How to deal with Brigand Vvulf?

[Marmorkatze]

So, I tried to take care of Vvulf last night, bit off more than I could chew, fled and lost three heroes in total. Two of them were at least level 6 and, yes, the third was killed because I left the mission. Yay, me.
Apparantly, a group made of a vestal, plague doctor, abomination and hellion wasn't the kind of group I should have used. And I'm not sure if taking care of the barrel full of bombs should have been a priority. Maybe taking out the summoned mobs first would be a better idea?

What is a good strategy and setup fighting him and his goons? I'm positive he's coming back in the future.

[Krampus]

Ignore the barrel, kill the mobs only if you can't outheal them, stunning the works best for me.
Focus down vvulf and bring a MAA to guard whoever has the bomb planted.

[SKull]

Aoe, riposte, a healer and a couple self heals, just in case. Ignore barrel and focus on the boss as much as possible. Abomination in beast form, MAA or HWM for the riposte or a Vestal healer is a good comp. The fourth can be anything, but I just did it with a houndmaster with both bleeds and the self heal. The AOE bleed takes care of some of the adds if you use that, although it takes a few rounds.

[Ralph]

I did it with a party of Vestal, Plague Doc, Stun focused BH and Crusader (basically the team has full stunning power and BH can capitalize on that).
I didn't really run a specialized team, just made sure to rice out the BH's damage, the Crusader's HP Prot (guy was a tank with 25 prot, 36 dodge and 71hp disregarding any dodge buff the 100 light I had gave), PD's stunning power (Blasphemous Vial) and Vestal's healing (Junia's head and Sacred Scroll). Also made sure to have abilities that can get bombed heroes off of death's door on everyone except the BH which has none to begin with.

With Vvulf all you have to do is make sure you have enough damage, crowd control, and utility to win, while simultaneously not stalling too much and getting your heroes off of death's door.

However that strategy is made in mind that you will come back to the Hamlet post-victory, because the stress damage you'd have been hit with would be pretty bad, and heart attacks will be caused by these ACCUSING PIECES OF ♥♥♥♥ if you keep going.

Others probably know how to do it better than me, my solution is most likely a DIY thing more than an actual flawless strat.

[PalmTree]

Give MaA +PROT trinket (Heavy boots or Barristan's Head) and have him constantly guard whoever's being targeted by the bombs. Have a Vestal with two +Healing trinkets (I recommend Junia's head and the Tome of Holy Healing) spamming divine comfort and occasional divine grace to keep everyone's HP up. Then just have your 2 other heroes be really heavy hitters that can just be constant DPS and can hit the backline (Highly recommend Graverobber and Highwayman) and make sure they have their ranged moves and whatever trinkets you want on them to maximize their power.

With this party, just focus on Vvulf himself and ignore his minions and the barrel. He can be really trivialized by this if you're lucky and he'll be dead fast. Just know that with this strategy he will always be in rank 3 so you need to be able to hit there.

[Marmorkatze]

Originally posted by Ralph:

[...] and heart attacks will be caused by these ACCUSING PIECES OF ♥♥♥♥ if you keep going.

Don't remind me. Next time Vvulf spawns, I walk straight up to him, since everything causes more stress damage than actual damage. Heart attacks were the main reasons I ♥♥♥♥♥♥ this battle so up. Sside from going in blind not knowing what happens and expecting to come out of top, of course.

Anyways guys, thanks a lot for all the good advise you gave me. Next time, I'll make sure to bring a MAA with me to tank bombed characters. He also has an attack to get his hand on rank #3, so that's a great bonus.
Vestal goes without saying, though I need to figure out who has Junia's head right now. And then I'll go all out with ranged characters on Vvulf himself. Plenty to choose from.
Thanks a lot!

[Krampus]

Personal opinion but i wouldn't use junias head.
Use tomb and something else, if you got prot on your MAA, tombs buff is enough to heal through (except unlucky crit chains ofc.)
Stress is gonna get you killed way before anyone goes down to 0 and the head amplifies that greatly.

[Ralph]

Originally posted by Ballchaser 9000:

Personal opinion but i wouldn't use junias head.
Use tomb and something else, if you got prot on your MAA, tombs buff is enough to heal through (except unlucky crit chains ofc.)
Stress is gonna get you killed way before anyone goes down to 0 and the head amplifies that greatly.

That's a good point, but I just find the massive AoE heals to be extremely valuable and totally worth it.

[TSense]

Originally posted by Fantasma:

Apparantly, a group made of a vestal, plague doctor, abomination and hellion wasn't the kind of group I should have used. And I'm not sure if taking care of the barrel full of bombs should have been a priority.

1. your group was very good
2. Your goal in this fight, IN THIS ORDER, is: Kill Vvulf, kill Vvulf, kill Vvulf, aim for the guy that Vvulf is guarding to hit Vvulf, keep a high blight on Vvulf to kill him.

You barly have any time to actually heal your team because you are hitting Vvulf so much.
This is a race, if you haven't killed Vvulf by round 4 you are lost.
You do not have time to hit anything else.
And the hitting the barrel does a little repost damage to YOUR team, and nothing else. It's not like that will help you.

You lost the fight because you literally prioritized killing yourself in the middle of battle. That's the other sides goal by the way.

[Skinny Pete]

Originally posted by Ballchaser 9000:

Personal opinion but i wouldn't use junias head.
Use tomb and something else, if you got prot on your MAA, tombs buff is enough to heal through (except unlucky crit chains ofc.)
Stress is gonna get you killed way before anyone goes down to 0 and the head amplifies that greatly.

You need all your team members behaving reliably, and getting afflicted means they do random stuff. They refuse guards (and get killed). They refuse heals (and get killed). They refuse to heal anyone or do anything (that is your healer with Junia's head who gets stressed out and afflicted). They move around (and get you killed).

It's much more important that your healer's heals are reliable and that you actually get to do them at all than that they're big. Similarly, anything (like being afflicted) that messes up you guarding whoever the bombs is on gets you killed.

Virtually everything in the Vvulf mission causes massive stress. Anything that jumps that stress up is a disaster in the making.

I like VES-HM-MAA-HEL for this, though this is also one where having LEP up front is just fine. Specifically because Vvulf is a nice guy and protects his front line guys, so you can just attack that front line guy to hit Vvulf. Or whack Vvulf with Intimidate and lower his damage a bit, but he guards a LOT.

Use MAA to guard whoever has the bombs on them. Use HM to handle stress and hulk out with doggy biscuits for the fight itself. HM can also guard but unlike MAA, his is a suicide guard in this fight, but it can be used if you have to. VES can bang on Vvulf and keep the party off DD and/or target heals as needed. HEL just causes damage, but again, almost any front line damage dealer can do this fight, you just need to hit either Vvulf or someone he's guarding.

Since everyone has to do their job to avoid dying, even one afflicted hero can cause the whole fight to go south rapidly.

[Skinny Pete]

Originally posted by dixon sider:

Honestly, what I do is ignore the bomb, and dot spam Vvulf. Idk if that strategy is very good, or if its because i just have nice trinkets by the time I get to him, but he is always very easy for me. I usually go all bleed, but PD is good anywhere too. Maybe swap out that abomination for a houndmaster? If thats not possible then maybe swap out the vestal for an occultist.

I'd say a big no to that. Last thing I need with a guy on death's door with a bleed and a bomb on him already is a 0 heal.

[nightshift]

Buy all shovels, a couple of Bandages and a few Laudanum.
Everyone's bleed resist should be reinforced. That is important through the whole mission. Hellion can Adrenaline Rush (boosts her damage too).

Towards the boss you can focus on stress healing and buffs (more crits = more stress relief) with my 4th spot Jester so everyone will arrive healthy to the boss both body and mind.
So onward it is: Jester, Vestal, MAA, Hellion.



Then when it's Vvulf time: MAA, Jester, Vestal, Hellion.

4th spot MAA with the Guardian's Shield + Heavy Boots: Defend the one with the Bomb, then Bolster. Then just Defend with Command and maybe some occasional Bellow.

3rd spot Jester with Bright Tambourine + Garlic/Bleed Amulet: Battle Ballad and Slice Off on Vvulf. Solo OR Inspiring Tune. Later and finish the boss with a fat crit Finale.

2nd spot Vestal with Profane Scroll + Cleansing Crystal: MAA with Guardian's Shield is ok with group heals. Everybody else will welcome the group heals too!. Can Mace Bash for lulz.

1st spot Hellion with Heaven's Hairpin + Garlic/Bleed Amulet: If it Bleeds on Vvulf.



Don't even think about 3rd spot Vestal and 2nd spot Jester, it has to be the other way around. Jester can use Battle Ballad which he and the Hellion benefits a lot. He looses his ability to buff the team other way and will be more fragile from summoned mob hits than the Vestal. Mostly the first two spot will be attacked by them. So everyone needs heals not just the MAA - thus group heals are the way to go.

MAA with Heay Boots + Guardian Shield will resist most of the damage and boost the heals recieved so you'll be more than fine (even if the bomb crits him) and further increase your Dodge. 4th spot MAA + 2nd spot Vestal is the best way to go here. MAA will be busy Defending anyway, use his Command-skill to boost crit chance to the skies, he won't have time to use his lame attack skills in this fight. Don't forget to Bolster, it's insanely useful here, and will last the whole battle!

Hellion and Jester already have great crit chance so Vvulf will be crit- and bled out in no time. After a a couple of rounds, Jester can simply Finale to finish off the boss and there you go. On Stygian I came out in a better shape that how I entered to face the boss, both HP and stress wise.
Grab the treasure then venture down on the other side to further heals and stress relief if you need to and exit the level.



BTW Thanks to Battle Ballad and Command, your SPD will be way too high so your whole
team will act first every round. Makes me want to leave a bomb on the Jester with a Martyr's Seal before doing Finale. The bomb will always explode as the closing act of a round, but Jester will move first right after. That upcoming Finale with +60% damage could be a pretty sight.

[Krampus]

Since were on the subject, are the blockades random or fixed (xcept the 2 in the middle)? I never seem to habe enough shovels to get through the whole thing.

[Skinny Pete]

Originally posted by Ballchaser 9000:

Since were on the subject, are the blockades random or fixed (xcept the 2 in the middle)? I never seem to habe enough shovels to get through the whole thing.

They're fixed. You can buy 4 shovels and you'll consume 2 getting to Vvulf and the other 2 getting into the room to the south. The curios in the room on the left (or right depending which way you go) and the one below Vvulf both contain ancestral trinkets.

I once got another shovel randomly (for 5 total) and went to the other room. It didn't have an Ancestral trinket, just a very rare.

I think there's a limit on how many ancestral trinkets you can get in the level and if you get the two major ones, you don't get any more, so it's no big deal that you only have 4 shovels.

I think that's enough to get all you can get in the level, although I don't know that for a certainty.

[nightshift]

Another example to further encourage the composition detailed above
(party shuffled after defeating the boss against mobs on the other side of the map).
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=782521263
Guardian's Shield can trivialize the Vvulf battle, it is made for this fight. The bonuses it gives validates the 2nd spot Vestal and her group heal - a benefit for the whole group, but the MAA will recieve +50% more - practically the amount of an otherwise solo heal.

[No One]

Taking Vvulf on with an MAA is vastly easier than any form of doing without. Getting +prot on him is helpful but unnecessary, and certainly not worth large speed or stress penalties. Since the bomb target tends to change every round most likely he will stack up 30+30+30>80 prot without any trinket support.
If you have a JES too then he can counter all the stress from the hallway fights, on top of helping control the crowd on the actual boss.

You can instead try to keep the damage manageable by killing the barrel every round, e.g. with a HM and HEL combo, but you'll have issues putting reasonable damage on Vvulf himself. It's fine if the first attacker crits, but otherwise you might spend your entire team on killing the barrel. Meanwhile Vvulf is yelling at you, building up to causing afflictions.