- For the raid boss, see Hyperius the Invincible (enemy).
Hyperius the Invincible is an optional mission in Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate's Booty.
Walkthrough[]
Objectives[]
- Defeat Hyperius the Invincible
Strategy[]
Hyperius will not attack until attacked. When first attacked, he will drop his aura, then start pounding the ground like a regular Hyperion Engineer for a couple of seconds, triggering a nova that completely depletes the Vault Hunter's shields. At this point the fight has begun and he can be damaged.
Next he will summon four Hyperius Minions. Once spawned, they will immediately begin powering Hyperius's shield, indicated by an orange parabolic semi-transparent light connecting the loaders to Hyperius. The shield of Hyperius prevents most elemental damage and reduces non-elemental damage. With four loaders, there will be four connections to Hyperius. On the PlayStation Vita version, Hyperius usually spawns only 1 or 2 minions, and after they have been destroyed, Hyperius's shield will not go down.
Hyperius will not perform an attack as long as he is shielded, and will only walk towards vault hunters (but not other targets such as Zer0's decoy, Gaige's Deathtrap or Axton's turrets). Occasionally Hyperius fires blue projectiles, similar to that of Hyperion Engineers. There are ~16 projectiles to his barrage, fired in quick succession. As they fly, they will have a tight serpentine path but will not home in on a target.
Each Hyperius Minion attacks with rocket barrages. Rockets fire in groups of four, but like the projectiles of Hyperius himself, they are slow and easy to avoid. At medium to long range, they will seldom hit a moving target. Rockets can also be shot down.
Each connection to Hyperius can be severed by dealing enough damage to the corresponding loader. At this point, the loader will stop attacking for about 30 seconds and call for repair similar to regular damaged loaders. While in this mode it uses its shield on itself instead of on Hyperius, but has no nearby repair units to affect a repair. After the call-for-repair period, the loader will transfer its shield back to Hyperius and resume the attack.
As long as there is at least one loader connecting to Hyperius, his shield will remain active. Once all four connections are severed, by either completely destroying all four loaders or by forcing all four simultaneously into call-for-repair mode, Hyperius's shield will disappear and he takes regular damage.
Once Hyperius's shield is down, he will trigger one pair of novas one after another, by attempting to stomp the ground with his mechanical fists. The first nova completely depletes all shields in the area, including his own. The second nova does extreme damage. Hyperius will also trigger the novas approximately every twenty-five seconds. Therefore it is possible that Hyperius triggers two pairs of novas in quick succession, e.g. immediately after his regular-interval nova is triggered, he loses his shield and triggers his nova again. It is also (inconsistently, except for using Zer0's B0re) possible for Hyperius to trigger three novas. After his shield is taken down, the first nova begins. If he goes aggressive, he will trigger a standard double-nova. This triple-nova effect can be extremely detrimental, and can easily cripple the character in a solo fight.
The twin novas will have no effect if Hyperius is too far away. He will also fail to properly trigger novas when he is standing on an uneven surface: he will attempt to stomp the ground with his fists, but no nova will follow. The character can also attempt to damage him enough, and if he flinches it will cancel his nova. If he is out of the line of sight, e.g. by hiding behind the pipe near the entrance or outside the arena, Hyperius's nova will have no effect.
If all loaders have been destroyed, Hyperius's health drops to about 1/3, or enough time has passed, then Hyperius will drop his shield, trigger a pair of novas and grow to giant size and change his tactics. He will now attempt to melee targets, including Deathtrap, turrets and holograms, by first jumping towards them, then stomping at them repeatedly with his feet, dealing high damage. If targets are out of range, or immediately after an unsuccessful jumping stomp, he will fire his blue projectiles instead.
At this point, Hyperius will not be shielded, regardless of the status of the loaders. He will still trigger his regular-interval Novas though.
General Tactics[]
The core strategy is basically to survive Hyperius's regular nova blasts, since direct hits from a pair of Novas is enough to kill most Vault Hunters with above-average equipment. The fight also tends to be long since Hyperius is shielded and mostly invulnerable for long periods of time. Survival is the key.
If a player has sufficiently decent gear, Hyperius can be kited to death fairly easily. It requires a lot of patience, and careful maintenance of long range, since Hyperius' nova is very dangerous, and his close range attacks will kill most character classes in 2-3 hits. While he is soloable, at least two players are preferred, since one can draw fire while the other does damage.
A party of four is recommended, with at least one Siren with investments in Res and Restoration. A large pipe immediately to the left of the entrance can only protect one character at a time from Hyperius's Nova. A Harmony-focused Siren is recommended to hide here to remotely revive and heal team members.
- One player can use singularity grenades to pull all the loaders tightly together. Other players may then throw corrosive cloud grenades or fire corrosive rocket launchers to simultaneously damage the bots. When loaders go into healing mode, deal massive damage on Hyperius. The point is to manage the timing of Hyperius's nova blasts by attacking the loaders all at once.
- When the loaders are destroyed, the player must rely on careful reading of Hyperius, as a single mistimed maneuver may lead to the character's death. Hyperius has a major tell when he leaps, dropping to one knee a mere second before leaping toward a target. Jumping sideways when they see this tell will allow a player enough time to jump again when hitting the ground and avoiding the leap attack from Hyperius. If Hyperius is not firing missiles, the goal is to keep moving backward and away from him, and unleash as much damage as possible.
- The fence on the eastern side of the arena is slightly curved which can be used to completely block all of Hyperius attacks. If Hyperius is lured towards the northern side (or eastern) and enraged he'll stop jumping and instead will fire his blue blades and rockets. Vault Hunters can then move sideways, take pot shots at Hyperius and duck when he fires his blades or Novas.
Class-Specific Tactics[]
- Assassin
- Assassins have the added advantage of B0re, allowing them to deal significant damage to Hyperius or loaders while shielded. B0re also has the ability to make Hyperius flinch (if shot through a minion first); with correct timing, Hyperius's Nova Blasts can be stopped.
- Assassins have an alternate strategy for soloing Hyperius using their melee capabilities. After beginning the fight, it's important to group the minions and Hyperius up by running around them and frequently using Decepti0n. Using Death Bl0ss0m augmented by Deathmark can stagger minions looking to launch their rockets, while Innervate allows one to make distance and recover lost hit points. After the group is clumped up, it's just a matter of circling the group while swinging repeatedly to damage the enemies, recovering hit points, and avoiding further damage. Decepti0n is still incredibly useful for kunai, regeneration, and the damage multiplier. High Ambush and Backstab skills along with careful positioning of the decoy can allow very damaging hits to Hyperius's back. Once Hyperius has low health, do not be afraid of killing all his minions. Having boosted points in Killing Bl0w will make short work of him. A Legendary Hunter class mod or a +5 Killing Bl0w Ninja class mod is recommended because of this. Even if an Assassin is incapacitated during the Berserk Stage, Hyperius will maintain close enough proximity to be finished off by Killing Bl0w, assuming the Berserk Stage is triggered by low health rather than a loss of all minions.
- Commando
- The main usefulness in a Commando here can vary. Axton's nuke can disrupt Hyperius from casting his Nova Blast. Sabre Turret shield will also block all damage from these blasts. While very effective at avoiding the blasts at the beginning of the fight, the shield does not stand up well to the minions' rocket attacks, and is therefore much harder to use later on, along with the complication of keeping party members together.
- An electric assault rifle with a Vladof barrel would be one of the best choices for the first half of the fight, since the electricute damage can drain the shield faster while also damaging in rapid succession.
- Axton's health regen from his Preparation and Able skills, and a Pointman class mod are extremely useful here, as is the Willing skill, to get the player's shield back up as quickly as possible, after it is depleted by the nova attacks.
- Axton's turrets are also very useful as decoys, since assuming Hyperius does not immediately destroy them, they can distract him for the turrets' duration, which allows the player to focus on doing damage.
- Gunzerker
- Gunzerkers have a relatively simple strategy for fighting Hyperius. Having boosted points in Last Longer and Get Some allow for endless Gunzerking. The greatest risk is a shield reflecting bullets back at the character, given the constant fire required to perform it. Care should be taken not to either sidestep past shielded loaders or to trigger a loaders' shield while close enough to reflect bullets.
- Siren
- Maya's melee override Scorn can automatically shoot down rockets.
- Phaselock with investment in Converge can round up loaders. It is much more efficient than using singularity grenades since those normally cannot replenish during the fight. A Chain Lightning grenade in the middle of the converged group will do five times the listed damages of the grenade to each single loader (due to chained area effect), quickly draining all shields simultaneously.
- Mechromancer
- Gaige's Deathtrap is useful to draw Hyperius's attention during the Berserk stage.
- Psycho
- Krieg's Buzz Axe Rampage can penetrate Hyperius's shield, even when thrown. When combined with Release the Beast, and correctly timed, Krieg gains health regeneration without killing any enemies and be able to cause a considerable amount of damage. Using this technique it is possible to solo Hyperius, although still with some difficulty.
- There is a chance when Krieg throws a buzz saw axe at Hyperius it will cause him to be knocked back stopping him from using his nova for a short time.
Completion[]
- "You've defeated Hyperius the Invincible! See if you can kill him again tomorrow!"
Transcript[]
- Main article: Hyperius the Invincible (mission)/Transcript