The Minstrel's Ballad: Shinryu's Domain, commonly called Shinryu EX, is a high-end duty added in patch 4.1: The Legend Returns. It can be unlocked by speaking to the Wandering Minstrel in Kugane ( 11.6 , 12.6 ) after completing the main story quest "Stormblood."
The minimum ilvl to enter this fight is i320, but can be bypassed with a full party.
Phase 1: Platforms (100%-44%)
Shinryu's Abilities:
Throughout this phase, Shinryu will be auto-attacking two targets. They will be the target with the highest aggro (usually the main tank) and another tank.
- Corrupted Aether: Meter shown in the duty bar that regularly fills. When it reaches 100, Shinryu will use one of his Corrupted Aether spells.
- Earthen Fury: Can only be cast when Corrupted Aether reaches 100. Deals heavy raid-wide magic damage, and destroys some of the arena's platforms. More info below.
- Burning Chains: Red markers will spawn on players, these players will then be tethered to other players. Tethers must be broken by running away from the tethered partner or will suffer from a stacking debuff of Suppuration(correct this spelling you nerd). Assuming all players are alive, only players of the same role will be tethered (i.e. tanks-tanks, healers-healers, dps-dps).
- Tidal Wave: Can only be cast when Corrupted Aether reaches 100. Shinryu will spawn a typhoon in one of the cardinal directions where Shinryu is not present. Will deal significant raid-wide magic damage and knock back players ~1.5 squares from it's origin. Knockback nullifying abilities, such as Arm's Length or Tempered Will will prevent this knockback.
- After Tidal Wave, 5 water puddles will spawn on the arena. Standing in these puddles will give you a very potent Lightning Vulnerability up, as well as a potent Fire Resistance up. These must be used or avoided to survive certain attacks.
- Summon Icicle: Shinryu will spawn 3 icicles at the back of the arena. These icicles cover half a square and will fly across the arena, with no aoe marker. Failure to dodge icicles will result in moderate damage, a knockback, and a pretty potent slow debuff. There is a very slight shadow that appears over the safe half, but I'd highly recommend just moving your camera to find Icicles that way.
- Levinbolt: Shinryu will target 6 party members with an AoE lightning attack that inflictsa stacking Lightning Vulnerability up. Players must spread out to avoid hitting each other.
- Hypernova: Shinryu will target one party member with a soak aoe that must be shared with the party. Standing in a water puddle will greatly reduce damage recieved, but can be survived without using one with mitigation.
- Ice Storm: Deals heavy raid-wide magic damage.
- Akh Morn: Shareable tankbuster dealing heavy magic damage to the player with the highest aggro multiple times. Tanks must both stack to take the damage together while using defensive cooldowns. During this, one healer/dps will be targetted with Akh Rhai, placing a circle on the ground dealing aoe damage multiple times. Move out of it as soon as possible.
- Hellfire: Can only be cast when Corrupted Aether reaches 100. Heavy fire-aspected raid-wide damage that must be mitigated by standing in a water puddle.
- Judgement Bolt: Can only be cast when Corrupted Aether reaches 100. Heavy lightning-aspected raid-wide damage. Has a 15% chance of inflicting a cleansable paralysis on each player.
- Earth Breath: Two markers targetting a healer and a DPS. When the cast is finished, Shinryu will target a wide breath attack, inflicting a heavy dot. These should be baited to the sides of Shinryu's hitbox.
- Diamond Dust: Can only be cast when Corrupted Aether reaches 100. Raid-wide aoe damage, which freezes the arena. Moving while the arena is frozen will cause you to slide ~1.5 squares`without being able to stop, so be careful.
- Summon Reiryu: Shinryu spawns 4 Reiryu adds. Adds will tether to a random DPS and inflict them with The Worm's Curse. These adds spawn with 0 HP and must be healed to full to be defeated.
- The Worm's Cures nullifies all healing received to 0. However, attacking will regenerate your HP, so just keep doing damage to not die.
- Reiryu's will also begin to cast Dragonflight when they spawn. If this cast reaches completion, they will jump up, deal AoE damage and inflict all players with Damage Down.
- Aerial Blast: Can only be cast when Corrupted Aether reaches 100. A tornado will appear in the center of the arena, dealing small raid-wide damage with a small knockback 3 times, followed by a more powerful raid-wide attack and knockback, pushing players about 1.5 squares from the middle. This can knock you off the arena, so be wary. Knockback nullifying abilities, such as Arm's Length or Tempered Will will prevent this knockback.
- Gyre Charge: Shinryu will jump and dive across the arena diagonally, with only two safe spots at the tip of the platform's corners. After Gyre Charge is resolved, Shinryu may appear in a different location than he was beforehand.
- Dark Matter: Shinryu will chain everyone in position, and begin an ACTIVE TIME MANEUVER. Get ready to mash all of your keys/buttons to succeed, or you will die. This signifies the end of Phase 1.
The Worm's Heart:
Before the pull, Shinryu will appear with another targettable enemy, The Worm's Heart. It has relatively little HP, and a regen effect. It must be destroyed as soon as possible, as when Shinryu casts one of his Corrupted Aether attacks, and the Worm's Heart is still alive, it will deal lethal damage to the whole raid. Killing the heart also deals 270352 damage to Shinryu himself, which is a nice bonus. When the heart is destroyed, it will become untargettable and begin to regenerate. after ~70 seconds, the heart will have fully regenerated, and begin with more max HP than before. This will continue throughout all of Phase 1.
Shinryu's Tail & Platforms:
Shinryu will begin the fight by casting Earthern Fury, and the left-middle and right-middle platforms will begin to glow. After damage is resolved, The left-middle and right-middle platforms will be completely destroyed, and 3 other platforms will be cracked. Naturally, if any players were standing on the glowing platforms after damage is resolved, they will fall off the arena and die. There are two possible scenarios, shown below:
Black squares signify destroyed platforms, red crosses signify cracked platforms. Tail 1 is placed by a random healer, Tail 2 is placed by a random DPS, and tail 3 is placed on a random tank.
Throughout the fight, Shinryu will mark players with a green marker over their heads, which signifies which platform he will use Tail Slam on, and what direction he will come from. Players marked must run to their respective platforms and wait until the mark disappears, locking its target on said platform. When Tail Slam hits an uncracked platform, it will become a cracked platform; and when Tail Slam hits a cracked platform, the platform will be completely destroyed. Shinryu's tail is 2 squares wide, which means it will hit the middle square and the square closest to where the marker was placed. Shinryu will always target a healer for the first Tail Slam, a DPS for the second, and a tank for the third. The diagram above shows where each tail should be placed. Order is not required to be followed, but the numbers indicate what order I recommend placing the tails on.
When Shinryu uses Tail Slam, and one of the squares he lands in is uncracked, his tail will become targettable and quickly retreat back to under the arena. The tail has very little HP, and if destroyed before it retreats, you will deal an additional 405528 damage to Shinryu, so i'd recommend prioritizing the tail for the extra damage. If both platforms Shinryu's tail lands on are cracked, it will simply slam through the platforms, with no chance to target it.
After Earthern Fury, Shinryu will mark all players with Burning Chains, and cast Tidal Wave. Quickly break chains and locate the Typhoon outside the arena and move toward it to avoid getting knocked off the arena. Knockback nullyfing skills, such as Arm's Length or Surecast can negate this knockback, so consider bringing them along. Shinryu will then mark a random healer with Tail Slam, and begin casting Summon Icicle. After Tail Slam and Summon Icicle resolve, Shinryu will cast either Levinbolt or Hypernova. If Levinbolt is cast, have your party spread out to avoid getting hit my multiple Levinbolts and move away from the puddles. If Hypernova is cast, make sure your whole party stacks in the same water puddle to share incoming damage. (NOTE: You can survive a Hypernova without using a water puddle if all 8 players stack and some mitigation is used, but I do not recommend it).
Red markers indicate positions where marked players should stand.
Shinryu will then cast Ice Storm, and Dragonfist. Make sure to avoid the large AoE from Dragonfist in the middle, and to mitigate accordingly for Ice Storm. After the Ice Storm, Shinryu will cast his first Akh Morn, hitting its target 3 times and placing one Akh Rhai on a random party member. I'd recommend spreading out to avoid the damage caused by Akh Rhai on more than 1 person, but this is not required. At this point, Shinryu's Corrupted Aether will reach 100, and he will cast a combination of Summon Icicle and either Hellfire or Judgement Bolt. Remember to locate and pay attention to which half the Icicles spawn in the back of the arena, and to be either inside or outside the puddle depending on Shinryu's Corrupted Aether spell. If you are hit by an Icicle, it's very likely you'll die to the upcoming Corrupted Aether spell.
Shortly afterwards, Shinryu will mark a DPS with Tail Slam, and begin casting Levinbolt. Once again, make sure to spread to avoid doubling up on Levinbolt damage. After a short pause, wherein you can destroy the tail, Shinryu will use an Ice Storm and a set of Burning Chains, this time only targeting tanks and healers. Almost immediately after, Shinryu will use Earth Breath, placing a marker over a DPS and a Healer. Each marked player must move to the sides of Shinryu's hitbox, with the rest of the party stacking in the middle of the arena in order to minimize damage done by Earth Breath. I'd recommend pre-assigning positions for Earth Breath, i.e. having healers always go to the front left and DPS to the front right.
Shinryu will then follow up with another Akh Morn, this time spawning 2 Akh Rhai and following up with an Ice Storm shortly after. Once again, I'd highly recommend spreading out the DPS and moving out of Akh Rhais as soon as possible to avoid major damage, as Ice Storm will likely kill players if they take too much damage from them. Shinryu's Corrupted Aether meter should once again have reached 100, and he will begin channeling Diamond Dust and place Burning Chains on only the two healers. As Diamond Dust will make the arena frozen and any movement will result in sliding ~1.5 squares of distance, I'd recommend with both healers starting on the second platform, and only one healer slide diagonally to the northwest or northeast platforms, while the other stays still. Be very careful, as a misstep can easily make you slip off the arena.
Reiryus:
After Diamond Dust, four Reiryus will spawn on the arena, with zero HP. They will each tether to one DPS and inflict them with The Worm's Curse. The only way to defeat these adds is to heal them to full HP. I'd recommend healers to communicate beforehand with their co-healer to efficiently heal them up to maximum. Note: Only heals with a direct target can heal the Reiryus. That means aoe heals like Medica or succor will do nothing, but single target heals like Cure or Benefic (or even Benediction!) will. Tanks will still be taking autos during this time, but DPS can be ignored, as all healing done to them will be nullified to zero anyways. Quickly heal up all Reiryus to full before they finish casting Dragonflight. While healers are dealing with Reiryus, Shinryu will mark a random tank with Tail Slam, so place it in the last available position and destroy the tail ASAP.
A diagram for a possible Divebomb preformed by Shinryu. Safe spots are marked by green circles placed on safe corners.
Afterwards, Shinryu will cast Summon Icicle, quickly followed by an Akh Morn, also placing 2 Akh Rhai. Be sure to pay attention to which half the Icicles in the back of the arena spawn. Positioning may be a bit tight, but do remember that tanks can be standing in the northeast and northwest platforms to give more space for DPS to spread out for Akh Rhais. Corrupted Aether will have once again reached 100 at this point, and Shinryu will cast Aerial Blast, as well as placing Burning Chains on all 4 DPS. Be sure to line yourself up during the smaller knockbacks to make sure the tornado does not knock you off the arena. If all is well, you should have the whole top row at your disposal. The chains are usually broken by the large knockback from Aerial Blast, but remember to run away from each other to break them if this is not the case. Once again, knockback nullifying abilities, such as Arm's Length or Surecast will prevent this knockback.
After a long pause, Shinryu will cast another Earth Breath, so once again have marked healers and DPS move to their appropriate positions. Shinryu will then use another Ice Storm and fly up to one of the 4 arena's corners. He will then do a very wide Divebomb across the arena, leaving only two safe spaces, those being the corners not in his direct line of sight. Once he comes back down, keep in mind he may move to a different cardinal direction of the arena than the one he was at beforehand.
After landing, Shinryu immediately follows up with either a Hypernova or a Levinbolt. You should have water puddles available, so once again stack together inside of a puddle/spread outside puddles to mitigate the damage if necessary. Shinryu will then follow up with another Akh Morn, with 1 Akh Rhai. Do these as normal, spread out DPS to avoid major damage from Akh Rhai. Shinryu will then use Levinbolt and Tidal Wave. Spread out for Levinbolts first, before moving to prevent getting knocked off the arena. You have more time than you think, so just deal with these mechanics one at a time.
After Tidal Wave (or when Shinryu is pushed to 44%), he will fetter all party members cast Dark Matter, an Active Time Maneuver wherein you need to mash as many buttons as possible to escape fetters and survive. This signifies the end of Phase 1.
Phase 2: Adds
Phase 2 begins with Shinryu flying up to a second platform, with the party hanging on his back. The party will land on this platform, and Shinryu will immediately begin casting a proximity based AoE that will knock you off the platform. In order to survive this, the party must move toward the north edge of the arena, where they will be knocked onto another platform.
Shortly after landing, Shinryu will begin charging Accumulating Aether, a bar found in the duty list, and 5 eggs will begin to fall on the platform, creating proximity based AoE markers called Meteor Impacts, one in each corner and one in the center. The place where players will take minimum damage is right at each of the cardinal points, but shielding is highly recommended, as damage is still very heavy. After landing, eggs will hatch into either Hakkinryus or Ginryus.
Hakkinryus are the large adds, and they will periodically cast Death Sentence, a physical tankbuster dealing heavy damage to it's target. Defensive cooldowns are highly recommended. They also periodically cast Blazing Trail, a somewhat wide line AoE originating from the enemy.
Placement of Meteor Impacts in Wave 1 and Wave 2. Green circles indicate recommended spots to stack in order to minimize damage.
Ginryus are the smaller adds. They will periodically cast Fireball, a small circle AoE marker targetted on one player. They also cast Blazing Trail, the same line AoE cast by the Hakkinryus.
These adds will spawn in waves. The first wave will spawn 4 Ginryus and 1 Hakkinryu. 10 seconds afterwards, another 5 Meteor Impact markers will spawn once more, spawning 2 Hakkinryus and 3 Ginryus. Mitigate and dodge these the same as the first set of Meteor Impacts. I'd recommend having 1 tank take no more than 1 Hakkinryu, as two Death Sentences on 1 target will do extremely heavy damage. ~10 seconds afterwards, 5 players will be marked with Meteor Impact markers, and are responsible for placing them. Two Meteor Impacts cannot land in the same location, or the egg will explode, likely wiping the raid. I'd recommend having all players spread out to the edges of the arena, and running to the middle of the arena to mitigate the damage. 5 Ginryus will spawn from these eggs.
After all adds are defeated, Shinryu will begin to cast Protostar, his ultimate, dealing massive raid-wide AoE magic damage that must be mitigated. If Accumulated Aether has reached 100, this attack will wipe the raid. Quickly afterwards, Shinryu will place a blue circle AoE on the ground, indicating where he will use Tail Spit, and stab his tail into the platform, dealing damage and a substantial knockback. Stay as close as you can to the circle to avoid getting knocked off, but not inside it, as doing this will deal lethal damage. Shinryu's tail will remain stabbed in the ground for a short time. You will be able to run up his tail, using it as a bridge to walk onto the platform Shinryu is currently standing on. You don't have to run all the way through, you can simply jump down as soon as you have the platform under you. While running along the tail, Shinryu will also shoot long line AoE lasers targeting party members. Getting hit by these will both deal slight damage as well as stun you for 2 seconds. You have ~20-25 seconds to move to the other platform before Shinryu's tail withdraws. This signifies the end of Phase 2.
Phase 3: Legendary Resolve (44%-23%)
Shinryu gains a few new abilities, while having some changes to old ones.
Shinryu's Abilities:
- Tera Slash: Tankbuster dealing severe physical damage which always crits, and inflicting a Physical Vulnerability up. This attack forces a tank swap, and Awareness helps a lot for mitigating the attack.
- Burning Chains: Same as P1.
- Atomic Ray: Stack marker targeting all 4 DPS. Must be shared with at least 1 person, and inflicts a Magic Vulnerability up.
- Ice Storm: Raid-wide AoE damage. if not moving during the attack, players will be inflicted with Deep Freeze.
- Deep Freeze increases Fire Resistance and Lightning Vulnerability, exactly like the puddles in Phase 1.
- Hypernova: Same as P1, but can be mitigated by being under the effect of Deep Freeze instead of water puddles.
- Levinbolt: Same as P1, except they can be placed and avoided. Will deal lethal damage if under the effect of Deep Freeze.
- Wyrmtail: Raid-wide AoE damage, inflicting Infermity on the whole party.
- Infermity can be avoided by standing deep inside Shinryu's hitbox, in the center of the circle that gives Doom.
- Benignting Breath: Conal AoE targetting the main tank, all players who are hit will recieve an infermity debuff. Avoidable like a regular AoE, but has a very quick cast time.
- Summon Reiryu: Same as P1.
Quick diagram showing the movement for Burning Chains + Atomic Ray. Not to scale.
Shinryu will remain in the middle of the arena, will have no positionals, and does not cleave (although he does have an AoE breath used at certain points), so there is no reason to not stack at the front with the tank. He will also have a small circle inside his hitbox, which inflicts a Doom debuff while players are inside, so don't be unless it's necessary. Shinryu begins by using Tera Slash, forcing a tank swap. Shortly afterwards, he will place Burning Chains on all players, and begin casting Atomic Ray on all DPS. I'd recommend assigning positions as shown in the diagram, with 1 DPS and 1 Healer/Tank on each platform. Begin with everyone stacked on the main tank at the front of the boss, and after chains appear, everyone should move to their positions, which will break everyone's chains. There is then a short while to adjust movement, and have each DPS stacked with either a tank or a healer to share Atomic Ray.
Shinryu will then cast a combination of Ice Storm and either Levinbolt or Hypernova. If Ice Storm is cast with Hypernova, have your whole party stack together and stop movement, getting frozen and then shortly unfrozen by Hypernova. If Ice Storm is cast with Levinbolt, Stack together while moving slightly to place Levinbolt AoEs in one central location. After the Levinbolt cast finishes, move out of the stack point. Be sure to be moving during the cast of Ice Storm, or you will be frozen.
Shinryu will then either cast Wyrmtail or Benignting Breath. I'd recommend moving inside Shinryu's hitbox ahead of time to more easily dodge these attacks. Wyrmtail is a raid-wide AoE that can be avoided by going deep into Shinryu's hitbox, past the circle that inflicts Doom. Be sure not to let the Doom debuff run out while dodging or you will die. Failiure to avoid this AoE will result in damage and an Infermity debuff. Benignting Breath is a conal AoE targeting the main tank. Treat this like any other AoE and just move out of it. Be wary that it does have a very quick cast time, so you may want to have your tank tanking Shinryu away from the party stack. Failiure to avoid this will result in damage and an Infermity debuff.
Shinryu will then cast another Tera Slash (forcing another tank swap), and Summon four Reiryus, once again targetting all 4 DPS. These work exactly the same as they do in Phase 1, heal them to full before they finish casting Dragonflight to avoid damage down and raid-wide AoE damage. He will then repeat this phase until he is pushed to 23%.
Phase 4: Race against Wings (23%-0%)
During this phase, Shinryu will cast a very slow Tidal Wave, His Left Wing will cast Judgement Bolt, and his Right Wing will cast Hellfire all at the same time, at differing speeds. A blue circle also appears on the arena, which players can step on to jump on Shinryu's back, and target the wings. These wings must be destroyed before any of the three casts are finished, or the party will wipe. Defeat the wing that begins casting first, followed by the other wing. Destroying the wings will deal significant damage to Shinryu himself (~9-10%!). After both wings are destroyed, jump off Shinryu's back from the side and proceed to burn him down as fast as possible, before Tidal Wave goes off. A caster LB to hit both wings, or a melee LB makes this DPS check significantly easier. There is absolutely zero damage going out on this phase, so encourage healers and tanks to push DPS. Once again, if any of the 3 casts are finished, the party will take lethal damage and wipe, serving as an enrage timer.
Loot
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