Submitted by cyclonus on Mon, 06/05/2006 - 14:54.

This Assault is also somewhat luck based; details in the guide below.

Awards and a map

You’ll need this; print out, copy it, whatever, just make sure you are looking at it while engaging in this Assault (hah, this is similar to my Excavation Duty guide). This Assault takes place in Ilrusi Atoll

Confirmed awards:

• ??? Box – Eggplant
• Link to Items that can be purchased with Assault Points from this zone

The “short version” of the strategy

Cyclonus’s recommended* party setup: x1 any job that can remove poison effect, x1 refresher, x4 DD (may want to include a tank).

*This my own personal take on it; please do not limit yourselves or state that “Cyclonus said, blah blah blah,” any group that works well together can complete this Assault – with a bit of luck

NOTE: This “short version” does not cover the full Assault, it is only meant as an overview/high-level guide.

Strategy: Zone in, buff as needed, start walking to labeled chests on the map above. Repeat until objective is completed.

The “Real” Guide

Cyclonus’s recommended* party setup: x1 any job that can remove poison effect, x1 refresher, x4 DD (may want to include a tank).

Strategy: Firstly, let us begin with an overview. The objective of this Assault is to recover a “figurehead” from a chest. Sounds easy, except that there are 15 chests in this zone…

Soez what?! I’s have WS

And that’s great… but I provided a map. Also, 15 chests and only one contains the figurehead; in FFXI terms, that means all the other chests are decoys, AKA, mimics.

Yeah, mimics suck. They have a draw-in ability and this nasty AoE move called “Death Trap,” which results in AoE Stun and AoE poison effects. The poison, at an uncapped event, results in 20HP/tick damage and can quickly create problems for your support mages. As such, I would suggest that melees bring a few antidotes to assist the support mages and help them conserve MP.

Any way, back to the strategy. It’s very simple… clear all chests until you find the one with the figurehead. When I did this Assault we had a know-it-all SMN who swore he could solo this (and to a certain extent he could have by having Carbuncle attack a chest while he ran away – takes too much time though).

Upon zoning in, the party leader should determine a path. I would personally suggest clear all of the "Northern" chests first, but that’s just my opinion.

In traversing the zone, careful consideration should be given to the Percipient Fish (a pug-type monster). These things hit hard, fast and have true sight. They are nasty and you must avoid them at all costs – you do not have the time to engage them.

Hopefully, in covering the “Northern” path, you will find the correct chest and win the Assault. In the event that you do not, you must cover the “Southern” path and repeat.

The biggest difficulty in this Assault is ensuring that support mages have enough MP to cure/remove status effects from tanks/melees. Tanks and melees should do everything possible to support the mages. Also worth noting, once you engage a chest, you must clear it. The draw-in ability is killer.

Finally, BLMs are particularly useful in this Assault. At an uncapped instance, our BLM was able to cause approximately 75% to a mimic by using a combination of a single tier-IV and a single tier-III nuke.

The Assault, like all others, can be won/lost based on your planning and execution of said plan. Additionally, you may encounter problems if melee are not prepared.