[Boss Fight] Need your ideas!

[Sapprine]

Spoiler: A rough rundown of his backstory

King Gorba is a crossbreed between Gnoll and Kobold, artificially created by a cruel Ogre Magi. He's genetically enhanced by magic during the birthing process and was the Ogre's favorite test subject. During captivity, he endured many cruel forms of torture like being force-fed experimental potions, kept near starvation and as punishment for escape attempts, the Ogre would snap his legs often.

One day, the Ogre fed him yet another hastily brewed concoction that happened to have an unintended, empowering and regenerative reaction on Gorba's altered genetics.
That day, Gorba broke free from his pen, decapitated the Ogre twice and before he left, he consumed the rest of the Ogre's concoction.

Gorba entered the world as a true one-of-a-kind being and grew tougher, larger, faster and smarter than any Gnoll or Kobold alike respectively could.
He single-handed defeated the current Kobold King at the time, as well as the actively ruling Gnoll Warlords in the area. Because he has equal blood and appearance of both races, both races accepted him as their new king.

King Gorba became a feared entity across the human kingdoms of Thrinthia. Captured and imprisoned Kobolds and Gnolls alike would speak highly of him, like he's some divine, unstoppable being. while no sightings or visual records of this Gnoll-Kobold-Hybrid "King" have ever been documented by any human.

One day, some half a decade into his rule, King Gorba was visited by a hooded hermit. One with a red, molten face, the humans call by the name of Kroga Trinth.
Kroga Trinth portayed a grand, but non-lethal display of power in front of King Gorba, proving his significance to Gorba without a doubt and made a plea before him.

Kroga, with his warped and twisted face spoke in a loud, but clear telepathic voice:
"I'm seeking followers and you have been chosen! I seek to cleanse this world of the order-devoted and a new kingdom of darkness will be arosen! Oppose me and be reduced to ashes! But listen to me, complete my task and join the clashes! Power and immortality shall be my gift if you join my plight! Follow me and claim your birthright!"

Upon agreeing, Gorba is tasked to regroup his minions and wipe the nearby town of Riverglen with one target specifically, the hero the humans refer to as "Sir Rhoderick Rugnar".

Right there and then, King Gorba was gifted a small portion of his promised power, causing him to grow even more in size, grow even smarter and cunning than he already was.

Over a single night, his minions managed to overrun and pierce the defenses of Riverglen's Western and Northern entrances, completely plunder the town's center and slip even more forces in via the mountains to the East.

Spoiler: pics for reference

Spoiler: The mission scenario

Sir Rhoderick Rugnar approaches the town from the South, just as a large group of King Gorba's minions march upon the entrance.
Together with the Guardsmen, he manages to hold the southern entrance all night onto the morning, until the attacks stop.
With a portion of the guards, he sets out to investigate the town only to find out all other entrances had been breached and much of the townsfolk slaughtered.
Small pockets of fighting are still happening around him as he attempts to aid them and gather as much militia as he can.
As Sir Rugnar liberates the town, many Gnolls he engages snarl out battlecries like "You are nothing before King Gorba!".
To avenge his hometown, Sir Rugnar promises the survivors to set out and slay this Gnoll/Kobold hybrid King.
Much of the townsfolk volunteer and join the march as militia.

King Gorba, smart, powerful and cunning, sits on a throne, south-west of Riverglen and I'm clueless as to how approach designing his bossfight.
He shouldnt be your typical powerhouse boss who underestimates his opponents and dies a fool's death.
He's cunning and smart enough to anticipate Sir Rugnar's arrival and to set traps, he also has access to a big number of Kobold and Gnoll minions, lots of food and resources.

Ultimately, his downfall should be composed of a mix between his minion's sloppiness at slaughtering the townsfolk and Sir Rugnar having a larger group of militia than he anticipated. He gets cornered, makes his stand, refuses to flail and dies fighting.

I desperately need help designing this bossfight haha.

 

[cleavinghammer]

You could have something like this: As Rugnar liberates the town, some of the gnolls/kobold minions fall back (from each small combat zone) to warn Gorba. Once all the fighting is cleared up, Rugnar advances on Gorba, who's holed up in the local fort.

The fort is very difficult to take with infantry (high armor, barricades, multishot, kobolds attacking from tunnels, Spiked Barricades etc.) and has lots of supplies, so there's no hope of a siege. Instead Rugnar starts building catapults. Gorba sends out successive waves (say 3) of minions from the fort to destroy the catapults before they're built, joining his troops but falling back to the fort with every defeat (having 3 potions of invulnerability/invisibility on him to do so).

Once the catapults are up and start attacking the castle, Gorba attacks with everything he's got left, setting fire/collapsing the fort so it can't be used afterwards. He has several lieutenants with auras, taking them out makes it easier to deal with the swarms of footsoldiers.

Once the lieutenants are dead, many of the minions flee (but not those close to Gorba), and he gets increasingly stronger as his health lowers, gaining extra stats and abilities, and new ones from his patron like Death Pact (on a minion), Burrow (can only use a limited number of times if the player doesn't have a way to detect invisibility), Resistant Skin and Spell Shield (not Spell Immunity, please).

There could also be a sidequest to stop enemy reinforcements coming in by blocking important passageways: the reinforcements stop, but the forces already present fight harder without an escape route. Kobolds digging tunnels can be killed to prevent reinforcements later. Filing to kill the kobolds makes the tunnel entrance vulnerable, but the digger reappears somewhere else to dig another one.

 

[Sapprine]

The fort is very difficult to take with infantry (high armor, barricades, multishot, kobolds attacking from tunnels, Spiked Barricades etc.) and has lots of supplies, so there's no hope of a siege. Instead Rugnar starts building catapults. Gorba sends out successive waves (say 3) of minions from the fort to destroy the catapults before they're built, joining his troops but falling back to the fort with every defeat (having 3 potions of invulnerability/invisibility on him to do so).

How would you suppose I put together a 'fort' in Reforged HD mode?
And would the fort be a human fort that Gorba took over or one he built himself?

some of the gnolls/kobold minions fall back (from each small combat zone) to warn Gorba.

Gorba is already well-aware that Sir Rugnar is coming for him, he should prepare traps and wait in anticipation. No need for his minions to give him that intel.

The only thing he doesn't anticipate is Sir Rugnar's skills in leadership and the fact he brought a moderately sized mob of pissed off militia with him.
He assumed his minions would be more successful at leaving no survivors.

Once the catapults are up and start attacking the castle

Even if I go through with this, I also wouldn't like the catapults to be a win conditions.
This would literally be the only instance of humans using catapults in my campaign and there would be no build-up or logical explanation where they came from.

Additionally, this is the first mission of my campaign and already pretty intensive and innovative in terms of mechanics.

Riverglen is not a big town in lore, it has a population of about 825 and an army size of about 120 (of which about 3/5ths are recruits).
During the invasion, I'd say about 85% of Riverglen's population was slaughtered, leaving Sir Rugnar with a maximum of about 18 capable foot soldiers and not more than about 20 volunteering militia (not counting the wounded, elderly, traumatized, women, children, ect.)

Once the lieutenants are dead, many of the minions flee

Gorba already has three lieutenants in the area, their names are "Ogmott the Prisonkeeper", "Nargl the Overseer" and "Heldruk the Taskmaster".

I don't like the idea of fleeing minions since it wouldnt really fit the narrative of the mission.
Once Gorba is defeated, the alliance between Gnolls and Kobolds is immediately shattered, they fight among each other and scurry off.

There could also be a sidequest to stop enemy reinforcements coming in by blocking important passageways: the reinforcements stop, but the forces already present fight harder without an escape route. Kobolds digging tunnels can be killed to prevent reinforcements later. Filing to kill the kobolds makes the tunnel entrance vulnerable, but the digger reappears somewhere else to dig another one.

It isn't like Gorba just has infinite armies of minions and they're smarted than just waiting somewhere. Nearly all of the Minions he has under his command are actively raiding an occupying areas in and around Riverglen, especially the surrounding woods, waiting in ambush for survivors that attempt an escape.

There currently already is a sidequest named "Gorba's Wrath"

Spoiler: Pic of Gorba's Wrath

A massive siege weapon that allowed the primary raiding party direct access to the townsquare and obliterated Riverglen's most potent line of defense (as this way the main entrance to town).

It also fires and destroys the bridge in front of it as Sir Rugnar nearly attempts to cross it, forcing him the long way around via the North where Gorba's lieutenants each are stationed.

King Gorba himself is really the last boss, awaiting at the very end of the map.

 

[cleavinghammer]

It would be the town's fort, with extra fortifications added by his troops: if he's smart enough to know there's going to be a counterattack, he'd want to await it with the defensive advantage.

In that case, replace the catapults by Rugnar capturing Gorba's Wrath and turning it on him.

Traps: Kobolds could create pit traps that stun and deal him damage, with gnolls ambushing when the traps are triggered.

 

[Sapprine]

In that case, replace the catapults by Rugnar capturing Gorba's Wrath and turning it on him.

That's a banger idea! I could even rename the Demolisher to something like "Rugnar's Fury" after he captures it! And repurpose his Militia to repair it in a cinematic of some sort! But the quest to stop Gorba's Wrath will still remain as an Optional Side Quest, I won't turn it into a mandatory win condition.

It would be the town's fort, with extra fortifications added by his troops:

I'm having trouble picturing how to put together this fort and how to make it fit. I am a pretty talented terrainer and know how to re-purpose doodads in HD mode by scaling/tilting/highering/lowering them. But the fort would be outside of Riverglen and located in a pretty remote and random position. Gorba's spot on the map is also not a very large area...

Spoiler: Either Red Lines = Approach block, Blue Area = Available space for the Fort

if he's smart enough to know there's going to be a counterattack, he'd want to await it with the defensive advantage.

I mean, King Gorba is literally tasked to wipe this town and specifically target down and kill Sir Rugnar.
Perhaps I should also mention he's pretty much a behemoth himself, rivaling the height of a full-grown ogre. His cannon height would be about 7 meters (23ft).
If I just took a step back and thought about it logically. He wouldn't worry about a counterattack one bit and not care if Sir Rugnar went after him or not, because he has taken proper measures to ensure that no survivors would aid him.
His forces are vast and very much calculated under his command.

Spoiler: Gorba's Attack Plan

The only things that really go wrong for Gorba is that Sir Rugnar manages to aid the Southern defenses, leaving a small pocket of survivors in the area between the South Entrance and the Town Square. However, Gnolls do make their way through the woods bordering the right map edge and some Kobolds are occupying the Riverglen quarry in that area. This would've been enough to wipe these survivors, literally killing a total of 99% of the towns population. But the player manages to aid them in time and recruit them.

There was also no way of anticipating how good of an aspiring leader Sir Rugnar was, leaving the player with some ~10 soldiers and ~20 militia, while Gorba loosely expected either Sir Rugnar alone or with a total of only about 3~6 soldiers.

Despite this, I still wouldn't brand this effort as an actual 'counterattack' per say as it isn't really an organized military effort of any sort.
It's more of just a pissed off mob of farmers that manage to take King Gorba by surprise, they corner him and he dies fighting.

Even though he wasn't expecting this, I still want him to put up a worthy effort during his fight. He's supposed to be seen as a successful villain at destroying this town well-beyond recovery. Regardless of the fact he dies at the end, he's definitely the winner of this siege.

 

[Sapprine]

@cleavinghammer

Some progress on Gorba's Fort with No imports! The Gnolls on top ARE interactive units and can move along the floorboards of the wall! They have 700 Flier sight range and a weaker attack that deals 10-14 damage per 1.90sec from 600 range. They're unkillable by Melee units, however the actual bossfight area will be out of their range. They're also guaranteed two-shottable by Gorba's Wrath (aka Rugnar's Fury) in case the player does decide to take them out.

In order to fit the narrative of the mission, the areas around the fort are now utterly deforested and dotted with savage-style logging encampments.

I just wanted to thank you for your amazing ideas and the boss area is turning out better than I ever imagined!

Sadly, I'm still clueless as to how to let the actual boss fight turn out and if I don't figure something out before this fort is done, I'm going to shamelessly decide to nerf King Gorba's intelligence and making him go down just like any other ordinary meat head boss. Underestimating his opponent and dying like a fool...

 

[cleavinghammer]

Depends on how you want to interpret that intelligence.

For example, the smart real-life thing to do would be to wait out the siege from the castle while waiting for reinforcements. Since that would be boring (and Rugnar has siege engines), Gorba is forced to either fight or flee, and decides to fight since as far as he knows he's only dealing with a rabble of peasants.

So you could have him wait in the castle courtyard (instead of wasting his forces looking for Rugnar and being defeated in detail), and once Rugnar arrives, ambushes him with his remaining troops. Rugnar would have to make sure Gorba can't escape anywhere since the smart thing would be to run.

 

[Sapprine]

Depends on how you want to interpret that intelligence.

I mean, he is feral and not good at speech or anything, but he does have excellent 'vision', is very cunning, good at planning steps and has been given a lot of useful information by Kroga Trinth about Sir Rugnar and the town's defenses.

For example, the smart real-life thing to do would be to wait out the siege from the castle while waiting for reinforcements.

This raid was an all-out attack and he totally 100% succeeded at the siege and invasion. Riverglen is wrecked and beyond recovery.
There's no reinforcements to be waiting for.

While preparing his plan, Gorba's scouts observed and documented the human's way of agriculture, fishing and shepherding. He specifically ordered his minions to leave any farms intact with high priority.
His plan is to demolish the remaining human buildings, utilize and spread his newfound knowledge about farming among his minions and eventually recruit the remaining and scattered Gnoll and Kobold groups into his utopia. The only sizable counterattack he could expect would be from Port Yester or Lycida Hold, but since he's planning on leaving nothing to be saved or salvaged, he considers himself a low priority target to them. (which he obviously is)

So you could have him wait in the castle courtyard (instead of wasting his forces looking for Rugnar and being defeated in detail), and once Rugnar arrives, ambushes him with his remaining troops. Rugnar would have to make sure Gorba can't escape anywhere since the smart thing would be to run.

There's no castle here, nor is there in the vicinity of Riverglen. The Fortress Gorba is in is more like a large makeshift camp with reinforced walls, constructed with a combination of Gnoll Axe-forging, proficient lumber jacking and the excellent mining and masonry skills of the Kobolds.

As for looking for Rugnar, he feels like he got that covered. Each possible town exit is clogged by a sizable force and in particular, he ordered a dozin of skilled gnoll archers to await in ambush along a particular forest road that he knew Rugnar would pass through. And just in case that wouldn't finish him off, a large group of Kobolds operating in the Western Riverglen Quarry (gathering stone for his fortress and ore for equipment) also are notified he might pass through. They're led by High Taskmaster Heldruk, which is one of his most intelligent and skilled lieutenants. Heldruk is a Kobold Pyromancer who fights with a shovel in melee combat. Lore-wise and in the in-game enemy encyclopedia it's stated Heldruk's Pyromantic flames can get so hot, he's able to use his magic to smelt ores and his fireblast is able to melt through the metal armor of soldiers.

Even if Rugnar reaches him, he expects him to be severely exhausted, wounded or alone.

But there is a reason Kroga Trinth wants Rugnar dead, since he's a champion chosen by the Heart of Order. As long as Rugnar strifes to bring order to the land, the Heart will continue to grant him power, even if he leaves Trinthia.