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DESCRIBE THE BEST BOSS YOU'VE DESIGNED
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LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
LockeZ
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CloseOne of my favorite bosses that I've designed is Grahf, for my Squaresoft crossover game. I've posted this in another topic before, but I wanted to hear other people describe what they think are the best bosses they've designed.
So that's what this topic is: Describe the best boss you've designed, gameplay-wise. You don't necessarily have to give as much detail as I'm about to, but I personally really enjoy the details and would love to see them if you feel like it. The goal here is to give other people inspiration to make more cool boss fights. So here's my example, Grahf.
My goal was to create a boss that felt like it was directly using Xenogears mechanics without being anywhere near as boring as actual bosses in Xenogears. I mean, all Grahf actually did in Xenogears was deal damage, deal more damage, and occasionally dispel you with Black Hole. All he did when he was in his gear was damage and damage and damage.
What I did was use Xenogears's deathblow system to give the player a way to predict how much damage would be dealt. I also used that game's fuel system. Both of these systems were player-only in the original game, but here they're used for the enemy. Then I had Grahf get in and out of his gear (the Xenogears word for "giant battle robot") based on it being disabled or out of fuel.
Keep in mind that a combat round in this game is only a couple seconds, so the amount of time that effects and timers last might sound kind of long if you're thinking in terms of VX Ace combat rounds.
Phase 1: Alpha Weltall
- Alpha Weltall has a limit of 3000 fuel.
- Booster increases both the damage and fuel cost of Alpha Weltall's skills by 10% until the end of the battle. Stacks with itself infinitely. Not used under normal circumstances.
- Building Strike, a basic strike which also increases Alpha Weltall's attack level by one, up to a maximum of three. This allows for stronger deathblows. 30 fuel.
- Raigeki, a level 1 deathblow. Mid power. 50 fuel. Lowers attack level by one.
- Hazen, a level 2 deathblow. High power. 90 fuel. Lowers attack level by one.
- Ryubu, a level 3 deathblow. Extreme power. 140 fuel. Lowers attack level by one.
Alpha Weltall's attack level starts at zero. It increases every time the boss uses Building Strike and decreases every time it uses a deathblow. Each deathblow requires a certain attack level.
When Alpha Weltall has an attack level of 0, it will always use Building Strike. When it has an attack level of 3, it will always use a deathblow. When it has an attack level of 1 or 2, it has a 50/50 chance of using either Building Strike or a deathblow.
The amount of fuel remaining is shown every time it uses a skill, as is its attack level.
Alpha Weltall is not immune to any status effects except poison and demi. However, on any round when it cannot act, it will use Booster instead. This lets players trade a temporary reprieve for additional danger later.
If Alpha Weltall cannot act for four rounds in a row, Grahf will emerge, becoming targetable. He will also emerge if Alpha Weltall runs out of fuel. Alpha Weltall's attack level is reset if Grahf emerges. This starts phase 2.
If Alpha Weltall is killed while Grahf is inside, Grahf emerges permanently. However, Alpha Weltall can take vastly more damage than Grahf. So unless you are extremely high level, the goal is typically to either disable Alpha Weltall or survive until it runs out of fuel, then use all your burst damage on Grahf.
Phase 2: Grahf
- Raijin does low physical damage to one target.
- Super Guided Shot strikes two targets for high magical damage. Unreflectable.
- Black Hole, AOE dispel, chance to be resisted based on each target's willpower. 30 round cooldown, which means this will only get used once per emerge.
- Refreshment, which Grahf casts on Alpha Weltall if it is affected by any status ailment. This is a ticking buff that heals all ailments every 3 rounds, and lasts 18 rounds. Refreshment is a basic white magic skill that the player is already very familiar with by this point in the game - it has nothing to do with Xenogears but is an interesting way to mitigate the usefulness of powerful status effects like Paralyze and Mini in this fight, which some player classes are capable of inflicting for 20 rounds or longer.
- Recharge, which refills 1000 fuel to Alpha Weltall. Only used if Alpha Weltall is missing at least 1000 fuel.
Grahf emerges from Alpha Weltall from time to time, using hand-to-hand combat. While Grahf is fighting, Alpha Weltall performs no actions or melee attacks, not even Booster, since no one is piloting it. It can still be damaged, however. Grahf's attacks are strong, on par with Alpha Weltall's level 2 and 3 deathblows.
Grahf himself is immune to all ailments.
After 10 rounds, Grahf will re-enter Alpha Weltall, returning to Phase 1 and becoming untargettable again, unless Alpha Weltall is dead.
So that's what this topic is: Describe the best boss you've designed, gameplay-wise. You don't necessarily have to give as much detail as I'm about to, but I personally really enjoy the details and would love to see them if you feel like it. The goal here is to give other people inspiration to make more cool boss fights. So here's my example, Grahf.
My goal was to create a boss that felt like it was directly using Xenogears mechanics without being anywhere near as boring as actual bosses in Xenogears. I mean, all Grahf actually did in Xenogears was deal damage, deal more damage, and occasionally dispel you with Black Hole. All he did when he was in his gear was damage and damage and damage.
What I did was use Xenogears's deathblow system to give the player a way to predict how much damage would be dealt. I also used that game's fuel system. Both of these systems were player-only in the original game, but here they're used for the enemy. Then I had Grahf get in and out of his gear (the Xenogears word for "giant battle robot") based on it being disabled or out of fuel.
Keep in mind that a combat round in this game is only a couple seconds, so the amount of time that effects and timers last might sound kind of long if you're thinking in terms of VX Ace combat rounds.
Phase 1: Alpha Weltall
- Alpha Weltall has a limit of 3000 fuel.
- Booster increases both the damage and fuel cost of Alpha Weltall's skills by 10% until the end of the battle. Stacks with itself infinitely. Not used under normal circumstances.
- Building Strike, a basic strike which also increases Alpha Weltall's attack level by one, up to a maximum of three. This allows for stronger deathblows. 30 fuel.
- Raigeki, a level 1 deathblow. Mid power. 50 fuel. Lowers attack level by one.
- Hazen, a level 2 deathblow. High power. 90 fuel. Lowers attack level by one.
- Ryubu, a level 3 deathblow. Extreme power. 140 fuel. Lowers attack level by one.
Alpha Weltall's attack level starts at zero. It increases every time the boss uses Building Strike and decreases every time it uses a deathblow. Each deathblow requires a certain attack level.
When Alpha Weltall has an attack level of 0, it will always use Building Strike. When it has an attack level of 3, it will always use a deathblow. When it has an attack level of 1 or 2, it has a 50/50 chance of using either Building Strike or a deathblow.
The amount of fuel remaining is shown every time it uses a skill, as is its attack level.
Alpha Weltall is not immune to any status effects except poison and demi. However, on any round when it cannot act, it will use Booster instead. This lets players trade a temporary reprieve for additional danger later.
If Alpha Weltall cannot act for four rounds in a row, Grahf will emerge, becoming targetable. He will also emerge if Alpha Weltall runs out of fuel. Alpha Weltall's attack level is reset if Grahf emerges. This starts phase 2.
If Alpha Weltall is killed while Grahf is inside, Grahf emerges permanently. However, Alpha Weltall can take vastly more damage than Grahf. So unless you are extremely high level, the goal is typically to either disable Alpha Weltall or survive until it runs out of fuel, then use all your burst damage on Grahf.
Phase 2: Grahf
- Raijin does low physical damage to one target.
- Super Guided Shot strikes two targets for high magical damage. Unreflectable.
- Black Hole, AOE dispel, chance to be resisted based on each target's willpower. 30 round cooldown, which means this will only get used once per emerge.
- Refreshment, which Grahf casts on Alpha Weltall if it is affected by any status ailment. This is a ticking buff that heals all ailments every 3 rounds, and lasts 18 rounds. Refreshment is a basic white magic skill that the player is already very familiar with by this point in the game - it has nothing to do with Xenogears but is an interesting way to mitigate the usefulness of powerful status effects like Paralyze and Mini in this fight, which some player classes are capable of inflicting for 20 rounds or longer.
- Recharge, which refills 1000 fuel to Alpha Weltall. Only used if Alpha Weltall is missing at least 1000 fuel.
Grahf emerges from Alpha Weltall from time to time, using hand-to-hand combat. While Grahf is fighting, Alpha Weltall performs no actions or melee attacks, not even Booster, since no one is piloting it. It can still be damaged, however. Grahf's attacks are strong, on par with Alpha Weltall's level 2 and 3 deathblows.
Grahf himself is immune to all ailments.
After 10 rounds, Grahf will re-enter Alpha Weltall, returning to Phase 1 and becoming untargettable again, unless Alpha Weltall is dead.
It was a slime, really big, and would temporarily eat a hero and a few turns later, would spit them out at one of the other heroes. It therefore stopped 1 heroes' turn at a time, which made it difficult!
Gredge109
4151
My favorite boss is a recent creation from the Kid's Design event. It's Coulduss from my short boss-rush game, Archstone.
He's a giant demon squid who acts as the final boss of the game (as the actual final boss is meant to be defeated with ease).
The battle starts out in phase 1 as the player and boss exchange blows. Coulduss has some solid damage but won't do anyrhing spectacular at first.
But after a few rounds, phase two begins, where Coulduss targets the mind of one of the two human player characters. As a result, he pulls them into a nightmare where they must battle a mirror of themselves.
The mirror has all of the abilities the player character has, along with a few tweaks. For example, while one of the characters can freeze an opponent and stop their actions, the mirror can only slow the player. Likewise, for the other player character, the mirror will use the same spells but will never inflict poison on the player, as poison is the most powerful damage in the game. Because of how taxing this skirmish is, I restore this character's health and energy following combat.
After a few rounds surviving, the character is woken from their nightmare, and returns to the battle with Coulduss.
This is phase 3. Coulduss is going all out, and he has a buff to prove it. "All-in" focuses all of Coulduss power on their raw attack power, while lowering its guard. He'll hit real hard during this buff.
Additionally, Coulduss will use a tentacle to "Thwap" a character, knocking them out of combat for a turn. It only lasts one turn, and the idea is that the character got knocked out of combat and had to run back.
Eventually Coulduss can be worn down and defeated. His attack power can be nerfed, and his self-inflicted weakness can be exploited. It's a satisfying conclusion, and I enjoy fighting this boss a lot. You feel your characters getting stronger as they acclimate to the battle and eventually overpower the most deadly enemy of the game.
He's a giant demon squid who acts as the final boss of the game (as the actual final boss is meant to be defeated with ease).
The battle starts out in phase 1 as the player and boss exchange blows. Coulduss has some solid damage but won't do anyrhing spectacular at first.
But after a few rounds, phase two begins, where Coulduss targets the mind of one of the two human player characters. As a result, he pulls them into a nightmare where they must battle a mirror of themselves.
The mirror has all of the abilities the player character has, along with a few tweaks. For example, while one of the characters can freeze an opponent and stop their actions, the mirror can only slow the player. Likewise, for the other player character, the mirror will use the same spells but will never inflict poison on the player, as poison is the most powerful damage in the game. Because of how taxing this skirmish is, I restore this character's health and energy following combat.
After a few rounds surviving, the character is woken from their nightmare, and returns to the battle with Coulduss.
This is phase 3. Coulduss is going all out, and he has a buff to prove it. "All-in" focuses all of Coulduss power on their raw attack power, while lowering its guard. He'll hit real hard during this buff.
Additionally, Coulduss will use a tentacle to "Thwap" a character, knocking them out of combat for a turn. It only lasts one turn, and the idea is that the character got knocked out of combat and had to run back.
Eventually Coulduss can be worn down and defeated. His attack power can be nerfed, and his self-inflicted weakness can be exploited. It's a satisfying conclusion, and I enjoy fighting this boss a lot. You feel your characters getting stronger as they acclimate to the battle and eventually overpower the most deadly enemy of the game.
KoopaKush
3024
Currently in the game I am developing, there is an optional boss by the name of Lord Viride, a dragon deity of life.
There is a core mechanic built around him where every X amount of turns he will spawn a single seed on the battlefield. These seeds come in 4 variations, green, red, purple, and brown.
The brown seed will act as a buffer, debuffer and attacker. It will dish out attacks, stun a party member, cast sleep, and as well as power up the main boss.
The green seed while not having attacks, will heal the main boss by a pretty substantial amount if kept alive for too long.
The red seed is highly volatile and will explode when damage is dealt to it, the explosion will hurt both the party and the boss, or you can wait for the boss to respawn another seed in its place, although ignoring it can result in party members being afflicted with the Burn status.
The purple seed is extremely poisonous and must be avoided at all times. If any member strikes it, it will unleash poisonous spores that will Poison the entire party. If you choose to ignore it, it will simply wither away in X amount of turns.
The dragon deity himself has an abundance of spells, including an aoe Silence, lower your resistance against a specific element. Every X amount of turns, the player will be notified that the boss is preparing a nuke-like spell against your party. This is where defending really starts to shine.
I think that's about it for this encounter, I feel like it's a pretty interesting fight most people will enjoy. There is also that sense of RNG on which seed will be spawned, so players will need to be aware of their stats, health, spells, etc.
There is a core mechanic built around him where every X amount of turns he will spawn a single seed on the battlefield. These seeds come in 4 variations, green, red, purple, and brown.
The brown seed will act as a buffer, debuffer and attacker. It will dish out attacks, stun a party member, cast sleep, and as well as power up the main boss.
The green seed while not having attacks, will heal the main boss by a pretty substantial amount if kept alive for too long.
The red seed is highly volatile and will explode when damage is dealt to it, the explosion will hurt both the party and the boss, or you can wait for the boss to respawn another seed in its place, although ignoring it can result in party members being afflicted with the Burn status.
The purple seed is extremely poisonous and must be avoided at all times. If any member strikes it, it will unleash poisonous spores that will Poison the entire party. If you choose to ignore it, it will simply wither away in X amount of turns.
The dragon deity himself has an abundance of spells, including an aoe Silence, lower your resistance against a specific element. Every X amount of turns, the player will be notified that the boss is preparing a nuke-like spell against your party. This is where defending really starts to shine.
I think that's about it for this encounter, I feel like it's a pretty interesting fight most people will enjoy. There is also that sense of RNG on which seed will be spawned, so players will need to be aware of their stats, health, spells, etc.
I have two and both are less about the skills and more about how the battles play out. (Gonna cheat ;p )
The first was a side-view battle system in 2000 way back when. I basically used rips from Fire Emblem and had a battle background that had the default sprite on it. When it came time for the enemy to attack, the battle animation would show a part of that background without the sprite and the animation would walk over to the hero and attack. There was another aspect, though, that I liked quite a bit - the boss had a certain number of items to use.
Basically I gave the enemy a pack of items that could be stolen from but also used. So it had a randomly generated amount of healing and damage items at its disposal and could use them under certain conditions. Then it would be removed from their pack, making the uses they had be limited. This allowed them to use skills tied to MP without worrying about using MP for healing and other attacks, but also allowed the hero to steal the items from them (and have them decrease in amount when stolen).
It also gave the illusion of a fair battle since the enemy was as restricted by items as the hero, and also made it feel a bit more 'real' since the items and such used were the ones from the game, with the same amount of healing and damage. I thought it was a pretty neat idea and will probably be using it again in the future.
The other boss battle I liked a lot was a variable boss that had a few ways to defeat it. There was a timer, a few based on how well you were doing and losing to the enemy to end the battle. The timer was hidden and quite long, so as to give you the chance to get to the end of the battle.
One of the other options checked to see if a certain character was given a charm status effect (boyfriend to the sorceress). If so, the sorceress got a significant boost to her skillset that allowed her to be able to beat the boss in a few hits. If you didn't finish her off by then, though, she would power up herself and do a party wipe (didn't lead to a game over).
Another path was if the sorceress fell in the battle, everyone else would get angry and get a small boost.
The changes in the battle led to different dialogue during the battle, different skills being used by the boss, as well as slightly different scenes after the battle was concluded. I like this kind of battle a lot and will be using it in the future.
(The only issue with this battle in particular was that I fucked a few things up when it came to the eventing so that one of the 'ends' didn't work. >.<; )
The first was a side-view battle system in 2000 way back when. I basically used rips from Fire Emblem and had a battle background that had the default sprite on it. When it came time for the enemy to attack, the battle animation would show a part of that background without the sprite and the animation would walk over to the hero and attack. There was another aspect, though, that I liked quite a bit - the boss had a certain number of items to use.
Basically I gave the enemy a pack of items that could be stolen from but also used. So it had a randomly generated amount of healing and damage items at its disposal and could use them under certain conditions. Then it would be removed from their pack, making the uses they had be limited. This allowed them to use skills tied to MP without worrying about using MP for healing and other attacks, but also allowed the hero to steal the items from them (and have them decrease in amount when stolen).
It also gave the illusion of a fair battle since the enemy was as restricted by items as the hero, and also made it feel a bit more 'real' since the items and such used were the ones from the game, with the same amount of healing and damage. I thought it was a pretty neat idea and will probably be using it again in the future.
The other boss battle I liked a lot was a variable boss that had a few ways to defeat it. There was a timer, a few based on how well you were doing and losing to the enemy to end the battle. The timer was hidden and quite long, so as to give you the chance to get to the end of the battle.
One of the other options checked to see if a certain character was given a charm status effect (boyfriend to the sorceress). If so, the sorceress got a significant boost to her skillset that allowed her to be able to beat the boss in a few hits. If you didn't finish her off by then, though, she would power up herself and do a party wipe (didn't lead to a game over).
Another path was if the sorceress fell in the battle, everyone else would get angry and get a small boost.
The changes in the battle led to different dialogue during the battle, different skills being used by the boss, as well as slightly different scenes after the battle was concluded. I like this kind of battle a lot and will be using it in the future.
(The only issue with this battle in particular was that I fucked a few things up when it came to the eventing so that one of the 'ends' didn't work. >.<; )
A large dungeon spanning four 50x50 maps (plus several small 5x4 stairwells). The boss was the dungeon itself. Supposedly, you were navigating the memories of one of your love interests, who died recently, to gain information about his murderer.
The dungeon itself was nothing impressive. But I think I did a pretty good job with the narration leading to, during, and immediately after the said dungeon sequence.
But as is tradition, the game was "set aside for future reference".
The dungeon itself was nothing impressive. But I think I did a pretty good job with the narration leading to, during, and immediately after the said dungeon sequence.
But as is tradition, the game was "set aside for future reference".
RyaReisender
200
A large dungeon spanning four 50x50 maps (plus several small 5x4 stairwells). The boss was the dungeon itself.
Heh, I've designed quite some dungeon I'm proud of. Definitely more proud of than any of the bosses I designed.
Designing more interesting boss battles is something I only really started doing like 12 years ago.
Not really a boss battle but a harder random encounter (which I called Fateful Encounter in the game):
The game has three times of slime: Green, Blue and Red. Green is weak to fire, blue is weak to lightning and red is weak to ice. Then there is a Fateful Encounter with a slime stack of a blue, green and red slime. It's weak to all elements, but strong to normal attacks (like all slimes). If you hit it with Fire, it splits into a green and a blue/red slime (weak to lightning and ice). If you hit it with lightning, it split into a blue and a green/red slime (weak to fire and ice). If you hit it with ice, it splits into a red and a green/blue slime (weak to fire and lightning). Then if you hit the double stacked slimes with a weakness again, they also split up into separate slimes.
In the larger project I'm working on, there are several boss battles I like. The most important battle in the game actually has all the systems that get introduced over the game combined into one battle. I won't tell more about it as it would be a spoiler, though.
He doesn't get mad when I come into work a little late. He often takes us all out for lunch (his treat!) and sometimes orders a pitcher of beer. He is helpful, knowledgeable and patient, and wants to see me succeed. He shields the team from moronic requests from upper management. He sets realistic timelines for projects and tasks. He understands that family is important.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Kentona, it doesn't count if you only imagined it and it's not actually in play anywhere.
I've always been terrible at creature design, but somehow, I managed to make the type of boss I like to see in a game, in Dry Fate.
It was Lady Avril. I know some people complained about how much HP she had. I balanced her on the prediction that you would face most of the enemies throughout the game instead of running, and as such, you'd be at level seven when you faced her. She had two minions with her. They didn't have attacks, but one locked attacks, and the other locked magic. Her attacks were otherwise standard, but she wound up being genuinely hard when other enemies significantly stronger than her were nowhere near as difficult to defeat. And I mean, I tested her at the max level, and she was still hard while enemies stronger than her still went down easy. I still can't figure out how I managed to make her such a nightmare to overcome. The big HP annoyed a few people, but that only seemed to be a minor part of what made her so hard (it took a little while to beat her.). The only thing I can think is that it was the minions that were able to lock your abilities.
It was Lady Avril. I know some people complained about how much HP she had. I balanced her on the prediction that you would face most of the enemies throughout the game instead of running, and as such, you'd be at level seven when you faced her. She had two minions with her. They didn't have attacks, but one locked attacks, and the other locked magic. Her attacks were otherwise standard, but she wound up being genuinely hard when other enemies significantly stronger than her were nowhere near as difficult to defeat. And I mean, I tested her at the max level, and she was still hard while enemies stronger than her still went down easy. I still can't figure out how I managed to make her such a nightmare to overcome. The big HP annoyed a few people, but that only seemed to be a minor part of what made her so hard (it took a little while to beat her.). The only thing I can think is that it was the minions that were able to lock your abilities.
Milennin
2060
Lol, it's the one you helped me design some years ago. Volcano serpent Savancaya is probably my favourite boss from my game, FADE, made in RPG Maker 2003.
Regardless of the state of the battle, and aside from attacking, Savancaya will always attempt to summon Lava Slimes each turn, summoning a random number between 1-5, with a much higher chance of summoning 3 or more when below 50% HP. Lava Slimes themselves do nothing and die against anything in 1 hit, but they need to be taken out fast.
Savancaya will always initiate battle with a heat wave skill, which lasts for 5 turns. It restores Savancaya's HP, and damages the player party, depending on how many of its minions are alive at the time. When it expires, it'll be cast again.
Between that, it has a regular attack, which isn't that impressive, but every few turns, it'll cast Meteor Crash, dealing massive damage to a single character. This happens more frequently in its second stage.
Additionally, the number of Slimes kept alive each turn add to a counter, and when that counter hits a certain number, it'll activate Savancaya's shield. In the first stage, the shield will protect from any kind of magic skill for one turn, while in the second stage, it'll protect from all auto attacks for one turn.
It's basically not that difficult to beat, as long as you keep down the number of Slimes to a minimum each turn. Two of the actors in the party have access to multi-damage spells at the time you get to this boss, and as long as you fuel their MP with one of the other character's MP regeneration skill, you can keep the number of Slimes down every time Savancaya summons a whole bunch of them while making progress to finishing him off.
Regardless of the state of the battle, and aside from attacking, Savancaya will always attempt to summon Lava Slimes each turn, summoning a random number between 1-5, with a much higher chance of summoning 3 or more when below 50% HP. Lava Slimes themselves do nothing and die against anything in 1 hit, but they need to be taken out fast.
Savancaya will always initiate battle with a heat wave skill, which lasts for 5 turns. It restores Savancaya's HP, and damages the player party, depending on how many of its minions are alive at the time. When it expires, it'll be cast again.
Between that, it has a regular attack, which isn't that impressive, but every few turns, it'll cast Meteor Crash, dealing massive damage to a single character. This happens more frequently in its second stage.
Additionally, the number of Slimes kept alive each turn add to a counter, and when that counter hits a certain number, it'll activate Savancaya's shield. In the first stage, the shield will protect from any kind of magic skill for one turn, while in the second stage, it'll protect from all auto attacks for one turn.
It's basically not that difficult to beat, as long as you keep down the number of Slimes to a minimum each turn. Two of the actors in the party have access to multi-damage spells at the time you get to this boss, and as long as you fuel their MP with one of the other character's MP regeneration skill, you can keep the number of Slimes down every time Savancaya summons a whole bunch of them while making progress to finishing him off.
I just scrapped one about an hour ago. That was revision 6, so I came here for inspiration on rendition 7. Final boss battles for games with lots of combat in the story but no actual combat in the gameplay are pretty tough to do.
Thanks, Karins. I think you solved my problem.
Thanks, Karins. I think you solved my problem.
Aegix_Drakan
6037
I'd need someone else to tell me what my best boss is. XD
I think they're mostly pretty decent, but none of them really jump out as "Best one ever".
Closest one is this:
Singing Green (Illusions of Loyalty)
3 color coded plants in a forest, who have been stalking you the whole time.
You have one big tough tanky green plant (Singing Green) that is the main enemy in the fight, and it's a strong damage dealer that typically lashes out with multi-hit attacks. Once it's low on HP it stops doing the vine wall thing (more on that later), and starts trying to heal itself by a large chunk every few turns, meaning that you need a heavy barrage of damage to actually finish it off.
Then there's Weeping Blue, which buffs and heals the boss party. The buffs are especially nasty, as the DEF buff will massively protect the boss for one turn, and the attack buff makes Singing Green's multihits REALLY dangerous.
Next up is Laughing Red, who specializes in full-party debuffs and status effects that make your life miserable.
Finally, the thing that holds everything together is that every few turns, Green will put up barriers of vines over the other two plants. These buff their defense to the point where they take no direct damage anymore. Further, once you kill one of the smaller plants, Green will start trying to revive them. It will start singing, giving you a one turn warning that it's about to revive its allies.
The key, then is this:
The vine barriers don't stop status effects. So you need to inflict the Silence state on Blue and maybe Red if you can to drastically reduce the amount of abilities they can use. Next, use a particular skill that disables "Cover" skills like the vine wall to make Blue damageable. Once you slaughter blue, keep the Green one silenced to prevent it from reviving Blue and keep wailing on it with all the damage you have.
There's another fight that's similar, involving a mage who keeps summoning new minions, and who has a massive high HP Minotaur "covering" him and his weaker summon, but while I REALLY like some of the things I did here, I still feel a tiny bit "Eh" about how I telegraphed though NPCs that he only has a limited number of Summons in the fight (Some people still don't realize he has a limited number and just end up brute forcing the battle by killing the mage instead of killing the weaker summon until he's out of Summons and then isolating him for the kill)
I also kinda like the HulkenSteve Mark 1 from Mayhem maiden (It's not in the demo build yet, it's in the next dungeon I've completed), which is a boss where the arms, legs and head all act as independent enemies. And since binding body parts is important to preventing enemies from using skills, this means you have to bind each one individually (unless you have the right upgrades for the heroine's turret, at which point you have a slight chance of putting some kind of bind on everything each turn). Even more fun, depending on how well you handle the dungeon's gimmick, you can start the battle with any number of the boss's parts "bound", giving you a head start. :P
I think they're mostly pretty decent, but none of them really jump out as "Best one ever".
Closest one is this:
Singing Green (Illusions of Loyalty)
3 color coded plants in a forest, who have been stalking you the whole time.
You have one big tough tanky green plant (Singing Green) that is the main enemy in the fight, and it's a strong damage dealer that typically lashes out with multi-hit attacks. Once it's low on HP it stops doing the vine wall thing (more on that later), and starts trying to heal itself by a large chunk every few turns, meaning that you need a heavy barrage of damage to actually finish it off.
Then there's Weeping Blue, which buffs and heals the boss party. The buffs are especially nasty, as the DEF buff will massively protect the boss for one turn, and the attack buff makes Singing Green's multihits REALLY dangerous.
Next up is Laughing Red, who specializes in full-party debuffs and status effects that make your life miserable.
Finally, the thing that holds everything together is that every few turns, Green will put up barriers of vines over the other two plants. These buff their defense to the point where they take no direct damage anymore. Further, once you kill one of the smaller plants, Green will start trying to revive them. It will start singing, giving you a one turn warning that it's about to revive its allies.
The key, then is this:
The vine barriers don't stop status effects. So you need to inflict the Silence state on Blue and maybe Red if you can to drastically reduce the amount of abilities they can use. Next, use a particular skill that disables "Cover" skills like the vine wall to make Blue damageable. Once you slaughter blue, keep the Green one silenced to prevent it from reviving Blue and keep wailing on it with all the damage you have.
There's another fight that's similar, involving a mage who keeps summoning new minions, and who has a massive high HP Minotaur "covering" him and his weaker summon, but while I REALLY like some of the things I did here, I still feel a tiny bit "Eh" about how I telegraphed though NPCs that he only has a limited number of Summons in the fight (Some people still don't realize he has a limited number and just end up brute forcing the battle by killing the mage instead of killing the weaker summon until he's out of Summons and then isolating him for the kill)
I also kinda like the HulkenSteve Mark 1 from Mayhem maiden (It's not in the demo build yet, it's in the next dungeon I've completed), which is a boss where the arms, legs and head all act as independent enemies. And since binding body parts is important to preventing enemies from using skills, this means you have to bind each one individually (unless you have the right upgrades for the heroine's turret, at which point you have a slight chance of putting some kind of bind on everything each turn). Even more fun, depending on how well you handle the dungeon's gimmick, you can start the battle with any number of the boss's parts "bound", giving you a head start. :P
Ramshackin
1462
I'll cheat and describe two.
The Prophet on the Hill
The Prophet has two skills. At the start of battle he adds an Extinction state to all battlers that lasts for the duration of the battle. When any battler dies with Extinction, they damage all other battlers. If any battler dies from that damage, they themselves deal damage to all remaining battlers and so on.
The boss has 6 zombie minions that do minor physical damage and can spread Disease, a poison like state that spreads between party members at the end of each turn.
The Prophet does nothing for most of the battle, but if all zombies are dead, he will use his second skill to revive them all.
The catch is the boss is immune to all damage except damage caused by Extinction. The zombies are pretty flimsy and will die in 2-3 hits from a player, and by the time 3 zombies have died, enough extinction damage has been done to kill the remaining 3, which easily snowballs into a full party wipe. The boss is balanced to survive the first "extinction event" but die on the second.
I love this boss because he plays so distinctly different from other battles in the game. If you charge in and start cutting down zombies, you'll wipe everyone, including the party, in the first few turns. You have to play cautiously and get a feel for how much you can attack a zombie without killing it, then slowly pace out the zombie deaths to give enough time to heal and keep HP at a point that at least one character will survive the chain reaction. Meanwhile the minor damage from the zombies adds up enough to mess up your plan.
Duke
Duke has one skill and no minions. On the first turn, he'll punch a party member for minor physical damage. On the second turn, he'll punch two. Three on the third turn, and so on.
At the start of the battle, he's a joke. The boss is rather early on in the game, so it gives the player a chance to learn how to maximize the party's skills rather than focus on reacting to the enemies.
But once you hit the eighth turn, you reach the tipping point where you spend more of your turn healing than doing damage. And the boss is getting stronger each turn. The last few turns become this frantic panic of desperation moves as you try to drain the last few hp from the boss as your party members start dropping.
The Prophet on the Hill
The Prophet has two skills. At the start of battle he adds an Extinction state to all battlers that lasts for the duration of the battle. When any battler dies with Extinction, they damage all other battlers. If any battler dies from that damage, they themselves deal damage to all remaining battlers and so on.
The boss has 6 zombie minions that do minor physical damage and can spread Disease, a poison like state that spreads between party members at the end of each turn.
The Prophet does nothing for most of the battle, but if all zombies are dead, he will use his second skill to revive them all.
The catch is the boss is immune to all damage except damage caused by Extinction. The zombies are pretty flimsy and will die in 2-3 hits from a player, and by the time 3 zombies have died, enough extinction damage has been done to kill the remaining 3, which easily snowballs into a full party wipe. The boss is balanced to survive the first "extinction event" but die on the second.
I love this boss because he plays so distinctly different from other battles in the game. If you charge in and start cutting down zombies, you'll wipe everyone, including the party, in the first few turns. You have to play cautiously and get a feel for how much you can attack a zombie without killing it, then slowly pace out the zombie deaths to give enough time to heal and keep HP at a point that at least one character will survive the chain reaction. Meanwhile the minor damage from the zombies adds up enough to mess up your plan.
Duke
Duke has one skill and no minions. On the first turn, he'll punch a party member for minor physical damage. On the second turn, he'll punch two. Three on the third turn, and so on.
At the start of the battle, he's a joke. The boss is rather early on in the game, so it gives the player a chance to learn how to maximize the party's skills rather than focus on reacting to the enemies.
But once you hit the eighth turn, you reach the tipping point where you spend more of your turn healing than doing damage. And the boss is getting stronger each turn. The last few turns become this frantic panic of desperation moves as you try to drain the last few hp from the boss as your party members start dropping.
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