Gwyn, Lord of Cinder NG7

Soooo, a character I'm in the process of leveling up to max level (current level is 238) is getting his butt stomped by Gwyn in NG7.

No other boss has given me such problems. I've tried the strongest armor+ iron flesh+ GC his butt, yet he kept doing his grab attack.
So I switched to lighter armor + pursuers and I keep getting gibbed when I go to re-cast (poor timing on my part).

I have beaten him before by straight up tanking his arse but don't think I'll be successful on NG7.

Generally I'm good with parries, but I can't get the timing down properly. Since one can parry him, is it possible to backstab him?

Any advice would be helpful. Hell, Manus didn't give me this much trouble on NG7 (took me about 5-6 tries and I'm over 10 on Gwyn by now).

Thanks =)

I suggest bringing some Flash Sweat pyromancy in case you find Gwyn's swings to shave a little too much hp to your taste. Other than that, it still comes down to getting the right parry window whenever he's not attempting the grab motion. And if you don't have enough stamina to block continuous swings, roll away.

And no, backstabs don't work on him. A reverse case of the Iron Boar where you can backstab its *** but can't parry it.

I always just cheese him by rotating around the big rock on the left side when you walk in.a g scythe can reach him and he keeps running into the rock.

Just keep him in the center on the other side of it and rotate with him

abmoner wrote:I always just cheese him by rotating around the big rock on the left side when you walk in.a g scythe can reach him and he keeps running into the rock.

Just keep him in the center on the other side of it and rotate with him

My son did this exact thing to beat gwyn, only he used a spear.

are you PS3?? i have SL240 i can help you with on my old account

Parrying always works eventually. Or there's the cheap combustion spam method where he keeps jumping to the side.

Cheap ways I know of is:
1. Dress up in full black iron set. Use a black knight shield. Block his first attack, and parry the second. You will have to time your rolls properly in order to avoid his grab attack.

2. Use a bunch of dragon king axes and Dragon greatswords, and spam that heavy two handed attack. This would prove rather inefficient on NG7, however.

3. Great combustion spamming. Gwyn's AI is messed up, and he will continuously jump from side to side and won't attempt to fight back.

4. Use a weapon with a longer range and seek cover behind one of the pillars near the bonfire.

(This next one is based solely on speculation, as I have not tried this myself)
5. Use Dusk crown, bellowing dragoncrest ring, power within (or an activated red tearstone ring, if you are confident enough you won't get hit a single time) and spam dark bead as if there was no tomorrow.

Thats all the help I can provide you with.

EDIT: Also, a black iron greatshield works wonder with a spear (or any other weapon, provided you swing them with caution)

I found out that the least frustrating way to beat him is to hyper mode, with your strongest(per hit) buffable weapon, Crystal Magic Weapon/Darkmoon Blade, Power Within, RTSR, Hornet Ring, Target Shield/Buckler/Parrying Dagger.

Keep retrying until you manage to parry him 3 or 4 times.

Parry. Parryparryparryparryparry. Tanking bosses is always a bad idea past NG.

Glutebrah wrote:are you PS3?? i have SL240 i can help you with on my old account

I am on PC. My apologies for not mentioning this in my original post.

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll try again tonight after work and see if I can bring him down.

My FreshStarter guy (drop everything at the end of each game) reached SL252 by ng15. Summon Solaire; keep Solaire between you and Gwyn until they start fighting. Solaire should kill Gwyn for you, if you wish.

It's fun to watch.

If I solo Gwyn, I use magic and use the circle of low-level rocks to keep my distance. Homing Crystal Soulmass and Crystal Soul Spears whittles Gwyn down fast.

i have always turtled through Gywns onslaught and waited for him to do the grab or jump attack, it's a free hit every time he does that.

the other way would be to parry him, but if you miss a parry on NG7, you are probably going to be dead.

so i say make the fight last as long as you can, take your sweet *** time and turtle through the worst of what Gwyn will throw at you, then chip him down when he gives you an opening, like after a grab or jump attack.

I've always fought Gwyn on NG, but after that I always summon Solaire for the fight. He can distract Gwyn fairly well, but won't last long to Gwyn's attacks. Solaire's like the Biorr of this game.

I had trouble with him on NG+7 as well. After tonnes of different attempts I went DWGR and RTR-hyper mode ans spam dark bead.
The best and safest chance to get a cast in is after his jumping attack. If you stagger him then you can get an extra cast in. You have to hug him though when you cast so all the beads hit.
I did this method with 30 int and had to use 2 or 3 homing soul mass when I ran out of dark bead but that was only because I only had the one of them.

Okay, that's great to hear. I'm about to finish my 6th Playthrough and go into my 7th with my lv 227 character.

Green__Eagle wrote: Summon Solaire; keep Solaire between you and Gwyn until they start fighting. Solaire should kill Gwyn for you, if you wish.

Summon Solaire?!?! I've missed a trick here - I've always killed him in Lost Izalith. So you can summon him for the last fight? Seriously?

(Take note: noob moment happening right now!)

Yes you can summon him. All you have to do is save him by killing the chaos bug, that drops the sunlight maggot helm, in the shortcut before going into Lost Izalith.

Argh! GORDON BENNETT!!! I guess one has to take a couple of hits from him to get to the chaos bug first though?

You have to get there before he does. Join the Chaos Covenant and get to rank #2. With that, you should be able to open the shortcut and kill the little bugger, before Solaire even gets there.

I believe it is also possible to simply not talk to Solaire, such that he won't move into anor londo. You can then kill the chaos bugs w/o opening the shortcut and Solaire won't be there.

I would like the shortcut more if it were much faster than running from the bonfire after centipede to reach bed of chaos...but while I think it's faster it isn't much. Besides, I cheese BoC every time I play it now anyway (right first, then quit/load, then run along wall safely on left, arrow or bolts to take out left, quit/load, bait middle twice + go) so I don't need to make that run much anyway.

If you come back to farm later the shortcut does have a bit more use though since you can elevator down from Quelag's.

As for Gwyn, it's probably easiest to load up on fire resistance, good fire block shield (dragon crest should work), and spam parry on him. It'd be tense on NG+7, but it's going to be tense no matter how you fight him.

Black iron GS tanking and punish after his grabs and jumping attack

TheMeInTeam wrote:I believe it is also possible to simply not talk to Solaire, such that he won't move into anor londo. You can then kill the chaos bugs w/o opening the shortcut and Solaire won't be there.

Well, if you want the white sign, you'll have to talk to him. However, you can simply avoid talking to him in Anor Londo. This is what I have done pretty much every single time now. Just progress through the game normally until you have finished Lost Izalith and killed the bug, then go back to Anor Londo to talk to him. Solaire saved, no covenant switch required Solaire has also been a huge boon on my SL10 runs. Gwyn would be nearly impossible to defeat otherwise.

So, I just finished NG+5 myself, and I decided to not waste too many Ring of sacrifices on him (load up around 12 into bottomless box per playthrough), so I went the cheesy way and spammed black flame nonstop. At this point in the game, I just stopped caring just like Bed of Chaos save/quit trick in all playthroughs lol

Lol Bed of Chaos is IMO the only true example of "fake difficulty" in a boss fight in all of dark souls. You could make a case outside of boss fights that mimics are also, although they do appear different from ordinary chests.

But Bed of Chaos? The floor just falls out from under and the thing swats at you and has (kill zones) if you try to jump the holes in certain spots. It is complete "trial and error" game play, since there is absolutely no way on a 1st playthrough without a guide to know that running to certain (IE most) spots will result in instant death, regardless of how much health, poise, shield stability, or dodging knowledge you have.

I pretty much always beat it by going right side --> quit --> run left along the wall + arrow or bolt the left side (no pits at all, safe and easy) --> quit --> bait swings in middle twice --> go.

TheMeInTeam wrote:I pretty much always beat it by going right side --> quit --> run left along the wall + arrow or bolt the left side (no pits at all, safe and easy) --> quit --> bait swings in middle twice --> go.

Aye, that's how I do it too. It is by far the safest method.
BoC sucks. I always save that 1 for last (I am a procrastinator). Duke's is second-last because of the damn infinite aggro and spell range on the Channelers. I really hate those guys.