vAA HM question

Lyss1991

Hello all!

I run a small guild on PS4 NA and we recently started a “Progression Group” for trials. We have completed all trials on vet multiple times (except vHOF) and we picked vAA as our first Speed/Vitality/HM trial. We made it through Speed first night at 31 mins, But HM was, well...hard. Lol. The part we were stuck on/confused about was the atros at the end with The Mage. How exactly do they work, And how do you handle them? We were originally told to have an off tank hold them with the axes, So thats what we did. Another friend told us his guild does it like that and they usually had 3-4 atros tops. By 68%, We had 7 atros up plus 3 axes and the off tank got overwhelmed and died. Is that normal? We tried some other methods too but kept getting stuck on those as well. So im coming to the community for advice. Was that a bugged instance? Are we doing something wrong? Any tips or advice would be helpful!

Lyss1991

@r3turn2s3nd3r

idk

If the OT is holding the atros with the axes what is the MT doing? The mages is not really much to tank.

Anyhow, The easiest way I have done it, especially with those not supper experienced, is to have the MT hold the axes on the tank rock as normal (rock where the group spawns in).

The OT holds the Atros next to the mage, keeps the mage taunted as best as they can but their focus is atros. iirc the Atros start their heavy damage around 20%ish percent. The OT would call out execute so DPS kills them fast (but range still focuses mini mages when they are up). This gets the atros off the playing field.

There are other ways but this is most straight forward.

Edit: I find it helpful to have the melee in 3 stacks at most . This gives the tank their own spot and the tank can step into the group to the left or right temporarily and as needed to place the newest atro close to the mage. The atros mostly die due to cleave.

Here is a MT PoV of the fight, skip to 25 minutes. You will see the MT holding the axes as I suggested and that the atros are being held at the Mage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPxKLJL24dY

Lyss1991

Thank you for the reply! We had OT holding axes on the rock, And MT holding mage in the middle. Then when the atros came up we originally tried having the OT hold the atros with axes but once 7 of them came out, He got overwhelmed and died. Then we tried it with the atros getting pulled to the MT in the middle with the mage, But that wasnt working out either because the atros pulse dmg at 20% was wiping the group. Could have been bad positioning, Not sure. We will give it another shot on our next run. Thank you for the video, Will share it with our tanks!

pelle412

The AA hard mode isn't an easy fight if you are just starting to progress. The melee DPS positioned with the Mage has to keep their AoE DoTs up to maintain damage on atronarchs and when the atronarch execute starts they should focus it down fast. Ideally you want the tank to place the atronarchs between them and the Mage so melee can reach them without moving. Healers have a lot of work to do to stay alive themselves and provide a lot of healing to the center group (ranged can get orbs and do fine).

Scottconno11y

The problem with this trial is that people have glitched the actros on the last boss for so long ppl struggle when it's needed to be done properly.

Drummerx04

Lyss1991 wrote: »

Thank you for the reply! We had OT holding axes on the rock, And MT holding mage in the middle. Then when the atros came up we originally tried having the OT hold the atros with axes but once 7 of them came out, He got overwhelmed and died. Then we tried it with the atros getting pulled to the MT in the middle with the mage, But that wasnt working out either because the atros pulse dmg at 20% was wiping the group. Could have been bad positioning, Not sure. We will give it another shot on our next run. Thank you for the video, Will share it with our tanks!

This sounds partially like a healer problem. Your dps should have shields or vigor and whatnot available to tank a little damage, but the dps should mainly focus on executing the atros once they hit that 20% mark. A group of decently solid dps (30k each) could execute one of those things within 5 seconds or so. That would only be about 1-3 explosions, which should be pretty manageable for the healers keep it in check.

One thing to keep in mind with the atros and mini mages, they do NOT despawn for execute phase (but they do stop spawning).

pluckpluck

Tank advice : MT should work with Axes. These can be nasty and there is that aoe, if you don't go out of it quickly enought, with less than 40k i'm not sure you aren't one-shot. Also, having OT with main group allow to use beneficial sets as ebon and powerful assault and lord warden dusk, for example.

If you can't survive the attro attacks, maybe ask your OT to get Imperium (heavy set from WGT) instead of PowerfulAssault, and have the OT or one of the healers the Barrier ultimate from Support skilltree.

And I am not sure it's a healer issue. Not only. If DDs can't kill quickly enough the attros, healers just can't follow. What do your healers wear? One of them have Jorvuld to give longer buffs and shields?

Alucu

We do it with one tank for axes and a melee DD taunting atros in mage, providing that DD can survive it sure is more deeps and smooth to run!. Also, save destros for mini mages, and place them accordingly so it can aoe both mage and mini mages. Other than that, block the meteors and you should be good

commdt

Last time we did it with 1 tank. I just stood near the boss keeping axes + atros, all other group was stacked right behind her back. This way chain lightning generally wont hit anyone but tank, except for moments when she turn her face to them to throw another mage. It's risky but very effective