Garuda's Difficulty

[Curcio]

Why trying to beat her if you already got all your weapons from manaburn?
It was a mistake on SE's part to legalize that bug, as it effectively killed the content.

What they should have done is not punish those who used that way before the bug was confirmed (which weren't that many), but once it was, they should have stated abusing it is against the ToS and acted accordingly. Then the majority of the population would still be making Garuda runs.

The majority of the community hasn't even had a chance to touch Garuda. The majority of the population isn't doing Garuda because the majority of the population CAN'T do Garuda. They don't have melds, they don't have Darklight, and they don't have the weapons.

[Ruisu]

This community, man. Ask for a difficult fight, get it, don't do it.

Nobody shouts for Garuda ever, nor does anyone care to do Garuda. It's pretty annoying. I guess I'll be getting Garuda down whenever I start my Relic quest.

[Lux_Rayna]

The majority of the community hasn't even had a chance to touch Garuda. The majority of the population isn't doing Garuda because the majority of the population CAN'T do Garuda. They don't have melds, they don't have Darklight, and they don't have the weapons.

This is true, you actually need great dps in order to even have a chance of winning. It is literally impossible without meeting the dps requirement. Most casual players, myself included, do not have the gear to be a viable option in Garuda...nor the skill to make up for the gear by increasing our dps through great play and risk-taking. Garuda is that primal that checks ppl into realizing they're not as good as they think they are, for those who can't do it. After I did Garuda I realized my DRG, and I, sucked. Flat out sucked. I was like "man I suck so hard, what a letdown". The whole time I actually thought I was pretty decent at DRG, but Garuda made me realize my gear and my skills were trash. So it was back to the drawing board, to learn how to be awesome at DRG in endgame scenarios. Only Garuda can do this. I've never had problems being effective in other fights, but Garuda was a huge smack in the face.

Most can't do Garuda because they lack the skill/gear to do it. Instead of admitting it, most ppl will just say its "too hard" and continue believing that "skill is not the problem". IT is always the problem.

[Crimzon]

Garuda is definitely a DPS check. With high enough DPS pre-AB, you can still easily skip the 2nd phase...which is probably where most Garuda parties have issues. If you get her HP low enough following the Aerial Blast, she will either summon the 2 adds or go to the plume/rotating whirlwind phase...both of which are not that hard to react to. The middle phase in my opinion is harder than either of those 2 and where low DPS groups are probably wiping.

A side note to those needing this for relics, it needs to be a win with 0 deaths to get the item.

[SwordCoheir]

This is true, you actually need great dps in order to even have a chance of winning. It is literally impossible without meeting the dps requirement. Most casual players, myself included, do not have the gear to be a viable option in Garuda...nor the skill to make up for the gear by increasing our dps through great play and risk-taking. Garuda is that primal that checks ppl into realizing they're not as good as they think they are, for those who can't do it. After I did Garuda I realized my DRG, and I, sucked. Flat out sucked. I was like "man I suck so hard, what a letdown". The whole time I actually thought I was pretty decent at DRG, but Garuda made me realize my gear and my skills were trash. So it was back to the drawing board, to learn how to be awesome at DRG in endgame scenarios. Only Garuda can do this. I've never had problems being effective in other fights, but Garuda was a huge smack in the face.

Most can't do Garuda because they lack the skill/gear to do it. Instead of admitting it, most ppl will just say its "too hard" and continue believing that "skill is not the problem". IT is always the problem.

True, another big point is Garuda, unlike other primals is almost completely unforgivable if something goes wrong. If you die pre-Ariel Blast it throws the entire process into disarray, because the lost firepower for that 15-30 seconds could mean a portion of a pillar/s get knocked down. If you can't burn her down to Ariel Blast within 5 minutes, there's not going to be enough of the pillars to survive it no matter how great your group is at taking out the plumes. If you get lag/latency it can mean life or death most of the time from getting hit with Mistral Shriek/Scream which can one shot players not careful.

The entire fight basically forces you to speed run it in order to win, and as you said people just don't have the capability or gear to pull it off. Frankly if they just lowered the minimum amount of pillars needed to survive Ariel Blast and perhaps tone down her Mistral moves a few hundred points of damage or at least remove the instacast post Ariel Blast so people could actually dodge I think she would be much more manageable for less hardcore groups.

[Vanguard319]

The entire fight basically forces you to speed run it in order to win, and as you said people just don't have the capability or gear to pull it off. Frankly if they just lowered the minimum amount of pillars needed to survive Ariel Blast and perhaps tone down her Mistral moves a few hundred points of damage or at least remove the instacast post Ariel Blast so people could actually dodge I think she would be much more manageable for less hardcore groups.

They could fix the fight easier than that, it's the sheer number of plumes and how much health they have. They could make it more accessible by just reducing the health of the plumes, or reducing thier number. I'd think the former would be the more preferable of the two, it would also make it more forgiving in regards to lag/player error.

[Noir]

They could fix the fight easier than that, it's the sheer number of plumes and how much health they have. They could make it more accessible by just reducing the health of the plumes, or reducing thier number. I'd think the former would be the more preferable of the two, it would also make it more forgiving in regards to lag/player error.

Too bad steel cyclone was nerfed right? Ooppps. Blame the paladins criers! If cyclone was like before, it wouldn't be hard to take plumes.

[Vanguard319]

That is a problem, it means the fight itself isn't a question of skill, but rather who has the best, most powerful gear.

Two words: Power Creep.

[Lux_Rayna]

That is a problem, it means the fight itself isn't a question of skill, but rather who has the best, most powerful gear.

Two words: Power Creep.

No, the fight is definitely a question of skill. Yes you need to meet a certain gear minimum, but its not exactly hard to meet. I've heard of ppl beating Garuda in single melds. This game has always been balanced around a set of single melded gear, and I know Garuda has been beaten with a set of single-melded gear. The problem is that most players who have sufficient gear, do not have the skill to back it up. Garuda is *actually* hard. I mean you *actually* have to be good in order to beat it. You don't have to be all that good to beat Ifrit. Nor Moogle. Nor any other boss in the game really from what I've heard. Garuda is pretty much the only one where being good is basically a requirement. The game leads you to think you're good until you do Garuda. Then if you can't beat Garuda, you just have to accept you're not as good as you thought. It's not really that bad, just practice and learn how to be more effective.

The #1 mistake people make is that they can't accept that they aren't as good as they think they are. Your skilled parties? Not as good as they thought they were. You? Probably not as good as you think you are, but I have NO idea what you think, nor how good you are, so you're the only person who can make that call. This is a long way of saying that its not Garuda, its you. If its not you, its the party as a whole (which includes you). Blaming Garuda = denial.

[Vanguard319]

yes, and like I said, the parties I've been in have the skill, and most have excellent gear as well, finally a well crafted fight should NEVER require you to have the best gear available, it should be enough to provide a challenge, not a one-sided curbstomp battle for either the players, or the boss.