A variant of the original Ni-Type Mech. This version has more heavy-duty weapons, running on a stronger power module.

The Ni-Type Mech - Falconer (usually just called "Falconer" and often accompanied by multiple expletives) is, like the name suggests, a variant of the standard Ni-Type Mech. It supposedly has had its weapons upgraded, but it apparently prefers to whack you with its legs instead. Unless... those are the weapons being referred to?

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Behaviour and Attacks

Like the normal Ni-Mech, Falconer has an innate 50% damage reduction against attacks that aren't on its parts or weak spots. It also has seven parts that can be destroyed - four leg armor pieces, and two modules on either side of its torso. The torso modules do... something, but it's not really worth bothering to destroy them unless you know exactly what you're doing (in which case you don't need this guide).

You do want to break the armor on its knees, however. This will reveal a weakspot that can be destroyed, immediately dealing 12.5% of its max health and downing it for an extended period of time. Falconer will also expose the weak spot on the back of its torso which can now be freely attacked.

Falconer will also occasionally jump towards you, knocking you back if you're too close to where it lands. At higher difficulty levels, this will also create a circular area of flames that deal damage over time. Try not to be too far away from it to minimize the chance of this happening.

Cannon

Falconer fires three bursts from its cannons towards you, dealing damage on hit. Its tracking can quite literally be pretty hit-or-miss, with it having pretty good accuracy sometimes while completely whiffing at others. As long as you don't get hit by all three bursts, you should be fine.

Ground Pound

Falconer jumps on the spot, creating line shockwaves away from it that knock back on hit. At lower difficulty levels, the four shockwaves will always point in the direction of its legs which makes dodging it much easier, but an extra four shockwaves will be created at higher difficulty levels. You can risk not bothering to dodge and get away with it surprisingly often, but don't count on it to happen every time.

Oh, and you get knocked back if you're too close to where it lands. Duh.

Charged Stomp

Falconer charges up a leg stomp that sends out a linear shockwave towards you (it's the same one as from its ground pound). Given the charge period makes it a sitting duck and the fact that the singular shockwave can be easily dodged, this is a big freebie.

Triple Trample

Falconer taps the ground twice, then stomps the third time, staggering you from anywhere on the map. At higher difficulty levels, it will also send out a ring of projectiles. Any of the taps or stomps can knock you back if you're too close, so keep your distance.

Charge

Falconer runs in a straight line towards your current location until it reaches the edge of the map. If you're in its path, you get knocked back as it runs you over. At higher difficulty levels, it will do three of these charges consecutively and leave a burning trail of fire in its wake.

It actually will end the sequence of charges early if it ends one of them close to you (within 12 meters), but that's a pretty awful consolation prize.

Casual players: Getting out of its way as it runs towards you actually isn't that hard, so just watch your timing.

Speedrunners: Reset. Reset. Reset. Reset again. Reset until you get a run where this godawful move doesn't happen. This is quite possibly one of the worst boss attacks in the entire game, and there are no words which I'm allowed to use on this website that can describe how much I hate it. As if it running around while you try not to become roadkill doesn't make it hard enough to land good shots on its knee armor, it actually flips its legs around every time it does the charge, which can mean you're completely prevented from finishing off one you already started.

There will be times where it opens with this move five, six, ten runs in a row. But the best way to deal with this attack is still to refuse to let it happen at all. Yes, it absolutely sucks. But instantly resetting the run if it does this attack will ultimately get you faster times with less frustration than actually interacting with it.

Strategy

Falconer really plays almost identically like Ni-Mech but with a different moveset, to the point that basically all the strategy there also applies here. If you've read the strategy section there, you're basically set for Falconer.

It is worth noting that its different moveset does mean that it has different reset conditions and ideal attacks. Charged Stomp is the ideal attack to get, as it means that Falconer basically stuns itself in place before sending out a very easy to dodge shockwave. Triple Trample is the next best thing, though you have to be careful not to get hit by the stagger. Ground Pound isn't particularly ideal as it can be hard to land shots on it while leg prepping, but it's at least a relatively quick animation with an attack that's not too threatening. The cannon shots actually can be pretty annoying as while they're not super dangerous, Falconer does like to shuffle its legs around while firing off shots which can make leg prepping quite a hassle. Oh, and of course there's also the attack where it runs towards you, which you basically reset on sight unless you can interrupt it with a leg break.

Control effect supports run into the same pitfalls as with Ni-Mech; Paralyze is great but locks you out of parts breaking and Slow loses its value once you're done prepping legs.

Bugs

Much like with the standard version of Ni-Mech, Marian - Swfit's Deiwos passive doesn't take effect against Falconer's leg weak spots. As well, the defense penetration that Swift normally gets from her ultimate ability doesn't work on Falconer for whatever reason. Poor thing. Seasun, please fix.