Introduction
Boss Rush and Land of the Morning Light content in this guide is currently not available on EU/NA. Some things that are mentioned in this guide are subject to change, the names of items are also roughly translated to English and are likely to change when we get the official localization.
Unlike previous regions, the Land of the Morning Light does not have traditional grind spots, instead, there are 8 different bosses you can challenge and defeat. This system is called “Boss Rush” or “Black Shrine”, and there is a kill-time leaderboard for the fastest time record.
Currently all the bosses are defeated solo. At Calpheon Ball 2022 Pearl Abyss did mention that the bosses can also be defeated in co-op with your guild. With the guild versions having different attack patterns and mechanics from the solo version. However this is currently not the case, and it is likely there will be more updates to Boss Rush in the future, since some difficulty levels are not unlocked yet, and you can currently only obtain 3 Jewels of Light (even though the UI suggests we can obtain more).
How to Enter/Exit Boss Rush
Each boss must be unlocked first by completing the relevant Story Chapter from your Land of the Morning Light Storybook. After facing the boss for the first time as part of the story, you will be able to challenge them again.
The Boss Rush/Black Shrine menu can be accessed by going to the ESC Menu > Adventure (F5) > Black Shrine.
Select a boss from the list on the left side, then click the arrow button to get a ping location to the boss. Once you are at the boss location, you can press the “Start Battle” button from the Boss Rush menu to begin the fight.
If you die to the boss, you will automatically exit the Boss Rush. You can also leave early by pressing ESC, bringing up a pop-up box that will ask if you want to leave the fight.
Difficulty Levels and Weekly Limit
The boss fights are designed to be challenging and intense, and there are up to 10 levels of difficulty for each boss, with new mechanics or attack patterns introduced as you climb to a higher difficulty.
Currently, you can only challenge up to level 5, and level 6+ will be unlocked at a later date to allow time for players to become more familiar with the bosses.
Any class can challenge up to level 5 difficulty straight away, but to reach level 6 and higher, the difficulty must be unlocked one by one.
Eg. For the Warrior class, you can challenge up to level 5 with no restriction. But level 6 will only be unlocked once you have completed level 5, and level 7 will only unlock once you have completed level 6.
In addition, you can only obtain rewards for defeating up to 5 bosses per week. This is for the entire family and resets every Sunday at 00:00 UTC.
- The weekly limit is consumed every time you successfully defeat a boss, at each difficulty level. For example, if you defeat a boss at level 5, that will consume 1 weekly limit, and defeating the same boss at level 6 will consume another weekly limit.
- If you successfully defeat the boss, the number of defeated bosses will not be consumed again if you challenge the same boss again at the same level.
- The number of defeated bosses is only recorded if you successfully defeat the boss, and is not consumed if you fail or choose to leave the boss fight.
- If you have consumed all 5 of your weekly limit, you can still continue to challenge the boss, and your kill-time leaderboard ranking will still update.
Boss Attribute System
Each boss has one of 3 “attributes” allocated to them (eg. Sun, Moon, Earth) and the attribute the boss has, shows which type of elemental the boss has a weakness to.
In the Boss Rush UI, you can see which attribute is allocated to which boss and you can also access the Attribute Menu.
Here you can invest “Jewels of Light” into the different attributes, giving you additional stats against bosses with the same assigned attribute. The additional stat bonuses gained through the Attributes only apply to the boss that has that attribute.
Currently, you can only obtain a maximum of 3 “Jewels of Light”, by completing the story quests in Land of the Morning Light. You also start with 1 default Jewel already invested into each attribute.
The attributes are very important, since 90% of your damage is determined by the attribute type, and the remaining 10% is determined by your character AP. The ratio for your defenses is the same as well, with 90% of your defenses determined by the attribute type, and the remaining 10% determined by your DP.
However, your character stats will become more and more important when you reach the higher difficulty levels since the attributes can only be leveled so far.
In addition, certain character stats behave differently during the boss fight:
- Only 10% of skill add-on effects and buff effects related to the character’s AP/DP are applied.
- During the boss rush, only critical hits from attribute attacks are displayed. (Critical hits by existing character stats are applied but not displayed.)
- During the boss rush, the critical hit rate for attribute attacks is applied at 50%.
- During the boss rush, 20% resistance to all crowd control effects is applied. (The increased resistance value due to the existing character stats does not apply.)
For each invested Jewel of Light, you gain 50 AP and 100 DP in the Attribute. Once the Jewels of Light are invested into an Attribute, you can allocate them further to refine which stats you want to focus on. Click on the Attribute icon, to focus on that one Attribute. You will have a set amount of points to spend depending on the number of Jewels you have invested. For every 1 Jewel you invest, you gain 3 stat points. You can then choose to invest these stat points in damage (AP) or defense (DP). For each invested stat point, you can gain 1 AP or 1 DP.
For example, in the image below, we have invested 2 Jewels of Light into the Sun attribute.
This gives us an additional 100 AP and 200 DP.
- 50 AP x2 from the Jewels, and 100 DP x2 from the Jewels
We then also have 6 additional stats we can invest seperately, and 3 of these have already been invested into AP (shown in blue)
You can reset stats and Jewels at any time for a small silver cost:
- Resetting your Invested Jewels costs 2,000,000 silver
- Resetting your invested stats costs 500,000 silver
List of Bosses
Below is a list of all 8 bosses and their weak attribute type.
Preparing for Boss Rush
All of the boss fights are around 5 minutes long (whether you defeat the boss or die), so popping buffs can feel like a bit of a waste.
It is much more important to make sure your Attributes are correctly applied for the boss. Even in the earlier levels (3-4) players found a huge difference in difficulty and found the fights much easier when their Attributes were correctly assigned.
If you do decide to use buffs, make sure you pop the buffs before entering the boss fight, since you cannot use consumables once inside.
Below is a quick example checklist of buffs you may want to use:
Boss Fight Rules and Mechanics
This section obviously contains spoilers for the bosses, so please bare that in mind if you would like to attempt the bosses and defeat them without any prior knowledge of mechanics.
For now, there isn’t a lot of information, and we will add more details as we discover more of the bosses and their mechanics.
After entering the boss room, you will not be able to use potions or other consumables, so you cannot heal if you take damage.
Instead there are green orbs around the edge of the boss room, and if you hit these green orbs with a skill, you can recover HP.
The locations of the orbs seem to always be the same, so you can memorize exactly where they are.
At the beginning of the fight, the orb will start small, and if you don’t hit it, the size of the orb will grow larger. The larger the orb becomes, the more HP it will recover.
In the image below, you can see the difference between the smaller (left) and larger (right) orb.
Rewards and Boss Kill Leaderboard
First Clear (Adventure Log) Rewards
The first time you complete a boss at each difficulty level, you can obtain a reward from the new “Black Shrine Adventure Log”.
For level 1 – 4 of each boss, you are rewarded with the item bundle below, and the bundle is different depending on the attribute of the boss.
For example, the Sun attribute bosses will reward you with an Imperfect Lightstone of Fire, and the Earth Attribute will reward you with an Imperfect Lightstone of Earth.
For level 5, you can obtain the bundles below, which offer more rewards:
Weekly Leaderboard Rewards
Unlike other content, your main rewards for defeating the bosses do not arrive in your inventory straight away. Instead, the rewards are tied to the leaderboard and arrive in bundles every Sunday at 00:00.
When you successfully defeat a boss, your kill time is recorded in a leaderboard against other players. The Boss Rush rankings are applied to each class separately, and not to your entire family, and also only compare with characters that are the same class. For example, if you complete a boss on a Warrior class, your ranking will be compared with other Warriors only.
Since the boss weekly limit is not consumed if you challenge the same boss and same level, you can challenge yourself to improve your kill time freely, and the boss ranking leaderboard will update your best kill time.
These leaderboard rankings are updated at 00:00 every day and each week on Sunday at 00:00 the leaderboard is finalized.
Rewards are given to all players who successfully completed the boss. However, there are different tiers for the rewards, and the reward you obtain is based on your kill speed and ranking.
- You must claim your reward box before the following Sunday at 00:00, otherwise the reward will be forfiet.
| Example Boss completion reward (e.g. Golden Pig King) | |
|---|---|
| Right-click to acquire all of the items below. Imperfect Lightstone of FireSealed Black Magic CrystalMemory FragmentsJoseon CurrencyTrace of BattleEmbers of HongikBlack Stone (Weapon)Black Stone (Armor)The items below can be obtained additionally according to the specified probability.Dahn’s GlovesFlame of HongikPhoenix TearsHaetae’s TearsKirin’s TearsPhoenix Crystal (Level 8+ Bosses only)Haetae’s CrystalKirin’s Crystal (Level 8+ Bosses only)Phoenix Fragments (Level 5 – Level 7 Bosses only)Haetae Fragments (Level 5 – Level 7 Bosses only)Kirin Fragments (Level 5 – Level 7 Bosses only)Illusion GemTaebaek’s SpiritHarmony crystalCovert Dark CrystalFrozen Cold crystalCruel Slaughter crystalResplendent Lightstone of Fire | |