Have a Nice Death – How to Dodge Brad’s Attacks

A guide on how to dodge Brad’s attacks.

Guide to Dodge Brad’s Attacks

All credit goes to Crevice; Abyssal Storm!

Introduction

Every new player’s first major hurdle and still a threat to experienced reapers, Brad is the boss of the Hall of Eternity, and as such is the easiest of the Sorrows. Despite this, he can still cause some trouble for Death, and not with that paddle ball set. We will be going over each of his attacks, how to effectively dodge them, and some general tips that make the fight easier.

Movement Tips

Since I will be using a few terms that may or may not be what the techniques are called by most others, I will be storing them here (and I will put this is any future Have a Nice Death guides that I make).

Upperslash

What I call the “upperslash” is one of the most important techniques when it comes to dodging. It is performed by doing an up attack, simple. The height can also be increased by jumping when performing the upperslash. This is useful when trying to get high into the air or to dodge attacks that cover the entire ground.

Air combos

They have as much utility as they have combat, as they can be used to extend airtime. These are useful for lingering attacks or when there isn’t enough safe space to land.

Attacks

Brad is getting special treatment, but for the exact opposite reason as Waldo. Brad’s fight isn’t divided into phases, or at the very least doesn’t have clear indicators for when he transitions into phase 2.

Disclaimer: The names of the attacks are not official, and are what I call them.

Swipe: Brad swipes his claws at Death twice. He will follow this up with either another swipe attack or a swiping dive attack. This can be dodged by dashing through Brad, going above him, or moving away.

Swiping Dash: This attack can only be performed after a swipe, and has more range than the regular swipe. This is best dodged by moving towards Brad since he dives a set distance with a set angle, around 45 degrees.

Dive: Brad will move to one of the upper corners of the arena before either dashing at a 45 degree angle to the other side of the arena before dashing horizontally to the side he was originally on or dashing in a parabola, ending at the upper-adjacent corner of the arena.

Slam: Brad will spin before flying to one of two locations, the center of the arena or directly above Death. When he reaches these locations, Brad will take a selfie, turn to stone, and drop onto the ground. Dodging the slam is as easy as staying on the move. If Brad decides to slam in the center of the arena, he will summon four boulders from the ground that travel upwards but return to the ground as they are affected by gravity. The boulders can be dodged by hugging the walls of the arena, and then performing an upperslash if Brad dives to the lower corner or he decided to swipe with his claws.

Boulderain: Brad flies above the center of the arena before making four passes across the arena, dropping rocks as he flies across. The best way to dodge this attack is to move to the gaps in the rocks for his first and second passes and hugging one of the walls for his remaining passes.

Tips

Most of Brad’s attacks don’t track Death himself, but he can still hit the reaper if he is in the gargoyle’s path.

Overconfidence usually results in getting hit, and Brad will take advantage of this. Just because he is the easiest boss doesn’t mean he can’t hit Death (I know this personally).

The End

Being the first Sorrow in every run, Brad is much easier than Sorrows such as Imamura and Pliskhan, but is still no pushover, with attacks that span the entire arena, despite there being few of them.