Artorias is a failure.
That’s the hard truth most players avoid when they talk about the legendary Abysswalker. We spent the first half of Dark Souls hearing about this untouchable paragon of knightly virtue, the man who walked the void and saved Oolacile. Then you actually step through that temporal rift in the Darkroot Basin. You expect a hero. You find a broken, screaming shell of a man with a shattered left arm, leaking black sludge from his armor. It’s devastating. Artorias of the Abyss isn't just a DLC expansion; it's the moment FromSoftware proved they could tell a story through a boss's limping animation better than most games can with ten hours of cutscenes.
Honestly, the lore is a mess of tragedy. You’ve probably heard the "official" version from the base game's item descriptions. They say Artorias faced the Abyss and won. Liars. By the time you find him, the Abyss has already swallowed him whole. He didn’t win. He sacrificed his greatshield to protect his wolf companion, Sif, and then lost his mind to the dark. You aren't fighting a legend; you're performing a mercy killing on a corpse that doesn't know it's dead yet.
The Tragic Mechanics of the Abysswalker
Most bosses in Dark Souls feel like puzzles. Artorias feels like a rhythm game where the music is screaming at you. When you enter that arena in the Royal Wood, he’s busy finishing off a bloated resident of Oolacile. Then he sees you. He doesn't give a speech. He just screams—a sound provided by voice actor Kevin Howarth that still haunts players—and lunges.
The fight is famous for its aggression. He has this somersaulting vertical slam that can track your roll if you're too early. If he hits you once, he’ll probably do it twice. Sometimes three times. It’s relentless. But look closer at his movements. His left arm—his dominant arm, according to many lore hunters who point to his sword-fighting style—is dangling uselessly at his side. He is destroying you with his "off-hand." It’s a terrifying realization. If he were at 100%, we wouldn't stand a chance.
🔗 Read more: First Name in Country Crossword: Why These Clues Trip You Up
The buff is where people usually mess up. When Artorias backs away and starts gathering dark energy, he’s increasing his damage output significantly. New players panic and back away to heal. Wrong move. You have to get in there and stagger him. If you don't, the next hit will likely one-shot you through your shield. This mechanical requirement forces the player to be as aggressive as the boss, creating a feedback loop of pure adrenaline.
What Really Happened in Oolacile?
The timeline of Artorias of the Abyss is a bit of a temporal headache. You’re pulled back into the past by Manus, Father of the Abyss, because you happen to have a broken pendant. But the reality of Oolacile is far grimmer than the "legend" suggests. The residents of the city were convinced by a "toothy serpent"—almost certainly Kaathe—to dig up the grave of primeval man. They woke Manus. And Manus didn't just kill them; he mutated them.
The bloat-headed enemies you fight aren't just monsters. They are the citizens. Their heads are swollen with humanity gone wild. When you realize this, the atmosphere of the DLC shifts from "cool fantasy adventure" to "cosmic horror tragedy." Artorias arrived to stop this, but the Abyss isn't a physical enemy you can just stab. It's an environmental corruption. It’s fate.
Elizabeth, the giant mushroom who talks to you, basically admits that history will forget you. She tells you that Artorias will get the credit for your victory over Manus because the truth is too messy. The world needs a hero, even if that hero died in a hole, corrupted and forgotten. It’s one of the most cynical bits of writing in the series. It makes your victory feel lonely. You saved the world (for a few hundred years, anyway), and a dead man got the trophy.
💡 You might also like: The Dawn of the Brave Story Most Players Miss
Why We Can't Stop Talking About Sif
You can't discuss Artorias of the Abyss without mentioning the Great Grey Wolf. If you play the DLC before you fight Sif in the main game, the cutscene changes. It’s one of the few times Dark Souls tries to make you feel like a genuine villain.
In the DLC, you find a younger, smaller Sif trapped in a magical barrier created by Artorias’s Greatshield. You save the pup. Sif even helps you fight Manus, appearing as a summon sign in the abyss itself. It’s a touching moment of bonding. But then, you go back to your own time. You walk into that clearing in the Darkroot Forest. Sif, now the size of a house, recognizes your scent. The wolf whimpers. It remembers you saved its life. But it still picks up the sword.
Sif isn't fighting you out of malice. Sif is trying to stop you from suffering the same fate as Artorias. The wolf is guarding the Covenant of Artorias (the ring) because it knows that whoever takes it will go to the Abyss, and the Abyss ruins everything it touches. It’s a fight where both participants want to be somewhere else.
The Legacy of the DLC
Before Artorias of the Abyss, DLC was often viewed with skepticism in the industry—often seen as "cut content" sold back to fans. FromSoftware changed the narrative. They didn't just add a map; they recontextualized the entire world. They showed that the Golden Age of Lordran was built on lies.
📖 Related: Why the Clash of Clans Archer Queen is Still the Most Important Hero in the Game
The influence of this fight is everywhere. You see it in the Abyss Watchers of Dark Souls 3, who literally model their entire culture on Artorias’s failure. You see it in the fast-paced, "dance-like" boss designs of Elden Ring and Bloodborne. Artorias was the prototype for the "Knight Boss" that FromSoftware would spend the next decade perfecting. He’s the reason bosses like Gael and Malenia exist.
Tips for Surviving the Abyss
If you're jumping back into the Remastered version today, don't play it like a tank. Artorias punishes high-poise builds that try to sit behind a shield. He will guard-break you and then punish you.
- Lighten the load. You need the fast roll. If you're "fat rolling," you’re dead. Mid-roll is risky. The invincibility frames (i-frames) on a light roll are your best friend during his triple slam.
- The 3-Slam Rule. If Artorias jumps for a vertical slam, assume he’s going to do it three times. Don't attack after the first one. Don't attack after the second. Wait for the third, then get one—just one—hit in.
- The Stagger. When he starts his dark charge-up, use a heavy weapon or a fast-firing crossbow to break his poise. If you're a sorcerer, hit him with your strongest soul spear. If he completes the buff, his damage increases by about 40%, and he gains a trail of dark energy that makes his hitboxes even more forgiving for him and miserable for you.
- Resistances. Artorias is highly resistant to Magic, Fire, and Lightning. He’s a god-tier knight; he’s seen it all. Physical damage or Bleed are your best bets, though Bleed is notoriously hard to proc on him. Pure physical strength is the way to go.
The story of Artorias of the Abyss is a reminder that in the world of Dark Souls, heroes don't usually win. They just hold back the darkness long enough for someone else to come along and take the blame. It’s bleak, it’s beautiful, and it’s why we’re still talking about it over a decade later.
To truly understand the impact, go back and read the description of the Soul of Artorias. It tells you that the "last drop of black settled within" him. He was a man who gave everything, including his soul, for a mission that was doomed from the start. That’s not a hero from a storybook. That’s a Dark Souls hero.
To see the full weight of this tragedy for yourself, your next step should be to complete the DLC before fighting Sif in the Darkroot Garden. This unlocks the alternate cinematic that completely changes the emotional context of the Great Grey Wolf's fight, providing a rare moment of narrative continuity that bridges the gap between the past and the present of Lordran. Pay close attention to the wolf's behavior during the intro; it's one of the most subtle and effective pieces of storytelling in the entire franchise.