How to Perform Melee Finishers in Cyberpunk 2077

Some of the melee weapons in CD Projekt Red’s RPG come with melee finishers, which offer a unique way to eliminate your enemies. Read further to learn how to unlock melee finishers in Cyberpunk 2077.

Cyberpunk 2077: How to Perform Melee Finishers

To perform a finishing move in Cyberpunk 2077, you must first bring your enemy down to low health. Then, you must perform a Strong melee attack directly in front or behind them. This step is crucial because you need to ensure that you deal more damage with a Strong attack than the amount of HP your enemy has left. Keeping a close eye on your enemy’s health is essential to execute the finishing move successfully.

Knowing when to perform a strong attack in combat can be crucial for defeating enemies effectively. A good indicator is when an enemy falls to the ground in a prone position, but it’s also essential to monitor their health level. However, it’s worth noting that you can’t perform finishers on enemies that are six or more levels higher than you, which are considered Very High threat level. Additionally, a specific distance threshold level must be met before you can execute a successful melee finisher.

Related: Cyberpunk 2077: How to Get Mantis Blades

In Cyberpunk 2077, players can execute multiple finishing moves using weapons like the Mantis Blades, Gorilla Arms, and Katanas by default. For example, the Katana can perform a finishing move, resulting in the enemy’s head being severed in a gory explosion. These melee finishers in Cyberpunk 2077 bear a striking resemblance to the Bloody Mess kills that were present in the Fallout series.

I found out that you can perform finishing moves on all NPCs that fight back, such as NCPD and MaxTech. However, you can’t target standard civilians for melee finishers since they die immediately. Once you get the hang of performing a melee finisher in Cyberpunk 2077, it will become second nature, and you will perform it with every kill.

How to Unlock Blunt Weapon Finisher in Cyberpunk

In order to unlock a melee finisher for your blunt weapons you must unlock the Finisher: Savage Sling perk in the Body tree. To activate this finisher you must press the F button when an enemy’s health is low. You will then throw the enemy, kill them, and damage other enemies where they land.

In addition to needing to unlock the Blunt Weapon Finisher you can also improve melee finishers for other weapons like the Katana. For instance, new perks relased with the 2.0 update will increase your finisher range by 100% (Going the Distance), make bleeding enemies more susceptible to melee finishers (Slaughterhouse), or gain an attack and speed boost after performing a melee finisher (Flash of Steel). Be sure to check out the tree for your favorite weapon to see how you can improve your melee finisher ability!

How to Unlock Blade Weapon Finishers in Cyberpunk

Players can unlock finishers for Blades in Cyberpunk 2077 through the Reflexes skill tree. Located on the right branch of the Reflexes skill tree, you will find the Bladerunner perk, which is the critical component of unlocking blade finishers.

To progress to the Bladerunner perk, you will need to spend two points on Lead and Steel, and then three points on Bladerunner. In other words, it costs a total of 5 points to reach the opportunity to unlock finishers for blades in Cyberpunk 2077.

If you need help obtaining the necessary skill points to unlock the Bladerunner skill, make sure to focus on completing main and side missions found throughout the game world. Completing objectives is the fastest way to get enough experience points for skill points.

Author’s Note: I wrote this guide while playing Cyberpunk 2077 on Steam Deck