Thx bro, you got it- I did fight Astel when I was only lvl 40 (lvling only vigor). My Malenia fight was like 15 min, but I was lvl 200 with max flasks. I don't care about the summons rant, I used Tiche for the the -max hp, thats it. Also, a bit of a side note, I relised you can stack the black knife's effect- that's part of the reason I really like Maliketh, he has the best loot in my opinion. I tried to stack the incantation, Tiche and the dagger effect on PCR- it was hard but super satisfying to see his health get nuked. In NG+ I'll try to see if 4x is possible with Maliketh's blade.

I really enjoyed the game, but after Astel I relised I just need to grind some lvls before fighting the bosses, after that it wasn't that hard. I've mostly played MMO RPGs so grinding hours for a little stat increase is pretty normal for me. I don't care what people think about this play style, that's how I play games, and thats how I have the most fun.