SWTOR: Firebrand and Stormcaller Guide
Recommended Group Composition
- 2x Tanks
- 2x Healers
- 4x DPS
Notable Mechanics
- When one boss dies, the other enrages.
- Double Destruction – Casted ability by Stormcaller that increases damage taken and adds a DoT to the closest two targets.
- Incinerate Armor – Casted by Firebrand on his tank, amplifies damage taken by Firebrand.
- Firebrand has a frontal cone.
- Stormcaller has a “cleave”.
- Defensive Systems – Two shields spawn with a generator and adds under each.
- Offensive Systems – Mortar volley hits entire raid and damages the shields.
- Stormcaller’s tank will also have lightning generators spawn on top of him throughout this phase, which do considerable ticking AoE damage.
Normal Strategy
- Split up into two groups.
- It helps to have a Sage on Stormcaller’s side to help with AoE heals.
- Ensure Firebrand and Stormcaller are both facing the front. Each group will stand to the side of each tank. Stormcaller’s group can actually stack on the side of the tank, very close to his turret for AoE heals. And Firebrand’s side should do the same, but have one ranged DPS stay at ranged (yellow pillar and lightning spire will always spawn on them).
- When Stormcaller casts Double Destruction, the tank should drop off Stormcaller, behind the group. This way, the group will receive the debuff, not the tank. Once they receive the debuff, they can then move forward again and prepare to tank swap. This will also help with lightning spire drops on Stormcaller’s side during Defensive System transitions.
- Shortly after Double Destruction, Firebrand will cast Incinerate Armor on his tank – this requires an immediate tank swap. This is a rinse-repeat process for the duration of the encounter.
- On Firebrand’s side, a person will be targeted with a yellow pillar debuff. This debuff will quickly fall off and drop a purple circle on the ground. Get out of of the purple circle immediately.
- It’s more efficient to have the DPS and heals on Firebrand’s side stack up on the side of Firebrand, much like Stormcaller’s side does. However, one ranged DPS should stay out – as he will be the only one targeted by the yellow pillar debuff and the lightning spires. Just try not to stand where the shields spawn for the Defensive Systems phase, as to not have lightning spires block the shield.
- 3x times throughout the fight, the tanks will engage Defensive Systems.
- A red shield will spawn on each side (two on each for 16man) with a generator and adds under it. Everyone with the exception of Stormcaller’s tank should quickly run under the shield and single target DPS the adds. Cleave damage will destroy the generator and leave you vulnerable to the mass AoE that is occurring outside of the shield.
- Stay under the shield until the mortar volley ends, then re-engage your assigned boss, avoiding red circles along the way.
- During the shield phase, Stormcaller’s tank will have to stay outside of the shield, as he will be targeted with lightning generators that drop on top of him every few seconds. The tank should run around, dropping the generators neatly along the perimeter of Stormcaller, while staying in range of heals, leaving a path open for the raid to get back to Stormcaller.
- Rinse and repeat and you’ll be good to go.
Hard Mode Strategy
- Also on Firebrand’s side, lightning spires will spawn in ranged – avoid them. This will occasionally spawn on Stormcaller’s side – shift accordingly.*
- During the Defensive Systems phase, the red shields will spawn in a random position. Position yourself between your assigned boss and the shield closest to you. The boss will knock you back into the shield, allowing you do sneak in a few more seconds of DPS.
Nightmare Mode Strategy
- Coming Soon.
5-second Recap
- Split up into two groups, AoE heals on Stormcaller’s side.
- Tank should back up and increase distance when Double Destruction occurs. Quickly get move back in when it’s completed and prepare to tank swap.
- Tank swap when Incinerate Armor is applied on Firebrand’s tank.
- Get under shields when they spawn, single target DPS the adds, not the generator.
- Stormcaller tank will kite and drop lightning generators – avoid them.
- Cleanse yellow pillar debuff on Firebrand’s side immediately, then move out of the circle.
Items noted with * have still yet to be 100% confirmed as accurate.
16 man story mode also contains the yellow pillar debuff (or some other similar looking one).
On 16man story there are 4 shield generators instead of 2, it’s important to split the party evenly amongst the shields as stacking too many people in one will put too much damage on the shield.
It seems like the adds take reduced damage under the shields, is there any suggestions about pulling/pushing/knocking them out of the shield?
@wesleycrushers – The yellow pillar is actually in story mode as well; I’ve updated the guide to reflect this. As far as knocking them out of the shield – we tried this and there are no benefits. Just use cc as much as possible to help out the healers and single target DPS them down.
Few more things:
1. In story mode the yellow pillar does not need to get cleansed. It doesn’t drop off from cleansing, just from time. Keep moving and it will drop off at the end of the debuff.
2. If possible a sage should cast force armor on the 1 ranged dps that is on the ground by Firebrand. This ranged dps will always be taking the first tick of damage from the lightning spires, and the force armor should help minimize healing needed.
3. The ranged dps on the ground should avoid the areas where the shields spawn. It is possible to have a lightning spire spawn followed by a shield phase. This can render most of the shielded area unusable, and should be avoided if at all possible.
4. The ranged dps on the ground should avoid the area in front of the tank as well as the tank will be casting frontal cone aoe attacks.
(In case it wasn’t clear I was the ranged dps on the ground this week)
@wesleycrushers – Great feedback! I’ve updated the guide to reflect most of it.
I’d like to recommend, on Stormcaller, that the 2 people don’t move, but the tank moves. It simplifies the fight significantly. 2 guys to the tank’s right, close to the turret. Tank steps wide right when the cast starts, then cuts back in sharp to spin the turret back around.
We had issues with 2 folks moving inconsistently, but if they’re in the right spot, the tank just steps and back, quickly.
@ MacAllen – Ha, it’s funny you mention this. We had that “Duh” moment while we were doing this fight on Hard Mode a couple nights ago. It’s definitely MUCH more efficient to have the tank move. This way the DPS can continue going to town and not have to disturb their rotations. Good call – Updating guide now.
Incinerate Armor didn’t require any tank swapping on our Story Mode clear, just use cooldowns wisely as the tank. I’m assuming Hard Mode will probably still require the swap.
@ Wickedr – Originally, that was correct. On Story Mode, you could just heal through Incinerate Armor. However, with the most recent patch, that has been changed and Incinerate Armor now requires a tank swap.
Question, my guild tried this on story mode Saturday night and had no issue with the double boss first encounter, but when we got to this boss we hit a snag that stopped our Progression. I’m a gunslinger, during the defensive system phase should I stay out of the shield at 30 meter range? It seemed like previous posts were alluding to this. 3 times in a row when we all went under the shield, I was on firebrand side by the way, one of those lightning pillars dropped inside the shield and killed all of us halfway through the shield phase. Thanks for any suggestions.
First let me say, “Great guide!”
After watching the video here and noticing that the tanks never switched my guild tried to have the Stormcaller tank stay where he was but taunt Firebrand right before / during his cast of incinerate armor to get the debuff.
Although Firebrand would change targets for a few seconds and sometimes even appear to cast incinerate armor while on the Stormcaller tank, it still gets cast on the tank closest to Firebrand. Took us getting them to 20% and then 3/2% to notice that it can’t be done without physically switching positions. Sad day in Denova.
If on 8 man one of your DPS does not pay attention and burns down a shield gen can you survive long enough to get to the other one or should you just call it a wipe?
@ ghael – Everyone should be under a shield with the exception of the Stormcaller tank. When you had the lightning spires dropping on you, was anyone dead? The only person targeted with lightning spires in the Defensive Systems phase should be the Stormcaller tank who stays out and drops them away from the shield.
@ Gregor – Ha, glad you figured that out! Originally both on the PTS and when 1.2 released, you could actually just heal through Incinerate Armor. However, with a recent path, they buffed it so it required a tank swap.
@ Myka_Stryver – That really depends on how quickly they kill the shield generator. Take about 2, maybe 3 hits and you should be fine. Anything more than that would probably kill you. Luckily this happens pretty quickly, so you should be able to judge if you can recover or not without wasting too much time.
@Accomp – Unless there was a patch between the 14th and the 16th, then we killed him with that patch and no tank swap, *shrug*.
Just did story again without tank swapping, however I’d recommend doing it anyway to get the timing down for hard in a more forgiving setting. An additional tip for tank swapping, like @Gregor mentioned, the Incinerate Armor will be stay on whomever he starts the cast on. Because of this you can do the tank swap as soon as he starts casting, well before it finishes and is applied.
Hey, our guild’s about to start progression on hard mode for these two and had a few questions if you get a moment.
– Are Incinerates and DD handled the same as on Story? Are they sped up, any time differences here?
-We’ve also always gotten the Lightning Spires on Firebrand’s side, are they just more random now instead of always on the furthest player out?
-Any changes, aside from damage to the yellow targeting ability? (Faster countdown?)
-The adds that spawn in the shields, do they spawn on a random location within certain predetermined locations, or are they truly random? If they’re predetermined, I assume all locations are near the tank in some way?
That’s all for now, thank you for the very well made guides and look forward to your future content!
My guild had no problem with Firebrand and Stormcaller last week; however, this week we ran into the same issue one of the other posters had. The lightning spires kept spawning on the players in the shields during Phase 2. The only person outside the shields was the Stormcaller tank…NFI what’s now different in the fight. Can anyone assist?
Regarding this:
“Also on Firebrand’s side, lightning spires will spawn in ranged – avoid them. This will occasionally spawn on Stormcaller’s side – shift accordingly.*”
We have a theory. SC fires a lightning spire when he hits the phase transition threshhold–80%, 60%, 40%, 20%–even though the defensive system phase induction timer has not yet started. Your hard mode video seems consistent with our hypothesis.
If correct, this theory suggests that DPS on SC should stop DPS during double destruction if they are within 1-2% of a phase threshold.
@ qoheleth – Good call. However, no need to stop DPS. We found that if you just have the tank on Stormcaller drop off the side of Stormcaller on the ground while outranging the Double Destruction, the lightning spire will drop on him, away from the group. Then he can just leap back to Stormcaller and get ready for Defensive Systems. Worked like a charm last night.