Flesh

Head =

Bone =

Heart =

Butt =

The Flesh is a boss which appears in the Warrens, after the Swine Prince. Like other bosses, it has three variations (Inchoate, Unstable, and Formless). It features 4 different parts that change each round, each of which has its own specific set of abilities and stats. Each part only has one action per round no matter what form it takes. Lastly, they all share the same Health Bar, thus, all four parts are alive and active until you deplete its health to 0.

Ancestor's Memories: The Flesh
"My zeal for blood rituals and summoning rites had begun to ebb, as each attempt invariably brought only failure and disappointment. Progress was halting, and the rapidly accumulating surplus of wasted flesh had become burdensome.

I could not store such a prodigious amount of offal, nor could I rid myself of it easily, possessed as it was by unnameable things from outer spheres. When excavations beneath the manor broke through into an ancient network of aqueducts and tunnels, I knew I had found a solution to the problem of disposal.

The spasmodically squirming, braying, and snorting half-corpses were heaped each upon the other, until at last I was rid of them. The warrens had become a landfill of snout and hoof, gristle and bone - a mountainous, twitching mass of misshapen flesh, fusing itself together in the darkness.

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- The Ancestor

Behavior
The Flesh has 4 different parts in every rank with a shared health bar. Each part has a unique attack and stats. At the start of every turn, it will morph, randomly transforming parts. It is possible to have multiple copies of the same part. All parts, except the Heart, have a high PROT and will inflict different status effect. The Heart heals whatever part is located in rank 1.

Strategy
Since the Flesh shares a single health bar across all of its separate pieces, it is highly vulnerable to multiple target skills and DoTs. Most of its pieces have PROT as well, which is ignored by DoTs. Its blight resist is actually lower than bleed, but due to its location, bringing bleed skills are still more ideal. It's also eldritch, so the Occultist benefits from a damage boost. But again, due to the location (i.e. Warrens), the class might not be ideal to bring.

To stack bleeds, the Houndmaster is uncontested, able to apply 4 per round (totaling 12 passive damage per turn at highest rank). The Flagellant and Jester can add another 2 per round (for 10 per turn plus bleed debuff and 6 per turn, respectively). The Hellion can also target three different ranks with bleeds. A team consisting of some combination of a Houndmaster, Flagellant, and Hellion can aggressively apply bleeds to the boss and is well-suited to fighting through the Warrens. If you prefer blight, then consider bringing 1-2 Plague Doctors and 1-2 Abominations. They can drown the Flesh in blight, but will have a harder time reaching the boss, as the beast enemies of the area are resistant to blight.

Another tactic is to target the heart, as this piece of the boss is the most vulnerable. But since each piece randomly shuffles its type; you won't know when or where it'll appear. One round there can be no hearts, followed by a round with several hearts. The other 3 pieces all have PROT, so it's not ideal to target them except with multiple target skills or armor piercing. You could bring a Shieldbreaker to grant piercing to the party if you really want to.

You should bring plenty of items to this fight, because the Flesh can have up to 4 offensive actions per round, each applying blights, bleeds, and stuns. Items are your best defense as they do not use up your turn, allowing you to focus on attacks. Holy water, in particular, significantly reduces the application of heavy bleeds and blight, while bandages and antivenom can be used to immediately clear characters of DoTs and control the pace of the fight. If you want a defensive class, the Man-at-Arms can buff your entire party to better suffer the Flesh's barrage of attacks, while also offering an offensive shout that affects every piece of the boss.

Preferred Heroes
These heroes can apply Bleed and Blight to multiple positions to decimate their collective health bar.
 * Houndmaster
 * Plague Doctor
 * Hellion
 * Flagellant
 * Jester
 * Abomination
 * Shieldbreaker

Reasonable Choices

 * Vestal - You'll be worrying more about physical damage than Stress, especially if the Flesh keeps hitting many party members at once.
 * Occultist - Bonus damage if you're using him for attacks. His big heals can help in a pinch, but only 1 member at a time.
 * Grave Robber - PROT-piercing skills can help pile on raw damage on the armored pieces.

Discouraged Heroes
Mark synergies are not as effective here, as the targets will constantly shuffle their features.
 * Arbalest/Musketeer
 * Bounty Hunter

Trophy
After completing the Flesh's champion quest, it will drop a heart as a Trophy.

Abilities
The Flesh has four different forms, and each one uses a different unique attack. The table below will show which form uses which attack. Apprentice =

Veteran =

Champion =

Trivia

 * The Flesh takes heavy inspiration from the 1982 film "The Thing."

Swinefolk

 * Swine Chopper
 * Swine Slasher
 * Swine Wretch
 * Swine Drummer
 * Swinetaur
 * Swine Skiver

Bosses

 * Swine Prince
 * Wilbur