Gone in (less than) 60 secs...
Poor Tom "better for him to be Loki" Hiddleswiftone. While it's a hyperbole to say that the Hiddleswift saga lasted less than 60 secs, I'm pretty sure it really sucks to be him. I'm not gonna make any speculations over who's the one drawing first blood, but here's hoping that his current ex won't start doing a follow-up song to her Bad Blood (i.e. First Blood).
To that Tesla girl: I still remember the lesson you've taught me like 3 yrs ago lol
Suffice to say, the beholder was really damn easy to deal with. Because it's just one undead boss versus the team, Cyrea had no problem doing what she does best: mass heal. Due to the massive AoE heal called Bastion of Health, it's very easy to play a mass AP building game (the only thing I needed to look out for is Magneto's tesla beam. Nothing to do with the Tesla girl fyi).
It's only once we reached the 2nd boss where everything spiraled into the Abyss. Long story short, we had to abort the run. It's not every day I did a Brexit, this was to be one of those few moments. The reason why lies in not enough CC to go around. Someone in my team mentioned not enough dps, but I suspect my team members were out to make fun of me since this wasn't the first time people decided to take me for a ride. It's like "oh we got a genius here. Might as well have a few laughs since he's really that damn good." Tbh, I don't really mind since I can just dismiss it as the classic angmoh humor (then again, years of solitude have somewhat warped my character). I'll be frank here: it could have been worse, it's basically just that once in a blue moon moment. Even my friend Private Ryan Shawcross made fun of me at times. Actually more often.
After the failed run, I decided to ask myself some questions. And together with that, some ideas on Cyrea's character in the event Ed "not Miliband" Greenwood decides that I'm good enough to rub shoulders with the likes of R.A "not rated R" Salvatore, Elaine "enough of your Elaine jokes, Wani" Cunningham, and Paul S. "not the actual apostle Paul" Kemp. Maybe not, maybe yes, hopefully time is on my side.
The first question is this: what if no one does a CC on the adds? Throughout the fight, the mobs were running all over the place at various interval. The poor hunter ranger didn't stand a chance once the mob broke free from the aggro hold. I was forced to multitask as a result since I'd need to keep two key areas in mind instead of just one. I only had Exaltation and Bastion of Health, it's quite hard to aim once you realized your bro had to move all over the place to avoid the aggro. And it didn't help that the tank was stuck at one place instead of following the crowd (word of advice to every tank: the hallmark of a good tank lies in knowing where to move, not when). I suggested a hammer-anvil strategy. I have to admit that this strategy actually worked wonders. Unfortunately, there's not enough CC and mass protection to go around. In other words, I wasn't responsible for the failure.
This comes to mind another question: how effective is Chains of Blazing Light in this scenario. No one was slowing down the mob, I should have considered this option since no one was using Smoke Bomb/Path of Blades (if this wasn't proof of my team seeing for themselves whether I think like Pep or Mourinho, I don't know what else is. We're talking abt the only effective AoE gameplay for a trickster rogue). By my own estimation, spamming this move may easily be the solution to a dearth of CC. The divinity version lasts only for a very short time, but you can afford to multi-cast 3 times in a row. After which, you just pull off an empowered version. In this case, I won't recommend using other encounter powers to build up your divinity. Whatever you do as a devoted cleric in this instance, you can't afford to do a mass heal until after you've spent all 3 stacks of divinity. The mob is nothing less than the fast moving and hard hitting type. The moment around 3-4 of them broke free, your team will never get back together. Period. Ideally, you should do a mass heal only after you consumed all 3 stacks of divinity on that divine straitjacket. I'll be testing this in the future CN run (then again, maybe not. Depends on my team since every CN requires at least a healer, if not both tank and healer). Tentatively, this may be what Cyrea's skill set looks like.
Encounter powers: Chains of Blazing Light; Divine Glow; Bastion of Health
At-will powers: Lance of Faith; Astral Seal
Daily powers: Flame Strike; Hallowed Ground
Class features: Divine Fortune; Anointed Armor
I'm currently hooked in Exaltation for open world PvE because the dual buffing too good to pass up. I tried a combination of Astral Shield and Divine Glow together with this. Once you max out Prestigious Exaltation while choosing the Virtuous path (note that you now can allocate a total of 15 paragon feat points to other skill trees without compromising that one point reserved for the final feat). Kills the mob faster and healing for more, I'm very sure of this. If I decide to use Exaltation for just about any epic run, most likely Divine Glow will be that sacred cow. Ultimately, it's more about Gift of Haste and mass heal than anything else (alternatively, using Divine Glow as a CC substitute for Chains of Blazing Light can be at least equally useful provided your team members can sustain both the CC and aggro holding).
Note: There are times where your encounter powers will enter a few seconds of cooldown during divinity mode. Therefore, it's advisable to have a main divinity move and a secondary one. Either that or you'll need to do what I'd call divinity braking (i.e. revert to normal mode for a few secs before reactivating divinity mode again).
Note: There are times where your encounter powers will enter a few seconds of cooldown during divinity mode. Therefore, it's advisable to have a main divinity move and a secondary one. Either that or you'll need to do what I'd call divinity braking (i.e. revert to normal mode for a few secs before reactivating divinity mode again).
Advice: Better late than never
I'm pretty sure all of us have done stupid things before. There are times where late and never mean the same outcome. Then there's the common saying above. I forgot who's the one telling me not to use Astral Shield during Cyrea's latest attempt to preserve Moradin's honor against mindflayers both (un)dead and alive. Long story short, that person told me to use Break the Spirit and Divine Glow instead. On the first glance, it didn't make any sense since Astral Shield would have given my party some much needed defensive shielding. Afterwards, I asked myself whether it's okay to use Break the Spirit due to its insanely long casting time (however, it must be said that this move can be very efficient in terms of dictating where the undead thoon hulks will headbutt the prison cells). Then I suddenly realized that the problem with Astral Shield lies in the long casting time. Which makes it quite cumbersome due to high mob mobility and the fact that they don't do things rank and file. Then I made a decision. By switching Astral Shield with Exaltation (while keeping the rest untouched), the process became much smoother. Because Divine Glow is instant cast, it's very easy to do a mob wipe no matter whether it's divinity mode or empowered mode. Retaining the usage of Bastion of Health means no compromises were made in the process (i.e. Gift of Haste). With Exaltation (together with a maxed out Prestigious Exaltation feat), keeping everyone alive while maintaining at least a decent dps momentum became a walk in the park.
Then I decided to test run this move set in open PvE. The flow of combat has never felt smoother where this Tesla (Ar-tel-quessir) girl is concerned. Initially, I was worried whether the absence of her holy straitjacket would affect the way she gets things done. A few tries later (against those bald Thayans no less), such fears were effectively banished. Ofc this doesn't address the problem of CC if your team couldn't do it for the party. But it really gives me something to think about.
Cyrea's first move set involved Bastion of Health, Astral Shield, and Chains of Blazing Light. I ended up enduring a bore fest not unlike watching Aston Villa playing football/soccer under Martin "Michael, wa si lin laopeh" O'Neill's stewardship. I don't know which one is worse though. Halfway through the fight, my brain entered screensaver mode for all the obvious reasons. The current move set actually set the pace on faster mode without the kind of Lamborghini accident any rich kid can be famous for. Felt a bit like watching Les Bleus playing their national sport instead of England crashing and burning on the pitch. I don't know how many devoted cleric gamers can do this, but I enjoy baiting the Thayans so that Cyrea can slap them with a Divine Glow (either that or Chains of Blazing Light since it's also counted as Radiant damage over time).
P.S: I suddenly realized that Cyrea purchased a respec token without my knowledge. I don't know whether it's via the Savras tokens or le zen, but I'm very sure I never purchase one. Because once I do, I'd just straight away do a respec, no questions asked.
Add P.S: In case you've yet to know the basics, Chains of Blazing Light isn't foolproof. Divine Glow, on the other hand, is.
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