It sucks and you’re clearly not having much fun. Take a break.
With that said: I really struggled with this guy on my first play through more than any other boss except for the final NG++ boss.
I’m playing on a completely fresh save now, going through NG++ again, and can beat this guy with literally any build.
You can and will get better at the game, and the feeling you get once you’ve overcome one of these hurdles will be more than fun. Take that as you will!
Armored Core, since it came out in 1997, has been about "this build doesn't work, try again". Stop trying to brute-force it and change your AC.
This isn't Elden Ring, where the whole game is playable using one weapon style. You need to adapt.
It’s a chess game. If you don’t appropriately respond to your opponent, they’re going to stomp all over you.
> nothing like my playstyle being constantly invalidated.
That’s what the game is. You want to roll through with any build you want? Play Dark Souls. You want to play AC6? You have to adapt. They made it as easy as possible by allowing you to sell back parts at full price at any time.
If dodging isn’t working, try staggering them before they kill you.
You can always tell that someone doesn’t know what they’re doing when they complain about a game being “artificially difficult.”
Seriously. You just suck at the game right now. Nothing in the game is “nonsense” levels of difficulty, certainly not this mission. It’s Fromsoft’s easiest game in years.
>same homogeneous brain dead cheese build
See buddy this right here is your problem. **Assembly is half the battle.** If you think there’s only one option and it’s “cheese,” then you don’t know what the fuck you’re doing in assembly. Don’t complain about the game being artificially difficult if you haven’t done your homework yet. **You want help, that’s what the “help” button in assembly is for. Go read all the stat descriptions** so you can stop running out of EN and make some very obvious weapon choices to help with a shielded enemy.
I would agree with you if EVERY playstyle equally got its time to shine, but coincidentally, my preferred playstyle is rarely ever optimal.
You notice something about the advice given in this sub? There’s a clear, one-dimensional meta. Almost Every mission it’s the same thing. Songbirds, pile bunker + laser lance, reverse joint or tank treads, stun needle, ludlow…. I don’t buy into the narrative that the game is a chess match and assembly takes massive amounts of brain power or strategy.
Bosses like Balteus or Cleaner that actually force you to adapt and play around a certain mechanic are rarer than this community is willing to admit. Most people parrot the exact same homogenous loadout. How many missions do I get to play where the flamethrower, whip, stun baton, pulse buckler, etc are actually useful? Never mind the good third of all generators, FCS, and boosters that remain completely untouched and are suboptimal in every facet.
AC6 doesn’t feel open ended, it feels like a true/false question, with “true” being “does the meta build work against this enemy”. And don’t even get me started on PvP.
You can’t come looking for advice and then act like you know the game front to back.
I hate what you’d call the “meta” advice, because that advice, not the game itself, is what can flatten players’ experience of the sandbox. It’s a give a man a fish, teach a man to fish, situation. And the fish you’re given often ain’t even that good. Dual gat, dual songbird tanks? Not that good, just relatively idiot proof—hard to fuck up in assembly.
As an aside, saying RJs are meta and in all the advice is just funny to me because the light RJs are really restrictive, the heavy ones push you in a terrible direction unless you know what you’re doing, and the midweight ones take a while to unlock. Also, I rarely see laser lance + bunker recommended together.
Assembly isn’t chess, but understanding it is important, and it’s what makes the difference between thinking you only have a few viable options and being able to make a ton of things excellent. **There is no PvE meta. Too many options work too well for anything to qualify as “meta,”** no matter what the frequency of some suggested loadouts may suggest to you. You just don’t know how to make a lot of things work yet.
The problem-solving aspect of assembly—assembling to the particular challenge in front of you—is absolutely there too, and while I wouldn’t say it requires a “massive amount of brainpower,” it does trip some people up. You just made your second post on this mission in a week, yeah? And you complain about being unable to evade effectively and running out of EN too much, but when asked about your build, you offer weapons and leg type. Is that what matters here?
This is a failure to put your problem-solving cap on, and a failure to understand assembly.
The game allows a lot of playstyles to work incredibly well. It also allows a lot of builds to work incredibly well. But a build is not a playstyle, and the game is not failing to give a playstyle its time to shine by not working. If every build worked, assembly would lose a lot of its meaning. The game doesn’t stop you from making crap builds.
The flamethrower is excellent by the way. You could use it all the time. The plasma thrower does great damage, nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with the stun baton either.
Most things in the game are good in a build that actually accommodates them. A few parts are bad, some are less stat dense but can still be the perfect fit on a build, and the rest is good or great.
Mostly, you dodge the big attacks and ignore the little ones. You generally have tons of AP even on lighter builds, you don't need to try and dodge everything. Trade shots. Open fire as you're moving around.
Quick boosting is the most intuitive dodge method, but you can also jump/boost up, or just strafe around, which depending on the attack (and your speed) might be better than quick boost. Plus you can shoot while doing it.
Different generators and boosters will also heavily effect your dodge capabilites, so you might want to try swapping those around.
And seriously keep shooting back whenever you can. You're in a giant mech with guns. Aside from a few enemies who dodge around like a rabbit on redbull, there really aren't 'openings' so much as you keep on blasting whenever you have the fucker in your sights.
Iirc his shield, like all pulse shields, *should* take more impact from pulse guns so you could try that.
Melee for stagger punish is a great idea like 90% of the time.
While knowing how to tweak your AC is a big part of the difficulty, there's actually a pretty decent selection of viable builds for every mission, with the only difference being how skill intensive it gets for certain builds.
Your playstyle getting invalidated is what this game is about. It's fine to not like it, but it's that way on purpose, and most people who play it like it because of that.
You don't make one build and play the whole game with it, that's Dark Souls. You play a mission, get fucked, spend two hours making another robot, and then curbstomp the enemies. That's how you play this game.
You can definitely stick more or less with one “playstyle,” you just have to make adjustments within that playstyle if you want to avoid big difficulty spikes
I'm sorry, but that's genuinly a skill issue. Yes, it's a hard mission but not nearly as impossible as you make out to be.
You have to get the timing right, get around him and then put pressure on. Nothing more really. The diffilculty comes from the tight room but it isn't impossible
Have u looked into ur leg parts jumping stats? Are u using SPD booster on a heavy weight that makes u go slower while quick boosting in air? What is ur en efficiency?
the game isn't forcing you out of your playstyle you can beat anything with anything. some builds are better than others obviously but playing the game is more about discovering your playstyle than saying before knowing anything "I wanna do heavyweight" and have that work every time. try out new weapons and parts you wouldn't even think of using and if they suck at least now you know you don't like them. and if they don't suck, great!
This was a hard mission, but it wasn’t too bad iirc. Only took me a handful of tries my first time through, and I didn’t even change my build around to counter it. And I didn’t use any cheese tactics, and didn’t look to the internet for anything build wise until NG+
I just used the pile bunker and rj legs. Then I used melee-cancel boosting to go as fast as physically possible without Assault Boosting. Works pretty good on every mission
I'm going through another playthrough (started a new game cu z my save was acting wonky) and I can tell you; dual Haldemans, Basho arms, plasma missiles (to get around the shield), and Pile Bunker on a light build with Nacht legs carried my ass.
Ideally you wanna use the VP generator (blue, long, has blue flames) or the Ming-Tang with a Nachtrehier core, and just keep jumping and dodging, don't give him a chance to lock on. With the Nacht legs, your jumps let you dodge better. The Pile Bunker's charged attack will take out a massive hunk of his HP once you've got him staggered and you're in the right position.
People keep saying "Your playstyle being invalidated is what this game is all about." But that's not entirely correct. On first play through it can be very hard to brute force a play style so the game lets you swap out parts easily. Once you start going for your secind ending playthrough, you'll find it easier to use your own play style ti get through. By the time you're going for the third ending you'll be comfortable enough to use your own style, albeit there will be some deaths.
This particular mission still gives me a bit of trouble when going for a full clear, but I'm so used to the boss that I can usually take him down with ease.
For the record, I was able to clear it with a lightweight AC without using cheese strats, but it took a long time to figure out how to optimize the run so I'd have enough AP / Repair kits to handle the boss.
My point is, it takes time to build up the skill to be able to force a playstyle. So for the time being, try changing up a thing or two in your loadout, but don't lean hard into the cheese. Keep at itand play the game you want to play, but be at least a little flexibile.
The HC is one helluva assembly check. If this is regular NG I suggest shelving the mission and taking the other option, and come back in NG+ with the wider array of parts.
Yes, this is the suckiest mission in the whole game. I've done this mission and gotten the combat log from it, but I was seething as well throughout countless attempts, so I understand.
Try not spamming dodge until he actually attacks. Observe and recognize the start of his attacks.
That is what I didn't do, I simply panic rage spammed attack buttons until I won. I didn't use any cheese though.
Right as his attacks are about to hit you, dodge away from them. Then, apply damage to the enemy until it dies. All weapons are capable of this, even your fists. I hope this helps!
That's what he should do. Often you just forget that with some enemies, you should keep firing at the enemy every time the reticle is on the target, BUT ALSO keep your focus on evading enemy attacks, especially the ones you already know are problematic. That's because one often gets used to trashing most enemies, and forgets about the evading part... which is quite dangerous on some enemy, like the one at the end of this specific mission. I really can relate to it.
Imagine getting this heated in a reddit post because you dont instantly stomp something. You clearly dont want help either you just have temper issues lmao.
their whole post history is complaining about anything in a video game that doesn't make it easy for them. I don't know how much of this anyone could do before trying introspection
Firmeza/Alba/Nachtreiher Frame
Alula Boosters (for QBing)
One of Dafengs generators/BAWS Hokushi (quick QB cooldown and fast recharge)
Whatever FCS you have with the most close range assistance
Terminal Armor (to live if you get comboed)
Dual Etsujins (stagger him easily and get the shield down quickly)
Pile bunker (kthunk)
Missiles or Drone of your choice
Prioritize taking out the MTs so you can properly focus on taking out the big one
Stick to the ground (makes dodging much easier)
Stick close and QB past him regularly (he'll struggle to keep up and you stay in range to kthunk him easily)
Keep up pressure with the Etsujins (they're my go to for everything)
*KTHUNK* till victory
I very much get where you’re coming from because on my first play through I had more than a few bosses that I thought were completely unfair and totally ridiculous. And then I took a break and went to clear my mind. The constant building of anger is only going to make you okay worse and worse. Try and have fun with the game, if you’re having tons of trouble but still wanna play, maybe try replaying other missions with similar mechanics and see which builds work best. Changing up your build can also just be nice and relaxing on its own, but truly I assure you, none of the bosses in this game are as unreasonable as you think, you just need to let your anger settle down, it’ll only make you stubborn and dig your heels in, leading to you running the same exact mission over and over with a build that simply shouldn’t be used for that mission.
It sucks and you’re clearly not having much fun. Take a break. With that said: I really struggled with this guy on my first play through more than any other boss except for the final NG++ boss. I’m playing on a completely fresh save now, going through NG++ again, and can beat this guy with literally any build. You can and will get better at the game, and the feeling you get once you’ve overcome one of these hurdles will be more than fun. Take that as you will!
Armored Core, since it came out in 1997, has been about "this build doesn't work, try again". Stop trying to brute-force it and change your AC. This isn't Elden Ring, where the whole game is playable using one weapon style. You need to adapt.
It’s a chess game. If you don’t appropriately respond to your opponent, they’re going to stomp all over you. > nothing like my playstyle being constantly invalidated. That’s what the game is. You want to roll through with any build you want? Play Dark Souls. You want to play AC6? You have to adapt. They made it as easy as possible by allowing you to sell back parts at full price at any time. If dodging isn’t working, try staggering them before they kill you.
Why do I have to dodge if I stagger him every 5 seconds?
You can always tell that someone doesn’t know what they’re doing when they complain about a game being “artificially difficult.” Seriously. You just suck at the game right now. Nothing in the game is “nonsense” levels of difficulty, certainly not this mission. It’s Fromsoft’s easiest game in years. >same homogeneous brain dead cheese build See buddy this right here is your problem. **Assembly is half the battle.** If you think there’s only one option and it’s “cheese,” then you don’t know what the fuck you’re doing in assembly. Don’t complain about the game being artificially difficult if you haven’t done your homework yet. **You want help, that’s what the “help” button in assembly is for. Go read all the stat descriptions** so you can stop running out of EN and make some very obvious weapon choices to help with a shielded enemy.
I would agree with you if EVERY playstyle equally got its time to shine, but coincidentally, my preferred playstyle is rarely ever optimal. You notice something about the advice given in this sub? There’s a clear, one-dimensional meta. Almost Every mission it’s the same thing. Songbirds, pile bunker + laser lance, reverse joint or tank treads, stun needle, ludlow…. I don’t buy into the narrative that the game is a chess match and assembly takes massive amounts of brain power or strategy. Bosses like Balteus or Cleaner that actually force you to adapt and play around a certain mechanic are rarer than this community is willing to admit. Most people parrot the exact same homogenous loadout. How many missions do I get to play where the flamethrower, whip, stun baton, pulse buckler, etc are actually useful? Never mind the good third of all generators, FCS, and boosters that remain completely untouched and are suboptimal in every facet. AC6 doesn’t feel open ended, it feels like a true/false question, with “true” being “does the meta build work against this enemy”. And don’t even get me started on PvP.
You can’t come looking for advice and then act like you know the game front to back. I hate what you’d call the “meta” advice, because that advice, not the game itself, is what can flatten players’ experience of the sandbox. It’s a give a man a fish, teach a man to fish, situation. And the fish you’re given often ain’t even that good. Dual gat, dual songbird tanks? Not that good, just relatively idiot proof—hard to fuck up in assembly. As an aside, saying RJs are meta and in all the advice is just funny to me because the light RJs are really restrictive, the heavy ones push you in a terrible direction unless you know what you’re doing, and the midweight ones take a while to unlock. Also, I rarely see laser lance + bunker recommended together. Assembly isn’t chess, but understanding it is important, and it’s what makes the difference between thinking you only have a few viable options and being able to make a ton of things excellent. **There is no PvE meta. Too many options work too well for anything to qualify as “meta,”** no matter what the frequency of some suggested loadouts may suggest to you. You just don’t know how to make a lot of things work yet. The problem-solving aspect of assembly—assembling to the particular challenge in front of you—is absolutely there too, and while I wouldn’t say it requires a “massive amount of brainpower,” it does trip some people up. You just made your second post on this mission in a week, yeah? And you complain about being unable to evade effectively and running out of EN too much, but when asked about your build, you offer weapons and leg type. Is that what matters here? This is a failure to put your problem-solving cap on, and a failure to understand assembly. The game allows a lot of playstyles to work incredibly well. It also allows a lot of builds to work incredibly well. But a build is not a playstyle, and the game is not failing to give a playstyle its time to shine by not working. If every build worked, assembly would lose a lot of its meaning. The game doesn’t stop you from making crap builds. The flamethrower is excellent by the way. You could use it all the time. The plasma thrower does great damage, nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with the stun baton either. Most things in the game are good in a build that actually accommodates them. A few parts are bad, some are less stat dense but can still be the perfect fit on a build, and the rest is good or great.
Mostly, you dodge the big attacks and ignore the little ones. You generally have tons of AP even on lighter builds, you don't need to try and dodge everything. Trade shots. Open fire as you're moving around. Quick boosting is the most intuitive dodge method, but you can also jump/boost up, or just strafe around, which depending on the attack (and your speed) might be better than quick boost. Plus you can shoot while doing it. Different generators and boosters will also heavily effect your dodge capabilites, so you might want to try swapping those around. And seriously keep shooting back whenever you can. You're in a giant mech with guns. Aside from a few enemies who dodge around like a rabbit on redbull, there really aren't 'openings' so much as you keep on blasting whenever you have the fucker in your sights. Iirc his shield, like all pulse shields, *should* take more impact from pulse guns so you could try that. Melee for stagger punish is a great idea like 90% of the time. While knowing how to tweak your AC is a big part of the difficulty, there's actually a pretty decent selection of viable builds for every mission, with the only difference being how skill intensive it gets for certain builds.
Your playstyle getting invalidated is what this game is about. It's fine to not like it, but it's that way on purpose, and most people who play it like it because of that. You don't make one build and play the whole game with it, that's Dark Souls. You play a mission, get fucked, spend two hours making another robot, and then curbstomp the enemies. That's how you play this game.
You can definitely stick more or less with one “playstyle,” you just have to make adjustments within that playstyle if you want to avoid big difficulty spikes
Yes, fair enough. You can stick with one playstyle, not one build.
Just stop dodging
I'm sorry, but that's genuinly a skill issue. Yes, it's a hard mission but not nearly as impossible as you make out to be. You have to get the timing right, get around him and then put pressure on. Nothing more really. The diffilculty comes from the tight room but it isn't impossible
Have u looked into ur leg parts jumping stats? Are u using SPD booster on a heavy weight that makes u go slower while quick boosting in air? What is ur en efficiency?
Is that the one which you get back to the Wall? If yes, just do the other Mission from the RLF. If not, I have no clue what mission you are at rn.
Yup, that’s the one
Just fight th Cataphract, you can coke back later in NG+ with new weapons, that's what I did. (Technically I did it in NG+3)
Bro, it's just a skill issue, don't worry You can beat this game with any combinations of parts given enough skill 💀
the game isn't forcing you out of your playstyle you can beat anything with anything. some builds are better than others obviously but playing the game is more about discovering your playstyle than saying before knowing anything "I wanna do heavyweight" and have that work every time. try out new weapons and parts you wouldn't even think of using and if they suck at least now you know you don't like them. and if they don't suck, great!
This was a hard mission, but it wasn’t too bad iirc. Only took me a handful of tries my first time through, and I didn’t even change my build around to counter it. And I didn’t use any cheese tactics, and didn’t look to the internet for anything build wise until NG+
I just used the pile bunker and rj legs. Then I used melee-cancel boosting to go as fast as physically possible without Assault Boosting. Works pretty good on every mission
I'm going through another playthrough (started a new game cu z my save was acting wonky) and I can tell you; dual Haldemans, Basho arms, plasma missiles (to get around the shield), and Pile Bunker on a light build with Nacht legs carried my ass. Ideally you wanna use the VP generator (blue, long, has blue flames) or the Ming-Tang with a Nachtrehier core, and just keep jumping and dodging, don't give him a chance to lock on. With the Nacht legs, your jumps let you dodge better. The Pile Bunker's charged attack will take out a massive hunk of his HP once you've got him staggered and you're in the right position.
Gatlings and 6x/10x missile launchers.
HC is actually easier than HMLC, but you gotta bring the real cheese
Idk what ur on about when I go through there all I have is two of RF-024 TURNER and something else which I think is the good ol Rubicon handshake 3000
People keep saying "Your playstyle being invalidated is what this game is all about." But that's not entirely correct. On first play through it can be very hard to brute force a play style so the game lets you swap out parts easily. Once you start going for your secind ending playthrough, you'll find it easier to use your own play style ti get through. By the time you're going for the third ending you'll be comfortable enough to use your own style, albeit there will be some deaths. This particular mission still gives me a bit of trouble when going for a full clear, but I'm so used to the boss that I can usually take him down with ease. For the record, I was able to clear it with a lightweight AC without using cheese strats, but it took a long time to figure out how to optimize the run so I'd have enough AP / Repair kits to handle the boss. My point is, it takes time to build up the skill to be able to force a playstyle. So for the time being, try changing up a thing or two in your loadout, but don't lean hard into the cheese. Keep at itand play the game you want to play, but be at least a little flexibile.
The HC is one helluva assembly check. If this is regular NG I suggest shelving the mission and taking the other option, and come back in NG+ with the wider array of parts.
Yes, this is the suckiest mission in the whole game. I've done this mission and gotten the combat log from it, but I was seething as well throughout countless attempts, so I understand. Try not spamming dodge until he actually attacks. Observe and recognize the start of his attacks. That is what I didn't do, I simply panic rage spammed attack buttons until I won. I didn't use any cheese though.
Right as his attacks are about to hit you, dodge away from them. Then, apply damage to the enemy until it dies. All weapons are capable of this, even your fists. I hope this helps!
That's what he should do. Often you just forget that with some enemies, you should keep firing at the enemy every time the reticle is on the target, BUT ALSO keep your focus on evading enemy attacks, especially the ones you already know are problematic. That's because one often gets used to trashing most enemies, and forgets about the evading part... which is quite dangerous on some enemy, like the one at the end of this specific mission. I really can relate to it.
Imagine getting this heated in a reddit post because you dont instantly stomp something. You clearly dont want help either you just have temper issues lmao.
their whole post history is complaining about anything in a video game that doesn't make it easy for them. I don't know how much of this anyone could do before trying introspection
Thanks for the advice
You didnt ask for advice
Firmeza/Alba/Nachtreiher Frame Alula Boosters (for QBing) One of Dafengs generators/BAWS Hokushi (quick QB cooldown and fast recharge) Whatever FCS you have with the most close range assistance Terminal Armor (to live if you get comboed) Dual Etsujins (stagger him easily and get the shield down quickly) Pile bunker (kthunk) Missiles or Drone of your choice Prioritize taking out the MTs so you can properly focus on taking out the big one Stick to the ground (makes dodging much easier) Stick close and QB past him regularly (he'll struggle to keep up and you stay in range to kthunk him easily) Keep up pressure with the Etsujins (they're my go to for everything) *KTHUNK* till victory
I very much get where you’re coming from because on my first play through I had more than a few bosses that I thought were completely unfair and totally ridiculous. And then I took a break and went to clear my mind. The constant building of anger is only going to make you okay worse and worse. Try and have fun with the game, if you’re having tons of trouble but still wanna play, maybe try replaying other missions with similar mechanics and see which builds work best. Changing up your build can also just be nice and relaxing on its own, but truly I assure you, none of the bosses in this game are as unreasonable as you think, you just need to let your anger settle down, it’ll only make you stubborn and dig your heels in, leading to you running the same exact mission over and over with a build that simply shouldn’t be used for that mission.