If someone in your party has a hammer or similar armor-busting weapon, this boss is quite easy. He goes down very fast. But if matchmaking throws you into a group that has no such weapon, the boss is almost impossible to kill.
It is only possible to damage him with the following in that situation:
Fully charged melee attacks (very slow, high risk)
Headshots (extremely difficult, low damage relative to his HP)
Bombs (limited, low damage)
Certain class abilities (limited, low damage)
You need a hammer or equally strong anti-armor weapon to beat this boss in almost all situations. It might have been possible to whittle him down without such a weapon in your party, if not for the continuous flood of adds - including more armored enemies - that must be dealt with.
As it stands this fight is either trivial or essentially impossible, and nowhere in between. I’m not sure what the solution is, aside from removing or reducing his armor drastically. I feel that something needs to be done though because I don’t think it is Fatshark’s intent to make certain builds/loadouts mandatory for certain missions, especially in Quickplay where you have no control over party composition.
Just a note, heavy attacks do not need to be fully charged. Most heavy attacks do the same damage charged for any length of time with a couple of exceptions (Rapiers and Picks).
From my experience most weapons seem to do enough damage to the boss. It’ll certainly be harder with some team comps, but the only time the team is actually crippled in my opinion is when there’s a Mace + Shield Kruber and a Hammer + Shield Bardin together.
It’s frustrating to play the map because there is no preparation before the boss. No health and no ammo box. If people had that it’d alleviate some headache.
But you’re also right that certain weapons are vital to get through this after the hectic map itself. Beam staff, hammers, some good crowd control (on legend especially), Bounty Hunter Saltzpyre of course. It’s harsh going.
Thankfully Fatshark were so lenient to place a nice steep cliff right next to the spawn so you can jump down and get a map going that is actually worth playing.
You can burst him down with virtually any setup if youve saved up 1-2 concentration potions and give them to the right person. Their ultimate staggers him and no matter how bad your team comp is, you can just clobber him to death as hes caught in an endless staggering loop. All it takes is a little bit of planning ahead and a tad self restraint on the ppl carrying the potions.
Problems like these are why we really need the inventory box at the start of a mission back. Equipping a weapon you deem necessary based on your allies gear, or the map you’re on.
I wasn’t “running” any party comp, it was Quickplay with matchmaking. The comp is 100% random and you will get thrown into parties with no armor penetration sometimes.
Which characters did you randomly get paired up with and what weapons were you/they running?
I just find it rather odd that out of the 4 different characters and all their various weapons and fire modes that none of them were packing any AP. It’s always on my mind that armoured targets are going to be a thing, so I’m rather intruiged what loadouts would end up with 0 ability to do even moderate armour damage.
Also helps if the players (who aren’t chased by the boss) understands that killing the trash should be the top priority instead of tunneling for the boss.
He isn’t terrible himself. You just always need to focus on adds always priority. When I see people die it is usually because they got hit from behind by single rat that dropped down or they didn’t respect the aoe cleave or they don’t know how to parry/dodge the knife attacks.
you can take your time on the boss just focus on adds and dodging hits. kite him around the little square column near the back of the room when he is on knife mode. if you see him focus a teammate while using the knives try to hit him in back to stagger and interrupt. it is doable with anything
And you can sometimes keep a single shield rat alive and he will just stay in corner and you can shoot him for a while.
the boss is doable, but what makes him feel hard is that there’s no loot stash before him like there is in halescourge and warcamp, and teammates don’t respawn in his room like others if they die.
I don’t remember all of that, but I can say that we had zero problem burning through the mission up to the boss. We just couldn’t damage it fast enough when we got there, in spite of a heroic effort by all four of us.
Can’t really take your time on this boss, it seems to have a soft enrage. After a certain amount of time the arena starts flooding with constant adds, including more armor rats and plague rats. You have to kill him fast or you will be overwhelmed.
No man you have plenty of time to kill him. You’re probably just having trouble with the knife attacks. Focus the adds always a priority and whittle him down as you can. The adds are always manageable just so long as you actually have everyone focus them, aren’t spread out all over the arena, and your teammates are using their specials correctly. There’s no reason you can’t handle some trash and a few stormvermine while Spinemanglr is just standing in a corner yelling at you.
The rate you damage the boss is irrelevant. However long you think is “too long” for that boss fight to take I promise you I’ve beaten worse there. Did it with two people down just tank kruber and tank bardin, got big old stinky hordes of trash could only whittle his health down but we beat it.
The adds don’t just show up when he’s doing his thing in the corner. They come in very quick intervals the entire time, while you’re trying to deal with his attacks. You must be getting better players than me or something, because in my runs I end up having to deal with the adds and the boss ends up taking no damage because it’s impossible for one person to manage both.
Umm no sweetie. There is constantly like 5 individual rats that drop down and you should always keep an eye out for them, smack them then hit the boss a few times then turn and smack the next set of rats. But on phase switch he summons adds like a small horde and some stormvermin and he goes and stands in a corner and if you try to melee him there he will just aoe cleave you after a hit or two.
Honestly you just need to git gud, and this is something I’ve never said before. But you’re being obstinate when I tell you the boss is fine. It is a hard boss because teammates don’t respawn in the room and there’s no healthpack ammo stash before the boss, but he doesn’t require a certain team comp as you suggest. I’ve beaten him after many many waves of adds, beaten him after two teammates immediately died right at the start and justs Foot Knight and Ironbreaker fighting him chipping off his health.
Anyone can use Shrapnel trait on their trinket and carry a bomb. Any can use strength potion with potion share. These will help. But apart from the aoe sometimes hitting you from a mile away, it is a very good tuned boss, very fair, and definitely beatable with any class.
Talk to your team tell them everyone has to kill the adds. Once adds are done you can all focus boss then go back to adds.
