How to beat the Elden Ring Fire Giant boss fight

Elden Ring Fire giant boss fight how to beat cheese weaknesses — (Image credit: FromSoftware)

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Preparing
Phase 1
Phase 2
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The Elden Ring Fire Giant boss fight is a big, tough battle against a powerful flammable titan, one of the trickier (and bigger) bosses in Elden Ring. Fighting the Fire Giant successfully will require careful knowledge of his attack patterns, using his long reach and bulk against him, as well as applying all of the lessons you've learned across the Lands Between so far. It also doesn't help that the Giant comes in two phases, each one vastly different from each other. We'll explain how to beat the Elden Ring Fire Giant here, including strategies, tips, tricks, weaknesses and rewards, and even how you can cheese the boss fight.

How to beat the Elden Ring Fire Giant

To beat the Elden Ring Fire Giant, players have to master the essential quality of evasion, if they haven't already. The Giant's attacks are brutal, doing massive damage and shattering defenses to the point where they can kill many players in a single strike, but they also tend to be fairly telegraphed, and some of them are slow.

Any general rules we give beyond that wouldn't apply, as the Fire Giant behaves very differently in Phase 1 and Phase 2, sacrificing mobility in the second phase for new area-of-effect attacks. Fortunately we'll take you through both phases below, as well as what you can do to prepare for the fight as a whole.

Fire Giant Tips and Tricks to prepare

Going up against the Elden Ring Fire Giant boss fight will require a fair amount of preparation even before you're inside the arena itself, especially considering that the Giant starts too far away for you to hurt, but his enormous reach and ranged attacks can devastate you. Here's some basic tips and tricks to read and keep in mind before going into the boss fight itself.

The recommended level for the Fire Giant should be at least 110, with weapons at least at +18 or higher. He's still achievable at less than this, but you'll definitely struggle. If you're not at this point, maybe go grind and explore until you are.
The Fire Giant is weak to Slashing damage if you have it - and resistant to Fire, Holy and most status effects. He's also got a generally huge amount of health; this'll be a battle of endurance.
There's two entrances to this boss fight - chains leading over the arena to fog doors on both the West and Northern sides. It doesn't really matter which one you take, honestly.
If you've been following Iron Fist Alexander's questline, you'll be able to summon him as an ally NPC for this fight. However, this is a double-edged sword - if you summon him or another player, it'll disable Torrent, who can be very useful in this fight, especially for closing the initial gap between you and the giant.
If you're summoning Ash Spirits, try and summon one with as much health as possible. They really struggle to avoid the Giant's attacks, so any glass cannons will die far sooner than you'd like.
Unsurprisingly, the Giant does a lot of Fire Damage, as well as Strike damage. If you're stuck between two armor sets, pick the one that'll help you with those.
Before going in, try mixing up a Wondrous Physick Flask that'll help you tank fire and damage generally.
Have Torrent ready to go in your quick-use menu. When the Giant suddenly rolls or backs away, it helps to have your horse ready to go to close the gap before he can strike you.

These are all pretty broad suggestions, but this isn't a boss with easy exploits (beyond one that can be done in Phase 2 for Faith builds, which we'll discuss afterwards). Now that you're ready to go, we'll explain what to do when you're in.

Fire Giant Phase 1

The Fire Giant is huge and capable of striking you with his giant bin lid from staggering distance even without using ranged attacks, so much like with Radahn, your first challenge is simply narrowing the gap between you and him without getting killed. Things will get easier as you get close, as we'll explain below.

At a distance, the Fire Giant will stick his shield in the ground and create a wide impact wave that moves quickly towards the player. Your best chance to survive is either to roll at the moment it hits you, or to dismount Torrent (if on horseback) and use the moment of invincibility to survive.
The Giant will also swing the shield, sweeping it across the ground - this always has bigger range than you think. Double jump up over it if on Torrent, or combat roll at the last second if not.
Your goal for the whole of Phase 1 should be to get between the Giant's feet. As dangerous as it is here, he can't do his worst attacks at this short range, and will often try to back away to line you up for the big shield strikes. Don't give him the chance!
One of the Giant's ankles has a manacle on it that protects him from attacks, but the other one does not. Target that unprotected one! Once you do enough damage, the covering on it will break, staggering the Giant briefly. All attacks done to that ankle now do slightly increased damage (and besides, the manacled one is still protected).
Once the covering breaks, the Giant will get new attacks based around launching fire.
- One of these is slow, following the player before eventually exploding when it gets too close. Lure it in so it prepares to explode, then immediately flee so you're not caught in the blast.
- The other fireball is fired from the Giant's palms, a nightmarishly fast and damaging attack with little warning. Roll to the side the moment you see him raise one hand towards you.
Sorcerers and mages should have at least one fast-firing damage spell, as the Giant's aggressive patterns mean that you won't usually have time to fire off anything more elaborate, at least not without a summon distracting him.
Area-of-effect sorceries and incantations that fire multiple attacks over a wide area can really hurt the Giant, as he's big enough to catch most, if not all, of the attacks. Rotten Breath and the Flame of Frenzy are good examples of what we're talking about.

Though challenging, this is arguably the easier of the two Phases, as the Giant's patterns are generally predictable, not to mention you won't be suffering from the exhaustion and attrition that afflicts players near the end of longer battles. Get the Fire Giant down to half health, and there'll be a cutscene cinematic that announces Phase 2. Break a leg!

Fire Giant Phase 2

The second Phase of the Fire Giant boss fight is very different. In the cinematic, the Giant's leg breaks under his own bulk, and he snaps the entire limb off in a moment of pained rage. Burning it in front of him, this awakens the second, cyclopic face on his abdomen - and despite being wounded, it definitely seems like two heads are better than one.

As mentioned, here the Giant has sacrificed mobility and his enormous reach for area-of-effect attacks and harder-to-predict attack patterns. He'll be using a lot more Fire now, and players will have to play more cautiously so as not to get squashed in a thrashing, titanic tantrum.

Before the strategy was to go for the ankle, and little has changed. The Giant will now spend the fight kneeling or crawling, and though he has a weak spot on his left arm, that puts you in the firing line for all his worst attacks. Instead, stay on his backside and chip at his hindquarters.
If you are in front of him, don't get too far away! His ranged attacks are deadly and you don't want to give him reason to use them.
The Giant has a nasty habit of rolling unpredictably, repositioning himself in a sudden flurry of motion that can squash players in his way. Again, staying behind him should ensure he never catches you in this, but your best chance for survival if he does come at you is simply to hold up a shield and hope it absorbs the worst of it.
The Giant has his two fireball attacks from before, but also two new moves - one from above, and one from below.
- If the Giant leans forward and presses both palms to the ground, you'll see the area around him begin to burn. These fiery patches are warnings that those sections of ground are about to explode. You can evade them if you're careful, though they last for a while, and it's possible to get caught by another attack while stepping around them. Safer to back away out of this danger zone altogether.
- If the Fire Giant roars and leans back, his stomach mouth is about to erupt and shoot fire that comes raining down around him. Rather than run away, actually get underneath his arched back - you can damage him safely from here.
Though he no longer has the shield to hit you with, the Giant will still perform all manner of strikes, swipes and grabs at targets in front of him. All of these can be dodged with careful rolling, but tend to be more sudden and less telegraphed than his Phase 1 melee attacks. Be wary.

Get him down to zero health, and you'll be done with this brute, earning yourself a reputation as a genuine giantslayer. This leaves you free passage to head to the Forge of the Giants past him - though was there an easier way?

Elden Ring Fire Giant cheese methods

For those who're finding the eighty-foot fiery mythic monster a bit hard to beat… well, that's fair. It used to be that the Giant could be lured into falling out of the arena, but recent patches seem to have thrown up invisible walls to prevent him from bumbling his way to his death. There does appear to be a method based around leaping out of the arena yourself back down to the other side of the North entrance by using Torrent's double-jump, then luring him over to the Northeast side and firing ranged shots at him from the raised cliffs to the West. However, we haven't tried this method for ourselves, and can't confirm if it still works (especially considering it seems very likely to be patched soon).

Fortunately, there is a simpler, if slightly riskier method: Swarm of Flies. Odd as it sounds, the community has discovered that this Incantation, found in a cave near the Palace Approach Ledge-Road Site of Grace outside Mohgwyn Palace, can absolutely devastate the Giant. It requires 11 Faith and 20 Arcane to cast at its full potential, which you'll need to get above the simple 16 Arcane requirement.

Put simply, Swarm of Flies casts a homing insectile swarm that flies towards the target to inflict damage and the bleed status effect. The damage done by the swan is negligible, but the bleed builds up incredibly quickly, suddenly doing huge damage to the Fire Giant. Equip the spell and play pure defensive evasion while casting it as much as possible at the Fire Giant. After a few casts, you'll suddenly notice the brute's health beginning to plummet. Combine it with the legendary Bloodhound Step skill on your weapon to avoid his attacks, and you should bring him down surprisingly efficiently.

Elden Ring Fire Giant rewards

Elden Ring main bosses

Elden Ring Margit fell omen boss fight — (Image credit: Bandai Namco)

You're now well over halfway through the Elden Ring main bosses. Check out our guide to see who's left to beat!

Killing the Fire Giant will net the player 180000 Runes, as well as a special Remembrance of the Fire Giant, which can be traded in at the Roundtable Hold for either the Giant's Red Braid (a mainly Faith-scaling whip that does additional Fire damage), or the Incantation: Burn, O Flame!, which creates randomly placed pillars of flame that erupt from around the caster.

Both of these are solid choices, though the Braid is a little less situational. The high FP cost of the Incantation means you need to use it carefully, either to clear enemies around you or to do big damage to large bosses who will be hit by as many pillars as possible. Still, there's no obvious wrong answer here, so pick whichever one fits your build or just seems more fun.