Rewatching my guide, some viewers might be confused as to why I show group 1 going East and group 2 going West at times. A top-down guide makes this hard to see, but group 1 are moving left and group 2 are moving right from THEIR perspective. Phases of the Shadow has the boss turn towards a random player before the cast. As players are moving around a lot before some of these casts, the boss's direction can feel fairly random. This is why fixed positions don't work great for the stack. If your boss faces towards one of your fixed positions, the group who are supposed to stack on the opposite side will have a big problem trying to get to their spot while also dodging the 'out'. I still think the best solution to this is stack positions RELATIVE TO WHERE YOU'RE MOVING TOWARDS. For phases of the shadow, you get behind the boss, run through to dodge the second cleave. While running through, group 1 starts to move slightly left, and group 2 starts to move slightly right. This ensures both groups have an easy time getting into stack groups. Fixed spots work slightly better for the stacks after gale sphere 2, but if your group is already using relative stack positions, you might as well use the same strat for these stacks as well. I've now released a mini-guide on how to do gale sphere 2 with fixed positions (True North Gp 1 N/W, Gp 2 S/E), so give that a watch and see if you prefer it. ruclips.net/video/U-C2nnjJhDI/видео.html Anyways, hope y'all enjoyed the guide!
I can honestly see the merit in both strats, and it's easy enough to adjust to anyway. But I guess some people are too lazy to just put something like "G1 N/W G2 S/E" or "TN gales" in their PF description, and instead would rather blame Hector for "ruining party finder" lmao.
Minor detail, but you don't need the OT to be second in aggro for the void meteor to target them. Those always target both tanks regardless of their threat level, unless one of the tanks is dead, then it will target someone else.
This is one of those fights where actually doing it and coming back to see a video like this again is super helpful. I did a few throwaway attempts with a practice first timer group, came back to watch this, and I had the confidence as if I'd cleared it. No more mistakes made.
I hear the accent with the word sphere. You've done well to hide it. I've always enjoyed hearing it. The favorite time was the "train to aire" because non new englanders had no clue where that train was going!
Thank you so much Hector, get some sleep, your animation guide is always appreciated it, and helped a lot during my first ex trials/savage, wish you the best and always maintain a healthy life hec
Incredible video as always. Adding the in game footage is so helpful too thank you so much for putting this out as quick as you do man. It's helped my casual groups prog a lot to have something to watch.
Our group had some visibility issues for double meteor so we ended up getting rid of the inter card markets and putting the square 1 market center. This made it easy to get the healer dead center and the corners of the square marker provided guides for everyone being knocked back. Worth a try for any group having the same kind of issues
Pretty sure Void Meteor targets both tanks despite aggro (if both alive ofc), I remember turning my stance on late some pulls and being targeted still, the 2nd tb definitely requires a swap tho so stance does still need to be on at some stage regardless
@@rpgdweller558 I think you're right tho. I was Off-Tank and didn't turn on my tankstance until Tankswap. Always got the second Void Meteor, despite of aggro.
@@usernamepog I'll double-check this. It's possible on my runs that the server still registered our tank as dead when the cast started and the busters were assigned.
EDIT Nvm what i just wrote. I didn't know the boss could actually be tilted towards an intercardinal. I was confused thinking that during the cast of those mechs, the boss would always face either north or south since the guide never shown or mentioned the boss could be tilted. For consistency' sake i'd also add that the stack parties during the small purple circle should have group 1 to the left and group 2 to the right, while in this guide you have g2 left and g1 right. Not that it matters much, but since g1 is usually left, it's just again, for consistency. I don't understand how "the way is facing" changes things. It doesn't have boss relatives mechanics. You have and should use markers. Just have g1 on 3 and g2 on 2. There's no risk of confusion. I'd say it's way more confusing continuing to swap sides when it's unnecessary. Im specifically talking about the shadow dragon mechanic. It's weird, first in the intro you say g1 left g2 right as per usual, but then during the whole guide almost always shows the opposite. I understand this was done very quickly, but yeah. It's quite unnecessarily confusing if you ask me.
Because the boss’s direction is semi-random before the mechanic having fixed spots for the stacks ends up really messy. In your example, if the boss happens to turn towards 1, the group who is supposed to stack at 3 is going to have an incredibly tough time dodging towards 1 for the front/back cleave and then getting to 3 without getting clipped by the out. With relative spots, you make which way the boss spins before irrelevant. Just walk through the boss and go left if 1, or through the boss and right if 2.
@@HectorHectorson Why would he run towards 1 tho. Unless you omitted it in the guide the boss is dead center. There;s only the half arena cleaves, and you can preposition g1 on the left and g2 on the right to make g1 go to 3 an g2 to 2. Instead, imo for no reason, you have g2 already prepositioned to the left and g1 to the right. Im talking about the 6 minute mark mech. I don't know, maybe it's my weird blm brain thinking about moving the least possible, but i really struggle to see how boss relatives (unless the boss moves/spins around) has any sort of relevancy to the "argument". EDIT OH ok, it was Turn not RUN xDDDD i think in your original message you had type run instead of turn hahaha, or maybe i've misread that. Ok it makes sense now.
Not run towards. Face towards, which determines the cleave directions. Fixed spots works fine for the spreads because you start IN, but the OUT during stacks limits where you can actually get to after dodging the front-back cleave. My group tried fixed spots east/west during prog. We had one pull where for the final out/stack, the boss turned to face perfectly east. This meant we went behind the boss, then moved across towards East, then got out. East stack group was sorted, but West stack group had no chance of making it all the way back to west and out.
@@HectorHectorson Yup, i edited my comment. But either im dumb and read "run" instead of "turn" or you actually wrote run first and then modded the comment (it says modified). So yeah now i gotcha. I was confused because in the visual guide the boss always faced north and it was never mentioned it could be tilted. I simply thought that during that cast, he'd always face either north or south, so i was like "why do i have to do boss relative and simply not having g1 use left side markers and g2 the right side". All cleared now.
@@davidepannone6021 No worries! Definitely think I could've explained it better, and still at least a 50:50 chance PF decides to stick with fixed spots. I might make a short follow-up video to explain this better than my long guide has, so thanks for the feedback!
Fantastic guide as always!! Makes it so simple to understand the mechanics in a nicely set out way, the top down style is so much easier to understand. Thank you so much for taking the time to make the guide as well as explaining everything clearly, it helps a ton!
Great to see your guides out so fast! ... (in the EU PFs, light party stacks are west/G1 & east/G2.., otherwise most in the EU are using your strats atm)
Thank you, so much simpler, shows a really keen understanding of all mechanics in the fight and could literally have a 5yo sat in front of it, and they could learn it provided the attention span was there. The wording is easy to understand and the graphic gives a great deal of context that can't be misunderstood. Honestly a perfect raid guide.
One little note, at least the first void meteor TB is NOT aggro based and seems to always target the tanks (if they are alive). I am not sure about the other ones or who it will prioritize if there is no second tank.
Why have group one going left and group one going right? Just keep them to their light party sides and tell them to go to their respective colors (group 1 purple and blue, group 2 red and yellow) to keep it consistent and prevent any camera angle 'my right vs bosses right' pf complications.
@@AdsAreRuiningEverything its less about knowing L/R and more about how some players use their camera. Some people *dont* move their camera relative to their own movement, which makes wall-relative strats not "always go left or right" because you might be facing the opposite way as the rest of the party. TN strats allow all players regardless of camera preference to do the mechanic the same way every time
@@ameliajohnson1726 That's just a skill issue at that point (I'm joking lol) But I can see what you mean, I'd just usually assume that people would do that
I was annotating this guide for teaching later and just now noticed that Phases of the Shadow signals the stored ability (Azdaja's Shadow) is about to be used while Blade means it isn't.. :I bruh.
Random question: Do you have a source for getting the arena images, or do you get them yourself somehow? I make diagrams for my static and it always helps a lot when I have access to an accurate reference for the arena.
For shadow you dont need to look at circles or orbs. The animation has either smoke coming from orbs in or out showing the same (smoke inside boss hitbox out-stack, smoke out in-spread)
If you're not a fan, change it up? Don't force people to do Your way because you can't look at the boss's ring and go "Oh... I'm NE boss relative" ... if the tank keeps the boss North, then it's both 'True North' and 'Boss Relative'.
No but this guide will force lots of players to adapt this this strat since PFs are filled with morons that take Hector’s guide to the dot without understanding how and why.
@@Nimoot man p5s tanks waiting at a wall while healers need their meele range uptime has still remained as the main goto pf strat Whoever comes first serves first in PF, making it a utter shitshow most of the time. This is slowly changing from useful to just bothersome lol
One PF variation Ive seen is that for Void Stardust, Light Party groups start E/W and adjust N/S to where the Exasquares start. No major difference to your strat, where LP groups start N/S and then adjust E/W. But people are likely to get mad about it, somehow.
E/W absolutely works just as well as N/S. It's just whatever people prefer. I'm sure everyone will express their preference as rationally and kindly as you have XD
I was legit waiting for this before I went in to prog. With Hector's excellent videos, I'll have this done by the early afternoon. Great guides, Hector!
As an exclusively legacy-cam gamepad player, I was super confused by left and right. I did not know standard players have their cameras automatically rotated towards the direction they are moving
Rewatching my guide, some viewers might be confused as to why I show group 1 going East and group 2 going West at times. A top-down guide makes this hard to see, but group 1 are moving left and group 2 are moving right from THEIR perspective.
Phases of the Shadow has the boss turn towards a random player before the cast. As players are moving around a lot before some of these casts, the boss's direction can feel fairly random.
This is why fixed positions don't work great for the stack. If your boss faces towards one of your fixed positions, the group who are supposed to stack on the opposite side will have a big problem trying to get to their spot while also dodging the 'out'.
I still think the best solution to this is stack positions RELATIVE TO WHERE YOU'RE MOVING TOWARDS.
For phases of the shadow, you get behind the boss, run through to dodge the second cleave. While running through, group 1 starts to move slightly left, and group 2 starts to move slightly right. This ensures both groups have an easy time getting into stack groups.
Fixed spots work slightly better for the stacks after gale sphere 2, but if your group is already using relative stack positions, you might as well use the same strat for these stacks as well.
I've now released a mini-guide on how to do gale sphere 2 with fixed positions (True North Gp 1 N/W, Gp 2 S/E), so give that a watch and see if you prefer it. ruclips.net/video/U-C2nnjJhDI/видео.html
Anyways, hope y'all enjoyed the guide!
ty sir
Think fixed positions are more simple for everything tbh
@@mistyotr4631 I agree.. Just give group 1 North and Group 2 South (if it's North-South) or Group 1 West and Group 2 East (if it's East-West)
Common farm parties are G1 N/W G2 S/E prios.
I can honestly see the merit in both strats, and it's easy enough to adjust to anyway. But I guess some people are too lazy to just put something like "G1 N/W G2 S/E" or "TN gales" in their PF description, and instead would rather blame Hector for "ruining party finder" lmao.
This is so well animated. Concise and easy to understand. Spoken clearly and not too fast as to get lost. Good work!
Just began raiding last tier, really appreciate the way you do your guides. Extremely helpful and informative. Thank you for making these!
Thank you Hector! Also shoutout to the kitty meowing in the background at 3:34
How the heck did you hear that the first time through?
I can't hear it... T_T
Hahaha i heard it!! So cute!
The purrs got me
Minor detail, but you don't need the OT to be second in aggro for the void meteor to target them. Those always target both tanks regardless of their threat level, unless one of the tanks is dead, then it will target someone else.
Just paused to post this, glad someone else beat me to it! Was surprised that the meteors targeted by role rather than enmity.
Oh thank god thats good to know!!
Thank you hector for these amazing guides! I always recommend your channel whenever i come across new peeps wanting to raid. :D
This is one of those fights where actually doing it and coming back to see a video like this again is super helpful. I did a few throwaway attempts with a practice first timer group, came back to watch this, and I had the confidence as if I'd cleared it. No more mistakes made.
knowing that me and the boiz just did it full blind and our strats matched hector is indeed something
i REALLY like that youve added a video visual to some mechs! ive progged to double flare + meteor stacks so far and this fight is pretty fun
The speed you put this out with how quality it is and how well described it is??? You're a fucking goat, for real.
I hear the accent with the word sphere. You've done well to hide it. I've always enjoyed hearing it. The favorite time was the "train to aire" because non new englanders had no clue where that train was going!
not much of these mechanics seem hard, but dang it feels like a lot to remember. thank you for the video
Started this today, got to about 50%, getting there! Thanks for the hard work Hector :)
Wow, you're a natural explaining this stuff. Nice job!
Thank you so much Hector, get some sleep, your animation guide is always appreciated it, and helped a lot during my first ex trials/savage, wish you the best and always maintain a healthy life hec
Incredible video as always. Adding the in game footage is so helpful too thank you so much for putting this out as quick as you do man. It's helped my casual groups prog a lot to have something to watch.
Your guides are a godsend. Thank you so much
Thank you so much Hector! You always explain the mechs clearly and it helps me and my friends with the fight!
He's doing it again! Thanks Hector, looking forward to the savage guides next week! 👏
no thanks
incredible guide, alot of effort thanks hector
Thanks so much for all the work you put into these guides. They're always incredibly useful for both PF and static prog.
Awesome guide as always, thank you Looking forward to the savage lectures!
dais = Day-us. Big thanks for the work done on this homie.
Thanks for this guide Hector! Nice animated guide as always! Ima study and attempt this on the weekend :)
Our group had some visibility issues for double meteor so we ended up getting rid of the inter card markets and putting the square 1 market center. This made it easy to get the healer dead center and the corners of the square marker provided guides for everyone being knocked back. Worth a try for any group having the same kind of issues
Pretty sure Void Meteor targets both tanks despite aggro (if both alive ofc), I remember turning my stance on late some pulls and being targeted still, the 2nd tb definitely requires a swap tho so stance does still need to be on at some stage regardless
Edit: Ignore me. I was completely wrong. Tank must have rezzed too near to the cast in my run. Apologies for the misinformation!
@Hector Hectorson - Hector Lectures ohhh I'll have to try again today and see, thanks for the info
@@rpgdweller558 I think you're right tho. I was Off-Tank and didn't turn on my tankstance until Tankswap. Always got the second Void Meteor, despite of aggro.
@@HectorHectorson I've seen a tank be 7th in aggro and get the tankbuster, not sure how it works then
@@usernamepog I'll double-check this. It's possible on my runs that the server still registered our tank as dead when the cast started and the busters were assigned.
The best part of the guide is the purring audible in the background.
you´re Speeeeeeeed, thanks for your fast work, can imagine how much coffee and work went into this! XD
thx Hector, i really love your animated guides, its so much easier
Thanks Hector! As always you have high quality content for us raiders! :) :) :)
thank you for the guide and the order of mechs in the description.
Lingering Spark has a WEIRD ASS SNAPSHOT!! Also CAT SOUNDS SPOTTED!! :D 3:33
Hector the GOAT
Really appreciate what you do, thanks for the guide, I always seem to resonate with the way you explain things.
I love you man, thank you for this guide! Great work as always 🥰
Good work on this one. Used your diagrams in combination with clear vods to understand mechs - approved 👍👍
This is a great guide, but if I hear you say Azdaja's name wrong one more time I'm going to scream.
I'm sorry, I love the cute, happy kitty noises in the background of this video.
EDIT Nvm what i just wrote. I didn't know the boss could actually be tilted towards an intercardinal. I was confused thinking that during the cast of those mechs, the boss would always face either north or south since the guide never shown or mentioned the boss could be tilted.
For consistency' sake i'd also add that the stack parties during the small purple circle should have group 1 to the left and group 2 to the right, while in this guide you have g2 left and g1 right. Not that it matters much, but since g1 is usually left, it's just again, for consistency. I don't understand how "the way is facing" changes things. It doesn't have boss relatives mechanics. You have and should use markers. Just have g1 on 3 and g2 on 2. There's no risk of confusion. I'd say it's way more confusing continuing to swap sides when it's unnecessary. Im specifically talking about the shadow dragon mechanic.
It's weird, first in the intro you say g1 left g2 right as per usual, but then during the whole guide almost always shows the opposite. I understand this was done very quickly, but yeah. It's quite unnecessarily confusing if you ask me.
Because the boss’s direction is semi-random before the mechanic having fixed spots for the stacks ends up really messy. In your example, if the boss happens to turn towards 1, the group who is supposed to stack at 3 is going to have an incredibly tough time dodging towards 1 for the front/back cleave and then getting to 3 without getting clipped by the out.
With relative spots, you make which way the boss spins before irrelevant. Just walk through the boss and go left if 1, or through the boss and right if 2.
@@HectorHectorson Why would he run towards 1 tho. Unless you omitted it in the guide the boss is dead center. There;s only the half arena cleaves, and you can preposition g1 on the left and g2 on the right to make g1 go to 3 an g2 to 2. Instead, imo for no reason, you have g2 already prepositioned to the left and g1 to the right. Im talking about the 6 minute mark mech. I don't know, maybe it's my weird blm brain thinking about moving the least possible, but i really struggle to see how boss relatives (unless the boss moves/spins around) has any sort of relevancy to the "argument".
EDIT OH ok, it was Turn not RUN xDDDD i think in your original message you had type run instead of turn hahaha, or maybe i've misread that. Ok it makes sense now.
Not run towards. Face towards, which determines the cleave directions. Fixed spots works fine for the spreads because you start IN, but the OUT during stacks limits where you can actually get to after dodging the front-back cleave.
My group tried fixed spots east/west during prog. We had one pull where for the final out/stack, the boss turned to face perfectly east.
This meant we went behind the boss, then moved across towards East, then got out. East stack group was sorted, but West stack group had no chance of making it all the way back to west and out.
@@HectorHectorson Yup, i edited my comment. But either im dumb and read "run" instead of "turn" or you actually wrote run first and then modded the comment (it says modified). So yeah now i gotcha. I was confused because in the visual guide the boss always faced north and it was never mentioned it could be tilted. I simply thought that during that cast, he'd always face either north or south, so i was like "why do i have to do boss relative and simply not having g1 use left side markers and g2 the right side". All cleared now.
@@davidepannone6021 No worries! Definitely think I could've explained it better, and still at least a 50:50 chance PF decides to stick with fixed spots. I might make a short follow-up video to explain this better than my long guide has, so thanks for the feedback!
the random meows and purrs through the video are hilarious but great guide
Thank god for your guides! And thank you!!!
Fantastic guide as always!! Makes it so simple to understand the mechanics in a nicely set out way, the top down style is so much easier to understand. Thank you so much for taking the time to make the guide as well as explaining everything clearly, it helps a ton!
Great to see your guides out so fast!
...
(in the EU PFs, light party stacks are west/G1 & east/G2.., otherwise most in the EU are using your strats atm)
This video was made more wholesome by your cat demanding attention in the background
I hear your cat purring at 5:45
Hector: teaches us the fight
Hectors cat: Meow
listening to your cat purr durning the video was a nice touch xD
Thank you, so much simpler, shows a really keen understanding of all mechanics in the fight and could literally have a 5yo sat in front of it, and they could learn it provided the attention span was there. The wording is easy to understand and the graphic gives a great deal of context that can't be misunderstood. Honestly a perfect raid guide.
If only the same applied to party finder players :p
Thanks Man honestly for making these (:!
The party finder would not be the same without you, I hope you know how much success and fun you bring to the pf with your helpful guides!
One little note, at least the first void meteor TB is NOT aggro based and seems to always target the tanks (if they are alive). I am not sure about the other ones or who it will prioritize if there is no second tank.
Came here to mention this. Forgot my stance as an OT today, was number 8 in aggro and still got the meteor.
Thanks for the vid! I hope it will help our party today :D
I love that your cat popped in to say hello. Lol
Poor Hector not only did not say Azdaja’s name the same way once in this vid he didn’t say it right any time either 💀 Ty for the guide man
I hear kitty meowing and purring 🥰 Anyways, great job on the guide once again!
Why have group one going left and group one going right? Just keep them to their light party sides and tell them to go to their respective colors (group 1 purple and blue, group 2 red and yellow) to keep it consistent and prevent any camera angle 'my right vs bosses right' pf complications.
So basically you think having to run back across in certain patterns is easier then just knowing what left and right is
@@threenotesoddity I don't understand the difficulty in knowing what left and right is...
We literally learn that as kids
@@AdsAreRuiningEverything its less about knowing L/R and more about how some players use their camera. Some people *dont* move their camera relative to their own movement, which makes wall-relative strats not "always go left or right" because you might be facing the opposite way as the rest of the party. TN strats allow all players regardless of camera preference to do the mechanic the same way every time
@@ameliajohnson1726 That's just a skill issue at that point (I'm joking lol)
But I can see what you mean, I'd just usually assume that people would do that
Thanks for the guide
The meteors in your video look like raspberries. i will refer to them as Raspberries from now on XD. Gj as always thanks for the guide!
Hector you are amazing as always!
Your guides are what I'm looking forward to watching again with the new patch
Love your guides as well, can't wait your versions of Anabesios!
thank you for this awesome guide!! also, its pronounced *Azh-die-ya* in azdajas shadow *(im sorry)
Aw yis! I was waiting for this! Thank you!
You are my Hero every patch ty for your work
Thank You for your work as always sir
I was annotating this guide for teaching later and just now noticed that Phases of the Shadow signals the stored ability (Azdaja's Shadow) is about to be used while Blade means it isn't.. :I bruh.
Best guide ever thank you!
Thanks for the universal PF strat!!
great guide as always
Keep doing what you're doing.
Random question: Do you have a source for getting the arena images, or do you get them yourself somehow? I make diagrams for my static and it always helps a lot when I have access to an accurate reference for the arena.
Thanks so much for your timely and well-crafted guides; you're a true Eorzean national treasure!
3:34 miqote spotted
Ty so much as usual!
I hear kitty cat, seems they enjoy your guides as well :)
it's pronounced azdaya
Thanks for the excellent guide!
shoutout to Hector's cat for being the best surprise guest
I owe you my E12s mount Hector, TYVM!
Thanks for this so quick!
Haha, just watching this for the first time. Give the kitty all the treats!
The 2nd Phases of the Shadow is always the inverse of the first. If the first is out/LPs, the second will be in/spread, and vice versa.
Doing my extreme before the expac release cause I've been very put off of the game this expac.
Golbez really wants us to just hold hands in this fight
I heard the Kitty at 3:35 😍
invented at least two uniquely wrong pronunciations of "azdaja" in one video
Nailed it!
omg cutscene skipper CONFIRMED 🤣
For shadow you dont need to look at circles or orbs. The animation has either smoke coming from orbs in or out showing the same (smoke inside boss hitbox out-stack, smoke out in-spread)
Good stuff but not a fan of the boss relative stuff for gale 2. should just do LP1 N/W LP2 S/E imo
THANK YOU!
If you're not a fan, change it up? Don't force people to do Your way because you can't look at the boss's ring and go "Oh... I'm NE boss relative" ... if the tank keeps the boss North, then it's both 'True North' and 'Boss Relative'.
No but this guide will force lots of players to adapt this this strat since PFs are filled with morons that take Hector’s guide to the dot without understanding how and why.
@@Nimoot man p5s tanks waiting at a wall while healers need their meele range uptime has still remained as the main goto pf strat
Whoever comes first serves first in PF, making it a utter shitshow most of the time. This is slowly changing from useful to just bothersome lol
@@Nimoot "Change it up" yeah until every PF is filled with "Hector Strats or Kicked" like it usually is lol.
Super fun fight! I'll always be bad at targeted knockbacks, though, regardless of the advice given to me. 😅
3:35 also a chance of a cat cleave
Cat purring is the ambience I need
One PF variation Ive seen is that for Void Stardust, Light Party groups start E/W and adjust N/S to where the Exasquares start. No major difference to your strat, where LP groups start N/S and then adjust E/W. But people are likely to get mad about it, somehow.
E/W absolutely works just as well as N/S. It's just whatever people prefer. I'm sure everyone will express their preference as rationally and kindly as you have XD
I hear cat purring at 4:07. Guide is cat approved.
I got distracted by the kitty cat purring
Kitten purr @ 5:42 - very cute
the voidcast days
me: *fully concentrated on mechs*
3:35 random cat noises threw me out lmao
I was legit waiting for this before I went in to prog. With Hector's excellent videos, I'll have this done by the early afternoon. Great guides, Hector!
hidden cat mechanic at 3:35
Thank you so much for this guide! The animations made it very easy to understand how to move and now I finally get some attacks I didn't before :>
As an exclusively legacy-cam gamepad player, I was super confused by left and right. I did not know standard players have their cameras automatically rotated towards the direction they are moving
This is the most frustrating extreme they have made in EW. By the time you have 100 tomestones you'll know the rage i'm feeling right now.