Question: How is Tanking Empties different

[DarleneFFXI]

I realized I probably should post this question here. For someone who has never fought an empty, I would like to know what are some of the new ins and outs of tanking or damage-dealing against an Empty as opposed to other mobs. It is my understanding that they behave differently, so I would like to hear some of the tricks and treats people have found.

Let me admit first, that I am by no means a stellar tank. I have only gotten my warrior to 35 and ninja to 29, and I'm still learning new ways to keep and use hate in a fight. But small things like MB'ing ice magic was a new idea I never knew would work until I tried it. And I always tried to get in hate using Slow & Poison magic or what not. I belive there are tricks like this that I need to know if I'm going to do well in the promys.

Thanks in advance.

 

[CmdrFly]

Buy Shade gear. It's all lv25 I think (definitely under 30), and gives you Empty Killer on each piece (plus the +1 gives evasion boosts, albeit small amounts). For each piece of shade EQ you have equipped, you get one more chance for Empty Killer to proc - I think. Someone please correct me if that's wrong.

Aside from that, the promy's really arent too difficult... get a competant party and hammer out your strategy down to the finest details before you climb the spire.

 

[Anaeran]

For the most part, you'll want to avoid agro whenever possible in the first three promys. You can get to the top with relatively few encounters if your party is on their toes. If you do get agro, just pull it to a safe spot on the side and beat it down. Its not too tricky unless you're talking multiple links.

As pointed out above- shade armor will help for those few encounters you're forced to fight through, though it is not required to succeed.

Its probably a good idea to farm Animas in each of the promys on their first floors. The mobs here are weak and can be soloed for the most part.

Once you have your animas (for weakening the bosses) proceed to the top as carefully as possible. Determine the strategy you want to use and have at it. Depending on your party makeup you may want to bring appropriate meds/potions to help relieve some pressure on your mages. Its up to you

Hope this helped some. If you have any other questions regarding promys you can shoot Arctyrael a tell in game- he coordinates CK promy runs for applicants who need them/friends/etc.

 

[Kyrial]

I've been the tank (or rather, one of the tanks) in pretty much every Promy-related thing I've done thus far (first as NIN, and more recently as WAR/NIN), and it's not different from tanking any other mob. I never had Shade gear; it would help, but I always did fine without it. Basically, if you're gonna blink tank empty (which I'm assuming you are, since you mentioned WAR and NIN), just remember to have echo drops, as the non-Wanderer mobs have an AoE silence/blind move. Eye Drops certainly wouldn't hurt either.

 

[Strid]

Most parties, pre weakening the promys, took two WAR/NIN (NIN/WAR sometimes but is less effective). Between two of these tanking is no problem just bounce hate back and forth depending who has shadows up and what not. Shade gear wasn't implemented at the time of my passing of these areas so I render it useless...save your money animas too. Just go through there like you would anywhere else but like stated before try to avoid, which is easy, aggro as much as possible. Ky left out one more thing you should take and that would be Antidotes. While you're in a promy zone never count on a mage. They are busy busy busy up there and may miss something also, everybit of help you give a mage, by unhexing yourself, will benifit the party in there.

 

[Kyrial]

I knew I forgot something! Yeah, antidotes are nice to have, too. And for Holla, Poison Potions and Holy Water.

But do get animas. Some people beat it without them and act like they're useless, but they help a LOT. Just remember that if you're gonna bring them, you only need a few. I see people getting ready to go through and demanding that everyone have some (or all 3) animas. Totally unnecessary, and a total waste of time. Mages should never even get close enough to the boss to use them, for one thing. Melees should have 1 or 2 each, but even if only one person has some, that's fine.

Dem doesn't even really need animas, it's so easy. With Mea they help (especially the one that stops special attacks, since Impalement can make things go bad very quickly), and with Holla they were pretty much necessary for my group. A lot of people seem to have had the opposite problem my group had (beat Holla easy, but had lots of trouble with Mea), but whatever. Like Strid mentioned, with two tanks, you can deal with little emergencies like Impalement a lot easier. Holla's boss, though, liked spamming the hell out of us with his Curse+Sleep special, and then further in the battle, kept trying to absorb our HP to heal himself. Lots of the anima that stops special attacks (Hystero, I think?) helped a ton with him. 2 SMNs helped a lot too, of course. I still had to Mijin Gakure him when he got down to a sliver of health, just to keep him from absorbing our HP to heal himself. Luckily it finished him off.

 

[ShomeGhuye]

save your money animas too.

I haven't fought a promy boss after they were nerfed, so I don't know how hard or easy they are these days. However, animas used to play an integral role in beating the mea boss, and partly holla. You should get some incase of an emergency.

As far as tanking goes - I'm not a tank, so I have nothing to say. Biggest difference I would say is for magic users, since the empty advertise their elemental affinity - thereby telling you what they are weak against.

 

[Ecks]

Well i did the promy runs after the nerf and having a strat and using the animas definately helped a ton. It might have made things easier than they needed to be, but hey, we beat them all, and the only time we lost was our first attempt (at Dem) since we didnt exactly know what to expect.

 

[wolfskymoon]

Shade gear is one of the most useless things you can spend money on.Just get good exp gear and you should be fine.

 

[hellstorm]

Shade gear is one of the most useless things you can spend money on.Just get good exp gear and you should be fine.

nothing is ever useless everything has a purpose