The Heliophage, or Rendain's freefalling lessons for the Battleborn (rant)

Battleborn Battleborn Campaign Discussion
#7

But that’s the thing : I never stay on the middle platform unless I have to pass by it to kill the Conservator or Hylis’ guards.

The problem is that, even on the ice platform, which is indeed the safest to stay on, you’re not guaranteed to not be rags older to death by his twisting blades attacks. When he does that one, you basically need to change platforms, and it’s even worse when you have to go out of your way to go rescue fallen comrades.

And I never said the thralls were the problem, mind you, it’s their sheer numbers. When you already have trouble with three brutes on a normal map, fighting ten alongside Rendain in this arena is just insane. ESPECIALLY if you play melee, and this mission will not be enough to force me to ditch El Dragon. Nothing will.

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#8

Go up the stairs or down the stairs when he does that - the blades will not follow. And if you can’t do that, there were some boxes on the upper platform at least - jump on them. Every character should be able to do it. And the Lava on the back part cannot hurt you!

Though all of this is moot if the… Slow(?) he throws out at the start of that skill hits you and the very first blade hit throws you out into the void.
Overall the whole Rendain fight feels like a cheap way to make something challenging.
Not to mention how boring it actually is to not get any new bosses, but instead being forced to fight all the past ones. Sure it’s a cool Idea, but since the whole game has such a serious lack of enemy variety, it just does more harm than good.

#9

If what you just said work, then I will worship you as my savior until the last star darkens. Next time I try the mission, I will try this strategy.

#10

Is there a scaling issue depending on how many players you have? I’ve completed it twice, first with just me and another and we got a bronze, second time was with a group of 3 total and we nabbed a gold. Both were tricky but didn’t seem unmanageable.
Tried with a full group and were decimated by the adds before we really made a dent. I certainly wasn’t prepared for the difference in numbers making such a difference.

#11

My favourite subject :wink:

In my experience 2-3 people is the best balance, 5 person is hardest. Solo kinda depends on the character/mission. I’d say this is valid for any mission, but this one even more so.

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#12

It does work for melee characters. Rendain will follow you. Although, if you are soloing him, I wouldn’t recommend melee for him. Or any mission, for that matter.

#13

Except you really have to play through it with melee characters :confused: (Though this can be ignored if you just want to get the mission done)

#14

Yup, and there really is a difference whether playing it solo, with a 2/3 people team or a full party.

The first two cases, I managed, though we didn’t go over Bronze rank. The number of Thralls really get ludicrous only with a full party.

#15

I have soloed all the missions with Boldur at least once, apart from a few annoying moments it was fun.

Heliophage I just sat in the middle island and tanked it out, got knocked off the edge quite a few times, it wasn’t hard, just a pain with knock back and a bit of a slog, fight took 20 mins I think.

Sentinel was annoying, all 3 bosses are so tall you can barely reach the vulnerable spot, you have to be in front of them and they have some slow but powerful frontal attacks, also knock back was annoying, I just couldn’t get to the point where I could predict it.

ISIC’s floating head moment on algorithm, was pretty lame too.

#16

Thanks.

#17

I did it with Galilea solo on advanced pre-nerf(to unlock Deande early) so it’s definitely doable with melee. Then again Galilea isn’t your average melee character.

#18

Yeah, all that DoT is definitely helpful.

#19

Yeah, El Dragon is way squishier than Gal, even post-nerf ^^'
Though I managed it with melee characters before. In fact, I think I only ever completed it with Rath and Dragon, soooo…

#20

Tried it on advanced, with Caldarius due to all the comments here, emphasizing the need for a movement skill. Failed horribly, though.

Then I realized that trying the final mission, you need to rely more an knowing your character. So I switched back to my main (Galilea) and beat it on first try. Even got Silver.

And before anyone feels the need to further point out her supposed OPness, that doesn’t do anything to help you getting knocked off the Platforms.

So my advice for all still struggling with this mission (especially on Advanced): Don’t settle for an ‘utility’ char to do it. Do what you do best and ALWAYS keep your back to a wall.
That’s basically all you can do to suceed.

#21

I was a 11000 health kelvin and I still died over and over again, without even loosing a fourth of my health. He needs a damage buff and less knockback.

#22

I managed it my first time with Rath solo (don’t ask me how. I don’t know… and I got the lore too!). I didn’t even know about staying off the middle platform.

That said, I agree that the knockbacks need to be nerfed, or at least give more save spots because the number one cause of death is falling into the abyss for me.

#23

I did it solo with galilea on advanced and won Np but I did die 3 times. In hardcore mode I could see this being very very difficult. And with a team everything is stronger.

#24

Was able to solo advanced with Thorn. I’ve run it with buddies multiple times and failed on Rendain during the add spawns on advanced.

#25

Advanced, solo with ISIC. Got a gold (Rather easy to get gold on advanced due to having 6 boss fights honestly). Did normal with Rath, mainly for his lore mission but still beat Rendain anyway, so strat works for melee.

Basically he spawns thralls, I would run around the entire map, non stop, until I had killed them all. This is so they’re never in your way if you have to run to regen or something, rendain can deal a ton of damage but he is still melee so kiting around the 3 platforms is quite viable.

Then focus him, on a side platform, until he spawned the dreadwind blades. Then I’d change to another platform.

At this point the pattern usually repeated.

Always attempt to keep him between you and the middle platform as all the side ones have back walls to foil knockback.

All the lives dropped by the boss rush help, especially getting twice as many on advanced.

#26

In general, it seems 3 is the perfect number for usefulness of teammates/extra guns versus scaling of the enemies. I am a bit disappointed the game discourages 5 player play through this mechanic.