Hamidon Raid Strategy, Revised and Finalized
By
AngelsFist,
Posted on: 2005-04-14 24:20 in Player Guides
We need to get this post stickied.
Great guide, Marut. 8)
Upsen.
forgot the spoons marut...AND MY COOKIE!!!
As always Murat, your posts rock! 
Added links to the other pertinent guides that have been posted for uniforms and AT specific lead roles. Hopefully, this will save a lot of time sifting through past posts 
-M
Marut, 50 FF/Rad/Power Defender - Champion
Leader of The Earthguard
Leader of The Galactic Empire
Holy cripes M..... give you fingers and your keyboard a rest!
Good god!
That man must burn thru keyboards like mad. I cant type that much to begin with and if I was to attempt it it would take me days. Marut, way to go!! You are the shizny!!! Saving ALL out lazy behinds some work. New slogan , "Marut for Sainthood" J/jk bro, now how much the worshipping gets to ya. Appeciate the hard work, keep it up.
You know, you could probably make a killing selling that as a strategy guide....
�Life's hard. It's even harder when you're stupid.� ― John Wayne
�Just think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize half of them are even stupider!� - George Carlin
Not a chance I got involved in the Hamidon problem because I was sickened by the likes of those people on other servers that had a method and were hoarding it for themselves (that, and I love puzzles). Champion has always lead the way for open strat posts, updates, changes and results. If this one's useful to people, then I'm all the happier that it's out there for everyone to see.
Champion is the best because of it's people, and that strat counts on it being implemented by the best. We know it works just about every time; It might not work for others, but if that were the case, we'd know why, too 
-M
Marut, 50 FF/Rad/Power Defender - Champion
Leader of The Earthguard
Leader of The Galactic Empire
As always Marut, great job !!!
Just one thing I would like to add:
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Stage 4: Attack!
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During this phase, I like to throw RI and EF from my RAD secondary on the mito the targetter has selected.
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Stage 7: Hold me close, don't ever let me go...
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However, I don't throw my RI and EF during this phase until Hami has been confirmed to be held.
Both those powers attract aggro so for the same reason I don't throw my imps, I don't throw these till after HAMI is held.
If there are any other RADS who can also chime in their strategies during the raid, it would be appreciated.
My raid knowledge from a RAD perspective can mostly be attributed to Alpha Decay as it was he who had mentored me as to which powers to use at the appropriate time when I first started attending the raids.
I hope he can also respond to this post.
MY EYES! THE GOGGLES! THEY DO NOTHING!
stuPENdous guide, Marut!! Not to one-up Vinnie, but 11 stars for you! And a slice of key lime pie!
-B!
Marut,
Killer. Thank You.
I think we should post "prettied up" versions of our Champion Hammi Raid Guides to the Player Guides section...
..at the very least, I am going to collect these guides (read:yoink!) on my SuperGroup site. When my SG site (which is still only on paper on my desk) is up and running, my sig will link there for everyone to share.
Excellent post.
@Deadboy
This post should be priority bumped everyday. Everytime someones asks a question I tell them to read this post, a most comprehensive tome on Hammi raiding. So here is the bump!!!
bump
You forgot 1 thing. with all the recent Mito splits probably due to all the changes they added, we probably need to go back to killing mitos in order. For a while we droppped the ordered killin altogether because we were killin them all to fast to split. But times have changed and almost every mito splits ands some split more than 3 times. I believe the old order was Blue-Green-Yellow. if that's not it then we should play with the order and see what works best. The mitos are diff so each one does diff things including buffing other mitos
The mitos really aren't splitting any more than they did before; we just don't have the initial damage output that we used to be able to start raids with. The splits only become a problem when we can't put out the pain fast enough to drop them before a split. I think our problem is more that we're starting with fewer people, but ending up with the same number 
The color order part is only sorta viable, in that we need to clear space for the aggro holder asap. That means clearing on area entirely regardless of color. So the best that we can do as far as the old color order (which was indeed blue-green-yellow) is to use it on a small scale first to clear that area, then wider after the regen has it. Overall though, color order isn't really neccessary; the raids have been succeeding without it, and we've been starting with fewer and fewer people, which is part of the reason for the splits. By the time the raid gets into full swing, the splits just don't matter so much anymore Certainly can't hurt to try it again though.
-M
Marut, 50 FF/Rad/Power Defender - Champion
Leader of The Earthguard
Leader of The Galactic Empire
It's up to you how you want to do it but clearing the mitos by color tend to be more dangerous for the raiders than clearing them by location - outside-inside counterclockwise. You might end up in pockets by hami with lots of uncleared mitos behind you. Those mitos will aggro on the raiders no matter what and you will end up taking more hits.
im just trying to find another reason besides blaming people at raids cause i rember when we pulled off raids with 70 people faster than the ones we've been doing lately with about 120 people on average.
Im going to say this straight up...You really have alot of nerve.
You want to find a faster way???? For what? You dont have to wait so long before entering the Hive at the final phase? Are we making you wait to long? You advocate leeching on the boards. You SHOW up in the Hive and yell at people in broadcast. You seem to have an abundance of complaints, feel free to take the higher road and skip the HO. You want it to go faster ...show up and do your part for the WHOLE raid...
dont instigate in broadcast...the comments dont help at all.
The Mitos split because we have new people....not bad people...we have new Targeters...and new Raiders....sometimes we lose target or fail to educate someone....I myself played my Troller through the Mitos phase a few raids and missed the target....
The ONE Raid you are referring to that xpp led....yes started with a small group....ended with a huge group...and we couldnt get past the hold phase until Marut was asked to take over....
The raids now arent much different, I realize you would have no way of knowing how many people we start with....but we actually only END up with 120 people...we start with 70 or less...
Hurrah for the guide, Marut. I wish there was a condensed version for folks to read it right before the Hami Raid as a refresher or introduction.
It would be nice NOT to be able to blame people.. but its difficult when I see a hero facing completely away from the current mitos target and shooting randomly (his excuse:" I can't see the target so I'm just shooting at what I can see") AND a spines scrapper using Quills (his reasoning: 1) "Quills are NOT AOE" 2) "the cone range of Quills is so small it really doesn't matter" 3) "I like Quills") and last night I saw several ice blasts coming out of the blanket heading DIRECTLY for Hami.
I also see folks using shadowfall, invincibility, and other toggles. I would like to imagine they genuinely think they are helping. I don't know if they are deliberately trying to grief the raid or if noone has gone over what IS and ISN'T helpful in the raid. (example: an invised blaster coming up behind me during the holding phase and throwing caltrops and web grenades) I also have witnessed people joining a critical team and then phase shifting and just wandering around Hami. Its one thing to Leech from a distance, but to pretend to actually be on a team in the blanket is quite another.
I am also suprised at the number of people who don't understand the concept that our biggest enemy is LAG (followed closely by Hami, of course). The use of each power must be weighed on the benefit (damage/hold/buff/debuff) vs the lag created. I heard a a non-controller complaining in the last raid :"why wasn't his hold good enough" for the holding phase. The concept that the MORE heroes in one area using powers creates MORE lag didn't register with him (or her). As the guides explain, if the controllers aren't cutting it, then other AT's with holds are called in as the benefit of their hold vs lag has now gone up.
To be honest, I credit our experienced and organized raid leaders for getting us through each night, despite people's best intentions that have resulted in garnering a LOT of Hami aggro the past few raids.
On the plus side, I now know the max debt cap for lvl 47 (770K) and I can now do my missions and story arcs without fear of outlevelling them
Control Queen
Mind Control/Empathy
Lvl 50
Champion Server
Battle Cry:"Oh, Honey, I don't THINK so!"
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It would be nice NOT to be able to blame people.. but its difficult when I see a hero facing completely away from the current mitos target and shooting randomly (his excuse:" I can't see the target so I'm just shooting at what I can see") AND a spines scrapper using Quills (his reasoning: 1) "Quills are NOT AOE" 2) "the cone range of Quills is so small it really doesn't matter" 3) "I like Quills") and last night I saw several ice blasts coming out of the blanket heading DIRECTLY for Hami.
I also see folks using shadowfall, invincibility, and other toggles. I would like to imagine they genuinely think they are helping. I don't know if they are deliberately trying to grief the raid or if noone has gone over what IS and ISN'T helpful in the raid. (example: an invised blaster coming up behind me during the holding phase and throwing caltrops and web grenades) I also have witnessed people joining a critical team and then phase shifting and just wandering around Hami. Its one thing to Leech from a distance, but to pretend to actually be on a team in the blanket is quite another.
I am also suprised at the number of people who don't understand the concept that our biggest enemy is LAG (followed closely by Hami, of course). The use of each power must be weighed on the benefit (damage/hold/buff/debuff) vs the lag created. I heard a non-controller complaining in the last raid :"why wasn't his hold good enough" for the holding phase. The concept that the MORE heroes in one area using powers creates MORE lag didn't register with him (or her). As the guides explain, if the controllers aren't cutting it, then other AT's with holds are called in as the benefit of their hold vs lag has now gone up.
To be honest, I credit our experienced and organized raid leaders for getting us through each night, despite people's best intentions that have resulted in garnering a LOT of Hami aggro the past few raids.
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I think that a lot of the problem here is education (that and idiots reaching high levels through power leveling and not having a CLUE how to run their own characters
but that's a different topic). If the new Hami Raider isn't following the plan, whose fault is that, really? His, of course, but also the fault of the raid leaders.
The guy blasting away at random Mitos just DIDN'T KNOW that they regenerate too fast for any one or two players to kill them. Thus, what he was doing was useless. Perhaps nobody explained to him about how the targeting system works.
I've done about 20 raids now, and only RECENTLY did I understand exactly WHY toggles are useless against Hami. (He does untyped damage, so all the toggles in the world won't reduce it by as much as a single point.) I turned my toggles off because I understand about lag, but I thought lag was the real reason. The real reason is that TOGGLES DO NOT HELP AT ALL!
Not everyone will come here and read the boards. I didn't until after my 15 th raid, I think. Team leaders should probably ASK if there are new raiders around and give specific guidance relevant to their AT.
Now, once someone has everything explained to him, and he STILL doesn't follow the program
that's a different issue.
"OK, first of all... Shut Up." - My 13-Year-Old Daughter
29973 "The Running of the Bulls" [SFMA] - WINNER of the Mighty Big Story Arc Contest !
- The Stellar Wind Orbital Space Platform
Had a lot of requests for this, and since the last one's been pushed off, and has had some changes, I figured I'd put a new one up.
At the same time as the melee enter to get monster aggro and clear space, the illusion team moves in to get position over Hami and to the WEST of him. Once there, they wait til the raid leader gives them the signal, and then they start dropping PA.
Stay back until there's room made for ya; it will make life easier for everyone 
This is the method we've been using nightly for about 2 months now. It works, and that's all I'm going to claim; we can back this up by the fact that we've had only 3 failed raids since the first time this method was successful. Considering the number that we've done overall, we're fast pushing a 20:1 win/loss ratio. So I'd say it's solid
So, let's cut to the chase.
Step One: Raid leadership
The following roles are needed before just about anything else:
Blaster/Melee Leaders: these guys keep the two main damage-dealing types on task and in line. Their job is to observe the trends of their specific ATs, funnel that info to the raid leader, and help to correct any issues that their AT is causing or experiencing (i.e. using cones and AoEs, etc.) These are not simple jobs, despite the description; while there's no blaster lead guide posted yet, take a look at Ghost Tiger's melee lead guide to get a feel for the responsibility neccessary in the role.
Heal Team Lead: The healing team is the hardest working group in the raid. They keep the rest alive so that we can even stand a chance, and they can't do it without coordination. The heal team lead is the only lead that generally isn't on command team. Why? Simple. They're too damned busy to have time for dealing with the lead team chatter too. Doesn't mean they can't be on lead, but most, I've found, choose not to be to save themselves stress. Our medics are the best around, and they know what they're doing. Genna's healer guide is about your best bet for understanding what your role is.
Illusion Drop Team Lead: A more streamlined role, but no less important. Your job is to consistently position the PA drop team in the best spot to not only get Hami aggro, but keep it off of the raid crew. You're also going to be responsible for hauling [censored] to wherever you need to when Hami decides to pick on the raid group, in order to get aggro BACK. You might spend 10 mins sitting and doing nothing but dropping PA, and then suddenly you're going to have to fly around like a bat out of hell trying to get your team moved so that the whole raid isn't wiped out by an angry cell. The Healing team sweats hard to keep the raid alive; the illusion team makes the workload managable in the first place. This leader is also often responsible for controller lead at the end(this depends on the raid leader; some prefer to do this directly). Regardless, all controllers should take a gander at Lothiriel's guide on controlling Hami
Targetter: The targetter picks the target, and moves right up to it so that everyone can assist them and concentrate fire. Generally a hero with Fly, Phase Shift, and preferably a good video card. This is the raid point man, the guy that picks each target and guides the attention of everyone else. Considering the lag, it's not easy, because oftentimes you lose sight of targets, and you have to be able to switch to a new one very quickly and still make sure you're not leaving splits behind, before people get bored and blast whatever is nearby.
Bubbler: This is the anchor of the raid structure. While the targetter picks the targets, the bubbler uses their ability to be seen from a huge distance to gather everyone into a tight spot, so the heal blanket is at maximum effectiveness. The bubbler moves to a point directly below the target, so that melee and blasters alike can gather to hit it. It's not as easy as it sounds, either, because when the bubble moves, so does the raid. Gotta make absolutely certain you're going where you're supposed to, or the whole raid could get squashed by hami aggro because you moved em to the wrong spot.
Raid leader: You are the voice of the raid, really. Your job is mostly funnelling information that is brought to you by observation and input from your AT leaders. It's stressful, and speaking from experience, it's oftentimes a place where you feel as though you're supposed to have all the control, and instead you have nearly none. Sometimes you're in constant tell hell; others it's as if everything around you is running itself. So instead of trying to define the position, I'll point out the most important aspects:
1. Think fast, and trust your commanders. Keep an eye on everything, but don't try to do everything all yourself, because there's too much going on. Any person that's led a raid can tell you that nine times out of ten, they're too busy with one thing to do another at the same time, and nothing ever happens in a convenient order. They'll also tell you that if the other AT leaders weren't doing a hell of a job controlling their groups, the whole thing would be lost. Adjust the whole raid as you would a single team; when hami aggro hits the blanket, move the PA drop the same way you'd call for a tank. When you're getting griefers dragging monsters into the bubble, get the targetter to switch to the monster and watch them melt like butter. The biggest thing is to forget how many people are individually pulling together, and remember that it's a server effort: The server is a hell of a team, and they're all with you.
2. Don't be a hero. Sounds odd, huh? For many of us, we see someone in trouble, and we want to move to help each one. But in this case, you're in a position where sometimes a couple of hundred heros are looking to you for direction. You can't afford to put the individual in front of the raid; the raid has to come first. The consolation to this pragmatism is that it's not a matter of cold logic; it's a matter of trust. Remember that you're responsible for making sure that the raid succeeds: There are 200 other people out there whose job it is to back each other up at all times. Trust them to do their job, and focus on the process of getting to the end. They won't let you down.
3. Keep talking. ALWAYS KEEP TALKING. Compliments, observations, stating the obvious, repeating yourself, relaying messages from AT leaders, whatever. KEEP TALKING. A raid, as organized as it can possibly be, is still in many ways a chaotic mess. Your voice needs to be the single most dominating facet out there: It keeps focus, it keeps people informed, it keeps them involved. You will be mocked, teased, harassed, and worse: KEEP TALKING. If someone is giving you a hard time, it still means they're paying attention, and that's what's needed. You can't make people follow directions, but as long as you're making sure that the directions are getting out, you're doing the absolute best job you can.
Step Two: Staging
This is simple: gather all participants by AT, and get them organized into teams. There are a couple of specific benchmarks in population needed before it's really safe to head in to start. They are as follows:
6-8 Healers: And when I say healers, no offense Rads, but I mean Emps. If you don't have at least 6 Emps, your blanket's in over it's head for the most part. Rads definitely help with Radiant Aura, but it's not the foundation of the blanket. I know I won't start a raid without at least this.
4-5 Flying Illusionists: Either with their own Fly, or Group fly. Doesn't matter how they do it, but they have to be airborne, and you don't want fewer than this. This seems to be the sweet spot for holding Hami aggro for the most part: You can do it shakily with fewer, or rock solid with just a few more. 4-5, however, is the benchmark
15-20 Blasters: These are your meat and potatoes damage dealers when it comes to both mitos and hami. Without this number, it can be done, but it will take FOREVER, and there's less debt involved in waiting to make sure you have this many than in starting early
15-20 Melee: Melee are the guys that not only help drop mitos, but they make sure we can all get in there in one piece to start with. They clear the path that the rest of us follow, but they need their numbers too, because let's face it: Monsters suck. Don't want to start without them.
What about Controllers, you ask? Well, staging is about STARTING the raid, not finishing it. To START, we only need the illusion controllers mentioned above. To FINISH, you're going to need about another 15-20 of our crowd control specialists, too, at least to be secure. It's been observed that the average raid doubles in size about 75% of the way through. While it's not fun to bank on it, if we waited for perfection to start with, not only would we never get started, but we'd have some very bored people for a lot of it. Have faith that they will show, even if you don't see em to start. They'll be there when you need them
And what, oh what to wear?? Check out Upsen's hamidon raid uniform guide , which was started here on Champion, and has been adopted by many other servers.
Stage Three: Blazing a Trail
When you've got your benchmarks, send the melee in to clear a spot to the EAST side of Hamidon. Why East? Two reasons. First, it's the closest side to the entrance, which means minimal monster involvement. Second, hami's mitos always spawn in the same place, and the East side has a blue one(electrolyte) that's always one of the closest to the edge of Hami. It's a perfect entry point, and it's served us well
The other AT's move in approximately a minute after the melee does, to assist them in killing, and try to keep them in one piece. 60 seconds is a long time in CoH, and it's plenty of time to ensure that the monsters will be focused mostly on our tanker and scrapper friends, and not on us poor squishies. It's also a short enough time that we can get in there after them and buff them so they can sustain holding aggro
Stage 4: Attack!
Once space is clear, the bubbler will turn on Dispersion Bubble, and the heal team will begin providing that lovely green glow that sustains us through the fight. Everyone gathers into the bubble, and the targetter targets that first mito (usually that aforementioned blue one). The raid leader calls for the PA drop, the bubbler moves to target, and assuming people are following directions, the raid moves with the bubble. The raid is on, and from here on, it's a matter of sticking together, moving with the bubble, staying on target and listening to instructions.
Stage 5: Aggro lockdown
Once a nice, wide stretch of space has been totally cleared of mitos, the raid leader should send a regen scrapper to the middle of that wide space, and get him to taunt Hami aggro to him. The PA team should move to surround this scrapper with PA as well. This system provides much more stable aggro management, but is not feasible until there's enough space that the regen isn't going to get owned by mitos while standing there. IMPORTANT: THE REGEN SHOULD NOT BE DOING THIS UNTIL THE RAID LEADER CALLS FOR IT. I can't stress this enough. If you're a regen, and trying this while taking mito fire as well, get out and wait. By default, you're going to be as far from the raid group as possible, and that means that if you fall, it pulls an emp off the line to get your [censored] back up and moving. The raid group needs all avaliable emps in there, and if you're getting yourself killed, it's not helping with aggro
Stage 6: Pull out, Regroup, and slap Hami
When the mitos are all gone, the raid pulls out and regroups. Generally, this is done to the north, but that's mostly a matter of convention. Regardless of direction, clear out any monsters there, and regroup the raid outside the bubble. Once regrouped, the melee lead will lead all the melee through Hamidon to land a single hit on Hami, and then pull through to the opposite side and gather. This is done to ensure that our hard working melee get an enhancement drop, even if our numbers are so great that we need to ask them to stay out of Hamidon to cut down on lag. This should only take a minute or two; it's the melee leaders job to get them in and out fast, and so far, we've had some great melee leaders
Stage 7: Hold me close, don't ever let me go...
At this point, controllers and defenders ONLY move in and sustain the healing blanket while throwing holds on Hami. NO PETS OTHER THAN SINGULARITY AND DARK SERVANT SHOULD BE USED. I can't stress that enough. Other pets can yank aggro off of the regen scrapper that's still going to be in there holding his attention, and that can be disastrous. JUST HOLDS. Why nothing else? Two main reasons. First, since we're going to be damaging him, AND he can't move anyway, the only mez effects that would make a difference on him are Hold and Disorient. We want everyone stacking the same mez effect on him, and we know that Holds have visible effects and are a more complete lockdown than a disorient. So stick to holds, and holds only. It's worked pretty well so far, I'd say
In the case that controllers and defs can't stack enough holds to get him(and it will take a while to verify if this is the case), then BLASTERS with holds should move in to hold. If THAT doesn't work, then and only then should scrappers and tanks come in with whatever holds they have. This sequence is dictated ONLY by the raid leader; don't assume that if he's not held yet that that means you have to pitch in and help if you're not a controller. Sometimes you're going to be adding more lag than you're helping, and that's a problem.
Stage 8: Beat him like he stole something
Once he's verified to have been held, the blasters move in and stay at range. They shouldn't bother sniping, because the bubble interrupts the snipe, so stick to your bread and butter attacks. For most raids, with our average numbers, this is all it takes: The blasters will whittle Hami down rapidly, with minimal lag to the control team, and therefore minimal risk of the dreaded mito spawn. The fewer the people in Hami, the better, considering our turnouts, and blasters are king when it comes to damage.
If the raid can't deal enough damage with just blasters, or blasters are helping to sustain the holds and can't risk breaking the sequence to attack, then we call in the scrappers and their criticals. This is a big decision, because that many toons crowded on top of Hami is lag city, and can be hard to deal with. However, it's been done more than a few times, and it's worked when neccessary. Again, the fewer toons the better, but sometimes the blasters just aren't enough. This sequence extends to tanks as well, when the scrappers are yet not enough, and in at least one case where our numbers were extremely tiny, we had to call in not only all the scrappers and tanks, but we had to have the controllers drop pets to get over the damage hump. The point is that when it comes to Hami, lag is the biggest enemy, followed by his damage resistance. We only risk increasing the first when we just can't overcome the second any other way.
If Hami breaks loose of the holds after 50% health, the raid is doomed. Why? Because he'll spawn a yellow mito for every hero in range, and that's simply too many to cope with. We tried once. It didn't go well. So please, don't skip a hold for ANYTHING. Blasters, if he starts firing on people again before he hits 50%, STOP FIRING. It's better to let him heal up and start over than to kick him past the mark and be destroyed utterly. Keep him locked down, and it should be smooth sailing; slow and steady wins the race
Stage 9: KILL THE BUDS
When Hami dies, he'll spawn a bud for each person in range. For crying out loud, please kill them. If even one survives, we can get stuck with no Hami for hours after that last one is hunted down and killed. So save trading time for after the bud killing, and everyone comes out happy
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is that. Hope it helps
-M
Marut, 50 FF/Rad/Power Defender - Champion
Leader of The Earthguard
Leader of The Galactic Empire