What is the actual point of 2 phase bosses?

[catnipdave]

I've NEVER liked multiple phase bosses, never understood the reason why they exist in games.

1, It will always take time to learn first phase and beat it
2. You are then very likely to die straight away in the 2nd phase because you haven't learnt the move-set.
3. The first phase then becomes a tedious chore to slog through just to learn the 2nd phase.

It feels kind of SADISTIC to me, unless anyone understands the design philosophy behind it?

[Pink Eye]

Sepulcher lähetti viestin:

Thing is FromSoftware actually tries to balance the two phases.

It used to be that second phase would trigger at half HPs. Boss will still have the same amount of HPs at start of second phase too. I miss those days.

[Farkus]

The occasional 2 life bar boss can be a cool "Oh sh*t" moment where the relief of beating a hard boss is followed up by the sinking feeling that it isn't over yet. However if you do it too much, players will start to expect it and then it becomes less cool and more annoying.

[catnipdave]

Aetrion lähetti viestin:

I like multi-stage bosses, but I hate it when they get a whole new health bar. Just make them transform when they hit half of their bar, or whatever the ratio is between the health of their stages.

What's the point of faking the player out? One cheap death on their first time beating stage 1 because they thought they were close to the end and started spending their resources more recklessly?

Doesn't sound like you enjoy multi-stage bosses, or at least the ones in LOP. They clearly did what they did in LOP for some reason? Me, I'd put it down to pure sadism.

[Baron01]

I admit that Lies of P is overdoing it with two-phase bosses. It is especially aggravating in their iteration where the boss has new full health bar. I mind bosses with two phases such as Fuoco where the fight is essentially same but he gets some new moves, same goes for Archbishop. It is completely different story when King of Puppets has a second phase were it is completely new fight, agile enemy instead of hulking giant, etc.

Multi-phase bosses are obviously meant to test your ability to sustain yourself, properly avoid damage and adjust on the fly. I assume it is also meant as a preemptive measure from just zerging the boss down.

I would appreciate if a boss with two phases and two separate health bars have one bar that is small and the other is standard one. One of those two phases should be done quickly if playing correctly.

Ultimate ♥♥♥♥ move in two-phase bosses are later bosses that actually add attacks when have their poise broken.

[Sharkofspace]

The devs have never actually played dark souls, and just tried to cobble together a cheap clone based purely on memes to cash in on the popularity of the genre.

They saw streamers freak out when when they realized Sister Friede had ANOTHER phase, and said, "We want that reaction to EVERY boss, so EVERY boss is going to be an insane damage sponge with multiple life bars!"

They know how to recognize and copy mechanics, but don't understand how to properly implement them.

[Deathwing1306]

That is what souls-like games are about lol what do you mean...

[Rena Ichigawa]

Imagine how ds3 felt with freida then. Not 2 phases. THREE

[Sharkofspace]

Rena Ichigawa lähetti viestin:

Imagine how ds3 felt with freida then. Not 2 phases. THREE

And that was so effective because it was the only boss where that happened. That doesn't mean you should make every boss have three phases. That's not how game design works.