that could easily bump your DPS by a bit. And if you don't already have it, I highly suggest getting Garuda Axe.

I have Garuda's Scream. Should I be equipping Heavy DL Legs+Feet, AF+1 Chest, and any helmet rather than AK Chain? And do you have a suggestion for DPS rotation on WAR, since I've never DPSed on WAR before?

[CurlyBruce]

I have Garuda's Scream. Should I be equipping Heavy DL Legs+Feet, AF+1 Chest, and any helmet rather than AK Chain? And do you have a suggestion for DPS rotation on WAR, since I've never DPSed on WAR before?

If you have AF+1 Chest then yes, that plus AK head gives a bigger bonus than Heavy DL body. DPS rotation for WAR is pretty simple. At the start of the fight pop Internal Release and Berserk and start off with Storm's Eye combo. Then switch to Butcher's Block combo and Fracture. Rinse repeat. When Pacification from Berserk is active you can toss out a Brutal Swing for a bit of extra DPS since its an ability not a WS and every little bit helps. If you Internal Release + Berserk at the start of fight, it will be up before Heart Phase so you should save it until then. During Heart save IR/Zerk until the first person gets rocked, if you use it from the get go and you are the one who gets rocked you'll have wasted almost all of your Berserk time and will be stuck with Pacification once you get out. If someone else gets rocked pop your cooldowns and start with Butcher's Block combo. It should take 1 Butcher combo + up to Maim to break the rock, then hit Titan with Storm's Eye to maximize Storm's Eye + Zerk uptime.

[Faction]

I tried this tonight with a party of FC mates. I threw together a bunch of AK chain gear which I had laying around from too many AK runs, but I didn't have any DPS accessories. I was parsing 100-105 DPS while the well-geared SMN in the party parsed in the 170's. Running 1 tank, 3 healers, 4 DPS (including me), our party did not have enough DPS to pass the heart phase even with LB2.

I could grind CM speedruns and deck myself out with all DPS accessories and maybe a few pieces of DL chain but the thought of doing a dozen or more CM speedruns just to have the DPS to pass this one fight after which I'll probably never DPS again with WAR makes my soul hurt.

100dps should be fine if you're using berserk on the heart. There's no reason to use 3 healers with a gladiator tank, and if your DPS are doing 170dps, the heart should be dying every time.

I've killed Titan twice while dpsing, the first time I did about 100dps, the second time 130dps, neither time did we have any trouble killing the heart. The 3 healer group comp is for Warrior tank, and even then it's still possible with 2 healers if you have a Warrior. Have one of your FC's SCH go SMN for this fight if you need to. It doesn't take much dps to kill the heart consistently if you have 5 dps, so the smn doesn't need to do much damage.

First kill a few weeks back when we had crappy gear was something like this:

Bard/Monk/BLM ~150dps
Monk ~120dps
Me ~100dps

And we had no problems with the heart (Using LB1 on it)