Hidden change last patch: Using swords on Howlitzers is now safer

The Howlitzer skulls no longer explode in your face if you keep swording them after they die, instead there is a moment where the skull is invincible, swording will knock it back, and it and also cannot hurt you. Then it does an attack animation with purple glow and flies at you.
It can still explode any time after the skull's the attack animation, but it's your own fault if you are still swording it that long after the skull appears. ^_^
Just wanted to let everyone know about this. :P

Cuz these things were a total pain in arenas. There were times where taking 2 bars of damage for each one was almost completely unavoidable.

to be honest, I was ok with them, but I can except a small grace period. I'll admit more than once.. I ran into that explosion when I didn't have my pulsar.
that explains why my polaris started knocking the skulls back instead of blowing them up.
~Spag

i got bit a couple times, then learned to shield right after attacking. it actually catapulted the skull far away from me.
You could always just shield bump them away when they spawned their ballistic head, but this is a bit safer for most folks.
thank GOD
these things were so ridiculously OP.
Since lag is always an issue for me, I have to either take these out one by one or die, because if anyone killed it and i went to hit it at the same time my hit would lag behind and break the skull, or the other way round, and everyone would die thanks to the damage being splash!
Not fun.
so yeah, woo thankyou nick.
@Vixter the shield bump didn't work if you used a multi-hit charge attack like the upgraded brandishes. The first hit would kill them, and the explosions would detonate the head in your face before the shield would come up.
Ah yes, I forgot to add this to the patch notes. Thanks for discovering it!