Kieran

  After the initial failure against the triple mechanic phase, the group got things back together quickly and threw themselves head first at [Bufon] again.

  Without everyone actively trying to sabotage each other, they were able to make good progress. While they still occasionally made a fatal mistake here and there over the course of the following two hours, generally speaking, Kieran thought their progress was solid.

  The party at large spent some time complaining about the way that the third phase was set up, given some of the triple mechanic combos needed to be seen before they could understand the interactions between them and how to solve each triplet.

  For example, the tank buster, spread, and donut AoE combo required a fairly simple positioning to make it through safely. Because the buster and the donut AoE were offset timing wise, with the donut AoE and spread mechanics happening first, the group simply needed to position the same way they had for the donut and spread combo in phase two, then move out of the range of the tank buster’s cleave.

  However, there didn’t appear to be any sort of tell for the way that played out beforehand - they simply needed to see it and die to it once to see how the combination worked. It felt a bit like a ‘gotcha’ moment, and it wasn’t the only combo like that.

  Once the party was knee-deep in the progression of the fight, though, the complaints happened less and less. Each time they entered the fight, they saw another triple combo and talked through how the positioning for it should work safely.

  By the time they were down to their last forty-five minutes of prog for the night, they felt pretty confident in their abilities to get through the phase as a party. Kieran agreed, believing that they really just needed one more good push to get through to either a win or at least phase four.

  “Alright, y’all,” Ash said eventually, “We’ve gone almost the whole three hours without so much as a break. Did anyone need one?”

  “Actually, yeah, I do,” Evie said. “We’ve been so locked in that I didn’t realize - I really need to pee.”

  “Same.” Jazz said. “Be right back.”

  “Yep, me too.” Evie said, and the sounds of headsets being taken off and dumped unceremoniously on desks or chairs followed.

  “May as well get more tea.” Marissa said.

  “Bisky, it scares me how much tea you manage to drink over the course of a raid night, and somehow rarely ever have to run to the bathroom.” Ash chuckled.

  “Oh, that’s easy.” She said, as the beeps of her electric kettle sounded in the background, “Once we’re done? I pee forever.”

  “I feel that.” Evan said.

  “I get that too.” Firo said. “Sometimes in the course of a few hours - like a raid night - I’ll just drink like three or four cups of water or tea, and not have to pee for hours. Then when it hits? It hits.”

  Marissa snickered. “Yeah, exactly. Tea doesn’t shoot through me, because I usually try to actively avoid the teas that make you go, but man can the liquid really pile up.”

  “It’s like those nights back in college when you drink too much and are totally fine - but the first time you actually go use the restroom, you just have to go back every fifteen minutes after that.” Evan said.

  “Ugh, yeah. Man, I do not miss those days.” Marissa said.

  “Not a big drinker?” Firo asked.

  “Nope. Never really have been.” Marissa responded. “I drank socially in college, but it was never something I particularly enjoyed.”

  “You were the responsible one, I bet.” Kieran said.

  “You know it.” Marissa said. “You too?”

  “Yep.” Kieran nodded. “Drinking is way less fun when you’re the one trying to stop people from overdoing it.”

  “Or trying to make a shot with window cleaner because, and I quote, “it’s such a refreshing, tasty looking blue”.” Marissa said.

  “Yikes.” Firo said.

  “Been there.” Evan said. “Drunk people - especially college kids - will do just the dumbest shit.”

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  “Looking forward to when Eli is a college kid, Fiona?” Kieran laughed.

  “Not particularly. But you can tell me what to watch for, bud, because Aoife and Kat are gonna get there first.”

  Kieran grumbled, “Don’t remind me. I’m terrified about what those two little monsters are going to get up to. Doubly so if they somehow end up at the same college together.”

  “Good luck, bro.” Evan said. “At this point, I’m still far more concerned with closer stuff. Like how to deal with teething.”

  “Oh boy, that’s not a fun time.” Kieran said.

  “No. No it’s not. I’m not looking forward to the endless crying and pain that I can do literally nothing about.”

  “There are some oral pain reducers I believe that can help. I don’t remember exactly what we used, but I can ask Nat.”

  “Thanks. At this point, every little bit helps.” Evan sighed.

  “At least it sounds like you’re starting to get some sleep?” Nyx said tentatively.

  Evan just laughed, and Kieran felt the hollowness of it deep in his soul. “No, I just pretend well.” He said. “I’ve read so many things online about how if new parents want to get any parts of their life back, they need to actually fight for it, but it’s very possible, even with younger babies. So here I am, fighting for it.”

  “Speaking from experience, yeah, you’ve got the right approach.” Kieran said. “Babies are simultaneously a full time job and not. There’s always something on your mind, or something you could be doing. But at the same time, after the first couple months that actually are very intensive, you need to start working to get your own life back on track. The kid will be okay for a few hours while you sleep or relax, especially when you have a partner to rely on.”

  “No kidding.” Evan breathed, “I’d be a dead man walking if not for Sam. And I imagine vice-versa, too. Being a single parent must be incredibly rough with a newborn.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Back. How we doing?” Jazz asked, settling back into her seat.

  “Talking babies.” Nyx said. “Now we just need Evie and we’re good to go?”

  “Think so.” Ash said. “How’s everyone feeling tonight?”

  “Good.” Marissa said, as she groaned while settling down back into her chair. “I think we’ve made good prog, especially given the state of this fight.”

  “Yeah, the tricky combinations feel a little stupid.” Firo agreed.

  “Well, at least I think we’ve gotten a lot of them figured out.” Ash said. “I really do think we’ve got this in the bag, probably tonight.”

  “Just keep in mind what’s probably coming if the pattern continues.” Kieran said, positive he wouldn’t be the only one thinking about it. “Going by his HP and what we’ve seen so far, given that he has nine mechanics to pull from and he doesn’t repeat skills, phase three is likely to be three total combos, which probably puts us as getting him to around 10% if we keep up good damage.”

  “Which means there’s definitely going to be a final phase of some kind, yeah.” Firo agreed.

  “And with 10% remaining, I’d bet it’s either two rounds of four mechanics, or some kind of big finale.” Nyx said. “I’ve been thinking about it all night.”

  “Me too.” Kieran said. “I’m leaning toward some kind of finale over just more complicated loops again. This is a raid boss, after all, I’d expect the last part of the fight to kick it up more than a single notch.”

  “I have returned.” Evie said, settling in. “Talking about the end of the fight?”

  “Yeah.” Nyx said.

  “I’m in agreement with what Caoimhe said, for the record.” Evie offered. “Given that this is a raid, I expect the final phase to be something more intense.”

  “All nine mechanics at once.” Firo said.

  “Do not put that shit out there, Firo.” Evan said. “You’re gonna jinx us. Again.”

  “Alright, well…let’s run it back, yeah?” Ash said, now that everyone had returned.

  “Yup.” Marissa said.

  Kieran took a deep breath and sat up from his relaxed slouch position he had slid into while chatting. He rolled his shoulders, cracked his knuckles, and stretched his neck a bit before settling in.

  “Alright, here we go.” Marissa said, and stepped into the blue circle where everyone else already was.

  The fight progressed as they expected. With almost six hours of experience on this fight, they had much of it very well in hand, especially the beginning that was fully scripted, and they had seen the most.

  Phase one came and went easily. They had also seen all of the combinations of phase two’s mechanical combos enough that everyone had more or less internalized their movement during them as well.

  As usual, everyone’s focus sharpened as they moved into phase three. [Bufon] opened with the tank buster, conal AoE, and donut AoE combo that they had seen the very first time they reached this phase. At this stage, the party knew exactly how to handle it.

  The party, except for Fiona, gathered on the very edge of the zone the buster hit, safely inside the donut AoE. Once the cleave explosion went off, everyone moved in around the boss and spread out. At this range, when the cone AoE target was decided, it would only clip three people, and the sliver of the cone closest to the boss was small enough that minimal movement was required to escape the damage.

  Second was the delayed damage, healer-targeting grab, and targeted attack combo, which was pretty easy to deal with. After the fiasco that caused their first wipe in phase three, they had figured out how to deal with the mechanic. They had developed a simple priority to decide who would bait the delayed damage if this combo came up again.

  When [Bufon] tossed his hammer up and it landed near Evie, everyone moved. Firo, who was at the top of the priority list for the delayed damage, used [Blink] to position himself furthest from the boss as quickly as possible, baiting the delayed damage. He also had a defensive cooldown ready to go, in addition to a shield from Mellody, to intercept the heavy damage.

  Mellody was targeted by the healer grab, but [Puddle Jumped] to safety easily, while Aleister [Shadow Stepped] over to Evie to intercept the targeted slam attack. There was a short cheer as the party executed the plan flawlessly. Admittedly, it wasn’t the first time they had done so, but Kieran still smiled to himself.

  The two combos they had seen so far left them with the triple threat of the single target pillar, the spread, and the stack. This was a combination they had seen before, but the combinations with spread and stack together had been rough, as the order of operations hadn’t been consistent between them all.

  “Fuck, which order was this one?” Evan asked.

  “I don’t remember.” Firo said.

  “Uh…the pillar was first, yeah? So…spread first?” Ash said, sounding far too uncertain for Kieran’s liking.

  “Whatever, we spread first then!” Marissa shouted, just making sure the group acted together. It was an all or nothing approach that was fine in Kieran’s book.

  The group spread out just enough to allow the spread mechanic to not kill anyone. They knew they would need to be close to quickly gather for the stack mechanic that would hopefully follow.

  There was a collective sigh of relief from most of the party as the smaller, single target explosions went off - spread was indeed first.

  Kieran did shout “Shit!” as he saw the pillar AoE appear below his feet, and immediately used [Driver] to fly inward toward the boss. Everyone else was able to close the gap easily enough as well, and everyone took the stack together without a hitch.

  “Here we go.” Marissa said, and Kieran glanced at [Bufon’s] remaining HP; 9%. He took a deep breath and refocused as a deep growl reverberated around their little clearing.

  “Allow me to congratulate you all. I don’t often need to use my final rune.” [Bufon] said, grasping his hammer in both hands. He held it out before him, and the handle itself began to glow with the same red energy the other runes had started with each time. It expanded to cover the whole hammer, and then slid over his armor as well.

  As it expanded, each rune lit up green - a color they hadn’t seen yet - and [Bufon] let out a gravelly chuckle. “I do love this part, though,” and then the runes around his armor exploded with a burst of light.

  “Ya’ll, I don’t know what’s -” Ash began to say, but was interrupted by one of the runes on [Bufon’s] armor turning the same red they were used to seeing. There was a short moment where the boss himself seemed to notice which rune it was that lit up, and reacted to it, moving into the tank buster’s animation, but skipping the hits before it.

  Fiona reacted spectacularly well, as did the rest of the melee party members. Everyone was able to narrowly avoid the cleave, and Fiona mitigated through the buster.

  In the same instant that the explosion of shrapnel finished, the tank buster rune bled back to green with the rest of the runes, while another lit up red. [Bufon] took just a moment to recognize which attack he had access to, before lining up to blast the massive cone AoE centered on Firo.

  As everyone scattered, sounds of recognition bounced around the chat.

  “It’s a mechanic rush.” Evan said, putting voice to what everyone realized.

  “Burn him down before we make any mistakes!” Evie shouted, quickly moving to heal Firo, who couldn’t escape the cone in time.

  “Too late!” Firo said, chuckling ruefully. “I’ll try to do what I can, but this is gonna be a lot of movement.”

  “We got it, no worries.” Kieran said, as he hit [Driver] to get Caoimhe back in the thick of the fight and get in as much damage as he could.

  As the spread mechanic was lined up next, the melee members spread around the boss while the ranged fighters remained further back. When they only needed to worry about one mechanic at a time, things were generally less dangerous - now it was just a matter of reacting quickly.

  A group stack was next, which brought the ranged party members in, interrupting Firo’s DPS again. Following that was another tank buster, which was as dangerous as things got - no one was expecting a repeat of mechanics at this point, after the absolute lack of repeating so far.

  Bisky and Mellody were both slow to get out of the tank buster’s range, as they had both used their movement skills already, leaving the other six to finish the fight.

  “You guys got this,” Marissa said, “just 3% left.”

  As [Bufon] moved into the targeted attack that a tank needed to intercept, everyone cheered. Everyone was close enough that there was no danger of Aleister not getting to the target in time, and that attack in particular was a long animation with low actual danger.

  They were able to push their damage and end the fight before the mechanic even finished.

  As [Bufon’s] HP hit zero, there was a big sigh of relief in chat as everyone took a deep breath.

  “...Are we clear?” Firo asked hesitantly, which was immediately answered by an explosion from the direction that [Uathach] and [Regnu] had run off in.

  “Firo. My man. Why do you always feel the need to jinx us?” Evan asked.