Abyssos: The Eighth Circle

Abyssos: The Eighth Circle, known to players as P8, is the fourth and final turn of in Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker.
==Story==
===Normal===
===Savage===
==Progression==
===Normal===
===Savage===
=== Phase 1 ===
In phase 1, Hephaistos uses modified versions of the mechanics from normal mode. Hephaistos's HP must be brought below 50% before he enrages. The nature of the arena plays a significant part in the fight. It consists two types of lines: strong white lines and thin black lines. White lines divide the arena into 16 squares and black lines divide the arena into 9 squares.
The fight begins with a raid-wide attack, Genesis of Flame, followed by either Conceptual Tetraflare or Octaflare. Tetraflare means Hephaistos will soon cast four explosions that must be shared by two players each, and Octaflare means each player will receive an explosion. Before these explosions Hephaistos casts Volcanic Torches, drawing blue flamed lines around the white lines of the arena. Keep an eye out how these lines move, because when they are done, all squares, except four, will erupt in blue flames. Hephaistos will also summon either a flaming snake or a bird. The snake will sweep the middle of the arena according to black lines and the bird will sweep the edges. All three abilities go off nearly at the same time. To resolve this, do the following:
* Check whether Hephaistos casts Tetraflare or Octaflare to know if you must be in pairs or fully spread out. Tanks and Ranged DPS usually pair up, and Healers with Melee DPS.
* Look for the safe squares with Volcanic Torches, as well as whether Hephaistos summons a snake or a bird. Move to the safe square with your pair and wait until the torches explode.
* Immediately after the torches, move to the safe place from the snake or the bird; edges if snake, middle if bird. Stack up with your pair if you got Tetraflare, or spread out if you got Octaflare.
Afterwards, Hephaistos casts Flameviper. This is a tankbuster that causes bleed and Magic Vulnerability Up-debuff. Unlike in normal mode, Hephaistos fires two busters. Also unlike with many tankbusters, this cannot be survived with tank invulnerability because the bleeds from both busters stack up, and there is no way to survive such a heavy bleed after invulnerability runs out. For tanks to survive, Off-Tank must provoke Hephaistos during Flameviper cast to ensure the Main Tank is hit only once. Off-Tank takes the second hit, and immediately after, Main Tank provokes Hephaistos to ensure Hephaistos's next auto-attack does not kill the Off-Tank due to Magic Vulnerability Up.
Following Flameviper, Hephaistos uses Reforged Reflection. He will then either spawn a Gorgon on his arm, or spawn monster legs. 
If he spawns a Gorgon, stay out from his hitbox, as he will sweep around it. Get ready for a complex mechanic: Hephaistos casts Gorgomanteia giving every player two out four different debuffs.
* Blue debuff with Roman numeral 1 [First in Line], or a pink debuff with Roman numeral 2 [Second in Line]. These debuffs will only tell the players in which order they must resolve their respective second debuff.
* A black debuff with a pizza slice known as "Eye of the Gorgon". This causes a petrifying conical gaze when it falls off.
* A green snake-debuff known as "Blood of the Gorgon". This causes an acidic AoE when it falls off.
For example, tanks and healers (henceforth known as support) receive First in Line and DPS Second in Line. Hephaistos will summon two Gorgon-eyes that will circle around the arena and eventually stop on either cardinal or intercardinal, depending on whether they are circling clockwise or counter-clockwise (CW = Cardinals, CCW = Intercardinals). From the eyes, Gorgons will spawn. As soon as they spawn, look away from them so they will not petrify you. Support will need to resolve the first debuffs. Those with Eye of the Gorgon will look at the Gorgon adds to petrify them, and those with Blood of the Gorgon go stand on top of the petrified Gorgons and kill them with the AoE. Repeat the process with DPS. After four Gorgons are done, Hephaistos casts Ektothermos, dealing raid-wide damage Then, he despawns the Gorgon on his arm.
If Hephaistos spawned monster legs, he stomps the ground, causing a heavy knockback. Either go near him on intercardinal, or use Arm's Length/Surecast to give you knockback immunity to not get pushed to the edge, where you will be instantly KO'd. Then spread out, as Hephaistos will cast Rearing Rampage. Hephaistos stomps four times, hitting every player with a small AoE, which applies Earth Resistance Down to 2 players with each stomp. Keep a count who was hit when, as it is necessary to survive Stomp Dead. With Stomp Dead, Hephaistos will jump four times on a player farthest from him. These jumps must be taken in pairs to share the damage and prevent Sustained Damage-debuff. The first jump is shared by the players who were hit first with Rearing Rampage, the second jump by those who were hit second, and so on. This is due to the Earth-resistance Down running out. Each jump also causes Physical Vulnerability Up, so make sure you stay out from the remaining jumps, but also in a way you do not make yourself as the farthest player.
Next, Hephaistos casts Illusionary Creation. He will summon four clones of himself on the edges of the arena. Two of them will summon a snake and a bird, that will sweep the arena. Move as light parties to the safe zones, light party 1 to north or west, and light party 2 to south or east, depending where the bird is coming from. Spread out as not to clip anyone with Manifold Flames, that targets either Tanks/Healers or DPS. Next, Hephaistos will execute Nest of Flamevipers. This does not have a castbar, so you will need to remember. When the bird and the snake sweep the arena, and you will receive the Manifold Flames explosions, support or DPS will receive Magical Vulnerability Up. These players need to stay out from Hephaistos's hitbox, and the rest need to go inside the hitbox to bait the Nest of Flamevipers, as it will target four closest players to him. Next, the clones will summon two birds or two snakes and Hephaistos will cast either Nest of Flamevipers or Tetraflare. This gives you four different possibilities to overcome.
# Birds and Nest of Flamevipers: Spread out in middle square formed with black lines, as every player will be shot with a Flameviper. Make sure you do not overlap with anyone.
# Snakes and Nest of Flamevipers: Spread out to the corner squares made by black lines, 2 players per each square and spread out so that Flamevipers do not overlap.
# Birds and Tetraflare: Pair up in the middle black lined square.
# Snakes and Tetraflare: Pair up in the black lined corner squares.
After this, Hephaistos casts Volcanic Torches leaving only one corner as a safe zone. Move there and deal with Genesis of Flame - another raid-wide attack. Hephaistos will use Reforged Reflection again, this time doing the mechanic he did not perform previously.
When the Gorgon/Monster is done, Hephaistos casts either Conceptual Tetraflare or Conceptual Octaflare. You only need to memorize which one, as it will not happen until you have resolved upcoming Fourfold Fires. Mostly, Fourfold Fires act like in normal mode, but while resolving it, you will have to deal with Tetraflare or Octaflare (not the same as Conceptual Tetraflare/Octaflare). First, stack up the party in the middle and wait for Fourfold Fires to generate flaming geysers to the corners. Like in normal mode, these geysers will blow up three times, two each time, creating a wide AoE, but this time, Hephaistos will not tether to the geysers that will blow up first. When Hephaistos has finished Cthonic Vent, two geysers will be flaming while the other two do not. Find the ones that are not flaming, and get to safety near those geysers. It is best to divide into light parties. Light Party 1 finds safety at the northern geysers and Light Party 2 at the southern ones. When the second geysers prepare to blow up, Hephaistos casts either Tetraflare or Octaflare, and you will need to deal with this accordingly with the geysers that are safe. After the first geysers blow up, keep an eye out which geysers the two fire snakes will jump into. The safe ones are the ones where snakes did not jump into. Hephaistos then casts Tetraflare or Octaflare. If Tetraflare, pair up in your light parties: Tanks with Melee DPS and Healers with Ranged DPS. If Octaflare, spread out in the safe areas. After this, there will be one more pair of geyser explosions and Hephaistos spawns again either a snake or a bird. After the geyser explosions, get to the safe lane accordingly, and prepare to deal with the Conceptual Tetraflare/Octaflare that Hephaistos cast at the very start of this entire mechanic. Hephaistos ends this part with a Flameviper tankbuster. Deal with this like in the beginning.
Next, Hephaistos will do the last two mechanics: Gorgon 2 and Monster 2. These differ from the first Gorgon or Monster and are more complex. Whichever Hephaistos does first depends on whether he did Gorgon or Monster first in the early part of the fight.
Gorgon 2 begins like the first Gorgon: Hephaistos spawns a Gorgon on his arm and then sweeps his hitbox. He will cast Gorgomanteia and this time every player receives a petrifying gaze and green snake-debuffs. Four players will receive one out of two new debuffs:
* Orange Circle [Crown of the Gorgon]: This debuff casts a spell called Omnigaze when it falls off. It will petrify everyone regardless whether you look at that player.
* Purple Snake [Breath of the Gorgon]: Causes an AoE that must be shared with 3 players.
After you get your debuffs, you will need to get inside the middle squares made by the white lines and spread out so that Blood's AoEs do not overlap because Hephaistos casts illusions to sweep every outer line made by the white lines. Like in the first Gorgon mechanic, Hephaistos sends out Gorgons, this time four at the same time. These will stop either at cardinals or intercardinals, depending whether they travel clockwise or counter-clockwise. If clockwise, they stop at cardinals. If counter-clockwise, they stop at intercardinals. After they spawn, they use Petrifying Gaze, so you will need to be aware where they stop and then look away. You must again petrify them with Eye of the Gorgon. Each player petrifies the closest one to them as these Gorgons will need to be petrified twice. Do not kill these Gorgons with Blood of the Gorgon's AoE effect, otherwise you will not be able to deal with the two new debuffs. After you have dealt with Eye and Blood, Hephaistos will spawn one more illusion that will sweep two out of the four Gorgons, killing them. You must identify the ones the illusion does not sweep, as you will need those two Gorgons to deal with Crown and Breath. Go to the Gorgons with your light parties, and have the player with Crown of the Gorgon go behind the Gorgon and the other three stack up in front of it. The petrified Gorgons act as shields from the Omnigaze and Breath of the Gorgon will then be shared with remaining players, destroying the Gorgon caught in the blast.
Monster 2 begins like Monster 1, but is otherwise completely different. After transforming, Hephaistos casts either Quadrupedal Crush or Quadrupedal Impact. In both cases, he will jump either to the north or south edge, depending on which side he is looking at. Crush causes an extremely wide AoE, which leaves a safe spot opposite where Hephaistos jumps. Impact causes a heavy knockback, which likely pushes you out of the arena, unless you are standing next to Hephaistos' landing point. Deal with Crush or Impact accordingly and then prepare for Blazing Footfalls. You will witness a pattern of what Hephaistos does next in sequence, accompanied by Conceptual Diflare or Conceptual Tetraflare. The sequence is the following:
* A sweep down the middle of the arena, between north and south, that causes an instant KO if you are inside the lane, and a knockback outside it.
* Crush or Impact on either western or eastern edge.
* Another sweep from west to east or vice versa, identical to the first sweep.
* Crush or Impact to north or south, depending which wasn't used at first.
During this sequence, Volcanic Torches will be generated, which leaves only one of the four white lined lanes safe by the time Hephaistos finishes the sequence. 
To complete this mechanic do the following:
# Check if you are getting Conceptual Diflare or Tetraflare. Diflare must be shared by four players, and Tetraflare by pairs. Pair tanks with Melee DPS and Healers with Ranged DPS.
# Look whether Hephaistos uses Crush or Impact. If Crush, move to the opposite side of the AoE. If Impact, move to the indicated side. Set up groups or pairs. Keep a safe distance from them, so you do not clip anyone, when Diflare/Tetraflare blows up. Adjust with the black line to deal with the knockback from the sweep.
# After the sweep, Diflare/Tetraflare blows up. If Hephaistos uses Crush, move to the next sweeping lane and prepare to be knocked back to the correct side, as he will use Impact after the next sweep. If Hephaistos uses Impact, get knocked back to the opposite side and then adjust with the sweep to get to safety with the upcoming Crush.
# After dealing with the final Crush or Impact, get to the safe lane from Volcanic Torches. It is always either the western most or eastern most lane.
Between Gorgon 2 and Monster 2, Hephaistos uses Flameviper. After the second mechanic, Hephaistos uses one more Genesis of Flame. If Hephaistos' HP is not below 50% by this time, he enrages and becomes untargetable, wiping the party. Otherwise, the fight progresses to Phase 2.
=== Phase 2 ===
==== Start ====
Following the transition Hephaistos will appear on one side of the arena the entire fight (henceforth referred to as north), and every auto attack must be shared by both tanks standing on top of each other. The boss will cast Aioniopyr, dealing raid-wide damage and inflicting players with bleed. The boss will continue to auto attack both tanks and then cast Tyrant's Unholy Darkness, a tankbuster that targets those with the two highest aggro. He will continue with a few more auto attacks and casts Natural Alignment, inflicting two random players with a DoT, and if these two take any damage, it will wipe the raid. He will then cast Twist Nature, which shows two bars that appear on the two afflicted players, one being a stack marker and the other being a purple marker for spreading. Whichever one fills first determines what the players will do. Players are usually stacked in the middle. Before this goes off, Hephaistos casts Tyrant's Flare, where an AoE will appear under each player, and either stack north of their position or spread in a clock formation. The boss begins casting Ashing Blaze after the first meter fills; the second effect & Ashing Blaze will then resolve simultaneously.
The two afflicted players will receive new meters, one being fire and the other being ice. When the meter fills with fire, it will target the three furthest players with Forcible Trifire, which must be shared with one other person. When the ice meter fills, it will target the two closest players with Forcible Difreeze, which must be shared with three players in each group to survive. Afterward, Illusionary Creation will create three clones on the west or east wall, leaving only one of the northernmost two rows open. Once those clones fire, three more will appear on the opposite wall, hitting the row that was once safe while leaving the other north row open. The boss will cast Aioniopyr again and hit the tanks with a few autos and a tankbuster. The boss will then cast High Concept, dealing raid wide damage and afflicting all players with debuffs.
==== High Concept 1 ====
After casting High Concept, Hephaistos becomes untargetable and players will have to resolve a rather complex mechanic. Each player will receive one of the following debuffs:
* Imperfection Debuffs marked with Alpha, Beta, or Gamma, with either 8-second debuff or 28-second debuff (6 debuffs in total). As these effects resolve, a very wide AoE will be cast around them, and the player receives three-marked concepts above their heads (a state known as Perfection, corresponding to their initial debuff). 
* 2-player stack-debuff [Multisplice] and a 3-player stack-debuff [Supersplice] with 8-second timers. As timers run out, these will cast a small AoE that must be shared with 2 and 3 players, respectively.
To resolve High Concept, the players who received the 8-second Imperfection debuffs must run to the corners of the arena to make sure no other players are affected by them. If this fails, the party will wipe. Meanwhile, the remaining 5 players stack up in the remaining free corner, with Multisplice's carrier and the long Alpha carrier standing together and the remaining 3 stacked together. Make sure Multisplice and Supersplice do not overlap. After 8 seconds, the Splice debuffs fall off, and Alpha, Beta, and Gamma receive markers above them while two towers appear in the middle of the arena. The towers are either blue, green, or purple, and need to be soaked by players who have developed a Concept of the matching color. Assuming the towers are green, for instance, two players that have a green Wind mark will move close to each other to form the green "Winged Conception" necessary to effectively soak the towers. At the same time, Hephaistos will cast Ashing Blaze to sweep either the left or right side of the arena. As you soak the towers, make sure you are standing on the safe side. The process is the same with blue ("Aquatic Conception") and purple ("Shocking Conception") towers, respectively.
After the first towers are done, the players who received the 28-second timer Imperfection debuff will prepare to do the same as the 8 second. The Multisplice and Supersplice players will now have to go near Alpha, Beta, or Gamma player, depending which of the three first concepts was not used. If, for example, the concept from Beta was unused (i.e. the towers required Aquatic Conception, the one that Beta cannot create), the player who had Multisplice will go stand near Alpha and the Supersplice player goes stand near Gamma. The unused concept can either stay near Beta corner or move to the safe corner. The players who soaked the first two towers will also move to the safe corner with a safe distance from each other. As these debuffs run out, every player inside the Imperfection AoEs receives a concept, and four towers appear on the middle line. The color of the towers is again blue, green, or purple. Again, combine with correct colors and soak the towers. Beware the Ashing Blaze that Hephaistos is casting in the meantime. Never combine two of the same concept (e.g. Beta x Beta = "Toxic Conception"), as it will cause a wipe.
Once the four towers are soaked, Hephaistos will become targetable again, and the fight resumes. Everyone has to keep a safe distance from each other so as not to cause accidental concepts that can cause a wipe until Hephaistos casts Deconceptualize. With this, all marks will be dispelled.
==== Next phase ====
Hephaistos will cast Aioniopyr again and couple of auto-attacks. He will cast Limitless Desolation and during the cast players will have to spread out, preferably so that tanks and healers spread to the left side, and DPS to the right side. Each player will get hit by a small AoE, 2 players at a time (1 support, 1 DPS). As soon as these players are hit, two towers will appear that these players will have to soak, but not immediately. Before these towers explode, the players will need to drop an AoE upon their feet so that it will not hamper tower soaking, nor cause other players problems. Move close to the tower by moving by the edges of the squares of the arena, and once you are close to the tower, wait until the AoE drops unto your feet, and then soak the tower. All players will have to do this. Afterwards, Hephaistos will cast Aioniopyr, Tyrant's Unholy Darkness, and a few auto-attacks before recasting Natural Alignment. The idea is the same as with the previous, but this time Hephaistos will cast Inverse Magicks, which inverts one or both of the alignments, meaning you will have to do the opposite from what they show: spread mark means you must stack and vice versa, fire means ice and vice versa. Each time one of these is resolved, clones on the side will blast a row, first or second will always be safe. After resolving all four alignments, Hephaistos will cast Ashing Blaze, followed by one more combo of Aioniopyr, Tyrant's Unholy Darkness, and a few auto-attacks. After this, Hephaistos triggers a second High Concept.
==== High Concept 2 ====
The second High Concept is mostly the same as the first, but with some critical differences. Like in the first, players receive the Alpha, Beta, and Gamma Imperfection debuffs, but this time Supersplice is absent, replaced by a 1-player AoE debuff known as Solosplice. These stack debuffs are always present on the carrier of an Alpha, Beta, or Gamma debuff with a long timer. The short timers resolve their debuffs like in the first High Concept. The player that received only one of the long Imperfection debuffs will stack with the Multisplice player. The two players that received no debuffs go with the 8-second Alpha-debuff and go stand near that player, but not too near. As the 8-second debuffs run out, two towers will appear in the middle. Deal with them like in the first High Concept. The players that had no debuffs at the start will combine their marks to form a red "Fiery Conception" (mostly referred to as Ifrit). These two players will then stay in a safe spot. They must be kept healed, as Fiery Conception comes with a powerful damage over time effect. After the towers are soaked, these players will also go to the safe spot but stand close to the edges to ensure they do not combine with others.
The long debuffs are resolved and again four towers appear in the middle, but this time on their own squares. Two towers will be green, the other two either blue or purple, depending which color was not used on the first towers. Alpha and Beta will combine to yield a "Winged Conception", and Gamma will combine with the marks that were not used in the first towers. Once the combinations are done, soak the towers accordingly. At the same time, four clones will appear on each side. The remaining four players will go stand next to these clones (Ifrit players usually take east and west clones, the other two north and south clones). They will get tethered by the clones and these players must then drag them to the corners by moving clockwise so that these clones will not blast any of the players soaking the towers. Like in Natural Alignment, these clones blast the row they are pointing towards. They must ensure the clones will only blast them alone.
After all of the previous steps are done, players marked with the red Ifrit's "Fiery Conception" and the green Zu's "Winged Conception" will merge to form the Phoenix-like "Immortal Conception", necessary to survive Hephaistos' upcoming Ego Death. Hephaistos will become targetable, and when Ifrit and Zu are combined into Phoenix, each player will receive a Phoenix concept mark above them. This concept will eventually blow up, causing damage equal to 99.9% of each player's max HP. Before this concept blows up, the party must be healed to full HP ASAP. Once the concept blows up, each living player receives the full effects of Immortal Conception, indicated by the mark of the True Phoenix above their heads. Hephaistos starts casting Ego Death. Deal as much damage as you can before Ego Death's cast ends, but save your bursts.
==== The Finale ====
After Ego Death, the screen goes black. If the party successfully formed "Immortal Conception", the party will rise from the ashes, and the fight continues. Every player now has an infinite-duration Damage Up buff, but the party must take care to stay alive, as the buff isn't retained when Raised. You will have only one last combo of mechanics to deal with before Hephaistos casts Ego Death again as an enrage.
Hephaistos starts by casting Aionagonia, which functions like Aioniopyr, but is more powerful. Then he will cast Dominion, hitting half of the party with a small AoE which inflicts Earth Resistance Down. Make sure you are spread for this. Afterwards, four earth-bound towers will erupt from the middle of the arena, moving towards the edges. Players that were not hit with Dominion will have to follow and soak these. The same will happen to the other half of the party.
Hephaistos casts Aionagonia and Dominion this way a second time and Aionagonia after the second Dominion, before casting Ego Death as enrage. Between each cast Hephaistos receives a stack of Damage Up, boosting the damage of each separate cast. It is recommended to form an effective mitigation plan to make sure each cast's damage is mitigated enough.
==Musical themes==
The boss theme that plays against Hephaistos is "Embers". In the second phase of Savage, "White Stone Black" plays.
==Behind the scenes==
In Patch 6.21 on September 13, 2022, the HP of Hephaistos in Abyssos: The Eighth Circle (Savage) was reduced and the reasoning for the HP adjustment was provided in the patch notes.https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/3740d2052d6f21aa5d3b8d4cc94795a082fca0f6https://jp.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/77cd1a18cde9857e145dff666639273760efa17f On September 16, 2022, producer and director Naoki Yoshida published a statement on the Lodestone giving more information on the reasoning for the HP adjustment as well as the source of the issue.https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/6d95409248d3ab3b5dbc0c8a04340b373870140bhttps://jp.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/e02788b75e2240bb44d9cc11b96946df37bffdda
==Citations==