Abbot Video Guides

[Xiadais]

I decided to make video guides on Abbot, since my guild wants to start running Abbot, many players have never run it before (or know only roids), and I'm not currently playing enough for my schedules to coincide with theirs to a degree that would allow for teaching in-game.

Might as well share them with the forum community.

They're on Youtube, recorded with the free version of Bandicam, edited very lightly with Windows Movie Maker. They're rather long, college video lecture-esque. You can blame me being a college student for that.

As mentioned in the description of all the videos, informing me of any left-out or incorrect information would be greatly appreciated, either here or as a comment on Youtube.

Intro to Abbot
Ice
Tiles
Roids

[Thalone]

Neat. I only had time to view the first one today; I'll try to comment on the puzzle videos tomorrow.

Couple of little-known facts that were missed in your intro commentary (you might have covered them on the puzzle-specific videos). While direct healing is not possible in roids, temporary HPs such as Cocoon and GH/Aid clickies did work when last I ran Abbot seriously. Also, PRR defends against roid damage. I've also swum ice lots with ~800 HPs and healing that hits for ~400. This includes the straight swim method (SF pots and 30% + 20% amp), Jump-Quickened Heal/Recon, and wand + fall into water + jump onto island and heal up.

[Thalone]

OK, had a gander at the other videos. I didn't listen to the entire roid one, but I never heard mention that you can avoid encasement by repeatedly jumping in the air. If the Abbot casts it on you while you're in the air, you'll fall down out of the rock immediately.

Regarding ice, you touched on it briefly, but the targeting is very sensitive. It'll usually fire off in the direction of whatever's in your focus orb if you have something in it. I find that having myself selected, and holding down the right mouse button to mouselook gives very good results; unless the wand bugs out, it'll shoot where the reticule is aimed. Also, I didn't catch you mentioning the semi-safe spot for Inferno: last I heard, if you stand on one of the Abbot statue's feet, you take very minor damage that is easy to heal through.

For tiles, I didn't hear mention of how to determine where the rows are when you don't have goggles. The first crack in the floor nearest the barrier is row 2; the second crack is row 3. If you have ranks in tumble, rows 1 and 4 are two tumbles away from those markers. If you don't have ranks in tumble, rows 1 and 4 are three tumble-hops away. With 30% striders, running one second is approximately one tile; in this way, you can anticipate very nearly where the guide will stop if they type out a pattern. A tile is also approximately one capped jump, so what I do when following is jump off the middle of the tile before a pause and featherfall to the pause to get a bigger time cushion. In the video, it looked like you were repeatedly jumping; I believe this actually slows your actual travel speed. If the pathing is safe, you're better off just strafing it so it doesn't throw off the timing. It's also a good idea to build in a half second of buffer in the pattern to account for network and reaction lag.

Just a minor unrelated tip: it looked like you were fully typing out the same pattern at one point. You can hit the up arrow in chat to echo the latest chat input, saving you the effort and the possibility of typoes.

All in all, a useful guide. I hope to see more people running some Abbots; I've got some alts I'd like to cycle through 20 completions.

[Xiadais]

OK, had a gander at the other videos. I didn't listen to the entire roid one, but I never heard mention that you can avoid encasement by repeatedly jumping in the air. If the Abbot casts it on you while you're in the air, you'll fall down out of the rock immediately.

Regarding ice, you touched on it briefly, but the targeting is very sensitive. It'll usually fire off in the direction of whatever's in your focus orb if you have something in it. I find that having myself selected, and holding down the right mouse button to mouselook gives very good results; unless the wand bugs out, it'll shoot where the reticule is aimed. Also, I didn't catch you mentioning the semi-safe spot for Inferno: last I heard, if you stand on one of the Abbot statue's feet, you take very minor damage that is easy to heal through.

For tiles, I didn't hear mention of how to determine where the rows are when you don't have goggles. The first crack in the floor nearest the barrier is row 2; the second crack is row 3. If you have ranks in tumble, rows 1 and 4 are two tumbles away from those markers. If you don't have ranks in tumble, rows 1 and 4 are three tumble-hops away. With 30% striders, running one second is approximately one tile; in this way, you can anticipate very nearly where the guide will stop if they type out a pattern. A tile is also approximately one capped jump, so what I do when following is jump off the middle of the tile before a pause and featherfall to the pause to get a bigger time cushion. In the video, it looked like you were repeatedly jumping; I believe this actually slows your actual travel speed. If the pathing is safe, you're better off just strafing it so it doesn't throw off the timing. It's also a good idea to build in a half second of buffer in the pattern to account for network and reaction lag.

Just a minor unrelated tip: it looked like you were fully typing out the same pattern at one point. You can hit the up arrow in chat to echo the latest chat input, saving you the effort and the possibility of typoes.

All in all, a useful guide. I hope to see more people running some Abbots; I've got some alts I'd like to cycle through 20 completions.

I didn't mention avoiding encasement, no. I'll probably have to make a video of how to deal with his special attacks sometime (i.e. this weekend). This is mostly because I've never really tried avoiding encasement. Out of curiosity, does the DC Astral Presence (or w/e it is) that has petrification immunity protect from encasement? I heard something about it, but I don't remember which way.

I think in the ice section, I annotated/commented that F1 to self-target probably works well. I usually don't because I don't do ice enough, and usually encounter no problems. If it's not in the video, I'll annotate it in. Yes, you can stand on the right foot of the Abbot statue during the inferno. It ticks for ~20 damage every 2ish seconds, or whatever the normal tick interval is. (If you only heal with cocoon, it can't keep up with the temp HP.) There seem to be 2 damage components, the big (200-400) one, and the tiny (~15-25) one. If you stand on the foot, you're just barely in the water, and high enough that you apparently don't take the "deep water" (thinking "deep lava") damage. Apparently. The same day I recorded the videos, after recording, I did 2 abbot runs and someone showed me that spot after completion. I'll put that in when I get around to adding info. There are also assorted safe spots (or maybe just one) inside the inferno. During those same abbots, I was wearing my jeweled cloak to stay in an inferno since the Abbot was basically dead so I didn't feel like jumping out; for the entire duration of the inferno my cloak kept the same number of charges. Also, is it just me or does it seem to drain only 1 charge per tick now, rather than the 4 it used to be for spell absorption? I probably should've done more abboting before making the videos, but since the intention was for informing guildies, I figured it would be best to make them soon so that I could do more abboting.

I don't personally know where the rows are for tiles. I'll probably include that stuff, but it feels like too much rote memorization to me. Maybe by doing it a few times, but I doubt I'd remember otherwise. I think flips (as opposed to rolls; 35+ or 40+ Tumble or whatever for various directions) are farther than rolls, so the 2-roll rule probably doesn't hold. I might have to test that.
I have a really terrible internal clock and I can't really be bothered to look at buff timers to count the seconds. I probably should. I'll mention 30% movement speed -> ~1 tile/sec. Darned monks. And barbarians. And swashbucklers.
Repeatedly jumping probably does slow movement speed.
Yep, time buffers. Those were seriously the first time I'd done tiles in probably over a year, so I obviously sucked (That is NOT suggesting that I don't suck if I have practice.) I've also heard stuff about people testing lag by instructing the follower to jump as soon as they're commanded to, and noting about how long it is between command and response, although I've never done that. #1 tip for tiles: Be in the same room as the other tiler. No lag, and you can even look at your own tiles in real time if you need to =P (But that usually just screws with your mind, watching the camera not move when you press movement keys, but the character moving.) Basically the benefits are 1) No lag, and 2) Idk, maybe help them plan your path for "yes I can run that" or "maybe I should do *that* instead" or "tell me when you're done, I'm going to go get a snack"

If I was manually typing out the same pattern, it was probably just a random fluke. I know that pressing up duplicates the last sent (or un-sent) thing, and pressing it multiple times scrolls up higher in the list (but can't press down). Oh, actually, I remember that. I had a question mark because I was still checking to finalize the path's feasibility, and I spontaneously forgot it if would allow editing or if it auto-sent the message, so I just typed it out.


Thanks for the tips/advice/help/stuff.

[Thalone]

As far as I can tell, the Petrification Immunity chatter is all recent for the epic raid. No idea if it works for the heroic one.

Inferno seems to be a level 4 spell. If you use a PLIS as your absorption, it'll knock off four charges, as it absorbs based on level. Other items which absorb by spell rather than level will only lose one charge per tick. Very interesting if there is a safe spot for Inferno... Never seen it.

Good point on the backflip tumbling. It may be possible on such builds to temporarily lower the character's tumble by putting on a shield/heavy armour and taking off Good Luck/Dex items. As you pointed out, sometimes the people in tiles have different run speeds. This can somewhat be alleviated by turning on Earth stance/an Enhancement Tree defensive stance or taking off your striding item.

[Rys]

As far as I can tell, the Petrification Immunity chatter is all recent for the epic raid. No idea if it works for the heroic one.

Inferno seems to be a level 4 spell. If you use a PLIS as your absorption, it'll knock off four charges, as it absorbs based on level. Other items which absorb by spell rather than level will only lose one charge per tick. Very interesting if there is a safe spot for Inferno... Never seen it.

Good point on the backflip tumbling. It may be possible on such builds to temporarily lower the character's tumble by putting on a shield/heavy armour and taking off Good Luck/Dex items. As you pointed out, sometimes the people in tiles have different run speeds. This can somewhat be alleviated by turning on Earth stance/an Enhancement Tree defensive stance or taking off your striding item.

Heavenly Presence (which gives immunity to petrification) works in the heroic Abbot as well. I have been using it a few months back when I was soloing Abbot mainly because the constant jumping method didn't work for me well and I ended up encased eventually.

[RD2play]

nice, good call on the guide here hope it will boost abbot runs as it is one of the more fun raids when you know it.

Regarding ice, you touched on it briefly, but the targeting is very sensitive. It'll usually fire off in the direction of whatever's in your focus orb if you have something in it. I find that having myself selected, and holding down the right mouse button to mouselook gives very good results; unless the wand bugs out, it'll shoot where the reticule is aimed. Also, I didn't catch you mentioning the semi-safe spot for Inferno: last I heard, if you stand on one of the Abbot statue's feet, you take very minor damage that is easy to heal through.

G is the default key for auto target on/off, that and mouse look (t) to aim makes ice a lot more doable. also try to gauge the others jump capability it can make or break your duo run.

also in roids you should have auto target off and be in mouse look, haven't seen the video yet will take a look later.

edit: see you did, and even alt-z that's a nice one! hadn't thought about that. also maybe cut the glitchy part I think 35mins for a roids tutorial is a bit long

[Xiadais]

nice, good call on the guide here hope it will boost abbot runs as it is one of the more fun raids when you know it.



G is the default key for auto target on/off, that and mouse look (t) to aim makes ice a lot more doable. also try to gauge the others jump capability it can make or break your duo run.

also in roids you should have auto target off and be in mouse look, haven't seen the video yet will take a look later.

edit: see you did, and even alt-z that's a nice one! hadn't thought about that. also maybe cut the glitchy part I think 35mins for a roids tutorial is a bit long

I unbound T because it got too irritating accidentally going into perma-mouselook when I tried to hit... something else, don't remember what... probably F. Right mouse button is much more controllable.
G is one of my hjeal keys I hate accidentally getting auto target turned off in the rest of the game.
Yep, probably should've mentioned measuring your partner's jump.
I'll just link (and annotate the link) to when the glitchiness is done, with the annotation at the start of the glitchiness.

Once I get "enough" feedback, or I get bored, I'll add to the videos.


Anything else people think should be in video?
-Dealing with his special attacks?
-Fighting the abbot?

EDIT: On my server, even in pugs, it seems to be pretty standard to instruct people to ALT+Z for roids. I guess it's good that I included it, then, for cross-server instruction.

Also, any advice for simple video quality things would be appreciated, rather than just the content. Not that I care too much about the quality... But if it's easy enough, might as well.


http://youtu.be/tFMTQwvuAFM
^ Potential safespot

[Rys]

I unbound T because it got too irritating accidentally going into perma-mouselook when I tried to hit... something else, don't remember what... probably F. Right mouse button is much more controllable.
G is one of my hjeal keys I hate accidentally getting auto target turned off in the rest of the game.
Yep, probably should've mentioned measuring your partner's jump.
I'll just link (and annotate the link) to when the glitchiness is done, with the annotation at the start of the glitchiness.

Once I get "enough" feedback, or I get bored, I'll add to the videos.

I have noticed that you have a little mention at the end of the ice video about ice wander standing in the front of the island and the rest standing always in the back (same in duo). That's a very important information imo and if you are planning to redo the videos, it would be nice to inculde it to the voiceover as well.

Anything else people think should be in video?
-Dealing with his special attacks?
-Fighting the abbot?

Short video about the Abbot fight (about his special attacks, how to see it's coming, how to avoid it - spell absorption or ice island against inferno + when it is safe to jump back to the platform; jumping or Divine Crusader against encasement + showing how to get someone out of the encasement thanks to the boulders, etc).

EDIT: On my server, even in pugs, it seems to be pretty standard to instruct people to ALT+Z for roids. I guess it's good that I included it, then, for cross-server instruction.

Seems standard on my server as well but definitely worth the mention.

http://youtu.be/tFMTQwvuAFM
^ Potential safespot

Very nice! Didn't know about it and gonna have to try it some time soon.

Also thanks for doing this, will be handy for those interested in running Abbot, I am sure.