ALERT: MULTI-POST WALL OF TEXT INBOUND!!!
Part 1: Overview & Pre-boss levels
An idea for a Poison-themed boss, Ouro, whose levels take place in a old temple in the middle of a swamp.
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Traps, Features & Obstacles:
Some new things that these levels contain are:
Boulder Droppers - Similar to FSC's Wheel Generators, but they drop Boulders, which are slower and 3 blocks wide. Unlike the Wheel Generators they cannot be destroyed (but can usually be disabled or blocked off)
Poison Dart Launchers - Fires poison darts at regular intervals, similar to the rocket launchers found in IMF/OCH. Compared to said rockets the darts are faster and inflict Poison on hit, but do less damage and have no splash damage.
Oil Pits - A pit permanently full of Oil similar to that left behind by Oil Pots or Oilers. Can be lit by throwing Fire Pots into it, which causes it to light for 10 seconds, doing inflicting Fire and doing damage to all monsters (but not Knights, to prevent grieving) in it.
Swamp Mud/Deep Water - Slows down the movement of Knights caught in it, but doesn't do any damage.
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Enemies:
Here's a list of enemies that appear throughout the Temple of Ouro. To put these categories in perspective, if this list was for FSC then Slags would be Common, Trojans & Red Rovers would be Occasional & Oilers would be Rare:
COMMON:
Wolvers & Alpha Wolvers
Virulisks
Coahtile
OCCASIONAL:
Sick Puppies
Ancient Guardian
Ancient Sentry
RARE:
Jade Greavers
Drouls
Tortodrone (possibly? he'd fit the theme of this area)
Enemies with Bold names are unique to this area and will be explained below:
Ancient Guardian:
A re-skinned Blight Knight that has the appearance of an animated Knight statue. They do not self-shock and their Charge attack sends out Poison Darts instead of bullets, but they are otherwise identical to a normal Blight Knight. They appear to be wielding a Dread Venom Striker, the Serpent Priest Set (see part 3) and the Serpentine Bulwark (ditto.)
Ancient Sentry:
A re-skinned Lumber that resembles a giant statue with a massive stone club in place of the Lumber's 'tree arm'. Appearance is the only way that it differs from a normal Lumber.
Coahtile:
A new Beast enemy that appears in the Temple of Ouro (though I suppose they could be regular enemies as well)
Appearance:
A large serpent with bird wings, a barbed tail,a crest of feathers coming out the back of it's head and a large Gem embedded in its forehead.
Attack 01:
A 3-hit combo consisting of the Coahtile swooping towards the Knight before biting them and impaling the Knight on their barbed tail (which immobilises them for a few seconds, similar to the Zombie's "Grab" attack) before pushing them away with their wings. The first 2 hits of this combo inflict Poison, the 3rd one doesn't.
Attack 02:
The Coahtile covers itself with its wings and, after a few seconds of charging, flaps them outwards, unleashing a small tornado. The tornado behaves similar to a Rocket Puppy missile, but doesn't move quite as fast and damages Knights in/touching it over time instead of exploding.
Ability 01:
The Coahtile's forehead-gem flashes briefly and it creates 2 mirror images of itself, while also teleporting a block or two in a random direction (to obscure which one is the real one). These copies act just like normal Coahtiles, but die in 1 hit and their attacks only do half a 'pip' of damage.
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As the Knights progress further into the Stratum, the "Common" enemies and the "Occasional" enemies switch places in how much they are encountered (i.e. Depth 24 has barely any of the Construct enemies, while Depth 27 has barely any of the Beasts in it.)
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Depth 24: Journey of a Thousand Steps
The first floor takes place entirely in the swamp, with the only parts of the temple being a few ruins near the lift. This floor is quite open and there would be several possible routes that the party can take.
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Depth 25: Caustic Courtyard
The second floor takes place in a sort of "courtyard" outside the temple, like the first floor it is quite open (but is more linear) and now the party starts to see the Construct enemies and not just the Beast ones.
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Depth 26: Temple of Gloom
This depth marks the point that the Knights have truly entered the temple, along with the point that the Construct enemies start becoming more common than the Beast ones. This floor plays in a similar vein to IMF, being more about dodging traps and solving minor puzzles than fighting enemies.
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Depth 27: Royal Summons
This floor, in contrast to the previous one, is basically one long fight as the Knights escort ("escort" as in "follow" rather than "protect") a mechanised Brazier sliding along a rail. The level is basically one big path that occasionally requires the party to go into a side-room/arena to lower a gate or stop a trap or some other task so the Brazier can continue. At the end of the level the Brazier is used to ignite a giant Pyre, after which the party hears the sound of something very large moving closer as they get on the lift…
Depth 28: Ouro Borolis
(it's a pun of "Aurora Borealis", because the name "Ouro" comes from "Ouroboros", I know I probably spoiled the joke there.)
Ouro's arena consists of 3 platforms (a bottom-left quarter, a bottom-right quarter and a top half) surrounded by water & connected by short "bridges" about 2 blocks long and only 2 blocks thinner than the actual platforms (no diagonal bridges). Each corner holds either a respawning Oil Pot or a Fire Pot, and the centre of the Arena has a large pillar (both of these play a part in the boss fight). The arena as a whole is about the same size as Vana's (maybe a bit bigger)
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Appearance & Resistances:
Ouro is a giant Hydra with 1 Main head and 8 smaller ones (though in the actual fight all you really see are the heads.) He is resistant to Elemental, neutral to Piercing and has a mild weakness to Shadow. To put his size in perspective, the smaller heads are big enough to swallow a Knight whole (just), and the main head is about the size of a Roarmulus Twin (maybe a bit smaller)
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Phase 1:
For the first phase you fight Ouro's 8 smaller (or "minor" ) heads, they are fought 4 at a time, with one head in each corner of the arena and the other 4 replacing the heads who die. Which heads spawn in what order is random, though he tries to keep a 2-2 ratio of Wild heads to Feral heads (see below) if at all possible. The heads only take 20% damage from attacks unless they're knocked out (see below)
Ouro's 8 minor heads are divided into two categories: the "Feral" heads (who do Piercing, and are the main attackers) and the "Wild" heads (who do Elemental, and are more support oriented.)
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Minor Head attacks:
Every Minor head has the following attacks:
- A 3-hit combo consisting of rearing back and striking twice in rapid succession, followed by a 180-degree neck sweep that basically covers their entire corner of the Arena. The first two hits inflicts Poison but the 3rd doesn't.
- The head begins taking a very deep breath, slowly sucking all Knight's towards it at a rate equal to a quarter a Knight's movement speed (so going directly against the effect is essentially a MSD: Max). If a Knight gets too close to the head doing this, it will bite him for massive damage & inflict Poison, but cancel the attack. Only 1 head can do this attack at a time.
Throwing an Oil Pot at a head doing this attack will cause it to gag and retch, cancelling the attack. Throwing a Fire Pot at the same head the second time it does this attack will cause the Oil in its stomach to light, which knocks it out for a few seconds, allowing the Knights to do full damage to it without fear of being attacked back.
Any bombs on the field will also be slowly sucked towards the head in question as they do this attack, and if they get close enough the head will swallow them by accident, whereupon one of the following happens:
- If the bomb in question was from either Blast Bomb or Spine Cone series, then the head takes damage equivalent to triple the Bombs normal damage and is knocked out without the need for the whole pot thing.
- If the bomb in question was a Shard Bomb, the head takes damage equivalent to being hit with the Blast and all 8 Shards, and is also knocked out
- If the bomb in question was a Haze or Vortex Bomb, the head takes damage equal to double the Blast damage, but isn't knocked out.
- If the bomb in question was from the DR Series, the head takes damage equivalent to the Blast + 10 orb hits, but isn't knocked out.
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Minor Head Abilities & Appearances:
In addition to the above attacks, each head has its own unique power & appearance:
FERAL HEADS:
Earthshaker Head (has a large stone crest/helmet on his head) - Arcs his head very far back, before suddenly swinging forwards and slamming it into the ground. Any nearby Knights are damaged and knocked back, this attack also creates several walls similar to the ones made by Maulos's mace swings (only made out of stone instead of ice) randomly throughout the arena (and like Maulos's ones, they can be destroyed with a few hits.)
Striker Head (more snakelike, with larger Fangs & Eyes than the other heads) - A holographic 'Snake eye' appears above a Knight and the Striker head bares his fangs in preparation to strike, after 6-8 seconds he bites the marked Knight with lightning speed, doing a lot of damage and inflicting Poison. This attack cannot be dodged, and does enough damage to destroy most shields. In order to avoid it the targeted knight must move to the opposite side of the arena, so that the pillar in the middle is between him and Striker, which causes Striker to cancel the attack.
Flora Head (wears a headband made of Vines with a gold disc set in the middle) - The head's eyes begin to glow bright green as numerous Spine Cones begin to sprout out from the ground throughout the arena before detonating similarly to the player versions (though his inflict Poison). These Spine Cones are not effected by the "deep breath" attack (see above)
Thorny Head (has a crest of dozen of porcupine-like spines) - Launches a wave of 5 spikes, followed by a wave of 3 spikes before finishing with another 5-spike wave. There is a delay between each wave of spikes appearing and said spikes actually being launched (similar to the Phantom's charge attack). All 3 waves can inflict Poison.
WILD HEADS:
Guardian Head (Grey-ish green, with more metallic scales) - Summons several spirits that orbit around each 'active' head (2-3 each), these spirits fire 1 bullet every few seconds, similar to a T1 Gun Puppy, and can be destroyed by hitting them with the respawning pots (which also means they can interfere with your attempts to knock out the head they're orbiting)
Plague Head (pale green, with white markings in the shape of bones) - Summons a large swarm of flies that randomly moves around the arena, damaging and poisoning anyone caught in it. While it doesn't actively seek out Knights, it will move in their direction if they're just outside its AoE.
Spirit Head (glowing eyes, ghostly aura) - Fires 2 waves of Spectral Howlitzer heads (similar to a Howlitzer head, but ghostly & does Elemental rather than Shadow), each wave consisting of 1 Spectral Head per Knight in the party
So for example if there is only 1 Knight in the party, the Spirit Head will fire a Spectral Head, and then fire a second one when the first one is destroyed (from either hitting or failing to hit.)
If there are 4 Knights in the party, the Spirit Head will fire 4 Spectral Heads (each one targeting a different Knight), spitting out the second 4 as they are destroyed/dodged.
Hydro Head (blue-ish green & has Fins) - Creates around 5 'Whirlpool bombs' at random points in the Arena. They are similar to the Vortex bombs but have a smaller AoE, and are Blue rather than Green/Purple. While difficult (if not impossible) to escape from they don't do that much damage (the only T3 shield that would actually risk breaking from them is Swiftstrike) The Whirlpool bombs are not effected by the "deep breath" attack (see above)
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Phase 2:
After all his minor heads have been defeated, Ouro's main head bursts out of the water at the top side of the arena. Ouro's main head does massive Normal damage, has the same 80% damage reduction if not knocked out that the minor heads do & has the following attacks/abilities:
- Withdrawing back underwater, only to appear on a different side of the arena a few seconds later. When he gets to around 10% health, he moves back to the top side and stays there (otherwise his death animation wouldn't make much sense.)
- A 3-hit combo consisting of slamming his head into the left part of the top platform, the right part of the top platform, and finally the middle part of the top platform. Each slam does massive damage to any Knight directly under it, and any Knight near it takes moderate damage and is knocked back.
(If the Main head is on the left or right side of the arena, then this combo will essentially be him hitting platform to the left of him, then the platform to the right of him, and finally the bridge connecting those two platforms instead.)
- Breathes a Stream of Acid into the air, causing chunks of acidic rubble to rain down from the ceiling, damaging and poisoning Knights who get hit by them. These persist for a few seconds after hitting the ground before finally dissolving into nothing.
- The same ability that the "Striker" head from Phase 1 uses. The only difference is that if you put the Pillar between yourself and him then he'll actually try to hit you anyway and hit the pillar, which causes rubble to fall on him, knocking him out
- Does a left-to-right sweep while firing a constant stream of 4 bullets in a "\V/" shape, meaning the Knights have to try and stay between the bullet streams as he moves (if you've ever played a Shoot-em-up at any point, you should know what I'm talking about.)
On death Ouro slumps onto the arena, and the Knights walk up over his head and along his body to reach the Lift.
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Alt. Phasing:
An alternate set of phases could be to fight 4 of the Minor heads, fight the Main head for a bit, fight the other 4 Minor heads and then finish off the Main head.