FFXIV Turn 9 - Nael Deus Darnusby Lilac Merthelin <RGRK> on Adamantoise

13-minute enrage timer. For advice on tank/healer cooldowns & timing, check Solitude’s guide.

Phase 1: 100% - 65.00%You want this phase down in 3 minutes or less to beat the enrage timer, and ideally before the fifth Stardust (see below).

● Ravensclaw: The cleave. Goes out fairly often, has a very wide angle, and hits for a few thousand on a tank. Don’t stand in front of Nael if you’re not the MT.

● Ravensbeak: The phase 1 Death Sentence equivalent. Tons of damage when it hits, gives a debuff, and the tank explodes in an AOE for another huge hit when the debuff expires. Can be straight tanked, or tank-swapped after the initial hit but before the explosion. (At i100+, you probably won’t even consider swapping it.) It’s not a big AOE, but it’s not tiny, either; melee classes should stay clear of the MT for phase 1.

● Stardust: Raid-wide AOE damage (~1k) and meteor placement for phase 2. A red or yellow marker will appear over a player’s head for ~5 seconds. When it disappears, that’s the spot the meteor will fall, and you need to get out of there, or you’ll take a ton of damage! Placing two meteors too close together wipes the raid in a giant explosion, and don’t take chances on that; they need to be pretty far apart. Where you place meteors is up to your group, but ideally you want them in groups of two. Below is Mrhappy’s some innocuous, non-flame-war-starting person from the Internet’s suggestion, but don’t stress about exactly one red and one yellow per group.

Mrhappy’s Someone’s meteor placement suggestion

● Lunar Dynamo: A big donut AOE that heals the boss for any damage done. Can hit pets! Safe spots are right on top of the boss and very, very far away. You may find it easier to start running when it’s coming up, since it’s really big. Having a /p macro helps (see Solitude’s guide for specific attack timings).

● Thermionic Beam combo

1. Ravensdive: Jumps to a healer or ranged DPS for small damage, then immediately uses…2. Iron Chariot: Avoidable circle AOE for lots of damage and knockback, and when it’s done...3. Thermionic Beam: Marker over a player’s head that is a turbo-charged Gaseous Bomb from T8 (15k

damage split among all targets). Everyone except the MT should simultaneously run out of the Iron Chariot circle and into the center of the arena to soak the damage.

4. Ravensdive: Back to the MT, which is why they don’t help soak Thermionic.● Melee DPS can usually keep DPSing Nael during this combo, especially MNKs, who will want to keep

their stacks up. Figure out what works for you.● Meteor Stream

1. Nael becomes untargetable, and white markers appear above several players’ heads.2. Meteor Stream: High AOE damage with no ground marker centered on the marked players. DO NOT

STAND NEXT TO ANYONE WITH A WHITE MARK! One set of marks goes out on the first Stream and two sets happen in succession on the second Stream. The latter may require targeted healing if one player is targeted by both waves. Calling these “doubles” out in voice chat for a quick Lustrate is helpful.

3. Dalamud Dive: Nael goes back to the tank with a high-damage small AOE. Melee should not return to the tank until after this goes off.

Phase 1 rotationRed dust > Beak > Beam combo > Yellow dust > Dynamo > Meteor Stream (x1) > Beak > Red dust > Meteor Stream (x2) > Beak > Yellow dust > Beam combo > Red dust > Beak > Dynamo > Meteor Stream (x1) > Beak > Yellow dust > Meteor Stream (x2)

You want to finish this phase before or immediately after the Stardust marked in red (i.e. four meteors on the field, it drops the fifth) to be on track for the enrage and to have an easier time in phase 2a.

tl;dr - Place your meteors correctly, group in center following ground AOE (except MT), spread out for white marker

Phase 2a: 64%, lasts for 65 secondsThis phase is a single mechanic: the golem adds. When you move from 65% to 64%, Nael becomes untargetable and green meteors appear over three non-healers’ heads. These are identical to Stardust meteors (including the raidwide damage and wipe if placed too close to existing meteors), except they spawn adds at the point of impact instead.

Each golem has a color which determines its behavior. The colors/stances are:

● Green - Normal Stance○ Demolish: Raid-wide 2k damage. Not stunnable, but can be Fluid Aura’d (risky).○ Boulder Clap: Frontal, instant cone AOE for stupid amounts of damage. Tank facing away from the raid.○ This golem also hits much harder than the other two. It should be tanked by an actual tank and may

require defensive cooldowns, especially with one or more red meteor buffs (see below).● Blue - Subversive Stance

○ Earthshock: Three-second cast, followed by a 2k raid-wide AOE and very nasty unhealable Paralyze. CAN AND MUST BE SILENCED! (BRD, PLD, Selene) Will probably wipe you if it goes off. This attack doesn’t happen until after the first color switch (see below).

○ Magnetism: Sucks in any nearby players, meteors, and golems. Will wipe you if it draws in a golem.● Red - Aggressive Stance

○ Heavy Strike: Like Ballast from Turn 2, a 270-degree staggered AOE with huge range. Stand behind the golem or far away to avoid. Calling this in voice chat helps.

○ Earthen Heart: A ground AOE that does lots of damage and a DoT if you get hit by it, and the AOE becomes a DoT void zone after the cast. Run out of the AOE and don’t run back in. With a yellow meteor buff (see below), this can be hard to dodge, and calling out the cast bar is very helpful.

● Golems will periodically rotate colors, in the order above (R>G>B>R). You want the one of them dead before this happens, so only the remaining two will swap back and forth. With good DPS, the first swap will usually happen immediately after the first golem dies, and you will not get a second swap.

● Golems eat meteors if you pull them RIGHT on top of one. Red meteors give Damage Up, and yellow meteors give Haste. The Haste buff makes all cast bars and AOE markers much quicker. Ideally, two of each meteor will be out from P1, or perhaps three red and two yellow.

● All meteors on the field need to be eaten by the golems before they die, ideally 1-2 meteors to each golem.● If a golem gets too close to another golem, they become a super-golem and you wipe.● If a single golem eats four meteors, it becomes a super-golem and you wipe.● The red and blue golems’ auto-attacks can be tanked by any member of the raid until they get a stack of

Damage Up. The green golem should be tanked by an actual tank whenever possible.

There’s no single best order for killing the golems, though most groups leave red for last since its special attacks are avoidable. Killing green first means no Demolish and no chance for aggro blip > turn > Boulder Clap > wipe, and killing blue first means no Earthshock or misplaced Magnetism. An important consideration is whether you’ll kill the first golem in time, which is a tight DPS check on a moving target. Focusing green first means you’ll be killing either the green or the blue, and it’s what our group prefers, but many prefer blue first. Experiment and see what works for you.

Phase 2a goes something like this:

1. Place the golem meteors correctly, then run away from them so you don’t die. Ideally, run to the center or other gathering point for heals. If the MT still has Raven’s Blight, do not stand next to them!

2. MT grabs green (because it does lots of damage to its target), and OT pulls either red or blue. The final golem is “pulled” by the healers and/or Eos. Take each golem near a set of meteors, to be fed to it as its health gets low.

○ If you have a PLD OT, have them grab red (if killing green before first switch), because it will turn blue and use Earthshock soon after, which the PLD can silence.

○ Aggro management can be very tricky in this phase. Manage healing aggro carefully, and watch your burst DPS on the first golem.

3. Focus down golem #1. If the MT and healers can handle it, feed it any nearby meteors as you do so.4. Focus down the golem that is about to turn the color you want for #2, assuming you killed #1 before the switch;

otherwise, go straight to that color. Feed it any nearby meteors as you do so. If you meant to kill green (for example) as #1 and you missed the switch, you’ll probably want to move to the new green.

5. Focus down the final golem, feeding it any remaining meteors. Depending on how fast you kill the golems, the meteor markers for phase 2b may appear while this golem is still alive. A /p macro with warning sounds at 55 and 60 seconds can be useful here.

tl;dr - Follow color order, don’t let them touch, feed all meteors by the end of the phase, silence blue’s Earthshock

Phase 2b: Still 64%, lasts for 75 secondsA repeat of 2a, with a slightly different start. Instead of the 4-5 existing meteors from P1, you’ll get six new ones that fall rapidly at the start of this phase -- which is exactly 65 seconds after the first golems spawn and doesn’t care how much progress you’ve made, so it can overlap the end of 2a. The meteors still do raidwide damage, still kill you if you stand underneath them, and still wipe the raid if you place them too close together. The six red/yellow meteors are followed immediately by the three golem meteors. There are two popular ways to handle this wave of meteors.

Strategy 1: Run around the edgeIf you can kill the final golem fast enough, this method is easy and fairly consistent. It works best with a timed /p macro that warns as the first meteor is approaching (60 seconds after golems spawn), and the red meteor marker signals when to start running. Everyone groups up on top of the final golem’s corpse, and runs clockwise around the arena in a tight pack, not stopping until the green markers appear. This disperses the meteors evenly along the outside of the arena, and lets you use the inner circles (fondly known in our group as “the boob circles”) for the golems. Due to connection latency, your character should appear to be slightly ahead of everyone else on your screen.

Strategy 2: Fixed-position placementsThis strategy is the most refined version I’ve seen for “just drop the meteors in specific spots”. The raid splits into two groups of four as the final golem dies, and moves to 12 o’clock and 6 o’clock. From there, you move to fixed points on the ground in a clockwise direction, as per the instructions in this image (credit to Jager Bomb & Versus Oneshot):

After the second golem meteors fall, it’s the same mechanics and strategy as 2a. Burn a single color down so you don’t have to deal with it, feeding it two meteors on the way, then repeat for the remaining two golems. Keep PLD or BRD focused on blue following the first switch to silence Earthshock. Each golem should ideally eat two meteors, and all meteors must be gone by the end of the phase.

When 65 seconds have elapsed, regardless of progress on the golems, Nael will announce Megaflare with a 10 second visual countdown. This needs every possible piece of damage mitigation -- Galvanize, Stoneskin, etc. -- as it does 5k-6k damage to everyone before that mitigation. Kill golems ASAP and hustle to get the shields in place. If any meteors are left when Megaflare goes off, they will explode and wipe the raid. Golems won’t wipe you directly if left alive, but it probably means you don’t have Succor and Stoneskin on everyone, which is a problem.

Phase 3: 64% - 47.00%The arena changes to resemble the Carteneau Flats, and the MT should run to the east or west side of the arena ASAP. Nael will immediately Dalamud Dive the person with the highest aggro for AOE damage, which should be the MT, but Nael still tracks aggro during the golem phase. WHMs will need to pop Shroud in there somewhere to avoid getting targeted by Dalamud Dive. Melee classes should not join the MT until the dive to avoid the AOE.

● Heavensfall: Immediately after Dalamud Dive and at long-ish intervals thereafter, a giant Allagan tower will fall in the center of the arena, killing anyone under it and dealing more damage the closer you are to the center. However, it also has a huge knockback, and the wall kills you, so the ideal spot is 60% towards the center (i.e. if you draw a line from the edge to the center, 60% of the line is between you and the edge).

○ Each tower creates yellow pulses on the ground to be avoided. The first one is a large wedge from the center to the north and south walls, so tanking Nael to the east or west is ideal. The second one, however, is a large number of smaller wedges that alternate (think Demon Wall’s void zones), and those must be actively dodged. The third set moves like a wheel around the arena, but ideally you won’t see that one.

○ The tower itself, like the edge of the arena, also kills you if you touch it.○ This move has a cast bar, so you have a few seconds to get into position.○ Many groups find it helpful to have a waypoint denoting a safe place to group up for Megaflare (group

heals) and Heavensfall. There are spokes pointing to the “boob circles” in phases 1 and 2 -- an ideal waypoint spot is centered on the small dot at the tip of each spoke.

● Nael no longer uses Ravensbeak or Ravensclaw (so standing in front is safe), but auto-attacks deal more damage and there are several new mechanics.

● Bahamut’s Claw: Multiple physical hits to the MT for high damage. This isn’t a huge problem right now, but it will be in phase 4.

● Garrote Twist: A random-aggro debuff that applies a stack of Garrote at regular intervals. Nine stacks of Garrote will kill you, but nothing bad happens until then.

● The Ghost of Meracydia: The adds for phase 3, one after each Heavensfall. Picked up by OT.○ Tail Whip: A single-target (not cleave) hit for 5k-6k damage.○ Fire Breath: Liquid Hell. Persistent fire AOE that ticks for 1.5k damage.○ Their auto-attacks also hit for up to 2k. Everything coming out of the Ghost hits hard.○ Binding Chain: At 50% HP, it stops hitting the OT and channels this skill on two random players, who

will be marked by Holmgang-like chains from the Ghost. This cast takes about 10 seconds and adds Garrote stacks to the chained players as it goes. If the add isn’t killed by the end of the cast, those players die, no matter how many stacks of Garrote they have. Save all cooldowns and burst damage for this.

○ Death AOE: As it dies, the Ghost marks a huge circle AOE on the ground that needs to be avoided. Melee should start running as soon as they use their final GCD. It’s not instant death, but it’s not good.

○ Finally, each Ghost produces three white circles on the ground upon death which heal Garrote Twist and Garotte when stepped on. These are precious resources that disappear when used, so only players with Garrote TWIST -- not just regular Garrote stacks from the add -- should pick them up! Nael’s second cast of Garrote Twist will happen right before Heavensfall 2, and you can grab a circle right away as long as you’re positioned properly for the knockback immediately after.

● Super Nova: These are cast during the second Heavensfall, and are black AOE void zones (with no cast indicator) on two random players. Get out of them immediately. If you step in them after the first second or so, you’ll take lots of damage and a Heavy debuff, which makes dealing with Heavensfall very difficult. They disappear fairly quickly.

Most groups use their LB3 during this phase in one of three ways. You can melee LB3 the second Ghost to get it out of the way quickly; you can caster LB3 Nael and the first Ghost to push the phase; or you can kill the first Ghost and melee LB3 Nael after Heavensfall #2 to push the phase before ever seeing the second Ghost. The latter two methods require high DPS and are not recommended for new groups (melee LBing the second Ghost is more consistent).

It’s important to get Nael to 47% before the third Heavensfall, and ideally with all Ghosts dead or almost dead. That Heavensfall is a huge pain to deal with, and the Ghost being dead or mid-cast for Binding Chain means it’s not hitting your OT while Nael starts phase 4. Basically, you don’t want any of the P3 mechanics happening when P4 starts.

tl;dr - Don’t stand in the yellow slices or void zones, focus adds, save DPS cooldowns for Binding Chain, death AOE

Phase 4: 47% - 0%This phase starts when Nael casts Bahamut’s Favor for the first time as you move from 47% to 46%, which summons three untargetable dragons around the edge of the arena -- Fireclaw, Iceclaw, and Thunderclaw. Unlike P1, all players

(including ranged classes) should group on or very close to the MT until a mechanic dictates otherwise. DRG and MNK will want to learn when Thunderstruck (below) is going out and time their rear/flank attacks appropriately.

For all of this phase, and unlike phase 3, prioritize learning the mechanics over taking risks and pushing your DPS. It takes long enough to get here, and there are plenty of mechanics to learn.

● Bahamut’s Favor: The move itself gives Nael a stack of Damage Up, making this phase progressively harder to heal as the stacks add up, but the real problems are the dragons’ attacks.

○ Fireball: A player will be targeted by a yellow line, and after a few seconds, they’ll do a fire AOE around them (think Scylla’s fireballs in Syrcus Tower). This does minimal damage and applies the Firescorched debuff...but it kills anyone who is already Firescorched (bad) and removes Icebitten (good). The accepted strategy is that Fireballs are alternately taken out of the group and brought into the group (“fire out”, “fire in”), starting with “out”. If you are targeted by a “fire out”, however, you’ll need to watch your stacks and ensure you don’t get hit by a “fire in” if you still have Firescorched.

○ Iceball: No line or marker, just a chunk of ice that flies at you and gives the Icebitten debuff. Like Firescorched, getting Icebitten a second time will kill you. Iceclaw will go through the whole party list before targeting you again, so you have that much time to stand in a fire AOE to remove the debuff. If you’re already Firescorched, Iceball will remove it. If you’re not targeted by a “fire out”, you never need to worry about this debuff. Just make sure you get hit by each “fire in”.

○ Thunderstruck: Doesn’t interact with the above two, but also doesn’t have an obvious line or marker. A visible bolt of lightning will strike a random player and grant the Thunderstruck debuff, which explodes in a medium-ish AOE after five seconds. Anyone hit with the AOE will take lots of damage and get a crippling, non-healable Paralyze. The player with the debuff is not affected, so running out of the group negates the entire attack.

○ Bahamut’s Claw: As in P3, but with more hits and way more damage. This is the tank/healer mechanic for this phase, and it becomes very challenging as Bahamut’s Favor adds up. With one Favor stack, a single PLD can survive with a ton of cooldowns, but you’ll want to tank-swap it later on. You can either swap right before, have the OT take every hit with cooldowns, and then Provoke it back, or Provoke mid-Claw to have each tank take half of the hits.

● Lunar Dynamo combo1. Ravensdive: As in P1. If your aggro is set up normally/correctly, the Ravensdive will always target the

person who got the first “fire out”.2. Thunderstruck: This happens at the same time as Ravensdive, but the explosion happens during Lunar

Dynamo’s donut.3. Lunar Dynamo: Immediately after Ravensdive, and thus not centered on where the MT was standing.

Everyone needs to quickly follow the Ravensdive or get hit by Dynamo. The trick to managing Thunderstruck here is for most of the party to stand behind Nael at the new position -- i.e. not too far from where you were before -- and for the Thunder target to stand ahead. Nael’s facing doesn’t change after Ravensdive, so this boils down to “the Thunder target just needs to run a bit further than everyone else”. This is also doable a bunch of other ways, so figure out what works for your group.

● Iron Chariot/Beam combo○ Iron Chariot: Now it starts the combo, and will start its cast a second or two after the red line for the

second “fire out”. It’s not preceded by a dive, so it’s just a circle around the boss. Then a few things happen at once:

○ Thunderstruck hits a non-MT target;○ Thermionic Beam’s marker appears over a different non-MT target;○ and three Super Novas are cast on three more non-MT targets. To handle this, everyone but the MT

and the Beam target should stay scattered following Iron Chariot, and NOT in the middle of the room. As the second Super Nova hits, everyone converges on the center to soak the Beam damage, leaving the third Super Nova behind them. Thunderstuck explodes around the first or second Super Nova, and that player can head to the center as soon as it does.

○ With careful positioning, melee DPS can form a triangle around Nael to continue DPSing during this combo (especially MNK to avoid losing stacks), but be very very mindful of the Super Novas.

○ A “fire in” Fireball also goes out right after Beam, so make sure to get hit by that (excepting possibly the target of the “fire out” from Iron Chariot, if they still have Firescorched).

● Divebombs○ For this attack, the placement of the dragons from Bahamut’s Favor is key. There are exactly three

possible dragon layouts, and each pattern will appear only once until all three are exhausted. The divebomb pattern from the first Bahamut’s Favor will be random out of the three, the second Favor’s divebombs will be one of the other two, and the third Favor’s will be the final pattern.

○ There are two actual divebombs, with a marker for each; one with two dragons at once, and then one with just the final dragon. Since there are only three possible patterns, it’s a matter of quickly identifying which pattern is active and setting waypoints accordingly. We use waymark A for where to place the first divebomb, and waymark B for the second, with waymark C always at 12 o’clock for orientation. Placing these marks is an excellent job for the main tank at the beginning of the phase, right as Favor is being cast. Pop your cooldowns for Bahamut’s Claw and scope out the arena as follows:

■ If there is a dragon at 12 o’clock, it’s “north pattern”, or “pattern 1”, or whatever. Place divebomb #1 at 2 o’clock (A), and divebomb #2 at 9 o’clock (B). (images courtesy of Stufoo)

■ If there is a dragon at 6 o’clock, it’s “south pattern”/”pattern 2”. Place divebomb #1 at 5 o’clock (A), and divebomb #2 at 10 o’clock (B).

■ If there is no dragon at either 12 o’clock or 6 o’clock, it’s pattern 3. Place divebomb #1 at 7 o’clock (A), and divebomb #2 at 12 o’clock (C). Note that there is no “B” for this pattern!

○ Everyone who is not placing a divebomb marker should stay in the center of the arena, loosely spread out for Meteor Stream (see below) but not so far that you get hit by a divebomb. When placing markers, get as close to the wall as you can to minimize how much of the arena is hit by each dragon. As divebombs are approaching, make sure you know where the waypoints are so you can start running if targeted! It’s also a good idea to pop Sprint after placing the marker to make sure you avoid the actual divebomb.

○ But that’s not all! During the first and third Bahamut’s Favor divebombs, you’ll have to deal with a double Meteor Stream. Do not stand next to anyone with a white marker, and try to leave room for the divebomb-placers to get back to the middle without running smack into a Stream. Like in phase 1, this is followed by Dalamud Dive on the MT, so stay spread out until Nael lands to avoid that AOE.

○ During the second Bahamut’s Favor divebombs, it gets even worse. Nael will cast Iron Chariot (ground circle AOE) right after the first divebomb marker, single-target dive to the MT, and then Lunar Dynamo

(big donut) right as the final divebomb goes out. Depending on the divebomb pattern, the person placing the second marker may not be able to get there in time, even with Sprint. Don’t sweat it, though. Better for one person to get hit by Dynamo than for the whole group to wipe to a divebomb.

First & Third Bahamut’s Favor rotationClaw > Fire (out) > Lunar Dynamo combo > Fire (in) > Fire (out) > Chariot/Beam combo > Fire (in) > Claw > Divebombs (first 2) > Meteor Stream 1 > Divebomb (final) > Meteor Stream 2 > Dalamud Dive on MT > a brief respite where Nael only auto-attacks before the next Favor

Second Bahamut’s Favor rotation(first row same as above) >Divebombs (first 2) > Iron Chariot > Divebomb (final) > Raven Dive to MT > Lunar Dynamo > that brief respite again

tl;dr - There isn’t one. Sorry. Phase 4 is hard.

Ideally you will kill Nael by the fourth cast of Bahamut’s Favor or shortly thereafter. Once you get through a full Favor rotation with everyone alive, you’ve totally got this. You can do it!