Why is Marmu hard to beat for so many players?

[ßimßócsavaЯ™]

I'm about to do the steel soul run and everyone says that Marmu is the hardest part of it. But how? He's one of the easiest bosses. You can literally defeat him without moving, just hit him when he's close. I would say Markoth is much harder.

[Noborus]

I agree, i completely agree. Though, i have never seen someone say Marmu is harder then Markoth, honestly i rarely ever see people complaining about Marmu. I can't really answer your question, i guess the reason people would find Marmu difficult is because they attempted it without nail lengthing charms (which also isn't really that much of a disadvantage but it does help a lot to have them equipped) but also i guess reaction time could be a problem.

[ßimßócsavaЯ™]

I watched Rusty's steel soul tips video on YT, see some reddit posts and that's where I found those comments. Even the youtuber guy said that warrior graves are annoying and not worth to fight.

[Boksha]

Ascended arena Markoth is sometimes mentioned as literally the hardest boss in the game (regular arena Markoth, though, is a complete joke; if that's what you meant, I really don't see how you could consider him more difficult than any Marmu variety). Meanwhile Marmu is just generally regarded as unexpectedly annoying.

The main thing with Marmu is their diagonal attacks. Often by the time you realize Marmu's angle of attack does not let you hit them vertically or horizontally early enough to be able to react, it's too late to jump or walk into a position where you can effectively counter attack. Once you're hit once, it's hard to get back into the rhythm of consistent counter attacks. And, of course, there's no chance of healing during the entire fight.

[kanna]

The first time I fought Marmu I was taken by surprise and died, but I think partway through the second time (or it could've been just before dying on the second attempt?), something clicked and it occurred to me I should just stand in the corner and that was it. No more problems. (Now I'm more likely to chase a bit more but I haven't mastered that yet so I'll retreat to a corner if necessary.) I wasn't particularly concerned about Warrior Dreams during my Steel Soul run.

I heard once the problem with Marmu's unpredictable movement is that if you hit her with your nail at the same time she's hitting the ground, your knockback gets cancelled. I have tested this a bit since I heard that, and at least as far as I've seen, this seems to be consistently true? (Maybe someone can test this more thoroughly.) I think it's why when I only stayed in the corner, I had much better luck avoiding the cancelled knockback if I took a step forward before swinging.

[ßimßócsavaЯ™]

Originally posted by kanna:

The first time I fought Marmu I was taken by surprise and died, but I think partway through the second time (or it could've been just before dying on the second attempt?), something clicked and it occurred to me I should just stand in the corner and that was it. No more problems. (Now I'm more likely to chase a bit more but I haven't mastered that yet so I'll retreat to a corner if necessary.) I wasn't particularly concerned about Warrior Dreams during my Steel Soul run.

I heard once the problem with Marmu's unpredictable movement is that if you hit her with your nail at the same time she's hitting the ground, your knockback gets cancelled. I have tested this a bit since I heard that, and at least as far as I've seen, this seems to be consistently true? (Maybe someone can test this more thoroughly.) I think it's why when I only stayed in the corner, I had much better luck avoiding the cancelled knockback if I took a step forward before swinging.

I can agree with that second part. Sometimes I get hit by Marmu even if I reflect his attack properly.

[kanna]

Originally posted by ßimßócsavaЯ™:

I can agree with that second part. Sometimes I get hit by Marmu even if I reflect his attack properly.

Have you tried timing your swings (or spells) so they only connect while she's up off the ground?

[Boksha]

Originally posted by Kagora:

A lot of the complaints of the lingering warrior dreams being difficult in the base game is probably from the way they scale based on nail upgrades, with all of them gaining over 50% health from 1 nail upgrade, over double health at just 2, and all scaling by a little under 3x health (compared to no upgrade) when the nail is fully upgraded

This combined with almost every guide I've seen telling people to upgrade their nail ASAP, and very few players using spells as a main source of damage on their first few runs, preferring to save soul for healing instead of going for damage with shaman stone, making the fights much harder when trying to beat them for the first time, or on repeat playthroughs if someone decides to wait until they have a fully upgraded nail thinking it will make them easier

Even though the Warrior Dreams gain HP when you upgrade your nail, the number of hits you need to land to beat them always consistently goes down* unless you rely on spells instead of the nail. So if you're not using spells as your main source of damage, it's still a good idea to upgrade your nail ASAP.

If you do use spells a lot and don't upgrade your nail, most Dream Warriors turn into complete jokes. No-nail-upgrade Marmu for example can be beaten with just 3 casts of Shade Soul with the Shaman Stone equipped. Late-game spells were balanced for bosses at max HP, so intentionally leaving your nail unupgraded throws the balance out of whack.

* Nail damage goes up faster than Warrior Dream HP does. The +50% HP you mentioned is offset by +80% nail damage; the 2x HP of the second nail upgrade by 2.6x nail damage and the 3x HP on the final nail upgrade by 4.2x nail damage.