Let’s talk about boss immunity phases

Borderlands 3 Borderlands 3 General Discussion
#1

I recently read an article that mentions immunity phases several times. The references were not overtly negative but, they held an inherent annoyance. As a long time borderlands fan I am curious what the rest of the community actually thinks about the immunity phases of boss encounters.

Personally, I find it humorous that I rarely go down during “active” phases of boss encounters but find myself scrambling during these lockouts. I miss the semi-active phases of the other BL titles like The Warrior and BNK3R.

Are full immunity phases good game design?

Are immunity phases simply a headache and annoyance?

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#2

Yes :l

The problem is then they try to have fast paced combat but at the same time try to stretch it through immunity phases that become longer than the whole battle without these phases

I like the warden with its “vulnerability phases”
It doesn’t exclude you from damaging him but certain phases are just better for dealing damage than others

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#3

They are annoying and break the pace of the fight. I never managed to have a one-shot build in BL2 but it was satisfying to kill bosses as fast as you could without useless waits.

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#4

I hate them, they artificially extend the battle and make repeat farming more of a chore than it needs to be especially with the likes of Tyreen, Rampager, and the Guardian Takedown bosses. Either multiple back to back immunities or immunities with extremely long and time wasting phases where you just sit there twiddling your thumbs waiting for them to finish.

Thank god DLC3 cut that garbage down and actually had enjoyable bosses.

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#5

I’ll be honest, I’m not a fan of the immunity phases.
If they made a boss fight more interesting , let’s say there was a special reward for beating an immunity boss early, then maybe I’d be more interested.
Admittedly, the 1st time you play the game, immunity phases make a fight more challenging. In some cases it makes the boss fight more intriguing whilst you try and figure out what it is you have to do to beat the boss.
In the end though, after a couple of runs through, all the immunity does is drag out the fight. You know you’re going to win, you know how to win, it’s just a matter of time.
I’m a console pleb so. at end game, immunity phases just make boss farming more frustrating. I WANT that gun but the immunity phases just add to the load times and well… in the end it just makes me move onto something else more quickly.
In any case, there are a heap of ways to whack most bosses in the game before they even get a chance to activate their immunity phase.
If immunity phases were going to count for something, I’d like to see special loot rewards for beating a boss based on how many immunity phases it went through before you killed it.
EG: 1 or 2-shot Killavolt and get some special gun. Do it on MH10 TVHM and get something remarkable. That type of thing. Just my thoughts.

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#6

I only tolerate immunity phases if there are ways to break the boss out of it like oh the boss has a protective dome that makes him immune to damage destroy the crystals in order to make him vulnerable or something like that. Any time you are forced to sit there and wait for it the finish is just bad game design imo.

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#7

I find it worse with everyone’s favourite purple militant friend, at which point did the Devs think it’s a good idea to make an attack that cannot be stopped by the player in any way or avoided because of that (talking about the anointed militant’s fire attack)

Lazy game design imo, considering the other games didn’t have anywhere near as many bosses with immune phases, why would this game need them so drastically

If it ain’t broke don’t fix it etc

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#8

In the main game (Rampager, Killavolt, Tyreen…) they really suck, because it’s just standing there and waiting for a long animation to end that just interrupts the game. It feels like they were designed with the first playthrough in mind, but it’s just awful on repeated fights, especially for farming.

I do think they’ve learned, I find immunity phases in the GTD much better because they give you something to do instead of just waiting and thumb dwiddling. Against Anathema you have to jump around between platforms which gives me a little Q3DM17 flashback which is always a good thing – and then I have a few moments to “prepare” the stage for the next spawn by killing one enemy for overkill damage and luring another one close to the spawn point, trying to build up a perfect Ties That Bind/Wedding Invitation/Remnant hit.

Against Scourge, you have to lure a Diadem towards him and kill it/make it suicide when it’s close enough to make him enter a vulnerable phase. I’m having fun with that too. I really like GTD’s immunity phases actually, none of them really interrupts the pace imo.

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#9

Yeah I agree completely with that, it’s fine when you can do something about it

When it’s just there as a way of stopping the player from killing it during a scripted animation, that’s when it becomes lazy

Suggestion for the killavolt fight for example, when he goes up into the ceiling during his shield phase and begins to spawn enemies on the side, he should come back down after all the enemies have been killed rather than on a set timer. Then killing all the bandits as fast as possible gets him back down quicker, a reward for killing the enemies and a way of breaking an immune phase if you’re quick enough. Stuff like that makes more sense because at least it keeps the player active

4 Likes
#10

I enjoy the fights that have extras and breaks - but only if it flows.

The warrior fight comes to mind from BL2. Sure - he went down and hid, popped up again and then moved to the front - extra mobs spawned etc. But, it was gratifying.

Plus - I am the only one that misses the massive explosion of loot out of its head!?

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#11

I dislike immunity phases when they force you to stay and watch, but bosses in DLC3 went down so fast that they were equally unsatisfying… The Quartermaster looked cool in the cutscene… He was dead before I reloaded my Reflux…
A middle ground would be ideal.

#12

not this game destiny 2 they suck like the whole game :smiley:

#13

Immunity phases = you’re not allowed to kill the boss too fast but we don’t know how to make it more difficult

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#14

Immunity phases are a useful tool if you can’t figure out how to reign in the player’s ridiculous damage output. They’re okay if they’re used as breaks in between actual changes in the enemy’s behavior, because then you get to experience the full boss fight (as opposed to me with Wotan right now, where I can go through his double shield in one shot).

The annoying thing about the Guardian Takedown immunity phases is that there are so many of them, and the boss’s attack pattern doesn’t change afterwards. So we get into this situation where we know exactly what to do and are fully capable of doing it, but we have to keep going through this repetitive cycle for twenty minutes before we’re allowed to do so.

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#15

Immunity phases should, as many have already started, move the player’s attention from the boss to something else that will enable the boss to be damaged again quickly if executed fast enough.
Be it a gauntlet like Anathema (maybe with a quicker cast…), the search for devices to destroy to end the phase, killing a certain enemy or a number of them… Just keep us entertained giving the boss the chance of surviving more than 10 seconds so we can enjoy it’s personality…
Sure when you have to kill the same boss 100000000 times ANYTHING becomes old quickly, so longer bosses should mean better rewards.

#16

Its a direct approach to what they’ve always done with bosses. Wilhelm, warrior, bunker and so on had these just indirect. They are annoying but my question is why some bosses have them and some dont?

#17

I’ve mentioned my disdain for immunity phases a number of times in the past.

And, its frustrating because GB did it (in my opinion) correctly in the Halloween event, with the method others have mentioned.

Capt Haunt became immune, but I could do something about it, I could destroy the shield generators (actually much like the Bo’sun fight in TPS) and make progress.

Standing around waiting for a shield to drop is pointless.

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#18

Things like Killavolt just getting mad adds some “character” to the fight and is a lot less annoying than when the big bad just flies away (Tyreen and Troy) and then flies back. If they can leave, why don’t they do it when it is obvious they are losing? The other obnoxious one is something like the Rampager where he has like a 42 minute invulnerability cycle several times mid fight.

For some fights where the big bad is truely out of commission it might be seen as player friendly letting them heal, recover action skills and reequip but since most of these phases have some mob or other variable attack they really don’t do that. Someone like Graveward has a massive attack but he isn’t immune during that so you have a fight or flight option which is better than say Troy’s meteors.

#19

I think having maybe one or two, just so bosses can properly go on to their second or third stage properly is ok, but I don’t like them as part of a general combat loop.
Also, this game has some very obnoxious ones. The Rampager can get staggered whilst in his immunity phase, preventing him from moving on to his next stage and thus spending more time in immunity. That’s just really frustrating when playing as Zane because your Clone obviously doesn’t know not to shoot the boss whilst he’s invulnerable.

#20

I’m not sure which I hate more… immunity phases, or add phases on bosses that are enough of a handful without a bunch of extra enemies… I suppose immunity phases are a more universal annoyance. If the adds are done right, they can at least serve a helpful purpose.

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