Earthlock - Part 16 - Battle of the Sands
8Honestly, I put off editing this video for quite a while, up until Part 15's video was up, because this boss battle, against the guardian of Burning Desert, was about 50 minutes long. If you thought the GobKing fight was long and difficult, this one takes it up a notch further. The more I go into this game, the more I regret choosing it--not because it's not popular, as I still stand that it's a hidden gem that needs more love--but because it's so very difficult to trim gameplay footage of this game down to something that might be interesting to watch as a passive spectator. Again, this is the real reason I have never put up any serious playthrough of a Legend of Zelda game, as I couldn't figure out how to trim them down. (Breath of the Wild would be the hardest of them all!) This is also why I don't put up much Super Mario Odyssey. Banjo-Tooie was on my list to cover since near when I started uploading videos, and it'd be quite daunting too.
Our foe at the end of this dungeon is Sharaan. (No, he is not in love in the shape of you.) I tried to look up if there's any suplementary lore to this, but there isn't any. As far as I can tell, Sharaan has been a presence in this region for as long as people can remember, before the world became tidally locked even. He was revered as a deity due to his fearsome power, and if Sparks, in Zaber, is any indication, there are a few people here and there who fear he will eventually destroy the world. To date, nobody has stopped Sharaan, but this group of adventurers is not your typical bunch.
If you're savvy with RPGs, you'll immediately spot separate HP meters for Sharaan's arms. Indeed, I immediately went for the arms, as I figured depleting their HP will severely hamper his capacity to fight. And you may have figured, Sharaan's head is completely invulnerable until his arms go down. As it seems, not only that, but Sharaan will collapse completely for a few turns, allowing you to go all out on that HP meter!
There's just one problem: Sharaan will go into a praying stance once his arms regain their functionality, which is him gaining complete invincibility to everything and charging up for a fire-breathing move that will instantly KO two of your party members and deal huge damage to the other two! If your party takes the full brunt of this, even with a lot of revival items and skills, you're going to be spending a lot of time recovering, and you'll eventually be unable to keep up, and your party will go down.
How do you deal with this incredibly overpowered attack? Well, you might have noticed newly-joined party members are the key to overcoming bosses. This one took me a few tries because I didn't fully understand how Taika works, but her main skill in her Packmate Stance, Elemental Absorb, is how you're supposed to survive. Based on its description and how Ive described it, I thought Elemental Absorb applied only to Taika, but apparently, she can share it with anyone else in the party. She just needs the time to do it. Elemental Absorb begins with immunity to Fire and Water, and since the fire-breathing move, Inferno, is a Fire attack, Elemental Absorb will prevent the damage on affected party members.
This means you'll need to switch Taika to Packmate, then spend the next four turns granting Fire immunity to the party members, one by one (including to herself). The turns Sharaan spends collapsed, head on the floor, as well as entering a praying stance, are the turns you're given to apply it. (Alternatively, you can start applying it the moment the battle begins, though waiting until you disarm Sharaan is safer.) Bear in mind, however, that once Elemental Absorb negates elemental damage, that immunity goes away, and you'll have to use Elemental Absorb on that character again to get the immunity back. That means you'll have to start this process back from the start each time Sharaan uses Inferno, though he'll use it only after recovering his arms.
Problem is that Taika, in spite of her appearance and overworld running speed, is one of the slower party members in battle. She may not necessarily get the five turns needed to switch from Predator to Packmate and apply Elemental Absorb to everybody. I realized it's best for her to change stances just before both arms are disabled.
And yes, this is definitely a boss battle you can't possibly prepare for without looking ahead on the Internet or something. You'll have to get struck with an Inferno before you can possibly have a chance of beating him.
The defeat of Sharaan, by the way, seems to lower the temperature in Burning Desert such that you no longer need to constantly seek shade. Apparently, he held a Zelda-style curse, and taking him down also took down the temperature. That being said, our work in the Burning Desert is done. I have one more video of my exploration of the area (which can be skipped), and Part 18 begins the next part of the story.