Elite Buff: Shielded 4 (Boss)

Internal engine status effect. Boss-specific variant of the Shielded elite buff at tier 4 (strongest). Grants the boss 16 Shield stacks that refresh at the start of each round, at the cost of -20% max health.

At tier 4, the Shield stack is extremely large, requiring substantial damage to break through before dealing health damage each round. Since Shield refreshes at round start, any Shield remaining from the previous round is wasted, incentivizing full shield-break within each round. Burn, Bleed, and Poison bypass Shield entirely, making them the most reliable damage sources.

Marked causes physical attacks to ignore Shield, making it the ideal debuff against Shielded enemies. High sustained damage from multiple cats is needed to break through 16 Shield each round. The -20% max health trade-off means once you get past the Shield, the boss has less health to work through. Standard elite versions use lower Shield values (3/5/7/9 by chapter tier).