Crystal Guardian uberpet hunt

[Fellis]

TLDR: next hunt at 2200 UTC on 2/6, we will be organizing in the RRF discord channel, a link to which can be found in #links on nexus clash general (click chat tab above)

Hello! Welcome to the Crystal Guardian uberpet hunt thread. The Mages Council, Ragged Philanthropists, Scales of Namm, and others have been working hard to research some of the stats of this new uberpet and I think it's time to present our initial findings and take a stab at it, literally.

First off, the fight is a lot different from the Wyrm. The Guardian and Constructors roam around Amaravati and will need to be scouted. Also the Constructors need to be killed before the Guardian as each one alive will buff it. We don't have all the info yet, but what we know follows:

Crystal Constructors:
• 150 hp / 80 mp
• 9 slashing damage, 80% to hit primary / no secondary yet
• Slashing aura 8 damage for Melee/HtH/Pets (character pets WILL attack these!!)
• Soaks 6 against all
• Vulnerable to flight, can't retaliate
• Respawn timer: Chance to respawn at 15 min after kill, chance dependent on # of constructors alive (less alive = higher chance)
• No MO impact even without HoZ/HTT, safe to hit for angels
• Will not aggro 40 MO characters

Crystal Guardian:
• 5000 hp / 1000 mp
• 75 hp regeneration every pet tick
• 20 Fire/Cold damage simultaneous damage, but is reduced by 2 Fire/2 Cold for each Constructor that is dead, to a minimum of 10/10. Can be further reduced by personal soak to the damage floor of 2 fire/ 2 cold.
• Character pets will not attack
• Immune to Holy
• Neutral MO, so without HoZ/HTT you will lose morality!
• Seems to be about 20% defense, with scaling based on # of constructors alive
• Will not aggro 40 MO characters, but you need HoZ to stop retaliations (morality drop from attacks occur first)


Potion prep guide for a good uberpet hunt:
--Survival--
• 8 soak vs fire/cold. If you have no soak, this is easy to do via 3x fire/cold affinity AND 3x lesser invulns OR 1 fire 1 cold soak clothing/innate. Or DIY 8 soak with your innates!
• 3x Regen Potions OR good morality if there are aethersprites
• If you have 40 MO and HoZ, you will not take retaliations as long as your MO does not drop. Be careful about: reloading Virtuecasters, hitting the correct targets, destroying doors
• Redeemed above 40 MO will also not take retaliations until they drop below 40
• 1x Planar Protection to take before the hunt so its duration covers you if you don't have PP

--Damage--
• 3x CC potions
• 3x affinity potion of your main damage type
• if melee or H2H: 3x strength potions

Amphetamines to help you drink all these pots (take them ahead of time while on full ap, and the debuff will wear off and not affect you!)

[Fellis]

Staging for the Hunt
There are several microfactions in Amaravati currently. We will probably have some cloven portals set up in Laurentia (typically Silver City Ferry) to catch a ride and bash open a microfaction to sleep there. Please join the RRF discord for more information and to coordinate

[Fellis]

Ignore the info in this post, I just wanted to keep some things around for posterity

Current Strategy:
The crystal constructors have a pretty nasty aura and soak, but a decently prepared petmaster or two should have no problems taking them out. Angels without HoZ can also help here without worrying about falling from good. Hits against the constructors will count for badge rewards (confirmed by admins).

The biggest issue with the guardian is it's massive regen, so we need lots and lots of damage, which is lots and lots of people. Fire/cold is pretty trivial to reduce to the damge floor, after fire/cold affinity you only need a lesser invuln or 1 point of soak to each element.
Not all the questions about the uberpet have been answered or even thought of, here's just what is unknown currently. I think we'll get some admin info after a kill or two:

Current Investigations
• The constructors are important to the fight, where do they respawn? (construction locations scattered around Amaravati? random?)
• Are there any weaknesses in the constructor's soaks? unholy/acid untested [but probably also 6]
• Do any other items work to defeat crystal constructors more easily (do chunks of crystal have an effect on them? any other Amaravati-only items? chunk of cobblestone/chunk of coral comes to mind)
• Any other changes (aside from damage) of the Guardian when variable amounts of constructors dead
• Will pets attack the Crystal Guardian when all constructors down?

[Fellis]

More detailed gameplan and orders (UPDATE 1/30 after first Guardian Kill)

Before the hunt I need people to sort of self-organize based on the following criteria in rough priority order:

**SCOUTS:**
Angels without Hand of Zealotry
Conduits/Holy Champs with MP movement (and don't need MP for attacking guardian)
Petmasters
If you didn't prepare for the fight and will die in ~5 attacks (please ping Fellis to buy potions from Tem Shop)

**HUNTERS:**
Everyone else

There will be 3 stages of the fight and I will put down the orders for each group. Please keep discord chatter to a minimum because we require some more coordination

**Stage 1: Locate the Constructors and Guardian**
Scouts: call out in the discord channel which quadrant of Amaravati you are looking (NW, NE, SW, SE), and once you locate a pet, call it out with the coordinates in the discord channel. We will be trying to track locations of the constructors and guardian via a google doc.

THIS PART IS NOT TIME LIMITED so do not rush too much. The later stages are on a timer and this info is very important for the rest of the hunt to go smoothly.

There is a possibility that constructors are hidden inside, but hopefully not. If this happens, we will need to nominate someone to find any locations with doors open and check them. Most of the doors in Amaravati have been closed as of now.

Hunters: stay put for now!

**Stage 2: Kill the Constructors**
Scouts: After the first constructor is killed, we will have 15+ minutes until they start to respawn at the 5 construction sites located around Amaravati. Petmasters should move onto the spaces with the pets and let their pets get to work (If you are in defensive stance, the constructor should be attacked after it takes a swing at you, otherwise you may need to go to non-faction). Please post your kill timestamp in the discord so we can track.

Hunters: step out of your staging spot, potion up, and get ready to move to the guardian location. Please monitor discord for pings and commands


**Stage 3: Kill the Guardian**
Scouts: move to a construction site and monitor it for respawns or move to the guardian and help get a few attacks in. PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU HAVE HIT A CONSTRUCTOR OR THE GUARDIAN ONCE!

Hunters: unload on the guardian, as fast as you can. The longer we take the harder it will be to get through the regen!

[Fellis]

Information in this thread has been updated 2/2/2021, with what we have learned from the first hunt!

40 MO people will not be aggroed by the Guardian/Constructors
40 MO people will not take retaliations from Guardian, but you require HoZ (or be above 40 MO) for this to take effect as attacks and MO shift come before retaliations

Constructors have a chance to spawn 15 minutes after being killed, with a % chance on how many are dead

Tactics changes:
We are going to make sure the doors are closed, but also we will have a google doc to try and track the locations of the crystal constructors/guardian.