Count Geonor, the Putrid Wolf, is the final boss of Act 1 inPath of Exile 2and serves as a skill check for players looking to advance into Act 2 and progress further into the campaign. There are three different phases of this boss fight, and each has a new attack pattern to learn and ingrain.
Defeating Count Geonor requires precise positioning to avoid his hard-hitting attacks and the understanding of when to go in and when to back off.Dodging or blockingis key, and button-mashing will get even the most overpowered builds killed in an instant, as the Mad Wolf is not an easy fight to brute force.
How to Beat Count Geonor in PoE 2
Geonor’s fight is split into three different phases. In the first phase, he is in his human form, swinging a large greatsword, using ice attacks, and occasionally transforming into a wolf. In phase 2, he fully transitions into wolf form, regaining all his HP and gaining entirely new attacks and abilities, ones that are significantly harder to dodge. In phase 3, he becomes enraged, becoming a significantly greater threat.
Phase 1: Human Form
The first phase in this fight is quite easy. Geonor telegraphs his attacks quite early, and plenty of time is available between combos to deal damage.
Dodge Difficulty
Sword Combo
Geonor swings the sword at the enemy in front of him seven times.
Easy
Sword Thrust
Geonor thrusts his sword forward, creating a wind slash that travels at high speeds.
Sword Charge
Geonor lines up his sword towards the player and charges in a straight line, impaling the player if they’re caught in the charge.
Sword Ice Wall
Geonor summons two ice walls to trap the player character inside a cone before slamming down his sword to deal massive damage. The walls are breakable.
Wolf Summons
Geonor transforms into a wolf and summons five smaller wolves to aid him.
Red Blood Slam
Geonor transforms into a wolf and fades away into a red mist for a second before slamming on top of the player’s location, dealing massive AoE damage.
Hard
The main move to look out for in this phase is theRed Blood Slam. It is very hard to dodge, mainly because if you start the dodge as soon as the blood circle appears, you won’t be able to escape the attack. The only way to avoid taking damage is to move toward the edge of the circle before dodging. This needs to be timed precisely. Otherwise, you’ll get caught on the edge of the blast zone and tank the hit. Since there are no i-frames, dodging is only effective if you actually escape the damage AoE.
To make this fight easier, players can summon others for help using the Party feature and have themteleport to the boss fight.
Phase 2: Wolf Form
After Geonor falls down to roughly 40% HP, he transforms fully into a large wolf and regains all of his HP.
IcicleBreath
Geonor creates icicles in a thin cone from his breath. The icicles deal low damage and slow enemies.
Ice Spikes
Geonor plunges his sword into the ground, creating small circles of frost in a large area around himself. After a brief delay, ice spikes emerge from the circles, freezing the player if they’re caught inside
Medium
Ice Mist
Geonor summons a damaging fog that blankets the edges of the arena, periodically summoning more and more wolves for 30 seconds. Periodically, he bolts across the arena, damaging the player if they don’t dodge out of the way.
Requiem on high
Geonor summons beams of ice from the heavens, striking the ground in a small AoE for medium damage and slow effect.
The safest area during the Ice Spikes attack is far away from Geonor. However, if players stand on a spot where there is no ice surface, they will escape the attack entirely. This allows melee characters to wail on the boss without worrying about dodging. It is thebestWindow of Opportunityfor DPS.
Avoiding the summoned wolves duringIce Novais a mistake. Thirty seconds is a long time to dodge out of the way consistently, especially with Geonor constantly nipping at your heels. It is, in fact, a blessing in disguise becausekilling the wolves is a way to refill the health and mana flasks.Do not hesitate to use your best AoE spells and abilities to take care of the wolves; they can easily trap you to death if you let yourself be caught and swarmed.
While it’s possible to use ranged spells during Requiem on high, it’s easier to focus on dodging the beams instead.
If you’re having trouble with a lack of DPS, consider upgrading your main weapon byincreasing its rarityor adding modifiers.
Phase 3: Enraged Wolf Form
When Geonor is on his final legs in wolf form and falls down to roughly 25% HP, he will become enraged. He uses the same attacks in this phase as in the previous one, with one key addition.
Red and Black Beams
Geonor summons beams of red light from the sky that deal damage in a small AoE upon impact. This works exactly like ‘Requiem on high’ only with slightly more damage.
After the first time, Geonor summons the beams, they start appearing alongside his other attacks without warning. Keeping a ready finger on the dodge key is the only solution to this.
Culling skills, ones that automatically kill an enemy when their health is below a certain threshold, work on Geonor and are an easy way to get through phase 3.
