Late in Elden Ring, players are able to face off against the optional boss Commander Niall at the end of Fort Sol in the northern section of Mountaintops of the Giants. While the enemy at first appears to be a reskin of Commander O'Neil, this endgame encounter manages to elevate the design beyond being another example of an overused repeat boss like Erdtree Burial Watchdogs.
The way that Commander Niall stands out among the endgame bosses comes from the way that he calls for reinforcements, similar to how the player can call on help from Spirit Ashes. This compounds perfectly with the way that the boss and his Spirit Ash helpers also incentivize players to use more unique items from Elden Ring that they might otherwise overlook.
Commander Niall Shows Off Top Tier Spirit Ashes in Elden Ring
Similar to the original fight against Commander O'Neil, the veteran Commander Niall starts the fight by summoning two spirit companions that can quickly outnumber the player. While these spirit companions could easily turn this into one of Elden Ring's frustrating double fights, the additional targets to fight are expertly integrated directly into the boss' two phases. This is because Commander Niall specifically changes his attack patterns depending on whether the spirits have been defeated, or if the player is still dealing with them both.
The two phases of Commander Niall's fight are separated by how well the player is able to handle these spirits along with the boss himself. In a unique twist from multiphase bosses, Commander Niall's second phase has two possible triggers to activate. There's the normal transition between phases at the mid-health threshold, similar to bosses like Elden Ring's Fire Giant or Maliketh. Alternatively, players can activate a phase shift by killing both of Commander Niall's spirit summons, which will start the transition regardless of health.
This design then gives players two options when jumping into the Commander Niall encounter, by either killing the spirit summons immediately or trying to drain the boss down while avoiding the extra enemies. The result either evens out the numbers quickly, by taking down Commander Niall's spirit summons immediately or making the second phase shorter at the cost of a more difficult start to the fight. However, just as Commander Niall shows off the power of Elden Ring's Spirit Ash, the fight highlights the strength of the more obscure item Bewitching Branches in the first phase.
Elden Ring Players Can Use the Bewitching Branch to Counter Commander Niall's Spirit Summons
While it might not be immediately obvious for first-time players making their way through Elden Ring blind, there is a unique item that has the ability to mitigate some of the difficulty found in Commander Niall's first phase. The specific item is called the Bewitching Branch, and it has the ability to turn enemies against each other instead of only fighting the player. Not only can this help keep one of the spirit summons from attacking the player during the first phase, but it also turns one of Commander Niall's own allies against himself and suddenly makes the fight two against two.
Interestingly, this isn't actually the first time that an item like the Bewitching Branch has popped up in a FromSoftware game, but it is one of the few times that the item has been useful in a boss fight. Fans of Bloodborne, for example, might remember the Shaman Bone Blade, which shined in the DLC as a method for obtaining the powerful Rakuyo weapon from the two giant sharks in Fishing Hamlet. Still, for newer players, the utility of these Bewitching Branches against Commander Niall just goes to show the power of experimenting with different builds and strategies whenever facing off against a seemingly insurmountable encounter.
Elden Ring is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
