Congratulations! You’ve bought Dragon Age Inquisition and decided you wanted to give the multiplayer a shot. You’ve picked your archer because auto-fire for victory, some level 12 Legionnaire just carried you through a round of Red Templars, one of your two Keepers uses barrier sometimes, and you just feel confident with your current group. The next round starts and Leliana mentions something about demons. You dominated the last round, how much harder can demons be? The Demon Commander? What a dumb name. You’re totally two-shotting these ghost demons. Why are you suddenly dead? Did it appear under you? But you had full health. Wait, you were the last one alive? You… wiped?
That is not a fictitious scenario. I would love to see the stats of just how many lives the Demon Commander has taken. Of the three bosses in Dragon Age Inquisition’s multiplayer, it is hands down the worst. What seems like sporadic or randomized movements have a way of popping up right from under you, which imitates your deepest fear from any horror film. Unless you are a warrior class, this attack can kill you even with full health. Did I mention that it’s an AoE? It’s an AoE. This boss has wiped entire parties with one attack. The Demon Commander is the stuff of nightmares.
So how do you beat this demonic messiah of death? Like most things, all it takes is the know-how. Its ‘random,’ one-shotting, teleport move actually follows a strict pattern that is easily controlled. Most of the heavy lifting is going to be placed on your tank (surprise) but even if you’re not the one taking the brunt of the damage, knowing the Demon Commander’s pattern will keep you alive. After all, the faster this beast dies, the burden inflicting your valiant tank’s shoulders lessens. So do ‘em a solid already.
First thing first, as the tank, seek out the tall, lanky, white, Slender Man-looking mother f@#$er the second the banner is placed down. Until he spots someone in your party, he moseys around pretty nonchalantly. Go and taunt this leader of the demons and get the party started right. At this point you’ll see a magic circle appear under it and the Demon Commander will enter the ground like a total freak. A second or two later you’ll see a dark-greenish smoke appear around you very briefly. This means it is transcending time and space to appear directly under your feet in attempt to murder your face off. He teleport attacks to the person highest on the aggro list.
The way to foil DC’s plans is with that huge shield strapped on your wrist. The moment you see him teleport into the ground, anticipate the dark-greenish smoke around. Once you see it, take a few steps forward and turn your character around 180 degrees with your shield up. If you have the stamina available, you’ll block his attack, get a ton of guard, and not get knocked over. This is the ideal situation and means you’re being a good tank.
At this point, the Demon Commander will do one of two things. It will either take a few swipes at you or shriek. If he swipes, just take the hits with your built up guard. They won’t do a ton of damage and you need to allow your stamina to recharge for what’s coming. If you leave you shield up the whole time, you’ll endanger your precious hit-points.
Let’s talk about this shriek. It’s a pretty big AoE and if you’re in melee range with DC, you’re going to get hit by it. Not only does it damage you, is also panics you. As the tank, you can block the damage, get some guard, but you’ll still be panicked. The Demon Commander always shrieks three times before the damage and fear kicks in. As the tank, melee the beast during the first two but guard for the third. Moves that dispel panic or all statuses will remove the effect. Mobility moves can get you out of the range before you’re hit by it. Combat roll is an option for tanks if they don’t want to block. Non tanks will want to rely on that mobility move. For melee DPS, this sucks for you. Get into a habit of running in, hitting DC with everything you got, and then run away before the shriek even starts.
After it shrieks, DC will teleport into the ground again. The demon will then reappear somewhere random – this is the only part of the fight that is actually random. However, once it appears, it will shoot a magic projectile at the highest on the aggro list. So even though it is random, the Demon Commander still should be attacking the tank. Finding DC’s random location in the chaos can be hectic. Block his projectile for some extra guard.
Congratulations again! You’ve learned this fight. After it fires the projectile, DC teleports back into the ground and appears under the character highest on the aggro chart. Thus the cycle has been completed. The Demon Commander literally will follow this five step process over and over again with no change. If your tank has the aggro and knows what to do, this fight is actually straight forward. Its attacks aren’t as random or ‘unfair’ as many think.
My suggestion is to have the tank grab aggro and then take DC somewhere romantic and isolated. The rest of the party should be killing the adds so everyone can focus the beast at once. The last thing you want is some Archer with Full Draw peeling the aggro off the tank. As not the tank, keep away from the tank. As mentioned several times, the Demon Commander’s teleport pop-up attack is AoE. So like, if the tank is doing his job, but you’re standing next to him, you’re still going to get hit. Don’t get hit.
Melee DPS has it the worst in this fight do to the shriek. After the pop-up teleport attack, wait to see if DC melees or shrieks. If it melees get some licks in, otherwise hang back. After the Demon Commander’s pop-ups for its projectile attack (directly after the shriek), go HAM on it as melee since it won’t shriek before teleporting again. As ranged DPS, just do your thing and don’t peel aggro before your tank establish dominance and you’ll be fine.
So that’s the Demon Commander. Super tough if you don’t know what you’re doing, a kitten if you got the knowledge. Because I like flow charts, we made a flow chart. I think it came out well, feel free to post it around the internet. He’s a cutie. I hope this helped. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. On harder difficulties, there comes a point where you prefer the Demon Commander due to his predictability. Remember, stick the pointy ends into DC’s gross face and you’ll do fine. Best of luck.
