Honed Bolt | Elden Ring Wiki

Hey everyone, I just added a PVP and dodging tip section to this page. You do not need to roll to dodge Honed Bolt, sprint jumping is sufficient to do the same thing. However, regular sprinting won't work and you will still get hit. Hope my efforts are helpful to all of you.

Also, make sure to reply so I know how helpful this tip was and whether you used it. Any kind will be greatly appreciated!

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Why can't this thing hit anyone on the otherside of a wall that's literally knee-high? It summons lightning from above!

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I wish the timing of this spell was the same as Thunderbolt, I hate how slow the startup is.

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Annoying to fight against when up against gank squads. If you see someone using this in invasions, target them first.

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Annoying to fight against when being ganked in invasions, whenever you see someone using this in a gank squad, kill them first.

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Those are some nice champions you have there, Fia. Be a shame if they were hit by lightning no more than three times each.

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A straight sword takes 15ish stamina per light attack and they weigh 4 elden units but this, which is just thrusting your fist into the sky costs 29 for no reason lol. The spell already takes an hour to cast the first time so just make it cost 15 stamina.

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Dodge this, Gideon

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Wondering if the ash of war version has higher damage with appropriate buffs and talismans or not.

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So what does charging this do outside of just becoming Margit and delaying your attacks?

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Mindless ganker spell

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Whenever I invade and see a helper using this I know I'm probably losing. Hard to dodge when fighting other players. Zap. Im not sure why I don't use this more as invader. Seems like it could work .

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So, how do you like it, 800 hp burger king spam wizard in the back of the gank? xDD

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Undodgable, 1000 dps, infinite range, lightning damage, chain castable, and can be used on a faith build that has access to buffs AND heals. This is the ultimate cheese in pvp. Either needs a massive nerf or be removed from the game asap.

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Stwike da Wabbit!!!

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The incantation that unlocks hidden dancing skills in most of ranged PVP enemies of its user.

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So today I tried this spell and found out you can spam-cast this like a maniac.. absolutely insane..

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So when I use this it hits behind the enemy for some reason and has less range than lightning spear. But when those beastmen in Farum Azula use their red version it can go through walls and hit me while I'm in a completely different room and going up an elevator?

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Cast this while locked onto an enemy charing me from the front... bolt goes off behind me when the enemy is still 15ft in front of me charging.... what is this tracking lol

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For the longest time I thought this was called “Horned bolt” instead of “Honed bolt”

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Compared to Lightning Spear, Honed Bolt is far more FP-efficient. If you can get away with not getting hit, you can fire away until your stamina runs dry.

Do note: the range is not particularly excellent and it won't be able to shoot foes from behind cover. Your best-case uses for this are:
- Shooting down pesky archers and mages who are out of reach
- Dealing guaranteed chip damage to foes who leap away from regular projectiles
- Pelting foes who can't shoot back from high ground
— Courh the Explorer

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Doesn't need cheese cast to be annoying AF and hit like a truck

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It's still a usable spell, just more niche now. I use it to punish casters playing too safe and put pressure on players who roll spam away.

If it feels too slow, add dex, equip radagons icon, or have an azur glintstone staff in one hand (works with incantations too). With radagons icon (30 cast dex) and azur glintstone staff (40 cast dex), you can cap out your cast speed with any level of dex.

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So now that they got rid of cheese casting, I’ve finally made a lightning build. I use honed bolt to roll catch after melee and chain cast it with a free aim lightning strike to where my opponent is going. Yes chain casting is still in the game, just no cross-school nonsense. This spell hits harder than you’d expect it to at 40 fth and using the wrong seal. Bet it will be brutal when I get gravel seal in NG+

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this is actually faster to cast compared to the AoW version, if you manage to get at least 40 DEX + Radagon talisman.
makes for a valid alternative if you're going for a Faith build, since you can slot a different AoW in your weapon.

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You can still chain cast this if you use beastial sling mid air first. More stamina used but whatever. Same with some of the sorceries. Honestly this was a good move. Now they just need to rework corpse piler and roll catches and pvp will be a lot more pleasant.

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patch 1.05 - RIP

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new patch ruined this spell. it takes 8 years to cast and can no longer swap

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If you do two chain casted discuses of light then cast honed bolt, it uses a sorcery staff casting animation. So buggy.

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People keep complaining about the beastial sling into honed bolt combo when mages get to do swift glintstone shard into comet and carian slicer into shard spiral. They come out even faster than the sling+bolt combo and does more damage. Incantations are way too slow on their own to compete with the lightning quick sorceries and the poke + hardswap meta, but these spell combos allows faith casters to effectively catch opponents without being hit with beast roar or a glintstone shard on the middle of their 5 year long startup.

TL:DR, fromsoft needs to either buff the cast speeds of most incantations significantly (maybe reduce damage a little for balance) and keep the spell combos we have right now, or keep the spell combos as an actual feature so that faith casters aren’t obsolete compared to many other meta builds.

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I wish they would fix the instacast glitch. In pvp, I always leave worlds where the host is exploiting bugs to win, and I've had to leave a lot of worlds recently because of this dumb bug. I don't care if you use it and think I'm anti fun, it is not fair to use bugs to win a duel. Fromsoft definitely did not intend for it to instacast after using bestial sling, please stop using this bug.

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If you are consistently being hit and punished by this spell, which seems to be the case for many annoyed invaders I've killed with it, then start going in and stop backing up. I use this almost exclusively against people who want to back 20 feet away from me. Otherwise you can easily roll and punish someone while they are casting this.

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can you parry it

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Chain castable, great against target running away, can roll catch, can be chain casted with a running bestial sling to really shorten the animation or with catch flame to skip it entirely, the latter is unintended, amazing spell in pvp.

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this spell is great to have around as a backup for when you can't hit something with Lightning Spear due to elevation differences, it can hit enemies standing directly above or below you

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Fromsoftware really needs to fix the combo. I dont care if people think I'm anti-fun. I find exploiting bugs in the game to be anti-fun. If you think Fromsoftware genuinely intended for honed bolt to be cast that fast after bestial sling you're out of your mind.

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punish anything for free, great spell

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Just so onlookers are on the same page; There are many, many "bugged" incantation combos. They are performed with arbitrary spells in an arbitrary order (there is pretty much zero logic to any of them other than their animation cancelling effects) but almost universally include a running/walking/rolling/BHS cast animation - or several. Performing the combo in the correct order will completely cancel certain casting animations, making the spells' effects go off both instantaneously and simultaneously. This spell is part of several of those combos. It's hard to imagine these specific combos are working as intended, however...

There are tons of bugs and glitches and unintended interactions in this game. Like, a whole bunch. They get patched based on severity, and whined about based on severity. Nobody cares that Cold Antspur +5 still has 75 Scarlet Rot build-up for some unknown reason, but people (rightfully) cared about Carian Retaliation + Glintstone Scrap invisible one-shots up until it was patched. Nobody cares that Fire's Deadly Sin still possesses its broken interaction with Bloodflame because it sucks compared to what people were doing with Death Blight before it was patched.

Whether or not you choose to employ any of these broken interactions is ultimately up to you. More people abusing them may in some indirect way contribute to them getting patched. Whether you think they are more or less fair than RoB/MV spammers or whatever flavour the "legit" cheese of the day is, is up to you.

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Cintrary to what many people claim, It isn't bugged with bestial sling if used normally. Bestial sling is supposed to shorten the next cast's startup animation.

However, like many spells, it is bugged if you use running, rolling, or double bestial sling before it. Much like Theodorix's Magma, it completely skips the casting animation rather than shorten it. By checking the animation data, there is actually an error in the code that's supposed to shorten the cast, but instead skips it completely.

I believe I've been objective enough. As for my opinion, I see it too much in duels. Because it's good, admittedly. Still, a bug is a bug. Take from that what you will.

This was tested in Patch 1.0.4 at 25 dex with Radagon's Icon, and at 10 dex with no talismans. Casting speed does not affect the bugged casts whatsoever.

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really good against NPCs if you're doing a pure faith run. Unlike other spells, they're blind to you casting this and will never bother dodging.

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Now has Super Armor is is even faster with 1.04

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If this was available, it's not anymore. I gave the book a long time ago, never bought this spell and now it's not available. Think I saw someone else having the same issue as of the new patch.

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Why do people keep saying "Tip: use bestial sling before this spell"
That is a bug do not do it in pvp its obnoxious

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I can’t find it anywhere. I gave the book to Miriel and even bought the other incantations from him, yet honed bolt doesn’t seem to be anywhere.

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Bestial sling followed by this incantation is quite effective in PvP, comes out very quickly for a decent chunk of damage

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Tips : Don't use it as your first spell, use a fast and can-be-consecutively-cast like Catch Flame, Bestial Sling, use it twice before using this, it will result in this spell being cast with a different animation, not only does this animation allows you to move while casting, it is really fast + can chain into a second ( normal animation ) cast.

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Good way to tweak this spell would be to reduce the initial cast and recovery times, keep the modest damage, and give about as much stagger as a straight sword R1. That way it's still functional and I want to use it, but it's not oppressive since you can be punished for just spamming it.

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Great spell, but it badly needs a cast time and recovery time reduction.

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This spell doesn't scale at all with dex, but it can be animation canceled by going bestial sling into it (certain spells other than sling also work, not sure exactly which). Did a speed test of this vs. ancient dragon lightning strike and the latter takes noticeably less to cast uncharged at 50dex + radagon icon, which seems outright silly. Also buggy with its hit box. Nonetheless quite efficient in PvP, but IMO FS should
- Have it scale properly with dex, have it always hit near target, and remove / significantly reduce the effect of animation cancel

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Holy **** this is bugged if interrupting another incantation to cast honed bolt. Gotta be a bug. Lightning strike too.

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Efficient, but a buggy mess to hit targets. Can't hit over a wall, you need direct line of sight, like lighning spear, even though it strikes from above. Fair enough, this would be OP in PVP. But it also constantly has problem hitting enemies below you, like on stairs or down a ledge, even with direct line of sight! Try hitting the Omen dudes near Underground Roadside site of grace from the ledge above, the spell will always hit the ground right in front of you.

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Efficient, but a buggy mess to hit targets. Can't hit over a wall, you need direct line of sight, like lighning spear, even though it strikes from above. Fair enough, this would be OP in PVP. But it also constantly has problem hitting enemies below you, like on stairs or down a ledge, even with direct line of sight! Try hitting the Omen dudes near Underground Roadside site of grace from the ledge above, the spell will always hit the ground right in front of you.

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Catch flame with honed bolt
Best for pvp runners and rollers

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Got tired of a dude turtling behind his shield in PvP.
Whipped out this spell and just spammed him to death in a few casts.
Ever since then I learned the use of this spell: To pressure overly defensive players, and it is quite good at that and the FP cost is low

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Rn this spell is a bit bugged, sometimes it will just hit behind the enemy for no reason and will have a different animation if is cast as the third spell in a chain.

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Honed bolt will bypass an enemies shield they are holding in front of them. It does not miss, and can be rapid casted after it's first initial cast. it doesn't do as much damage as lightining spear though.

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Any incantation that can be chained, can be comboed with other chain incantations, removing the start up of the second incantation. Bestial Sling to Honed Bolt can catch people off guard, since it's casted immediately.

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I'm so thankful for the information on this website. And the comment sections too

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I have found out that after using Honed Bolt or Lightning Strike, miracles like DragonClaw and Black Blade can be instantly cast right after however you are unable to do the second cast because of that. I'm not sure if this will be good in PVP but it's really worth considering as it speeds up the initial cast.

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Beat Red Wolf of Radagon boss with this because it doesn't miss and boss has lower health, beat it with just 1 try with skeleton summons. Black flame incantation travels slowly and miss at least 50%, tried around 10 times with Black Flame and all failed.

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This is good! I've been able to hide behind a short wall and snipe things without them noticing. I hope they tweak it so this is happens more, because sometimes it would just hit the wall, and if it hit enemies more often it would make this insanely useful.

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I don't understand the use case for this. The initial cast is slow, & chain casting it in both PvE and PvP the majority of strikes are going to miss, unless you're fighting a new/bad player or a land octopus. Way easier to use other incantations that hit harder and are more damage to FP efficient.

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This spell is really good for hyper active bosses early if you are cooping . Targeting is def better than lightning spear but spear has bigger range. Also I assume this is not a bad spell for pvp because you can roll catch people with this.

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I get the criticisms, but you'd be surprised how well this spell does in PvP. Especially when the enemy is rushing towards you.

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Lightning Storm and Spear are better.

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Any balance reason why the range on lightning is trash? This spell fits right into the Templar build I'm aiming for but so far this and lightning bolt seem to have a significantly shorter range than other schools of magic so far.

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Ohhh.... We're all starting to slowly understand. I thought this was trash compared to lightning spear because it does less damage. But if it can be chain cast then that's a whole new ballgame. We need all incantations to have a line in the description of "Can/Cannot be chain cast"

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This spell is not good. Just sick with lightning spear.

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This thingie is awesome, can be chain casted for absolute carnage, and its more effective damage to FP wise then lightning spear, and it has a small AOE strike for enemoes standing near the main target

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This incantation can be casted in fast succession after the initial long charge of the first cast

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Feels weaker than Lightning Spear but not sure, it’s hard to test.

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Extremely useful in PvP. While casting time is long, once "released", it strikes immediately, from the sky towards whatever you are locked on. Huge range, high damage and instant strike make it great finisher for wounded players.

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How to increase the damage of this please? and does it scale off faith? thanks

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A Golden Knight drops the tome for these, he is found near Artist's Shack, there is a road nearby, he will be patrolling it

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