The Comprehensive Guide to Cheesing Bosses

In the bowels of hell, you are surrounded by beings that are weaker than you. Beings that, despite their weakness, continue to waste valuable time you could be using to kill more of them. You are a SUPREME MACHINE, and it's time you started acting like one.

This guide will show you the ins-and-outs on how to bully, belittle, cheese, and shred the health of every boss in the game, including the secret ones. That being said, this guide spoils all secret (and non-secret) bosses in the game, so be warned.
(Greed bosses aren't in yet, I'll get to them soon.)

Essential Bullying Techniques

Not Blowing Yourself Up 101, Or How I Learned to Stop Dying and Love the Pump-Action

Unarguably, the most useful weapon for cheesing bosses is the green/pump shotgun, thanks to how damaging the overcharge is. However, since taking off 50 health is risky in the middle of a boss fight, it's best to get good at dodging the explosion by abusing the dash invincibility frames.

Neither the direction you dash in, nor the direction you shoot in matter, so long as you correctly time your dash.

Railcoining

The railgun is valuable. It does a lot of damage, but it can be hard to hit something with it if what you're trying to kill is slightly faster than a slab of concrete. Thankfully, you can both negate this problem, by tossing a marksman coin out, and shooting it with the railgun. However, if you want even more damage, you can try and get the boss you're fighting in between two separate coins, which will make the railgun shot hit multiple times. This can be tricky to pull off on some bosses for obvious reasons, but is good for bosses that move predictably (or barely move at all).

Shotgun Swapping

Just pressing the '2' key on your keyboard repeatedly and holding left click while you have the shotgun equipped. Only works if you have both versions and is only really effective if you can get really close to your target without worrying about damage, or if your target is so massive you don't need to aim.

Nail Traps

Simple. Use the nailgun to place a magnet where you know an enemy's going to spawn, and use the overheat nailgun's alt-fire on it twice. Then, just spawn the enemy and watch them lose a fifth of their health walking into the nail trap. This works with every boss except for Gabriel, since he flies, Hideous Mass and Flesh Prison, because of how they spawn, and Agony/Tundra, since there are two of them. With Agony and Tundra you can still get one of them, though, and once the magnet explodes it still does a decent amount of damage to everything in the area. This was nerfed in the Soul Survivor update, thanks to the nailgun getting reworked, but it still works to a degree.

Prelude Bosses

Malicious Face

The easiest boss to kill, thanks to its relatively low health and easy-to-parry attacks. Just walk to the left or right (or in a circle if you don't have room) and abuse the wide hitbox to parry the normal attack to bring it down to half health.


If you don't have enough space or just suck at doing this, wait for it to charge the laser. Once it does, dash toward it and either shotgun it in the face or punch it with the blue arm right before it fires. This is less damaging than the other parry, though. From there, you can either finish it off with the shotgun or wait for another chance to parry it. It doesn't matter which shotgun you use or how charged up it is, the parry does the same amount of damage. If you don't want to parry or are in a situation where it's a pain in the ass to, then use the pump shotgun or the nailgun.

Swordsmachine

Normally, you could just keep jumping backwards and taking potshots at it, and kite it until it dies, but that isn't fast enough. Almost every attack Swordsmachine uses can be parried, and nearly all of them can be parried with the shotgun, but if you're really in a hurry, you can parry it with the pump-action overcharge, though it'll make it pissy and attack faster.

This is the fastest way to kill it, though the hitbox for parrying seems a lot tighter. Remember to dash out of the explosion as well, and when it goes from phase 1 to phase 2, switch to shotgun swapping until it starts attacking again. Feel free to use railcoins as well. If you're in Cyber Grind, then you can also bait its some of its melee attacks to make it fall offstage. Just keep in mind that the main attack it uses can change direction after the first swing.

Cerberus

Cerberuses (Cerberi?) are absolute bastards to parry, thanks to the speed of their projectiles. Not to mention, that's the only attack of theirs you can parry. Luckily they're idiots, and you can easily bait them into charge-attacking over a bottomless pit, assuming there's one nearby.
If there isn't, you can get by just with railcoins and shotgun overcharges. Nail traps are also really effective, since you almost always know where they're going to spawn. Be wary if they're in an elevated position, since their stomp attack can create some weird shenanigans when you're below them, and stay away from walls if you can to avoid their splash damage.

Limbo Bosses

Hideous Mass

Can be a problem due to its tankiness. When it's upright, dash into its stomach and shotgun swap until it changes position. When it does, focus on avoiding its attacks and dash back in to shotgun swap at every opportunity you have, either at the base or the tip of its tail.

If you keep getting gimped by its harpoon limiting your jumps, then point your crosshair at the harpoon and punch it until you're free.

V2

One of the fastest bosses if you know what you're doing. This only works when not starting from the checkpoint, so restart the level if you mess up, and if you're tired of collecting the skulls to open the door, just shoot the window above the skull door and jump through.


When V2 jumps in, toss a coin in a direction where you'll be able to confidently punch it. When you do, it'll ricochet towards V2 and bounce up again. Dash over to V2 when it gets hit and punch the coin before it hits the ground. Repeat the process enough times, and V2 will be rendered armless before it's finished bowing to you. This can be tricky to get nailed down, since when V2 enters the arena it creates a shockwave.

Even if you fail, V2 will start the fight off with lower health, so long as you hit the coin at least once. If you screw it up and don't want to bother restarting the level, V2 has pretty low health, likely to make up for how fast it is, and can be taken down by spamming shotgun overcharges and railcoins. Just try not to get sniped by its pistol and you should be fine.

Lust Bosses

Mindflayer (I know it doesn't get a boss health bar, shut up)

The mindflayer has a weapon designed to bully her in the form of the green railgun, since it stops her from teleporting. Even if you miss with it or don't have it equipped, then you can still deplete her health pretty quickly with the shotgun overcharge. Normal ricoshots also help, since you don't have to worry about where it's teleporting to, you'll get a headshot regardless.

Always keep an eye on where she is, and be ready to dash away from its melee and shotgun overcharge it in response. If it shoots its projectiles, use the red arm's explosion to render them impotent. If you do it fast enough, some of them might hit the Mindflayer and drain a good chunk of her health. If you're good at video games, you can also use an explosion to redirect her projectiles back into her as she spawns them, killing her instantly.

King Minos

Hand of Minos
Not much to mention. Shotgun swapping works well thanks to how huge the hitbox is, and shotgun overcharges take care of it quickly.

Minos Himself
The biggest ♥♥♥♥♥ of them all. Nail trap one of his hands before the start of the fight, and shotgun swap in the vague direction of his face. Parry every punch you can (including the one where he slams his fist downward, shown below), and save your railgun for his second phase. Pay more attention to which punch he's going to throw instead of worrying about the black hole, but never let the black hole out of your field of vision.
When his second phase hits, start using railcoins. Keep shotgun swapping toward his face, and only parry projectiles if you don't have to go out of your way to. You can also try using the red arm to reflect them since you don't have to worry about hitting him.

Gluttony Bosses

Gabriel

Asserting Your Dominance Over Gabriel
Gabriel's an angel, and thus isn't technically killable in-game yet. Because of this, it is absolutely crucial that you assert your dominance over him not only in combat but also by interrupting his monologue to show him what a nerd he is.

Gabriel has two lines of dialogue that trigger when coming to his boss room, the first happening when you open the door in the first room, and the second happening about two thirds of the way through the hand room.

The second line is the easier of the two to interrupt as long as you know which directions to slide in, but if you want to be even faster, tap the slide button repeatedly instead of holding it when going through the small tunnel at the end.
The first line of dialogue is significantly harder, since you need to platform around the small obstacle course in the third room. Bonus points if you manage to skip both without falling into the acid.

The Actual Fight
As with just about every boss in the game, railcoins and shotgun overcharges are the fastest way to deal damage. Normal ricoshots are also good bits of damage while avoiding Gabriel. If you hear his attack noise and you don't know where Gabriel is, assume he's above you. This attack is the best time to use the shotgun overcharge since you're not wasting a dash you could be using to avoid a different attack.

After phase 1, you can dash underneath Gabriel to juggle him, and can do so until he's at about 2/3s of his health or less, where he'll then teleport away. You don't have to worry about him landing so long as you're underneath him.

If you need to heal and aren't confident in your ability to dodge, wait for him to start blabbing about nerd ♥♥♥♥. He hasn't figured out he can attack and talk at the same time, so use this time to either heal, shotgun swap, or railgun him.
Overall, it's fastest to beat Gabriel when you stay grounded.

Gabriel's Attacks, Phase 1
Gabriel's moveset is pretty limited, but a good rule of thumb is to keep your eyes on him at all times. The only time this becomes a problem is when he teleports above you, in which case, he'll slam down and then throw a spear that explodes. Dash forwards to avoid the slam, and wait a bit for the next teleport noise, since the spear attack has a bit of a delay before he throws it. It will always come from behind where you were when the teleport happened, so dash away from where you were standing.
Gabriel can also pull out a sword and swing at you three times, similar to Swordsmachine, but faster. Sometimes, however, there'll be a bit of a delay between the second and third swing, and Gabriel will do a dorky little spin. This means he's about to throw the sword, which you can parry back at him to take away about a fourth of his health. Otherwise, dodge to the side.

He can also throw a projectile without the swings, which takes away about the same amount of health from him when parried.

Gabriel's Attacks, Phase 2
After getting his health down to half, Gabriel turns red and puts on a hula skirt made of swords to try and defend himself. Deny him the right to clothing by parrying it and watch his terrible fashion sense blow up in his face. Just be careful not to get too close or they'll shred you.
Besides that, most of his attacks are the same as they are in phase one, though faster and with some minor differences. Namely, his spear attack now has him slam down twice in a row before throwing the spear, and when he uses his sword, he will now sometimes teleport on the third attack. Because of the unpredictability of the teleport, I don't recommend trying to parry the sword if you're bad at it. His other projectile, while faster, is still very parriable, though.

He still doesn't attack while talking in this phase. Making sure you have an extra dash ready at all times is key, and if you don't have a dash and need to dodge an attack, slide. Most importantly, know when to distance yourself from him. He does damage faster than you're able to heal it back in phase 2, so if you're about to die, focus on just dodging until he calls you a mean name, and then shotgun him to get your health back.

Keep everything here in mind, and you'll be able to completely disgrace him.

Secret Bosses

Cancerous Rodent

There is no way to cheap out this boss. I'm sorry. You have to beat him legit.

Very Cancerous Rodent

You can stand on top of him to make it impossible for him to hit you. Just ground slam on him and shoot down until he dies.

Agony & Tundra

Two Swordsmachines. They get destroyed by the shotgun overcharge since it hits both of them at once and they have less health than Swordsmachine. Don't even bother parrying them, just let them charge towards you and get caught in the blast radius.

Prime Sanctum Bosses

Flesh Prison

Oh God Not a Healing Boss
The Flesh Prison's whole schtick is that it's completely stationary, but it makes up for it by having a thick health bar and being able to heal, which it does by crunching on the eyes that it spawns. However, it only heals when it thinks you're actively damaging it, and the chance of it healing decreases the fewer eyes there are. It spawns 10 of them at a time, and spawns 12 at a time once it reaches half health or below.

This means the fight mostly consists of destroying the eyes while trying to avoid the Meat Diamond's attacks. The most effective way to do this, since the eyes are small and move like scanners, is with the (non slab) marksman revolver. Even if a few of the split shots hit the Beef Octahedron, it usually won't be enough to trigger a heal. Try and keep one or two of the eyes alive if you can, since the boss won't spawn more eyes if they aren't all dead, and if it tries to heal, you can just kill the remaining eye(s) with a ricoshot or two. The eyes take one uncharged revolver shot to kill. The malicious face versions that spawn on Violent take two revolver shots to kill, but still die to one ricoshot.

Once you've killed enough eyes, focus all of your damage on the Tendon Rhombus, particularly when it's beginning one of its attacks, since it has to wait until it's done attacking before it can heal. If you have a railgun charge/nailgun overheat/slab revolver charge ready when it starts healing, save it for when it spawns the eyes, since it takes reduced damage while it's in its healing state.

Attacks
Every attack from the Living D8 has a visual telegraph, except for when it spawns the eyes. Speaking of, the eyes are only able to hit you if you're either right in front of them, or practically standing still. The malicious face eyes can be a problem though, so try and prioritize them. An uncharged slab revolver, a ricoshot, or a decent shotgun blast will one-shot them. Shotgunning the eyes from point-blank is also your safest way to heal if you're afraid the boss is gonna heal.

Cyan Ring: Projectile Spam
The Viscera Block rotates around and vomits slightly-homing projectiles as it spins. These can be easily avoided by dashing. If you're out of stamina, try either sliding to get them to collide with the ground, or parrying them, which can be used as a safe heal like the eyes. Does about a rotation and a half (2 full rotations on Violent) and does 3 full rotations when at half health or below.

White Ring: Light Beams
Surrounds you with some holy circle crap that indicates where beams of light will land in a couple seconds. Said beams do tons of damage and stick around for a decent while. This is the most dangerous attack, and I recommend focusing on dodging it over killing the eyes until the attack subsides. Chaining slide-jumps is the most consistent way to avoid this. Spawns two beams of light in phase one (three on violent), and spawns an additional beam at half health or below.

Purple Ring: Black Hole
Functions the same as the black hole King Minos spawns. It doesn't seem to change at all between phase 1 and 2, and it's not much of a problem unless you don't pay attention or just dash directly into it. Just be wary of it because it can hit you during the Boss's death animation and screw you over.


Thanks to the boss's massive hitbox and lack of mobility, most weapons work well on it. Railcoins are particularly effective. Shotgun swapping is preferred over overcharges because of how fast the boss attacks and you don't have to worry about missing with shotgun swapping anyway.

Minos Prime

Like Gabriel, Minos Prime is a boss that talks. Unlike Gabriel, he understands that he can talk and kick your ass at the same time. Minos Prime indicates which attacks he'll use based on which voice line he uses, and understanding how to respond to each attack he throws out is critical for not getting combo'd into the floor. Minos moves around a lot, but for most of that time he's in your face, so the slab revolver, marksman, nailguns, and railgun are all effective. Prioritize dodging over shooting him, since he doesn't give many opportunities to heal. Be sure to abuse the short period after his speech/after you respawn where he's not attacking to railgun him or just heal off any damage you took from the last boss.

Minos Prime's Attacks

Uppercut
One of two moves Minos doesn't telegraph through speaking. He teleports directly in front of your face and tries to punch you into the air so he can bully you. Because of this move (and the fact Minos talks slower than he fights) it's a good rule of thumb to dash backwards immediately whenever Minos teleports in front of you, at least until you know what move he's using. If he lands this, ground slam so he can't punt you back down there himself. He also likes to combo this move into his own ground slams, so be ready for that.

DIE!
Minos rises into the air and slams into you, creating a shockwave. Let him finish saying "DIE," and then wait about half a second before dashing, jump as soon as he lands to avoid the shockwave, and then dash again while still in midair because he can and will follow this move up with something else you're going to have to dodge before you hit the ground. Don't target him after he lands, he'll come to you. He can also do a variation of this where he rises directly above you and slams straight down, where he says "CRRUSH," instead. Treat it as you would this move.

THY END IS NOW!
Minos teleports in front of you, throws one punch you have to dodge, and then throws three more that you can avoid by walking backwards. The final punch he throws can be parried, but it doesn't prevent you from taking damage. This is a great time for railcoin, If you suck at parries, this is your opportunity to heal.


JUDGEMENT!
Minos teleports and dropkicks you, creating an explosion. This can be dashed through if you get the timing down, but if you can't, then just dash-jump away as soon as you hear him say the word, and outrun the explosion. You can also parry this, but it only stops the explosion if you're not playing on Violent.


Overhead
The other attack Minos doesn't telegraph with a voice line. Minos teleports directly in front of you and swings at you in midair. Minos can cancel any of his moves into this one if you're off the ground long enough, except for JUDGEMENT. It's easy to dodge, but also hard to get some decent damage in through it.

PREPARE THYSELF!
Minos raises his leg and starts a three-hit combo, and unlike the four-hit one, you actually have to dodge the first two moves. The third hit is a homing projectile you can parry. Do as he says and prepare thyself. If you suck at parries, try to bait the projectile into a wall.

Phase Two
Phase two of Minos Prime is about the same as phase one, but he's faster and starts throwing projectiles more. Parry every projectile regardless of whether you think it'll hit Minos, since it heals you and sometimes he'll just teleport into the projectile like a moron. Don't get greedy and pay attention, and you should be good.

[V2]

this was made before sisypus existed

[CremeCrimson]

I AM NOTICING A DISTINCT LACK OF SUSSYPHUS PRIMUS

[Moltum]

how to cheese boss - skill

[DivineOrange]

act 2 bosses when?

[HeroRyker]

I have first tried P-ranked almost every boss in the game, and I'm still getting bullied by Minos, is there any cheeses that haven't been patched?

[Sleepless™]

Actually you can Cheese pretty much any boss as long as you have the Knuckle Blast and Whiplash arms or like the Slab revolver.

[NOT penis man gaming]

you can use the boomboomrailcannon to 1shot druid knight by firing it while he is doing fuller auto

[Dom]

the definitive way to cheese v2 is to juggle him with rockets over and over
he can do very little about this

[Funny dogs worlds]

on v2 2

[Funny dogs worlds]

decent way to get extra damage is by letting v2 shoot one of your coins then countering that (shoot the red flash)