Well, first of all, {Congratulations!} to all those who did this.

Second of all, I knew how long it was going to take, which is why I suggested that no one should plan on a second ascent unless someone else lead it up :-)

Third of all, to those who wanted to do this one but weren't able last night, I'm sorry. The thing is, these events are a first come, first serve affair. When the event has been on this site for more than two weeks, and listed in the LS-message for a week, you can't reasonably expect those people who show up on time and prepared to wait for you to log out and come back in an hour or two later. The simple fact is if you have a problem with the time of an event then you damned well better get on this site and vocalize it sooner. It may be that your schedule wont sync up with the event coordinator(s) and you have to start up the event some other time.

For example, last night we started at 9:20pm my time. It took us (as Tamara said) 4 hours including preparation. We ultimately took an hour for the Mammet (Boss) fight alone. Seeing as I had work this morning, I sure as hell wasn't going to stay up any additional time simply because one person wasn't prepared to leave when everyone else was.

As far as how much money we spent last night, yes, it was a lot. Ultimately it shouldn't have been as much as we did simply because we lacked any real tank (the only person with Provoke was Trix who was a THF :-) This meant that those of us who were DD and tanking needed to hold hate without as many cures (e.g., gulp potions). In the future, if we had a dedicated tank this probably would cut the expense considerably.

What I personally used were:
* Easily a dozen X-Potions
* Some Hi-Potions that Tam gave me
* 1 Icarus Wing
* 3 Sole Sushi
* 2 Hits from a Reraise Earring

As far as a strategy guide, I don't think you can really write one effectively. This battle is so unlike anything else in the game and every time I've beaten it we wound up having to change strategies mid-fight. I think honestly the best way to prepare for it, strategy-wise, is to be flexible and attentive in the battle. This means paying attention to what the leader says in battle, changing strategies dynamically without argument or debate (you just don't have time), and not goofing around.

I think we won last night primarily because the people in the group did all these things.

Vis Maior's Journeys
http://maior.samhart.net/

I, like the rest, spent quite a bit of gil on medicines. Approx: 25K on food items, 60K on various medicines (hi-ethers primarily) and about 6K on yellow liquid for the group.

In my opinion, the most important thing is coordination between the main attack group and the kiters. As a support healer initially, I found it difficult to cure too frequently due to hate issues and changes in kite patterns.

Luckily, Trix is a very good typist and was able to relay his status to me. We timed it so that, when I went to help finish up the first Mammet he would use his 2-hour and buy himself a few seconds.

I then switched my role to nuker for the second Mammet and was able to deal some solid damage. I had to run out to help cure Dragonlance at some point, which almost became an issue. Again, different people, different kiting patterns and it is hard to cure in a tense moment while the target is moving.

On the final Mammet, as I use my 2 hour, he decides to use that cheesy manawall crap and I had to just wait it out.

All in all, while this is no strategy, you do need to come prepared to this event. I feel our dry run could have been a winner; we just had some DD issues.

You need to be willing to spend the gil it takes to win. For those of you that have done other fights, like Maat for example, you know what I mean. As long as you are semiautonomous, able to control hate, and most importantly COMMUNITCATE, you should be able to take these things out.

FYI: Go, go Thunder spells!