Darklurker

Darklurker is an optional boss in Dark Souls II.



General Information
The Darklurker is an optional boss that can be fought only through the Pilgrims of Dark covenant. The player will be transported to it's arena once all beacons are lit, all three dungeons have been cleared, and the player drops out  at the end of one of them. It appears as a four-armed, hooded angelic humanoid, with a face obscured by an apparent hood. It's lower arms are constantly folded across its chest. The Darklurker is shrouded in mystery, and it is not yet known who or what it is.

Strategy
The Darklurker is very weak against fire, even more so than most other bosses. WIth a +10 pyromancy flame and 2-4 casts of flame swathe, the fight becomes almost trivial for skilled pyromancy users. Alternatively, if one does not have pyromancy, a Charcoal Pine Resin will normally do the trick. For melee players, the best option would be to wield a shield with high magic defense and stability, i.e. Rebel's Greatshield, and bait the boss to use its melee swipe attack, blocking it if necessary. Skilled users can bait the Darklurker to use its melee attack, dodge it, and then circle around to its back to deal damage.

However, once the Darklurker's health drops below 60%, it will attempt to make a copy of itself, telegraphed by it creating a bright light and folding its wings around itself. Contrary to popular belief, this phase is not immune to staggering, and the player should concentrate on dealing as much damage as possible in order to stagger the Darklurker. A good spell to use during this time would be AOE pyromancy spells like Firestorm, Fire Tempest, and Chaos Firestorm, as the Darklurker will take constant and massive fire damage if it is caught in one of the fire pillars, sometimes even killing it outright if the player is in possession of a +10 pyromancy flame. Also a Flame Swathe right before it is going to duplicate itself is a Huge damage modified x2 as it will do damage to each copy if timing is correct.

This boss IS susceptible to Profound Still, making this fight exponentially easier. The boss will limit itself to charging the player with its dark melee attack, and will sometimes attempt to use long range attacks to no avail. Using Profound Still will not interupt any of its spells.

Attacks
Energy Blade Strike: One of its hands glows brightly and shapes into a energy blade, swings this 2 twice in a row.

Laser Beam: Floats into the air and fires off a bright laser beam with slight homing capabilities

Magic Bolt: Fires a quick bolt of magic that resembles Soul Spear (Dark Souls II) although the color of it is bright white with a purple lining.

Dark Meteor: Several dark orbs hover the its body and from an angle fires off dark meteors at the player, exploding in a moderate size AoE.

Fire Balls: Conjures up many fireballs and fires them at the player

Explosion: Gathers its arms together and explodes the area around it, dealing heavy damage. the area is wider in front of it, and the animation appears similar to that of split.

Split: A glow will appear around it and will split into 2. Both share the boss's HP and must be fought both at once as the fight goes on. The copy has the same attacks as the original.

Drops

 * Darklurker Soul