How to defeat Ralva the Great Red Bear in Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtee

Ralva the Great Red Bear in Shadow of the Erdtree is essentially a Runebear, from the base game of Elden Ring, albeit with much higher strength and ferocity. Although you can still employ the same tactics against Ralva that work for the Runebears, you will need to make some minor changes to compensate for her higher aggression and AOE attacks.

Shadow of the Erdtree is mostly comprised of new enemy types and boss fights, completely separate from the base game. However, there are still quite a few bosses that are either reskin of base game enemy types, such as the Ghostflame Dragons, Senessax, and of course, Ralva, who is basically a Runebear, but red.

Thankfully, the reskinned enemies feature new attacks and movesets that set them apart from their base game counterparts. Here's a comprehensive guide on how to easily defeat Ralva the Great Red Bear in Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree.

Note: Some aspects of this article are subjective and solely reflect the writer's opinions.

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How to easily defeat Ralva the Great Red Bear in Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree?

Ralva the Great Red Bear, much like the Runebears relies heavily on claw swipes and bite attacks. The claw swipes in particular are the toughest move to dodge since those are also her gap-closer. Thankfully, the arena where you fight Ralva is wide enough to give you room to dodge her attacks. You will find this boss to the northeast of the Scadu Altus location.

If you're having a hard time with Ralva, the Mimic Tear or any other Ashen Summon can help give you some breathing room (Image via FromSoftware)

Follow the road after the first Site of Grace you unlock in Scadu Altus after defeating Rellana, Twin Moon Knight. Upon reaching the Messmer Soldier encampment, make a hard right and head straight until you reach a small pond-like area. Here, you will find Ralva, accompanied by a few small red bears.

I defeated Ralva the Great Red Bear with the Blasphemous Blade, using a level 185 Strength-Faith build. However, if you're struggling against the boss, I highly recommend making a switch to either a Great Katana build or a Bleed build. Much like in the base game of Elden Ring, Bleed is very effective in Shadow of the Erdtree.

Here are a few tips that should help you defeat Ralva the Great Red Bear in Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree:

• The key to defeating Ralva relies upon dodging her attacks properly and retaliating with weapon arts, instead of regular attacks. This might sound a bit tough to pull off, but once you get a sense of the boss' attack patterns, it becomes quite easy to dodge all her moves.
• Ralva always starts with a charge attack, which she chains into either a ground slam or a claw swipe combo. Having a Great Shield equipped can help you negate some of her attacks and also retaliate with a guard counter at the end.
• If you don't want to use a Great Shield, you can simply dodge her attacks. Do be mindful of not dodging too early. Like any other Elden Ring boss, Ralva usually has a delay on all her attacks, which is an easy bait to roll-catch players.
• One of the most damaging attacks of Ralva is her ground pound, which unlike the same attack from the Runebears has a massive AOE aftershock, akin to Godrick or Godfrey's "Earthshaker" stomp.
• You can dodge this attack by jumping or dodge rolling at the right time. However, I highly suggest just unlocking your camera and running away from the boss if you're not confident at timing your dodge.
• Ralva is very weak to fire, especially Messmerfire Grease, which thankfully is quite easy to collect and craft early in the DLC. You can also use heavy weapons like the Ancient Meteoric Ore Greatsword with Claw Talisman and Blade of Mercy to easily stagger the boss and deal critical damage.

The build I used to defeat Ralva the Great Red Bear (Image via FromSoftware)

Defeating Ralva the Great Red Bear rewards you with a Pelt of Ralva, a headgear that's part of the Iron Rivet armor set. Ralva the Great Red Bear also teaches you how to dodge and retaliate against the beast-type enemies in Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree, which will come in handy pretty soon, since the next major boss is the Golden Hippopotamus.