I can't figure out Crucible Knights.

[MrDugan]

All the enemies I see complaints about like Runebears and Dinodogs and all that, I got it. They don't bother me, zero fear unless there's a bunch all at once.

A single crucible knight is a whole load of massive BS though, at least that's what it feels like right now. I was in the capital, with about 100 enemies waiting to respawn between me and the nearest grace site, like 10 minutes away unless I rushed past everything if I died and had to get back.

A single crucible knight, hanging out in a small space. Almost dead. I have 50ish vig, tree sentinel set, talismans for life, damage negation for physical and elemental, the works. I can take a hit. Medium load, so no fat roll. I have taken maybe one hit this whole fight and healed it back up. Full health. This dude pulls a nearly zero windup attack at point blank range in the middle of me hitting him (animation locked in the hit, so no rolling away from it, even though I was hitting the roll button.) that turns my entire health bar yellow instantly.

It doesn't feel like it's "fair as long as you're really good." It feels like complete and total BS. I don't understand what I'm supposed to do other than be frame-perfect for the whole fight, which I know is going to be everyone's answer.

The icing on the cake is that on the run back, I stupidly tried to rush it, got hit with that OP perfumer bolt barrage from a paige, made it through a door to heal and got hit THROUGH the wall with a second barrage before I could heal. 200k runes gone because enemies get to attack through walls or one-shot my entire health bar.

I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to do about any of this. Every Crucible Knight fight is like this for me. They are harder than any of the bosses I've fought, any other enemy. I know they're broken because I've let my mimic straight up solo other minor bosses, and yet I've seen a single crucible knight pound a +10 mimic into dust and still have 1/3 of its health bar left. What am I missing other than the same tired old "git gud"?

[Mango Tree]

They are legendary knights dude what did you expect, i know the feel dude, they scare me more than any other creature i find, good thing they dont' respawn. i killed the one at the gaol with mixed ranged tactics, sometimes i would get close to knife him but mostly done with fireball and bow. was pretty awesome. i am level 40 using +3 bow and knives

[Hammer_Squirrel]

I find it’s easier to stay up close then dodge and heal when they whiff. If you try to make space then they’re getting ready to punish a heal and you’ll get hit consistently

[GONDAL]

Here's the trick, they're super weak to parry, and it is easy to get one off on them. Just run up with a buckler and parry him to death.

[MrDugan]

Originally posted by Hammer_Squirrel:

I find it’s easier to stay up close then dodge and heal when they whiff. If you try to make space then they’re getting ready to punish a heal and you’ll get hit consistently

Dude, I was literally in his face hitting him when I got one shot. He hit me for like 1500 damage through heavy armor. I barely got hit at all until I got one shot. All of that is in the OP.

I need to know how I'm supposed to survive a massive one shot that they can do pretty much instantly. I already know to stay close.

[zab]

hit them while they have their shield up to bait their shield bash attack
roll to avoid the shield bash
hit them

[Derdak54]

key with them is breaking their stance + crits, or parry attacks ( if you good at it , not my case tho :P )

if you strenght build , get heavy affinity weapon + flame of the redmanes , use that ash couple of times to put him on knees then crit , once he up , repeat .

if you intel build , use greatblade phalanx + carian grandeur ( carian sword or ash ) to similar effect ( works also well with darkmoon blade ash to )

faith build is the easiest , just stay at good distance from him and spam charged giantflame at his face , they relatively weak to fire .

[(MP) Bud Tendy]

Attacks clipping through walls is total bs but if your sword clips a wall it blocks all damage & makes you wiff fresh air.
And yes CK are tough.
As long as you have cleared areas around them you can cheese them with frost arrows or night comet, land a couple hits & run to the edge of there lease/zone let them walk away rinse repeat.

[The Tempted Man]

Simply use mods, balance doesn't exist in this game. The guy who was suppose to do it, never came to work and they didn't realize even post release.

[MrDugan]

Originally posted by AzureDreams:

Here's the trick, they're super weak to parry, and it is easy to get one off on them. Just run up with a buckler and parry him to death.

That sucks for me, because I could never get the hang of parrying. Parrying is part of why I never like the original DS. I'm used to games like DMC or Bayonetta, where parry mechanics are hitting parry the instant before they hit, not having to time my press to line my animation up with their animation with like a 4 frame window of opportunity. That basically requires me learning the timing for every single attack and when in their animations to start my animation and that sounds like absolute torture.

[BIG E.]

I think Curcible Knights are best designed enemy in this game and most fun to fight. Their moveset can be tricky at first but once you figure it out you will not get hit once. I was literally happy everytime i found a Crucible Knigt to fight in my first run.

Most problematic enemies for me were the ones with extremely agressive movesets, like hands and giant birds.

[Citizen of Zozo]

A lot of people parry them.... but I never have. I know it's not what you want to hear but I think Crucible Knights attacks are very easy to dodge. The key is to fight them reactively. Do not be aggressive. Dodge the move they choose to do, punish it with a hit, repeat.
It's a memory game. A melee fighter (who isn't parrying or blocking with high stamina/greatshield) has to learn what the moves look like and when they end.

The worst thing you can do is mash roll. Only roll when you absolutely need to.

[GONDAL]

Originally posted by MrDugan:

Originally posted by AzureDreams:

Here's the trick, they're super weak to parry, and it is easy to get one off on them. Just run up with a buckler and parry him to death.

That sucks for me, because I could never get the hang of parrying. Parrying is part of why I never like the original DS. I'm used to games like DMC or Bayonetta, where parry mechanics are hitting parry the instant before they hit, not having to time my press to line my animation up with their animation with like a 4 frame window of opportunity. That basically requires me learning the timing for every single attack and when in their animations to start my animation and that sounds like absolute torture.

There's a shield called "buckler shield" sold by Gostoc that is much easier than your standard DS parry. There's an ash of war called Golden Parry which is even easier, and is found outside the centermost outer capital gate. Use these on some Godrick soldiers to get the hang of it, then go back and try on the crucible knight.

Edit: The ideal time to parry with these is standing right under the enemy and right before they begin swinging their weapon at you (not charging up)

[Señor Brown]

1) Parry them. Use a medium shield with Carian Retaliation, Golden Parry or a Buckler.

2) Get right in their face and circle them to your right (their left). You can sprint as you circle them so their tracking can't keep up. This should help you avoid most attacks and keep you close enough for a hit or two.

[balmora pete]

Infinite poise, hard to stance break, input reading. That said, they do leave themselves open after many attacks. One thing that works well is to hug them and hope that they do their shield bash. If you know the timing to dodge, it lets you attack them pretty easily in return. Their stomp into sword slashes combo has the longest recovery when fully completed, giving you ample time to retaliate.

If they use their wing move and have the tail move as well, it is unwise to try and attack them as they land since they will do the tail move twice. The second tail sweep has a massive range.

[Don Purrleone]

I did capital with 25 vig and never god one-shot by anything but bosses, or if I got stunlocked (read: failed to dodge) into a double hit.

think it was eighter a bug or something doesn't quite add up. I was wearing the ronin set with fp and spell focused amulets