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How to beat the Arch-Illager in Minecraft Dungeons

Two boss fights.
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Minecraft Dungeons’ main villain, the Arch-Illager, is a tough fight. You face off against him in the last mission of the main story, and you’ll have to defeat him as he uses the powerful crystal he’s been using to gather his forces for the entire game. He has a few specific moves to keep in mind, but so long as you notice these, you shouldn’t have too much trouble taking him down.

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How to beat the Arch-Illager

When the battle starts, he arrives into the fight, floating in the air. Once he lands, he’ll stand right at the center of the arena. He’ll be summoning minions the entire time, firing blasts from his staff at you, and they’ll come at you in three balls. You can weave past these to get in close and do some damage to him. You primarily want to stick to using your ranged weapon for this portion of the fight, so take out the minions first so they can drop bundles of arrows for you. The first part of the fight is not too difficult. Once his health bar hits zero, the real fight begins.

How to beat the Heart of the Ender

Following the first fight, the Arch-Illager becomes the Heart of the Ender, and you now have to battle a much more powerful enemy. There’s a big, dark silhouette of a monster wrapped around the Arch-Illager, and that will be doing the most damage to you. It crawls around on the ground, and you want to dash to the side to avoid it. You also want to dash away when the creature goes into the ground and pops up four heads that fire beams in multiple directions. Another attack is when it goes to the center of the arena, and fires four beams out, and does a circle with them activated, forcing you to run in the middle of them.

Overall, the Heart of the Ender fight is much more hectic, but the goal remains the same. You want to approach it and attack the Arch-Illager at the center of it. This is the only way to damage it. You can do this with your skills, melee weapon, or your ranged weapon. You may lose a life or two during this battle, so it’s a good idea to arrive with fresh revive in your back pocket. If you do die, you revive not too far away, and you’ll be able to return to the battle with full health.

After you defeat the Heart of the Ender, you’ll receive a few items, and you’ll be able to advance to the final portion of the game.


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Zack Palm
Zack Palm is the Senior Writer of Gamepur and has spent over five years covering video games, and earned a Bachelor's degree in Economics from Oregon State University. He spends his free time biking, running tabletop campaigns, and listening to heavy metal. His primary game beats are Pokémon Go, Destiny 2, Final Fantasy XIV, and any newly released title, and he finds it difficult to pull away from any Star Wars game.