BLM Pro tips for Titan EM.

Hello,

In my humble opinion, Titan EM is an absolute nightmare for Black Mages. As a DD you are expected to deliver good amount of DPS and dodge everything up to 99% success rate. I have defeated him 4-5 times so far, in DF and PUGs (Not counting the kills with my Coil group/friends groups). However, I have failed at him many times, more than I can count, at times it is me who was playing like a /b/ tard, sometimes it was another person or the entire group failing.

I learned few tricks here and there, thought it might help another BLM and even learn new tricks from you guys.

So here goes,

1- At the beginning of the fight everyone will rush to be right behind Titan in a direct line. Don't do that, matter of fact be on the right side or the left side so the first landslide won't be put on your path. This is important so you can setup yourself with Thunder II/III followed by fire III without having to cancel your cast. Save your swiftcast please ^^.

2- You do not have to stack up with the rest of your team for Weight of the Land before the Heart Phase. However, you do need to spawn your plume directly behind your team and not have it at a random place. There is a small chance you won't be one of the five plumes which means more free time to do some damage.

3- This is the one fight that I don't think you need to wait for full mana before you start your Fire rotation, there is small window for you to do some Fire damage so don't be greedy with mana after the heart phase. One UI 3 tick can be enough and I have found Thunder I to be a very comfortable choice after the heart phase. Before the Heart phase I just use thunder II/III.

4- Swiftcast is extremely useful to break out your healer from Gaol. Swiftcast will be available for every Gaol. After we break out the DD I wait for the landslide to show up then swiftcast > flare. Just be careful not to break out your healer too early, a couple of times I sent a healer flying because flare crited for 2k.

5- When you get Jailed pre target the healer Gaol while you are jailed. It gives you all the time in the world to dodge the upcoming Landslide then do your swiftcast > Bliz III or Fire III. From experience you will always lose your UI3 or AI3 when you get jailed so no reason to use flare at this stage. Oh don't be afraid to use Tundercloud procs on jailed healer.

6- Some groups expect you to LB the second set of the two adds. I have not found a way for me to LB and avoid damage completely. However, there is a way to LB and live. When the 2 adds shows up, bombs will follow, bait landslide as always, dodge the bombs then stay away from everyone. Once you are far enough, cast LB and just eat your own plume, you won't die and you will get your LB off.

Edit: "For the lb it's easy. Right after heart phase I stand directly south where the first bomb spawns. Attack Titan till AF3. By that time tank should have the adds to the right. As the left add is moving I do the lb. this gives me just enough time. The lb finishes off just as the bombs spawn and your already in position to bait the landslide. You get plenty of time to move for the landslide." - Gloulion

7- Super bombs, quite annoying little shit if you asked me. Once the bomb have been selected just use it to make sure you are on fresh Astral III, dodge the plume, move right behind the bomb to the very edge of the platform then Raging Strike or Mega Int HQ > Swiftcast (if available, which it should be even if you used it on every single healer Gaol) > Flare. Crit or not, no one will dare complain you did not do enough damage to it. You can push for Double flares, I just find it to be a close call every time.

8- Did I mention that you don't need Acc at all for any EM fights? Yep that is right put on your full DD suit with no regards to Acc. I have 360~ or 380~ Acc using my pure dmg ilvl90 set, never missed a hit.

I hope this helps someone, and hope to learn something new form you guys ^^.

thanks Neo.

This is nice thank you. For the lb it's easy. Right after heart phase I stand directly south where the first bomb spawns. Attack Titan till AF3. By that time tank should have the adds to the right. As the left add is moving I do the lb. this gives me just enough time. The lb finishes off just as the bombs spawn and your already in position to bait the landslide. You get plenty of time to move for the landslide.

I just wanted to say thank you. It's always nice to have someone take the time and put out their experiences and information. I haven't even attempted this fight yet, I did and do still enjoy helping ppl in Titan HM, but tome farming to get the rest of my gear in check. I've already seen the rage threads and hear different opinions, but from the video's I've seen this does look like a casters nightmare hopefully with all of the useful information we have available it won't be "so bad" lol. Again Thank you.

Thanks for the kind words ^^. Gloulion solution added, thanks buddy.

So cute :3

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Originally Posted by Kettle

So cute :3

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wot? wrong thread?

KrazyKupo,

The fight isn't THAT bad. It just takes a bit of skill. You have to kind of memorize the rotations and move before they happen. Just as an example, the land slides, if they're baited in the middle (as in your whole party is in the middle) take the advantage to move between the middle and left or right landslide before it happens. Does it always work? No but the majority it does and you can do this once you learn and practice the fight.

Thanks for adding Neo :)

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Originally Posted by NeoAmon

Hello,
4- Swiftcast is extremely useful to break out your healer from Gaol. Swiftcast will be available for every Gaol. After we break out the DD I wait for the landslide to show up then swiftcast > flare. Just be careful not to break out your healer too early, a couple of times I sent a healer flying because flare crited for 2k.

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Why not just use Swiftcast + Flare on the first Gaol so that Titan will also take damage from Flare? When the groups overall DPS is decent, as a MNK I get to hit Titan a couple of times after breaking the first Gaol and before Upheavel hits. And we stop DPSing the healer's Gaol at low % to wait for landslide to hit so we dont break them out just to get hit with landslide.

It would make more sense to use Flare on the first Gaol so melee can hit Titan and Range can start hitting the 2nd Gaol before Upheavel even hits the raid.

Thanks for the tips, I like to think I am a pretty good player but oh my god I cannot deal anywhere near my usual damage and dodge everything on this fight.

Thanks for the tips. I just recently got my first Garuda win so I haven't quite attempted this yet, but I'll share this with some of the other BLMs I commonly group with as well.

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Originally Posted by NeoAmon

8- Did I mention that you don't need Acc at all for any EM fights? Yep that is right put on your full DD suit with no regards to Acc. I have 360~ or 380~ Acc using my pure dmg ilvl90 set, never missed a hit.

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I was actually curious about this. I'm currently running with a set of gear that's 415 acc and I was parsing myself on HM Primals to see if my attacks would miss or not. Now that I know this, I can gear for full crit/det.

Wondering if it's socially acceptable to stand away from the rest of the group during plumes.

Everyone just stacks on titan's butt and it takes just takes so much concentration to move away at the right time because I DON'T want to move when I'm in the middle of a cast (or eat 4-5 weights because I overestimate my cast speed). As a result I'm a bit burnt out after 5 runs or so of getting my fire cycle interrupted (and/or eating weights that I know I can avoid). At the same time, I feel like I'm not contributing as much as, lets say, a summoner who can DPS with Dots and move preemptively

In HM titan, I just move where I want and don't have this problem because I'm usually away from the rest of the group and can time swift-casts/procs for any phase where I know I'm going to be interrupted. Here, it feels I'm being interrupted all the time. Dunno maybe it's getting used to the fight. Or maybe this fight is just really BLM unfriendly. Not good feels man D:

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Originally Posted by HoroBoro

Wondering if it's socially acceptable to stand away from the rest of the group during plumes.

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Some do complain, but just assure them you will be at the right place at the right time for Gaol and double plumes. You are a BLM, your natural position is the back line, not even Titan going to change that fact.

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Originally Posted by Oblit

Why not just use Swiftcast + Flare on the first Gaol so that Titan will also take damage from Flare? When the groups overall DPS is decent, as a MNK I get to hit Titan a couple of times after breaking the first Gaol and before Upheavel hits. And we stop DPSing the healer's Gaol at low % to wait for landslide to hit so we dont break them out just to get hit with landslide.

It would make more sense to use Flare on the first Gaol so melee can hit Titan and Range can start hitting the 2nd Gaol before Upheavel even hits the raid.

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I place higher priority on the healer Gaol. What I do is save Fire 3 proc for DD Gaol, then Flare for Healer. I'm not saying this is the best method just what I got working for me atm. As for damaging Titan I do that while the DD is getting Gaoled until I get fire 3 Proc.

There is also the other fact, using flare on Titan will force the BLM to do low damage to the healer gaol in most cases. Convert is a long cd and transpose going to guarantee one small tick of 1.2k mana, which means the player would be forced to use Bliz iii on the healer gaol, at best 600 Crit with just one UI. I don't know, there may be batter ways, but I really think flaring the DD gaol is not better than what I'm doing.

Why do you flare the healer gaol? That's silly. There is no need to ever use flare in a single target rotation ESPECIALLY after the patch when we are even more sensitive to the server's regen timer.

You should have enough DPS in your group so that you can completely ignore the gaol under Titan's butt. I am always on the healer's gaol. I save swiftcast, just like you do, but often have fire 3 due to firestarter to follow. This way, I judge whether the landslide is safe or not and break them out.

No mention of manawall negating landslide pushback or manaward for bombs either. These abilities are so useful for this fight. You can actually ignore the x bomb mechanics by popping manaward/wall.

The very beginning of the fight....lining up when you know a landslide will be placed on you (causing you to have to interrupt your casting) is just pretty stupid. I actually had a DF group gripe at me because I wasn't stacking behind Titan like they were despite being very far away from them so that my plume wasn't an issue and I was still being hit by succor/medica.

Another tip is to save raging strikes on the heart phase till the brief period between plumes and circular bombs. Before that, there is too much movement to optimize the damage from raging strikes like you normally would.

On the super bomb, save swiftcast for this part and stay away from the rest of the group just like you would in the very beginning. This assures you that you you are always facing the target (even when you go to dodge the plume) so that you can have constant DPS on it. Aetherial manipulation back to a party member and manaward for the geocrush + explosion.

If you have a SMN in the party, have them use LB instead. They have plenty of time to get DoTs on both adds before they need to use LB where as BLMs need to constantly cast to push out damage on the adds. So while the SMN's DoTs are ticking and they're casting the LB, you both are doing near-optimal damage.

You don't seem to be too 'pro' after neglecting to mention all of these other facts. :X

^ extra tip for ya, Transpose exactly as Flare fires off guarantee a mana tick instantly. This trick have always worked for me since the game came out up to 90% success. As for Swiftcast, you will always have it up for what you need to use it on, Healer Gaol and super bombs, the cool down goes well between Titan mechanics.

As for your last question, I actually don't know. When the DD get selected I keep firing at Titan until the DD Gaol is target able, saving Fire Starter in the process, switch target then position myself inside the Gaol and use the Fire III proc.

Edit: I did not test ManaWard/Wall on the fight...silly I know, but I just got used to dodge dis and dat. Could you kindly confirm which Titan ability is affected by what, in another word Landslide is physical so Manawall works on it, Bombs physical? Plumes, magical? I will add your notes to the OP :).

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Originally Posted by NeoAmon

I place higher priority on the healer Gaol... - snip

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I'm sure any decent player would still be DDing Titan before Gaol is targetable. When I'm on melee we break the DD Gaol quick enough where I can still fire off 2-3 GCD skills on Titan before we get knocked back by upheavel. I haven't tried BRD or BLM on Titan EX yet but I would be nuking down the 2nd Gaol instead of Titan before getting knocked back. You said yourself that you don't want to break your healer off too early (under landslide). If you find yourself slowing down DPS (idling) then I'm assuming the overall DPS is good. If overall DPS is low then I can understand saving your best nukes for the healer goal (Flare or not), though I would still break out the DD as fast as possible, the longer they are in Goal the less time they can spend DDing. Especially for MNKs, 1 or 2 seconds could mean losing or keeping 3 stacks of Greased Lightning.

I'm not saying your method is wrong, it's all about preference. Your protip is about efficiency and maximizing damage output, idling (holding back so you dont sent the healer flying) doesn't maximize your damage output. In my opinion breaking the DD a couple of seconds sooner would be more efficient. Melee can throw DOT or two on Titan or ranged DPS can start damage on the healer Gaol earlier.

You can find a guide to the HM primals in my Lodestone profile. Since he doesn't change abilities too much, most of the guide should still be relevant to extremes. You can jump in a HM Titan DF run and do some tests to confirm the results.

Another interesting note is that jumping during upheaval negates the knockback. Jumping during a landslide also reduces the distance you are pushed back.

SC > flare still sticks you at 1.1k~2k MP and isn't 100%. The best way to handle it is just turn around and start DPSing the healer gaol. There should be no need for DPS on the gaol under Titan if everyone is alive. It dies pretty quick. A firestarter + swiftcast fire 3 (neither crit) does more than a flare crit. Both spells have a chance to crit opposed to just one with flare, yielding more potential damage in the end, not being stuck at 0 MP during the 10% of the time that flare > mash transpose doesn't work, and grants you control over when the healer is broken out so that others do not release the healer too early.

Manawall is still there...failure to mention it in a fight where it has its uses is just sloppy on your part. Manaward, on the other hand, helps a ton on tumults, geocrushes, etc. I find landslide to be the easiest to dodge so manawall really isn't necessary. Just thought I'd throw it out there since a lot of people have trouble with the x bomb/cross bomb part. As a BLM, you can just play it safe and pop both abilities if you are struggling to survive that section. Heck, you can pop both and eat a bomb, continuing to DPS the adds that are up without worrying at all as long as you don't pull aggro and get manawall knocked off you. Then again, that's the part I save quelling for anyways.

Edit: Here, just use these:

http://i.imgur.com/xwdJfeO.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/ladRYg5.jpg

Would appear we do the fight very different from the norm.

My group never uses Mage limit break we save limit 3 solely for Titan himself.

DPS in the group is good enough for me to cast 1 fire on the first Gaol if transpose is up i am free to flare and only use Scathe on the Healer Gaol whilst dodging plumes and regenerating enough mana for fire3. Doing this and if other people are on they're game we can skip the Bomb phase completely.

Single target dps the Adds you should be into UI phase when you need to dodge the landslide and explosions, then your free to either kill the second add or get your rotation going on Titan himself before the Plumes.


To me the fight is all about managing your casts and downtime, you want to make sure your animations finish as soon as you need to dodge plumes etc so that you are moving during any GCD where Scathe can fill. Doing this I average top 2 damage behind the Monk without limit break damage between 250 and 280 dps.

It is about timing, also move just enough out of the aoe to avoid it so you can proceed with a rotation but thus is for any battle.
I never bother using scathe if must move as it is sort if useless spell
Thanks for posting

If you dont have a fire3 proc, a swiftcast fire3 for the healer gaol makes way more sense than a swiftcast flare. Flare is overkill and the recharge time afterwards sucks, fire3 is only a little less potency without the hindrance afterwards.

Remember that landslide is going by the cast bar and not the animation and the animation plays for a little longer than it should. This means you can pretty much run into a landslide to avoid getting hit by a bomb explosion if you time it right. You won't get knocked back or won't take any damage. Also, for EX mode, there is a small delay between Titan smashing his fist on the ground for Landslide and the moment the bombs explode when compared to Hard Mode. So don't go running to the middle of the arena during row bombs the moment Titan smashes his fists down, lol.

Landslide is physical, bombs are magical. Not sure about weight, but I'd say magic.

Don't forget as a mage, Sprint is your friend. It has saved me many times when i just needed half a second to complete my spell and rush out of the plumes. I even have a macro to let the other casters know to pop Sprint....I hate seeing players die to avoidable damage.

Also, I've found in terms of LB, if you're doing it on the 2nd set, you'll definitely have LB2 which covers the full battleground in Titan ex. You don't even have to wait for the Egi's to spawn. Start casting your LB2 right when you see them on the mob list. LB doesn't generate hate, you don't have to worry about the OT grabbing them. It'll save you the stress of wondering if you'll be locked at Landslide/bombs.

Thanks for the tips. I will be sure to use them especially as one of the big problems for me has been misjudging cast time and eating up to 4 plumes at once. Ouch!

Manawall prevents landslide push back, so you can be stationary and cast for two landslides.

Edit: I will re-write the OP with all the feedback here.

For gaol/upheaval, I hard cast Flare on Titan so that it hits both Titan and the close Gaol as it spawns for extra damage. Then just Transpose, get knocked back, and Swift + Blizzard 3 the other Gaol to continue your rotation.

Pre-cast Sprint during your Fire rotation when you are expecting plumes. The faster you get out, the faster you get back to casting.

Firestarter and Thundercloud procs = mobility. If you get a proc and plumes are coming up, save it so you can cast it while dodging plumes.

Manawall is best used during Circle bombs in heart phase, X bombs during adds phase, or row bombs during the final phase. Use it on whichever pattern tends to give you problems.

If killing the heart isn't a problem, save your CDs for a fully-buffed 2x Flare on the Titan Egis. At the start of the final phase, start your fire rotation on Titan and wait for the OT to get into position. Pop Raging + Quelling + Int Pot and hard cast Flare on the adds. Immediately hit Convert and Swiftcast + Flare again. This should get both adds under 50% by yourself and is one of the main reasons to bring a BLM over other DDs in this fight.

On the second cycle, quelling strikes should be up but other CDs will not. Just use standard Fire rotations and be sure to use a single Swiftcast + Flare while dodging bombs followed by Transpose. In general, Flare + Transpose is best used right before periods of high mobility since you aren't gonna be able to cast anything other than Scathe anyway.

If a party wants you to use mage LB, save it for the second cycle when you can't do 2x Flare. Make sure it hits Titan too.

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Originally Posted by kro

Pre-cast Sprint during your Fire rotation when you are expecting plumes. The faster you get out, the faster you get back to casting.

Firestarter and Thundercloud procs = mobility. If you get a proc and plumes are coming up, save it so you can cast it while dodging plumes.

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Truthfully everything she said is 100% spot on, but these two bullet points I feel are the most important. Also, if a party asks me to mage LB the egis, I usually pop manawall/ward before I start the LB. That way, if someone didn't bait the landslide properly, I don't get thrown off or if I have to eat a bomb, its damage is significantly reduced.

Our black mage precasts the flare so it goes off right when the gaol on the dps is active, this hits the gaol AND titan for 1.5k-2k damage. Doubling the damage your doing each time you use it. Then, if shes feeling really generous, she'll potion/convert/etc and swiftcast another flare, effectively solo'ing the first gaol and doing all that damage to titan as well. The second gaol is a cakewalk and a flare on that one would really risk your healers life, especially because your other dps buddies might not be expecting it.