This achievement is fairly easy to achieve. There are two primary strategies:
Sacrifice a player. In this strategy, one player stands out of the Derpridic flower AoEs and so continutes to pick up Red Venom stacks until they reach 25. Once they reach 25, they either die or /stuck and are immediately rezzed. If the group can avoid unexpected deaths, this strategy is fairly easy.
Do not sacrifice a player. This strategy is similar but with a goal to avoid a player death. The easiest way to do it is to time the use of Derpridic flowers so that the designated player reaches 25 stacks of Red Venom during the second flower AoE. This timing enables the player to cleanse immediately upon reaching 25 stacks, though depending on the timing they may not be fully cleansed but only reduced from 25 to around 6 or so stacks. For this timing to work, the group needs to wait to activate Derpridic flowers until around 12 or so stacks of Red Venom.
This achievement is relatively straightforward with good coordination of DPS and good tank positioning.
The basic concept is for the team to DPS Red in the normal manner through the first two flowers but only push Red to around 40% or so health. At that point, the team starts pulling Red through the area looking for Stampeding Bulls. The first Stampeding Bull comes at the third flower (right as the path branches) with additional Bulls coming typically at each branching point as the team moves back towards the research facility.
When adds spawn, DPS need to kill the small adds ASAP while minimizing damage on Red. DoT spread will do some damage but given Red's health level starting at 40% this should be okay.
When the Bull appears, the off-tank should grab it immediately and pull it to a position right next to Red. The tank holding Red needs to face Red towards the Bull but make sure to do so in a way that will not clip the other tank. The tanks then hold this position until Acidic Jet goes out. Acidic Jet happens every 30s so this should not take long. When Acidic Jet happens, step out of its conal and watch the Bull die.
Move Red from spot to spot and make sure it doesn't lose too much health. I feel that around 10% per Bull killed is about right (so 30% after 1st Bull, 20% after 2nd Bull, and 10% after 3rd Bull is killed). Again, jump on adds immediately.
Once the third Bull is killed, just hold Red in place and kill immediately.
This achievement is also fairly easy. The key is to avoid killing any adds after defeating the second Warden Droid and opening the path to the generator shed. The tank should hold all adds inside the doorway and maintain flares on them until the power is reactivated. If DPS avoid killing any adds, this usually requires only a small delay for an additional wave of adds.
Running out of flares is a real possibility but the group can grab more flares from the interior of the generator shed. This will require resetting the instance afterwards before fighting the third boss. As long as flares are used continually and healers focus heal the tank, then this achievement is mainly about DPS not killing any adds.
The simplest and easiest way is to have a third tank in the group. There is no timer-based enrage in the encounter, so lower DPS is not an issue. The group should have a DPS "tank" Greus while each of the tanks take one of Hissyphus, Kronissus and Titax. The team should DPS each boss to an appropriate level of health, pull all of them to the tracks, and push them all to 15% at the same time then summon the train.
The trickiest parts to this strategy are (1) not pushing any boss early; and (2) coordinating to push them all to 15% at the same time. Since a DPS will be tanking Greus who has low health, I recommend having no extra DPS on Greus the entire fight. If the DPS player is ranged, they can easily DPS Greus down to around 20-22% then swap targets to help DPS. If the DPS player is melee, they may simply have to stop DPS, which makes avoiding any extra DPS on Greus ideal to minimize any down time. Everyone else should be attacking Hissyphus for one minute until Kronissus and Titax jump down.
The remainder of the fight is very similar to balancing DPS on the Dread Council fight in Dread Palace. 1 DPS "tanks" Greus and gets his health down to around 20-22%. A tank and DPS continue burning Hissyphus down to around 20%, when the DPS should swap to other bosses (likely Titax) while the tank burns Hissyphus down to around 17-18%. The other 2 DPS should immediately swap to Titax when he comes down and along with the tank (and likely eventually the third DPS swapping off Hissyphus) burn him down to around 19-20% and then swap to Kronissus (DoTs should carry him to 17-18%). Then all available DPS push Kronissus.
As soon as Kronissus passes 60%, all tanks should begin pulling their bosses to the tracks. Each tank should call out boss health. At this point, Greus should be around 20%, Hissyphus & Titax should be around 17-18%, and the group should straight burn Kronissus to 15% then push the rest.
As a reminder, the train takes 30s to arrive in Veteran Mode and the Torpor regen effect lasts 35s. So, the team need has a fairly narrow window to push all the bosses. Normally, the strategy to kill one boss is to summon the train around 10-15s before the boss is pushed. In this case, I suggest having a Sage/Sorc healer or Gunslinger/Sniper use their phasewalk (or equivalent) to summon the train as close to pushing the first boss as possible. This provides about 5s of cushion on the first boss and provides the team around 30s to push the other three.
As long as the bosses are pushed to the appropriate health levels before the final burn (Greus @ 20%, Hissyphus & Titax @ 18%), then the total burn over 30s represents a DPS check of maybe 10k per DPS (less counting tanks/healers). So do not panic, take your time to get health levels right, make sure someone is set up to summon the train, and go get that cheevo!
All the Final Form mastery achievements should have three tanks, one for each of Hissyphus, Kronissus and Titax. There is no timer-based enrage and it simply isn't possible to tank two Trandoshans for very long in Veteran Mode.
Greus is by far the easiest of the Final Form achievements, since his Chaotic Evolution buff is the least dangerous and his low health makes burning him much faster than either Hissyphus or Titax.
Greus' Chaotic Evolution buffs his Trandoshan Torch AoE ability. Each charge of Chaotic Evolution increases its damage by 15%, increases radius by 3m, increases the effect duration by 15s and accelerates the tick rate by 0.5s (starts at 2.0s, so first charge goes to 1.5s and so on).
The ideal strategy to get this achievement alone is to have all DPS on Greus until he is pushed to 15% with 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution. Each of the three tanks should tank the other 3 bosses normally and in opposite corners to Greus, leaving a DWT or ideally a ranged DPS to hold aggro on Greus.
For positioning, I recommend holding Greus in the back left corner (as you enter the room, the left corner against the train railing). The team continues to DPS Greus even through his Torpor buff. Torpor will cause Greus to regenerate 85% health over 35s and grant 80% damage resistance. However, it is still optimal to DPS Greus as (1) the Trauma debuff can be applied by any tank, Sentinel/Marauder or Gunslinger/Sniper and will reduce the self healing by 20%. Taken together with burning Greus through his 80% DR, most groups should be around 60% or less when Torpor ends and Greus resumes attacking the group. Thus, most groups should only be able to push Greus back into Torpor in around 30s.
The ideal composition for this achievement would be to have exclusively ranged DPS with at least one Gunslinger / Sniper. That class is ideal since it applies the Trauma debuff to reduce self healing and through its defensives is ideally suited to mitigate the AoE damage from a buffed Trandoshan Torch. For the remaining DPS, all ranged DPS will take no extra damage from Greus at any point in time and thereby making the healing requirements very straightforward. If a melee DPS has to kite Greus or a ranged DPS other than a Gunslinger / Sniper handles it, they will need much heavier healing when as Greus reaches 2-3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution.
After Greus is pushed the third time to 15%, the DPS should move him immediately upon Torpor expiring. Greus should be around 50-60% so will take very little time to push to 15% and getting to the tracks quickly is the key. Greus does not have a pull ability so run immediately there. Summon the train when Greus hits around 25-30% and you should be good.
All the Final Form mastery achievements should have three tanks, one for each of Hissyphus, Kronissus and Titax. There is no timer-based enrage and it simply isn't possible to tank two Trandoshans for very long in Veteran Mode.
Titax is probably the next easiest Final Form achievement after Greus. His Presence of Titax aura gets larger with each stack of Chaotic Evolution, increasing by 3m per stack. At 3 stacks this makes his aura very large and can be difficult to avoid clipping other bosses without skillful positioning.
The recommended strategy for this achievement requires 2-3 Sage / Sorcerer players in the group. The biggest challenge for DPSing Titax to 15% four times is not running out of Mutagenic Goo tanks (there are six in the room). With at least 2 Sage / Sorc players (preferably 3), the Titax tank can be pulled out of the Titax Strike knockback to avoid it entirely.
3 tanks are also required to tank Titax, Hissyphus and Kronissus. A ranged DPS should "tank" Greus in the corner. A Gunslinger / Sniper is ideal for this task due to their Hunker Down / Entrench having very high uptime on 60% AoE DR as well as numerous other useful defensives. If damage is an issue then a fourth tank should be viable in 16m compositions.
With this composition, the basic concept is to burn Titax to 15% and continue attacking him through his Torpor 35s self heal phase. He takes 80% less damage during Torpor. However, even reduced damage still shortens his uptime after Torpor ends, and the Trauma debuff applied by the Titax tank will reduce that self-healing even more. Good DPS should see Titax emerge from Torpor around 70-75% health levels.
The biggest key to success is having a pull rotation to ensure the Titax tank is pulled during each Titax Strike. I recommend having 2 dedicated pullers with a third backup. Make sure to communicate who is pulling each time to avoid a double pull, and have the backup ready just in case that happens. After the tank is pulled and Titax Strike ends, pull Titax back to the original position and continue.
From a positioning perspective, I suggest dividing the area into quadrants and keeping Titax in one of them to ensure he is well removed from the other Trandoshans. Since he will be either the first or second killed, I suggest holding him at the train railing on either the left or right side.
The main strategic choice for groups pursuing this achievement is (1) whether or not to kill any bosses before pushing Titax; and (2) if so, which one? For the first, I recommend killing Titax first as long as the group can keep bosses positioned away from each other. Killing any boss first will increase the surviving boss damage +15%, so it really isn't worth it in most cases as long as the tanks are effective at mitigating damage from Hissyphus and Kronissus.
For the second, if the group does want to kill one boss first then I highly recommend Kronissus. Kronissus is the most dangerous boss and having him down first provides a backup tank in case the pull rotation to cheese Titax Strike fails. Depending on how skilled the tanks are at avoiding damage from Kronissus, it may be a push or even a DTPS gain despite the +15% buff by removing Kronissus first.
Once Titax reaches 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, I suggest waiting to move him to the tracks until he reaches around 20%. If he is tanked on the track fencing then he won't have far to go. Titax does have a pull if you get too far so make sure to move him steadily but not too quickly. Most importantly, make sure the pullers have LoS on the tank for a Titax Strike. Once Titax reaches around 20-25% health, go summon the train and push him to 15%.
All the Final Form mastery achievements should have three tanks, one for each of Hissyphus, Kronissus and Titax. There is no timer-based enrage and it simply isn't possible to tank two Trandoshans for very long in Veteran Mode.
Hissyphus is very dangerous when attempting his Final Form achievement. As he gains stacks of Chaotic Evolution, he gains +1 stacks of Venom Synthesis and the radius of the Tx-1Ch E. Gas increases by 1m. This means that the acid puddles and DoT go out faster and faster and the acid puddles get larger and larger. This becomes especially dangerous at 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, when kiting Hissyphus requires nearly constant movement, a 3-person cleanse rotation, and nearly half the room.
The key requirement for this achievement is having a cleanse rotation for Venom of Hissyphus and having a positioning strategy to give the tank sufficient room to kite Hissyphus without getting into trouble.
3 tanks are also required to tank Titax, Hissyphus and Kronissus. A ranged DPS should "tank" Greus in the corner. A Gunslinger / Sniper is ideal for this task due to their Hunker Down / Entrench having very high uptime on 60% AoE DR as well as numerous other useful defensives. If damage is an issue then a fourth tank should be viable in 16m compositions.
With this composition, the basic concept is to burn Hissyphus to 15% and continue attacking him through his Torpor 35s self heal phase. He takes 80% less damage during Torpor. However, even reduced damage still shortens his uptime after Torpor ends, and the Trauma debuff applied by the Hissyphus tank will reduce that self-healing even more. Good DPS should see Hissyphus emerge from Torpor around 70-75% health levels.
It is worth noting that tanks should swap periodically to enable the defense debuff applied by Hissyphus to drop off. Make sure to call this out in voice comms to the pullers know whom to pull during Titax Strike if Titax is still up, otherwise the swap is very straightforward.
The biggest key to success is having a strategy to coordinate cleanses. At 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, Envenomed Strike will go out every 4 seconds to apply the Venom of Hissyphus DoT and Tx-1Ch E. Gas acid puddle. Given the cooldown of most cleanses, this will require a "1-2-3" strict cleanse rotation.
From a positioning perspective, the major challenge will be having enough room to kite Hissyphus and drop acid puddles. When Hissyphus reaches 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution it will take up at least a third of the room to drop them safely. For this reason, I recommend considering the elimination of one boss prior to burning Hissyphus, as this will more easily enable the Hissyphus tank to take up to half the room without clipping any other bosses.
Greus is the easiest to eliminate but the least dangerous by far. Kronissus is the most dangerous in terms of outgoing damage. However, I recommend eliminating Titax unless the group is prepared to use the "pull cheese" strategy to pull the Titax tank out of Titax Strike. This greatly simplifies the logistics of what folks are doing and eliminates the Presence of Titax buff that can make Hissyphus and Kronissus far more dangerous if they get buffed by it.
With that said, the optimal approach in terms of incoming damage would be to eliminate Kronissus and use the pull strategy to cheese Titax Strike. Kronissus does far more damage normally than Titax and killing him will also provide a backup tank for Hissyphus.
The tactical strategy for the fight will be to have a ranged DPS "tank" Greus, burn Hissyphus until the other two drop down, then have the tanks each pick up their boss. If the group intends to burn a boss other than Hissyphus, do that fight before pushing Hissyphus the first time. Once the team is ready to focus on Hissyphus, keep DPS on him at all times. The Hissyphus tank needs to be watching the stacks of Venom Synthesis carefully and make sure to start moving in the moments before the stacks reach 5. This will eventually progress to nearly constant movement. Cleansers should coordinate to get cleanses immediately when Envenomed Strike is used to apply the DoT.
Once Hissyphus reaches 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, I suggest moving Hissyphus to the tracks relatively early at 25% or so. The healers and ranged DPS should position themselves at the entrance to the tracks, where they have LoS on the Hissyphus tank and the other tanks. The Hissyphus tank should pull Hissyphus to one side of the tracks and work their way down the wide until he reaches 15%. Once Hissyphus reaches around 20-25% health, go summon the train and push him to 15%.
All the Final Form mastery achievements should have three tanks, one for each of Hissyphus, Kronissus and Titax. There is no timer-based enrage and it simply isn't possible to tank two Trandoshans for very long in Veteran Mode.
Kronissus is extremely dangerous when attempting his Final Form achievement. As he gains stacks of Chaotic Evolution, the channel time of Endothermic Blast increases by 1s for each stack. The base channel time is 2s so the channel time will be 5s at 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution. Endothermic Blast ticks once per second so it ticks
The element that makes Kronissus' Chaotic Evolution by far the most dangerous is the Blistering Cold debuff applied by Endothermic Blast. Each tick of the Endothermic Blast ice conal ability (ticks once per second) applies a stack of Blistering Cold. One stacks reduces movement speed by 100% as well as other effects to reduce alacrity and increase threat. Of critical importance to this achievement is that a cleanse only removes 1 stack of Blistering Cold. Finally, reaching 3 charges of Blistering Cold applies the Frozen debuff with a 6s duration.
Normally, a channel of Endothermic Blast will only apply 2 stacks of Blistering Cold and is used every 12s and will not apply Frozen on its own. As such, the tank needs to keep Kronissus moving nearly constantly so that when Endothermic Blast goes out they get most of the way out of the conal before the first tick is applied. They then can use a cleanse or self cleanse, or possibly use a cooldown to either eat the damage or cheese the slow and run out. Then any remaining stacks of Blistering Cold can be cleansed before the next Endothermic Blast 10s after the first finishes.
As Kronissus picks up Chaotic Evolution stacks it becomes tougher and tougher to avoid Frozen status from reaching 3 stacks of Blistering Cold. If the tank is consistently getting to 3 stacks of Blistering Cold, it places a lot of pressure on healers to keep cleanses going out quickly enough given that they only remove 1 stack per cleanse.
The key requirement for this achievement is having a tank with very quick reaction time and good defensives. Shadow / Assassin and Vanguard / Powertech tanks are preferable due to their frequent availability of Force Speed and Hold the Line / Hydraulic Overrides to help get out of Endothermic Blast. Shadow / Assassin is the best due to more frequent availability of Force Speed and the ability to use Resilience / Shroud to eat the damage from an Endothermic Blast channel.
With this composition, the basic concept is to burn Kronissus to 15% and continue attacking him through his Torpor 35s self heal phase. He takes 80% less damage during Torpor. However, even reduced damage still shortens his uptime after Torpor ends, and the Trauma debuff applied by the Hissyphus tank will reduce that self-healing even more. With good DPS, it should take around 30s to push Kronnisus each time after Torpor ends.
In addition to skillful tanking, the next biggest key to success is having a strategy to coordinate cleanses. It is critically important to make sure the tank either has 0 stacks of Blistering Cold or has a movement speed ability ready going into each Endothermic Blast. In addition, having a healer who is very quick on the trigger to cleanse the first stack of Blistering Cold will be hugely helpful. In this scenario, the tank gets 1s after Endothermic Blast begins to move before being slowed by Blistering Cold, then has some additional time after the first cleanse to move a bit more before the second (and third-fifth) ticks go out. If the tank is quick to move, this can help them avoid most channels of Endothermic Blast entirely.
From a positioning perspective, not a lot of room is needed to kite Kronissus. I suggest putting him in a corner near one of the train ropes and hold him in that general area.
The only other tactic to consider is tanking Titax. Burning Kronissus does not take that long but the tank will still run out of tanks of Mutagenic Goo when pursuing this achievement. As such, either the team needs to eliminate Titax first before focusing on Kronissus or needs to coordinate a pull team to pull the tank out of Titax Strike. I suggest eliminating Titax first when pursuing this achievement alone, as the +15% damage buff to Kronissus is manageable and significantly eases the logistics of the encounter.
Another huge benefit to this strategy is having a second tank available in case one dies to Kronissus, which is HIGHLY LIKELY at 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution. I strongly recommend eliminating Titax first.
The tactical strategy for the fight will be to have a ranged DPS "tank" Greus, burn Hissyphus until the other two drop down, then have the tanks each pick up their boss. The tanks need to separate Kronissus and Titax immediately. If the team is burning Titax first, eliminate him immediately while the Kronissus tank keeps Kronissus in the corner. This phase will require a lot of logistics for non-tanks between cleanses of the Kronissus tank for Blistering Cold, cleansing the Hissyphus tank every 12s of Venom of Hissyphus, and pulls every 35s on the Titax tank. The Greus DPS should only damage Greus enough to hold aggro then focus DPS on Titax.
Once Titax is eliminated, all DPS should focus Kronissus. DPS should burn as quickly as possible even during Torpor (Kronissus' 35s self-heal mechanic). Good DPS should reduce Kronissus into the 60-70% health range coming out of Torpor, meaning that the tank will only have to deal with Endothermic Blast for around 30s (so 2 channels hopefully or 3 at the most). The tank needs to be quick on their feet and move out of Endothermic Blast as quickly as they can, using cleanses and movement abilities to help.
If the Kronissus tank gets excessive stacks of Blistering Cold or runs out of defensives, have the Titax tank (now relieved of duty since Titax was eliminated) grab him for a rotation. If DPS can burn Kronissus quickly enough to only get 2 channels of Endothermic Blast, each tank can take one channel before swapping, or can alternate uses of defensive abilities to take two channels and let the other tank take the next one.
To illustrate this more specifically, consider the following situation with two Shadow Tanks. Shadow Tank #1 uses Deflection with utility to ignore the Blistering Cold slow and move out of Endothermic Blast. They then continue to hold Kronissus and use Resilience to cheese the effects of the second Endothermic Blast. The team then pushes Kronissus to 15% before the third channel of Endothermic Blast, with Shadow Tank #2 taking aggro the next rotation and using the same combination.
Once Kronissus reaches 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, I suggest moving him to the tracks immediately when Torpor ends (boss will be around 60%'ish). It is highly likely that a tank will die dealing with the repositioning, so the second tank and any DWTs need to be prepared to taunt as needed. The team can afford to sacrifice both tanks and a DPS in order to hold Kronissus on the tracks, as it will take very little time to push him to 15% while still having DPS to push the remaining bosses. Once Kronissus reaches around 25-30% health, go summon the train and push him to 15%.
Okay, so to begin with I suggest anyone pursuing this achievement read the complete commentary on all the Final Form achievements above. A quick recap of the requirements for each individual Final Form achievement:
3 Sage / Sorcerer players for pulls to cheese Titax Strike knockback
Gunslinger / Sniper to "tank" Greus in place while using AoE DR to take survivable damage
3-person cleanse rotation for Hissyphus Venom of Hissyphus DoT
1 (preferably 2) Shadow / Assassin tanks for effectiveness of cooldowns / utilities on Kronnisus
The basic strategy for this fight is to push one Trandoshan at a time to 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution then pull them to the train and kill them. This makes the third and fourth bosses exceptionally dangerous because their damage will be buffed +50% after 2 are killed and +300% after the third is killed.
The kill order for this achievement should be as follows:
Greus: Of the two initial bosses, Greus is much faster to eliminate than Hissyphus. Since a DPS has to "tank" Greus it is also preferable to free them up and avoid the higher DTPS. Greus can be pushed quickly with only around 30s of activity and outgoing damage between Torpor phases.
Titax: Titax is incredibly annoying due to the need to cheese the Titax Strike mechanic, thus he is killed next. His Presence of Titax buff is also incredibly dangerous if it affects Hissyphus or Kronissus for any length of time.
Hissyphus: Hissyphus requires a LOT of space to kite as he reaches 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, so getting rid of Greus and Titax frees up most of the room for kiting. It is also much easier to manage the quick cleanses with Titax gone (and thus the need to cheese pull Titax strike every 35s).
Kronissus: Kronissus is left for last because he has less health than Hissyphus. He is the most dangerous but the lack of uptime is incredibly huge. With a +300% damage buff, it just isn't possible to tank Titax or Hissyphus for the amount of time needed to push them to 15% four times. With Kronissus, it should only take around 30s to push each time and so tanks (3 should be available by this point) can cycle through defensive abilities and swap as necessary.
The basic strategy combines the Final Form strategies above into one combined approach.
Opener
The Hissyphus tank grabs Hissyphus and pulls him to the back right and tanks him normally (all positions relative to the team's perspective as they begin the fight). All DPS jump on Greus. Any free tanks can help DPS Greus but should either delay jumping in or avoid any high threat abilities to avoid aggro. The Greus "tank" DPS should NOT threat drop while other DPS should do so. Greus should be pulled to the back left near the train railing.
Healer cleanse rotation begins on Hissyphus tank and continues until he is killed. Three cleanses will ultimately be needed, though early on only one may be necessary due to the slower application of the DoT.
Tank swap rotation begins on Hissyphus and continues until he is killed. The exact swap depends on preference but usually 5-7 stacks of Damage Defenses.
After One Minute
Titax and Kronissus drop down. Tanks pick them up. Take Titax to the back right and Kronissus to the front left (in the same vicinity as the train console). All DPS remain on Greus, who should be nearing the end of the first Torpor phase by this time.
Pull rotation begins on Titax tank. Titax Strike happens every 35s and the tank with aggro needs an immediate pull to avoid being instantly killed. This also enables the Titax tank to hold Titax in one position rather than moving him around to be knocked into Mutagenic Goo containers. Titax tank needs to taunt back immediately to avoid losing aggro.
Tank swap continues on Hissyphus with Titax tank.
Cleanse rotation continues on Hissyphus tank.
Cleanse cycle begins on Kronissus tank. Try to cleanse 1s into Endothermic Blast to help the tank get out of the conal. If any stacks of Blistering Cold remain, additional healer cleanses will be needed.
Burn Greus
All DPS stay on Greus, continuing to threat drop except for the Greus "tank" DPS. As soon as Greus finishes Torpor and adds third stack of Chaotic Evolution, the Greus "tank" should pull him to the tracks immediately. Continue DPSing him. Summon the train at 25-30%. After Greus reaches 15% and triggers Torpor, DPS swap to Titax.
Pull rotation continutes on Titax tank.
Cleanse rotation continues on Hissyphus tank and Kronissus tank.
Tank swap rotation continutes on Hissyphus and Titax.
Burn Titax
Titax is held in place near the tracks and burned. No additional mechanics needed. Pull Titax to the tracks around 30% but be careful to keep LoS for pull rotation. Summon the train at 20%. After Titax reaches 15% and triggers Torpor, DPS swap to Hissyphus.
Pull rotation continues on Titax tank until Titax reaches 15% health and becomes inactive.
Tank swap rotation continues on Titax and Hissyphus.
Cleanse rotation continutes on Hissyphus tank and Kronissus tank.
Burn Hissyphus
Hissyphus can be kited around half the room as needed. Once Hissyphus reaches 2 stacks of Chaotic Evolution he will drop acid puddles every 4-6 seconds and cleanse rotation will need to go very quickly.
Due to the frequency and size of the acid puddles, I recommend the Hissyphus tanks kite him in a grid pattern of around 5 spots taking up a large amount of space. Tank swap will still need to happen during this phase but will be easier with the off-tank not having to hold Titax, so be proactive in swapping early if necessary to avoid a death.
Pull Hissyphus to the tracks around 22-25% and be VERY CAREFUL to avoid dropping acid at the entrance to the tracks if possible. Summon the train at 20%. After Hissyphus reaches 15% and triggers Torpor, DPS swap to Kronissus.
Sometime during this phase, Kronissus should be moved up to be on the back left of the room near the train fencing. It is highly likely that the tank DPS alone will have pushed Kronissus to 1 stack of Chaotic Evolution by this point in the fight.
Cleanse rotation on Kronissus and Hissyphus tank should continue during this phase.
Burn Kronissus
Like Greus, Kronissus can be burned very fast and should only have around 30s or so of active time in between Torpor phases. However, he will be exceptionally dangerous during these phases.
There are now 3 tanks available so be very proactive in swapping when necessary. Of particular importance are abilities that provide immunity to Blistering Cold (Force Speed w/ utility, Hold the Line / Hydraulic Overrides) or abilities that can ignore damage (Resilience / Shroud).
Healers should help DPS during Torpor phase as much as possible. They should watch the Torpor buff on Kronissus and stop DPS with around 10-15s to regen energy and re-apply shields, probes, HoTs, etc.
DPS should hold any offensive cooldowns for use outside of Torpor.
In my opinion, the most dangerous phase is the burn phase while Kronissus has 2 stacks of Chaotic Evolution, and thus recommend using all raid buffs as soon as Torpor ends and applies 2nd stack of Chaotic Evolution.
Once Kronissus reaches 3 stacks of Chaotic Evolution and finishes Torpor, the tanks should IMMEDIATELY pull Kronissus to the tracks. This can be very messy due to Kronissus damage buff and greatly extended Endothermic Blast. However, it should only take 30s and there are 3 tanks, so even if the team loses a tank every 10s they should still be able to kill it. Once Kronissus reaches 30% and if any tanks are still alive, then healers should help DPS too.
Summon the train at 25-30% if all DPS are alive (lower if not). Just keep one person alive after pushing Kronissus to 15% and you will have done the (probably) impossible!!!
This mastery achievement is very straightforward but quite difficult to time. The basic concept is to burn Huntmaster to 36% and then hold DPS until he reaches 0 stacks of Master of the Hunt. He then begins a 6s cast of Ultimate Hunter. The team needs to push him to 35% before that cast finishes, or else Huntmaster will get a +400% damage buff and likely start one-shotting people.
This achievement is also straightforward but quite difficult to time correctly. The basic concept is to burn Huntmaster to 36% and then hold DPS until the Huntmaster begins his Fortress Shield ability. The team should then immediately DPS Huntmaster to 35% to push him.
Huntmaster will then teleport to the edge of the pond as usual when reaching 35% except with the Fortress Shield active. Shelleigh will come out of the pond but be unable to eat Huntmaster. Huntmaster should complete his Ultimate Hunter enrage cast. The charging bull will then ram into the Huntmaster and punt him into the pond.
Shelleigh will then aggro normally to the team and can be attacked. The team needs to prioritize killing the charger first before attacking Shelleigh. Huntmaster (still alive in the pond) will continue using his ranged attack on Shelleigh to deal very high damage (taking out around 8-10% per hit at low stacks). This keeps the Shelleigh phase very short.
This achievement is fairly straightforward is fairly taxing on the healers. The team will need to push at least 15 adds into the pond, causing them to be killed by Shelleigh aka "Something Ill-Tempered".
This significantly extends the Shelleigh burn phase due to Shelleigh getting extra health for each add she devours. The extra burn time causes the group to get more stacks of the Toxic Cloud DoT and take far more group damage.
I suggest during the first Primal Fear cast of each spotlight phase, a tank should run to the pond to grab aggro of the adds. Pop an AoE taunt to hold them. A DPS or healer with a knockback should run out and knock the adds into the pond. Two instances should be sufficient with good positioning and coordination.
Apex Predator ticks Photogenesis once per second when the lights are on, so this achievement requires the lights to be on for 150s after Photogenesis is cast.
Apex should get around 13-15s of uptime on Photogenesis while the team DPS's the Power Transformer to expose the battery, and thereafter takes around 10-11s each time the battery is fully recharged.
Most groups will get this achievement with a successful kill, though teams with very good DPS or very skilled battery running (thereby minimizing the number of recharges) may not.
I suggest that the battery runner be pro-active in leaving the battery in a few seconds longer when needed to fully eliminate Apex's Darkness Overdrive stacks. Every kill I have seen that did not get this achievement was sometimes removing the battery with Apex at 2-3 stacks of Darkness Overdrive, so making sure to fully cleanse these stacks should guarantee the achievement.
With that said, be careful early on about leaving the battery in any longer than necessary. The DPS will have a small cushion for Peak Performance early in the fight that should build over time, so the battery runner should keep an eye on the boss' health and stacks of Peak Performance to make sure pursuing this achievement doesn't result in a wipe to enrage!
This achievement is fairly easy with coordination. Stims can be produced one every 2s once the Stim station is powered up and can store up to 12 stims at a time. So producing 60 will require 120s / 2 minutes of uptime on the Stim station during a fight that typically lasts 14 or so minutes for most groups.
The main requirement for this achievement is having a battery runner who can manage very low stacks of Tired and get to and from the Stim station while continuing to cleanse Mass Target Lock and Red Venom Cloud, keeping high uptime on Flare production, and Washing when needed.
My suggestion for teams is to have DPS pick up 6 stims each time they grab any and the battery runner should carry/use around 10-12 stims themselves for the speed boost.
The basic concept to this achievement is having DPS and the battery runner grab stims during each Voltinator phase and then any time the stim station is online and making stims. With minimal coordination this achievement is fairly easy.
This achievement is straightforward but difficult to achieve primarily due to the length of the fight.
Apex gains stacks of Darkness Overdrive any time the lights are off and Apex is not affected by Neutralizer Field (i.e., debuff applied by standing in a flare AoE). So, this fight requires that Apex always be tanked inside a flare AoE and that the battery runner fully cleanse stacks of Darkness Overdrive each recharge.
In practice, some tips to make this easier are as follows:
Be pro active in using flares. This goes without saying. That said, in many pulls teams will elect not to use a new flare when one expires and the battery runner is about to recharge. Use one anyway just to be safe.
The battery runner needs to be very aggressive in making flares as quickly as possible. In some pulls, the battery runner tries to prioritize making extra stims along with making extra flares, as this helps shorten the fight through extra stim use for DPS. When pursuing this achievement, I would avoid making any more stims than necessary to make sure flares are being made as fast as humanly possible.
Consider having healers share flare duty. Have one healer pick up the first three flares as the fight starts but another healer grab flares thereafter. Ideally flares should be produced fast enough so that the backup flare healer still has 1 left in reserve just in case a flare runs out while the main flare healer is picking up more flares.
This achievement is straightforward if timed correctly.
Apex gets a +20% damage buff per stack of Darkness Overdrive, so reaching 20 stacks equates to a +400% damage buff. This can't be sustained indefinitely or even for very long. Also, it takes too long to get Apex up to 20 stacks mid-fight and then leave the battery in long enough to get the stacks to drop off.
Given these considerations, the recommended strategy is to stop using flares near the end of the fight and let Apex keep adding stacks. The key to success is timing it so that Apex hits 20 stacks at 1-2% and dies almost immediately afterwards.
The exact timing will vary by group but seems to involve stopping flare usage around 15-16% (depending on how quickly the flare will run out at that point) and then burning the rest of the way without flares.
A key consideration here is to have plenty of stims available for DPS, healers and tanks. Tanks in particular benefit from these, as the Overclocked Defense gives them a huge mitigation boost.
In practice, the tank starting on Apex should hold him and start using normal defensives around 6-8 stacks, then use x2 stim at 10-12 stacks. The other tank grabs Apex at that point and uses all defensives to hold Apex for a few stacks then hits x2 stims. That tank then holds Apex until they die and other tank picks him back up. The first tank should be able to stim x2 again at this point, which should provide enough cushion to get the clear.
Only key point is that if Apex isn't at 19 stacks when group hits 1% health they may need to pause DPS for 4-5 seconds just to make sure. It would suck to get a kill at 19 stacks.
Another potential option that is riskier but more time-efficient is to try and push Apex to 20 stacks relatively early in the fight and then use the battery to drain his stacks back down. This is potentially doable but would require a DPS to run the barrel so that both tanks can hold the boss. That loss of DPS combined with the extra battery uptime could lead to enrage issues. The benefit is the team can rather quickly get to 20 stacks and if everyone survives and can get stacks back down to 0 with no enrage, then you know for sure you just have to get a kill and the 5% enrage burn will be much easier by comparison.