Underneath my yellow skin

Shadow of the Erdtree, final boss (and other thoughts), part two

In the last post, I started talking about the last boss, then wandered all over the place. Yes, this is my method, and I’m sticking to it. I did mention who the boss was and that I knew better than to go into the fog gate at 2 a.m.

*SPOILER WARNING*

The Radahn fight in the base game nearly broke me. At that point, I had 18 Vigor and he could one-shot me with his spears that he used as great arrows. I was a very squishy (soft)strength(hard)caster. I loved the spectacle of calling in all your fellow warriors and having at him. The problem was that any one hit would kill me.

I didn’t mean to only have 18 Vigor. I usually don’t put much into Vigor, but 18 was ridiculously low. In the other games, I kept it around 25 or so. In this game, they say you should have 60 by the end boss. Which was ridiculous, by the way.

Side note: someone in the RKG Discord Elden Ring forum is helping me with a  fire-faith build. It’s someone who is really into builds. It’s funny because I already have a lot of what they say to have, but I have way too much intelligence. I know that. I had 70 Intelligence and lopped it down to 52 for the DLC so I could have 60 Vigor. My fellow slug told me to not have more than 60 in Vigor and that I should go to 80 in Faith. I have 65 in Faith, I think. If I get rid of all the points I have in Intelligence, then I could go crazy with other stats. I have something like 220 levels. 80 + 60 leaves me with 80. The slug suggested 30 for mind, 20 for endurance (or whatever I needed to not fat roll) and as much strength as I wanted to up the damage of my weapon. Which is a strength weapon.

It’s funny because I don’t min/max my build at all, and yet, I’m about 70% there to what the person suggested. Basically, a pyro/heal build. Which is entirely my jam. I was so appreciative of this person, and now I have a guide if I want to completely maximize my build.

I had a few things to clean up in the DLC, which I’ll talk about later. Let’s talk about the final boss because–oh, another thing. I did not realize that you can buy the armor from some of the bosses in the DLC. Two of them are main story bosses (including Mesmer, of course, and Radahn, double of course. The other two are Rellana, which I understand, but the fourth is Commander Gaius. His shit says that he is the student of the same Alabaster Lord who taught Radahn and Gaea gravitational magic. Now, other than the fact that he had the same teacher as Radahn, who the fuck is Gaea?

Anyway. I wouldn’t wear any of the four armors (and I bought them all), but I’m happy to have them in my collection. Radahn’s armor is the Young Lion’s Set, and there are a few differences from the set in the base game–including he has braids in his hair.

Back to, well, him.

I walked through the golden fog door, my heart pounding. I tried to keep calm, but I knew my Shadow of the Erdtree journey was coming to the end. Or at least the last boss. That doesn’t mean that I was done with the game, oh no. I had a half-dozen other things to do after, but once I found the final boss, I knew I was in for it. Or rather, I assumed. But also, I thought  maybe not. As I mentioned before, I was pretty overleveled by the time I did the main storyline. All that exploring helped me get most of the Scadutree Fragments and the Revered Spirit Ashes, so I was nearly maxed out by the time I hit the end of the game.

I was not having that much trouble with the bosses. Which, I will be honest, is exactly what I wanted. I most emphatically do not play the games to solo bosses any longer. I don’t want hard bosses. It really emphasized that I play the games to explore.

Let’s speak about this for a moment.

At some point soon, I will do an actual review of the DLC. There is one person in the RKG Discord who thinks Elden Ring is the worst of the From games and did not enjoy the DLC bosses at all. I disagree that Elden Ring is terrible, let alone the worst From game. But. And this is so controversial. I agree that many of the bosses in the DLC were…forgettable. Apparently, there are only three bosses you have to beat in the DLC. Mesmer (for his kindling), Romina, and Radahn. Oh, and Needle Knight Leda and her allies. There are ten Remembrance bosses, and you only have to do three of them. Leda is not one. There are (yes, I Googled this) 78 bosses in total. I probably have done most of them.

Back to Radahn. The cutscene at the beginning was amazing. Him and Miquella, the huge arena, and all the spectacle. Radahn does the move that he does in the trailer from the base game–which he did not do in the base game. Everything was so epic, but I could not help noticing how fit and fine Radahn was. Apparently, people smarter and more attention-to-detail than I (plus, acutally doing the NPC questlines) were able to piece together that Radahn would be the last boss. I had no idea (as I explained in a previous post), even though I knew he would be in the game.

He hit like a tank. REAL hard. And he had combos for days. Thius is one of the complaints that people had in the base game as wel, but it was up to a hundo with Radahn. In addition, there are attacks he does that he may do once or twice in a row, depending on his mood. It’s the Lion’s Claw Ash of War in which he sticks his sword in the ground and does a front flip. Then, if he feels like doing a second, it’ll be after a second so I can’t really react properly.

It’s a good thing I was a caster! And so was my Mimic Tear. And we got him into his second phase on the second try. And got him down to about a quarter health. And then died. Even though I did so well, I had a sinking feeling about this fight. The second phase was bananapants. It was so bonkers, I can barely even talk about it. First of all, from a visual standpoint, there was just way too much shit going on. All his attacks had AoEs and just radiated everywhere. It was one reason I was so happy I was a caster because there was no way I would be able to get close enough to hit him. I did not use my sword at all. At. All.

Getting him to his second phase in my second try was probably the worst thing that could have happneed to me. Why? Because it got my hopes up that it would be, if not an easy fight, then a quick one. Quickish.

I’m done. More tomorrow.

 

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