Malenia is easily the hardest boss of elden ring and it is already tricky to beat her with spirit and player summons, so I wrote this guide for those who want to solo kill her with a mele build. Enjoy!
Introduction
Note: Credit goes to Vlad
First off, Malenia is the hardest boss i have ever encountered in all of the Fromsoftware games simply for Waterfowl Dance move and after dying +50 times and trying different methods, I daresay that 90% of my deaths was because of this move so either if you want to challenge yourself further more or don’t want to use spirit or player summons, then this guide is for you.
Requirements and Character Stats
My stats (consider it that i was on NG+1 so maybe some of you be on a lower level)
- Level : 150
- Vigor : 40
- Mind : 21
- Endurance : 36
- Strength : 50
- Dexterity : 55
- Intelligence : 10
- Faith : 8
- Arcane : 9
Weapons
Ghiza’s wheel +10 (Reward for killing phantom Inquisitor Ghiza in Volcano manor)
Ghiza’s wheel location:
Keen Hookclaws +25 with bloodhound step Ash of War (located at Stormveil Castle, it doesn’t need to be Hookclaws, you can use any weapon that you want to put the bloodhound step on it).
Bloodhound step Ash of War location (Dropped by killing Night’s Cavalry at night time only).
Buckler with Golden Parry Ash of War (Buckler can be purchased from Gatekeeper Gostoc at Stormveil castle, if you have killed the Godrick, then he will be no longer selling items so simply kill him and gave his bell bearing to Twin madens at Roundtable Hold).
Gatekeeper Gostoc’s location at Stormveil castle:
Gatekeeper Gostoc’s location if you have already killed Godrick:
Golden Parry Ash of War location (Dropped by a Teardrop Scarab besides the stairs atop the balcony, you need a projectile to kill it):
Armour
I used crucible Axe set exept for it’s Greaves i used a random one from my inventory as if i used the whole set, it would make me heavy load.
Talismans
- Claw talisman
- Axe talisman
- Viridian Amber Medallion +2
- Great Turtle Talisman
Guide
First off, this guide is heavily based on parrying so if you are not good at parrying, practice parrying simple enemies to understand the active frames of Parry, using the Golden Parry ash of war on shield will give you a longer range for Parrying and you don’t need to stick into her face. Malenia is a very fast boss so parrying her attacks will give you a huge opportunity cause dodging some of her attacks can be tricky and she punishs you very hard with her ability to heal on every attack even if you block it so try to parry all her attacks.
Also don’t spam R1 with Ghiza’s Wheel but wait for an opening then perform a jump heavy attack as this will give you a higher chance of bleeding and staggering her.
But some of her moveset can’t be parried so you need to dodge it.
Attacks that you can’t parry in first phase:
Her Roundhouse kick but you can trick her cause after the kick she will continue the combo with a Parryable attack.
Her move which she charges for a few seconds then slashs upwards then continues with another slash onto ground, simply dodge two times and punish her by a jump heavy attack.
Her move which she charges then sprints forward with a upward slash then continues with another slash, simply dodge and punish her.
How to deal with her Waterfowl Dance:
for this move you have two options, either hit her below %75 health then run back to a safe distance and throw a throwing knife at her, this will trigger her to perform her move at a safe distance, so wait for the first and second phase to finish then when she launchs up to start the third phase, simply dodge under her and then dodge to the right, this will leave you unharmed, or you can switch to your weapon that has bloodhound step on it and simply dodge through all of her ♥♥♥ but note that this is tricky as it will require you to first switch to the other weapon then duel wielding it, i personally found this trick to be hard as it needs to be pulled really fast otherwise you are clipped.
After you managed to survive the first waterfowl dance, continue the same method, parry all her attacks except those three that i mentioned before and you will manage to bleed her easily, another note, when you parried her 3 times and riposted her, perform a heavy Ghiza’s wheel attack on her so when she stands up it will land on her, other than that, use jump heavy attacks on her at every opening and don’t spam normal attacks, eventually, if you manage to parry her constantly and jump attack her, you will bleed her below 25% health, be quick after this and finish her health bar fast cause there is a chance that she will perform another Waterfowl dance, note that she can do it anytime after the first waterfowl dance but the chance of doing it will increase when she reaches 25% health.
Second phase:
The first phase is hard, but with this tricks you can manage it and reach second phase without dying too much, just consider saving your flasks for second phase as she will be much more aggressive. For the second phase, she will immediately perform a dive bomb attack at you with a nasty delay before it, so don’t roll panic till she launchs towards you then dodge back and continue running cause her AO attack has a massive area damage, after this you will be safe for 5 seconds so heal yourself and wait for her Orange wave to disappear then perform a Jump heavy attack on her, after this it is hit or miss, either she will perform every BS attack on you or she will only attack you with parryable attacks, but at any rate try to stay away some distance from her as it is possible that she will spam her waterfowl dance two times or more, the trick to dodge it is same however, just wait for first and second wave to finish then dodge through her third phase, also she will be more likely to spam roundkicks and after that she will slash you two times so dodge the kick and parry the slash, other than that the only attack that you should worry about is her summoning her spirits so either dodge her or use the bloodhound step but consider that they hit pretty hard and even with 40 vigor and armour, they managed to two shot me.
Do this tricks specially parrying and jump attacks and you will eventually beat her but be prepared to die a lot as it is the hardest boss of the game and Fromsoftware in general.
Be the first to comment