THE DEVELOPER

• ELITE

THE DEVELOPER is a named elite somewhere off the campaign path.

He built this bunker and sold every suite in it, then sold the fleets that made the suites necessary — the vacuum units and the door detail both. He has not yet worked out that the guards on his own door are his own stock, or that the zero on his account is not a clerical error.

Where you meet it

What to know

• THE ENTRANCECloses at 60/s until it has said its piece, then fights at its own pace.
• WHAT IT WAS CARRYINGMore than it should be. Its corpse sheds 4× the gold an ordinary body of its rank does.
• WHEN STRUCKIt bleeds. A blow that overwhelms it bursts it, and there is a face among what lands.

Mechanics

Every dangerous move is telegraphed — it roots, it winds up, and you get the beat you need to be somewhere else.

• SLAMWith you inside 85 it roots for 1s and then smashes the ground for 130% of its contact damage to everything standing in that circle. A jump sails clean over it. Once every 9s.
• RALLY CRYIt roots for 0.7s first, and then it shouts. Everything hostile within 240 comes at you 30% faster and hits 26% harder for 7s — and wakes up, if it was not already. It does nothing to you at all, which is exactly why it is dangerous: the answer is not a dodge, it is deciding to kill the one doing the shouting first. Once every 12.5s.
• QUAKE LINEIt roots for 0.7s first — the bearing LOCKS — then the ground splits away from it along that line: 6 fissures, one every 36, opening 0.1s apart in order, each biting 72% of its contact damage within 24. Nothing travels — it stays where it is and the floor does the walking. A step SIDEWAYS is the whole answer, and the further out you are the longer you have to take it. Once every 10.5s.

What it drops

Every kill pays one piece of gear, 2 medkits and one XP scroll.

Its drops roll 40% better on the rarity ladder than the level's ordinary loot.

Guaranteed pieces by rarity: 1 rare, and a 50% chance of one more and 1 magic. A rarity the monster's own level has not unlocked yet is skipped, so the same fight pays better on a harder rung.

What it says

Spoilers for this fight, covered until you ask for them.