God Tamer

"Veteran warrior of the Colosseum of Fools. Fights by the side of creatures she has trained. Some hunters train beasts to join them in chasing down prey. I tried it once, but couldn't resist the urge to test my companion's strength against mine."

The God Tamer is a boss in Hollow Knight. She sits at the top of the Trial of the Fool.

Lore The God Tamer is a veteran warrior of the Colosseum of Fools, taking the mantle of boss of the last and most brutal trial. She compensates for her small stature with the strength of her tamed beast, alongside which she fights. They both present signs of the Infection.

In-game events The God Tamer is confronted at the end of the Trial of the Fool after all other gladiators and foes have been vanquished. She abandons the fight if her Beast is defeated before her. On the other hand, the Beast will continue fighting even if she is defeated first.

Upon defeat, the Infection within the Beast bursts out, making it explode. While the Beast dies at the end of the fight, the God Tamer herself remains alive and collapses on the ground no matter who is defeated first.

Behaviour and Tactics
The Tamer has the following attack:
 * Leap: The God Tamer leaps into the air and swings her lance down. She brings her lance down just as she lands. God Tamer tracks the Knight with this attack, bringing her lance down where the Knight was when she started the leap. Despite this, there is a maximum range to this attack of about 75% of the arena. This attack happens independent of the Beast's attacks.

The Beast has the following attacks:
 * Roll: The Beast curls up into a ball and rolls across the arena towards the Knight. It traverses the entire arena and when it hits the wall, it bounces high into the air and attempts to land on the Knight. The bounce tracks the Knight, landing where the Knight was when the Beast struck the wall, not when it started the roll. While it is rolling, the Beast is invulnerable to Nail attacks, but not spells.
 * Spew: The Beast spews blobs of infection towards the Knight. The projectiles travel in three groups: one group drops just in front of the Beast, another flies across most of the arena, and the third group splits the difference. This formation creates large, safe gaps on the arena floor between the groupings. The blobs persist on the ground for about two seconds.

Be warned that there are no checkpoints in the Colosseum, so if the player loses to the God Tamer, they have to start the Trial of the Fool from the beginning. This boss is also found in the Pantheon of the Sage.

God Tamer stops fighting once her Beast dies so it is recommended to focus on the Beast while dodging and ignoring the Tamer. To focus damage on the Beast, the Nail Art Cyclone Slash is very helpful as a way to respond when the Beast completes a Roll attack. The Spells Vengeful Spirit/Shade Soul and Desolate Dive/Descending Dark are also very useful to damage the Beast, either when the Beast is far away or when the Beast is bearing down on The Knight, respectively. Thus Shaman Stone is recommended. The Beast has very few ways of dealing with attacks from above. Therefore, down-striking the Beast with the Nail is incredibly effective when the Beast is not Rolling.

There is plenty of time to heal before God Tamer enters the arena. Both God Tamer and her Beast have relatively little health by boss standards, making them susceptible to damage-bursting them both down, especially with Stalwart Shell equipped.

The Spell, Vengeful Spirit/Shade Soul, is useful in this fight because it can hit both the Beast and God Tamer with a single cast. It is also able to keep the Tamer away when dealing with the Beast.

Equipping Weaversong can make the fight trivial. Simply sticking to one of the walls of the arena using the charge of Crystal Heart keeps the Knight completely safe while the weavers slowly kill the two enemies.

The Shade Cloak helps immensely with dodging the God Tamer and the Beast.

Even once the Beast is defeated, the God Tamer may make one more Leap attack but stops fighting shortly after.

Location
This Boss is only found in the Colosseum of Fools and Godhome.

Trivia

 * God Tamer is the only backer designed Boss that is not a Warrior Dream.
 * God tamer's initial name was Lobster Lancer and as the name suggests, the original concept for the Beast was a giant lobster. The God Tamer's design was based on a cockroach.
 * The name Lobster Lancer is still used within game files.
 * "The Lancer is a mysterious, melancholy figure, ruminating in a field of countless discarded nails and bones. Hollow Knight may find the challenge is more than he'd bargained for if he should attempt to speak with the Lancer. For the Lancer is not alone, he is accompanied by his stalwart steed: a massive, battle-scarred crustacean. But the old warrior has led a long, arduous existence filled with regret... Perhaps he may finally find peace on the edge of Hollow Knight's trusty nail. Regardless of any embellishment from future bards, what follows is not a glorious battle between heroes; what follows is a miserable execution of a crestfallen veteran well past his prime."
 * God Tamer is one of few bosses to have multiple entities attack the player, the others being Mantis Lords, Watcher Knight, Oblobbles and Brothers Oro & Mato.
 * The Tamer has the Dream Nail dialogue of generic husk enemies instead of the lines of the Colosseum's Fools.

References

Божья укротительница Domatrice di Dei Pogromczyni Bogów