Cowgirl

*This article may contain spoilers about the game*

 First appearance | E2M6

The **Cowgirls** are enemies encountered in The Facilities. A single Cowgirl makes her first major appearance as a boss in E2M5: The Escher Labs, and soon appear as regular enemies throughout the game in the level after.

## Appearance

Cowgirls appear as tall, emaciated women wearing cowboy hats (which are grafted onto their heads). They are half-naked and have various mechanical augments, including robotic legs and a rocket launcher replacing the left arm. The Cowgirl's constant moaning may suggest that they were experimented on by The Military against their will, to the point of constant agony.

## Tactical Analysis

Upon spotting a player, Cowgirls will moan and begin to move towards the player. Cowgirls can fire up to 5 high-speed rocket projectiles in a single barrage from their rocket launchers. They telegraph each barrage by bending over towards the player, an act which is accompanied by a long creaking noise; Cowgirls will *immediately* fire upon a visible player for as long as they're in firing "stance", so players who wish to avoid being fired upon should hide out of sight until the Cowgirl stands upright again. Cowgirls make a distinct squeaking noise when they move, giving away their position to players.

Because Cowgirls don't move while in firing stance, the weapons that can do damage without requiring a direct line of sight such as the Crossbow and Mortar are very useful for exploiting the Cowgirl's immobility. Cowgirls give a short grace period between each firing stance, which can be taken advantage of with Riveter fire or point-blank Super Shotgun blasts.

Cowgirls are excellent for instigating monster infighting because of their large amount of health and damaging projectiles, which enable them to do significant damage to any monsters that are in their line of fire. They can also be hurt from their rockets' own splash damage, which can often cause Cowgirls to inadvertently suicide during prolonged bouts of infighting. Cowgirls have the largest health pool of any regular enemy at 2000 hp (Superhuman/Beyond-Enhanced Durability), and as such they are the only non-boss enemy that can survive more than two perfect Super Shotgun shots.

## Trivia

* The Cowgirl shares many similarities with the Iron Maiden, a *Quake 2* enemy. Both are female, cybernetically altered, and possess an arm-mounted rocket launcher.
* A single large Cowgirl appears as the Mama boss in The Escher Labs. In E2M9: The Dig, two more boss Cowgirls appear as The Twins.
* Cowgirls appear to be analogous to *DOOM*'s Baron of Hell and *Quake*'s Shambler enemies, serving as mini-bosses.
* An unused texture found in Dusk's files depicts the Cowgirl fully nude with mutilated breasts and genitalia, compared to the final's breastplates and mechanical thighs. A more minute difference is there being slightly more saturated colors and the metal portions being brighter and having less contrast. David Szymanski cites this texture was created when DUSK was more horror centric, only for Dave Oshry to claim it to be too grotesque and could potentially offend people. The texture can be restored with the modding SDK.

## Gallery

* A Cowgirl in-game.
* Current Cowgirl texture.
* Original Cowgirl texture.
* Original texture in-game.
* David Szymanski on why the texture was changed.