Veteran Scalecaller's Peak: difficult or outright broken?

Fanghur_Rahl · January 2020

Okay, so I recently put myself through the herculean task of doing Scalecaller's Peak on veteran mode, and to say that I was getting frustrated with it wouldn't even begin to do it justice. I have no problem at all with dungeons being challenging; that is to be both expected and encouraged for the dungeons that have the most valuable equipment. However, time and time again with this dungeon in particular it seemed to be the case that even if you knew the mechanics perfectly, whether you got insta-killed or not was completely down to the flip of a coin, especially with the final boss. The AOE attacks and safespots involved in that fight seemed completely random, and in the case of the statue AOE, unless you were lucky, once you realized you were in the danger zone, it's already too late, as you won't have time to move out of the way. That strikes me as a bug, not a feature. I ended up having to slot Streak into my bar to deal with them, and only Sorcs have access to that attack.

Is there more to the mechanics of this dungeon that I just haven't figured out, or is it indeed purely a matter of luck? Because besides Streak, there seems to be absolutely no defence against those AOEs.

Sanguinor2 · January 2020

Towards last boss statue AoEs, your best bet is to Keep the boss and yourself on a line between 2 statue heads so that if one does its AoE you are very close to the Edge of it and 1 or 2 steps to the side will get you out of it. You can get unlucky with mechanic stacks but if you Always stick close to the edges of the cones you should be fine.

Camb0Sl1ce · January 2020

Been a while since ive did scalecaller but I'm pretty sure if you keep an eye on the statues the one that will cone will glow green, also if group damage is high enough you wont even see cones.

WoppaBoem · January 2020

Stay in line with boss and have visualbon the statues. They will show where aoe 1 shot will happen. Once trick clear its easy.

MiguZ · January 2020

I duo vet scp regularly and theres no issues at all doing it even with the low dps of just one dd. Sounds like you just need to get more used to the mechanics because you do not know them perfectly if you have issues in there.

LadyNalcarya · January 2020

Sanguinor2 wrote: »

Towards last boss statue AoEs, your best bet is to Keep the boss and yourself on a line between 2 statue heads so that if one does its AoE you are very close to the Edge of it and 1 or 2 steps to the side will get you out of it. You can get unlucky with mechanic stacks but if you Always stick close to the edges of the cones you should be fine.

This.
Also I've noticed that dodging cones still kills people sometimes (lag, maybe?) so its better to stay near the line between 2 cones and run out of them.

Juhasow · January 2020

No need for streak. You just need to remember the sequence of mechanicss plus position Yourself properly to avoid standing in the middle of posion cone area.

Dagoth_Rac · January 2020

LadyNalcarya wrote: »

Sanguinor2 wrote: »

Towards last boss statue AoEs, your best bet is to Keep the boss and yourself on a line between 2 statue heads so that if one does its AoE you are very close to the Edge of it and 1 or 2 steps to the side will get you out of it. You can get unlucky with mechanic stacks but if you Always stick close to the edges of the cones you should be fine.

This.
Also I've noticed that dodging cones still kills people sometimes (lag, maybe?) so its better to stay near the line between 2 cones and run out of them.

For some dumb reason, it seems like your position is not re-calculated until roll dodge and related animations are completely finished. So you can be visually out of red cone and still get killed because game considers you at location where roll dodge began. This is a fight where you really must sprint when you see the statue glow. You can roll dodge, but the time window to do it successfully is much tighter than sprinting.

LadyNalcarya · January 2020

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

LadyNalcarya wrote: »

Sanguinor2 wrote: »

Towards last boss statue AoEs, your best bet is to Keep the boss and yourself on a line between 2 statue heads so that if one does its AoE you are very close to the Edge of it and 1 or 2 steps to the side will get you out of it. You can get unlucky with mechanic stacks but if you Always stick close to the edges of the cones you should be fine.

This.
Also I've noticed that dodging cones still kills people sometimes (lag, maybe?) so its better to stay near the line between 2 cones and run out of them.

For some dumb reason, it seems like your position is not re-calculated until roll dodge and related animations are completely finished. So you can be visually out of red cone and still get killed because game considers you at location where roll dodge began. This is a fight where you really must sprint when you see the statue glow. You can roll dodge, but the time window to do it successfully is much tighter than sprinting.

I guess you're right. Dodge is very unreliable in this situation.

karekiz · January 2020

Poison statue is semi timed.

Rule of thumb: Mechanic <Flame wave / Zaans link etc> -> Followed by Poison statue. They don't tend to overlap, or else I have never seen it <It won't for example Zaan's a player then hit them with a poison cone as that would be 100% impossible to move since your CC'ed>. Once you get this its just keeping yourself into a position. Flame wave hits -> Kite to opposite side -> Move between statue. Zaans link -> Block <Only if needed> -> Once over go to safe spot.

UntilValhalla13 · January 2020

I always tanked her literally under the dragon statue, facing the door. That way, the cone is so narrow it's easy to move out of. Ideally, if the dps is high enough, you can just skip a lot of the mechanics, and constantly go to ice add phase.

When the adds die, she throws her shield somewhere in the room. It's a very clear animation. Go stand in the shield aura to protect you from the blast. After the blast is gone, get out of it or she'll kill you.

The Zaan beam has to be physically blocked by a group member (tank) to prevent the person tethered from dying. Zaan will turn to face you before she does the tether. If a tank is tethered, dps can dip in and out of the beam so the tank doesn't die.

Fire waves have to be kited away from group ideally.

I think that's literally all of the mechanics.

El_Borracho · January 2020

If you fight close to the statues you have a better chance at avoiding the AOE as its narrower.

BejaProphet · January 2020

Others have said it already but to put it more simply:

If you find yourself in a cone you can’t get out of you are already way past the mistake that killed you.

You should never be in a spot that it takes you more than one second to get out. You were in the wrong spot, the cone just pointed it out.

Kurat · January 2020

Your dps must have been very low if you got poison cone mechanics. I pug it all the time and if group dps is above 35k, the boss will start next mechanics. After she throws her shield its important to keep dps on her and when she takes the shield you get ice statues again, so no poison at all.

GlorphNoldorin · January 2020

I think codes alerts gives pretty good alerts for the poisons, and like has been said earlier, dodge roll doesnt work til you complete the animation (fantastic on oceanic ping). It's better to stay on the lines between the statues and sprint if u can. I heard that streak gets a little more room for error avoiding poisons but I dont know.

It isnt bad if dps is good enough....hard mode.....is quite a bit more difficult.

p00tx · January 2020

It's a difficult dungeon. The difficulty can be bypassed if you have high dps, but having moderate to lower dps will also give you the added benefit of experiencing and learning the mechanics, which a lot of high end players never even see. You'll end up being a much better player in the long run than those who were good at running a rotation and missed out on learning mechanical awareness. We have quite a few of those in end game who hit like trucks, but spend a large portion of the time on the floor (dead damage dealers do zero dps).

My advice? Find some other players who are also interested in progressing this content. Start working on it piece by piece until you have it down perfectly, all with the goal of eventually completing the trifecta achievement for the skin (which is actually pretty nice looking). Eventually it'll actually become easy for you, and you'll look back and wonder how you ever struggled with it. Its actually a fun dungeon!

KageNin · January 2020

Its difficult nit as difficult as .Fang Lair though , keep calm and carry on trying youll get there.

ayu_fever · January 2020

i have cleared vet fang lair a few times with no issues (never tried hard mode) and i have never attempted vet scalecaller peak.
the very thought of even entering that dungeon on vet gives me trembles and shakes and spikes my blood pressure to unhealthy levels.
that is not a joke.

perhaps it is from the struggles of normal mode scalecaller with my 1% completion rate from terribad PUGs that are the root cause.

i loathe guilds with the drama and toxicity that spawn from groups of people so i have to PUG or i cant play dungeons.
i only ever tank or heal and i recently made my first ever dps character and ideally i would need the zaans helmet, so thats why i am very stressed out about doing this dungeon.

zos should nerf vet dlc dungeons to make them more accessible IMO because puglife sucks!!!

it is such a shame the cat lady hasnt sold zaan helmet yet, as that would instantly fix my dilemma!

Bobby_V_Rockit · February 2020

Just did it now, started at the disease boss, guessing the other DPS left/kicked. We wiped a bit on Zaan, but once I kept the screen aimed at the statues so I could see which was gonna fire I did better. Amazing tank and healer, the other DD was probably better than me but hard to tell.

Edit: first vet DLC for me ever. Including wgt and icp.

gatekeeper13 · February 2020

As the others said, stay close to the statues where the cones are narrower. Dont try to roll dodge if you find yourself inside the poison aoe. It wont work. Try calmly to move left or right.

I agree thats poison cones are pure RNG and that sometimes, situations may put you inside the center of the aoe without any chance of getting out, like when rez a dead group mate.

But still, I dont think the last boss is the most difficult one. I think the most difficult boss in the dungeon are the first two Ogres. Sometimes the protection shards in the yellow circles are far from you or are already taken by another member and you have to sprint to get in one, if there is bad communication.

The giantess is pure dps fest. The Orb is 100% taking out adds in right order. The Plague Concoctor is just a long fight, with only thing to have in mind is killing the right adds who serve as ingredients for the potion and getting in the green circle in time.

method__01 · February 2020

i find Doylemish and Mortieu more difficult than Zaan (just be ready to roll dodge to avoid poison the rest is easy mechs)
there isnt enough time to free your teammates and we usually wiped once there

Kahnak · February 2020

The poison is easier to manage if you position yourself:

a) facing the statues
b) in between the statues so as to straddle the line that separates the individual cones that manifest so that you limit the amount of movement required to avoid them

Re-positioning yourself in this area is really important.

Everything else is choreographed and relatively simple to get down if you're paying attention. The RNG with the poison cones is the most difficult part. That being said, I wouldn't call Scalecaller broken or even difficult in relation to the other DLC dungeons. The fights come down almost entirely to understanding of the mechanics.