Cosmic Observatory Extra Detail

This information is intended to compliment the Cosmic Observatory Strike Guide with suggestions and settings that may make it easier for some members of the community to participate in the content. It is not repeating all of the information, so please use both documents together.

It contains false colour images to highlight mechanics as some of our community must memorise the shapes of mechanics that may be difficult to see. Images more faithful to game rendering may be found in the original guide.

Feedback is welcome to improve additions like this, as suggestions contained may be limited to particular observations and life experiences of those contributing to the guide.

Consider the time of day the strike instance is opened. You can check with the chat command /time in game.

• For instances opened during the night the floor will be visually more homogenous with minimal lighting sources, but foes on split phase will blend more into the background. This is generally more pleasant for those who do not like looking at contrasting elements or find extra visual details distracting.

• Instances opened during the day are overall much brighter and are good for those who need more contrasting visual references to identify where their characters or enemies are on screen by the model, not just the names. Light coming through the terrain and props outside the playable area can make distances easier to judge.

Toggling between high and low on the Postprocessing can also affect how clear the visuals are. The higher the setting the less hazy it is.

This instance can be problematic to some people with Red/Green colour blindness. The floor is predominantly green hued and the majority of the mechanic indicators are green, orange or red.

The Planet Crash attack is extremely bright and reflects off the floor and props in the instance. If this is going to be a problem, turn shaders down to the lowest setting. This changes this attack indicator into a simple orange circle underneath the boss, which is also the range indicator for the lesser attack on a successful Breakbar.

The most important consideration for a build is to bring something you are comfortable playing so you can watch for mechanics rather than your skill bar. Strikes are a group effort when learning, not a place to worry about getting a perfect benchmark and overlooking important mechanics. Breakbar is used minimally in the fight, but is important after Dagda is under 50% health as Planet Crash is in her attack rotation, not a set health point.

If low Action Per Minute (APM) gameplay is important, a build with at least 300 range will enable minimal repositioning by standing outside the range of the first two attacks in Dagda's basic auto attack chain and Spinning Nebula.

Consider bringing a block or damage mitigation, such as Distortion, if you need extra time to survive exiting the danger zone of Demonic Blast and Rain of Comets.

While the main guide has a more complete attack pattern with accurate skill names, the important thing to focus on is abilities between the basic attacks in a manner that makes sense to you. Up until the first Demonic Blast (orange wedges) at 90%, it will likely only be Shooting Stars (green arrow). After 90% a simplified way to think of it might be: stack green arrow, orange spread circles, spin attack, orange spread circles.

With sufficient range, it is not required to move toward Dagda when she teleports to a side, but be aware you may be temporarily out of range for boons and heal skils if the rest of the squad moves. After she finishes Spinning Nebula, be prepared to move immediately out of the Soul Feast mechanic.

Extra Visual Assistance

Most of the fight from Dagda at 100% to 75% health will be fought in the middle of the arena. If you have ranged attacks, look to position yourself just outside her basic attack range. The floor pattern can be used to judge the distance using the squares around her. If you stand behind an imaginary line through the corners of the squares her basic attacks will not reach you.

Extra Audio Assistance

Shooting Stars: this attack starts with a metallic clank as Dagda stabs her sword into the ground and has a few repeats of a warbling woo-ooo effect. The attack typically hits during the third repeat of the sound.

Spinning Nebula: this has wind sounds of a blade whipping through the air. If certain projectile control skills are used, you might hear multiple rapid impact strikes instead.

Demonic Fever: is not useful as an indicator to spread, this is a muffled explosion noise as it damages.

Ideally, Dagda won't overlap mechanics and the squad can be pushed/run to the wall together on one side, or subsquads split to opposite sides, to clear the adds faster.

Mechanics overlapping through the Split Phase are extremely dangerous with overlapping Demonic Fever orange circles potentially sending multiple players into downstate.

Shooting Stars overlapping into the Split Phase is slightly less dangerous to the squad overall, so if you have to make a choice to move before you see the mechanic, spreading during push is better than stacking, but get to the outer edges.

Try to maintain a position between the coloured segments, if they occur, as you move, but if anyone goes into downstate the push will continue to move them to the edge where they can be revived if they have enough health.

The field indicator on the floor is not itself a highly damaging field, the danger is at the end of the timer when the segment visually explodes. If you have to make a choice it is better to fail the mechanic and do less damage with Debilitated than to be defeated and do no damage at all.

Extra Audio Assistance

As there are multiple things happening at once the audio is less clear to hear it, but Demonic Blast has a muffled explosion sound as it damages, similar to thunder.

This phase only has one more attack, Soul Feast, added into the rotation, but it adds consideration to movement.

Like the previous rotations, a simplified way to look at it might be: stack green arrow, spin attack special action key foe, orange spread circles. Just remember the Soul Feast immediately follows the spin without any autoattack padding, so you can treat the attacks as a pair.

There is time to step out of the indicator where Soul Feast spawns, but as it can be hard to see under the squad stack it is easiest to be moving while it spawns.

As there should only be two targets on the field when Soul Feast spawns, one of the simplest ways to aim the Special Action Key attack (Purifying Light) can be to use the tab key to cycle to the next target. As Dagda should have been highlighted already, this single key press should target the Soul Feast.

Extra Audio Assistance

Soul Feast: There are three possible lines Zojja will say when this attack starts. As soon as she starts speaking the visual for where the Soul Feast will appear is on the field and it appears at or near the end of the line. Using the start of the line as the warning is most effective, but the damage and target will appear at certain words of each line you can listen for to make sure you are clear:

• She's dropping more orbs! The key word is orbs.
• Pick those up! The key word is up.
• Gather as many of those as you can! The key word is you.

Purifying Light: this skill doesn't have a sound when collected, but when used it has a metallic clank. As there are two possible copies, if you hear it twice and the Soul Feast is still on the field it will be neccessary to wait out its timer instead.

The attack pattern has got to its most complicated point, but can still be simplified without the auto attack chains to something like this:

• stack green arrow
• spin attack special action key foe
• 50% of field attack, breakbar
• spin attack at side
• 50% of field attack, orange spread circles

Failing to break the bar causes a large amount of damage to go out over the entire squad. It can also make an extra Shooting Stars attack be added in before Dagda goes out to the side, which can make any reviving difficult while trying to stack into the arrow.

Extra Visual Assistance

One of the new attacks, Rain of Comets, can be hard to see for some colour blind players. As it is predictable in when it will happen in the rotation, there are a couple of things to watch for the safe side of the attack:

• Dagda faces into the side she is attacking
• At the start of the attack there is a second half circle outline directly in front of Dagda

A smaller version of Rain of Comets falls in the area directly around Dagda if the Planet Crash attack is interrupted on the breakbar. This covers the same range as the field of Spinning Nebula.

Extra Audio Assistance

Rain of Comets: this has a higher pitched effect as they fall with a metallic jingle noise. It is similar to sounds associated with sparkle visual effects.

Planet Crash: this has a low hollow tone, gradually pitching upwards. If the skill is broken, it will switch to Rain of Comets audio.

Voice Cues for Planet Crash as a hint to use Breakbar skills are lines with the word stun in them.

• A-Alchemy—stun her or we're done.
• If you don't stun her... We have no other options!