Tips and Tricks: Rat King

The Rat King, found in Amber Island's Cave, can be a difficult boss to fight. Most players are simply unprepared to face him because he is not in a Hazardous Ruin like the Chemical Dropout, instead appearing during  The Poisoned Water.

Not only is his dungeon a surprise, but he also has high health, starts with minions, deals a lot of damage, and has a long combo. These make him dangerous.

Below are some tips and tricks specific to the Rat King and where you are in the main quest.

Level: 21+
You'll want to be at least level 21, preferably higher. The Rat King is level 25. The higher your level, the better the Clothing you can use and the more Skill Points you end up with.

Health: 1,100-1,500
1,100-1,500 is a good range to have, but the fight is doable without as much health, just harder. You can boost this with your level, furniture, and skills.

Skills: Combat-focused
There are several skills that help with this fight. If you are having difficulty, you can use Acupuncture to rearrange your skills both before and after the fight. You can reach the end of the combat skill tree with 22 skill points. Below is a good guide by tier.
 * Tier 1 - Evasive, then dash. For the purposes of this fight, Intensive Training is not necessary.
 * Tier 2 - Any are good. Go by your style.
 * Tier 3 - Recovery, then both/either Defense Posture or Aggressive Stance. Recovery helps with dodging and running. Defense Posture makes the Player more immune to damage. Aggressive Stance provides additional damage as you lose health.
 * Tier 4 - Healer because it makes your recovery items last longer. Pain Dealer helps with the stun from the Lion's Claw (mentioned later). For the purposes of this fight, Loot is not necessary
 * Tier 5 - Fatal strike. Precision Strike if you bring a Triple Barrel Snakebite.

Equipment

 * Clothing: The best you can afford. At this point the best you can get is probably the Meidi Traditional Top, Bottom, and Hat. Clothing is your primary and biggest source of Defense.
 * Carol can revise clothing to higher levels if you've made her the special sewing machine. Note this mission happens later in the year, so it is possible you don't have access to it yet
 * Weapons: Lion's Claw and Triple Barrel Snakebite.


 * The Lion's Claw (reward from the 4th level Hazardous Ruins in the Collapsed Wasteland) is strongly recommended. Not only does it deal a high amount of damage, the third, last hit in the combo briefly stuns. This stun can be enough to stun lock the Rat King, or at the very least reduce the Rat King's damage output.
 * If you cannot obtain the Lion's Claw, it is unlikely you can defeat the Rat King simply because the Rat King is a tougher opponent than the level 4 Chemical Dropout.
 * The Iron Sword (Enhanced Iron Sword if possible) is also good but not as necessary to bring because the Iron Sword hits faster and in a larger area.
 * You can grind the Animal Skeletons necessary for the Enhanced Iron Sword from the Rats in this dungeon. A good infinite spawn spot is apparently right before you meet the Rat King (please confirm)
 * The Triple Barrel Snakebite, although this will cost you some Relationship points with Lee and Nora on the first use, provides an auto-aiming, ranged solution.
 * Accessories: Critical Chance items are the most beneficial.
 * For Critical Chance items, Sunglasses and Exquisite Fountain Pen both give +10% Critical Chance. A Desk Lamp will give +6%. You cannot have multiple of the same item in your accessory slots. This will provide more damage overall with the higher damage weapons.
 * Defense items such as Knight's Shield or Pinecock Bowler can be mildly helpful, but these are both extremely hard to get by this point without grinding.
 * If using the above mentioned weapons, Attack accessories will simply not increase the Player's damage output nearly as much as critical chance items will. +33 from 3 Yellow Sapphire Necklaces, even if possible, simply gives less damage than the 26% chance of doing 2-2.5 times as much damage per hit for both Lion's Claw (+150) and Enhanced Iron Sword.
 * At this point, the Player's Health Points should be high enough even +150 from 3 Small Satchels only adds around 10% to your health. Since this is roughly equivalent to a single hit from the Rat King, sacrificing damage output for being able to survive a single hit is not ideal.

Consumables
By this point in the game, you should be able to craft Sweet Caviar for Health Points, Golden Radish Soup for Stamina if the season is Fall or later, Dried Apple Slice if not, and Bubblefish Stew for Critical Chance. See the general page Tips and Tricks for other options

Strategies

 * Use Inventory Screen to heal and apply buffs. Although you can assign the items to the item bar, having to switch between food and weapons while fighting can be confusing and will waste time. Default key for inventory is " i "
 * Stay Close. The Rat King, unlike Chemical Dropout, seems to have a spot right under his belly and by his feet where some of his attacks can't hit (please confirm with current build). He also turns slowly.
 * Dodge Some Attacks. Some attacks deal more damage than others (Please confirm which attacks deal the most damage). Figure out which attack or attacks are most damaging and dodge those. Some attacks may take two dodge rolls to completely avoid
 * Bring Enough Good Consumables. Sweet Caviar (health), Golden Radish Soup or Dried Apple Slice (stamina), and Bubblefish Stew (Critical Chance) are ideal. Something for Defense and Attack are also helpful if you're having issues
 * Maximize your critical chance. With a potential +26% from accessories, a +35% from food, +20% from being best friends with Arlo, you will have an 81% chance to land a Critical Hit with just boosts. This can let you deal 1-2k damage or more per combo with Lion's Claw.

Other

 * Check your house level - if you don't have enough health, you can try to upgrade your house before the fight
 * Have the right friends - as mentioned before, befriending the Civil Corps members helps with your stats