Lowdown on the loadouts (plus I may have finally gotten the trick right)

Since I have like 1 hr+ to my sleeping time, might as well I do a bit of write-up here. Before I get started...

I may have finally gotten the trick right

A few hrs ago, I tried doing another round of Kabal. With one HR and one GF, no less. Suffice to say, Kabal's trial of fire was now far easier since I've already gotten the hang of it. Due to a lack of sleep, however, I got myself killed once. Interestingly enough, it always helps to have the tank reaching the finishing line first since the fight against the "guard dogs" would commence asap.

When it comes to dodging, it should only be used primarily to cover ground asap so that you'll be out of the firing range.

The first try was a disaster so as to speak (the tank apologized, so I assumed the aggro grabbing part went terribly wrong somewhere). Come the second time, we did in Kabal nicely. One thing of note is that Kabal will always be at the edge. At the same time, he seems to have some kind of ability to pull you towards him. Not only that, he's got some knockback move that will throw you down prone straight into the lava pit. Thankfully, the arena is surrounded by a wall. In other words, you won't get thrown off the stage if you happened to position yourself near the edge rather than the center.

On the fireball and chain, the damage over time can be very insane. Even more insane than Nostura's Death Star. Funnily enough, my first/previous Kabal run also involved a 3 member party (including me), but the flaming morningstar never did a DoT on me. Thanks to valuable input from one of my guild alliance members (can't remember his/her name), I managed to put one and one together. Apparently, the source of DoT comes from another fireball situated. This second fireball is stationary. I know this because, in my second/current run, I noticed a stationary fireball while getting pulled by Kabal's chain. At the same time, I actually survived the flaming morningstar in the second try after the party got wiped. Yes, half the HP was gone. But hey, at least it's better than the first round where the DoT killed me outright.

In other words, do NOT let the chain come into contact with the third party fireball. The moment you do that, you die. Once the DoT sets in, you'll have to act fast. The stationary fireball would most likely pop up at random location. However, there's a fixed pattern to this. Namely, the third party fireball will always be situated anywhere at the center of Kabal's arena. Once you get the burn, move slightly away to the side until you're very sure the chain is no longer in contact with the third party fireball. And trust me, you'll really need to move asap. The DoT won't kill you straight away, but it will still kill you in a matter of seconds. The moment the DoT stops, it means you're in the safe zone. This sole method of surviving the DoT burn, however, would most likely require a few tries if this is your first Kabal fight (read: #respawnlol). This is because the camera view will only cover the frontal view, hence making the detection part quite difficult at least for the first try.

Assuming you're fighting the mob during the process of defying Kabal's law of physics, the only way is to pull the fireball towards them. If possible at all, CC them once they close in. Otherwise, you'll have to take them on until the fireball hit them. The mob will always spawn at the center where the anvil is, so it should be relatively easy to do them in once you're able to move past them in a straight line (read: exploiting the space between one enemy and the other). If you get the DoT burn as well, wait for a brief moment before moving slightly to the side. This is to give you more space to outmanoeuvre the mob while trying to get away from the stationary fireball (unless you have an effective dodge/dash game). Since they will just automatically close in (read: most of Kabal's minions are melee damage dealers anyway), it should quite easy to use the flaming morningstar against them. If possible at all, pull the fireball towards Kabal (read: somewhere near enough along the edge). Otherwise, killing his Kabalites will automatically remove his super armor. While I'm not sure of this being doable anywhere else, at least I have reasons to believe the anvil is actually the source of Kabal's invincibility (read: detonating any golem near that thing plus the fact that Kabal doesn't seem to enjoy moving towards the center stage). Once the super armor is removed, just go straight for the jugular. With the super armor, Kabal is literally invincible. Without it, he's basically worse than a glass cannon. Which is why any Kabal fight should very easy if you're running his trial of fire and iron with a party of 3 or more. Once he said something after the explosion, it means you can just start fragging him. Ultimately, key to defeating him lies in how much damage you can deal in a go.

Note: Once the DoT sets in, you won't have time to consume potion, let alone activating any self-heal artifact. Just move immediately. Also, I might be wrong here, but it seems that only one stationary fireball will appear when the chain comes out.

Add note: Apparently, Kabal can only use one chain at a time. Also, it seems that the stationary fireball will not come out once Kabal submerges the arena center with magma.

More add note: Above part was actually written like N days ago.

Planning the loadouts: Things of note

Be mentally prepared for increased difficulty on the PvE front. This is due to the presence of loadouts. To understand what the loadout system, one must understand the hassle behind changing the moveset just because you need to raid a Castle Never. For those who have the luxury of joining private queues, it's not that bad. For those doing public queue via auto team matchmaking, the frustration can be very real.

Because the loadout system also affects the stats, boons, and feats, it also means giving much more leeway in creating two builds. One for open world PvE, another for raiding instances (and this is not including PvP and specific raid instances like Demogorgon, Fangbreaker Island, and Svardborg).

For the dps builds, open PvE is all about surviving while raiding instances is all about the damage. For the tanks, it's quite the other way round. Because the devs have already started tweaking the difficulty level since mod 7, be prepared for somewhat of an overhaul come 2nd May 2017. Already, the zombies and Thayan servitors in the Dread Ring have gotten very dodgy with an insanely high dodge/deflection game. Quite likely both. Don't believe me, go run the Dread Ring now and see how the HP bar drop.

So what to expect come 2nd May 2017?

1. Be prepared for open PvE dishing out more damage. This is due to tanks having a better survival game than any other builds especially when it comes to the high-end stuff like Vault of the Nine one-shot quest and quite possibly the Biggrin's Tomb weekly quest.

2. Be prepared for raiding instances taking more damage without dropping dead. This is due party teamwork and that one thing called combat advantage.

Next up: Because it's already very late and that my sleeping pattern works like a Tesla guy, therefore I need to end this. Next up, loadouts for Arylos, Cyrea, and Myrreas.

P.S: Something's wrong. Some unknown fellow actually replaced Cyrea's profile with Kariss' profile. Either the people in Cryptic were trolling me or some hacker got nothing better to do. Worst come to worst, my super mignonne stickwoman may have gotten hold of my account info and that she actually played a prank to get my attention. Okay, ignore the last possibility. My prefrontal cortex is abnormal anyway...