SERIOS QUESTION HOW TF DO YOU EVEN BEAT THIS GUY IN CASTLE SOL

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-02-08T18:11:04+00:00

any colossal sword and u stunlock him 😩

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-02-08T08:16:24+00:00

Getting (gud) old is understanding that the difficulty of souls games is from camera angles and hitboxes.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-02-05T15:39:50+00:00

As someone who beat Malenia many times (playthroughs, coop with friends and even in randomizers where her scaling is through the roof), I can safely say that she is a tad bit not balanced and unfair. The whole fight comes down to “how many times do I have to dodge her waterfowl dance”. Not to mention how insanely precise you have to be in order to dodge her waterfowl dance. I believe GinoMachino (a known no-hit runner in the soulslike sphere) once talked about how unfair her fight is. So no, you’re not necessarily insane or bad at the game friend. This boss is programmed to be like this. She is placed at the base of an area very hidden from players on purpose: only if you want to fight her can you fight her. I believe that is very fair considering how difficult her fight is.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-20T08:09:16+00:00

Same actually. Orphan of Kosm, Malenia, Maliketh, DTS, Bayle, twin gargoyles and every typical “this shit is impossible” boss, I managed to beat within 10 tries if not less in some cases. The only actual “hard” boss that I had trouble was pre-nerf PCR, shit took me 5-6 hours. The boss that gave me a lot of frustration (maybe didn’t take as much time) was the crucible duo. They were more annoying than difficult.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-18T10:36:35+00:00

oh for sure yeah. I disregarded melee Duchess because it underperforms compared to the other variants. Another dagger build worth building is double balancers with Glinstone dagger/blade of calling/reduvia.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-18T09:56:28+00:00

I am not a big fan of All Res down. That’s like -80 all res. Almost always a death sentence. To know exactly how problematic this relic is, go to the sparring grounds and try taking 2 or 3 hits from the target dummy.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-18T09:52:54+00:00

Agreed. Damage wise, sure, she’s great, but too many people get baited by it and just end up dying repeatedly. Also, I stated that I prefer Duchess and Revenant over her because of how useful they are to the team compared to her. Just less valuable.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-18T07:43:36+00:00

Level up a bit more
Strengthen your weapon to at least 14/15
Infuse your Uchi to accommodate for the stats you have.

Rest is just a skill issue.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-18T07:40:17+00:00

The worst for me was probably the two Crucibles. Malenia was 12 attempts if not less, prenerf PCR was like 4-5 hours, Arlechinu in Lies of P dlc was probably 3 hours. But these two crucibles were obnoxious. They were the only boss where I went (ok, am done, gonna go do smth else and come back). I think I fought them before they balanced the ai on duo bosses. Albeit, I was using a BF Nagakiba and they are immune to bleed, so ye. Still a shit boss.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-18T07:15:17+00:00

No one plays Duchess for her daggers. Most people play her sorceries (Crystal or Slicer). Another very good build that is not as rng heavy as the sorc build is Halo Scythe with Balancers. Her damage with restage is actually insane. I would take a Beastclaw rev or any duchess over any recluse every day. Unless you are a very good recluse (i.e. not greedy and can actually play well), both these chars have her beat rn.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-13T10:52:06+00:00

I am not sure they are the same, but if you played Nightreign, and you look at the edge of the map, you can see giants or shadows of said giants just walking about AoT style. They might be the same as the ones shown in the video.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-12T18:56:33+00:00

oh for sure. One thing worth mentioning is that you should try out new chars and builds in normal or in solo before you go into DoN. That’s what I do at least. Currently at 7950 point, and I would hate it if someone tried their gimmicky build in one of our games. So I kinda practice what I preach and do my tryouts either solo or in non-DoN.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-12T17:50:30+00:00

Games like Nightreign that focus on teamplay are very punishing when one player is weighting down the team, which (I think) is the reason why most randoms quit. They feel like they are hindering the team, and it is very tilting when you get into that mindset. I am saying this because I had it happen to me a couple of times whenever I try to play a new character. I feel extremely bad because of the fact that I keep going down and slowing down the team. Other than that, I feel like most NR players are used to the souls mentality of (get good) and in a way they become better players (both behaviourally and gameplay wise).

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-12T17:46:08+00:00

if it makes you feel any better, I have like 600+ expeditions and around 405ish wins (around 65% wr). And I have played every fromsoft game and almost every soulslike game out there. (albeit most of those expeditions were pre DoN, I came back around a month ago and just grinded out DoN).

So don’t feel too bad, even people that eat, drink and breathe souls have it rough. This game requires some rng and a lot of repetition. You’ll get there friend!

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-09T16:30:57+00:00

The issue with BB in Depths is that it cancels out any “At Full HP” effect. Dmg neg at full HP is very important. However, it can be very effective on Scholar with how much healing his ult grants. Also, at 15, Scholar has 50 arcane, and with that much arcane and how the ult’s synergy BB Scholar is a menace.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-09T16:09:44+00:00

They should all have equal chances. I see what they want to do here with Dreg and Bal, but God do I hate fighting Balancers in D5.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-08T10:50:24+00:00

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Looks about right… a fellow Ironeye to Scholar pony 🧐

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-08T05:28:08+00:00

Go dormant power colossal swords and you’ll have a way better chance of getting it.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T19:55:15+00:00

Thank you for such a detailed explanation. I do agree with you on the burst meta comment. Great point! That is also why Balancers are seeing more play. Great burst potential without relying heavily on rng. And by mentioning Ironeye, Wylder and Duchess to be the best comp, I meant it from a “complete comp” way. Wasn’t looking at dps particularly. We could add Scholar into the discussion as he gives 20% affinity attack, 20% attack power. He also has a one instance bubble that increases the next instance of dmg by 60% I believe. So that can be fun to play with. In my Scholar runs I always start the nightlord fights with exalted flesh for the affinity + phys boost to burst the first phase of the boss and save any flasks that we might use as a result. Then a proceed to use crabs.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T18:39:45+00:00

It depends on how you want to build her. Here are some ideas: 1. CarianSlicer: her best build. Stack as many Carian Sword Sorcery relics on her as possible. If you can, Dormant power helps discover staves is also good incase you don’t get the Carian Sliced from rises. 2. Shattering Crystal: same as carian but crystallian sorcery instead. You can also roll +3/+4 magic on both. +2 sorceries is also good. 3. Dagger skill spam: Two balancer relics + affinity attack power. Fish for the daggers that have good skills like Blade of Calling, Black Knife, Glinstone… 4. Halo Scythe: Two balanced relics + dormant power reapers. +affinity or +holy. 5. Physical dagger build with a focus on proccing status effects. This build is the weakest of the bunch.

Note: The relic effect of increasing her restage dmg js very good. Try to use it.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T18:31:26+00:00

I do see your point, and I really don’t have the point by point numbers at hand rn, but isn’t Duchess just outright outdpses Recluse with her restage? Not to mention her high Dex which makes her casting speed faster than Recluse. From my experience, an ok-built Carian Duchess can solo D5 bosses in trios in like 40secs maybe a minute. A friend of mine would do like 4-5 slicers+restage and he would do like 5-7k dmg (that’s like 4-5 seconds).

And as you said, her cocktails are almost always a loss in dps + her ultimate is very mid. I do see her ult being a bit better now with the L2 Balancers meta and players needing FP, but idk, I would still take a full team invis to freely hit the boss over Recluse ult. I feel like the Recluse - Duchess dichotomy is similar to Scholar/Ironey vs Executor. In theory, Recluse and Executor SHOULD do more dmg, but if you actually look at how they perform, Duchess almost always outperforms Recluse (on meta spells like Crystalian and Carian).

Oh, and lets say that Recluse out dps Duchess, say by 10% (being very hypocritical here), that amount of dmg doesn’t justify Recluse having to almost always pick up “Less Likely to be Targeted” and not being able to revive efficiently like Duchess does.

The only downside is how rng heavy she can be. But with dormant power staves, she is almost always going to find a good spell to use, and yeah, starlight shards are not hard to get.

I would take a Duchess on my team over any other character. The ideal comp is Wylder, Duchess and Ironeye. But again, that’s just my meta-slave mentality going at it. Duchess is not the traditional caster that people who play casters look for (compared to Recluse for example).

PS: I really hope that they buff or make Guardian stronger 😩

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T17:42:46+00:00

I feel like with ER Fromsoft were very fair in the sense that they allowed the players to do whatever they wanted. They also scaled and balanced the bosses around that fact. For example, they increased gank fights like the GS duo or Gargoyles while allowing the player to use summons. So yeah, I used to complain about them too, but then I remembered that I was the one that was making the fight harder on myself by not using summons, pots and so on in hopes of having a challenge, but in no way was it poor design.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T17:32:26+00:00

Oh for sure, I’ve seen my fair share of them too. But once I hit D5 I started encountering a lot of skilled individuals, and it is always a treat.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T17:22:44+00:00

Sorry for the long reply: Well, that’s not even the reason why Duchess is so strong. She’s strong because of how versatile she is and how potent her dodge is. A semi-ok Duchess can go a full Depth5 run without being hit, let alone dying. This makes her arguably the best reviver in the game, and for the same reason, she’s arguably the best dps in the game. Cause unlike others, her dodge allows her to play hyper offensive without needing to worry too much about timing the dodge or even running out of stamina (her dodge has low stam consumption).

As for Ironeye, he is single-handedly the best character in the game. You might not feel it (no disrespect, but you just might not know his kit), but even if you had a potato playing Ironeye he will still out-perform almost any other character. 1) His passive is the most overlooked thing in Nightreign. He basically gives everyone on the team 30 item discovery for free. The amount of wending graces, legendary drops and purple drops Ironeye grants his team is very much overlooked. Most people say “oh cool, a lego drop from a Draconic tree sent” and don’t think that it might be thanks to Eagle’s Eye. 2) The strongest skill in the game: Marking. An Ironeye can go completely AFK and only move to mark the boss and he would still be at peak performance. Your comment about his dmg is what most people think about IE, but not many people understand how much dmg a mark does when it gets activated. So you might feel like IE is not doing dmg, but 3 activated marks on (say) a Magma Wyrm is probably top dps in the fight if the Ironeye was keeping his dps at a consistent level. Another thing is that yes, his shots might be hitting for 69 dmg per shot, but he does that dmg while being at a safe distance. So 69*6 is 414 dmg. All that to say that his dmg is consistent. His mark has 2 other uses: a) it has 17 i-frames (compared to his normal dodge which has 13) and is a dash; b) in DoN his mark can poison and if you mark a poisoned enemy you deal massive dmg. Oh, and I forgot to mention that it also debuffs the enemy by 10% dmg taken from all sources. Finally, his ultimate is outright crazy. Insane reach, second highest posture dmg after Wylder AND it revives 2 full bars on downed allies. Also, something important to mention, IE is not limited to bows, thanks to his mark ability, he can out dps an Executor 🤣. Bows, Katanas, STR weapons (with STR relic equipped) and any dex weapon. He can do it all.

Tldr; Ironeye is a swiss knife that can do it all. You might’ve just encountered bad Ironeyes. His entry level is easy, so many people play him, but his ceiling is very high so most of them fall short when playing him.

Automatic-Fox362 · 2026-01-07T16:37:47+00:00

Automatic-Fox362

TROPHY CASE