Bell Bearing Hunter removed?

[Grey Dragon]

I recently decided to start a new game of Elden Ring and things went well until I started trying to fight the optional boss, the Bell Bearing Hunter. Just to be clear, I know how you're normally supposed to get this boss to spawn:

1 - Wait until night time
2 - Enter the location where the Hunter spawns, so that the name of the place appears on screen. There are separate encounters at the Warmaster's Shack, Isolated Merchant's Shack, Church of Vows and the Hermit Merchant's Shack.
3 - Rest at a site of grace or use the map to travel there and reload the area.

For some reason, this no longer works. Is there some hidden requirement that I've missed?

EDIT: The Bell Bearing Hunter encounters have returned, but I have no idea what changed. Elden Ring has not received any updates since I posted this thread.

[Sc0rpiTr0n]

Your save might have been corrupted by invader.
Keep manual backups of save file to avoid loss of progress.

You could also try verifying game files.

[Grey Dragon]

Originally posted by Sc0rpiTr0n:

Your save might have been corrupted by invader.
Keep manual backups of save file to avoid loss of progress.

You could also try verifying game files.

I haven't actually been invaded. Oddly enough, the Bell Bearing Hunter started to appear again as normal after I posted this thread, despite the game having had no updates since then. It still seems as if there might have been some hidden requirement that I missed.

[Agent Chieftain]

Bell bearing hunters have always been finicky. I often find I have to do some random number of resting, passing time, and fast travelling to make them spawn.

[youmeathead]

When you rest at a grace site near the bb bosses and switch to nightfall you have to unrest and rest again to actually get the game to recognize nightfall.

[Kitsunegari]

Never had this issue with Night's Cavalry. I've only had this issue with Bell Bearing Hunters.

[nfinite.recursion]

Originally posted by youmeathead:

When you rest at a grace site near the bb bosses and switch to nightfall you have to unrest and rest again to actually get the game to recognize nightfall.

^This. It's just... this.

[Kitsunegari]

Originally posted by nfinite.recursion:

Originally posted by youmeathead:

When you rest at a grace site near the bb bosses and switch to nightfall you have to unrest and rest again to actually get the game to recognize nightfall.

^This. It's just... this.

You also need to exhaust the dialogue of the local NPC.

[Grey Dragon]

Originally posted by Kitsunegari:

Originally posted by nfinite.recursion:

^This. It's just... this.

You also need to exhaust the dialogue of the local NPC.

Thank you. I hadn't realised it, but I hadn't yet exhausted the dialogue of the NPCs. This seems to have been the problem at all encounter sites.