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) and features 4 different parts that change each round and each have their 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, killing one part will end the fight.

Ancestor's Memoirs: 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. Narration_load_warrens_04.wav 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. Narration_load_warrens_05.wav The spasmodically squirming, braying, and snorting half-corpses were heaped each upon the other, until at least 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. Narration_load_warrens_06.wav"

- The Ancestor.

History
The Ancestor eventually got tired of his attempts at demonic summoning, with his most successful creation being the uselessly stupid and ravenous Swine Prince. He was left with the problem of a massive amount of demon-possessed pig flesh that couldn't easily be disposed of. The Ancestor found the solution to this problem once his excavations broke into a vast, ancient system of tunnels and aqueducts. He poured the nightmarish, shape-shifting flesh into the Warrens, and promptly forgot about it.

Over the years the twisted half-corpses of shifting flesh merged together in one mountainous mass of snout and hoof, gristle and bone with countless mouths, teeth and eyes. Slowly it began crawling deeper into the sewer labyrinth, searching for food, devouring anything that is unfortunate to come within its path. The Swinefolk that made the Warrens their home both fear and worship this Abomination of Formless Flesh, bring it daily offerings and human sacrifices to keep it appeased, so that it does not decide to eat them.

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 is healing flesh's part located in rank 1.

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

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

Veteran =

Champion =

Strategy
Damage over time is king in this fight: since all four ranks share a single health bar (and typically have high PROT), DOT attacks that hit multiple ranks are even more effective. As such, you should focus on a party that can lay down a lot of blight and bleed. The Hound Master's Hound's Harry ability is particularly effective: since it hits all four ranks, it effectively does quadruple the normal bleed damage. Use of Hound's Harry can trivialize the fight, taking down the health of the boss extremely quickly. Similarly useful is the Plague Doctor's Plague Grenade as a multi-target blight, as well as the Jester's Harvest, possibly helped by the Grave Robber's Flashing Daggers to reduce bleed resistance. The Flesh is also an Eldritch creature, making the Occultist's Abyssal Artillery work reasonably well.

If the Heart appears, target it if you can: it has no PROT and will take full damage. Taking characters that can hit multiple ranks, such as the Hellion, is strongly recommended: the front two ranks may well have PROT high enough to mostly shrug off direct attacks.

In terms of defense, you should have high blight, bleed, and stun resist, since the Flesh will use them a lot. You should also have a tough front row, since the Maws of Life ability hits hard. Note that the heads can one shot your wounded squishy heroes like Flagellant with critical attack and bleed at higher difficulties. Marking, stunning and debuffing are less effective than normal, since the pieces you hit may change between turns - this said, they aren't useless, especially if you can mark the heart for your Houndmaster. Having a Plague Doctor can really help here: along with using her Plague Grenades to great effect, she can cure the damage over time on your heroes before it has a chance to drain their HP.

One viable party composition for Stygian Formless Flesh is:

Plague Doctor / Vestal (with both healing trinkets) / Houndmaster (with both dodge trinkets) / Man-at-Arms. The front liners applying holy water should guard your squishy heroes in the back as they will frequently face bleed, blight and stun.The boss should die of blight after about 10 turns.

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