Jester

Jester
Boxed and Popped Jester
Information
Power Level	3
Max Spawned	1
Can See Through Fog	No
Leave Time	Doesn't leave
Traits
Behavior	Roaming / Winding / Chasing
Dwells	Inside
Shock Response
Stun Grenades	4.5s
Radar Booster	1.05s

Jesters, also known as Music Boxes and Jack In The Boxes, are entities in Lethal Company.

Appearing to be jack-in-the-boxes with skinny legs, they might seem somewhat harmless, but beware—these creatures are ticking time bombs that can eliminate your entire crew in seconds if you aren't careful. At first, they follow an employee around, then they start to wind themselves up. Once their wind up is done, every single employee must get out of the building otherwise they will meet their demise.

Bestiary

Sigurd's danger level: 90% Get out o fthere before it goes APE!! You cant hide from it, just evacuate. i think it goes back in its box if everyone stays outside long enough

Scientific name: INSANEUS THINGUS

THERE'S NO FREAKING SCIENTIFIC RECORD! good luck, you know as much as us. we just call it the jester

Occurrence

Moon	Spawn Chance
85-Rend	14.85%
8-Titan	12.84%
68-Artifice	8.07%
7-Dine	5.10%
20-Adamance	1.93%
61-March	0.33%

Unreleased Moon	Spawn Chance
44-Liquidation	10.49%

Behavior

These peculiar creatures operate in three distinct modes:

Roaming

When a Jester spawns, it begins randomly roaming the facility. When it spots an employee, the Jester will begin following them. Once a Jester begins following an employee, it cannot be lost by any means except for leaving the facility. If an employee should find themselves stuck in a dead-end with a Jester blocking the doorway out, it is possible to jump on top and crouch walk to get out. The Jester will stay in this passive following phase for a short period (of around 13-18 seconds).

Winding

After a short timer of 13-18 seconds has passed, the Jester will suddenly halt in place and begin winding itself. The Jester will play "Pop Goes the Weasel" as it winds, the tune becoming faster and more demented as time goes on. Employees that see, hear, or otherwise perceive a winding Jester should begin making their way to the nearest Facility entrance with urgency. Once a Jester starts winding, it will not stop until it reaches the end of its winding timer, which lasts roughly 42 seconds.

Chasing

When a Jester pops, it immediately enters the Chasing phase. Its top will open, revealing a colossal and apparent human skull attached to a fleshy stalk. The Jester will begin screaming incessantly, which can be heard from across the map, and the Jester will always know where the nearest player is and rush towards them, its speed ramping up constantly until it can outrun even sprinting employees. Once a Jester has popped, there is very little employees can do to outrun or hide from it unless they are already close to a Facility entrance. If the Jester catches up to an employee in this phase it will instantly kill them, holding the unfortunate sap's body in its jaws for a few seconds before dropping them and beginning to chase after the next employee. If there are no living employees in the Facility, the Jester will immediately return its skull to its box and re-enter the Roaming phase.

Strategy

• There are no truly reliable strategies for handling a Jester. It's often best to escape the building as soon as possible once targeted or wait for it to pop before exiting.
• There are a handful of places inside the Facility that are out of the reach of the Jester. They're often difficult to access and rather gimmicky, but if you find yourself trapped inside with a popped Jester between you and an exit, using them to wait for a teleport out may be your only hope.
• Allowing it to pop and luring it to one entrance before leaving will return it to its normal state far from the other entrance, allowing your team to reenter and loot safely. This tactic can be incredibly useful if you find yourself constantly having to leave the Facility to avoid a Jester, but can be difficult to coordinate without walkie-talkies or some other form of communication.
• If encountered on the Factory layout, employees can possibly lure and trap a Jester behind a secure door with help from a teammate operating the terminal or manipulating the breaker box. This is extremely difficult to pull off as it requires coordination, communication, and near-perfect positioning, but it completely eliminates the threat posed by the Jester; it cannot escape unless a third-party opens the door.
• If encountered near the elevator of The Mineshaft, it's possible to bring a Jester up to the entrance in the elevator, cutting it off from the rest of the map. Whilst this move requires effective communication with other team members, as well as knowledge of the planet's fire exits, it completely trivialises the Jester encounter.

Notes

• A Jester's transitional wind-up phase can be stalled for a maximum of 20 seconds by using the Zap Gun, allowing more time for employees to evacuate. However, stunning a Jester that has not yet started its windup phase is unadvised, as once the stun wears off it will immediately start winding.
• Rather than detecting their target based off of sound, sight, or movement, a Jester is always aware of their target's location. This means that attempting to hide from one that's locked-on is a waste of time that could be better spent trying to find a way out of the Facility.
• A popped Jester's speed quickly ramps up every second. However, its speed will be reset when it kills an employee, is stunned via the Zap Gun, or is flashed by a Stun grenade, DIY-Flashbang, or Radar-booster.
• The Jester's scream can alert Eyeless Dogs, though a mod is required for it to be outside in the first place.
• Though completely arbitrary, canonically, the Jester winds up for 42 minutes before snapping, which seems awful short to our 42 seconds. It's assumed all of its flesh gets caught in the winding mechanism, hence the screaming and noise distortion after popping.

Audio

Audio	File
Jester Theme
Jester Popping Out
Jester Screaming
Jester Step 1
Jester Step 2
Jester Step 3

Gallery

A 'popped' Jester as seen from behind.

A Jester starting its music.

Render of a Jester without the game's shading

History

Launch

• The Jester is added.

Version 47

• The Jester now takes 25s - 42s to begin cranking.
• Fixed a bug where the player could loop a Jester by staying close and going around in circles.

Version 50

• The Jester's follow-timer is now set to 13s - 18s in multiplayer.
• The Jester's follow-timer is now set to 25s - 42s in singleplayer.
• The Jester Forcefield has been fixed.