So, my guild just starting working on NiM EC Firebrand/Stormcaller (8-man), and I was wondering what the DPS requirements are to avoid the second DD, which seems pretty important.

We quickly realized that we couldn't make this DPS check, and started trying some sort of strategy where we had 3 people DPSing Firebrand to push the phases faster, then we will switch and focus Stormcaller later on with more DPS to share DD with on the Stormcaller tank, but will we run into hard enrage issues if we need to use this strategy?

Also, are there any good ideas of required DPS numbers on the fight to clear it? I want to know about how much we need to step it up as a raid, whether it is through more fully optomizing our DG gear, working on maximizing DPS uptime, rotation work, etc.

Any advice is appreciated!

We usually try to keep 2 dps on each of the tanks, but our strongest dps is usually on storm caller (which usually are melee dps), then we have 2 range on firebrand. At the start of the fight we will have one range dps stormcaller a bit, how long sorta depends who we have on stormcaller that night. For rest of the phases, the dps stick their respective tanks unless it is obvious that stormcaller isnt being burned fast enough.

After the last shield, and the melee dps get DD, they jump over to firebrand, while one of the range dps go to stormcaller and eat the 2nd DD with the healer.... Firebrand is usually a bit higher then stormcaller but usually balances out when there are 3 dps on it at the end.

For actual numbers when i am on my marauder i am averaging over 2k on the tank, and when there is another marauder on there we dont need any assistance from a 3rd dps at all... we actually push to the shield phase shortly after the first DD... so i would have to speculate that you only need about 3.2-3.5k dps on stormcaller to prevent the second DD. Overall the dps checks are not to tight once you get use to the fight and develop a good strategy.

As a side note i been told (havent tested it myself), that a dps that has cast times (Merc, lightening Sorc) may experience a dps drop by eating the DD due to the push back from the damage ticks.

Here is some math that will give you an idea of the required DPS.

In 8-player mode, the tanks combine for 2066834 HP. The enrage timer is 390 seconds. Now there is a total of 100 seconds (4x 25 second shield phases) where you aren't damaging the tanks. So the 'effective' enrage is 290 seconds. If we assume that tanks will average out to 800 combined DPS then the average DPS per DPSer is 1581. Your melee classes should be doing much higher than this, and so this brings down the requirement for the ranged.

FWIW, melee shouldn't be doing less than 1700 in this fight, and if your range are sitting in the 1450 range, you should be in a good spot.

FWIW, melee shouldn't be doing less than 1700 in this fight, and if your range are sitting in the 1450 range, you should be in a good spot.

You have to take into account that the adds under the shield are weaker then ****, on my marauder i usually stand under the shield for about 8 seconds doing nothing for we dont blow up the bomber on us.

You have to take into account that the adds under the shield are weaker then ****, on my marauder i usually stand under the shield for about 8 seconds doing nothing for we dont blow up the bomber on us.

I take that into account.

Melee still shouldn't be under 1700.

I think i remember reading somewhere in a post that 16m is 1700ish dps... I'd assume 8 man is abour 1450-1500... i think HM its 1150... these are numbers from a pot head so take them with a grain of salt

Your 8 man numbers are off. 8 man may be easier but it's not that much lower dps requirements.

1500 dps average on 8-man is pretty much correct. We beat the enrage timer with 2 maras and 2 ranged totaling about 7300+ dps. so that's about 1500 dps for the 4 damage classes each and another combined 1300 dps from the tanks.

We're using the old 3 - 1 tactic and burn stormcaller first.

This one is a bit tricky. We have a marauder on Storm Caller who pops bloodthirst right at the beginning. The two dps on SC toggle using their Relics/Adrenals. Sometimes we have one of the ranged throw out a dot or two or a little dps to help push SC to the 20% markers to make sure there isn't 2 double D's.

Now, the trick with this at that in the 0%-20% remaining health of SC, FB is usually around 30-40%. We end up swapping toons to absorb the double d at this point as we even out FB then burn then down together. So, what we do is we have the 2 dps on SC eat the first DD, then, right afterwards, one of the dps comes over to SC and switches places with one of the dps who already has the DD. Now the new dps and the SC healer eat it. Then switch back.

Usually one full switch is good enough and the tanks die.

1500-1600dps average feels about right. This was our average from our 8 man NiM kill of tanks last night. One of our dps DC'ed near the end of raid so I don't have an exact number for all the dps involved.

We had 1 melee and 3 ranged (1 sentinel, 2 commando, 1 gunslinger). Our method for dealing with DD was front loading all dps on Stormcaller until the first DD, at which point melee and one ranged (both of which who ate a DD) peel off and focus on Firebrand. Melee stayed on Firebrand the rest of the fight, ranged switched to Stormcaller until next DD went off. In this way we were able to avoid a second DD after each defensive system phase.

Once Stormcaller gets down to 20%, ALL dps switched to Firebrand to burn her down. All the ranged dps and our healers would alternate the remaining DD's that went out until Firebrand was dead and then all dps focused Stormcaller down until she was dead as well.

During the shield phases we kill the first transdouchan as a group, melee or one dps would finish the 2nd one while ranged booted the exploding transdouchan out of the shield and range dps'ed it down.

One other mechanic, we have our shadow tank (that is tanking Stormcaller) taunt Firebrand during incinerate armor since our guardian tanking Firebrand was getting positively nuked by that ability.

My guild uses a DPS-switching strategy, where the DPS swap sides after every DD. Each DPS pair consists of a melee and a ranged, so that there is always one ranged DPS in each shield (we run twin shadow tanks and yank the explody trandoshans to be killed from afar). Since we DPS swap, we're usually lazy and just allow the second DD to go off, but there have been ocaisions where we push it (just for fun) and skip the second DD. Based on the numbers we've seen from parsing when that happens, it looks like the DPS requirement is in the range of 1900 for both DPS on SC if you want to reliably skip the second DD. Our two melee DPS parse in the 2-2.1k range, while our commando parses around 1950 and our sage is 1800-1900, so it really just depends on how we feel like doing the boss.

I'd say that, in general, DPS switching is the most lenient strategy, especially if you have at least 2 ranged. The burst requirements are less severe, and mistakes are more recoverable. Once everyone masters the positioning and movement requirements, this boss becomes a pretty easy one-shot.

Our normal group has 2 sin tanks, a merc DPS, ptech dps (me), Mara and a sniper. 2 sorc heals or a sorc and an op usually.

I do the taunt swap on my ptech, so of course on firebrand. We actually push the phases through on firebrand instead of stormcaller. Between me and the merc usually no problem with it, though we have sniper do his orbital on fire instead of storm. On storm caller adds, merc knocks em out and we aoe them, ptech aoe+10meter attacks works great for this. The sin on our side will sometimes pull one back in. On storm side they kill the non-bomb first, get second low and sniper knocks it out and finishes it off.

Storm caller is usually at like 10-15% when fire dies, and starts spam casting "ultimate destruction" on the tanks. They swap back and forth to slow debuff and we burn him down.

I guess everyone seems to push phases on storm instead of fire, while we do the other way around, but it seems to work for us. /shrug.

Did anyone find any real numbers for this, as far as I can work out the second double begins to cast at 46 seconds

1033427 hp per tank is 2066854 total hp.

Broke down into 4 20% phases is 516,713.5 total raid dmg needed per phase in 45 sec which is a total of 11,482 combined dps needed from your raid

Shadow and Vanguard tanks can push around 700-800dps max, guardians 400-500dps max so say we take a shadow and a vanguard that is 1400 dps of the total leaving 10082 dps needed from dps and healers so thats 2k per dps and around 500 dps needed from each healer.

Which means if you take two guardian/jug tanks your going to get two doubles every time as 2k dps is the limits of what most classes can do now other than sent / vanguard and the occasional slinger pulling 2100 ish

Feel free to add anything if I have missed anything here ?

Did anyone find any real numbers for this, as far as I can work out the second double begins to cast at 46 seconds

1033427 hp per tank is 2066854 total hp.

 

Broke down into 4 20% phases is 516,713.5 total raid dmg needed per phase in 45 sec which is a total of 11,482 combined dps needed from your raid

 

Shadow and Vanguard tanks can push around 700-800dps max, guardians 400-500dps max so say we take a shadow and a vanguard that is 1400 dps of the total leaving 10082 dps needed from dps and healers so thats 2k per dps and around 500 dps needed from each healer.

 

Which means if you take two guardian/jug tanks your going to get two doubles every time as 2k dps is the limits of what most classes can do now other than sent / vanguard and the occasional slinger pulling 2100 ish

 

Feel free to add anything if I have missed anything here ?

If you put three or four dpsers hitting one tank, the dps required to avoid a second double destruction lessens significantly. At the same time, I've seen videos of groups take two DDs. So it doesn't matter either way.

Did anyone find any real numbers for this, as far as I can work out the second double begins to cast at 46 seconds

1033427 hp per tank is 2066854 total hp.

 

Broke down into 4 20% phases is 516,713.5 total raid dmg needed per phase in 45 sec which is a total of 11,482 combined dps needed from your raid

 

Shadow and Vanguard tanks can push around 700-800dps max, guardians 400-500dps max so say we take a shadow and a vanguard that is 1400 dps of the total leaving 10082 dps needed from dps and healers so thats 2k per dps and around 500 dps needed from each healer.

 

Which means if you take two guardian/jug tanks your going to get two doubles every time as 2k dps is the limits of what most classes can do now other than sent / vanguard and the occasional slinger pulling 2100 ish

 

Feel free to add anything if I have missed anything here ?

Only problem I see with this is you actually have a little under 1 minute. 5 seconds to get in position (so wasted), 10 seconds until first DD, then 45 seconds until the second which needs to be beaten. You also need to take into account small amounts of DPS during the DS casting, though that is usually only 1-2%.

My guild uses a DPS-switching strategy, where the DPS swap sides after every DD. Each DPS pair consists of a melee and a ranged, so that there is always one ranged DPS in each shield (we run twin shadow tanks and yank the explody trandoshans to be killed from afar). Since we DPS swap, we're usually lazy and just allow the second DD to go off, but there have been ocaisions where we push it (just for fun) and skip the second DD. Based on the numbers we've seen from parsing when that happens, it looks like the DPS requirement is in the range of 1900 for both DPS on SC if you want to reliably skip the second DD. Our two melee DPS parse in the 2-2.1k range, while our commando parses around 1950 and our sage is 1800-1900, so it really just depends on how we feel like doing the boss.

 

I'd say that, in general, DPS switching is the most lenient strategy, especially if you have at least 2 ranged. The burst requirements are less severe, and mistakes are more recoverable. Once everyone masters the positioning and movement requirements, this boss becomes a pretty easy one-shot.

Why? What is the point of doing this? I'm really curious because I just can't work out the whole thing at all. Your ranged DPS parse similar and your melee parse similar and you have one of each in both pairs - so what's the point in switching them around?

I'm sure I'm missing something here as I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed but can't figure out what is it.

Why? What is the point of doing this? I'm really curious because I just can't work out the whole thing at all. Your ranged DPS parse similar and your melee parse similar and you have one of each in both pairs - so what's the point in switching them around?

 

I'm sure I'm missing something here as I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed but can't figure out what is it.

Because they're taking two double destructions. In Nightmare mode, the debuff from double destruction does not wear off before the next double destruction is cast.

If you have the debuff and take DD, you get one shot. So they switch sides after every double destruction so they always have people without debuffs taking it.