Tank swap on Titan Ex - When do you do it?

I seem to have run into a couple of different pieces of information regarding this, but I haven't seen a general consensus on it.

Is there one?

A guide I read said every 3 stacks.

But in a practice group for the fight the other tank detailed out to me you should do it at 1 or 2 stacks in the beginning, pending on the first phase jump, 2 stacks after that until the two Adds come out, and then 3 at that time because Provoke will be down from being use on add.

The above seems really dependent on knowing the timing of your group.

Also, don't tank swap right before a landslide.

tl;dr: Is there a standardized number of stacks you tank swap on Titan?

Uhm. I don't really have a standardized number I swap at. My goal is to never swap before two stacks and to never let the other tank get more than three.

generally, its swap at 2 stacks, usually after landslide or gaols. After heart, sometimes people swap at 3...

2 stacks. Swap when Titan use landslide. Off-tank can Fast Blade/Heavy Swing and provoke as he casts it, run between the Landslide, use Savage Blade/Skull Sunder as he lands landslide and Rage of Halone/Butcher's Block to seal hate once he's done. You don't need provoke on adds neither. Spam Fast Blade/Heavy Swing till he comes out of invulnerability after he lands, go to the west mob and use Savage/Skull Sunder, go to the east mob Rage of Halone/Butcher's Block then proceed to Flash/overpower/circle of scorn/steel cyclone to keep hate. 3 stacks is dangerous for the tanks and they could die from Mountain Buster and AAs that follow.

Everyone does it slightly differently. You have to kind of work it out with your tank partner what the 2 of you are comfortable with and can execute.

My recent wins as Warrior:
*WAR Starts the fight and hold it till after the jump.
PLD will switch in either after the jump or right after the first landslide following the jump.

* WAR will switch back in right after the triple landslide following the PLD reaching 2 stacks.
PLD will hold through the heart phase

* WAR will switch back in after adds are dead and PLD has 3 stacks
PLD will switch in during line bomb phase after WAR reaches 2 stacks

Repeat 3rd part until titan is dead

The tank you want handling Titan in post-heart pulls. The tank you want handling adds begins the fight as OT.

Pre-Heart Tank Swaps

Swap #1. OT provokes Titan as he lands from his first jump. This is regardless of how many debuff stacks the MT has. Depending on DPS, sometimes it's 1 and sometimes it's at 2.

Swap #2. MT provokes Titan after two stacks AFTER the Landslide. It is dangerous to tank-swap during Landslides.

There is no further tank-swap until post-heart. If your DPS is on par, you should be able to get to post-heart before the MT takes a third stack. If your DPS isn't good, your MT may take a third stack. Alternatively, you can have the OT pull at the beginning, and do a third swap during the third set of Granite Gaols.

Post Heart Tank Swaps

Swap #1. OT provokes Titan as he is casting Weight of the Land (aka Plumes) for the first time.

Swap #2. MT provokes Titan before or during Tumults.

No further tank swaps. It is unnecessary to swap after the MT gets two stacks, because they will fall off by the time Titan spawns the Gaolers again.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bokchoykn

The tank you want handling Titan in post-heart pulls. The tank you want handling adds begins the fight as OT.

Pre-Heart Tank Swaps
Swap #1. OT provokes Titan as he lands from his first jump. This is regardless of how many debuff stacks the MT has. Depending on DPS, sometimes it's 1 and sometimes it's at 2.

Swap #2. MT provokes Titan after two stacks AFTER the Landslide. It is dangerous to tank-swap during Landslides.

There is no further tank-swap until post-heart. If your DPS is on par, you should be able to get to post-heart before the MT takes a third stack. If your DPS isn't good, your MT may take a third stack. Alternatively, you can have the OT pull at the beginning, and do a third swap during the third set of Granite Gaols.

Post Heart Tank Swaps

Swap #1. OT provokes Titan as he is casting Weight of the Land (aka Plumes) for the first time.

Swap #2. MT provokes Titan before or during Tumults.

No further tank swaps. It is unnecessary to swap after the MT gets two stacks, because they will fall off by the time Titan spawns the Gaolers again.

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During Post-heart, it depend on your DPS on the ADD Idealy between Weight of the Land and Jail. but if you DPS can't kill the add before Weight of the land the MT prolly have to take the 3 MB.



On the side note, every debuff have have is 20% extra damage receive from everything titan do. Had 2 stack once and got hit by Rock Buster for 3.5k ish...

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Originally Posted by Remn

During Post-heart, it depoend on your DPS on the ADD Idealy between Weight of the Land and Jail. but if you DPS can't kill the add before Weight of the land the MT prolly have to take the 3 MB.

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Ya and if it is a PLD during this phase with a good cooldown ready it shouldn't be an issue.

TBH, i think PLD is more suit toward ADD tanking in this fight. just because Tempered Will and HG will prevent KnockBack from ADD Landslide. most WAR I saw seem to have problem dodging Add LS.

If you need Tempered Will for that phase your a slacker lol

and /wave to my white haired alternate fellow lalafell tank : )

You just walk through the gaoler or strafe, dunno how any tank could mess that up after having to do it for most of the AOEs we've dealt with in the game.

I ran with atleast 1 or 2 Malee. Tempered will is really helpful during add since it allows you to keep them in the same position and let malee continue to kill them w/o dodging LS

There's lot of ways to do it.

I really want to find a group for Titan EX - interestingly enough you can do a change when you have a single Mountain Buster debuff @ 5-7sec remaining swap with the other tank. They immediately will take a Mountain Buster debuff, but they will have a full CD suite available and you will have 5-7sec elapse on your single stack and have no debuff - once you're free of the debuff you can switch with the other tank as soon as possible. This would ensure you never have a tank without CDs nor a tank with multiple stacks.

It's extra work - and it'd take practice and timing but I think it'd be much easier on the healer if you never had tanks with multiple stacks, and by swapping more regularly you get used to the dodge patterns required in the fight.

This is just an idea I'd like to try out - but I think it has potential. Even if you can tank with three stacks... should you? /shrug/

I don't ever see swapping every stack as a thing.


In that fight you either get 2 quick ones back to back. Or you have long spans between 2 hits.

1 stack swap thing might work with lower iLV tank, most of the i85+ tank i saw take the first mountain buster without any defendsive debuff (except WAR w/ IB). for me i take the first MB naked ;P, then either rampart or FOresight + COnvo(Maybe) for 2nd MB then Sentinal or Balwak for 3rd MB


on a Side note, during final rotation. Titan will do MB after he summon the add and THEN do MB again after every 2 action he does untill Super Bomb.

here is his rotation after Heart phase, (on the top of my head, at work atm ;P)

ADD > MB > X+ Bomb > LS > MB > Plume > Jail > MB > UpHeavel > LS > MB > Stump > 2X Plume > MB > 3Line Bomb > LS > MB > Super Bomb > Stump > Plume > GeoCrush > Repeat....

Titan will mostly repeat the above rotation twice, on the 3rd rotation he will enrage at some point and murder everyone.

*deleted, was talking about a different phase*

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Remn

Titan will mostly repeat the above rotation twice, on the 3rd rotation he will enrage at some point and murder everyone.

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I'm fairly sure the "Rage" point is for the third rotation's upheaval - the Knockback increases and forces everyone off.

On our more successful Titan EM runs, we've used a "Swap after the first jump", then after two stacks (OT Provoke During or immediately after Landslides) until Heart.
After Heart, usually the Adds die just before the Jail>MB>Upheaval phase (3rd stack). OT will then voke either before or after the MB depending on the MT's HP level and whether both healers are still up.
After that there's one more swap (just after two stacks, usually during the Bomb phase before LS) in order to get the MT back on Titan again for the Superbomb phase and free the OT up to grab the next set of adds.

For the first set of adds, as an OT I'll usually pull them both directly East (or West). The order of CrazyStuff to handle for the OT is: 3-o'clock Bomb spawn >> 2/4-o'clock bomb spawn >> Titan Landslide (usually hits the 3-o'clock bomb) >> 3-o'clock Bomb BOOM >> 2/4-o'clock bomb BOOM >> Add Landslides (sometimes together, sometimes staggered over as much as 5 seconds). Usually as the OT I'll try to pop Sentinel and Tempered Will, and Eat Titan's Landslide and one bomb. Then dodge the add Landslides (baiting one EAST and one NORTH EAST, pointed towards the outside of the arena). The idea is to get both gloop patches (dropped when the adds are killed) as far over to the North East edge of the arena as possible to increase the available dodging space for Plumes. For the second set of adds, Tempered Will won't QUITE be recharged in time. But you can Hallowed Ground through the Titan Landslide/Bomb bit... it can make it easier for the healers as by that point even if everyone's still alive, you'll all be running on fumes and MP will be an issue.

Technically you can dodge Titan's Landslide by baiting it at the 3-o'clock bomb, then dodging towards 2-o'clock. You'll still likely eat a bomb unless your timing is very good... but it's slightly less damage to worry about from the Landslide. The problems with doing this are that you may end up with bad landslide timing from the adds (doh!), Melee DPS have a VERY hard time killing the adds (doh), you may get a slight lag spike and eat two bombs (doh), or one or both of the adds might get killed by the DPS in the "wrong spot" - so although it's usually possible, unless I know the group well I'll just pop Tempered Will, stay put and eat Titan's landslide and one bomb at -40% damage from Sentinel (saving Foresight, Bulwark and Rampart for next two Mountain Busters after the impending Tank swap!). Good add positioning comes first - you really really really need them to die in the right place! :)

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Originally Posted by dimsumdarren

generally, its swap at 2 stacks, usually after landslide or gaols. After heart, sometimes people swap at 3...

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This is how I've done it. It makes the last phase much easier for tanks. First swap is at upheavel(should be at 3 stacks). Second swap is after the the row bomb + landslide combo (should be at 3 stacks). The tank at this points holds titan until superbomb then the whole thing repeats.