Did They Overshoot GEO Nerf By That Much?

I recently did sortie A+E, duoing with a GEO and 4 trusts to see how much of a difference it makes compared to solo with 5 trusts. There obviously was some unoptimal play happening in regards to coordination and order of objectives since it was the first time we teamed up but I estimate it made us lose maybe 5 minutes max, more likely less than ~3.

We had 1 healer trust die during E caused by weird pathing of the boss so I don't know if and how much this caused the GEOs attention shifting from buffing/debuffing to support curing/poison removal.
I think we agreed on malaise and accumen. GEO had Idris, according to him bubbles stayed up around 70% of the E boss fight and he also used Bolster at some point during E boss, so he didn't hold back.

The GEO replaced star sybil in my usual solo trust setup.

The thing is our clear time on E was roughly the same, maybe even a minute or two slower than my average when I go solo with trusts, around 5+ minutes slower than my personal best.


I always thought magic damage in sortie is one of the few content left where GEO can shine. I figured even with the minor screw ups we'd still easily beat my solo best time, did I expect too much?

No they made it too OP in the first place which was their mistake. Never should have been so much def down so it could remain at normal values for new content.

Umm GEO is still amazing, I think you are experiencing a skill issue.

Geo debuffs are at -50% potency, which sounds like a lot until you realize how bonkers OP Frailty and Malaise are, not to mention with Bog/EA giving you a +75% potency buff.

Afaik GEO initially only was that strong cause of a bug/mistake in the calculation which got found and fixed like ~2 years(?) after it's release or the implementation if Idris or something along those lines. The % based nerf on new content came on top of that bug fix.

They apparently are about to buff trusts:

Which I appreciate a lot cause it's long overdue.


But it raises the question - why should someone take a pickup GEO to sortie when even a Idris GEO with Bolster has trouble competing with star sybil - pre trust buffs?
It's not going to emphasis group play, which they also try to work on according to the picture above, if they leave it that way.

The values used in Sortie are the values they always should have been really. People got used to OP and think sortie values are a nerf, but they are what they should be.

This just isn't correct, with a 50% nerf idris malaise is -22.5 MDB, which gives you 1.0/.775 = 29% extra magic damage with no other source of MDB- on neutral targets. Bolster is -45, which is +81.8%. I cannot personally verify from experience that Dhartok is 100MDB, but that's what bg-wiki claims.

Trust is 19 MAB, which is sub-5% on any job with a decent MAB build. Don't even need acumen for the GEO to thoroughly trounce it. I can't comment on why your specific run was shorter or what went wrong; I wasn't there. However, at a baseline, the job is still quite strong for magic based setups even against content where geomancy is nerfed.

Maybe you were relying on the 19 m.acc from Star Sibyl and should have had the GEO use focus instead? Seems unlikely; probably some user error involved past that. If you honestly believe malaise was doing nothing or don't trust the math, idris focus+acumen is 45 MAB and 100 m.acc compared to 19 of each from star sibyl (before JA).

Star sybil's buff is obviously weaker than a real GEOs but her buff is active 100% of the time while a real GEO constantly will have to recast geo- bubbles due to position switching cause of miasmas.
I don't know but there is probably also the issue of a second body to cure/remove poison stacks when they stand in range for indi- to take effect?
Either way you'll always have some bubble down time with a real GEO and sub optimal play with pickups is simply a given.

Maybe he had to stay in backline cause of trusts not taking care of his poison stacks and I didn't get benefit of indi- at all. However, according to your numbers the real GEO should still have easily won with geo- buble alone so something doesn't add up.


I'm worried that if I had the same run with a regular GEO (no Idris or neck) we would have timed out and lost like 80% of galli for that run. Had around 4-5 minutes left after Dhartok.

Use geo buffs if movement is an issue.

Isn't GEO just afk stand in the bubble? Also there is no way a trust can match an Idris Geo. Come on now.

Cause the GEO has 2 potentially 3 buff/debuff bubbles, can nuke/MB, or can alternatively heal effectively. Though YMMV on pug GEOs but they can do a fair bit more than just lay down 1 bubble and afk

The only thing SS has going for her is that she cannot be hurt so she's a freebie buff. That's still laughably little compared to an actual dunna GEO, much less an idris one

Also; you can determine where the miasma's go if you wanna bother moving around, can also widened compass to keep it way out of the aoe potentially, though again, youll need to bother positioning the miasma pools to some degree

Of course it isn't, that's also not the point of this thread. However, apparently what ever a Idris GEO brings to the table doesn't always outweight the performance loss that comes with beeing distracted by having to communicate and coordinate with a real player.

Umm no to the first, it wasn't a bug it was by design, they just didn't realize how short sighted that design was. Originally Vex / Attunement / Languor / Focus were percentage modifications and not static values. Once added with Idris those percentages were removing hundreds of MEVA / MACC from the monster and giving us hundreds of MEVA / MACC allowing us to consistently resist the status effects of monsters TP moves and then later to overcome the insane stats of T4 HELMs. SE changed them from percentage to static values while also lowering the HELM's stats and putting a cap on how much evasion AGI gave monsters. This has absolutely nothing to do with what you are doing now.

Second is that you are either experiencing a skill issue and refusing to acknowledge that, or you are trolling the community and laughing with your friends about it. If it's the first, take the crayon out your mouth and learn to maneuver through the battlefield and have your GEO sets checked as your likely not even changing to the correct gear. I once knew an Idris GEO that went a whole year with a malfunctioning lua that never equipped their Idris. I've been able to easily due E boss with a Dunna GEO friend as RDM/NIN + GEO/NIN using Seraph Blade / Seraph Strike and just moving as needed. It's a super easy boss compared to the rest.

Considering that Idris GEO at base potency gives you +45 MAB and SS gives you +19 MAB and MACC you should be much quicker with an actual GEO. That is unless you need the 19 MACC that SS gives.

First of your not my dad and can't tell me what to do, I love me my cryons so let me chew in peace ok?

Second there is a miss understanding. I wasn't on GEO, the random pick up was. I have no control over how a random pick up organizes his gearswapping. I was mostly busy focusing on my own gameplay (organizing trusts, spellsets, tanking and DDing).
The only thing I know for sure is that he in fact had a Idris, the rest (70% bubble up time, Bolster used) is just rephrased info from the GEO after the run.

As far as GEO debuff nerf goes, they didnt overshoot it, they just implemented it too late to do it in a reasonable fashion. GEO +potency as it is should have capped at dunna's level imo, at least in regards to debuffs, and i think even that would still be too potent depending on who you ask.

Least that way we wouldnt have to wonder how much of a potency nerf is in place for every new content or updated ambu, much like we'll have to do for limbus(though i assume itll be mostly left alone for the trash mobs)

The geo nerf is only to debuffs though. Theres no nerf to buff potency.

Instead of doing acumen and malaise, do acumen and focus or int if you think its too harsh and didnt see the expected results.

But if you think 50% is harsh, remember in Sheol C and Gaol its 95% after a certain veng.

If it was a random person and they seemed weaker then a trust, I believe that is sufficient to highlight the problem area.

To summarize the answer to your question of


No they didn't and none of those original nerfs have anything to do with what you are doing now. At no point in time did they nerf Acumen, Malaise, Frailty, or Fury, those have the exact same potency now as they did on day 1.

True, I don't think focus is necessary. Does math favor Geo-INT over GEO-Malaise in sortie?

I know and IMHO 95% potency nerf is condensed retardation in it's purest form.

i doubt the int boost beats a seperate -22.5 mdef down, especially if its stacked with other stuff though idk how mdef down lands on dhartok

GEO could also be using impact, or doing indi-int as well, or entrust it and run indi-acumen, etc etc

And now someones gonna read this and wonder why their Malaise and Frailty feel weak in certain events.

Its not wrong in-itself, but its a flawed statement because geo debuffs are absolutely nerfed in Sheol B, C, Sortie and Gaol after a certain veng.

Its like saying "They never nerfed savage blade" when talking about content with a WS wall. Sure it applies to every WS, but we all know why the WS wall was implemented.

Depends, its situational on the players gear. What good is Malaise if you're constantly getting resisted on your nukes?

With S-tier gear, highly unlikely. But considering what OP is saying and the math not mathing, I dont think theyre in S-tier category and theres a strong suggestion they are suffering from macc deficiency.

I guess they could, not sure if macc would be a issue with the old cloak though. I was already applying Searing Tempest for the -INT down so it wouldn't have added that much compared to the MP strain it causes on a GEO.

I've used the same lite resistant set as I do when I go solo. Didn't notice many resists either.

sortie bosses have some nasty elemental resistances so i wouldnt entirely rule out possibly having some with dhartok depending on if this was blu rotating nukes for example.

As for impact, the debuff itself cant resist, just the duration and dhartoks dark evasion is pretty high iirc(frazzle for example is usually a pain to land on RDM consistently)

Is this one of them self report threads?

Regarding Impact duration on Dhartok, I had a vague recollection that it didn't last long so we didn't bother. I checked a few logs and.. yeah.
I didn't check every sample in my logs, but.. 11~12 seconds in the 4 I did check. Dhartok's dark resist rank is just too high(I checked BGwiki after digging through my logs, and it does actually have a value listed for it. 5% for dark, which is the most resistant tier possible.)

Technically, you could still use it. It'd last for.. basically 1 MB window if timed right. But landing it that close to the SC would also cost the GEO a nuke(Assuming a long MB window from closing with helix.) Also since Searing is Burn, and impact is INT down, you could stack them. But impact would be really awkward to use and reapply.

I don't think Star Sibyl is gunna pull out an Idris and do 20~30k Judgments or 50-60k nukes in a magic setup.

Please keep in mind we were duoing, no super buff situation. Afaik Dhartok has pretty high ACC requirements, somewhere around 1600-1650.
I think even a decked out GEO would struggle to hit that much ACC without sacrificing bubbles for more ACC, most pick up GEOs certainly will.
Not to mention that I'm not sure I'd want a second body within dhartoks range as I'm not sure trusts can keep up with debuff removal and curing.


Anyway, even though I doubt most statements come from personal experience (duoing E on the same setup) consensus seems to be that something went wrong which lead to disappointing results, fair enough. Maybe I should give it a second try some day.


How much of a time improvement is realistic to expect with a pick up GEO duoing over soloing?

We're u getting nuke walled by weaker nukes? I've gone in with a geo b4 and been so busy I didn't notice till tabula was over that they were nuking walling me occasionaly. Just always was happening when I wasn't looking at the log. Asked them to stop nuking and fight went much better.

Not sure but think he didn't nuke much at all, assume was busy replacing bubbles and backup curing when a trust died.
I went BLU though, not SCH so nuke wall isn't much of a issue since they can only MB like once every 1:40-2 minutes and majority of damage is just cycling BLU spells without MB.

Makes me wonder if maybe a SCH would make a better duo partner since we'd not get in each others way?

Sch - geo would work best IMO.

Sch makes SCs, both nuke. Will still need to kite so will need someone to land gravity.