Sand Worm

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The Sandworm is a recurring enemy in the Epic Battle Fantasy series. It is a monstrous burrowing worm with numerous brown bumps and black spines on its pale body. Its fanged mouth takes up most of its front end, and a long tongue dangles from its middle.

It primarily attacks with its massive mouth, biting and even swallowing players. It also wields a variety of other mouth-related attacks, such as belching and vomiting - many of these moves can inflict status effects such as Poison and Blind.

Appearances

The Sandworm first appeared as a boss in Epic Battle Fantasy 2, attacking Matt and Natalie in Stage 15. In this appearance, its tail acted as a separate enemy (called Sandworm's Tail), aiding the worm with powerful physical attacks. Both the worm and its tail were resistant to Earth, but vulnerable to the Water, Ice, and Poison elements. After slaying the Sandworm, Matt and Natalie ate its remains, only for the worm's poisonous blood to contribute to their (temporary) deaths.

The Sandworm returned as a powerful enemy/miniboss in Epic Battle Fantasy 3. Although its threat level was somewhat reduced (due to losing its tail helper and the addition of Lance to the party), it remained a threatening opponent with a tendency to spam its powerful blood vomit attack when its health dropped below half. Its weaknesses and resistances were largely unchanged from its previous appearance, save for switching its Water vulnerability for a weakness to Holy damage.

The Sandworm (now parsed as Sand Worm) appears in Epic Battle Fantasy 4 after the Battle Mountain update, guarding the path to the Ladder in Goldenbrick Resort and appearing in a few battles on Battle Mountain (most notably, the Miniboss Marathon). It is once again a boss-level foe, similar to its EBF2 appearance, and is once again assisted by its tail (now called Sand Tail). Both parts of the worm are immune to Wind, Stun, Freeze, Syphon, and Death, resistant to all stat debuffs, and weak to Water, Earth, Ice and Poison. When defeated, the Sand Worm will drop a Bio Virus and a Solid Spike, with a 50% chance of dropping Cake and Chocolate. Its tail has a 50% chance to drop a Solid Spike upon defeat.

Attacks

• Charges at a player and bites them/bumps them with its head.
• Swallows a player temporarily, inflicting high physical damage with a high chance of poisoning them.
• Burps, dealing Wind-element damage to all players.
• Spits green vomit at all players, doing moderate Poison damage and poisoning them.
• Belches sand on all players, doing light Earth damage and debuffing their Accuracy (In EBF2, it inflicted the Blind status effect).
• Vomits blood on all players, inflicting high Poison damage and the Poison status effect. (In EBF3, it only uses this attack when its health drops below half. In EBF4, it has a chance to lower the party's maximum HP)
• Raises part of its body near a player, grinding them against its spines for multiple hits. (EBF4 only)
• Leaps into the air and lands on the party, dealing massive Physical damage to all players (EBF4 only).

Sand Tail (EBF2/EBF4 only)

All of the Sand Tail's attacks begin with it burrowing underground.

• Pops up in front of a player and stabs them with the spike on its tip.
• Pops up in front of a player, striking them with the spines on its sides.
• Emerges in front of a player, grinding them against its spines for multiple hits. (EBF2 only).

Strategy

Epic Battle Fantasy 2

If she didn't do so in the previous wave, Natalie should start by summoning Slime Bunny - Regen helps counter the numerous poison effects you'll likely sustain. Matt should cast Protect to reduce the damage from the Sandworm's physical attacks, especially since its tail will use them exclusively. Depending on your difficulty, you may want to kill the tail outright (preferably with Water and Ice attacks) or just try to Stun it with Thunderbolt (the "Thunderclap" skill bonus helps immensely) and Matt's Blizzard Unleash. The latter strategy is recommended for Hard and Epic difficulties, as the worm's tail respawns fairly quickly.

When the tail is neutralized, turn your Water and Ice attacks on the Sandworm. As counterintuitive as it may seem, the beast is also vulnerable to poison; a few hits from Toxic and/or Nettle will cause the Sandworm to lose massive chunks of health every turn. Focus on keeping your HP and defenses up, but use Antidotes or Natalie's Purify if the status effects start piling up. If Matt is equipped with the Blizzard, using Legend and Cleaver can also deal high damage. Don't be afraid to use your Limit Breaks - you'll have a few waves to recharge them before the next major boss.

Epic Battle Fantasy 3

This version of the Sandworm focuses on attrition, relying on its high HP to protect it while it wears the party down with multi-target attacks and status effects (primarily Poison). As such, Regen is an effective means of keeping the party healthy without compromising their offensive output. Initially, you should try to simply keep the worm contained with accuracy debuffs while you pick off its less durable allies - if you can spare a turn to do so, poisoning it can help make its massive HP more manageable.

When the Sandworm is alone, hit it with your best Holy and Ice attacks. Natalie should use Iceshard and Shine/Judgement, while Matt can use Iceberg and Seiken (as well as Legend if he's using the right sword). Lance has no ice or holy attacks, but equipping the Ark Angel and using Double Shot or Unload could provide some offensive opportunities. Alternately, Lance can focus on helping the party with Bind, Medipack, and (if he's learned them) other defensive skills like Flare or Guardian. As with EBF2, Natalie can also use Purify if the status effects become too numerous.

After the Sandworm's health drops below half, it will spam its blood vomit attack, dealing moderate damage and rapidly stacking the Poison effect on the entire party. At this stage, switching to Poison-resistant gear may be helpful, or have Natalie take over healing duties with Purify and Healmore. To reduce the amount of time spent getting drenched in poisonous blood, try to gauge when the worm's health will fall below half and have your characters primed for maximum damage output - with luck and proper buffing/debuffing, you may be able to wipe out most or all of the Sandworm's health before it begins vomiting blood.

Epic Battle Fantasy 4

The Sand Worm and its tail are characterized by their high attack power and poor accuracy - as such, your best option is to make your party even harder to hit. Solar Flare and other accuracy debuffs are risky, given the worm's 50% resistance to stat debuffs, but raising the party's Evade with Reflex or Evade-boosting equipment is a reliable means of reducing the chances of the worm or its tail hitting their marks. You can also try to inflict the Tired status effect on the enemies, as their resistance to stat drops does nothing against the Accuracy/Evade penalties inflicted by the Tired status - and as a bonus, most means of inflicting Tired also hit the worm's Earth weakness.

Offensively, the Sand Worm and Sand Tail are mostly unchanged from their EBF2 appearance. There will be plenty of status effects and stat drops coming your way, including Poison, Stun, Accuracy-Down, and Defence-Down, so have Purify, Medipack, and/or Cleanse ready to use (the Maid Outfit is useful here, as it can randomly cast Cleanse between turns and offers great resistance to the Sand Worm's Earth attacks). Protect and Barrier can help mitigate the damage done by the boss and its helper, Lock On is useful for mitigating the Sand Worm's frequent attempts to reduce the party's Accuracy, and Poison can knock off significant chunks of the worm's health if you can keep it at a high enough level for a few turns.

In general, the Sand Tail can be ignored in favor of the Sand Worm if your party has high Defence and means of curing or resisting Stun. If gear is equipped that randomly uses Ice, Earth, Water, or Poison-based skills between turns, it's possible to simply wear down the tail without even targeting it, but if the dual assault is proving too much, a few turns of attacking the Sand Tail will force it to back off for a while, allowing you to focus all your efforts on the Sand Worm.

After losing half of its HP, the Sand Worm will unveil its new attack - a massive, almost physics-defying leap attack that inflicts enormous physical damage on the party. Although Accuracy/Evade manipulation will greatly reduce the boss' chances of landing its attack, you should make sure to keep the party's HP and Defence buffs as high as possible to ensure that a lucky hit won't set you back too much. For added insurance, the Kitten Fort summon can provide Morale to further increase your chances of survival - if going this route, it may be advisable to take out the Sand Tail whenever possible to avoid having it pick off a weakened party member.

EBF4 Rewards

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Trivia

• As a running gag in the Epic Battle Fantasy series, the Sandworm's bestiary entry labels its species as "Giant Mutant Penis".
• The Sand Tail is one of the few enemies which is not killed outright by the party - instead, it simply retreats underground for a few turns.

• When you first encounter the Sandworm in Epic Battle Fantasy 3 and Epic Battle Fantasy 4, Lance will exclaim, “Walk without rhythm to confuse the worm!” This is an obvious reference to Dune, the book by Frank Herbert.
• An NPC in the Kitten Ruins references the Sandworm's boss status in EBF2 by mentioning how he was torn between attacking the tail or the head first. Ironically, the EBF3 version of the Sandworm never uses its tail in battle (the only time so far where it has appeared without its tail).
• In EBF4, Matt says the gang will eat the Sandworm when they kill it, despite the consequences he and Natalie suffered in EBF2 when they attempted to consume it. Interestingly, Matt also admitted earlier that even he had doubts about eating the similar Evil Worm enemy.