Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is being heavily praised by Soulslike enthusiasts for its great boss fights with challenging combat. The latest title by Team Ninja is now of the hottest topics of discussion among gamers. Some players who have progressed quite a bit ahead have hit a wall and have been wondering how to defeat Zhang Liao. The difficulty of the bosses at this stage of the game is a level above the rest.
Zhang Liao is the main boss of the mission, The Way of the Warrior, and is a mandatory enemy. He appears later again in The Fearless Blade as well. His attacks hit hard and have quite a bit of range. It will hurt significantly if you are caught in them, especially in his fatal blow attacks. As always, deflection is the key to winning this battle.
You should go into the fight with some considerable preparation. Use your Genuine Qi as much as possible and upgrade your Dragon’s Cure Pot to the maximum for significant healing. Equip your Tiger Seals as you will need them to call reinforcements. Zhang Liao uses lightning attacks quite frequently so boost your lightning resistance by equipping such items and gear. Buff yourself before entering the arena as the fight starts as soon as you step into it.
In this article, you will know how to defeat Zhang Liao in Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty:
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty guide – Zhang Liao’s attacks, tips to defeat, and more explored
Summoning allies
You can summon Zhang Fei and Liu Bei in this fight to help you out. As it takes place in a closed room, having two allies will prove to be a good advantage. Let them attack from the front while you go and land some hits at Zhang Liao from the back.
Moveset and attack patterns
Zhang Liao’s Divine Beast, Bixie, will have a lightning attack that can reach all around him, even his back. You should keep your distance from him during this, and it is better if you are careful with your attacks and are not greedy.
Zhang Liao will have a lot of rush, spin, slam, lunge, and leap attacks, which might be normal or be infused with lightning. His lightning slam is an AoE attack that is best avoided by getting behind him while he charges up.
The spinning attacks are a problem as they can only be parried or dodged at the last-second thrust. You should ideally get away from these and either dodge or ideally parry the rest of his attacks if you want to bring down his spirit gauge.
Fatal blow attacks
Zhang Liao has three fatal blow attacks that he will use soon once you start progressing in the fight.
The first critical attack is a forward slash that you will be able to identify by a red glow. He will jump backwards and charge towards you in a straight line. You can deflect this attack by pressing the parry button right when he is about to hit you.
The second fatal blow attack is a jumping slash where he will jump into the air and come down with a spinning slash with his sword. As always, you can perfectly parry this attack too by successfully timing your deflection.
The third fatal blow attack is the most powerful and critical move Zhang Liao does. It consists of lightning strikes that are very powerful and difficult to parry. As such, it takes very precise timing to successfully pull the deflection off. He coats his sword with lightning, does an overhead spinning slash, and dashes towards you for the horizontal slash that radiates lightning strikes.
After finishing half of his health bar, Zhang Liao’s fatal blow attacks will always be followed by another, so make sure to deflect or dodge both of them. Getting hit by consecutive critical blow attacks will kill you for sure.
You should always aim to perfectly deflect all the critical attacks as it will significantly exhaust his spirit gauge, creating an opening for one of your fatal strikes. This is the best way to deplete his HP and win this fight.
How to defeat Zhang Liao: Final thoughts
Zhang Liao is easily one of the toughest bosses in the game and requires the implementation of all the skills you have learned up till this point. All his attacks hurt quite a bit and have a considerable amount of range.
If you are not confident about parrying a certain attack, dodge it. Taking advantage of his long telegraphed wind-ups and getting behind him to land some hits is another way of approaching this fight. Even so, deflecting his critical attacks is the key to winning this battle.
Using Qilin as your Divine Beast for this battle is also a good idea to break Zhang Liao’s stance quickly. You can use your own preference as well. To help you out, here’s a list of the five best Divine Beasts in the game.
Defeating Zhang Liao will reward you with the Valorous Vanguard Armor Set and the Dire Tiger Straight Sabre.
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