Machinist DPS Weapon's Refrain (Ultimate) — Endwalker 6.1

The Weapon's Refrain is the second ultimate released in FFXIV: Stormblood. The fight syncs you down to level 70 in an attempt to keep the difficulty of the fight equal to what it was on release. While it does not do a great job of that, it does remove certain skills and abilities that we gained in Shadowbringers. The encounter is split into 5 phases; Garuda, Ifrit, Titan, Lahabrea, and Ultima. The fight in its entirety is 16 minutes long. This guide assumes a basic understanding of how Machinist works while outlining specific optimization due to phasing and AoE situations.

These tips have not been updated for Dawntrail, but are still largely relevant.

With so many gearing options and different phase pushes, true BiS does not exist. The most important thing that will affect your DPS is ensuring you have got the Shadowbringers 535 relic. This weapon allows you to maximize your stats with a load out of Relic substat with 136 CRIT/132 DH/136 DET/63 SKSP. Every other piece of gear should be at a minimum of i500 to ensure it syncs down to max stats. Food for the fight will just be whatever the current max level food with critical hit on it is.

There is three differences at level 70 that should be thought about when figuring out how to maximize potency gains.

1. Hot Shot: 300 potency compared to Air Anchor, which is normally 700 potency. The main thing to consider is that buff alignment matters very little (if anything it is better to use it outside of buffs) for Hot Shot. With only 300 potency, it now does less damage than Slug Shot. Expected potency is 460 when you include the Battery gain though, so it is still worth using, and should be used as many times as possible.
2. Rook Autoturret: 100 Battery is now 800 potency and there is no wind up animation on summon. Rook should still be used within buff windows, but you no longer want to use it before buffs come up. At 100 battery, Rook will attack for exactly 15s from pressing the button, to give you an idea of when you would need to summon it to get Rook Overdrive in buffs.
3. Gauss Round and Ricochet no longer have three charges; They have been reduced to two. It is much harder to avoid overcapping your charges inside of hypercharge, and this also limits which openers you can use. 3rd, 4th, and 5th GCD openers all work at 70. The General Purpose opener (6th GCD) will force an overcap on Gauss and Rico. If you go into Hypercharge at zero stacks on both, but the cooldown on Gauss or Rico is seven seconds or less, it will overcap by the end of the ability's usage even with weaving between every Heat Blast. Sometimes this may be unavoidable and it is just something you would need to deal with. It is a minimal loss (if any), but it is mentioned to let you know it may not be a mistake on your end.

Garuda is a very short phase. You will only get a single use of Wildfire in this phase, so there is no need to worry about opener alignment. There are two options for the first set of plumes-- Either use Flamethrower for approximately two GCDs (5 seconds) or you can delay your opener and, instead of using Heat Blast, use Auto Crossbow for a portion of the Hypercharge window. The decision should be made on a group-by-group basis. The Plumes do not have a ton of health, so killing the spiny early will result in the tank only having one friction stack and make waking Garuda tighter than normal.

You may notice that Garuda jumps at an awkward time after the first set of cleanses go off. I handled this by using a 4-Heat Blast Hypercharge into Clean Shot. I ran into the issue where if I was not using Hypercharge before the jump, I would be forced to delay Drill/Hot Shot, or I would overcap heat. Doing this avoided that problem and also ended my combo before the jump so I did not need to worry about it dropping with a ton of gauge to spend. Faster GCD speeds can either hold Hypercharge for post-jump or use a full 5 Heat Blasts and still get the clean shot off, at the cost of using a skill speed accessory or dropping more skill speed into their relic at the cost of another substat.

The second set of plumes lines up perfectly with a Reassemble which can either be used on Auto Crossbow (If you have saved the required heat) or on Spread Shot into another use of Flamethrower. Both are 180 potency so the choice should be made purely on how much you are able to burst on the plumes and/or forced to hold DPS on Garuda, since killing her before tethers go off results in not waking. If using the aforementioned alignment in the previous paragraph, you will be able to finish off your Heated combo and lead directly into Spread Shot for the Plumes and not need to worry about dropping combo. Hot Shot and Drill both come off cooldown as this mechanic is ending, so you should do your best to ensure you get both off before she jumps. There is slightly under 15 seconds of downtime between Garuda disappearing and Ifrit becoming targetable.

Tactician only has one spot it should be used on in this phase, and that is during Cleanses. It is possible to cover both Frictions and the cleanses that happen after them.

As with Garuda, Ifrit is a very short phase. You will only be able to get off a single Wildfire here. Your reopener is a good place to pot if your group is trying to make Ifrit dash skip consistent.

Machinist should be one of the two people baiting eruptions. With how heat lines up around nails, you will be able to get a Hypercharge window out and possibly pad a bit during this mechanic. It is completely dependent on comp and which jobs are actively hitting the two nails closer together. At minimum it is suggested to unload a single target Hypercharge into Ifrit and enjoy the free cleave from Ricochet on three targets. There is a Drill (and possibly a Reassemble, depending on push timings) that comes up during nails that can be used on the nail you are responsible for to make quick work of it without requiring the Hypercharge to do so.

Tactician use for Ifrit should be during Nails. Attempt to cover the Searing Wind healer if you can.

Depending on if you skip dashes or not will change whether or not you will manage to get two Wildfire windows or not. If your group is seeing dashes, plan on using Wildfire immediately for your reopener and again during Mario Kart at the end of the phase. If your group is skipping dashes, you will Wildfire after gaols during the Tumult spam.

For prog purposes, it is wise to hold Drill for the healer gaol. Especially early on, some people in the party may have weakness and nobody wants to wipe to such an easy damage check. Machinist excels in short burst, it is best to take full advantage of this until everyone is comfortable with the phase.

Your last Barrel Stabilizer should happen either right before or right after Mario Kart. Ideally you do not want full gauge coming out of Titan because of the Magitek Bits and Lahabrea himself in the transition, so planning out a last use of Rook and possibly a final Hypercharge before Titan dies may be a benefit to you to avoid overcapping.

Tactician can be used on any of the Tumults, with priority on the ones in the middle of the phase after the healer gaol. This will also cover the Rock Buster and Mountain Buster on the tank.

There is not much for us to do here except build up some gauge. This phase lasts approximately 95 seconds (Time from Titan jumping to Ultima becoming targetable) so it is something to keep in mind for Barrel Stabilizer usage and a possible late Wildfire in Titan.

You will be able to get at least 3 GCDs on the Magitek Bits before caster limit break kills them, so it is wise to get a full Heated Combo on them and leave Hot Shot for Lahabrea, who sticks around for approximately 5 GCDs.

Ultima is targetable before Predation for about 28 seconds. Perfect for a Dex pot and a reopener. You can get two Hypercharge windows in the opener and still end on Clean Shot but you will need to cut the second Hypercharge short by a single Heat Blast and finish the uptime with Drill and Clean Shot. You will need to drift Drill a bit for this, but it is fine as the next bit of downtime during Predation is longer than 20 seconds.

Your next Wildfire window comes up during Annihilation, and can be a bit tricky to get off properly. Due to downtime, Drill and Wildfire butt heads a bit here, but the priority should be Wildfire. Holding Wildfire here can be detrimental as Ultima will disappear momentarily prior to Active-Phase 2 and will cut into your Wildfire if it is delayed slightly. Delaying Drill for Wildfire will not lose you a usage prior to Suppression.

Your second pot and third Wildfire should come back up in Primal Roulette. Burst timings should be coordinated with your group for this portion of the fight. This Wildfire can be held for as long as it needs to for your party's buff windows since you will not get another in the encounter.

Tactician has a few uses here, but consult with your healers on where they will want it. Predation is an option if you are building Limit BreaK gauge by eating the Afterburner. If not, Tumults during Active Phase 1 is another choice. If you use it during Annihilation, ensure the Searing Wind healer is covered before they leave the group. For the final usage, both Aetheric Booms or any of the Primal Roulette raid wides work.