Dulk Fakis: Hard or Just Cheap?

The final Shred the Darkness event mission, The Fourth System, has now been available on the US/EU servers for a week. In this mission, players must run through areas infested with dark enemies and defeat a boss monster at the end.

Overall, the highest difficulty of the mission is not terribly hard. However, it seems to have sparked a little bit of discussion on the official PSU forums about whether the boss, Dulk Fakis, is difficult or simply cheap.

One of the attacks used by Dulk Fakis throughout the battle is a large "tail" swipe. It basically covers the entire room and has the potential to do massive damage to all players in its path. In fact, many times the attack does so much damage that it's a guaranteed KO -- even with dark armor equipped.

Therein lies the question: does this make the boss difficult? Hardly. Dulk Fakis isn't difficult at all -- for the most part, the boss has specific attack patterns that are easy to avoid or defend against if you know what you're doing. The "tail" swipe attack is where the Dulk Fakis boss fight crosses into unfair territory. The attack is almost unavoidable. You can stand virtually anywhere in the room and still get hit. "Difficult" bosses use clever attack strategies and combinations to fight (read: clever AI). How is there any strategy involved in using an unavoidable attack?

Some players insist that lazy one-shot kill attacks like this do contribute to the game's difficulty. Take this comment from the official forums:

I love that he can one shot us. It reminds me of the good old days where the game was actually hard and having scapes was a Must. now people are crying in game and out that he's Hard omg he needs to be fixed the list go's on and on. I say Bring it on Sega !! I enjoy the challege !

Many people fail to realize the difference between difficult and unfair. Difficult is an avoidable attack that can cause major damage when it connects (i.e. Dark Falz's soul steal attack in PSO). Unfair is an unavoidable attack that always causes major damage when it connects (i.e. Dulk Fakis's "tail" swipe attack). Unfair bosses are not always difficult. Dulk Fakis is one such example. If Sega were to take away the "tail" swipe, would this boss be so "difficult"? I doubt it.