Guide to the Imperious Strike/Task Force
By
Alexandria2000,
Posted on: 2008-05-15 24:15 in Player Guides
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Update - except most people [censored] about going to the tower and trying to pull him rather than killing everything. PUGs are making me angry.
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I'd be one of them, and would probably be [censored] about noobs on my global channel. Killing everything > silly wastes of time.
[/ QUOTE ]I am sick of people that tell me to skip tot he end or try to stealth to the end of strike forces. No, big whoop I might get a recipe worth a few mill. You are killing several mill infamy from me in sellable IO recipes and savlage that I can use to craft common IOs that others buy as well as salvage that can be sold. Been running into people that want to do that with every strike force I run lately, and it's been getting bloody annoying.
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some people have time constraints but really I don't see this as a problem. Most people stealth to the end of the last mission just to get Romulus over with just in case they run into some problems with him.
I don't see the point in that at all, since that really prolongs the feeling of fight since you gotta turn around and kill 300 traitors to begin with.
One of them people find easy to do if 4 players get struck by lightning and cannot continue. The other people do not find easy if 4 players mysteriously leave. Thus, many do the difficult one first
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Update - except most people [censored] about going to the tower and trying to pull him rather than killing everything. PUGs are making me angry.
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I'd be one of them, and would probably be [censored] about noobs on my global channel. Killing everything > silly wastes of time.
[/ QUOTE ]I am sick of people that tell me to skip tot he end or try to stealth to the end of strike forces. No, big whoop I might get a recipe worth a few mill. You are killing several mill infamy from me in sellable IO recipes and savlage that I can use to craft common IOs that others buy as well as salvage that can be sold. Been running into people that want to do that with every strike force I run lately, and it's been getting bloody annoying.
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yea its even worse when they try to stealth some parts and will recall friend at end, but they end up dying. would have been much faster jsut fighting through the mobs. like the tree thorn vine part of STF. but you never know if the guy is competent or not.
My experiences with people who like to jump to the end, so far, have been negative. They've not been particularly good about playing team-friendly, nor have they seemed to be having fun. Their primary concern has been "are we following that winning script?"
They also seem to be consistently unaware that keeping Rommy out of sight on the nictus seems to encourage the nictus to wander back to the podium, after he drops. Having pulled the nictus and Rommy away, to keep them away from all the 5th that are nearby, we then fight the surviving nictus on the podium in fairly restricted quarters because inviting over-aggro is a good way to get the squishies to repeatedly face-plant, and becomes, at least, a distraction from focusing on bringing down the nictus.
The very best ITF I was on, to date, was led by somebody who took the left fork in on the last mission. We fought our way to Rommy, and then the leader brought Rommy and the nictus back to near the stairs that we had cleared on the way into the square. The nictus were kept far enough away from Rommy that he wasn't healed while fighting, but the nictus all had a clear view of Rommy. And so, the nictus duly sacrificed themselves each time he was defeated. And, we had a place to which to easily run to avoid Rommy's post-death stun.
We ended up needing to get a handful more traitors after defeating Rommy for the fourth time, which illustrates that there was very little time wasted killing more mobs than necessary (other than a fairly small number of 5th, who all went down easily and quickly). The ease with which we were able to fight and beat Rommy more than made up for that (we won against Rommy and his helpers quickly because we could fight easily and well, without concerns about inviting over-aggro).
That was the fastest and smoothest ITF I've been on so far, with the leader more interested in being a good teammate and in having fun than in herding everybody into following some script.
A "blastroller" build explanation: electricity / ice / fire
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I have been toying with using that, to take out the summon nictus first since it is not in range of the heal, since that is one that casues team wipes. It seems to me, that after it blooms, and spawns is when alot of people get upset and quit.
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This has been the cast on my runs. After we regrouped and killed the Summoner the rest of the fight went much easier with Romulus and the remaining Nictuses.
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Toying with the idea of letting someone keep aggro, and wipe the spawner, so less trouble down the line. Then kill romy by separating the healing from him, to have him eat the nictus on purpose and get rid of the healing nictus for us. Romy is not that hard of a kill by himself but the healer can be a problem especially with melee MM pets.. so let romy do it for us.
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That strategy worked well for my first run.
It's the job of the debuffer/controller to take care of the summoned mires, they're only minion level. Any AoE debuff or (soft) control puts them out of action. I cast my Dark Servant into them and forget about them: "Fluffy, go play with the balls!"
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using the tower trick with rom and the 4 nictus, how did you keep the healing nictus from healing rom? is the tower trick only viable with a certain team makeup??
also, i'd like to make a suggestion on a tip i received doing my last ITF. final mish, with just rom and the nictus, anyone with single target ranged attacks attacked the healing nictus. the leader told us to go no further than a certain point, not close enough to aggro them, but close enough to use my ranged attacks.
i had 2 attacks i used, the default range was 80ft with no range enhancements, and it was enough range to hit the healing nictus. i'd guess it took us 4 minutes or so, to kill the healing nictus from safety. after that we pounded rom 3 times.
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using the tower trick with rom and the 4 nictus, how did you keep the healing nictus from healing rom? is the tower trick only viable with a certain team makeup??
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You break Line of Sight using a corner.
Position the players (P) like so depending on whether they are ranged or melee. Keep Romulus (R) at the corner tip and the Nictus (N) trailing behind him out of view. If you don't get this positioning on the first try, simply have the tanker drag him around the next corner.
P ____________
..|XXXXXXXXXX|
..|XXXXXXXXXX|
P|[u]XXXXXXXXXX[u]|
R....NNN
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using the tower trick with rom and the 4 nictus, how did you keep the healing nictus from healing rom? is the tower trick only viable with a certain team makeup??
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You break Line of Sight using a corner.
Position the players (P) like so depending on whether they are ranged or melee. Keep Romulus (R) at the corner tip and the Nictus (N) trailing behind him out of view. If you don't get this positioning on the first try, simply have the tanker drag him around the next corner.
P ____________
..|XXXXXXXXXX|
..|XXXXXXXXXX|
P|[u]XXXXXXXXXX[u]|
R....NNN
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oh...so the team is out of LOS of the nictus, while Rom is in LOS w/the nictus. is this correct? so the only way the healing nictus can heal Rom is using targeted AOE on the teammates??
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using the tower trick with rom and the 4 nictus, how did you keep the healing nictus from healing rom? is the tower trick only viable with a certain team makeup??
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You break Line of Sight using a corner.
Position the players (P) like so depending on whether they are ranged or melee. Keep Romulus (R) at the corner tip and the Nictus (N) trailing behind him out of view. If you don't get this positioning on the first try, simply have the tanker drag him around the next corner.
P ____________
..|XXXXXXXXXX|
..|XXXXXXXXXX|
P|[u]XXXXXXXXXX[u]|
R....NNN
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oh...so the team is out of LOS of the nictus, while Rom is in LOS w/the nictus. is this correct? so the only way the healing nictus can heal Rom is using targeted AOE on the teammates??
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Correct, if the Healing Essence can't 'see' any of your teammates or their pets, it has no target to heal off of, even though you all me be within 80 feet of it (typical 'Dark' mechanics). Teammates and tanks need to be careful of not hitting/taunting the Healing Essence which will encourage it to chase someone around that corner and get you all in its Line of Sight.
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I ran another one on invince last night. Was pretty easy but we had 2 VEATs so my stalker's positional def was like 60-70% total. We just ganged up on Romulus (kin kept transfusion going so the aura nictus wouldn't kill us, but ke got some of us). After Rommy ate the auto-hit aura nictus nobody died anymore and just ganged on him, we didn't have a Tank or Brute to keep nicti away. 2 VEATS, my stalker, a kin, a defender (mebbe a bubbler, I never noticed since it went by so fast), and a blaster were the ones i remember from the team. 1:28 not skipping anything... This TF is so easy when there's real good team coordination (like getting SB without asking and all the fulcrums). The only part we had a 'plan' was to pull the 2 AVs from the top floor, and it wasnt really needed. The rest wsa just 'kill kill kill' and at the end 'gang up on Rommy'.
BTW the damn aura nictus is susceptible to fulcrum and siphon power, when i did the ITF on my kin he was constantly doing little more than half the usual 600ish he does.
Interesting to hear of this tower strategy. Going to try that next time.
What I and my sg have been doing lately, even on PUGs, is separating the healing essence and Romulus, then taking out Rom 4 times. We have a tank, brute, scrap, kheldian dwarf, whichever is available, attack or taunt the healing essence from under the left ledge. Then the other tank, brute, scrap, kheld taunts/attacks Rom immediately. 6 or 7 of us (depending of the off tank needs healing/support) then pound Rom 3 times. He seems to rez off the aoe essence, then the spawning essence, then the healing essence, in that order. Consistently the last 3 runs he has done that order anyway. And then we all 8 get to pound on him the last time.
Taking Rom 4 times definitely is the way to go. On test I was on two teams that separated the essences and had no problems. But live experience has been completely different.
Anyway the run I was on last night, we had a warshade and peacebringer for our two melee "tanks." I was a little worried, but after 45 min of trying to gather a team I was just ready to try the darn thing. Our first pull the pb off-tank died, and when our corr tried to cast veng, they went down to the other essence. We got Rom down under 30% or so before finally falling. Then it took us 3 more attempts to get the right essence and proper separation. So at 3:12 this was the longest ITF I have done. But it was actually really rewarding when we got it right, and Rom fell with no problem.
FYI last night's team was 4 50s, 4 sks: 3 blasters, 2 corrs, ws, pb, and crab. RoA + RoA + Omega was a ton of fun on the large spawns for majority of TF, even the boss-heavy ones. 
Also, that ambush on the first mission is brutal. That was NOT happening on open beta or live previously. Or it was very delayed. Now it's like as soon as you enter the top circle the ambush comes. Usually in the middle of fighting that first spawn with an EB. Caused team wipes the last 3 ITFs I have run. From now on I will be leading team around to the side or back and try to avoid that ambush completely. On a team of 8 on heroic that ambush consisted of 8 nictus bosses, I think it was. Pretty ridiculous. 
Anyway, I am still enjoying this TF. And still believe it is on par difficulty-wise with the LGTF. Heck if you haven't done the Hami raid mission before on LGTF or some of the team hasn't, you can have a lot of difficulty with that, just like the ITF's final fight. Experience counts for a lot, or at least an experienced leader.
I laughed an insane laugh when I was surprised they fixed that ambush spawn. We of course died because none of us were expecting it.
People always seem to die when Rommy summons an ambush at half-health, too. I always warn them about it and ask a tank or brute to watch for it and grab it, but it always pwns people.
"Sometimes you have to roll the Hard Six." -- Adama
Teabagging Ms. Liberty - http://kk-comics.com/allmmproject/rsf21.jpg
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People always seem to die when Rommy summons an ambush at half-health, too. I always warn them about it and ask a tank or brute to watch for it and grab it, but it always pwns people.
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*points to Tower strategy*
I never have that problem.
To be clear:
The first mission has an ambush on top of the temple hill as you are rescuing Sister Solaris.
It's an all-Kheldian boss + Cimeroran ambush. And it happens at least twice.
It was present in Closed Beta, but disappeared when they made the final AV encounter much more difficult (and enjoyable, IMO).
It's baaaaack.
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People always seem to die when Rommy summons an ambush at half-health, too. I always warn them about it and ask a tank or brute to watch for it and grab it, but it always pwns people.
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*points to Tower strategy*
I never have that problem.
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You clearly run with teams (PUGs?) that don't whine when you try the tower strategy.
"Sometimes you have to roll the Hard Six." -- Adama
Teabagging Ms. Liberty - http://kk-comics.com/allmmproject/rsf21.jpg
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People always seem to die when Rommy summons an ambush at half-health, too. I always warn them about it and ask a tank or brute to watch for it and grab it, but it always pwns people.
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*points to Tower strategy*
I never have that problem.
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You clearly run with teams (PUGs?) that don't whine when you try the tower strategy.
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Because I make it clear they need to listen to what I say or get kicked. I'm not unreasonable and alter my plan as needed and keep everyone informed as I do so, but I don't like whiners crying about something they know nothing about and don't have time or patience to sit down and explain everything facet of this game's mechanics. Easier just to warn them they are endanger of getting booted and if they cause further problems for me, I'll boot them and be done with it.
Gave the tower thing a try this afternoon. I don't wanna badmouth anyone in particular, but let's just say some of our team wasn't as sharp as they could have been. 
Never could get Rom on the corner right with the essences on the other side. I saw some of the team cheaty video to figure out where the best spot looks to be. But it just didn't seem to work with our group. Hopefully can try another time with sg members and really give it a solid go.
Also, we ended up doing the "blast two essences that aren't the healer from 80 ft" thing. First time I have done that. Surprisingly easy, but very time consuming. Another 3+ hour ITF, and that is really sad. But at least I haven't lost one on live yet. That's two at 3+ hours though and that's not much fun.
A few comments:
I've run this "Strask" Force on Public Test Server (a/k/a "Staging Server," a/k/a "Training Room") 10 times and on Live (various servers) 31 times; 4 times on PTS/Training were failed attempts and 2 times on Live have been failures. I've tanked 15 times with a Stone/Stone Tanker.
Mission 1: Consult the Oracle
Now with the Kheldian ambush squads (1 of Dwarves and 1 of Novas), this is trickier. I feel it's best to grab the Elite Bosses from the group with the captive and bring them back from he center closer to the steps area and pound 'em all down. Take out all waves (2? 3?) of the ambushing Kheldians. Then go back up. Tanker could keep the mobs busy while someone else grabs the captive and takes her to the altar.
Mission 2: Destroy the Cysts
Don't stealth & run. It's easy and fast to just run through, defeat all of the mobs. Save the Cyst for LAST. If you have a player Kheldian, there will likely be a Cyst (Boss-class <Object>
with a group of Traitor Cimerorans in the mission. If this is the case, that particular Cyst does NOT count as one of the 10. The 10 are guarded/surrounded by the Kheldian hordes.
Mission 3: Stop Rom (Stop Rom, Defeat 5 Generals, 100 Cimeroran Traitors, etc.)
This map is lagtastic. it appears PBAoE or Targeted AoE "booms" seem to cause a LOT of lag. It may be the sheer number of calculations that have to be performed and then relayed to all of the clients or something like that. I just remember our Archery Blaster doing Rain of Arrows on almost every mob up to the lip of the Valley of the 5th Column. Each mob was a wonderful lagfest for the Rain of Arrows. Finally, it's easier to handle the ambushes as they come.
Mission 4: OVER NINE THOUSAND
Don't shortcut. Defeat most of the "300" Cimeroran Traitors along the way. Take out the 5th Column in the main pavilion and then work the "stage" area where there are rows and rows of Cimeroran Traitors. After the area is clear, have a ranged attacker pull one (or both) of the groups on either side of the 4 AVs -- pulling the Elite Boss (Cyclops or Minotaur) is a good tactic. Now, all that should be left are the four AVs.
I feel the best way is to have everyone stand back. Have a lead tank (in all cases where I tanked, I was the only Tanker/Brute) go in and Taunt the AVs out and down from the Temple/Steps. The Tanker should attempt to taunt the Nictus Essence[Healer] and the Nictus Essence[Sunless_Mire] as far from Romulus as the threshold allows before Romulus comes within healing range. Also, the Tanker shoudld try to keep Romulus at range enough so he does his range attacks -- if Romulus doesn't come near his target, he doesn't do his own Sunless Mire. Okay, if this setup is correct, the tanker should be Taunting all of the AVs (2 near him, Romulus close, but not close enough and the Nictus Essence[Summoner] somewhere in between -- also taunted). The rest of the group should go in and pound on Romulus 4 times -- each time he is resurrected via one of the Nictus Essence's Death Throw (sacrifices itself and resurrects Romulus). Boom, boom, boom, boom. Done.
It worked every time via this method.
(Does this make sense. I'm typing this as I'm waiting for the rest of the team to come back from the Cimerora Hospital.)
Aeon vs. Television?
Uhm, okay | Get Mashed!I'm Tanking / Bruting so get familiar with my hand signals.
Had an exceptionally fun bug this morning on Freedom where in the last mission, there were actually 2 versions of Romulus standing on the steps. One was the full nictus version and the other was the 3rd mission AV version.
I was able to taunt the Nictus version to the far end of the platform alone. The essences stayed behind with the other version. Because the essences were still in LOS with the nictus Rom, he consumed them when he died. After his 4th death, the TF ended. But for kicks we went up and beat the snot out of the other Rommy who was just standing there. Good times!
"Sometimes you have to roll the Hard Six." -- Adama
Teabagging Ms. Liberty - http://kk-comics.com/allmmproject/rsf21.jpg
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You clearly run with teams (PUGs?) that don't whine when you try the tower strategy.
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I'd whine. It's a ridiculous tactic to make an already simple AV even simpler through the use of an AI exploit.
Doom.
Yep.
This is really doom.
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Had an exceptionally fun bug this morning on Freedom where in the last mission, there were actually 2 versions of Romulus standing on the steps. One was the full nictus version and the other was the 3rd mission AV version.
I was able to taunt the Nictus version to the far end of the platform alone. The essences stayed behind with the other version. Because the essences were still in LOS with the nictus Rom, he consumed them when he died. After his 4th death, the TF ended. But for kicks we went up and beat the snot out of the other Rommy who was just standing there. Good times!
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I guess the server lagged out or something and skipped over the "Despawn Romulus" code after the scene occurred. Was there by chance a 4th Nictus Essence as well?
Killing everything is fun. I like fun.