How to easily defeat the Recreant Knight in Forspoken

Shortly after bringing Robian back to Cipal in Forspoken, Tanta Sila will make her first in-game appearance. Clearly unhappy that people are disobeying her, Sila, being the strongest of the Tanta, has to make her displeasure known. To do so, she summons one of her signature minions, the Recreant Knight. A powerful, fire-wielding angelic entity, it’s a difficult fight for players who are unaware of the trick to beating it.

Following this initial encounter, players will have to fight many more Recreant Knights, which will be the same every time. Thankfully, it can be an easy fight with the right knowledge, whether it’s the boss variant or the regular ones that you'll fight across Tanta Sila’s domain later on.

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Recreant Knight is intimidating, but can be easily bested in Forspoken

In the very first appearance of the Recreant Knight, it’s being controlled by Tanta Sila directly and will introduce you to the attacks and abilities this particular enemy will use against you later on in the game.

You may notice something right away in Phase 1 of this Forspoken boss battle, which is that you can’t harm the main body of the Recreant Knight. Don’t waste your time doing that and lock onto the boss’ wings instead (it doesn’t matter which one), and unload all of your damage on it. Scatter Shot is highly recommended here as it delivers fast and reliable damage as you hold the button down.

Watch: Fighting in Phase 1

The Knight will hover in the air for most of this fight, so you'll have to keep moving. While several attacks might feel difficult to dodge, as long as you stay in motion, it won’t be too much of a challenge. Whenever the boss lands, you must use Bind to hold it in place.

At this point, you should continuously dish out damage until you break one of its wings. Doing so will result in this Forspoken boss taking a major chunk of damage. When it flies into the air and conjures a host of fireballs, the safest location to be is right underneath it. From here, you can continue hitting your enemy, and you won’t be struck.

When you see the Recreant Knight landing with only one fiery wing, that's when Phase 2 of this boss fight begins in Forspoken. It will begin using its spear for powerful melee strikes, which are slower and easier to dodge. You have to lock onto the other wing and start smashing it with Scatter Shot to make it go down easily.

Watch: Phase 2 transition

If you don’t use lock-on, this Forspoken boss can be much harder to defeat. Once you destroy its second wing, the final phase of the battle begins. As before, Scatter Shot/Bind continues to be the best option. Phase 3 will feature slow but powerful strikes, which should pose no threat as long as you continue using parkour.

It should be noted that the last two phases have a dangerous, wide-sweeping attack that you should definitely avoid. You should remember that if a boss uses an attack with a Red X appearing above it, you can’t parkour around those. Although this portion of the fight is fairly simple, you can easily lose if you let it hit you too many times.

Watch: Phase 3

Your reward for defeating the Recreant Knight will be an additional point of Stamina, which can be incredibly useful. You will likely see this creature appearing as a regular enemy across Tanta Sila’s domain and later on in the game as well. As long as you use this strategy, it will serve you well, even if you're facing off against two of these foes at once.