My struggle against Fume Knight

September 27, 2022

I was playing Dark Souls 2 before I dropped it for Elden Ring, but having now beaten ER I went back to try the Fume Knight.

Before I proceed let me just say I absolutely hate the Radabeast fight. Radagon was even more annoying than Mar/gott with his delayed attacks, especially since unlike Morgott, Radagon loved spamming AoEs. Dude I dodged! Yet I still get hit. Anyway I slapped him around with a cold Zwei and Lion's Claw. Elden Beast was annoying when I had to chase it down but otherwise it was more manageable than Radagon.

Okay, back to DaS2. I have a tendency to pump END for the Souls games because I unironically want to shoot four arrows consecutively before my stamina bar gets depleted entirely. Bloodborne was my first Soulsborne so I got used to light armor, even if it means low poise. Don't need to hold down L1 in fights anyway; I'm shit at parrying but I can drop L1 to reset my poise.

Okay, that background out of the way. I was stuck on Fume Knight before I put DaS2 aside. Coming back to the game after my hand surgery, I struggled with the touchpad and Options controls but I quickly got used to it, and I decided to go deal with other bosses before coming back to the Fume Knight. Elana gave me trouble and I hate her. Sinh was better, but I really hate the camera, and also I had to farm souls for repair powder when I realized he broke my Zweihander.

Putting off the Fume Knight was not going to last for long. I went back and in a million tries got down the timing for Phase 1. Phase 2 wrecked me and I died a million times again. I couldn't beat him. I tried dodging but for some reason I got roll-caught a lot. I don't think delayed attacks by bosses was a thing in DaS2; pretty certain it wasn't in 1. I knew when to heal, and I knew which direction to dodge, which position to take for punishes. Still, I couldn't beat him. Are my reflexes bad? I just had surgery. Is my controller broken or something? Well, no, I can't blame the controller for my lack of skill. I needed to git gud.

So I did what I didn't do in Souls games before. I dropped the shield. I stripped my Undead to his loincloth. I still couldn't beat him. I thought I got the timing down, but I get roll-caught still. I looked up a guide and it was just dodging, or wearing Vengarl's helm to trigger Phase 2 immediately which I did, and I died to the move where he sweeps the flame sword in a wide arc (that move killed me so many times it's actually embarrassing). I dropped the helm and equipped the Ladle offhand for the stat boost.

"Look up a video guide," my siblings said. So I did, and the video I watched was just skillfully dodging. I was already doing it! I just needed to adjust my timing! The second video took advantage of the Fume Knight keeping his sword buffed in Phase 1 to avoid Phase 2, and when I attempted that, it seemed From had already patched that exploit.

Fine, I'll just level up. Pumped ADP to 40 and the spare into VIG. Then I was back to dodging, again, and again, and again. Then on yet another restart, using the trusty Craftsman's Hammer, I dodged perfectly! Until Fume Knight thrust his sword and my roll was delayed. Phase 2 came and I dodged well, only getting hit by the AoE where fireballs flew because my timing was wrong. Then he hit me again with one of his slash moves and I resisted healing; good thing my last dodge was timely, letting me land the last hammer smash.

Whew, that was the single most difficult boss I faced in all of Soulsborne. Three unfortunate hits. If my timing were better, he would've been the first Soulsbornekiro (excluding ER) where I fought a boss with zero damage.

Then I went to Frozen Eleum Loyce and I confirmed in the Aava pet boss fight that my circle button was busted.