Core Keeper Hive Mother Boss Fight Guide

In this Core Keeper Hive Mother Boss Fight Guide, I'll tell you how to find and defeat the Hive Mother, a boss in The Clay Caves biome.

Where to Find the Hive Mother

The Hive Mother can be found deep inside of The Clay Caves biome. Unfortunately, you might have to search for quite a while to find her. It is easier to go to the Glurch Statue in the Core and craft a Hive Mother scanner for 5 Ancient Gemstone and 5 Mechanical Parts. Once you use it, it will create an icon on the map showing you where she is.

How to Unlock the Hive Mother

The Hive Mother is unlocked by default at the start of the game.

How to Win the Core Keeper Hive Mother Boss Fight - Best Strategy

There are several strategies for beating this boss in our Core Keeper Hive Mother Boss Fight Guide, but none of them are easy. This is going to be your toughest fight yet.

Preparing Equipment and Supplies

You're going to want to have the best equipment possible. I strongly recommend going to The Forgotten Ruins biome and getting enough Iron to craft two Iron Swords. You'll also need some Tin to craft at least two Slingshots. Cook some Hearty Pepper Wraps (Heart Berry + Bomb Pepper). You may also want to craft some Healing Potions.

Finally, you're going to need a Shovel. Yes, a Shovel. 1 Iron Shovel should do, although you can get away with two Wood Shovels or Copper Shovels if you're low on materials.

Preparing the Arena

Fortunately, the Core Keeper Hive Mother boss fight can only be started once you actually attack the Hive Mother. You can otherwise walk right up to her with no problems (except for any other monsters in the area).

First, you should widen the arena. I recommend at least a 30x30 area with the Hive Mother at the center. Place torches around the outside to light it up, too, although keep in mind that some of the enemies in The Clay Caves biome will destroy Torches. Remove any of the acid pools in the arena with your shovel, and make sure you have an escape path if you need to run -- it's better to run away and try again if you think you're going to die.

I also recommend building a small room with a Bed at least 50 blocks away from the Hive Mother. This will let you quickly respawn if you die, saving you the trouble of having to run back from your base elsewhere (or from the Core if you don't have a Bed of your own at your base). Make sure to put a door on it. It may be helpful to have other workbenches there too, such as the Repair Bench.

Strategy 1 - Melee + Ranged

The best strategy to beat the Core Keeper Hive Mother boss is a combination of melee and ranged combat. First, eat your Hearty Pepper Wrap to get your buffs. Then, start attacking the Hive Mother with your Iron Sword to begin the battle.

The Hive Mother will shoot acid into the air where you're standing. Start moving as soon as you see a target icon appear on top of your character.

That's not all the Hive Mother does, though -- she also spawns in larvae from one of the five eggs surrounding her. You can proactively kill the eggs with melee attacks before they spawn if you can do enough damage quickly enough. However, I actually advise against doing this -- the longer the battle goes, the more acid that will cover the floor from each of the Hive Mother's attacks. A better strategy is to continually run in a circle around the Hive Mother, moving in close for a few melee whacks and then backing away to avoid acid attacks.

Occasionally, glowing yellow larvae will spawn. Destroy these with your Slingshot -- they'll explode into  acid if they get close enough to you.

The Hive Mother will escalate her attack speed when her health gets low. If you can keep a cool head and keep moving, you'll be able to kill her using this strategy.

Strategy 2 - Ranged

Alternatively, you can use an exclusively ranged strategy to fight the Hive Mother. It's certainly doable, but I recommend doubling the size of the arena -- make it at least 50x50 blocks with the Hive Mother at the center. You're going to need a lot more room to move around as the arena fills up with acid.

Strategy 3 - Explosives

I attempted to use explosives to kill the Hive Mother several times, all to no avail. I'm sure it's possible, but I do not recommend this strategy. If you fail, you'll have used a lot of resources for nothing.

Strategy 4 - Traps

I also tried using traps to kill the mobs while shooting the Hive Mother from afar. This can work, but it's an awful lot of trouble to get it done. You can probably kill the Hive Mother faster by using a mix of melee and ranged combat instead.

How to Summon the Hive Mother Again

As with the first two bosses, you can summon the Hive Mother again by using a specific idol on her summoning rune. You'll have to buy a Hive Mother Summoning Idol from the Backpack Merchant.

Once the Hive Mother is summoned, she shouldn't actually start the fight until you attack her. If she does, you can leave the arena and return to reset her.

Core Keeper Hive Mother Boss Loot

Here is the loot you can get for defeating the Hive Mother in Core Keeper. Keep in mind that this may not be a complete list -- there could be other loot from this boss that we haven't discovered yet!

Hivemother Chest

• Guaranteed drop.
• Has 24 item slots (8x3).

Heart of the Hivemother

• Guaranteed drop.
• Used to activate the Glurch Statue in the Core.
• Unlocks recipes for:
  • Larva Spike Club
  • Grubzooka
  • Ancient Hologram Pod

Grub Egg Necklace

• Necklace
• +18.1% melee damage
• Part of a set with Larve Ring.
  • 2 set bonus: immune to being slowed by slime.

Larva Meat

• Cooking ingredient.

Fiber

• Crafting material.

Ancient Gemstone

• Crafting material.

That's it for our Core Keeper Hive Mother guide! Check out more guides below: