Introduction

This document contains suggestions on how to use your cooldowns effectively and small things you can do to maximize them such as using Soil for two back-to-back damage instances that are just under 30s from each other. Ideally, you should communicate with your cohealer to make a plan that reduces stress for both of you and maximizes damage between you while being safe.

Dragonsong Reprise (DSR)

Gearing

We have provided multiple sets based on your P7 Akh Morn strategy and heal plan.

The BiS weapon for this fight is the Endwalker SCH relic (645/665 are functionally the same). If you choose to do the 3-3-2 strat for P7 Akh Morn, you should allocate stats into Crit/Det > SPS. If you choose to do the 6-1-1 strat, stats should be allocated into Crit/SPS > Det.

Phase By Phase Fight Tips

Phase Two: King Thordan

Thordan Opening

• Healing isn’t too heavy here – only the tank takes damage, but if they aren’t using invulnerability they can take a lot.
• Prepull Recitation lines up well for this fight, so feel free to Excog your tanks.
• It’s important to understand how your tanks will be handling busters in this phase. Tanks will require healing during Ascalon’s Might if they’re using cooldowns instead of their invulns. Discuss with your tanks how they’re planning mitigation and invulns so you can be prepared with Excog and shields.

Strength Healing Advice

• Be aware of where you can go, even when healing. If you have defamation markers, look at where people are going so you can quickly get to a spot without forcing someone else to adjust for you.
• Seraph has a good use here. I usually summon her after dodging so I can get my second Consolation before Ancient Quaga. (Note: Seraph can also be used in Sanctity to help survive 3/5 splits during prog. Both are good spots to use Seraph and it’ll be back up in time for Nidhogg)
• Expedient is a good use here, letting everyone quickly get to their spot and mitigating the significant damage. I press it after my Succor so it’ll last as long as it can.
• Tethers are proximity based. Crossing them will make tanks take less damage.
• Use Soil for the Ancient Quaga into tankbusters. As a reminder, Soil applies instantly so a later Soil can help mitigate and give regen to Tanks taking the buster while also mitigating Quaga.
• You can start Recitation at the start of Thordan’s Tank buster and start casting Adlo after the second/third swing. This ensures Recite Spreadlo is back up for Nidhogg transition if your group doesn’t want to hold for whatever reason.

Sanctity

• If your Thordan kill time is fast, you may need to Dissipation before Thordan casts Sanctity. You can cast Adlo after the third hit of the tank buster and it’ll last through jumps. Doing this will make sure Recite is back up before Nidhogg transition.
• With Recitation Spreadlo, you only really need small mitigation and Succor to heal this. However, you can add an Indom if you want to be safer. (You can move Seraph to this during prog to help heal ⅗ jumps)
• You can queue up a Swiftcast after taking the second damage – in case someone dies, you can be ready to raise them instantly. If they don’t die, you can just Succor in the middle.
• If you’re in the 1 group, start casting Succor when the cast bar for The Dragon’s Gaze is nearly complete.
• If you’re in the 2 group, start casting Succor when the cast bar for The Dragon’s Gaze is complete.

Thordan Post-Sanctity

• Shields and Soil are needed for this. With proper mitigation, you will barely live, but you don’t want to over-mitigate this.

Phase Three: Nidhogg

Transition

• With Tanks, regen Healer, and personal mitigation being given out you only need two 10% mitigation to live this cleanly. To play it safe you should also add a fey illumination to boost your healing and give an additional 5%
• Spreadlo & mitigation from your group and personal mitigation from Tanks and party members can make this liable skipping Soil entirely which helps for stacks
• Most damage in this phase comes from stacks so they should be your main priority for mitigation and healing

Nidhogg stacks

• You can Soil every stack if you use your first Soil when numbers appear over your head and then on cooldown. (Note: Soil turns your character which can mess up tower facing when using it too close to the dive timing.)
• I use Seraph for the first stack and Expedient for the second stack, contributing most of the mitigation and shields from me, making much smaller room for error. (If you used Seraph during Sanctity, it may not be up. Just switch the order and Expedient the first stack and Seraph the second stack.

Nidhogg Tank healing advice

• Tanks can either invuln the buster or mitigate it. Excog on a non-invuln tank can help with burst healing after the tether tankbuster. For the auto chain afterward, I suggest Protraction and Fey Union plus Excog (if needed), but remember that you have a co-Healer who can deal with the autos extremely well.

Phase Four: The Eyes of Nidhogg

Eyes healing advice

• Orbs do more than max HP, so your group needs shields for them.
• Dives also do more than max HP raw, so shields and Soil are also needed here.

Intermission

How to heal Haurchefant advice

• Any spells/abilities that do not list party members in the description can target Haurchefant.
• Adloquium, Lustrate, and Physick can target him
• I suggest always giving him an Adloquium. Combined with regens, this gives him a lot of healing over the duration. WHM can instantly top him with Bene or you can give another Adloquium before the end of Charibert’s cast to help an AST give Haurchefant enough HP to survive.

Targeting Haurchefant advice

• You can create a macro that targets and focus targets Haurchefant when he appears. Remember: he can’t be targeted until he stops and takes his stance.

  

• Controller players should turn on Cycle through NPCs Objects to make targeting Haurchefant possible

  

Phase Five: Dark King Thordan

Tank healing advice

• Busters are the same as Phase Two except they do more damage now. If you’re planning on doing 6-1-1 in P7 then chances are that your Tanks are just going to invuln these busters. If you aren’t doing 6-1-1, tanks might not invuln these busters. If that’s the case, you must be proactive with healing. Give Excog and Protraction, and your co-healer should also be giving out mitigation and heals in-between hits.

Intermission heal timing advice

• Recitation Spreadlo for the upcoming downtime mechanic.
• Seraph is also helpful in this mechanic: one Consolation after the initial damage and a second one before Quaga.
• Pay attention to your fire baiter as they can easily die from the fire baits.

Intermission 2 heal timing advice

• Your party should have full health and shields before the knockback.
• Soil can be used here as it gives a lingering mitigation buff that is long enough for the knockback and explosion. (Note: Soil turns your character and you can end up looking at Thordan or an eye, so make sure to turn your character after placing Soil)

Phase Six: The Great Wyrms

Wyrm’s Breath 1 healing advice

• Seraph is great here as it’ll also come back up for Cauterize

Tank healing advice

• Tanks take a lot of damage here with autos into pretty big busters, so keep an eye on them.
• Healers need to give personal mitigation to Tanks to help them with busters. my priority for giving the strongest mitigation is GNB = WAR > PLD > DRK. DRK shouldn’t need help unless they’ve made a mistake and asked for help. Don’t be afraid to Adloquium a Tank – the DPS check should be easy if no one is dying.
• Personal mitigation and healing that can be used effectively on tanks include Protraction, Fey Union, Excog, and Adloquium.

Wroth healing advice

• Place your Soil as soon as you find the starting spot for Wroth so that it’ll be back up for Akh Afah.
• Place your Soil so that your allies are in the tip of it at the start and can run through it giving you as long of mitigation as possible. Reminder: Soil gives a mitigation buff so even when out of it they’ll still have it for 5s after the last Soil tick.
• Spreadlo is important for the first hit making healing this a breeze. Keep a Swiftcast so you can swift Succor as well.

Post-Wroth TB advice

• Some Tanks could use help here, Paladin > GNB = WAR is my priority for giving help, DRK shouldn’t need help unless they’ve made a mistake and asked for help. Don’t be afraid to Adloquium a Tank the DPS check should be easy if no one is dying

Cauterize advice

• Seraph is great to use on cooldown for WB2 and it comes back up before Cauterize
• Tanks take a strong DOT after Cauterize. Make sure to pay attention and properly heal/regen them
• Place Soil in front of the dragon and make sure both Tanks are in it to help them take the wild charge damage. Soil is pretty helpful since this does a lot of damage and there is another AoE coming up afterward.

Phase Seven: Dragon-King Thordan

DO NOT USE SWIFTCAST UNLESS IT’S A LAST RESORT. LET WHM/AST OR CASTERS DO IT BEFORE YOU.

Thordan transition advice

• Alt End is a strong raid buster, however with Recitation Spreadlo you can shave some mitigation and use it for Dragon-King Thordan. With personal mitigations, four 10% mitigation, and additional mitigation from your regen healer and Tanks spreading out on as many people as possible, Alt End should be no problem.

• As a follow-up, some personal DPS mitigations are harder to time. For these short-duration mitigations like Third Eye or Arcane Crest, you want to use it when Thordan extends his swords.

Akh Morn advice

• For 3-2-2: Timing Succor to go off right after the first hit is important to keep up pace with the damage of this mechanic.
• For 6-1-1: Timing is less important as everyone takes very low damage. Make sure to keep an eye on your non-invulning Tanks, however.

Gigaflare advice

• You can Soil in the middle of the boss.
• Time your Succor to go off right after the first Gigaflare hit.
• Swiftcast Succor after the second hit. Do not waste Swiftcast in this fight to raise unless you’re the last option

Soil advice

• First Soil can be placed after the second Trinity auto. This ensures that it’ll be up for Gigaflare. By doing this, you can Soil all Akh Morns and Gigaflares.

Heal Partners

Below, we’ve supplied a brief rundown of the strengths and weaknesses of each cohealer option when paired with a Scholar in DSR. Keep in mind that every healer combination (of unique healers at least) can and has cleared the fight, but Scholar especially tends to lend itself to very strong pairings. As such, none of these options are poor but offer differing strengths and potential weak points to pay extra attention to. If in a pug situation, these pros and cons can be utilized to shift your use of tools to an extent, and if you’re planning to prog the fight with a static, these can be helpful to your cohealer choosing a job, if they’re flexible between multiple healers.

AST

Astrologian: On paper, Astrologian is probably the most powerful general co-healer option, and as such tends to be favored by cutting edge progression groups. However, AST’s kit can be difficult to leverage at times.

Pros:

• Neutral Sect is the strongest healing cooldown in the game, and, when combined with SCH’s kit, serves to outright invalidate certain mechanics, along with a steroid on the heal over time + shield that can stack with your own
• Collective Unconscious provides an extra 10%, 60s cd form of mitigation, as well as regen
• P5 Meteors quickly become a joke with Macrocosmos + Earthly Star + Lord of Crowns

Cons:

• Astro’s bar for execution is undeniably harder than the other options, and can prove unforgiving to less comfortable players of the job
• Low personal DPS means burst window execution becomes even more important, and some (especially in Dragon King Thordan) can be quite busy mechanically while handing out cards
• Astro does lack an automatic answer to multi-hit abilities in the mold of Lilybell and Panhaima. Macrocosmos works, but needs more planning and/or a manual pop

WHM

White Mage: Of the three options for a co-healer, White Mage is probably the most straightforward and can play a bit more reactively if needed. As such, many pugs will include a WHM, and the healing potencies on offer do allow extra safety in some areas

Pros:

• Instant cast lilies, especially when paired with Plenary Indulgence, are super powerful as a repeatable, high throughput source of healing that doesn’t rely upon swiftcast. Wroth Flame and Gigaflares especially appreciate these.
• Having fewer tools and major cooldowns on offer means fewer moving parts that require coordination, especially in less organized environments.
• Benediction makes Intermission nearly very simple from a single target healing perspective

Cons:

• Compared with the other two options, WHM is essentially missing an entire source of mitigation. Even the other regen option in AST offers CU in addition to Neutral, while WHM packs only Temperance, demanding more mitigation from others
• Bell and Temperance both feel solid, but lack the raw power of things like Neutral Sect or Kerachole

SGE

Sage: The double shield healer pairing is one that was talked about a lot coming into Dragonsong, and in retrospect, there have been interesting lessons learned from such. It is important to note that we massively recommend you plan to do 6/1/1 Akh Morns for Phase 7 if you plan to run SCH/SGE, otherwise the lack of high potency/regen GCDs becomes a liability for Akh Morns.

Pros:

• Stacking Sacred Soil with Kerachole is incredibly powerful. Offering mitigation + OGCD regens on 30s CDs is tremendously powerful, with the ability to put both on literally every mechanic in the fight
• The addition of a shield to Holos has only served to make this combo’s single-hit mitigation potential even more ridiculous. While not recommended, it’s totally reasonable to say you can handle even an Alternative End level hit utilizing only healer mitigation, which allows even further flexibility in the Mitigation sheet planning of abilities.
• Sage’s notable weakness of lacking deploy is masked with an SCH co-healer, and the ability to leverage Zoe more often on Pneuma instead of worrying about shielding with such allows for strong burst healing on Sage’s side

Cons:

• More than any other combo, SCH/SGE relies upon the strength of mitigation. Missing forms of mitigation can snowball things very badly quickly, and this duo lacks a bit of brute force heal vomit compared to other options if this occurs
• Without 6/1/1 Akh Morn Tank invuln strats, Sage is left spamming Prognosis to heal through Akh Morns. This is pretty inefficient, especially compared to the other options which can leverage regens (in the form of Aspected Helios/Medica 2), and just simply more powerful base-level heals (in Helios/Medica). This, in turn, makes planning where you plan your other CDs, namely Pneuma, Ixochole, and Indom extremely important
• Lack of attention to shields can end in disaster if a deployment is overwritten

Credits

• Morgan - Providing the heal partner section
• Scholar Helpfuls for looking over and correcting any mistakes