Elden Ring Unsightly Catacombs guide
Elden Ring's Ugliest Dungeon
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With the sheer number of dungeons in Elden Ring, it’s inevitable that you might eventually miss one or two of them. If you’re going back to try and sweep up the ones you’ve missed, then you’ll probably end up trying to tackle the Unsightly Catacombs at some point, and this particular dungeon is not to be sniffed at. Not only is it tucked away in a difficult-to-find corner of Mt Gelmir, but the dungeon itself is nothing to be sniffed out. Luckily, we’ve written this Unsightly Catacombs guide to help you get through one of Elden Ring’s tougher dungeons.
How to find the Unsightly Catacombs
Getting to the Unsightly Catacombs shouldn’t be too much of a challenge, depending on how you entered the Altus Plateau region. If you came via the lift, you’re going to have to take quite a journey, but if you entered through the back route up the mountain then you’ve got it made. Head for the Abandoned Coffin point of grace in the Western Altus Plateau. From here, head northwest until you come to some ruins. Go down the slope to the left of the ruins and you’ll see the door to the catacombs in plain sight on the side of the cliff.
If you came up through the lift you can still manage this pretty simply. Head north from the lift until you hit the Erdtree-Gazing Hill point of grace, and follow the slope down to the west. Follow the road and you’ll come to the Abandoned Coffin point of grace that we mentioned above. From here, you can just follow the path we already described. Bear in mind, to get inside you’ll need two Swordstone Keys, so make sure you have them before you start out.
Unsightly Catacombs walkthrough
Unlike most catacombs in the game, these ones don’t feature either imps or skeletons, so you won’t need a holy weapon to get through it. Instead, it’s mostly beast-type enemies that inhabit these decrepit halls. Head down the stairs, but don’t attack the thing lying on the floor at the end of the next room. Instead, look to your right to find another monster waiting to ambush you. Take it out, then turn around and dispatch the other one. Sneak around the corner carefully and backstab the huge monster ahead of you. You need to take it out quickly because another one will soon join you in combat. Once you’ve dispatched these two goons, you have a choice to make.
If you want, there’s a shortcut that you can take here to get to the boss of the dungeon almost immediately. However, you will miss some loot and Runes for doing this. If you don’t want the shortcut, skip ahead to the next section. Head to the bottom of the stairs and take out the enemy here. If you approach the end of the ledge and look down, you can probably see the boss lever below you. If you run off the edge and keep moving, you can land on the switch ledge from here. Then drop down to the next floor and quickly run down the north passage to be at the boss room immediately. If you miss the jump, spring up the southern passage and follow it all the way round to get back to the stairs to try again.
Without the shortcut
If you’re not taking the shortcut, head down the stairs and take out the enemy here, then head into the next room. There’s actually a dog and big beast enemy here asleep, but you can safely ignore them unless you really need the Grave Glowwart [5] that they’re sleeping next to. In the next chamber you’ll see a bunch of stairs, and at the end of it is another hallway with a monster inside. Kill that monster, then head back to the stairs.
The best option here is to use ranged attacks. You need to drop into that chamber below, but it’s filled with beasts posing as dead bodies. hit lock-on and take them out from a distance, or you can drop down into the middle of them if you’re feeling confident. Once they’re all dead, loot the room for some more grave plants and an Ash Summons. Leave via the stairs and you’ll be at the boss room lever. Activate it, then you can either go straight to the boss or try and take on the ogre on the other side of the hallway. If you just want his loot, you can aggro him with a ranged attack, then run around the room the opposite way that he does to grab the loot safely.
A few notes on the boss
There are a few things to be wary of with this boss fight. First up, it’s a two-enemy boss fight, so unless you’re really against it you’re best off summoning someone to help you out and draw aggro for you. Secondly, there’s no Stake of Marika near the boss room, so you’re going to need to use a shortcut if you don’t want a long run every time you fight the boss. Off the right side of the first set of stairs in the dungeon, there’s a grave that is sticking out. You can drop onto it, then drop from there to the ground safely.
One final note is that the ogre enemy may drop down to the ground floor when you do. As long as you immediately sprint into the boss room you’ll be safe, as he can’t fit his big butt through the doors. This is also a great place to farm for the ogre’s greatsword if you want to get it without working up a sweat.
