Act III Obsession Boss - It's Not Fun

[DJ G]

I've tried this over 10 times and still get 2+ people marked every single time. I understood the mechanics previously in another patch, where you could swap a character around to the position you want them in to get marked by the eyeballs, and try to line it all up on one. But now? How is this better? This feels completely random. I don't understand how Taunt is supposed to be a better design, when your tank is the slowest person on the team, and they don't even get a chance to use their abilities, (which is only 2 buffs of Taunt?). On top of which the marked players get crit for over 20 damage and are dead within a few turns lol.

I'm frustrated with it and it's not fun right now. I'll probably try again later, but this is absolutely the dumbest fight I've played in any game, in awhile, and it's not enjoyable to wipe over and over.

[Pixel Peeper]

A slow tank is actually best for this fight. As long as you have a very fast character use a Noisemaker on the tank on the first round, you're all good. For all consecutive rounds, the tank will Taunt at the end of the Round and thus catch the first enemy attack of the next round (which is the one that applies Seen tokens).

It's still the hardest fight in the game, but the main problem with it isn't even that it's hard, it's that it's highly unpleasant.

Honestly, Phase 1 was better in the previous incarnation of this boss fight, it's just that Limerence did way too much damage and applied a stacking healing debuff and it was just too much. They could have just toned those things down and it would have been fine.

[Ignosius]

Getting more than one person marked in phase 1 isn't a death sentence anymore, since the damage in phase 2 is lowered and they removed the healing debuff.

Bring a lot of healing items, and you should be able to survive long enough to finish off the boss.

[Alpro]

I confirm you can win with 3 marks, though you may not leave with 4 heroes. Last time my vestal took over 1000 damage, she was barging at Death's door, yet she lived. I'm not sure if this is this boss specifically or if it's like that all the time, but Divine Comfort gave her a tiny bit of health every turn, so when she got hit, she knocked on DD instead of dying, like 10 turns in a row.

[Ignosius]

Originally posted by Alpro:

I confirm you can win with 3 marks, though you may not leave with 4 heroes. Last time my vestal took over 1000 damage, she was barging at Death's door, yet she lived. I'm not sure if this is this boss specifically or if it's like that all the time, but Divine Comfort gave her a tiny bit of health every turn, so when she got hit, she knocked on DD instead of dying, like 10 turns in a row.

That's how the game works. You can only die if you take damage while sitting at 0 health. If you're above that, you cannot be killed for any reason, even if you get hit for a hundred damage while you have 1 health.

What's really fun is the quirk that heals you every turn, which can make you literally immortal if the enemy only gets one attack per turn and has no dots.

[Alpro]

Originally posted by Ignosius:

That's how the game works. You can only die if you take damage while sitting at 0 health. If you're above that, you cannot be killed for any reason, even if you get hit for a hundred damage while you have 1 health.

I've only noticed this during this fight specifically. But then, enemies with 0 death resistance (and i mean 0, not "--") never die when they have more than 0 HP. Thanks for confirming though, i thought death res applied at death's door and i got very lucky. Aaaand this is what makes DoTs so valuables (or heartbreaking when on you)

EDIT: forgot to add, this makes Divine Comfort the best skill to bring to this fight, right? or pretty much any fight, even!

[Ignosius]

Originally posted by Alpro:

I've only noticed this during this fight specifically. But then, enemies with 0 death resistance (and i mean 0, not "--") never die when they have more than 0 HP. Thanks for confirming though, i thought death res applied at death's door and i got very lucky. Aaaand this is what makes DoTs so valuables (or heartbreaking when on you)

EDIT: forgot to add, this makes Divine Comfort the best skill to bring to this fight, right? or pretty much any fight, even!

Yeah, anyone with death resistance, even if that number is 0, will hit death's door instead of dying when they hit 0 health. Then, any time they take damage while at death's door, it will check their death resistance to see if the damage finishes them off or not. For enemies with 0 resistance, any damage will finish them off after they hit 0.

And yes, healing over time is really good for this exact reason. It won't save you if the enemy gets to take multiple actions before you get your turn, but it's just enough to get you back into positive values so you can't be killed.

[Æɴɪsᴏ]

Taunt your tanks, keep your tanks alive. That's about it.

[Samseng Yik]

I got 2 heroes get seen in the 1st phase. It is still acceptable.
After countless loss, I change my tactic by let everyone stock up instant heal item.
My heroes is
GR (Deadeye) - PD (Melee specialist) - Runaway (Fire res Pierce) - HWM (Yellowhand)

In the past the boss steal positive token (crit, damage, armor) and make hell for us.
So this run I use party who don't rely on positive token except evasion (the boss cannot steal this). Evasion from Respect relationship also help massively on survival for evading the seen.

Like other said, I am sure the taunt item is very useful.
My success run forgone the tank class because I just want everyone raw DPS kill the boss ASAP. Regardless of the boss seen anyone, everyone is also a DPS.
The taunt is useful in 2nd phase just in case the boss "accidentally" seen unseen hero

[Alpro]

crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence crit limerence

Then walked away with 3 heroes still on their feet. Still wasn't fun.

[Yes]

Act 3 is not fun at all. I can trudge through all of Act 3, get to the final boss with full positive relations, buffs stacked to the roof, party tailor made for killing the boss, every single item I buy or save all in reference to the boss. 4 noise makers I bought and saved. Every talent point spent specifically with boss in mind. Final boss slips one seen mark past my tank and that's that, game over. Aoe crits 3 times in a row, because it just does. There is nothing to adapt to in phase 2. The fight starts with an ill defined puzzle, then proceed to beat you slowly for getting a single answer wrong. As of now, I have no desire to play the game any more. I know I can get through all of Act 3, no issue. But even if I prep my entire run in reference to the final boss, I could get absolutely dumpstered for not generating enough taunt for a single round or just bad luck in turn order.

There needs to be some way to remove or shift block tokens once you get into the phase 2. Or do something to make the fight something other than "lmao, not enough taunt tokens? Die." The fight isn't even fun. You just watch it do the same 2 moves over and over and over again. Of course the damn aoe is going to crit a lot, it attacks like 3 times per round.

[Alpro]

Does plenty of taunts really help? I've had some and got lucky the eyes only targeted my tank. 2nd phase spammed Behold and ended marking 2 other heroes. Maybe Crit Limerence should split damage among marked characters, like 3 marked take 33% damage each.

[Pixel Peeper]

Originally posted by Alpro:

Does plenty of taunts really help? I've had some and got lucky the eyes only targeted my tank. 2nd phase spammed Behold and ended marking 2 other heroes. Maybe Crit Limerence should split damage among marked characters, like 3 marked take 33% damage each.

This is why you want a slow tank that can Taunt every round. If you taunt at the end of the round, you'll catch the Seen token at the beginning of the next round (be it from the eyelings' Evince in phase 1 or the Focused Fault's Behold in phase 2). Then no one other than your tank ever gets a Seen token.

The only exception is round 1, but there a fast character with a Noisemaker can put Taunt on your slow tank before the first eyeling attacks.

[Alpro]

Slow or fast tank, get seen this round or the next, it doesn't seem to make much of a difference to me. Though all tanks are slow anyway, I started phase 2 with only 1 mark, ended with 3, but then, i didn't taunt every round. Yes pointed it out above, everything you do in this act is in preparation for the boss and even there, luck may frown upon you.

[Pixel Peeper]

Originally posted by Alpro:

Slow or fast tank, get seen this round or the next, it doesn't seem to make much of a difference to me. Though all tanks are slow anyway, I started phase 2 with only 1 mark, ended with 3, but then, i didn't taunt every round. Yes pointed it out above, everything you do in this act is in preparation for the boss and even there, luck may frown upon you.

It makes a massive, massive, massive difference.

If you have a fast tank (which is achieved by stockpiling +4 SPD inn items and/or using +6 SPD trinkets and/or certain quirks that add a lot of SPD), they will be completely unable to Taunt the Behold because it happens at the top of the round, before anyone else gets a chance to act. In that scenario the boss gets to choose who to add a Seen token to and there's nothing you can do about it.

That's a huge deal.

[Rain]

I was scared of this boss as well. I made an extra savefile so i could keep trying over and over again but in the end, i did it on 1 try and i honestly have no idea why. I had my PD decked with +blight dmg and duration trinkets and she basically did the second phase all by herself.. by throwing bottles... Leper in R1 and Vestal in R4 tanked the hits due to them getting the tokens but other than that, it was basically just holding out until the bosses many turns killed itself.