How much damage do you need to dominate a boss?

[Achelousaurus]

Most bosses stay put and do nothing if you whack the head enough?
But just how much is enough?
And in what time frame?

I frequently find myself not dealing enough damage and just end up at point blank range of the bosses attacks and that's not very nice.

And I also seem to not hit the exact spot that often, despite hitting only the head, especially with Quartz it's a problem for melee cause when you deal enough damage to dominate him, he will hold his nose high into the air and it's hard to deal enough damage again to keep him submissive before he starts attacking again himself.

[Maninbluejumpsuit]

That depends on the boss.

Banthers for example flinch into submission when you break their parts in intervals.

Quartz, vol, and ex suffer from the same as above on top of flinching when hit in the face with enough damage. Afaik, you just need to do a certain amount of damage to cause them to go reeling. Time frame in which you do this damage shouldn't matter.

[strikerhunter]

I'm not exactly sure, but in my personal experience Quart, vol, and Ex tend to flinch around every 100k-150k damage on their heads. Haven't done enough testing yet though.

Banthers, as manin said, just break parts to stun lock them or burn them.

Actually that I think of it, most bosses can't be stunned unless status effect like Decol or them just stupidly sitting around. Only a few can be stun locked, the few I can name of the top of my head are dragons, banters, Vib, Luther, Elder, Decol, and possibly Hunar if you can make him laugh for attempting to get an SE on him.

[Bellion]

For the dragons, apparently breaking their exposed and multi-breaking part the first time is 10% of their total HP. The second time is doubled that. Not sure about anything beyond that, but seems to be yet another double? I haven't seen their heads break past 3 times before they die.

Ringada's rings have their hp x1.5 each time they regenerate. And those rings don't actually count to the overall hp of the boss. Base hp of the rings are 6% of total hp, it seems.

Paws of Banshee/Banthers are 8.5% of their total HP. I want to say their roars are triggered for doing at least 30% of their total health each time. Banther will eventually roar after you kill his waifu, always.

Rockbear rages are at approximately 50% of their health.

Wolgada rages are at 80-70% of their health remaining, and you must hit it at least 3 times. Dealing out enough damage past that point before 3 hits and it won't rage.

Yeah, shit varies between bosses. Just gotta count the damage in your head. Or record because that's how I get to certain estimates with decent accuracy, not perfect.

[LonelyGaruga]

Actually that I think of it, most bosses can't be stunned unless status effect like Decol or them just stupidly sitting around. Only a few can be stun locked, the few I can name of the top of my head are dragons, banters, Vib, Luther, Elder, Decol, and possibly Hunar if you can make him laugh for attempting to get an SE on him.

Hunar laughs as his flinch from taking a significant amount of damage. Usually, he powers up after the first one and does the shockwaves > sword phase. Particularly in MPAs against an untitled Hunar (like in City EQ), it's possible to flinch lock him from 100% to 0 (which makes him come off as a masochist as all he does is stand and laugh as players beat him to submission).


And I also seem to not hit the exact spot that often, despite hitting only the head, especially with Quartz it's a problem for melee cause when you deal enough damage to dominate him, he will hold his nose high into the air and it's hard to deal enough damage again to keep him submissive before he starts attacking again himself.

1) Practice hitting the same spot. Quartz, for example, has a nose and a head hitzone. The nose is the weak point. Get too close to the head and you'll hit that instead. Get a good sense of where to hit and where not to hit to keep your attacks landing on the nose.
2) Figure out an attack to use when you flinch Quartz. I've seen, for example, Over End (flinch with the first hit, third swing will hit Quartz's nose) and Symphonic Drive being used to continue doing damage to Quartz during its flinch animation. Those are far from the only other options you have, find something else if you don't want or cannot use those.
3) Make sure your damage is as high as possible. You can't expect to flinch lock consistently without doing everything in your power to optimize yourself. While not everything you can do is necessary, strictly speaking, more damage = easier flinches = faster flinches = more flinches. With sufficient damage, you can do enough damage to be able to flinch Quartz with attacks you otherwise couldn't be able to, which means more options and more variety in how you can go about flinching it.
4) The key to flinch locking a boss is not how many times you can flinch it, but how few you need to kill it. If you can't kill it within a couple flinches, don't aim for a flinch lock in the first place.

[Achelousaurus]

Thanks.
Guess I need more practice after all >_>

It's just when I see those boss vids and people killing everything in 30 seconds or less by making the bosses flinch nonstop and never even giving the boss a chance to attack and then compare it to the way I fight bosses with dodging a lot, not being in range when it counts, etc. I feel like the safest way is to go full offense but I can never really do it.

Still, as a 70/0 BrHu with good gear and even 110 points in satk up ontop of fury I don't know how I can't deal enough damage on Vol's head.
Not even when I ignore the horn (assuming it's a different hitzone and doesn't count) and going straight for the mouth.

Any tips on how to consistently reach Quartz's nose when he waves it around (not attacking, but flinching after after breaking it)?
Cause I can hit it a couple of times, sure but not enough for a 2nd flinch before he starts attacking so much again that I must dodge.

[LonelyGaruga]

Vol is easier to flinch by breaking the back/head spikes. They're weak points, unlike the head, and break sooner than the head flinches. Personally, I alternate between head, head horn, head, and back spike after getting a tail break and usually kill it before I break the back spike (70/70 Te/Hu, 50 Dark Ex Wand, 60 T-ATK affixes on units, uncapped S-ATK mag, so as you can see my damage can be improved by a lot).

Quartz, though, I can't say I can flinch lock, but more because I never cared to practice it and I have no luck with poison even with Gimegid's 40 proc rate. Usually, it goes break, rage, flinch, and then it starts attacking again, but after the next flinch it dies.

I don't really understand what you mean from your description. Do you mean the flinch animation? Or that alternative animation where it just examines itself? I think you can land Hatou just fine either way, just need good spacing.

Important, what kind of weapon are you using? Aseracta would undoubtedly be the best possible choice for dragons. Personally, if I played Br/Hu, my build would probably look like this (http://pso2-skill.pwnedgalaxy.net/skillcalc.php?08eTbsIkbsIkbsIkbsIkbsIkbsIkbsIkbsIk da0fdodBIbHnIkI2Io0JksNI2000000doIn0000008doib0000 006do000000lo00000007oIn0000000jebIo4NGAIr6sNHSHx0 000jdoIb000000f). Between that kind of build and Aseracta, with at least +60 affixes, in theory, you should have an easy time flinching dragon bosses. In practice, I don't have enough technical information about how the bosses work or how Braver plays right now. I don't really watch Braver gameplay, and I don't know how much damage it takes to flinch a boss. But it's hard to beat that kind of setup for your situation.

[Maninbluejumpsuit]

If you catch SH quartz in a good position for hatou spam to the nose with ketos proi out, he becomes a free kill in under 20 seconds with no poison/anti dragonkin katana needed. Bait a katana counter for the gear, use KC, and go nuts on his nose with hatou+ketos when the chances comes up.