The difficulty in Elden Ring’s Shadow of the Erdtree is…something. Things start very hard, then slowly get easier as you power up, then eventually, if you’re keeping pace with Scadutree fragments, you might be killing even tougher bosses in just a few attempts.
Then there’s Radahn.
The final boss of Shadow of the Erdtree is not remotely balanced, way, way harder than anything you’ve encountered before. And I would argue in many ways he was harder on my class, a sorcerer, mage, whatever you want to call it. A Tarnished who uses all the blue spells. Because all the “easy” Radahn clears I see are usually tanked up melee players with massive shields and one-hit staggers. You ain’t doing that with spells.
So, I beat him. It took forever and a ton of trial and error for a build, but I beat him. Here’s how:
Stats: Scadutree (19), Revered Spirit Ashes (9), Vigor (65), Mind (45), Endurance (35), Strength (20), Dexterity (40), Intelligence (85), Faith (15), Arcane (9)
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Weapons
Staff of Loss – This is to enhance Night Comet with 30% more damage, plus the scaling from maxing the thing.
Magic Hookclaws with Bloodhound’s Step – I know Bloodhound’s Step got nerfed, and ideally you could wield two staffs for more damage, but I have played 150 hours of this game using it as my main dodge mechanic and especially for Radahn, I didn’t want to screw up my muscle memory timing. I tried to just roll and there was a 0% chance I was beating it that way.
Armor – The highest values that still kept me at Medium load. I think this was Veteran’s armor for me.
Talismans
Cerulean Amber Medallion +3 – I was finding having to dodge so much with Bloodhound’s Step was depleting my mana for attacks, so I upped it dramatically with this.
Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman – Arguably the most important one as the highest physical resist negation, which is a ton of his attacks. I would not fight without this. Go get it from the original map.
Holy Braid – Highest Holy negation which his loads of his attacks in his second phase. Also kind of a must for this fight. It’s in the top right of the map in Shaman village, accessible through emoting O Mother at the statue by the Gaius fight.
Boltdrake Talisman +3 – He doesn’t have a ton of lightning attacks, but I thought there were enough to use it.
Physick
Opaline Bubbletear – A shield right at the start so you can summon early and tank at least one of his initial attacks, mainly the thundercrash spin he always does right at the start.
Magic-Shrouding Cracked Tear – Even if I am only activating this up front, I like trying to get to Phase 2 as soon as possibly by laying on more damage up front. Getting through this phase fast also means your Mimic Tear may not have taken much damage.
Summon: Mimic Tear. I swear to god it is the only summon that can go any distance in this fight. When I won, he had survived all the way to the end. One trick you can do here is to put Blessing of Marika in your potion rotation. Mimic Tear will not use your normal potions but it will use this to max heal sometimes. Not every time, but sometimes, which can make him outlive you. I maxed probably five different summons to +10 ranging from big damage ones to tanks, nothing else survived even half the first phase. Every summon I tried except Mimic Tear was terrible in this fight and they really need to mass buff health on all of them. I did not have either of the two NPC summons because I accidentally bricked both questlines.
Spell: Night Comet – Yes, spell, singular. This was it. Mainly it was not just that I was using it all the time, and it did big damage with Staff of Loss, but because it would force your Mimic Tear to only use it as well. Putting on even other good spells results in too much variability in what the Mimic will end up using, and Night Comet does big damage on Mimic and has very low cast time unlike say, throwing moons at him.
Defensive Item – I only used Boiled Crab for this. I used to do this whole dance with Golden Vow but I got tired of doing it before every fight and trying to find time to reactivate it. Managing too many consumables kept getting me hit. But Crab has a short eat time and you can use it in between movesets.
The Fight
Radahn Phase One – Here he is only using physical attacks or the occasional lightning, and one fire move. The most annoying are his multi-hit combos where generally, if possible, you just want to stay far back from him so his misses with most. Sometimes he adds one final swing at the end of this that can catch you, which is annoying.
Meteor Throw – This is pretty easy to double dodge once you figure out the timing.
Spin Crash – Very easy to dodge if you see it coming and it’s not the first five seconds of the fight when you’re summoning
Gravity Pull – This one sucks. The timing window is so tight many people think you can’t dodge it, but you actually can. Eventually I realized using the audio cue for it would make me almost auto-dodge after being caught so many times. If you are caught, immediately dodge backward multiple times until the spikes stop coming up from the ground.
Fire Slash – This isn’t a good move. I almost never got hit by this.
When to Damage - Almost always when his attention is on Mimic Tear, which can get you 5-6 Night Comet shots in. You can get maybe one comet shot in after most dodges for individual moves, but if you get greedy you will get smashed. I mostly used those windows for potions or crab.
Radahn Phase Two (75% health): Screwww this phase. This is brutal. Some luck involved here honestly.
Giant Light Meteor Rain – Almost always he will start the fight with this move. If you start running backward immediately you can dodge it, and you’ll have a window at the end to use some potions. Mimic Tear is an idiot and will always get hit, but he will keep him busy at least. However, eventually I gave this up. I got as many Night Comet shots in as I could and just tanked the blast, which with my holy defense, was just one potion to chug to regain it.
Rush/Slash Combos – These are the bad ones. There are at least three of these that rush you and often shoot additional beams of holy light out to catch you. Generally speaking dodging toward him or a little to the right could make him miss frequently. The final AOE holy blast he does in many of these combos I only dodged being essentially on top of him when he did it. I died more from these combos than anything else in this fight, and dodging felt like luck half the time as you can barely even see what’s going on with all the holy beams everywhere.
Miquella’s Kiss – This is a grab move that at first, doesn’t hurt, but if Miquella charms you a second time, you will die automatically. There is a rune to negate this but I wouldn’t bother as the grab is not that hard to dodge at least once a fight. This is actually a good move for you because Miquella will often grab your Mimic Tear, and after the animation is over, you can probably get five or so Night Comet hits in.
Old Moves – He still does the meteor throw and gravity pull. If you’ve gotten to this phase a bunch you may be able to dodge these more consistently now. I’d use them as potion windows.
Giant 25% Health Meteor Slam – Once he gets that low, he will leap in the air, and probably five seconds later smash down to earth with a double AOE blast that practically covers the entire arena. This will probably kill you. I thought it was impossible to not get hit by it. But if you start running right when he leaps, and don’t stop and don’t hit a wall, you can get out of its range. But this may be the moment your Mimic Tear dies unless it has healed itself. From here, Radahn will go back to his normal move set and probably kill you with combos. If not, you win.
When to Damage – Namely just a few times. Before tanking the first blast. After he Miquella kisses your Mimic Tear. When he’s going after your Mimic Tear in general. You can risk one hit between movesets but I don’t know if I would bother, and I’d use it for potions. The damage windows will be there, but surviving is 90% of this fight. And you Mimic Tear living is very, very key.
Good luck, prepare to die.
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