Abyssos is the newest Pandaemonium wing introduced in 6.2, with an amazing story and even better raid mechanics. In this quick & easy guide, you’ll learn how to beat the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eight circle bosses!
Proto-Carbuncle
Proto-Carbuncle is the Fifth Circle boss, so it’s the first one you’ll encounter. The fight itself has two stages, and the main difference is that the Ruby Glow mechanic starts being more complex in the second one, but more on that later.
First, you’ll see the boss casting Searing Ray, when the boss will go to one corner of the arena and face towards the middle of the room, cleaving the entire arena in that direction. In order to avoid damage, make sure to stand behind the boss. Then, there’s Topaz Stones, when the boss summons four crystals around the arena in random locations. They will eventually explode in small circle AoEs, so move out of the way when you see them. Ruby Glow is important to understand, and that’s when the boss divides the arena into two, and later four, separate areas. The boss’ attacks actually bounce off these walls. The main goal with this mechanic is determining where attacks will hit, depending on how the room is divided. For example, if the boss is casting Searing Ray, this means the safe spot is the cell without the boss because the cleave bounces back behind the boss as well, leaving the area in front of him safe. Crunch is your ordinary tankbuster, so use your cooldowns if you are one. Sonic Howl is a party-wide AoE and something for healers to work through. Acidic Slaver is another AoE that affects everyone, but it’ll hit the party with Down For the Count debuff and transition to phase number two.
In phase two, apart from the Ruby Glow getting harder, poison will also be added to some of the abilities. Toxic Crunch is the new tank buster that, apart from hitting the tank, also applies Poison debuff. Venom Squall is basically the boss creating puddle AoEs under random party members, while also marking others with circle AoEs. To go through this, avoid the puddles and spread out to avoid stacking the AoE damage from Venom Rain. Topaz Stones attack also changes a bit in this phase, so two kinds of stones are created. The yellow stones just explode in a small circle AoE, while the green stones leave puddles of poison that expand from where they first appear. You always want to be near the yellow stones, as they’ll explode early on, while the green puddles will grow larger and you don’t wanna be there when it happens. Starving Stampede will start with the message, “The hungry Proto-Carbuncle begins its hunt!” So what will happen is large red teeth spawning in the arena, along with some blue arrow markers. The red teeth will create a path from the boss and through the blue arrows. You need to remember the order the red teeth symbol travels, as the boss will pounce on each spot in the order that you got to see, hitting with a really large circle AoE. If you get hit, you’ll receive a ton of damage, as well as the debuff Down for the Count, so make sure to stay out of the teeth’s way. In Devour, the boss will eat anyone with Down for the Count debuff and spit them out into one corner. This does a ton of damage, and pretty much means you’re dead, so make sure to respect the mechanics that can debuff you and don’t find yourself in that position. So after Devour, yellow stones will blow up the entire cell they’re in during Ruby Glow. If every cell has a stone, they’ll explode in a random order, which means you have to wait for the first one to explode and enter its cell to avoid damage from the rest. Green stones work in the same way, basically limiting the available space you have as their green puddle products will keep expanding. If you can get through all of this, you’ve beaten the Fifth Circle boss and may proceed to the next one!
Hegemone
Hegemone is the boss of the Sixth Circle of Abyssos. This one is quite interesting, as the key to fighting the boss is the focus of her introduction cutscene. The square arena is divided into sixteen smaller squares, arranged four by four. Hegemone’s primary attacks will have a lot to do with this space, so pay attention. This encounter also has two stages, so let’s go.
Aetheric Polyominoid is one of those attacks that’s tricky to explain, but you’ll know it when you see it. This attack summons aetherial nexuses at the corners between each section, which are pretty much glowing spears that pulse orange energy thingies into a random number of sections around them. After a while, the marked areas will explode, hitting anyone inside them, so make sure to not linger around waiting for the damage. While the boss is casting Choros Ixou, Hegemone will charge up black and red orbs in opposite directions, either frontal and back, or both of her sides. When the cast finishes, she’ll fire cone AoEs in one of those two directions. You want to be in front or behind her to avoid this, but in order to do that, you have to be looking at what she’s doing and where she’s pointing the attack. Hemitheos’s Dark IV is nothing but a light, raid-wide AoE for the healers to heal through. Transmission is a fun one, when Hegemone targets four members of the raid with the Glossomorph parasite, which is a ten-second debuff. After a short pause, she will do the same with everyone else. When the debuff reaches five seconds remaining, you’ll see the countdown as an icon over your head. When it finishes, you’ll go Out of Control and fire a long cone AoE in the direction you’re facing, so you want to be facing away from the raid when it’s time to fire it off. Synergy is a tank buster that targets both tanks at the same time, along with the Bleeding debuff, so both should use mitigation for this one. Strophe Ixou is quite similar to Choros Ixou. Hegemone fires cone AoEs in opposite directions, but this time, they’re in front and behind her. The difference is that there’s a directional cycle marker as well that will let you know which way the damage will be rotating. After the first cast, she’ll rotate slightly and repeat the attack multiple times, so just run around her to stay in the safe area, preferably closer to the middle of the room. Finally, Dark Ashes are circle AoEs that everyone gets, so make sure to spread to avoid piling up the damage.
Phase two will start around 50%, when Hegemone says “You cannot measure against a keyward!” and cast Aetherial Exchange. You’ll need to be aware of Polyominoid Sigma, which is similar to Aetheric Polyominoid, with the boss placing aetherial nexuses around the arena. The difference is that these nexuses will now have blue and yellow arrows traveling between them. These arrows let you know which nexuses will switch prior to exploding. When the nexuses switch, the directions of the sections remain the same, so you need to look at the AoE pattern on the switched nexus to figure out where the safe spot is. What’s weird about phase two is the combination of Polyominoid Sigma and Strophe Ixou. If these attacks happen together, then at the end of the last cast, the nexuses will switch as they were marked and then rotate once counter-clockwise. If you don’t know this is coming, you’re probably going to wipe here, but that’s okay, and now you know, so hopefully you’ll be fine and will beat the boss easily as there’s nothing more to worry about.
Agdistis
Agdistis is the Seventh Circle encounter and, in my opinion, the most fun one of the entire Abyssos. The boss is unmoving and has a massive hitbox, so you’ll be the one moving around and trying to hit the boss while at it.
In Phase one, you’re mostly learning the mechanics, the first one being Bough of Attis. So basically, there are two wildly different versions of this attack. Agdistis will raise her arms either at her side, or looming over the arena. If the arms are raised at the side, it will slam down on the arena in two massive circle AoEs, popularly known as the booba attack, then push with one arm as indicated by the arrow markers. If you wish to not get yeeted, I suggest you move out of the arrows’ way. The Far version of this attack is when the boss’ arms are over the arena, and one massive circle AoE will appear on the far end away from the boss. There is no pushback on this version, so you just need to go towards the boss and find a safe spot that isn’t caught by impact. In Hemitheos’s Holy, circle AoE markers will appear over each member of the party, so just spread to avoid taking damage. This is followed by a wide donut AoE, with only the small center being safe, where you need to make sure you find yourself if you choose to live. When Immortal’s Obol happens, it means we’re switching from phase one to phase two, and the arena changes to three smaller round platforms connected by bridges. The platforms appear before the bridges, so you need to be within one of them in order to not fall through. This will happen along with a proximity AoE on the center of the platform, so move as far away as you can from the center of the room while still being within the new platforms in order to take less damage.
In Phase two, you’ll see a lot of mechanics repeating, but this time, you need to navigate between the smaller platforms to avoid damage and stay alive. Hemitheos’s Aero II is a dual tankbuster on each tank, which they need to use a cooldown to mitigate. The AoE is quite large, so the tanks need to navigate this well and go as far away from everyone as possible in order to not wipe the raid with it. Spark of Life is a raid-wide AoE that hits like a truck, so it’s mandatory to heal through it ASAP. During Forbidden Fruit, there’s also two possible versions of this attack. Agdistis will drop fruit in the center of each platform, but the fruit can hatch into either behemoths or birds, and if they belong to other species, you’ll just have to excuse me. The behemoth-like creatures, which hatch from eggs with circles on them, do a point-blank AoE that covers the entire circular platform, so stand on the bridges to be safe. The bird-like creatures, which hatch from ridged eggs, do a straight line AoE down the bridges, in the direction pointed by their arrow marker. To avoid this, stand to the side of the bird, while also not standing in the path of another bird’s attack. There’s another ability that doesn’t really have a name – at least not to the knowledge I gathered from playing, and please correct me if I’m wrong, but I’ll describe it to you as well as I can. It normally follows Forbidden Fruit, and during it, paired circle AoEs start on the outside edge of each circular platform, and travel down each bridge with subsequent hits. Your job is to figure out where the damage is going and to stay out of the green circular areas that move. Lastly, there’s Hemitheos’s Glare III. A large donut AoE will cover all of the platforms, with the safe space being the center of the arena, which is a hole at first. You need to wait for the arena to spawn back under the hole and go to the safe spot in the center, and that’s when you go back to phase one.
When you rotate back to phase one, you’ll also see the Forbidden Fruit, with the fruit being anywhere on the larger platform, but it all works the same. The new addition is the Big Burst, which is multiple soak markers that at least one raid member needs to stand inside of. What’s tricky is that these are usually paired with the behemoths from the Forbidden Fruit, so you gotta wait for the point-blank AoE to resolve and then move into the soak marker.
This encounter will transition back-and-forth between phase one and two. If you get through this, you’ve beat the boss and you can move on to the Eighth Circle.
Hephaistos
Hephaistos is the boss of the Eighth Circle of Abyssos, and honestly, a bit easier than the other Abyssos fights in my opinion.
This boss also has two stages, and in the first one, you’ll have to deal with Genesis of Flame. This is a raid-wide AoE that takes more than half of a non-tank’s health bar, so if you’re a healer, be ready for it. Apart from that, we’ve got Sunforge. This attack also comes in two versions, but Hephaistos will move to the center of the room for both of them. If you see the burning dragon circling around him, he will attack with a line AoE through the center of the arena, so you need to move to either side to avoid damage. If you see the phoenix behind him, then the line AoEs will be on both sides of the arena, with the center as the safe spot. With Flameviper, the boss targets the main tank with a line AoE. If you happen to get the marker, move away from the rest of the raid, and know that you’ll also receive a Bleed defuff.
Reforged Reflection is Hephaistos’ main mechanic, where he changes forms to mirror previous Pandaemonium bosses, either Hippokampos or Hegemone, and this marks his second stage. The order might not be the way I’m presenting it here, be aware of it if you’re watching while playing.
Hippokampos Form
If you happen to see Hippokampos from the Second Circle, the first thing to consider is Blazing Footfalls. Hephaistos will move to one edge of the arena, and while he’s casting, he’ll present you with a series of knockback markers that appear in order. You need to remember the order of the shown markers and move towards those locations accordingly, to avoid being knocked back into the damage zone. Rearing Rampage is a raid-wide AoE dealing moderate damage, so just heal through it and you’re good to go. Fourfold Fires come after the boss’ first Reforged Reflection form. Hephaistos will mark the four corners of the arena with proximity markers, so you need to stack in the center to minimize the incoming damage. The markers will turn into four fire puddles and Hephaistos will tether to two of them with Cthonic Vent. So two of these fire puddles will activate, and that’s indicated by a tether from the boss and the lava-activated puddles. Eventually, they’ll explode in large circle AoEs, so you need to identify them and stay away from them. Not long after that, fire dragons will leap from the explosions to two different puddles, activating them and repeating the attack. All you have to do is pay attention to where the dragons jump in and stay away from both of them.
Hegemone Form
Another form the boss takes is the Hegemone Form. The first thing to consider is Into the Shadows, when Hephaistos will move to the center of the room. He’ll summon two gaze markers that roam around the arena, and when they stop moving, Gorgons will appear and cast Petrifaction. To avoid getting petrified, make sure to face away from both of the Gorgons and then attack them straight away as they will start casting Gorgoneion. I’ll be honest, I didn’t see what happens if the cast goes through, but I can’t imagine it’s a raid buff, so make sure to kill them. There’s also Gorgospit, and that’s when the boss will target a random raid member with a long and wide line AoE. You need to avoid this, or you’ll get poisoned. Ektothermos is a raid-wide AoE that hits super hard, so if you’re a healer, stay sharp and deal with it ASAP.
Volcanic Torches will happen after the second Reforged Reflection. You’ll see some blue flames that will trace around certain areas of the arena. They will eventually separate two or three rectangular columns, and you need to absolutely stay away from the marked area. Hemitheos’ Flare is a circle AoE marker that four party members will be targeted with, so if you are one of them, stay away from everyone else. Apart from the boss switching from one form into another and mix-matching some mechanics later on, that’s all there is to the fight.
If you’re more of a visual person, and you don’t mind getting easy wins in-game, you can check out all of this in my video – and subscribe for more awesome FFXIV stuff!
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