Raptor damage too high?

[Misery]

Just wondering what some of you think about this.

Thing about this boss, it's not THAT bad when it comes to it's attack patterns. It's less chaotic than the lunacy of the walking tank thingy, more structured in it's attacks. The first time I beat the thing (it was the second boss at the time) it wasnt really too hard, but then I didnt get hit by it's central attack as far as I could tell. The basic strategy for dealing with the boss isnt too hard to figure out, same as with that waddling monstrosity.

BUT. The DPS it dishes out seems WAY too high. It's possible to die to this thing, while having genuinely no idea as to what just happened (which is exactly what happened the first time I fought it. Fight started, BAM dead, I had no idea what the boss even did at the time). Considering the fact that it's *always* right in front of you, this seems like a bit of an issue. It means that ONE misstep, and chances are, your run is over, which... well, that's a recipe for ragequits, I imagine.

As it is, I had a run just now where I had LOTS of survivability items/upgrades (using the specialist here, I freaking love that one). Plenty of enemies that normally give me trouble with any class just due to the damage they can put out (like those shotgun jerks I hate so much) werent able to hit me nearly as hard as usual, and the run was actually progressing really fast.

But I get to the Raptor as the second boss of the run, and even with all those upgrades and armor and whatever.... insta-killed. I mistimed *one* dash. One. And it was over.

Seems a bit overboard? What do you guys think?

[Xinn0bun]

I thought it was strong at first as well. But I learned its patterns and the next few matches against the raptor becomes less overwhelming. The key is not to get bogged down by using weapons that slows down your movement. The faster you are, the easier this boss match gets.

Wait until you reach the second stage 4 boss fights. Then you'll realize all the other bosses are no where near as ridiculous as "the room". (But then again, devs said they're looking into it).

[Logorouge]

Raptor and the missile walker bosses can easily melt a new player within 5 seconds the first time. At least that's how it went for me and a few of my coop buddies.

I think it's not so much the DPS but the fact that there's nothing to stop the first salvo of attacks from hitting you directly in the face. Then you try to dash away to safety and you're dead. In my opinion it's more a problem with the rooms than the bosses themselves.

[BlackjackGT]

Solo I don't usually have problems with the tank-leggie-thing but is is frantic for sure.

I think on Raptor I tend to get incinerated before I can even make a dash to cover. I do much better in solo if my partner and I sort of work on different sides of the screen and force Raptor to move back and forth.

I wanna say my Guardian tends to fare better in terms of withstanding the initial Raptor beating and being able to regroup. :)

I guess the point of boss battles is to break things up and get you out of your comfort zone. I just feel sometimes that all the regular levels which I generally love fighting on are usually teaching me to shuck and move, and juke and find cover, and back-back-back to cover and such. And then suddenly the boss battles just throw almost ALL of that way in favor of "now RUN RUN RUN FORREST GUMP for your life this entire level and don't stop for a second or you're dead!"

Think I've grown to appreciate the single Server Hack and the Arena Masters because they aren't quite *that* "run for your life every second" and there's some decent cover in Server Hack, some small areas where I can stand my ground a bit, and some room to set up and get my wits about me against the Arena Masters.

[Misery]

Originally posted by logorouge:

Raptor and the missile walker bosses can easily melt a new player within 5 seconds the first time. At least that's how it went for me and a few of my coop buddies.

I think it's not so much the DPS but the fact that there's nothing to stop the first salvo of attacks from hitting you directly in the face. Then you try to dash away to safety and you're dead. In my opinion it's more a problem with the rooms than the bosses themselves.

Actually I havent had the problem with the missile walker.

Dont get me wrong, I had a couple of losses to the thing. But even taking a really direct hit from it, it was never an insta-kill. It did huge damage, sure, but not an insta-kill (and that's without using the tanky Guardian). The Raptor is the one and only thing in the game I've seen that seems to be capable of doing this. Even those awful green crystals dont do THAT much damage, and those things hit like freight trains.

The missile walker though also isnt permanently in your face the whole time (yet still puts up one heck of a fight). That's always seemed a little odd about the Raptor fight; you can run as much as you want but most of the time, it *will* be right in front of you. Which is a problem considering that attack it uses.

The other odd part that occurs to me is that the Raptor's other attacks are.... not all that strong, really (as far as I could tell). Not that they cant get you killed, but they seemed bizarrely easy to deal with to me (as opposed to the walker, which seems pretty balanced in terms of it's overall weapon set). I mean, the first time beating the Raptor, I was barely even paying attention to anything else it did; I was just watching that main attack and ignoring everything else. What I'd love to see with this boss is the ultra-deathray made, well, less of an insta-kill, but it's other attacks made a bit more threatening to compensate. Just balance the thing out better. Which I also think would just make it more interesting.

Originally posted by BlackjackGT:

Think I've grown to appreciate the single Server Hack and the Arena Masters because they aren't quite *that* "run for your life every second" and there's some decent cover in Server Hack, some small areas where I can stand my ground a bit, and some room to set up and get my wits about me against the Arena Masters.

Yeah, I was really surprised about that with the Arena Masters. They seemed the direct opposite of the other bosses... less crazy chaos, more methodical. And I'd gone in there the first time expecting some giant robot or screen-filling tank or something.

[Anxarcule]

I only got to raptor once and died in less than 7 seconds. I appreciate this game being hardcore and love the challenge but since beating bosses requires a lot of pattern recongition it would be nice to be given a chance to learn the patterns before I restart. I too think it should be toned down, or maybe have it gain strength the more it's HP are low, so at less than 50% have it be at full stength (as it is now)

[Misery]

Originally posted by Anxarcule:

I only got to raptor once and died in less than 7 seconds. I appreciate this game being hardcore and love the challenge but since beating bosses requires a lot of pattern recongition it would be nice to be given a chance to learn the patterns before I restart. I too think it should be toned down, or maybe have it gain strength the more it's HP are low, so at less than 50% have it be at full stength (as it is now)

Best tip for that thing: When you go to a boss room in the first or second areas, start walking left or right *immediately*. Just hold the button down until your character moves so that right from the start, you can stay ahead of the beams.

And then every now and then, use a dash to cross the path of the blue doom beams. While using weapons that preferrably are the sort that fire a single heavy blast at a time instead of something that needs to to keep firing for awhile. I"ve found that shotguns tend to work well against the Raptor. But yeah, that's pretty much the entire strategy for the fight. Just crossing over the death line with your dash at the right times and not slowing yourself down.




As it is, I had another run just now.... bloody good run, died by derping at the Arena Masters when the third guy had like 2 pixels of health left (ugh).

The Raptor fight in that run wasnt even a fight. For the most part, the thing just couldnt touch me, as I didnt screw up my dash timing to cross the death lasers this time, and it's other weapons just werent a threat. Definitely seconding my earlier suggestion of toning down the doom beams, but upping the other stuff somehow.

[BlackjackGT]

WEll since the Arena Masters just eviscerated me and the nice fella i was playing with just now before I could even figure out hardly what was happening, I guess my earlier post is silly. :D

I guess I just feel it's the stuff between boss battles that I love, and the boss battles are exciting just most of them make me crazy more than they make me love playing them. :)

I generally do better at the tank-walker thingie and Server Hack, than with Raptor.