Death Lightning | Elden Ring Wiki

Deathblight is useless in pve, yes, but the main feature is the sheer damage output. From my very limited testing with the Atlus celebrants (which supposedly lack lightning absorption but idk about flat negation), it did 6.1x my incant scaling of 330 for 2010 damage with no buffs or talismans.

It's decent for big enemies that don't have lightning res, groups of mid-range dudes, or pvp where the deathblight can provide cover and the bolts can score you a one or two shot. But, the random spread can hurt a lot and make it very inconsistent- plus there are a few lightning spells that fill the first two niches and one of them you get from the same boss. I whiffed three consecutive casts against a godskin apostle right in front of me.

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Remember that anticipation then the excitement you felt when get one off and delete multiple foes.

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I thought this thing was supposed to be trash so I tried trading with the invader, then I looked at my health and I had like 3% left and the host was already dead

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It seems a pale shadow compared to Normal dragon lightning storm thing. Very underwhelming.

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i just died to an invader who had to have done over 1500 damage uncharged with a single hit of this spell, level 150ish and had more than 0 vigor

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spell is Dogwater but gawd damn this name is just plain cool

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Either you die, or you fkin die.

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Is the lingering part of this incantation apply black flame blade's dot like chilling mist and ghostflame ignition does?

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I think fortissax was going to spew death light one way or another but someone was sane enough to stop that nonsense. Props to that person who knew rot swamp was enough

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Does it still get buffed by Godfrey Icon with the newest patch? I want to use it together with charged Eclipse Shotel

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Maybe by making it work like honed bolt, but having a very high fp cost and less speed when landing, this could have a better use since it’s outclassed by ancient dragon’s lightning strike in terms of precision and damage output. It would make this an expensive range spell. Now how much it should cost for it to be balanced I don’t know. But it would be nice to have this implemented

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Death lightning? What more needs to be said, best incantation in the game.

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I know...in my bones...

This incantation range and precision will be buffed and become PvP meta...

A tarnished cannot survive lightning + Death Blight. Not even you...

A man cannot survive death...

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Endure doesn't last long enough to do a non-charged cast of this spell at the moment lol

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Counter of fingerprint shield

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This should have been a death blight version of lightning spear or thunder bolt. Death blith buildup 70 and higher damage than normal lightning spear, but with a higher fp cost.

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either use this under a dragon or use this in pvp, if you are trying to kill a normal enemy you need to be right up in their face for it to even land

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People are sleeping on this in PVE. ADLS outperforms it in terms of total damage and is good against large enemies/bosses due to multihit effect, but heavely depends on RNG and can completely miss sometimes even someone like Radahn (speaking from expirience). Death Lightning does one guaranteed blow with much higher damage than a singular bolt of ADLS, so it's better against small enemies. I know that death blight status is useless in PVE

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Someone one shotted me with this spell?? I have 60 vigor with bull goat talisman and hp bro. Lightning in this game fr needs a nerf, cause everyone uses it.

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A reason I can think of to use this in PVE is accessibility and damage , even though Deathblight is useless in PVE this spell still does like 2k damage , but the real reason is that Ancient dragons lightning strike is locked all the way in farum azula , but death lightning can be obtained as early as Liurnia by following Fia's quest , use this untill you get ancient lightning strike then switch

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Sacrificing damage in exchange for a status effects that literally can't proc in PvE was definitely a decision fromsoft made, just use ancient dragon's strike

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If you actually manage to hit with this in pvp and have your build worked around this then it's an almost guaranteed one shot kill, besides one of the coolest looking spells in the game

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This thing takes so long to charge you may as well go make a sandwich while you wait.

If it moved outwards like ancient lightning or could be a targeted attack like honed bolt, it might be worth something. But it has the worst range out of all the lightning spells, and the worst charge time. That includes vs ice lightning.

In pvp this might work at catching someone off guard since you never see it, but the chances of it working more than once is slim.

Not to mention that you are a sitting duck while charging this up. I’m serious. You can charge a comet azur in the time it takes to cast this.


With all that said, it is a cool looking spell. So if you’re going for style points you’ll want this.

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Question, does this also apply deathblight to yourself if you stand in the fog or is it just hostiles? (Sorry for stupid question.)

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+10 erdtree seal in the main hand, gravel stone seal in the off hand,lightning scorpion charm, lightning shrouding cracked tear and whoever you are attacking WILL die.

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Very inconsistent because the lightning bolts are random. It misses a lot, but when it hits, it HITS. In PvE it’s useful against large bosses or groups, but death blight doesn’t proc on NPCs so you’re only relying on the lightning. In PvP it is a good zoning tool and works well in close spaces. A combo I have been enjoying is Black Flame Ritual and using this as a follow up when people try to jump inside the fire ring.

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I can't figure out what the damage on this thing is because I keep missing that one Gatefront guy that gets hit with all the other tests.

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Good for Area Denial i guess

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"i wish death blight was viable"
instant death? you want to cause instant death really easily? that'll be the only thing anyone does

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Does Death lightning still only death other players?

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513 mv uncharged and 564 mv charged, very strong if you actually hit it

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Hear me out, the incantation from Fortissax should've been something akin to a death blight dragon breath.

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Old lord’s Talisman makes the death fog form this spell stay around longer, especially when fully charged

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This spell deals the absolute highest theoretical single target damage of anything in this game. To spell it out I'm going to show the entire math, but I'll round down to keep it clean. On a Golden Order Seal with 99 Int/Fai you start with a spellbuff of 418 and you have a Jellyfish Shield in your off hand, with a 1.2x, giving us 501. Next we have Red-Feathered Branchsword with another 1.2x, giving us 601. Next we have consecutive damage bonuses from Millicent's Prosthesis (1.11x), Rotten Winged Sword Talisman (1.13x), and Thorny Cracked Tear (1.2x) giving us 903. Next Lightning Scorpion Charm gives use 1.12x for 1,011. For our other Crystal Tear we have Lightning-Shrouding Cracked Tear for 1.2x giving us 1,213. For our boby buff, we have Howl of Shabriri adding a 1.25x giving us 1,516. For our aura buff, we have Golden Vow with 1.15x for 1743. Next we will purposely maddness ourselves for Black Dumpling's effect of 1.1x giving us 1,917. We will also hard swap Mushroom Crown (1.1x), White Mask (1.1x), Kindred of Rot's Exaltation (1.2x), and Lord of Blood's Exaltation (1.2x) prior to placing our current talismans on for 3,337. Now we will cast a charged version of Death Lightning, with a final multiplier of 5.64. This gives us a grand total of 18,820 Lightning Damage! And it promptly misses because you are using Death Lightning. All in all, it is still cool to see how far you can push one single attack to. I know a spell like Ancient Dragon Lightning Strike can potentially deal more damage, but I think it is much more impressive to see what something like this can do. Also, the next most powerful single attack in the game is Dragonmaw, maybe I'll do the math for that one down the road too.

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the deathblight cloud needs to last longer or the lightning needs to track better for two slots this needs more love smh form soft.

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Hits hard in most scenarios but fails to perform as desired. You get this spell so you could create space or to death blight enemies in pvp, but this ash is only reliable for nuking certain bosses. Fortissax lightning strike or even ancient dragon lightning both create space in pvp better than death lightning. And they are cheaper, come with hyper armor and will still one shot just like death lightning. Unless you’re using eclipse shotel, don’t even bother with death lightning.

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You can use this for big damage against big body targets like you can with Ancient Dragon's Lightning. Got under Fire Giant in his Second Phase and it took out a MASSIVE chunk from his healthbar.

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“It’s bad because it has no range”
Melee players are crying now. Look at what you’ve done.

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Ignore that idiot that suggests you shouldn't lock on to hit a target with an incantation that has a problem with hitting targets.

It's patently false, and if you think about it logically, doesn't even make sense. I have literally observed the difference; no lock on: lightning all over the place, incidentally not hitting much or anything at all, with lock on: same result most of the time usually but at least one column of lightning tracks towards and hits the target you're locked onto (if it doesn't happen to step out of it just before it lands).

Telling people to try with no lock on is just straight up BS and really just shows this guy doesn't know what the hell he's talking about. Run a Dragon Cult build using their incantations exclusively for any extended period of time so you actually get the opportunities and exposure to various situations and you'll quickly realize that locking on is obviously the better option.

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Got it to hit for 6302 fully charged vs the guard overlooking the balcony just outside the Prayer Room grace at 80 faith, Godrick's rune, primary hand Erdtree +10, offhand Gravel Stone Seal (for the 15% boost), Ritual Sword Talsiman, Lightning Scorp Charm, Flock's Canvas, Godfrey Icon, Lightning Cracked Tear and Golden Vow.

To compare one hit of Ancient Dragon's Lightning does 4235 (though randomly does 3968 for some reason), Frozen Lightning does 2995, Lighting Spear does 3274, Homed Bolt 1989, Ancient Lightning Spear 2317, Fortissax 2810 x 2, Lansseax 2642, missing Lightning Strike so didn't test.

Pretty insane damage esp if it hits a boss multiple times, obviously other reasons to consider for strength's though. Range, reliability, and speed all seem lacking. Seems pretty bad for duels but seems good when there's multiple people fighting.

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Got it to hit for 6302 fully charged vs the guard overlooking the balcony just outside the Prayer Room grace at 80 faith, Godrick's rune, primary hand Erdtree +10, offhand Gravel Stone Seal (for the 15% boost), Ritual Sword Talsiman, Lightning Scorp Charm, Flock's Canvas, Godfrey Icon, Lightning Cracked Tear and Golden Vow.

To compare one hit of Ancient Dragon's Lightning does 4235 (though randomly does 3968 for some reason), Frozen Lightning does 2995, Lighting Spear does 3274, Homed Bolt 1989, Ancient Lightning Spear 2317, Fortissax 2810 x 2, Lansseax 2642, missing Lightning Strike so didn't test.

Obviously there's more reasons to use a spell than damage such as range, tracking, reliability, hitting multiple times on bosses well etc. Seems well suited for med sized bosses that you can't hit more than once anyway and if there's DLC that adds more ways to proc blight it might see some more use in PVP. This hits even harder than Giant's Fireball for me but maybe I'm missing something.

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Death Blight is just not viable, even with this. Played colosseum using this w/ seal in one hand and eclipse shotel in other hand. When I managed to get players in the cloud, and hit them with multiple buffed eclipse shotel hits, Death Blight still wouldn't proc. Avoid this mechanic and just enjoy the abilities damage when RNG goes your way.

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for when you need everything around you to die instantly

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Guy said it below but stop locking on and you'll hit everything

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Use Rejection following Death Lightning. Surely anyone would have thought of this set-up, by now.

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I love how people think this spell can't hit anything yet if they'd just remove lock-on it will hit everything. like bro it's not meant to focus all of the lightning on one person, people who think faith sucks expect every incant to work in most situations when it's more of a swiss army knife build

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no range + super long charge time + RNG hits = useless

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anyone know how many ticks of deathblight occur before the clouds fade?

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For those that like playing roulette, either non of lightning strike will hit or you melt everything...

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does this have any hyperarmor on cast? I thought not, but then I didn't get interrupted using this a few times, even thou I was wearing my measly 6 poise mage robes.

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this is insanity. i can do 24000+ damage to rykard at 50 faith with physic active

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Looks cool but in reality is one of the worst incantations, because it's strike radius is just bafflingly stupid. Often it will hit everywhere except the enemy you're trying to hit, even standing directly next to them. On top of that then you're open to get hit.

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Horrendous spell. Death blight has no effect in PVE, minimal effect in PVP and despite its high damage it barely hits half the time. For a faster, more reliable spell that does more damage in a similar aoe look no further than the other spell on the same remembrance. Not to mention death lightning takes up two slots.

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More like death BLIGHTning

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Gatefront and Palace approach ledge road site of grace. I had just killed fortissax and wanted to see its full potential. i killed 3/4 of the red albinaurics with one fully charged shot of this and 50 faith, 32 arcane, and a +10 dragon comm. seal. 2048 damage. You have to use it like the explosive crystal tear in your psykick, not like ancient dragons lightning strike.

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Guys the secret to hitting this spell is to free aim. Not that hard

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It’s a get off me spell rather than a kill them spell. Does high damage and the lingering clouds dissuade people from rushing in while you rebuff eclipse shotel, cast more offensive spells or maybe just use a heal/buff incantation. You must layer your spells or you won’t hit players at all in pvp. Thunder bolt ash of war to roll catch people fleeing the lightning. Red lightning is better for damage, this is better for getting space.

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"It said that this golden lightning was wielded by Godwyn."
Does this imply that Godwyn had the power of death before the night of the black knifes?

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Considering you get it together with Fortissax's Lightning Spear that comes out faster, staggers/knocks down, has hyper armor, reliable hit rate and similar effective range, there is barely any reason to use this one instead. It looks cool as hell, but is just as unwieldy and whether it hits or not (if you even manage to get it off in time) is pure lottery.
The death blight is nice distraction, though. People seem to panic a lot once they notice the build-up even if getting the actual proc off is next to impossible.

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Godwyn was using this very spell? That means he was aligned with both the dragons AND Destined Death prior to his murder. It seems like he was trying to coup Marika and she was like nah son

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“I am either going to one shot you or miss completely and waste FP”. Based Incantation.

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I really want to like this spell. The lightning damage when it hits, is incredible! With a 359 Incant Scaling and no Flask or Talisman bonuses to the damage, I've done up to 1500 damage to an opponent with heavy armor in PvP. The overwhelming problem however, is getting the lightning to actually hit. Literally 1 in 20 of my successfully cast, point blank Death Lightnings actually connects in PvP. Incredibly irritating when you can find a perfect window to cast or Endure and uncharged cast to trade, and see such spectacular lightning effects do literally nothing 90% of the time.

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I wish more things included death. like, the death flare effect looks cool. but nah, only Eclipse Shotel. Death lightning looks. Cool, that's all there is really. I understand it's really only something effective in PVP because of the way death blight works seriously like 3 things... :/

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compared to Ancient Dragon's Lighting Strike, this one has way less range and it seems to cast less thunder columns too.
considering that it's not really good alone, i guess it's meant to be used together with Fia's mist, but then again it's unlikely that someone will stay in the Death clouds once they figure out what you're trying to do.

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Clearly some people think spells should always just "work". From Soft does a great job of encouraging people to "learn" each spell. For those that hate on this spell, git gud!

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I was testing this on single soldiers at Gatefront ruins. It literally only worked 1 out of 3 casts. When it did hit it was absolutely crushing. Is it more for mobs AOE style?

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While the death blight buildup is pretty unnoticeable, the damage the lightning bolts can deal is pretty insane. Killed multiple ganks with this incant dealing over 1000 dmg

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The bolts are heavily pixelated on Xbox One. How do I notify FromSoft?

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"How it feels to chew five gum"

(Cut to Crimsonwhorl tear/poise tear physick walking into a 3 rivers gank with an anti-bleed armor set with robustness charm+1, before using this and killing literally everyone in an explosion of lightning and annihalation)

"5 gum. Stimulate your senses"

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Frankenstein Spell

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It's complete garbage, never use this, whats the point of point blank spell on a mage character....

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The problem with some of the lightning spells is the steep learning curve.

Not every spell is spammable and this is one of them.

However, I have one shot 3 gankers with this spell simultaneously. Once you get the timing this spell, along with ancient dragon lightning can insta kill everyone, especially when it’s fully charged.

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This spell is trash tier, without the poise and with how rng the bolts are, you will never consistently land it in pvp. Furthermore the status application is low as all hell - Ive had duelers stand in the clouds for 3 full fasts and not have a proc.

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Jesus take the wheel spell

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It needs more poise to be more viable in pve. With full crucible knight armor I constantly get staggered by random soldiers while casting.

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Either it incinerates all life around you or misses there is no in between

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the strength of this one isn't the upfront damage, it's in PvP and how it creates incredible zoning opportunities, as well as harsh pressure. like with the eclipse shotel the build up of death blight is very little, but deathblight takes a LONG time to tick down. pair this with either fia's mist or the shotel and you will literally scare people to death.

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Okay I just had a huge brainwave. Anyone else make this connection? Godwyn. G-od-wyn. Gwyn. If this wasn't a lightning incantation I never would've noticed this.

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So the way electrical aoe striking spells seem to work is: they strike the immediate surface or lower and can only go down in elevation. So if you are next to a wall it counts as up from your elevation and fizzles,’and if you cast it near a ledge it will cascade down. This gives it a good suprise potential from high ground positions, but lacks utility in closed spaces. The smoke produced by death lightening in particular mitigates that somewhat by giving better area denial.

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How can a spell be so good and so bad at the same time?

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If just one of the bolts homed in and striked down on a target while the redt were random, cool...but the build up is very low and its so random. All that fp to hit nothing even while infront of you is wild. Almost as bad at the flower jump incant.

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I have 84 to Faith. With two Gravel Seals, Lightning And Godefrey Talisman this sucker does a charge hit for 3,111 damage against those Red Albenurics ( the Red Skinned Enemies in Mogh’s Dynasty.

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I have 84 to Faith. With two Gravel Seals, Lightning And Godefrey Talisman this sucker does a charge hit for 3,111 damage against those Red Albenurics ( the Red Skinned Enemies in Mogh’s Dynasty.

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I have 84 to Faith. With two Gravel Seals, Lightning And Godefrey Talisman this sucker does a charge hit for 3,111 damage against those Red Albenurics ( the Red Skinned Enemies in Mogh’s Dynasty.

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Spell is ideal when you have a summon out or a friend with you in pvp.
Not the best idea to use in a 1v1.

Kinda like fortisax, I don't think he ever got me with this attack. But if he had a homie, this attack would be a nightmare to dodge

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Biggest thing to note about this spell is that Death Blight exclusively applies to other Tarnished. And even then, it isn’t guaranteed to affect a given tarnished enemy. The only things you can 100% be sure death blight works on is other players, or npc invaders.

This isn’t the fault of the incantation, just how death blight works. Decent for use in PVP, but it’s too erratic to trust in PVE. Only use it if you’re invading.

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I used to dislike this incantation, now that I have a proper build for it I love it.
insta-kill any PVPer if you use it right.

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Wow it would be so good if it could hit something.

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I personally love this spell for its dmg AND randomness.

For example, I use erdtree seal at 80 faith (354 scaling). And I have lighting dmg talisman + great incant talisman + lighting tear, golden vow. It does about 2000 dmg to players on average and that's above 60 vigor (1900hp).

As lots of ppl mentioned, it's very random, it hits half of the time for me, and that's enough already, it's either you take a hit or another player dies, I think it's a good trade. Also the randomness makes the rolling timing tricky too, so even if the player has seen it before, the timing is different every time. The death mist can also keep another player away for a bit, and you can set up smth in the mist. So I like this spell for PVP.

For PVE, use Ancient lighting strike, this is soooooooo much worse in PVE

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Costs 32 fp now

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Is this spell usable in duels or should I not bother?

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It's not terrible, but it could be tweaked a bit to be more viable. The damage is respectable, the FP cost acceptable, the range is okay, the recovery fair, and, for what it does, the cast time is decent, but, like a lot of lightning spells, it really just has to hit targets in its purview. There's just no excuse for a boss spell that needs 2 slots with a decent wind-up to completely miss the enemy YOU'RE LOCKED ONTO, let alone any others in range. Other fixes it needs would be to have the charged version have a larger range (as of right now, it just gives a very slight increase in damage and more bolts to strike enemies with, although doesn't actually guarantee all enemies in range will be hit which, again, is ridiculous) and to make it chainable (preferably, at half the initial cast time). The death blight build-up could be better, certainly, but the clouds are still handy for masking your next move and look cool; if the spell was chainable, it would make the clouds much more useful since it makes it difficult to gauge whether it's now safe to attack you or they're attacking into the follow-up strike. To be PvP viable, nova spells need to be able to trade well against aggression, and prevent follow-up attacks. Think Wrath of Gold, which is literally the gold standard for nova-type spells right now.

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This does around 50% more damage per lightning bolt than ancient dragon lightning strike but it shoots way fewer bolts, they don't expand to a farther radius and if you get staggered in the animation it stops casting the rest of the bolts (ancient dragon keeps striking). It is funny if you do get the money shot with 3-4 bolts hitting though but it's like winning the lottery.

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Its not very accurate at all. I can hug an enemy and sometimes completely miss. And it has very little range. But its damage is ludicrous! Challenging this move is a good why to die instantly. However, outside of a potential insta kill on a reckless PVPer. I just cant find a good use for this. It doesn’t seem to hit taller monsters like ice lightning spear and ancient dragon strike can. So its near useless in PVE compared to other dragon cult incantations... and unlike ancient dragon strike. It can be interrupted during its attack suddenly ending the entire move and wasting your FP. This spell is so cool and i tried to make it work. But it just doesnt...

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40 VIGOR USERS HATE THIS

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I actually think this should operate similar to Founding Rain of Stars. Charging increases length of storm and by using this to create a zone of death lightning it would be both interesting in pvp and pve since it would operate different from Ancient Dragon Lightning Strike.

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The dmg it does is pretty need, but the death-blight build up is a joke. in pvp u can just stand in the clouds 2 times in full duration even if u got hit once.

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oh jeez , even I have Protection of Erdtree buff , this skill can one hit kill me.
I will not yolo to this skill again lol.

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does anyone know if beastial sling can also animation cancel this ?

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This costs too much for how short ranged it is, I guess its trying to balance around pvp but jesus could this get some kind of buff.

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