Elite Nethengeic Wither

**Damage** | **Fireball:**
Easy: 16 (×8)
Normal: 30 (×15)
Hard: 45 (×22.5)
**Flamethrower:**
Easy: 1 (×0.5)
Normal: 1 (×0.5)
Hard: 1.5 (×0.75)
**Flame aura:**
Easy: 3.5 (×1.75)
Normal: 5 (×2.5)
Hard: 7.5 (×3.75)
**Fire Bomb:**
Easy: 24 (×12)
Normal: 45 (×22.5)

**Elite Nethengeic Wither** is a stronger version of Nethengeic Wither with increased stats and various behavioral changes.

## Spawning

Elite Nethengeic Wither can be fought by using a Gold Nethengeic Wither Trophy on a Boss Altar.

## Behavior

Elite Nethengeic Wither is aggressive, and will attack any entity within 64 blocks of it without provocation. Once Elite Nethengeic Wither is aggroed to a target, or a player/mob aggroed it, it will continue attempting to attack until the target moves over 100 blocks away.

Elite Nethengeic Wither is a flying ranged attacker that combines aspects of the Wither and Nethengeic Beast. It has three heads which are all capable of independently attacking targets.

Elite Nethengeic Wither is immune to fire damage, wither damage, and the Nethengeic Curse effect.

### The three heads

Elite Nethengeic Wither consists of three heads: One 'central' head in the center and two 'side' heads. All of the heads are capable of using the Fireball and Flamethrower attacks, but only the central head can use the Fire bomb attack. No matter what, the side heads will continue to use the Fireball or Flamethrower attacks as long as Elite Nethengeic Wither is aggroed to something.

If more than one player is within aggro range of Elite Nethengeic Wither, each head is capable of independently targeting different players.

### Flight patterns

Elite Nethengeic Wither is a flying monster that attempts to keep within a certain distance of its target.

While targeting an entity, it will attempt to keep within a 5-20 block distance between it and its target, moving back and forth as necessary to try to maintain this distance.
If it is within this distance, it will then strafe left and right slowly to increase its evasiveness.
While moving to a new position, or strafing its target, it is unaffected by gravity and will hover in place or move up and down only as determined by its pathfinding.

If it is not actively pathing to any location or strafing a target, it will slowly glide back down to the nearest surface.
It will then randomly roam around, hovering to new positions and floating down as needed.

### Fireball

Elite Nethengeic Wither's most common attack is shooting fireballs from each head. These fireballs have the following properties:

* Deal 30 (×15) Ranged attack damage on a direct hit
* Create a small concussive explosion on hit. This explosion has a radius of 2 blocks, deals up to 5 (×2.5) damage, and has a chance to ignite blocks outside Nowhere
* Ignite entities on direct hit, dealing 3 (×1.5) total fire damage
* Inflict Nethengeic Curse for 10 seconds on direct hit. The level of Nethengeic curse depends on the difficulty: II on easy, III on normal, and IV on hard

The central head will fire a fireball every 0.5-0.75 seconds, while the side heads each fire a fireball every 1-1.5 seconds.

### Flamethrower

Elite Nethengeic Wither's second most common attack is its flamethrower. This attack will only ever be used once a flame aura has been activated, and so is bound by the cooldown of the flame aura itself.

When this attack is started by any head, Elite Nethengeic Wither will stop strafing and positioning itself, and will instead emit flame particles from the corresponding head towards its target, whilst slowly floating towards them.
Coming into contact a flame particle will deal 1 (×0.5) Flamethrower damage, with an additional 1/3 chance to set its target on fire for 1 second, and a 1/3 chance to add wither II for 4 seconds. The fire time of this attack will cap out at 15 seconds.

During the attack, other heads can continue firing fireballs at targets or initiate flamethrower attacks of their own.

This attack lasts for 8-12 seconds, before ending.

### Fire bomb

Once Elite Nethengeic Wither has been damaged to 75%, 50%, then 25% of its max health pool, it will be able to trigger its highest-damage attack - the fire bomb.
This attack cannot begin if a flame aura is currently active.

When this attack begins, it will immediately stop moving, and after a second it will activate its flame aura.
Every 0.7 seconds, it will spawn 8-9 columns of fireballs in a ring around, each with 5 fireballs in a column.
They will remain in place for 0.7 seconds, before shooting off directly away from the wither, and another set of fireballs will take their place, with a slight offset that continuously changes for every round.

Fireballs fired during the fire bomb attack deal 50% more damage than normal, but travel ~15% slower than their normal counterparts, making them easier to dodge.
During the fire bomb attack, the firing rate of the other heads will be halved.
The fire bomb attack continues for 14 seconds.

While normally a fighter will only encounter the fire bomb attack 3 times in a fight (once for each quarter-health threshold reached), it is possible to encounter it more times if it is able to regain health back above a previous threshold before being damaged down below it again.

### Flame aura

Every time the central head attacks with a standard fireball, it has a 1/10 chance to instead do its flame aura special ability.
When this occurs, it will spin its hands out to its side, and a second later a sphere of flame particles will appear swirling around it.

While it is active, it has the following effects:

* Any melee damage dealt to it will inflict 5 (×2.5) fire recoil damage back to its attacker, set them on fire for 2 seconds, and add Nethengeic Curse III for 10 seconds
* Any energy-typed damage dealt to it (such as blaster projectiles) will heal it instead.

Once a head has activated an aura, it will begin a flamethrower attack.
This aura remains until its target dies or otherwise disappears, or its flamethrower attack finishes.
Once finished, each will have a cooldown of 20-40 seconds before it can use it again.

In addition to this, the central head will also activate its flame aura ability while it is doing its fire bomb special attack. It has all of the same effects during this, and lasts until the fire bomb attack finishes.
It will not have a cooldown after activating its aura in this manner however.

## Drops

 The above pool is rolled 1 time

## Bestiary Entry

They are an extremely rare occurrence, probably due to the rarity of the Wither itself combined with the isolated nature of the beasts.
Not much more is known about them due to both their rarity, and their intensely aggressive demeanor, but it is generally accepted that they are not naturally occurring creatures, but are purely constructions of fused essence.
Regardless, much like either of its counterparts; it is extremely dangerous and any time spent in its proximity is time spent peering into the finality of death.
Run, while you can.
This particular creature was magically enhanced by unknown means, giving it much greater strength, abilities, and intelligence.

## Trivia

* The fiery parts of Elite Nethengeic Wither's body will glow in the dark.