GamerEscape

The Twinning is one of two level 80 dungeons related to, but not directly part of, the Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Main Scenario Quest (on release). It’s available by finishing the quest Shadowbringers and unlocked by the quest By the Time You Hear This. It can be completed via the duty finder.

For the sake of your fellow players, please remember that this is new content (at the time of this publication). Many factors may contribute to a player’s efficiency, or lack there of, in running this dungeon, including gear that might be lacking, or job structures that might be new or different. Never be afraid to take a dungeon at your own pace, but for the purposes of this guide, we’re going to be speaking terms of multiple group pulls.

Encounter 1

2 Enforcement Droid 209s, 2 Search Drones, & 1 Zaghnal

Up what should be a very familiar set of stairs, wait a small pack of enemies guarding the way into a door we’ve never been able to pass before. Attacks of note:

• Auto-cannons – Linear AoE lasers from the Search Drones.
• Heave – Wide conal from the Zaghnal.

As you approach the doors to the inner chambers of the Crystal Tower, they open for you. To your right is one of our favorite modes of transportation: the jump pad.

Encounter 2

1 Servomechanical Minotaur, & 4 Enforcement Droid 209s

While the Droids bash away with normal swings, the Minotaur rehashes some of its predecessors’ moves:

• 32-tonze Swipe – A conal.
• 128-tonze Swing – A full, 180° swing around the mob with no ground indicator. Stunnable.

Encounters 3 & 4

2 Zaghnal, 3 Clockwork Ark Knights, & 1 Surplus Kaliya

This group’s only annoyances come from the baby version of Turn 11’s boss, Kaliya:

• Main Head – Tank buster.
• Nerve Gas – A huge conal attack that the Surplus Kaliya will turn toward a random play and unleash after a brief charge. Getting caught by the gas does high damage.

Alpha Zaghnal

Note the 8 trapped Zaghnal around the edge of the arena. Hitting them with AoEs will free them!

• Augurium – Tank buster.
• Beastly Roar – Arena-wide, unavoidable AoE.
• Fornlorn Impact* – Without a cast bar of any kind, the Alpha Zaghnal will stand up on its hind legs and begin placing sword icons of 1 to 4 swords on each player. As long as your party has two players north and two players south, however, the order in which these are placed isn’t terribly important. The linear strike, Fornlorn Impact, from the boss to each player is fairly thin, so just stay toward the center line enough to avoid hitting the outside Zaghnal cages, but far enough away from your party members to avoid hitting them, and far enough from the boss to avoid being clipped.
• Beastly Roar
• Pounce Errant – Without a cast, the boss will start placing large, yellow/green AoE circles that travel with them on each player. Space these out so as not to overlap with your party members, but also avoid touching the outside cages.
• Augurium
• Charge Eradicated (x2) – A stack marker that drops a sizable puddle of blue fire. Staying in or stepping back into the fire applies afairly heavy burn debuff that is only active when in the fire. Place these side-by-side on one of the open sides of the arena to leave the maximum amount of easily accessible space clear.
• *Repeats from Forlorn Impact.

Encounters 5, 6, & 7

3 Flanborg, 1 Vitalized Iksalion, 1 Vitalized Reptoid, & 2 Vitalized Shabti

The following are the mechanics of note:

• Wind Spout – A circular AoE from the Iksalion.
• Berserk – A stunnable physical damage up buff that the Reptoid casts on itself. Reptoid’s buffed attacks hurt, so make real efforts to kill this mob first and stun the buff.
• Sideswipe – A small conal AoE from the Reptoid.

After this group is dead, the door opens to the next path.

Encounters 8, 9, & 10

4 Flanborg, 1 Vitalized Iksalion, 2 Vitalized Reptoid, & 1 Vitalized Shabti

Since this pack has two Reptoids, remember to keep an eye on both to stun that Berserk. Once dead, yet another door opens to let you further into the heart of the Crystal Tower.

Mithridates

This fight involves a moderate amount of dodging and standing in tiny safe areas.

• Thunder Beam – Tank buster.
• Electric Discharge – A near-instant cast that places several balls of lightning around the room in a random pattern (though on a particular grid).
• Laserblade – The boss will return to the middle of the room and place diagonally crossing linear AoEs across the entirety of the arena. These leave 4 little diamonds of safety in the middle and a few other gaps of safe space around the edges.
• Thunder Beam
• Allagan Thunder – Each player will get a circular, lightning AoE that moves with them.
• Electric Discharge*
• Laserblade – While Electric Discharge is still up, Laserblade will cover the arena floor, so the party must find their tiny slots of safety away from the lightning balls that have yet to go off. Additionally, Allagan Thunder will return on 2 players, without a warning cast, so while finding a safe spot to stand, you have to avoid other people with Allagan Thunder. If you don’t have an Allagan Thunder and are afraid to get caught in Laserblade, you can stack with another player that has Allagan Thunder without too much issue.
• Thunder Beam
• *Repeats from Electric Discharge until death.

Encounters 11, 12, & 13

3 Ghrah Maximizations (bird form), 2 Ghrah Maximizations (human form), & 1 Ghrah Maximization (spider form)

Though they share the same name, only the humanoid ones do anything note-worthy:

• Luminous Laceration – Tank buster.
• Vorpal Blade – A wide, conal AoE from the Human Grah.

Upon defeat, the door ahead opens to the final stretch.

Encounters 14 & 15

3 Mark CXLIV Thermocoil Boilbuster, & 3 Flanborg

You may wish to split these two packs up based solely on the how annoying have overlapped donut AoEs can get. If you’re any good at the art of the dodge, though, you should be fine.

• Thrown Flames – A wide, donut AoE centered on the Mark CXLIV Thermocoil Boilbuster mobs.

The Tycoon

Finally, in the central chamber (probably?) of the Crystal Tower, you find an oddly familiar foe. If you’re interested in the images around the room, take a look (or a screenshot) before you begin the fight. They’ll disappear afterward.

• Magitek Crossray – Four lasers will shoot from the boss in off-cardinal directions relative to the boss (not the room!). Halfway through their journey, they will freeze in time. If you or any of your party members run into any of these half-complete laser streams, it will explode, doing heavy damage to everyone in range and applying vuln’ stacks. Multiple explosions will likely mean death to all, with the possible exception of a tank. Getting hit by the laser when it actually fires also applies a vuln’ stack.
• Defensive Array – The same sort of freezing lasers will appear, but from points on the edge of the arena. Be mindful that there may be an unseen laser on the opposite side of the boss.
• Artificial Gravity – The boss instant casts an ability that puts a pattern of small, red dots on the ground. These will quickly grow into large, red dots with only a few, small safe spots between. Use the small dots to figure out where the safe spots will be before they grow. There will always be a safe spot in the center of the arena from the dots, but later mechanics may make it unsafe via combination mechanics.
• Rail Cannon* – Tank Buster.
• Defensive Array
• Magicrystal – Every player will have a travelling AoE circle placed on them. It will explode right before the Defensive Array lasers unfreeze.
• High-tension Discharger – Arena-wide, unavoidable AoE.
• Magitek Crossray
• Artificial Gravity – Magitek Crossray is still active.
• Rail Cannon
• Defensive Array
• Magitek Crossray – Defensive Array is still active.
• Magicrystal – Defensive Array and Magitek Crossray are still active.
• *Likely repeats from Rail Cannon until defeat.

Congratulations, you’ve completed The Twinning! …Though, why can’t I shake the feeling we’ve made a mistake…?

Check out the guides for the other two expert roulette dungeons: Akadaemia Anyder, and Amaurot.