What does the sentence "The last boss was deceptively hard" mean?

It can go either way. It's a case where context would resolve the issue. That sentence on its own is useless so it would need more expansion on it to provide its proper meaning

The word has meaning it means something is misleading or hidden, however it can be used both ways, this is why context with the remainder of the text it's generally required. I chose the first choice as that is the context I see that statement written in most often however I know the word can be used the other way, yet I rarely see it used.

Generally it would mean that the boss looked like a pushover, possibly due to physical appearance or initial patterns, but turns out to be more difficult than your impressions would let on. Hence, "deceptive".

Deceptively generally means it was worse than it looked like at first. So 'deceptively hard' and 'deceptively easy' both mean that the boss was harder than it looked at first.

The word "deceptively" makes no sense there but the sentence sounds like the boss is hard. In this case you could substitute "deceptively" with pretty much any adverb and the sentence would keep its meaning.

Harder than it appeared, it never would have occurred to me that it might have a different context

Based on the context, I read that as saying the boss was harder than expected.

Deceptively hard - An easy looking challenge that turned out hard.

Deceptively easy - A hard looking challenge that turned out easy.

That's how the statements look to me, anyway.

In that case it's impossible to know for sure. The sentence should be rewritten to something like "The boss appeared deceptively hard".

I'm guessing it would mean hard from reading it.

The key word here is the one preceding 'deceptively'. In this case it's 'was', which is making it a statement of fact that the boss was hard (to beat), despite giving the impression of being not-so-hard to beat.

Replace 'was' with 'looked' and the meaning is reversed, because it implies that the deceit now rests with its appearance rather than its ability (as was the case in the first example). He looked hard to beat, but actually wasn't.

Replace 'was' with 'seemed' and you may as well flip a coin, because it becomes unclear whether you are using 'seemed' to refer to his appearance before fighting him or are reflecting on his ability after fighting him.

Yeah this. No ambiguity here. Though I can see how some might get confused.

@subwayd said:

This is the right answer. As a native English speaker and someone who has almost finished getting his degree in English Language, it never occurred to me that the boss could be easy based on that sentence.

Now there's a sentence that suggests the boss was easy, as it puts forward the idea that while your first reaction may be that the boss is deceptively hard, this is not actually the case if you put the boss under further scrutiny.

Ok, but so here's my question: 96% percent of people in this poll say that "the boss was deceptively hard" means that the boss looked easy, but was in fact quite difficult. So by that logic, if something is "deceptively X", it means "it looked like it was [not X], but it was, in fact, X".

But what if the statement was this: "This artwork is deceptively simple" (which is something you frequently hear about minimalist art), which is universally understood to mean "This piece of art looks very simple, but it is in fact, quite deep and complex". In that sentence, "deceptively" means the opposite of what it meant in the previous sentence.

And what about "The boss was deceptively easy", like someone suggested earlier? To me that sounds like the boss was quite hard, but looked easy at first. Am I alone in that?

Edit: And by the way, if you start search for examples of people using "deceptively" in either Google Books or the Corpus of Contemporary American English, they generally use "deceptively X" to mean that something is Not X, i.e. the opposite of what this poll indicates. For instance:

" Oh, it's my business, " she replied, her voice soft and deceptively calm. " It's very much my business. "

Classical and deceptively austere on the outside, this monastery is renowned for its ornate baroque interior lined with gold leaf and frescoes.

They never look blowsy or overly girly. His clothes are always deceptively wearable; that is the secret of his success.

Those quotations are from a book published in 2012, Newsweek and Harper's Bazaar, respectively. So why does everyone think that "deceptively hard" means "hard"?

It means it looked hard but wasn't. I don't even begin to understand how it could mean easy.

"Deceptive" comes from "Deceive" so you don't even need context to understand for the most part. It appears to be something it isn't.

@gkhan: First thing you need to learn about English: logic doesn't work. There are way too many rules that have massive exceptions or just straight up aren't true. "I before E except after C" is a rule that we teach kids so they can logically spell words out ... and then they go to science class.

Seems pretty unambiguous to me. The poll agrees. 'Deceptively' absolutely has a meaning, I frankly dunno why you'd say it doesn't.

It means the boss looked easy, but was actually really hard. There was deception.

if you really want to get your noodle in a twist, try and come up with a distinction between 'deceptively' and 'deceitfully.' (i mean, i suppose deceit has a slightly more negative connotation, but it's not like that really matters when used to describe non-human interactions).

but to be on-topic- i think this is an example of english wherein context is absolutely essential. in the case of 'deceptively,' the speaker is usually trying to indicate something is contrary to expectation. and since the expectation can only be established through context, the meaning of 'deceptively + X' (where X is hard, easy, whatevs) is dependent upon that.

if one favours clear and concise language over the loquacious, i can see where this would be troublesome. i'm sure there was a clear protocol for use of 'deceptively' at one point- but vernacular erodes all, and at a certain point, you're pissing into the wind if you fight the natural wear-and-tear of language.

Fuck context, apparently.

Deceptively is an adjective to the noun hard. "The last boss was deceptively hard" means the last boss was hard, but did not appear to be so. It was hard, deceptively so.

It's all about context.

Or that. Whatever.

Deceptively doesn't imply any misdeed or 'lie' on the part of the subject; deceitfully implies that the subject intentionally mislead someone or something. In general, only subjects capable of telling a lie or actively hiding the truth (I.e. people) would make sense with a modifier like 'deceitfully', while deceptively refers to the perceived appearance, rather than a quality which we know to be definitely true or definitely false. 'Adverbs appear deceptively simple' couldn't really be replaced with 'adverbs appear deceitfully simple'.

@brodehouse: Deceptively is an ADVERB that modifies the adjective 'easy' or more appropriately, it modifies the entire clause 'easy (to beat)'. Most words that end in -ly in the English language are adverbs.

Yeah I'm not seeing the confusion here.

right- but if you really get into it, i think it gets messy. for example, if we were to apply both words, deceitfully and deceptively, to the subject 'boss,' i think significant distinction becomes difficult. if i were to say

'the boss was deceptively difficult.' i'm essentially saying the boss difficult in a manner that i, at first glance, did not understand or observe.

and if i say 'the boss was deceitfully difficult.' i'm essentially saying the boss was difficult in a manner that was disarming and/or treacherous. deceit carries the connotation of betrayal and the breaking of trust, but when talking specifically about a videogame 'boss' (where both human and non-human behavioural characteristics readily apply)...this becomes a bit of a clusterfuck trying to unpack it all. where does the deceit come from? the coder, the boss itself, the characterization?

interesting stuff, though.

Deceitfully simple is the problem there...using deceitfully to modify simple is clunky and it's syntax I don't think I've ever heard. To describe something as deceitful also implies foreknowledge of the lie being told, whereas deceptive speaks to an uncertainty about the qualities at hand.

I honestly can't see how there is any debate here. If something is deceptively hard it appears easy but is hard.

In a sense you are right. "Deceptively" can be used variably, so without context there is no clear meaning, as some have already pointed out.

There is a similar problem with "suspending belief" and "suspending disbelief." Because those phrases are rather idiomatic, they are understood to mean the same thing; however, for someone who doesn't speak English, those phrases require an understanding of which way belief/disbelief is being suspended (i.e. retained or repelled), the subject that is to be believed or not, and whether or not it is ideal to believe in said subject.

I would have said that both "deceptively easy" and "deceptively difficult" are idiomatic at this point, meaning "not easy at all" and "quite easy," respectively. But if your poll is accurate, I'm wrong about the latter phrase. Honestly, the best choice for a writer would be not to use the damn word at all.

@melos: 'Suspension of belief' is improper syntax if what you wanted to say was 'suspension of disbelief' (which is idiomatic anyway, it's a phrase coined by S.T. Coleridge in 1817 to describe fiction immersive enough to make the reader forget it is fiction).

I don't see how there can be any confusion with the word in this sentence. There's really no room for interpretation here. The boss looked easy but was in fact hard.

I've never heard it used in the context of game bosses, but in sports it's like "Jeremy lin is deceptively quick", Meaning he looks slow but he's faster than you think.

But language is dictated by the people who use it, so if more and more people don't understand the 'proper' use of a word then it's meaning will change over time. Just think how it was before dictionaries started to document definitions, a language could change completely in a generation.

I can't even count all the ridiculous debates I've had online with people who only disagreed because they had made up their own definitions to what something means.

I interpret all of those examples the opposite way (that is, "A is deceptively B" implies that "A is B").
I think it is quite clear in the first one that the voice is calm; "deceptively" means that the speaker is not actually calm but is using a calm voice (so "deceptively X" == "X" in this case).

For the second, the writer is clearly contrasting the exterior and interior of the monastery. The exterior is austere, but deceptively in that the interior is disproportionately ornate.

And the third may be the most obvious, why would unwearable clothes be successful? The author is saying that though the designs may not look wearable at first glance, they actually are (in contrast to most "high fashion").

It's pretty simple. Deceptively describes the way in which it is hard. Think of it this way: If you say someone is "quickly running" somewhere. Remove "quickly" and the statement is still entirely accurate. IF you remove the "Deceptively" and you see that the boss is hard, and deceptively is simply a description of the way in which it is hard.

So we know that it is in some way hard. But in what way? The definition of "deceptively" is basically less blank than you expected. If something is deceptively simple, it is appears simple from the outside, but in actuality is quite complex.

If used correctly, it is used to indicate that something appears that way but is in fact not that way. So the way in which it is difficult is in appearance, and not in reality.

It's a bit of a complex concept because it essentially means "technically, this is true, but there's more to the situation that is contrary." If someone is deceptively calm, it generally means that they are behaving calmly but mentally or emotionally are distraught or excited.

If something is deceptively hard, I would say it's something that is difficult until you notice you've completely cocked it up and once you realize the fairly simple solution it's not all that difficult. One example would be seeing a pattern and exploiting it in a way that would allow you to easily conquer the boss.

Not so. Something being deceptively anything means it is less of that thing than it appears. If someone is deceptively calm, it means they are putting on a calm face when in reality they are very excited. Not that they are calm but don't appear to be.

Another way to define the word would be "so as to deceive." So if you are deceptively calm, you appear calm so as to deceive those observing you, when you are in fact quite excitable.

Except that the definition of the word is not that it appears differently than X but that it is less X than it appears.

@jarmahead said:

That's a faulty definition of the word 'deceptively'. A better definition is 'to do something in a way that causes somebody to reach false conclusions'. You can be 'deceptively [X]' and still be more [X] or exactly as [X] as you first appear. An example would be deception by association: let's say someone from a certain school of martial arts is a very tough opponent, but the context is that you are facing his associates afterwards and they are all very weak. 'That guy was deceptively tough' means he was exactly as tough as he appeared, if not more, but he deceived you, perhaps inadvertently, into thinking that your later opponents would also be very tough.

The context of a game is that you are trying to beat it. 'Deceptively hard' means you have been led to reach false conclusions about the difficulty level. This means the final boss was either much tougher than the rest of the game (so the game in general was deceptive) or was tougher than his appearance or initial behaviour led you to expect (the boss itself or its appearance was deceptive). The only ways 'deceptively hard' could mean it was easy overall would be if the boss was initially very tough, but then goes into a latter phase which is easier or, as you say, if you figure out the trick to him later - however, that would still be a clumsy usage of 'was deceptively hard' because it would be better to say that it 'appeared deceptively hard'.

'It was deceptively hard' should mean 'it was hard'; the way to say 'I thought it would be hard, but it wasn't' should be 'it appeared deceptively hard'.

Dude, there is no one right answer, it's fucking context sensitive.

Oh hey, what's going on in h...

Nevermind. I'm out, nerds.