Canterbury are staring down the barrel of at least a month without Mat Burton and Viliame Kikau, after claiming a costly 40-24 win over Gold Coast.
On a bittersweet night for the Bulldogs at a hot and heaving Belmore Oval, their dynamic left-edge pairing of Burton and Kikau suffered match-ending knee injuries.
Canterbury's chief playmaker Burton was first left reeling in pain when his knee twisted trying to make a tackle on Jojo Fifita.
Bulldogs medical staff suspect that the five-eighth has suffered a torn medial ligament, which would likely leave him sidelined for at least four weeks.
A similar diagnosis is expected for second-rower Fifita, after he was hurt attempting a tackle on Moeaki Fotuaika just before fulltime.
Undefeated after two rounds, the Bulldogs have a struggling Parramatta next week before crunch games against Parramatta and Newcastle ahead of their round-six bye.
The injuries soured the Bulldogs' high-scoring win, with both sides mixing moments of attacking brilliance with early-season lapses in defence.
Playing their first game of the season, after a round-one bye, the Titans trailed 22-0 before fighting back with an Alofiana Khan-Pereira double before halftime.
And after they slipped 34-12 behind in the second half, Keano Kini gave Gold Coast some brief hope with a bust out of his own end that ended with Fifita scoring.
But the Titans ran out of time on a night when their big-money forward pack was soundly beaten and let in a number of tries.
One Bulldogs four-pointer came when Josh Curran pushed through three defenders to reach the line after a one-out pass from a 10-metre penalty tap.
Another came when Jaeman Salmon dummied his way past Fotuaika, while Kurt Mann had a four-pointer when he hit a gaping hole in the middle.
When Curran and Max King walked off the field to a standing ovation after just 25 minutes, the Bulldogs' front-row pairing had run 170 metres between them.
In comparison, Gold Coast's starting props Fotuaika and Reagan Campbell-Gillard totalled a combined 40 metres in that time.
Titans coach Des Hasler also waited until the 50th minute to bring his most damaging forward David Fifita off the bench, when his side were down by 22.
In contrast, Canterbury's hulking second-rower Kikau was dominant in the opening half, having a hand in two first-half tries.
He batted on a Burton ball to Marcelo Montoya for Canterbury's first after a Reed Mahoney intercept.
And his skills were on show again 13 minutes later when he charged onto a ball and got away a late offload to help Burton put Mahoney in under the posts.