Astrologian Healer Tips for Asphodelos Savage — Endwalker 6.3

Asphodelos is the first raid tier released in the expansion FFXIV: Endwalker and consists of four fights, with the fourth fight having two phases and being split with a checkpoint:

1. Warder of the Condemned: Erichthonios
2. Mythic Creation: The Hippokampus
3. Mythic Creation: The Phoinix
4. Himitheos: Hesperos

If you are looking for more generalized guides, you should take a look at our Savage guides written by Lyra Rose, linked below each section.

Every section will discuss important Divination and Astrodyne windows, important damage intake sequences in the fights, and recommended Macrocosmos and Earthly Star uses. Please keep in mind, the recommended actions assume at least a modicum of assistance from your cohealer. If your cohealer is not pulling their own weight, you will likely need to spend a little more effort in each fight.

Disclaimer: This document contains suggestions. If your group has decided they wish to do something different listed on this page, assess the changes with your group. The suggestions below are not your only options for these fights, and this page should not be treated as if it is.

The very first fight of the raid tier introduces you to Endwalker raiding in a light, slow fight. The damage intake is fairly light, even at minimum item level (i580), and the mechanics are fairly chill to execute once you have a hang of the solutions.

You can cover all of the healing in this fight with just oGCDs alongside some help from your cohealer. There is one significant healing section: first Intemperance. If you are not getting much support from your cohealer, this is a good place to use Neutral Sect. Otherwise, as will be listed below, Macrocosmos alongside some oGCD you have available will do a lot of work.

Keep in mind the two moves that open up and close the brighter sections of the fight, Shining Cells and Slam Shut do a significant amount of damage, and I recommend using Collective Unconscious for these moves.

However, in an optimized scenario, P1S has shockingly high execution requirements for a first raid fight of the expansion. Your Divination usage at the start absolutely must be used in time on the opener (generally after the second Malefic post-pull). Afterwards, you must have be very tight with your usage of Divination, not drifting it at all for the next two usages at 2m and 4m. This is to ensure that the 6m burst during second Intemperance is executable. If Divination falls behind at all, you are going to be unable to use your Divination buff before the second tile sets explode, and due to how the mechanic plays out, you will likely be unable to land the buff on everyone. Since you are in Lightspeed and using many Cards while also moving around for the mechanic, this buff window is sneakily actually one of the two or three toughest Astrodyne windows in all of Pandaemonium. However, bear in mind there is very little damage that goes out during this Intemperance, compared to the first. You should not need to weave any healing oGCDs during this section.

Use Earthly Star at -4s prepull. Use off cooldown for the rest of the fight

The following are recommended Macrocosmos usages in P1S:

• During first Intemperance. Use at some point before or after the second tile explosions to cover the Warden's Wraths that are around the tailend of the fight. You can utilize this to also help with movement.
• During second Intemperance. Use at some point to help with movement. It is fundamentally just an instant cast Malefic here (reminder: Macrocosmos is DPS neutral with Malefic on single target).
• Some time during the enrage sequence at the end of the fight.

The second fight of the tier is a far call from the first. P2S is a very high raid damage intake encounter, with a large number of heavy party damage raidwide AoEs, many of which need to be mitigated, or will oneshot the non-tanks in the party. Mechanically, there is one section where you must be very prepared with your healing rotation near the end of the fight.

There is one particular move that needs to be mitigated: Sewage Deluge. This is the best use of Collective Unconscious in this fight, and this ability will be up for every instance in the fight. Do NOT use Macrocosmos on these moves: Macrocosmos does NOT have any mitigation, and you will always have a plethora of resources to heal the party up afterward, with a lot of time to do so.

Another move that does significant damage to the party is called Coherence, a move that starts with a heavy damage intake on one party member (has to be a tank) that inflicts raidwide damage based on proximity to the tethered party member, followed by a raid soak line AoE that splits the damage among all party members, with the player at the front taking significantly more damage than the rest (again, must be a tank). The first two Coherences will be covered by Macrocosmos. The third, however will need a little more assistance, as there is a Channeling Overlow that sandwiches it. This is a great place to prep a Swiftcast before the Coherence damage, and then a Neutral Sect buffed Aspected Helios as well as Horoscope to be used as soon as possible. This will most reliably cover this spooky high damage intake moment. An optimized group will not be seeing this mechanic, so do not worry about your personal parse.

There is one significant mechanic that affects our usage of Divination. Right around our 4m buff sequence, the boss will use Kampeos Harma, and then go completely untargetable (note: this will also affect our usage of Earthly Star, and will be mentioned below). We will need to hold our Divination for about 30 seconds. Because of this, we can both use one extra Play and Draw at the 3m section (right after the first Channeling Overflow), thus prepping ourselves with a full Astrodyne for after the mechanic. Right after the boss goes targetable again, we can use our second pot in the fight, and then execute a full Astrodyne, three Play, Astrodyne sequence here to line up with our pot as well. There is very little mechanical movement required after Kampeos Harma, so it is not a particularly difficult Astrodyne window.

Use Earthly Star at -4s prepull. Use off cooldown until 4m. Hold your Earthly Star placement until after the boss has finished casting Shockwave. This will let it naturally Explode to both heal the damage from Kampeos Harma, as well as actually damage the boss. You can delay it a little bit more depending on your killtime to let it land under buffs.

The following are recommended Macrocosmos usages in P2S:

• A little bit after the first Coherence begins casting.
• During the Sewage Eruption dodges after the 6m window as an instant cast spell. This will heal the Tainted Flood damage before the second Coherence.
• Anytime near the end before any raidwide AoE you will see.

The third fight in Pandaemonium: Asphodelos is surprisingly actually a bit easier healing-wise compared to the second fight, until the third phase of the fight (post-adds). Most of the fight is an execution check of mechanics. As an Astrologian, you do have a significant amount of power in completely invalidating a core healing check with Macrocosmos. However, you may not actually see this mechanic if your group is good enough and geared enough to skip it. Thus, there are two main outlines to the backend of the fight depending on whether or not you see Life's Agonies or not.

Since the Sunbird section of the fight has been removed from FFLogs, it is effectively for most any scenario most ideal to pool resources in this phase to have as much to dump at once Phoinix is targetable again. Because of this, we will be holding Divination during this phase, and using as many Cards as possible while both:

1. Maintaining between one and two charges of Draw
2. Having a Card drawn and ready to play for after adds phase

The re-opener may or may not have a Potion available for usage depending on how quick your group kills adds phase. If you do not have a Potion available for usage until after you use Divination, it will be better to just hold this Potion usage until the 6m window.

Your healing plan in this fight is entirely contingent (as mentioned above) on whether or not your group sees Life's Agonies. This will change your healing plan for the third phase of the fight entirely.

• Macrocosmos plan if you do see Life's Agonies:
  • During Darkened Fire phase when all four fires are targetable; This is purely just to do damage to up to five targets at once.
  • In third phase, after the Experimental Gloryplume telegraph is shown. Use this as a mobility to tool to get to your assigned position. It will heal the damage incurred from the Experimental Ashplume.
  • Used for Life's Agonies to solo-heal the entire mechanic. After all four eyes/birds/teeth adds have been placed, use Macrocosmos. Please do not use it too much earlier, as it runs the risk of timing out prematurely.
  • Use at the end of the fight for a Scorched Exaltation during enrage sequence.
• Macrocosmos plan if you do not see Life's Agonies:
  • During Darkened Fire phase when all four fires are targetable; This is purely just to do damage to up to five targets at once.
  • Hold all the way until Flames of Asphodelos. Use Macrocosmos at some point that most optimally asissts your cohealer in hopefully healing this phase GCD-less. This typically will land the spell after the Experimental Ashplume, before the Storms of Asphodelos damage goes off.

There are three core damage-focused intakes in the fight. As an Astrologian, Life's Agonies is nullified entirely because of Macrocosmos. This leaves us with Fountains of Fire, and Flames of Asphodelos.

Our own Fountain of Fire can be handled solely with weaving Essential Dignity and Celestial Intersection. However, during progression or for the sake of comfortable and stressless weeklies, I recommend also using Neutral Sect and Horoscope for at least one or two Aspected Helios, preferably one after the first fountain and after the final fountain. This will almost entirely nullify all damage intake you and the party can take.

Flames of Asphodelos has a lot of damage, and GCD-lessly healing it will very severely test you, your cohealer, and your party's ability to mitigate and efficiently heal the mechanics. You should have most of your oGCDs available, and luckily if your party is skipping Life's Agonies you can use Macrocosmos during it to alleviate much of the responsibility. However, it is okay and rather expected to use at least one Aspected Helios.

It should be noted that as a caster, you are much better served separating from the party at the end of Flames of Asphodelos phase for the Searing Breeze AoE baits. Only five party members at a time are targeted for this mechanic, and having to dodge every single one is very difficult to maintain uptime while doing. However, if you were to away from Phoinix and to the side of the 'dark tornado,' you can likely just slidecast only a couple of the baits and get to skip one at some point. Make sure to not bait any Searing Breeze AoEs in the party/melee's path, and to get to the 'dark tornado' back in time for Darkblaze Twister.

The "door boss" of P4S has a lot of damage, and a couple very intense mechanic dump segments, referred to by their primary mechanic cast, "Pinax." There is a rather busy Astrodyne sequence during the first Pinax. I recommend during progression to hold Astrodyne and Divination for after you have handled the first Pinax. This is to reduce your brain memory load when executing the rather high-intensity mechanic, and because the RNG of the mechanic can make a mid-Pinax Divination rather atrocious, possibly missing multiple party members (getting water first). If you do hold Divination for after first Pinax, use a second Card in the 1m sequence to avoid overcapping Draw.

There is a move you will encounter a few times called Decollation. Decollation is a severe amount of damage intake, and must be mitigated. For this reason, every Decollation should be paired with a Collective Unconscious, except the very first one just a few seconds into the fight (you should have prepull Neutral Sect shields on the party for it) and the final three during enrage sequence, since obviously you can only use Collective Unconscious on one of them. You can use Collective Unconscious on the Bloodrake after the second Elegant Evisceration (tankbuster), the one right after first Pinax. You can also use it on the Bloodrake after 'orbs' phase.

Damage in Hesperos is primarily centered around two types of mechanics: the Bloodrake and Aetheric Chlamys phases, and the 'orbs'/Belone Bursts phase. Your usage of Macrocosmos and Neutral Sect are very important to optimally heal this fight, as time is a bit strict on when you can execute these abilities.

Use Earthly Star -4s prepull. Use off CD the rest of the fight. There will be one Earthly Star that is a bit awkward, after first Pinax and before 'orbs.' Unless you know your killtime, however, you should not hold this Earthly Star, as the amount of time you would hold this to be "useful" for healing is way too long and likely to lose a usage of Earthly Star in the fight. Considering that Earthly Star is stronger than Malefic, and that using Earthly Star off CD regardless of this one awkward usage will line up much better for the rest of the fight, this awkward 3m Earthly Star is effectively a DPS one.

The following are recommended Macrocosmos usages in P4S - Hesperos:

• After the first Bloodrake, during the Aetheric Chlamys cast.
• After Belone Bursts, as you are moving to resolve the mechanic. Execute Microcosmos AFTER the Periaktoi cast, not before.
• During enrage Decollation spam.

This is a fight that will almost certainly require GCD healing in most situations. Thus, a fantastic place for Neutral Sect is for 'orbs' phase, and for after second Pinax, during enrage sequence. Be aware that while Pinax is the core mechanic check in Hesperos, it does not have a significant amount of damage during the mechanic itself. Be more concerned with handling the mechanic itself, namely your Surecast timing, with just one happenstance oGCD heal (most likely Earthly Star) to handle the healing

While being the final fight, Batsperos does not have a significant amount of healing you have to do, nor has much difficult by way of executing Astrodyne windows, with a couple exceptions: Akanthal Act 2, Akanthal Act 4, and Akanthal Curtain Call.

Very important to note: do NOT use Neutral Sect prepull in this fight. You will want it for Act 2, and it will not be off CD for this mechanic if it is used prepull.

As a healer, you can handle most of the mechanics in this fight with slidecasting. Be calm and utilize slidecasting liberally.

The major raidwide AoE in this fight that needs mitigation is Ultimate Impulse. As you would expect, pair Collective Unconscious with this AoE attack. You can also use a Collective Unconscious after Act 3 and before Act 4 for a Searing Stream, and another after Finale and before Curtain Call for yet another Searing Stream.

Act 2 will both be your first important section as a healer, and has a rather tricky Astrodyne window. Use Neutral Sect and Aspected Helios, paired with a Horoscope as tethers begin telegraphing the mechanic, and then use Macrocosmos (more below) as you are fanning out with whichever mechanic you have. As an Astrologian, you will be wanting to start preparing for your Astrodyne segment that comes up immediately after the mechanic is finished. We can then utilize both Lightspeed and Swiftcast during this phase to assist our movement. Use Swiftcast before moving after the first Aetheric Nails detonate, and immediately follow with Lightspeed. During Act 2, depending on the execution and gear level of your group and cohealer, you may need to weave an oGCD between the two nail detonations. Move middle and read your Horoscope Helios to do this. After the mechanic, come middle and weave a Collective Unconscious for the Ultimate Impulse and immediately get into your Astrodyne sequence.

Act 4 will also require a lot of healing as dark tethers are detonated. Neutral Sect is once again phenomenal here. If you used Macrocosmos on Act 2, it will NOT be up for Act 4.

Curtain Call will be your big healer check of the tier. There is a lot of damage intake in a short period of time, and the more of the mechanic you see, the more your resources will be stretched thin. Especially for those that are not fully experienced with this fight yet or the game in general, be prepared to use a lot of Aspected Helios and even Helios. If you see just one of the two Curtain Call segments, you can use your entire healing kit (you will have everything up) on the first segment obvious. Lead with Macrocosmos and then use the rest of your kit as you can. If you see the entire mechanic all the way until enrage, you will best be served splitting your cooldowns. Do NOT split one healer to primarily handle one segment and the other to do the second. Use Macrocosmos on one, and Neutral Sect on the other, as these are our two strongest healing cooldowns, especially for this mechanic. Remember you will have to move out for a dark bait at some point. Try to do it quickly and get back middle for AoE dodges and healing. You can do your movement here with primarily slidecasting. Take a breather, and execute cleanly

As a recap...

• Use Earthly Star -4s prepull.
• Do NOT use Neutral Sect prepull.
• Earthly Star will be used off cooldown.

Recommended Macrocosmos timings:

• Act 2, right as you are fanning out for your first mechanic. Delay this as much as possible without griefing your party. Let it automatically resolve by itself, as the timing is quite tight to heal the mechanic. If this proves too hard for you, make Microcosmos your oGCD usage between Nails if you need it. If your party does not need an extra heal between Nails, do your best to learn the timing.
• During Curtain Call.

And recommended Neutral Sect usages:

• Act 2, as Nail tethers are being set.
• Act 4, as party begins detonating Dark tethers.
• During Curtain Call.