Anabaseios: The Ninth Circle

Anabaseios: The Ninth Circle, known to players as P9, is the first turn of in Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker.
==Story==
===Normal===
===Savage===
==Progression==
===Normal===
===Savage===
Like most raids, the fight begins with a raidwide, Gluttony's Augur, to heal and mitigate through. This is followed by Ravening, another raidwide, which also changes Kokytos's stance to Mage. With Mage-stance, Kokytos starts wielding elemental magicks. First, he uses Duality of Death, a tankbuster that hits the two highest players on the aggro-table, and also forces a quick tankswap. Main Tank will be hit with a fire-AoE spell, which inflicts Fire Resistance Down and Off-tank will be hit with a wind-AoE spell, that inflicts Wind Resistance Down. Because of these debuffs, a swap is needed, as Kokytos casts these spells a second time, and the elements used will be the same, unless tanks swap. Without swapping, this would result both tanks getting KO'd, unless they use invulnerability. So, during the cast, Off-tank provokes Kokytos to ensure tanks will be hit with different spells both times. Main Tank can then retake aggro.
Next comes Dualspell, a series of three elemental attacks, that use fire, ice and lightning elements. The first and third are always fire and ice, and the second is ice and lightning. How to resolve these depend on which element flashes on the screen. If you look at the arena, you can see that it has three circles. If ice flashes on screen, it means that only the inner-most circle will be safe, as the two outermost circles will be struck with ice. If other than ice flashes, then ice hits only the outer-most circle. Ice only determines, where you will need to be when the spells are resolved. Fire spell targets four players, either all Tanks/Healers or all DPS, and these must be taken in pairs. Pairs need to keep a safe distance with each other and be mindful about the ice as well. If fire flashes on the screen, the spell's AoE will be wider. Lightning targets all players with a line AoE, which means every player needs to spread in an appropriate safe area that is determined by ice. If lightning flashes on screen, these line AoEs will be wider, forcing players to go farther as not to clip anyone.
After Dualspell is resolved, there will be some auto-attacks, until Kokytos casts Ravening again to change it's stance to Martialist. This Ravening also conjures up crystalline walls to either cardinals or intercardinals, that don't do anything, but they will be needed for the next mechanics. This phase starts with Ascendant's Fist-tankbuster, that not only hits hard but also inflicts Physical Vulnerability Up, meaning that the next auto-attack will kill the tank. Because of this, a tankswap is needed. This is followed by Archaic Rockbreaker, a knockback that cannot be countered with Arm's Length/Surecast. This will knock you out of the arena unless you have a crystalline wall behind you. And if you are standing on the purple area indicating the knockback, you will be instantly KO'd. Also, after the knockback, either all Tanks/Healers or DPS will be hit with a rock, that must be taken in pairs. So, pair up so that you have a wall behind you and get knocked to a wall where you will also take the hit from the rocks. Following this Kokytos casts either Front Combination or Rear Combination, which are accompanied by two other mechanics. Front Combination means Kokytos will sweep the half he is facing towards and Rear Combination sweeps the half behind him. Also, the cracks on the floor begin to glow. These will give out AoE's at the farther end of their respective cracks. And finally, there will be either a point-blank AoE around Kokytos, or a donut AoE outside his hitbox. To resolve all of this, do the following:
# Check, whether the AoE around Kokytos is point-blank or donut. If point-blank, you need to be outside of it and if donut, you need to be inside his hitbox.
# Search for cracks in the respective safe-zone relative to the AoE around Kokytos, that are not glowing to find a safe zone from them. See if you can locate the safe area that won't be affected by Front/Rear Combination. Wait in that safe zone for AoEs and cracks to resolve, and evade the respective Combination.
# Kokytos then does second cracks and the AoE around him, this time opposite from the previous.
After this, Healers will be targeted with Archaic Demolition, so stack up in light parties to deal with this. This will then be followed by Gluttony's Augur and a second Ascendant's Fist. Deal with these accordingly.
Another Ravening is cast, which changes Kokytos's stance to Chimera, which is a mix of Mage and Martialist. This form brings out Levinstrike Summoning, which is widely considered the hardest mechanic in the fight. The following things take place here:
# Kokytos summons four lightning orbs, that have uneven dots (1, 3, 5, 7).
# Four random players receive even dots above them (2, 4, 6, 8)
# Four players without dots will receive a blue mark above them, called Defamation.
The above things will be resolved in sequence, that happens four times, which is the following:
# Kokytos kicks a lightning orb towards a wall, which then transforms into a tower, that must be soaked, otherwise the whole party receives heavy damage and Paralyze-debuff.
# Following the orb kick, Kokytos jumps an even dot party member, which causes a small flaming AoE on them.
# At the same time as the flaming AoE is done, a very large AoE will explode around the Defamation-marked player, dealing ice-damage.
A common strategy to handle this is, that Defamation players move away from the rest of the party to the very edge of the arena so that they wont hamper tower-soaking. The even dot players willl soak the towers in following order: 6, 8, 2, 4. Even dot players move to the opposite edge from the Defamation player to bait the flaming AoE, in the following order: 2, 4, 6, 8. Overall, it goes like this: Kokytos kicks the number 1 orb towards the wall, and after it hits the wall, number 6 goes to soak it. Meanwhile, the first Defamation player moves to the opposite wall-less edge from where the first orb is kicked, and number 2 goes to the opposite wall-less edge to bait the Flaming AoE. Next, Kokytos kicks the number 3 orb, and number 8 soaks the tower, and the next defamation does the same as the first. This will be done four times in total.
After the fourth sequence, Kokytos casts Two Minds. This is in general identical to Dualspell, but Kokytos will only do one dualspell, and you'll need to quickly identify, if it is fire and ice, or ice and lightning. Then go to your clock position, pair up, if it is fire and ice, and watch out, which element flashes, to deal with this accordingly.
Kokytos then does another Gluttony's Augur and Ravening that changes its stance to Beast. In the Beast stance, Kokytos first casts Charybdis, that summons four tornados on either cardinals or intercardinals. Stay out of these areas. Kokytos then casts Comet, bringing down four rocks between the tornadoes. Two of them are cracked while two are intact. For the next part, you'll have to make sure both of the intact rocks stay intact, otherwise you'll wipe no matter what you do.
Next, Kokytos casts Beastly Bile, that'll target the farthest player from him, that must be shared by four players. It will also target four closest players with Thunderbolt, a conal lightning attack, that must be directed away from the rocks. The easiest way to do this is use role stacks. Have all Tanks/Healers stack on one of the cracked rocks to bait the bile, and have all DPS spread in front of the tornadoes so that their lightning cones don't hit any of the rocks. After these are resolved, Kokytos does the same thing again, but for this time Tanks/Healers and DPS switch positions: DPS will go to the second cracked rock and Tanks/Healers spread in front of the tornadoes. After this is resolved, Kokytos casts Ecliptic Meteor to another of the intact rocks. Have the whole party take cover behind the other intact rock until the meteor crashes and destroys the rock. Note that every destroyed rock leaves a wide point-blank AoE around them. If there is no intact rock for the meteor, you will wipe.
Kokytos casts Beastly Fury-raidwide to end the Beast-phase. Next, Kokytos brings Chimera-stance again, but it will be different from the previous. In this phase, you'll need to deal with cracks you encountered on Martialist form, and elements from Mage-form. Keep a close eye, what elements Kokytos uses, and find safe spots from the cracks accordingly.
After the previous phase Kokytos casts Chimeric Succession. This is somewhat similar to Levinstrike Summoning, but there won't be lightning orbs. Soon after the cast, four farthest players from Kokytos receive dots from 1 to 4. These players will have to bait Defamations. The remaining four players will have to bait the flaming AoE away from the Defamations, and also direct the boss accordingly after he jumps on them, depending whether he uses Front Firestrikes or Rear Firestrikes. Front means Kokytos uses a large conal AoE in front of him after he jumps, and likewise Rear means he'll do the same behind him. Defamation players will bait their dots to northwest and northeast intercardinals, all the way to the edge of the arena. Also, to make baiting the flaming AoE safer, Main Tank should drag Kokytos all the way to the northern edge.
After Chimeric Succession, Kokytos only uses repeated mechanics, until he starts casting Disintegration as an enrage.
==Musical themes==
The theme of the Ninth Circle is "One Amongst the Weary".
== Etymology ==