The Odyssey - || Strategy And Discussion ||

My memory is hazy because it was so long ago but I'm certain it was two phones. Nearly nobody who was in my original group plays anymore, Geriond would probably remember but he rarely posts on here anymore. But now that I think about it some more, it's more likely that we used WAR on phone 1 instead of 2. So:

Phone 1 softening something like: RUN BLU SMN GEO WAR RDM. TP denial and get it to sub 75.
Phone 2: DRK BST COR BRD PLD WHM. TP on add, WS Mboze. Tank holds Mboze, adds was on DRK the entire fight

I honestly can't remember if we used WHM on phone 2 or 1. 1 wouldn't make sense since we'd have to rely on PLD heals for phone 2. I'll defer to someone who has actively done Mboze 25 within the past year since I haven't, and I could be is misremembering details a little, but the point I made earlier about Soul Enslavement tearing through sub 25% still applies, just no war on this one (which I still don't think is a harsh DPS check). We also would have used Unleash right after Soul Enslavement to give a bit of relief for the final push.

I posted my strats a few pages ago but reposting here in case there are questions. Unfortunately some of those who need it the most have me blocked which is...hilarious.

Mboze V25:
RUN RDM SCH BST SMN DRK
BLU BRD COR WAR GEO PLD

First KI:
Lobby Bubbles:
Haste SMN, Barrier RUN, Frailty BST, STR SCH, Fury DRK
Goal is to push Mboze to 75% and pop the add. Any damage beyond that (we never accomplished it) is bonus.

Darkness SC for landing Ooze: Cross Reaper -> Eclipse Bite. Also use Unda Rayke & Stymie Frazzle 3
BST: Open with Purulent Ooze, then vermin KI, then Fatso TP Drainkiss every 30s for the rest of the fight
RUN: Stay disengaged and keep stoneskin up. Can TP add/WS boss once add is out
DRK: Open with Armor Break. Make sure TP and WS sets have capped SB in them. Alternate WS so you don't wall yourself. Once add has spawned, use it as TP battery. Use SE if we can afford to sacrifice second KI 1hr. I used Father Time for this, though you could use other weapons and just be a bit more cautious with turning.
SCH: Heal and buff people. Use TR at ~9 minutes and keep Embrava up on everyone. Asc Stoneskin to maintain it
RDM: Stymie Frazzle 3 at the beginning. Haste 2 everyone, enfeeble the ***out of Mboze (and the add once it spawns). Once add is out, TP on add and WS on boss.
SMN: Crimson Howl, Crystal Blessing, Wind's Blessing. Mew on cooldown. Reapply buffs with Apogee mid-fight. Alternate Mewing & a BP:R (Predator Claws)

Second KI:
Lobby Bubbles:
Fend WAR Refresh BLU STR BRD Wilt COR Barrier PLD
Everyone is TPing on adds, WSing on boss. Use Remedy to remove debuffs as necessary. <lastst> and <stnpc> WS macros are essential. Make sure you have as-close-as-possible to capped SB in your WS sets. Using SB food helps with this.

WAR: Open with Armor Break, keep hate on the boss the whole time. Try different weapons and figure out the best one for this situation, probably something 1-handed? Alternate WS so you don't wall yourself
BLU: feather tickle/Reaving Mboze on CD, heal as necessary (White Wind). Expiacion on Mboze. Keep Silent Storm up on boss. Probably use Diffusion for Mighty Guard?
PLD: Cure people, tank both of the adds. Try not to get hate on Mboze
BRD: HM, 2 minuet, 2 Minne. PLD gets Ballads. Elegy adds, Wind Threnody on Mboze. TP adds, WS boss (savage)
COR: Chaos/Sam, TP adds WS boss.
GEO: Indi-Frailty, Geo-Fury. Keep bubble outside of his auto-attack range so BoG/Ecliptic will last as long as possible. Bolster sub-40%. Entrust Attunement (to avoid para) and/or STR

This is called projection. Those are you personal thoughts and feelings, not anyone else's, much less my own.

Bad content design is just bad content design regardless of the players involved. Pointing out bad content design is no different then pointing out it's raining. No value judgements, it mere is. Insisting that it's not raining, while standing in said rain... well I'll leave it at that.

Regardless of wether luck does or doesn't play a large role for any of these fights is it beneficial for the longevity of FFXI insist it's a skill issue?

If you do you'll have to start looking for the culprit that didn't perform, some of those called out will fail to ramp up their performance despite trying and some will be offended for beeing called out which will lead to groups splitting and people quitting.

I don't think FFXI player numbers support this level of elitism anymore. I think it's probably better to either trust people who participate that they want to win and eventually make necessary improvements autonomously or chalk it up to bad luck and focus on different content with your group.

I'm sorry but if you want to beat the hardest content in the game you need to be comfortable taking criticism, willing to examine your own play, and open-minded about ways you could improve what you're doing. Going into this stuff like "I'm perfect, I've never made a mistake in my life, and this strategy and all of my equipsets are perfect" is not going to net you great results.


Is it elitist to say "Hey, I think you should cast Phalanx before you cast Crusade, because our problem seems to be with survivability more than threat. Let's try it for a couple attempts and see how it goes"?

Is it elitist to say "Hey guys, we always die before the timer runs out, and our DPS seems to be really strong, maybe we should swap one of our songs from Minuet to a Minne or a Carol, at least until we get to the point of timing out"?

Is it elitist to say "Every time we wipe, it's because someone died, and his attacks are all magical. Maybe we should sacrifice some of our DPS, since we're way ahead of pace, to put Shadow Ring and Warder's Charm on all our characters in melee range"?

Look at the sets people died in and say hey, maybe this set should have more MDB in it, or more meva, or whatever.

IDK, if that's elitism then I guess this game is too elite.

Interestingly, Odyssey can take weeks or months of frustration to finally clear the V25s, but once you do it once, you ae done for good. Conversely, Sortie is relatively easy, but it requires months-long commitment to finally get your completed shiny. It's a similar time investment overall if you think about it, the difference is the frustration levels between the two. Some might absolutely HATE grinding Sortie for months, but even average players can make a prime and it is low-stress. Imagine if SE wanted to truly be jerks and locked primes behind V25 clears.

I think you're deluding yourself if you truly believe that just because a small number of competent players who already beat Odyssey will find new motivation to help newbies and just because you have "infinite tries to learn the fight" then everyone like you said, will beat Odyssey.
In reality a lot of people and I mean a lot, will still continue to fail. Some will succeed, some will struggle and eventually make it. The big difference is that a lot of people will start to bother and actually enjoy the content.


The second part of your post is a problem indeed and far from me to deny that. The fact is though that such a problem exists regardless of a small amount of new people being able to beat Odyssey rather than keeping on failing or, more often than not, not even trying.
What do you do once you're done with Odyssey and augmenting pieces to R30?
Excellent question indeed.
What has people who beat odyssey been doing so far?

Either way, like I said above, such a problem is not solved by cockblocking other people who haven't been able to beat Odyssey so far. It's been over 2 years, it's long due they do something about it.
We're talking about QoL into actually PARTICIPATING in the content, not a STRAIGHT NERF to the difficulty.
Being so hardcore and elitist to be against even something as simple as this for a 2+ years old content makes no bloody sense imho.

I apologize if this comes out as too strong or offensive or anything else, wasn't my intention.

I don't think that's the "elitist" part.
The elitist part is rather when someone has been very vocal over months into supporting the fact that not a single thing should be made easier in any way whatsoever otherwise the sky will fall.

That's the elitist part some people are talking about, not the very common sense and highly agreeable and socially healthy things you mentioned in your post.

But hey, I could be wrong eh

If I had a dime for every time I checked a dead player and saw he wasn't wearing either of these accessories after they ate magical damage in succession from Zissurus or TP moves/Spells, I'd be approaching a hundred dollars. I actually had to make a PDT-Waltz set on DNC because I noticed how any times I ended up dead in that set on stuff like Xevioso or even Sortie.

I've caught ***for using those multiple times from people who thought I should be wearing more damaged oriented accessories instead. I guess that speaks somewhat to the points being made here that some folks just aren't willing to learn/adapt.

I've sometimes wondered if the sachets from Abyssea would stack with those as well. I realize that the charm technically shouldn't stack with other magic absorption, but since they are a specific element instead of all magic damage, I've wondered if they might have a place here (but never actually tried)

This is what happens when an unstoppable force, meets an immovable object. I will try my best to explain how luck plays a role in this fight, because trying to quantify luck vs skill here is actually quite difficult.

I was fortunate enough to do V25 Bumba with an extremely skilled, mature and patient group of people. We beat Bumba V25 after just 16 attempts. I think we were the epitome of maximum skill and player synergy, after we ironed out some minor kinks in the first 2-3 attempts. In fact, we beat Bumba v25 with almost 4 minutes remaining.

Full Bumba V25 notes can be found here: Bumba V25 Notes

Anyway, I want to point out all of the common and uncommon situations that we were subjected to an automatic LOSS based entirely on randomness/luck. (This means, a complete no-win scenario, where we had to exit and come back. It goes without saying, that in the interest of time, we chose to exit and come back instead of waiting out the timer for RP).

Keep in mind: it may be possible to overcome the negative outcomes below with future updates, power creep or newer gear. However, as of 10/22/2024, you should just exit and re-enter/re-attempt the fight if you see any of these random outcomes:

1.) In KI#1, Bumba's aligned elemental absorption is WATER (no Ooze debuff from BST)
2.) In KI#2, Aura #1 is either M.Acc or MAB down (2/4 chance).
3.) In KI#2, Aura #2 is either M.Acc or MAB down (2/4 chance).
4.) In KI#2, Wild Card fails to reset 1hr for another round of Kaustra (5/6 chance, maybe?)
5.) In KI#2, Bumba's aligned elemental absorption is DARKNESS (no Kaustra damage).

Having said this, everyone should be able to, at a minimum, understand how LUCK plays a role in this fight and can simply exit and re-enter, hoping for better luck on the next attempt.

P.S. While waiting an earning RP may seem valuable during these scenarios, I don't recommend it, if it can be helped. It is quite a slog (very exhausting) to try to maximize RP and the number of Bumba attempts in a single sitting. Our group averaged just 2.1 attempts per sitting, across 7 separate dates.

Remember this being brought up before, not sure if it answers it fully

https://www.ffxiah.com/forum/topic/46016/first-and-final-line-of-defense-v20/137#3682264

JP Wiki states they don't stack. I carry my aqua sachet with me for Ngai, but mainly use Charm for melee/eva/dt sets, while using the sachet for WS (still gives ~2% absorb in a weaker slot). Charm or sachets do stack with empyrean proc armor from RUN/PLD though, so there's no reason not to double up there. Sachet does compete with Staunch for a slot though, so that 2% absorb isn't necessarily as good. Still good to keep around if you need a chance to negate damage. Shadow Ring is one of a kind, and is irreplaceable in one of the ring slots IMO. Also, if you decide to use Carol II vs Carol 1, you will have an even higher magic damage negation proc rate (53% with SV and Ring).

Dude, lol. Thorny has repeatedly said Bumba V25 is 90% luck. Nealy everybody in this thread has commented how badly designed the fight is with the current-known strategy. Absolutely nobody is defending that pile of garbage fight. Use a better example to quantify luck vs skill.

I don't have enough experience with the fight to say for myself but: is not landing ooze actually a loss...? I would assume you can still get 74% on KI#1 without Ooze, in fact I believe some of the reference videos I've been watching had Ooze miss (in their winning videos).


Does Bumba not have the normal array of auras or something? Should be phys attack, macc, matk, phys def, magic def, meva. This means macc/matk are 2/6, not 2/4.


If you want a 5 OR 6, like this case, and are using relic boots then 5 OR 6 is 4/9 or 44.44% chance. This means chance to fail because of WC fail is 55.55% chance.


After he enters fetter mode (1 minute, I presume?) he no longer absorbs darkness damage.

Are you suggesting people auto-equip with oshit/react/gearswap?

No, you just do any midcast actions in DT gear, pretty simple really

Damn. The fact that the very first thing that comes to your mind when someone suggests wearing defensive gear instead of +.002% dps is to have a react gearswap planned ahead of time. Nobody can fix that, yall are cooked

Is it really so hard to have a line in your gearswap or a secondary macro that puts DEFENSIVE ARMOR on? I am concerned that everything seemingly has to be automated and players can't just react naturally.

This is an option but what I was referring to in my OP was just wearing the ring all the time. You just put it in your engaged set. Either make a new engaged set for the fight, or just swap the ring into your regular engaged set.

I don't think it's necessary to wear in WS set, but you can/maybe should do that too. All you need to do is change your set(s), no reaction required.

I know exactly what you meant, because I fulltime the ring myself. I was responding to K123 who immediately correlated Shadow Ring/Warder's Charm to react/gearswap. My suggestion about a macro line or a swap was countering the idea that you HAVE to use a program to do this when players can do the same with a simple button. Fulltiming it is the better option, but we need to offer baby steps first before we suggest lowering dps for the sake of survival (sarcasm of course)

All of you guys are good players, just accept that many don't have time and static, most of us are fathers, mothers no time to deal with luck based auras and Hate reset TP moves that make adds destroy healers. SE dont understand their game community that is filled with people with kids. Odyssey V25 design is just bad.

K

Mothers and fathers can't wear DT armor, *** me that's a new one.

The system is literally designed for all manner of players. If you do not have the time or energy to invest into completing the hardest content, then you can still earn rewards by completing the content at a lower Vengeance level. If all a player can clear is V0, then they still get a huge power boost in gear relative to what they already had in R0 gear. If a player is dedicated enough to pound their head against the Bumba wall instead, they are rewarded with an extra *checks notes* 2% Double Attack and 2% WSD (Nyame Mail) for their efforts. It seems to me that the biggest benefits are in clearing everything except the V25s.

This is actually a better argument for Sortie. V25s can be planned and done at your play time, there is no "daily lockout" for Gaol. You can do 5/10/15 runs in a day or weekend with a group after getting a set time. Sortie on the other hand is super demanding on your time (one hour a day), but even that can be done with a group that has similar play schedule.

I rather play a game not a second job, life > ffxi.

I dont get why luck is a factor in an event that you just need to beat once.

I mean, even if its a 1% chance of win, at this point you would still beat it already.

Or you can beat it tomorrow. Or next week.

Game wont be releasing new contemt any time soon so its not like you dont have chance or time to try again.

Life as a whole is based on luck. You born because of chance, you live because of chance, and you die because of chance

Despise that, all you can do is persevere.

If you want that win, you just get up and go get it.

Thats all you need to do

Yeah I agree. Stop playing a game that doesn't feel like one. What's the problem?

They also became mothers and fathers by not wearing protection IRL either though




ba dum tss