Here you can find a full Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree DLC Walkthrough & Roadmap that shows how to 100% complete the story, including side questlines.
How to Start Shadow of the Erdtree DLC and reach the Realm of Shadow
To access the DLC you must first have beaten Shardbearer Mohg (Mohg, Lord of Blood) and Shardbearer Radahn (Starscourge Radahn) in the main game. If you already platinumed the main game you will have defeated them because each gave a trophy/achievement. In this case simply fast travel to the site of grace called “Cocoon of the Empyrean” which is where the Mohg boss fight took place. Behind where you fought Mohg you can interact with the Withered Arm to start the Shadow of the Erdtree expansion.
If you have not yet beaten Mohg, check the video below for the full path leading to the DLC entrance, or refer to How to reach Mohgwyn Palace:
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If you have not yet beaten Radahn, this video shows the location:
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You should be Level 150+ at minimum for the DLC area.
World Map – Story Path & How to Reach All Optional Side Areas
The map below shows the full Realm of Shadow map, which is the new DLC area. It’s separate from the main game map. After interacting with the Withered Hand you will be teleported there, but you can use the Sites of Grace menu in the map screen to travel back and forth at any time.
The map below outlines the main story path in red. There are only 4 main bosses (and two minibosses) you must defeat. For the purpose of this walkthrough we will first focus on the story path. At the end we’ll also discuss how to reach each optional side area.
Video Walkthrough
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Step 1: Beat Rellana in Ensis Castle to reach the North
From where you start the DLC (Gravesite Plain), head north until you reach the Ellac Greatbridge. Cross over it and keep going straight until you reach the Castle Front.
The main gate will be locked. To the right of the locked gate (“Castle Ensis Checkpoint” site of grace) you can drop down. This leads to a flooded area, climb up the ladder on the left. It leads to the back of the locked gate. You can open it using the lever next to the gate if you wish. Now continue further into the castle until you reach the “Castle-Lord’s Chamber” site of grace. It’s a linear path.
After this you must face the first main boss, which is mandatory to reach the northern part of the map. If this boss gives you a lot of trouble, you should spend time exploring the side areas for Scadutree Fragments and Spirit Ash Blessings, these are new DLC exclusive items that can be redeemed at sites of grace to permanently reduce the damage you take. You frequently find these items near Sites of Grace.
Main Boss 1: Rellana, Twin Moon Knight
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Strategy: Rellana has high resistance to blue magic (but less resistance to purple magic). She has a ton of health and hits extremely hard, at Level 150+ she killed me in 3 hits. She is also very fast, leaving very little breaks between attacks, constantly casting ranged magic while simultaneously continuing her onslaught of long melee combos. After she takes damage, she will buff her weapons with magic and will shoot more magic missiles. She will also shoot Glintstone Arcs (that cover a wider radius) and a huge magic Greatsword with a devastating forward hit followed by a 360° spin that requires perfect timing to dodge (just before the attack hits you), but can also be avoided by staying far enough away from her. By far the most problematic attack is when she flies up and unleashes 3 blue orbs that drop to the ground and cause shockwaves over the entire boss arena. To dodge this, you have to JUMP UP (press 
/ 
) just slightly before the blue orb hits the ground. If you’re in midair you won’t get hit by the first 2 shockwaves. However, on the third shockwave Rellana will drop down and it will always hit you wherever you are in the arena, regardless of whether you’re in midair or on the ground. This can’t be dodged so always heal to full health to not get killed by it.
Before the fight, summon two of the orange NPCs outside the boss door (at least two of them will always show up even when you’re offline). Also bring Mimic Tear Ashes but DON’T use them until the two companion NPCs have died, this way you can call your Ashen summon midway through the fight to keep distracting the boss. If you were to call your Ashen summon right away it would die alongside the companions and then you’re on your own, so save it. For Talismans equip Spelldrake Talisman (greatly boosts magic damage negation) and Pearldrake Talisman (greatly boosts all non-physical damage negation). Erdtree’s Favor talisman is also good for more stamina and HP. If you’re a mage, equip Radagon Icon talisman for faster cast times, it will make it easier to kill the boss before all your companions die. Equip the spells “Rock Sling” and “Great Glitstone Shard”. For Flasks bring 9 Health and 5 Mana.
As a mage, spam nothing but “Rock Sling” spell the entire time. Let the two companions distract the boss. Try to take down at least 60% of the healthbar before your companions die. This will happen at probably the same time when the boss uses the 3 orbs that create shockwaves over the entire arena. Immediately when the second companion dies, summon your Ashen Remains, preferably upgraded “Mimic Tear” ashes, which create a copy of yourself. While this is active keep spamming Rock Sling. This spell is great because it covers a long distance, automatically homes in on the boss, does more damage than blue spells, and stuns the boss every few hits. Avoid using Comet Azur because the boss jumps around too much and is hard to hit with it, plus has too much resistance to blue magic anyway. Stay far enough away so the blue spinning Greatsword can’t hit you. Dodge any magic projectiles coming towards you. If the boss focuses on you, run away and let the companions bait her again. It’s recommended being Level 150+ for this. As a mage put 60 Vigor, 30+ Mind, 30+ Endurance, 70+ Intelligence (99 Intelligence would be best). The main issue you’ll have is that the NPC helpers die before finishing the boss. This is why you want maxed out Intelligence so you can deal damage fast enough to kill the boss. There is a slight element of luck to this because sometimes the NPCs get hit more and sometimes your Rock Slings miss, so it can take a few tries and is ultimately a matter of brute force.
If your companions and your Ashen Summon have died, cast only Great Glintstone Shard. However, the boss doesn’t leave many openings for attacks so carefully dodge her full combos, then you can maybe shoot 1 or 2 Great Glitstone Shards. Also keep an eye on your Stamina between dodging and using magic, you always want some Stamina left for an emergency dodge.
Reward: 180,000, Remembrance of the Twin Moon Knight
Step 2: Beat Messmer in Shadow Keep
After Rellana is defeated, follow the road going north, until you reach the Shadow Keep. Enter the big elevator. In the very first room you will be attacked by a boss.
Miniboss: Golden Hippopotamus
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Strategy: This is a big Hippo monster. It mostly uses melee attacks with its head, and sometimes ranged electric projectiles from its back. Its attacks are slow and easy to avoid by dodging sideways. As soon as you enter the boss room, summon your Mimic Tear ashes. Wait until the Hippo focuses on your Mimic Tear. Then consume Wondrous Flask with Cerulean Hidden Tear (infinite mana), cast Terra Magica for more damage, and fire Comet Azur spell to deal it a lot of damage. Follow up with more Comet Azur spells or Great Glintstone Shard spell. This will kill the boss very quickly and easily. Also, if the Hippo grabs you with its mouth it will sometimes bug out and stand still in place without moving or attacking (both times I tried this it happened each time). So if you’re lucky and the boss bugs out you can just keep attacking and it won’t do anything to harm you.
Reward: 200,000 Runes, Scadutree Fragment x2, Aspects of the Crucible: Thorns
After the boss fight, exit the room through the left and go up the stairs. Pass through the room where an archer shoots at you from the other end. Then go left to enter the Storehouse in the north of Shadow Keep. The second main boss “Messmer” is on the top floor of the Storehouse. We will have to do a lot of climbing to reach him.
IMPORTANT: In the north of Storehouse First Floor, there’s a hostile NPC with red healthbar called “Sir Ansbach”. He is tied to Leda’s questline. It’s recommended to NOT kill him. If you finish Leda’s side-questline you will be able to summon Sir Ansbach as a friendly helper during the endboss fight, which makes it easier. If you kill him he will be gone from the game and cannot be summoned for the endboss. You can beat the endboss regardless but without NPC helpers he is extremely difficult. So if you run into Sir Ansbach just ignore him, don’t kill him.
From “Storehouse, First Floor” head north (don’t take the path to the west) and go up two floors. When you reach a wooden bridge with two small black enemies, there will be a big crucified-man statue hanging from the ceiling. Jump onto its feet and then walk over its back, jump off its head to reach the “Fourth Floor” site of grace.
Continue upstairs past the fire mage, when you see bat enemies enter the last room on the left. Then turn right and go to the end of the floor, there are two wooden staircases leading up to the next site of grace “Seventh Floor”.
From the room with this site of grace, turn around and go to the end of the floor where you see a red fire mage and a hanging oxen statue. Drop down the statue to the floor below – straight ahead, at the end of this floor is a lever you must pull.
Upon pulling the lever, the statues in the middle of the room will rotate. From the same floor where you pulled the lever, you must jump on the wooden beam. Then jump on the tail of black lion statue, walk over its back and jump off its head to the floor above.
Now you can go outside and up the stairs, turn left and defeat the fire mage, then go through the gate behind him. This leads to the “Dark Chamber Entrance” site of grace where the Messmer boss awaits.
Missable Warning: Defeating Messmer makes Hornsent Grandam’s questline unavailable, she will no longer talk to you after this. Now is the last chance to do her questline. It’s totally optional and only rewards you with some consumable items (not a problem if you missed it):
- Hornsent Grandam Questline
Main Boss 2: Messmer the Impaler / Base Serpent Messmer
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Strategy: Messmer is extremely aggressive, has long combos that cover a medium range, uses fire magic, and the fight consists of two phases. He will change to his serpent form when his health reaches 50%. He only has one health bar overall. He is weak to blue magic, the best spell to use is Great Glintstone Shard. Don’t use Comet Azur or Rock Sling because they are too slow for this fight and Messmer jumps around too much. Bring 11 Health Flasks and only 2 Mana Flasks. His most dangerous move is when he grabs you, which can instant kill you. Always stay at full health, if you have over 60 vigor you might be able to survive 1 grab if you’re at 100% health (depending on your other equipment/stats). He leaves only short breaks between his attacks, focus on dodging and only attack after he finishes a combo. His moves to exploit are: in the first phase when you’re far away from him he’ll jump in the air and turn into a burning ball when he jumps on the ground near you. Dodge as he hits the ground, then you have a few seconds to attack. In the second phase whenever the big serpent has a burning mouth it will hit the ground with an explosive blast, then the Serpent transforms back to Messmer and he will be stunned for a few seconds. Also any other time he transforms from serpent back to human he won’t attack for a few seconds. As soon as the fight starts, summon your Mimic Tear ashen remains. During the first phase it should survive. Just wait for Messmer to focus on the Mimic Tear, then shoot him from behind with Great Glintstone Shard until you’re out of Stamina. If he focuses on you, run away until he refocuses on your Mimic Tear.
In the second phase he will always start as a Serperent with a burning mouth, then comes crashing down to the ground where you stand to create an explosion. You can quickly shoot 1 Great Glintstone Shard as soon as the 2nd phase starts to deal some damage before he crashes down. Just before the Serpent mouth crashes on the ground, dodge sideways to avoid the blast radius. Then he transforms into human and is slow for about 5 seconds, hit him with Great Glintsthone Shard repeatedly. If your Mimic Tear is still alive it might survive one or two more combos, enough time to let your stamina refill and shoot him with magic. After your Mimic Tear dies, focus on dodging all his attacks. This will take some practice to learn his moveset and to build muscle memory for perfect dodge timing. Generally: when he’s calling the serpent heads, dodge sideways just a moment before they strike you (don’t dodge while they are further away and not yet coming your way). When the floor is glowing dark, run/dodge backwards because a Serpent will come out of the ground. If he uses melee and fire, dodge backwards. Especially if he does stabs, you just need to dodge far enough back to get out of range, or dodge just before he is about to hit you. When he shoots fire around himself it gets a bit hectic and it’s hard to dodge perfectly every time. If you get hit keep dodging and heal after his combo is done. Your priority is to keep your health at maximum, only attack when your health is good, otherwise dodge and heal or he’ll kill you in a single combo. When he does his slow serpent attacks you have time to recharge stamina, then when your stamina is full and he changes back to human form you can blast him with Great Glintstone Shard until you’re out of Stamina. Being Level 170+ is recommended (I had 60 Vigor / 37 Mind / 30 Endurance / 85 Intelligence / other stats don’t matter as mage). Overall one of the tougher fights so far, just takes a while to learn his moveset and when to dodge, and takes some luck with what attacks he will do in his 2nd phase. Eventually you’ll get a good try where he does more of his slow attacks in the 2nd phase where you can deal him a lot of damage quickly.
Reward: 400,000 Runes, Remembrance of the Impaler, Key Item: Messmer’s Kindling (must be used on the sealing tree at Church of the Bud to advance story)
Step 3: Use Messmer’s Kindling on the Sealing Tree at Church of the Bud
After defeating Messmer, you automatically get the key story item “Messmer’s Kindling” which must be used on the Sealing Tree. We’ll head to the Sealing Tree next.
Fast travel back to the site of grace “Storehouse, First Floor”. Now take the left path (west). Exit the castle via the West Rampart and you’ll reach the Rauh Ancient Ruins.
This area is a labyrinth, you must reach the west edge there. From “Viaduct Minor Tower” site of grace, follow the linear path forward until you head inside the ruins. Go straight > right > left > straight. You’ll reach a big torch in the middle of a room with 4 pillars around it. The floor is open here, drop down while riding your Spectral Steed (use “Spectral Steed Whistle” from equipment menu to summon it). You can jump in midair using / to soften the fall. It’s a steep fall but you’ll survive.
After the fall, turn southwest (see the compass at top of your screen). Open the big gate. Ride into the next room and drop down the hole in the ground, where a wind torrent is coming from. While riding the Spectral Steed you won’t take fall damage here. After the fall, go straight ahead (northwest) and then turn left to find the path outside. This leads to the “Rauh Ancient Ruins, East” site of grace, at the cliffside.
From this site of grace turn west and drop down to the bridge. Head southwest across the bridge, where one of the fire giants is. After the bridge, take the path to the left and you’ll reach “Rauh Ancient Ruins, West” site of grace.
From here, turn southwest and enter the next labyrinth section. There will be an enemy bouncing red balls down the stairs. Ride up those stairs > take a right turn > keep going straight until you go back outside > keep going straight until you enter the next labyrinth section, it will be flooded with bloody water and red enemies that are praying and shooting projectiles at you. Upon entering this room stay on the left side, there’s an elevator on the left. Step on it to go upstairs. Then turn southwest and ride up the staircase, you will now reach the “Church of the Bud, Main Entrance” site of grace. The next main boss awaits here.
Main Boss 3: Romina, Saint of the Bud
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Strategy: Romina is a hybrid being of a centipede with a woman attached to it. She mostly uses the centipede body to attack with melee. This has relatively short range and is easily avoided by running backwards. As soon as the fight starts call your Mimic Tear ashen remains, run away until she focuses on the Mimic Tear. Then blast her with Rock Sling spell from afar or Great Glintstone Shard. If you time it well you can also fire Comet Azur at her to deal huge damage when she’s not moving around. If she flies up and creates purple butterflies run away because they will explode. She is weak to damage and takes a lot of damage from spells so the fight should be over pretty fast.
Reward: 380,000 Runes, Remembrance of the Saint of the Bud
After defeating Romina, it is highly recommended to make a save backup (if on PlayStation you can use PlayStation Plus cloud to do so, disable Auto-Sync).
POINT OF NO RETURN WARNING – SEALING TREE: Using the Sealing Tree behind the Church of Bud will make most NPCs disappear from the game. You will no longer be able to advance their side questlines. The ones that remain in the game are Ymir & Jolán (found at Cathedral of Manus Metyr), Igon (found at Pillar Path Waypoint and then throughout Jagged Peak), Dragon Communion Priestess (found at Grand Altar of Dragon Communion until you defeat Bayle the Dread), Fire Knight Queelign, and Moore (he’s still there but his quest will fail). All other NPCs will be removed from the world. So if you have any unfinished side questlines do them now, it’s your last chance! You can still free-roam the world at any point after here, just the NPCs will disappear.
IMPORTANT – NPC Helpers for Endboss: It’s HIGHLY recommended to finish the questlines of St. Trina / Thiollier + Leda / Sir Ansbach. Then you can summon Thiollier and Sir Ansbach to help during the final boss fight. This makes it much easier. Without doing this you’d be on your own during the final boss fight which can make it nearly impossible to beat without overleveling or using game-breaking builds (it’s by far the hardest boss in the entire game).
- St. Trina & Thiollier Side Questline
- Sir Ansbach & Leda & Freyja Side Questline
- Dryleaf Dane Side Questline
- Moore Side Questline
- Igon Side Questline (can still be done after Point of No Return)
- Ymir & Jolán Side Questline (can still be done after Point of No Return)
- Fire Knight Queelign Side Questline (can still be done after Point of No Return)
- (Hornsent Side Questline – his questline autocompletes later during the Enir-Ilim section so don’t worry about this one)
After you finished any remaining side quests, exit the Church of the Bud to the south and you’ll find a black tree. This is the “Sealing Tree”. To advance the story you must interact with it, this will consume Messmer’s Kindling that you got from beating the Messmer boss.
It will transform Belurat into the floating city “Enir-Ilim”. If you went to explore Belurat and defeated the Divine Beast Dancing Lion (totally optional) you may have run into black roots that blocked off the staircase in Belurat. Using the Sealing Tree removes these roots and makes the whole area open for exploration.
After using the tree you get a cutscene and will automatically be teleported into the floating city Enir-Ilim.
Step 4: Enir-Ilim
All that remains is going to the end of Enir-Ilim where you will find the endboss of the DLC. It’s a fairly linear area. Basically, you’ll always want to go upstairs. The endboss is at the very top of the city.
From where you spawn, go up the stairs past the dual-sword samurai enemy, the first room you enter has the site of grace “First Rise”. Head outside to the courtyard and go upstairs. Go past another samurai enemy and keep heading upstairs (a mage will cast traps on the floor, run quickly and they won’t hit you). Open the gate at the end of the stairs to reach “Spiral Rise” site of grace.
Go up the staircase, near the top you can jump through the window to get outside to the balcony. Turn right and climb up the roof, past some bird enemies, then further upstairs, past an ice-samurai enemy, then you drop back into the staircase above the Spiral Rise site of grace. Keep going up more stairs and you’ll reach the “Divine Gate front Staircase”. After this you will encounter Leda, who will challenge you to a duel.
Before fighting Leda, finish Step 10 of Thiollier’s questline, otherwise it will fail!:
- St. Trina & Thiollier Side Questline
If you did all steps for Thiollier’s and Ansbach’s questlines, you can now summon them for the fight against Leda. This is necessary to get them to join you in the final boss fight, so don’t miss it. After interacting with the golden summoning sign they won’t spawn immediately, they will join mid-fight.
Miniboss: Needle Knight Leda & Her Followers: Hornsent, Dryleaf Dane
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Strategy: To start this fight you must interact with the red summoning rune. Before doing this, interact with the golden summoning sign(s), depending on whose side quests you did your allies will spawn midway through the fight. Then interact with the red rune to teleport to the fight. Immediately call your Mimic Tear ashen remains, then heal back to full health. Consume Wondrous Flask with Cerulean Hidden Tear (infinite mana), cast Terra Magica to buff your damage, then spam Great Glintstone Shard on the first enemy that spawns, called “Hornsent”. He will die within a few seconds, by the time the second enemy arrives (or very shortly after) he should have died from your Great Glintstone Shards. He’ll try to dodge but he doesn’t have much health and will quickly go down. Now wait for your stamina to fully recharge, then spam Carian Slicer spell on the second enemy, called “Dryleaf Dane”. Now the NPC you summoned before the fight should also join in, so it’s 3 vs. 1. If you are quick enough you can kill Dryleaf Dane before Needle Knight Leda arrives (or at least have him nearly defeated). When you’re out of stamina wait for it to recharge then run to him and again spam Carian Slicer until out of stamina, rinse and repeat. Don’t worry about taking some damage here, just overwhelm Dryleaf Dane with attacks and kill him as fast as possible, then it’s 3 vs. 1 against Leda. On her own she doesn’t pose much of a threat. Just shoot her with Great Glintstone Shard spell from afar while your teammates distract her. Cast Terra Magica again for increased damage. Leda will try to heal a few times but as long as your teammates are alive you can stay at safe distance and keep attacking constantly, she will try to dodge a bunch which leaves her unable to attack. Bring 5-6 Mana Flasks for this fight. After the fight you will return to your world, you can now loot the bodies of all 3 enemies for their armor sets.
Reward: 300,000 Runes
After the fight you will be returned to your world. You can loot the corpses of the 3 enemies for their full gear set (two inside the room where the fight took place, one in the next hallway).
Then keep going upstairs and take the elevator. If you did Ansbach’s questline you can talk to him at the top of the elevator. After this you’ll reach the final site of grace “Divine Gate Front Staircase”. After this all that’s left is the endboss. You can summon Thiollier and Ansbach to help you against the endboss, if you finished their questlines.
Main Boss 4 (Endboss): Promised Consort Radahn / Radahn, Consort of Miquella
How hard this fight will depend on whether you finished Thiollier’s questline & Ansbach’s questline to summon them for the fight, what level you are, how many Scadutree Fragments you redeemed for damage negation, and your character build. This fight is extremely hard as a mage build, but can be quite easy with a good bleed build, which we’ll go through below.
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Strategy: The final boss in the DLC is Radahn. He is by far the hardest boss. He has two phases, he transforms at half health but in total he has only 1 health bar. He kills in 2-3 hits and does a lot of AOE attacks that are hard to dodge. He also has a lot of health. He is weak to bleed damage however. You have the best chance against him if you finished Thiollier’s questline & Ansbach’s questline, both of which are highly missable. If you didn’t do the required steps before burning the Sealing Tree and fighting Leda you can no longer do their quests and will have to face Radahn solo, which makes his second phase near impossible without overpowered game-breaking builds. If you call your Mimic Tear and have Thiollier and Ansbach to help then it will be 4 vs. 1 and they will draw his attention away from you, giving you time to attack from behind with bleed damage, dual-wielding melee weapons with bleed effect. If the bleed status builds up he will take huge chunks of damage at once. The downside of having Thiollier and Ansbach summoned is that Radahn will have 3 times as much health, as a mage you would run out of mana too fast and Radahn will be super tanky. If you are solo he has less health but he won’t leave you much of a break to counterattack. If you didn’t do the NPC questlines and are solo, you can try summoning a friend for help in co-op. If you know someone with a game-breaking build who finished Radahn before you might get carried through the fight, but won’t be able to summon Mimic Tear if there’s a co-op player.
For the fight itself: He will usually start the fight with a jump attack that does purple AOE gravity damage. Dodge just before he lands. Then quickly summon your Mimic Tear and heal back (don’t summon the Mimic Tear before he jumps, as he’ll hit you). Definitely have all or most of the Scadutree Fragments for damage negation, otherwise you can get one-hitted by Radahn. Dual-wield two powerful melee weapons with bleed effect, attack Radahn from behind. If you have enough faith stat you can also buff yourself using incantations.
His 1st phase attacks are: melee combos = dodge backwards / purple rock sling spell (shooting rocks at you from above) = run sideways and dodge sideways in last moment / jump with purple AOE splash damage = dodge sideways just before he lands / jump without magic = dodge sideways just before he lands (he sometimes does two jumps in succession so stay alert after the first jump) / gravity pull-in = be far away from him to not be affected or dodge backwards just before the gravity shockwave hits, it’s his most annoying move and if he pulls you in will follow up with a melee combo / he also does a variety of other AOE damage on the ground such as summoning purple rocks from the ground in a wide radius or punching the ground and pulling his swords up = dodge backwards and get out of range.
His 1st phase attacks are less aggressive than the 2nd phase. Try to learn the dodge timing perfectly to not take too much damage in the first phase. It can take dozens of attempts to master this but it’s ultimately a matter of pattern recognition and timing. His first phase isn’t too bad with using Mimic Tear.
His 2nd phase is absolutely busted and downright unfair. At the start he will always do two big waves of light damage from the floor. Keep running sideways until he lit up the floor twice. Then he will start incorporating light-based attacks into his other attacks. If you are solo against him you will just be busy healing and dodging and won’t have time to deal damage. Plus he’s constantly jumping around so he’s hard to hit. The way to success here is to have him distracted with one of the summoned NPC helpers or your Mimic Tear, and overwhelm him with bleed damage from behind. If he focuses on you run away and wait for him to attack your allies. If all else fails you can always try to summon co-op players online.
The following build is considered to be one of the most powerful, game-breaking builds in all of Elden Ring. It relies on Bleed and with the following loadout you can easily increase your damage by 50% and kill Radahn quickly.
Weapons
- Right Hand Armament 1: Mohgwyn’s Sacred Spear +10 (can be obtained by trading Remembrance of the Blood Lord with Enia at Roundtable Hold)
- Left Hand Armament 1: Dragon Communion Seal +10 (can be found at Fringefolk Hero’s Grave, right at the beginning of the game)
- Right Hand Armament 2: Gargoyle’s Blood Twinblade +25 with Seppuku Ash of War and Blood Affinity (the weapon is dropped by Valiant Gargoyle, the Ash of War can be found east of the “Freezing Lake” site of grace in the Mountaintops of the Giants, dropped by an invisible scarab)
- Left Hand Armament 2: Gargoyle’s Blood Twinblade +25 with Seppuku Ash of War and Blood Affinity (the weapon is dropped by Valiant Gargoyle, the Ash of War can be found east of the “Freezing Lake” site of grace in the Mountaintops of the Giants, dropped by an invisible scarab)
- (Optional) Right Hand Armament 3: Lusat’s Glintstone Staff +10 (found in Sellia, Town of Sorcery in Caelid, dropped by Nox Swordstress and Nox Priest)
Armor
- Head: White Mask (dropped by the Nameless White Mask red NPC in the Mohgwyn Dynasty Mausoleum, can be easily reached by going through Varre’s quest line which start at the beginning of Limgrave)
- Chest, Arms, Legs: anything that raises your stats, keeps a Medium Load and a Poise above 50. The higher the Poise, the less easily you get staggered.
Talismans
- Lord of Blood’s Exultation: dropped by Esgar, Priest of Blood in the Subterranean-Shunning Ground > Leyndell Catacombs
- Rotten Winged Sword Insignia: earned after choosing to assist Millicent and successfully defeat her sisters in Elphael, Brace of the Haligtree. Millicent’s quest line can be started in Caelid.
- Ritual Sword Talisman: dropped by Demi-Human Queen Gilika at Lux Ruins in Liurnia of the Lakes.
- Shard of Alexander: earned after completing Alexander’s quest line which can be started in Limgrave.
Flask of Wndrous Physick
- Greenburst Crystal Tear: dropped by the Putrid Avatar found at the Minor Erdtree in Caelid, east of Smoldering Church.
- Thorny Cracked Tear: dropped by the Putrid Avatar at the Minor Erdtree in the Consecrated Snowfield, east of Ordina, Liturgical Town.
Spells/Buffs
- Golden Vow (found in a hut in Mt. Gelmir)
- Howl of Shabriri (found at the top of Frenzy-Flaming Tower in Liurnia of the Lakes) -or- “Flame, Grant Me Strength” (found behind Fort Gael in Caelid, on a body between two Flame Chariots)
Great Rune
- Radahn’s Great Rune: raises maximum HP, FP and stamina. Make sure you have Rune Arcs in your quick selection wheel.
How to Use the Build
Before any challenging enemy or boss gate, do the following, in this order.
- Consume the Wondrous Physick
- Equip both Gargoyle’s Twiblades and press
then 
then 
(:y: / 
/ 
). Do this one more time for the other Twinblade. - Cast “Howl of Shabriri” or “Flame, Grant Me Strength”
- Cast “Golden Vow”
- Heal up
- Pop a Rune Arc
- Equip Mohgwyn’s Sacred Spear
- While in the arena or right before a powerful enemy encounter, summon your Mimic Tear and let the boss aggro it.
- As the boss aggros the summon, get close to the boss and spam / to unleash the bleeding power of the Spear. You’ll start doing insane dame, especially if you’re level 300+. Alternatively, use melee attacks using dual-wielded Gargoyl’s Blood Twinblade.
Reward: 375,000 Runes, Remembrance of a God and Lord, Shadow of the Erdtree story finished.
Ending
After defeating Radahn, activate the last site of grace and interact with the golden spark to see the ending cutscene.
Post-Story Content
After this the Shadow of Erdtree story is done, but you can still keep free-roaming in all areas for side content. For reaching all optional side areas refer to All Map Pieces & Secret Areas.
More Guides:
- All Map Pieces & Secret Areas
- All Sites of Grace Locations
- All Bosses
