Fought Garuda for the First Time...

[Warren Castille]

Thanks to all for your advice and such. Guess it's only hard because Madda's the lowest level you can be to do it. That and Madda's never been in a situation healingwise where you have so much to heal and interrupts and LoS to deal with. 

 

Sorry for venting. Madda shall git gud.

 

Naw, just takes practice. Garuda takes the other lessons you're taught in primals (Don't ignore the adds on Ifrit combined with paying attention to your surroundings on Titan) and assumes you've mastered them. Combine that with the considerable power difference between lv44 and lv45 and it makes for a rough time on newcomers. Don't get discouraged, just don't be afraid to let your group know you're legitimately new to it if you return into the DF.

[-no longer matters-]

Thanks to all for your advice and such. Guess it's only hard because Madda's the lowest level you can be to do it. That and Madda's never been in a situation healingwise where you have so much to heal and interrupts and LoS to deal with. 

 

Sorry for venting. Madda shall git gud.

Give me a shout if you need help Madda! and Ignore the people being jerks.

[Kage]

Thanks to all for your advice and such. Guess it's only hard because Madda's the lowest level you can be to do it. That and Madda's never been in a situation healingwise where you have so much to heal and interrupts and LoS to deal with. 

 

Sorry for venting. Madda shall git gud.

Don't feel bad at all. Garuda is one of the difficulty ramps for healers. It is a common place for people to have issues with. (So much so that Square Enix is implementing a small nerf to some 2.0 instances and Garuda Normal is one of them.) It is just the unfortunate happenstance that a struggling healer makes the trial extremely frustrating.

 

Unsync will help, Playing in it with better gear will help. Make sure your gear isn't 10 ilvls behind etc, especially your main hand.

[Swashbuckler]

Back in 2.0 when I was leveling Berrod, our group kept wiping to Garuda's limit break, even though we managed to keep a decent number of the rocks up. What we ended up doing was grinding to 45 to get the four pieces of Artifact gear. That gear gave us a significant boost and made the trial lots easier! We were able to endure the damage and push on. Gear matters for Garuda Normal!

 

You can always do an undersized party of non-synced folks, but where's the fun in that?

This was pretty much what I did. Doing Garuda with lv 40 gear vs doing it with lv 45 artifact gear saved me so much trouble as a Scholar.

 

I'd also suggest leveling when and while you can. While it's not absolutely necessary to do so, it makes things so much more easier. I actually ran a few Dzemael Darkholds just for gear before I attempted to do Garuda normal.

 

I'm sure I'm echo'ing what others have said already, but every little bit helps! Also, don't be afraid to ask us for help!

[Larson]

I've always considered myself a GOOD Scholar. Never not been able to carry even the narbiest BLK. It's probably the ability to use Adloquium as a trampoline...

 

But the other day I was running The Vault and something I can't explain was happening:

 

I couldn't keep up.

 

The tank was a WAR, and had great gear. My gear is optimized for mind with some spell speed, and usually I can get a tank to full health in a flash.

 

But...though she was taking regular sized pulls, my heals were not enough to maintain her. I wasn't sure if she was taking an abnormal amount of damage or if my heals were weak, but I realized early on that, huh...something isn't right here. I was having to keep physic on spam and never had her at 100%.

 

We made it all the way to the last fight, where the problems really started. With the inability to break from healing, I kept getting delayed on telegraphs. Even going back and forth from Adlo to Phys wasn't helping, and each time we wiped, the tank and deeps were telling me "You are doing (insert thing) wrong" so I'd try to change it, and still end up with a wipe. Both of us had great gear and nothing had changed on my end since the last time I ran it. After the 4th wipe, they kick-voted me.

 

Has anyone ever experienced something like that in a Primal or a dungeon? I can't for the life of me figure out what I was doing wrong.

 

[edit] It was more like the effectiveness of my heals was reduced, and the effectiveness of her defense of reduced, so it was constantly me spamming heals until I could get some Aetherflows going to jumpstart her health, which still seemed less effective.

[-no longer matters-]

I've always considered myself a GOOD Scholar. Never not been able to carry even the narbiest BLK. It's probably the ability to use Adloquium as a trampoline...

 

But the other day I was running The Vault and something I can't explain was happening:

 

I couldn't keep up.

 

The tank was a WAR, and had great gear. My gear is optimized for mind with some spell speed, and usually I can get a tank to full health in a flash.

 

But...though she was taking regular sized pulls, my heals were not enough to maintain her. I wasn't sure if she was taking an abnormal amount of damage or if my heals were weak, but I realized early on that, huh...something isn't right here. I was having to keep physic on spam and never had her at 100%.

 

We made it all the way to the last fight, where the problems really started. With the inability to break from healing, I kept getting delayed on telegraphs. Even going back and forth from Adlo to Phys wasn't helping, and each time we wiped, the tank and deeps were telling me "You are doing (insert thing) wrong" so I'd try to change it, and still end up with a wipe. Both of us had great gear and nothing had changed on my end since the last time I ran it. After the 4th wipe, they kick-voted me.

 

Has anyone ever experienced something like that in a Primal or a dungeon? I can't for the life of me figure out what I was doing wrong.

Sounds like your tank wasn't using cds on his tank buster (the room wide AoE) that thing hurts if you don't time the use of them. That's the only reason to wipe on that fight outside of dps not being able to dps the adds in time.

 

So likely it was your tank, especially if she was taking huge damage the whole run.

 

Good Gear can't make up for not managing CDs (also was she in defiance or Deliverance?) while it can be done, I do not recommend fighting that boss in deliverance other than the add phase.

[Warren Castille]

The only thing that comes to mind is that your weapon was either broken or you had the wrong one equipped. Consistent drop across all encounters and trash is weird.

 

Also, you might have been drunk.

[-no longer matters-]

The only thing that comes to mind is that your weapon was either broken or you had the wrong one equipped. Consistent drop across all encounters and trash is weird.

 

Also, you might have been drunk.

Still sounds like the tank not managing CDs to me, but that  ^ could also be a thing!

[Unnamed Mercenary]

I've always considered myself a GOOD Scholar. Never not been able to carry even the narbiest BLK. It's probably the ability to use Adloquium as a trampoline...

 

But the other day I was running The Vault and something I can't explain was happening:

 

I couldn't keep up.

 

The tank was a WAR, and had great gear. My gear is optimized for mind with some spell speed, and usually I can get a tank to full health in a flash.

 

But...though she was taking regular sized pulls, my heals were not enough to maintain her. I wasn't sure if she was taking an abnormal amount of damage or if my heals were weak, but I realized early on that, huh...something isn't right here. I was having to keep physic on spam and never had her at 100%.

 

We made it all the way to the last fight, where the problems really started. With the inability to break from healing, I kept getting delayed on telegraphs. Even going back and forth from Adlo to Phys wasn't helping, and each time we wiped, the tank and deeps were telling me "You are doing (insert thing) wrong" so I'd try to change it, and still end up with a wipe. Both of us had great gear and nothing had changed on my end since the last time I ran it. After the 4th wipe, they kick-voted me.

 

Has anyone ever experienced something like that in a Primal or a dungeon? I can't for the life of me figure out what I was doing wrong.

 

[edit] It was more like the effectiveness of my heals was reduced, and the effectiveness of her defense of reduced, so it was constantly me spamming heals until I could get some Aetherflows going to jumpstart her health, which still seemed less effective.

 

Aside from possibly broken gear (since you can't check other people's), is it possible you might've accidentally had Cleric Stance turned on? The WAR tank may also have had Deliverance (DPS stance) on instead of Defiance (Tanking stance) turned on. One or both of those would have created MAJOR healing issues.

[Larson]

By the end of the fight, I had checked everyone's gear. We were all good. She wasn't in any stance in the first half of the dungeon, and finally went into Defiance close to the second boss. I know nothing of Tank mechanics other than rotating hate, so I can't say for certain what was wrong. It must have been CDs.

 

But after dying the 4th time, I couldn't figure it out and just said, "I don't know how, but it has to be me." they unanimously agreed. Bye bye.

 

Actually, I had CS on for the first pull, but turned it off after that.

[Edda]

Gear means little in The Vault if your tank is not properly using their CDs. I have seen it often enough, and with the large amount of damage dealt in The Vault, it is usually the fault of the tank for not taking trash pulls, let alone bosses, seriously. Many times I have queued in progress Vaults as a healer to hear "oh the healer sucked" only to find... Well, whether they did or did not is irrelevant, but the tank is never so stellar themselves in such scenarios.

 

If the tanks ARE using their CDs properly and you still have issues, you will need to adjust your play style to better deal with the huge difficulty spike The Vault has.

[Warren Castille]

Gear means little in The Vault if your tank is not properly using their CDs. I have seen it often enough, and with the large amount of damage dealt in The Vault, it is usually the fault of the tank for not taking trash pulls, let alone bosses, seriously. Many times I have queued in progress Vaults as a healer to hear "oh the healer sucked" only to find... Well, whether they did or did not is irrelevant, but the tank is never so stellar themselves in such scenarios.

 

If the tanks ARE using their CDs properly and you still have issues, you will need to adjust your play style to better deal with the huge difficulty spike The Vault has.

 

I don't doubt healers saying this, but the math doesn't line up. Paladin and Dark Knight have (can't speak to WAR) got tanky cooldowns on long timers, and if you're doing one pack at a time you're either spreading them out (so you're only buffed for 15~ seconds per pack) or you're dumping them all at once and being unprotected on the following pull. If your DPS is shredding things so quickly that you kill everything in those 15 seconds, you've definitely not got them up again for the next pull. If your DPS takes forever to kill anything, then those 15 seconds amount to even less mitigation. Maybe it's a WAR thing? I'm not sure how Defiance works compared to Grit or Shield Oath.

 

Still very strange, though.

[Syf]

Garuda was the first real skill check in the game when I was leveling, managed to get a full group of 44ish new players and it was essentially an hour of leading people by the nose and getting lead. Had to teach people about the usefulness of focus bars, when to AOE, and had to pop limit break to survive the buster, and it was a close fight. It was fun to run it blind and learn with a group that was willing to talk and improve. Nothing else in the game is skill check until that point, so it's understandable that a lot of players wouldn't know how to handle the mechanics.

[Kage]

The only thing that comes to mind is that your weapon was either broken or you had the wrong one equipped. Consistent drop across all encounters and trash is weird.

 

Also, you might have been drunk.

Still sounds like the tank not managing CDs to me, but that  ^ could also be a thing!

Reduced healing effectiveness would not be a CD management issue though. The Vault can still hurt a bunch in trash (especially before the first boss). It's a bit of a damage spike. It sounds more like peoples' gear is broke, gear is getting too outleveled or main hands are a little behind.

 

Were these symbols going up?

If you didn't see the Inner Beast going up or Steel Cyclone every so often fuckyouWar.

 

Defiance is like 25% HP increase as well improving HP recovery via curing magic by 20% and reduces outgoing damage by like 25%.

 

Warrior and Scholars -should- go well together. The shield on large HP is great. However if you're already behind lustrates+physick go well. Would also need to ask how Selene was being used. Was she on obey or Sic? Were you typically far away? It sounds stupid to ask but I did a Bray Normal with a Scholar who had their fairy far away from me (on heel) that Embrace was never hitting me

 

Edit: The Warrior's defensive cooldowns are for shorter durations but they're a bit manageable because they also have a shorter recast.

[Zezeki]

Defiance is like 25% HP increase as well improving HP recovery via curing magic by 20% and reduces damage by like 25%.

 

Defiance doesn't offer any reduced damage like Grit or Shield Oath does. Which is why most people stay in Deliverance anyway for the damage except in some fights when you have to switch.

[Edda]

Gear means little in The Vault if your tank is not properly using their CDs. I have seen it often enough, and with the large amount of damage dealt in The Vault, it is usually the fault of the tank for not taking trash pulls, let alone bosses, seriously. Many times I have queued in progress Vaults as a healer to hear "oh the healer sucked" only to find... Well, whether they did or did not is irrelevant, but the tank is never so stellar themselves in such scenarios.

 

If the tanks ARE using their CDs properly and you still have issues, you will need to adjust your play style to better deal with the huge difficulty spike The Vault has.

 

I don't doubt healers saying this, but the math doesn't line up. Paladin and Dark Knight have (can't speak to WAR) got tanky cooldowns on long timers, and if you're doing one pack at a time you're either spreading them out (so you're only buffed for 15~ seconds per pack) or you're dumping them all at once and being unprotected on the following pull. If your DPS is shredding things so quickly that you kill everything in those 15 seconds, you've definitely not got them up again for the next pull. If your DPS takes forever to kill anything, then those 15 seconds amount to even less mitigation. Maybe it's a WAR thing? I'm not sure how Defiance works compared to Grit or Shield Oath.

 

Still very strange, though.

I've not leveled a tank class past 50 yet, so I'm no expert, but from my own experiences in The Vault, the best tanks stagger their CDs. That does not mean one is always up at every moment, but they are present enough to make a difference, believe me. A good tank that uses their CDS properly is far more than just a tank that takes less damage, as well, at least for me.

 When I do not have to baby a tank, I get to DPS instead, which allows trash pulls to drop much faster, thus lessening the importance of the duration of tank CDs.

 

Not all healers do this, however, and I'm not willing to give up my damage in order to see what that's like, so... No comment there. The Vault is the only HW dungeon where I've had to give up most of my damage to baby crappy tanks, though, since the damage can be pretty unreal. I just wanted my exp.

[Kage]

Defiance is like 25% HP increase as well improving HP recovery via curing magic by 20% and reduces damage by like 25%.

 

Defiance doesn't offer any reduced damage like Grit or Shield Oath does. Which is why most people stay in Deliverance anyway for the damage except in some fights when you have to switch.

It reduces outgoing damage. However most warriors do a piss poor job of using their defensive cooldowns which means they do a piss poor job at tanking with Deliverance. Along with hate issues. Just because Defiance does not reduce damage taken by the warrior does not mean you should be staying in Deliverance.

[Warren Castille]

I've not leveled a tank class past 50 yet, so I'm no expert, but from my own experiences in The Vault, the best tanks stagger their CDs. That does not mean one is always up at every moment, but they are present enough to make a difference, believe me. A good tank that uses their CDS properly is far more than just a tank that takes less damage, as well, at least for me.

 When I do not have to baby a tank, I get to DPS instead, which allows trash pulls to drop much faster, thus lessening the importance of the duration of tank CDs.

 

Not all healers do this, however, and I'm not willing to give up my damage in order to see what that's like, so... No comment there. The Vault is the only HW dungeon where I've had to give up most of my damage to baby crappy tanks, though, since the damage can be pretty unreal. I just wanted my exp.

 

Perhaps I'm undervaluing how far they go, then; How you describe them is how I've always hit cooldowns through dungeons. I haven't had a problem in any of the new dungeons that weren't related to mechanics specifically, so I'll just check my tank privilege at the door and back out of the conversation.

 

:cactuar:

[Zezeki]

Defiance is like 25% HP increase as well improving HP recovery via curing magic by 20% and reduces damage by like 25%.

 

Defiance doesn't offer any reduced damage like Grit or Shield Oath does. Which is why most people stay in Deliverance anyway for the damage except in some fights when you have to switch.

It reduces outgoing damage. However most warriors do a piss poor job of using their defensive cooldowns which means they do a piss poor job at tanking with Deliverance. Along with hate issues. Just because Defiance does not reduce damage taken by the warrior does not mean you should be staying in Deliverance.

 

I misread. At any rate, I didn't have much if any problems holding aggro as a WAR while leveling. I'd say I'm a halfway decent tank. I only stay in Defiance long enough to build 5 stacks of Wrath then I switch to Deliverance for the rest of the fight. WARs have the easiest time holding aggro in my opinion at least.

[Madda]

Wish Madda could get the Artifact gear, but it's 50 > o>

[Unnamed Mercenary]

Wish Madda could get the Artifact gear, but it's 50 > o>

 

Hmm? No. All but the chest piece is from the lvel 45 quests. So you can get headpiece, hands, legs and boots.

[Kage]

Defiance is like 25% HP increase as well improving HP recovery via curing magic by 20% and reduces damage by like 25%.

 

Defiance doesn't offer any reduced damage like Grit or Shield Oath does. Which is why most people stay in Deliverance anyway for the damage except in some fights when you have to switch.

It reduces outgoing damage. However most warriors do a piss poor job of using their defensive cooldowns which means they do a piss poor job at tanking with Deliverance. Along with hate issues. Just because Defiance does not reduce damage taken by the warrior does not mean you should be staying in Deliverance.

 

I misread. At any rate, I didn't have much if any problems holding aggro as a WAR while leveling. I'd say I'm a halfway decent tank. I only stay in Defiance long enough to build 5 stacks of Wrath then I switch to Deliverance for the rest of the fight. WARs have the easiest time holding aggro in my opinion at least.

I edited the post to better reflect where the reduction is at. I would agree that Deliverance is good with a decent Warrior. I have sadly met far too many Warrior who should not be using Deliverance.

 

I can only imagine that the issues in vault (along with just the high damage spike being put out by the mobs) are from broken gear, old gear, or poor cooldown management (either in what and where they are used or when).

 

Nothing beats a Paladin using all of their cooldowns before a shield lob (Yes. Hallowed, Bullwark, Foresight, Fight or Flight, Rampart, Sentinel, Awareness, Tempered Will, Bloodbath, and Convalescence. All at once. Before the boss was pulled.)

 

Wish Madda could get the Artifact gear, but it's 50 > o>

 

Hmm? No. All but the chest piece is from the lvel 45 quests. So you can get headpiece, hands, legs and boots.

I've heard some jobs had things changed. I think some award the pieces differently what with the HW equipment thingamajigs. However I think for most jobs you should still only be missing the chest piece at lvl 45. You should be able to get a lvl 44 chest piece however. I think the Marketboard has one that I think you can get from Darkhold if you can't run it forever. or get HQ crafted.

 

Definitely make sure your accessories and main hand are decent too!!

I've met a WHM doing Fates in Northern Thanalan, sorta new. They had lvl 20 accessories and their main hand was lvl 30 etc. They had kept getting kicked out of dungeons because their healing was just not good because of the poor equipment.

[Edda]

I've not leveled a tank class past 50 yet, so I'm no expert, but from my own experiences in The Vault, the best tanks stagger their CDs. That does not mean one is always up at every moment, but they are present enough to make a difference, believe me. A good tank that uses their CDS properly is far more than just a tank that takes less damage, as well, at least for me.

 When I do not have to baby a tank, I get to DPS instead, which allows trash pulls to drop much faster, thus lessening the importance of the duration of tank CDs.

 

Not all healers do this, however, and I'm not willing to give up my damage in order to see what that's like, so... No comment there. The Vault is the only HW dungeon where I've had to give up most of my damage to baby crappy tanks, though, since the damage can be pretty unreal. I just wanted my exp.

 

Perhaps I'm undervaluing how far they go, then; How you describe them is how I've always hit cooldowns through dungeons. I haven't had a problem in any of the new dungeons that weren't related to mechanics specifically, so I'll just check my tank privilege at the door and back out of the conversation.

 

:cactuar:

Yeah you know me, biggest privilege checker on this side of the Internet. Seriously you'd think tanks staggering CDs would be basic knowledge, but some tanks just don't use them... ever! At all! Then again one tank that I had that never used CDs in The Vault I also had to ask to stop spinning the mobs with a monk and ninja in the group... And no, he wasn't dodging anything, just... spinning. It's a doggy dog world out there in DF... Keep staggering your CDs and godspeed.

[Warren Castille]

I've not leveled a tank class past 50 yet, so I'm no expert, but from my own experiences in The Vault, the best tanks stagger their CDs. That does not mean one is always up at every moment, but they are present enough to make a difference, believe me. A good tank that uses their CDS properly is far more than just a tank that takes less damage, as well, at least for me.

 When I do not have to baby a tank, I get to DPS instead, which allows trash pulls to drop much faster, thus lessening the importance of the duration of tank CDs.

 

Not all healers do this, however, and I'm not willing to give up my damage in order to see what that's like, so... No comment there. The Vault is the only HW dungeon where I've had to give up most of my damage to baby crappy tanks, though, since the damage can be pretty unreal. I just wanted my exp.

 

Perhaps I'm undervaluing how far they go, then; How you describe them is how I've always hit cooldowns through dungeons. I haven't had a problem in any of the new dungeons that weren't related to mechanics specifically, so I'll just check my tank privilege at the door and back out of the conversation.

 

:cactuar:

Yeah you know me, biggest privilege checker on this side of the Internet. Seriously you'd think tanks staggering CDs would be basic knowledge, but some tanks just don't use them... ever! At all! Then again one tank that I had that never used CDs in The Vault I also had to ask to stop spinning the mobs with a monk and ninja in the group... And no, he wasn't dodging anything, just... spinning. It's a doggy dog world out there in DF... Keep staggering your CDs and godspeed.

 

Yeah, I wasn't able to phrase that without sounding like an asshole. I think the train of thought goes like this: "I should save this for a boss, or in case I really need it!" Then they sit on CDs like they're items in an actual FF game and only hit them if shit has already hit the fan.

 

I just like using the phrase "tank privilege." It explains so many conveniences in the game!

[Kage]

Yeah, I wasn't able to phrase that without sounding like an asshole. I think the train of thought goes like this: "I should save this for a boss, or in case I really need it!" Then they sit on CDs like they're items in an actual FF game and only hit them if shit has already hit the fan.

I apologize to Madda for the thread derailment that has come out.

 

But honestly I've met many tanks who say this (even in the RP community or more casual RP etc) "if you need to use cooldowns in trash you're not good" or that the healers are not good. Or "no you don't need to use cooldowns in trash ever."

 

My opinion of said people is not good.