Trial By Earth  

Summary

Ring the Tuning Fork of Earth upon the protocystal in the Quicksand Caves. A path will open to the trial that awaits.

Walkthrough

To obtain the Earth Avatar Titan, first speak to Juroro in Port Bastok. He is located at I-8 near the drawbridge. If you have sufficient fame, he will give you an item: Tuning Fork of Earth.

To use this, you need to travel to Quicksand Caves and find the Cloister of Tremors. To do so, go to Eastern Altepa Desert and enter (J-7). People often XP here in the mid-40s and you may find this place familiar. Only Sneak will be needed for this entire section, and the distance is fairly short. Once you reach the first room, you want to drop down at the east end of the south wall. Don't drop at the west end, you'll be in the wrong place. Head down that passage until you come to a room, take the passage due west out of that room. You'll find another room where you can drop at the south end this time, drop on the west side, not the east. Run up that passageway and you will come to the Cloister of Tremors. There is a fork inside the Cloister, take the right path to get to the Earth Protocrystal, the left path will take you back to Eastern Altepa Desert in a one-way exit.

Try to fight Titan on Windsday and do not fight him on Earthday. Keep up Barstonra at all times, if you can.

Once you defeat him, you will acquire the Key Item: Earth Whisper. Return it to Juroro for your reward, or hold onto it. If you have all six whispers simultaneously, you can give them to Leepe-Hoppe in Windurst Waters to gain the Moon Bauble' which is basically the Tuning Fork of the Moon, granting you the ability to fight Fenrir. If you are collecting items for the Evoker's Ring, you will want the Desert Light.

Battle Notes

First, a few notes about Avatar in general fights. This is not the Trial Size quest, which is the solo fight, capped at level 20 (refer to Trial Size Trial by XXX for those quests). Everyone who is involved in the fight must have a tuning fork of the correct protocrystal. There is no cap on this battle, although there is a 30-minute time limit (not that it ever seems to be important).

General level guidelines: 60+ for melee and 55+ for mages. You'll want a Black Mage for certain and a solid tank, but the rest is relatively flexible. A well-balanced party is critical, though. You'll likely want at least 2 of the following 3: Red Mage, White Mage and Bard. You will want one of the melee or the Bard to be able to cast Bar-a spells. Having the WHM or BLM try to cast them will be problematic. Our strategy for this was to have the RDM sub WHM and melee using the appropriate En-spell for easy Bar-a casting. Additionally, if you can buy an Enhancing Torque (usually much cheaper than corresponding Torques), that will add 2-3 points of resistance to Bar-spells. Additionally Mal-rings (from the ghost NMs in Gusgen Mines) can be helpful for the fight. You can buff up before entering the protocrystal, so feel free to do so and rest up while still outside.

Battle strategy for all six fights is pretty much the same. The battlefield layout for all six fights is exactly the same, although the coloration scheme for the battlefield will be different. The battlefield is shaped like a long path up the side of hill, with a switchback about halfway to the top. This topographical feature allows the mages to stand above the fight (and out of easy reach of the avatar) while still being able to cast spells upon the combatants. This allows for the tank(s) to have extra time to pull hate back should the mages draw it. It is ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL to keep the correct Bar-spell up at all times. Not doing this will result in multiple deaths when the Avatar's 2-hour comes (at about halfway), and will likely produce a loss. Each avatar is also only easily susceptible to debuffs of the element they are weak to (i.e. Shiva can be Paralyzed). Whether they are susceptible to other enfeebles of very high level is not confirmed.

It is strongly recommended to fight each avatar on the day it is weak to (i.e. Shiva on Firesday) and even more strongly recommended NOT to fight the avatar on its day (i.e. Shiva on Iceday). Spells of each element are much stronger on their specific day of the week.

Each quest is repeatable, but only once per real life day. Once you have returned to the quest giver and gotten your reward, you have to wait 24 hours (some say midnight Japanese time) in order to get the quest again. At that point, you can get a new tuning fork. Each time you complete the quest, you can choose ONE reward from the list, which varies from avatar to avatar.

In order to get the Fenrir quest (The Moonlit Path), you have to have whispers (key items) from all six elemental avatars. This means that you can't turn them in for reward until you have all six, at which point you can give them to the Fenrir quest giver (Leepe-Hoppe in Windurst Waters). So, in order to be able to get Fenrir and all six avatars, you'll need to fight each of them at least twice. Additionally, if you are a Summoner, the Evoker's Ring is only obtainable through the Mama Mia quest in Norg, which would mean you would have to fight them each a third time.

If you can't get any of these quests, the problem is likely fame. Each quest giver is a taru who stands next to a non-taru warrior. If you don't have sufficient fame, the taru will just complain about being hurt a lot while his companion will discuss perseverance and not giving up. If you have sufficient fame, the Tarutaru will give you the fork. The non-taru will give you a Trial Size Tuning Fork if you have met the requirements.