O gathering of champions, the revels begin!
Starscourge Radahn is one of the few gatekeeper bosses in Elden Ring that can really break your morale. He’s a monster of a demigod, dealing lethal damage with every move, and has the most questionable hitboxes in the game. If you thought Margit was bad, you’re in for a world of hurt. Anyhow, here are some “cheese” strategies to make this legendary fight against Starscourge Radahn that much simpler in Elden Ring.
Starscourge Radahn Cheese Strategy
Radahn has a huge weakness to Rot, so you can make sure of the Rotten Breath Incantation to inflict massive damage from a safe distance during the fight. You can purchase this Incantation from the Cathedral of Dragon Communion in southern Caelid using a Dragon Heart, which can be obtained by defeating any dragon.
You will also need a Sacred Seal weapon to use this Incantation as well as a minimum Faith stat of 15 and Arcane stat of 12. Thankfully, these are very low requirements and you can always respec your character with Rennala’s help if you don’t have any Runes to level up with.
During the fight, just summon as many NPCs as you can to distract Radahn and then cast Rotten Breath when you have a chance. If it hits Radahn, he will be inflicted with Rot and his health will slowly trickle down throughout the remainder of the battle. Just keep reviving the NPCs and then reapply the Rot damage in the second phase of the fight, keeping a safe distance away from Radahn so you don’t die. You can see the full strategy in the video below.
With this cheese strategy in mind, here’s what you need to know to take down Starscourge Radahn in Elden Ring.
How to Beat Radahn in Elden Ring
There are three phases in this battle, so be prepared to adapt as they happen. You also shouldn’t tackle this fight until you’re at least level 70 or above.
The first phase consists of closing the distance between you and the demigod. He’ll constantly shoot deadly purple beams at you and rain blades down from the sky, providing constant areas of denial in large areas. The best thing to do in this scenario is to summon all the NPCs you met back at Redmane Castle, including Blaidd and Iron Fist Alexander.
This can be considered cheese because, in this instance, you’re summoning several NPCs to basically remove aggro off of you so you can then get closer to Radahn while taking minimal damage. As you inch your way towards him, do not get on your horse. It may be faster, but Torrent doesn’t have I-frames to dodge the oncoming death beams.
Once you have made it to where you can actually hit him, let the summoned NPCs take him from the front while you wail at him from the back. You’ll essentially want to beat Radahn’s HP down as fast as possible while your summons tank the damage. If you hit him enough, he’ll even be susceptible to having his poise broken, allowing for a critical hit. This second phase can easily go south if your allies fall in combat. Since Radahn has such a high damage output, your allies won’t last for long.
Then, as you get to his final phase, he’ll start to summon purple homing comets and ride around on his hilariously small horse. This is where you match him, taking Torrent out for a ride. In this phase, you can once again summon and previously killed NPCs. They can essentially be the aggro once again as you go in for attacks of opportunity.
Beware of his electrically imbued attacks. When his swords start to have purple lightning on them, he’ll start slashing them onto the ground. When he pulls his swords back up, he’ll send out waves of deadly lightning. If you’re on Torrent, you can actually jump over that wave and go in for a few attacks.
This is his most agile phase too, so using Torrent is almost a must. He can cover ground from his spinning dive attack, which can be blocked, but will most likely also kill you in the process.
Summoning NPCs can be seen as cheese, but this almost seems like a needed mechanic to simulate something akin to a raid boss. You’re dealing with a behemoth of an enemy, and in terms of the lore, are banding up with unlikely forces to take on a demigod. Of course, their only role is to take the damage while you sneakily pepper him down from the back.
As for magic/ranged users, you can simply follow the aforementioned strategies, but safely take him out from afar while dodging any sort of projectiles from his final phase.
Elden Ring is out now for the PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Series S/X, and PC.
- This article was updated on March 6th, 2022
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