Any tips for NMA?

ice34697

Finally reached the point where I am able to consistently solo a WB, and I decided to try to solo FG1. Needless to say, I think my StamBlade is ready to hit up some trials and arenas.

Any tips for running Maelstrom Arena for the first time?

Jim_Pipp

If you are doing that you really sound ready for nMA, you might find it easier than you expect.

It has difficulty spikes, and there are some frustrating mechanics you might need to google, so the best advice is to expect there to be a learning curve.

If you have the quest, you can leave the arena and come back to the same round, so feel free to walkaway.

Make sure your build has
A good burst heal.
A way to breech enemy resistance..
An interupt is really useful.

For most of each zone you don't need to rush, use the sigils and play defensively, BUT...

...Know how to do a lot of damage quickly (lining up your procs and ultimate), as there are some DPS checks. The final 25% health of the icey arena giantess is trivialised if you are ready to go beast mode.

Good luck!

DocFrost72

There is exactly one dps check in maelstrom arena, vet or normal. If you can clear the first arena (veil of the surreal) without succumbing to the adds spawned by the boss, you have enough damage.

There is one heal check in maelstrom, and that is the second rounds bleeding blades. If you can survive the blades' constant strain on your hp and resources, you'll be fine in the rest of the arena.

Every round from 3 on tests mechanics exclusively. People assume rounds 5 and 6 are a dps check, but they're not. In fact, rounds 5 and 7 actively punish players who ignore mechanics to focus pure damage, unless that player knows what they're doing.

Take it slow, on normal it can be easy to face tank mechanics such as actually killing round 6's spiders, or bashing the boss to interrupt a scream on round 7. Try to see what each round is suggesting you do, and follow the mechanics. Your first time in is just to clear, worry about time, score, and style after a few successes in there.

Oh and, for whatever reason, people often forget about or intentionally ignore the sigils. The sigils reset every round (not every arena), meaning in one 5 round arena you can activate 20 sigils. The effects vary from faster movement speed and resource regeneration, to increased damage, a reflecting ward, and a powerful heal over time.

Use. The. Sigils.

Especially on normal where points and score aren't even recorded.

Keep at it, kick some major butt, and remember we're rooting for you!

FrancisCrawford

ice34697 wrote: »

Finally reached the point where I am able to consistently solo a WB, and I decided to try to solo FG1. Needless to say, I think my StamBlade is ready to hit up some trials and arenas.

Any tips for running Maelstrom Arena for the first time?

I've done it on every magicka spec and most stamina ones, before hybrid builds were such a thing. I'd say for starters:
-- There are plenty of informative vMA guides.
-- Some of the clearest videos are the gimmicky runs (e.g. naked or not using skills), because those take longer and illustrate the mechanics more clearly.
-- vMA guides will suggest that the 5th, 6th and 7th stages are particularly hard, and the 9th is hardest of all. That mainly holds up in nMA, except that the 9th isn't nearly as hard as one might expect.

Mechanics you absolutely have to understand include:
-- The ice platfom breakage in Stage 5:
-- The poison flowers and poison cleansing in Stage 7.
-- The upper level in Stage 9.
Many others can be DPSed and/or healed through, depending on build.

Actually, there also are some invulnerability mechanics you need to understand. The one that's easy to miss is that in Stage 8 there's an obelisk you need to break before the boss is vulnerable, and in the final round of the stage the obelisk keeps reassembling itself. (Actually, I think there are three obelisks; my memory of the details is a bit fuzzy.)

ice34697

Appreciate the tips. I'll report how it goes.

boi_anachronism_

One addendum to the above post - lvl 7. When the lizard screams stand under the shield the mage creates otherwise you die. If you are confident in your ability to dodge and heal you *can* interrupt him but note that it does cause him to enrage. I can't remember if he one-shots you in normal when enraged but honestly just use the shield lol.

FrancisCrawford

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

One addendum to the above post - lvl 7. When the lizard screams stand under the shield the mage creates otherwise you die. If you are confident in your ability to dodge and heal you *can* interrupt him but note that it does cause him to enrage. I can't remember if he one-shots you in normal when enraged but honestly just use the shield lol.

I don't always bother standing under that bubble. But in fairness, I favor builds that use heal-on-damage skills, and did so even before there was such a thing as Ring of the Pale Order.

boi_anachronism_

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

One addendum to the above post - lvl 7. When the lizard screams stand under the shield the mage creates otherwise you die. If you are confident in your ability to dodge and heal you *can* interrupt him but note that it does cause him to enrage. I can't remember if he one-shots you in normal when enraged but honestly just use the shield lol.

I don't always bother standing under that bubble. But in fairness, I favor builds that use heal-on-damage skills, and did so even before there was such a thing as Ring of the Pale Order.

Good habit to start if they ever wanna do vet. It's definitely a one shot in vet.

FrancisCrawford

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

One addendum to the above post - lvl 7. When the lizard screams stand under the shield the mage creates otherwise you die. If you are confident in your ability to dodge and heal you *can* interrupt him but note that it does cause him to enrage. I can't remember if he one-shots you in normal when enraged but honestly just use the shield lol.

I don't always bother standing under that bubble. But in fairness, I favor builds that use heal-on-damage skills, and did so even before there was such a thing as Ring of the Pale Order.

Good habit to start if they ever wanna do vet. It's definitely a one shot in vet.

I believe you, but I doubt I'll ever do vMA. I'm not sure I've ever had a true "flawless" run of nMA, and I've done it on 15 different characters.

boi_anachronism_

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

One addendum to the above post - lvl 7. When the lizard screams stand under the shield the mage creates otherwise you die. If you are confident in your ability to dodge and heal you *can* interrupt him but note that it does cause him to enrage. I can't remember if he one-shots you in normal when enraged but honestly just use the shield lol.

I don't always bother standing under that bubble. But in fairness, I favor builds that use heal-on-damage skills, and did so even before there was such a thing as Ring of the Pale Order.

Good habit to start if they ever wanna do vet. It's definitely a one shot in vet.

I believe you, but I doubt I'll ever do vMA. I'm not sure I've ever had a true "flawless" run of nMA, and I've done it on 15 different characters.

Welp far be it from me to tell anyone how to enjoy their gaming experience but I will say that vma made me a better player just because I absolutely had to follow the mechs to get through it. Best of luck.

Necrotech_Master

the stages that most people tend to get stuck on is stage 5 (the ice arena, which is also a dps check, because if you dont kill the giant matron fast enough on the 3rd platform, she will just destroy that one too and then you quickly die from the water)

stage 7 the poison still sucks on normal, i usually suggest stay in an area of the arena with few or no plants (the further you are the better), and then killing the weak adds that force the plants to keep popping, ive done maelstrom a lot on vet and normal and im fairly sure the roar from the argonian behemoth is a 1 shot on both normal and vet, but on normal you can usually kill him before he even does a roar

my most successful toon to complete this was a mag warden due to the high survivability as well as the passive dmg

ice34697

So I said I would update you all on how it went...

OMG I don't know why I didn't try MA sooner. Definitely went much smoother and easier than I expected. Thank you all for your advice. I've added nMA to my list of daily stuff to do, and hopefully in a few weeks or so I can graduate to vMA.

Thanks again for all your advice.