FFXIV: Alexander Normal Win
Last weekend, we ran an attempt on Alexander Floor 1. This was the first time I attempted what FFXIV calls an 8-man raid, since I was too chicken to run any of the Coils. I heard the difficulty of Alexander Normal was do-able for most folks, which encouraged Syn and I to give it a try. However, I think our timing was bad in that it was Sunday night and we struggled through with a group for three rounds before having to vote abandon.
I’m not sure what all was going on, but the DPS just wasn’t there (I’m saying that as one of the DPS). This encounter seems to highly stress a DPS check and mechanics that fall on DPS folks doing and killing things in a precise manner. Tai is only ilvl 173, so I wasn’t sure if the lack of DPS was my lower ilvl, and have been saving up for my Eso weapon in hopes to give my damage a boost.
My suggestion was to also wait until after reset when more folks would be running it, in hopes to hit a group with better composition. While I wasn’t totally ready for it last night, FC folks kept encouraging us, so we did the run.
I’m really not sure what was different about this try compared to the previous. I’ve only upgraded one piece of armor since that run, and not even to ilvl 180 (need to get out and do hunts). But this time went much smoother than the previous, and we one-shotted the floor without problem. In fact, we had to send a DPS off of the Oppressor I was working on to attack the .5 version, and we downed them both almost exactly the same moment.
So, it’s my first ever FFXIV 8-man raid completed! It’s kinda fun, I guess. I doubt I’ll ever consider myself a real raider, however. ^^;
Oh, and one moment of oddness last night. When coming out of the raid and picking up the quest for the next part of Alexander, Tai ran across his twin!
