Apologies for the necro. I was going to post a seperate topic until I realized I'd literally be using the same title.
Anywho, I'd like to present more confirmation that the Dense Cluster is a possible, albeit ultra rare, drop from Macrocosmic orb campaign.
I have been running Macrocosmic Orb campaign for a long time (you can see my edits on the area on bgwiki). I have run a considerable number of runs over the last few years (easily 2,000 plus as I have burned through over 40k seals). I had two goals.
1) Validate myself if a Dense Cluster/Cat's Eye/Other dropped from any other the BCNMs
2) Build an Empyrean weapon from the drops alone.
In that time, I focused my attention on the particular fight "Demolition Squad II". This is because bgwiki had notes that the Sahagin fight could drop the Cat's Eye and that the Kindred fight could drop the Dense Cluster. Looking at the potential gil drops of the fights that remained "unconfirmed", the Gigas fight was the most optimal choice for me to spam due to the value of Delve items.
So I ran that BCNM over and over and over, every campaign. This was made easier recently when SE split the Seal Drop Rate Campaign and the Macrocosmic Orb Campaign to run on different months, allowing me to build up huge stockpiles of seals for the recent Feb-March campaign.
Finally, this last campaign, I got a Dense Cluster from the Gigas BCNM. This was great, while a Cat's Eye would have been lovely as well, I personally preferred getting the Dense Cluster as I could use it to upgrade the Empryrean I'd get from the campaign as well.
Remembering how bgwiki denotes the existance with a large "this is potentially a fake rumor" and the forum here remarked with understandable skepticism, I figured when/if the day happened, I'd be ready. As such, for your validation, I present my evidence. I hope to use it as a reference when I edit the wiki.
1) To start, I wrote a lua to alert when drops occurred based on the item id, and it fired on id 9010 - the Dense Cluster. Here is a snippet of that code (and yes, I also alerted on Cat's Eye, Balyd Crystal, and the Apademak Horn, the very odd drop that isn't included in the Abyssea drops from Macrocosmic BCNMs but is used for JSE Reforges (SAM)):
Code
notify_ohlawdy_items = S{3289,3443,9010,8799}
if (notify_ohlawdy_items:contains(item_id)) then
log(res.items[item_id].english)
local item_name_big = res.items[item_id].english
windower.add_to_chat(123,'OH LAWDY! A '..item_name_big)
end
2) Obviously, that is all client side and isn't proof, so here is the drop occurring on screen from slot 6 as expected. By the way, running over and over helped me independently confirm the Slot 6 drop rate on VD as ~28% for any slot 6 drop.
3) Of course, I could just be editing my client to show that or photoshoping the picture. However, thanks to running the BCNM thousands of times, I built up quite a collection of Abyssea trophies used for reforge/weapons.
4) So, not only was I able to accomplish my #1 goal, I was able to accomplish my #2 goal of building an Empyrean weapon. I chose the Staff because who would build a Staff from grinding alone (also Staff is unqiue in the drops for stage 1/2 are only used for Staff - Kukulkan Fangs and Sedna Tusks).
5) Okay, but that could be using a dressup command. So, as future evidence, I screenshotted my actual usage of the Dense Cluster to upgrade the weapon
6) At this point, I used my Guildwork sync to confirm the creation of the level 95 tier of the weapon. If you check GMT vs. EST, you can see the times line up as well. This syncs to my FFXIAH profile still, so again I lean on the hope that this is sufficient proof, alongside whatever "reputation" I could point to from my years being around.
So, I'm now satisfied any of the BCNMs for Macrocosmic Campaign can drop either Cat's Eye or Dense Cluster, depending on the BCNM.
I'll continue to run Macrocosmic in the future, as I still have the following to figure out:
Could I potentially get a Cat's Eye from Gigas? (I don't think so. If I get a second Dense Cluster I expect that will be enough proof to me that each BCNM gets one type)
What do the other fights drop? (Tonberry looks to be a good option to make gil, the abjuration ones even I may say I don't care to find out if they do)
Don't I have anything better to do? (No, I think I enjoy FFXI for the mysteries more than anything else atm).
I hope this satisfies the burden of proof. Personally, given a 28% chance of getting slot 6, and a dense cluster being Ultra Rare, unmodified by TH (assuming you think this is like DRing, Lilith/Shinryu drops, etc.), getting one drop after 2k+ runs seems... lucky actually.
Hope people find this data useful. And yes, running hundreds and thousands of runs getting 5k direct gil and all those Delve/reforge/misc. items fills up your gil quite a lot. I expect the crafters and currency buyers enjoy when I unload after the campaign.