Phase 3: Oracle of Darkness

UNDER CONSTRUCTION MAY BE INACURAT AND INKOMPLETE

After the Ice Veil is broken and the intermission is completed, enjoy a long break through the lead-in of The Extreme as Gaia is possessed by Loghrif’s memories and takes up her role as the Oracle of Darkness.

As you might expect, this phase reprises mechanics from phase 2 of E12S. It’s a straightforward full-uptime phase where, again, you need to get the boss below 20% before enrage to proceed to the next phase.

Intro

After the 27 seconds or so of downtime for the transition, the Oracle of Darkness—or just Gaia, as everyone calls her—becomes targetable. She kicks things off with Hell's Judgment, which inflicts damage on everyone equal to their HP-1, ignoring migitation and shields.

The usual effect of this is to set everyone to 1, but there’s a brief gap between the moment when damage is computed and when it’s applied. If your current HP changes in this time, you won’t go to exactly 1. Pay careful attention to the cooldowns of Max HP-increasing abilities, as it’s possible to die if they fall off after the snapshot.

Sequence 1: Ultimate Relativity

The first sequence is Ultimate Relativity, with its classically over-the-top cast animation. The cast is a raidwide in addition to starting the mechanic off, but unlike the Relativity casts from E12S, it seems like it is simply a normal raidwide rather than shared damage.^[1] The message “The laws of time are in chaos!” appears on the screen, although it’s purely for flavour.

The arena floor changes from dark blue to a bright teal colour for the duration of the mechanic, but this is a purely cosmetic effect.

Spells-in-Waiting

What’s actually in chaos is everyone’s debuff bars, as everyone receives three spells-in-waiting. From left to right on the debuff bar, they are as follows:

1. Every player receives a 10-, 20-, or 30-second or :

   1. Two supports and one DPS each receive 30 Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Fire III .
   2. One support and one DPS each receive 20 Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Fire III .
   3. Two DPS and one support each receive 10 Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Fire III .
   4. I lied a little bit. Either the support with 10 or the DPS with 30 actually receives 20 Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Blizzard III instead.

   However, for the rest of the debuff breakdown, I’m going to pretend the doesn’t exist, and all players receive . It simplifies the explanations.

2. Three players receive Spell-in-Waiting: Unholy Darkness : one for 10 seconds, one for 20, and one for 30. The duration will not match their or , but the recipients seem otherwise random.

3. Every player receives a 16- or 26-second .

   1. The three players with 30 receive 26 Spell-in-Waiting: Return ,
   2. The other five players receive 16 Spell-in-Waiting: Return .

4. Every player receives a 43-second , , or :

   1. The three players with 30 receive 43 Spell-in-Waiting: Shadoweye .
   2. The DPS with 20 receives 43 Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Water III .
   3. The remaining four players all receive 43 Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Eruption .

It perhaps comes as a bit of a surprise how tightly role-based the assignments are, given that this is an ultimate. Thankfully, though, it means that everything apart from the three can be summarized in a single small table:

Role	2×	1×	1×
Support	30 26 43	20 16 43	( 10 / 20 ) 16 43
DPS	10 16 43	20 16 43	( 20 / 30 ) 26 43

When Spell-in-Waiting: Return expires, the position of its bearer will be recorded with a blue marker, and the bearer will receive Return . The duration of the debuff will be either 24 or 14 seconds, so that the expires 40 seconds after the start of the mechanic. A ticking clock marker also appears above all players’ heads until the rewind occurs.

At the expiry of , all players receive 4 Stun and are teleported back to their recorded positions. The , , and resolve before the expires, so the recorded positions must solve these debuffs. Furthermore, due to the stun, the direction of facing can’t be changed, so players must be facing the right direction to avoid the gaze attacks before the rewind begins.

Hourglasses

In addition to the debuffs, Ultimate Relativity summons eight Delight's Hourglass, one on each principal direction. Because of their three-lobed appearance, and the various colours they had in E12S, they’re often called “traffic lights” in the community.^[2] They are all green in this fight, however, so the anology doesn’t work so well.

Right after the Hourglasses appear, Gaia casts Speed. As she does so, three yellow lines and two purple lines—with bright orbs in the middle—connect her to some of the Hourglasses. Although the orientation is random, the pattern is always the same: the three yellow lines make a Y shape, while the two purple lines are horizontal relative to the Y. Note that Gaia herself does not change facing during this cast.

The effect of Speed is to set up the order in which the Hourglasses use their one attack, Sinbound Meltdown. The yellow-marked Hourglasses make up the first wave, the unmarked ones the second wave, and the purple ones the third wave. The three waves happen approximately 16, 26, and 36 seconds after the start of the mechanic, with the first two corresponding to the expiry of the Spell-in-Waiting: Return debuffs.

As the Hourglasses cast Sinbound Meltdown, there is an advance warning with either a clockwise yellow indicator, or a counterclockwise blue indicator, randomly selected for each Hourglass. This indicates the direction the attack will rotate.

The attack itself is a laser targeted on the nearest player to the Hourglass in question. Two seconds later, the second laser fires, rotated a bit in the direction originally indicated. Eight more follow, one second apart, creating a total arc of roughly 120° across ten shots.^[3]

Note that the third wave of lasers will still be firing during the rewind to snapshotted positions, so players must be careful not to snapshot in positions where they will be hit.

Intermezzo

As the last set of Hourglasses are firing, Gaia casts Shell Crusher and jumps to a random player, hitting them with a full-party stack. She subsequently casts Shockwave Pulsar, a heavy raidwide, and Black Halo, a tankbuster intended to be shared by both tanks.

Relativity Timeline

t = 0	Buffs go out
t + 4 s	Speed cast begins Tethers appear
t + 4 s	Speed cast completes Tethers disappear
t + 10 s	10 10 denotate
t + 11 s	First Sinbound Meltdown casts begin Rotation indicators appear
t + 16 s	16 snapshot positions First Sinbound Meltdown lasers begin
t + 20 s	20 20 20 denotate
t + 21 s	Second Sinbound Meltdown casts begin Rotation indicators appear
t + 26 s	26 snapshot positions Second Sinbound Meltdown lasers begin
t + 30 s	30 30 denotate
t + 31 s	Third Sinbound Meltdown casts begin Rotation indicators appear
t + 36 s	Third Sinbound Meltdown lasers begin
t + 40 s	Players stunned and returned to snapshotted positions
t + 43 s	43 43 43 denotate Sequence complete Gaia begins casting Shell Crusher

Sequence 2: Sextuple Apocalypse^[4]

Gaia’s second and final mechanic sequence begins with a cast of Spell-in-Waiting Refrain. This cast gives her the Spell-in-Waiting Refrain buff, but is purely cosmetic. As she casts a follow-up Dark Water III, stack markers will appear over the heads of six random party members. These markers are fake-outs, and will not resolve until later. So there’s no need to stack for them now.

When the cast resolves, six random players receive Spell-in-Waiting: Dark Water III : two for 9 seconds, two for 28 seconds, and two for 37 seconds. These timings determine which players must be in separate LP stacks when they go off. The remaining two players will not have any debuffs. The delayed spells remain visible over players’ heads as spell-in-waiting markers until they fire.

Moving Lights

As Gaia completes a cast of Apocalypse, the pattern on the arena floor changes from the six large circles to an eight-way geometric design with lines along each of the four orthogonal and diagnoal axes, and a single circle around the center.

For the next segment of the mechanic, lights appear on the ground, travelling along the lines and the outer circle. When a light appears, and every two seconds afterwards, when it reaches an intersection of one of the axes with the circle, a pulse of light is emitted vertically upwards, along with an expanding white circle. Each of these circles indicates an upcoming AoE, slightly bigger than 1/3 the width of the arena, but none of them resolve yet.

1. First, three circles appear in a straight line through the center. From the circles on the ring, two lights appear traveling in the same direction along the ring, either clockwise or counterclockwise. From the center, two lights appear traveling along the same axis that the circles were aligned on.

2. When the light reach the next intersections, the second set of circles appears. In addition to the four caused by the existing lights along the outer ring, forming a sort of hourglass shape, there is a circle in the center as well.

   After the circle is emitted, the lights follow the same path, further along the ring. There are two new lights moving out of the center this time, bringing the total to six.

3. At the next intersections, the six circles emitted now cover most of the arena, three in a row on opposite sides of the ring. The safe area is just a line through the center, offset 45° from the original axis, away from the direction the lights are traveling. For this wave, and the following ones, there are no circles in the center, so the center of the arena becomes safe.

4. The lights continue their journey around the ring for each of the remaining three waves. The safe spot is the same shape each time, vaguely line-shaped through the center of the arena, but each time offset 45° from the previous in the direction the lights are rotating.

After the sixth wave of circles, the AoEs actually begin. Note that although the circles appeared every two seconds, the first wave of AoEs is only one second after the last circle. The remaining AoEs match the timing of the lights, with two seconds between each wave.

The Oracle’s Casts

Gaia casts Spirit Taker, starting just before the first circles appear. When this completes, she jumps at a random player and hits them with a small circular AoE. Anyone else hit by the AoE is knocked back from the targeted player, likely into the death wall. Immediately after the circles appear, the pair of 10 go off.

Just after the fourth wave of circles, Gaia begins to cast Dark Eruption, causing spread markers to appear above everyone’s heads. These spreads are not spells-in-waiting and go off immediately after the cast bar, right after the second wave of circle AoEs.

After the third wave of AoEs, Gaia starts a cast of Darkest Dance, finishing immediately after the final AoEs. The pair of 29 goes off right before those AoEs, near the end of the castbar, so there is very little time between the stack and Darkest Dance. Gaia jumps at the player farthest away from her, hitting them with an AoE tankbuster, followed in a few seconds after by a spin attack, hitting the entire party with a strong, non-resistable knockback from Gaia’s position along with a small amount of damage.

The arena changes back to normal just after she jumps. Shortly after the knockback, the last pair of 38 go off, marking the end of the mechanic.

Apocalypse Timeline

t = 0	Buffs go out
t + 3 s	Gaia begins casting Apocalypse
t + 7 s	Apocalypse cast completes
t + 9 s	Spirit Taker cast begins
t + 10 s	First light circles appear 10 go off
t + 12 s	Spirit Taker connects Second light circles appear
t + 14 s	Third light circles appear
t + 16 s	Fourth light circles appear
t + 18 s	Fifth light circles appear Dark Eruption cast begins Spread markers appear
t + 20 s	Sixth light circles appear
t + 21 s	First AoEs go off
t + 23 s	Second AoEs go off Dark Eruption goes off
t + 25 s	Third AoEs go off
t + 26 s	Darkest Dance cast begins
t + 27 s	Fourth AoEs go off
t + 29 s	Fifth AoEs go off 29 go off
t + 31 s	Sixth AoEs go off
t + 32 s	Darkest Dance tankbuster connects
t + 35 s	Darkest Dance knocks party back
t + 38 s	29 go off Sequence complete Gaia begins casting Shockwave Pulsar

Enrage

Gaia casts Shockwave Pulsar a second time before diving into Memory's End, her enrage cast. There is a very brief opportunity to reposition her a little bit in between the casts, which can technically affect the initial position of the phase 4 boss, although in practice it’s unlikely you can move her far enough to make a difference. Get her below 20% HP before the end of the castbar to turn it into “only” a heavy raidwide, and clear the phase.

In E12S, the enrage cast was notable for traveling relatively slowly out from the center, allowing players to put distance between them and the Oracle of Darkness in order to get an extra fraction of a second. That niche strat unfortunately isn’t applicable here, as whether or not you advance to the next phase is determined when the cast goes off.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Silent Bramble, Evansith, whoever worked out the debuff assignment pattern for Ultimate Relativity, and all the usual suspects.

1. If anyone can actually confirm this, it would be appreciated, as currently all I have is one person who said they “Don’t think it is.” ↩

2. Also, absolutely no one looks at these things and thinks “hourglass!” Seriously, what good is a three-chambered hourglass? ↩

3. Exact angle measurements would be appreciated, if anyone has them. ↩

4. The “sextuple” comes from the fact that there are six moving AoEs. and the original E12S had Apocalypse, Double Apocalypse and Triple Apocalypse, with the appropriate number of AoEs. ↩