Archon Boreal is one of Erra's Archons, amalgams of Sentient and Warframes. His head is that of an owl with the body of a 
Loki Prime, armed with the 
Korumm. Boreal is fought during The New War and was revived for Archon Hunts.
Lore[]
Boreal the Owl was once a Sentient Beast, which were Sentients created by Praghasa and Hunhow to serve as the peacekeepers of Tau. After fighting and dying in the Old War, Boreal and the other Beasts were revived by Erra during the New War as Archons; hybrid abominations of Sentient and Warframe.
On Tau, the solitary Boreal believed he was above the other Sentients, only seeing the Ram, Pazuul, as his equal.
Becoming an Archon was humiliating for Boreal. Mutilated and turned into a tool of war, he is now filled with hatred, blaming both the Sentient and the Tenno for what he has become. He is indifferent to Erra's suffering under the guise of Pazuul, since it was Erra who turned Boreal into an Archon. Boreal now serves only the Ram, who provides him with easy targets for his spite.[1]
Behavior[]
- Shoots a targeted stream of
Electricity from his trident. - Converges a tri-beam of energy into one blast, dealing knockback and Electricity.
- Produces an Electricity ground field which causes static in an area for a short duration dealing damage over time.
- Boreal screeches as a giant orb of blue energy that surrounds it inflicting slow and dealing a small amount of damage while Boreal becomes immune to damage from attacks outside the orb while slowly regenerating its health. Attacking Boreal inside the sphere will cancel it.
- In Archon Hunts, Boreal gains an extremely small layer of Overguard. Depleting his protection will cancel the ability.
- Boreal becomes immune to damage, summoning Sentient reinforcements which must be killed to remove its invulnerability.
- Teleports a short distance.
- In Archon Hunts, Boreal surrounds itself in a blue pyramid-shaped barrier. Shooting the red orbs on each of its corners will disable the barrier.
Strategy[]
The New War[]
Boreal pollutes the field with 
Electricity hazards; stay moving at all times to avoid the danger. The main threat is Boreal's screech which can be negated by 
Smoke Screen and cancelled by attacking Boreal from within.
At parts of the fight, Boreal tries to grapple the Drifter, which must be escaped with a quick-time prompt (melee button, default E ).
Archon Hunt[]
Boreal's fight is largely similar to his New War counterpart but has been massively upgraded: he is level 150, is immune to most Warframe abilities, now has armor which cannot be removed, takes up to a maximum of 4 Status Effects of any type, and has Damage Attenuation which resists high-damage weapons. His health type has also been changed from Neutral to Narmer, taking increased damage from 
Slash and 
Toxin damage but resists 
Magnetic.
At half health, a cutscene has Boreal try to grapple the Warframe but is pushed off. He then retreats and must be pursued, the gateway ahead is guarded by two Narmer Deacons whose veils must be seized and placed at the gateway. The Deacons can tether itself to nearby allies, rendering it invulnerable until those linked allies are killed.
As Boreal's health decreases further, he will summon two to three Aerolysts to shield himself, which must be killed to remove Boreal's invulnerability; the Aerolysts themselves are invulnerable until the canisters on their torsos are destroyed. Boreal's final resort is surrounding himself in a pyramid-shaped barrier which can be destroyed by shooting the red orbs on each of its corners. After depleting all his health, Boreal collapses allowing the Warframe to interact with him and rip out his Archon Shard.
Trivia[]
- Boreal's name derives from the Greek God Boreas, the God of the North Wind.
- Miniature owls can be seen on Boreal's wings and on the back of his head.
Gallery[]
Patch History[]
Hotfix 36.0.8 (2024-07-25)
- Fixed Archons in Archon Hunts not using their proper Narmer Weaknesses/Resistances.
- As a refresher, here are the Narmer vulnerabilities/resistances:
- Vulnerable to Slash and Toxin
- Resistant to Magnetic
- The Archons in The New War Quest remain neutral since you don’t know what the “Narmer” faction is until the near end of the Quest, and therefore wouldn’t be able to plan for them given that you are locked into the Quest once started.
- As a refresher, here are the Narmer vulnerabilities/resistances:
Update 35.0 (2023-12-13)
- Fixed certain multishot alt-fire attacks, namely from the Arum Spinosa and Quassus, dealing unintentionally high damage to Archons.
- Maximum Damage Per Instance was incorrectly using these weapons’ Primary (single instance) attack instead of its alt-fire (multi-instance) attack in the damage attenuation calculation - which resulted in higher than intended damage numbers for each instance.
Update 34.0 (2023-10-18)
- Archon Hunt Damage Attenuation Changes
Speaking of earning Archon Shards, Damage Attenuation (or “damage pillows”) may be a familiar mechanic for those who frequent Archon Hunts each week.
This was a hot topic, especially near the end of 2022. Since then, we’ve taken our time to assess player feedback and devise a plan to address it -- and we’re finally at a place where we can execute it.
Damage Attenuation is one tool of many to increase enemy difficulty by limiting how much damage they take from player weapons, etc. Our current form of Damage Attenuation has resulted in many weapons feeling lackluster due to the high attenuation values, and damage output was reduced significantly to balance out the post-attenuation modifiers -- meaning that Archon fights felt like a slog if players did not use a limited set of optimal builds.
This is not a favorable outcome, so we have made the following changes:
1 - Maximum Damage Caps have increased
- Maximum Damage per Damage Instance has been increased
- Maximum Damage Per Second has been increased
Our goal is to make big hits still feel like big hits, especially for low-rate-of-fire weapons. We’re able to reduce the damage cap significantly because of the next change:
2 - Modifiers now apply before Damage Attenuation
Critical Multipliers (and other modifiers) applying post-damage-cap allowed for many of the One Shot builds to function, and for full transparency, we want to prevent One Shot Archon builds as much as possible. By changing where these modifiers apply, we can increase the Damage Caps to a much less punishing level for players.
Our goals with these changes are to:
- Increase player damage output, thereby reducing the overall time to kill for Archons
- Make “big hits” feel impactful by no longer throttling them to such an extreme degree
- Encourage overall build diversity for Archon Hunts
- Reduce the ability to use one-shot builds
We’re excited to see what Archon Hunts look like for players with these changes in the live build! Now that these changes have been released, we'll be keeping a close eye on player feedback and the resulting time-to-kill for Archons to see if further iteration is needed.
Hotfix 33.5.5 (2023-07-06)
- Fixed Archon Boreal at times being fully invincible during his screeching ability (even if you are within the sphere) in Archon Hunts.
Hotfix 32.0.2 (2022-09-08)
- Added complete Status Effect immunity to abilities that grant invulnerability to Archons.
- Fixes Archons being vulnerable to Status Effects in their invulnerable phase and presenting opportunities to potentially one-shot the Archon.
- Fixed Archon Boreal's Shard taking reduced damage when it should be taking more.
Hotfix 32.0.1 (2022-09-07)
- Made the following changes to Boreal:
- Added decay on scaling of Boreal’s invulnerability.
- Added Overguard protection on Boreal’s AoE attack.
- Both of these are to address the Archons sometimes taking exorbitant amounts of damage.
- Improved the pillar sound FX in the Boreal fight.
Update 32.0 (2022-09-07)
- NEW WEEKLY MISSION: ARCHON HUNTS (AVAILABLE NOW)
Upon completion of the Veilbreaker Quest, you will unlock Archon Hunts. Archon Hunts are a new class of weekly Mission that are available each week. Now, you can tackle these Narmer experiments with a full squad at your side!
Archon Hunts can be started from the tracking console in Kahl’s Garrison (releasing next week), or through navigation. Equip your Arsenal for a true test of your formidable power as Old foes re-join the fray.
Archon Changes
The final mission of the ARCHON HUNT will always be an Assasination - or ‘Archon Hunt’ mission - Tenno must take up arms against an Archon to complete the Hunt and earn themselves a great reward. Each weekly rotation of an Archon Hunt will feature a new Archon to defeat - Boreal, Amar, or Nira.
The Archons are not how you remember them, Tenno. Since your time fighting them solo in The New War, they have grown stronger. Each of the three Archons have received a rework to increase their difficulty level.
Their greater resistance to damage, harder-hitting attacks, and new methods of trickery make them a formidable foe - a well-equipped loadout and/or a resourceful squad are necessities to defeating these reworked Archons.
Update 31.0 (2021-12-15)
- Introduced.
See Also[]
- Korumm, Boreal's weapon
- Boreal's Mod Set:
 Narmer
| ||
|---|---|---|
| Grineer | Light | Narmer Flameblade • Narmer Powerfist • Narmer Shield Lancer |
| Medium | Narmer Ballista • Narmer Hellion • Narmer Lancer • Narmer Scorpion • Narmer Scorch • Narmer Trooper | |
| Heavy | Narmer Bombard • Narmer Commander • Narmer Heavy Gunner • Narmer Napalm | |
| Vehicles | Narmer Firbolg • Narmer Bolkor • Narmer Thumper Doma | |
| Corpus | Crewmen | Narmer Crewman • Narmer Detron Crewman • Narmer Jailer • Narmer Nullifier Crewman • Narmer Prod Crewman • Narmer Sniper Crewman • Narmer Corpus Tech |
| Walkers | Narmer Dera MOA • Narmer Disc MOA • Narmer Geminex MOA • Narmer Glaxion MOA • Narmer Raknoid | |
| Ospreys | Narmer Leech Osprey • Narmer Mine Osprey • Narmer Sapping Osprey • Narmer Shield Osprey | |
| Ships | Narmer Dropship | |
| Other | Narmer Deacon | |
| Archons (Bosses) | Archon Amar • Archon Boreal • Archon Nira | |
- ↑ Dialogue spoken by the Lotus during Archon Hunts.