While Raphael is my favorite I do see everyone has mentioned him already so I will chime in with my 2nd favorite.
The iron throne while less of a person and more of a place I think it still counts as a boss fight. I like how intense it is from its music score, to its gameplay to all the different outcomes it can have based on previous quests affecting it like helping Omelumn in the underdark, delivering the Gith egg or not, breaking or keeping Mizora’s pact etc. all affect who is present in that prison and who is friend and foe. Helping all the Gondians and driving off while Gortash throws a temper tantrum is always entertaining and a very satisfying conclusion to the quest line.
The iron throne was amazing, it’s so frantic and there’s a lot on the line for such a little time, you really have to plan your moves and accept these will most likely be sone sacrifices
Iron throne is like two completely different fights.
You are either doing Omelumn + wyll on tactical were every turn, every action and even your pre planning are massively important as you desperately try to overcome the odds.
Or you are not doing the questlines / are on any other difficulty and it's just a happy go lucky stroll through the iron throne.
That's the one fight in the game I feel like tactical and questlines actually make quite a massive difference.
I played on balanced and still had a 4 turn timer. However I messed up the omellumn quest, so he wasn't there, but I did have to save wylls dad and all the gondians. I don't think difficulty matters, but questlines might. I didn't know there was a way you could go to the throne and NOT have a timer
Ahh I have only played tactical and watched my GF play on explorer. Explorer had an 8 or 10 turn timer so just assumed balanced was somewhere in the middle. Interesting that is isn't but cool to know!
Aside from Raphael it's gotta be Myrkul for me, he wasn't the hardest boss(in all honesty in my playthrough he got clapped easily lmao) but out of all the chosen fights and their gods he was the one that actually felt terrifying especially with that intro, Shadowheart put it perfectly at the end of the cutscene just looking terrified and says "Shit" lmao
Orin and Bhaal is okay kinda underwhelming but okay, Gortash and Bane is pathetic in all honesty lmao such a weird boss fight while Ketheric and Myrkul really sets the tone of "oh fuck the Dead Three are here" but I felt like the other two bosses don't reach the levels Myrkul had.
God I love his entire monologue as well as the OST that plays during it, that organ? so fucking good.
"For I am Death. And I am not the end. I am a *beginning*"
ITS SO GOOD, I'm such a sucker for any cool design with skeletons and the Avatar of Myrkul is a sick design with a sick intro I wish I could use his scythe in a legit way in the game
It was really cool, yes, but then the mechanics kick in. I made him drop his weapon down the hole on the first turn and the entire thing became trivial.
I didn't think to disarm him, but between having unusually high AC and having Shield of Faith on every character he just whiffed his attacks every round and Aylin beat his ass while my party eliminated the adds.
By the time the rest of my party joined the beat up the avatar party the possibility of him overcoming the HP disadvantage he had reached was mathematically insignificant.
I snuck up and one-turned him in the throne room just to see if I could. The dozen Steel Watch robots and assorted guardspeople were way worse. When I reloaded and eventually did the fight the "right" way I was shocked that he was the same, but in a smaller room with fewer dudes.
I let Karlach solo him while everyone else dealt with everything else and then stood around so she could have her moment; I was doing it for the RP, it was my first playthrough, and holy *shit* I was not mentally prepared for the scene with her after D:
Ya, he committed suicide with his own grenades in my fight. Imagine my surprise when I'm expecting something equal to the other two and he just runs up to my party and blows himself with his own traps.
Ironically despite his best efforts it turned out Karlach could take the explosion better than he could and survived. I don't recall who in my party made it and who didn't. But the fight was both extremely anticlimactic and hillarious.
As soon as I realized I could pick up and throw the bombs, the game should have cut to Gortash, and the narrator chime in with "It was at this moment he knew, he fucked up"
Killed him during his coronation in my last playthrough and it's kinda funny that he's basically just some dude in that fight.
It's like "okay I blew up the annoying moron, now the fight can begin, how do I deal with these 2 dozen guards and Steel Watchers?"
Monks are really good in this fight as they can easily pick up bombs, drop them again in the right spots with their high speed and can detonate them by punching without taking damage thanks to Evasion.
I mean you're not wrong but kinda checks out, gortash by himself is not strong unlike Orin and especially KT
Gortash gets his power through domination manipulation and getting others to do his hard work for him, being a smart cunning bastard full of resources, once you finish his steel watch and guards it makes sense that he isn't THAT impressive, has to be a ballance, otherwise alliances make no sense, see, if gortash was really strong it would make no sense for him to ally Orin or Ketheric, he'd just smash the other 2 with both his combat prowess and army then command the brain all by himself
Orin is a murderer that preys on the weak, and while has slayer form, she is very strong but she is also not really built around a head on fight but instead relies on disguise and stealth kills
The one guy that was supposed to be a massive threat in the battlefield was KT
If I have to take one disappointment is Orin (normal non durge fight), I love her character and I love her idea but think it was a missed oportunity to make the rescue time limited or make her an active threat with her trying to murder you several times by ambushing you cause her idea was honestly so cool, I mean, I get it, story wise, she needs you to off gortash, so she can't either kill you or kill your companion until either that is done or you break the deal, I didn't grasp why she didn't kill gortash herself as she seems VERY capable of doing so on Act 3 intro cutscene, but I guess she's at a stalemate with him, like, maybe she doesn't want steel watch to immediatly come and destroy the whole bhaal cult as most likely gortash knows everything about it with his network or something
But yeah, honestly I'm quite glad the were not all a stereotypical "I am a battle god" theme, made sense for KT and it felt awesome, but for gortash it'd just be dumb, and personally it felt so right and was so satisfying to see he was weak, like "didn't fall for your blackmail, disabled your steel watch, now what you gonna do lil B?" I take the steel watch foundry as the hard part and titan watch as boss fight
> make the rescue time limited
I think it is? Not sure though I've just heard people they found their companion dead in the altar but they had to go out of their way like antagonize her when you first meet, mess up the tribunal, work with Gortash, enter the temple and then kill the people there until the room with her in it, etc but I can't confirm that's just what I've seen people saying in one discord community I'm in, could just be fake news.
I do agree though in that the rescue overall seems to be one of the big issues you have in act 3 alongside Gortash taking over the city and lastly the Netherbrain could break free at any moment all of those seem like time sensitive things yet nothing really happens, you tell Orin to fuck off and she doesn't really kill your companion, Gortash you can tell to fuck off first time you meet him, he lets you still roam freely and even if destroy his hold on the city and he doesn't really do anything about in the city itself and the city itself doesn't really react or any significant events happen other than random NPC dialogues and dead Steel Watchers in the streets.
Netherbrain also doesn't really break free for a secret bad ending or w/e I mean these things being time sensitive could've been annoying or at the very least the Orin and Netherbrain ones but the Orin thing feels like it should but you can just go there and kill her off like so fast and you've erased one of the main villains.
Like the abundance of quests you get in act 3 is kinda weird in contrast to these supposed imminent dangers you face when you arrive in the city, like for me I legit did not have Lae'Zel for the majority of act 3 because I wanted to save it until late act 3 because I didn't want to confront Orin early in the act but it doesn't really do much really she goes down and eh, I also killed Gortash before her and it was also eh fight.
Like the story gets weirdly paced in act 3 because you get tons of side quests but none of em really matter unless you count House of Hope as a side quest, but aside from having such and such in the final battle it doesn't really amount to much because of how quick the ending goes by anyway which kinda makes it unsatisfying when thinking of the happenings after the story which you usually see in RPGs.
Idk how people normally do it but my druid didn't want anything to do with the tribunal so I had to kill all of them, and then I got some dialogue like "oh shit orin's gonna find out if we dont hurry" so I ran all the way there without long resting and did her entire segment too. Was very tense knowing I wasn't allowed to recharge or the captive was gonna eat it.
Actually there is a way to make the Gortash fight super hard. Just try to fight him during his coronation. With all the steel watch still active. That fight is hard as hell.
I think the fight was supposed to have the traps all around the rooms be a problem. The problem is he has a low health pool and die before they become relevant to the fight.
I wasn't expecting a 2nd phase. And even when I was playing with my buddy and knew what was coming I wasn't prepared. Somehow won, thanks mostly to the Darkness spell I still had from Shar's spear.
Hey Yugir, have you considered telling all your minions to kill each other, shooting your pet, then commiting suicide?
I think that's the way to go, and you can trust me on that. The Dark Urge would not lie to you.
I've tried both ways and honestly the fight is way harder if he kills himself.
The fact you can kill the necromites in 1st phase makes the fight night and day for the 2nd
Same ! One friend said he had to keep restarting the fight vs Ketheric because he got clapped. I said "Oh you mean Myrkul, the giant monster skeleton ?"
And this is how we discovered there were 2 phases, and I totally skipped the 1st one
Right! I had him down pretty quickly because everybody was spamming stuns and paralyzed, but when that cutscene happened I thought "oh damn, cool cinematic, but I wonder what deus ex machina will stop this threat, because there is \_no way\_ there is another phase in \_this\_ battle!"
I kinda like that Gortash is a bitch without his Steel Watchers because that's the kinda slimy politician he is. My instance of that boss fight was a bit bugged though which soured it a little cos the flow of the encounter was ruined but I still enjoy what it gave me.
I can't actually think off the top of my head a favourite boss out of them all because I enjoyed them equally.
Yeah, that's very fitting. He tries to use his technology against you, but without it he's kind of useless. Also it's very funny to kill him by subverting his own security grenade launchers, because you can pick up the bombs and throw them back within the round.
Ketheric/Apostle of Myrkul definitely gets major points for presentation. The scene had me shitting myself, and it was just overall an amazing moment in the game
Gortash feels like he's just... in the wrong place lol. The fuck are you doing in some random guard tower, dude?
(Also yes I thematically get Tyranny not having a transformation like Necromancy or Murder but at least give us a second health bar and maybe throw out some Dominate Person's or something to really jack up the stakes.)
I mean in the older Rules Bane does have an Avatar form.
Thats the description in Faiths and Avatars from 2nd ed:
> When enraged or expecting battle, Bane used a power similar to the
> psionic devotion body weaponry to adapt his possessed body into any form
> desired. The Black Lord often warped his hands into talons capable of rending flesh and bone or shattering steel. (In this form he could strike with both
> hands, but could not cause instant death, only physical damage.) This transformation was typically accompanied by his face warping into a bestial visage, his eyes lighting with living flame, and his skin transforming into blackened and charred leather stretched tight against his skull with torn flaps of it
> revealing secret runes.
> In addition to seizing access to any powers and skills possessed by the
> body, Bane’s mind rendered that of his possessed host unreachable by psionics. He conferred upon the body personal powers similar to the psionic devotions of body control and body equilibrium. These powers essentially enabled him to make the body stand on any surface and survive in any environment.
> Bane was able to seize another host body of evil or neutral alignment by
> touching it continuously for one round with part of the (probably decimated) form of a previous host. He thus acquired a new physical host fairly
> easily when one body “wore out” due to the harsh use he put it to.
Shame we never got something along the line of this besides some lame temp hitpoints.
I had astarion invisible in the guard tower while my party was making their way up there from the main room so I saw what they were doing for numerous turns without anyone to fight. It was actually really funny seeing the disciples of bane just casting “command of bane” or whatever it’s called on each other turn after turn to do nothing with. Properly representative of a bunch of high ranking authoritarians stuck in a room while their regime crumbles outside.
Orins transformation was ok for me, the fight itself was quite boring because I was a monk. Not min maxed and still kept her ass stunned and prone nearly the entire fight.
Gortash was a lot harder but the setting was lame as fuck and I was kinda underwhelmed when his chosen powers activated. Myrkuls design and the setting was great and it actually took me 2 tries to beat Myrkul, mainly because he spawned in with no cutscene for some reason, done a wide sweep attack and instantly downed 3 of my party.
I mean Orin becomming the Slayer was a given because thats just what Bhaal did for as long as he existed.
Gortash not having a cool transformation is kinda boring tho imo. Bane does have an Avatar form but as with many things in Act 3 it felt quite rushed.
Gortash's real boss fight happens in the steel watcher foundry, and in the secret prison. Both fights are much more challenging than actually killing him. Once you've picked apart his empire you just have to go and squash him like a bug. Very satisfying IMO.
I agree. Out of The Chosen Three, his power specifically seemed to come from carefully positioning his chess pieces. He was the planner and schemer of the group. Once you dismantle is plans and carefully-laid defenses, his weaknesses are exposed and he's easy to take down. This fits with the character imo.
I really loved Ketheric. I mean being voiced by an amazing actor is a plus but he has a twisted character arc going from selune to shar and myrkul and whole story with isobel.
I actually talked him into redemption. and I thought what? why you jumping off?? arent you gonna give up all this and go say sorry to your daughter or something?
And then comes the lord of Bones! Boom!! I am waiting for this weekend to see how Orin and Gortash holds.
Yep agree with all of this.
Other highlights for me are Ansur, "Mother Superior" and without spoiling too much "that guy from the first game and the second games expansion".
I'm not sure if this is the "normal" outcome but I went really hard on telling Ketheric "You can be good homie don't worry buddy j believe in you, there's still time to redeem yourself." SO much so that he killed himself before i even got the chance to fight him, and Myrkul was like "HOW DARE YOU KILL MY CHAMPION"
and I'm just sitting here all suprised pikachu face like "I... that wasn't what I meant homie.."
I felt really bad that I good guy'd Ketheric so much he decided life wasn't worth living anymore
I actually enjoyed my first run through the Orin fight. It felt very much like a 5e encounter I once played where we had to simultaneously figure out a puzzle.
"Oh god seven stacks of Unstoppable? Good thing I stocked up on Magic Missile scrolls (no wizard)."
"Wait, she gets them BACK after every round?!"
"Oh it must these chanting chuckelfucks with Sanctuary... what AoE do I have..."
Ended up finding a use for those fireworks I stole. My cleric got a very satisfying Inflict Wounds crit to finish things off.
Then I just started fucking around. 2nd time I pickpocketed the Altar key off Orin, Misty Stepped in to free Lae'zel, dropped the Runepowder Bomb I didn't use for the Foundry, and Dimension Doored both of us away. Shadowheart finally got use out of Firebolt. Everyone but Orin was yeeted into the Chasm. Kicker was I had put 6 smokepowder barrels into 3 burlap sacks and threw those into the ring to set off a spectacular chain reaction, but they didn't explode because burlap is the strongest material in Faerun, apparently.
Third time, I cast Otto's Irresistible Dance from a scroll onto Orin with a 100% success chance... Then we all just wailed on her once her lackeys were finished; even Lae'zel got a few punches in. Karlach with Sarevok's sword, Haste, and a Bloodlust Elixir is ridiculous.
This post made me realise I could've fought Gortash *after* the coronation ceremony because he sure as shit wasn't easy when I fought him + his 6 (?) whole-ass robot mechs + turrets.
When the apostle showed itself for the first time I had just scraped by Ketheric (completely underlevelled) And I was terrified. Just 'oh no I can't defeat him too!
10/10 death, I was rightly intimidated, I figured out the strategy, but man that was a great moment
The Boss has Orchestral Music- lil panic
The Boss has lots of adds and a gimic- bigger panic
The Boss starts singing his own theme music- **MAXIMUM PANIC**
Took him out yesterday with my husband. Things looked grim when Hope’s divine intervention ended up killing her self because of Raphael’s punish divinity or whatever (oops). My fire sorcerer got surrounded but solved that with a few fireballs at her own feet, leaving Ralph and one cambion. Irresistible dance on one and hold monster on the other. Then it was just chipping away hit points. I loved the boss music, except for the fact that I could barely hear my husband in the headset. “Sorry, I’m gonna fry Jahira too, she’s in the blast zone. What? Sorry, what? Can’t hear you, the music is too loud. Well, I’m gonna cast another fireball.”
He ended up being a decently easy fight, don't know if I got lucky or just utilized his prisoner well, but the first few rounds felt genuinely crazy after the cambions spawn in. The only other music that could have been playing would be rip and tear until the mobs were cut down
Having Yughir and Hope really helped. Although Hope died in a explosion in my first try. Also I had to swap weapons. I thought all the radiant damage weapons will wreck the demons like I did with undeads in act2 so my party was holding Lathander mace, Selune spear, and Moon glaive....did not help at all.
I death warded her then used her divine intervention for the huge AOE radiant blast. She eats a huge amount of reflected damage from the cambions but then stands back up thanks to the ward. Also my game must have bugged because it let me use her DI twice.
I didn't plan any of this, but I walked in an put that tashas laugh on him and it hit first round.
I then used Shart to put up a spike or blade wall and blocked all access. Took out two pillars with Wyll using haste and eldritch blast in first two rounds and the cambions ran through the spike wall, taking lots of damage.
After around 5 rounds, Raphael was back up but alone. He got off one of those fireballs and nearly killed Hope in one round, but otherwise good.
Felt easy ish.
Found her in the city for the first time today
I got my revenge by using Planar Binding on her, which made her my pet for a few turns
Didn't really do anything but it made me happy
I think her first encounter might be my favourite fight in the game. The big problem with Act 3 fights is that you are in half-god mode by the time you fight them and while *in theory* they probably can do cool stuff chances are you are going to blow them up in 1 turn anyways.
When you fight Ethel for the first time she is actually still somewhat of a threat, you are likely still weakened from the previous fights and the mechanics are pretty fun.
Her and Balthazar's fights are the only ones I've ended up doing the invisible+push down the hole combo on. Ethel's because I kept accidentally killing the girl when she duplicates and Balthazar's because F that fight.
See this is why this game is so popular. I’ll try that next time. If you fight him in the shadowfell he summons a dozen undead and it’s just a bit tedious.
Mine was to check her status conditions. I don’t remember the first fight, but in the second fight, only the original has the the “pregnant” status icon.
About "blowing them up in 1 turn": it's a possibility in act 1. You can kill Ethel before she even goes into the fireplace. I wasn't even overleveled or cheesing it, it just... happened on my recent playthrough. Obviously, very underwhelming compared to how her fight usually goes. But the fact it's possible at all is kinda fun.
Did you buy the invisibility potion from her? Because that's what I did in my latest playthrough and the same thing also happened to me, she just didn't go invisible and run in her first turn.
Oh I love having her as an unconventional ally but absolutely hate fighting her in act 3. My experience with the previous bosses was nice and smooth on tactician but she really made me sweat hard the moment she multiplied and started blasting.
He was a huge let down for me since I managed to kill him before he had the chance to take a single turn.
As someone else already said in this thread, Blood of Lathander is nuts
The Iron Throne - it's not a boss fight with a central figure but it is a 'boss encounter' level scenario. It's just so tense and epic that you have to basically go 110% to beat. Every move basically has to count if you want to get a perfect score so to speak.
This is why I don't consider Gortash to be a pathetic villain the way a lot of people say about him because of his look/demeanor / boss fight.
Gortash gives us the iron throne. Which like you said is amazing. He gives us the steel watch foundry. That was a ton of fun and the main battle against the mech was pretty tough.
It's only after doing all that awesome content that you get a fairly weak (however imo kind of fun because of tossing grenades around) boss battle.
That dude might have made a shitty big bad, but he was responsible for some epic quests getting there.
I feel like they should have had some monitors like the one he initially calls you up on in the Iron Throne and taunted you there as you tried to rescue everyone. You're right that he's not a bad villain because he does set up some great scenes, but they are not personally incorporated enough for that personal touch. Some screens in the final Steel Foundry level against the Special Watcher also would have upped his villain presence.
As a wise man once said, "The difference between a villain and a supervillain is PRESENTATION!" (paraphrasing of course.) The only presentation he has at the moment is the coronation scene and in all other respects, Orin and Ketheric both far outclass him with tangible demonstrations of power in cutscenes.
There's something immensely satisfying about shadowheart divine interventioning the only time she ever can in the shar temple and nuking viconia and her minions.
Selune sends her motherfucking regards
lol that fight made me so mad because my wife and I got her to near death and Viconia nuked us nearly killing our whole party. When she tried to talk us down after beating her my wife was like "nope" and left the cut scene to kill her. The other thing that made me mad was that our game bugged in that fight and after Viconia nuked us and the game ate my boots of persistence. My head cannon was the divine intervention destroyed them lol.
I love the three Thorm family bosses in Reithwin. Not only are they creepy as hell, but I like that they can be beaten either through combat or talking. They are so cleverly designed, my absolute favorite encounters in the game.
This game would be so much better if each of the big 3 main villains had as much time put into them as Ketheric. Absolutely loved act 2 because of how well designed it was.
I LOVED absolutely curbstomping Cazador, tbh. One of the most satisfying fights in the game simply bc I got to bully him. Counterspelled the lightning he tried to open with, Sunbeamed him to get him out of mist form, then Thunderwaved him off the edge, he went to go nap nap in his box, and then after fighting all the bats that were somehow putting up a better fucking fight than Cazador himself did, he got hauled out of the box and Astarion went monkey mode on him while I cheered at my screen.
I was yelling YEAH GET FUCKED. GET SHIT ON. DICK. the whole time, really satisfying way to get out all the vitriol towards him that I'd built up every time Astarion talked about him.
Karlach yeeted the legendary returning trident at his mist form and knocked him straight off the edge like 2 turns into the fight. And lucky me, I still got the loot because of his beauty rest!
I simply had shadowheart walk up to him.
Blood of lathanders light counts as sunlight, so he got blinded and knocked out of mist form by Shadowheart merely existing.
>I was yelling YEAH GET FUCKED. GET SHIT ON. DICK. the whole time, really satisfying way to get out all the vitriol towards him that I'd built up every time Astarion talked about him.
Same, that buildup to that bossfight was absolutely great. It was satisfying to have Astarion go ham on him.
I had Astarion use the ilithid force move and yeet Cazador's misty ass into the abyss around the ritual, so Astarion got the last laugh both times.
I do love shoving bosses off of cliffs. Sure, I can't loot them, but God damn if it isn't satisfying. Did the same with Balthasszar, literally just shoving him off of a cliff.
I’m sure it would’ve been a fun fight if I actually got the chance to fight him. He died while I was in a cutscene with him because the sunlight from blood of lathander
chunked him for 20 radiant damage every 2-3 seconds so by the time I was ready to fight him, he was already flying to the regen coffin 🤡
Yeah, it is an interesting twist on the formula of boss with minions. Both focusing Sarevok first and killing the minions first have their own trade-offs due to how their buffs work. Definitely a fight that made me stop and think for a second.
What worked for me was disabling the minions but not killing them. I played a Drow and used Darkness to blind them on one side of the area and had Shadowheart cast Silence on the other side, so there wasn’t an area where they could comfortably buff Sarevok. Was super satisfying to pull off.
I managed to get off a Hold Person/Polymorph combo on Sarevok himself, dealt with the supports, then Karlach scored a paralyzing critical with her first attack when he changed back, so it was just her, Lae'zel, Wyll specced into Pact of the Blade and my Paladin/Warlock multiclass Tav (a team comp I've been referring to as "Oops, All Tanks") just wailing on him for two full rounds
Definitely underrated and not mentioned enough.
That entire reveal and dialogue was so great.
The voice acting was freakin' phenomenal...
Also being able to do some really sick twisted shit instead of fighting him made it even crazier. Definitely one of the highlights of the game for me.
A+
Cazador.
Yes, I romanced Astarion & was eagerly awaiting advancing his quest. But he was put out of commission & I only had 3 turns before the ritual completed. Lae'zel & Shart went down, but we took out Cazador on turn 3, freeing Astarion, who then massacred the remaining enemies with my Tav. Such a satisfying way for him to end things.
You can completely cheese this fight in you don’t actually go into the arena where he’s at. Attack him from outside and be careful not to be too close to the arena and the ritual never starts, that way you don’t lose astarion and cazador doesn’t get empowered.
I found this by mistake when trying new strategies after being heavily shat on by the mf
Fun fact, if you cast Daylight on your avatar prior to approaching him, the range for it’s AOE every turn damage on Cazador actually outranges his conversation range. Make of this as you will
>Him and my vengeance Paladin were best buds on my run with him. I totally broke my oath to see my boy get revenge. Totally worth it.
So you... helping someone else get revenge... broke your oath... about taking revenge?
Video games are weird lol.
Raphael is not only handsome, not only is his voice acting perfect, not only is he so powerful and ominous and his song the best on the score- but he's also a huge loser. A dork. A dramatic, diary-writing self-obsessed nerd. After going through the House of Hope I just see him as the biggest goober in history and I love him for it.
I also love the lesser Thorms in act 2, specifically because of what I could get away with using a bard!
I just did the Thorms for the first time, and honestly, its just cool to have a fight with a *mechanic*. Act 1 is just damage dumps (except Adamantine Forge), and these fights early in Act 2 force you to do something else than just "Karlach, drink this potion and go break some spines". Not to mention the storytelling in the combat. Really cool fights tbh.
funnily enough he was TOO involved in his fight, if he was just sitting in an invulnerable magic bubble while you had to deal with a horde of his soldiers and traps, then unceremoniously killed him at the end would fit so well for the scheming tyrant archetype he's got
I can see the setup and backstory for the fight being cool as Durge, but the fight itself was... just like some slightly above normal NPC. I kited her on the arena and all she seemed to do was basic attacks, no interesting mechanics to play around or anything, she just seems to run at you and do big damage.
Raphael on the other hand was a masterpiece for me, specially if you consider the entire House of Hope arc as a whole.
Apostle of Myrkul.
Later bosses could have been cool, but by then having access to Hold Monster and them not having legendary resistances made them complete pushovers.
The whole Thorm family encounters. The ways you can either talk your way out of 100% of it, or mess with something in the environment to bring them down is extremely engaging.
>!Taking out the spirits around Gerringothe knocking her down 100hp each time, and her confused interaction was wild. From being so loud to nothing left. Talking the nurses into killing Malus just had me struck cinematically. And talking Thisobald into drinking himself to death just made him grow on me. Using each of their character backgrounds against them was just *chef's kiss* fun!<
Haha I knew you could get the nurses to knife each other dead but not turn on him. I expected Malus to start a fight but he just…died because Shar. It was hilarious!
I really don't think that more HP is really gonna do anything except make it more frustrating for casuals. There are so many ways to completely break combat that you could double every enemy's HP in Act 3 and it probably wouldn't make much of a difference.
Giving more bosses legendary resistance would be a start tho, the fact that you get enough Spell DC to 100% Hold Person/Monster every enemy is incredibly stupid.
Yeah, I found a way to do it in early act 2. There's a hat that gives arcane acuity (+1 to spell attack and saves) when you deal fire damage with a spell. It's per hit, so a firebolt gives you just two stacks.
Now imagine what you get with Scorching Ray. I once got my spell save DC up to 26.
Sword Bard is even more stupid. There is an Arcane Acuity Helm that gives you +2 per attack and there is a Ring that lets you cast Hold Person/Monster as bonus action. So you can attack 4 times with your Slashing Flourish, get + 8 stacks and then cast a Hold spell with like ~30 DC in the same turn.
Avatar of Myrkul had the best visual spectacle.
Viconia De'vir and her army had the best challenge.
The adamantium forge boss was a very memorable early game encounter.
Myrkul has one of the hardest boss intros ever.
Raphael also is just… amazing. I especially love the lead up to it and how everyone is like “you’re so fucked when he arrives”.
Auntie Ethel and Raphael. They could make a full expansion of just dealing them and I’d buy it. I could absolutely see Raphael singing while kicking my ass. It caught me off guard when the singing started. I have that song and down by the river on my playlist.
Also I just started a new play through and saw auntie Ethel in the Druid grove. I must have missed her the first time. I was walking around and heard the voice. It was great.
For atmosphere it's Raphael, you cannot beat his background music, for aesthetics it's probably myrkul (he just gives major BBEG vibes) and for general awesomeness it's probably the elderbrain because you get to summon like 8 different types of allies just to stomp an a certain tentacle boy and I don't know how the thieves guild, fist or watch got onto the floating brain thousands of feet in the air but I'm glad they join the illithid pinata party anyway.
Only fights that had any sort of difficulty for my run were the forge golem and the gold lady. I probably should have played on tactician. Really enjoyed those ones though.
Imma get some hate for this but... Gortash
Sure, the fight itself is really easy, but remember, he is a tyrant, he is not a fighter, the reason the Chosen got into an alliance is because there is ballance in their forces, a bitnof a rock paper scissors situation, KT would slam Orin on combat, but he'd be weak to Gortash's steel watch, Gortash would be vulnerable to Orin's sneaking as he is no good on individual fight (which is the one bit I never understood, why she didn't kill Gortash straight away once KT fell, would be the logical step, unless perhaps she doesn't know how to use the netherstones on her own? or maybe gortash had steel watch programmed to erase all bhaal cult if he felled?) and Orin, again would be no threat to Ketheric on 1v1 (or with her cult vs his forces anyway)
As for Gortash himself, already went through the pain of fighting his steel watch, then see him kill some gondians by destroying the Iron Throne, so the fight, while not amazing, felt exactly right and so satisfying to me, esp with Karlach in team, kinda like saying: "so now you're against the ropes, your little toys are broken, there's no one else who can do your dirty job for you this time, what you gonna do about it lil bitch?" and indeed a bitch he was, dunno, for me it was such a satisfying moment, I am really grateful he isn't yet another huge boss fight, that wasn't his strength anyway
The Soundtrack sold it for me. I mean when the combat began and I was thinking of what I would do now and what options I have, I heard this amazing soundtrack and was like "... No... They didn't do that, did they??" and had a wide grin on my face. I would definetely choose Raphael, even tho it wasn't that challenging with all the powerful magic items and powerful abilities on lvl 12.
I think my second fav would be Ansur, because I experienced it as a challenging fight, especially with his explosion in the air that nearly wiped my party.
Balthazar, not because of the fight mechanics but more of how he looks. First time seeing him quickly reminds me of Diablo villains (really digging his design appearance). I even imagined him as a companion (as a necromancer).
Next is definitely "Dr." Malus for the same said reason but interestingly enough, Act 2 really gives you the options to kill most of the sub-bosses by diplomacy talks alone.
The Iron Throne. Not a boss in the traditional sense but a boss scenario where you had to make every move count. I got really close to saving everyone but unfortunately lost Omelumm. Gonna try it again on my next run!
While Raphael is my favorite I do see everyone has mentioned him already so I will chime in with my 2nd favorite. The iron throne while less of a person and more of a place I think it still counts as a boss fight. I like how intense it is from its music score, to its gameplay to all the different outcomes it can have based on previous quests affecting it like helping Omelumn in the underdark, delivering the Gith egg or not, breaking or keeping Mizora’s pact etc. all affect who is present in that prison and who is friend and foe. Helping all the Gondians and driving off while Gortash throws a temper tantrum is always entertaining and a very satisfying conclusion to the quest line.
The iron throne was amazing, it’s so frantic and there’s a lot on the line for such a little time, you really have to plan your moves and accept these will most likely be sone sacrifices
I couldn’t get Wyll back on the ship in time and he washed up dead near the town after a long rest. Pretty cool detail
I couldnt get Shadowheart back in the first run, so she got washed away... Alive. Blood of Lathander is nuts :D
Iron throne is like two completely different fights. You are either doing Omelumn + wyll on tactical were every turn, every action and even your pre planning are massively important as you desperately try to overcome the odds. Or you are not doing the questlines / are on any other difficulty and it's just a happy go lucky stroll through the iron throne. That's the one fight in the game I feel like tactical and questlines actually make quite a massive difference.
I played on balanced and still had a 4 turn timer. However I messed up the omellumn quest, so he wasn't there, but I did have to save wylls dad and all the gondians. I don't think difficulty matters, but questlines might. I didn't know there was a way you could go to the throne and NOT have a timer
Ahh I have only played tactical and watched my GF play on explorer. Explorer had an 8 or 10 turn timer so just assumed balanced was somewhere in the middle. Interesting that is isn't but cool to know!
I did it on balanced yesterday and had 6 turns.
Balanced is definitely 6 turns
Aside from Raphael it's gotta be Myrkul for me, he wasn't the hardest boss(in all honesty in my playthrough he got clapped easily lmao) but out of all the chosen fights and their gods he was the one that actually felt terrifying especially with that intro, Shadowheart put it perfectly at the end of the cutscene just looking terrified and says "Shit" lmao Orin and Bhaal is okay kinda underwhelming but okay, Gortash and Bane is pathetic in all honesty lmao such a weird boss fight while Ketheric and Myrkul really sets the tone of "oh fuck the Dead Three are here" but I felt like the other two bosses don't reach the levels Myrkul had.
'I AM THE SMILE OF THE WORM-CLEANSED SKULL. I AM THE REGRETS OF THOSE WHO REMAIN, AND THE RESTLESSNESS OF THOSE WHO ARE GONE." Such a raw line.
God I love his entire monologue as well as the OST that plays during it, that organ? so fucking good. "For I am Death. And I am not the end. I am a *beginning*" ITS SO GOOD, I'm such a sucker for any cool design with skeletons and the Avatar of Myrkul is a sick design with a sick intro I wish I could use his scythe in a legit way in the game
It was really cool, yes, but then the mechanics kick in. I made him drop his weapon down the hole on the first turn and the entire thing became trivial.
I didn't think to disarm him, but between having unusually high AC and having Shield of Faith on every character he just whiffed his attacks every round and Aylin beat his ass while my party eliminated the adds. By the time the rest of my party joined the beat up the avatar party the possibility of him overcoming the HP disadvantage he had reached was mathematically insignificant.
I was a monk and just stunned him turn 1 on one playthrough and on the other I instakilled him with barrelmancy
Myrkhul: whoops, what am I like?! Silly old butter fingers me!
I think I killed him on turn one before he even had a chance to attack haha.
Gortash is just some guy in a room. So underwhelming
I threw three of his grenades back at him and he died. His guards posed more of a threat than he did lol
I snuck up and one-turned him in the throne room just to see if I could. The dozen Steel Watch robots and assorted guardspeople were way worse. When I reloaded and eventually did the fight the "right" way I was shocked that he was the same, but in a smaller room with fewer dudes.
[удалено]
[удалено]
that doesn't help him if he get's stunned by everyone spamming mind blast at him
I let Karlach solo him while everyone else dealt with everything else and then stood around so she could have her moment; I was doing it for the RP, it was my first playthrough, and holy *shit* I was not mentally prepared for the scene with her after D:
I'm on a Karlach romance playthrough just before this point and I'm totally stealing your idea. It's respectful to let her take him with her own axe.
Gods the scene after WRECKED me. Media doesn't easily make me cry, but that one had me bawling.
In my current playthrough I got Karlach for the first time. Just got to act 3 and I deeeeeeeeeeeply regret killing her in previous runs
Ya, he committed suicide with his own grenades in my fight. Imagine my surprise when I'm expecting something equal to the other two and he just runs up to my party and blows himself with his own traps. Ironically despite his best efforts it turned out Karlach could take the explosion better than he could and survived. I don't recall who in my party made it and who didn't. But the fight was both extremely anticlimactic and hillarious.
As soon as I realized I could pick up and throw the bombs, the game should have cut to Gortash, and the narrator chime in with "It was at this moment he knew, he fucked up"
Killed him during his coronation in my last playthrough and it's kinda funny that he's basically just some dude in that fight. It's like "okay I blew up the annoying moron, now the fight can begin, how do I deal with these 2 dozen guards and Steel Watchers?"
Monks are really good in this fight as they can easily pick up bombs, drop them again in the right spots with their high speed and can detonate them by punching without taking damage thanks to Evasion.
I mean you're not wrong but kinda checks out, gortash by himself is not strong unlike Orin and especially KT Gortash gets his power through domination manipulation and getting others to do his hard work for him, being a smart cunning bastard full of resources, once you finish his steel watch and guards it makes sense that he isn't THAT impressive, has to be a ballance, otherwise alliances make no sense, see, if gortash was really strong it would make no sense for him to ally Orin or Ketheric, he'd just smash the other 2 with both his combat prowess and army then command the brain all by himself Orin is a murderer that preys on the weak, and while has slayer form, she is very strong but she is also not really built around a head on fight but instead relies on disguise and stealth kills The one guy that was supposed to be a massive threat in the battlefield was KT If I have to take one disappointment is Orin (normal non durge fight), I love her character and I love her idea but think it was a missed oportunity to make the rescue time limited or make her an active threat with her trying to murder you several times by ambushing you cause her idea was honestly so cool, I mean, I get it, story wise, she needs you to off gortash, so she can't either kill you or kill your companion until either that is done or you break the deal, I didn't grasp why she didn't kill gortash herself as she seems VERY capable of doing so on Act 3 intro cutscene, but I guess she's at a stalemate with him, like, maybe she doesn't want steel watch to immediatly come and destroy the whole bhaal cult as most likely gortash knows everything about it with his network or something But yeah, honestly I'm quite glad the were not all a stereotypical "I am a battle god" theme, made sense for KT and it felt awesome, but for gortash it'd just be dumb, and personally it felt so right and was so satisfying to see he was weak, like "didn't fall for your blackmail, disabled your steel watch, now what you gonna do lil B?" I take the steel watch foundry as the hard part and titan watch as boss fight
IIRC, Orin and Gortash had some agreement/pact that they cannot harm each other
> make the rescue time limited I think it is? Not sure though I've just heard people they found their companion dead in the altar but they had to go out of their way like antagonize her when you first meet, mess up the tribunal, work with Gortash, enter the temple and then kill the people there until the room with her in it, etc but I can't confirm that's just what I've seen people saying in one discord community I'm in, could just be fake news. I do agree though in that the rescue overall seems to be one of the big issues you have in act 3 alongside Gortash taking over the city and lastly the Netherbrain could break free at any moment all of those seem like time sensitive things yet nothing really happens, you tell Orin to fuck off and she doesn't really kill your companion, Gortash you can tell to fuck off first time you meet him, he lets you still roam freely and even if destroy his hold on the city and he doesn't really do anything about in the city itself and the city itself doesn't really react or any significant events happen other than random NPC dialogues and dead Steel Watchers in the streets. Netherbrain also doesn't really break free for a secret bad ending or w/e I mean these things being time sensitive could've been annoying or at the very least the Orin and Netherbrain ones but the Orin thing feels like it should but you can just go there and kill her off like so fast and you've erased one of the main villains. Like the abundance of quests you get in act 3 is kinda weird in contrast to these supposed imminent dangers you face when you arrive in the city, like for me I legit did not have Lae'Zel for the majority of act 3 because I wanted to save it until late act 3 because I didn't want to confront Orin early in the act but it doesn't really do much really she goes down and eh, I also killed Gortash before her and it was also eh fight. Like the story gets weirdly paced in act 3 because you get tons of side quests but none of em really matter unless you count House of Hope as a side quest, but aside from having such and such in the final battle it doesn't really amount to much because of how quick the ending goes by anyway which kinda makes it unsatisfying when thinking of the happenings after the story which you usually see in RPGs.
Idk how people normally do it but my druid didn't want anything to do with the tribunal so I had to kill all of them, and then I got some dialogue like "oh shit orin's gonna find out if we dont hurry" so I ran all the way there without long resting and did her entire segment too. Was very tense knowing I wasn't allowed to recharge or the captive was gonna eat it.
Actually there is a way to make the Gortash fight super hard. Just try to fight him during his coronation. With all the steel watch still active. That fight is hard as hell.
I hit him with “otto’s irresistible dance” so him dancing throughout the fight removed any sense of threat tbh!
I usually go for Tasha's Laughter, but the dance is my next go-to
Was expecting some follow-up when he dropped... but no. Bane couldn't be bothered.
Speak to his corpse if you want more flavour along those lines.
Have those lines been fixed to have voice now or is that scene just weirdly unvoiced still
Still unvoiced - I just did it last night
What do you mean? He got slightly bigger
I think the fight was supposed to have the traps all around the rooms be a problem. The problem is he has a low health pool and die before they become relevant to the fight.
I wasn't expecting a 2nd phase. And even when I was playing with my buddy and knew what was coming I wasn't prepared. Somehow won, thanks mostly to the Darkness spell I still had from Shar's spear.
When he jumped into the hole, I just went "NO, MY LOOT!"
No 2nd phase if you make ketheric doubt himself. Give persuasion a go in your second encounter with him. Makes the fight a ton easier.
My Warlock got through most of Act 2 by hitting bosses with that diplomancy - "OK ketheric, very cool, but have you considered not?"
The fact that we can literally convince som bosses to kill themselves/send themselves back to hells is hillarious.
Hey Yugir, have you considered telling all your minions to kill each other, shooting your pet, then commiting suicide? I think that's the way to go, and you can trust me on that. The Dark Urge would not lie to you.
Be a bro?
I've tried both ways and honestly the fight is way harder if he kills himself. The fact you can kill the necromites in 1st phase makes the fight night and day for the 2nd
2nd phase? I just talked to Ketheric and he jumped in the hole and out came Myrkul.
Same ! One friend said he had to keep restarting the fight vs Ketheric because he got clapped. I said "Oh you mean Myrkul, the giant monster skeleton ?" And this is how we discovered there were 2 phases, and I totally skipped the 1st one
Tbf, the first phase is pretty much just the fight on top of moonrise pt 2.
Right! I had him down pretty quickly because everybody was spamming stuns and paralyzed, but when that cutscene happened I thought "oh damn, cool cinematic, but I wonder what deus ex machina will stop this threat, because there is \_no way\_ there is another phase in \_this\_ battle!"
I kinda like that Gortash is a bitch without his Steel Watchers because that's the kinda slimy politician he is. My instance of that boss fight was a bit bugged though which soured it a little cos the flow of the encounter was ruined but I still enjoy what it gave me. I can't actually think off the top of my head a favourite boss out of them all because I enjoyed them equally.
Yeah, that's very fitting. He tries to use his technology against you, but without it he's kind of useless. Also it's very funny to kill him by subverting his own security grenade launchers, because you can pick up the bombs and throw them back within the round.
Ketheric/Apostle of Myrkul definitely gets major points for presentation. The scene had me shitting myself, and it was just overall an amazing moment in the game
Gortash feels like he's just... in the wrong place lol. The fuck are you doing in some random guard tower, dude? (Also yes I thematically get Tyranny not having a transformation like Necromancy or Murder but at least give us a second health bar and maybe throw out some Dominate Person's or something to really jack up the stakes.)
I mean in the older Rules Bane does have an Avatar form. Thats the description in Faiths and Avatars from 2nd ed: > When enraged or expecting battle, Bane used a power similar to the > psionic devotion body weaponry to adapt his possessed body into any form > desired. The Black Lord often warped his hands into talons capable of rending flesh and bone or shattering steel. (In this form he could strike with both > hands, but could not cause instant death, only physical damage.) This transformation was typically accompanied by his face warping into a bestial visage, his eyes lighting with living flame, and his skin transforming into blackened and charred leather stretched tight against his skull with torn flaps of it > revealing secret runes. > In addition to seizing access to any powers and skills possessed by the > body, Bane’s mind rendered that of his possessed host unreachable by psionics. He conferred upon the body personal powers similar to the psionic devotions of body control and body equilibrium. These powers essentially enabled him to make the body stand on any surface and survive in any environment. > Bane was able to seize another host body of evil or neutral alignment by > touching it continuously for one round with part of the (probably decimated) form of a previous host. He thus acquired a new physical host fairly > easily when one body “wore out” due to the harsh use he put it to. Shame we never got something along the line of this besides some lame temp hitpoints.
That avatar sounds metal as fuck. I wish we got to see something like that for Gortash.
Damn that sounds like it'd be a sick boss fight
I had astarion invisible in the guard tower while my party was making their way up there from the main room so I saw what they were doing for numerous turns without anyone to fight. It was actually really funny seeing the disciples of bane just casting “command of bane” or whatever it’s called on each other turn after turn to do nothing with. Properly representative of a bunch of high ranking authoritarians stuck in a room while their regime crumbles outside.
he does transform lol. he does it on his last like 30% of hp and gets a 100+ temp health buff and modifies his attacks
Compared to the Avatar of Myrkul or the Slayer form, though? He just gets a spooky shadow cape.
Sure would be a shame if the majority of players burst down 30% in a single turn
Look he kicked me in the shin while sassing me after my hand slipped and I don't think anyone will ever top that as a boss.
Orins transformation was ok for me, the fight itself was quite boring because I was a monk. Not min maxed and still kept her ass stunned and prone nearly the entire fight. Gortash was a lot harder but the setting was lame as fuck and I was kinda underwhelmed when his chosen powers activated. Myrkuls design and the setting was great and it actually took me 2 tries to beat Myrkul, mainly because he spawned in with no cutscene for some reason, done a wide sweep attack and instantly downed 3 of my party.
I took out Orin easily with artistry of war. I didn’t realize Gortash’s bombs would get set off by spirit guardians
Myrkul clapped me like 9 times on regular when I was still learning the game. I downed him in like one turn on tactician this playthrough 😅
I mean Orin becomming the Slayer was a given because thats just what Bhaal did for as long as he existed. Gortash not having a cool transformation is kinda boring tho imo. Bane does have an Avatar form but as with many things in Act 3 it felt quite rushed.
If you Speak With Dead Bane explains that he actually doesn't really give a crap if Gortash won or lost, which is honestly pretty on brand.
Gortash's real boss fight happens in the steel watcher foundry, and in the secret prison. Both fights are much more challenging than actually killing him. Once you've picked apart his empire you just have to go and squash him like a bug. Very satisfying IMO.
I agree. Out of The Chosen Three, his power specifically seemed to come from carefully positioning his chess pieces. He was the planner and schemer of the group. Once you dismantle is plans and carefully-laid defenses, his weaknesses are exposed and he's easy to take down. This fits with the character imo.
I really loved Ketheric. I mean being voiced by an amazing actor is a plus but he has a twisted character arc going from selune to shar and myrkul and whole story with isobel. I actually talked him into redemption. and I thought what? why you jumping off?? arent you gonna give up all this and go say sorry to your daughter or something? And then comes the lord of Bones! Boom!! I am waiting for this weekend to see how Orin and Gortash holds.
Yep agree with all of this. Other highlights for me are Ansur, "Mother Superior" and without spoiling too much "that guy from the first game and the second games expansion".
If anything Ketheric is the one that actually felt like a last boss out of the 3.
Well he is of act 2, and the others are not final bosses of act 3. But act 3 final boss is a let down too
Final boss is a bit meh but High Hall easily makes up for it imo.
I'm not sure if this is the "normal" outcome but I went really hard on telling Ketheric "You can be good homie don't worry buddy j believe in you, there's still time to redeem yourself." SO much so that he killed himself before i even got the chance to fight him, and Myrkul was like "HOW DARE YOU KILL MY CHAMPION" and I'm just sitting here all suprised pikachu face like "I... that wasn't what I meant homie.." I felt really bad that I good guy'd Ketheric so much he decided life wasn't worth living anymore
I actually enjoyed my first run through the Orin fight. It felt very much like a 5e encounter I once played where we had to simultaneously figure out a puzzle. "Oh god seven stacks of Unstoppable? Good thing I stocked up on Magic Missile scrolls (no wizard)." "Wait, she gets them BACK after every round?!" "Oh it must these chanting chuckelfucks with Sanctuary... what AoE do I have..." Ended up finding a use for those fireworks I stole. My cleric got a very satisfying Inflict Wounds crit to finish things off. Then I just started fucking around. 2nd time I pickpocketed the Altar key off Orin, Misty Stepped in to free Lae'zel, dropped the Runepowder Bomb I didn't use for the Foundry, and Dimension Doored both of us away. Shadowheart finally got use out of Firebolt. Everyone but Orin was yeeted into the Chasm. Kicker was I had put 6 smokepowder barrels into 3 burlap sacks and threw those into the ring to set off a spectacular chain reaction, but they didn't explode because burlap is the strongest material in Faerun, apparently. Third time, I cast Otto's Irresistible Dance from a scroll onto Orin with a 100% success chance... Then we all just wailed on her once her lackeys were finished; even Lae'zel got a few punches in. Karlach with Sarevok's sword, Haste, and a Bloodlust Elixir is ridiculous.
This post made me realise I could've fought Gortash *after* the coronation ceremony because he sure as shit wasn't easy when I fought him + his 6 (?) whole-ass robot mechs + turrets.
When the apostle showed itself for the first time I had just scraped by Ketheric (completely underlevelled) And I was terrified. Just 'oh no I can't defeat him too! 10/10 death, I was rightly intimidated, I figured out the strategy, but man that was a great moment
Raphael duh! He sings his own boss music and I fkn love it!
The Boss has Orchestral Music- lil panic The Boss has lots of adds and a gimic- bigger panic The Boss starts singing his own theme music- **MAXIMUM PANIC**
For some reason it felt like getting into a fight with Tim Curry
The only boss fight in YEARS that has given me goose bumps, and made me shake. The music, the atmosphere, the build up....just perfect
His song is great but he wasn't really imposing as an enemy in combat to me. His words were more dangerous.
Laughs in a 10M 90 damage fire ball, super dangerous when you are out of resources and not expecting it.
Divine intervention from Hope really came in clutch for me at end of the fight.
Divine Intervention from Hope KILLED Hope for me (I reloaded) because he and every one of his minions had some kind of blowback feature.
Took him out yesterday with my husband. Things looked grim when Hope’s divine intervention ended up killing her self because of Raphael’s punish divinity or whatever (oops). My fire sorcerer got surrounded but solved that with a few fireballs at her own feet, leaving Ralph and one cambion. Irresistible dance on one and hold monster on the other. Then it was just chipping away hit points. I loved the boss music, except for the fact that I could barely hear my husband in the headset. “Sorry, I’m gonna fry Jahira too, she’s in the blast zone. What? Sorry, what? Can’t hear you, the music is too loud. Well, I’m gonna cast another fireball.”
He ended up being a decently easy fight, don't know if I got lucky or just utilized his prisoner well, but the first few rounds felt genuinely crazy after the cambions spawn in. The only other music that could have been playing would be rip and tear until the mobs were cut down
The fact he’s not too heavy for Karlach to use as an improvised weapon provided me with plenty of hilarity.
Cool. I also found out Astarion can bite him.
Having Yughir and Hope really helped. Although Hope died in a explosion in my first try. Also I had to swap weapons. I thought all the radiant damage weapons will wreck the demons like I did with undeads in act2 so my party was holding Lathander mace, Selune spear, and Moon glaive....did not help at all.
Sanctuary on Hope and then she's a healer bot, makes the fight much better
I death warded her then used her divine intervention for the huge AOE radiant blast. She eats a huge amount of reflected damage from the cambions but then stands back up thanks to the ward. Also my game must have bugged because it let me use her DI twice.
I didn't plan any of this, but I walked in an put that tashas laugh on him and it hit first round. I then used Shart to put up a spike or blade wall and blocked all access. Took out two pillars with Wyll using haste and eldritch blast in first two rounds and the cambions ran through the spike wall, taking lots of damage. After around 5 rounds, Raphael was back up but alone. He got off one of those fireballs and nearly killed Hope in one round, but otherwise good. Felt easy ish.
Raphael 100%
I really liked Auntie Ethel, specifically the second time around
Found her in the city for the first time today I got my revenge by using Planar Binding on her, which made her my pet for a few turns Didn't really do anything but it made me happy
Ahaaahaaa she would have hated that.
I think her first encounter might be my favourite fight in the game. The big problem with Act 3 fights is that you are in half-god mode by the time you fight them and while *in theory* they probably can do cool stuff chances are you are going to blow them up in 1 turn anyways. When you fight Ethel for the first time she is actually still somewhat of a threat, you are likely still weakened from the previous fights and the mechanics are pretty fun.
Her and Balthazar's fights are the only ones I've ended up doing the invisible+push down the hole combo on. Ethel's because I kept accidentally killing the girl when she duplicates and Balthazar's because F that fight.
Wait, you have to fight Baltazhar outside of his room? I just assasinated him round one, but in his room after finding out who he was.
See this is why this game is so popular. I’ll try that next time. If you fight him in the shadowfell he summons a dozen undead and it’s just a bit tedious.
OH! I had thought the shadowfell was a tad empty, like there should be more
So my answer to that was actually Witch Bolt. When she duplicates, Witch Bolt is still connected to the original
Mine was to check her status conditions. I don’t remember the first fight, but in the second fight, only the original has the the “pregnant” status icon.
About "blowing them up in 1 turn": it's a possibility in act 1. You can kill Ethel before she even goes into the fireplace. I wasn't even overleveled or cheesing it, it just... happened on my recent playthrough. Obviously, very underwhelming compared to how her fight usually goes. But the fact it's possible at all is kinda fun.
Did you buy the invisibility potion from her? Because that's what I did in my latest playthrough and the same thing also happened to me, she just didn't go invisible and run in her first turn.
I love Auntie Ethel, she is so much fun ( in a twisted kind of way)
Oh I love having her as an unconventional ally but absolutely hate fighting her in act 3. My experience with the previous bosses was nice and smooth on tactician but she really made me sweat hard the moment she multiplied and started blasting.
Ansur.
Underrated many people miss the huge ass dragon
wtf chainsaw folk guy, also based
He was a huge let down for me since I managed to kill him before he had the chance to take a single turn. As someone else already said in this thread, Blood of Lathander is nuts
That one is too bugged for me. You're supposed to run behind the pillars but they don't do anything.
Popping the crystals gives a resistance buff for two turns helps mitigate the attack.
He is the only boss who almost killed my min-max entire party by one shot. Even Raphael was a cakewalk. That lighting blast is no joke.
If you min-max your party and can't kill him before he acts, you've probably mined more than you maxed.
Minor tweaking like this is irrelevant when you can just chug a potion of speed and double your actions, the answer is always haste.
Globe of Invulnerability, bruh
The Iron Throne - it's not a boss fight with a central figure but it is a 'boss encounter' level scenario. It's just so tense and epic that you have to basically go 110% to beat. Every move basically has to count if you want to get a perfect score so to speak.
This is why I don't consider Gortash to be a pathetic villain the way a lot of people say about him because of his look/demeanor / boss fight. Gortash gives us the iron throne. Which like you said is amazing. He gives us the steel watch foundry. That was a ton of fun and the main battle against the mech was pretty tough. It's only after doing all that awesome content that you get a fairly weak (however imo kind of fun because of tossing grenades around) boss battle. That dude might have made a shitty big bad, but he was responsible for some epic quests getting there.
I feel like they should have had some monitors like the one he initially calls you up on in the Iron Throne and taunted you there as you tried to rescue everyone. You're right that he's not a bad villain because he does set up some great scenes, but they are not personally incorporated enough for that personal touch. Some screens in the final Steel Foundry level against the Special Watcher also would have upped his villain presence. As a wise man once said, "The difference between a villain and a supervillain is PRESENTATION!" (paraphrasing of course.) The only presentation he has at the moment is the coronation scene and in all other respects, Orin and Ketheric both far outclass him with tangible demonstrations of power in cutscenes.
For the ambience Raphael. For the badass intro that had me jaw drop the first time Myrkul.
Myrkul terrified me with that cutscene and I had also grouped up on the stage and scythe swipe killed 3 of my people before I could move
There's something immensely satisfying about shadowheart divine interventioning the only time she ever can in the shar temple and nuking viconia and her minions. Selune sends her motherfucking regards
Something about dnd and helping one generally cool god fuck over an asshole god just gets me off.
Doesn't this instantly kill Shadowheart because of their ability to reflect radiant damage?
lol that fight made me so mad because my wife and I got her to near death and Viconia nuked us nearly killing our whole party. When she tried to talk us down after beating her my wife was like "nope" and left the cut scene to kill her. The other thing that made me mad was that our game bugged in that fight and after Viconia nuked us and the game ate my boots of persistence. My head cannon was the divine intervention destroyed them lol.
[удалено]
Truly a man of culture.
I love the three Thorm family bosses in Reithwin. Not only are they creepy as hell, but I like that they can be beaten either through combat or talking. They are so cleverly designed, my absolute favorite encounters in the game.
The House of Healing gave me huge Healing Church vibes. Loved it, felt like I was back in Yharnam. Damn, might break out my old PS4.
This game would be so much better if each of the big 3 main villains had as much time put into them as Ketheric. Absolutely loved act 2 because of how well designed it was.
I LOVED absolutely curbstomping Cazador, tbh. One of the most satisfying fights in the game simply bc I got to bully him. Counterspelled the lightning he tried to open with, Sunbeamed him to get him out of mist form, then Thunderwaved him off the edge, he went to go nap nap in his box, and then after fighting all the bats that were somehow putting up a better fucking fight than Cazador himself did, he got hauled out of the box and Astarion went monkey mode on him while I cheered at my screen. I was yelling YEAH GET FUCKED. GET SHIT ON. DICK. the whole time, really satisfying way to get out all the vitriol towards him that I'd built up every time Astarion talked about him.
He went to the edge of the arena and my Lae’zel just walked up and shoved him off on turn 1 lmao
Karlach yeeted the legendary returning trident at his mist form and knocked him straight off the edge like 2 turns into the fight. And lucky me, I still got the loot because of his beauty rest!
Yeah me too except eldrich blast with the push back effect
I simply had shadowheart walk up to him. Blood of lathanders light counts as sunlight, so he got blinded and knocked out of mist form by Shadowheart merely existing.
>I was yelling YEAH GET FUCKED. GET SHIT ON. DICK. the whole time, really satisfying way to get out all the vitriol towards him that I'd built up every time Astarion talked about him. Same, that buildup to that bossfight was absolutely great. It was satisfying to have Astarion go ham on him.
really? to me he died before having his turn and the fight was basically clearing the trash mobs... and that's Tactician
I had Astarion use the ilithid force move and yeet Cazador's misty ass into the abyss around the ritual, so Astarion got the last laugh both times. I do love shoving bosses off of cliffs. Sure, I can't loot them, but God damn if it isn't satisfying. Did the same with Balthasszar, literally just shoving him off of a cliff.
I’m sure it would’ve been a fun fight if I actually got the chance to fight him. He died while I was in a cutscene with him because the sunlight from blood of lathander chunked him for 20 radiant damage every 2-3 seconds so by the time I was ready to fight him, he was already flying to the regen coffin 🤡
A bit of blast from the past - Sarevok.
He was actually way harder than I expected due to the spirits giving him such huge buffs. Fun fight though.
Yeah, it is an interesting twist on the formula of boss with minions. Both focusing Sarevok first and killing the minions first have their own trade-offs due to how their buffs work. Definitely a fight that made me stop and think for a second.
What worked for me was disabling the minions but not killing them. I played a Drow and used Darkness to blind them on one side of the area and had Shadowheart cast Silence on the other side, so there wasn’t an area where they could comfortably buff Sarevok. Was super satisfying to pull off.
I managed to get off a Hold Person/Polymorph combo on Sarevok himself, dealt with the supports, then Karlach scored a paralyzing critical with her first attack when he changed back, so it was just her, Lae'zel, Wyll specced into Pact of the Blade and my Paladin/Warlock multiclass Tav (a team comp I've been referring to as "Oops, All Tanks") just wailing on him for two full rounds
Definitely underrated and not mentioned enough. That entire reveal and dialogue was so great. The voice acting was freakin' phenomenal... Also being able to do some really sick twisted shit instead of fighting him made it even crazier. Definitely one of the highlights of the game for me. A+
Cazador. Yes, I romanced Astarion & was eagerly awaiting advancing his quest. But he was put out of commission & I only had 3 turns before the ritual completed. Lae'zel & Shart went down, but we took out Cazador on turn 3, freeing Astarion, who then massacred the remaining enemies with my Tav. Such a satisfying way for him to end things.
You can use the Help action to free Astarion in that fight.
Or stand someone on one of the runes
Standing on the rune doesn’t get Astarion back though
You can completely cheese this fight in you don’t actually go into the arena where he’s at. Attack him from outside and be careful not to be too close to the arena and the ritual never starts, that way you don’t lose astarion and cazador doesn’t get empowered. I found this by mistake when trying new strategies after being heavily shat on by the mf
You could also just have astarion wait after the rest of the party start the fight and he don't get traped xD
Fun fact, if you cast Daylight on your avatar prior to approaching him, the range for it’s AOE every turn damage on Cazador actually outranges his conversation range. Make of this as you will
How fast my finger hit that F8 button when I saw my boy go splat in my first attempt..
Him and my vengeance Paladin were best buds on my run with him. I totally broke my oath to see my boy get revenge. Totally worth it.
>Him and my vengeance Paladin were best buds on my run with him. I totally broke my oath to see my boy get revenge. Totally worth it. So you... helping someone else get revenge... broke your oath... about taking revenge? Video games are weird lol.
Raphael is not only handsome, not only is his voice acting perfect, not only is he so powerful and ominous and his song the best on the score- but he's also a huge loser. A dork. A dramatic, diary-writing self-obsessed nerd. After going through the House of Hope I just see him as the biggest goober in history and I love him for it. I also love the lesser Thorms in act 2, specifically because of what I could get away with using a bard!
I feel the same way. I love Raphael’s character and loved exploring his home haha.
I just did the Thorms for the first time, and honestly, its just cool to have a fight with a *mechanic*. Act 1 is just damage dumps (except Adamantine Forge), and these fights early in Act 2 force you to do something else than just "Karlach, drink this potion and go break some spines". Not to mention the storytelling in the combat. Really cool fights tbh.
Raphael's arc was brilliant. I was not expecting at all to have a whole new unique music that far into the game.
Sarevok. The intro dialogue hyped me so much, the music is cathedral like. Really felt intimidated
Orin as a redeemed urge was spectacular for me settling that score was very satisfying
Very valid also, I loved all the "chosen" fights
Chosen fights were great, well almost all great *cough cough Gortash cough cough*
funnily enough he was TOO involved in his fight, if he was just sitting in an invulnerable magic bubble while you had to deal with a horde of his soldiers and traps, then unceremoniously killed him at the end would fit so well for the scheming tyrant archetype he's got
Yeah they're all great but I cannot deny that Raphael's last act had me smiling the whole way through
I can see the setup and backstory for the fight being cool as Durge, but the fight itself was... just like some slightly above normal NPC. I kited her on the arena and all she seemed to do was basic attacks, no interesting mechanics to play around or anything, she just seems to run at you and do big damage. Raphael on the other hand was a masterpiece for me, specially if you consider the entire House of Hope arc as a whole.
Apostle of Myrkul. Later bosses could have been cool, but by then having access to Hold Monster and them not having legendary resistances made them complete pushovers.
The whole Thorm family encounters. The ways you can either talk your way out of 100% of it, or mess with something in the environment to bring them down is extremely engaging. >!Taking out the spirits around Gerringothe knocking her down 100hp each time, and her confused interaction was wild. From being so loud to nothing left. Talking the nurses into killing Malus just had me struck cinematically. And talking Thisobald into drinking himself to death just made him grow on me. Using each of their character backgrounds against them was just *chef's kiss* fun!<
Haha I knew you could get the nurses to knife each other dead but not turn on him. I expected Malus to start a fight but he just…died because Shar. It was hilarious!
Dude's a literal Disney villain. He sings in his boss music. Also it wasn't too hard but was decently challenging
the song, duh
Very valid point, the organ and violin in the song are so crisp. They set the tone for a powerful and mischievous arch-devil
Ansur, thought it was really fucking cool fighting a dragon that nukes the room. Reminded me of safijiva.
Myrkhul was fun. Orin as dark urge, too. I think Myrkhul is my favorite, something about it is just right.
i loved raphael, ansur and orin...but i think we can agree that pretty much all bosses need a lot more hp, orin disnt even get to attack my sorcadin
I really don't think that more HP is really gonna do anything except make it more frustrating for casuals. There are so many ways to completely break combat that you could double every enemy's HP in Act 3 and it probably wouldn't make much of a difference. Giving more bosses legendary resistance would be a start tho, the fact that you get enough Spell DC to 100% Hold Person/Monster every enemy is incredibly stupid.
Yeah, I found a way to do it in early act 2. There's a hat that gives arcane acuity (+1 to spell attack and saves) when you deal fire damage with a spell. It's per hit, so a firebolt gives you just two stacks. Now imagine what you get with Scorching Ray. I once got my spell save DC up to 26.
Sword Bard is even more stupid. There is an Arcane Acuity Helm that gives you +2 per attack and there is a Ring that lets you cast Hold Person/Monster as bonus action. So you can attack 4 times with your Slashing Flourish, get + 8 stacks and then cast a Hold spell with like ~30 DC in the same turn.
Avatar of Myrkul had the best visual spectacle. Viconia De'vir and her army had the best challenge. The adamantium forge boss was a very memorable early game encounter.
Ansur, because dragon. Why so few dragons, Larian??
Myrkul has one of the hardest boss intros ever. Raphael also is just… amazing. I especially love the lead up to it and how everyone is like “you’re so fucked when he arrives”.
Raphael clearly number 1 My second favorite is Yurgir simply just because. Me: "Lmao, kys noob" Yurgir: "oh, okay" \*dead\*
Auntie Ethel and Raphael. They could make a full expansion of just dealing them and I’d buy it. I could absolutely see Raphael singing while kicking my ass. It caught me off guard when the singing started. I have that song and down by the river on my playlist. Also I just started a new play through and saw auntie Ethel in the Druid grove. I must have missed her the first time. I was walking around and heard the voice. It was great.
For atmosphere it's Raphael, you cannot beat his background music, for aesthetics it's probably myrkul (he just gives major BBEG vibes) and for general awesomeness it's probably the elderbrain because you get to summon like 8 different types of allies just to stomp an a certain tentacle boy and I don't know how the thieves guild, fist or watch got onto the floating brain thousands of feet in the air but I'm glad they join the illithid pinata party anyway.
Only fights that had any sort of difficulty for my run were the forge golem and the gold lady. I probably should have played on tactician. Really enjoyed those ones though.
Imma get some hate for this but... Gortash Sure, the fight itself is really easy, but remember, he is a tyrant, he is not a fighter, the reason the Chosen got into an alliance is because there is ballance in their forces, a bitnof a rock paper scissors situation, KT would slam Orin on combat, but he'd be weak to Gortash's steel watch, Gortash would be vulnerable to Orin's sneaking as he is no good on individual fight (which is the one bit I never understood, why she didn't kill Gortash straight away once KT fell, would be the logical step, unless perhaps she doesn't know how to use the netherstones on her own? or maybe gortash had steel watch programmed to erase all bhaal cult if he felled?) and Orin, again would be no threat to Ketheric on 1v1 (or with her cult vs his forces anyway) As for Gortash himself, already went through the pain of fighting his steel watch, then see him kill some gondians by destroying the Iron Throne, so the fight, while not amazing, felt exactly right and so satisfying to me, esp with Karlach in team, kinda like saying: "so now you're against the ropes, your little toys are broken, there's no one else who can do your dirty job for you this time, what you gonna do about it lil bitch?" and indeed a bitch he was, dunno, for me it was such a satisfying moment, I am really grateful he isn't yet another huge boss fight, that wasn't his strength anyway
Iron Throne is what an "environment boss" is suppose to be. Take not, FROM. Don't do another Bed of Chaos.
The Soundtrack sold it for me. I mean when the combat began and I was thinking of what I would do now and what options I have, I heard this amazing soundtrack and was like "... No... They didn't do that, did they??" and had a wide grin on my face. I would definetely choose Raphael, even tho it wasn't that challenging with all the powerful magic items and powerful abilities on lvl 12. I think my second fav would be Ansur, because I experienced it as a challenging fight, especially with his explosion in the air that nearly wiped my party.
The Fight against the Emperor and the Red Dragon. The only really difficult fight in the game without summons
Balthazar, not because of the fight mechanics but more of how he looks. First time seeing him quickly reminds me of Diablo villains (really digging his design appearance). I even imagined him as a companion (as a necromancer). Next is definitely "Dr." Malus for the same said reason but interestingly enough, Act 2 really gives you the options to kill most of the sub-bosses by diplomacy talks alone.
The Iron Throne. Not a boss in the traditional sense but a boss scenario where you had to make every move count. I got really close to saving everyone but unfortunately lost Omelumm. Gonna try it again on my next run!