Malenia is a two-phase Demigod boss fight in Elden Ring. You will encounter her near the roots of the Haligtree and in the first phase she will be called Blade of Miquella, while in the second phase, she will transcend into Goddess of Rot. Both phases have their own HP bars, and there is a significant deviation in movesets between them.
Malenia is by far the hardest boss fight in the RPG. Even with a summon she is absolutely brutal as Malenia is capable of regaining all of her missing HP.
Fortunately, she is an optional boss, and you don’t need to beat her to complete the story. However, if you are adamant about beating her, Malenia will drop 480,000 Runes, Malenia’s Great Rune, and Remembrance of the Rot Goddess.
Contents:
- Malenia boss overview Elden Ring
- How to find Malenia
- Malenia moves and counters
- Malenia resistance and weakness
- How to beat Malenia
Malenia boss fight overview
Location:
- Miquella’s Haligtree (Beside the Haligtree Roots Site of Grace)
Optional:
- Yes
Summons:
- Other Players
- Spirit Ashes
Boss Drops:
- 480,000 Runes
- Malenia’s Great Rune
- Remembrance of the Rot Goddess
Weakness:
- Riposte
- Hemorrhage
- Frostbite
Resistance:
- Poison
- Scarlet Rot
- Madness (Immune)
- Death Blight (Immune)
- Magic
- Lightning
- Holy (High)
- Standard
- Slash
- Strike
- Pierce
Malenia is the most powerful of the Empyreans in FromSoftware’s RPG. She gained much renown for her battle prowess during the Shattering. She fought Starscourge Radahn to a standstill and then proceeded to reduce Caelid to ruins by unleashing her Scarlet Rot.
There are two phases to the Malenia fight, the Blade of Miquella and the Goddess of Rot. During the second phase, she will gain a lot of new movesets, along with the ability to inflict the Scarlet Rot status effect on you.
She is very weak to Frostbite and Hemorrhage. While you can exploit these status effects multiple times during the fight, Malenia can completely heal her entire HP bar if she hits you.
The more she hits you, the more she heals, making the fight difficult. You will need a fair amount of patience to learn her movesets and then beat her. Don’t be disheartened if it takes you hours to consistently reach her second phase.
Where to find Malenia in Elden Ring?
To find Malenia you will need to make your way to the very bottom of Elphael, Brace of the Haligtree. You will find the Haligtree Roots Site of Grace here, from here, make your way down the stairs to access her arena.
Malenia moves, phases, and counters in Elden Ring
As mentioned, there are two phases to the Malenia boss encounter in Elden RIng. There are some moveset variations that she gets in the second stage, along with piloting some of the abilities from Phase 1.
Below are some of the abilities that you will face when going up against Malenia in the boss encounter:
Phase 1: Blade of Miquella
Kick
- Move: Malenia will rush at you and then swipe with her leg. She can then follow it up with either a delayed dash stab attack, a sword swipe into an overhead slam, two quick slashes, or a grab attack.
- Counter: The kick cannot be parried, however, you can completely dodge it by creating some distance. You can then just roll away from any follow-up attacks.
Thrust
- Move: The Blade of Miquella will jump and then follow up with a thrusting attack. It deals an incredible amount of perce damage and comes out very fast. She will usually use this attack when you have created some distance from her and are trying to heal up.
- Counter: You will be able to parry this move. However, an easier way of avoiding it will be to roll to the sides. However, make sure you are not caught drinking a Flask when she goes in the thrusts attack animation.
Consecutive Prosthetic Slashes
- Move: Malenia will shorten her blade and then rush at the player executing a string of slashing combos. There will be a series of three consecutive slices initially, and she can follow this up with a horizontal slam. The slam can be delayed and will catch you off guard. Malenia can execute this flurry of moves while in the middle of some other combo. This attack can deplete your entire HP bar while healing her back up.
- Combo: When she shortens the blade, there is a ping sound, so as soon as you hear it you will need to roll into her. You will I-frame the entire hit if you roll to her right. For the follow-up move, you will need to roll away once. Do not try and punish the move during the flurry. The follow-up will hit you for a big chunk.
Uppercut into Slam
- Move: If you aare close to her she will at times do an uppercut move, then leaping upwards, she will slam her sword down on your location.
- Counter: When executing this move Malenia will hold her sword back. When you see the uppercut coming out, you will need to dodge backward. When she leaps and starts the slam animation, you will need to dodge diagonally into her.
Charge into Spin
- Move: If you are standing a bit far away from her, then she will hold her sword back once again and charge at you. She will then execute a spin attack with her sword and then follow it with a downward slam.
- Counter: As soon as you see her running at you, you will need to roll away two times. However, make sure to time them right. The attack also has a big recovery period, and you will have some room to punish it.
Lunging Grab
- Move: This is Malenia’s grab attack. She will raise her hand during the start of the attack animation and then lunge at you. If the move connects, she will grab you, throw you into the air, and then impale you before tossing your body aside. It deals a lot of damage and can one-shot you. Additionally, in Phase 2, this move can be followed by another thrust attack or a flying sweep.
- Counter: Roll away as soon as you see the lunge come out. If you are in Phase 2, be wary of the follow-up and dodge accordingly as soon as the animation begins.
Waterfowl Dance
- Move: This is the most dangerous move in Malenia’s arsenal. This can completely destroy your HP bar when it connects and is one of the hardest moves to get away from in Elden Ring. Malenia will leap into the air reading her blade for a few seconds and then dive at you slashing multiple times in an AoE. This rapid slashing occurs a total of three times and she will keep diving at you after each time. She will then do a final slash after the third, shorter AoE. In phase 2, this attack will build up Scarlet Rot if you are hit by it.
- Counter: There are several ways of countering this attack, but none of them are that easy to execute:
- If you have maintained some distance when the move starts, then run back and the first two slash strings are likely going to miss if you keep running. Once the second string ends, remove the lock-on and then run or roll into her to completely avoid the third flurry. Keep maintaining some distance so that her fourth slash misses as well.
- If you are close to her during the Waterfowl Dance animation then start running back and then jump and roll away as soon as she dives into you. Then move towards her when she redies the second flurry, and then roll into her left arm. For the third set of slashes, roll into her again, and then make some distance to avoid the final slash.
- If you are boasting a Seppuku build with high bleed build-up you will be able to stagger her out of the Waterfowl Dance animation when Hemorrhage procs.
- The Ash of War, Bloodhound Step can make it much easier for you to dodge the attack. Just take the lightest dagger, equip it with the Ash, and switch to it when she starts the attack animation.
- You can also try using Vow of the Indomitable to dodge the first string of slashes. However, it’s not as reliable at dodging the follow-up strings.
- You can also use a shield with very high stability ratings to block the entire combo. While you will block the incoming damage, Malenia will completely heal up her HP bar by just hitting you.
Phase 2: Goddess of Rot
Scarlet Aeonia
- Move: As soon as Phase 2 starts, Malenia will dive at you and then summon a giant flower of Rot that explodes in an AoE. It then creates a mist around it which builds up Scarlet Rot while ticking down your HP bar. She can use this attack again during this phase.
- Counter: The best way to counter this when Phase 2 starts is to remove the lock-on from her, and run straight past her till you reach the other side of the area. By doing this you will completely avoid the attack. Once she lands, you will have a window of around 5 seconds to heal up and re-apply your buffs. If you are a caster, you can continue to spam spells at her.
Scarlet Explosion
- Move: Malenia will leap up into the air and then slam her sword down to where you are standing. This deals a lot of damage and leaves a vortex of rot behind which then explodes after a brief delay. She can follow this up with more moves, and those can create a vortex of rot as well.
- Counter: You can roll in any direction to completely dodge the attack. However, if you want to punish this move, then you will need to roll into her as soon as she starts the slam-down animation. Then make your way to her backside to get a few hits in.
Flying sweep into a Thrust
- Move: Malenia will once again fly up in the air and dive at you from the left. She will then sweep her sword and then follow it up with a thrust. She can also go into the Scarlet Explosion movie from here.
- Counter: This move usually comes out when you are trying to keep your distance from her. You can roll left to avoid the sweep, then roll left again or jump up to avoid the thrust. If a Scarlet Explosion is coming, dodge to the side.
Counter Kick
- Move: Sometimes when you hit her, she will counter you with a kick. While it doesn’t do much damage, she will use it to stagger you and interrupt any combo that you were in the middle of.
- Counter: You can take the hit if you want. She does not follow this up with any attack and the damage is negligible. However, you can choose to counter it by anticipating the counter kick and then rolling away as soon as the animation starts. You can then punish the recovery period.
Phantom Scarlet Spirits
- Move: She will fly into the air while creating a pool of Rot just below her. She will then send out four projections of her which will attack you, the first projection will do two horizontal sweeps, the second one will do a vertical slam, the third one will do another horizontal sweep, and the final one will do a thrust. After the fourth projection, Malenia will dive at you and perform a thrust. This move can also hit multiple people, and won’t just be limited to it. So it can hit your summons or other players in the arena.
- Counter: When the first projection comes out roll backward two times, then roll forward two times, and then roll to the left two times. Make sure you get more familiar with the move to nail the timings. Once you get it down, you will be able to completely dodge the attack.
Malenia resistance and weakness in Elden Ring
Resistance
When it comes to elemental damage, Malenia has a fair bit of resistance to Magic and Lightning while having a very high resistance to Holy. For status effects, she has higher negations towards Poison and Scarlet Rot while being immune to Madness and Death Blight.
Malenia also has small negation values towards Standard, Slash, Strike, and Pierce.
Weakness
Malenia takes a fair bit of Ripostedmaage. You can break her stance rather effectively, and if you are looking to parry her, you will need to successfully parry her three times to break open her guard.
The Rot Goddes is also very weak to Frostbite and Hemorrhage. Hence, builds that revolve around pricing this status effect will have an easier time taking her down.
How to beat Malenia in Elden Ring
While Malenia doesn’t have too many moves up her sleeve, what makes the fight incredibly difficult is her two large HP bars and her ability to heal back her missing health. She will heal back by hitting you, another player, or even your summon.
Even if you are able to dodge the entirety of the Waterfowl Dance, your summon may not be able to. She can instantly take them out and heal back with every hit she lands.
Below are a few tips and tricks that help make Malenia a bit more manageable in Elden Ring.
General tips for beating Malenia
- Malenia primarily deals physical damage and you will be able to reduce the amount you take by:
- Using the Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman
- Eating Boiled Crab
- Using the Opaline Hardtear in your Wondrous Physick
- Using the Black Flame’s Protection or Golden Vow incantation (these both don’t stack together)
- Like Maliketh, Malenia has low poise which can be easily broken by weapons that do a lot of posture damage. Even Ash of War like the Glintblade Phalanx will be able to open her up to a Riposte once she is hit a few times with the ability.
- Use weapons that build Frost and Bleed. Malenia is weak to both Frostbite and Hemorrhage and you will be able to proc it several times throughout the fight. Seppuku builds in general will have a much easier time taking her down. If you have Rivers of Blood, that will do the trick as well.
- Malenia is neutral to fire hence incantations like the Black Flame can do a lot of damage to her. You can even opt for the Blasphemous Blade as its unique skill can help melt her HP bar while knocking her down several times.
- If you are planning to use a Spirit summon make sure you use one that can stagger Malenia a lot, or dodge away from her attacks, limit the amount of healing that she can do. Here are some of the best summons against her:
- Redmane Knight Ogha
- Latenna The Albinauric
- Dragon Knight Kristoff
- Black Knife Tiche
- Always stay topped up during the fight. Malenia has a lot of hard-hitting combos that can one-shot you if you do not have enough remaining HP. Some of her attacks have the pierce effect, which can completely ignore the resistance that you have. So try not to fall below 80% in the fight.
Melee build tips for Malenia
If you are using heavier weapons that stagger Malenia, then keep attacking her till she side-hops to interrupt the stagger. You will then need to roll away, as she will follow the hop with an attack.
As she has low poise, heavier weapons will be able to posture break her more often. This will leave her vulnerable to a Riposte, and you will be able to take away a chunk of her HP.
Bleed and Frost builds are going to shine in this fight. If your weapons cause Hemorrhage or Frostbite, then you will be able to proc. it multiple times to melt her HP bar. This is why builds around Seppuku as well as Rivers of Blood are so effective against her.
Dagger users are going to struggle if you are not going for either of these status effects. You can, however, go for a Riposte build with the Misericorde if you are confident in your parry skills. Alternatively, you can use the Glintblade Phalanx Ash of War to break her posture. Misericorde has the highest critical value out of all the weapons in Elden Ring, and one Riposte with it will take away 30% of Malenia’s HP.
Ranged Strategy
Malenia will dodge away from most of your Spells and Incantations if they have a small AoE. So for Bow builds and sorcerers, the best way to deal with her will be to use a summon. While the summon like Black Knife Tiche distracts her, you will have more time to channel and spam your spells.
However, do keep in mind that when up against ranged players, Malenia tends to go for the Waterfowl Dance more often. Make sure you put in some practice to dodge through the entire combo string.
One of the best Incantations against Malenia will be Swarm of Flies. It will build up Bleed and proc Hemorrhage multiple times. You can even rely on the Dragon Communion spells to deal other status effects including Frostbite. Another great Incantation against her is the Ancient Dragon’s Lightning Strike.
Spell builds should rely on Night Sorceries as these spells are something that Malenia can’t see, and hence will not be able to dodge.
Bow users should rely on just procing status effects while using a summon to round out the fight.
Irrespective of the build you are going for, ranged players should also look to punish the Scarlet Aeonia attack in Phase 2. If you have Comet Azure, just keep spamming it as soon as she lands and you are clear of the AoE.
Once you defeat Malenia she will drop 480,000 Runes, Malenia’s Great Rune, and Remembrance of the Rot Goddess.
