Elden Ring Royal Knight Loretta tips and strategy

How to prepare for Royal Knight Loretta

Preparing for Royal Knight Loretta doesn't take a great deal of doing. We'd merely recommend you kit yourself out in your strongest possible armor, without sacrificing your movement speed, and take a physical weapon in to battle against Royal Knight Loretta with you.

Arguably, the hardest part of the fight against Royal Knight Loretta is actually securing a route to the boss herself. It's a tough gauntlet to even sprint through, as you've got multiple wolves, magic users, bandits, and even an armored giant to deal with.

If you're going to be running to Royal Knight Loretta from the Site of Grace on the upper floor of Caria Manor, we'd recommend sneaking around the giant by taking the ladder to the left of the archway directly in front of the beast, and taking the right-hand stairway past the bandit just before the boss arena, as you've only got one bandit to deal with there instead of two on the other side.

Royal Knight Loretta tips: How to beat Royal Knight Loretta

One of Royal Knight Loretta's most common ploys is to summon a storm of spectral swords against you. The boss will stand still momentarily and wave their spear around, summoning five swords that'll hang their in mid-air before pursuing you.

The swords themselves are pretty easy to deal with, as you can either strafe sprint around them, or dodge roll through them, but don't take your eye off Loretta here, as she'll be bearing down on you.

Speaking of the spear though, Loretta attacks in big sweeping arches, bringing her spear crashing down on you from the side and above. She can attack in patterns of one, two, or three slices, but these attacks are honestly quite slow-moving, and relatively easy to dodge through.

We wouldn't recommend putting your shield up against the attacks, as two strikes can break the majority of player's stamina bars.

One of Royal Knight Loretta's most devastating attacks comes in the form of a gigantic spectral arrow. Loretta summons a bow out of nowhere and charges up an arrow for a second, before letting it fly at you.

Don't roll around the arrow, instead try and get the timing just right to roll through it and towards Loretta entirely, as you're more likely to evade damage this way, and you can bear down on the boss right after.

Don't get greedy around the back of Loretta's horse. The spectral steed has a nasty kick attack that it can pull off on anyone hanging around behind the boss, and it can absolutely rip through your stamina meter or health reserves.

When you attack Loretta, try and get in a jump attack or two against the boss.

We've found attacks that connect with the head of her spectral steed tend to do far more damage than simply chipping away at the boss, and you're way more likely to eventually knock the boss down for a massive stun attack if you lay into her with a jumping slash.

Royal Knight Loretta reward

Once Royal Knight Loretta is down for the count, you'll gain a few items. Firstly, you'll bag yourself 10,000 Runes, which is probably enough to get you another level at this point in Elden Ring.

Additionally, you'll earn the Loretta's Greatbow Sorcery, which can be used to pull off the massive arrow attack we mentioned earlier, as well as the Loretta's Slash Ash of War, which can be fitted to weapons or shield to produce a huge upswing attack.

It's worth noting that you can now access the Three Sisters behind Caria Manor, and in the graveyard area on the east side a spirit can leave behind a Larval Tear.

With Royal Knight Loretta finally down, it's time to continue the main story of Elden Ring. You're about to meet an intriguing retinue of characters in the area immediately after this boss fight, which will set you on the way to facing off against the next main story-based boss: Starscourge Radahn.