Predator Boss Fight

[Corvus]

I like this game, but this boss fight is souls-like levels hard, and not in a good way. The way he constantly gets up in your face is super annoying because he somehow manages to constantly position himself in the spot where he's covered by Jodi on the screen, which makes it very hard to tell how he's going to attack you. There's also very few breaks in between attacks, which makes it hard to reload, heal, and dodge, and with this boss, you constantly find yourself in a position where you need to do all three. On top of that, in order to avoid being hit, you need to dodge, and because he attacks so frequently, your stamina is constantly empty. The room is also super cramped and dark, which makes it hard to move around as he's attacking, and it's easy to get caught on obstacles when you're trying to avoid being hit. Speaking of being hit, he also has a far-reaching grab attack, and if you screw up the timing, it takes half of your health or just straight up insta-kills you if you don't have a knife. Even after getting past this guy, eventually you have to fight 2 more of them at the same time, which is exactly what I was worried about, not just because these guys are a pain in the ass to fight, but also because it honestly feels like a lazy reuse of a boss enemy.

Of course you can use brain smashers to kill them instantly, or use cheese tactics, but encountering an enemy that makes you want to resort to these tactics is a sign that there are flaws with the design of that enemy. It just isn't fun to fight these guys.

What would make fighting the first predator a million times better is if Jodi's superhuman abilities were activated during the boss fight, or at least partway through, and allowed us to fight with infinite stamina, increased health, and not needing a knife to escape grab attacks. I think this qualifies as a stressful enough situation for those abilities to activate, plus she can survive being impaled if you escape the grab with a knife, which wouldn't be possible for a normal human anyways, so why not lean more into the superhuman abilities she showed earlier in the game before falling down the stairwell?

Edit: This fight has been made less annoying by expanding the size of the room you fight him in, so now you can actually move around. Fighting the other Predators in the defense section is also less difficult as long as you save some of those turret devices for when they appear.

[Whols]

The miniboss is not difficult, you just need to unload the rifle magazine twice into the head area. Sometimes he lets you unload the magazine without any obstacles. That's half the battle. Then we improvise, run and dodge, blow gas cylinders and grenades.

[ₖ ₒ ₘ ₐ]

just use zombie brain smasher

[Dodge This]

It took me 4 mines, 3 grenades and 4-5 shotgun shells (on normal mode).
I placed the mines at the door before the fight began and then threw the grenades.

He has too much health.

[Huntress Missy]

Zombie brain smashers... bruhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

[Rogue Stave]

There's a reason you hoard the brain smashers. Either for them or if you're too much in a pinch with the weepers.

[bypasser]

Unless a brain smasher - the gas cylinders do a lot of damage, so even a single close-by explosion makes him a relatively easy prey. And (also for many other reasons btw) always keep a few knives with you ;)

[MRDAEDRA15]

what i usually do is place a couple landmines by the cylinder before the cutscene, he spawns right on top of there and does alot of damage to him. on my first playthrough I just ran a train on it around one of the support columns and unloaded my AR into it

[saltyaf]

Originally posted by Whols:

The miniboss is not difficult, you just need to unload the rifle magazine twice into the head area. Sometimes he lets you unload the magazine without any obstacles. That's half the battle. Then we improvise, run and dodge, blow gas cylinders and grenades.

This. AK FTW

[Ebi Furai Mayonnaise]

brain smasher is always the answer

[sling_shot]

brain smasher is indeed the answer... for subsequent playthroughs.
in a blind run however, most people have probably used them all and have no money to spare for the smasher cause they've spent it on clothes, so yeah just like the screamer, this enemy can be kinda frustrating, I don't think I've ever fought those 2 enemy types in a legit way since my first run and that's imo not good.
An enemy type you want to cheese/skip is a flaw of the game.

[Seishisha]

I have mixed thoughts about the predator, the very first time I played that section it really caught me off guard and genuinely I felt pressured by the fight. Every time after that, I thought on easy mode it's too easy just shoot him a bit and he drops, on normal it's just about right for taking down with guns but on hardcore he has way too much hp and really demands the use of explosives or a smasher, ammunition is already tight on hardcore and spaffing away bullets on him is a bad choice.

The problem is that if you know it's coming you can prepare the doorway with mines or just get ready on the brain smasher and obliterate him easily regardless of difficulty, he is only really effective if the player is unaware of the encounter or if they have self imposed restrictions to not use explosives or smashers.

Honestly I think to make that enemy more interesting it would need to spawn randomly but with some restrictions, it wouldn't be fair to make the player fight it with only the handgun for example, but maybe once you've cleared a certain point in the story such as the scripted fight, then it should have the chance to spawn in and hunt you down. Something that keeps the player on edge never knowing exactly when it could appear is way more threatening than something that only appears during scripted events and can easily be prepared for.

[bypasser]

Well, I'm not really a big fan of things spawning into the areas you've just cleaned up, or random enemies spawning infinitely and chasing you (it would kinda kill the exploration here by forcing you to move faster, I'm not talking the random zombies and squirters that are both easy and not that infinite, as they only spawn in some particular areas). Although a chance of him spawning instead of a horde wave could be fun. The only problem is, he is a real bullet sponge atm (and even that ammo crate doesn't help too much on Hardcore), also with his speed and blocking ability fighting him is very frustrating (wait for an opening - shoot a few rounds - dodge his attack - repeat). Could probably benefit from some more "bossy" features, like idle phases followed by heavy attacks (when you can choose whether to reload/heal, or try to do some damage instead), attack warnings etc.

[Seishisha]

Yeah it's not a perfect solution by any means, I was just postulating that It might make the enemy more interesting. I like your idea of him spawning instead of a horde it would certainly keep people on their toes.

[Phynrae]

Originally posted by sling_shot:

An enemy type you want to cheese/skip is a flaw of the game.

Yeah that's my take on him aswell.

I don't think he's a fun enemy to fight, just an annoying one, and having played a couple of custom maps that spawn these guys liberally, i've only come to dislike this enemy type even more.

[Duplucky]

The key to fight this boss is really to put an element of decor between you and him and turn around so that he will always be block behind this obstacle. The most difficult part is to hit him because ihe will block the attacks or dodges them but you can overcome this by using explosives (which can destabilize him and allow you to empty a magazine in his head by stunlocking him).