Commander Lucius Help

Grim Dawn Gameplay Discussion
1

I had some difficulties on veteran killing Commander Lucius, so I was a bit prepared for him this round on Elite, yet I quickly realized, despite understanding his mechanics, I can’t beat him. I’ve died well over ten times now. I’m playing a Reaper (Necromancer/Nightblade) a melee build as you may expect. Basically, here’s the run down as to my encounters with him;

I hit him a few times in melee, with each melee attack of his own, he drops me by 30-40% so I understand I can take at least two hits, maybe three, then I get out of melee with him to try to heal back up with Pneumatic Burst, often, I try to get him to use his, ‘flame thrower’ ability, as that will kill me in about 3 seconds as well, but in truth, I need to get out of it in about 1.5-2 seconds lest the DoT kills me. Generally I still receive an initial hit from the flamethrower, so that’ll drop me about 50% when I try to get him to use it so I don’t take the full effect. He’ll then start to shoot rapidly, I dodge all of those attacks generally. Then he uses meteor, which usually will kill me even if I’m moving in a straight line, no where near Lucius, about 25% of the time. Sometimes, I’ll get nicked still by one of the meteors, taking about 10-20% of my health in damage.

I’ve tried using Shadow Strike when he uses his meteor attack, which is a guarantee that I’ll dodge his meteor, but for some odd reason, he often will start to attack frantically, potentially killing me in 2-2.5 seconds. Most of each fight consists of kiting him, which as melee, is quite frustrating. In the past, I did have to resort to kiting from time to time, dodging certain mechanics, but normally they have attacks which /aren’t/ lethal, meaning if I choose wisely, I can dodge bursty damage by understanding and abusing their mechanics.

Commander Lucius has so many lethal attacks, the only one I’m sure of that I need to dodge is his meteors, but honestly, I need to dodge /all/ of his attacks, even his basic ones, which is fairly impossible. I seriously don’t know what to do, concerning Lucius, considering his attacks are aetherial and physical largely, I don’t see why I’m having such difficulties with him. Any assistance on how people would go about as a Reaper (or even an ordinary Nightblade) to beat Lucius would be most appreciated.

2

Can you show us your character using grimtools calculator? There’s an option in the top-left to import a .gdc character file if you know where your saves are.

It sounds like you’re taking way more damage on some of his attacks than you should. What are your Aether and Fire resistance looking like?

3

Do you have any life leach?

Personally to me his ranged attacks did more damage then his flamethrower, that I could just stand in and easily outleech the damage.

4

I’m not going to lie, I don’t feel comfortable posting my character. I know I know, it sounds convenient, it’s just that I personally make all of my builds and treasure them greatly, even the failed ones, as I spend a lot of time on them both in-game, and out. But I will tell you my resistances without hesitation.

My resistance for Aether is a mere 25%. (Seriously, I’ve found only one piece of gear with aether resistance… Malmouth in Veteran wasn’t fun.) I also have 68% Fire resistance. I have several pieces of gear which reduce the chance of being hit, (not to mention maxed Shadow Dance) 917 armor, 1397 defense rating, and 6950 HP. Do you think I should get more aether resistance?

5

I have 15% attack damage converted to health, if that’s what you mean.

6

Life leech or lifesteal means “attack damage converted to health”, since ADCTH puts a portion of the damage dealt to your current health, and so behaves lifesteal or life leech.

7

If you can afford to, then yes. I’d consider doing one or two of the following for a few quick ways to bolster it:

-Using a Purified Salt on your weapon for 20% Aether resistance via the aura.
-Using an Aether Soul on your amulet or medal for 16% Aether resistance.
-Could always chug a Spiritbane Ointment for a free 25% for the encounter too if you need it.

I’d make sure you have 100% armour absorption (hover over your armour rating to check). Use Scaled Hide or Ancient Armour Plating if you do not. ~43% increased Armour Absorption will make your armour 100% efficient.

If you’re a Reaper (Nightblade/Necromancer), I would make sure I have points in these for my defense (as I do not know what skills you have invested in):

Nightblade

  • Veil of Shadow for an effective increase in OA.
  • Pneumatic Burst + Shadow Dance for an on-demand heal and DA/Dodge/Deflect.
  • 1 point in Blade Barrier for a life saver.
  • Probably 1 point in Ring of Steel + Circle of Slaughter for the Fumble. It even works on Bosses/Nemeses.

Necromancer

  • Spectral Binding for the flat health.
  • At least 1 point into Mark of Torment for the % damage absorption. More is better.
  • I would consider Soul Siphon on an Aether or Vitality character if I had spare points and had nowhere else to put them.
  • I would consider using Ravenous Earth solely for Decay if I had spare points and had nowhere else to put them.
8

Your advice has been of big help, I honestly hadn’t considered that Fumble might effect bosses, and furthermore blade barrier. Most of your advice I had already followed, and concerning Shadow Dance I had even mentioned before. Though I didn’t have much consumables on me, I did have an Aether Cluster, which I hadn’t considered until you mentioned using consumables. It gave me a chance to really put some damage into him, even if it only was 8 seconds. So often I either sell, or forget about them, thinking they’re far too situational, but this one just saved my bacon. It allowed me to put in the killing blow!

Thanks a lot!

9

Since you’re going to run into him again on Ult (bet you’re looking forward to that), Lucius is one of the strongest bosses in the original content so I’m not surprised you had trouble with him.
If you do a search you can find various threads of people with similar issues and the advice they got.

I often fight him with undergeared melee characters as well and the way I do it is pretty simple. Let’s break down his attacks:

  1. Melee swings: you can dodge these by taking one step back as he swings and then hitting him between the attacks. Takes some practice to do but when you get it down that should nullify most of the damage.
    This is one of his attacks where you can deal damage.

  2. Flamethrower: this shouldn’t kill you instantly even with low resists, you should be able to hit him for a while if you use a potion during the attack, this is the other attack where you have a chance to deal damage.

  3. 3 Aether balls: when he starts doing it just run back, you might eat the first one but the other two should miss.

  4. Shotgun attack: he stops moving for a second before he uses it, that’s your cue to run back. The obstacle in the middle can be used as a shield.

  5. Meteor: He says something and raises his arms to the sky, his meteors drop on the spot where you were standing at that point so you can just run away and it’ll never hit you.

In short you just hit him during attack 1 & 2 and you should get him eventually, even if it takes a really long time.
If you use a Hollowed Fang in your weapon for the Bloodthirster ability or have Ghoulish Hunger, the massive leech those skills provide will let you tank for their duration.

10

No one’s going to steal your build if it can’t even beat story mode on elite, duder. If we can’t see your build we can’t tell you why it’s bad and how to make it able to at least beat Log on elite. So you can “cherish” them in secret and post your “woe is me” threads until you’re tired of getting shit on, or you can buck up, upload your character, and get real advice.

11

Surely there’s advice that can be given without seeing the ins and outs of the character. Having been in his shoes, it doesn’t feel good when you ask for advice on one thing, innocently give your build to someone, and then have them not address your original question at all, tell you that you must tear it all the way down to the beginning and then rebuild it in a very specific manner…in other words what the other person wants to play, not what you want to play.

12

Poor excuse at best. Someone can suggest he do this and that all they want, doesn’t mean he has to completely restructure everything at someone’s whim just because they saw his build.

Rather I suspect he thinks he might have some secret sauce and people are going to flock to steal the trade secrets. Considering he is having issues handling Lucius even on Vet I don’t foresee that happening anytime soon, there are fucktons of builds on these forums freely available that far exceed anything he has come up with.

It makes it much easier for people trying to help when they can see the lay of the land and chances are good where he has been going wrong will be readily spotted by all the experienced builders here. Being able to see what gear and components are equipped, what’s being done with Devotions etc is a big help. Quite often it wouldn’t call for a complete restructuring as opposed to some minor tweaks here and there to shore up the problem area with this specific encounter.

13

Firstly, before you even posted, I managed to get the advice I needed to defeat him. Secondly, I didn’t once act in a manner which even hinted at being, ‘woe as me’. I asked in a civilized manner for some in general advice, in which I managed to obtain, and defeat him. I could go on, but really, you’re delusional if you somehow managed to acquire any bad taste from previous posts. I never once did this for attention, if that’s what you’re insinuating.

When did I say that people would steal my creation? Not once. Indeed, I said I don’t feel comfortable posting my build, but ‘stealing my creation’ was actually not the main reason. I simply didn’t want people to create a discussion based around my build, I’ve largely stayed away from looking up builds online, to see what kind of builds I can create on my own, like I did as a child when I played Diablo 2. Furthermore it would lead the conversation likely down on a road that is unrelated to the topic at hand. It already has; look at what you’re discussing. Does it help me in defeating Lucius? I can only imagine where you would’ve led this thread had I posted my build.

@powbam I never even hinted at having, ‘secret sauce’. Once again assumptions are being made. I am quite aware that there are likely many builds out there who don’t have difficulties with Lucius, though, to be fair, it’s not as if I go out of my way to see meta builds. (as hinted at above) It’s irrelevant in any matter, as another poster, (several posts above you who I thanked) gave me some in general advice about what abilities could really benefit my defenses by even distributing one point into, and items which could be of assistance, which was more then enough to defeat him. I wont deny the fact it would be certainly more descriptive, but it would ultimately lead to, “Just scrap your build, and build meta.” Your entire post is made of one big assumption based around I believe my build being better then most. I know for a fact that not only is my build quite likely not comparable to meta builds, but hell, not unique at all, as there’s so many players, SOMEONE has had to at least think the same as I, at some point.

I like to build characters without much outside influence, to see what I’m capable of doing, not others. I want to put my mind to the test, after all, it is a large portion of why I like this game - its’ dual classing system. Without it, this game would quickly lose appeal to me. The point is, that this build is made by myself, and while giving in general advice about notably good skills I should consider is fine, having people post builds, tell me what to take out of and put into, is another. I hope you understand, and if not, I’m fine by that. Either way, your assumption is incorrect.

@Weyu Thank you for your insight, I probably would’ve ended up here once I reach ultimate! I’ll be sure to keep this thread bookmarked, just in case I forget. I didn’t think you could dodge his auto-attacks, perhaps I’ll go back and ‘fight’ Lucius on Veteran just to play-test this. I imagine if I can get it down, it should might the fight relatively trivial. Again, thank you very much.

14

Well here’s the deal. When you ask for help, you need to give all the information you have, or you get bad results.