Missions: The Savage (CoP 4-2) - Third Time's the Charm

We headed back out to Monarch Linn through Riverne Site B01 last night to face Ouryu again, hoping to show him he couldn't push around like he had last week. We went with the same jobs:

Wendell WHM50/BLM25
Elboron BRD50/WHM25
Itera MNK50/WAR25
Grymalkyn THF50/RNG25
Splinte WAR50/NIN25
Tsakiki PLD50/WAR25

I didn't bother with any au laits, since Horrid Roar would just remove it, so I used the space for more hi-potions, and had 20 of those on me. I also had Qiara make me a stack of fish mithkabobs, since they're still a good defense boost for the level, and a lot better to use as a one minute food (assuming they'd get stripped from me) than Tavnazian Tacos. I also set up a separate macro palette, just for things I'd need to do in this particular fight. Other than that, I had the same items as last week: Blink Band, Memento Muffler, High Breath Mantle, and the rest of my level 50 tanking gear. We all had reraise items, and a strong will to not let the nasty wyrm beat us again.

We had to fight three drakes (and a hippogryph) to get the Giant Scale we'd need for the unstable portal. We were doing a good job avoiding any of the mobs as we made our way through the different islands until we got to one with 2 hippogryphs (true sight) and a whole herd of malboros (detect by sound). Wendell and Elboron cast Sneak on us all, and we made our way to the next portal. We were spread out across the island, and at the exact same moment, on opposite sides of the island, Grym and Splinte were spotted by the two hippogryphs. Because we were spread out, and because the malboros immediately joined in when the hippogryphs hit the Mithras, we had to let them die. The aggroing mobs despawned or wandered away, and I raised Grym and Wendell raised Splinte. We waited for their weakness to wear, and continued on to Monarch Linn. We hoped their deaths weren't harbingers for more doom.

Our plan was to fight Ouryu near the entrance tunnel, with me standing just to the right of the entrance, having Ouryu perpendicular to the tunnel, and Wendell and Elboron right at the tunnel. The last one standing, presumably Grym, was to drag Ouryu to the back of the arena to give us time to reraise and run back down the tunnel to recover without Ouryu noticing us. Grym was also planning to Perfect Dodge, Sleep Bolt Ouryu, then give him a good smack with Sneak Attack before dying.

As we were reviewing our plans before going in, Wendell made a comment about "when Kiki dies", so we made fun of that word "when", though really, I didn't think we wouldn't wipe. (I love double negatives.)

We went in, buffed up, got reraise on everyone, rested for MP, and headed in. Grym ran in to get aggro and pulled Ouryu to where I was waiting, and we started in on the fight. I did what I could to keep hate and help keep my HP up. Provoke, Flash, weaponskill with TP, Cure IIIs when I could, Shield Bash - the usual PLD stuff. Itera and Splinte were using Raging Fists -> Raging Axe for Detonation. Grym was using blind and acid bolts to help enfeeble Ouryu. Wendell and Elboron were keeping Barstonra and Earth Carol on us, trying to keep Ouryu Silenced and Finaled, and both were frantically trying to keep Kiki and everyone else alive.

Ouryu did Horrid Roar twice, the first time knocking off 8 of my buffs, the second time just 7. Wendell was quick to get Protect III back on me, and Elboron made sure to get Earth Carol back up, and I quickly ate more food, drank another juice, and used another charge on my Memento Muffler. Ouryu did more AOEs than I remember from our two fights last week. Typhoon Wing would take around 200 points off each of us, and Stonega IIs were doing 100-140 damage. Slowga was annoying, but at least not deadly. I only remember one Geotic Breath, which hit me for just 93 damage. Ouryu hits like a train at times, but it was so variable. Sometimes he'd hit me for as little as 50 points, and other times as much as 280, on a normal hit. Usually it seemed around 100 damage.

The fight was very tough, but we really didn't have to do anything "strategic". We just kept plugging away at him, and I just kept getting hit. I held hate throughout, but with the AOEs, there was a lot of damage to go around. The melees all had au laits, which helped out, as well as a few hi-potions. I ended up going through my entire supply of 20 hi-potions, and most of my MP. At one point, it looked like we were going to eat dirt, since my health got down to 28. But I chugged some potions in quick succession, and Wendell and Elboron got me back up to a better health level.

When we got Ouryu down below 50%, Itera threw on Hundred Fists. Unfortunately, Ouryu decided to jump up in the air about then, so a few of those fists didn't hit until Grym's mistmelt brought him back down. Splinte threw on Mighty Strikes to time it with their skillchain, and Splinte's 262 point Raging Axe was the deciding blow for the fight. We had won! No deaths! We won! We couldn't believe it. I think Grym was a bit disappointed he missed out on the sleep bolt/sneak attack he had planned, but I'm so happy we won and didn't have to die to do it. Grym ended up using 4 of the mistmelts during the fight.

The fight took us 11 minutes and 22 seconds, about a minute off the current record, so we felt it wasn't too shabby. As usual, I didn't get any action shots, and had to settle for a post-fight screenshot of the happy group.

New titles: Mist Melter, Nag'molada's Underling