The Elden Ring DLC Shadow of the Erdtree has been out for less than a week, and we’ve already got absolute sickies beating the new content bosses at level 1. Just because they can!
A content creator known as LastDarkHope has been quietly hanging out on their YouTube channel for the past few months, beating Elden Ring boss after Elden Ring boss with absolutely no runes gained and no gear leveled. That’s impressive enough on its own, but when the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC dropped last week, this incredible player just started beating those bosses, too. Again, this is without using any runes to level up at all, and without using any smithing stones to upgrade equipment.
Critically, LastDarkHope appears to be using Scadutree Fragments. These shards only affect DLC content, but they provide damage negation and increased damage output that are far from negligible. As we have mentioned elsewhere in the country, the Elden Ring community has been really battling the difficulty of some of Shadow of the Erdtree’s bosses. Scadutree Fragments are the DLC’s way of countering its terrible difficulty, and you’re highly encouraged to seek them out if you’re having trouble. But it seems even these buffs weren’t enough for many, prompting FromSoftware to release a patch today that boosts the benefits of Scadutree Fragments earlier before flattening their buffs later.
That said, what LastDarkHope is doing is still an extremely impressive feat. Most people who are fighting these bosses and collecting Scadutree shards are doing so at levels well above 100, while LastDarkHope is still stuck at 1. No 60 Vigor, no extremely high intellect or strength, and no ability to use certain weapons with specific statistical criteria. Additionally, they don’t seem to be going all that hard on Scadutree Fragments despite collecting a few. Checking their latest stream, it looks like LastDarkHope was running around Castle Ensis with only three levels of Scadutree. That’s certainly lower than I personally would be comfortable with, and I’m running around with a level 168 mage trying to sneak attack the guys with the Azur Comet.
At the time this piece was written, LastDarkHope had just released a video of him defeating Chief Bloodfiend and seems to have tackled at least some of the Jagged Peak – though there’s still no video of the highly cursed Bayle. What’s incredibly interesting is that LastDarkHope doesn’t seem to have finished all of the regular Elden Ring bosses yet – the ultra-strong Malenia, for example, isn’t listed, nor are the base game end bosses. We’ll be keeping an eye on their direction to see how it progresses…as well as the certain parade of ridiculously difficult runs that other content creators start creating in the coming weeks and months. We reached out to LastDarkHope for comment on this story, but have yet to hear back.
If that somehow isn’t impressive enough for you, just as we were on the verge of releasing this story, another wild kill came from another content creator and threw us for a loop. GinoMachino posted their video of a Level 1, no weapon upgrade, no Scadutree Fragment, no shot kill the hereditary warden of the Rellana prison. GinoMachino has been on a roll performing all sorts of challenging Elden Ring feats, but this is one of their first cracks at the new DLC, with more almost certainly to come. Absolutely incredible.
This boss is just beautiful. Already one of my favorite Fromsoft bosses.
Here is a RL1 weapon, +0, blessing level 0, no status, no hit to it 🙂 pic.twitter.com/Tc2v9WDJcE
— GinoMachino (@GinoMachino) June 26, 2024
We love talking to people who beat Elden Ring bosses in cool ways. In the past we’ve interviewed community hero LetMeSoloHer, as well as MissMikkaa, who inexplicably defeated Malenia using a jumping pillow. But if you just want to complete the DLC for yourself before reading what others are doing, we highly recommend loading up on Scadutree Fragments even if you’re level 500. Here’s a guide to get you started.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.