i just beat ffII after playing it on and off across multiple console systems for more than a decade not more than 6 months ago.  my leet DPS doesn't translate over to console games too well.

on to real business.

here are a few problems and possible solutions i've seen on our last few attempts:

1) cats are really distracting.  =(  it seems as the whole event is fairly chaotic and designed to distract you from doing full DPS.  when she appears after spawning, it seems like the whole raid is going &quot;oh shit, when are the cats coming?&quot; rather than focusing DPS on the boss.  when the gong goes off, and the tank gets aggro, let fly.  ignore the one or two cats that trickle through until she disappears.

2) this brings me to my next point.  it seems as though our mages, who are a tremendous source of DPS, blow their loads early in the fight.  our DPS drops sharply after she comes back from stealth.  this could be for two reasons.  a) mages still busy burning down loose cats instead of focusing DPS back on to the boss or b) they just drained half their mana pool from spamming arcane explosion and other AOE spellness and now they're conserving what they have left for the next wave of cats.  now the possible solutions:  dread mentions frost nova rotation.  this can work, but i'm in favor of low mana cost aoe roation.  kitties can't break frost nova when they're laying on the floor.  now i need a few magely types for some assistance in calculations.  cats have roughly 2800hps.  i don't know what arcane explosion does for damage.  but say for the sake of arguement that arcane explosion does 700 to all mobs in a cast radius.  that means it would take 1 mage casting arcane explosion 4 times.  or... 4 mages casting arcane explosion once.  4 mages casting once, each a second apart will a) conserve mana for mages since there's not going to be anyone spamming AOE until the boss reappears and b) will help conserve mana for those healers unfortunate enough to be tasked with healing the mages which are mostly likely pulling all the aggro.  if you pull aggro from cats with your one cast of aoe, you will most likely not be hit for more than a second.  once cat population is beaten down to a manageable population, we can easily resume pwning the boss.  if they get out of control again, the lead mage in the rotation can begin the process again when the boss vanishes.

3) but what about the mark!?  well, if cats are low in numbers from slaughtering them en masse, we should be fine.  otherwise, if someone gets marked and there are too many, they have seconds to live.  being the unfortunate recipient of the mark twice last night, i'm speaking from experience.  i don't about any of the other marked players, i got no heals.    i'm not pointing fingers and i don't care that i died.  shit happens.  however, when someone is marked they should be pulling all the aggro from cats in the area, leaving most healers fairly free to heal.  when a mark is announced and there are cats beating on that person, every healer in the raid should be throwing a medium heal at that person.  if the player's hps jump up back to full very quickly, keep an eye on that player for a few seconds more without casting a heal.  druids and shammies should continue to heal as necessary.  priests should resume waiting to heal the tank for when the boss respawns.  a few seconds after the marked player starts receiving heals, mages should already be starting their aoe/nova rotation to clear adds.

4) step 4, profit!

sorry for all the runons and poor grammar.  i'm making little sense this late at night.  feel free to agree with, disagree with, or flame me.  ;)  we need more input on what people are seeing so we can come up with a strat to down this bitch.

and remember folks, remember to spay and neuter your panthers.

ohnoez, out.