Maelstrom poison stage 7 no death as a melee stamina class?

Sleeping_OwI · August 2021

I can do pretty much all the other stages with no death easily, but the RNG gets me in stage 7 everytime and pops a poison explosion right under my feet or under the boss, and it's even worse since I always have to be in melee range. Any tips?

Andre_Noir · August 2021

It's a pure random even on a ranged classes as well. This game is flooded by achievements that rely on random oneshots or similar things

Styxius · August 2021

Sleeping_OwI wrote: »

I can do pretty much all the other stages with no death easily, but the RNG gets me in stage 7 everytime and pops a poison explosion right under my feet or under the boss, and it's even worse since I always have to be in melee range. Any tips?

Best tip I can give is making sure to safely prioritize the poison mages, and there always is an open ring of movement left in the map as they spawn. I tend to try and force things to fight me in it between mage spawns.

validifyedneb18_ESO · August 2021

most classes have access to a range closer, one of those should help.

Templar charge, DK leap, 2h charge
A source of major expedition would help too, warden wings are good if you are on warden, stamsorcs have hurricane for minor, and medium armor has (or used to have, its been a while) expedition on rolling.

MirandaSharp · August 2021

Sleeping_OwI wrote: »

I can do pretty much all the other stages with no death easily, but the RNG gets me in stage 7 everytime and pops a poison explosion right under my feet or under the boss, and it's even worse since I always have to be in melee range. Any tips?

Yep, I hate that place. Watch out for the mushrooms... -Yeah, right!

MirandaSharp · August 2021

Styxius wrote: »

Sleeping_OwI wrote: »

I can do pretty much all the other stages with no death easily, but the RNG gets me in stage 7 everytime and pops a poison explosion right under my feet or under the boss, and it's even worse since I always have to be in melee range. Any tips?

Best tip I can give is making sure to safely prioritize the poison mages, and there always is an open ring of movement left in the map as they spawn. I tend to try and force things to fight me in it between mage spawns.

Yes, those have to die immediately after they spawn..

robpr · August 2021

Having a bow there helps, poison mages have very little hp. One or two Snipes should kill them. The hint that poison mage spawns is that your screen tints in darker green. Mages can be only in 4 corners of arena.
As for the 'unfortunate' explosion, magicka chars can spam Harness Magicka and survive up to 5s more and cleanse - for stams only way to do that is by spamming Brawler from 2H, it gives sizeable shield even without target hit.

SirAndy · August 2021

My first vMA clear was on a DW Stamblade many, many moons ago. Made me hate that stage with a passion.

novemberhhh · August 2021

maybe someday someone will somehow pull off that "impossible" vet no-death stamnb run *shakes fist at rng cloud*

BXR_Lonestar · August 2021

Sleeping_OwI wrote: »

I can do pretty much all the other stages with no death easily, but the RNG gets me in stage 7 everytime and pops a poison explosion right under my feet or under the boss, and it's even worse since I always have to be in melee range. Any tips?

I frequently do Maelstrom on my Magplar healer (just swap armor and perks), and because Jabs is like 50% of my arsenal, I'm always in Melee range. With that in mind, I've no-deathed this round on a couple of occasions, but it is really just a matter of luck. You have to be hyper-vigilant about not going anywhere near the spores (i.e., stay in the middle of the arena) and when you do cleanse the toxin, do so well before the end of the round, as you may find yourself poisoned in the next round without a cleanse pool.

In sum, its possible, but often just a matter of luck whether you can actually DO it.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · August 2021

novemberhhh wrote: »

maybe someday someone will somehow pull off that "impossible" vet no-death stamnb run *shakes fist at rng cloud*

I have flawless on stam NB, and it is one of my least played specs. It can be done. Even on a ranged class, I stack right on the stage 7 boss and nuke him.

Stage 7 comes down down to situational awareness TBH. Yes the mushrooms spawn at random, but like any mechanic, they can be dealt with. Proactively triggering spores in a bad spot is a very good idea. Picking the correct add to kill during the shield phase is also important. If one is standing on a spore, kill that one and go to the other one. If that means you need to be at range during the shield phase, well, its better than dying. All melee builds should have some option to do a bit of ranged damage. That way you can take out summoners (it doesnt take much) and do some damage during shield phase. I typically slot snipe on my bow bar for stage 7.

A stam nightblade has the potential to kill the stage 7 boss before he screams if you are on top of it.

Shantu · August 2021

One of the most frustrating, infuriating, and unsatisfying experiences in this game. There's nothing rewarding about being lucky in this round.

fred4 · August 2021

Yeah, it's the most random stage. I've shot myself in the foot with gap closers in the past and prefer "just" speed. Speed is a noticeable boon in many arenas, although I really only use Vicious Ophidian, a bow back bar and Shuffle for the snare removal (and Celerity CP this patch). I do no death runs pretty regularly with my Brawler stam DK. It's almost the default, because it's such a comfortable build. Master's 2H, Brawler, Pale Order is a pretty OP combination and the DK DOTs mean you're always progressing the fight, even if you temporarily can't stand in front of the boss.

The poison plume conjurers may get me. Fully zoom out the camera and set it to the widest angle. I am always weary and watching out for them, so I can kill them before they set off the plumes. When you attack them, position yourself with your back to the cleansing pool so that, if you get poisoned, it's just a backwards roll to get cleansed. You also can't afford to be shot by the poison spray cone attack from the archers.

The wamasu may get me. You do not want to have to multi-task when dealing with it, e.g. you want the two archers down by the time it appears. It's not the end of the world, but it makes your job easier. I reserve Corrosive Armor for this boss, so I can execute it without worrying about it's lightning attacks.

The final boss requires you to follow the intended choreography. The fight is bugged af and can go haywire, if you don't. I am assuming you're not so good that you just nuke the boss, otherwise you probably wouldn't be here. When the mages appear, nuke one of them, then seek shelter in the other's bubble. I don't particularly worry about where the second mage is. He can end up near a plume, which can make your positioning very difficult. Mostly, though, it works out. When the crybaby screams, he kills any conjurers, so don't worry too much about those at this point.

For what it's worth, I have a video of my stam DK doing vMA. The build is more or less unchanged for this patch and now consists of:

Master's 2H front bar (does not matter which type)
Maelstrom bow back bar
Pale Order Ring
5x Vicious Ophidian
2x Briarheart (just for the crit)
1x Slimecraw (more crit)
1x Bloodspawn (I needed that little bit of sustain)

All weapon damage enchantments, Serpent mundus, Stamina + stam regen (+ health, or not) food, double DOT poison front bar, precise front bar weapon, infused weapon damage enchant on the bow. Skills are in the video description.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4Z3eiH3gK8

Jaimeh · August 2021

For the add rounds try to chain things in the middle, be congnizant of your positioning relative to the pools. Some adds can't be chained but if you roughly remember their spawns it helps a lot with needless running around. For the boss, when the two minders appear, check first who is closer to mushrooms and who is in a relativel clear area, and leave that one alive, so when you go to their shield there's no chance of having an erruption under you. That might not be a 100% the case every time, but usually one will appear in a better spot than the other (though it's nice when they are in a clear area *and* close to the boss, so you can keep doing damage). Another thing that helps is to get a feel for the timing of when the summoner (who makes them all errupt) appears, so you can kill him fast.

shezof · August 2021

i dont wanna be that guy as i already made a post about this very subject, but besides the bugginess and lag you can MANIPULATE rng at this stage in your favor. it takes immense knowledge of spawns and timings though.if you have major expedition on you can run over mushrooms and dodge at last minute, you ll be out of the way when it explodes.basically if you are confident enough and dont have lag you can clear the mushrooms on your own.

fred4 · August 2021

shezof wrote: »

i dont wanna be that guy as i already made a post about this very subject, but besides the bugginess and lag you can MANIPULATE rng at this stage in your favor. it takes immense knowledge of spawns and timings though.if you have major expedition on you can run over mushrooms and dodge at last minute, you ll be out of the way when it explodes.basically if you are confident enough and dont have lag you can clear the mushrooms on your own.

I like having a space in the middle. If there are too many there, I will occasionally clear one, but the next one seems to then be on a timeout and won't go off for a while. In general watch out for ones at the edges behind a troll or the last boss, when they spawn.

Elendir2am · August 2021

Within rnd, a poison mushroom can appear under the feet of adds, which was not killed at the moment you run to it. So it's just pure luck, to do it without death. However, if you have mastered the arena, bad luck will not meet you repeatedly.
That's probably the only chance. Within a few runs, luck must come to you.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · August 2021

Elendir2am wrote: »

Within rnd, a poison mushroom can appear under the feet of adds, which was not killed at the moment you run to it. So it's just pure luck, to do it without death. However, if you have mastered the arena, bad luck will not meet you repeatedly.
That's probably the only chance. Within a few runs, luck must come to you.

Meh, you sort of save it in the second half of what you wrote, but skilled players rarely die to poison. Even getting poison is not a death sentence if you are positioned correctly.

Yes the spawns are random, and yes its a punishing mechanic, but implying its pure luck is like saying there are times you will die no matter what, or that there was nothing that could have been done to prevent said death. While I wont say never, that situation is EXTREMELY rare. I get it, it's easy to blame mistakes and poor play on RNG, but that doesnt make it true. This mechanic, if nothing else, requires very good player awareness, something the vast majority of players lack to some degree.

vesselwiththepestle · August 2021

validifyedneb18_ESO wrote: »

most classes have access to a range closer, one of those should help.

Templar charge, DK leap, 2h charge
A source of major expedition would help too, warden wings are good if you are on warden, stamsorcs have hurricane for minor, and medium armor has (or used to have, its been a while) expedition on rolling.

I would not recommend a gap closer. When I was using a gap closer, poison blossoms would spawn on my route and I wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

The solution is to be highly aware of your sourroundings and to play safe and smart instead of rushed. I don't even focus the poison callers as fast as possible, but I keep doing what I am doing, if it's the archers which hit very hard or a boss, look out for poison blossoms and get to the poison caller controlled and safe. They die very fast anyway and don't need full dot's and ground aoe etc.

The only random poison blossom which definitely will kill you in my opinion is the one which spawns under the dome on the last boss. Every other poison blossom can be avoided if you keep staying aware and react fast. When I die, it's usually not to a randomly spawning blossom, but because I didn't see one and got to close (if it was hiding beneath a boss, for example).

Elendir2am · August 2021

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Meh, you sort of save it in the second half of what you wrote, but skilled players rarely die to poison. Even getting poison is not a death sentence if you are positioned correctly.

Yes the spawns are random, and yes its a punishing mechanic, but implying its pure luck is like saying there are times you will die no matter what, or that there was nothing that could have been done to prevent said death. While I wont say never, that situation is EXTREMELY rare. I get it, it's easy to blame mistakes and poor play on RNG, but that doesnt make it true. This mechanic, if nothing else, requires very good player awareness, something the vast majority of players lack to some degree.

In the last fight, when you kill one add, you can't choose where to stand or not. You had to stand at cupola of other add. You can't run for cleansing because screaming would kill you. If poison mushroom appear under your feet at that moment, you are done.
That it is rare? It happened to me 3 times in a row once.

EDIT: For clarity, out of about 10 visits to the vMA, I did not encounter this in 9 cases. I only met it during 1 run, but 3 times in a row.

Adremal · August 2021

Sleeping_OwI wrote: »

I can do pretty much all the other stages with no death easily, but the RNG gets me in stage 7 everytime and pops a poison explosion right under my feet or under the boss, and it's even worse since I always have to be in melee range. Any tips?

Keep an eye for portals where they spawn, burst them down immediately so they don't explode the shrooms and grow a new random pattern of shrooms that might end up being where you don't want it do be. You have to anticipate the spawns by looking out for portals/timers for this to work, even as a ranged class, and there's still the bad possibility of "boss starts yelling, venomancer is on one side of the room and minder on the opposite side" deathless run ruiner RNG. So while it can be mitigated somehow but not completely, it's a RNG that's there to stay. Not that it matters, given that there's no way to mitigate the drops RNG and chances are you'll get a deathless run well before getting the drops you need, but that's another topic I suppose.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · August 2021

Elendir2am wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Meh, you sort of save it in the second half of what you wrote, but skilled players rarely die to poison. Even getting poison is not a death sentence if you are positioned correctly.

Yes the spawns are random, and yes its a punishing mechanic, but implying its pure luck is like saying there are times you will die no matter what, or that there was nothing that could have been done to prevent said death. While I wont say never, that situation is EXTREMELY rare. I get it, it's easy to blame mistakes and poor play on RNG, but that doesnt make it true. This mechanic, if nothing else, requires very good player awareness, something the vast majority of players lack to some degree.

In the last fight, when you kill one add, you can't choose where to stand or not. You had to stand at cupola of other add. You can't run for cleansing because screaming would kill you. If poison mushroom appear under your feet at that moment, you are done.
That it is rare? It happened to me 3 times in a row once.

EDIT: For clarity, out of about 10 visits to the vMA, I did not encounter this in 9 cases. I only met it during 1 run, but 3 times in a row.

Of course you can choose. You have a choice as to which add to kill. Two adds spawn. Look at both of them. If one has a poison mushroom under their feet, you have two options. Trigger it to remove it, or simply kill that add and stand next to the other add. The screem kills the summoner, so when the summoner spawns, every spore will explode. By the time the next set of spores spawn, and explode (yes you can get very unlucky here), usually the shield phase is pretty much over at that point. Lets also not forget that the sheilds are big enough that you have some wiggle room to position yourself.

Even if you somehow get poisoned under the shield, you can still survive. It's tricky but it can be done. Interupt boss, cleanse, and execute. Yes the boss will be enraged, and yes that is not an easy move, but it can be done.

I am not saying there isnt a small compenent of RNG to this, the point I am making is that it can be greatly mitigated. And even when it does get you, it is possible to deal with it. The typical response seems to be, this stage is pure RNG and it its simply luck to get through it. I reject that statement.

Ippokrates · September 2021

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Elendir2am wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Meh, you sort of save it in the second half of what you wrote, but skilled players rarely die to poison. Even getting poison is not a death sentence if you are positioned correctly.

Yes the spawns are random, and yes its a punishing mechanic, but implying its pure luck is like saying there are times you will die no matter what, or that there was nothing that could have been done to prevent said death. While I wont say never, that situation is EXTREMELY rare. I get it, it's easy to blame mistakes and poor play on RNG, but that doesnt make it true. This mechanic, if nothing else, requires very good player awareness, something the vast majority of players lack to some degree.

In the last fight, when you kill one add, you can't choose where to stand or not. You had to stand at cupola of other add. You can't run for cleansing because screaming would kill you. If poison mushroom appear under your feet at that moment, you are done.
That it is rare? It happened to me 3 times in a row once.

EDIT: For clarity, out of about 10 visits to the vMA, I did not encounter this in 9 cases. I only met it during 1 run, but 3 times in a row.

Of course you can choose. You have a choice as to which add to kill. Two adds spawn. Look at both of them. If one has a poison mushroom under their feet, you have two options. Trigger it to remove it, or simply kill that add and stand next to the other add. The screem kills the summoner, so when the summoner spawns, every spore will explode. By the time the next set of spores spawn, and explode (yes you can get very unlucky here), usually the shield phase is pretty much over at that point. Lets also not forget that the sheilds are big enough that you have some wiggle room to position yourself.

Even if you somehow get poisoned under the shield, you can still survive. It's tricky but it can be done. Interupt boss, cleanse, and execute. Yes the boss will be enraged, and yes that is not an easy move, but it can be done.

I am not saying there isnt a small compenent of RNG to this, the point I am making is that it can be greatly mitigated. And even when it does get you, it is possible to deal with it. The typical response seems to be, this stage is pure RNG and it its simply luck to get through it. I reject that statement.

But the thing is, if you are doing this phase from scratch (after death), pace of events is rather regular - you can plan everything exactly as you have describe. But as far as I have noticed, during long runs, arena has tendency to overlap events, so it is possible to have stormboi and poisonboi almost at the same moment. And then poisonboi would explode half of the ground the moment when you killed first stomboi and run for cover with second.

Asardes · September 2021

You can pop mushrooms near the middle before the boss scream phase, then focus the mage furthest from the boss so the other one and the boss come to that clear zone and stack up properly. If the summoner spawns before that focus it ASAP, before it changes the spore configuration. This way you should be safe under the shield and be able to fully DPS the boss while he is screaming, then execute him and the remaining mage, and you should be done.

Toc de Malsvi · September 2021

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Elendir2am wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Meh, you sort of save it in the second half of what you wrote, but skilled players rarely die to poison. Even getting poison is not a death sentence if you are positioned correctly.

Yes the spawns are random, and yes its a punishing mechanic, but implying its pure luck is like saying there are times you will die no matter what, or that there was nothing that could have been done to prevent said death. While I wont say never, that situation is EXTREMELY rare. I get it, it's easy to blame mistakes and poor play on RNG, but that doesnt make it true. This mechanic, if nothing else, requires very good player awareness, something the vast majority of players lack to some degree.

In the last fight, when you kill one add, you can't choose where to stand or not. You had to stand at cupola of other add. You can't run for cleansing because screaming would kill you. If poison mushroom appear under your feet at that moment, you are done.
That it is rare? It happened to me 3 times in a row once.

EDIT: For clarity, out of about 10 visits to the vMA, I did not encounter this in 9 cases. I only met it during 1 run, but 3 times in a row.

Of course you can choose. You have a choice as to which add to kill. Two adds spawn. Look at both of them. If one has a poison mushroom under their feet, you have two options. Trigger it to remove it, or simply kill that add and stand next to the other add. The screem kills the summoner, so when the summoner spawns, every spore will explode. By the time the next set of spores spawn, and explode (yes you can get very unlucky here), usually the shield phase is pretty much over at that point. Lets also not forget that the sheilds are big enough that you have some wiggle room to position yourself.

Even if you somehow get poisoned under the shield, you can still survive. It's tricky but it can be done. Interupt boss, cleanse, and execute. Yes the boss will be enraged, and yes that is not an easy move, but it can be done.

I am not saying there isnt a small compenent of RNG to this, the point I am making is that it can be greatly mitigated. And even when it does get you, it is possible to deal with it. The typical response seems to be, this stage is pure RNG and it its simply luck to get through it. I reject that statement.

This 100%. Did this a bunch a long time ago, and it’s relatively predictable provided you follow the same patterns. If you do it enough the pacing becomes second nature.

colossalvoids · September 2021

Not sure it was mentioned here before but if you're getting a spore under both shield NPC's you can draw them to any position you like via silver leash you're probably already using (and I'd recommend using one for no death run) so the only rng you're getting is getting a spore under a shield while behemoth is screaming which is way more rare.