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Omen Aeolian Edge Cleave - General Guide (video upcoming)------
Hey all, since we're on the subject of soloing and malignance gear I thought I'd post a followup to my omen hybrid soloing experiences several pages back. I've been working toward improving my clear rate and I've come a long way with it. So much so that I'm going to give a rundown and general strategy. I'll record a video tonight of it and post it to youtube when I get a chance and add the edit link here. We already know the overall gist of aedolain edge cleaving, but like I said doing it with trusts in omen is tricky because of bouncing hate and no true player party support. First off a few takeaways
1. First and foremost, a quality aeolian edge gear set is required. I've put a ton of effort into my herculean augs and this is my aeolian edge set. You don't need the orpheus's sash, but some good herc magic attack and most of the accessores are key.
ItemSet 368547
There are only two pieces in here that are truly "luxury" and those are the epamidonias's ring and the orpheus's sash. The rest is pretty easy to obtain, save for maybe the dingir ring.You can substitute a pair of shiva rings in their place, and for the belt just use grunfeld or something similar for the dex mod.
All five of my herculean pieces have pretty much Max MaB and a large chunk of magic accuracy, and my feet are a dark matter campaign aug. The two malevolences are also max potency. Using this set at 3000 TP I deal an average of 12,000 damage to everything I strike, and around 5-8k closer to 1000, meaning I can fell entire waves of mobs in just two weaponskills. Once again, you don't need your aeolian edge set to be completely optimized, but you can't be dealing 2-3K damage weaponskills and expect to get away with it either.
Note 1: The final 4 camps on the third floor beyond ladybugs all have extremely high magic defense. Ladybugs, Porxies, and the floating eyes all take roughly 3000-5000 damage, and that's not from resists. Their magic defense is just that high. The final Unseelie camp MUST be meleed. The Unseelies are so magic defensive that aeolian edge goes from 7-8k to triple digit numbers. You cannot magic weaponskill them or you will wind up stunned, TP drained, biod, nuked and killed. That's fine though because tauret utterly shreds them to bits since their physical defenses are extremely low.
Note 2: Have a variation of your aeolian edge set to apply treasure hunter 8 to all mobs. In addition to the set I posted I have a second variant that swaps out the herculean gloves and dingir ring for plunderer's armlets +3 and gourney ring. You only need to use this once per wave of mobs. You can use your max power set otherwise.
2. You need approximately 1250-1260 evasion to cap out on these mobs. I'm eating black curry buns for my runs, and this is my TP set.
ItemSet 369907
I've built a TP cape specific for this setup. My toutatis's has HP + 60, evasion/magic evasion + 20, an additional + 10 evasion (so 30 total), store TP +10, and -10% physical damage taken. I'm using moonbeam rings becase for what I'm doing I DO want to cap my -PDT, and the extra 260 HP between the rings and cape is extroardinarily useful. It puts my evasion at about 1260 on the nose, with the black curry buns I have about 1450 defense, and 2200 HP. Evasion has a cap of 80%, so even when you're capped you'll still get hit an average of once every 5 times. So the extra insurance is very worth it.
3. You must be able to weaponskill and swap back to your defensive hybrid set quickly. When you swap to your aeolian edge set your going to have floored evasion and there is a brief window and you can take a LOT of incoming damage very quickly. The biggest problem here is that following mobs as they bounce between trusts can often lead to your target being out of range, and you have to make sure your weaponskill doesnt get canceled out because the mob is too far away. Losing all your TP really sucks, and its easy to get caught in your weaponskill gear longer than you intend if this happens.
4. Have reraise up always. It goes without saying, but this is dangerous and easy to screw up. You can easily wipe, so the backup insurance is important.
And with those general pointers out of the way here's a basic rundown of my strategy per floor, with specific camp notes.
----------Floor 1---------
The important thing to note here is that damselflys are somewhat resistant to wind damage. If your aeolian set is lacking magic accuracy you may get a few resists. I have enough magic accuracy to only see resists on about 1 in every 4 or 5 damselflys, but if your aeolian edge set isn't able to handle them you may consider sticking to melee for this floor. If you can handle them however my strategy is straightforward
Step 1 -- Run in and grab 3-4 mobs and melee them at the outer edge of the camp. More will agro as you build TP. Supertank the adds until you have 3000 TP and unleash your most powerful aeolian edge on them, probably 6-8 mobs by this point. Make sure your trusts are positioned relatively safely because mobs will start to bounce at this point. Then build TP to 1,000 and weaponskill in your treasure hunter set. If your aeolian set is strong enough all the non-transgenent mobs should die at this point, otherwise repeat the cycle.
Step 2 -- Rinse and repeat. Resummon trusts as necessary if you get downtime. Try to be aware of mob positioning and know where potential aggro may come from, and keep the number of mobs you juggle to a reasonable amount.
If your aeolian edge set is strong enough, consider saving 3000 TP right before you warp up. My strategy for floor 2 is to perfect dodge the entire room and kill everything before my damage immunity window closes. Neither beetles nor leeches are wind resistant so I take this opportunity to do something risky
Note: Plunderer's Armlets +3 extends perfect dodge duration from 30 to 45 seconds. This is kind of important. I know I have enough time to get away with this. So gear quality will affect your strategy for floor 2.
--------Floor 2 -------
If you've saved 3,000 TP and plan to perfect dodge the room
If you're following my path you'll have 3,000 TP at this point. The goal is to take down everything in two weaponskills.
Step 1 -- Target the transgenent Leech,
NOT the beetle. The beetle can and will use Rhino Guard, which raises its evasion by stupid amount, and this can really screw with your TP gain if you don't account for it. Activate flee and run in and aggro the entire room and pop perfect dodge right before they all get in range to start clobbering you. Engage the transgenent leech and unleash your strongest aeolian edge. You will lose 2-3 trusts at this point because the entire swarm will murder anything that casts in the timeframe it takes you to build 1K tp again. That's ok because perfect dodge will keep you safe. Build tp again and unleash your treasure hunter aeolian edge to hit everything with TH 8, and you should hopefully take down everything but the transgenets and maybe 3 or 4 randm mobs. Then just clean up the mess, resummon trusts, and head to floor 3.
If you've chosen to do this floor the safe way
My strategy for this floor is an advanced one that requires high gear quality, and it isn't for everyone. If you don't have a 45 second perfect dodge and/or you need 3 aeolian edges to fell mobs then you just do this floor as you would the first. Grab a few mobs and juggle them, weaponskill to apply treasure hunter once for each wave and take them down methodicaly. No different from floor 1.
------------------Floor 3 -------------
This is just going to be more of the same. The only advice I have for this floor is a few camp specific notes.
Rarabs -- Nothing special here. Standard tank and spank.
Mandragora --
These! Are! Dangerous!! I can't stress enough how you need to be very cautious here. Mandragoras attack speed is brutal, so you will want to juggle fewer mobs because they're going to hit you even in evasion gear. The -dt portion of this set really shines here. Also they can AoE sleep your trusts. This is the camp where things are most likely to go wrong so tak eextra precautions and play it safe.
Lizards and Birds -- see rarabs. Nothing special.
Ladybugs and Porxies -- Extremely high magic defense. They just flat out don't take as much damage as other camps, and ladybugs can amnesia you as well. Reduce your pull sizes to accomodate.
Floating Eyeballs --- These take reduced magic damage just like the previous 2 camps, but they also dont melee. Your magic evasion will be a godsend here. 5/5 malignance is HIGHLY recommended for these, and between the evasion hybrid cape and yamarans magic evasion you should be eating stone V's and stongea Ivs for 200-500 damage. Your trusts can heal through this.
Note: I've found of all the camps this is also the hardest to get mass aggro. I swear these things are stupid, becuse their line of sight aggro often just doesn't pull more than a few mobs at once. Use this to your advantage.
Unseelies --
Can Not Be Aeoilian Edge Burned. They just have astronomical magic defense. But their physical defense is as low as their magic defense is high. Equip your melee gear and mow em down.