This might be a more long form comment but I feel it’s warranted. This is extremely well done video that combines a lot of the tips and build ideas thrown around these past few days especially regarding poise,armor,and talismans. This is all genuinely fantastic advice and I’m seriously recommending it to my friends who are also stuck on radahn lmao. I beat him ng+ with two summons but my ng play though is gonna have none so even more so these tips will be beneficial. Super excited to fight Radahn again. Thanks for the encouraging words too a lot of people don’t realize the spike from even rellana/dancing beast to radahn and alot of discourse online is really “git good” idealized and telling people they’re bad at playing rather than encouraging them to have an open mind about the boss and the player…..ie not JUST get good. This vid was fantastic man genuinely a top tier video. 10/10

Gamers, if you use summons, I recommend summoning only once you're outside the big laser beam he usually starts phase 2 with. This way your summon won't die mid phase 2 and leave you alone with the big scary boss, and phase 1 is relatively easy to learn.

You can use miquella’s greatrune that you get from defeating the scadutree avatar, it negates the affect of his grab attacks entirely

For the meteor, run as far away as you can from where he leaps and you should be fine

Excellent video, especially the part about the build reevaluation and the mental coach adivce at the end. I will leave a foolproof tactic with mimic tear here for anyone who cares to know: Equipment: Any Greatshield with 70+ Stability and preferably high holy damage negation + the strongest catalyst you have. Talismans: Double headed turtle Talisman. Build: Around 30 faith to cast black flame orb and the great aoe heal. Ideally 60 Vigour, 35 Mind, 60 Endurance. Tactics: Summon Mimic at earliest opportunity. It will only ise Black Flame Orb to deal %-based damage. You do the same. Whenever you have aggro, just block and wait for your mimic to take aggro back with black flame. Your mimic has infinite FP so it will always use the AoE Heal to restore itself. Make sure you only have the greatshield, catalyst, and those 2 invocations equipped. No weapons since then mimic AI will act less optimal (although you can equip a weapon AFTER summoning the mimic). This works on every boss in every ng+ cycle since black flame damage scales with max enemy hp. However, I avoid using this strat since I like changing up my builds, but I had to fall back on it for Promised Consort Radahn since my patience ran out. In any case, it is good to have a build to fall back on.

After you beat the scadutree avatar behind the shadow keep you get miquella a great rune, after you get grabbed find an opportunity to use it to dispel the charm

If anyone wants a build that makes the fight more bearable here is what I used (I beat him with no summons): 2 twinblades that you can equip seppuku (if possible 2 godskin peelers). If not I used 1 normal Twinblade and 1 Godskin peeler. Put seppuku on them with the bleed affinity. (Apply seppuku before the fight) I used Golden Vow and howl of shabiri for buffs. Talismans were dragoncrest great shield talisman, haligdrake talisman +2, lord of bloods exhalation, and either the claw talisman, rotten winged sword insignia, or the turtle talisman he talked about in the video. If you’re struggling with stamina pick the turtle talisman, if you prefer damage choose the rwsi or claw talisman. Armor was Crucible tree helm and body. And tree sentenel legs and gauntlets. If you really want damage go with the white mask and raptors black feathers. For the physic I used thorny cracked tear or either Opaline bubbletear or the one you get that heals your health halfway because of the seppuku. Finally just spam jump attacks whenever there is an opening. It procs bleed in like 4-5 jump attacks for like 6-7k

Great video, appreciate the tips and the encouragement.

I actually decided to keep trying with my build (battle mage with dark moon and comet/glintstone icecrag) until i defeated him. First i used icecrag to frost him easily (unfotunately you don't have time to cast ranni's moon so i gave up using it), then i punished big opening with dark moon charged attack and when he wasn't super aggressive and i was at a comfortable distance i used comet (don't spam it tough, you wanna be able to avoid both the gravity dash and pull). So yeah, my advice is to not give up even if you don't have a shield, just make sure your build is optimized. Oh and 1 more thing that really helped me and can be used be all types of build: use the giant scarlet rot pot! Just 1 is more than enough to apply the status even in his second phase (where he gets mor resistance to it). Hope this will help, have fun!

Parrying him is also a good strategy it stops him from doing his aoe spam after each hit

Here’s the thing though, I’ve NEVER had to change my build for any boss ever, and if I have to then that’s saying something. I just stuck to my two handed greatsword. And sure, it took me about five hours to finally kill him, but I feel like it was worth it.

Bro I just beaten him thanks to our tips to have holy dmg negation. That helped SO MUCH!

Cool strategy. I wish more players were open to using blocking. I think it adds an interesting option to the game that so many players neglect. It's not overpowered ever as long as you're not using certain greatshields. One of my fondest memories from DS1 is beating Artorias using the Twin Eagle Greatshield.

There are a lot of holy damage negation things in this game so make sure to take advantage of them to make second phase easier

I’m primarily someone whose apart of the ds2 community and I take pride in the fact that I’ve beaten every boss in this series - so knowing that the best way to help people who think the dlc is “too hard” I made a almost guaranteed build and strat for him. I also did this on a character who hasn’t progressed past fire giant, so I beat radahn with only +18 weapons and 12 lvls in shadeau which you can get by pretty much speed running the dlc. Gear - fire knight helmet that increases hp, stamina, and equipment load. The godskin noble chest and bracelets that you get at ranni’s great rune tower. And the dlc solitude knights leggings. This gives you 60% holy negation Tailsmans - haligtree +2 at mogh’s palace for 68% holy, greatsheild tailsman, dlc pearl sheild tailsman, and twin headed turtle tailsman. Weapons - fingerprint greatsheild with barricade sheild AOW (aow not really necessary) from the night rider in weeping peninsula. And the antspur with a innate bleed AOW to proc both bleed and scarlet rot. Stats - 50+ vig, 35+ end, 50 strength, 40 dexterity (this one just help with dps, so this is flexible) Want at least 11 crimson tear flasks at +11 In your wondrous physics you want the bubble negation to cancel out one of his nukes (uplifting aromatics are helpful but not necessary) and the crimson physic that passively regenerates a small percentage of your hp for about a minute. With the holy damage negation this will outheal the chip damage his holy does to you when blocking. - drink this when he first uses the big laser in phase 2 Attack advice - circle around to his back, getting about 2 pokes in each attack chain, stop attacking if your stamina bar is under half. When he ends chain with x dual slash roll to his side. When he slams into ground roll into him as he begins to pull his swords out. When he crosses his swords into a L just tank then roll into him as he lands from his jump. (When ever he does the big light wave from these attacks are good times to heal, plus the mogh bloodflame if behind him) The grab, roll to side after he jumps. Gravity barrage, run straight away from it then jump to the side at the last second then tank which he’ll probably end it with a ground slam. If he does the light dash where he goes off in a random direction DON’T stand in it’s way, avoid at all cost. Will easily one shot you in less than a second. The dive bomb - look towards yellow dot in sky, will blink once and roll as it blinks twice. Then roll a second later. Scarlet rot will most likely proc again during phase 2 once he’s about to do dive bomb. Just need to survive once it does. But keep agro to minimize chance of him going for a nuke.

This feels like a therapy session and I’m depressed :D

I already killed him, but I wanted to see how much of my suffering was unnecessary

If you can do the sekiro style blocking, you may able to do this with a middle shield, or even your weapon.

Beat him in 7 attempts and did it solo. Did i use an op build to do it? Yes, but I spend my time helping others defeat these bosses. idk why, but I love this dlc

You know when his left hand swings right. You dodge that and then wait to perceive his next swing before panic rolling. And like >50% of the time he immediately backhand swings with same hand and despite you pressing the roll button, fromsoft has a penchant for tarrying roll execution so you just watch your char stand like an idiot to get hit by smthg so dodgeably slow. So i guess panic roll is the way; i started to roll before i know what he is about to do. It works. Where he delayed his backhand attack, panic rolling immediately after dodging the forehand gives time to roll again to avoid his delayed backhand as it would his immediate backhand. But then there is a problem. There is a 3rd backhand variation where it is quite delayed but not as much, and this would catch panic rolling. UNBELIEVABLE miyazaki - let me see you play this dirt of a game. I managed to reduce like 75% of his health after 1-2 hours. 2-3 more hrs went unfruitfully. Next time i play this game im gonna be merciless and pick up scadutree filths which i have hitherto neglected save the ones found on my way straight to miquella the ostentatiously mumbo-jumbo. The only detour hitherto is the dancing lion area. I am like scadutree 5/6/7. Next i will explore south and west (edit: east) etc. honestly i just wanna beat the hardest boss asap and not waste time exploring but it seems i have to give fromsoft more than my money and preferable amount of time

essential tips for beating any boss: get naked. light load makes dodging attacks so much easier, and taking damage doesn't matter if you don't get hit

This is very helpful, I'm not going to lie though, its hard to abandon my twohanded greatsword build lol

I took a different tack to this bossfight and did not end up swapping off my two handed colossal weapon. My strategy was to use the perfect block hardtear, stack as much damage resist as possible (bubbletear, paledrake+3, and the physical damage resist one), and guard counter off of perfect blocks. All of his first phase attacks will deal zero damage to you if you're using the perfect block tear, and his second phase attacks will only barely chip you when perfectly blocked. Using the anvil hammer at +10, Radahn staggered in two guard counters if they were close enough together. This method did end up turning the boss into sekiro, though, lol. I think a shield would have made it much easier. Weapon blocking is surprisingly good though!

Few strategies I developed during my time with this boss, after 4 hours of attempts until I beat him -Bring a shield, holy enchant it, even if you don't want to use it the whole fight or are dual wielding. Having a shield at the ready is a great way to deal with Phase 2's long ranged attacks where he teleports to you repeatedly. If you block the light moves but if you dodge the real one's attack, you get an attack window -From my experience the phase 3 transition with the God ray coming in seems to target where Radahn was before he jumps off screen. So once he leaves get out of that area and you should be okay to buff back up or heal -I typically save my Physick buff for the start of Phase 2 after getting away from the giant holy explosion. You have enough time to use the physick or even summon a spirit ash. Phase 1 starts too aggressively and after long enough that phase is pretty figured out. So save your valuable buffs for the hard part -If you're feeling too pressured by the boss and struggling to notice his patterns, call the NPC summons in for a few runs. I don't think they help that much but having some breathing room to properly observe Radahn's attacks can go a long way -While risky, many of his attacks are parryable. It is absolutely a viable way to go for the fight -Use all the buffs/rune arcs, consumables you got once you think you got a grip on the moveset. Theres nothing harder in the game so whatever items you've been holding, NOW is the time to use em Best of Luck to y'all fighting this beast! We'll all make it past this guy, just like every other boss they've thrown our way o7

he keeps his stagger bar after the 2nd phase transition, so if you are fighting him and noticed he didn't stagger, charged R2s might break his poise during his AoE charge

Tip for Colossal Sword users: I beat him solo using the Guts sword two handed infused with bleed using a STR & ARC build. I used Giant Hunt in most openings which builds up huge stagger, has some hyper armor, & big damage. I think the crouch animation in it evades some attacks as well (not too sure). Otherwise, use jump attack as a gap closer & light attack for a quick hit. I personally can't find an opening for a charged heavy so just use Giant's Hunt. Blocking with the GS is also pretty effective if you think you can't dodge. You can take a few hits with that. Bleed will also proc a few times if you aren't too passive. It was my first day with the boss. I beat him after like 25-30 attempts before going to bed that time (thank goodness). Goodluck.

use a rapier if u going to do shield, so u can block and attack. plus u can infuse it with blood for bleed build up.

You can use the new weapon called the bloodfiends arm at 60 Arcane it has over 200 Bleed build up. In 2-3 Heavy attacks you can probably stun Radahn and get a bleed proc.

If you're using a greatshield build like this, the greatshield sounds like it would help... but ironically... it helps greatshields less. The Pearl greatshield talisman however raises holy negation on block. THAT helps.

wanna beat rhadan without memorizing movesets???? Use a big ass shield and moghwyn spear. Hold shield and poke til he's dead.

Finger print + anystupr + marika's braid equipped for extra defence , thank me later

I just beat him and yeah I had too change from Dex backhand blade lightning build to a heavy shield with sacred affinity and blasphemous blade. U can use Miquella's great runes, it's a re-useable consumable that breaks his charm, u get it from scadutree avatar

I got him with a 2 handed greatsword with giant hunt, level 200 and it took about 5 giant hunts to get through phase 1 and just wait for opening in phase 2 and get a few giant hunts in

What’s the music used in the beginning of the video ?

Unfortunately I am a mage. 60vig, 80int, and enough stats to equip Icon Shield, Blaidd's Armor, and Dark Moon Greatsword/Wing of Astel. I'm used to cheesing everything with Mimic Tear, Rock Sling, Comets, and Sword Beam/Nebula spam. How fucked am I?

Impenetrable thorns.

Most of his melee combos have long recovery time on the last attack so I was using rakshasas great katana w/ two handing sword talisman, axe talisman and spear talisman if you manage to dodge his last attack of the combo and immeadiately hold a charged heavy you can usually get the heavy off and dodge his next attack this lets you get massive combo damage and massive poise damage for each charged heavy

Havent watched yet but im pretty sure the answer is shield poking

are dex weapons good? i really like using the light greatswords and i want to know if they are viable enough to deal with him. great video btw. im trying to fight this boss with an open mind because he is so cool, but its a little hard when everyone is complaining about the boss, valid reasons or not

ive never used a shield because i liked the challenge but i might have to swallow my pride and use this build😭

I could not beat him by myself because I just don't have the reflexes to dodge his attacks. The second I got a Cooperator to join I got my kill. ALWAYS REMEMBER: jolly Co-operation is an option and you can beat the Bosses together. If you are playing with friends, try and figure out how your builds can compliment each other. And remember it's just a Game, have FUN.

Radahn is just a huge skill gap no gear unless it’s cheese will help you 1st phase is honestly not hard at all this boss punishes very hard on players who dodge away from the boss u gotta stay close or the holy light will keep clipping you and that’s what u don’t want because one stagger from one of those holy lights after his swings means u gonna get chained by his other attacks and that’s gonna cause u to panic roll further ending ur attempt tips for the fight it’s either u get good and learn his moves or cheese no ther way around it stay close the light beams come down in the direction where he’s swinging too

heavy/shield builds breeze thru the DLC, heavy damage 2H have problems, light armor casters cant do anything in this DLC (unless they get the crazy OP DLC spells but even then they get oneshoted) ...add to that 1/4 of DLC weapons and spells are OP busted and the 3/4 are useless garbage even if you try your hardest to build around it and you can clearly see that there is ZERO balancing done in this DLC, add cut coontent and empty areas and you can clearly see where the problem is, and its not the player

No need for mental coaching, get a big greatshield, and get a bleed thrusting weapon. He is dead.

Just use a good shield. 😊

Well im not struggling, i just wanted to say shield bros this is our time!!

Where do you get that weapon?

2:43 commander gaius would disagree with you, that bastard was just not fun to fight to me atleast, even with +17 scad and 65 vigor and dragon crest greatshield talisman, he was comfortable 3 to 4 tapping me

You shouldn't have to change your build for 1 boss in the entire game lol If you can kill every boss but one it's not the build that's the problem, it's the boss.

W hollow knight pfp, and secondly I will NEVER use a shield, i have over 200 weapons upgraded and my best one was duel twinblades with bleed got him one then died

I don’t know what I did, but I found this boss not nearly as hard as everyone was saying, I beat him in 11 tries

No spoiler warning or anything smh

genuinely laughed when i saw they recycled Radahn for the final boss. the gudcels are really trying to convince people (mostly themselves) that this isn't lazy slop. you guys sound like the Star Wars nerds walking out of Episode 1 lmao

I know this is silly. But the reason I'm so stubborn with my builds. Is because I'm RPing either OCs who have a set fighting style. Or, as a character from another game.... Like Ganondorf. I'm using the Banished Knight's Greatsword. Because that was the closest thing to what he used in Twilight Princess, while still being a good bonk build. Also used Braggart's Roar for the defense and stamina boost. For another character. She uses two Flame Art Bandit's Curved Swords. Golden Vow and Flame Grant Me Strength, the Fire and Multihitting Physic, and both of the Multihit boosting and Claw Talismans. I dunno, it just feels weird to completely change my loadout when literally no other boss in the game REQUIRED a shield.... Hell, Malenia was the anti shield boss fight.