I was already mad about this particular Elden Ring knight before players used cannon science to prove it's even worse than I thought

Elden Ring colosseum locations — (Image credit: Bandai Namco)

Be me, right? It's my first playthrough of Elden Ring. I'm playing a spell swordsman, which means I start a lot of fights in the Lands Between by chucking my strongest long-range spell. This strategy serves me well until I get to Castle Sol and chuck spells at the wrong dude. A notorious dual-wielding Banished Knight shrugs off my magic like it's a paper ball thrown his way, and then teleports behind me to turn my entrails into extrails before I know what happened.

It was a humbling experience, and this specific knight has become notorious among Elden Ring players for his sheer tenacity and aggressiveness. He's a big surprise and difficulty spike for an otherwise moderate area, and it turns out this dude is even more overpowered than we thought. I may have triggered his teleport with a long-range spell, but even I didn't expect this guy to close the distance demonstrated by this clip from Reddit user oldeluke:

This dude's teleport range is ridiculous... from r/Eldenring

Before oldeluke can even load and fire a second shot of their long-distance cannon, the knight not only spots them in an instant but appears right behind them, swords drawn. Is there no limit to this dude's power? What I really want to know is: what the hell is this knight doing guarding some random corner of Castle Sol? Somebody get this guy a promotion. He at least deserves to be an Evergaol miniboss with moves like this. Now I want somebody to test how far this guy will chase you once aggroed, because clearly a few hundred meters is nothing to him.

This knight is such a well-known roadblock that people have come up with cheese strategies just for him, which is about the highest praise a random NPC can get. He's hard coded to teleport right behind your character, which means you can aggro him with a ranged attack, stand right next to a steep drop while facing away, and trap him in a Wile E. Coyote-worthy death. Oldeluke didn't quite pull this off from their cliffside sniper's nest, but they did manage to trade with the guy, which counts for something.

My various failed cheese attempts. Got em at the end though... from r/Eldenring

To my surprise and amusement, other users pointed out that sniping this knight in the name of science is a time-honored tradition going back months. It's a FromSoftware special: thinking you've worked out a bulletproof counter to an enemy only to get owned twice as hard. This dude's been taking names since launch, and he's still got it. I wish I'd seen this clip earlier; it would've saved me a death, that's for sure.

Castle Sol Knights aren't real, they can't hurt you. from r/Eldenring

We need that DLC, because Elden Ring challenge runs are getting filthy now: horse-only, bow-only, no arrows, just mounted attacks.

Austin has been a game journalist for 12 years, having freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree. He's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize his position is a cover for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a lot of news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.