Mission Name
 8-3 - When Angels Fall
Locations

The Garden of Ru'Hmet
Estimated Time
 Varies wildly depending on party setup and strategies. At least 3 hours.
Special Items:
none
Difficulty:

Hard. Last hard mission in CoP
Medicines Needed:
 Usual BC medicines plus reraise items
Brief synopsis:
 Travel up a tower for a cutscene, then navigate the hallways for two more.
At the top, battle four magic-using enemies in a BC

When Angels Fall is the last dungeon mission in the Chains of Promathia campaign, and boy does it go out with a bang. Although much less linear than the previous “travel corridors until you come to the end” mission, 8-3 is much more complicated.

Although many of the enemies in this zone are the same as in the Grand Palace, most of them are operating in sneaky new ways. Also, the rooms are somewhat more complicated, having ramps and alcoves with monsters and mysterious portals that warp you half way across the map.

Cutscene:

Zone

NPC name

Location

Ru'Hmet

none

 zone in


The Five Towers

The first objective is for you to climb a specific tower of the Garden, which are located in the five “corners” of the map. Each tower corresponds to a specific race. I tried explaining this without a map, but it just wasn’t working, so I broke down, borrowed a map from FFXI Atlas, and labeled it from you.


It is actually possible to do this part solo, though you would have to be extremely lucky, reraise a lot of times, or probably both. Mages with reliably Sleep spells will have less trouble soloing. Of course, if you want to take your party to the top of each tower, feel free.


The long hallway marks the entrance to each tower, which is guarded by a spinning Zdei. All of them spin in the direction of the fastest way to the first elevator. For example, if a Zdei is spinning clockwise, the elevator is to the left. Counter-clockwise, it’s to the right. If you can’t figure it out or aggro and kill it or something, just use the map.

In each of the larger rooms are an alcove with another (much faster spinning) Zdei in it. This is where the luck, sleeping, or reraising comes in. Getting past this Zdei is possible, but extremely difficult, and you have to sneak past it TWICE since the alcoves have two views into the main room. My suggestion: sleep the darn thing and run. Keep in mind that this enter area is filled with Aw’ghrah enemies, so you’ll have to sleep them too if they are in spider form. Make your way to the elevator and go up.

There are two more floors of enemies in the towers. The elevators going up alternate sides. It the first elevator was on the east side, for example, the second will be on the west, and the third on the east again. There are tons of Ghrahs (birds on floor 2, humanoids on floor 3) and fast Zdeis on both floors. Sleep, fight, or run-die-reraise your way though.


The fourth floor has no enemies. Run in and check the Ebon Panel in the center of the room. Any race can check it in any tower to get the first cutscene. After that cutscene, people of the right race in the right tower check it again to get a key item and a totally awesome title. Once you get what you came for, it’s probably easier to escape out and reenter the zone than climb back down.

Continue doing this until you have climbed the towers that correspond to each race in your party. Or just tell your members to do it solo. Whatever works for your party. Just make sure everyone has it done when you want to do the next part.

Cutscenes:
Zone
 NPC name
 Position
 Other
Ru'Hmet
 Ebon Panel
 varies
 Any race, any tower
Ru'Hmet
 Ebon Panel
 varies
 Race-specific tower.
Key item obtained at correct tower
 

The Guantlet of Zdeis

Once everyone has gotten their tower done you need to progress up the central area of the Garden. The green dot marks the elevator you want to reach. The most convenient way, however, is sealed by a locked door that doesn’t open from either side, so you’ll have to circle around and will run into… *dun dun dun* the Guantlet of Zdeis!


Ooh, those crazy Zdei pots. They’re always up to something! Having them spin quickly wasn’t enough, nope, no way. Now they’re teaming up in groups of four while spinning. Even worse, they’re all sitting on a pressure plate of a sorts, so when they aggro you and move off their starting positions, the door at the far end of the room slams shut and won’t open until they return to their starting positions. These Zdeis are totally immune to sleep, Elemental Seal or not.

The two gauntlets on the east and west have a very fast spinning Zdei in them, which makes getting by next to impossible. I recommend taking the slightly longer way around to the north gauntlet. Still, when you get there, you’ll have to get past the four spinning Zdeis or the door at the end of the room will lock you out.

There are four ways I can think of to do this:

1)      Have EVERYONE sneak by. It’s hard, but if you’ve practiced, it’s the easiest way by far to get by these things.

2)      Fight them. They’re monsters and can be beaten. In fact, since the BC is against a very similar situation as this gauntlet, it might not be a bad idea to get some practice.

3)      Have your best sneaker cross over into the elevator room and open the door from that side. The locked door opens from the elevator room. Then have your highest defense character run in, aggro the Zdies, and die near the door while the rest of the party heads through. Raise the sacrifice and move on.

4)      Run into the room and all die by the closed door, then reraise. The worst plan as it involves a full party wipe, but if no one can get by the Zdeis and you aren’t up to fighting them (it’s a hard fight) this might be your best (i.e. only) option.

 
Anyway, you’re in the elevator room. Good work. Step onto the platform and choose to ascend (decend does nothing – yet) to the next floor.


Brands and Glowing Weird Portals


The BC is on the floor above you, but the path upward is closed off by some sort of menacing seal thing. As the Quasilumin nearby will explain, you need to get two key items (Brand of Dawn and Brand of Twilight) in order to be allowed access up to the third floor.

The Brand of Twilight is to the south. The Brand of Dawn is to the north. But to the north is… another gauntlet of Zdeis! It’s painful but rather quick to run through, die, and reraise, but you need to do it twice, so that can be a sting on the old experience points. Much safer and much less heavy on the bitter death total is to run through the Garden hallways. You can actually get to BOTH brands this way and bypass the Zdeis entirely.


Zoomed-in map of route

My main concern with using maps for this sort of route is that this map TOTALLY FAILS to give the true grasp of what the Garden looks like. This area has ramps
and balconies that overlook other rooms and a whole number of obstacles to navigate, and that’s without considering the enemies you’ll have to avoid. The upside is that if you get lost, you can use <pos> to get your position, check the map, and generally figure out where you are.


The pink dots are what I affectionately call Glowing Weird Portals. You can’t target them but if you get close, they’ll zone you to a different part of the Garden similar to the shimmering colored walls in that Diabolos Pso’Xja tower (remember them? No? Oh well) This counts as a zone so aggro enemies will leave you alone if you warp.

Follow the path I outlined above to get both brands, then backtrack to the central elevator (unless you want to fight the gauntlet on the first floor again, that is)

Cutscenes:

Zone
 NPC name
 Position
 Other
Ru'Hmet
 ?
 (H-7)
 Brand of Dawn
Ru'Hmet
 ?
 (H-10)
 Brand of Twilight

Oh Come On… Pots?

Once you have both brands and your tower light, you can ascend again to the top floor of the Garden of Ru’Hmet. No mobs up here. Check the Particle Gate for a cutscene, then enter the battlefield when you’re ready.

Cutscene:

Zone
 NPC name
 Position
 Other
Ru'Hmet
 Particle Gate
 (H-8)
 Doesn't lead automatically into BC


This BC is against four Xi’zeid NMs. Yeah, those pot things again.  I know you beat Omega Weapon and Diabolos and the misguided samurai Tenzen. You're going to take one look at this BC and think "Pots? Bwa ha ha! Too weak!" Heh... you'll be grumbling a different tune after a few dry runs.

Even though you started south of this room, when you warp into the “BC” you’ll be at the north end of the room, facing south at the pots. This means that if you want to run away from the battle, you have to CROSS the room and choose THAT door to leave. The door at the north end cannot be targeted and won’t let you leave.

As for the Ix’zeids themselves, there are four. The two larger, closer ones are RDMs. The two smaller, farther ones are BLMs. All of them are immune to silence and are heavily resistant to sleep. The danger in this battle isn’t getting hit with some cheap shot like Tenzen’s Cosmic Elucidation or worrying about running out of time like the Snoll Tzar. The problem with this battle is simply that these pots will keep casting spells on you, and you can’t shut them up.

The black mages are the more dangerous, having tier-3 aga spells, tier-4 single-target spells, and ancient magic. They also are easier to defeat. Even so, they take a hard beating to destroy. Target one of them first and give it your all.

What about the other three pots? Well, they are resistant to sleep but not immune. This means that you can elemental seal Sleepga them. Anything without elemental seal has a virtually 0 chance of sticking on the pots. It's TECHNICALLY possible but it's nothing to rely on, so try to avoid putting sleepga without Elemental Seal into your strategy if you can. Keep in mind that Sleepga builds a lot of hate, success or not, so when those three pots wake up, they’ll be out to kill whoever slept them.

When a pot gets low on life it may attempt to flee to its starting pedestal. If it sits there for a mere few seconds, it will regenerate to full life, and then you’re totally screwed. Stun it, weapon skill it, do whatever you can to stop it from regening to full.

Inevitably you’ll run out of sleepga before you run out of pots to kill, and the spells will start taking people down. TRY VERY HARD to kill the two black mages before you wipe. If you can, you’re in a good position. And speaking of position, where you wipe matters, since if you die in front of a RDM pot it will likely try to kill you when you get up. Try to wipe at the door at the FAR end of the room near the BLM pots. Wait for the pots to go back to their starting spots (they only regen life if they flee in battle, so they won’t be healing), reraise up, rest to full, and tackle the RDMs.

 Ix'zdei move list:
Move
 Jobs that Use
 Effect
Tier-III aga magic
 BLMs
 AoE magic damage
Tier-IV magic
 BLMs
 Single-target magic damage
Ancient Magic
 BLMs
 High-damage, long cast time
Flood Flare etc
Tier-III magic
 RDMs
 Single-target magic damage
Bindga
 RDMs
 AoE bind effect
Dispelga
 RDMs
 AoE dispel, removes a random positive buff
Silencega
 RDMs
 AoE silence effect
Tier-I, II magic
 both
 Single-target magic damage
Reactor Cool
 both
 Ice Spikes + def bonus
Ice Spikes cannot be dispelled
Core Meltdown
 both
 AoE damage
Reactor Overheat both
 Silence and damage
Optic Induration both
 Petrify and high damage
(return to starting position)
 both
 Will return to full life after several seconds

Strategy tips:

On your second attack try to kill one of the two RDM pots. Even though the BLMs are more deadly the RDMs still hit very hard. If you can kill the 3rd pot you should be able to finish off the 4th one with minimal hassle. If you wipe before killing the 3rd pot, hit it VERY hard when you attack the third time to quickly down it. You only get 30 minutes so time will be an issue if you wipe twice, but you can still win. Wiping three times is not a feasible option in this battle.


Once you beat the pots, cross the empty room and check the Luminous Convergence for one mind-blowing cutscene.


Cutscene:
Zone
 NPC name
 Position
 Other
Ru'Hmet
 Luminous Convergence
 (H-10)
 Very cool

With that, you’ve completed the mission. Mission 8-4 begins with a cutscene in Al’Taieu. Check the Particle Gate again and choose to leave the Garden of Ru’Hmet, or escape out.

Exp reward for completion: 1000


(last mission!)
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