Cultists

As the unfortunate souls that venture into the tower approach the end of the wastes of the lower floors of the tower, they are filled with relief at the fact that they no longer have to tread through endless piles of corpses. They are instead greeted with an air of sophistication and the break from all the madness that came before made this new unfamiliar ground feel safe. But once you start to listen closely to your surroundings, the tittering of madmen becomes deafening. Adventurers that had lost their minds in these halls walk aimlessly through the corridors, laughing to themselves. When touched they scream in agony at the memories of what they had seen in this hellish dungeon. The further they went, the more they caught glimpses of hooded figures, wandering through the halls while whispering to themselves in unknown tongues and as soon as they turned a corner, they would already be gone. Those that managed to stay sane through the mad ramblings of these hooded madmen were greeted with *IT.* The whispers turned to loud screams and incoherent prayers as they enter the dark open room. Surrounded by these horrific noises, the maddening light of the moon revealed the horrifying contents of the room. All around them stood shaking figures hiding in the shadows, presumed to be the ones producing the maddening whispers. In the middle was a creature of horrific implications, a thing that should not be... Those that see it begin to laugh to themselves at the thought that such a creature exists and for all eternity are left to pray in front of this abomination without a single coherent thought in mind.

## Location

Gather your party of 4 next to the tower's entrance and press the Enter [Hotkey - Q] option. The cultists are currently (version 6.8) the second wave of the tower dungeon, the first wave being skeletons that are not worthy of a mention. **DISCLAIMER:** In it's current iteration (Version 6.8) tower has very little purpose and is only meant to be a demo. It still provides an entertaining challenge and not many people have done it in the past, so beating it is still an admirable feat. If you wish to fight the tower bosses, come prepared with a fully loaded squad of max geared characters.

## The Fight

The cultists will come out of all 4 portals. 2 weak cultists from the top, left and right portals and the strong cultist will come alone from the bottom portal. The weak cultists are very squishy and rather easy to kill but their damage dealing potential is no joke. All of the weak cultists have a "Lend me your power" attack much like the big one, however theirs isn't followed by the waves of carrion swarms. 3 seconds after the "Lend me your power line" the small cultists will shoot out an orb projectile in the direction that they're looking in. Although they won't 1 shot you, due to their numbers it is possible for you to not notice another cultists beginning his channel while you're focused on a different one. The key to taking care of this fight is to eliminate all the small cultists as quickly as possible. The purple cultist, outside of having increased stats has a more dangerous version of the same attack that the smaller cultists have.

On top of the orb projectile that the weaker cultists fire, shortly after firing it, carrion swarms come out of him in all directions, dealing heavy magic damage. The safest way to approach this attack is to keep your distance and look for gaps between the carrion swarms. Tanks can use their spell blocking abilities to block the damage from the carrion swarms but they first have to dodge the orb projectile. A bit more of a risky way to dodge it is barely avoiding the orb projectile and walking into it's trajectory after it's passed by. This way you can immediately get back to damaging the boss since there is no carrion swarm that goes in the same direction as the orb.

## Tips for Cultists

Cloud is by far the best way to deal with this fight. With just 2 F's, all of the small cultists are brought to very low HP and at that point they become a breeze to clear up. Without the small cultists, you can focus all your attention on the big one and dodge all of his AoE accordingly. Without a Cloud to AoE them down, have all your damage dealers (no matter if they have AoE or not) focus on clearing up all the small cultists before engaging the big one. The first thing your tank should do is taunt the large cultist so it doesn't target a squishy team mate and keep him in place while the rest of your team cleans up all the weaker enemies. It is also beneficial to call out the purple cultist's Unholy Decay so that everyone is aware and can dodge properly. Supports should use whatever damage they have in their arsenal to kill the small cultists and use their supportive abilities to heal up any wounded team mates that got hit by an unfortunate orb. After wiping out all the small cultists, proceed to take your time killing the big one and do your best to avoid getting hit by the carrion swarms. **You can use mini-stuns or regular stuns to delay the casting of the orbs (this includes the small cultists as well)**.

## Tips for Tower

Tower is very difficult and not very rewarding but for those that wish to look for a challenge and to have a chance at getting a look at an item that was previously in the game as the previous reward for beating tower (may make a comeback in the future, you never know), you should be aware of the best strategy for taking on this dungeon. The best team composition that was used for many successful runs through the tower consisted of the following: Slaughter, Sephiroth, Blessing and Miku. The 2 most impactful characters by far are Blessing and Miku. This is primarily due to the fact that it is very easy to make mistakes during the last 2 waves of the tower (Sisters of Harmony and Amaya) and the sheer amount of damage those 2 waves can dish out, making sustain insanely valuable. This is also why Sephiroth is the best tank for tower, due to his ability to provide even more added sustain and he combos well with Miku as well (mostly due to the ability to protect her from an incoming magic nuke while she's attempting to resurrect a fallen ally). Slaughter is also very good because of his high survivability (having STR as a second stat and [R]'s ability to protect him from an incoming magic nuke) and insane damage potential. And with only 1 DPS in the fight, all of the buffs can go onto the Slaughter, making his damage reach crazy heights. Of course there can be substitutes to each character, like Slaughter can be cut for a Cloud or a Nightmare or Sephiroth can be replaced by a Revenge or a Disgust and so on. Trial and error is key for tower, none had completed the dungeon on their first try, therefore making persistence the key to success.