big boy is harsh

We've finally reached the end of Eden's Gate Savage for our fated showdown against Titan, the Heritor of Crags.

"Wait," said newbie. "Is he wearing a stone loincloth??"

Yes, yes he is.

As befits a final boss, Titan has impeccable aesthetic. He has blasters on his back that transform into a car that he rides around the arena, doing donuts and knocking people off. He transforms into a giant and punches the arena, destroying huge chunks with every swing. This guy doesn't mess around.

I spent most of our first session dying to Evil Earth and being clueless. It doesn't help that Kan's mic was super quiet, so I missed half his explanations, and the other half was often conveyed in a way that didn't make sense to me. (I hesitate to call him "unclear," since the others seem to understand him better than I do. It's more like...we're mentally incompatible. Though I've noticed when he types out his explanations I understand them like 10x better.) For instance, based on Kan's explanation, I thought aftershocks were triggered by moving too quickly after an earthquake. Actually, it's the exact opposite: after a quake, all previously safe squares will get hit by an aftershock, so you need to move asap.

I died to a lot of aftershocks. I died to a lot of everything. We all did. Before entering the first lockout, I fully repaired my gear; when we exited, my gear was at 6%, with big warning tickers scrolling across my screen.

It's okay though; we had lots of time to practice, since we were able to raid both Saturday and Sunday (a side benefit of quarantine). By now I've become vaguely competent: I understand the sequence of the fight and, when I die, I generally know why and what I should have done differently. (though I have no idea when to hypercharge. xivanalysis gonna be yelling at me all day. I can fit one in before landslide, probably? do I have enough heat to do one right after evil earth?)

As a team, we got to Uplift 2, midway through Titan's second phase. That's good prog! Also, HGR can't stop thinking about Titan and planning strategies. He apparently got out of bed at 11 pm on Sunday night to draw us an MSPaint diagram of how we should position ourselves for bomb boulders.