To defeat the Elden Beast, focus on dealing physical damage and exploiting its stance breaks.
Here's a more detailed breakdown of how to approach this challenging fight:
Key Strategies:
- Prioritize Physical Damage: The Elden Beast is highly resistant to most status effects like bleeding, poison, and frostbite. Therefore, concentrate on using weapons and skills that deal significant physical damage.
- Heavy Weapons and Stance Breaking: Employ heavy weapons or charged heavy attacks to break the Elden Beast's stance. A broken stance opens it up for critical hits, significantly boosting your damage output.
- Stay Aggressive, But Patient: The Elden Beast often moves around, making consistent damage difficult. Maintain aggression, but don't overextend. Wait for openings after its attacks.
- Target Weak Points: The Elden Beast has a few key weak points, usually illuminated parts of its body. Targeting these areas will substantially increase the damage you inflict.
Weapon and Build Recommendations:
- Heavy Weapons: Greatswords, colossal swords, and greathammers are excellent choices for staggering the Elden Beast.
- Faith Builds (with Physical Damage): While status effects are ineffective, faith builds incorporating incantations that deal physical damage (like Black Blade or Lightning Spear) can be very effective, particularly if combined with a weapon buff.
- Ashes of War: Giant Hunt or similar Ashes of War that provide high stagger potential are incredibly useful.
- Talismans:
- Axe Talisman: Increases charged heavy attack damage.
- Green Turtle Talisman: Increases stamina recovery.
- Erdtree's Favor: Increases HP, stamina, and equip load.
Things to Avoid:
- Bleed, Poison, Frostbite: These status effects are largely ineffective against the Elden Beast.
- Pure Magic Builds: While magic can work, it's generally less efficient than focusing on physical damage.
- Over-Aggression: The Elden Beast has powerful attacks, and getting greedy can lead to quick deaths.
In Summary:
Beating the Elden Beast requires a strategy centered around dealing physical damage, breaking its stance with heavy attacks, and exploiting its vulnerabilities. Choose a weapon and build that complements these strategies, and be patient during the fight.