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High Brunhilda Guide

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The High Lady of Flame

High Brunhilda was released alongside the Dragonyule Defenders Content Update on 12/16/2018. Soaring above High Midgardsormr, she raised the ceiling for endgame difficulty with an even tougher HP check and strict DPS requirements. An extremely large amount of resources are needed to even join the fight, with F2P options requiring long grinds to acquire, and P2P only speeding up the grind by providing more options.

While the required equipment may at first be discouraging, it’s worth noting that High Brunhilda is among the hardest end-game content. Players will need to invest long hours into their progression before being ready to attempt this fight.

Stat Requirements

HP HP +7% HP +12% HP +15%
Melee (Water) 2165 2023 1950 1882
Ranged (Water) 2705 2529 2437 2353

This guide is written around Adventurers considered part of the "meta" of High Brunhilda. Namely, adventurers that have 100% Burn Res, as well as kits that are well suited to the fight. Currently, that meta is limited to only four heroes: Xainfried, Orsem, Lily, and Thaniel. It is possible to clear with off-meta characters, but they require a great deal more skill, resource investment, and specific team compositions. Off meta adventurers will also struggle to find a team willing to bring them along in pick up groups and will typically need to use an out of game group finder such as the GamePress Discord to find teammates.

The minimum requirements for High Brunhilda vary slightly depending on your role, and on the level of HP co-ability present.

In the past, it was difficult to hit HP minimums without Xainfried having maxed his Mana Circles, however the advent of double wyrmprints and the addition of new Water facilities has somewhat reduced this. Note that these values are a minimum, and that more HP is always better as it will make surviving the fight easier.

For Strength, it is vital that DPS units have a minimum of 2.4k strength to meaningfully contribute to the boss, or 2.2k strength with a Void Weapon with Brunhilda’s bane on it. Again, more strength is better, and strength should be valued more highly than HP. The faster the boss dies, the less time for mistakes and the smoother the run will be.

For healers, strength is far and away a secondary concern in this fight. Stack HP instead, as keeping your teammates alive is your most valuable contribution.

Note on the Group Finder: These days, you will struggle to find accepting Pick Up Groups if you are under 5.5k might as a DPS, or under 5k might as Thaniel. While Might is not as good a metric as one might wish, it is what most PUGS use as a surface level judgement. It is far more important to hit your HP and strength minimums, but be prepared for rejection if you’re just barely hitting the minimums.

The Burn

Burn Res will make the fight against High Brunhilda much easier. High damage ticks constantly for 45 seconds, and while it’s not lethal, it will keep Adventurers sitting at the brink of death with 1 HP. This leads to peril when the unavoidable attacks such as Flame Chaser start; while a well-timed heal or Break can save them, it’s best to learn the rotations with a burn-resistant character.

The probability of being burned is mathematically 200%, which also scales unfavorably:

$$Affliction Chance = Proc Chance * (1 - Resistance)$$

Burn Res 0% 25% 50% 75% 100%
Chance of being Burned 200% 150% 100% 50% 0%
A Burn chance over 100% signifies additional damage taken. Because of this, only 100% Burn Resistant, on-meta Adventurers will be listed under builds.

Who and What to Bring

Like High Midgardsormr, High Brunhilda's battle involves a great deal of preparation:

• The Volcanic Queen Wyrmprint is a must, only select very specific builds can even think of getting away without this print.

• 45-50 Mana Circles

• Crafted Elemental Weapon (Void, or IO)

• A powerful Dragon. 5★ gacha Dragons (such as Leviathan or Simurgh) require the least grinding investment, but there are viable F2P and 4★ options if you are willing to grind.

• Maxed Water Altars and Water Slime Statue (Maxed facilities will greatly ease the level of investment required, but are not absolute musts to gear up for the fight).

• Dojos at 16+. The higher your dojo level, the easier the other grinds. Using budget choices in weapon, dragon, or prints can be made up with higher dojo levels. If you lack water facilities, you’ll most likely need to max your dojos.

Many of these require an incredibly long Imperial Onslaught grind, especially for those crafting 5★ IO weapons. Vermillion Insignias will be a main target for the Volcanic Queen wyrmprint, which can be bought as five separate copies or max unbound. For those crafting a Void 5★ weapon, another long grind in Void Agni must be undertaken, as well as using facilities or other areas to bring strength and HP up to the required threshold.

Preparation

Gearing up in High Brunhilda requires you to decide where you want to grind. With water event facilities, a great deal of grinding can be alleviated as they provide a significant boost to HP and Strength. They open up more budget options, such as using F2P prints, Void Weapons, or  4★ dragons. Without them, much more investment is required to hit the thresholds needed for this fight. It is recommended to play around with a calculator to consider your options and determine what path to High Brunhilda you wish to pursue.

Meta Adventurers: Xainfried, Fjorm

Strohm Mare: The void Lance needs to be MUB, but is a straightforward F2P path. Its full HP defensive ability is inferior to the group healing in many regards, but has some use against the initial HP check. Note that with its High Brunhilda's Bane Ability, you can get away with approximately 2200 Strength and deal as much damage as another player with 2400 Strength.

Ocean Lord: This Lance offers superior stats and a very useful group heal, but as is the case with most mainline weapons, it requires a very long material grind.

Wyrmprints

Wyrmprints

Heralds of Hinomoto, Valiant Crown, and Resounding Rendition are all excellent Wyrmprint picks for Lances.

F2P prints, like Astounding Trick, Plunder Pals, or Hitting the Books are viable choices, but their lower stats and bonuses mean you will need to make up for them in other areas.

Weapons

Marine Staff: Unlike other weapon styles, the 4★ mainline Staff is widely considered the top pick for healers with its extra heal Skill. While it has lower stats than the 5★ Bracing Waters, the improved Skill means you’ll likely want to sacrifice some stats here. They’ll need to be made up elsewhere, usually with maxing dojos and having Water facilities.

Endless Azure Core: Rather than an active Skill, the Void Staff has two passive Abilities. Full HP Defense has the same caveats as it does for other weapon types, but what's relevant here is Skill Haste. Time is of the essence, and charging heal Skills more quickly is invaluable for aggressive bosses like High Brunhilda.

Bracing Waters: The only reason to favor this one is its higher stats-- its Active Skill does boost Recovery Potency, but only in very short bursts.

Wyrmprints

Some of the best prints for staves are F2P, notably Take My Hand, which gives a hefty 10% recovery potency. This makes up for its lack of stats in comparison to other prints, like Give Me Your Wounded, though it lacks the Full HP Defense which can really help with the initial blast. Lousie’s Hobbies is another good pick. Stay away from HP conditional prints, as you’ll need healing the most when you’re low.

Frigid Sting: The Void 5★ dagger offers a quick and easy grind compared to the IO choice, and it also features two relevant Abilities in Full HP Defense and 8% Brunhilda’s Bane.

Lux Lamina: The standard 5★ has excellent stats and the Cobalt Strength Skill for additional DPS, but like most weapons, it requires high investment to craft.

Wyrmprints

Daggers have a fast moving crit focused playstyle, so their top picks are prints like Levin’s Champion, Stellar Show, and The Prince of Dragonyule. F2P print choices are the ever popular Plunder Pals and Hitting the Books.

Currently, there are no Void Wands viable for High Brunhilda. This means your choices are between the 5★ and 4★ IO weapons.

Ocean Monarch: In nearly every way, Ocean Monarch is superior to the Rod of Tears. Its stats are far higher and its active is a relevant damage ability. The only true disadvantage is that the Monarch requires an extremely hefty grind in IO to obtain plus limited Twinkling Sands, and perhaps that unlike Rod of Tears, its active can’t be used to cheese certain abilities. Still, using this weapon will really free up your other options as it has such a massive boost to your strength and HP.

Rod of Tears: The main draws of this weapon is that it requires fewer resources to obtain, plus its Active Lachrymal Protection can help Lily users skate by the HP check. However, its lacking Strength has to be made up elsewhere (whether through Facilities, Wyrmprints, or a Dragon) to avoid timing out against the boss.

Wyrmprints

Wands value skill damage the most, so F2P prints like Hitting the Books and Plunder Pals are decent picks. Better choices would be Valiant Crown, Resounding Rendition, and Heralds of Hinomoto. If you’re a bit low on HP, Crystalline Envoy both packs good skill damage and flame res that can make survival easier.

Dragons

5★ Gacha Dragons

Leviathan: The best DPS dragon, providing the largest strength boost at 40-60%. The only drawback to Leviathan is that while he provides a massive Strength boost, the lack of HP must be made up with other equipment or with multiple unbinds to Leviathan.

Simurgh: The best dragon for the healer at a 40% HP boost, and a very inferior choice for anyone else. Her Overdrive punisher +60% should be largely ignored, as it’s not very relevant for a low-damage healer. Simurgh brings a lot of utility thanks to her group heal, making her far superior to other HP dragon choices.

Poseidon: Once a popular meta choice, the mixed 20-30% HP/STR boost Poseidon has fallen out of favor as HP requirements relaxed thanks to Slime Statue, Dragonata and double Wyrmprints. However, don’t underestimate how useful Poseidon can still be for those building on a budget. His weakness is that you will need to make up his lower Strength bonus when compared to pure DPS dragons. He's also very viable for healers.

Dragonyule Jeanne: Essentially, Jeanne is a Critical-focused dragon who has identical stats to Leviathan but a passive Ability that boosts both Strength and Critical Rate. She's the premier option for Orsem or any other Dagger user, but breaks even for other DPS.

F2P Dragons

Peng Lai: As a pure HP30% dragon, Peng Lai is only suitable for healers, and should only be used at max level and max unbound. His low stats make him only barely superior to MUB Poli’ahu, though is Bog is more relevant.

High Mercury: On paper, High Mercury is everything you would want from a F2P dragon, with a stat line only slightly inferior to gatcha 5★ dragons, a great 20-30% HP/STR boost, and an ability that inflicts bog. So what’s the catch? The absolutely massive amount of grinding and investment that is required to obtain and MUB her. You will need to grind High Mercury for months to obtain this dragon. If you do have High Mercury, she’s a great pick.

4★ Dragons

Voldyanoy - The DPS choice for 4★ dragons, Vodyanoy has a great 30-45% strength boost. When MUB, he’s superior to a gatcha 5★ that isn’t MUB. There is an argument to be made that he’s superior to both Poseidon and High Mercury even if they are MUB, thanks to his 15% higher Strength boost, but he does have lower stats, and the lack of an HP boost means that using Voldyanoy will require you to heavily invest in other areas to hit minimums.

Poli’ahu - As a mixed dragon, Poli’ahu suffers as she provides only a 15-20% HP/STR boost. To use Poli’ahu, you must heavily invest in a weapon, print, and Mana Circles, or have multiple water facilities to make up for the lack of stats this dragon provides.

Attack Rotations

Table Version

Thaniel's most essential heals are listed in italics.

Phase One

Opens with Scorching Blast, the HP check.

• Brunhilda jumps backwards.

• Fire Breath indicated by exclamation marks above her head.

• Dash attacks and swipe

• Healing Wave

• A divebomb, Crimson Inferno 1, in which she jumps in the air, targets the furthest character (usually Thaniel or Lily) and lands in an orb of fire. Unlike the regular trials variant, the circle is much larger and not telegraphed.

• Volcanic Blitz 1 or “the volcanoes” leave solid barriers which ranged attackers can hide behind. Since they’re telegraphed, try to land these surrounding High Brunhilda so that they box her in.

• Another Crimson Inferno 2 dive.

• Fire Breath

• Healing Wave

• Hellfire 1 is a series of four radial blasts punctuated by dash attacks. The way to avoid these is by hiding inside or behind the volcanoes, though one will disintegrate with each blast. Note that the dash attacks have knockback, so players hit by these are especially vulnerable to the hellfire blasts. If anyone gets hit, use Healing Wave or Marine Healing.

• Seafarer’s Pride right before Flame Chaser lands

• Flame Chaser 1: Another homing attack, analogous to Midgardsormr’s Storm Chaser but much larger. Separate immediately to four corners of the map, leaving DPS (Orsem or Xainfried) near the boss.

• Searing Pillar 1: Pile on top of one another to divide the damage.

• Marine Healing

• Fire Breath

• The Meteors, a series of four purple telegraphed attacks that sequentially target one player. Dodge-roll these and stay moving so that they land along one side of the map, preferably away from teammates.

• Healing Wave

• Crimson Inferno 3

Phase Two

Opens with Grand Muspelheim which is initiated by High Brunhilda reaching Overdrive.

• Boss takes flight and creates a huge patch of lava dividing the platform. Everyone should gather one one side for the next Searing Pillar. Thaniel and Lily can Force Strike her a bit, while Xainfried can stab from a distance (but only using the first stab of his weapon combo)

• Seafarer’s Pride right as the red marker appears

• Searing Pillar 2; order is reversed now.

• Healing Wave

• Flame Chaser 2. Once again, the goal is to scatter and keep Orsem near the boss.

• Marine Healing

• Meteors

• Crimson Inferno

• Fire Breath

• Volcanic Blitz 2

• Hellfire 2, use Healing Wave as needed

• Flame Chaser 3

• Searing Pillar 3

• Fire Breath

Phase Three

Opens with Grand X Muspelheim.

• Flame Chaser 4, now the lava patch is a chunky x-shape with four safe corners. The group should divide based on pre-planned coordination, and Thaniel uses Healing Wave once the purple markers appear.

• Afterwards, the barrier clears and Searing Pillar 4 begins. Time to use Marine Healing if the party is in trouble.

• Volcanic Blitz 3

• Crimson Inferno

• Fire Breath

• Hellfire 3

• Flame Chaser 5

• Searing Pillar 5. If Brunhilda’s health is low at this point, the targeted player may wish to sacrifice themselves and take the Pillar alone, allowing others to finish off the boss. A well-timed Shapeshift can also be used at this time, though the targeting is random.

Details

Volcanic Blitz and Hellfire

Brunhilda will target each player with a homing purple AoE that does minimal damage, applies Burn, and leaves a volcano obstacle. Then come waves of Hellfire which must be blocked by standing in or behind the volcanoes. These will disintegrate one by one with each Hellfire, so placing them in a line surrounding High Brunhilda is ideal. Overlapping the second and  fourth volcanoes lines up a replacement for lost safe spots.

Flame Chaser and Searing Pillar

Notice how the second sequence reverses order? This is deliberate-- coordination is key to navigating around the two different Muspelheims. Tanking both hits requires full HP, so most of Thaniel’s heals will be timed around these.

For the Muspelheim's single line of lava, most players gather on the right to take Searing Pillar. For X-Muspelheim, which is followed by a Flame Chaser, the team must instead split up into four corners.

Fire Breath

This is a 180 degree sweep going left to right, centered on the nearest player (likely Orsem). Look for an exclamation mark appearing above her head.

There are several ways to avoid this attack:

• Best: Bait away from group entirely
• Okay: Bait right so that the flame moves clockwise, giving Thaniel and Lily time to move away
• Last resort: Skill iframes

Rewards

• ‘Conqueror of Flame’ Epithet
• High Brunhilda 5★ Dragon (bought and unbound with Flamewyrm’s Greatspheres)
• Flame Fafnir Statue
• Dragonfruit, Talonstones, Flamewyrm’s Scaldscales

Sources

“Dragalia Lost - Stats Calculator” by Jun Li, accessed January 04, 2019. See: https://junlico.github.io/dragalia-lost/

Brotel, “High Brunhilda's Moveset and Attack Patterns Guide | Dragalia Lost.” Youtube, 8 Feb. 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvBpRgH6AAc

“Thaniel Guide” by Delta (Delta#0785, u/DeltaRumble), accessed February 11th, 2019. See: https://www.docdroid.net/G20ECyn/thaniel-guide.pdf