*: Enhanced Edition Values
The Witch of the Lake is a Boss in Salt and Sanctuary
Saira, one of two twins. The Witch of the Lake, guardian of the Salt Alkymancery, is a magic user of legend, an immensely powerful arcanist and alchemancer. Her black robes conceal a physical form that has been grotesquely disfigured by alchemy as obscure as it is dangerous."
Location
- Siam Lake: This is a small area, the boss is on the left side.
- Coordinates: {X:55811.56 Y:30732.57}
- Boss Flags: xx NPC / Merchant progress
Combat Information
- Attack Types: Arcane, Strike
- Weak vs: Fire and Holy Damage
- Strong vs: Strike Damage, Stagger
- All of her magic attacks can be spell reflected.
Phase 1
The Witch will attack you using ranged spells mostly, and she can float around the arena. It is advisable to have arcane-resist gear and a light build, as you would most likely fail at blocking, thus rolling and dodging away is imperative.
- Arcane Barrage - She points her staff slightly downwards, conjuring a stream of energy balls from her staff that can stagger, drain stamina (if blocking) and irremediably kill you if caught off guard. Be sure to follow the witch at all times.
- The individual damage of the projectiles is not very high, but it's impossible to survive if one manages to hit you while you're in the line of fire of the rest.
- It is recommended to stand directly below her, as this attack has no tracking and she can't reach you if she's in the air. If she's not at the end of one of the sides of the arena, then roll through her to get behind and punish her.
- Attempting to spell parry this attack won't save you if done too early, as the immunity time period of the spell reflect won't last enough to save you from the whole barrage.
- Dark Swarm - Shoots a line of accelerating dark balls positioned on an arc to one of her sides, which then follows the player. Deals heavy stagger, medium damage and if one hits, the player is vulnerable to the rest of the projectiles.
- Depending of the position the boss is at the time of the cast, is the way the projectiles are arranged. Sometimes the player may have to go through a "split" arc (one line above the boss and one line below it) at the same time.
- The player may need to Jump then use the Dart Brand to go through safely. Be ready to judge when this is necessary.
- This attack always tries to home in based on the position of the ball that is closest to the player in the line. This means that if the player is able to go past the last ball in the line, the rest of projectiles will lose almost all of the tracking, missing the player enterely.
- Due the accelerating nature of this attack, it's recommended to dodge it after 2 to 3 seconds when the projectiles appear, instead of trying to do it instantly. This will allow the balls to gain slight speed, which will make them go crashing into the ground and dissapear once the player dodges through them.
- This also makes spell reflecting this attack a bit tricky, but completely safe if one learns the timing. The spell reflection will grant you enough immunity to ignore the rest of the balls, allowing you to punish the boss.
- Depending of the position the boss is at the time of the cast, is the way the projectiles are arranged. Sometimes the player may have to go through a "split" arc (one line above the boss and one line below it) at the same time.
- Limb Smack - If close to her for too long, she will melee hit downwards in an arc with her arm. If the player is close enough, then she can combo it into an uppercut launching you into the air. Can be done on the air or on the ground.
- Both of these attacks have tracking and try to reach the player, but can be easily rolled through. Be prepared to roll twice.
- Be mindful of your positioning, as you can punish her if a roll is timed right. Conversely, she can punish you if you whiff.
- Dark Arrows - Shoots a medium sized ball in one direction which after a second will explode and shoot lines that follow the player. These lines can stager and chain into themselves, which leave you completely vulnerable once one of them hits. They have medium tracking, and it's impossible to roll-dodge through them. Deals medium-low damage per projectile.
- This attack deals heavy stamina damage if trying to block all the projectiles. High stagger reduction advised.
- This attack can be "evaded" by running away in the opposite direction of the ball, for the whole duration of the attack. It is actually not advised to roll, as the recovery can make the rest of the projectiles catch up and hit you. If you must roll, do so at the end of the attack.
- It is recommended to start running after the projectiles start coming out, not once the ball has been cast, as this reduces the amount of ground you have to cover to dodge the attacks.
- Be wary of getting too far away, as the boss is still able to move and cast spells once the lines start shooting out.
- You can safely reflect this attack most of the times, because even if the duration of a successful spell reflect is not long enough to last if done early, you nullify 90% of the projectiles once the parry connects. This will get you hit only once, maybe two at best.
- And if you spam roll after a successful spell reflect, you can dodge through the rest of the spell with no damage done.
Phase 2
- Follow up - After using Limb Smack, she will stand still and casting for a brief second an arc of balls above her (much like the Dark Swarm attack). These will then target and home into the player. Deals medium-light damage per projectile and heavy stagger.
- Since the boss can do Limb Smack in the air and on the ground, be wary of your positioning and get ready to roll through.
- If done on the ground, make sure to not stand too close to the boss when it does this, as it may cause one of the balls to spawn directly on the hitbox of the player, staggering you instantly and leaving you completely vulnerable to the rest of the attack.
- This attack can be reliably dodged, if the player waits out a short distance away from the witch once the second limb smack has been done. Once the Dark Swarm has been casted, immediately close in and roll through the attack. The projectiles will home into the player, but will accelerate too much and crash into the ground
- This tactic is more consistent when the Witch is in the air. If she's on the ground, then roll into the attack twice. You can safely go through with one roll at medium roll or lower, but rolling twice will ensure you don't get hit at all, and get into position to punish her after it ends.
Melee Strategy Video
Player Notes
- Boss Set: Steepled Hat, Fleshbound Basque, Fleshbound Frock
- Boss Weapon: Saira's Staff
- The Ashen Effigy Greatshield is the perfect shield to use if available as it has 100% resistance to arcane attacks, making it an ideal tool against her. Due the special properties of the shield, it can also reflect back some of the damage done by the boss back to her.
- The Silver Shield also offers 100% arcane resistance, but its stagger resistance (aka Balance) is much lower, which means it probably won't stand up to the Witch's multi-hit attacks. If you use it, try to do it with high willpower.
- When fighting the Witch, Make sure to keep an eye on your arena space as this will benefit against the Dark Arrows and Arcane Barrage attacks.
- If avoiding the Barrage from a far distance, the balls will split into spaces that can be jumped over or rolled through. This however is not a really safe or consistent strategy. Use it only if the boss has floated beyond the player's reach of the arena.
- When fighting her, try to NOT stay near the edge of the arena as she can simply leave from view and attack, using any ability which you can't predict and kill you in the process.
- Carsejaw The Cruel's armor set (Umbral Set) that is sold after his defeat by the Nomad Trader, can provide a significant defense against her Arcane based attacks. This set requieres Heavy Armor tier 4 to wear.
- The Mildeweed Set from the Queen of Smiles is also a really good alternative for builds with Light Armor instead of Heavy Armor. Sold by the same vendor and requieres Light Armor tier 3 to wear.
AnonymousOn one of my many attempts she was near death and went off screen to kill me with her bullshit barrage.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Dunno if i was lucky or overleveled (i was lvl 84) but i defeteas her on my 2nd try with my mage build. I spammed Fire Barrage all the time and sometimes Thunder Barrage to mitigate elemental unbalance
- Anonymous
To kill this anoiyng boss it takes me 5 tries...was I lucky?. Btw, at that moment i had 55 str. 40 end. and thats all....ah!! That was my firts round.
EQUIPMENT
Jaws of dead (vii)
Doppelsöldner set (vi)
Mossy charm
Rings = bloodflower
Mossy
Plate band
Relentless
STRATEGY
Hard attack in air, roll as much as possible and attack lika dumb werever a had chance to do.
Reading the comments i can only think i was really lucky. Sorry for my bad english
- Anonymous
Don't try to mitigate her damage, just hit her as much as possible. The key to victory is agression.
You must kill her as fast as possible, each second being an opportunity for her to randomly go for one of her few true combo that will one shot you.
Just pray that she doesn't go for a double dark arrow into an arcane barrage or it's back to the sanctuary.
- Anonymous
This boss cheated, she did the orb thorn attack and I dodged it perfectly and then she blasted a wave of magic mid roll.
- Anonymous
Probably would agree to say she is the hardest boss in this game. The RNG factor plus her opposing magic attacks are evil.
Overall it helps to stay below her all the time, but then there is this one magic attack where you should run. If she spams the other straight magic attack directly after it you're dead.
So it's highly RNG and a bit luck based too. But took me a lot of tries to beat her.
- Anonymous
Def architect's twin, yall prob knew already tho. i just found out about this gam haha
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Her single attacks are... fine. She can pretty handily oneshot you unless you change into arcane resistant gear (and even then it's close) but you can dodge. The problem is that she usually doesn't kill with the attack she just did but with the next one, because her moveset is randomized enough that she can easily just lock you in a corner. Homing Missile into Machine Gun is the one I died most to.
The worst part of this fight is the soundmixing though. Her sound effects are still absolute ear piercers at 10% SFX, which leads me to believe they somehow don't scale with the option.
- Anonymous
Died a ton. Mobility is your friend, keep close to her to be able to dodge the attacks as they come. beat her using merchant set LMAO.
- Anonymous
A truly despicably awful fight. Can regularly go out of reach? Check. Will fly off the map and machine gun you with attacks that are nearly if not actually impossible to dodge? Check. Atrociously good tracking? Check. Can true combo you with a single attack? Check. Drops less salt and gold than enemies you fought a almost half the game ago? Check. Not even enough salt on kill to level you up once at the point in the game she's fought? Check. Necessary to fight to progress the game? Double check. A truly awful design, a black mark on what is the best 2d souls like and the game would be better off without her.
- Anonymous
This boss is the hardest to me, on Ng+ i suffered in this fight. But today i kicked her ass - finally!
- Anonymous
this boss with a mage built and new game plus is a complete pain in the ass
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
At this point it's not the attacks that are the problem, why tf did they design her to float 95% of the time.
- Anonymous
This game's equivalent of the Moonlight Butterfly, except it attacks 5 times faster, with 3 times the damage and double the tracking. Fun.
- Anonymous
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Warhammer with some cheese on it + Silver Shield on A DIFFERENT SLOT because war hammer is garbage on 1 hand
- Anonymous
I don't even play S&S, but I saw a video showing the fight. The background for her fight is remarkably similar to Ash Lake in Dark Souls, which was what caught my attention lol.
- Anonymous
This ***** goes off screen where she can't be hit on purpose every ****ing time.
- Anonymous
After failing so many times with a heavy armor build, I decided to go at it with absolutely no armor and my trusty Coveted Axe. It worked! Mobility is your best friend in this fight. I was able to outrun most of her magical attacks and easily dodge her melee attacks. I wish I'd done it sooner, it would have saved me a lot of headaches.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
When I played co-op with a mage & cleric, this was great. Playing singular with my mage, stay below her and use fire spells. I used Flame Barrage.
- Anonymous
As a MAGE: Took me 8 tries then figured it out. Use lightning pod before entering. That will dps while you evade. STAY CLOSE to her. If you end up away from her, you are dead. Stay close and spam fire barrage. Prioritize evasion. Don't forget, lightning pod will be jacking her up at all times. Flame guardian performed horribly.
- Anonymous
somehow it took me 3 tries for her and 7 ****ing tries for carsejaw.
also 5 tries for the wyrm and the tree, 4 for murdelia, and somehow only 3 tries for the third lamb despite having zero clue on how to dodge the lightning sprite attack. am i just playing a different game than everyone where carsejaw is now as strong as he is in lore?
- Anonymous
Oh yes please more of 3 unavoidable consecutives shard balls, more barrages immediately after a shard ball, more flying behind the edge of the screen from the middle of the level and cast barrage, oh yes please more. What? I'm not salty you are.
- Anonymous
Remember to make offerings to get bonuses, especially Alchemist, which gives you big bonuses to upgraded armor.
White Armor set with a lot of upgrades can help you raise your arcane defense.
- Anonymous
Easily the hardest. But i finally did it she really used a lot of magic. But i had something that helped a lot. I went to the blackest vault and put the guy that you exchange stuff for items. So i got Flask of Defilement and threw it at her, it did serious stuff to her. So what it does is when you throw it at someone, each time you hit them the stronger it gets. Also GG
- Anonymous
Ok so I run a cleric build. And i gotta be honest, the gun with built in holy (it's a class 3, forgot the name) absolutely destroys this boss. This coupled with the Mildewed set, ethereal intervention, and divine blessed weapon made this boss a joke I beat on the first try.
My str build heavy armor character on the other hand struggled horribly against her...
- Anonymous
on my first playthrough i defeated her on my first attempt, without using a shield, but on ng+ this became the pure form of suffering. Hardest boss on the game.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
cheesy way to easily kill her: ashen effigy with 100 arcane defense. take whatever weapon you want, just use mireheart charm. hit her a few times and raise your shield. gg
- Anonymous
simply the best boss the game offers in my eyes. every attack can be dodged with good timing and positioning, especially since you are able to double dash while in air at this point of the game. BUT once one shot connects from her spells, youre most likely to die. having arcane resistance is basically useless, because you cant outtank all this damage. you have to be aware of every movement and use the time you have to be aggressive as possible while avoiding all these oneshots. i really enjoy fighting her and winning against her feels almost like you did a perfect fight.
- Anonymous
I had a super easy time with her on my first playthrough, was using sheikimaru and made pretty quick work of her, only died 2 times I think, worst boss for me has to be either kraeken wyrm or the third lamb
- Anonymous
I also think it is one of the easier bosses. The Kraken Wyrm and Nameless god are difficult, especially in ng+7.
- Anonymous
The umbral aegis and umbral armor makes this fight easy, but even with it she still hit pretty hard. I made sure to stay well out of the way of her magic attacks but i only survived cause of the insane arcane resistance i had. I pretty much was running the perfect counter build for dealing with her. full umbral set, iron butterfly greataxe with the holy damage charm and prayer, and the ethereal intervention up. Absolutely melted her, but tbh i could easily see how she is awful to fight. Even with all my advantages she got pretty close to killing me a few times.
- Anonymous
The hardest boss in the game. Don't let any anonymous boasters on here saying 'oh just wear X set and she's ez' get to you if you're having difficulty with her, she is EASILY the hardest fight in this game whether a first runthrough or on any NG+. It's not enough that she has a few spells that can OHKO you, but while can be avoided easily once you get the feel for her, she has a tendency to occasionally use moves back to back in a fashion that would imply a strong AI. Getting you to run far to one side to avoid tracking lasers, then following up with machine-gun balls which you wanted to be close to her to avoid. Advice for fighting her: First the obvious, equip a light load for faster mobility, as much arcane defense as you can get. If you have rank 3 prayers, try and keep Ethereal Intervention up at all times. If available, use fire, holy, or poison damage. Poison, as always, works great on a first run, but it's tick damage won't be as spectacular in NG+, but it's still nice to let her tick damage while you focus on dodging. Spend all your salt and gold before fighting her. Chances are you will die a lot trying to figure her out. No need to be losing several thousand gold each time you die, and there's even a good chance she'll get a random one shot on you early in a fight and make you lose your salt. If you're melee, use a weapon with an overhand swing if you can, plenty of times she'll be floating frustratingly above your reach. Won't be available til you face her in NG+, but trinity greatsword is great for it's overhand swing, and for being very fast as far as greatswords are concerned. Now for her actual moves, most are easy to dodge on their own. Her melee swing is easy enough to roll through, and if you just step back to avoid the follow up swing, you can usually get several hits in on her. At low health she'll usually follow a melee swing by glowing purple and shooting those homing swarms at you, just back up and roll through to dodge. Her three spells: Machine gun fireballs, the easiest to avoid on it's own but the one most likely to one shot you. If you had been able to stay close to dodge this and her melee, just walk or roll past her. If she's low to the ground when she casts this, you can get some free damage from behind her. If you are far away when she casts this (because you were dodging a different spell) this is the thing most likely to kill you even after you've got her pattern down. Only thing to do here is try and dart dash even farther away and then jump, roll, or whatever dodge you can to hopefully only get clipped by one or two hits. They'll still hurt, be ready to heal. Dark Swarm: Actually easy to dodge. If you're close to her, just jump and dart dash over the ones that come in low, and the other ones should go over your head in the process. If you're far away, just roll through to dodge. Tracking Laser: Only annoying because it's the one best dodged by being far away, which will then set you up for being one shot by other spells. Run from her when this comes out, dart dash to get some distance, then if necessary try and dart dash over the last few bits or roll through them. Chances are you'll still get clipped, but getting clipped by this one isn't as deadly as getting clipped by the other spells. Now you just need to worry about your position and which spell is coming next. If your FAR, stay far and dodge the next spell appropriately. If you're mid range and she's preparing a low to the ground machine gun... well you're probably going to die. And of course, don't get greedy even when she's low health. She can one shot you, you're not safe til she's dead, even if she's only one hit away. Play it safe, get your hits in when you can, prioritize dodging. Seen too many deaths to this boss because I tried to rush in and finish her off when she was almost dead.
- Anonymous
I hate this boss there is no reason she needs three moves that have tracking spells that fire a billion rounds at you.
- Anonymous
Here's my advice. You know the machine gun magic balls she shoots at you? That's the only safe window for attacking other than her melee attack. never be greedy with her and take your time.
- Anonymous
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Because being 1shot is fun. Why do so many of the bosses in this game suck?
- Anonymous
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If she chains two spells in NG+, you’re dead. No room to dodge or parry unless you just Greatcheese the fight. Died 42 times tryng to kill her with light armor + 2h Trinity sword + every arcane resist crap equippable + miracles. Never, and I say never, did I manage to melt before her RNG OHKO combos cucked me. Got bored, picked Ashen Effigy, won first try. I was close to a no-damage. Like, seriously, cheesing makes everything dumb easy, not doing so turns this fight into your worst nightmare, and I can’t stand this chick turning into Rare Akuma just because I try not to play like a hacker.
- Anonymous
too much RnG boss, you need to melt her to reduce the chance to get unevitable Death.
- Anonymous
ahhh complete annihilation followed by the magnificent sound of earraping magic, how wonderful
- Anonymous
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I am in NG+7 with a 50 str and 50 wis build. Overall muy best weapon against this boss is the purifier reaper, while a GS will do more damage per hit, the extra aerial hit of the purifier helps a lot.
- Anonymous
The video isn't a melee guide, it is a shield guide. Tough boss!
Anything with a high Fire Damage completely melts her HP bar. I know she's weak to Holy but I always had way quicker results with Fire. On a mage Flame Barrage and Dragon Plume completely anihilates her. Putting a stone Alchemist and stone Mage (or Cleric if you go Holy and/or Blacksmith to boost physical if you dont use magic) at the Siam Lake Sanctuary is pretty useful.
- Anonymous
all of her moves are easy to dodge EXCEPT for the bull*****floating orb that spews a million deaths. For that one you MUST be away from the edge of the arena as the only way to avoid it is to run away from it. You basically have to control the space in a way you usually don't have to.
- Anonymous
I mean I might have been a bit overleveled (naginata+7 and thunderstone), and then the 100% arcane shield + some arcane defense armor then you can pretty easily dodge the ball attack, by moving left/right then rolling through it. Staying close to her avoids most of her attacks and the only attack you really have to dodge is the stream
- Anonymous
I mean...she's not that hard. She has a pretty limited range of attacks that are easy to dodge if you know how, and a relatively small health pool. I recommend wearing light armor with strong arcane defence or just forgoing armor entirely, for extra mobility. just takes practice lmao
- Anonymous
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Had a hard time against her. Took me about 25 trys until I defeated her. Other bosses fell mich quicker, mostly within 3 trys.
- Anonymous
She is stopping me from completing my NG+ run for over a year now.
- Anonymous
last time i checked i was playing salt and sanctuary not touhou
- Anonymous
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Didn't use a shield. Just stacked poison with wraithfangs and tried to stay alive until she died.
- Anonymous
I almost beat her on the first try with my greatsword build with no armor, impen charm and holy pages. I'm using the Disembowled Husk boss weapon with a level 4 upgrade tier.
- Anonymous
I tried every weapon (best and most appropriate for every class) against her to see how quickly I could kill her with melee in NG+7. Turns out Daggers are the way to go, no contest. More specifically the Eviscerator. With a Blessed Page or Pitch Fire, the fight barely lasts a minute if she doesn't troll you (Spoilers : she will). Now... with Divine Blessed Weapon at 50 wisdom and Golden Wine... you pretty much make her health bar turn yellow.
- Anonymous
Some Strategies:
Equipment:
-Strong Slashing Weapon
(Chitin Obelisk with 34 strenght works wonders)
-Holy of Fire Buff
(Either through Prayer or Items)
-either no armour or light armour with high arcane resistance
-Fire Bombs can help
The actual fight
-dash towards her and spam 2-3 attacks
-try to stay under her and try to bait the magic barrage
-hit everytime she can't hit you
She is fairly squishy and should go down within 5-6 combos.
- Anonymous
first of all this boss IS well made as there are more tips and replies for her than any boss from dark souls and nioh.
second thing is used pitchfire/ 2hand obsidian pillar (v) and attack ring/charm and she went down in 6 jumping strong attacks in about 45 seconds. also run and jump attack as soon as fight starts which will give you an immediate second chance to do it again after you recover. only used one pitchfire and it does out when collecting her gold. you don't need a shield just do it quickly. high strength helps with this. my hammer was swinging at base 187 on ng. each hit burns her for a bit after you do that jumping strong attack as well. you can get through most bosses with the obsidian pillar / (seawolf cutlass for third lamb) actually.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
The way I beat her was poison spam. It was race against Health. If you ask me it was really effective, but risky. I died multiple (around 4) times, but managed to beat her.
So here's my tips to this boss:
1. Max Arcane Defense, both Shield and Armor (+ Ring). With my equipment I had 50% Arcane Resist (Mostly Nullifies Otherwise certain Deaths)
2. Poison Build = Forestfang + Pessklaw (First forestfang when she approaches you and pessklaw when she spams her rapid fire)
3. Run far away and Jump Block the Homing Shadow Burst Sphere of Nearly Certain Death (Only 1-3 Will hit you and your shield will block the damage at least mostly)
4. Dodge the other homing spheres where multiple are cast at once (they will hit the ground and disappear)
5. Stay Behind her and be ready to roll against Melee and Rapid Fire
- Anonymous
The *itch gets EXTRA aggressive when she is poisoned, for some reason. She becomes so spammy, the game turns into a bullet-hell, making poison stacking to a reasonable point with Mossy Pessmud such a pain, you're better off not using it (no wraithfangs, those things are broken). I have been through the game many MANY times (27 journey bottles on my jack-of-all-trades character alone, but haven't dropped daggers for a while now :p), and can pretty much beat her with my eyes closed. But DAMN she's never been such a *itch, which made me love her again.
- Anonymous
Game breaking boss at NG+. Has the tendency to move offscreen and spam homing missiles while you can't reach her. I don't mind a challenge but this is ridiculous.
- Anonymous
i found this boss to be more rng than anything, stay incredibly close and hope she uses the barrage, then get a few hits in, rinse and repeat
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Any of distance attaks can be avoided by simple jump and dashing in the same direction. All of her projectiles has a limited lifetime. So if you have a good gun or crossbow you will not have any issues fighting her.
- Anonymous
Took me a few death before I decided to abandon my shield and most of my armor ; I killed it on my next try. Maybe keep enough stuff to tank the melee damage, but the rest is quite easy to dodge. Stay under her, and jump to avoid the arching projectile she uses to reach you when you're there. I used the charm that gives holy damages and a two handed headman's voulge, which was enough to inflict a lot of damage.
- Anonymous
I recommend the Wardens Set and whatever headgear has the highest arcane resist. Additionally you can use the silver shield, which has 100% arcane resist.
If you have problems dodging the mayority of a spell's projectiles this is the best armor to wear, either dodge as much as you can then take the rest of the damage (just don't take all) or block as much as you can and then take the rest.
Since her melee atatcks aren't that strong and sonsists only of a 1-2 combo you can afford it.
Currently on my first playthrough and this was the best setup for me
- Anonymous
Run away, then turn around a boost jump over them. Its that easy. Also the Gatling attack is easy to avoid, just run the other way and jump the projectiles.
- Anonymous
make sure to place an alchemist at the sanctuary... the extra magic resist made this trivial
- Anonymous
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I found the orb that spawns missiles to be the hardest part initially. What worked well for me is to be close to underneath the orb (like 7 or 8 o'clock if the orb was the center of the clock) then just walk away. Dont jump. Dont dash. If you just walk away they all miss you. The annoying part is if she happens to follow up with her rapid spray ability you will likely die but most of the time she did not so it worked out after a couple tries. I had a shield on but honestly never even pulled it up.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
If you're cooping, this boss is pure evil. Two of her three magic attacks can one-shot you if they so much as touch you, and she's got a pretty sizable health pool.
- Anonymous
If you use the Iron rampart you can literally block 100% of everything she can do. You can just..be naked even other than that shield and your weapon and she wont hit you a single time. No cheap tricks or I frames or strategy needed, block Every single spell and attack inbetween.
- Anonymous
First playthrough is a bit easy.. but when ng+, fortunate and damage don't work at all.. you need to concentrate extremely long time to defeat her..
- Anonymous
I was worried about fighting her but i beat her on my 3rd try, her spells hurt a lot but she can be killed rather quickly
- Anonymous
Maybe it's because I was running a flint & steel build when I fought her, but I beat her after 4 tries.She has like, 4 attacks. Just learn those, stick close to her so you can dodge easier, and be agressive.Unless you have a really high arcane defence don't bother blocking either.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Seriously that shield is insane. Add that Faithful Ring and you can tank everything this girl throws at you.
- Anonymous
The first time I beat her, I was playing a paladin build, and it took me 6 tries because I couldn't go from attacking to blocking fast enough. Then I went to do this fight again with a Mage build, wearing the Evanescent robe set and using a staff/greatsword loadout. The lightness of this loadout made dodging almost too easy, and the staff allowed me to rapidly use fireball at close range and Flame Barrage at long range. And I managed to do it under a minute, with only one candle difficulty rating to boot. Mobility and ranged attacks are the real keys to making this an easy fight.
- Anonymous
This is definitely one of the harder fights in the game, and requires quite a bit of learning out of you since any one of her attacks can one-shot you. I recommend that approach this boss coming from Pitchwood, as it's likely you'll be dying to this her quite a bit before you get the manuevers down and its' less infuriating if you can use the nearby Sanctuary. Pre-preperations: I used the Steel Armor set personally as it has some pretty decent Arcane defense without sacrificing physical defense too much in the process as she does have a few physical attacks that might catch you off guard. She is weak to Fire, Slashing, and Holy damage. You won't have a lot of time to cast spells or re-apply buffs, so consider weapons that have these attributes inherit and/or use charms to give your weapons the necessary attributes. You'll want a weapon that has pretty good vertical reach as she'll often be hovering just out of harms way. The big key thing to this fight is to make sure that you stay as close to her as possible. The further away she gets the more difficult her spells become to evade and you obviously can't follow-up with your own attacks if she's not within reach to clobber. Prioritize evading her attack and then attacking yourself. Keep an eye on your stamina; You'll want to have enough to do a few complicated dodges of your own as you get done. The witch has four attacks that she can string together. Her first is a pretty basic melee attack that doesn't do a lot of damage but will knock you prone if you are hit by it. Staying close to her prompts her to use this more often, and its' one of her easiest attacks to dodge. She'll hover to your vertical position and then slash with her spider-claw-arm-thing at you, moving herself forward as she does. At lower health she'll string two of these together. Simply dodge-roll towards her, turn around, and dodge-roll again. It's safe to get one or two attacks after evading. For her second ability the Witch will pause in the air, and then let forth a stream of dark energy rapid-fire in a cone in front of her. If you've been staying close to her you'll want to always run a little bit behind her whenever she casts a spell as this will give you enough time to figure out which spell she's casting and how to respond to it. This is her only spell that doesn't have any tracking, so feel free to attack her while she's firing off, but get back to evading once she starts moving around again. Her third ability will summon forth a circular formation of little ghost-head looking guys that will travel forward, and then track to your location. Again, if you are behind her when she uses this spell you'll want to move back slightly, and then actually jump+dash towards the floating ghost heads once they're headed towards you. There should be a you sized gap in-between them that you can dash through safely, although you might clip one or two of them occasionally. So long as you can dash through the majority of them this won't kill you. Air-Dashing through the ghost-skulls should land you near the witch; Jump again and get a few swings in on her. Her final spell produces a menacing red orb that travels horizontally forward and then expels several missiles of arcane energy that home in on you. This is probably the hardest spell to avoid and will be responsible for a lot of your deaths as you learn her mechanics. Unlike the ghost-skulls which follow your character in a circular pattern, these missiles will travel directly at you. You need to goad the missiles into following you at an angle that you can quickly dart away from them. If you see the ball go out, get under it, and then just as its' starting to shoot missiles at you air-dash to the right or left to avoid them. If you're a little off to a side of the orb then you'll want to wait for the missiles to start firing at you, and then jump and air-dash over them. You'll likely catch one or two of them, but so long as you miss the majority of these missiles you should be able to recover. As always, reward your successful dodge by smacking the witch around a bit before you get back to the evasion game. That's it as far as her spells go, but the witch actually has one other kind of meta-game cheat she can do that you'll need to watch out for; She can float off-screen and will absolutely attack from there. This places you at a really bad disadvantage since you can't see what she's doing and you can't get close enough to her to dodge correctly. If she does this I like to just haul-ass to the other end of the arena by air-dashing away from her as quickly as possible. While her spells have impressive range, they will fizzle out before they can catch up to you this way. Once the threat has passed try to get yourself back to the center and then stick to her again. Hopefully these tips help you bring this witch down. She's one of the harder bosses in the game (if you aren't just cheesing everything with a mage build, anyway), so don't get discouraged if it takes you awhile to adjust to her mechanics. While her spells are very deadly and everything she does has the potential to one-shot you, they aren't unavoidable either.
- Anonymous
I died tons just like you would a boss you aint used to the moveset to yet so hey it happens. I used a 2H shrouded bulwark with the electric charm and the white knight armor took a good few tries but hey patience and RNG be in your favor you'll get it. Now those spindle beasts to the right now they are the true enemy shield piercing pieces of *****.
- Anonymous
So here tactic throw a @@@@ ton of fireballs at her legit that was all she's weak to fire after all and hitting her with consecutive fireballs destroys here Also the possible glitch I mentioned on the top is this when fighting her I had gotten here to the last sliver of health and just shot a fireball at her she then proceeded to go into the stage groud to a extent and started casting her phase two spell she then she instantly died I don't know if she died from going to far under the ground or if my fireball had finished her(I did not seem like so as she still had some life left) also I noticed I only got 13200 salt for beating her is that the correct amount?
- Anonymous
This one was the worst. Took me 31 deaths before I finally put her down. Even with high arcane resist, her shots basically cause unblockable juggle damage if you got clipped with your shield down. And even with your shield up, her shots will eat thru your stamina like a bear in a henhouse, and you'll get juggled regardless.And what the eff is with her flying offscreen and taking cheap shots from there?? You can't dodge, you almost can't block, and you certainly can't retaliate. If you're lucky, you might be far off on the other side to minimize the damage to you... maybe.Then her attacks sometimes come consecutively. I swear, I can't anymore remember the number of times I got fekked when she decided it would be nice to throw two different projectiles thrice in a row!I finally beat her when, aside from the requisite dodging, rolling, and blocking at the right times, I used the lightning charm on my wep. It would score two hits per swing instead of just one. Plus, whenever she was beginning to float offscreen, I ran like hell to the other side.But seriously, this bi-- I mean witch, need to get nerfed. Like, no more cheap shots from offscreen. Even if just that, coz that's just unfair.
- Anonymous
1-shoted me 3 times than is used flame barrage, stayed under her/dodged her "fireballs", used flame barrage and killed her right before she 1-shoted me again :) ...Just stay under her
- Anonymous
There are two strats on this site. Kill her fast before RNG kills you, or get ***** greatshield.I'm currently in NG+4 and I found alternative strat. I'm quite sad to say it's based on shield, but it's only tier 2 shield with "Reflect" special. There are two that I know of, Mirror Shield and Bloodbrow Scutum (a little bit of farming in dome should net you materials for one or another)Reflect special means that you can parry spells, which means that if you parry first of witch's BS projectiles, you'll be invicible for the duration of parry animation, and you'll even have some frames to roll. Or you can hold shield up button and you'll block last 1-2 shots for some chip damage.I'd say that after beating her on NG+4 without taking damage it's very skill-based way to beat her. WITHOUT Greatshields. Go away Havel Moms.Which means you can save about 10 skill points and 25 units of weight.
- Anonymous
the best strategy i found was to use an upgraded iron rampart to block all her attacks and wait for an opening with my seawolf cutless and pitchire combo
Did anyone ever notice that she uses Elden Stars?
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