Care to explain why some people are taking 20k dmg in NM then? We have no problem with Soa NM, but when people say if you're taking more than 1 tick you're doing it wrong is just stupid. Like I said, the few rare occasions I take only 1 tick of dmg when I take the ball and stop in the middle. This happens about 1 out of every 5-10 balls. Running through the ball is always two ticks dealing 20k dmg which I have to heal through.

 

Nice pro tips there, I'm sure all the healers who are doing NM didn't know to use those.

The dozen of other Soa bugs must be because we're doing it wrong as well right?

There's a thread burried in here somewhere with a list of "bugs." I responded with how to deal with each of them in that thread. Here's the deal. There is a BUG where every once in a while you will take double damage as if the ball exploded twice on you. This happened to me ONCE since the game released. Nobody in my 16 man nightmare run EVERY WEEK has the problem you're describing and haven't in the past 2 months. Therefore, it stands to reason, that we're doing something differently than you are.

Here is how to pop balls. Forgive me if the steps seem obvious, but clearly you're having problems:

1) Be on NOT the East side of the map. The balls will spawn on the East. When they do, look at the raid warning. Is your name there? If yes, proceed to step 2.

2) Go to the outer ring of the platform to the north or south. This will prevent the ball from traveling through melee. Balls through melee is bad. By this time, you should hopefully be able to tell which of the 2 balls is yours. If you can, go to step 4. If you can't, go to step 3.

3) Move away from the other ball target in such a way as you're not kiting the ball over a "bad area"--mind trap or melee range. Move until you are 100% sure the ball is yours. If you're unsure, TARGET it, press Alt+T. If you are now targeting yourself, it is safe to move to step 4.

4) If you are a healer, do all you can to prevent dmg and/or immediately heal dmg. This includes but is not limited to hots, shields, cooldowns, adrenals, having a medpac button ready, etc. If you are a dps, make sure your healers have prepped you. If they haven't, call out for it. Once you are prepared, proceed to step 5.

NOTE: Throughout steps 1-4 you should never be closer than 15m away from the ball.

5) Run straight at the ball and through it. Note that it should be near the edge of the platform, away from other players, and nowhere near a "bad area."

6) Heal up.

At MAXIMUM, you will take 17k dmg from this on nightmare~12k explosion + 5k tick. This is why a shield from a sage/sorc and/or a personal cooldown helps considerably. If you are dying because of these two hits, you are not preparing yourself as explained in step 4.

I understand that most guilds working on this don't need things broken down so much for them and that this is all fairly straightforward. I also understand that being told you're "doing it wrong" can cause some people to feel butthurt. But really, it IS that simple and if you are dying, it's likely not the bug that happens maybe 1% of the time.

1) Be on NOT the East side of the map. The balls will spawn on the East. When they do, look at the raid warning. Is your name there? If yes, proceed to step 2.

Are you sure of this??? cause I am pretty sure i have seen them spawn at multiple locations on the map.

1) Be on NOT the East side of the map. The balls will spawn on the East. When they do, look at the raid warning. Is your name there? If yes, proceed to step 2.

 

Are you sure of this??? cause I am pretty sure i have seen them spawn at multiple locations on the map.

In phase 2 they only spawn between NE and SE. They never spawn on the west side of the room. You are safe on the whole western half of the room. In phase 3, they spawn at all directions, so the safest spot to be is in the middle. If you get targetted in p3, you should move out of the center to the edge where there aren't balls.

1) Be on NOT the East side of the map. The balls will spawn on the East. When they do, look at the raid warning. Is your name there? If yes, proceed to step 2.

 

Are you sure of this??? cause I am pretty sure i have seen them spawn at multiple locations on the map.

A vast majority of the time they spawn on the east side. One time last week, one of them spawned somewhere to the right of the raid group.

I know this happened because I DPS fairly close to Soa and when my ball spawned, I ran to the far right side. I was searching for my ball and I noticed it coming from the group's general direction, but farther to their right.

The ball came at me from an angle which I had never seen before and I actually dragged it through another player because there was nothing I could do to change its direction at that point. Just a one time thing, but was very weird.

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Another random bug that I saw last weekend....3 ball phases in a row, someone elses ball came straight for the group and when we split up to move, the ball came right for me and I was able to pop it. I knew it wasn't mine so I was watching for this to happen again, and I moved away from the group to DPS. Sure enough during the next 2 ball phases, a random person's ball came specifically for me even though my name wasn't listed. This didn't really cause a problem but was definitely a bug. It was a one time thing.

Another random bug that I saw last weekend....3 ball phases in a row, someone elses ball came straight for the group and when we split up to move, the ball came right for me and I was able to pop it. I knew it wasn't mine so I was watching for this to happen again, and I moved away from the group to DPS. Sure enough during the next 2 ball phases, a random person's ball came specifically for me even though my name wasn't listed. This didn't really cause a problem but was definitely a bug. It was a one time thing.

The swapping of targets can happen under two circumstances:

1) The person the ball was destined for died.

2) The person the ball was destined for vanished.

In both of those cases, the ball chooses a new target and it is NOT announced. Is it possible that either of these happened with your stray balls?

We've seen the double pop from balls in NiM.

Once we figured out what was occasionally happening we were able to deal with it.

Sure it hurts, as a sawbones I have no speeds so I'll generally take 1 tick of the AoE running in (5K dmg in Nim) then the ball will pop causing around 7500 to me. Now thats easy to manage, however we did notice that sometimes the ball would double pop, Causing the 5K on run in then 2 instant hits of 7.5K right after. Totaling ~20K instant damage.

Its not a common thing but you have to act as if every ball will do it, so make sure your ball runners are topped off and using Defensive CDs / have sage bubble etc .. whatever they can.

Most of the time .. it wont double pop and your runner will take next to no damage, on the occasions that it does double pop they will walk away ... which is the important part.

The swapping of targets can happen under two circumstances:

1) The person the ball was destined for died.

2) The person the ball was destined for vanished.

 

In both of those cases, the ball chooses a new target and it is NOT announced. Is it possible that either of these happened with your stray balls?

Yea I'm definitely aware of what happens when something happens to the target. But actually now something different happens. Now when someone gets airborne or dies, the ball moves to a specific spot right next to Soa and doesn't come after anyone. They stay on the NW side of Soa and stay there til they fade.

In my case, the balls spawned in and came directly towards me. I am sure of this because I was expecting it to happen and moved to the far north side ahead of time. A ball came for me right after it spawned, two more times.

I know its hard to believe me, but we have been doing EV forever and Im very familiar with the ball mechanics. I was even telling my guild this over TS as it was happening and I'm not even sure THEY believed me, based on the silence I received.