Ultima Ballad, why are DPS all terrible? (DF EXPERIENCE)

[Ruri]

All the good players completely farmed this fight months ago, also usually in my pts its the tanks and healers that suck (when I actually ran it)

[Ryuko]

Tanks are the only ones who should not. They should have each other on FT and almost always be targeting Ultima (well, DPS should be targeting him too, but they have to kill adds; tanks don't have to, and if stacks are weird they should probably stay on the boss)

Alright, I guess in a tank's case they have a choice... they can either have Ultima as the FT or the other tank as the FT, but truly they can do it either way since you can see stacks on the party bar. The only reason FT would be slightly better is because you can see the exact timing on stacks if you are unfamiliar with it yourself. When I do this fight as a healer, I am constantly watching the tank stacks on the party bar (same with stacks in Garuda extreme) so I think it's more than possible to do it that way as well.

[Sessurea]

I actually farmed ultima for the choker. I wanted to go ahead and farm garuda, which I think is even easier than ultima ( at least for bard lol ), but most parties in pf were ilvl 80+ and wouldn't accept me at 78 or even at 79 when I would /tell them that I was short ilvl but had full experience.

And I think my choker is pretty damn good too. All that crit rate omnom.

[FurryFury]

everytime, i see people forming for ultima HM, i always has the same question, why do ultima when you can farm Xm Primal. (except necklace, but i would rather get it from coil or buying myth) most of people i have know will not farm ultima, unless it for helping friend for quest or got bored LOL. imho, if you have time to learn and form ultima, use those to Learn Xm Primal, Titan Xm delay issue can be overcome by moving a head of time and hang back behind your team so you only get hit by 1 plume.

I farmed Ultima HM for a casting ring for my mage (second job).
No myth tomes, as all of them go to main job. No Coil drops because RNG hates me.
Can't get into PF Titan Ex grp with ilvl < 80 (at least, most groups require 85, which is too much even for my main job).
Also, Ultima is so much easier than Titan Ex...

All the good players completely farmed this fight months ago

So all those fresh-new Steam players are bad, right?

[Shirai]

Well, aside from it being a DF experience I wonder how much experience the OP has with the Minstrel's ballad.

Looking up his character on the lodestone (assuming that that is his main) he's still quite new to the game and perhaps he doesn't know that this fight has a lot of unavoidable AoE attacks like Tank Purge, Aetheric Boon and the crashing airships.
While the fight is not too hard for groups that know the fight well, it is still a very intense fight that needs good coordination.

Apart from that, he's saying that Ultima is starting to hit like a truck at a certain moment so I am wondering if the tanks are managing their stacks right and swap consistently.

[Fynlar]

Ultima hitting like a truck is more likely than not referring specifically to Diffractive Laser, which does not start getting used until later on in the fight

[Shirai]

Ultima hitting like a truck is more likely than not referring specifically to Diffractive Laser, which does not start getting used until later on in the fight

Oh yeah, I forgot about that one.

[Ruri]

So all those fresh-new Steam players are bad, right?

So far yes

[Darksword]

I've farmed Ultima for both healer drops, both caster drops, and the tank choker. Still need the tank ring.

DPSing on Ultima is actually really bloody hard, especially for melee and for BLM. He throws so much crap at you so fast that it can't help but either break your rotation constantly or press on you until you get hit.

Perfect example is my BLM. It's i82, with Ultima Choker and Ring, Allagan Ring and Earrings, Crimson and DL gear. I built it up partly from SMNs hand-me-downs and its been good enough to clear up through T4. I got called out in an Ultima run the other day for doing crap DPS, and got told the old "l2p" bit by one of the tanks. Ultima doesn't hit super hard, except for Diff. Laser, but you still have to move to not soak up all the healers MP. Moving breaks rotations, which nerfs DPS.

[Kuroyasha]

Every now and then I'll get a good grp in ultima DF.

Otherwise it's people who go full retard on ifrit part and lasers(magitek bits) and run like scared ants. Like just move a little to the left and atk/heal, a little to the right and atk/heal. Too many times I see so much unnecessary movement. Makes me give up on DFing Ultima as a tank really.