In a hidden part of the Lost Bastille stands the twin bell tower to that of Forte Ferreo, the Campanile of the Moon. The prison created to confine the undead in Dark Souls II thus has its hymn to love, because the bell tower was built by the prince of Alken for the beautiful princess of Venn, whose story was mentioned in the guide dedicated to Mytha, the Destructive Queen.
Mytha, who came from one of the two realms, was adept at infusing life into empty mannequins and today's bosses are not very dissimilar because they too are lifeless beings who mysteriously begin to flap their wings: let's talk about the Gargoyle of the Bell, optional bosses of Dark Souls II.
Those who played the first Dark Souls will have a déjà vu: the second round in the sequel is a more difficult re-enactment of that confrontation, with a lot of the same OST just to push more on the nostalgia effect.
The arena is basically the same, that is the roof of a church from which you can also fall. What changes is the number of Gargoyles: we are no longer at the beginning of the game and for this reason we go from two to five Gargoyles that will have to be knocked down to win this challenging battle.
Bosses share a life bar but at the same time also have a single one. The first will decide how many Gargoyles will join the fight, and it works like this:
- it starts with two Gargoyles. The first one who awakens is to the left of the entrance, while the second is towards the end of the roof;
- the third Gargoyle reaches about 90% of the HP bar;
- the fourth Gargoyle is added around 70%;
- the fifth Gargoyle closes the dance when it reaches 50% of the bar.
For advice on how to defeat these bosses that are easy to be overwhelmed by just keep reading, but before that we describe as you get to the fog of the Bell Gargoyles.
As mentioned, the Bell Tower of the Moon is hidden from view by a Pharros stone found after the post Sentinels of Doom bonfire. Once the stone has been used, it will be enough to cross the door to find yourself in the new area guarded by the Keepers of the Bell, dwarves who will explain the history of the bell towers in their own way and who will allow you to join a pact. The Bell Gargoyles are found at the top of the stairs of the old bell tower; to access the fog you have to pull a lever that will ring the bell.
Dark Souls II Gargoyles are optional bosses and are weak to magic and poison. Given the nature of the fight, a high DPS (damage per second) is required to have an easier life, or an AoE shot capable of hurting multiple enemies in one hit such as Firestorm pyromancy. The best way to defeat the boss, however, is to focus on only one Gargoyle at a time, so that you will have to manage at most three Gargoyles. Attacking all the enemies without distinction will in fact drop the shared life bar and as explained will only make the boss fight very difficult. Another tip is not to aim: you will also need eyes behind your back and a lot of patience.
Attacks:
- Horizontal shot: It's the most basic blow these bosses wielding a forked spear can make. As the name suggests it is a horizontal slash with the weapon, to be dodged backwards if possible or in the opposite direction.
- Spear combo: it's a combo formed by the horizontal hit plus a vertical one immediately after. Everything can be dodged with two rolls backwards or one sideways.
- Combo with rotation: this other combination consists of two horizontal strokes plus a 360 ° rotation with the spear, again the best thing to do is to back up. The boss will also back away with this move.
- Colpo di coda: beware of the tail, Gargoyles like to use it to sweep and make the situation worse. To dodge it, just roll back quickly.
- Stocked: what launch would it be without a classic forward thrust? This simple attack can be avoided with a side flip.
- Flight and crash: attack similar to the Gargoyles encountered in Dark Souls, sees the bosses take flight or better take a leap, stay in the air for a few seconds and make a crash. This shot also has a variant that sees the Gargoyles breathing fire from the sky for about half the arena. Once again you have to keep an eye on the statue's movements and dodge to the side one or more times.
- Blaze: At 50% of the individual health bar, the Gargoyle will start breathing fire just like in Dark Souls with a range of about 180 °. Back off as much as possible.
- Thunderstorm: a rare attack that takes many by surprise, Gargoyles are also able to summon lightning by raising their spear to the sky for about 4 seconds with relative sound effect. Move away from the Gargoyle who is making the attack as the lightning bolts cover the area around him.
Note: In Dark Souls II Scholar of the First Sin some Gargoyles reappear at Drangleic Castle and Aldia Fortress.
Drop:
- 25.000 souls.
- Soul of the Bell Gargoyle (creation, from Straid: Gargoyle's Pitchfork).
- Golden snake ring +2 (NG +).
Lore:
Gargoyles are familiar faces: they are in fact the first real obstacle in Dark Souls. It is mandatory to pass them to ring the Awakening Bell and thus be halfway there to open the doors of the Sen Fortress. Time has passed, but the task of these statues has remained the same, that is to defend castles, fortresses or in this case bell towers. They are creatures enchanted by someone who "mysteriously come to life" and appear cyclically throughout the history of Lordran and Drangleic.
In Dark Souls II they are pinned to protect the bell tower and more generally the memory of the Venn princess, and they don't really need many other details to be justified. Humans and gods soon learned how to exploit golems and lifeless beings for their own purposes, infusing them with magic or even souls. Most of these still faithfully follow their task today, like the Gargoyles, while others like the Fiend of the Forge have rebelled, bringing twilight over the reign of the Old Iron King (one of the most important bosses of Dark Souls II) - the papabile prince of Alken, for whom the bell no longer rings.
► Dark Souls II is an RPG-Adventure game developed by FromSoftware and published by FromSoftware Bandai Namco for PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, the video game was released on 11/03/2014 The version for PC came out on 25/04/2014
