Divine Might

For the past few weeks, Kyubigokou was planning a run at Divine Might, which is basically a super-charged version of the 14th Zilart Mission, called "Ark Angels". Ark Angels is actually a series of five 6-man BCNM battles against the five Crystal Warriors, which correspond to the five races in the game.

Each of these fights is challenging, supposedly harder than the ZM8 fight against Kam'lanaut, since each of the Ark Angels have two different jobs (both presumably at 75), and can use the 2-hour abilities of both jobs. Yes, that means that the Ark Angel EV (Elvaan) who is a PLD and a WHM, can use both Invincible and Benediction. Not fun. >_<

Add to that a whole slew of extra special moves that are bot high-damage, AoE, and inflict multiple status effects, like the Ark Angel TT's Amon Drive with is AoE, Petrify, and Paralyze, and you have a very challenging battle ahead of you.

That was "Ark Angels". Got that? Good.

Divine Might lets you bring in an entire 18-man alliance instead of a 6-man party, but puts you against all five Ark Angels at the same time.

It is the hardest BCNM style battle in the game, for very good reason. Many people attempt Divine Might for the challenge, others attempt it for the special reward at the end- one of five RA/EX level 72 earrings that have very, very nice stats to them. Divine Might takes lots of planning, co-ordination, and skill. Some say a little bit of luck as well, but I don't really like factoring luck into things like this. ^^

Alternatively, you could just bring 15+ Black Mages down to get the job done. Yes, you read that right. The hardest BCNM battle in the game just became a walk in the park with a full Black Mage alliance.

Because of this, a lot of people have scorned upon Black Mages who choose to clear Divine Might this way, since it's not exactly the hardest thing to time eighteen people to all cast one spell at the same time. Admittedly, the fight was very easy, but boy, was it fun! ^^.



I woke up early this morning to head down to the Ru'Ann Gardens where we were all meeting up. Kyubigokou was actually organising this run, but unfortunately, his computer blew the night before, so we were at a loss as to what to do. In the end, we decided to go ahead without him, since it would be too much to get seventeen people to cancel, unfortunately for Kyubi. ;; Fortuantely, Nanahara was also planning his own BLM-style Divine Might run, and together, we had more than enough Black Mages who were all seeking that Abyssal Earring from the mission.

The plan was simple. Everyone go in, test their range with ancient magic, then wait for the alliance leader's signals. One Elemental Seal and eighteen Thundaga IIIs later, all the Ark Angels are now defeated, with perhaps one or two left alive, which can be fixed with a few Blizzaga IIIs.



It was Black Mage elegance at its finest. While so incredibly simple, there is nothing as satisfying as seeing eighteen Thundagas go off at the same time, wrecking death and destruction upon those unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end. Suffice to say, we cleared them out in no time at all, and a few minutes later, I now have my Abyssal Earring! ^^



We then went around, ferrying non-BLMs through Divine Might so they could get their earring as well, and boy, did that take a long time! All in all, I think we spent 6 hours there, killing off the Ark Angels, which also meant that some of the people there spent 6 hours just sitting outside the La'Loff Amphitheatre waiting for their turn. We started off sluggishly at first, but we sped up once people got the hang of what to do. We still had some accidents though. Occasionally, the nukes weren't enough to kill off the Ark Angel EV and Ark Angel GK (the Galka always survives this) and they'd kill a few Black Mages before the others could finish casting Blizzaga III on them, completing the job.

Then, there was the one time someone was in autorun and lagged, and so ran in too far and aggro'ed all the Ark Angels, who then continued on their merry way obliterating the entire alliance. >_< I think I lost about 10k xp from all the Reraises I ate- better go xp my Black Mage again soon- one more death and it's back to Level 74 for me! >_<

Also, clearing Divine Might gives you the title, "Pentacide Perpetrator", although that didn't exactly go well as a title for today's entry. ^^ I'd very much like to try Divine Might again, the regular way though, since I like a good challenge, even though I do not regret the fun I had in doing it BLM style. I figure we'll all have to do it again someday, when Kyubigokou gets his computer back online!