Killing SoM : DAOC Submissions

I pulled this off the boards, i hope this will help

------------------------------------------------------
Version 1.00
Shades of Mist
By Borlac Deathdealer, Aka Galac_Usul on VN
----------------------------------------------------
Where to go:
Ok, lets start off with getting to this encounter. Shades of Mist is located in Tyhpoons Reach, which is just west of Volcanus Haven, if you port there using the Djinn stone.

This is a very easy and short ride to this encounter, and the easiest way to remember how to get there, as well as the safest, is to head into Typhoons Reach, and head directly North along the wall, which will be on your left.

Youll recognize the encounter as it has 3 rectagular pedistals, not very tall however.

The first thing youll need to do when you get here is determine whether or not the encounter is even up, which you can easily determine by looking to see if there are large lion like Sphinx's on these pedistals, as well as a lone statue in the very center of them.

Now, if the encounter is up, lets get you setup, what exactly is recommended to bring to do this reliably with a servant necro.



----------------------------------------------------
What you need to do the encounter:
----------------------------------------------------
Things that are necessary to bring:
Bare necessities:
-Servant necro (sight necro can fill this role as well, but the lower the damage shield for the necro, the more difficult this encounter will become as well as length)
-Cleric with at least 35 in enhance as well as 25% bonus to stat enhancement from ToA and Catacombs items.
-Some form of power for the necromancer. These can range from FoP, MCL, and a second necro that can transfer power to the necro.


Recommended:
-Servant with at least 44 in servant.
-Cleric with 50 enhance, 25% bonus to stat enhancement, 25% to healing bonus, and Font of Power(FoP).
-MCL 2 or greater on necromancer.
- DI 1+ on the cleric.

- Notice - Healing Field (HF - ML3 perfector ability) does not work on the necromancer pet, and is unnecessary when doing this encounter.

----------------------------------------------------
Things that are useful to bring that can help speed this encounter:
----------------------------------------------------
Additions and extras:
- One to 2 other servant necros.
- A minstrel with a orange or red pet, fully buffed.
- A Master Level 9 sorc or cabalist.


----------------------------------------------------
Things to avoid having add into the fight, but may sit along for credit/artifact/loot:
----------------------------------------------------
Who sits on the sidelines:
-Infiltrator
-Scout
-Tanks or others that may attempt to damage/grab aggro from the necromancer

Now you may question why you would not want any of these things to try to help kill the greater crinosphinxs, but I will get to this later when I explain how this encounter works and how aggro works on these mobs.


----------------------------------------------------
IMPORTANT! - How this encounter works:
----------------------------------------------------
Once you have at least the bare necessities to do this encounter, dont jump in head first, even if you think you understand the encounter. Theres far more to this encounter then meets the eye, and knowledge is one of your greatest strengths that the necromancer uses to make these encounters doable. In other words, we observe, note, test, and experiment with things to determine the nature and workings of encounters. Because we have done this, we know how to do these encounters with very high success rates, but we never stop at just 'acceptable', we always try to find newer and better ways to do them, whether it is faster, with fewer people, or with less resource useage. To succeed in doing what your wanting to do, which in this case is complete the Shades of Mist encounter, use your brain. And Knowledge is what your brain is needing here, which I am about to provide to you.

----------------------------------------------------
Aggro Code:
----------------------------------------------------
This is the single most dangerous part of this encounter, and what gets many people killed, is that they assume these mobs work like regular mobs, which they do not.

First off, they have a very very large aggro radius, which I would estimate at around 1.5k+ unit's aggro radius circle. WIth all 3 sphinx's, there are few spots that are safe from at least not aggroing one of them without being far away.

Second, these mobs react different to those that attack it then others. Instead of having a solid aggro build, these things basically have either a very small aggro 'pool', if you will or those that attack/heal those being aggro, instantly go to the top of the aggro list, which causes the mobs to attack the one generating the aggro. Heres how the pool idea works: the more damage, healing, whatever can generate aggro, is put into this pool, the deeper it is, the greater chance of the mob staying on you if you are the primary one that is 'filling' the pool. This works on other encounters very well, and is important to remember.

Which of these is in fact the truth about them, is rather difficult to resolve, because it is not easy to determine, because both situations seem to occur, so take both as a possibility. Playing safe on assumptions is always the best.

- Important -
Now, heres the big thing that alot of people do not know about this encounter, is that these mobs will lose aggro IF they are not being attacked! So, if you cast dmg shield, HoT, but your pet does not swing its big nasty sword at the mob, it will soon lose aggro on the mob and it will go back to its pedistal. You can reaquire aggro by having your pet swing at it more.

This is why the infiltrator, scout, tanks, or whatever is not cabable of handling these mobs very well, should stay out of the fight. Well built tanks can help hold aggro and damage, but if anyone else helps in trying to damage them, they may grab aggro from the tank and take a severe amount of damage, and soon result in the cleric healing the other too much to generate aggro on the cleric itself.


So basically anyone that swings their sword, casts a spell that heals/attacks the mobs, may generate aggro on the mobs, and when you are trying to kill them on your pets damage shield, this is a bad thing. Very bad.

----------------------------------------------------
What to do to Complete the Encounter:
----------------------------------------------------
The objective of this encounter is:

- To kill all 3 sphinx guardians
- Grab the long black cloak from the center statue by right clicking on it
- Exitt the circle with cloak in hand after the first 2 are done.

Once these 3 things are done, the long black cloak will turn into a unactivated version of the Shades of Mist. This encounter works with BGs.

What order you do those first 2 steps, is entirely up to you, because it is possible to do it in either order. But I will tell you the easiest way.
----------------------------------------------------
What NOT to do:
Do NOT let anyone with Sphinx aggro run outside of the center, or the cloak will go BACK to the statue. This isnt quite what happens, but its a good idea to keep it as a baseline for it, because theres a way to stop their 'god mode'.

'God mode' when referred to Shades of Mist, is when the sphinxes either step outside the circle, chasing someone, and they are instantly have a glowing effect about their body. At this point, the sphinxs will hit 3-4 times HARDER then normal, as well as become much more difficult to hit/kill. That does not mean it is impossible to kill them in this state, as I have had my close PvE farming friend take them down in this mode. I recommend not doing this however.
----------------------------------------------------
IMPORTANT - Time Limit:
Dont freak out when I say time limit. This is different from other encounters such as Golden Spear, where if you do not kill some of the mobs in a certain amount of time the encounter will reset completely, and/or you will not be able to do it again. What I mean by time limit is that after a time period, the mobs will go into god mode. Dont freak out when this happens, and think your screwed. There is a very simple, easy, fast way to counter this. Grab the cloak from the statue again. It will aggro all 3 sphinxes, but it will turn off their godmode instantly.
----------------------------------------------------
Helpful Information - When they go into god mode, and you grab the cloak again, all of the sphinx will drop to 75% life, but those that were below will go back up to 75% life. I would estimate their Time Limit is approximately 10-20 minutes, so if you think they may be nearing this edge, and have yet to pull, wait it out, and you can knock down one of the mobs down to 75% life without even doing any work.

Also, there are orange salamanders that are near this encounter, so you want to be very careful if you see any or very many. Have anyone helping you kill these mobs while you handle the sphinxs. Try to kill any in the way before you start if within range.

----------------------------------------------------
How to do the Encounter:
----------------------------------------------------
If something starts to goes wrong, see the bottom of this section.
----------------------------------------------------
Setup:
Always best to setup to do an encounter first, instead of just charging in, because being setup means your more prepared.

Best spot to put your raid and people, is on the Southern side of the encounter, 1/2 between the 2 closest pedistals, but just outside the circle. From here, buff all needed people, this mainly includes those using pet classes to deal damage to the sphinxs.

Casting FoP or staying here is not recommended or needed, its just the 'starting' place for your raid party. Youll be moving inside the circle after you start the encounter.

Make sure you mention where for the raid party to go as soon as you start the encounter, which will be either the left or right sphinx closest to the necro, and have them cast FoP there. Basically you will be moving into that sphinxs 'territory'.
----------------------------------------------------
Starting:
The Vision of Sages (VoS) walkthroughs for this are a little out of date, because of lack of information. So, you do not, will not, and will never need, a sacrifical lamb to grab the cloak. Whether this is with a pet class, or a tank.

FYI, I also wrote a bit of a walkthrough to VoS, and they have it posted, but this was when I knew less about this encounter, and I was sight specced, so ignore it.

Have the servant necro walk/run between the 2 aggro radius' of the Sphinxs, and have him grab the cloak. Whether or not he gets aggro along the way is not important, just a good idea to try to grab the cloak before the sphinxs get to the necro, as the 'god' mode will hurt alot. As soon as you grab the cloak, cast your necros Damage Shield (DS) and Heal Over Time (HoT), and have your cleric/support move to the aggreed upon spot in the circle. This next part you need to make sure you do correctly, or you will bring trouble to your raid. Not trouble you shouldnt be able to handle, but unnecessary trouble.

You need to make sure you target whichever sphinx your group has moved into their territory, by telling your pet to 'attack' that sphinx. The other 2 will lose aggro fairly soon, and walk back to their own pedistal. If you are safely within this sphinxs territory, the other 2 will never aggro your group unless you reactivate the encounter when they go god mode, or someone in your party goes into their territory.

Make sure the necro is somewhat close to the statue, in case they do go into god mode, so that the necro can quickly turn it off.

----------------------------------------------------
First Sphinx:
With a full buffed necro pet and capped resistances, the damage they will do is between 90 - 180 or so damage, and will deal back about 75-10 damage with the damage shield. Luckly, this is controlable just by the HoT itself, which is necessary or else your cleric will grab aggro in a very short amount of time.

Pick up any loot.
----------------------------------------------------
!IMPORTANT!
----------------------------------------------------
So, from here, cast DS every 30 seconds, and HoT every 15 seconds, until you are either low on power or the mob is dead. If your pet starts getting lower on health, allow the cleric to ONLY throw 1, MAYBE 2 small heals onto the necro. Any more, and you will almost guarentee get aggro.

If you run out of power on the necromancer, have the necro put pet on passive, and either wait for DS to do not damage for 10 seconds, or the mob loses aggro, and cast MCL. If you rely on FoP for this, you will want to do this in short bursts fairly often, because the mob will heal if you let it sit unattacked for a period of time. With a second necro, just have them transfer power to you when needed.

Continue to do this until the mob is dead. If you follow the strict aggro guidelines and are careful, you will kill the first mob within a very reasonable amount of time.
----------------------------------------------------
Second Sphinx:
If you killed the first one easily, with no trouble, then wait a minute for necromancer to gain full power and the necro pet to be at full health. Then pick one of the second 2 and just pull him to your spot, and repeat as the first one. This one will be at 100% if it was on its pedistal for a small period of time, unaggroed. Take him down as fast as possible, but will usually be a bit longer then the first. If this gets extended too long, the time limit will hit, and it will regain full life. So taking down the first and second mobs in as short a period of time is highly advised.

If they go god mode while on the second sphinx, just grab the cloak again and start over on the mob.

Still be aware to stay out of the last sphinx's territory until the last one is dead.

Pick up loot.
----------------------------------------------------
Third Sphinx:
If you killed Sphinx two before they went into god mode, and its nearing 20 minutes, be prepared for this one to do it to you.

Just rinse and repeat for this one. Once he is dead, make sure that everyone is in the BG/group that needs credit, make sure you pick up the rest of the loot, and that one of your group/BG has the long black cloak (necro should still have it), then just have the necro leave the circle.

Thats it! Youve just completed Shades of Mist Encounter!



----------------------------------------------------
What to do if something goes wrong:
----------------------------------------------------
Q. If the Sphinxs turn into god mode
A. Have the necromancer, or even a sacrifical lamp, right click on the statue again to grab the cloak. This will immediately cancel their God Mode, but will generate aggro from all 3 mobs. The Necromancer just has to repeat what he did at the beginning of the encounter, and that is to only have the pet melee the one you are currently trying to kill, ignoring the others. Even with the damage shield up, they will lose aggro.
----------------------------------------------------
Q. What if someone or the cleric grabs aggro from the necromancer?
A. Make sure you state to them before not to panic, and just stop attacking/healing, and allow the mob to hit them a few times, but have the pet constantly swinging on it. If they die, sorry, but just resurrect them when they do. The longer the pets swinging on it, the faster the sphinx will refix aggro to the pet. If its your cleric and your only cleric, be ready to burn instas. Healing font can be useful to help keep those that steal aggro alive longer and better, but it may generate aggro on the caster of it.
----------------------------------------------------
Q. What if whoever grabs aggro, panics, and either runs outside the circle dragging the sphinx with them or aggro a second or third sphinx?
A. If they run outside of the encounters circle, tell them to immediately right click on the statue, and tell them to get inside. If they aggro more sphinxs, tell them to get away from them, and to not attack them. Do not have your clerics heal these people, or else they may generate aggro from the added sphinxs. Another way is to have the necro attack them and try to grab aggro, but this can become very dangerous and tedious.
----------------------------------------------------
Q. We all died, are we still going to be able to complete this encounter?
A. Oh god yes! I cant name the number of times in the past that I have died 2, 3, 5 or more times on one attempt of this. I still cant get a perfect record on this encounter. Couple things to be aware of, if you do fail, is at how many of the sphinxs are still alive, and whether or not they are in god mode again. If any are dead, you can move into their territory with ease. If they are in god mode again, just grab the cloak again.

If all are alive and not in god mode, make sure you try to pull their aggro into the circle, so that you dont have them running outside of it, unless you want to purposefully make them turn into god mode, which I personally have no problem with if your careful with how you do it, because when you turn it off, as mentioned, they are at 75% life.

If they are all alive and in god mode, just do the encounter as if you hadnt even started yet.