if one needs wings, one need simply make them

We’re now progging Wicked Thunder (M4S1(?)), without anything much of significance having happened in the interim. “Why does she want our soul, anyway?” Dante asked.

“She wants to stuff it in her doohickey,” numbers said.

Everyone looked at him (especially newbie and me, who, at HGR’s behest, are currently reading through the greatest modern work of American literature). “Perverts!” numbers said. “I mean her regulator! She wants to put it in her regulator!”

(Actually, Wicked Thunder is suffering from soul necrosis, which she has discovered can be cured through application of a particularly dense soul. Which we have. By the way, I still don’t buy the Arcadion being able to keep the existence and cause of soul necrosis under wraps, considering that hunters in the outskirts frequently use feral souls as part of their jobs.)

To recap the past couple fights: The most notable thing about M2S (Honey B. Lovely) is Alarm Pheromones, where sixteen bees in sequence appear on random spots on the outer edge of the arena, target a random player, and do a straight-line AOE with knockback. Dante spent a long time trying to hash out a strat for the mechanic. Eventually we reached the conclusion that there is no strat. The strat is Just Dodge the Bees. Observe Where the Bees Are and Go Somewhere Else. This strat has had middling success, but it’s all we got. Oh yeah, and hit arms length in the middle of the mechanic, even if you don’t think you’re going to get hit, because it’s not like you need it for anything else. I’m generally pretty okay at the mechanic except when I’m not. So it goes. I avoided dying in three out of our four clears so far, which feels about right, ratio-wise. (I also got two 19% parses, which is pretty solid by my standards.)

The most notable thing about M3S (Brute Bomber) is the ref getting kicked out of the arena. I could make a ref fandragon, which I would probably get bored of in two months and exalt, but that would actually be part of the bit. I have plenty of time to think about this because the ref-getting-kicked-out-of-the-arena sequence happens every pull.

And now we’re at Wicked Thunder, who may or may not be a door boss. HGR thinks the HP doesn’t line up for that. Well, we’ll see.