Spells

Choose a small number of spells you are comfortable with to help you defeat all or some mandatory bosses as quickly as possible. Know when to use which spell against which enemies and bosses. A small number of spells helps you to easily remember and quickly swap to the required spells. For example, have approximately six different spells in your inventory. Move all other spells to storage to prevent clutter.

Crystal Soul Spear is the best offensive spell against most enemies and bosses. In case you do not have enough copies of Crystal Soul Spear, Soul Spear is an effective replacement. Use the Staff of Wisdom to cast sorceries. Infuse the staff with a Faintstone to raise the base magic damage to 297. The second best spell is Yearn, which has the same effect as Alluring Skull but lasts up to 10 seconds.

Some bosses are vulnerable against dark damage. Use the Sunset Staff to cast Dark Orb and/or Dark Hail, and buff your melee weapon with Dark Weapon. Infuse the staff with a Darknight Stone to raise the base dark damage to 319. There is no need to use hex on your way to a boss arena. Crystal Soul Spear and/or Soul Spear are usually more effective and can one- or two-shot many enemies.

Pyromancy is effective against some bosses. Use the Pyromancy Flame to cast pyromancies and/or buff your melee weapon with Flame Weapon. The Great Chaos Fireball is the general-purpose spell for all your pyromancy needs. It has high damage output, leaving a small pool of molten lava upon impact. The lava can cause a small amount of damage to enemies that step on it. Forbidden Sun is more powerful than Great Chaos Fireball, but the latter requires less attunement slots and has more uses. Fully upgrade the Pyromancy Flame to +10.

Attune a main spell that you will use while dashing to a boss arena. Crystal Soul Spear is usually a good choice as it can one- or two-shot many enemies. The following spells are useful from time to time:

• Sacred Oath. Boosts your physical damage output and reduces the physical damage taken, lasting for 60 seconds. Also affects any nearby summoned phantoms. After consuming a Brightbug, do not cast Sacred Oath because the spell would nullify the effects of the Brightbug. The most useful feature of the spell is that it can buff any nearby summoned phantom(s). Only attune Sacred Oath if you want to buff your summoned phantoms because the spell takes up four attunement slots. You are better off using a Brightbug and attune some other offensive spells.
• Sunlight Blade. Adds lightning damage to your melee weapon, lasting for 90 seconds. Useful to help you one- or two-shot many enemies.