Did you know that Malenia still steals health even if your shild absorbs all the damage of the attack?

>>714131894 (OP)
Yes, I knew that

Yes that's why you only pull it out for waterfowl. Also you're using the Greatsword you dumbass, you don't even need a shield at all.

>>714131894 (OP)
and did you know that an ultra greatsword mimic tear with giant hunt will keep her on her ass for half the fight?

>>714132849
It's thematic, since my character started out as a sword and shield knight and she's the second to last major boss I have to fight.
>>714133139
I'll have to try that.
Me and Myself managed to make he try to escape the boss room we were slapping her around so bad.

Staminashit

poorly designed and artificially difficult slop

>>714133324
If you insist on using a shield you should stack poise and defense and spam the fuck out of guard counters. If you aren't doing enough damage to negate the healing there's something wrong with your build. But personally I prefer to twohand for this fight because it becomes way more fun as you can jump punish her extremely telegraphed horizontal swipes.

>>714133541
Dunning Kruger smooth brain post
>>714133842
I forgot about Guard Countering.
Would've helped.
>If you aren't doing enough damage to negate the healing there's something wrong with your build.
Yeah, I was playing like a pussy trying watch her pattern.

>people are so bad they have to use cheese strats to beat her
you didn't beat the game.

Just steal it back.

>>714132849
The insistence of putting le epic judgment cut spam bosses in Elden Ring shows how FromSoft has completely lost sight on what makes the "soulslike" combat system work.

>>714134710
I just found one of those too.

I always bring a shield for malenia because parrying her regular attacks is fun and blocking the first flurry of waterfowl makes it easy to roll the rest.

>>714136012
Prayerful Strike is super underrated for basically any build that's not pure Int, everyone talks up Giant Hunt and Lion's Claw but Prayerful Strike has knockdown, big stance damage, big poise, and lifesteal that scales with your max HP. You can poise through entire boss fights and not even touch your red flask. I always fight Malenia with it since the first time I tried it, it more than evens the playing field against her.

Blaidd, Sellen, Alexander, Millicent, Ranni...everyone I get close to either leaves or dies...the Land's Between deserve to shatter.

its the only mechanic in the game that i feel like legitimately cheats. like breaks the fiction of the world as established, to the point that i suspect it's a bug they never bothered patching. her ability is literally called life steal, she's hurting you and turning into her own vitality. why would her sword bouncing off your shield do anything?

>>714138419
It works exactly the same as player lifesteal always has since the Meat Cleaver in Demon's Souls. The damage the attack deals isn't relevant, only that it makes contact with a target. You can keep rallying off dead enemies in Bloodborne for as long as their death animation is still playing, and in ER you can even whack inanimate objects like ballistae and flamethrowers and still trigger lifesteal effects.

>>714138712
the corpse whacking gets a pass because you can still steal blood from a freshly killed body, but every other example you gave is literally a bug. you cant genuinely be making the argument that From intended flamethrowers to give you health back.

>>714131894 (OP)
obligatory reminder to take off the FUCKING SORESEAL

>>714138950
It's all the same mechanic, they haven't changed it since Demon's Souls. I wouldn't even describe it as "lifesteal" because the HP restored is always a fixed amount (in Bloodborne it varies by attack type and damage type but still not damage dealt). And considering they made it Malenia's main mechanic they clearly know its quirks or they'd have fixed it in any of the dozen or so patches they've put out. Worse has been done to things people complained about less like the duo boss AI lobotomy.

>>714131894 (OP)
The difficulty is overblown, all you have to do is spam running attacks or charged attacks, depending on what she does.

>>714139770
No
>>714141081
It's my first time playing through a Souls game and I'm running a Strength build, everything is difficult for me.
Because I'm a caveman.

>>714141554
That soreseal is doing very little good for you this far into the game and a lot of bad. You'll be way more survivable if you replace it with one of the physical defense talismans, the best one is in Haligtree if you didn't already find it on the way to Malenia.

>>714141849
Thanks

sex with Malenia

i just downloaded elden ring cuz it was on sale and it crashed when i got outside and talked to the guy