The Dark Souls series is known for many things, one of which is its variety of unique and fun (sometimes frustrating) bosses. These bosses often have their weapons, and through the power of ascension at a blacksmith, you can gain some of these weapons for your own.
So, which ones are the best? The game offers a nice variety of weapon types to choose from in the pool of boss soul weapons. With this list, you will find one suitable for any type of build. These are eight of the best boss weapons in Dark Souls, ranked.
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The Lifehunt Scythe is one of the few scythe weapons in the game, which is a shame because scythes in Dark Souls are amazing weapons. They have great reach, a solid moveset, and a sweet spot that lets you do increased damage.
Plus, the Lifehunt Scythe has a fantastic bleed build-up. It’s a bit too good, and if you aren’t careful, you can bleed yourself out before taking down the enemy. But, if you build correctly and use items like the Bloodbite ring and Bloodshield to increase your bleed resistance, you can negate the downsides of the weapon.
How to Get
This weapon is acquired by using the Giant Blacksmith in Anor Londo to ascend a +10 halberd, whip or scythe with the Soul of Priscilla.
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The Greatshield of Artorias is a great option if you are doing more of a defense-focused build and care more about prioritizing that defense over a powerful offensive weapon.
With this Greatshield, you get incredible physical resistance, as well as very high resistance to many of the games' other damage and status types. It will completely stop status buildups, like toxin or bleed, as long as the attack is blocked.
This can be acquired by upgrading a shield to +10 and ascending it at a blacksmith with the Soul of Sif item gained from defeating Sif.
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An iconic weapon that appears in every single FromSoftware game, the Moonlight Greatsword is a beautiful-looking, magic-based greatsword.
When wielding this weapon, you’ll get a moveset similar to the Claymore, which is a solid hack-and-slash combo with decent speed for its size. The weapon will deal both physical and magic damage, as well as give you a magical arc wave that fires outwards upon heavy attacks. For a battlemage, this weapon is perfect.
This weapon can be acquired by slicing off Seath the Scaleless' middle tail during his boss fight.
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The Dark Silver Tracer is a dagger that is perfect for those who prefer to backstab and reposte their enemies. In the community, the weapon is often used in conjunction with other weapons, but it is just as viable solo.
The weapon boasts a high critical hit rate and damage when fully upgraded. It also inflicts toxin, a great way to deal damage over time to bosses, especially with a weapon as fast-hitting as a dagger, which allows you to build statuses quickly.
This weapon is acquired by handing over the Soul of Artorias to the Ciaran NPC, who will be in Artorias’s boss arena after his defeat.
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Manus is the iconic final boss of the Artorias of the Abyss DLC. The Manus Catalyst is a staff weapon that allows you to use sorceries, and for a sorcerer, this is a great option. However, there are a few catches.
The Manus Catalyst has some unique properties. It lowers the amount of spells you can cast, as well as scaling a bit less with intelligence than other staff options. However, it gives an incredible damage boost to dark sorceries like Dark Orb and Dark Bead, which more than makes up for the lowered spell amounts. This is a great backup staff to use specifically for dark sorceries.
This can be acquired by ascending a catalyst and the Soul of Manus at a blacksmith.
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Weapon ofOrnstein the Dragonslayer, is a solid option for faith-based characters. While the weapon doesn’t have any Faith requirements, it deals lightning damage along with its physical damage based on your faith skill.
As a spear, it also has great reach and is useful either two-handed or with one hand and something else in the off-hand. Plus, once you buy the Ornstein armor set, you will be able to cosplay Ornstein for the rest of the game, which if nothing else, is very cool.
This weapon can be acquired by ascending a +10 spear at a blacksmith, along with Ornstein’s soul in your possession.
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At the other end of the spectrum from the Greatshield of Artorias, we get his Greatsword. While this weapon has a wide stat spread and requirements, needing a decent dip into all four of the main stats, it is worth it.
You get a solid moveset that works well against any enemies, as well as massive damage to abyssal enemies and skeletons. For some, this may not seem like a worthy trade-off for the stats required, and that is fair. But we think the weapon is worth investing in if you have the stats required and want to do some extra-hefty damage to a boss like the Four Kings or Neto.
This weapon can be a bit tricky to get. You need to ascend a +10 broken straight sword or straight sword hilt, as well as have the Soul of Sif. If you use any other upgraded sword or greatsword, you will get a different variant of the weapon.
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This is one of the best scaling strength weapons in the game. The Demon’s Greataxe can be acquired very early on, and the main caveat against it is that, to get it early, it is a rare drop from the Taurus Demon boss, the second boss in the game. This is part of why it wasn’t included in ourbest-strength weapons list.
However, statistically, the thing is a beast. It has an S scaling with strength, so for those who like to smash enemies with a large object, this weapon is perfect, and if you can get it, will serve you for your entire playthrough.
The weapon can be acquired in one of two ways. It can either be dropped from the Taurus Demon boss fight, which will let you get it very early. Alternatively, it can be bought from the Shiva of the East NPC for 10,000 souls. Shiva is located in the forest after unlocking the door sealed by the Seal of Artorias item.
