Cyberpunk 2077 Boss Guide (All Bosses)

Cyberpunk 2077 (CP77) has several boss fights in the story. This Cyberpunk 2077 Boss Guide will walk you through the best strategies to defeat all bosses in the game. They are listed in chronological order below. It’s important to note that you might not trigger some boss fights at all depending on your choices. Most of them are optional and not mandatory. You won’t lose out on anything important by not doing a boss fight.

Bosses generally work the same way: They will first attack you with melee strikes, then as their health declines some of them will start using ranged weapons. But most are melee-oriented. You can dodge them by pressing the crouch button twice ( / ). Always dodge to the side or backward, then land some hits with a ranged weapon and repeat.

If you have too much trouble with any boss fight, remember you can lower the difficulty in the game settings at any time.

Royce

Main Mission: The Pickup
If you did the optional objective during this mission to talk to Meredith Stout and accepted the money chip from her, you can give it to the Maelstrom gang. Then Royce will run away and you will face him in a boss battle later in the mission, towards the exit of the Food Processing Plant. There are some alternative outcomes that would never trigger this fight. If you choose to pay the Maelstrom gang for the Flathead bot, you could get around the combat. If you go to the Maelstroms without the money chip from Meredith Stout, you can ask Royce “Really expect me to pay twice?” > “Prepared to offer us a discount?” > “Draw Weapon” to kill him right then and there without a fight.

Strategy: Assuming you get the fight with Royce at the end of the Food Processing Plant (Maelstrom hideout), he will be guarded by a shield and shoot rockets at you. Attacking will bring the shield down. Dodge his missiles or hide behind cars and other objects to stay safe. He also has a weakspot (orange color) on his lower back, if you make good use of cover you can get closer to him, then slide past him, shoot his weakspot, retreat to cover and repeat (shotguns are good for this tactic).

Item Drops:

• [Epic / Purple] Spiked Maelstromg Short-Sleeve Jacket (Outer Torso, 13.4 Armor / +15% Crit Chance /  Block Damage Reduction)
• [Rare Iconic / Blue] Chaos (Tech Pistol, 79.9 DPS, 18-22 Damage, can be charged to release a powerful shot)

Oswald Forrest (Woodman)

Main Mission: Automatic Love
Oswald Forrest aka “Woodman” is the boss who you’re supposed to interrogate in the Automatic Love main mission. If you choose not to pay him for the info you want and pick dialogue “Could end you with my bare hands” it will start the fight. If you were to pay him you’d not get this fight.

Strategy: Woodman will first try to hit you with melee attacks but pulls out a gun as his health declines. If you want to make really quick work of him, pick up the Katana in the restricted area leading to his office. Equip it and slash him up. This is the easiest method. Alternatively, you can use your bare hands but this is tricky on higher difficulties because of the bullet damage he will deal to you. If you use the Katana he will go down much faster. Regardless of however you defeat him, you can get the info you need from his computer afterward.

Item Drops:

• [Purple / Epic] M251S Ajax (Power Assault Rifle, 154.9 DPS, 28-34 Damage, 7.2 Weight)

Matilda K. Rose (Sasquatch)

Main Mission: I Walk the Line
While fighting your way through the mall in this mission, you will automatically run into a boss called Matilda K. Rose (aka “Sasquatch”). During the objective “Find the agent in the cinema”.

Strategy: Matilda (Sasquatch) is a big female brawler. She only does melee attacks. She’s slow and easy to dodge. The easiest method is to use firearms against her, keep your distance as much as possible and dodge all her attacks. It’s best to dodge to the side (press the crouch button / twice to dodge). On her back she has a glowing tech piece, which is her weakspot. By dodging sideways it’s easy to hit her weakspot. This piece also makes her recharge her health. Taking that out should be your first priority. It will explode in just a few hits, deals her a lot of damage, and stops her from recharging more health. After she lands a heavy attack she will be standing still for a moment, that’s your chance to hit her back. The rest of the fight is rather straightforward, just dodge and shoot her head. Fully automatic weapons and shotguns are best here. At some point she might pin you to the ground. Just keep attacking / and she should let go off you pretty quickly.

Item Drops:

• [Orange / Legendary] M-76E Omaha (Tech Pistol, 263.6 DPS, 20-24 Damage, 4.3 Weight)
• [Orange / Legendary] Comfy Nomad Shorts (Legs, 37.4 Armor, 0.4 Weight)

Akira

Main Mission: Never Fade Away

Strategy: While playing a Johnny Silverhand flashback you will encounter this boss in a room with normal enemies, can’t miss him. He doesn’t really pose a threat because he’ll go down pretty quickly and you have some teammates with you who will also attack him. Clear out the lesser enemies first, then focus on him. Akira will use a rifle. If you get close to him he will switch to melee. Odds are, you won’t even notice he’s a boss with a health bar because he will go down so quickly.

Item Drops:

• Nothing / No Drops

Placide

Main Mission: Transmission
If you sided with the NetWatch agent in the cinema during “I Walk The Line” (didn’t take him down) then the Voodoo Boys will turn hostile on you during this mission. After the Johnny Silverhand flashback, when you awake in the Voodo Boys’ hideout and they turn hostile on you, Placide will be waiting by the exit.

Strategy: He uses a shotgun against you.

Item Drops:

• [Orange / Legendary] Timeworn Trench Coat (Outer Torso, 54.2 Armor, 2.4 Weight)
• [White / Common] Chapel Access Key (Access Card)
• [Green / Uncommon] Ram Jolt (Long-lasting consumable, 1800 sec duration, Increases max RAM units by 2)
• [White / Common] Wooden Beads (Junk, worth 750 Eurodollars)

Sandayu Oda

Main Mission: Play It Safe
After you pull the cable out of the netrunner, the Sanduya Oda boss fight will start automatically.

Strategy: Sandayu Oda is the most versatile boss so far with the most varied moveset. He will start attacking you with dual melee weapons. Always dodge away or to the side when he attacks (double-press the crouch button / ). When you’re not dodging you’ll continuously want to shoot him. Doing Headshots with a Revolver works well here. Fully automatic weapons work good too but might run out of ammo too quickly. Shotguns can deal decent damage but depending on the model might be very slow to reload. Equip a weapon of a different ammo type in each slot (one Pistol / Revolver, one fully automatic weapon, one Sniper Rifle). This way you won’t run out of ammo so easily. Be careful to not get pushed into a corner by Oda’s melee attacks. When he jumps in the air and comes smashing down with a melee attack he will deal a lot of damage if not dodged. Just keep dodging continuously when he does that. After his first attack wave he will start alternating between a homing bullets and his melee attacks. When he uses homing bullets always run to cover. He will also start jumping / climbing up to the higher areas, from where he will shoot homing bullets exclusively. He takes little breaks between these bullet attacks, giving you a perfect opening to land some Sniper Rifle Headshots on him. As soon as he shoots you hide behind cover and repeat. As his health drops, he will start to use a stealth cloak and “disappear” from the minimap. You will see his health recharging while he hides away. Run through all the constructions huts in a circle around the area to find him. He will always hide in one of them (random where) and you can see the blue outline of his cloak. Shoot him and he will stop recharging health. Finding him quickly when he does that is important so he doesn’t have time to recharge much health. If your health gets dangerously low, just start running away through the constructions huts around the area and spam health items on yourself (press ). As long as you don’t run out of ammo or health items you will be fine. So ideally, go into this fight well-stocked on both of those things.

Item Drops:

• [Purple / Epic Iconic] Jinchu-Mari (Melee Katana, 465.4 DPS, 97 Damage, 4.5 Weight)
• [Orange / Legendary] Arasaka Polycarbonate-Lacde Bulletproof Aramid Vest (Outer Torso, 70.3 Armor, 2.8 Weight)
• [Orange / Legendary] Kogana No Yume Titanium BD Wreath (Face Armor, 33.4 Armor, 0.1 Weight) – dropped on Hard Difficulty for me, didn’t drop on easy
• [Purple / Epic] Heat-Resistant Military Boots (Feet, 45.0 Armor, 0.5 Weight)

Adam Smasher

Main Mission: Totalimmortal / Belly of the Beast
Depending on what Ending Path you are on, the final quest will be called different and you will fight Adam is a different room. But the same strategy applies, he uses the same attacks regardless.

Strategy: For this fight it’s recommended that you equip a Revolver, an Assault Rifle, and a Sniper Rifle (this covers different types of ammo so you don’t run out of bullets). Adam Smasher will initially use melee attacks. Shoot off his right arm (when you aim at him, to your left). When he loses this body part it deals him a lot of damage and he will stop using melee attacks. Then he will mostly resort to using the rocket launcher on his back. When he shoots rockets you will always want to keep moving because they are targeted at the area where you were standing. They are easy enough to avoid. Between his missile charges you can then shoot him with your Sniper Rifle and Assault Rifle from afar. He will also start spawning some lesser enemies as his health drops. The Ninja-type enemies are easily defeated with 1-2 frag grenades (they might evade your bullets, so toss a grenade to save ammo). Circle around the upper area and keep your distance to Adam Smasher. Only focus on the lesser enemies when they get close to you, otherwise focus your attention on Adam Smasher. He has quite a lot of health but after his initial melee phase he’s pretty limited in his moves. Shoot off the rocket launcher on his back and he will be defenseless and not have much left to attack you. At that point you could also smash him with melee weapons if you run out of ammo.

Item Drops:

• Access Card (mission key item) – only if you’re on the Totalimmortal Ending Path.

For more guides check out the complete Cyberpunk 2077 Wiki & Strategy Guide.