How To Get Past Veteran Imperial City Prison's Second Boss (Ibomez The Flesh Sculptor)?

Higgs_Field

I am a VR16 templar healer and with the exception of ICP and WGT I have successfully finished all the vet dungeons, veteran DSA and the trials. I've also completed ICP and WGT in normal mode.

Today's vet pledge on PC NA is Imperial City Prison so I figured it's time to give it a try. Finding people for a group was hard because everyone told me ICP is too hard and a waste of time. Nevertheless, I managed to form 3 different groups throughout the day. All groups were composed of experienced players, VR16, with endgame gear, who like me have no problems in vet dungeons and other endgame content.

In all attempts we had no problem whatsoever with the first boss, so the DPS was high enough and people generally knew what they were doing. However, once we got to the second boss, Ibomez The Flesh Sculptor, we could not even get him down to 50%. This eventually caused each group to give up and disband.

In this boss fight, inmates go towards the pool in the center, and once 10 get there they spawn a flesh atronach. You can throw grenades at the inmates to kill them instantly, and you can throw grenades on the flesh atronach to make them more susceptible to damage so they die a lot quicker. The problem is that after a short time the flesh atronachs get enraged and start hitting for ~180k damage, one-shotting everyone. If you don't prevent them from spawning, or don't kill them quickly enough, once 3 of them are running around enraged there's no possible outcome except wiping.

My groups have tried many different strategies. We had only the healer, or the healer and one DPS, or the healer and 2 DPS, all throw bombs at the inmates and/or the flesh atronachs that spawn. We also tried to ignore them and just DPS the boss. Nothing seemed to work and we just kept wiping. As I said, this happened with 3 different groups.

I watched this video guide, but unfortunately it didn't tell me anything new. Furthermore, in the video the fight appears much easier than what I've experienced. No one even bothers throwing the grenades on the flesh atronachs, and the flesh atronachs don't one-shot anyone. So either this dungeon is simply bugged now for some reason, or there's something important about this fight I'm missing.

I would love to hear any kind of advice from players who have managed to kill this boss in veteran mode. If someone (or an experienced group) is willing to show me the ropes by doing this dungeon with me, that would be even better. I'm @Higgs_Field on the PC NA server, let me know if you wanna do it so I can log on. I've got TS.

Thanks!

paulsimonps

No that video is basically it, being good enough with the bombs to not have a 2nd Atro spawn is one thing but you also need A LOT OF DPS. We are talking +23k dps on both dps if not higher. And to do the burn strat you need even more. If you can kill the first atro before the boss enters the phase where is stands by the spawn pool you know you got good enough dps, cause if you can bring him down that fast then its all about how well you can kill the inmates and at that point its just a battle of attrition.

Higgs_Field

Is that really all there is to it? Just do more DPS? I'll try to find some people who can do that, but most people I usually run with can do at most 17k DPS. This does not seem to be a problem in any other vet dungeon.

maxjapank

paulsimonps wrote: »

No that video is basically it, being good enough with the bombs to not have a 2nd Atro spawn is one thing but you also need A LOT OF DPS. We are talking +23k dps on both dps if not higher. And to do the burn strat you need even more. If you can kill the first atro before the boss enters the phase where is stands by the spawn pool you know you got good enough dps, cause if you can bring him down that fast then its all about how well you can kill the inmates and at that point its just a battle of attrition.

I wonder how many have done Vet ICP. I know some people like a challenge, but if it's too difficult for all but the top 1%, then it could be tuned down a bit. Those grenades are also hard to interact with in my opinion.

paulsimonps

Higgs_Field wrote: »

Is that really all there is to it? Just do more DPS? I'll try to find some people who can do that, but most people I usually run with can do at most 17k DPS. This does not seem to be a problem in any other vet dungeon.

Not only more DPS but flawless aim with those bombs are necessary as well, the fewer people you have on the bombs the better their aim must be as not to waste a shot. You also got to be able to move around fast so as to get to the bombs ASAP, while still doing either healing or dps depending on your role.

maxjapank wrote: »

paulsimonps wrote: »

No that video is basically it, being good enough with the bombs to not have a 2nd Atro spawn is one thing but you also need A LOT OF DPS. We are talking +23k dps on both dps if not higher. And to do the burn strat you need even more. If you can kill the first atro before the boss enters the phase where is stands by the spawn pool you know you got good enough dps, cause if you can bring him down that fast then its all about how well you can kill the inmates and at that point its just a battle of attrition.

I wonder how many have done Vet ICP. I know some people like a challenge, but if it's too difficult for all but the top 1%, then it could be tuned down a bit. Those grenades are also hard to interact with in my opinion.

While I will agree that its basically only the top 1% that can complete this I would not want this nerfed. Do you know how boring it got for those of us that can do vICP and vWGT before those came out. There needs to be challenging content for those that seeks it, there is a normal version for a reason. If they keep making dungeons and later trials with this kind of set up I will be a very happy man.

maxjapank

paulsimonps wrote: »

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While I will agree that its basically only the top 1% that can complete this I would not want this nerfed. Do you know how boring it got for those of us that can do vICP and vWGT before those came out. There needs to be challenging content for those that seeks it, there is a normal version for a reason. If they keep making dungeons and later trials with this kind of set up I will be a very happy man.

I hear you and can appreciate what you say. But normal mode is pretty damn easy and can be boring, too. So those that seek a challenge of a more moderate level, which is probably a greater percent of players, are pretty bored right now.

Higgs_Field

Update: Yesterday I tried veteran Imperial City Prison yet again with two DPS who said they can do 20k+ DPS. Indeed, they burned down the first boss in less than 2 minutes. Nevertheless, the second boss was still impossible. We gave up after 15 wipes.

No other vet dungeon boss in the game is even close to the difficulty level of this one boss in this one dungeon. Sure, IC dungeons are intended to be more difficult, but no boss in vWGT, which I actually cleared today without much problem (it was the vet pledge), is even close to the difficulty level of this boss in vICP.

If this boss in vICP is intended to be this hard (i.e. it's not just bugged and I'm not just missing some important mechanic) then the game designers made a serious balancing error, in my opinion. A group that is good enough to get through vWGT should be able to get through vICP as well. Many of my friends are farming vWGT for the helm and set pieces, but no one I know farms vICP because it's so much harder. The IC dungeons should be harder than pre-IC ones, definitely, to provide more challenge for the experienced players. However, they are currently imbalanced and it seems to be just because of this one boss.

Higgs_Field

Another update: I just read today's PTS patch notes and it appears that this boss (The Flesh Sculptor) is being nerfed. I guess I'm not the only one who has complained about this problem. Thank you, ZOS!

tangy.citrus

Theres 2 ways to do it.

If your dpsers have 20k+, you can do it the quick and easy way.

If not, then you will have to play the mechanic.

The fast dps way is to stay on boss, have tank hold all the atro's, once boss runs towards pool all dps goes on the atro's that are up. The healer will need to throw grenades on the atro and boss to keep the debuff on them as much as possible. The dpsers will be single targeting the entire time and will just switch from boss to 1st atro, then 2nd atro. There should only be 2 atro's that spawn and that you need to kill during this time. After the boss stops doing his pool animation - all dps back to him (after 2nd atro is dead) and then you just burn.

The mechanic way theory should be common knowledge -somewhat. Healer is the main grenadier, 1 dps on boss full time, tank and other dps assist with grenades when they can. This will be slow and painful, but you can get through it this way. No atro's should pop up. If they do, you are most likely screwed.

Higgs_Field

A month later, an update and a guide!

Please see new discussion here: http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/232957/guide-veteran-imperial-city-prisons-second-boss-ibomez-the-flesh-sculptor

Dr_Ganknstein

Recent played this on Xbox and when i pick up the grenades i automatically throw them so its damn near impossible to aim. I've done this multiple times in the past, did they recently change something? Wtf

paulsimonps

Icky wrote: »

Recent played this on Xbox and when i pick up the grenades i automatically throw them so its damn near impossible to aim. I've done this multiple times in the past, did they recently change something? Wtf

Nice necro man. 2 years old.