Elden Ring is the gift which keeps on giving. The lion’s share of thanks for this goes in part to the fact I still find grinding for runes as addictive as I ever have, and because I’m massively over-levelled already thanks to my 127 levels worth of runes that I…found in a hedge…
I’ve been successfully eviscerating the majority of enemies in the game, with just a few exceptions. Crucible Knights remain a real thorn in my side but I’ve come up with a genius way of dealing with them: not. I simply run away from all of them.. They’re simply not worth the rune risk and time it takes to defeat, particularly in Leyndell where they respawn every time I rest (often) so there aren’t enough hours in the day to tolerate them on my daily commute through the capital.
Since my last article I have routed Praetor Rykard in what is quite possibly the best boss arena in the game, though he did manage to kill me once which I confess was unexpected. I also travelled north to the Shaded Castle where I battled the boss who has killed me the most in this playthrough since the Draconic Tree Sentinel kept stealing my lunch money outside of Leyndell. The corkscrew blade wielding Elemer of the Briar. No boss defeat in living memory has given me the level of satisfaction I felt upon finally besting him with a final and desperate Bloody Slash from my nearly fully levelled Uchigatana.
After dozens of hours of meandering around the open world, as well as descending to the stunning underground eternal cities of Nokron and Nostella, I finally headed to the big boss of Leyndell: Morgott. I only barely defeated him on my first try, a little below the level 200 mark, and the fight was as epic and cinematic as I had hoped after watching various YouTubers fight him.
I ascended the Divine Towers of west and east Altus, activating the Great Runes atop them, as well as descending through the Caelid Divine Tower to kill the Godskin Noble waiting patiently for me at the bottom. I know some players give FromSoftware a tough time for reusing bosses but I enjoy the fights against the Godskin Noble and Apostle so much that I don’t mind seeing them pop up every now and then. I could have done without the Erdtree Burial Watchdogs though as they can be rather irritating.
I have finished with the game for a while now, leaving my Tarnished looking out to the snowy pathway which leads to the Mountaintops of the Giants. I have been warned the difficulty can jump significantly once I reach the mountainous area so I’m preparing for that by not playing the game for a while, allowing me to finish off others before the imminent release of God of War Ragnarok. As I said last time, I don’t expect Ragnarok to be able to topple Elden Ring from my favourite game of 2022, but there’s not long to go so we’ll soon find out!
When I return to the game I want to hunt down Mohg as I am yet to reach him, and I will also cross the Lake of Rot to complete Ranni’s questline. I’ll be back with this and more when my adventure resumes, so in the meantime thank you for reading and I will be back with a new Elden Ring update likely fairly soon.
Written, edited and images sourced by Alexx.