Byakko... HM or EX ?

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Originally Posted by loreleidiangelo

Ding ding ding. I'm actually really hoping they patch this out so that parties where nobody breaks 4k DPS can't clear it by getting almost 20 seconds of free damage on the boss (also "no double jobs" is pretty frickin' annoying when you're an Astrologian, the class that can literally change their healing style to fit into any healer comp, including a comp with another Astrologian). I'm always sad to see non-melee-DPS LB use get punted to the side but I really do feel like being able to skip this aspect of it trivializes a big portion of the difficulty of the fight.

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It isn't harder without the tank lb, though. It just takes longer because for a bit of time you're just not hitting the boss. Its simply more efficient to tank lb.

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Originally Posted by Mavrias

It isn't harder without the tank lb, though. It just takes longer because for a bit of time you're just not hitting the boss. Its simply more efficient to tank lb.

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Yeah, that's why I made the edit that I did. Not sure if you saw it. It's an optimization tool for good groups but I'm not gonna pretend it's not a clutch for bad groups either.

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Originally Posted by ElazulHP

Good for you. Meanwhile, I've yet to get into a clear party that actually clears because the average player is still having trouble with this fight... and because I don't have a static PUG's are whom i'm getting matched with. Been to enrage many multiple times now because DPS is dying too often or the tank forget to LB3 or people don't place Gale Force correctly or forget to avoid leg sweep.

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This is me right now. 3 parties later, I've only seen past skydiving mechanic once. And on o5S, I've been in 5 parties and we haven't gone past 50%. I'm usually one of the last still alive. I'm not even that good of a player anymore.

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Originally Posted by Khalithar

Byakko ex is perfectly tuned and balanced for what it rewards. If the rewards were 365 weapons you could justify a higher difficulty but for 355? No, absolutely not. As someone that’s beaten O4S on content, I consider shinryu ex to be an overtuned piece of garbage fight with rewards not worth the effort. Byakko on the other hand? Again, for what it rewards you, the difficulty is perfect.

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This. Byakko gives you an entry level weapon to patch 4.2, it is roughly equivalent to a HQ ilvl350 crafted weapon: same weapon damage, slightly better stats, but can't be overmelded. If you don't have (or know) max level, decently geared crafters, you have the choice of tossing a few million gil into to MB or learn the fight and farm Byakko for the new standard of weapons in 4.2.

It is not a broken fight handing out overpowered weapons like they were candy.

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Originally Posted by loreleidiangelo

Ding ding ding. I'm actually really hoping they patch this out so that parties where nobody breaks 4k DPS can't clear it

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Wow, such pettiness. What is the problem, those "scrubs" running around with Byakko weapons and mount are hurting your pro-player feelings?

If you want to show to the world how much of a cool kid you are you should be considering that title from Ultimate, and not something from Byakko.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

I guarantee you it wasn't. They simply don't adapt to our cheese strats. This same thing happened with Zurvan, thus creating the ever beloved "Skip Soar or disband" memes. The dev team has difficulty with the NA/EU mindset. JP does the mechanics almost as a show of respect. NA/EU only care about getting through the fight the fastest way possible. If we can break a fight, we're going to do it.

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You make it sound like ingenuity is a bad thing. Tank LB is a tool handed out to the players long ago, if people can't see past using it only when it is mandatory like A12 that is a limitation of their own.

If the possibility of skipping the second tiger with a tank LB3 was intended or not we will only know if the devs ever outright state it. But as others have said, they could have easily just turned it into insta-death no matter what if they really wanted.

There is no disrespect or disregard for the developers by being creative on tackling the challenges they put in our way, unless someone is outright cheating or using exploits.

Killed this 10 times with PUGs last night (best part: zero weapons dropped that anyone in the group could actually use for their main Job). Hadn't cleared it before then. The fight is very simple (by far the most similar to its NM version of any trial I can recall), compounded by the way shielding and healer power creep is trivializing any sort of damage that bosses can do. We were getting through the boss's ultimate without anyone taking damage. Tank buster? *Excog* What tank buster? Stop in and dine at the all-you-can-eat Vulnerability Buffet? Not a problem.

I've got case in point here. There is no way we should have killed this with how terribly we played (8 deaths!), but since you can outrun the raging incarnation of a tiger as a WHM in a dress, the tank can eat any Vuln stacks s/he likes because you can just employ Strategic Death® to drop them: https://youtu.be/5lOr3PtQxx4

My advice to those having difficulty: use voice comms. In my experience, PUGs that do so are far more effective. Why? Because when you screw up, you can let others know, and they can compensate; or when someone else is screwing up, you can tell them, "hey, you're screwing up"; or when someone is having trouble with a mechanic you can tell them, "hey, get behind the boss, he's casting Leg Sweep". And when you're talking to a real human being with a voice it makes people less inclined to just give up and ragequit. This is what kills most PUGs -- people get tired of sitting around, because every time you wipe, 1-2 people quit, so there's no consistency to the group. It's hard to kill anything that way.

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Originally Posted by Coratanni

This is me right now. 3 parties later, I've only seen past skydiving mechanic once. And on o5S, I've been in 5 parties and we haven't gone past 50%. I'm usually one of the last still alive. I'm not even that good of a player anymore.

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Stick with it! I just got my clear a couple hours ago. New strategy I learned today made it easier to get through the fight. Basically, nobody does the stack mechanic. It's completely ignored and the tank pops one of their big CD's right before they're grabbed and they'll survive. Healers will heal them up and then do the same to the next tank on second stack. Lets everyone keep on dps'ing the boss down and is easier on the healers just having 1 person to heal at a time. Then as previously mentioned by others the tank lb3 on the second tiger method. My group didn't play perfectly and we still got the clear.

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Originally Posted by ElazulHP

New strategy I learned today made it easier to get through the fight. Basically, nobody does the stack mechanic.

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Can people really not do the stack mechanic? Mark one set of people with numbers and another set with shapes. You only need 3 for each stack. You can Cure III them from range as it happens -- one person to heal at a time. Then the tanks have their cooldowns for when they actually need them -- I dunno, when they have 4 Vuln stacks and Heavenly Strike is coming? -- making it easier to get through the more hectic later phases. This is why groups fail. They waste their "oshi-" cooldowns trying to ignore mechanics and lose all their wiggle room for actual mistakes.

How do people get to level 70 and not understand the meaning of four gigantic, flashing, bright orange arrows pointing exactly at the spot you need to stand???

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Originally Posted by loreleidiangelo

(also "no double jobs" is pretty frickin' annoying when you're an Astrologian, the class that can literally change their healing style to fit into any healer comp, including a comp with another Astrologian).

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The reason for "no double jobs" is pretty simply actually. For every double job you have, you receive a penalty to LB gains. You gain LB fastest when you have 0 double jobs. That's all it comes down to really.

Came from Tonberry, no harm mean
But I'm quite surprise that you guys Tank LB. I use Range LB most od the time :0

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Originally Posted by Paladinleeds

The reason for "no double jobs" is pretty simply actually. For every double job you have, you receive a penalty to LB gains. You gain LB fastest when you have 0 double jobs. That's all it comes down to really.

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? I know why people want double jobs, I just dislike that none are willing to attempt to do the mechanic properly and be more flexible with their comps. It's not me not understanding why people do it, it's me disliking it because pug teams for the most part can't do enough DPS to kill the boss otherwise and static groups just want to farm it as fast as possible (though my team sometimes overlaps jobs if people really want to play the same thing).

"Oh man, it's not hard enough! Agh!"

Well, did you have fun? I had fun!

Lots of fun, in fact! My favorite trial so far. I hope to see more of these, regardless of how "difficult" it is!

Speaking of Byakko, a lot of parties thought I was crazy when I suggested that they let the OT solo the first stack, and then the DPS eat the second stack when the MT is grabbed. A few of the farm parties were very hesitant to try it. Fortunately, there were other groups who ran with the idea and it worked pretty good. But it seems that pre-assigned stacks with the tanks each grabbing aggro is the dominant "meta" strat right now.

I personally think Byakko Ex is extremely easy, especially compared to Shinryu Ex. Makes me kind of sad, but it is what it is. I personally found the fight kind of fun the first couple of runs (mostly the falling phase), but now it’s just a tedious sort of gimmick-y thing to me. I will probably feel the same about V6S, even though I think the fight is super fun right now.

That being said, my favorite Ex is still Sophia, and she was the easiest Extreme in HW at release. Difficulty doesn’t necessarily equate to how fun a fight is.

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Originally Posted by Bacent

(Partially because I don't like dropping gil bombs on stuff that will be replaced in about a week or so, as well as me spending 3200 tomestones on 2x new orchestron rolls).

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Little off-topic, but isn’t tank BiS crafted accessories again this tier? That’s what I’ve been hearing anyways. I don’t play tanks so I’m not sure, but I’ve heard that pentamelded crafted is BiS again. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.

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Originally Posted by HyoMinPark

That being said, my favorite Ex is still Sophia, and she was the easiest Extreme in HW at release. Difficulty doesn’t necessarily equate to how fun a fight is.

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This kind of fits in to my point about Byakko Ex a few pages ago. Much like Sophia, the difficulty is perfectly fine for the reward that it gives. Byakko and Sophia both provide entry level weapons for the new patches and aren't nearly as good as a tomestone or savage mode weapon. Based on the ilevel of the weapon Byakko yields, I believe the fight is perfectly fine as is. Now, if Byakko yielded a 265 weapon that was superior to the tomestone weapon? I would absolutely agree that it should be significantly more difficult. But since it doesn't, it shouldn't.

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Originally Posted by TheAngelneer

You make it sound like ingenuity is a bad thing. Tank LB is a tool handed out to the players long ago, if people can't see past using it only when it is mandatory like A12 that is a limitation of their own.

If the possibility of skipping the second tiger with a tank LB3 was intended or not we will only know if the devs ever outright state it. But as others have said, they could have easily just turned it into insta-death no matter what if they really wanted.

There is no disrespect or disregard for the developers by being creative on tackling the challenges they put in our way, unless someone is outright cheating or using exploits.

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We know it isn't intended because the devs outright acknowledged Skip Soar memes were due to an inexperienced programmer on the battle team. Regardless, tank lb cheesing just encourages people not to bother actually learning the mechanics. What caused a handful of wipes with Zurvan were the sheer number of people who couldn't do Soar because they never bothered with it. There isn't much "ingenuity" to ignoring mechanics entirely.

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Originally Posted by Khalithar

This kind of fits in to my point about Byakko Ex a few pages ago. Much like Sophia, the difficulty is perfectly fine for the reward that it gives. Byakko and Sophia both provide entry level weapons for the new patches and aren't nearly as good as a tomestone or savage mode weapon. Based on the ilevel of the weapon Byakko yields, I believe the fight is perfectly fine as is. Now, if Byakko yielded a 265 weapon that was superior to the tomestone weapon? I would absolutely agree that it should be significantly more difficult. But since it doesn't, it shouldn't.

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Is Byakko "perfectly tuned" relative to his reward or has Savage equally become watered dumb compared to what it once was? Regardless, even if you wouldn't place him around Shinryu's difficulty, he shouldn't roll over with a decent party. He does. The only real challenge is getting competent people, which, in PF, can be a struggle on the levels of Ultimate, admittedly.

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Originally Posted by RiyahArp

Titan EX hasn't been done at min ilvl for 3 years or more. A lot of people came and went during that time, using it as any form of example is dumb. Everyone had to do Royal Menagerie, just to get to endgame, as the first phase of a popular new expansion launched. If you wanted to try to do an ex primal synched you often looked at hours of waiting in queue.

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The difference is Titan EX actually demanding competency from you. I agree, being ejected from the fight entirely probably isn't the best mechanic but he had far more in his arsenal. Frankly, Titan Hard Mode was more punishing than Lakshmi EX. That's what spawns the continuous complaints about how easy content has become. Forget the primals for a moment and look no further than dungeons. When was the last time an Expert dungeon punished you for dumb mistakes? Not on an a constant insta-wipe, savage level nonsense. Just old ARR equivalents where Stone Vigil ate you alive if you pulled a ton. Even The Vault has been labeled "too hard on new healers" when it was among the few to actually demand healing in lieu of Holy spam. Granted, Hell's Lid is hella better than Kugane Castle, I'll say that much.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

Is Byakko "perfectly tuned" relative to his reward or has Savage equally become watered dumb compared to what it once was?

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Byakko is perfectly tuned relative to his reward.

I can't speak for Shinryu since I didn't try that one, but Byakko does feel a little easy compared to Susano EX. Though that could be because there was a wider range of gear players might be using by the time one gets to him, VS Byakko being right at the high mark for the patch previous to him. That said I found him to be the most fun of the EX fights thus far (partly because it made me think of Touhou, then about how the devs who worked on it must have wanted that Automata cross-over to happen. And also cause I liked it.)

If we can have a simillar fight to Byakko when it comes to enjoyability while upping the difficulty a couple hairs, i think we'll be in a good place. If we have something similar to Byakko's second phase it probably needs a bit more RNG to it.

As far as the "tank lb cheese" goes, it does kinda suck that the only time players ever see the Tank lb is when it is an absolute requirment rather then as something that could be helpful but other strats don't require it. The only time I personally remember seeing/using it outside of A12 (and also knowing both Bahamut and A12S need it) was against Cloud of Darkness when the stacks got to high. Which given that both DPS and Healer LB get used way more often makes me glad to see we are getting to use the Tank lb a bit more. Course I may be forgetting other times since I didn't really start trying to do EXs till SB since Sephirot.

Any helper for his mount ? :/ iv no wolf mount and want this one so bad :(

I'll be honest, was expecting it to be harder than this after Shinryu. Quite frankly it may be easier than Susano or Lakshmi. Was still a fun fight, I really like the falling phase in particular. A couple of my friends don't, so as a joke I kept telling them "but SE spent a lot of money on this!" lol

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Originally Posted by Metalwrath

Only reason its 'not that hard' is because you can cheese through it with tank limit break.If it wasnt for this factor i guarantee that most clear parties would be still seeing enrages.

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If it wasn't tank LB3 it'd prolly just be melee LB3 on the add, not much difference really.. This part was the only thing that held us up, once we got the timing right it was a clear.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

"Skip Soar"

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The distinct difference that you don't seem to be getting that the Tank LB doesn't let us ignore the tiger mechanic entirely. We still have to do it in the first phase whether we like it or not. Meanwhile Soar could be skipped in the first phase by high DPS, which I'm almost certain is the part that devs were referring to with the comment about an inexperienced programmer. Nobody learned to do Soar and as soon as people had to do it groups fell apart. This isn't happening with Byakko.

Just wanted to make that clear.

difficulty has a rubberband effect because the devs spend too much time listening to a whiny internet audience
shinryu was "too hard!" so now byakko is "too easy!" it just goes back and forth

I think with the way people are nowadays any content developer needs to take in that the unhappy are about 1000% louder than the happy people

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Originally Posted by Sacred_Nym

The distinct difference that you don't seem to be getting that the Tank LB doesn't let us ignore the tiger mechanic entirely. We still have to do it in the first phase whether we like it or not. Meanwhile Soar could be skipped in the first phase by high DPS, which I'm almost certain is the part that devs were referring to with the comment about an inexperienced programmer. Nobody learned to do Soar and as soon as people had to do it groups fell apart. This isn't happening with Byakko.

Just wanted to make that clear.

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? Groups are absolutely falling apart if they don't have tank LB3 for the second add phase, are you kidding? Why do you think "no double jobs" is the new "skip Soar or disband"?

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Originally Posted by Sacred_Nym

The distinct difference that you don't seem to be getting that the Tank LB doesn't let us ignore the tiger mechanic entirely. We still have to do it in the first phase whether we like it or not. Meanwhile Soar could be skipped in the first phase by high DPS, which I'm almost certain is the part that devs were referring to with the comment about an inexperienced programmer. Nobody learned to do Soar and as soon as people had to do it groups fell apart. This isn't happening with Byakko.

Just wanted to make that clear.

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IIRC Tank LB2 was used on the soar after broken seal, not the first one. Wasn't a fix all like tank LB3 in Byakko (I've actually been in a group where all 4 dps were dead in that phase due to failed gale/orbs and still cleared it using tank LB3 and raising people during the LB time, lol), since sometimes people still died because people were that bad at soar but sort of similar situation.

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Originally Posted by loreleidiangelo

? Groups are absolutely falling apart if they don't have tank LB3 for the second add phase, are you kidding? Why do you think "no double jobs" is the new "skip Soar or disband"?

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If groups fail because of a lack of Tank LB3, it's because the group got lazy to do a mechanic for the second time in a fight. If groups failed Zurvan because they didn't skip, it was because nobody there knew how to do soar and actively refused to learn it. There's quite a difference.
Also maybe it's an unpopular opinion, but I don't understand why "no double jobs" isn't the standard as well an option in PF. I mean the LB penalties on high end content are there for a reason but we have to police it ourselves. I honestly don't see why it's being compared to "Skip Soar".

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Originally Posted by Vaer

IIRC Tank LB2 was used on the soar after broken seal, not the first one. Wasn't a fix all like tank LB3 in Byakko (I've actually been in a group where all 4 dps were dead in that phase due to failed gale/orbs and still cleared it using tank LB3 and raising people during the LB time, lol), since sometimes people still died because people were that bad at soar but sort of similar situation.

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Soar was skipped in the first phase and then tank LB'd in the second for the express purpose of nobody having to learn the mechanic. You can't skip or Tank LB the first tiger in Byakko, so you can't avoid learning the mechanic or how it works. That's all I was trying to say.

I must admit the mechanic actually becomes quite hard if you don't tank lb. I think a doable alternative is to LB the add or ranged lb both. I dont think that mechanic can be completed w.o any lb casually at our gear level. If we couldn't just LB cheese it, that mechanic would be pretty rough and the entire fight would be hardr . And I have a bunch of orange dps, tanks, and healers in my party so it's not quite just big deeps.

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Originally Posted by RLofOBFL

I must admit the mechanic actually becomes quite hard if you don't tank lb. I think a doable alternative is to LB the add or ranged lb both. I dont think that mechanic can be completed w.o any lb casually at our gear level. If we couldn't just LB cheese it, that mechanic would be pretty rough and the entire fight would be hardr . And I have a bunch of orange dps, tanks, and healers in my party so it's not quite just big deeps.

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People did it just fine before tank LB strategy was found out.

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Originally Posted by Kazrah

I've definitely seen people make mistakes on that fight. What's funnier is that the worst players I run into in there seem to be players rocking full crafted sets that somehow even underperform compared to people below the ilvl requirement for it.

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Are you saying gear doesn't equal skill?!

/dramaticfaint

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Originally Posted by alimdia

People did it just fine before tank LB strategy was found out.

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Groups were doing the tank LB3 on the first day....

I quite like where it is in terms of difficulty.

It's very 'middle of the road' which is exactly the sort of content I want more of in FFXIV.

For those who want something tougher? Well, that's what Savage is for. Those who manage to complete that and need an even larger challenge have Ultimate Coil to tackle.

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Originally Posted by ThirdChild_ZKI

Are you saying gear doesn't equal skill?!

/dramaticfaint

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It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't so insanely consistent.

I mean he does extra aoes during second tiger that in my experience healers just don't realize how much aoe is actually going out on top of orbs. I can't even count the amount of healers in "Clear" parties that I had to tell to shield or put regen on during the first tornado set. So ignoring the stack instant kill tank bug into instant sweep things that wipe group is second tiger and tornado placement. So is this hard content because people can't read a tank b healer and c dps? Walking toward a predetermined spot marked while having the same static fight repeat it in the same exact way as difficult? The fights mechanics are pretty simple and self explanatory. Although oh its new and fun tends to wade when you are just trying to find people competent enough to not lose their attention spans for a "farm" party.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

I quite like where it is in terms of difficulty.

It's very 'middle of the road' which is exactly the sort of content I want more of in FFXIV.

For those who want something tougher? Well, that's what Savage is for. Those who manage to complete that and need an even larger challenge have Ultimate Coil to tackle.

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I quite agree. Too bad they can only manage one boss like this per few months, bit sad really.

Since this is the only relevant topic about Byakko right now in recent memory, question. I haven't fought him since before the quick patch this week. I didn't see it mentioned in the patch notes, but did they fix the LB3 tank strat? On that note, I've been using the strategy where, when Byakko grabs the main tank, the offtank will take the first stack alone, and all four DPS will eat the second stack. It has worked perfectly in every party I've been in (as in no deaths and the MT's debuff falls off by the time Byakko finally turns his attention back to them). Has that been unnecessarily fixed too?

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Originally Posted by KaivaC

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All they fixed was that at some attempts he would grab the tank for the first stack and just instantly one-shot him midair, leaving him unable to be rezzed.

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Originally Posted by ErryK

All they fixed was that at some attempts he would grab the tank for the first stack and just instantly one-shot him midair, leaving him unable to be rezzed.

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Ah good. Alright, thanks.

Byakko EX's difficulty is ok.

It might be easy for older players since we've been playing this game for so long that we know every single mechanic and can anticipate anything, yet there are newer players who will find it difficult even if they're veterans in other games, so I think Byakko's difficulty is just fine.

If you want difficulty, there's Savage or Ultimate, and if you've completed it already, then move on to a different thing, unless you're an "endgame-only" player (wich is pretty boring, IMO).

Yep, I'm just glad that we haven't got a repeat of Shinryu EX where the Primal was harder than half of Savage.

That was just silly =/

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Originally Posted by Sebazy

Yep, I'm just glad that we haven't got a repeat of Shinryu EX where the Primal was harder than half of Savage.

That was just silly =/

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It really wasn't. It was just that O1S and O2S were way too easy to begin with. Even with that being said, Shinryu Extreme is only somewhat hard in the first phase. Both the add phase and the final phase are ridiculously easy.

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Originally Posted by Sebazy

Yep, I'm just glad that we haven't got a repeat of Shinryu EX where the Primal was harder than half of Savage.

That was just silly =/

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ShinEX wasn't hard. People just don't know how to pay attention. Everything he does is telegraphed for a clean five minutes before he does it.

Wha? What is this over complication? =s

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Originally Posted by Starflake

It really wasn't.

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Ok so you disagree with what I just said right?....

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Originally Posted by Starflake

It was just that O1S and O2S were way too easy to begin with.

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Uh.....

Wouldn't that make Shinryu EX harder than O1S and O2S?

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Originally Posted by Sebazy

Yep, I'm just glad that we haven't got a repeat of Shinryu EX where the Primal was harder than half of Savage.

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Wait, that's what I said in the first place?

ShinryuEX's difficulty and the reasons for it being so are irrelevant to my point. It was a rougher fight for most compared to O1S/O2S which were both face roll encounters, doubly so once people got geared.