Why do i aggro bosses so much?

[jtcLIVE]

I have been having this issue for a very long time now. When i fight bosses, as a host or a summon, the boss for some reason makes it his/her personal mission to kill me, and i cannot fathom why, because i am a sorcerer, and staying back and casting spells while letting the two other players melee them keeps their attetion, right? Dead Wrong, The strongest example for this is the dancer.

Holy hell the dancer. She is testing my patience, i have a few stories from her boss fights.

-When I fought her as a host, i summoned one phantom with a greatsword. This phantom was very passive, and let me take the brunt of her attacks, run up, hit her once or twice, then roll away to the other side of the room, rinse and repeat. She only attacked the phantom ONCE the entire fight. Every other minute was her attacking me.

-Story from today. I was a summon casting spells in one corner of the room, while on the opposite corner was the dancer and two other players meleeing her. She proceeded to do her jump attack torwards me, i rolled away, and for the next 30 seconds i was moving in a circle around her in the center of the room, her aggro'd on me completely. The other two were bashing her with constant melee attacks, but did she even bat an eyelash? Nope, she wanted me DEAD.

-Another story from today, same setup as the above situation, but she proceeded to do her constant spinning attack, and instead of trying to kill those near her, she used that attack to get across the room to ME. I managed to dodge those attacks, where i rolled to the opposite corner of the room, her still doing the same attack aggro'd on me, and i was cornered and died.


The other boss that this was a strong issue was Pontiff Sullivyn. He would randomly jump attack halfway across the room torwards me, then attack me until his second form. Once, he went into his second form, summoned the phantom him, and the entire time, the real Pontiff attacked me. He did not waver, he did not look away, for rest of the boss battle, the real Pontiff was focused on me and did not attack anyone else. A few times, his phantom abandoned attacking the other two, and decided to help him on his mission to kill me, so i was dodging two bosses a few times as well.


I'm so confused why this is happening. Is it an item i have? A ring? A spell? Just a side effect of being a sorcerer?

[Aphrodite's Saddle]

Bosses will switch between players so that you can't be just a passive damage dealer, from my games i have noticed that they will switch aggro frequently to the one who does the most damage.

[Alex_]

My guess is that bosses will often target the person with the highest DPS potential, or maybe FS just decided that anyone with magic and a staff equipped will have automatically have higher priority than other players. Or maybe even both! Endless possibilities!

[Kabraliah]

Originally posted by Aphrodite's Saddle:

Bosses will switch between players so that you can't be just a passive damage dealer, from my games i have noticed that they will switch aggro frequently to the one who does the most damage.

This^^

As a mage you're probably the one causing the most damage. So the boss ends up focusing on you. When that happens, usually the other people start attacking the boss from behind. Let them do it, and run. They cause more damage again, the boss turns its attention to them, and you can resume your attack.

[jtcLIVE]

Originally posted by ~ M ~:

Originally posted by Aphrodite's Saddle:

Bosses will switch between players so that you can't be just a passive damage dealer, from my games i have noticed that they will switch aggro frequently to the one who does the most damage.

This^^

As a mage you're probably the one causing the most damage. So the boss ends up focusing on you. When that happens, usually the other people start attacking the boss from behind. Let them do it, and run. They cause more damage again, the boss turns its attention to them, and you can resume your attack.

I've tried that, kiting the boss letting others attack, but as in my Pontiff story, sometimes the boss will. NOT. stop. I'd like to believe it is total damage done, but i feel as if there is something else at play. The only thing i can imagine during that fight is that somehow I, casting great souls arrows in between his attacks, was doing more damage than two melee charatcers on the phantom, which caused me to continue being the main target.

Originally posted by Noob:

My guess is that bosses will often target the person with the highest DPS potential, or maybe FS just decided that anyone with magic and a staff equipped will have automatically have higher priority than other players. Or maybe even both! Endless possibilities!

But how is that added up? For me, would it be all my spells + My melee weapon + My staff + my pyromancy glove = Total DPS potential? If so, that is completely unfair, since most people run in simply with a shield and a sword, maybe two, which would be way lower than my DPS.

[Alex_]

Originally posted by jtc0999:

But how is that added up? For me, would it be all my spells + My melee weapon + My staff + my pyromancy glove = Total DPS potential? If so, that is completely unfair, since most people run in simply with a shield and a sword, maybe two, which would be way lower than my DPS.

I agree that would be strange, that's why it's just a guess. If I did it, it would be the currently equipped weapon, but honestly I'm not betting that this is the answer.

I played Payday 2 extensively, and I learned that in that game there are several different variables that decided who an enemy would target. Distance from the player, how much noise the player was making, line of sight, damage being dealt by the player, how long the player was out of sight, etc. There's no way that it's decided by just one or two things.

I assume that in this game, it's some sort of weird combination of proximity and damage being dealt, with some other unknown stuff mixed in. I also assume that certain combos will prevent the enemy from switching targets until the combo is complete. (Vordt's multiple dashing attack, for example, but that could be caused by the fact that other players are pretty much completely unable to hit the boss during an attack like that.) Maybe if you do enough damage in x amount of time, the boss will prioritize you for a certain amount of time regardless of damage dealt by other players. Proximity wouldn't be much of a factor at that point since the boss will obviously be close to you if it's attacking you.

Again, these are all just guesses, but that's why Discussion forums exist.

[Backline HogCranker]

All I hear is git gud

[Velkhana's Summer]

Low hp, dodge all attacks first. They target people with low hp to try and finish off. You can notice this because even when being attack by others they don't change aggro.

[ardoon]

Damage dealt. This is too stop people like you who hang back and do tons of damage. All bosses have this targeting and it also plays with DPS. If the other player does more damage then you but keeps backing up and going forward it won't target them as every few seconds they get hit by you.

[Dark Angel]

Someone else want to fall into this necro trap? GG.

[AlmightyDunkle]

Originally posted by Corinthian:

All I hear is git gud

Holy mother of necro Batman!

[ardoon]

Originally posted by Corinthian:

All I hear is git gud

Holy...
God how did you even find this post.

[Dark Sun Gwyndolin]

Originally posted by Xalech:

Originally posted by Corinthian:

All I hear is git gud

Holy...
God how did you even find this post.

Not only does he necro, he only contributes

[ardoon]

Originally posted by Levia:

Originally posted by Xalech:

Holy...
God how did you even find this post.

Not only does he necro, he only contributes

How did he contribute

[Dark Sun Gwyndolin]

Originally posted by Xalech:

Originally posted by Levia:

Not only does he necro, he only contributes

How did he contribute

He only contributed salt.

[Laptop]

And now he's contributed another number to the banned list.