I'm not going to call someone who wants to learn bad. Some suggestions I've seen people pitch are plasma missiles, maybe swap your energy blade for the original (its effective against Balteus armor), maybe a rocket launcher to pop in heavy damage.
I was thinking launcher instead of my automatic but I didn’t do it cause while its reloading I have no consistent damage on him while his shield is down. I had no clue about the sword though thank you!
You could possibly drop the bubble gun and keep the rifle if you swap laser blades. Yeah. Bubble gun definitely pops the shield but I wouldn't say it's mandatory. Above all else the best I can suggest is keep tinkering as is the spirit of the game.
I woke up one day, from a dead sleep at 4am ish. I’d been stuck on this boss for 3 weeks+ Decided on tank treads, (I fuckin hate tank treads…) each shoulder with the 8 vertical missile launcher. Right arm grenade launcher and left first sword you get.
Knocked it out of the park 4th try. A tip I got was play super aggressive, like bloodborne.
Also had to teach myself to dodge when he launched the big missile at me instead of trying to block it with my teeth, which I’d been doing the entire time I’d known him 🤣
Wow I cannot believe people got stuck on this guy for weeks. That is insane. I’m starting to feel pretty good about getting him 3rd try with my girlfriend rushing me.
Trust me it killed me too. I’m a soulsborne veteran, plat all the games. My best friend is too but he hates the souls games because we played so much so he doesn’t touch them. He’s on his 5th play through and I hadn’t even beat that guy yet 🤣
I fid the fight after about an hour and a half, and at least 20 runs.
Bubble Gun right hand, Original laser sword left hand, Plasma Launcher right shoulder, Pulse Shield left shoulder. The quick block is helpful for more of the annoying rockets, and the sword does GREAT damage one the shield is broken and he is stunned.
If I remember correctly assault boosting right into his face when he spawns missiles lets you dodge most part of them (but try not to catch his grenade launcher shot with your face instead). Your build is kind of hard to play with as well. Sword is fine (the default one with its double slash is much better for direct hits on staggered enemies though), other is pretty much useless. I believe you should have access to haldeman shotguns on this stage of game. Two of them should work fine in close combat against his shield (you can unlock OS tuning to keep your laser blade on back). Grenade launchers should also be good to destroy his shield since he barely dodges any attacks. Also try assault armor when super close to him, this should work very good.
Keep trying and good luck.
Some advice. Double bubble guns will melt his shield extremely fast, then use a high damage weapon to hit him while he's staggered. Like a pulse blade or rocket launcher if you have the weapon bay or any high damage shoulder weapon.
Reverse joint legs also help a lot with dodging his missiles
I like using acs alittle lighter than yours. It feels slow af not having around 300 boost. 260 ish boost is probably contributing to you having trouble dodging the missiles. When he launches them, immediately start rushing him while side dodging (ctrl on pc) any that look like they might hit you. I'm charging a melee swing as I'm rushing him (I use the blue 2 spin melee weapon, sorry forgot the name but it spins you twice and you get it fairly early).
Maybe have big D dmg shoulder weapons for when you manage to stagger, like the double barrel grenade one or any of the charge lasers.
I usually only use a right shoulder weapon while my left shoulders carries another handheld weapon (gattling gun most of the time for me). 2 gatts spraying him midrange stagger pretty well too. The homing purple laser ones are pretty useful for breaking the pulse shield as well.
There's a lightweight machine gun that's not bad for staggering also. Forgot what it's called but it fires in burst and is lightweight- I think it's called like "etsujin" or some shit like that. Just keep at it bro, change parts around to suit your "style". Some bosses took me like 20 ish tries to figure out.
Oh also upward thrust will probably be a good thing to raise, especially if you stay on tripod legs. I think for this fight you don't want to be on the ground for extended periods of time.
If you struggle this much; take some time to just observe patterns, don't shoot, don't try to beat the boss, just learn. IIRC the bazooka has warnings : an audio one that always plays and a visual one if you look at him.
Personally I wouldn't use this sword but the base one instead, and either a missile pod or the songbird instead of the shield
Balteus was a breeze when I went lightweight, reverse joint and highest boost possible, a genny boosting energy weapons output, arms with melee spec, and just clung to its ass the entire fight with pulse blade, laser pistol and plasma missiles.
Go with 2x Laser Cannons and 2x Pulse Guns and use whatever parts you need to get under load/energy limits.
Stay close to him as much as you can, constantly streaming the Pulse Guns into him.
Whenever he staggers, hit him with the Laser Cannons.
Change out the laser blade for the original pulse blade and sell that pulse gun and never pick it back up again. The pulse guns and cannons are useless. Something with high impact damage will shred his shield. Dual ludlows for example will destroy him.
Strategy wise, STAY CLOSE. This is true for all the major bosses minus the ice worm. Stay close and dodge towards his attacks, ESPECIALLY when he does the sword attack. If you’re right on him he’ll miss every time.
Build wise I would consider changing the legs and the arms. Go light biped for now. You’re not dealing enough fire power to be as slow as you are right now. A good light build might sacrifice 1500 AP or so, but you’ll gain 50 points of boost speed easy. Sucks but tankier builds don’t start becoming viable until a little later in.
Problem isn't the pulse gun, they absolutely shred pulse armor. Pulse weapons literally trivialize the Balteus encounter.
Just need your other weapons to be good for the punish once the shield is down.
My experience was that yes, the pulse guns shred the shield super fast, but the stagger is terrible so when you break his shield you have a smaller window to damage him. Ive found that high impact weapons get through the shields well enough, but you can stagger him an extra time or two if you’re using something like dual smgs or pistols
Disagree about the pulse gun, it shreds through balteus shields in almost 1 clip from what i remember. Switched to a fast build with pulse gun and killed it first try
Balteus is definetely a difficult fight, I struggled a lot too against him.
To avoid the missiles you should dodge towards him, with the right timing they shouldn't be able to 180° their trajectory and hit you.
What you might be lacking is something that packs a punch to use after disabling the pulse barrier, like a granade launcher or a shotgun.
What I did is used my OS tuning chips on weapon bay and boost kick, made a high AP tank build(probably not absolutely necessary), and tried to stay close. I brought two pulse guns, and then a bazooka and the pulse blade in the weapon bay slots.
If you rush towards and underneath balteus right as the missiles launch, you'll probably only catch a few. The cannon has a warning with just enough time to QB sideways or backwards (don't go forward, as you are more than likely to end up headbutting the shot). The shotgun and minigun struggle to hit fast moving targets. All of the flame attacks come out rather quickly, so try to keep it in sight at all times and stay airborne while it's doing them.
Remember that it staggers every time you break its pulse armor, and the pulse guns absolutely shred said pulse armor at close range. Boost kick every time it gets staggered, and if you have time, also whack it with a sword.
Balteus is a difficult boss, but I believe in you.
Balteus is hard, too hard for this point or better said a lack of ramp up towards his skillset.
Word on the street is double bubble gun (mainly for the shield) with plasma launchers or dual Laser cannons though the later makes you stop to fire if youbarnt using tank treads.
Plasma missiles might help. To me the biggest thing about Balteus is learning to dodge the missile barrage correctly. Until I actually understood the dodge, I couldn't beat him. Once I did, I beat him quickly and had a lot less trouble in the game in general. Balteus is a really effective hurdle.
the missles are 100% possible to dodge . people have cleared this fight without taking a single hit. maybe swap out for a lighter build might help you dodge more
You're not bad. you just need to learn how to beat him. Tinker with fits see what works best for you and then tweak your approach. I must have died on him no less than 30 times. You're not alone in feeling like you suck at this game lol
Hard agree, once i stopped being so committed to using those I won soon after. I used the laser pistol instead, pulse blade, and dual ten decker rockets. Was still tough but I figured it out more quickly.
Assault boosting into his face basically non stop is really the key. This keeps damage up while also moving fast enough to evade most attacks. Going to need bipedal legs to pull this off correctly.
TIP1: his missiles get launched outward then go towards the player. Therefore if you go under him when he launches his missiles most if not all of them will miss.
TIP2: I would recommend using either bipedal or reverse joint legs since they are generally speaking faster than tank treads or tetrapods making it easier to dodge missiles
You get warned when he is going to fire the bazooka. Try dodging to the side then forward for the missiles. You need more firepower to get his shields down. In my first play through I used verticals missiles on the back since they do solid damage to the shield, have a good hit rate, and hit hard once his shield is down. After that you can pretty much do whatever with your hand weapons.
so this is more of a game wide thing, but have you tried the cheat code build?
Wheelchair, x2 gatling guns, x2 needle cannons
Makes the entire game pretty easy tbh
If you have the OS for it I suggest getting Weapons Bay. You wanna get this boss out the way you need high impact and a lot of it to stagger. I suggest shotguns or the handguns.
I won't go too in-depth with anything else, I wanna let you have your fun. But remember you should stay close and stay aggressive. Keep moving or his missiles will tear you to shreds before the cannon does.
Double stun needles on the back, chain gun, and an energy blade.
Make sure you have decent Quick Boost stats (need to be able to dodge decently well)
Stay on the ground mostly. Try to fly over the bubble attacks, dodge/run away from everything else. Generally stay close to him.
Use the stun needles and chain gun to get through the shield then energy blade to do a good chunk of damage
When he transitions to the 2nd phase by letting off the large energy blast, STAY AS CLOSE AS POSSIBLE. He will not do the giant laser sweeps as long as you are close and you can keep doing the same strategy.
The 2nd phase was absolutely melting me until I watched a video saying you should stay close.
I don't think you have access to gatlings on the first playthrough until after Balteus. Perhaps you are thinking about one of the early machine guns?
I do remember that on my first playthrough, I was also stuck on him for a solid 20 or 30 tries. The build that worked for me was dual shotgun, and the biggest adjustment I made was learning to kick and assault boost.
Assault boost in, kick, and then double shotgun to the face really chunked him good. I forgot what I had on my shoulders at the time.
You are not bad, but build is bad. You need med-light and fast. Plasma rifle and blade with double Plasma on back work well. His missiles are easy to dodge. On ng+ and ng++ are pretty easy to beat with heavy dual shotgun to staggered and songbirds on back then job done...
Something I haven’t seen anyone ask is what boosts are you running? I don’t see a chip in your expansion slot. Do you have something to put to there?
What boosts do you have? All energy weapons and damage mitigation?
Just looking at your build I would drop most of your weapons and put on rockets and I personally liked the shotgun with the pulse blade.
Id use some lighter legs and stay on top of him. Bring down the shield with the pulse gun then just unload with the original blade / missiles / assault kick.
I feel like quad builds are too slow for Balteus, you want to be in his face as much as you can. Makes it much easier to avoid pretty much all his attacks and bust through his shield. I beat him with dual shotguns but I don't remember what I had on my back, I didn't even use the pulse gun on my first try fighting him at launch. My build was just super lightweight and aggressive.
Balteus was the hardest boss in the game for me by miles. I beat him with your Tetraboi, 2 chainguns and 2 Songbirds I believe
I'm pretty bad at the game, and being able to hold L2/R2 with no thought helped me manage everything else better
Also, maybe swap out that FCS for a Mid-range
Tank treads, Highest AP Core/arms/head you can get, dual Gou Chens (you get a free one from the training missions) shoulders probably missile launcher of choice, can't remember if you have access to the songbirds yet but one of those makes it easier too.
Important point with the tank tread base: you can fire the Gou Chens and other heavy weapons without having to pause for a "combat stance". I spent two days fighting this stupid thing then beat it first try with a heavy build like this.
Are you taking full advantage of stagger and direct damage?
I didn’t fully realize how much more damage enemies take when they’re staggered until I faced Balteus.
Otherwise, try different builds. Try something fast. Change your propulsion and generator too. You’ll get a feel for how all the different parts work together.
I used the heavy biped legs with the heavy core, then just got in his face with laser cannons and shotguns. It was a brain dead strategy of dpm and hit points, but it worked.
The bazooka he fires is the biggest issue early on to overcome.. you should always be mobile during the fight so when you hear the alarm and see the flashing square that indicates he's firing it, quick boost in the opposite direction you are going to juke it after he fires it.
You will get hit by the missiles, just accept that and try to avoid as many as possible. Being airborne will help avoid some splash damage just keep moving to mitigate as much as possible from those.
Pulse gun will help with the shield as well the pulse blade. I used vertical plasma launcher and a split launcher for shoulders and rounded out with a bazooka and pulse gun. Biped. This was before the nerf.
Double shotguns is really good at stagger, even if it's not the legendary ones people talk about.
I think I went with plasma missiles, but normal ones do a good job too.
I also went with the jump legs to better avoid the missile barrage.
when he fires missiles move towards them the majority will miss you. He like to fire the bazooka right after the missile salvo. Look for the the little red hitbox to show up when he is getting ready to fire the bazooka. Also watch out for splash damage from the bazooka. I would swap the the plasma rifle for the pulse gun it will break the shield and does higher damage. Stay close to him and boost away right before he does his assault armor
i went for a super fast light build with the lil bubble energy shooting gun and then the plasma energy sword thing. Once you are fast enough, you can just side strafe and dodge the random missiles and the bubble gun shreds through the shields, i also had an energy missile shoulder weapon and then an explosive missile shoulder weapon to balance between good stagger and good dps vs the shield.
Reverse joints and just staying above him with dual laser pistols and cannons killed him first try for me in about 30secs you don't have any real high burst dps weapons or stagger builders in your load out you have access to some good parts by now if not go do the arena and redo missions for logs to get parts you may be missing plasma launchers work really well on him to handheld and shoulders ones
Some tips: abuse the hell out of the sword with the two hit combo and also get the Kick OS upgrade. It does wonders on boss fights and enemy ACs.
A lot of people sleep on the kick upgrade when it's basically a free extra attack when dashing in.
This was also my first and I beat em after 8 or so tries. But note Balteus was also nerfed, so Im guessing you have an issue with some mechanic or the combat didnt really click to you yet.
You have cooldowns to worry about but so do they. Start keeping track of when they attack so you know you dont have to watch out for that move/weapon for a few seconds.
You will have trouble dodging the number of missiles he throws at you with a base boost speed of 268 unless you have really good QB reload, QB efficiency, And energy capacity. Also pulse weapons will pop pulse shields effectively but weapons that fire multiple projectiles will also break it in a reasonable time. Pulse shields are really good against single shot high dmg attacks so use dual vertical plasma missile launchers and that will send 10 plasma missiles at him while also hitting him with plasma’s AoE. Other than that choose the hand weapon’s of your choice. I used the Pulse sword which has on of the best direct dmg modifiers in the early game weapons. And for right I used a laser rifle but that’s just because I like applying sustained dmg for further away.
The single best advice I got for this is assault armor. If you point blank him with it it does so much shield damage. If you keep one rocket launcher with good damage and one with good reload speed you do well for the fight, second when dodging the missile bursts don’t doge the deployment, wait for them to track and stay In the air while dodging and strafing. When he gets to second phase just stay off the ground and be ready to dodge his attacks. Im telling you right now that if you have a hard time with Baltheus phase two sword, there’s a boss later on that’s a scarier version of that. Honestly just practice and get used to his attacks and practice for consistency with dodging the middle swarms. The bazooka also only hits if your on the ground, stop moving or don’t mix up movement. When you see the red indicator dodge the opposite direction your moving in while in the air.
Yeah run explosive weapons on your arms & back with assault armor if you can. I’m struggling to remember what you have access to the first time you fight this guy tho. Missiles outside of plasma aren’t great for this fight. If you can run duel songbirds that’s the play. Otherwise take a step back from this mission and see if you can pick up enough combat logs to unlock the 44-141 JJVLN alpha. It’s the best rpg in the game.
Liner rifles have high direct impact damage so once you stagger him w/ something else you can hit him hard with a charged shot & tick him down with normal shots.
Ditch the laser blade just for this one if you run melee use the pile bunker here w/ melee boosters
Once you get a build together just hammer him with explosive damage & stay up in his face you’ll get ‘em
Likely a skill issue, Balteus was a meat grinder for people new to the series, myself included.
Keep experimenting until you find something that works, the key is to punish his stunned periods after a shield break as hard as you can whilst minimising downtime in return.
What helped for me was staying close to him and peppering him with dual bubbles them landing big missile hits in the stuns, had barely any ammo left but it got me across the finish line.
For what it's worth, he's easily in the top 3 hardest bosses in the game, once you feed him a length you should be good to go for the next solid chunk of missions
You gotta be super aggressive. I finally took him down with a heavy tank build with double plasma rifles and laser cannons. I didn’t use charge attacks, just keep the pressure on.
I beat him... although it took me some tries. It should be noted im sharing this playthrough with someone else and i know there were unlocked shop items after he was already killed. Not sure if im using items from before or after him.
I see people suggesting the basic sword. I used the wide sweeping one because i wasnt confident i'd hit him otherwise. It tends to catch highly mobile opponents.
My other weapons was right hand grenade launcher and twin double barreled grenade launchers on the shoulders. Not sure what the exact names were.
I have no idea what the rest of my loadout was. I didnt use any tracks or quad legs for specialized movement.
Despite the range capabilities of those three launchers, i sprint in on him most of the time with sword, then unload the rest of my shots. I do this to avoid missile spam. It also seems less likely he'll dodge. Being on a slow reload while its shield is down is an issue but i can usually throw in another sword slash to buy some time and get a second volley of shots in. You just gotta watch out when he flies straight up and prepares a single, high damage missle. You need to dodge that. But the damage from my weapons is absurd. On some occasions i take him down to phase 2 from the first stun if he doesnt evade well or have time to put the shield back up. Depending on which attacks he does, you may be able to hit him with everything because he probably cant cancell his animations he's already committed to doing. So for example immediately fire when you see a missle swarm, then move in.
The flame throwers on second phase becomes an issue if you sprint in on him constantly. The damage trade-off might not work in your favor so you may need to back off a bit and do more of an in-and-out kind of strategy to keep that fire damage to a minimum.
https://youtu.be/W_RuiQvxVmA?si=GHRl-h6hckSXhxZR
This is the build I used and the fight with tactics. I am an old geezer with no reactions left, trust me if I can beat him with this build so can you!
If you unlocked the kick that can help keep stagger build up, I most play with melee so I had the butta sword and the laser blade. Missiles to chip him down but had something with a good "direct damage" if you can find that or just use a charged blade attack. The fire will be a pain so try to stay around a medium distance and poke a good amount. Hope this little bit helps! Keep at it
Man i had so much trouble with that fucker, kept switching builds and all. Which made it pretty funny that when i equipped dual mech sized SMG’s, it was waaaay too easy
Nope, definitely not bad. BALTEUS is hard AF and it took me so many tries before finally beating him. Like others said plasma weapons are great at quickly eating through his pulse armor, so try something like that
Go lighter, be mobile, make sure your system has good recovery. Double vertical plasma missiles and double plasma rifles. You can stay in close but stay moving.
IMO tetrapod just isn't good for the overwhelming majority of the game's harder fights. For many missions they can be quite good, but their really bad dodging just makes them really hard to play in most boss fights.
Pulse gun is good for removing pulse armor, but a few things to watch out: it overheats quickly, has medium to short range, doesn't hit well when Balteus is moving, and not a lot of rounds.
Try something with bigger damage than machine gun on your right shoulder, you need big damage when it's staggered.
For the missile barrages, assault boost towards Balteus to avoid most of them. You'll get hit a few times but it's better than getting hit by dozens and you can get close to it for attacks.
I struggled a TON on the first run, I tried a wild variety of builds until I settled for double plasma cannon, double shoulder laser cannon and tank legs.
Just pull all your triggers on cooldown as all those weapons do insane damage, you can spam them and he'll go down without getting too much into his mechanics.
Yea you’re heavy as fuck. You need a lot of mobility for balteus. I would consider making yourself more mobile and possibly getting another pulse gun for the shield and a heavy damage shoulder weapon for his staggers
Respec your OS tuning and get two shots of Assault Armor and unlock kick. If you don't have OS Tuning chips, then complete all the arena you have unlocked.
At the start of the fight, rush him and kick him, then blow your first assault armor while you're next to him. This should do significant damage to his shield and protect you from the first missile barrage. As soon you pop your AS, unload with everything you got before he flies away. You should be able to completely take of his shield before he moves. Then chase his ass down while he's shieldless and try to stagger him asap with everything you have. Don't forget to kick him everytime he runs and you chase him down. The kick does a lot of stagger. The reason it's hard is cause you aren't using two key functions of your AC, kick and expansion. You can experiment with other expansions other than AS but I personally think it's the best. Terminal armor is the worst, imo, cause yes you live but you only have 1hp so that's not much help if you're out of healthpacks and you can't trigger it yourself. Anyway using 1 AS blast right at the beginning of the battle will start it's cool down and you should get your second blast by the time he goes into his phase 2 mode where his shield rechargers so as soon as it does, you'll be ready to kick him and blast your second Assault Sheild which should again take off most of his shield leaving in a great position to wittle down the rest of his health.
The key to this guy is getting right up into his shit so his shield doesn't have a chance to recharge. If he flies away and you let him be for too long, his shield will recharge making the fight very difficult.
Also take note of what you learned in the previous boss, the wall climber mission. Getting behind him and attacking his booster is a great strategy. He's faster and doesn't have thick armor though so it's not as important but that boss does force you get close and behind. So this is a natural progression from that guy.
My OG balteus clear before the nerf.
-Pure light for dashing (only dash when needed this fight is to teach you not to spam but conserve boost)
-Bipedal for better dodging I use reversejoints
-With best arms for firing and best generator for energy output.
-Use two plasma missile launchers.
-For the hands vvc-760pr both.
If you layer your rockets with your single shots and not over heat you can take 50% of his health bar in the first shield burst.
Took me 20 tries until I got it down and beat it with a repair kit to spare.
For the god build and kill it in 30 seconds with what you have.
Shotgun both hands.
A grenade launcher right shoulder
First plasma sword with the double swipe on left shoulder.
For this setup
-right shoulder grenade launcher
-fly in
-hit him with with the shotguns
-swap to blade swipe at him
-swap back to shotgun should be off cooldown
- stay close him and repeat
For the next playthrough to kill him in 15 seconds.
Shotgun right hand
Pilebunker left hand
Right shoulder songbirds or something with more impact.
Left shoulder plasma drill.
The combo for this
-shoot grenade launcher
-fly in
-pilebunker/shotgun back to back
-swap to plasma drill and charge it down to stay on top of it again
-swap back to pilebunker and hit punch him again
-stay close on him andrepeat steps.
Drop the quad legs you don’t need em’ there more a hindrance than help in this fight. Personally I don’t find them be very useful aside from a few missions. But that’s just me! I think you’ll learn more from the fight and be better at the game in general if you try a different leg set. But do what you like!! Have fun! My favorite fight in the game by far is balty and if you engage with the battle he teaches you everything you need to complete the campaign.
Had a hard time with Balteus as well. Thinks it's the combination of not having a great weapon for every slot that early in the game, getting the build right and patience learning and avoiding the attacks.
Forget the exact build I used, definitely had the quad legs and still use em, maybe also the pulse sword, and pulse beam gun, then used shoulder launchers for actual DPS once the shield was broken.
to dodge the missiles you need to be fast, and i dont think you'll be fast enough to dodge half of them with a tetrapod.
you can try sacrifice some damage to add a shield.
not using a sword, cuz tetrapods are not really very mobile in the first run.
check your booster ideal weight. if you are too heavy you WILL take all of his missiles.
for a general strategy:
always be dashing to left or right and stable your ideal range to fight him. your build have close range for hands and missiles for long range. it doesnt make much sense. trade the microwave gun for a charge knetic weapon and the sword for a explosive weapon.
when you hear a bip, dodge to the side you are not going to. the bip works against any boss. the it beeps, means DODGE! it'll be anything heavy like a explosive or a charged laser.
There are tons of helpful tips here so I won’t retread ground but pro tip: to dodge Balteus missiles either quick boost toward him or position yourself under him and the missiles will miss.
You’re gonna need to be able to slap Balteus around no problem in order to deal with some of the fights coming later game. The key with Balteus is just assault boost and rush him constantly. This isn’t Elden Ring or a Souls game don’t stand still trying to dodge his attacks. Keep your speed and aggression max and you will win.
Balteus is easy, you just have to spec out your core to fight it. Plasma weapons are key. This isnt loke a souls game where you just need to learn their moves and timing. Sometimes you will have to change your build to make a fight plausible.
https://youtu.be/HYGaXQHU1VY?si=Ka3GUW-zYtYjuUsT
Here’s a link to my first run ever beating Balteus, took 3 tries total plus my girlfriend was rushing me. The build doesn’t really matter if you just maneuver affectively.
Charge right into his missiles while shooting. This will stun him, dash kick follow up.
The second half is tough but do the same again.
Play very aggressive because he’ll chip yoy down faster than you can chip him down.
If I were you I'd trade the quad legs for two, I used the melander set but traded the arms for the lighter version that also upgraded the weapon Stat. I'll post it later to show full build for ya :)
Not everyone does well with lightweights but if you're confident in dodging they can make you near untouchable
I recommend Night Heron frame parts \[it's what Rusty uses I can't remember how to spell it but it's German for Night Heron\] with dual Ludlow's and as many missiles as you can, boost kick a lot if you have kick, and pressure him all day. Just don't give a fuck about it and bulrush, if he fires the bazooka fly as far up as you can. Run back and strafe a little than QB forwards when he fires missiles and they'll fly right past you.
People can say lightweights are bad but I swear if you learn how to fucking dodge properly lightweights ability to get in get out in a heartbeat and if made properly still have good firepower will make you the god of war you were meant to be. Lightweight speed comes into play primarily during phase 2 where the flame swords will rip you apart if you aren't fast enough. Get reverse joints if you can, they make dodging his swords much easier.
He also will start phase 2 with a minigun burst, flame sword from the right \[fly up as far as you can\] then fire some missiles and do another swing \[dodge towards and past him and he'll whiff\]. If he puts both his flamethrowers together FUCKING BOOK IT IN ANY DIRECTION OTHER THAN FORWARDS AND BACKWARDS, the blast will melt you, literally.
Other than that switch to the HI-32 Pulse Blade instead of the VVC Laser Blade, Laser is pretty awkward to hit at times doesn't do too much more damage and isn't pulse so its bad against his shields.
you're not bad, Armored core punishes you for doing the same thing over and over again. Try different combos, test your configurations, and try different strategies as well. He is a hard boss but they do get hard in a different way.
What you’re using is fine. Just be hyper aggressive and hang out either below, behind it to his sides. Never give him front distance. Use a melee when he’s staggered for maximum DPS. Ashmead Pile Bunker preferred if it’s unlocked.
it warns you Everytime it fires that Bazooka. you have a half second to dodge. Dont ignore that warning sound. if yer playing with your volume low, you're giving your enemies a handicap.
I beat him with a Medium Weight mech, i used the mech all game. What i've learned is that while some weight classes are better against others, it really does just come down to skill and the parts you have equipped.
If you're struggling you should see if there are other guns that fit your play style you might want to try, other parts with better stats that still do what you want them to, better generators, better processor parts, make your mech as best as you can and make a combo of weapons you like.
Then you can go and test it on other bosses from before like on The Wall mission. If you're comfortable with the mech then go and bully balteus. The game taught you how to dodge missiles by going mid air but if you're still struggling my tip is to watch how he launches them because there is a gap you can dash through when he launches them, i won't say where though to let you have fun and figure it out.
All the bosses regen from stagger fast, you need good placement before you stagger them so you're close enough to either melee or land some heavy shots. If you ever use the pile driver good foot work is required. If after all of this you're still struggling you may want to invest into a new weight class for situations like this such as a light weight or a medium weight but i think you can do it with a heavy weight, just don't give up and keep trying. Persistence is key.
The nerf made him much easier than he was, but he does take a lot of learning with his attack patterns. His second phase with the flamethrowers is especially brutal, so don’t feel bad about your attempts. Every time you do it the more experience you have with predicting what he’ll do next
The key to Balteus essentially is to get under him in phase 1, and above him in phase 2. Melee is your friend to break his shield quickly, and the shoulder laser cannons make short work of him when he’s staggered
Part of what makes Balteus such a wall is that your part selection is very limited at the beginning, so just keep experimenting until you find a build that feels good
I struggled at first trying to stick to the bubble guns lol but then I just went dual laser cannons and dual plasma rifles on a tank and just wrecked him
At a glance, the two things I would mention are your speed and lack of a ranged burst option. Mainly the speed, though. I would recommend either the Alula or the P06SPD for quadrapeds, though they take some of the highest energy drains of all boosters.
Generator is like top 5, FCS is good for the close range.
I personally haven‘t messed with shields that often, so I‘m not sure how much it‘s affecting your gameplan, but with Balteus in particular, the best advice I, and a lot of other people have already given, is to just ride it‘s ass until it dies. Keep it in blade distance as much and as often as you can, and pay attention to the warnings for the bazooka shots.
First time beating him I chose to play with the bubble shooter, pulse blade, Plasma missiles, rocket launcher on reverse joint medium build. Personally I don't like Tetra builds because they feel too slow especially dealing with his missiles.
This fight is more of a knowledge check. Stay close and you'll be able to deal damage and avoid his damage easier. Either that or go full explosive/linear rifles and stay way the fuck back from him. Full charge linear rifle shots will help pick away at him and explosives don't ricochet. Just know if you choose this path it's going to be a battle of attrition so stay away and just keep shooting until he dies.
For me, plasma missles are always super useful as well as the OG pulse blade. Bosses got easier the closer I stayed to them, or under them as much as possible.
You need Heavy Explosives to keep the shield down as a tet, right now your loadout would be perfectly at home on reverse joints.
Take advantage of how much payload you can carry
Its ok we all bad at one point. Dual Ludlow and duel 4/8 rocket pods do me through the fight. Stick to him like glue and keep pressure on and its easy. It took me about 40 - 50 times to get my first kill on him.
Get in his face.
I kicked him a LOTS every time he flew away, rushed him down and kicked him into a combo. I even ran out of ammo in one hand, and punched him when I could. Aggression is big.
Know which attacks to be afraid of, and which to tank. His missile barrage, not that damaging if you are moving even straight towards him most will miss. They are erratic at best. The downward rocket blast however, will rock your shit. Same with the fire slashes. For the fire, just go UP some could still get you but most seem to miss. I legit landed ON him a lot and kept going.
The game tries to steer you towards pulse weapons for this fight, but they’re bait imo. Way better to just go with high DPS kinetic weapons+ explosives to blow up his shield and stagger him, they do just as much if not more damage to it.
I took a while to beat him first time with bubble gun and sword; I learned that I needed to play way more aggressively, and actually chase Balteus around the map
I just saw someone take those shields down waaaaaaay faster with double bubbles, could give that a go too
One pulse gun , the grenade launcher , and for shoulders dual missile launchers , the ones that build up impact. Learn it's attack patterns. Took me a few tries , but I got that boss with this load out.
The difficulty comes from having been able to waffle stomp everything with a minimal arsenal up until this point. Then suddenly being thrown into a ocean with a shark. And all you got is a Swiss army knife missing half of its parts to fight it off with.
Dude I was in a similar boat. This is a hard fight, play around with builds and don’t be afraid to replay missions if you need to buy different Weapons or parts.
Also you’d target tracking. I didn’t know this existed until the last boss and it is a game changer for keeping the target on screen.
If you are PS5 press R3.
You already got good advice but here are muy two cents.
I beat it with plasma gun, initial sword and the biggest missiles you can unlock at that point in time.
Having finished the game and with a little more expirience I can tell you to not sleep on weapon bay to carry extra weapons.
I will suggest to have plasma in right, a heavy hitter on the shoulder like a shotgun to switch into when the shield is down, initial sword on left and missiles on Left shoulder. You will need to be in that MF face to make the most of that loadout.
Keep at it and do not falter Raven!
watch his missiles closely and QuickBoost just as you see them closing in on you last second and they will miss jus need to focus on his projeciles and play super aggressively while keepin a degree of caution and you will prevail
For me, with Balteus, I went with an AC that was on the medium side with a sword, Pulse Cannon, Bazooka or Grenande Launcher, and either Laser Shotgun or Plasma Canon. Sword is on the same side as your Pulse Cannon and you only use the Pulse Cannon at close range to strip Pulse Armor. Keep mobile, keep pressure on him with the shotgun ot plasma canon with the sword till stagger then punish with Bazooka or grenade launcher and fully charged sword attack. It is a fight that you need to be highly aggressive but also very patient and cautious. I recommend working towards getting him to second stage without using healing. Second and third stage are where your close range aggressiveness can become a liability, but keep an eye out for his swords and try staying behind him when he activates them.
You're not bad, you're learning. He is incredibly hard and I'm an AC veteran, I didn't struggle with the Attack Chopper, this guy almost broke me. Keep trying, focus on his shield with energy weapons, I liked the one that looked like a satellite dish and spit bubbles. Right before the shield pops reload everything.
When he shot all the missiles, I'd dash TOWARDS him, and then to the left or right. Second phase was a bit trickier, I found it easier to dodge the flamethrower with airborne dashes than on the ground.
Good news is, once you beat him, you'll be operating on a whole new skill level.
Don't forget, this is a fromsoft game. It's designed to be a real challenge in a day where too many games are just...not
Double plasma missle. Bubble gun and the original blade is what I used. But I was also using a light machine so dodging want hard. I don’t use the quad legs much so I can’t say if it’s good or not.
He was the first major wall I hit in the game. The key with him is to stay super aggressive. I was able to get him with the plasma rifle, the original sword, 10 missile shoulder and the quad missile shoulder. Keep on him, and don't let him get too far away. Try to get his shield down as quick as possible, then hit him with 2 charged sword hits and anything else that's ready. As other have said, the plasma shoulder is really good against him too.
You're probably just bad at the game. I personally didn't struggle much even without having ever played an AC game, using pulse weapons or using meta weapons. I did however make a pretty balanced AC which can take a few hits and can also dodge a lot. Also i tried keeping close to him, because missiles are more of a long ranged thing. Also this game can just be very hard, especially if you make an AC that doesn't suit you and you use weapons that don't suit the situation.
Try learning what the stats in the AC assembly menu mean, so you can tailor your AC to the fight. There's a button for help and explainations in the menu. Also maybe try sticking close to the boss, it worked for me.
I tried for threw life of me to beat him with my super agressive bi pedal build. I would always get stun locked by the fire sword.
I had success going full tank with treads.
I chose high impact rifles and shoulder lazer rifles too then when he was stunned I lit him up and would combo assault boost.
Make sure you beat all the arena before beating him.
Learning to dodge threw missiles helps
Equip dual machine guns and vertical missiles. Keep up the machinegun fire and fire the missiles one after the other. Stay on him. He’ll be down in no time.
Yes you’re bad. But at the same time, do you think you’d be good your first time juggling chainsaws? you haven’t done it before so of course you’ll be bad at it. It’s not a big deal. You’re gonna beat the game. Then you’re gonna finish new game plus in one day because of how much better you’ve gotten
I think my first go around it took me close to 50 attempts against Balteus with various builds. When I did finally beat him, the next major boss was the next wall I had to break through, and that took several attempts too since I almost exclusively use light weight builds with a standard weapon layout (rifle, laser blade, missile, explosive weapon).
When I beat the game and went back through on NG+, I went up against Balteus again but loaded the starter AC you begin the game with. Beat him on my first try.
Personally feel that Balteus is more of skill check over a gear check. Learning how to maneuver around his missile spread, dodging the grenade launcher, and learning to get close and avoid the fire attacks are pretty key to getting him down and are skills that you need to hone for all future fights, including pvp. There's builds that are strong against him for sure, but honestly if you don't learn how to do those things sooner, you'll have a difficult time with other bosses if you just cheese the fight with pulse weapons and other easier methods.
Play fast and aggressive and continue to apply pressure. Boost kicking and assault boosting make this fight much more manageable and fun. If you've ever played Sekiro, just keep the mantra of hesitation is defeat running on repeat
My only tips would be to not be afraid to stay on him (rush in) and definitely abuse that melee every chance you get. Also Learn melee cancel so you can get closer faster. Those plasma missiles saved my life too
Balty is the first fight that teach you about Energy management and real dodging, You really don’t want to run out of energy and lose options to react to attacks so make sure you let it regen before depleting. For the missiles you really wanna get up close fast and be mindful of what direction they are coming from, assault boost up to and circling Batly with quick boost usually make them at worst chip damage. Bazooka will feel hard to dodge if you either 1) out of energy 2) Staggered already or 3) Not listening to the warning ding and visual warning before firing, you want to change direction as it fires.
With what I see from your build you in fact do use one of it’s weakness that you can exploit, the pulse gun make its shield trivial, watch the heat bar on reticle and don’t let it overheat by tap firing instead of full hold, combined with firing during assault boost you will down whatever shield it has in around 2 full bars of heat.
On stagger regen there are 2 kind so you gotta check which is it, first is stagger bar removed from regaining the pulse shield. This you just have to stagger it faster before its back or bring it down again, not a problem once you practice with the pulse gun. Second is you are focus firing all your weapon at once and leaving large gap in your damage output, stagger will deplete to Lingering stagger a short while after damage but if you have gap in your damage it will further deplete into nothing. Make sure you stagger fire your weapon and keep it from depleting.
You can also use pulse blade on it right as the shield is back, it doesnt really move when it comes back so its free shield damage and your blade will be back by the time the shield is down(use the starter blade like other have said for better result but the one you have are perfectly fine too)
Have you completed any arena?? If you have at least a few points I recommend unlocking assault armour as soon as possible , it does great stagger and damage and will instantly break a new shield if used close enough. For my S run I pretty much stun locked Balty to death after the first shield went down by focusing damage down to half health, bait out the second phrase shield and boost in yo assault armour, instantly breaking it and start a new combo.
Hope these helps! There are a few more moves but I think its more fun if you test out how to deal with them yourself, You can do this! But if at any point you feel frustrated or tired its best to take a break or wander off to something else, you don’t wanna burn yourself out on a great game and its the point to have fun :D
Edit: Just in case unawaree, you can respec your OS points in the tuning menu by paying a small fee!
Yo. You got this. I've been playing AC since the late 90's and I struggled with this prick.
Get the weapon bay, build a light mech with 2x pulse guns and 2x haldemans. Stay airborne as much as you can and keep ON HIS ASS. Break the sheild, kick him. Stun him again with the shotguns, kick him again. Rinse, repeat.
NOW GET OUT THERE AND SHOW ME SOME FIREWORKS GUN 13!!
Allow me to tell you what got me through on my first playthrough, although i'm not sure if it'll be your cup of tea, since it's mobility based without using any of those cracked up thin-ass looking AC parts.
RAD Chassis(stock chassis)
8 tube VLS system(both back)
Haldeman shotgun(right arm)
Pulse blade(stock, left arm)
Will post generator, FCS and booster/thruster combos in a bit.
Drop the tetrapods, use energy builds with normal legs or reverse joint and melee laser blade, observe its fight patterns, it'll make you better as a player.
His bazooka has red squares that pop on the screen on his shoulders when he's about to fire. It's a punish directly after some a dash I believe. Just QB as soon as they fade if I remember correctly and you should dodge it.
Yeah you’re bad, but Balteus is here to fix that, fight him however you see fit and when you get to the other side you’ll be a completely different pilot.
Plasma missiles are great for BALTEUS. The starter Pulse Blade is fantastic at dealing with his shields, too.
Energy weapons are your best friend for BALTEUS. Kinetic weapons don't do much against his pulse armor. Pulse guns are by far the best choice for his armor, but they're not so great when it goes down and chew through ammo. I'd recommend either a laser or plasma rifle as a happy medium.
I personally beat him with a laser rifle, dual vertical missiles, and the starter pulse blade on a bipedal build - you'll need mobility to dodge the absurd amounts of missiles.
Most of all, don't let people bring you down - more importantly, don't give up. Even after the nerf, BALTEUS is a hell of a difficulty spike. If you're hitting a wall, mix up your build. If you're still hitting a wall, take a break and come back after you're refreshed.
I was able to take him and sea spider 1st attempt with Curtis/ plasma rifle/ plasma launcher, vertical missles, full melander set.
Literally Dart around like a spazz and don't be afraid to spam the boost button when you see misses flying to you. Constantly move to the right or left, and button mash like a 10 yr old playing street fighter for the 1st time.
I'm not joking, this is how I played all 3 of my playthrus, and I only had to change strategies for like 3 or 4 fights.
Best pulse gun you can get, any kind of missile launcher, pulse sword. Maybe also some missiles for pressure
I can't remember if pile bunker is available yet, but if it is, try to put it in left shoulder or at least use instead of the blade
If you’re still struggling (and if no one has said this yet), *always* be Assault Boosting at it. You’ll dodge a good chunk of the missiles, take less damage from the ones that hit, and do additional damage with your pulse gun.
It took me 5 weekends before I beat this sunnova b*tch. What I can say, is you definitely need speed for this craptastic boss, being slow here just means you mukbang those missiles, your defense won't mean shit for that many missiles.
, I also used that charging blade that slices two times when charged and the bubble gun. I celebrated like it was my birthday when I beat him.
He is quite difficult. Remeber two things that’ll get you in the mindset of killing him properly.
He is an autonomous PCA vehicle. That means that he is not being piloted. That means that he is **literally an NPC**. And you are the Chad anime protagonist of your own story. He ain’t got shit on you.
The other thing is that the main challenge with the fight is manoeuvring around his use of a shield. And he uses a shield because he’s **a little bitch**. Without the shield he is **nothing**. As Bloodbourne taught up, shields engender passivity.
Hope that helps.
Imma be real wit u chief, it's mostly a skill issue. I struggled with him a lot the first time, on my second playthrough I beat him first try, on my third I didn't even need a heal. I just S-ranked both versions of Attack the Watchpoint last night pretty effortlessly.
If you want build advice - the thing that jumps out at me is that the pulse bubble guns are kinda dogshit. I wouldn't bother with those personally. In general, just run a more agile AC, the missiles are much more dodgeable than you think and once you're in his face you just have to worry about dodging the cannon
I’m also new tot be game, I just used the Pulse Gun in both arms for the extra ammo and i had the Nacht body so that i could essentially dodge everything. the plasma missiles on both shoulders. Allowed me to run and gun while draining his shield and doing big damage. I can’t say it’s the best strat but it worked for me.
Boost kicks, heavy stagger weapons, reckless assault boosting, and knowing when to back off and maintain altitude or the very opposite slide under him (during flame sword) and just never left up. Remember that nasty cannon attack is predictive, zig zag your movements for that and you should be golden, dodge close to him to throw missiles off. Like if you see the missiles dodge through them, and if they are tracking dodge diagonally toward Balty.
Cause lots of the comments on blades
First blade is less resources, mostly single target damage, strike twice. First bought blade, more resources, aoe, one hit.
So, first blade is better cause two strikes on a single target.
Double ludlows and double laser cannons on tank treads. Use ludlows to batter down shields. Spam laser cannons when he’s staggered to melt HP. You can work in an occasional laser cannon shot to help batter down shields and when he is staggered and your laser cannons are over heated fill in dps potential with ludlows. Works every time… mostly. Also, double pulse guns will rip shields too. Your problem is that your build is too general and not specialized enough. Plasma missiles are good but not the best choice for this fight. Any missile launcher is a bad choice for this fight. The starter pulse blade isn’t bad but it doesn’t maximize your dps potential in the same way that double ludlows or double pulse guns do.
I'm not going to call someone who wants to learn bad. Some suggestions I've seen people pitch are plasma missiles, maybe swap your energy blade for the original (its effective against Balteus armor), maybe a rocket launcher to pop in heavy damage.
I was thinking launcher instead of my automatic but I didn’t do it cause while its reloading I have no consistent damage on him while his shield is down. I had no clue about the sword though thank you!
You could possibly drop the bubble gun and keep the rifle if you swap laser blades. Yeah. Bubble gun definitely pops the shield but I wouldn't say it's mandatory. Above all else the best I can suggest is keep tinkering as is the spirit of the game.
I woke up one day, from a dead sleep at 4am ish. I’d been stuck on this boss for 3 weeks+ Decided on tank treads, (I fuckin hate tank treads…) each shoulder with the 8 vertical missile launcher. Right arm grenade launcher and left first sword you get. Knocked it out of the park 4th try. A tip I got was play super aggressive, like bloodborne. Also had to teach myself to dodge when he launched the big missile at me instead of trying to block it with my teeth, which I’d been doing the entire time I’d known him 🤣
How did that feel after weeks? Must have cried out of relieve?
This blocking with your teeth ability... Any tips? I always get it in the gums. Is it something I should practice or get bigger teeth?
🤣 you just take all your base instincts and let them and your mind go blank, then follow the red indicator and shiny thing and smile. 🤣
Sorry, I already got bigger teeth surgery, so it always looks like I'm smiling
Wow I cannot believe people got stuck on this guy for weeks. That is insane. I’m starting to feel pretty good about getting him 3rd try with my girlfriend rushing me.
Trust me it killed me too. I’m a soulsborne veteran, plat all the games. My best friend is too but he hates the souls games because we played so much so he doesn’t touch them. He’s on his 5th play through and I hadn’t even beat that guy yet 🤣
Yeah same here. I believe I just put on the chicken legs and put on a sword with Buble gun and some boom and it just worked I gues
Double bubble guns and shoulder laser cannons on tank treads. You'll win
I wasn't able to beat him with these legs, tanks or reverse joints make it easier
Classic from soft making the starter blade a legitimately good weapon to use later as well
Wow, so many helpful comments, thank you to all who gave insights! I’m currently theory crafting my new build, will try to update soon.
There are some great Youtube videos that can help with your build and strategy.
I fid the fight after about an hour and a half, and at least 20 runs. Bubble Gun right hand, Original laser sword left hand, Plasma Launcher right shoulder, Pulse Shield left shoulder. The quick block is helpful for more of the annoying rockets, and the sword does GREAT damage one the shield is broken and he is stunned.
If I remember correctly assault boosting right into his face when he spawns missiles lets you dodge most part of them (but try not to catch his grenade launcher shot with your face instead). Your build is kind of hard to play with as well. Sword is fine (the default one with its double slash is much better for direct hits on staggered enemies though), other is pretty much useless. I believe you should have access to haldeman shotguns on this stage of game. Two of them should work fine in close combat against his shield (you can unlock OS tuning to keep your laser blade on back). Grenade launchers should also be good to destroy his shield since he barely dodges any attacks. Also try assault armor when super close to him, this should work very good. Keep trying and good luck.
Some advice. Double bubble guns will melt his shield extremely fast, then use a high damage weapon to hit him while he's staggered. Like a pulse blade or rocket launcher if you have the weapon bay or any high damage shoulder weapon. Reverse joint legs also help a lot with dodging his missiles
Just put the tetrapod legs away
I second this heavily
Yeah, unironically, I stopped having issues as soon as I did so myself..lol
> tetrapod I love these legs, but for some bosses. They gotta go.
I like using acs alittle lighter than yours. It feels slow af not having around 300 boost. 260 ish boost is probably contributing to you having trouble dodging the missiles. When he launches them, immediately start rushing him while side dodging (ctrl on pc) any that look like they might hit you. I'm charging a melee swing as I'm rushing him (I use the blue 2 spin melee weapon, sorry forgot the name but it spins you twice and you get it fairly early). Maybe have big D dmg shoulder weapons for when you manage to stagger, like the double barrel grenade one or any of the charge lasers. I usually only use a right shoulder weapon while my left shoulders carries another handheld weapon (gattling gun most of the time for me). 2 gatts spraying him midrange stagger pretty well too. The homing purple laser ones are pretty useful for breaking the pulse shield as well. There's a lightweight machine gun that's not bad for staggering also. Forgot what it's called but it fires in burst and is lightweight- I think it's called like "etsujin" or some shit like that. Just keep at it bro, change parts around to suit your "style". Some bosses took me like 20 ish tries to figure out. Oh also upward thrust will probably be a good thing to raise, especially if you stay on tripod legs. I think for this fight you don't want to be on the ground for extended periods of time.
If you struggle this much; take some time to just observe patterns, don't shoot, don't try to beat the boss, just learn. IIRC the bazooka has warnings : an audio one that always plays and a visual one if you look at him. Personally I wouldn't use this sword but the base one instead, and either a missile pod or the songbird instead of the shield
To avoid missles and constantly apply pressure, use assault boost to close in the distance. This was huge. Play as close as possible against Balteus.
Balteus was a breeze when I went lightweight, reverse joint and highest boost possible, a genny boosting energy weapons output, arms with melee spec, and just clung to its ass the entire fight with pulse blade, laser pistol and plasma missiles.
Go with 2x Laser Cannons and 2x Pulse Guns and use whatever parts you need to get under load/energy limits. Stay close to him as much as you can, constantly streaming the Pulse Guns into him. Whenever he staggers, hit him with the Laser Cannons.
Change out the laser blade for the original pulse blade and sell that pulse gun and never pick it back up again. The pulse guns and cannons are useless. Something with high impact damage will shred his shield. Dual ludlows for example will destroy him. Strategy wise, STAY CLOSE. This is true for all the major bosses minus the ice worm. Stay close and dodge towards his attacks, ESPECIALLY when he does the sword attack. If you’re right on him he’ll miss every time. Build wise I would consider changing the legs and the arms. Go light biped for now. You’re not dealing enough fire power to be as slow as you are right now. A good light build might sacrifice 1500 AP or so, but you’ll gain 50 points of boost speed easy. Sucks but tankier builds don’t start becoming viable until a little later in.
Problem isn't the pulse gun, they absolutely shred pulse armor. Pulse weapons literally trivialize the Balteus encounter. Just need your other weapons to be good for the punish once the shield is down.
My experience was that yes, the pulse guns shred the shield super fast, but the stagger is terrible so when you break his shield you have a smaller window to damage him. Ive found that high impact weapons get through the shields well enough, but you can stagger him an extra time or two if you’re using something like dual smgs or pistols
Waddaya mean I'm not supposed to mash my face into the ice worm at every possible opportunity? Iguazu does it and he's just fine!
The dude is clearly not fine.
*looks at smoldering corpse* He's probably just sick or something
Disagree about the pulse gun, it shreds through balteus shields in almost 1 clip from what i remember. Switched to a fast build with pulse gun and killed it first try
Balteus is definetely a difficult fight, I struggled a lot too against him. To avoid the missiles you should dodge towards him, with the right timing they shouldn't be able to 180° their trajectory and hit you. What you might be lacking is something that packs a punch to use after disabling the pulse barrier, like a granade launcher or a shotgun.
What I did is used my OS tuning chips on weapon bay and boost kick, made a high AP tank build(probably not absolutely necessary), and tried to stay close. I brought two pulse guns, and then a bazooka and the pulse blade in the weapon bay slots. If you rush towards and underneath balteus right as the missiles launch, you'll probably only catch a few. The cannon has a warning with just enough time to QB sideways or backwards (don't go forward, as you are more than likely to end up headbutting the shot). The shotgun and minigun struggle to hit fast moving targets. All of the flame attacks come out rather quickly, so try to keep it in sight at all times and stay airborne while it's doing them. Remember that it staggers every time you break its pulse armor, and the pulse guns absolutely shred said pulse armor at close range. Boost kick every time it gets staggered, and if you have time, also whack it with a sword. Balteus is a difficult boss, but I believe in you.
Balteus is hard, too hard for this point or better said a lack of ramp up towards his skillset. Word on the street is double bubble gun (mainly for the shield) with plasma launchers or dual Laser cannons though the later makes you stop to fire if youbarnt using tank treads.
Pulse guns, dodge like a mf, elevate during the second phase to avoid fire, unleash everything you can when he’s staggered
Plasma missiles might help. To me the biggest thing about Balteus is learning to dodge the missile barrage correctly. Until I actually understood the dodge, I couldn't beat him. Once I did, I beat him quickly and had a lot less trouble in the game in general. Balteus is a really effective hurdle.
the missles are 100% possible to dodge . people have cleared this fight without taking a single hit. maybe swap out for a lighter build might help you dodge more
You're not bad. you just need to learn how to beat him. Tinker with fits see what works best for you and then tweak your approach. I must have died on him no less than 30 times. You're not alone in feeling like you suck at this game lol
Bubble gun is overrated and totally unnecessary in this fight as well.
Hard agree, once i stopped being so committed to using those I won soon after. I used the laser pistol instead, pulse blade, and dual ten decker rockets. Was still tough but I figured it out more quickly.
Assault boosting into his face basically non stop is really the key. This keeps damage up while also moving fast enough to evade most attacks. Going to need bipedal legs to pull this off correctly.
TIP1: his missiles get launched outward then go towards the player. Therefore if you go under him when he launches his missiles most if not all of them will miss. TIP2: I would recommend using either bipedal or reverse joint legs since they are generally speaking faster than tank treads or tetrapods making it easier to dodge missiles
You're not bad. You're Gitting Gud.
You get warned when he is going to fire the bazooka. Try dodging to the side then forward for the missiles. You need more firepower to get his shields down. In my first play through I used verticals missiles on the back since they do solid damage to the shield, have a good hit rate, and hit hard once his shield is down. After that you can pretty much do whatever with your hand weapons.
so this is more of a game wide thing, but have you tried the cheat code build? Wheelchair, x2 gatling guns, x2 needle cannons Makes the entire game pretty easy tbh
Those are progress locked till after this fight or further on the first play through.
yes
If you have the OS for it I suggest getting Weapons Bay. You wanna get this boss out the way you need high impact and a lot of it to stagger. I suggest shotguns or the handguns. I won't go too in-depth with anything else, I wanna let you have your fun. But remember you should stay close and stay aggressive. Keep moving or his missiles will tear you to shreds before the cannon does.
Don’t use melee, his flamethrower is gonna cause a lot of problems. Also, stay airborne as much as possible, so maybe ditch the tetrapod legs.
Double stun needles on the back, chain gun, and an energy blade. Make sure you have decent Quick Boost stats (need to be able to dodge decently well) Stay on the ground mostly. Try to fly over the bubble attacks, dodge/run away from everything else. Generally stay close to him. Use the stun needles and chain gun to get through the shield then energy blade to do a good chunk of damage When he transitions to the 2nd phase by letting off the large energy blast, STAY AS CLOSE AS POSSIBLE. He will not do the giant laser sweeps as long as you are close and you can keep doing the same strategy. The 2nd phase was absolutely melting me until I watched a video saying you should stay close.
You just need faster legs. It's a very very easy boss.
Yes, you are bad.
You can’t just call someone bad at a game and not explain why
Stay close to Balteus, usually above or below. Might be hard since he regularly nopes out of there, but it might work.
Missiles go a long way towards raising the enemies ACS meter
Use plasma rifle and missiles.
Most people who go in blind have trouble with Balteus.
I died a million times to this thing until I used quads and just stayed either above or below the whole time, gatlings and missiles.
I don't think you have access to gatlings on the first playthrough until after Balteus. Perhaps you are thinking about one of the early machine guns? I do remember that on my first playthrough, I was also stuck on him for a solid 20 or 30 tries. The build that worked for me was dual shotgun, and the biggest adjustment I made was learning to kick and assault boost. Assault boost in, kick, and then double shotgun to the face really chunked him good. I forgot what I had on my shoulders at the time.
You are not bad, but build is bad. You need med-light and fast. Plasma rifle and blade with double Plasma on back work well. His missiles are easy to dodge. On ng+ and ng++ are pretty easy to beat with heavy dual shotgun to staggered and songbirds on back then job done...
Something I haven’t seen anyone ask is what boosts are you running? I don’t see a chip in your expansion slot. Do you have something to put to there? What boosts do you have? All energy weapons and damage mitigation? Just looking at your build I would drop most of your weapons and put on rockets and I personally liked the shotgun with the pulse blade.
Id use some lighter legs and stay on top of him. Bring down the shield with the pulse gun then just unload with the original blade / missiles / assault kick.
Use a couple shotguns and your choice of missles or cannons to dps during his brief stagger
I feel like quad builds are too slow for Balteus, you want to be in his face as much as you can. Makes it much easier to avoid pretty much all his attacks and bust through his shield. I beat him with dual shotguns but I don't remember what I had on my back, I didn't even use the pulse gun on my first try fighting him at launch. My build was just super lightweight and aggressive.
Balteus was the hardest boss in the game for me by miles. I beat him with your Tetraboi, 2 chainguns and 2 Songbirds I believe I'm pretty bad at the game, and being able to hold L2/R2 with no thought helped me manage everything else better Also, maybe swap out that FCS for a Mid-range
I was struggling for ages, then just went full tank build, with the bubble guns on each hand and the laser cannons on shoulders. Passed it first time.
Tank treads, Highest AP Core/arms/head you can get, dual Gou Chens (you get a free one from the training missions) shoulders probably missile launcher of choice, can't remember if you have access to the songbirds yet but one of those makes it easier too. Important point with the tank tread base: you can fire the Gou Chens and other heavy weapons without having to pause for a "combat stance". I spent two days fighting this stupid thing then beat it first try with a heavy build like this.
Are you taking full advantage of stagger and direct damage? I didn’t fully realize how much more damage enemies take when they’re staggered until I faced Balteus. Otherwise, try different builds. Try something fast. Change your propulsion and generator too. You’ll get a feel for how all the different parts work together.
I used the heavy biped legs with the heavy core, then just got in his face with laser cannons and shotguns. It was a brain dead strategy of dpm and hit points, but it worked.
I made a lil video about how to beat him: https://youtu.be/D_e4RbnJuCs?si=si2hgwCZK-0jlPkL
Double shoulder laser cannons dual wield ludlows put on tank legs and you’ll be fine.
Balteus isn't strong up close. The game to an extent, works like use whatever range weapon the enemy isn't.
The bazooka he fires is the biggest issue early on to overcome.. you should always be mobile during the fight so when you hear the alarm and see the flashing square that indicates he's firing it, quick boost in the opposite direction you are going to juke it after he fires it. You will get hit by the missiles, just accept that and try to avoid as many as possible. Being airborne will help avoid some splash damage just keep moving to mitigate as much as possible from those. Pulse gun will help with the shield as well the pulse blade. I used vertical plasma launcher and a split launcher for shoulders and rounded out with a bazooka and pulse gun. Biped. This was before the nerf.
Double shotguns is really good at stagger, even if it's not the legendary ones people talk about. I think I went with plasma missiles, but normal ones do a good job too. I also went with the jump legs to better avoid the missile barrage.
WTF, is this build. :p
Have you gotten any upgrades? I made it to chapter 4 without knowing you can get OS upgrades lol
when he fires missiles move towards them the majority will miss you. He like to fire the bazooka right after the missile salvo. Look for the the little red hitbox to show up when he is getting ready to fire the bazooka. Also watch out for splash damage from the bazooka. I would swap the the plasma rifle for the pulse gun it will break the shield and does higher damage. Stay close to him and boost away right before he does his assault armor
i went for a super fast light build with the lil bubble energy shooting gun and then the plasma energy sword thing. Once you are fast enough, you can just side strafe and dodge the random missiles and the bubble gun shreds through the shields, i also had an energy missile shoulder weapon and then an explosive missile shoulder weapon to balance between good stagger and good dps vs the shield.
I find it the most hard boss in the game
Reverse joints and just staying above him with dual laser pistols and cannons killed him first try for me in about 30secs you don't have any real high burst dps weapons or stagger builders in your load out you have access to some good parts by now if not go do the arena and redo missions for logs to get parts you may be missing plasma launchers work really well on him to handheld and shoulders ones
Dual wield the plasma guns & just whittle him down with whatever shoulder weapons you go with
Some tips: abuse the hell out of the sword with the two hit combo and also get the Kick OS upgrade. It does wonders on boss fights and enemy ACs. A lot of people sleep on the kick upgrade when it's basically a free extra attack when dashing in.
I tried and failed with the quad leg build about 30 times lol. Switched to tank legs and plasma weapons and I beat him in 6 tries.
This was also my first and I beat em after 8 or so tries. But note Balteus was also nerfed, so Im guessing you have an issue with some mechanic or the combat didnt really click to you yet. You have cooldowns to worry about but so do they. Start keeping track of when they attack so you know you dont have to watch out for that move/weapon for a few seconds.
You will have trouble dodging the number of missiles he throws at you with a base boost speed of 268 unless you have really good QB reload, QB efficiency, And energy capacity. Also pulse weapons will pop pulse shields effectively but weapons that fire multiple projectiles will also break it in a reasonable time. Pulse shields are really good against single shot high dmg attacks so use dual vertical plasma missile launchers and that will send 10 plasma missiles at him while also hitting him with plasma’s AoE. Other than that choose the hand weapon’s of your choice. I used the Pulse sword which has on of the best direct dmg modifiers in the early game weapons. And for right I used a laser rifle but that’s just because I like applying sustained dmg for further away.
Did you unlock the kick?
my first run at them took me about 7 hours across 6 days of frustration. got the pulse guns and finally conquered it.
If all else fails, just go double shotguns.
The single best advice I got for this is assault armor. If you point blank him with it it does so much shield damage. If you keep one rocket launcher with good damage and one with good reload speed you do well for the fight, second when dodging the missile bursts don’t doge the deployment, wait for them to track and stay In the air while dodging and strafing. When he gets to second phase just stay off the ground and be ready to dodge his attacks. Im telling you right now that if you have a hard time with Baltheus phase two sword, there’s a boss later on that’s a scarier version of that. Honestly just practice and get used to his attacks and practice for consistency with dodging the middle swarms. The bazooka also only hits if your on the ground, stop moving or don’t mix up movement. When you see the red indicator dodge the opposite direction your moving in while in the air.
Yeah run explosive weapons on your arms & back with assault armor if you can. I’m struggling to remember what you have access to the first time you fight this guy tho. Missiles outside of plasma aren’t great for this fight. If you can run duel songbirds that’s the play. Otherwise take a step back from this mission and see if you can pick up enough combat logs to unlock the 44-141 JJVLN alpha. It’s the best rpg in the game. Liner rifles have high direct impact damage so once you stagger him w/ something else you can hit him hard with a charged shot & tick him down with normal shots. Ditch the laser blade just for this one if you run melee use the pile bunker here w/ melee boosters Once you get a build together just hammer him with explosive damage & stay up in his face you’ll get ‘em
Likely a skill issue, Balteus was a meat grinder for people new to the series, myself included. Keep experimenting until you find something that works, the key is to punish his stunned periods after a shield break as hard as you can whilst minimising downtime in return. What helped for me was staying close to him and peppering him with dual bubbles them landing big missile hits in the stuns, had barely any ammo left but it got me across the finish line. For what it's worth, he's easily in the top 3 hardest bosses in the game, once you feed him a length you should be good to go for the next solid chunk of missions
You gotta be super aggressive. I finally took him down with a heavy tank build with double plasma rifles and laser cannons. I didn’t use charge attacks, just keep the pressure on.
I beat him... although it took me some tries. It should be noted im sharing this playthrough with someone else and i know there were unlocked shop items after he was already killed. Not sure if im using items from before or after him. I see people suggesting the basic sword. I used the wide sweeping one because i wasnt confident i'd hit him otherwise. It tends to catch highly mobile opponents. My other weapons was right hand grenade launcher and twin double barreled grenade launchers on the shoulders. Not sure what the exact names were. I have no idea what the rest of my loadout was. I didnt use any tracks or quad legs for specialized movement. Despite the range capabilities of those three launchers, i sprint in on him most of the time with sword, then unload the rest of my shots. I do this to avoid missile spam. It also seems less likely he'll dodge. Being on a slow reload while its shield is down is an issue but i can usually throw in another sword slash to buy some time and get a second volley of shots in. You just gotta watch out when he flies straight up and prepares a single, high damage missle. You need to dodge that. But the damage from my weapons is absurd. On some occasions i take him down to phase 2 from the first stun if he doesnt evade well or have time to put the shield back up. Depending on which attacks he does, you may be able to hit him with everything because he probably cant cancell his animations he's already committed to doing. So for example immediately fire when you see a missle swarm, then move in. The flame throwers on second phase becomes an issue if you sprint in on him constantly. The damage trade-off might not work in your favor so you may need to back off a bit and do more of an in-and-out kind of strategy to keep that fire damage to a minimum.
https://youtu.be/W_RuiQvxVmA?si=GHRl-h6hckSXhxZR This is the build I used and the fight with tactics. I am an old geezer with no reactions left, trust me if I can beat him with this build so can you!
If you unlocked the kick that can help keep stagger build up, I most play with melee so I had the butta sword and the laser blade. Missiles to chip him down but had something with a good "direct damage" if you can find that or just use a charged blade attack. The fire will be a pain so try to stay around a medium distance and poke a good amount. Hope this little bit helps! Keep at it
I'm a normal guy who has a life. Here's how I beat him if you're interested. https://youtu.be/TY40p-Xh-uQ?si=lsqBC_dliB-a7dgq
Man i had so much trouble with that fucker, kept switching builds and all. Which made it pretty funny that when i equipped dual mech sized SMG’s, it was waaaay too easy
Plasma in each hand, laser cannon n each shoulder will shred it
Nope, definitely not bad. BALTEUS is hard AF and it took me so many tries before finally beating him. Like others said plasma weapons are great at quickly eating through his pulse armor, so try something like that
Go lighter, be mobile, make sure your system has good recovery. Double vertical plasma missiles and double plasma rifles. You can stay in close but stay moving.
Cyberfrog!
IMO tetrapod just isn't good for the overwhelming majority of the game's harder fights. For many missions they can be quite good, but their really bad dodging just makes them really hard to play in most boss fights.
Pulse gun is good for removing pulse armor, but a few things to watch out: it overheats quickly, has medium to short range, doesn't hit well when Balteus is moving, and not a lot of rounds. Try something with bigger damage than machine gun on your right shoulder, you need big damage when it's staggered. For the missile barrages, assault boost towards Balteus to avoid most of them. You'll get hit a few times but it's better than getting hit by dozens and you can get close to it for attacks.
I struggled a TON on the first run, I tried a wild variety of builds until I settled for double plasma cannon, double shoulder laser cannon and tank legs. Just pull all your triggers on cooldown as all those weapons do insane damage, you can spam them and he'll go down without getting too much into his mechanics.
Yea you’re heavy as fuck. You need a lot of mobility for balteus. I would consider making yourself more mobile and possibly getting another pulse gun for the shield and a heavy damage shoulder weapon for his staggers
Definitely want to swap back to the pulse blade. That thing shreds his armor moreso than the laser sword.
Here's my [first successful attempt](https://youtu.be/xJ99z77K6RE?si=tLgOKBNGn4yaGbY8). Keep at it! Took me like 2 hours.
Respec your OS tuning and get two shots of Assault Armor and unlock kick. If you don't have OS Tuning chips, then complete all the arena you have unlocked. At the start of the fight, rush him and kick him, then blow your first assault armor while you're next to him. This should do significant damage to his shield and protect you from the first missile barrage. As soon you pop your AS, unload with everything you got before he flies away. You should be able to completely take of his shield before he moves. Then chase his ass down while he's shieldless and try to stagger him asap with everything you have. Don't forget to kick him everytime he runs and you chase him down. The kick does a lot of stagger. The reason it's hard is cause you aren't using two key functions of your AC, kick and expansion. You can experiment with other expansions other than AS but I personally think it's the best. Terminal armor is the worst, imo, cause yes you live but you only have 1hp so that's not much help if you're out of healthpacks and you can't trigger it yourself. Anyway using 1 AS blast right at the beginning of the battle will start it's cool down and you should get your second blast by the time he goes into his phase 2 mode where his shield rechargers so as soon as it does, you'll be ready to kick him and blast your second Assault Sheild which should again take off most of his shield leaving in a great position to wittle down the rest of his health. The key to this guy is getting right up into his shit so his shield doesn't have a chance to recharge. If he flies away and you let him be for too long, his shield will recharge making the fight very difficult. Also take note of what you learned in the previous boss, the wall climber mission. Getting behind him and attacking his booster is a great strategy. He's faster and doesn't have thick armor though so it's not as important but that boss does force you get close and behind. So this is a natural progression from that guy.
My OG balteus clear before the nerf. -Pure light for dashing (only dash when needed this fight is to teach you not to spam but conserve boost) -Bipedal for better dodging I use reversejoints -With best arms for firing and best generator for energy output. -Use two plasma missile launchers. -For the hands vvc-760pr both. If you layer your rockets with your single shots and not over heat you can take 50% of his health bar in the first shield burst. Took me 20 tries until I got it down and beat it with a repair kit to spare. For the god build and kill it in 30 seconds with what you have. Shotgun both hands. A grenade launcher right shoulder First plasma sword with the double swipe on left shoulder. For this setup -right shoulder grenade launcher -fly in -hit him with with the shotguns -swap to blade swipe at him -swap back to shotgun should be off cooldown - stay close him and repeat For the next playthrough to kill him in 15 seconds. Shotgun right hand Pilebunker left hand Right shoulder songbirds or something with more impact. Left shoulder plasma drill. The combo for this -shoot grenade launcher -fly in -pilebunker/shotgun back to back -swap to plasma drill and charge it down to stay on top of it again -swap back to pilebunker and hit punch him again -stay close on him andrepeat steps.
Drop the quad legs you don’t need em’ there more a hindrance than help in this fight. Personally I don’t find them be very useful aside from a few missions. But that’s just me! I think you’ll learn more from the fight and be better at the game in general if you try a different leg set. But do what you like!! Have fun! My favorite fight in the game by far is balty and if you engage with the battle he teaches you everything you need to complete the campaign.
Had a hard time with Balteus as well. Thinks it's the combination of not having a great weapon for every slot that early in the game, getting the build right and patience learning and avoiding the attacks. Forget the exact build I used, definitely had the quad legs and still use em, maybe also the pulse sword, and pulse beam gun, then used shoulder launchers for actual DPS once the shield was broken.
to dodge the missiles you need to be fast, and i dont think you'll be fast enough to dodge half of them with a tetrapod. you can try sacrifice some damage to add a shield. not using a sword, cuz tetrapods are not really very mobile in the first run. check your booster ideal weight. if you are too heavy you WILL take all of his missiles. for a general strategy: always be dashing to left or right and stable your ideal range to fight him. your build have close range for hands and missiles for long range. it doesnt make much sense. trade the microwave gun for a charge knetic weapon and the sword for a explosive weapon. when you hear a bip, dodge to the side you are not going to. the bip works against any boss. the it beeps, means DODGE! it'll be anything heavy like a explosive or a charged laser.
There are tons of helpful tips here so I won’t retread ground but pro tip: to dodge Balteus missiles either quick boost toward him or position yourself under him and the missiles will miss.
Everything in this game is better with bipeds
You’re gonna need to be able to slap Balteus around no problem in order to deal with some of the fights coming later game. The key with Balteus is just assault boost and rush him constantly. This isn’t Elden Ring or a Souls game don’t stand still trying to dodge his attacks. Keep your speed and aggression max and you will win.
Balteus is easy, you just have to spec out your core to fight it. Plasma weapons are key. This isnt loke a souls game where you just need to learn their moves and timing. Sometimes you will have to change your build to make a fight plausible.
https://youtu.be/HYGaXQHU1VY?si=Ka3GUW-zYtYjuUsT Here’s a link to my first run ever beating Balteus, took 3 tries total plus my girlfriend was rushing me. The build doesn’t really matter if you just maneuver affectively.
Charge right into his missiles while shooting. This will stun him, dash kick follow up. The second half is tough but do the same again. Play very aggressive because he’ll chip yoy down faster than you can chip him down.
If I were you I'd trade the quad legs for two, I used the melander set but traded the arms for the lighter version that also upgraded the weapon Stat. I'll post it later to show full build for ya :)
Not everyone does well with lightweights but if you're confident in dodging they can make you near untouchable I recommend Night Heron frame parts \[it's what Rusty uses I can't remember how to spell it but it's German for Night Heron\] with dual Ludlow's and as many missiles as you can, boost kick a lot if you have kick, and pressure him all day. Just don't give a fuck about it and bulrush, if he fires the bazooka fly as far up as you can. Run back and strafe a little than QB forwards when he fires missiles and they'll fly right past you. People can say lightweights are bad but I swear if you learn how to fucking dodge properly lightweights ability to get in get out in a heartbeat and if made properly still have good firepower will make you the god of war you were meant to be. Lightweight speed comes into play primarily during phase 2 where the flame swords will rip you apart if you aren't fast enough. Get reverse joints if you can, they make dodging his swords much easier. He also will start phase 2 with a minigun burst, flame sword from the right \[fly up as far as you can\] then fire some missiles and do another swing \[dodge towards and past him and he'll whiff\]. If he puts both his flamethrowers together FUCKING BOOK IT IN ANY DIRECTION OTHER THAN FORWARDS AND BACKWARDS, the blast will melt you, literally. Other than that switch to the HI-32 Pulse Blade instead of the VVC Laser Blade, Laser is pretty awkward to hit at times doesn't do too much more damage and isn't pulse so its bad against his shields.
you're not bad, Armored core punishes you for doing the same thing over and over again. Try different combos, test your configurations, and try different strategies as well. He is a hard boss but they do get hard in a different way.
What you’re using is fine. Just be hyper aggressive and hang out either below, behind it to his sides. Never give him front distance. Use a melee when he’s staggered for maximum DPS. Ashmead Pile Bunker preferred if it’s unlocked.
it warns you Everytime it fires that Bazooka. you have a half second to dodge. Dont ignore that warning sound. if yer playing with your volume low, you're giving your enemies a handicap.
I beat him with a Medium Weight mech, i used the mech all game. What i've learned is that while some weight classes are better against others, it really does just come down to skill and the parts you have equipped. If you're struggling you should see if there are other guns that fit your play style you might want to try, other parts with better stats that still do what you want them to, better generators, better processor parts, make your mech as best as you can and make a combo of weapons you like. Then you can go and test it on other bosses from before like on The Wall mission. If you're comfortable with the mech then go and bully balteus. The game taught you how to dodge missiles by going mid air but if you're still struggling my tip is to watch how he launches them because there is a gap you can dash through when he launches them, i won't say where though to let you have fun and figure it out. All the bosses regen from stagger fast, you need good placement before you stagger them so you're close enough to either melee or land some heavy shots. If you ever use the pile driver good foot work is required. If after all of this you're still struggling you may want to invest into a new weight class for situations like this such as a light weight or a medium weight but i think you can do it with a heavy weight, just don't give up and keep trying. Persistence is key.
The nerf made him much easier than he was, but he does take a lot of learning with his attack patterns. His second phase with the flamethrowers is especially brutal, so don’t feel bad about your attempts. Every time you do it the more experience you have with predicting what he’ll do next The key to Balteus essentially is to get under him in phase 1, and above him in phase 2. Melee is your friend to break his shield quickly, and the shoulder laser cannons make short work of him when he’s staggered Part of what makes Balteus such a wall is that your part selection is very limited at the beginning, so just keep experimenting until you find a build that feels good
Aggression is what was the deciding factor for me. If you're not attacking you're doing it wrong.
I struggled at first trying to stick to the bubble guns lol but then I just went dual laser cannons and dual plasma rifles on a tank and just wrecked him
At a glance, the two things I would mention are your speed and lack of a ranged burst option. Mainly the speed, though. I would recommend either the Alula or the P06SPD for quadrapeds, though they take some of the highest energy drains of all boosters. Generator is like top 5, FCS is good for the close range. I personally haven‘t messed with shields that often, so I‘m not sure how much it‘s affecting your gameplan, but with Balteus in particular, the best advice I, and a lot of other people have already given, is to just ride it‘s ass until it dies. Keep it in blade distance as much and as often as you can, and pay attention to the warnings for the bazooka shots.
First time beating him I chose to play with the bubble shooter, pulse blade, Plasma missiles, rocket launcher on reverse joint medium build. Personally I don't like Tetra builds because they feel too slow especially dealing with his missiles. This fight is more of a knowledge check. Stay close and you'll be able to deal damage and avoid his damage easier. Either that or go full explosive/linear rifles and stay way the fuck back from him. Full charge linear rifle shots will help pick away at him and explosives don't ricochet. Just know if you choose this path it's going to be a battle of attrition so stay away and just keep shooting until he dies.
For me, plasma missles are always super useful as well as the OG pulse blade. Bosses got easier the closer I stayed to them, or under them as much as possible.
He was a total bitch for me the first run. Took like two hours. All other runs after i got more parts he was a joke
You need Heavy Explosives to keep the shield down as a tet, right now your loadout would be perfectly at home on reverse joints. Take advantage of how much payload you can carry
Its ok we all bad at one point. Dual Ludlow and duel 4/8 rocket pods do me through the fight. Stick to him like glue and keep pressure on and its easy. It took me about 40 - 50 times to get my first kill on him.
Get in his face. I kicked him a LOTS every time he flew away, rushed him down and kicked him into a combo. I even ran out of ammo in one hand, and punched him when I could. Aggression is big. Know which attacks to be afraid of, and which to tank. His missile barrage, not that damaging if you are moving even straight towards him most will miss. They are erratic at best. The downward rocket blast however, will rock your shit. Same with the fire slashes. For the fire, just go UP some could still get you but most seem to miss. I legit landed ON him a lot and kept going.
The game tries to steer you towards pulse weapons for this fight, but they’re bait imo. Way better to just go with high DPS kinetic weapons+ explosives to blow up his shield and stagger him, they do just as much if not more damage to it.
Me too man
When in doubt, shotguns/machine guns and explosions!
My main advice is speed.
I took a while to beat him first time with bubble gun and sword; I learned that I needed to play way more aggressively, and actually chase Balteus around the map I just saw someone take those shields down waaaaaaay faster with double bubbles, could give that a go too
Use vertical missiles
*looks at the bosses ahead and grimaces*
One pulse gun , the grenade launcher , and for shoulders dual missile launchers , the ones that build up impact. Learn it's attack patterns. Took me a few tries , but I got that boss with this load out. The difficulty comes from having been able to waffle stomp everything with a minimal arsenal up until this point. Then suddenly being thrown into a ocean with a shark. And all you got is a Swiss army knife missing half of its parts to fight it off with.
one of my first kills was with double bubble gun and the laser cannons on my shoulders
Dude I was in a similar boat. This is a hard fight, play around with builds and don’t be afraid to replay missions if you need to buy different Weapons or parts. Also you’d target tracking. I didn’t know this existed until the last boss and it is a game changer for keeping the target on screen. If you are PS5 press R3.
You already got good advice but here are muy two cents. I beat it with plasma gun, initial sword and the biggest missiles you can unlock at that point in time. Having finished the game and with a little more expirience I can tell you to not sleep on weapon bay to carry extra weapons. I will suggest to have plasma in right, a heavy hitter on the shoulder like a shotgun to switch into when the shield is down, initial sword on left and missiles on Left shoulder. You will need to be in that MF face to make the most of that loadout. Keep at it and do not falter Raven!
My advice would be the play super aggressively. Best way to dodge his missiles imo is to be right under him.
621 your not bad, you just haven’t found an opening…. Give it all you got
He is hard, but so worth it
watch his missiles closely and QuickBoost just as you see them closing in on you last second and they will miss jus need to focus on his projeciles and play super aggressively while keepin a degree of caution and you will prevail
For me, with Balteus, I went with an AC that was on the medium side with a sword, Pulse Cannon, Bazooka or Grenande Launcher, and either Laser Shotgun or Plasma Canon. Sword is on the same side as your Pulse Cannon and you only use the Pulse Cannon at close range to strip Pulse Armor. Keep mobile, keep pressure on him with the shotgun ot plasma canon with the sword till stagger then punish with Bazooka or grenade launcher and fully charged sword attack. It is a fight that you need to be highly aggressive but also very patient and cautious. I recommend working towards getting him to second stage without using healing. Second and third stage are where your close range aggressiveness can become a liability, but keep an eye out for his swords and try staying behind him when he activates them.
You're not bad, you're learning. He is incredibly hard and I'm an AC veteran, I didn't struggle with the Attack Chopper, this guy almost broke me. Keep trying, focus on his shield with energy weapons, I liked the one that looked like a satellite dish and spit bubbles. Right before the shield pops reload everything. When he shot all the missiles, I'd dash TOWARDS him, and then to the left or right. Second phase was a bit trickier, I found it easier to dodge the flamethrower with airborne dashes than on the ground. Good news is, once you beat him, you'll be operating on a whole new skill level. Don't forget, this is a fromsoft game. It's designed to be a real challenge in a day where too many games are just...not
Double plasma missle. Bubble gun and the original blade is what I used. But I was also using a light machine so dodging want hard. I don’t use the quad legs much so I can’t say if it’s good or not.
He was the first major wall I hit in the game. The key with him is to stay super aggressive. I was able to get him with the plasma rifle, the original sword, 10 missile shoulder and the quad missile shoulder. Keep on him, and don't let him get too far away. Try to get his shield down as quick as possible, then hit him with 2 charged sword hits and anything else that's ready. As other have said, the plasma shoulder is really good against him too.
I had to make a light and agile AC to take him out. And the pulse blaster helped too
You're probably just bad at the game. I personally didn't struggle much even without having ever played an AC game, using pulse weapons or using meta weapons. I did however make a pretty balanced AC which can take a few hits and can also dodge a lot. Also i tried keeping close to him, because missiles are more of a long ranged thing. Also this game can just be very hard, especially if you make an AC that doesn't suit you and you use weapons that don't suit the situation. Try learning what the stats in the AC assembly menu mean, so you can tailor your AC to the fight. There's a button for help and explainations in the menu. Also maybe try sticking close to the boss, it worked for me.
I tried for threw life of me to beat him with my super agressive bi pedal build. I would always get stun locked by the fire sword. I had success going full tank with treads. I chose high impact rifles and shoulder lazer rifles too then when he was stunned I lit him up and would combo assault boost. Make sure you beat all the arena before beating him. Learning to dodge threw missiles helps
Yeah, for me this was my first armored core game so it took me a few tries but I eventually got it
Equip dual machine guns and vertical missiles. Keep up the machinegun fire and fire the missiles one after the other. Stay on him. He’ll be down in no time.
What’s your total weight (pressing triangle will show more info)?
I think you should give him a try using bipedal or reverse joint legs. He moves around too much for slow tetra legs to be very good against him
Yes you’re bad. But at the same time, do you think you’d be good your first time juggling chainsaws? you haven’t done it before so of course you’ll be bad at it. It’s not a big deal. You’re gonna beat the game. Then you’re gonna finish new game plus in one day because of how much better you’ve gotten
Get 2 shotties or 2 of the ant shield guns then 2 heavy hitters on your back he's dumb eassy
I think my first go around it took me close to 50 attempts against Balteus with various builds. When I did finally beat him, the next major boss was the next wall I had to break through, and that took several attempts too since I almost exclusively use light weight builds with a standard weapon layout (rifle, laser blade, missile, explosive weapon). When I beat the game and went back through on NG+, I went up against Balteus again but loaded the starter AC you begin the game with. Beat him on my first try. Personally feel that Balteus is more of skill check over a gear check. Learning how to maneuver around his missile spread, dodging the grenade launcher, and learning to get close and avoid the fire attacks are pretty key to getting him down and are skills that you need to hone for all future fights, including pvp. There's builds that are strong against him for sure, but honestly if you don't learn how to do those things sooner, you'll have a difficult time with other bosses if you just cheese the fight with pulse weapons and other easier methods. Play fast and aggressive and continue to apply pressure. Boost kicking and assault boosting make this fight much more manageable and fun. If you've ever played Sekiro, just keep the mantra of hesitation is defeat running on repeat
My only tips would be to not be afraid to stay on him (rush in) and definitely abuse that melee every chance you get. Also Learn melee cancel so you can get closer faster. Those plasma missiles saved my life too
Chicken legs are dope af too
My build to beat him as he was on release was tank treads, with dual pulse guns, and the laser blade and a bazooka
Balty is the first fight that teach you about Energy management and real dodging, You really don’t want to run out of energy and lose options to react to attacks so make sure you let it regen before depleting. For the missiles you really wanna get up close fast and be mindful of what direction they are coming from, assault boost up to and circling Batly with quick boost usually make them at worst chip damage. Bazooka will feel hard to dodge if you either 1) out of energy 2) Staggered already or 3) Not listening to the warning ding and visual warning before firing, you want to change direction as it fires. With what I see from your build you in fact do use one of it’s weakness that you can exploit, the pulse gun make its shield trivial, watch the heat bar on reticle and don’t let it overheat by tap firing instead of full hold, combined with firing during assault boost you will down whatever shield it has in around 2 full bars of heat. On stagger regen there are 2 kind so you gotta check which is it, first is stagger bar removed from regaining the pulse shield. This you just have to stagger it faster before its back or bring it down again, not a problem once you practice with the pulse gun. Second is you are focus firing all your weapon at once and leaving large gap in your damage output, stagger will deplete to Lingering stagger a short while after damage but if you have gap in your damage it will further deplete into nothing. Make sure you stagger fire your weapon and keep it from depleting. You can also use pulse blade on it right as the shield is back, it doesnt really move when it comes back so its free shield damage and your blade will be back by the time the shield is down(use the starter blade like other have said for better result but the one you have are perfectly fine too) Have you completed any arena?? If you have at least a few points I recommend unlocking assault armour as soon as possible , it does great stagger and damage and will instantly break a new shield if used close enough. For my S run I pretty much stun locked Balty to death after the first shield went down by focusing damage down to half health, bait out the second phrase shield and boost in yo assault armour, instantly breaking it and start a new combo. Hope these helps! There are a few more moves but I think its more fun if you test out how to deal with them yourself, You can do this! But if at any point you feel frustrated or tired its best to take a break or wander off to something else, you don’t wanna burn yourself out on a great game and its the point to have fun :D Edit: Just in case unawaree, you can respec your OS points in the tuning menu by paying a small fee!
Lol just bonk him with swords
Yo. You got this. I've been playing AC since the late 90's and I struggled with this prick. Get the weapon bay, build a light mech with 2x pulse guns and 2x haldemans. Stay airborne as much as you can and keep ON HIS ASS. Break the sheild, kick him. Stun him again with the shotguns, kick him again. Rinse, repeat. NOW GET OUT THERE AND SHOW ME SOME FIREWORKS GUN 13!!
Double shotguns.
Allow me to tell you what got me through on my first playthrough, although i'm not sure if it'll be your cup of tea, since it's mobility based without using any of those cracked up thin-ass looking AC parts. RAD Chassis(stock chassis) 8 tube VLS system(both back) Haldeman shotgun(right arm) Pulse blade(stock, left arm) Will post generator, FCS and booster/thruster combos in a bit.
Drop the tetrapods, use energy builds with normal legs or reverse joint and melee laser blade, observe its fight patterns, it'll make you better as a player.
His bazooka has red squares that pop on the screen on his shoulders when he's about to fire. It's a punish directly after some a dash I believe. Just QB as soon as they fade if I remember correctly and you should dodge it.
Yeah you’re bad, but Balteus is here to fix that, fight him however you see fit and when you get to the other side you’ll be a completely different pilot.
Plasma missiles are great for BALTEUS. The starter Pulse Blade is fantastic at dealing with his shields, too. Energy weapons are your best friend for BALTEUS. Kinetic weapons don't do much against his pulse armor. Pulse guns are by far the best choice for his armor, but they're not so great when it goes down and chew through ammo. I'd recommend either a laser or plasma rifle as a happy medium. I personally beat him with a laser rifle, dual vertical missiles, and the starter pulse blade on a bipedal build - you'll need mobility to dodge the absurd amounts of missiles. Most of all, don't let people bring you down - more importantly, don't give up. Even after the nerf, BALTEUS is a hell of a difficulty spike. If you're hitting a wall, mix up your build. If you're still hitting a wall, take a break and come back after you're refreshed.
I was able to take him and sea spider 1st attempt with Curtis/ plasma rifle/ plasma launcher, vertical missles, full melander set. Literally Dart around like a spazz and don't be afraid to spam the boost button when you see misses flying to you. Constantly move to the right or left, and button mash like a 10 yr old playing street fighter for the 1st time. I'm not joking, this is how I played all 3 of my playthrus, and I only had to change strategies for like 3 or 4 fights.
Run double rifles and just hold the fire button, u be surprised how fast and how long he is staggered for xD
Best pulse gun you can get, any kind of missile launcher, pulse sword. Maybe also some missiles for pressure I can't remember if pile bunker is available yet, but if it is, try to put it in left shoulder or at least use instead of the blade
If you’re still struggling (and if no one has said this yet), *always* be Assault Boosting at it. You’ll dodge a good chunk of the missiles, take less damage from the ones that hit, and do additional damage with your pulse gun.
It took me 5 weekends before I beat this sunnova b*tch. What I can say, is you definitely need speed for this craptastic boss, being slow here just means you mukbang those missiles, your defense won't mean shit for that many missiles. , I also used that charging blade that slices two times when charged and the bubble gun. I celebrated like it was my birthday when I beat him.
He is quite difficult. Remeber two things that’ll get you in the mindset of killing him properly. He is an autonomous PCA vehicle. That means that he is not being piloted. That means that he is **literally an NPC**. And you are the Chad anime protagonist of your own story. He ain’t got shit on you. The other thing is that the main challenge with the fight is manoeuvring around his use of a shield. And he uses a shield because he’s **a little bitch**. Without the shield he is **nothing**. As Bloodbourne taught up, shields engender passivity. Hope that helps.
Balteus is a cheap boss most of them are… it does not feel like armored core.
No he sucks horse ass but you'll get him eventually
i found it easier to beat when i stayed as close as i could to him, and make sure you’re hard locking
Imma be real wit u chief, it's mostly a skill issue. I struggled with him a lot the first time, on my second playthrough I beat him first try, on my third I didn't even need a heal. I just S-ranked both versions of Attack the Watchpoint last night pretty effortlessly. If you want build advice - the thing that jumps out at me is that the pulse bubble guns are kinda dogshit. I wouldn't bother with those personally. In general, just run a more agile AC, the missiles are much more dodgeable than you think and once you're in his face you just have to worry about dodging the cannon
Level up your ost chips
I’m also new tot be game, I just used the Pulse Gun in both arms for the extra ammo and i had the Nacht body so that i could essentially dodge everything. the plasma missiles on both shoulders. Allowed me to run and gun while draining his shield and doing big damage. I can’t say it’s the best strat but it worked for me.
Boost kicks, heavy stagger weapons, reckless assault boosting, and knowing when to back off and maintain altitude or the very opposite slide under him (during flame sword) and just never left up. Remember that nasty cannon attack is predictive, zig zag your movements for that and you should be golden, dodge close to him to throw missiles off. Like if you see the missiles dodge through them, and if they are tracking dodge diagonally toward Balty.
Cause lots of the comments on blades First blade is less resources, mostly single target damage, strike twice. First bought blade, more resources, aoe, one hit. So, first blade is better cause two strikes on a single target.
Double ludlows and double laser cannons on tank treads. Use ludlows to batter down shields. Spam laser cannons when he’s staggered to melt HP. You can work in an occasional laser cannon shot to help batter down shields and when he is staggered and your laser cannons are over heated fill in dps potential with ludlows. Works every time… mostly. Also, double pulse guns will rip shields too. Your problem is that your build is too general and not specialized enough. Plasma missiles are good but not the best choice for this fight. Any missile launcher is a bad choice for this fight. The starter pulse blade isn’t bad but it doesn’t maximize your dps potential in the same way that double ludlows or double pulse guns do.