Anybody who has played FromSoftware’s earlier titles, let aloneElden Ring, will be well aware of enemy and boss “cheese.” Cheese refers to when players are able to cheekily attack enemies in a manner where it is impossible for the enemy to attack back, and thus make it an unfair battle that favors the player. Likewise, this is encouraged as an improvisational feature withinElden Ring’s open-world.
Cheese can either be seen as a way to cheat FromSoftware’s games if players are unable to handle enemies in the intended way, or as a viable strategy when an enemy’s AI is particularly brutal. Indeed, enemy AI can sometimes clip past certain geometries, but the player can sometimes use environmental structures to their own benefit and smack enemies through walls for safety. Rather, one player has shared evidence that a lack of collision in environments used as a cheese strategy inElden Ringcan fatally backfire.
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Redditor Tactical_Tugboats shares footage of their close-call battle with a man-serpent, whose command grab poisoned and nearly killed them. Tactical_Tugboats is able to quickly replenish their health with a Flask of Crimson Tears and land a final, definitive leaping strike on the man-serpent to finish the fight, but that is where things take a dramatic turn for the worse. In a moment of believed respite, the player enters their inventory toconsume a neutralizing bolus and alleviate their poison status ailmentbefore a massive scythe appears from below the platform to kill them.
The scythe, which is part of a pair of scythes connected by chains, belongs to none other than an Abductor Virgin. In this particular part ofVolcano Manor’s lava-filled depths, the Abductor Virgin is stuck on a tiny stretch of dried magma that players traverse to reach the platform that Tactical_Tugboat is seen on. Once circumvented, however, it would appear that the bizarre apparatus entity would be a memory of the past. But unfortunate circumstances demonstrate that players should always have their wits about them, even if their death is inexplicable.
In this case, the enemy’s scythe attack ignored collision for whatever reason and clipped through the bridge platform to vanquish Tactical_Tugboats in a single hit, where they would have effectively lost 39,225 runes in the process.Elden Ring’s runes, similar toDark Souls' souls, can thankfully be retrieved as long as players make it back to them before they die again. Unfortunately, they may never again feel safe inElden Ring’s most dangerous recesses unless a site of grace is nearby.
Elden Ringis available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
