Master of Magisterium (MoMAG) The Really Hard Way 6/8-9/12

Thanks to Makerian for hosting---The 3rd attempt was a full league (24) and successful for the Hard Way Badge (and thus, giving a lot of us the MoMag badge.)

I was an empath and I did notice that there were significantly a lot less deaths in the last runs (as an emp, I am always looking for people to rez ).

In the 2 previous runs, there would be 3-4 deaths per lightning but the last run, it was 1-2 and at times 0 deaths. I think as people run the last part again and again, it gets easier to get into the mindset of "get out" at the crackles.



The other thing I noticed was that when we hit the wall at around 36% and the call went out for lore pets--the damage dealers I was buffing with fort were +4 already (prior to lights) which I am assuming were due to Ultimate inspirations. When we did the lights round, a number of blasters were +10. He went down fast from 30-10%. So stock up on Ultimates for future attempts! (An interesting note, I wonder if lore pets spawned at +10 as well? I didn't target any and didn't notice.)

Thanks to everyone on that league and Makerian for hosting. Looking forward to the next attempt for the "Really Hard Way" badge.

Are we running again tonite? I had to hit it after round b/c of jet lag.

Kotchie - good points about the Fly problems. I thought he was doing that on his own. Didn't think that some flyers were causing the issues by leading him up.

Yeah, I was wrong, his HP does dynamically scale. As Tamerlayne says, it doesn't reduce percentages, but I wonder if it could still be used strategically?

I did a quick test on Malaise in MOM, his base HP seemed to be 67,489.74 with 8 and scaled up to 104,302.33 with 16, about 4,601.57 extra HP per person.

It does appear lightning patches are fewer with a smaller league, but I don't know the pattern if there is one.

Turg, yes the 16 cap is still there, so I asked people to dismiss Lore before we fell back to Hard Way and 12 lights method. Gave people a 30 second window, based on how fast he collapsed, I'd say it worked pretty good.

I'm going to do runs tonight, everything willing.

Another thing I noticed when running around was if I was running in a circle instead of straight back it seemed easier for me to completely avoid dmg from lightning, as opposed to running back I tended to get tagged with 2 dmg ticks. It also seemed easier for me to find a spot to move back in to the fight.

Do AV HPs scale dynamically DURING the fight, or only when the AV spawns? It would seem more logical to do it when it spawns, which should make it easy to invite people late for easier kills. Those people, however, may not be in the trial long enough to reap much of a reward.

I read somewhere, a while back, that the lightning has an effect that does a no-dmg attack right before it spawns, and it if hits you, lightning spawns on you. If true, that could explain why smaller leagues get fewer lightning spawns. Again, I have nothing but rumor to back this up, but I have seen a small effect hit me right before the lightning spawns...

Xyzor, it changes within a few seconds of someone joining or quitting/kicked from a league. I think if someone DCs, they still count as part of the league size.

So, you will see a change in HP up or down pretty quick if you add or remove a player.

I'm gonna run a synchronized defeat run today and will check for lightning effects, although in the hectic speed of the trial it won't matter much, you gotta run whether you like it or not. But it might indicate some type of pattern, like it triggers on people closest to him, or people who recently attacked him, or maybe just random.

Made it through Synch and Speed runs, noticed that league mates are starting to get into the rhythm of moving away from and back to Tyrant. There are still too many deaths, but the rate of dmg seems better overall.

We'd use lights minimally or not at all until around 50-70% depending on the speed we were bringing him down. I think that's a good strategy to get leagues used to fighting him without shifts.

Also, considering having some people slot barrier for the first 60% + 1 min of fighting so we can keep Olympian guards to the level of minor annoyance.

If you're coming tonight, please get at least 6 Ultimate Inspirations and as many DMG inspirations as you can. You can get them from Astral vender in OB or market.

The lightning doesn't seem to be the real issue, it’s the guards and the fist pound thing he does. Here’s what I’m thinking:

On the fist pound — Does anyone know if a tank/brute can get Tyrant facing in one direction and planted as opposed to having him turning around and moving all over the place? I think one designated tank should try taunting him and try to keep him faced in one direction after the lightning drops so that the squishies can be behind him. It seems like the tanks are competing with each other for aggro which causes him to move and face all over the place which makes it harder for everyone else to know where to position.

The guards -- That would leave the rest of the tanks to keep the guards off the squishies. We might want to kill at least some of the guards before really focusing on the boss as we lost a lot of DPS when everyone kept getting killed by them.

Good runs last night Mak

Couple things...we still are not getting in and getting out quick enough, but I am sure you noticed this.

Can Tyrant be pulled to the "rim" of the map? I have not noticed if the lightning hits that far out or not....

Maybe we need to stack Sonic debuffs for that max -res...like the Marauder fight... (I am going to try this at some point..stack -res debuffs, only really need a few sonics to melt stuff)

I know everyone is screaming that melee should be taunting the guards/Tyrant...if we taunt, and actively hold their aggro....we lose that DPS from high damage attackers (but i get if the squishies get killed we lose thier DPS too...got to be a middle ground, maybe figure out from where those guards are spawning). The reason those guards like the ranged guys is when you are using your targeted AoE, you are hitting the guards too....I honestly haven't found the guards to be a problem...but I am a Brute.

Maybe arrange the teams like a CoP trial...have every team have a specific makeup (1 kin, 1 rad, 1 emp, 1 sonic...etc...)

In all reality...other than just hammering away at it...the solution is just eluding me...every other server seems to be able to get it together to do it at least once...whats happening with Freedom?

Nuke, I think the solution to Olympians is have about 4-6 people with Barrier that use it during the first 60% of DMG + 1 min to Tyrant. That's how long it takes to get rid of them. Some Olympians will die, some will be absorbed.

I think Kotchie has it right, it's the lack of Single Target that brings them to some squishies more than others.

When I get that kind of aggro, I try to run around in a circle to the other side of the fight while casting Aim or Build Up and hope they get distracted while following

Kotchie, as for Rim, he will summon lightning anywhere I've moved him (that was one of my very first tests, albeit partial, was just enough to see that he does summon lightning outside the bowl).

Yes, I think Sonics and Kins would make a big difference. I haven't seen how far his Res can be debuffed, but I see that it goes negative, it's just that S/L is buffed by +50% from Temp Invuln, and other DMG types are not.

Also, not that it helps, but I think 50+4 or 50+5s with Ultimates and Lores would have an easier time than 50+3s, so there's that ...

Look at Madame Pistacio's (Victory) league composition here:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=290958



And look at

Canine's post of the successful Union run:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=290653

[URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/411/thereallyhardwayj.jpg/"]

The things that strike me are:

1) Neither team looks particularly similar to each other
2) Both teams have a lot of either Defenders or Corruptors

7 COR, 3 DEF, 3 CON, 1 MM or 14 buff/debuffers
7 DEF, 3 COR, 3 CON, 2 MM or 15 buff/debuffers

I think what is not obvious is whether there's some specific powersets in there that, when added up and used properly, give enough of an advantage to overcome his HP during the final push.

So that's about 2/3 of the league buff/debuff. I don't have screenies of our leagues, but we're definitely BLA heavy (including myself). We had like 7 or more on some runs, several Dominators, etc.

So, our leagues could contribute the same base dmg, maybe even a little more (our pets + our personal dmg). I think what's getting them over the edge are either DMG buffs or RES debuffs, but can't be sure.

Next run, I will probably try to be more restrictive to buff/debuff sets, but didn't wanna go that route at first.

Also, I think MP is wrong about Longbow Core -regen making a difference (unless he does get regen debuffed despite what stats say).

When we did a couple trials with Longbow Cat Cores, we did melt him down to about 35-50% within first 5 minutes, but the second wave of LBs in the last 5 minutes was not enough to do much at all to get him under 30%.

Presumably, we summoned 2nd wave of pets after being shifted, but it still wasn't enough.

I will look into ST DPS for exotic dmg lores. Recommend Cores of another type, esp without a lot of -RES debuffing.

2 leagues...2 runs...both stacked with debuff/buffs...fail on both..

Interestingly...Poison's "vomit hold" interupts the LIGHTNING strikes...

I was on the first run, I think. It was at 25% health (which probably means a little bit lower) at his lowest point.

The issue seemed to me to be the number of deaths. We summoned pets immediately and within 2 minutes, about 12 people had died, losing their pets, shifts, and buffs.

During the final fight, over 14 people died within the first 3 lightning strikes (less than 100 seconds). That was huge. I think we were close otherwise.

I might be trying one day next weekend. I'll be watching for other people who are smarter than me to try to make sense of what pets, buffs, etc. work best.

Poison choke was nice. I think it did interrupt at least one lightning.

Also, it might be my graphics settings, but a few times it seemed like a lot less lightning, probably just my angles/imagination, but not sure if it was happening.

Moira, I agree, I think that's the case too. I've definitely had moments where I'm zoomed out and can't see something that's causing me ticks of dmg. Occasionally, that results in a defeat if I trigger an animation and get rooted before I realize what happened.

Hi there,
Just wandering through the forums to see what's going on. I don't know if the Union run had a sign up, but Madame Pistacio's run did. If you want to take a look at our league, here's a link to the sign up: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=290837

MP was very particular about her requirements, but it worked and we wound up doing two successful runs back-to-back.

Good luck!

I probably won't be on much this week. I hope you guys keep plugging away at it and get the badge!

Guys, if u ran the trial last nite about midnite, and didn't get the hard way badge, petition it!!!! I did and i got awarded the badge!!!!