Grim Reaper Achievement in Dragon Age: Origins

  • Grim Reaper

     

    50

    Defeated the Harvester on Hard or Nightmare difficulty

  • How to unlock Grim Reaper

    I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is that you can switch difficulty right before The Harvester fight (after you find the sixth note) and get the achievement. You CANNOT switch the difficulty once the fight begins however. If you had thoughts about getting the Harvester within one hit of death changing the difficulty, think again. The bad news, the Harvester is insanely hard. The easiest character type to beat the Harvester with is a Mage. With a Warrior or a Rogue, struggles will ensue.

    With the Mage, you want an Arcane Warrior. Some of the spells that you want are flame weapons, crushing prison, group heal, revival, haste, and miasma. With the Warrior, be a tank. With a high enough number of hit points, you can take anything. Just have plenty of health poultices. With the Rogue, you'll have to be crafty. Attack the Harvester from behind as much as you can. If you have dual wield and two good weapons, use them. Otherwise, stick with one powerful weapon.

    Prepare early. Find all of the notes for your golem and get it fully upgraded. Set it's tactics to Ranged and make Group Heal it's top priority. Set the tactics of the two dwarves to Defensive. Set three of Brogan's tactics to use "Taunt" and "Grievous Insult" and to use a stamina poultice when that drops below 25%. This will ensure that the Harvester is usually targeting only Brogan. You'll spend most of your time in the battle with Brogan selected downing health poultices, so make sure you have plenty of health poultices left. I had about 220 in my stockpile when starting the battle. Anytime someone's health drops to about half, switch to them and heal unless the golem takes care of them first.

    The first form is the hardest. This first phase of the fight is really about how quickly you can knock down the Harvester's health while avoiding the "yellow" and "orange" skeletons. Hack away as best you can and heal anyone that needs it. During the first form, skeletons will start to appear around you. The Harvester will basically stay in place though. You want to start the second phase with as few skeletons as possible since the Harvester will just summon more. One good thing you can do to get around the skeletons is to use the switch on the right side of the room as you enter. If you click on it, the skeletons will disappear. To click on it, hit (or hold depending upon your set up) , get the switch in the center of wheel, and push . Be warned though, more will appear a few seconds later though, so get your shots into the Harvester quickly. At certain points, you'll hear one of the dwarves yell that weapons are no longer effective. If you can, switch to the golem and cast chain lightning. If you find yourself being overwhelmed, as the sole survivor, and you can't get to the switch, then start running around. Get some distance between yourself and the Harvester and chip away at the skeletons. The most important thing to remember with the first form is that you keep the golem alive at all costs. If the golem goes down, you will too, eventually.

    Once you defeat the larger form, the Harvester will become the little crawling thing you've seen in the distance. It'll jump around to certain points in the room to spawn skeletons. Continually attack it as best you can. Move around when you get overwhelmed. At least with this phase, all of the skeletons will be standard ones. When you're pretty clear of skeletons, hammer away on the Harvester. The second form is much easier than the first.

Recently unlocked by

Comments
  • wow this is hard... any tips?
  • i agree with the post above. i've tried everything and can barely make a dent
  • ya. what i'm in the mittle of trying is to get a mage to lv 30 by playing through Awakening. and then import it to the Golems of Amgarrakthis dlc. this way you can focus on healing your teammates and let them beat on the harvester. i'll let u guys know if this works.
  • All ya gotta do is import a higher character as possiable with a load of healing potions, i had 423 of them ^_^, then if you've set up your AI tactics half decent then you should be able to just keep switching in and out of all of your party members to keep indiviually healing them, its basically just a slog battle of you trying to keep your guys healing every few seconds whilst they do damage to that ugly mofo, your crack it eventually guys :)
  • Ya it worked. and may i say that i will never be doing this achievement. Thanks VampireCommando for the tip of having a lot of potions. I ended up using about 150 in this fight. my mage us lv 32 by and i also saved a bunch of good armor/wepons from awakenings to put onto my teammates(including crystals for the golem) all i have left to say is Good luck and happy killing =)
  • i finally got it too. my mage was also level 32, and what seemed to work really wellwas well was the dalish nature ablities, combined with constant healing, mana use, and reviving any fallen party members
  • Having so much trouble with this. Maybe a fighter is not the way to go.
  • Another way to do it is to get a rogue around lv32 or so with the Accuracy skill (From the awakenings archery line) with about 90 or 100 dexterity and you'll be hitting constant 200s on him... I just beat him in 5 or 10 minutes with this way..
  • This guy seems impossible .. I've beaten his first form on Hard 4 times to be slaughtered by him and his skeleton friends within a minute during the second form. I've tried everything I could: use the dwarf rogue as an archer, my main using two-handed, my main as a tank running around with the Harvester chasing me while my party attacks him ... I don't know what to do anymore :(
  • When he's very close to the end of his first form, wait until the last possible to second to push the button. This way you can clear most of the skeletons he summons. I had to get rid of about 4 or 5 whilst we hammered away at him. If you havent, set all of your team to use a small health at 75%, and a large one at 25%. Then be the Golum and just hammer Heal as often as possible. Make sure as the golum you stand by the button. Set the dwarf up so hes taunting etc and they should concentrate on him and leave the golum alone. Watch out for a glitch as well. First time I had him down to 10% health on phase 2...he disapeared from the arena. Had to restart the whole battle.
  • Just beat him last night, as a level 32 Warrior. As a Warrior simply make a tank (20 Strength, 15 Willpower, 20 Constitution, all left Dextitery) During first phase have the Dwarf Rogue shoot the Harvester from a distance and have all others attack. Set tactics to take a pot at
  • this was a total pain. but used a tome on my mage and whammo
  • I knew this would be hard going into it so I started the DLC knowing I would cheese this boss. I imported my 32 mage specced arcane / blood / battle. Loaded up on defensive abilities as well as vulnerability hex, inferno and tempest. I kept Elemental Chaos up at all times and turned Blood Magic on to cast Inferno and Tempest between those two pillars in the middle of the room. I kept hex up as much as possible and just did my best to keep the harvester in the middle of the room. For healing I relied on potions and I used a lot of mana potions to keep elemental chaos up. Good luck.
  • I just completed this, and in my opinion the first phase is the easiest. Once the harvester phase shifts into the red "aura" just click the lever and it goes back to normal and kills all skeletons currently up. Rinse and repeat. The second phase actually glitched on my twice, to my benefit. Keeping all party members killing the skeletons that came up, the tiny harvester leaped away to spawn more skeletons but jumped out of range and brought me out of combat. I noticed when the golem revived on its own. The second time the harvester glitched into the wall while I was out of combat with it and remained there. All I did from this point on was use abilities that did not require a target and killed him without skeletons spawning and without him moving what-so-ever. Stamina continuously
  • *character tactics: Add a tactic for each character - Jerrik / Self: Health < 75% / Use: Health Poultice - Runic Golem / Self: Health < 75% / Group Heal - Runic Golem / Ally: Health < 75% / Group Heal - Brogan / Self: Health < 75% / Use: Health Poultice *must have: Strength - 80 Constituition - 70 Dexterity - 50 *hotkeys: War Cry - Gives enemies around you a penalty to attack. Carapace - This skill is key for defeating Harvestor Stage Two. Skeletons will not harm you, and the boss will do little damage against you. Second Wind - To keep your stamina up. Disengage - This one is optional, but its nice for keeping Harvestor Stage one off of you. The first stage is the harder of the two, but it's still not a problem. There not a whole lot to say here. Some of you
  • [Harvestor Stage One] The first stage is the harder of the two, but it's still not a problem. There not a whole lot to say here. Some of your allies will die. Heal when you need too. Use Disengage when you need too. Just fight and live. I would also like to point out that I used The Reapers Cudgel, which you get from traversing the dungeon. Using this it still did Physical damage while the Red Mist was present. [Harvestor Stage Two] (This one is extremely easy.) As soon as the fight starts you will have to run from a pack of skeletons, and the boss who is now in a smaller, crawling form. You will run for nearly the whole fight. Continue to run in a great big circle around the map. Stay near the walls. The skeletons are fast, and they will hit you while your running a few times. No
  • No worries though, because as soon as your ready turn Carapace on and go straight for the Harvestor. Have good judgement and pay attention to your health. When you think Carapace has worn off or won't protect you anymore, start to run again. If you need health then heal yourself while Carapace is active before you start striking the boss. This is not a long method. The Second Stage of The Harvestor should only take 10 minutes at most. vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bka6uFP7Au0
  • Can i also get the "reaper" achievement if i go on HARD mode?
  • For anyone who is a rogue and hasn't used the re-spec book, check out this link: http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/rpg/dragonage/show_msgs.php?topic_id=m-1-55988953&pid=950918 I modified this strategy just slightly to accommodate my gear (I used the heartwood bow) and some of my preferred skills. I managed to take the thing out on hard using only one potent health poultice!
  • One of the hardest achievements I ever got! I used a warrior specialized in weapon/shield combat and the Carapace skill. The auto-healing tactics for your group is also vital.
  • well... i found this quite easy. and as for my party members died within the first half of the fight, i had to solo the harvester and got it on my first try on hard. i imported my awakening character and used a simple tactic: lvl 35 human noble warrior dual wield spirit warrior/champion/templar 600hp it is most important to keep up "beyond the veil" and also to have it fully upgraded. so the summoned creatures and the harvester do not hit for more than abou 30-50hp per hit... if they hit at all (due to fully upgraded dual wield-trees). it also helps to wear the first commander's armor set from awakening (the black/red one fron the fade there) and wielding vigilance as one of your two swords comes in handy, too. i used up about 80 health poultices and 4 stamina potions (well.
  • bah... it cut off my message :D i used up about 80 health poultices and 4 stamina potions (well, i didn't own more ;)) and kept running from the adds and towrds the harvester. i didn't bother about any skeletons or phase shifting and simply kept punching that harvester-freak in his face, using stamina-potions, second wind and health poultices when needed. so it was simply a matter of time as for the harvester doesn't seem to regenerate any health.
  • i was very pround when i beat him and then realise i was on easy... tried again on hard and couldnt get it. if anyone has a really really easy way to do this message me please.
  • I can't believe people have a problem with him. From what I read he's the hardest so the other boss you have to beat on Hard/Nightmare I should have no trouble. I did this with a lvl 33 BM,BM,AW mage. I didn't know how to carry over any gear (I didn't strip my characters basically). Also didn't have any skill books to reset the brothers attributes. As everyone knows buffing an AW is pretty OP, but I still found myself having trouble. Till I actually sat there after a few attempts, read every skill I didn't know about (rogue & warrior) and set them up accordingly. Making sure they only used single target attacks, and only attacked the boss (Enemy - Rank - Boss or higher). With that in mind I had my main auto pilot when I switched to the rogue so I could hit the switch and insta-kill adds. I
  • That was seriously one of the hardest achievements I've ever had to get. The advice I have to add on top of the other very useful advice is to do a skill reset on Brogan and then pump almost everything you have into Con, with Str as your secondary. Give him Guardian, do everything you can to make sure he draws all the aggro. Here's what happens: you hunker down as Brogan using all your shield abilities and you heal obsessively, occasionally using War Cry to knock back the undead when their relentless assault gets to be too much. Meanwhile, the rest of your party remains untouched by the skeleton hordes and they work on taking down the Harvester. Remember: set everyone's tactics to Boss or Higher!! I had a lvl 31 arcane warrior and this is what worked for my party. PHEW.
  • I just beat this yesterday. I used a lvl 33 Mage. The first phase is pretty easy as long as you continuously hit the switch ( make sure you hit up on the D-pad to allow yourself to activate it before pressing A ..... I can't tell you how crazy i was becoming not being able to use that switch ). I used the frost cone quite frequently but spent most of my spells on group heal and individual healing of my party members. After the first phase the mage wasn't cutting it so i changed to one of the dwarfs and chased the harvester around getting in a couple of hits before his army of skeletons got to me. It took awhile, but was completed the first time a tried this strategy. Good luck
  • Don't know if I got lucky but I did this first try in 10 mins or less. I was so nervous going into it I must have over prepared by using little bits of each guide in these comments, I used a 31 warrior brought over straight out of Awakening and only used Carapace 3 or 4 times and had the Golem alive by the time I killed it in Phase 2 (though barely alive because of those red skeletons. So again don't know if I got super lucky or not but this isn't as super hard as this guide makes it sound lol. Though I can imagine not importing a character plays a large role in this boss' difficulty.
  • The skeletons are a pain, is there a way to get this with a warrior, i would have this guy if not for his little minions
  • Couldn't beat him until for about 10 days until I figured out how to kill the skeletons by pressing the switch. Once I got that, I beat it the first time with a level 35 mage. Make sure you face the switch, bring up the radial menu, then press the A button to activate it. Once you bring up the radial menu it will have an option to activate it.
  • so i finally got him today with my mage after trying for quite a while (lets put it this way.. i got "reaper" on the 12/9/2010. haha). if you can get past the first stage, then there's a way you can "cheat" to get through the 2nd stage. see link http://www.trueachievements.com/a60849/grim-reaper-achievement.htm "true marvellous" had a good idea. This worked for me, long but got there in the end. my party even managed to stay alive during stage 1, which was kind of a shock.. "Stage 2- Turn around and face the bridges that were blocked with fire during phase 1 and run across the bridge to the right and hug the far wall. You will see a small alcove with a litte protruding wall. If you run behind the wall nothing can follow you in there 99% of the time, if somthing does get in
  • oops.. msg got cut off... "... 99% of the time, if somthing does get in run out a little bit away from the area and get back in the alcove. Now simply from the safe haven of the alcove spam all your aoe and cone attacks at the harvester, it will take a while to take him down, but ths is a 100% guranteed win if you follow the above stage 2 tips to the letter. Ocassional you will have to leave the alcove to draw the harvester back in but just nip out do a little circle and pop back in and start the spell same again." Good Luck!!
  • I have defeated him on hard right now...thought this gonna be hard, but it was very easy with my elf archer. The Harvester and his/her skeleton friends just killed my teammembers within 4 secs. then they were looking for me, all of them attacked me but missed me the entire battle, even the harvester could not hit me xDD so I could kill him and win the battle without losing any health My archer has 177 Dex and was lv 34 and 470 health and had activated 2 skills: my lovely spider :D and the skill ,,Genauigkeit,, it's german and means ,,accuracy,, in english, I don't know how it is called in the english version. But it is the skill from awakening with the ,,evil eye,,. Sorry if my english is bad, I am german ;D
  • Here is how i did it. 1. You play origins until you get 2 tomes of the mortal vessel 2. You do the duplicate item glitch many times over to get your stats high ( glitch at WWW.CCG.com) Mine were about 200 each 3. Import Character from origins 4. Get through the DLC 5. Save before start of battle 6. Change to Hard or Nightmare 7. Fight and kill him 8. Enjoy achievement and victory ?'s send to GT: CraZy Marty 695
  • I took a lot of the advice in this thread and went with a AW/BM/SH for my main, switched Jerrik to an archer and pumped Brogan full of con. First form was easy as hell, but second form kinda raped the rest of the party. Wound up running around in a circle with Elemental Chaos active, slowly killing off the skeletons. After a while there seemed to be no more piles to generate skeletons from, so killing the Harvester came easy. Imported a post-Awakening mage at level 33, went smoothly. (Also sorry if the post looks weird, text wouldn't stay within the box.)
  • Do you have to complete the whole DLC or just the harvester on hard and which location should I turn the difficulty on hard?
  • You can switch to Hard right before the boss.
  • I did this on my first attempt. I found the Archdemon more difficult lol.
  • Damn this is tough without a healer
  • For those of you who don't have a level 35 rogue and were using an Arcane mage I found a beautiful method, Got achievement and ALL my party was alive. Yes this was a pain so don't think I got lucky. Arcane build, Arcane War, Battlemage, Spirit Healer Specializations. Set your Tactics on your character. Sustain skills, Arcane shield, Combat Shield (Battle mage spec), Devouring shield, Rock Armor. Set tactics, because you will not be playing your Mage, sad but true. Set the mage to heal, group heal, thats all he/she needs to do. Use the Tome of the first warden on Jarrick. He sucks as a dual wielder, reset his skills and put them all in archery. Give him 24 strength so he can ware his equipment, the rest max his Dex. Give him a bow. He will kill the Harverster for you. The only skill
  • The only skill he needs is Sustained, Accuracy. Set tactics to drink potions if his health falls low. You will not be playing Jarrick either, so when it starts plant him next to the switch for the red mist. When it turns on switch to him and have him hit it. The Golem, set him to group heal, for ally and himself. I turned off his other skills, ie, no attacking skills, I want his stamina for magic. Brogan, well he is the spring chicken. Literally. He has skills that attract the enemies. Threaten is an example, but don't use that. Alone it doesn't attract the Harvester.
  • He has another skill which uses 10% fatigue and it is a sustained skill, it attracts the Harvester. Its called Air of Insolence. The skill Grievous insult does the same thing except its activated, which means you stop and get hit, and it goes away after a set time. Use another sustained skill, Shield Wall, so when he gets hit he won't be screwed. Set everyone to Defensive. Once you get going run near the Harvestor with Brogan, and he will follow you like Bacon (who doesn't like Bacon?). When the red mist turns on, quickly switch to Jarrick and have him switch it off, if you can be strategic and wait for him to throw a skeleton so that one will disappear as well. While running around Both healers will heal you. Your main character will kill with draining aura, and if she takes damage she
  • will gain mana, i.e. a Stoic (battlemage) Jarrick will shoot away at the Harvester, remember to have him attack the Harvestor after he hits the switch, if you hit it and don't he will stand there. After a while the Harvestor will summon the Red elite skeletons, make sure they follow Brogan as well. I only ever saw my team be attacked by a yellow or white skeleton. All the reds came after me, and at times it seems like they run pretty fast, just keep moving. Once his first form is done, just have Jarrick keep shooting his second while you do...thats right run around. In 10 minutes they were dead and a hard battle became easily beatable. On your try they may get lucky and hit and kill Brogan, but try again and you will learn the finesse of running away. Sorry to post so many tim
  • for those who have hard time playing mage. there is a glitch for them. when you come to place where Grim is, dont go to him yet, but look for anvil near right bridge, there is a little space. go there and.. now nobody can attack you - except grim, but its little damage - now just youse inferno and others spells. in next stage, just finish all of skeletons anr revive friends. now just finish boss. it took me about 20 min to get two achiv.
  • very frustrating.
  • just got this achievement. way easy. i used the book that was in my potions radial menu and it reset my attribute points, i dumped most of em into dexterity, 80, then maxed out my archery skill tree. soon the battle started i headed for the anvil area described in post 43, activated all my archery skills and let loose with my level 18 warrior, i also got the heavy hitter achievement during the 5 minute battle.
  • All you really have to do is take out the skelotons when he call's them fairly easy for a lvl 31 warrior only had the golem die.
  • Here's my tactic, with a level 30+ warrior. It took a while to beat him, but I managed with minimal pots (about 10) and did it solo. Before fighting the boss, I used the respec tome and put 100 pts into dex and the rest into str. For skills, I maxed out my archer skill. Let your teammates do their thing and when they wipe, run over to the anvil hiding place and commence shooting the harvester (or skeletons). Periodically someone will make it through and start beating on you. When this happens, just run out, do a lap, and head back into the hiding place. With your dex so high, The skeletons will miss a lot and any damage you take will be manageable. You can use this tactic throughout both phases. The only difference is, in the second phase, you have another place to hide in the back a
  • check out post 45, i beat him with a level 18 warrior in 5 minutes max.
  • This battle is more tedious than anything. Level 35 mage (Arcane Warrior, Spirit Healer, Battlemage). First stage: Do whatever, it's simple enough. I generally made an attempt to keep my companions alive for this section. Second stage: My "strategy" (if you can call it that) was to ignore my companions (who are worse than useless at this point), ignore the skeletons, ignore the switch, and just keep smacking the Harvester. Death Hex and Curse of Mortality were my most useful spells here (ignoring standard Arcane Warrior sustained spells), and I used Quick Heal whenever my health reached 50%. I literally just watched my health bar, and anytime it reached 50% I'd hit the Quick Heal button. In the end I used about 30-40 potions and beat him in about 10-15 minutes on the first attem
  • Got it after first attempt. LVL34 Mage. Haven't used any switches. LOL, I didn't found them when I'm running. Spent around 30-40 health bottles and around 15-20 mana poltices. First stage went too easy for me healing allies with heal and group heal, casting hexes to Harvester and some quick attacking magic. The second part was not so quick, but anyway was easy enough. My companions died and then I'm start running around waiting for Revive cooldowns. Miasma slows skeletons enough to run comfortable and reviving dwarves when I'm running near. Then reset cooldown spell (don't remember the name) and then again revive. Right after reviving I make the pause opening wheel and commanding to dwarves to attack Harvester. They do some damage to him before dying. While I'm (Mage) always in running pro
  • ...While I'm (Mage) always in running process. This took some time, but with success after first trying. Good luck.
  • Did on my first try with my level 35 melee rogue. 113 Dex and 78 cunning using Voice of Velvet and The Rose's Thorn and gear to maximize my backstab damage. What I did was not typical but it worked. I had ~150 potions and after my group died I able to tank the first stage down no problem, dodging almost everything (but I did stand right next to the switch and hit it everytime it was available). Phase 2 was actually a little harder but I just ran in circles, keeping everything off of me and using Flicker every time it came up (also made sure to turn on Shadow Form just before using Flicker for even higher BS damage, my BSs are 300-400, but make sure to turn shadow form off right after so your stamina can recharge). It took longer than I would have liked and was not elegant but it worked ver
  • ha cracked it, 35 warrior, 130 dexterity, using arrow of slaying and accuracy, bish bash bosh 5 minutes and don he went, all my party alive to :D just set em up so they heal at
  • Haven't finished Origins or Awakening yet, and didn't realise this would be hard. Just beat it with a mage created at the start of Golems of Amgarrak (level 21). Went for the skills suggested in the guide, and dumped the rest into passive/sustained buffs (76.8% fatigue lol). I specifically did *not* use any taunt-type skills with Brogan - having aggro on the mage means you can run around in circles (occasionally poking a few hits in) without the Harvester attacking your other guys. Flicked the switch as soon as possible every time so that my guys would concentrate their attacks on the Harvester instead of the corpses. Fought the second form normally. Only needed to use about 5 poultices in total. Did have to try a few times though. Seems down to luck as to whether the mage can hold a
  • This battle wasn't as a hard as I thought.. We were able to destroy the first form fairly easy, however the second form and the skeleton army eventually wiped out the entire party except for my main.. I was able to finish him with just my main.. (Level 22 Rogue, 112 Dexterity) I switched between archer and dual-wielder a lot.. Archer for Arrow of Slaying, Scatter Shot to stun, Burst Shot and Critical Shot.. While dual-wielding I was able to melee with the skeleton army, 112 dexterity allowed me to dodge every attack.. Just be sure to find the healing abilities for the Runic Golem and set him up to heal as often as possible..
  • I found a barrier glitch which I used to get this achievment. After you beat the first phase, run back across the bridge to the other side (entrance), if your facing the door, then got to our right into a little corner with a wall and debree, back right up onto the debree and right into the corner against the low wall and you won't get attacked, just spam AOE with a mage and it's easy pickings.
  • I was really stressing about getting to this one, but killed it yesterday on my first try on hard in about 5 minutes with one companion still alive at the end. Really did not find it that hard at all. I think it might be because I knew this was coming, so was well prepared. When playing Awakenings I levelled my rogue to level 35 before finishing got the Dragonbone sword (Vigilance) and another really good sword (cannot remember its name) and covered them with Paragon runes, Blackblade Armour also covered in Paragon Runes . Also had a collection of about 400 health poultices (50 Master ones that I made) and took quite a few high end runes with me as well to use on the companions. Set everyone’s tactic to use health potion when below 50% and the golem to group heal at below 75% and I j
  • Set everyone’s tactic to use health potion when below 50% and the golem to group heal at below 75% and I just ran at him and hacked away with my sword, ignoring the skeletons. 2 minutes of this and the first form was gone, then just a case of running around after the second form hacking at him and he was dead in about 3 minutes. No problems (I actually thought I forgot to change the difficulty as it was no more difficult that some of the boss fights I had when playing through the game on casual. So that’s my tip. No skill required, just get your level as high as you can, with the best equipment you can, and the best runes and potions you can. Be prepared !
  • So I found this relatively easy. Didn't have quite 100% dodge but had 85 I think, arcane warrior. Kept my group alive with healing during the first phase to down him quick then I let them die and I just kited the phase 2 around, taking a few shots and then running around with a bunch of auto-healing gear. I would honestly not worry about maxing gear and getting all the best possible ruins and stuff because my character was very sub-optimal and I didn't use any particular strategy.
  • congratz to everyone who has done this
  • just play as an archer. import a rogue from origins, it should be level 23-ish. play awakening, it'll be level 33-ish. make yourself an archer, get the talent "accuracy." it bases your damage, etc., on dexterity. so have just enough strength and cunning to get whatever talents or weapons you need, and then enough constitution that you don't die in one hit, and put the rest into dexterity. i had an archer with 130+ dexterity, you hardly get hit and deal about 300 damage a shot.
  • Finally did it after so many tries. I used a combination of some of the tactics above. First of all I was a lvl 35 mage, I set everyone's tactics to
  • Finally did it after so many tries. I used a combination of some of the tactics above. First of all I was a lvl 35 mage, I set everyone's tactics to
  • I FOUND AN EASY WAY WHERE THEY CAN'T HURT YOU! (But I can't describe it well) - - Make sure you make a rogue (that uses bows) Just before you enter the cutscene you'll see behind you about 2 - 3 anvils, with some crafted weapons, you'll see a little gap in between the bridge and the big podium statue, if you hide there they can't hurt you. So enter the cutscene,and lure the harvester to the anvils and go to the spot where he can't hurt you (make sure you have his Line of Sight), and just keep shooting him. - When he enters his second form he'll jump around (so be patient), so if you don't have his line of sight just take out the adds, if you can't see any get out of the spot and let them run towards you then hide back in the spot, then shoot. - Takes aboues 5-8 minutes to do... YOU
  • Figured I'd give this a try since everyone is saying how hard it is. Only took me 2 attempts as a lvl 32 BM/BM/AW. Ended up soloing the second phase by just spamming health potions, not too hard really.
  • Aah! The Harvester is super hard to beat... for me the Archdemon was much easier even on nightmare mode. :P
  • this sucks. ive tried every possible method. ive completly re-done my level 33 mages skills etc, and edited all of my parties tactics. they attack the reaper and heal when their health gets to 75%, while i gather all of the irritating skeletons to chase me around the room. ive got his health half way in his second phase.
  • Used the Akira1908's method in post #43. Slow but sure, took him down in about 20 minutes. Sacrificed the rest of my team. Who needs them when I have my Anvil of Invisibility?
  • When i was playing, i notice theres a sprit switch, or Whatever its called, when the screen went red so i went into my cirlce with the quick heal and inventory and activated it and the screen returned to normal and the undead minions die almost instantly.
  • Don't feel bad if you're having a hard time killing him as a warrior, the rouges and mages have it easy in comparison. My Warrior Dwarf with over 120 const. and strength still I got his kicked. Just make sure to click that lever as often as possible to kill the skeletons.
  • I was having trouble with this,I was a level 22 mage,I did the awankening DLC and by the end of that I was a level 33 mage,I defeated him first try, So just do awakening and get as much exp and potions as posibble, Set everyone to use a health potion at -50% Health and set your Golem to group heal when your allys reach -50% health and to group heal when Itself reachs -25% health, Like I said I did this first try without a single death, Goodluck guys :)
  • This is not really as hard as everyone says. Just follow what is says on the achievement guide
  • seems like i really lucked out on this one. the harvester glitched into the wall and couldn't attack me. all i had to do was duel weapon strike and whirlwind and it went down
  • best bet for this is likely to be an arcane mage. i did it fairly easy after a few trys with a couple different character. Arcane mage level 35, with maxed out elemental powers and a few oddball spells like healing and such, but the best way to kill him is to as much as possible cast inferno(fire is the best against it) and tempest(second best) in the same spot and have your tank lead him through the combo as you are crowd controlling the corpses, make sure all of the characters have their tactics set to heal at health
  • Now this was easy as fuck. As a lvl 33 warrior tank, I just auto hit the harvester on hard mode and whenever I was low on health I used a potion. My whole group died in the first 10 seconds, but who cares? I defeated him alone in like 3 minutes without even trying. I don't get how anyone can call this shit boss hard.
  • This was beyond easy. Level 34 Battle Mage/Arcane Warrior/spirit healer with 100 in magic. I tanked the harvester the whole time, golem died pretty fast and I healed as I went. Super easy, I couldn't even figure out how to work the damn switches so the skeletons built up. The description makes this seem impossible, I was shocked at how easy it was.
  • You guys had me worried this was going to be hard! I imported straight from origins (without stripping my party before hand so I just had all default armor and weapons), by the time I got to the fight I was lvl 24 tank warrior. My companions died before I got the first stage health down past 75%. I never pressed any switches. First try killed it achievement popped.
  • Arrgh this acheivment is so frustrating. All of the companions are useless
  • Pretty easy :) Niveau35 Autohit-Melee-Mage *lol* The Golem is a very good healer! His mana CANNOT run out! ... Tactics: Groupmember health
  • Pretty easy :) Niveau35 Autohit-Melee-Mage *lol* The Golem is a very good healer! His mana CANNOT run out! ... Tactics: Groupmember health lower than 75%: group heal ... :P Remember to switch sometimes to groupmember and take manually a potion. (I used ~20)
  • Oh and use the Tomb, to reset the skills from the rogue, skill him as an archer and he will do 700dmg shots.
  • This achieviement is giving me such a hard time! I hope everyone's tips will help me out to beat this meanie soon ):O
  • This is annoying. My mage is a warrior mage, so he has armor and swords, etc, rather than robes and staffs, to make him take a lot more hits. He is also basically the highest level. I spent about 2 hours following the tips here, pulling the lever, etc, and after a while I found only my mage alive, though I tried my best to keep the others alive. I had got the harvester all the way down on his health, practically a few more hits and he would have been defeated. Then I ran out of politices. Time to try again.
  • This was a long grind of mostly luck and running around in sheer terror like a little girl. I must have done this 12 times before I got it. My proudest achievement by far... and most painful. Don't give up... try different strategies.. I used my arcane warrior build and watched a ton of youtube tries.
  • That corner trick worked wonders for me! Granted I had a few run in but I turned on Elemental Mastery and as long as you are in that corner tucked as far back as you can get you can take them out with attacks and they won't attack you. Ijust got this achievement 10/29/11. The 1st part is cake as long as you stay with the tactics the others gave you about health potions and the lil bro taunting. Keep everyone set to attack boss or higher. That was my main problem was everyone going after the lil bads. Stay by the switch and hit it as SOON as it pops. This kills the skeletons. Keep the Golem healing everyone and focus your heals if you have them to keep the Golem standing. Put once you are past the 1st phase head right over the bridge and you will find a lil corner to hide in. Tuck yourself
  • ** Tuck yourself to the far right corner next to the broken part. This is where I was able to stand and not get hit as I picked off any that came into the corner with me. After you drop that Orange boss skeleton, who I think is harder then Harvester, then just go to town with single attacks on Harvester. Now for the most part I just hit "A" to keep attacking when I ran out of Mana potions. You still do decent dmg and when I ran out I would stop attack drop that Blossom power to get enough Mana restored then that Mass Reguvenation power and went back to picking him off. It took me awhile I didn't time it but if you are patient and follow the step and tactics others and myself provided then I see no problem in anyone getting this achievement. Good luck!! Hope that was helpful!!
  • I swear there is no switch in that room. I beefed everyone up appropriately, set awesome tactic slots (health potions #1), and could not keep my golem alive. He cowered during the entire fight, and while it was nice to get his buffs, he didn't try to hurt anyone else, didn't defend himself, and, most importantly COULDN'T USE HEALING POTIONS. Why?? So after trying to revive him a couple times, I left him dead and fought it myself. It probably took a full minute to kill each skeleton, and I'm pretty sure sometimes my attacks weren't hurting them. I can't find out why.
  • i got lucky with this one cause the harvester got stuck inside a wall so it couldn't do any damage to me..
  • Well I defeated it on Hard with a Rogue Character. Level 33-34 Strength 40-50 Dexterity 70 Constitution 50 Have both Dwarfs use healing poultice at
  • 75 percent, and the golem uses group heal at 75 percent for both self and allies. first stage, just attack it as much as you can, everytime the room goes red use the Radial menu to locate and activate the switch nearby, which often kills alot of the skeletons in the area. for me by the time the first stage died, only 1 dwarf died, the others somewhat full health. Second stage a bit more about luck, there is no switch to turn off the red smoke from what I saw, and the creature jumps everywhere, luckily somehow my allies killed the other skeletons and helped me finish off the boss Fairly easily.
  • okay just set up da AI so they heal @ 25% and 75% make sure that da dwarf (B something) keeps uiseing his 3 abilities which lures all enimies to him and give ur charater awsum weps den play as golum and keep doin group heal every chance u can and rev any1 who falls (i had my main guyy summon a great bear along with the dwarfs' summon so that i had 6 people onj my side)
  • I was able to get this achievement by changing the difficulty to casual after the fight starts and before you finish off his second form changing it back to hard. I can 100% confirm this works. After wiping on him for hours I decided to give it a try and it popped for me.
  • Disregard my last post. I didn't realize there was a story achieve for beating the reaper and when it popped I got all excited but just realized it was for the other one. Sorry for any confusion.
  • I think someone already said this but here's what I did. -Casual difficulty -Import level 35 character -If you're a rogue DON'T SUMMON YOUR CREATURES (the Bronco is the best option) -The golem dies easily so whenever you see the creature attack your golem, assume direct control (sorry lol) and run away -When the room becomes red, you run (don't walk, run.) to that pedestal right by the creature thingy in the beginning of the fight. This will stop the lackeys from aiding your foe -Make sure you have plenty of health potions and stamina potions -One of the dwarves (the lost brother dude) is extremely weak and he dies quicker than the golem. He's not a concern if he falls just have your golem revive him -Use bombs and coatings on your weapons to add damage Don't worry if you die
  • (continued) Don't worry if you die a lot trying to beat the monster. It took me nearly 16 tries before finally figuring it out :) Also, I don't have any proper advice on defeating the Harvester guy on any other class besides the rogue. You should still be fine tho
  • Just completed this achievement on the 2nd try, and previously did the achievement on my ps3 account. The fight is actually not that hard, so long as you know the fight, which I did fortunately, after doing it on the ps3 about a year or so ago. I completed this on my Xbox (Hard mode and not Nightmare since I was lacking a mage in the group) using my level 30 dual wielding warrior, imported from Awakenings, no respec, Champion/Templar/Beserker. I set up all my characters to use health potions (I always keep a ton of these on hand when leveling in the game anyhow) at 90%. Why 90%? Because if you've taken 90% damage, by the time you've popped the health pot, you've already taken more than 90% damage in this fight. I then used a tactic that I'd eventually used previously while working
  • I then switched to the Golem and let the AI play my main character. As long as you keep the Golem alive and out of danger, you can usually beat the Harvester easily. For those who are complaining that you can't use health potions, I found on Wiki that you CAN use Injury Kits on the Golem to heal it. For most of the fight, I kept my Golem out of the melee and near where the switch pops. No, the switch isn't there all the time, it pops at random times, but hitting it is vital to defeating the skeletons. Using the Golem, I'd hit the switch when able and use the Group Heal as needed. So, if at all possible, keep one character/companion parked where the switch pops at all times. I easily beat the Harvester using this tactic, no deaths at all. Hoping this helps!
  • Continued: Also for Health potions, if you scroll towards the bottom of the list on Tactics, you'll see "Use Most Effective Potion" use that, that way you'll never have to worry about running out of potions during this fight, or about using too weak a potion.
  • So, I only recently came back to finish full combo-ing this game and really can't believe how glitched so much of this game has become. I'm currently trying to get this one and the one where you have to keep the ogre alive. They're my last 2 achievements. I've come across 2 glitches on this doc though so far. The first being that not every kill is being registered to help with approval. I know I have to be the one who kills them whether from full health or just the last hit, but there are times where all the others are focused on someone else while I kill someone from full health and get nothing towards my enthralled guys. In addition, I'm at the part where you have to burn down the gates to proceed. I somehow managed to get past the first gate with an ogre, but the next one isn't being re
  • Got this achievement today, definitely play as the golem, just group heal and hit the switch every time you can and try to stay out of combat with the golem.
  • "Keep the golem alive" is the name of the game, unless you're a healer mage. I personally ran a lvl 20 tank, so my guy was able to throw down with the Harvester by himself, I just set him to soak up health poultices, gave Jerrik a bow (it keeps him out of the way, plus he got the occasional stun with his arrows) Gave Brogan and my character Paralyzing weapons. I had my guy keep the aggro while I controlled the Golem and ran around killing skeletons and healing when necessary. Injury kits can heal the golem (a little), so if he starts to get low, pump some injury kits into him. Rock Salve is a great idea, too, don't forget to spam grenades and keep weapons coated. But yeah, you have to keep the golem alive for group heal and revive in case something goes awry, he's indispensable, get a
  • get all his upgrades, and just keep him away from the harvester.
  • To do this achievement easily all you have to do is be a lvl 30 rogue with both the strenght and dexteriority stats at about 40-60 each and upgrade all your archery stats and then have loads of health poultices and set it so all the party members take them and dont do anything else and archer near the pedestal so you can easily get rid of the skeletens. Also remember to wear your toughest armor so the harvester attacks you because you will use the poultices better and just fight it. Doing this you should do it within 3 attempts at th worst.
  • There is a method to help level up your character more for extra skill points, but it's long and isn't fun; I imported my lvl 32 warrior save from just before the Harvester fight into Witch Hunt, then completed Witch Hunt again (Cos I had already done it with the same character), then imported into a new Golems of Amgarrak file, and my character levelled up and got stronger.. I'm not sure what the limit is on their levels but if you've got enough patience and determination, you could perhaps keep importing to build up your character for the final fight.
  • Impossible >_
  • Are you able to fight him on casual, then switch on to nightmare at the last second?
  • @106: No you cannot change at the last second. The difficulty must be changed before you aggro the Harvester. #43: I seriously did not think your method would work but, I was pleasantly surprised when it did. I just did it last night on the Ultimate Edition and got both Reaper and Grim Reaper on my first kill (about 34th attempt as I tried it legit for a while). I figured by now a lot of this game's glitches would have been patched but, apparently Bioware doesn't bother with patching old games. Thanks for the tip, now I just have to complete Witch Hunt and this game will be 100%.
  • #43 and #45, thanks a ton! I thought my poor level 32 rogue elf was never going to be able to do do anything like that! I hid in that spot, used the book, and put enough stat points into strength, willpower, and constitution to allow me to wear decent armor, and then I put everything else into dexterity. Then, I maxed out the archery talents and managed to beat the stupid thing in less than 5 minutes, even after my crew all died. I just picked off the rest of the skeletons, lured the Harvester back to my hiding spot, and killed it. You can also use this to get the Heavy Hitter achievement if you haven't done so already. Using the Arrow of Slaying talent got me well over 500 damage at one point.
  • I was a lvl 21 Mage and used the Grey Warden Tome to restart all my stats. I used Arcane Warrior and Battlemage specializations. I chose the AoE spells and then put 20 Const and the rest for Magic. My teammates died IMMEDIATELY but it worked out for me. I just lured the enemies and the harvester to small crevice near the iron forges. Just stay all the way back in that crevice casting spells continuously and come out and lure them towards you so you can go back and keep casting. I just kept using health/mana poultices when necessary and continued hammering down the harvester's health. I got the achievement on Hard on my first try. it is super easy.
  • Truly a hard achievement to get. It is possible to beat the harvester with a warrior. I was a LV35. Tip press the switch when the area turns red. Have an archer with you, max out his dexterity. Have those nifty grey warden tomes with you. Make it follow you with threaten. Keep the golem alive. Lots of potions. Oh yeah and thanks for all the great ideas guys I combined them to get my achievement.
  • Just beat this guy on Hard a few hours ago on my FIRST TRY! I didn't touch the switches at all (didn't look at a walkthrough until after I beat him), and all of my party members died in the first battle. The way I finished it was by using my main (imported from Origins/Awakening) as an ArcaneWarrior/BattleMage/SpiritHealer combo, and activating 'Draining Aura'. This way, all of the stupid skellies that were summoned (at one point numbered 8 of them!) would get continuously sapped of health, no matter how many times they hit me. I just focused on Harvester, chopping away and guzzling Lyrium potions until he got too tired to fight anymore, and raised me a white flag. :)
  • you need to play through the entire dungeon on hard or nightmare difficulty, playing on easy and then switching the difficulty before you kill the final boss will not reward you the attachment sadly... I recommend loading a character enough times till your well over level 30, of course the higher the better. on top of that mages >worrier archers> rouge archers are your best bet.
  • http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/950918-/55988953 This is a link to the guide which finally let me kill the harvester using a rogue level 30 and I didnt have the same equipment as he did. Worked for me though and ALL of my characters were alive at the end of the fight!
  • Ive heard of a high level mage (origins to witch to awakening to amgarrek) with several potions to reset the dace brother skills will get through this.....its what ill be trying
  • This achievement is impossible , I need help with it I'm a Mage level 31 help please....
  • Nevermind thanks anyways
  • Finally got this last night using the alcove method. Can't remember the OP, but the basic principle is to have a Spirit Mage with 70 magic, and everything else in constitution and willpower. For skills you want Inferno, Tempest, Blizzard and Death Cloud, plus Group Heal and Revive. Survive the 1st wave by letting the others fight the Harvester and keep them healed as much as you can. Stand by the altar in the right hand corner of the room and press the switch whenever Skeletons spawn. At the beginning of the 2nd phase, turn around and run out of the room. Run across the bridge to your right and hug the wall. At the end of the wall is a little alcove that you can stand in (It might help you to find this before the fight so that you know where to go). If you stand in here the monsters
  • won't follow you in or attack you most of the time. If anything does come in, just run out and make a circuit of the area, coming back to the alcove. While in the alcove, target the Harvester with your big area of effect spells. He's pretty clever, and will move out of their range, so try and use this to keep him front of you. Cone attacks (Cone of Cold, Thunder and Flame Blast I think) will also go through the little wall in front of you, so make sure to hit him with these whenever he's in range. Rinse and repeat until he finally falls. It will take a while, and it's a bit of a cheap way to do it, but it is a way and it's a way that works.
  • The alcove glitch worked like a charm! You just have to occasionally run out to get the Harvester's attention then go right back. Cheap and easy; exactly how I like my impossible boss battles.
  • I was really worried about this after reading the comments but, at least on hard, this is a breeze if you played through Awakening and have your character at 35
  • If you just want to get this cheevo without spending hours duping Tomes or making this harder than it has to be, I just did it easy-peasy thanks to using/combining two suggestions from these comments. I have a Lvl 34 Mage, I didn't re-do any stats or bother trying to heal my people, or reset any of their stats for that matter. Starting it, I just activated any sustainable spells I had to increase my spellpower. I used my Spell Wisp and Elemental Mastery, I think it's called. I basically ran in circles around the Harvester using Cone spells on him, like Cone of Cold to freeze him for a few seconds, then the Lightning Cone and the Flame Cone if I had time before he got too close to me. My group died within 30 seconds, it didn't matter. When he summoned the skeletons, I would circle arou
  • (cont.) around again and hit the switch using the Left Trigger button and then A when the switch was highlighted. When the Harvester gets about half way down on his health, I referred to Comment #43 and ducked into the alcove/cubby hole right behind the Anvil. He'll be in front of you and keep summoning skeletons but they very rarely hit you. Just watch your health for when they do, I think I used 6 or 7 lesser health potions total until he died for the first time. While behind the Anvil, I just kept using Cone spells and whatever else I could so that I wouldn't have to move out of the alcove. It takes a little while, but it's easy. When the cut scene happens and you fight his second form, refer to Comment #30/31, the part for "Stage 2." Immediately after the cut scene, the bridges
  • (cont.) are now open to cross, so run over the right bridge and duck behind the half wall very close to the corner of the room. It took a little while for me because I had skeletons on the other side of the wall but I just ignored them and kept using Cone powers on the Harvester whenever he came close enough. The Cone powers will go right through the wall, so you don't have to move. Just stay in the corner. If you go by the edge of the wall like you're about to run out, the skeletons will be alerted to you and will rush in. I used the huge inferno and lightning storms spells on the Harvester if he was out of range to make him move around, and when he was in my range, I would Cone blast him with everything I could. Again, took a while, but my health never went down. It made it easy,
  • (cont.) hope this helps someone else, and thanks to the commenters above for the help. :)
  • The corner trick suggested by #43 worked great. That's not even a glitch. It's just positioning yourself well in battle.
  • Just got this cheevo today! after almost snapping this disk in half from 4+ hours of getting my ass handed to me (lvl 35 2H warrior, all legit stats, no tombe glitches) I found the thread where they said to use the skill portion of "weapon and shield" and use the CARAPACE ability - IT WORKED LIKE A CHARM!! phase 1 just swarm the harvester will everyone and hit the "button" whenever it appears to kill off skeletons. phase 2 all my allies died very quick in this part, i just used carapace and attacked the harvester until it wore off, ran around the map until it cooled down, rinsed and repeated two more times and DING - CHEEVO UNLOCKED!! BTW when i respec my main character right before the fight i pumped 90% of points into strength and the last 24 points into constitution.
  • "That's it... it's over..." and I'm never doing that again. ugh... the worst. My Warden kept glitching and getting stuck in one stop being completely useless on top of all the pain of this damned achievement.
  • A lot of these tactics were super insightful thanks everybody. I'm doing a complete play through of Origins and 2 for Inquisition
  • 92 is full of shit just in case anyone was wondering.
  • Been at this fight fir a while, doing well all by myself, its a waste of time bring the others back, best way to do this is have a made with arcane warrior and spirit healer at level 30 plus, high health and mana and an aoe and decent armour and a good weapon. 1000+ health poultices hlp alot too
  • Soooo is anyone else having issues where THE SWITCH DOESN'T WORK?! I'm losing my mind. The switch appears, but I can't select it. Any ideas how I can fix this?!

Game navigation