Fellow Tarnished, let me explain why learning to parry is a game changer in Elden Ring. And no, it’s not just about adding a slick new move to your arsenal (although that’s a nice bonus). It’s about how it completely changes the way you look at the game.
I’ve spent way too many hours in Elden Ring without ever becoming a no-hit god or anything close to it. Honestly, I was still dying way too often to way too average enemies (no, I’m not talking about gravity), until I finally decided to invest real time into learning how to parry.
Gearing Up: The Buckler and a Humble Dagger
By the time I started training, the character I used had already taken down a few remembrance bosses and put a decent chunk of levels into Vigor, so I wasn’t worried about getting one-shot the second I stepped into a fight. That alone let me approach things a lot calmer.
For the shield, I picked up the Buckler from the Twin Maiden Husks at the Roundtable Hold – you’ll need to offer them Gostoc’s Bell Bearing first to unlock it in their shop. The Buckler carries its own unique skill, Buckler Parry, which has a noticeably shorter windup than the standard Parry skill found on most starting shields, making it far more forgiving while you’re still learning timing.
Your main weapon barely matters for parry training itself, but it does affect how much you get to enjoy those precious “opening” moments you suddenly discover – more on that below. I stuck with a Dagger. It’s fast, doesn’t ruin the pacing by two-shotting everything, and lets you throw out the occasional crit riposte just because it feels so satisfying.
The Bandit Fast-Start
If you’d rather skip the shopping trip entirely, though, there’s a shortcut: roll a fresh character as Bandit and you’ll start with the Buckler already equipped, plus the Great Knife as your dagger. From there, deliberately jump into the transporter trap chest in Dragon-Burnt Ruins to get whisked straight to the Sellia Crystal Tunnel in Caelid. Make your way to the sleeping Elder Dragon Greyoll near Fort Faroth and finish it off with a bleed weapon for a payout north of 50,000 runes – pop a Golden Pickled Fowl Foot right before the killing blow and that number climbs closer to 74,000. Then swing north into Dragonbarrow and bait Night’s Cavalry off the bridge for another 42,000 runes. Dump all of that into Vigor until you’re sitting around level 40, and you’ll have plenty of cushion to practice parries against just about anything the game throws at you.
Why Parrying Rewires How You Play
So, why is learning to parry such a game changer? First, it puts you in a completely different headspace going into a fight – because suddenly, dying doesn’t really matter. You’re not there to survive; you’re there to find that one perfect moment to hit your parry input and get rewarded with that unmistakable parry chime. That alone strips away a huge amount of pressure and makes you way less anxious about every incoming swing.
Reading the Enemy Like Never Before
Once you’re relaxed and hunting for that sweet spot instead of white-knuckling every exchange, you start actually watching the enemy’s moveset instead of just reacting to it. Suddenly a swing seems to take forever to land and you catch yourself circling an enemy to sidestep an attack you already know can’t be parried. Openings appear that were never really “new” – they were always there – you just weren’t in the right mindset to see them. That mental shift is really all it takes to understand a moveset on a deeper level and when that parry sound finally rings out, it’s pure music.
Know What to Parry – and What to Dodge
Along the way, you’ll naturally start figuring out which attacks can be parried and which ones you’re better off dodging. One classic trick that carries over from earlier Souls games: keep your eyes on the hand your enemy is swinging with, not the weapon itself – the hand telegraphs the strike earlier and more consistently than the weapon does.
Once you’ve got a feel for what’s parryable, it’s worth practicing dodging those same attacks too – you’re not always going to be running a parry shield, after all. Next time a boss is bullying you over and over, spend some time figuring out their parry windows specifically. You’ll come away understanding that fight on a completely different level, and more often than not, victory becomes less of a fluke and more of an inevitability. It really just comes down to one thing: practice, practice and more practice. Take your time, don’t get frustrated, and stick with it.
PC Tools That Make Practice Painless
If you’re on PC, you’ve got some extra tools that make grinding parry timing a lot less punishing. Community-made practice tools include a no-damage option, letting you stand in front of a boss and just… not die while you drill the timing. There are also Save File Manager mods floating around Nexus Mods that let you save your game right outside a boss fog gate, so you can reload into that exact moment as many times as you want.
Unfortunately, if you’re playing on console like me, none of that exists – you just have to let the boss kill you and eat the walk back every single time.
The Payoff
Learning to parry didn’t just give me a new tool. It changed how I think about every fight in Elden Ring. Once you stop fearing death and start hunting for that one perfect moment, the whole game opens up differently. I’m still nowhere near a no-hit god, and I still eat my fair share of hits from enemies who clearly don’t respect my Buckler timing. But every fight feels less like a wall now and more like a puzzle waiting to click. That shift alone was worth every death it took to get there.
That’s it for this time, fellow Tarnished. I’m actually thinking about putting together a full, dedicated parry guide – so stay tuned for that.
Did parrying change the way you play too or are you still team dodge-roll-everything? Let me know in the comments. I’m curious how universal this shift actually is.
… and yes, there are a lot more Guides&Tips on this blog you shouldn’t miss.
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