Thanks to Celaeris and Qilong for clearing up my ignorance about Warrior mechanics :D

So when you pull threat, you get the orange symbol over your head (and an orange circle around your feet). Similar to that, sometimes an angry red face pops up, which I think you were just describing Celaeris -- THAT shows when the boss is enraged?

I think I'm much less confused now.

Thanks for the informing read. I'd be interested in knowing also the optimal defensive crystal setup (ie, how many anarchics and how many relentless make for an optimum damage soaking setup, and at what damage?)

I'd be interested in knowing whether or not Mutinous crystals specifically affect non-crit damage only (they certainly don't say that) or if they affect crit damage by a percentage also. Obviously crit magnitude is another stat entirely, but the tooltip is unclear.

Stacking % damage for ALL your attacks against a boss definitely seems like the way to go.

Quote: MangTheory on 05/21/2012, 04:00 PM

Just tested it myself, and both Slaying and Furious crystals trigger when YOU personally are below 50% hp. At first the Furious seemed a little buggy, but I forgot to take into account the stamina bonus to determine what the 50% cutoff point for my HP would be. Really annoying that they call the crystal "slaying" when you're not slaying, you're getting slayed...

@EasymodeX If you're right about mob's spending nearly half of the entire fight enraged, then I will totally re-include that, but I was under the impression it was more like 20%, which is simply not gonna cut it. Even if it was predictable periods of time it might be really useful, like if the boss in Balder's is enraged the whole time when he's under 30% hp, the gem would be super awesome... but I don't think this is the case. Will have to test.

Thanks for the feedback, EasymodeX! I'll have to get into those details you mentioned a little bit more.

Mobs will switch into and out of enrage generally frequently. Time in seems constant and thus averaging to 50%, but I do not think anyone's timed this. I know that in some fights (Kaprima below 20%, Auricadis below 30/35%) you can count on the boss hitting enrage and staying there. Such crystals become invaluable, especially for Auricadis where the group can refocus in time to "push him over."

I know that I can push a BAM into enrage by packing several criticals into it at once. The more massive damage the mob seems to receive, the more readily it will switch into enrage. Averaging higher crits causes the BAM to hit enrage more frequently (and also revert from a "backstabbable" condition, and you begin drawing aggro). I tend to decrease my overall hyper criticals for the sake of maintaining position on the boss or BAM, but sometimes I cannot help myself!

I will restate it again. I've been doing a lot of research into crystals since the game came out. Every site/thread I've seen says to use this build:

Always use these 3 crystals:
-Acrimonious
-Savage
-Forceful

For your 4th crystal use:

-Focused (If you have a Mystic in group)
-Carving (If you have a Priest in group)


Can anyone confirm why they would go with this build?