Infographic Courtesy of the Eureka Addicts of Aether

Surviving Early Pulls in BA

Despite all best efforts, early pulls for bosses _do occur_ in BA for a variety of reason ranging from "Didn't realize they only had LB1" to "Auto-ran up to the boss". To avoid a trip to sprite island, you should always be prepared to react accordingly. To reduce the likelihood of an early end to your run, a few general rules are as follows:

1. Do not attack the boss unless you are going to start engaging.

2. Prior to an ET being called stay outside of the arena.

3. If an ET has not yet been called and you see the "[place name] will close in 15 seconds" message, check to see if the MT has picked up aggro. 

   1. If the MT has the boss, start the fight as planned.

   2. If the MT is outside of the arena, follow them.

4. If an ET has been called, and you see the "[place name] will close in 15 seconds", just start the fight as normal. If you are a tank (MT/ST or otherwise), immediately provoke and tomahawk the boss and position as an MT to help keep the squishy DPS and healers alive.

If you are the one to early pull, try your best to leave the arena with everyone else to disengage or die near the entrance so that healers can consider giving you a sacrifice if your remembered doesn't proc.

Owain/Art Specific notes

If only one of the two twins has been pulled, they will hard enrage after 15 seconds.

As a result, if there has been no ET for Owain/Art when an early pull occurs, immediately leave the arena. Since you cannot know if the otherside is going in, it is safer to run away.

Bonus points if you can put the following in /shout:

/sh { Stop! } { Run away! } { Run away! } { Run away! } 

Ozma

Unlike the other bosses in BA, once you hop down to the platforms, there's no retreating during an early pull.

Before you hop down

1. Do not hop down onto the platform until all platform assignments are ready.

2. If someone early pulls before the raid has hopped down, leave them to their fate.

After you hop down

1. Do not target Ozma until ET has been called

2. Do not target Ozma until ET-5

3. Do not press any buttons while targetting Ozma until ET (ET-1 for LB1 or ET-2 for LB2)

4. Do not run too close to Ozma as it will EP

5. If you are a healer, stand on the ring, not the platform to remain safe from autoattack aggro.

6. If you are a tank (ST, MT or otherwise), be prepared to use your highest aggro generating ability (shield lop, tomahawk, unmend, lightning shot), invuln, and provoke as soon as you see the "[room name] is closing in 15 seconds". Auto attacks come out very quick and will kill any non-tanks that are hit.

7. If all else fails, call retreat and survive until the first blackhole to escape without dying.

BA - Tank Responsibilities

See our Main Tank Guide for more information

Sub-Tank (Off Tank)

As an ST in BA, your main job is to deal damage by running Wisdom of the Martialist and some DPS or Utility logos actions.

Your second job is to be ready to peel mobs off of DPS and Healers when an MT dies, perceptor accidentally pulls a few mobs, etc. While mobs will likely kill an unprepared DPS/Healer, tanks still have access to the defensive cooldowns available (along with an inherent 20% damage reduction).

When you see a mob running to kill your healer, do the following:

1. Provoke the mob and turn on your stance.

2. Hit your big 30% damage reduction ability.

3. Hit the mob to hold enmity with your highest threat building skill available.

4. Turn your magia board to defensive (keeping this as a macro is very handy /magiadefensive).

5. Repeat 3 until MT grabs the mob or the mob is dead, rotate cooldowns as needed.

In addition, as a tank, it highly important that you be ready to become MT in an emergency situation. 

The generally accepted "emergency tray" to have available as a tank is one that has "Wisdom Guardian" and"Cure L III". Wisdom of the Guardian will allow you to actually tank for the boss, while Cure L III serves as a way to self sustain the yourself and party (and generates very nice aggro)

BA - Tank Responsibilities (As not a Tank)

BA Veteran's Healer Guide

Bravery

Healing DEL

Sacrifice

Repose for Centaurs

BA - Healer Combat Sacrifice Timings

Ozma Combat Sacrifice

Teleport Sacrifice Cheese

One quirk of Doom is that if the effect expires during a loading screen it will not proc and kill you. To do this successfully you need to start the loading screen when doom reaches about 2 to 3 seconds.

There are two places that you can do this in BA:

1. The teleporter before AV.

2. After you have defeated Proto-Ozma you can jump into the void below and it will teleport you through a loading screen to the south platform alive and well.

BA - When to determine a "Tactical Retreat"

In BA, there are several points throughout the run where it is necessary to evaluate the feasibility of continuing.

General

General signs a run may need to disband include the following:

• No MT

• No Perceptors left prior to rooms

• All healers dead

• A majority of the raid dead after a boss (or boss attempt).

• A large portion of the raid is KO'd.

Entrance

Fewer than 24 players is considered to be an undersized run. While BA has been cleared with as few as 8 players, to do so requires fully geared players with heavily optimized logos actions.

While only bosses 3 and 4 have a hard enrage, you do have to beat the duty timer that will kick you from BA when it expires. As such, it is highly advised that you pay attention to the number of players that have entered the instance (by navigating to the Adventurer menu and pressing the purple sword icon. Unfortunately, you have to count manually).

The go no go number for "normal PUG runs"

• 24+ is a normal run.

• 20-23 should be doable, but gear or logos actions will be needed to make up the loss in damage and rooms will require more coordination based on raid composition.

• 16-20 will probably not clear AV unless you have a lot of players with full elemental gear and good logos. Even then, it may become a frag run or end early.

• Fewer than 16 is not advisable outside of a static.

Rooms

If you reach rooms and do not have enough tanks/platecense to handle rooms, you may have to disband the run.

Advanced: You can "Trigger support while returning" if you have 6 volunteers who will remain behind to trigger the support fate before returning. This can be accomplished by beginning your return cast as soon as the indicator in the center of the room makes the trigger sound effect.

AV/Ozma

For AV and Ozma, if the DPS has been severely lacking during the raid (such as seeing a large number of mechanics on Raiden), it may not be feasible to continue. AV and Ozma both have a hard enrage at 7:30 and 10:30 respectively. While it is perfectly acceptable to "give it your best shot" if you see many DPS players using Platebearer instead of a DPS wisdom, you will likely wipe to enrage on either of these.

In addition, Ozma has specific requirements per platform. If you cannot field a full party per platform, it will be very difficult to complete and may be worth retreating.

Ozma

While the platform requirements may make it inadvisable to continue, Ozma is the only boss with an "escape hatch" via it's blackhole ability.

As mentioned in the BA guide, blackhole returns you to Central Point in Hydatos (dead or alive) and if you were downed, you can be raised normally by anyone in the zone.

If you have enough players, but you are unsure about DPS, it is perfectly acceptable to "give Ozma a shot" and purposefully fail the blackhole mechanic if it looks like the run will hit enrage.

Typically, if Ozma's HP is more than 2-5% when the fifth blackhole is cast, you should call for a retreat and not stand on the blackhole buttons. Be sure to yell this multiple times (preparation of a macro is useful for this).

BA - Unlocking stone room solo, without fighting

Generally frowned upon in non-undersized PUG runs, this method allows you to utilise just 1 person for the Earth room, without the use of Reflect L. By forcing the room to not recognise that there is any player in the room, the door will unlock, allowing the player to exit and disengage, or for other players to enter and assist to kill the Earth mobs.

<insert infographic>

Disclaimer: This method for handling solo can result in you getting KO'd if you are not careful. It would be best to practice the climb prior to attempting the above

General Eureka Advanced Loadouts

Most of these loadouts can be used by anyone, at their own risk. 

Important note When using these advanced loadouts and tactics, if you do not communicate their usage sufficiently, you may cause issues and it can garner a negative reputation among the community.

There are various advanced loadouts, but below are the more commonly seen. They are designed for those who know how Eureka and BA works, to make the overall run faster, or give extra breathing room for others to make mistakes.

Indom Changes with 6.4 Update

Patch 6.4 change indom from increasing your defense to becoming a 64% passive damage reduction. As health boost procs based on "raw unmitigated damage dealt", it is now significantly easier to proc healthboost.

This opens up a few new interesting possibilities for building stacks within BA

• Can still easily (and safely) build off of Zebus/Crystal claws outside of BA.

• Can refresh/build during Absolute Virtue by standing right next to any of the proximity markers (clones included).

• Ozma orbs will refresh Indom.

• Ozma sphere auto attacks will also refresh/build on low stacks.

• Any level 65 mobs in BA (such as in the rooms) can be used like Zebus that multi-pull. Mobs will de-aggro if you run to either the end of Raiden's boss arena or just outside of AV's boss arena.

  • If wary about it, Remove armor and keep physeos weapons + accessories to reach 12 stacks (starting with 5 defensive magia -> moving to 2 or 0 once the stacks stop accumulating).

  • If confident (or have a shield healer), can be fully naked like with Zebu.

  • Any room mobs that aren't killed in the hallway before AV, do not despawn and can be used to refresh prior to Ozma (this does not work if you are party lead and need to call positions, talk to your party before attempting).

If you plan to refresh on mobs, please be sure to communicate your intentions otherwise you may surprise a newbie that heals/shields you could grab aggro and get bapped once you attempt to de-aggro the mobs. Whenever attempting this, it is best to say something such as the following macro:

/y { Wisdom of the Indomitable } { I'm getting ready now. } { Watch your aggro! } { Wait, please. }

Job Specific notes for Indom

All tanks behave similarly when using indom without healthboost stacks, if you expect to build and maintain healthboost with indom, this is information regarding which tanks are considered to be "the best" with indom.

Warrior

• The most flexible Indom Tank.

• Holmgang with a four minute cooldown has great flexibility when refreshing your Healthboost (either via traps or via Catastrophe L). 

• The easiest of the tanks to use when attempting to build stacks inside of BA from traps. 

• Thrill of battle is a 20% HP heal and will scale with Healthboost.

• Advanced do not do without consulting your healers: Can use Double Edge L relatively safely while MTing.

Paladin

• Great choice for Indom with lots of Group utility.

• The only downside of PLD's indom is Hallowed Ground, which has a 7 minute cooldown. This only affects building stacks inside BA from traps unless you bring Rapid Recast and use it with Hallowed Ground.

• Hallowed Ground is the safest way to refresh indom. As there are there are several mechanics in BA -- such as Ozma Orbs and Toy Hammer-- that bypass invulnerability. PLD is the only tank that can refresh healthboost at any time risk-free.

• Divine Veil scales with PLD HP and is the equivalent to a crit Spreadlo. It is a fantastic mitigation ability.

Dark Knight

• Has the strongest personal mitigation of any tank when using Indom. Is the most risky to refresh and/or build health-boost.

• The Blackest Night allows you to ignore most mechanics and be nearly invulnerable for 7 seconds. On the flip side, you will almost never proc the "Dark Arts" effect as there are few things in Eureka that deal enough damage to break it (unless they are otherwise lethal like traps).

• Living Dead has the second lowest cooldown, but, due to the "Will kill you unless you are healed for your maximum HP", every stack of health boost makes it more difficult to fully refill your HP. As a result, it requires one of the following or it will kill you when you attempt to refresh your healthboost.

  • White Mage holding Benediction for you.

  • Completely Naked with level 1 weapon and a healer ready to spam their heals at you

  • Completely Naked with level 1 weapon + eurekan potion + hyper potion + pray that the server ticks don't kill you.

  • Completely Naked with Cure L (can only be used for traps).

Gunbreaker

• Solid, but has no abilities that interact with indom.

• Superbollide has a relatively longer cooldown and still will require rapid recast to build stacks inside of BA from traps. As it sets your HP to 1, it can be risky to use in combat if a mechanic bypasses invulns (such as Ozma cube form Orbs).