I've just been put to shame: Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree player parries its final boss into the dirt like they're Gwyn, Lord of Chumps

I consider myself a middle-of-the-road soulslike player. When it comes to Elden Ring, I'm one of those stubborn people who doesn't use spirit ashes or summons, and that self-destructive streak persisted for all of Shadow of the Erdtree. I like a good two-handed sword. I don't (usually) wear a shield. I am a fan of a well-timed dodge roll—in summary, a Tarnished of simple pleasures.

After defeating most of the DLC's bosses in my humble, honest-work fashion, its final boss proceeded to grab me by the scruff of my neck and give me the mother of all divine swirlies for around 13-15 hours of attempts over two days. We're going to launch right into spoiler territory for it, now, though you probably knew that from the headline.

Promised Consort Radahn «made» me change up my build, swapping to a greatshield in order to deal with his barrage of faster-than-light nonsense. Many attacks, I reasoned, seemed borderline impossible to dodge. Only borderline, mind—but if you remember Malenia's waterfowl dance, which required a super specific set of inputs to get through, imagine a boss with around 4 different waterfowl dances to figure out and put into muscle memory. It's a special kind of hell.

After spending 10 hours bashing my head against that wall, I figured out that you could drop Scarlet Aeonia on him at the start of both phases—he had about a 20% chance of just killing me outright after his phase 1 jump, and it didn't always connect while he was doing his phase 2 orbital laser, but it was possible. It felt cheesy, but at least it was thematically appropriate considering that's what messed up Radahn the first time, and I was running out of Sunday. It worked, and I then proceeded to write an article you might have read.

Obviously, then, it's taken less than a week for me to be put to shame. Some absolute monster has managed to parry Promised Consort Radahn to death like he's Gwyn, Lord of Cinder from Dark Souls 1. I don't have any clown makeup on me right now, but it's in the