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In Sea of Thieves, Megalodons are already one of the most dangerous enemies in the game. Season 15’s newest Ancient Megalodons are even more dangerous, with the fiery Feared Redmaw and Barnacled Dread both presenting unique threats a pirate needs to prepare for.
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This guide will focus on how to find and kill the latter, the Barnacled Dread. This armored, electrical monster can be a challenge, but it’s a challenge you can prepare for.
Preparing for a Hunt
The Barnacled Dread is a challenging boss fight, so you’ll want to prepare before seeking it out. In terms of personal weapons, the community typically agrees that the Eye of Reach, the scoped sniper, is the best standard weapon for killing Megalodons. While still weaker than a cannon, it does the most damage per hit and its scope makes hitting the creatures from a distance as they swim relatively easy. Even better would be a Trident of Dark Tides, which deals more damage but will require some adventuring to get, but a trident isn’t required to take down this beast.
Your second weapon is more to taste, but the Barnacled Dread can spawn a minion aboard your ship, so a sword is a decent choice simply so you can always repel the summoned enemy without worrying about ammunition. Even then, it’s sometimes better to kill this minion at a distance, so something like a pistol is arguably better if you stay on top of your ammo count.
In terms of ship weapons, your cannons should be loaded, and you should have a good stock of standard cannonballs. Theoretically, a cannon will be your main weapon in the fight, using your Eye of Reach only when not in range to hit the Dread with your cannon (or when allies are already manning the heavy guns).
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You’ll want an inventory of decent food, withMango, Pineapple, and any perfectly cooked meatthatisn’ta Basic Fish (Trophy Fish are fine) all being good choices. Having a stock of food stored as well won’t hurt, but the Barnacled Dread fight is going to primarily damage your ship, not you.
Finally, make sure to have a full inventory of planks, with more stored in the appropriate barrel on your ship.
Finding the Barnacled Dread
In theory, one can find the Barnacled Dread by chance without any preparation as long as it’s currently spawned. However, the ocean is vast, and the creature isn’t really visible at extreme distances. Thankfully, there is a relatively easy way to learn if the Dread is spawned and where to find it if it is.
The best way to find the Barnacled Dread (and the Feared Redmaw) is to reach Grade 5 with the Hunter’s Call Emissary Flag raised. In testing, this was obtained relatively quickly by doing a few Hunter’s CallTreasured Fishvoyages back-to-back. Upon reaching Grade 5, the location of any spawned Ancient Megalodons is revealed (viewed from your Map Table, in aninteresting piece of in-world UI work). You’ll know the Barnacled Dread is spawned, and where to hunt it, by the symbol shown in the image attached to this section.
As you approach the location of the Megalodon, be on the watch for other players. Swooping in to sink a player’s ship while they fight a challenging boss isn’t uncommon, and the Ancient Megalodons specifically usually require a crew to first obtain Grade 5 on an Emissary Flag, so people fighting them are especially likely to be targeted by enemy pirates seeking broken flags for the Reaper’s Bones.
Killing the Barnacled Dread
While not easy, the Barnacled Dread fight is relatively straightforward. Its total health is going to scale with your ship, although to what degree isn’t yet known. The community also debates what size of ship (Sloop, Brigantine, Galleon) is typically best for Megalodon boss fights (or if it even matters much). Realistically, you may defeat these creatures with any ship; just make sure you have the most crew your selected size allows. A bigger ship means the boss will have more health, but it also means more crew and cannons to chip away at that health.
The Barnacled Dread’s primary point of difficulty is its armor. Its body is covered with chunks of coral which must be damaged and broken before the creature can actually take damage when struck in a given area. This means a crew needs to be aware of where they’re aiming both their firearms, cannons, and tridents. The more you spread out damage over its body, the less effective you’ll be.
Another unique trait of the Barnacled Dread is its ability to spawn Eel-ectric Ocean Crawlers onto your ship. This enemy is more of a nuisance than a serious threat, but should be taken out quickly when one appears. Its main threat is a move where it charges and then shoots an explosive bubble. If you attack the creature while it charges its bubble, it will stun nearby crewmates. To avoid stunning yourself or your crew, either attack it when it isn’t charging or shoot it while it isn’t near anyone.
Periodically, the Dread will charge your ship, its mouth open and ready to bite. This attack will do major ship damage if it hits. However, it’s possible to repel these bite attacks if you can hit the creature in the mouth multiple times with a shot from your Cannons. If at all possible, repelling these attacks should be your priority the moment you notice it’s readying a charge. You can recover from these bites, but they deal significant damage, and it can be hard for a crew to continue effectively attacking while scrambling to board holes and bail water.
The following is a decent battle plan when tackling the Barnacled Dread:
Put as simply as possible, this boss is beaten by bombarding it (keeping in mind what’s armored and what’ss vulnerable) with cannonballs, bullets, and trident magic. Repel its bite charges whenever possible, and deal with any summoned minions quickly. Beyond that, just keep repairing any holes and bailing water. In theory, you cannot lose as long as you stay in the creature’s range and keep your ship afloat (which is easier said than done, admittedly). You just need to keep hitting it.
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