Current Events > I see now that I was naive that I'd steamroll Malenia, Blade of Miquella.

(+) Yeah! (+)

People kept talking about how easy she was to stagger and how simple she is with cheese builds. My poor Rock Sling-based build did not hold up.

I am Malenia, Blade of Miquella.

The Scarlet flower doth bloom once more.

I don't know much about Elden Ring lore.

But Malenia is deffinetly the Blade of Miquella.

I am Malenia, Blade of Miquella.

I hear she has never known defeat

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/5/7/2/AAV_o9AADQJc.jpg

Seaman_Prime posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/5/7/2/AAV_o9AADQJc.jpg

I'd say I could beat that one, but the Godskin Noble is the only other boss to give me major trouble.

Cheapest boss

I literally put down the game because I couldn't beat her. I'm not going to keep playing her waiting for that 1 in a million run.

Billyionaire posted...

Cheapest boss

I thought she was absolute bullshit at first. She was just way too fast and I suddenly felt incredibly clunky.

I'm now fighting that bitch in a helmet and a dirty poncho for the low equip load and I'm enjoying it a lot more. The armor wasn't doing shit, so I freed myself of the burden.

Stop listening to MarthGoomba

It took me a bunch of tries. The AI has an unerring way of seeking the weakest player.

Finally got 2 guests who kept Malenia away from me at the end.

I also tried the cheese where you stand on the branch with a shield. It would have worked eventually, probably.

pegusus123456 posted...

People kept talking about how easy she was to stagger

They fucking lied to you. She is essentially broken compared to every other Boss in From Soft HISTORY since Stagger was introduced as an idea. She CAN'T be staggered if she is performing a move with Super Armor, this is counter to EVERY OTHER ENEMY IN THE GAME.

First time I fought her:

"Wow, that was pretty tough but I beat her on my first attempt and barely won. I'm pretty good."

*flower blooms*

"Oh..."

I was a strength/faith build from start to finish on my first playthrough so I guess I just got lucky that I was using a build with a weapon (blasphemous blade) that made her manageable out of pure coincidence

Second playthrough, new character, I could not for the life of me beat her with a mage build despite full knowledge of her moveset, had to respec into a cheese arcane build with rivers of blood and mimic tear to kill her

Northlane posted...

Second playthrough, new character, I could not for the life of me beat her with a mage build despite full knowledge of her moveset

Yeah, she retaliates hard against ranged attacks. I swapped to Night Comet since enemies don't respond to it and she calmed down a lot. Also swapped from Moonveil to the cold-infused Petal Whip for a bit more range and a little more stagger on the melee attack.

Swift Glintstone Shard is nice for mages to bait out Waterfowl Dance every 30-60 secs. Once you internalize that cooldown, she gets substantially easier to work with.

Sine I ditched the armor, Waterfowl hasn't been tooooo bad. I still get hit more often than not, but I'm getting better. That one I did kind of cheat on though, I looked at tips on how to dodge it.

Only gotten to phase two once, I'm hoping I can cheese her a bit with some Comet Azur when she does her flower.

pegusus123456 posted...

Yeah, she retaliates hard against ranged attacks. I swapped to Night Comet since enemies don't respond to it and she calmed down a lot. Also swapped from Moonveil to the cold-infused Petal Whip for a bit more range and a little more stagger on the melee attack.

I actually didn't learn about night comet's usefulness until I saw a video after completing my second playthrough, so many spells in ER

Would've definitely been helpful for her, the rest of the game was mostly a fun romp as a mage

Yeah, my wife had a rock sling caster. She spent three days on it before just summoning help.

Meanwhile, I had Rivers of Blood and spammed the special. That health melted like butter

Irony posted...

Stop listening to MarthGoomba

But if people listened to my advice of just using Barricade Shield then nobody would fine her difficult

Rock Sling usually does pretty well against dodgers because they dodge the cast and not the actual projectile, but she dodges every cast you make. So I found that if I tried to spam it, I was casting the next one just as the first was about to hit her which meant that she was dodging the first one. Even if I did stagger my casts a little, her baseline walking speed is quick enough that one of the rocks always seemed to miss.

And, of course, if you're staggering the casts which doesn't stagger her, she's on your ass like a pawn shop owner on Marcellus Wallace.

After another forty or so tries where I can get to her second phase fairly reliably...I'm a little more inclined to say she's kinda bullshit. The healing mechanic just isn't necessary and - I'll admit this is a nitpick - there's not even a lore justification for why she does it.

Waterfowl Dance is alright though. I thought that's what'd really piss me off, but it hasn't been. That's not to say there aren't times it isn't bullshit just because I think it strains the mechanics of the game. There are times where I just don't sprint. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure it's not a matter of being out of stamina, ol' Emmet just straight-up doesn't move.

I was running a Dex/Faith build dual wielding the Winged Scythe and Grave Scythe and it took me around 15 tries or so.

She's tough but definitely doable. Jumping attacks helped me a lot.

This is the first time all game I've tried jumping attacks and I think they're fucking me over more than helping. I've only broken her poise a half dozen times over all attempts and I'm always too far away to actually crit. But jump attacking does make it harder to dodge.

pegusus123456 posted...

she's kinda bullshit

only her anime slash thing is bullshit, the rest isn't that bad

I'm sure Waterfowl is an absolute crock of shit if you're super melee focused, but I have some ranged options.

pegusus123456 posted...

I'm sure Waterfowl is an absolute crock of shit if you're super melee focused, but I have some ranged options.

It was definitely a hell of a lot harder to deal with on my melee Dex build than it was on my Dex/Int hybrid. It's a very easy attack to bait out at range, and if you're far enough away that she can't reach you with the first flurry, you can just roll through the second and third to get through with no or very little damage.

Yeah, I can't even tell how you'd dodge it if you're a melee character. My only idea is that you just go with the idea that the ability has an internal cooldown, so you only whack her immediately after she's finished doing it. But my experience with this game as a whole is that there is no internal cooldown on it and she could just spam it forever if she wanted to.

Oh, I also just remembered that she has an input read attack which I also think is shit lol.

i can dodge it with melee like 40% of the time, there are points in the attack where she stops tracking and blasts past you instead.

The last flurry deliberately targets behind you to fuck with the dodging lol

pegusus123456 posted...

Yeah, I can't even tell how you'd dodge it if you're a melee character. My only idea is that you just go with the idea that the ability has an internal cooldown, so you only whack her immediately after she's finished doing it. But my experience with this game as a whole is that there is no internal cooldown on it and she could just spam it forever if she wanted to.

Oh, I also just remembered that she has an input read attack which I also think is shit lol.

There is definitely some sort of cooldown period. I've spent a lot of time messing around with her on both my Dex and Int builds. I've been able to consistently avoid Waterfowl Dance by adhering to the 30-60 second timeline I described and backing out to mid-range to use Swift Glintstone Shard/throwing knives.

While being less cautious, I've also noticed she has a proclivity to slowly strafe walk back and forth if Waterfowl Dance is "off" cooldown.

Obviously not empirical because I have no way to verify via the game's code, but those are my observations and experiences after spending almost a week poking the bear.

My dudes, I am happy to say that after probably seventy-eighty attempts, I got gud. My hands are still shaking and I feel like I'm having a mild cardiac event, but I did it. No ashes, so major cheese, no leaving to grind levels and coming back. I don't even think I got super lucky, she used Waterfowl and Aeonia at least twice in the final run. All I had to do was completely abandon nearly every aspect of the playstyle I've done the rest of the game and specialize specifically with her lol.

Instead of my Moonveil/Rock Sling strategy that I've typically gone with, I swapped to Hoslow's Petal Whip with a Bloodhound Step cold infusion. The only sorceries I used were Rock Sling, Night Shard, and Comet Azur. If I'd had a bit more mind, I'd have gotten rid of Rock Sling too, but as it was I'd have enough for a full mana bar worth of Night Shard with exactly one Rock Sling left over and I hate waste. Comet Azur was used solely in the phase 2 transition's Scarlet Aeonia with the traditional mana cheat and mana buff flask.

I didn't even use the Bloodhound Step. I kept hearing about how useful it was on this fight, but I was just really bad at using it. I don't think it really saved me at all whereas it directly killed me multiple times where I'd Step into Waterfowl or Aeonia. I just stripped down to an Ivory-Draped Tabard and Rennala's ridiculous but +3 intellect hat for the light load roll.

Two posts that actually helped me a lot ITT:

wanderingshade posted...

They fucking lied to you. She is essentially broken compared to every other Boss in From Soft HISTORY since Stagger was introduced as an idea. She CAN'T be staggered if she is performing a move with Super Armor, this is counter to EVERY OTHER ENEMY IN THE GAME.

Saltiness aside, this was probably the most helpful advice I could have gotten. I've heard the phrases Super Armor and Hyper Armor but not really thought about them. I thought Malenia was staggering based on some kind of poise mechanic which made it semi-random. This post made me realize that it wasn't randomness, she wasn't being staggered due to the attack she was doing. This meant that I could just be very aggressive when she was doing her posturing and be on the defensive when she was not.

ThePieReborn posted...

While being less cautious, I've also noticed she has a proclivity to slowly strafe walk back and forth if Waterfowl Dance is "off" cooldown.

Maybe it's just confirmation bias, but I started seeing the same thing after you said this. And that made me realize that she doesn't seem to rush in and do it. She will do it in melee range, but you have to stay on her. So that again meant I could be a little more aggressive instead of running whenever I felt Waterfowl was off cooldown.

I think I still veer on the side of the healing being a little overkill, but I ended up thinking she's a great boss. And after feeling a little bad throughout the game for seemingly having a relatively easy time, it feels pretty good to beat the apparently hardest boss in the game with no "cheese" strategies.

congrats tc!!!!!!!!!!

Bleed/frost is pretty much OP in Elden Ring, if youre melee.

I made a glass canon build and absolutely smoked her in seconds with azur comet. Buffed the fuck up with every magic boosting accessory, armor and consumable.

Managed to get her to charge me and she just ate a full cast of comet. Took like 7/8 of her health first phase.

Same thing second phase, used her Rot Bloom super. Caught her during her recovery. Melted.

I tried Comet Azur once in P1. She immediately dodged it and slapped me in the face, so I didn't do it again lol.

I probably don't have the stats for it to have worked anyway. Even with the mana cheat and buff flask, I still only got her down to about half health in P2. She starts at about 80%, so I only did roughly 30% of her health bar with Comet Azur.

I remember early release, the moon veil and sword of night and flame pre nerf was levels of ridiculously over powered.

I beat her early release and it took a ton of tries before I got the hang of it.

sword of night and flame special spam, spirit ash black knife tiche or great shield soldiers, magic armor, and then comet azure for her 2nd phase.

Yeah, Tiche was going to be my backup plan if it really wasn't happening, but the worst thing was that it kept feeling like it could happen lol.

pegusus123456 posted...

Yeah, Tiche was going to be my backup plan if it really wasn't happening, but the worst thing was that it kept feeling like it could happen lol.

The shield soldiers is probably the easiest spirit ash against her. Theyre a good distraction while I spammed her with my sword beam. Usually they survived long enough for the 2nd phase.

Yeah, I've heard good things about them too. The only ashes I've really used are the Undead Militiamen and the Mimic Tear. Tbh, I think I prefer my zombie boys.

pegusus123456 posted...

Yeah, I've heard good things about them too. The only ashes I've really used are the Undead Militiamen and the Mimic Tear. Tbh, I think I prefer my zombie boys.

Mimic tear carried me through most of the game up till that point. She was the first boss to make me research strategies lol

The Mimic Tear is basically an "I win" button for fights since the AI can't properly handle fighting multiple targets.

UnholyMudcrab posted...

The Mimic Tear is basically an "I win" button for fights since the AI can't properly handle fighting multiple targets.

also your mimic was pretty much a 1:1 copy of you and did the same damage lmao

Tiche carried the last 4 bosses in the game, because I was done trying to be a brave solo boy by then.

Glad to be of help, even if in just a small way. I love dissecting how bosses work through trial and error. It's how I got real good at figuring out Midir so that I had an unbroken streak of keeping the host alive in my co-op adventures.