Questions for SMN by a SMN on Garuda HM

[Trihuuger]

Hey guys.

I've been having some... "times" trying to take down Garuda as a SMN with the duty finder without getting lucky and having a bunch of geared people all magically congregate together (I've got my Ifrit book and either AK or DL gear in every other slot). I know I could join a crew farming her after the various resets and have no issue, but I know I'll only get better when I'm having to carry my weight, and then some in a given situation.

My questions are basically timing related. When the feathers spawn, at what point of them spawning do you bane? Do you tri-disaster first? I'm baning when I first actually see the names of the feathers pop up, but I'm only hitting maybe 3 of them. For the longest time I just figured that was as good as it got until yesterday I hit a bane and got 6 feathers with it, but didn't really do anything any differently.

I have my DoT timing down as to when to refresh early/use contagion so that DoT's will have enough time left to kill a feather outright, just can't quite master when to Bane to hit a bunch of them.

When the two harpies pop, is there a reason the two birds aren't stacked up to spread DOT's around between them? I am not sure if both harpies use the melee based AoE is basically the extent of my question.

I pretty well have shadowflare placement and timing down, but the rest is still... iffy.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated, thank you.

[Estellios]

Typically on Garuda it seems that you can AOE the feathers and hit them once their models pop up, but it is iffy sometimes.

For your last question, it depends on what your group does, but yes the two sisters do have both Wicked Wheel and Slipstream. Wicked Wheel isn't too bad and can be patched up with Medica/Succor, but Slipstream from both at once will likely instakill non-tanks.