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Viper Napuatzi highlights something important (my first actual critique)

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Geonor is (in my opinion) the most forced, dev try-hard, none interesting, annoying boss in the entirety of the game so far. Every time he goes into his "I'm gonna disappear and tell you a poem" phase, I literally want to uninstall the game. It's the most uninteresting, "let me show you how cool our devs are" content I've ever encountered in an ARPG. And I played Loki for years back in the day.

I don't care about your stupid poem, Geonor. It's the most forgettable part of the game.


That's cool.

What about Viper, since thats the topic here?
Stupid people never lose an argument.
Last edited by NotPivot#9831 on Apr 17, 2025, 12:20:54 AM
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That's cool.

What about Viper, since thats the topic here?


Am I not allowed to comment on a boss you brought up in your post? If you want to bump, just bump. No need to try and start friction just to keep your post at the top
I wrote some longer feedback on that fight but nobody replied. I think we agree on many points: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3759936
The fight is trying to teach you to pay attention to your surroundings and dodgeroll.

If you look at soldiers their spears glow green before they stab, giving yu roughly 1 second to react. It's better to dodgeroll a bit too early rather than a bit too late.

Don't bother dps:ing during this phase, unless you're pro.
She’s invulnerable during the spear stabby phase so not even the pros can do damage
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I wrote some longer feedback on that fight but nobody replied. I think we agree on many points: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3759936


I'll take a look.

Regarding the spears and the comment that "it's better to dodge to early, than to late".

Actually no, it's about the same amount of not okay, whether early or late since, specifically the last volley, is generally a 1 shot mechanic. You can get hit and survive if you time a high heal flask to tick you through, but even if you survive the hit, the poison magnitude from the hit will usually finish you off when it procs (the antidote charm is usually out of charges for at least one of these spear volleys).

Early, and late are both the same amount of dead, because it's a 1 shot.

The spears weren't really the issue, but when she stands there, locked and loaded with the machine gun poison balls, and bursts you the second you leave dodge roll... or sometimes starts the bursts as you're still in the final part of the clunky animation, it's takes a good flask, not skill, to keep you alive.

That's sort of the clue. If there are boss mechanics that force you to use a high end flask, specifically because they feel almost like the boss has found a cheese to kill you, it's a problem.

I didn't mention before, but thought it was funny that a few times, the split second the fight begins the boss will tele to you, stab you and knock a charge off your charm before you can even move normal speed (the fight starts with a dramatic slow walk) - also definitively simulated difficulty since there is actually no way to do anything about that, you mechanically cannot move or dodge.

I want to say I did beat this boss (again, for the 13th time btw, which some of you seem to ignore), but that doesn't change anything in what I said or the way I feel about it.

Stupid people never lose an argument.
Last edited by NotPivot#9831 on Apr 17, 2025, 7:20:17 AM
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She’s invulnerable during the spear stabby phase so not even the pros can do damage


Yeah, she isn't even targetable, at least not on console.
Stupid people never lose an argument.
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NotPivot#9831 wrote:
I have been stuck on this reworked boss for 2 days straight, after 1000+ hours and never getting stuck anywhere on any character or build. I have cleared all content, on max difficulty levels. I have played ARPG games for a long time, as well as From Software games, and other games notorious for their difficulty (Hollow Knight, etc.). I enjoy "funstrating" games.

HOWEVER, their is a difference between difficulty, and simulated difficulty.

A good example of a difficult boss is Godfrey from Elden Ring. That is my all time favorite boss, because you can literally dance with him for hours and always learn something, come up with cool ways to fight him, and never feel stuck, always having a light at the end of the tunnel because he has a move set that is variable, but learnable nonetheless.

I haven't experienced what most people have talked about concerning GGGs boss design philosophy, but the last 2 days have me a bit concerned.

1. Grinding Gear, you are not From Software because you don't have Miyazaki. You will never be them, because frankly, none of you are even on the same level as From Software, and Viper Napuatzi proves it.


This boss must have been reworked, at least in cruel difficulty.

This entire fight is what is called "simulated difficulty" because I have hours of video proof that it is entirely RNG based.

You cannot bait attacks.

You cannot predict the next move set.

The boss will often spam the same move set over and over, like this most recent attempt - I practically had her beaten, she had already told her cronies to throw spears 3 times, and I immediately started DPSing her after what I thought would be the last spear volley.

Wouldn't you know it, within 2 seconds of the final spear volley, she floats off and the spears start being thrown again immediately.

So as I type this my character lies dead in the arena, again, because of simulated difficulty in the form of spammed 1 shot mechanics.

This brings me to my second point -


I wanted to believe you guys over in New Zealand had a clue, but I think I just blasted through the content so fast before that I never really experienced the dumpster fire that was alot of the bosses.

The executioner is good, however. The bloated miller is decent for a first boss. Geonor is typical, nothing special, but nothing horrible either. Doryani is pretty cool, I like his opening voice line.

But I've been around these boss centric and difficult games since the day they all released, and have played them all - and GGG, if your trying to carve out your own place amongst them, you need to remove RNG from the fights, make some attacks baitable, and if your using adaptable AI, you suck at it (this would explain the Vipers spamming the only attacks that hit me, over and over).

I have been wondering if their is some form of adaptive AI in some of the fights, because it seems like in this Viper fight, she will endlessly spam the attacks that connect most often, and that's not ok.

Anyway, I'll give it another day or so and if I am still hard stopped at this dumpster fire, Imma go play and stream Monster Hunter until you all get this sorted out - because not to sound arrogant, but if I'm walled off by a boss, there is definitely something wrong with the boss mechanics.



Firstly, stop comparing Elden Ring and PoE 2, they are not the same game genre not even close.

The only truly dangerous part of the fight is when she goes invuln and the mobs get the poison spears.
If you are having trouble with the normal parts of the fight then you need more defences.

The invuln part is just pure movement. For the first phase with random locations, don't roll, just run into the safe areas you have plenty of time between each strike.

For the final attack you need to figure out which direction it is coming from, and roll towards it. If it makes it easier then go to the OTHER side of the corridor to allow you to pay attention and time it better.

From here you just need to also have enough damage to be able to kill her before she kills you. Sorry but this is not a souls game you WILL get hit by some basic attacks. Thats why you have a potion.
Last edited by Cyriac_Darakus#1022 on Apr 17, 2025, 8:41:18 AM
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NotPivot#9831 wrote:
Bumped, because I want to hear from the community here.


You want to hear the community ? ok let's go.

I only play HCSSF and Viper is faaaaaaaaaaar from being the most dangerous thing. I'm 1000x more afraid of fighting the monkey (silverfist or whatever, can't remember the name right now) but since i started in 0.1 last december, with all the chars i made and ripped, i have exactly 0 (zero) death from viper.

maybe learn the patterns, her attacks, maybe use a poison charm also ?

i have beat her on many characters even with 0% chaos res and a 1000 - 1200 hp/es pool.

what i don't understand is when you said she's even harder in Cruel difficulty, because to me, it's the exact opposite, Cruel difficulty is a walking-simulator to mapping, because your character start to have some stuff (im still HCSFF talking obviously), some ascendant points, your ehp pool is higher etc....

i had rips on normal difficulty and mapping but not a single one on cruel difficulty.

[Removed by Support]
Last edited by BenMH_GGG#0000 on Apr 17, 2025, 9:55:53 PM
It's not unique to this boss, but this boss is definitely one of the worst offenders, for continuously chaining actively-avoid-or-die mechanics, giving you no time for DPS. This is often why boss fights are so long and difficult, and it's not the good kind of difficulty, it's just tedious and exhausting and makes you want to quit the game whenever you run into it.
Fairgraves was a slave trafficker specialized in the kidnapping and transport of children. He was not "a good man".

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