Dark Souls - Darkroot Garden strategy
How to tackle Darkroot Garden in Dark Souls.
Darkroot Garden is one of many optional areas in Dark Souls, and paves the way to two bonus boss encounters.
If you're looking for more help, our Dark Souls walkthrough and guide can help with all other areas of the game, including the dreaded Taurus Demon, Capra Demon, Ornstein and Smough bosses.
Darkroot Garden
Head over to Blacksmith Andre, then go out of the archway in front of him and defeat the Titanite Demon to get access to Darkroot Garden, you can also get access to this area at the bottom of the Undead Burg. For this walkthrough, we're heading from Andre. If you can't kill the Titanite Demon yet, it's probably best to leave this area until later. Load up with your best fire weapons and head through and to the left.
You will be attacked by a Tree Creature, but these go down quickly if you have a fire weapon or pyromancies.Keep going forward and kill another, to the right will be a shortcut down to Darkroot Basin and a Hydra, so keep going forward for now until the path opens up a bit.
Here you will encounter two more Tree enemies, with another popping out of the ground to the right. Again, use fire to dispose of these quickly. Then, head all the way up the path and to the left of the glowing door is an illusory wall, hit this to open up a bonfire.
Optional path to Moonlight Butterfly
From the hidden bonfire, go past the glowing doors to the pathway on the left. Head down the path and on the right will be an opening, but the item inside is bait for an ambush, where Tree Men will come to attack you as soon as you pick up the item. Then, head to the Fog Gate to get deeper into the garden.
After entering- take caution there are many ambushes here which can leave you dead very quickly. Head towards the stone giant and take it out- it's big, lumbering and slow, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue. Try to bait these enemies out of the woods, where you will also encounter more of the tree types we saw before. Hang left and go behind the left wall to find a Partizan, and another tree enemy.
Go back and continue to hug the left until you see broken stones, then head straight forward until you encounter another Stone Knight. Then, head inside and up towards an optional boss - the Moonlight Butterfly.
Now, we're going to want to ensure that you've bought the Crest of Artorias from Andre for 20,000 Souls, as that's going to open up the rest of Darkroot Garden to us. It is possible to loop around the other way from Darkroot Basin, on a ladder behind the Hydra, but for the sake of ease, this will be the path of least resistance.
From here, we're going to encounter some pretty tough enemies, so make sure that you've fully upgraded all of your weapons and proceed through the garden, as we're going to get an item that will allow us to get another one of the Lord Souls, and one step closer to the final portion of the game.
Now, proceed with caution, immediately you will be faced with a knight wielding a Claymore and a Sorcerer. You can fight them head on and risk ambush from the other upcoming enemies, or head back and to the right on the edge of the stairs in order to glitch their AI into jumping ontop of your head and to their doom. This is a great way to farm souls, if needed.
Then you will encounter a Ghost Assassin in addition to a Cleric. Beware taking on the Assassin, as it will also be able to parry and backstab you. Take these out and proceed forward to face a barbarian, deal with this and push onwards. Enter the large building and look left to encounter Alvina.
If you're looking for more help, our Dark Souls walkthrough and guide can help with all other areas of the game, including the dreaded Taurus Demon, Capra Demon, Ornstein and Smough bosses. Meanwhile, we have explainers on how to access DLC Artorias of the Abyss, the best gift and best class in Dark Souls, Dark Souls' best weapons, Dark Souls Covenants, Dark Souls Estus Flasks locations, Dark Souls Titanite Slab locations and NPC quests including Lautrec of Carim.
Head down the path and own the stairs. From the stairs, head immediately left and follow the building around to a chest which contains Stone Armour. Then, head forward into the wood and be careful to not attack the docile small mushrooms, as a larger version will hunt you down and hit very hard. If you choose to attack, we recommend taking these out at range, just because of the sheer force of their punch.
Then, you will want to go towards the glowing door. Head here and open the fog gaate to face off against Great Grey Wolf Sif. Head behind the grave of Artorias to get a Hornet Ring.
Then, we're going to warp back to Firelink Shrine.