Huntmaster

Group Composition

Group Composition for this fight should ordinarily be 2 tanks, 4 DPS and 2 healers. It is possible to run with 1 tank in both Story Mode and Hard Mode, though in Hard Mode doing so will require some combination of a DWT with good defensives, careful defensive timing by the tank and/or prepared healers to burst heal through the Penetration Shot armor debuff.

No particular class or discipline is especially better or worse than others on this encounter. The one helpful capability for a group is to have multiple players with AoE hard stuns and/or AoE-based defensive buffs or accuracy/damage debuffs to enemies. This capability is very helpful when dealing with adds to help control damage.

In addition, ranged DPS disciplines with 35 range will be able to continue damaging Huntmaster during his Holdout Cover phase as they can safely stand outside the 30m red AoE but still attack. Telekinetic Sage / Lightning Sorcer and all disciplines of Gunslinger / Sniper have this capability. It is helpful but not critical to most successful strategies, so is not worth any player swapping to a sub-optimal discipline (for them) just to get some additional DPS during these periods.

Pre-Fight Preparation

The most crucial preparation is ensuring every one knows how to recognize the Firestorm Grenade mechanic and how to deal with it. See below for some suggested options, many may work depending on preference. That said, the one sure way to wipe is to leave a fire AoE inside the spotlight, as standing in it will kill the group but leaving the spotlight will typically lead to a wipe also.

See Hard Mode discussion further below for additional items to discuss regarding (1) Penetration Shot tank strategy; (2) Powershot Volley group positioning; (3) positioning to kite Charger into Huntmaster; and (4) whether to kill Lurking Beasts during first Primal Fear debuff window in each cycle.

Strategy Key Points

In the simplest sense, the overall strategy for this fight has the following key points:

1. Stay inside the spotlight when it is powered up. The Lurking Beasts that spawn deal heavy damage with their leaping attack and will all leap to the same player if only they step out of the spotlight. The entire team must remain in the spotlight nearly all the time. The only exceptions are discussed at #2 and #3 below.

2. Drop Firestorm Grenade outside the group. The Firestorm Grenade AoE lingers for a while and cannot be placed in a position where the group has to stand in it to follow #1. The player can move briefly out of the spotlight to drop the grenade, but needs to leap/teleport/rocket out/holotraverse/etc. back in immediately after the grenade explodes or they will die.

3. (Optional) DPS Lurking Beasts during first Primal Fear window. The Primal Fear debuff reduces damage by the beasts for 18s, which should be plenty of time to AoE them down. A tank should step out first to grab their aggro and group them up, then DPS should use AoEs to kill them (and stay inside the spotlight if possible while doing so.)

4. Kill the Charger ASAP after it hits the Huntmaster. The Charger will be stunned for 8s after it hits the Huntmaster and breaks his Fortress shield. It must be killed within 1-2s of the stun expiring, or else its Confused and Infuriated +300% damage buff will lead to players being one shot.

5. Stay outside the 30m Holdout Cover Red AoE. Shortly after his Fortress shield is broken by the Charger, Huntmaster will leap to the shoreline of the pond and utilize Holdout Cover. This effect places a large Red AoE with a 30m radius on the ground, which extends from the shore to the middle of the grassy knoll in the main area. This taunts all beasts to him so he can kill them to reduce his stacks of Master of the Hunt. More importantly, any player who enters that Red AoE will receive a Holdout Cover Jolt debuff and be killed by Culling Shot shortly afterwards. Stay out of it at all costs!

6. Stay out of Shelleigh's Nom Purple AoE. When Shelleigh targets a player with Nom, it drops a small purple circle. Anyone in that circle will be instantly killed in 1.8s. As long as players move out of it or are pulled out of it, Shelleigh is very straightforward to kill.

• Huntmaster begins with 30 stacks of Master of the Hunt instead of 50.

• Penetrating Shot applies an armor debuff.

• Powershot Volley deals much more damage and will kill the targeted player unless others share hits by standing in front of the targeted player.

• Huntmaster entering Melee Frenzy after Fortress Shield will usually kill one or more players and lead to a wipe.

• Primal Fear debuff reduces damage dealt by 60% instead of 70%.

• The Deliberate Charger targets a player with Trample instead of Huntmaster.

• Shelleigh's Pulverize attack applies a 4s stun to the target.

Overally Hard Mode Strategy - Master of the Hunt & Adds

Since Huntmaster has only 30 stacks of Master of the Hunt, the biggest difference in Hard Mode is needing a strategy to kill adds. Absent such a strategy, Huntmaster will usually reach 0 stacks during the second Holdout Cover / Red AoE of death phase and enrage. Just killing as many adds as possible after Fortress Shield goes up and until the Charger attacks will not be enough.

This fight is relatively new and more strategies may develop, but the current most popular strategies are as follows (note these are primarily tailoed for 8m HM):

• Run with 1 tank / 5 DPS and push Huntmaster before 2nd Fortress Shield.

In this strategy, the second tank swaps to DPS gear or swaps to a "DPS tank" loadout (i.e., stays in tank discipline with defensive OH equipped but swaps most equipment slots to DPS gear). The objective of this strategy is to largely ignore the need to kill adds to to manage stacks of Master of the Hunt, and instead to DPS him faster than he can drop stacks. Since Huntmaster ordinarily will hit 0 stacks during the second Holdout Cover phase without specific action being taken, this strategy aims to apply enough DPS to push Huntmaster below 35% before the second Fortress Shield.

For context around required DPS for this strategy, the first time we cleared Huntmaster with this strategy our team pulled around 76k DPS for the entire fight (14-18k for each DPS, 9k for the "DPS tank" and 4k for the tank). At that level of DPS, we pushed Huntmaster to 35% around 10-12s before the second Fortress shield.

In terms of DPS capability, that requires higher numbers since the fight has some downtime during the Holdout Cover phase. I would estimate this strategy will require 4 normal DPS capable of at least 18k+ sustained DPS and a DPS tank capable of 11-12k, so it requires good DPS but not exceptional DPS given the extra DPS from the DPS tank. Any group that has enough DPS to clear the Control Center fight likely has enough DPS to execute this strategy, provided other mechanics are followed to prevent deaths.

The upside to this strategy is that it eliminates any need to take risks to deal with Lurking Beasts during the spotlight phase, either via knocking them into the pond or AoE'ing them during Primal Fear. The team can simply stay grouped up for Powershot Volley, stay near Huntmaster to kite the Charger, and otherwise essentially follow Story Mode mechanics to push the Huntmaster. It also keeps the Shelleigh phase as short as possible by avoiding any stacks of Crabby Demeanor from adds falling into the pond.

This strategy has two downsides. First, it involves significantly higher single target damage on the tank from Huntmaster. Either the main tank has to continue holding the boss with the Penetration Shot debuff (reduces armor rating to 0 for 24s) or the "DPS tank" has to hold the boss for a short time and take higher damage by virtue of much lower mitigation stats. Armor rating typically contributes damate mitigation of around 30-40% depending on the discipline (Vanguard/PT > Guardian/Juggernaut > Shadow/Assassin), though this is diluted by defense and shield chance and is ignored by certain types of damage. So, not swapping should lead to somewhere around 30% or so higher damage on the main tank while the armor debuff is active and around 20% higher damage taken for the whole fight.

In my experience, this higher damage can be healed through on 8m encounters. Our successful clears have usually had the main tank taking around 8-9k DTPS (damage taken per second). Given that the DPS tank should be around 5-6k and the rest of the team 2-3k, that contributes to overall damage taken / healing requirements of 25-33k in total or 13-17k eHPS (effective healing per second) for each healer. That is relatively high but given the boost provided by group proximity and AoE healing, the heal check for this strategy is challenging but not insurmountable for healers. Similar to the DPS check, any teams that can heal through Pack Leader (Red) and the Mutant Trandoshan Squad are likely able to handle this requirement. The main concern will be prioritizing burst heals when needed.

The second downside is it makes the Fortress Shield phase more challenging in terms of incoming damage. Nearly all of the Lurking Beasts that spawn during the spotlight phase will be active and will attack the team. For the duration of Primal Fear, damage will not be too bad. When Primal Fear wears off, it can be very challenging for both the tank(s) and healers to avoid any deaths. A key to success will be grouping up adds on the tank for AoE taunting, heavy burst healing on the tank, keeping everyone grouped up so any stray adds come into range of the tank, and using any AoE defensive or stun abilities to help moderate damage.

• Push the Lurking Beasts into the pond.

If a team is unwilling to go with one tank (or 1.5 tanks if using a DPS tank approach) and/or dislikes the stress of the many adds during Fortress Shield, another viable strategy is to push the Lurking Beasts into the pond. Any creature or player that enters the pond instantly dies, so this strategy does not typically require any loss of uptime by DPS on the Huntmaster.

This strategy entails the off tank breaking out of the spotlight during the first Primal Fear window and running over to the pond while holding aggro with an AoE taunt. The Lurking Beasts will leap to them but deal moderate damage due to the Primal Fear debuff. A healer with a knockback (Commando / Mercenary or Sage / Sorcerer) should go with them and use their knockback to push the adds into the pond once they are grouped up. If the group is running 2 Scoundrel / Operative healers, a DPS with a conal knockback can handle the task as well.

The major upside to this strategy is it is very effective at killing adds so that Huntmaster's Master of the Hunt stacks stay higher, and is nearly always good enough to enable the team to make it through two Fortress Shield / Holdout Cover phases without hitting 0 stacks. Pushing the Huntmaster to 35% during the third spotlight phase is fairly easy as a result. Another benefit is that the reduced pressure on DPS allows a second tank (actually is required to have a tank to hold adds near the pond), which is a benefit to reduce overall damage taken by swapping on Penetration Shot and having another AoE taunt to hold adds during the Fortress Shield phase is very helpful also.

The major downside to this strategy is each add pushed into the lake adds a significant amount of health to Shelleigh and can significantly extend that last phase in the fight. Between the simple but high risk mechanic to tank swap on Pulverize to avoid anyone being Nommed and the heavy stacking damage from Toxic Cloud, killing Shelleigh with high stacks can become far more difficult than the fairly easy task of killing her at 0 stacks.

As such, teams should only employ this strategy to the extent needed to make it past two Fortress Shield / Holdout Cover phases without dropping to 0 stacks of Master of the Hunt. I suggest employing it on the first Primal Fear window during the first spotlight phase for sure, and then only doing it again if Huntmaster's stacks are too low after the first Holdout Cover phase (i.e., below about 17-18).

This balancing act can make it very tight in terms of balancing the act of minimizing Shelleigh's stacks while making sure Huntmaster does not enrage during the second Holdout Cover / Red AoE phase. This challenge is the main reason I do not personally prefer this strategy, though other teams favor it strongly. The biggest random variable is that RNG can kill the team if adds walk through a Firestorm Grenade and die or if a player dies, both removing unexpected stacks of Master of the Hunt.

• DPS the Lurking Beasts during each Primal Fear window.

An alternative to the "push the adds into the pond" strategy is to simply kill the Lurking Beasts. The team uses each Primal Fear window to have an off-tank step out and kite the adds to them then has all DPS attack the adds for the full 18s duration of Primal Fear. When the debuff expires, the team resumes normal mechanics and leaves any remaining add health to be killed during the Fortress Shield phase.

First, let's consider the math. The Lurking Beasts each have 725k health in 8m, which is a decently high amount of health to burn in a short time. Fortunately, most DPS can easily output burst DPS of 20k or better single target or 10-12k per add in an AoE context. If we assume those numbers are good, then the team can output around 700k or so over 18s (after factoring in the first 6s having a 60% damage debuff on the players from Primal Fear). That is almost exactly the add health amounts, so killing them is very viable. In the "worst case", the team can swap back to Huntmaster and leave one DPS to finish them off with one or two more AoE attacks.

The upside to this strategy is that it has the same effect as the pond strategy without making the Shelleigh phase substantially more difficult. It similarly makes the Fortress Shield phase much easier in comparison to the max DPS strategy since much fewer adds will be present (only those spawning after the first Primal Fear window). It is also simpler to execute than the pond strategy, because there is always a chance that the knockback does not work very well and misses several adds while killing the adds should work every time.

The downside is that it extends the Huntmaster phase slightly since DPS will have 18s of downtime from the boss each spotlight phase. That said, DPS levels should ensure the team can still push Huntmaster during the third spotlight phase. It also carries some risk of the tank taking excessive damage from adds, though again this can be easily mitigated through carefully watching the Primal Fear debuff on adds and using defensive cooldowns.

Each strategy has its own risks and rewards, so really comes down to preference and which feels easiest / more comfortable to the team. My team has successfully cleared Huntmaster using the extra DPS as I feel like it is the simplest option so long as healers can handle the extra damage from the Penetration Shot armor debuff on the main tank. My guild's other prog team on Dxun has cleared with pushing adds into the pond and dealing with the much longer Shelleigh phase. My overall expectation is that using Primal Fear to kill adds is the intended strategy by the developers, as it is the "safest" in terms of surviving the Fortress Shield phase while still keeping Shelleigh at or near 0 stacks.

Other Hard Mode Mechanics / Strategies

• Tanks should swap after Penetrating Shot (if applicable). Penetrating Shot applies a 24s duration armor debuff that reduces armor rating to 0, so a tank swap should normally be executed if possible. Note that with some group compositions it is possible to tank through this debuff with use of defensives and focused healing, and is critical to strategies to solo tank or use a fake tank/DPS as discussed above.

• Powershot Volley requires careful group positioning. The ability ticks 5 times from 3s - 5s in the channel, with each tick dealing damage, knocking the target back and applying/refreshing a 100% damage debuff. In Hard Mode, the first tick hits for around 20% health and the next for around 40% health. One player taking all ticks would be hit for 180% of max health over 2s, so sharing the damage is necessary.

The simplest way to handle this mechanic is to have everyone group together within the spotlight. Ideally everyone would be in a line though that level of coordination is not required. This positioning ensures that the first hit damages the target (or a player in front of the target), they get knocked back behind other players and do not take consecutive hits. In this way, even in a 8m team no one should take more than one tick. 5 players getting hit for around 20% health is relatively easy to heal through, versus the alternative of multiple players getting hit for most of their health or one death.

• Face Scattershot away from adds. The Scattershot conal has a 70m range (much longer than the graphic) and Lurking Beasts hit with it get the Recently Hit by Huntmaster buff and an explosion icon above their heads. These adds become a high priority to kill to avoid Melee Frenzy (see next point) after the Fortress Shield mechanic. As such, trying to minimize how many adds get the buff is extremely helpful.

• Melee Frenzy must be avoided at all costs. The Huntmaster applies either a Ranged Stance or Melee Stance after his Fortress Shield is broken. Ranged Stance transitions the fight to the Holdout Cover / Red AoE of death phase, while Melee Stance leads to Melee Frenzy and crazy high damage. Melee Stance is only triggered if one or more Lurking Beasts are alive with the Recently Hit by Huntmaster (see above for debuff) and continues for as long as they are alive. Adds with this effect have a graphical marker above their heads. To avoid this mechanic, the team's DPS need to make sure those adds are killed before the Charger hits the Huntmaster.

• The player targeted with Trample must LoS it with Huntmaster. The Deliberate Charger targets a PLAYER in Hard Mode, not the Huntmaster. However, we still need the Charger to hit the Huntmaster to break his Fortress Shield. The player with the graphic should place Huntmaster in between them and the Charger so that the Trample graphic intersects with Huntmaster. This overwhelmingly tends to be a healer that must kite the Trample path.

Be wary that the Charger does not run in a precisely straight line. If the targeted player stands more than 15m away from Huntmaster, the Charger may curve around and miss him. I strongly suggest the targeted player (and indeed the whole team) move together to stay relatively close to the boss to ensure he gets hit. Moving together also negates a delay in identifying who is targeted, as everyone positions themselves automatically.

• Cross-taunting is necessary on Shelleigh to avoid Nom attack. Shelleigh's Pulverize attack applies a 4s stun effect that outlasts the Nom buff. This means if a player with aggro gets stunned, they will not have time to step out of the Nom purple circle. As such, a tank swap or taunting off by a DWT is necessary on Shelleigh, which should happen immediately after the Pulverize ability. Keeping Shelleigh on the move at all times will minimize the frequency of this ability.

16m v. 8m Differences