Byakko... HM or EX ?

[Odstarva]

"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!

[KaivaC]

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.

[HyoMinPark]

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.

(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).

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.

[Khalithar]

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.

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.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

[Khalithar]

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

Byakko is perfectly tuned relative to his reward.

[Dualblade]

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.

[RosaLunaCelestia]

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

[whiskeybravo]

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

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.

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.

[Sacred_Nym]

"Skip Soar"

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.