Grabbing the Garuda minions?

I've been duty finding Garuda HM as a PLD tank and...how do you grab the red lined minion extra fast and never let go as OT during the first part of the loop (arena not reduced)? As I main tank garuda herself alot (others either seem to have less HP or just want to OT instead of MT), I can only watch as the rest of the party struggles with the two minions and hope they survive through it and kill them on time. Some times I see the off tank unable to keep the red lined minion in check and it lets loose on the party along with the green lined minion and they all die, then I die, then the OT die. Sometimes I see the off tank clearly prepared for it and fighting hard to get the red tank but to no avail.

I've off tanked for the fight too and I face similar problems. If the red line spawns right at the party area, I seem to have a decent chance of grabbing it early: shield lob, start combo and go to my little corner between the north circle and center circle.

If the red lined minion starts at the other side...I've tried provoking first for (0+1 enmity, yeah yeah) and then mashing shield lob it as it comes closer, get the red icon on enemy list and then proceed to watch the minion ignore me and go for the group, start comboing it hard+ spirits the red lined minion who seems to still be hellbent on cleaving the group two to three times before it finally turns to me. I thought it might be because the healer is aoe healing hard and gotten on top the minion's list (but i'm unsure since so far I have not managed to take a good look at the threat list during this and besides, like I've mentioned, I have the red aggro icon the whole time) so I started to just lob as soon as i can and start comboing and provoke if it still ignores me after the first fast blade or savage blade. It's not...always succesful but I really cant tell what needs to be done otherwise, on my/ot's part.

Also, I prefer just stone skinning up when she summons the minion and using sentinel as she casts slipstream and just take the hit during that phase. I've never tried running forward to bait the slipstream before running back to my tank spot. It seems to be way too risky on the OT behind me if I do that and doing what i do... I only take like 20% dmg of my HP max. Should I not be doing that?

The red add has a specific path that it takes before it turns to face whoever it has aggro on, just like Garuda. What you need to do is stand at the spot where you're going to tank the red add (generally the edge of where 2 of the whirlwinds intersect). It will turn around as soon as it gets to where it's going without cleaving the rest of the group.

If you, as an off tank, can't take the red minion, someone is screwing things up. Either a DPS is colorblind and/or stupid, or a trigger happy whm decided new adds popping is the perfect time to spam medica 47. To be honest, i had quite a lot of trouble with whm on this fight, either right at the start of the fight, or when adds just popped. For most whm, it will be the first 8-man fight where the group takes consistently a lot of damage and is gathered on a tiny spot -- i.e: they do not have the first clue just how much hate medica generate on 5 to 7 people right when the hate metter of the tank is baerly more than zero. I had wipes happen right at the start of the fight because the whm would medica on the first aoe used by garuda, leading to hate grabbing, taking moar aoe damage from having garuda facing the group, using moar medica... well, that did never end well :)

I never off tanked garuda, but the same happened to several of my groups, where the whm would medica while adds are just moving into position, generating a hell of a lot of hate before the OT would grab red. Obv, it is then possible to voke it, but if the whm has not yet learned its lesson, he will have his hate fly over yours like a supersonic jet. So let your whm know. Your dps can take a bit of beating. ST heal onry during this phases, and stop the medica silliness.

Also, you don't have to check who have hate to know if its a whm that screwed up, just look on who ate dust first. Or don't, it will be the whm anyway (or the colorblind trigger happy blm, yeah).

For the slipstream of garuda while she moves toward the group, when it is in the center of the storm, you can definitely bait her on doing it toward the exterior of the circle (go through her just after she entered the circle, wait for her to cast slpistream, go through her again). On first and third sister spawn, when she comes toward NW from SE, i usually stand on the corner made by the arena border and the green tempest that is at the northest point possible. As soon as she hit splistream, i run like mad in the direction orthogonal to the one formed by me-her (almost like following the border of teh arena, but not quite, like cutting the turn a bit). Worst case scenario, i eat the slipstream and garuda is facing a bit toward the group for 2 second, which shouldn't matter much, best case scenario, zero damage. In both cases, i achieved : 1) slipstream was directed as far away from where people are supposed to be as possible 2) by moving back to my spot on the north again once garuda have moved toward me, i will have made garuda make a S shaped trajectory, positionning her well outside of the green tempest and still facing away from the group. If you don't move, either you are not standing on the corner said before, in which case slipstream will be closer to hit people badly positionned, or garuda will end up in the green tempest (and there is no moving her later on), which will screw your melees until the green tempest disappear.

Honestly, during the first part of the second phase when you're getting ready to deal with the sister spawns on the NW side, the add that you kill doesn't matter. Have one of your Damage Dealers grab the one that spawns near where your main tank should be and as off-tank, you can grab the one that pops on the NE side. If they're uncoordinated and can't position well enough, you could even run in between the tornadoes as Garuda disappears and grab the sister and wait while your party deals with the other. You have a few (3?) seconds to run in between the tornadoes. You can run through them so long as they aren't whirling. It's basically foolproof.

When you're in the center, have the same damage dealer snatch the green sister up while you get the red. No tank needs to hold anything other than one target. They might roam a bit even if your enmity confirms that you've got hate, but don't stress it and keep spamming shield lob/tomahawk until the add returns to you. Edit: This part should be relatively easy though. Do your thing then run through them while putting your back to the wind wall. Ezpz.

I was told in DF Garuda that I was a bad tank because I didn't pick up the green add that spawned near Garuda. They thought I was supposed to tank whichever appeared next to Garuda and they were to burn the other as it came across. I instead ran to the spot by the whirlwinds and picked up the red one. Anyway, it can be tricky to maintain threat on the red one as the healers are likely spamming mass aoe heals. Your best bet probably is to throw some shield lobs at it and then use fast blade followed by a provoke and then your two enmity combo attacks. It also helps if you don't have a dumb group that thinks it's okay to burn the red add before the green one.

Ugh, today was not my day. I just dutied a party where the other PLD has more HP so I let him main tank. I was able to grab the red lined minion on the first spawn. Then on second spawn during eye of the storm, someone marked the red line as attack1 and I lost aggro and couldnt get it back despite provoke. On 2nd try, same 2nd minion spawn, I somehow managed to fail grabbing it. I was already mashing everything, lob, provoke, the combo and it just wouldnt peel off the group and we wiped. I asked if someone was spamming medica and one of the WHMs snapped back so I just let things by.

Then the other PLD wanted me to MT and I accepted. The whm casted regen as I was running into lob range but strangely enough the lob didnt seem to have any effect. I tried lobbing a couple more times with voke in between and it just wouldnt peel off the party that wasnt doing anything. It dawned on me that I might be seeing my character doing actions but not registering to the server but I was too...floored to look if any damage was scrolling through the screen from the lob to confirm. We had to wipe and I felt really nervous at this point. On the 4th try, the fight started smooth enough but the lag was soon apparent enough to me. I was already behind Garuda halfway through the slipstream cast and I even activated a skill before it finished and I was still stunned behind her. This happened through out the fight and even though we finished it, I only managed to evade 2 slipstreams. The other PLD seemed to do his OT role very well.

I was doing AK a couple times and a garuda fight 12 hours ago with no problems. I went to reset my connection after that garuda fight and it didnt seem to fix it. Gah.

Here's the trick:

Just wait a bit before you provoke. It's going to take a path over there to the party anyway, and you're going to have a healer spamming Medica 2 or whatever else. If you provoke too early, it's just going to be overridden by heals (and the add won't move anyway because it's on its set path). So wait a moment, hit provoke, and then go after the add.

Additionally, you may find it hard to pull enmity even doing that while throwing your shield / tomahawk afterwards. If the green add spawns close, while you're waiting on the red add, go ahead and hit the green add with step 1 of your 3 hit enmity combo. When the red add is in range, throw out provoke and slam down steps 2 and 3 of the enmity combo. You'll have much less problems doing this than trying to throw a shield / tomahawk afterwards.

If the rest of the party wants to stand on top of you or the main tank or won't pull their mob away, that's not really your fault anymore.

1st Add spawn is rough; red tether can appear right on your DPS/Mages or it can appear entirely out of range.

I do my best to have Heavy Swing done so that I can Tomahawk -> Skull Sunder -> Flash -> Butcher's Block and then I Provoke the green tether and then Butcher's Combo red while maintaining a healthy Tomahawk repetition on green - I corner tank (facing it into the center in one of the niche corners that appear when plumes appear) red tether both using Path & Inner Beast with Bloodbath/Berserk active -> if you manage to have both alternate you Enmity combos and weave in Flash to push your hate as the DPS are going gangbusters on green tether. (Having hate control on both is rare since in a competent group the DPS burn the green tether nearly immediately)

Holmgang is your friend - you /can/ stop a red tether at the abilities max allowable distance with it and save a few seconds if it's coming across the field. If you do manage this - you can simply spam Tomahawk or utilize Provoke - Tomahawk to be on top of the enmity pile when it's free to move again. Just be aware of your tools - don't bind yourself & the monster in a bad position.

2nd Add spawn when you're sheltering in the eye is interesting - I tend to gather red tether and move to about 10 o'clock (MT being at 6 o'clock) and establish my hate and if I can gather up the green tether in the process - I do; but usually DPS will have killed her by the time you've got the red tether positioned and enmity locked down so it doesn't matter.

This is one of the few instances where if you have Wrath V & Infuriate available using Unchained is plausible because you immediately recover the Wrath V - heavier damage output on adds (especially adds you /cannot/ lose threat on) is a good idea; though not essential Unchained makes the 1st Add phase easier when paired with Bloodbath/Berserk with and Inner Beast available as the healer is trying to split their focus between MT/DPS/OT(you) during these phases.

Just have the dps target the green link( it doesn't do any damage, shit or a whm). All the have to do is go to a corner to avoid cleaves while the it grabs red. Just throw at them and provoke if it gets pulled ( off gcd remember) and stand where you will tank it.

The important thing about off tanking the red line add is to make sure it's away from the group. It's bad enough the DPS/healers have to take damage from one of the adds, but taking damage from both just makes things unmanageable.

Early spam cures can make the red add dart over to the healers, so as mentioned above, it's best to just let it wander in, then provoke it and hit it with a shield lob and maybe a flash. You should be able to hold it with combos after that I'd think. Tanks shouldn't care about what's happening with the green add so much as DPS can burn it down pretty quickly.

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Originally Posted by Gardes

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They have specific paths but, I always tank Garuda and the one that spawn closest to her. I have seen other groups us the off tank to tank both adds or even a dps to tank one of the adds but imo it just best for the mt to grab the one that spawns closest to Garuda.

The OT should be able to grab the one coming across the area w/ provoke or what ever ranged attack they have then just flash and do your rotation. The only problem is when you have A.D.D. DPS that want to going b4lls deep on the mob before the tank gets any hate then yo have issues. It's a team even ;)

wait til it starts to move

provoke

tomahawk/shield throwy thingy

flash

done

Tornado phase:
1) Prime a Rage of Halone / Butcher's Block on Garuda before she flies away
2) Use defensive CD's + Offensive CD's when there is nothing to attack
3) Use Rage / Butcher on the close add
4) Provoke + Shield Lob / Tomahawk the far add
5) Flash when the far add gets near you
6) Spam flash or overpower 3~ times

Eye of the Storm phase:
1) Defensive CD's + Offensive CD's when she flies away
2) Run to each side and Shield Lob / Tomahawk both adds
3) Stand in the middle of the safe area, Flash a few times
4) Move them away from the middle
5) Provoke if one runs off. It probably will. Hopefully your WHM's know how to Shroud.

That's about it.