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Bryan Willy
Combat Design
 Rhulk (Concept art by Tobias Kwan)I was the boss designer for Rhulk on for the Vow of the Disciple Raid. Collaborating with the Raid team on their vision I designed his combat, gameplay, behaviors, and defined goals/priorities for the art team's execution. Players had very high expectations due to this being the first appearance of the mysterious Pyramid race that had caused the collapse ages ago and he delivered and is widely cited as some player's favorite boss. Released in the Witch Queen expansion (2022) |  The Witness (Screenshot by Dewey Bonczyk)The Witness was the biggest, most important, and most complex boss of my 9 year career on Destiny 2. It required us to merge all of the Combatants and Bosses team into a single massive team that I led thru development, juggling competing stakeholders across multiple director roles, and entire branches of the studio to deliver the climactic finale in the Final Shape. |  Weaver and Attendant (3D Character Art by Dewey Bonczyk)While the Witness feature I was leading for this release was on schedule, the game's leadership team had spun up the need for additional combatants as we had announced a release date delay for The Final Shape expansion. Me and a designer below me (Giancarlo Gioelli) took these two units and built them in a very short time. The Final Shape (2024) |  Atraks-1 (3D Character Art by Roderick Weise)Atraks-1, aka "Replix" internally, was a boss I designed for the Deep Stone Crypt. The fantasy of a boss that found a way to sort of 3D print copies of herself and become a sort of hive mind. A lot of her complexity came from supporting the raid team's desire for this sort of airlock experience where you had to kill each of these boss bodies, then pick up the bits, then take them to an airlock - all the while if you take too long the boss will rebuild herself, killing you. Beyond Light (2020) |  The Caretaker (Screenshot)I designed the Caretaker as the mid boss for the Vow of the Disciple raid. The Witch Queen (2022) |  Sanctified Mind, Sol Inherent (3D Character Art by Roderick Weise)The final boss for the Garden of Salvation raid I also designed - these bosses were done with 'Silver' scope, which is about only 2/3 of the usual resources of prior raid bosses, so a lot of his design was done in ways to try to maximize impact of those limited resources. Shadowkeep (2019) |
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 Consecrated Mind (3D Character Art by Roderick Weise)'Mall Cop' is the internal dev name I had lovingly given this boss I was responsible for the design for the Garden of Salvation raid. Released for the Shadowkeep expansion (2019) |  Destiny 2 Sundial Psions (3D Character Art by Roderick Weise)I designed 2 of the 3 sundial Psions, building the gameplay for each of their attacks/abilities for the Sundial Activity. Released with Season of Dawn (2019) |  Zulmak, Instrument of Torment (3D Character Art by Roderick Weise)I designed Zulmak - AKA 'Sloppy Joe' or 'Spicy Crota' for the Pit of Heresy Dungeon. The encounter designer (Brendan Throne) specifically requested some attack/ability that would complicate Well of Radiance - which had started to make DPS phases stale. The boss's big rift + fire tornado attack was designed to knock players out of a WoR but not necessarily invalidate the use of the Super - more make it more interesting/tricky to be optimal. Shadowkeep (2019) |  Nezarec (3D Character Art by Dewey Bonczyk)I designed Nezarec for the Root of Nightmares raid - the major challenge here was I did not own the design of the sandbox combatant that was simultaneously being built and had to work with that team's design and iteration - also faced some unique challenges due to how world art directors and combat art directors were on different teams which created a lot of coordination problems with the use of terraforming visual languages shared between him and the environment. Released with Lightfall (2023) |  Berserker (3D Character Art by Allan Lee)I designed the Berserker miniboss that is fought across the Scourge of the Past Raid including his special two-player mechanical game/abilities. Released with the Season of the Forge (2018) |  Taniks, The Abomination (Screenshot)'Shaniks' as he came to be lovingly referred to was the final boss I designed for the Deep Stone Crypt raid. Players by this point had fought this character so many times it was on the verge of being stale, and we played on the player expectations to sort of jump the shark so to speak and give him a proper final sendoff. Shipped in Beyond Light (2020) |
 Insurrection Prime (3D Character Art by Roderick Weise)Nathan Vetterlein designed Insurrection Prime and stepped off to another project midway thru development as I took over and closed on the boss - I ultimately only needed to make minor changes to his design as we iterated/closed on it but over the 7 years since he shipped I've fixed so many different bugs on him I consider him in the umbrella of my work. Released in Season of the Forge (2018) |  Ablative Armor (Screenshot)Ablative Armor was a very troubled feature that had gone thru significant churn by the time I got involved as I stepped into the Lead AI Designer role. The goal was to create a system new mechanic that could create a 'power creep agnostic' challenge as we were struggling with player power creep this late in Destiny's lifespan making it difficult to have Combatant gameplay 'breathe'. (Making something a damage sponge/giving it a bunch more health doesn't really cut it for) |  Dredgen Sere (Screenshot)I was Destiny's Lead AI Designer by this point in 2025 and trying to mentor the next generation of leads by shifting more towards oversight rather than directly owning the design of individual bosses. Dedgen Sere needed to seem human despite us not having a human base to work or scope to make one and I got more involved to help us find a way to use resources in a way players wouldn't feel like it's 'just another taken wizard boss'. |  Harrow, Dredgen-Apprentice (Screenshot)I was Destiny's Lead AI Designer by this point in 2025 and trying to mentor the next generation of leads by shifting more towards oversight rather than directly owning the design of individual bosses. Some bosses like Harrow I would get involved in more so than others depending on the complexity/risks (Melee only bosses are tricky) or if there is a need for additional resources the team didn't have access to (The team's idea for it's intro needed lighting support and I ensured we got that) |  Argos (Screenshot)The first raid boss I worked on in my career - I was tasked with the boss's 'Detain Sphere' attack that would snare players and cause them to become helpless/start to get sucked away (into the Leviathan's engine was the fantasy/idea). |  Koregos, the Worldline (Screenshot)I designed Koregos as The Desert Perpetual Raid's final boss. Similar to the Sanctified Mind back on Shadowkeep I had only 'silver' scope to work with and opted to get the spectacle/novel experience needs met via making it so big you fought on 'top' of it for DPS - and investing over 30% of it's entire VFX scope on it's primary attack laser and the design of how it chases players around the map (also utilized to deliver its DPS gameplay) Released with The Edge of Fate (2025) |
9 years of best-in-class
Combat & Boss Design
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