Lech Kril

A while back, with the Corpus ship rework, the Jackal got a makeover. Instead of just shooting it in various knees, you need to do Parazon shenanigans. Overall, it’s a slightly better fight, but it’s not one you can speed-run. And, in all honestly, it sets people up for bigger expectations. Because not every boss is is made equal, and some are more of a pain than others.

However, some boss fights are just stupidly old. And some bosses are just bad. Somehow though, these bosses all pale in comparison to Lech Krill, the assassination mission on Mars.

An ancient boss

Lech Kril is a really old boss. So old in fact that he was one of the first bosses that wasn’t just a beefed up normal enemy. He has two phases and his own attacks. Sure, the attacks are mostly similar to Frost or Ember, but he is at least unique. So, back when Ambulas was just a black MOA and Vor wa a standard butcher, Lech Kril didn’t seem too bad.

Now though? Lech Kril is a boss that could seriously do with a rework.

The fight isn’t obvious in any real way.

The basics of the battle with Lech Kril though are a bit hard to work out on first glance. You need to shoot the coolant pipes off his back and make them flail around, by shooting the bright blue bit, then shooting him again when he freezes. Until you’ve done this, Lech Kril will be invulnerable, and will switch between his hammer and Gorgon rifle.

When all four tubes have been shot off, Lech Kril goes into a rage mode, and you can kill him for real. But this stage will be completed almost instantly if you have high damage gear. Once you reach the angry Lech stage, he always just seems to melt with ease.

Now, the concept of shooting weak points to be able to fully attack an enemy isn’t anything new. It’s a very simple boss design, where the boss is invulnerable until you break something. Heck, Eidolon fights are just like this. And while they also suffer from being hard to figure out, at least the weak spots are nice and big and obvious. The weak points on an Eidolon are about the same size as half a Lech Kril.

Even now though, it’s not always clear whether you’re doing it right.

It took me ages to originally work out how Lech Kril’s fight works. And I’m technically a veteran player. There’s no real visual feedback until you’ve managed to break a pipe. Sure, the pipes are supposed to flutter around, but they don’t do so in an obvious way. And then you have Lech Kril randomly freezing himself when you do break a pipe. And matters are made worse when Lech Krill becomes invulnerable. Which he does when the AI decides it can’t reach you. Or he’ll just appear to be invulnerable anyway.

Lech Kril isn’t alone in this either. Vay Hek also has tiny hit box areas, that you need to shoot to be able to shoot him more. And, really, Vay Hek is a way more annoying fight. But Lech Kril is the third boss you’ll ever fight, and he is far different from the Jackal or Captain Vor.

Maybe I’m just stupid.

I mean, that’s always possible. But at first glance, Lech Kril’s fight really doesn’t make much sense. And it makes even less sense now that he drops Excalibur parts instead of Frost parts…