The gimmick
What Test Subject does
The one thing that defines this fight — read this before you draft your route.
A multi-phase marathon: it revives into successive phases with more HP and a fresh modifier each time, and cleanses its debuffs on transition. Reported phases punish Skill spam (gaining Strength), insert Wounds on unblocked hits, and go Intangible on alternating turns — so each phase demands a different gameplan.
Game plan
How to beat Test Subject
Ordered priorities for the fight. Tools shift by deck, but these beats hold across most archetypes.
- Plan for the long haul — total HP across phases is large, so conserve burst and one-time resources rather than blowing them on phase one.
- In the Skill-punish phase, lean on attacks and avoid spamming Skills that feed its Strength.
- In the Wound phase, block diligently — unblocked hits clog your deck, so prevention beats cleanup.
- Time your biggest hits for the turns its Intangible drops; dumping burst into an Intangible turn is wasted, since damage is shaved to 1.
By character
Class-specific tips
How each kit leans into this matchup. Open a class hub for full builds and card priorities.
Exhaust synergies clear the Wounds it inserts, and big controlled burst lands cleanly on the non-Intangible turns.
Pre-stacked poison keeps damaging it through Intangible turns and across phase transitions where direct hits stall.
Verify
Sources
Roster and mechanics cross-checked against the official wiki and EA boss coverage: