How to Beat the Archon in Mass Effect: Andromeda
The Archon is the last hurdle standing between Ryder and a home for the Andromeda Initiative in Mass Effect: Andromeda. After studying you ever since you boarded his ship during the saving of the Salarian Ark, he figures out that its SAM who helps you control the Remnant and gives you your extra abilities. He also learns from studying you that your sibling has the implant as well so launches an attack on the Hyperion to kidnap them and make a move on Meridian.
After fighting through waves of Remnant and Kett as you make your way to Meridian’s central controls, it’s time to face the Archon and win the fight for humanity. Except you don’t exactly face him. He has hacked SAM and is fully integrated with Meridian now. Fortunately enough, the Ryder sibling that has been kidnapped is still connected to SAM and figures out how to power the Archon down. What you’ll have to do is is head to three different terminals to kill the power while also dealing with endless Remnant and an Architect in the middle of the area.
You’ll need to head to each waypoint to hack these terminals. The hacking process is sped up by killing Remnant. There will be tons of Nullifiers, Assemblers, and Observers, so Shotguns and any Electricity-based weapons are welcome. Also, Overload is a good skill to have to build combos off of. The Architect in the center is simplified as well. There are no legs to worry about, but it’s face will be active. You’ll need to shut down the face to give yourself time to Interface with each terminal, but don’t worry it’s not too difficult.
Movement is the most important thing to remember during this encounter. There will be a lot of enemies coming at you from all sides, so make use of cover and constantly change your position. Both the Architect and Nullifiers can shoot through cover, so don’t get caught in just one place.
The one problem you’ll come across is that sometimes the waypoints can be very buggy. They won’t send you to the wrong spot or anything, but they’ll either take forever to recognize that you’re there or require that you keep leaving the immediate area and returning, hoping that it will trigger. The latter method seems to work best if you’re trying to get things moving along quickly, so just back away and move back in so the dialogue can trigger and you’ll start hacking.
One thing to note is that you don’t have to kill all of the enemies, which is a good thing because it’s literally impossible. Enemies won’t stop coming, so just do what you can to keep them off of your back and keep it moving.
When the third and final terminal appears, ignore everything and make a bee-line for it. As soon as you interact with it the Archon will be overloaded and defeated. You did it, you just beat Mass Effect: Andromeda by killing the enemy who made life in the Heleus Cluster complete hell.
For more on Mass Effect: Andromeda, be sure to check out our wiki.
