Opulent Flint Beetle

The Opulent Flint Beetle is a large species of Flint Beetle with a castle-shaped shell.

=In fanon games=

In Pikmin Evolution
The Opulent Flint Beetle is a large species of Flint Beetle appearing in Pikmin Evolution. It gets its name from the large regal appearance it has, having a shining blue shell that spirals into a castle-like spiral. It is the largest species of the Flint Beetle family, being what appears to be almost a queen for the species. It dwells in very deep and dark caves, appearing at first to be nothing more than a small castle with a piece of refuse on the top. But trying to dig the refuse out will cause it to rise up and attack your army. The sheer size and durability of the shell makes attacking it directly futile, and since the shell is rounded it is immune to being flipped over, unlike most Flint Beetles. Rather to damage it you need to attack each of its four legs, each having an orb-shaped joint that needs to be broken. So you need to swarm these joints, however the Flint Beetle is prepared for such a tactic and the joints are covered in thick metal, blocking any attacks not matter how hard you swarm it. This makes the beetle near impenetrable, making it a formidable foe, especially with its varied arsenal. You see the shell on its back has small holes from which a multitude of different items may come out. It can shoot out boulders in an attempt to crush Pikmin, these boulders come in a straight line and will shatter when they hit a wall just like the boulders of an Armored Cannon Beetle, this is indicated by the sand coming out of the hole the boulder will come out of. It can also shoot streams of acid to melt anyone who is in the radius of the blast instantly aside from Germ Pikmin, this is indicated by the bubbles coming out of the hole from which the acid comes out. It can also shoot clouds of spores indicated by pink dust coming out of the shot hole, making Pikmin into Puffmin who assist the Flint Beetle in combat before eventually wearing out. It can shoot icy snow, which is indicated by a white powder coming out of its hole, this freezes and buried Pikmin which causes them to shatter if they get plucked, meaning that you need to wait for the snow to melt before plucking them. Finally it can shoot flaming spines from its body indicated by black smoke coming from the hole where its being shot at. This varies arsenal is quite deadly and the sense of unpredictability makes it quite formidable at first, however the fifth and final item it can shoot out may be its undoing. At certain points a fleshy bulb may come out at one of the holes, this is a weak point that you can attack and when destroyed three things happen. First the Beetle will trip and slightly crack open the metal casing on its legs, secondly a layer of the castle-like shell will break and become shorter, and third the attacks of the Flint Beetle will become more erratic and therefore more difficult to predict. You do this four times until the casings on the joints break open to reveal a fleshy weakpoint and lose its ability to shoot projectiles as its shell is now flattened like a normal Flint Beetle, however the Flint Beetle isn't going down as it not will try to eat your squad with its mandibles, being capable of eating up to half of your squad if your not careful, luckily this attack is slow so just pay attention. When all of the joints are broken it will fall leaving you able to dig the refuse out of its shell, once completed the Beetle will flail about before it eventually dies, if not dug out in enough time though you need to repeat breaking the exposed joints so you can try again. If this sound too long the Opulent Flint Beetle can be killed quicker by just tossing a cyan syrup, as the ice will freeze the joints and can be broken without needing to destroy the castle-shaped shell first. However without that this can prove to be one of the trickiest battles in the game due to the number of steps needed to defeat this boss.