Thanks so much :D
Yeah the cliff took a backseat; it's literally the first thing I slapped in there "temporarily" to bridge the starting cave to the arena. Intention was to make more of a "level" leading up to the boss, to introduce the shooting mechanic and the fire that got left out.
Damn, thought I added the reset for the rotating phase. Guess not, or maybe a path exists where it gets bypassed. I also managed to become invulnerable in my own post-patch testing, no real idea how.
Yeah I've even got a system on the player to choose different respawn points but didn't find time to a.) place one or b.) add appropriate scripting to actually select a new spawn point. Would've used campfires like the one in the starting room to indicate if I'd managed to make enough of a level to justify multiple checkpoints but eh, game jam timeframes. Thanks again!
Edit: and your response to the shooting is basically everything I was hoping for with it :) with more balancing time I might've limited the auto-aim so that you had to at least be facing towards the target to add a skill floor to that element (most likely with the health bars adjusted down a bit) but again, without introducing the mechanic properly to the player that felt like it could be a bit impenetrable.