O4S (Exdeath)

Taken by curiosity, you activate something called the Savage Initiative at a Garlond Ironworks terminal. Apparently a program to address work-related stress, you are treated to a soothing song composed by a certain minstrel, its lush strains massaging your mind and adding vibrant flourishes to the memories of your trials within the Deltascape…

Overview

This is the first fight in the Omega raid series, but it’s no pushover. This fight is the easiest of the three, but I also think that it can be the most chaotic.

Video Guide

Party Setup

For this fight I recommend the standard one tank mimic, two healer mimics, and five DPS mimics. It can be solo healed if the tank is good at balancing MP and helping heal with White Wind, but two healers will be easier for most groups.

Phase 1: Exdeath

Utility Spells

• Mighty Guard and Diamondback can be helpful if you don’t skip Black Hole, but otherwise nothing is needed.

This phase is pretty short and straightforward, but there are still a lot of mechanics to juggle. At minimum, every player should be assigned a standard clock position around the arena.

Dualcast

Right after being pulled, Exdeath will use Dualcast followed by the three elemental abilities of Blizzard, Thunder, and Fire. The first one that happens is Blizzard III which places ground AOEs underneath each player two times. Move out of the way when they appear. This movement can make things a bit weird with a Moon Flute opener, but once you get used to it you can get the full opener off including Phantom Flurry. This was a bit tougher at level 70, but the level 80 opener pushes things back by 1 GCD so it’s a bit easier. If you still struggle with the timing, I recommend starting your opener a few GCDs later (filling with Sonic Boom) to make everything fit.

The second ability used is Thunder III, a two-hit tankbuster with a Lightning Vulnerability Up debuff. Normally this requires a tank swap, but this is comfortably survivable with just Diamondback.

The third ability used is Fire III, which will hit four random players with moderate AOE damage, then another four random players with moderate AOE damage. Everyone should spread to their clock position for this. Players can be hit by both hits, so mitigating with Addle, Bad Breath, Magic Hammer, and Gobskin can make things safer.

Exdeath will then use White Hole. When the cast finishes, anyone below 100% HP will be petrified, but anyone below 50% will die immediately. Group up and heal to full HP to avoid these effects entirely.

The Decisive Battle

The next mechanic we need to deal with is The Decisive Battle. A bunch of tentacles will spawn around the center of the arena in a circle. Find where the last tentacle spawned, stand inside it, and note which direction the tentacles spawned and will hit the ground (clockwise or counterclockwise). There will be a knockback followed by a Holy stack AOE. I recommend having the tank or a healer use Swiftcast White Wind to heal up right after the stack damage. The knockback can also be ignored with Surecast (allowing you to just stand at the outside of the arena), but some players might find it more useful to save that for the vacuum wave later. There will be quite a bit of damage, and usually players struggle with this bit, so Mighty Guard can be helpful for even more safety.

Right after Holy resolves, three players will be targeted by Flare, which deals proximity-based damage from the targeted player. These players need to quickly run around the back of the zombie head that spawned in the middle and spread out from one another. Players that get caught in front of the head will turn into zombies and lose control of their character. Everyone should aim to be on the edge of the arena, because when Exdeath returns he will return directly on top of a random player.

When Exdeath returns, he will start channeling an elemental ability on the black hole. If it’s Thunder III, it is no longer a tankbuster but a large AOE centered around him, so get away. If it’s Fire III it will apply a hefty Pyretic debuff to players, so everyone needs to stop all movement and actions until the debuff fades. If it’s Blizzard III it’s the opposite of Fire, so everyone needs to be moving around to prevent being frozen in place and taking damage. Immediately after these abilities Exdeath uses Vacuum Wave which is a huge knockback. This can be ignored with Surecast if you didn’t use it for The Decisive Battle, but if Exdeath is at the edge you can just get knocked back normally. A well-timed J Kick can also be used to handle Vacuum Wave.

Black Hole

Exdeath uses White Hole again, so everyone needs to group up for quick heals. Next he will use Black Hole, which spawns a bunch of black orbs around the arena. Coming into contact with these will immediately kill you. Some will be tethered to players and move towards them. Additionally, everyone needs to stay spread out because Dualcasted Fire III will happen during this. After Fire III there will also be another Holy stack marker. It is usually easiest to just have this person use Diamondback, but if they are tethered to an orb they will likely die. Everyone should just use Mighty Guard through this entire mechanic for extra safety.

After Black Hole finishes, Exdeath will do another Dualcasted Thunder III tankbuster, so just handle it the same way as before. Next will be Meteor, which is a heavy-hitting raidwide AOE, before looping from The Decisive Battle.

Final Sting

Exdeaths’s Final Sting threshold is roughly 67%, since he transitions at 60%. Once he is at 67%, apply Off-guard, use Moon Flute, any Primal abilities you have, then finish with Whistle and Final Sting. Most groups will be able to sting before Black Hole, and being able to skip Black Hole makes this phase considerably easier. At least one person needs to be alive for the entire transition, otherwise you will need to redo the phase.

Phase 2: Neo Exdeath

Utility Spells

• Mighty Guard
• Diamondback on the Earth Shaker baiter and on some players to handle Grand Cross Alpha damage if the tank has Allagan Field.
• Hydro Pull or another AOE spell, such as Stotram for non-healers.
• Frog Legs on an Earth Shaker baiter.
• Avail on the main healer. The Earth Shaker baiter can also bring this instead of Diamondback if they prefer.

This phase can be a bit overwhelming at first. Each individual mechanic is pretty simple, but when they are combined they can be quite complex. One thing to point out is that there are no auto-attacks at all in this phase. The only outgoing tank damage is from Aero, Double Attack, and Earth Shaker. This means that even if things get messy (which they probably will) it is possible to recover pulls. Most kills come down to either skipping Grand Cross Omega or doing it successfully. Even if only a handful of people make it through Grand Cross Omega, it is still clearable as long as people have Angel Whisper available. All of Neo Exdeaths “Antilight” attacks actually have a “Flood of Naught” castbar, but I will refer to what each one does using effect names for clarity. The last thing to note is that Neo Exdeath moves around the arena at different points of the fight, but all mechanics will be explained treating Neo Exdeath himself as “north.”

Neo Exdeath starts the fight with Almagest, a brutal bleedwide that requires a lot of healing and mitigation. Bad Breath and Addle should be used at minimum. Since the DPS will all be using Moon Flute, the tank or one of the healers will need to apply Addle. Almagest is a good time to use Angel's Snack.

Delta Attack

Shortly after Almagest, which is also about when Phantom Flurry will be finishing, Neo Exdeath will start casting Delta Attack. This casts the Dualcasted versions of Thunder III, Fire III, and Blizzard III from the first phase all at once. To handle this, everyone should start in the exact center of the arena and then spread out to their clock position. The tank will need to use Diamondback to survive Thunder III. Since the tank is going to be in Diamondback, the main healer can use Avail on them to just stay in the center of the arena and use AOE heals on the group. To do this, the tank should actually start just north of the center instead of in the exact center. The healer using Avail does not need to move out of the Blizzard III AOEs; they can just stand in the center and let Diamondback do the work. This will still be a lot of raid damage, so it should be mitigated as much as possible. The DPS still will not be able to apply Addle due to Waning Nocturne, so the tank and healers will have to handle it. Gobskin and Magic Hammer should also be used here.

Grand Cross Alpha (Toolbox)

Once Delta Attack has resolved, Neo Exdeath will start casting Grand Cross Alpha. This is the first of the Grand Cross abilities we’ll see in the fight and it is the simplest. Every Grand Cross ability is actually a raid-wide stack, so if anyone is dead it will hit the remaining people even harder. It also resets everyone’s threat to zero, so the tank should use White Wind not only to heal everyone up but also to generate threat again. Grand Cross Alpha applies the following debuffs:

• Hysteria: Applied to everyone, causes people to run in a straight line in a random direction.
• Alagan Field: Any damage taken while affected by this debuff will be stored and then hit the entire raid when the debuff expires.
• Acceleration Bomb: Deals damage and applies debuffs if any actions are taken as the debuff expires.
• Off-balance: Damage taken causes a massive knockback away from the source of the damage.
• Light/Dark Wound: “Color” debuff, any damage taken from the same-colored beam will cause lethal damage.

Everyone gets one of the Wound debuffs, Hysteria, and Acceleration Bomb. Three people receive Allagan Field, and the other five people receive Off-balance. Everyone should start in the center of the arena to prevent running off the edge with Hysteria.

Once Hysteria resolves, Neo Exdeath teleports to a random side of the arena and starts casting Terminal Antilight, a raidwide hit that deals significantly more damage to the person closest to Neo Exdeath. The Allagan Field players should plant in the center of the arena to reduce this damage, and all other players should be between Neo Exdeath and the Allagan Field players. The person at the front, ideally the tank, should Diamondback to survive the initial hit. When the damage hits, all players with Off-balance will get sent flying backwards, including the person in Diamondback.

Acceleration Bombs resolve after the knockback, so do not move or take any action until the debuff falls off. Once it does, move to whichever side of Neo Exdeath has the opposite color of your current debuff. This is a good opportunity to use Cold Fog.

After Grand Cross Alpha is resolved, Neo Exdeath uses Double Attack, a shared-damage tankbuster with a huge knockback. The tank should position themselves such that they don’t get knocked off the arena and use Diamondback; the center of the arena or right in front of Neo Exdeath is fine. The AOE for Double Attack is pretty big, so everyone should stay away from the tank.

Emptiness

The next mechanic to deal with is Emptiness. There will be three Exaflare-style circles that show up in the arena. Getting hit by a circle will deal damage, apply a Damage Down debuff, and zap 2500 of your MP. This damage can also go through Transcendence, so if you’ve been raised you still need to avoid the damage. Two will be on the edge and one will be in the center. Find a spot that is safe from these circles ad move into it. Once the circles start moving Neo Exdeath will start casting Inner/Outer Antilight, so move to the center line of Neo Exdeath or the outside edges to be safe from the beam while still avoiding the Emptiness circles. This mechanic can be quite difficult to resolve, especially in certain patterns, so I recommend having one person call it out if they are confident about it.

Grand Cross Delta (Toolbox)

Next up Neo Exdeath will use Grand Cross Delta. This time there will be a different set of debuffs to handle:

• Cursed Shriek: Deals damage and petrifies players looking at this player when the debuff expires.
• Forked Lightning: AOE damage around the player when the debuff expires.
• Death Wave: AOE stack damage.
• Beyond Death: Immediately kills the player when the debuff expires; removed by taking lethal damage before the debuff expires.

One person receives Death Wave and Cursed Shriek, one person receives Forked Lightning and Cursed Shriek, one person receives Forked Lightning and Beyond Death, and every other person receives Off-balance and either Beyond Death or Acceleration Bomb. The basic solution here is that Forked Lightning needs to avoid hitting others, everyone needs to look away from, Death Wave needs to be taken solo with Mighty Guard (this makes it survivable without stacking), and everyone with Beyond Death needs to fail the Neo Exdeath beams that happen in the middle in order to “die.”

If you have the Death Wave debuff, immediately put up Mighty Guard and stand somewhere off to the west away from everyone else. If you have Forked Lightning and Cursed Shriek stand somewhere near the center of the arena. If you have Forked Lightning but no Cursed Shriek, you can stand anywhere that’s not near anyone else. Standing between the center of the arena and Neo Exdeath is fine as long as you do not hit anyone with Forked Lightning. If you have Off-balance, move directly underneath the boss. When all of the initial debuffs expire, the Death Wave target should survive and no one should be hit by Cursed Shriek or Forked Lightning. As before, Acceleration Bombs need to make sure they’re not moving or casting when the debuff expires. Once the first effect wears off, everyone needs to resolve the Antilight beam. Players with Beyond Death need to be fail the mechanic to cleanse Beyond Death, while others can handle the beams normally. Remember that Off-balance will send you flying really far backwards, which is why it’s crucial to be close to Neo Exdeath.

Once Grand Cross Delta has resolved, Neo Exdeath will start casting Almagest again so mitigate and heal appropriately. Neo Exdeath then uses Aero III followed by Earth Shaker, a conal tankbuster on the two players with top threat. Whoever is the other baiter will need to use Frog Legs (or White Wind with Mighty Guard) sometime after the Grand Cross Delta cast to ensure they’re #2 on threat. The easiest way to handle this is to have the tank use Diamondback and the second target use Avail, but both players can Diamondback as well. Regardless of how it is handled, Earth Shakers should be pointed away from the party, such as on the sides of the arena while the party stays in the middle.

After Earth Shaker, Neo Exdeath uses Vacuum Wave so just move away from the boss. There is no knockback or damage as long as you avoid the small dangerous spot in front of the boss. Immediately after is another Emptiness, but instead of an Antilight beam there will be Light and Darkness. This puts a Holy stack marker on one player and Flare on three players. Everyone should start directly underneath Neo Exdeath, adjusting for the Emptiness, and once the markers go out the flares should move away and spread out while everyone else shares the stack marker. “Flares away, everyone else stay” is an easy way to remember this. Neo Exdeath will then finish with an Antilight beam, so dodge accordingly.

Next up Neo Exdeath will cast Meteor, which just spawns four orbs that need to be killed before they explode. If you stand in the middle and cast an AOE spell you will hit all four at once. Neo Exdeath will teleport to a random side and use color beams again.

After color beams have resolved, Neo Exdeath will cast Charybdis and set everyone’s HP to 1, then use Double Attack. This is a good opportunity to use Revenge Blast if you brought it. Make sure to heal the tank for Double Attack, and then the tank should heal the the party with White Wind before the following Almagest.

Neo Exdeath will then use Vacuum Wave, Aero III, and another Emptiness. As the Emptiness circles start moving outwards, Neo Exdeath starts casting Grand Cross Alpha. Players should make their way towards the center of the arena while dodging Emptiness. Grand Cross Alpha can be handled exactly the same way as before.

Grand Cross Alpha is followed by another Delta Attack, but this one is tricky because it is followed by Inner/Outer Antilight, so the tank doesn’t want to be stuck in Diamondback or there is a good chance that they die. The timing for this is about 4 GCDs after the Grand Cross Alpha color beams. If the DPS are using Cold Fog on the color beams, then the tank can use Diamondback when there is about 7 seconds left on the DPS’s Cold Fog buff.

Grand Cross Omega (Toolbox)

Grand Cross Omega is the next big mechanic and it’s the final new mechanic that is introduced. All of the debuffs will be things that have happened already, but the order of resolution is a little bit different. I think about this mechanic as “Grand Cross Delta followed by three beams and finished with Grand Cross Alpha.” There is a lot going on here, but the boss isn’t targetable for the entire mechanic, so everyone should put up Mighty Guard for safety. If anyone does die it can very quickly spiral into a wipe. The debuff assignments are:

• Hysteria on everyone.
• Death Wave, Acceleration Bomb, and Allagan Field on one person.
• Cursed Shriek, Off-balance, and Beyond Death on two people.
• Forked Lightning, Acceleration Bomb, and Allagan Field on two people.
• Forked Lightning, Acceleration Bomb, and Beyond Death on one person.
• Off-balance, Acceleration Bomb, and Beyond Death on two people.

Everyone should start in the center of the arena like with Grand Cross Alpha to handle Hysteria. As soon as the debuff wears off, everyone without a Forked Lightning should move to where Neo Exdeath was when the cast finished. The Death Wave person should be at the edge of the arena and the other players should be just a step inwards, since the damage from Death Wave will cause them to go flying backwards due to Off-balance. Another option which can be easier for some groups is to have the Death Wave person take the damgae solo (like in Grand Cross Delta) and have the other players without Forked Lightning go to the opposite side of the arena. The one downside to this is that it will make Allagan Field hit harder later, but if everyone has Mighty Guard on and is healed up it should be fine. The Forked Lightning players should spread out along the center horizontal line to avoid hitting each other. Once Death Wave and Forked Lightning go off, Neo Exdeath will teleport to the south, east, and west and use random Antilight beams on each side. The beams should be avoided, but on the third beam the Beyond Death players should fail again in order to “die” and cleanse their debuff. It can be cleansed during any beam, but the third is recommended because color beams still do some damage, so if you get cleansed and are at 1 HP then handle a color debuff you could still die. Keep in mind that color beams will still cause Off-balance players to be knocked back, so it’s important to be close to Neo Exdeath for each step!

After the beams are done, Acceleration Bombs and Cursed Shrieks will resolve. Everyone just needs to stand still and look away from each other. Finally, Neo Exdeath will cast Terminal Antilight again which gets handled the same way as in Grand Cross Alpha.

Once Grand Cross Omega is done, Neo Exdeath will just repeat mechanics until enrage. Enrage happens a full six minutes later, so as long as a few people survive and are able to raise the rest, you can stabilize and clear. If it is a messy cleanup situation, everyone should keep Mighty Guard on until everything is stable. There is an Almagest after Grand Cross Omega, so it’s important that healers are alive for this. Most groups will clear in the same pull that they have a clean or recoverable Grand Cross Omega, but the mechanic is also skippable with decent DPS.

Final Sting

Neo Exdeaths’s Final Sting threshold is roughly 7%. Once he is at 7%, apply Off-guard, use Moon Flute, any Primal abilities you have, then finish with Whistle and Final Sting. Most groups will be able to sting just before or after Grand Cross Omega.