I don't mean this in a boastful way, but I beat Rom on my first try by completely ignoring the little spiders, getting a few swipes in on his sides/back, and then backing away when he was about to attack. I think I was a bit overleveled for it, but making judicious use of dodging/sprinting and disregarding the little spiders made this fight a lot easier for me. I hope this helps!

Not trying to toot my own here, but I had no problem with Rom.

Just ignore the little spiders, get close, do him real rotten and back away.

He's weak to lightning and you don't have to worry about the little spiders. Find an opening, get in close and shank him. Continue shanking him while he teleports too. Just back away to heal if you get hit by a little spider. It's a stressful fight but it's not that bad. Wait until the last boss or some of the chalice dungeon bosses. Some of those are just insane.

Dodge his stuff, then kill him. Just hit him once, maybe 3 times depending on the weapon you are using, then auto-dodge. Repeat until you are out of stamina, then back off, run back in once your stamina is full, and repeat.

Also, Capra Demon in a legitimate arena would be easy as balls. The tough part about Capra Demon was its poorly designed arena. Hard to compare these two, since Rom has a infinite-appearing arena.

I just wasn't patient enough then.

Rom was a pretty stupid boss, just kill all his little spider buddies and try to bait his AOE attack once you get to that phase and attack when he finishes it.

Ignoring the little ones is viable, I did it on my first time meeting Rom that way without really thinking about it, but it is more risky that way. On subsequent fights with Rom, i've taken out all the spiders and had a lot safer of a time.

He only spawns new little spiders when he teleports, and he will only teleport twice. The first time is a given, since he doesn't use magic at that point. The second two waves you just have to keep your distance relatively close, and just watch out for when he rolls to his side so you can back off quickly from the underside attacks.

Like the majority of the bosses in Bloodborne, a viable strategy is to sprint up to his butt and start spamming R1. When it looks like he's charging to do something run away. I did kill the first wave of spiders.

Martyr Logarias, Ebrietas and the final boss (Gerhman) are all more difficult than Rom. Just poke at the spiders and dodge when he uses spells. When the spiders are dead, beat the shit out of him. Repeat.

On my first playthrough, I skipped the spiders entirely. I just beat the shit out of him while keeping the spiders on the other side of his body; he basically body-blocked them from me. I wouldn't recommend this strategy though. The positioning of the spiders and his use of spells is too unpredictable for this to work every time.

I got him on my first try, though it took nearly all my vials. I learned pretty quick that Rom and the spiderlings are super vulnerable anywhere but their head. After his first teleport, when more spiderling spawned in, I decided to avoid a fight of attrition and to make the fight as short as possible. I went straight for Rom any chance I got, and only took out the spiderlings that were directly in my way. Other than that, just keep moving. I spammed the dodge button, I don't think I ever moved at all without using dodge. That helped me avoid most of the ice attacks, and the AOE is fairly well telegraphed in true Souls fashion.

I tried both of the main methods mentioned here, and they both seem pretty easy. If you take your time and pick off the spiders one by one, Rom is basically helpless. The spiders do a lot of damage but they're very easy to dodge if you take it slow. Same with Rom's attacks.

With this method, I got him to about 1/3rd health. Probably could've beaten him if I tried it again.

What ultimately worked for me was just rushing past the spiders, getting a few shots at Rom's belly, circling around and picking off spiders here and there, and charging back in and repeating. It got slightly more difficult when Rom started attacking (more stuff to dodge and be aware of), but it worked.

My insight is always high, by the way. I dunno how the fight works with low insight, but I didn't have much of a problem dodging the homing ice attacks.

Rom was okay, expect for the meteor ice shower thingy. I was never able to reliable dodge it and it still frustares me. ;'(

@vanillaplant: I had beaten the game and i'm already dreading facing it again with my new character.

This by far is the worst souls boss ever. It challenges the game's limits making you fail because of the game design itself.

Rom is not that bad. I was knocked out a few times, but had much better success when thought about the parameters of the fight. I got the right armor on, got the right gear to kill the spiders. Learned the pattern for watching Rom and where the arcane meteor spell will hit relative to your motion at the time he casts. Learned the call sign and distance for his AOE. Beat him pretty easily, then got him the first time in the Chalice much later.

Well, I managed to beat Rom today thanks to all the hot tips from GiantBomb at large. Thanks guys. Even some of the more strongly worded ones. I wasn't accommodating when I made this topic and I'm still really unhappy about the whole thing. I still fucking hate this boss, but he's dead now. Really strongly reconsidering playing through this game anytime soon due to this guy.

What a bastard. What a pile of garbage. I tried a bunch of things. I couldn't find a flamethrower but I did find the Tonitrus and put that to use after upgrading it as far as I could. I never do co-op on my first playthroughs on these kind of games so it was just me. Just me and a whole lot of deaths.

The strategy that worked was doing as much damage as I could on the first phase and then doing a hit-and-run when he starts casting magic. I got really lucky on the time that I won because Rom warped like a foot away where I could close the distance before he could use that death from above spell. Really, really, close call with his god damn spider buddies and the AOE blast but I poked him enough until he was no more. What an asshole.

Like every other boss up to this point had been a decent challenge without being aggrivating, and I think that's why I hate Rom so much.

Like FromSoftware does this every game. I don't know why I thought Bloodborne would be different, but they always put the hardest boss toward the middle of the game. It fucks up the pacing. If I get to the last boss in Bloodborne and he's not even close to Rom's test of decency, they'll have a four game streak. Like the Maneaters in Demon's Souls. Like Capra (or Ornstien and Smough) in Dark Souls. The only exception from Dark Souls 2 being Smelter Demon, so congrats to them for making that a legit challenge without mobbing the player I suppose.

If it gets any worse than Rom, I'll be super surprised. And so very angry again, haha.

@bceagles128 said:

This. This was also the turning point for me where the game got really soul's like and I hit my wall at this point. Once i did this Rom was a joke and killed him after two tries. The smaller spiders are no joke.

@sarumarine: Like I said earlier, I appreciate your frustration as someone that also had a fucking frustrating day-long hate-session with one of Bloodborne's bosses (Blood-Starved Beast), but there are two things you should consider to put things in perspective

1) Rom is not objectively the hardest boss. This is obvious, of course, because almost every thread out there discussing the Easiest/Hardest bosses in Bloodborne almost never has posters with the same answers ("Shadow of Yharnam was by far the Hardest." "What?! No, they were the EASIEST. Vicar Amelia was broken-difficult." "Are you insane? Just dodge her, you won't even get hit!"), but it is important to remember that everyone will have that one boss that manages to act on all of your weaknesses as a player. For you, maybe your problem was crowd-management or predicting dodges, and maybe it took so long to beat Rom because it's such a deeply ingrained part of the way you play that you never noticed you were doing anything wrong. Remember, the Souls games aren't just RNGs, or you wouldn't have speed-runners that breeze through every boss like it's nothing; your success is based on how you play, and even if you didn't realise, Rom being dead wasn't a result of the game throwing a lucky dice roll, it was because YOU OVERCAME YOUR PLAYING FAULTS.

2) It's actually thematically perfect for Rom to be one of the hardest bosses. Rom is a hugely important character to the story of Bloodborne, and his role is basically being the gatekeeper to the second half of the game. This is similar to Ornstein & Smough, who basically signalled the end of the "Ring the Bells" half of Dark Souls and the beginning of the "Gather the Lord Souls" half. After Rom, EVERYTHING is different, and it'll likely be a while before you fight a boss as truly intimidating as he was. To be honest, I think it'd fuck with the pacing way harder if the first half of the game was just complete pushovers slowly getting harder, with the latter half being hard boss after hard boss after hard boss. The ebb and flow is more satisfying, to me at least.

You can of course disagree with me on either of these points, but hopefully it's given some food for thought. Good hunting!

@sarumarine: What is the intended level for this boss fight? I feel like I must have been a bit overleveled, because even though it did take me a decent number of tries to figure out the patterns and everything, I feel like I had waaay less of a hard time than some people with Rom. It helps that it is super quick to get to the fight after you die.

It should be noted if you do decide to Lock on to Rom you will close the distance on him marginally faster, which could be relevant depending.

@demoskinos: I always forget about Insight, kind of amusing that the game could be way easier.

If you put points into arcane, check out the flamesprayer, and use it on him after the first phase. It makes it (slightly) more possible to ignore attacking the spiderlings. You can dodge almost immediately while using the flamesprayer, unlike with weapons where you're committed to the attack and then a spider could jump on you and take all of your health. Very high dps, and no stamina cost.

Other advice: Use lock on the close the distance. Once you're next to Rom, take it off.

Also, fuck Rom.

I'll be an asshole and say I beat him first try and didn't find him overly difficult. Like at all. I had the benefit of getting in free hits since he's not aggro on a first encounter and you can keep hitting him for a bit even after he turns invisible. The first phase he's still not really aggressive, so you can clear out the spiders before moving in to hurt him, again making sure to get the extra hits in when he's still first vanishing.

The mistake people make is worrying about the spiders once Rom starts attacking back. Fuck the spiders. They're only there to distract you from the real threat: Rom and his ice shit. Just book it. Book it past the little spiders and get right the fuck up against Rom. Dude will do some Covetous Demon shit and roll and flail a bit and he'll do the ice thing but you can just step yourself around that thing. He'll vanish again and you just have to get in there and punish him for being a damn spider. Fuck the little spiders, you'll only wind up focusing on them and then getting slapped in the face with ice.

Then again I was running a Skill/Endurance build so I was more focused on not getting hit at all because I literally couldn't afford to and I could hit a bunch of times before having to regain stamina, so playing it safe was never an option. Because fuck it, man, I'm a hunter.

@fredchuckdave: Yeah I feel like discussion of bosses in BB should be preempted with how much insight you had going into it cause seriously especially with some bosses like ROM its a night and day difference in how the fight flows.

I was level 58. Looks like the Gamespot guide recommends level 60. I didn't have any problem with him (solo) on my playthrough but once I beat him, I tried to coop the area a bunch of times to farm vials and a lot of the time either myself or the host would die. I think there is a luck element to this fight that many are ignoring. You don't always get the lanes you need to run through the little spiders, and sometimes while you are looking for one, you will get one shot by either Rom or the diving spiders. I think my success rate as a coop summon was only like 50% (and almost all those were me doing like 80% of the work to Rom). That's quite a bit lower than almost all of the bosses I've cooped extensively, with the exception of the Ancient Dragon, where I don't think I've ever had a host survive.

don't waste your time with his friends, pick and roll baby!

The only way I managed to beat him was by summoning a friend. Rom is fucking lame. If you REALLY need to go at it offline, the best strategy seems to be in phase 2 and 3, kiting the smaller spiders away from him--enough to leave an opening--so that you can dive in, get a few hits in, then bail out. It's a real test of patience. If you just take a couple pot shots in here and there, he'll eventually go down. Throw some high Arcane resist armor on in case his ice attacks get you and hope for the best.

Also, bolt paper. Shit does pretty heavy damage.

But yeah, fuck Rom and fuck spiders.

Chalice Rom's the worst. All of the sudden Rambo strats don't work because everything 1-2 shots you. I'm stumped on this version atm, and chalice dungeons only get worse...I hate chalice dungeons.

Forget Rom. That hunter inside the Bergynwerth mansion was the real boss of that area.

I managed to beat Rom on my second try. I just kept fire or bolt on my cane at all times, rolled to dodge every attack from him and his spiders, and hit him in his rump over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over........

I strafed to the right of him/it/her when the air attack happens witch meant the missiles went over my head. kill the first wave of spiders,if not they will join in when it respawns making it harder to avoid them.

shit what?. it's the final boss, confused ;/

Cannon and bone marrow ash worked for me

Just take your time with the battle, kill off the small spiders. Just take note that they only take big damage from the sides or the rear, as do Rom.

Make sure to dodge them, they can almost one hit you depending on what your vitality stat is. Personally i rolled in there with the Holy Blade, used its normal mode on the spiders, then switched to the Ultra Sword mode and beat up Rom until the next wave hit. Then rinse and repeat.

for me the trick was to keep moving, the attacks from little spiders have poor tracking and shouldn't hit you unless you stay at the same spot for more than 2-3 secs. After Rom started using magic, keep running in and out and do the dash/roll attacks, don't do it more than 2 - 3 times each time as Rom will likely use the AOE blast when you are that close and stunlock you for spiders to finish you off.

"It took me a FULL DAY to figure out how to jump into the lake that there are messages saying try jumping next to and the fucking npc literally does one thing and that's point at the lake and there's literally no other place to go, but clearly FromSoft are the idiots here."

For the record I had a lot of trouble with this fight too and I don't think it's one of the strongest in the game, but what I just said is a much more reasonable statement than claiming that FromSoft "don't understand videogame design."

I just used the 'run in hit once or twice run out' tactic.

Btw his above barrage is stupid easy to avoid, look for the tell its coming then look up, they have such a stupid long travel time that you don't even need to dodge roll them.

1st tried him. :P I actually loved this fight. Visually I think it's really neat, and it's such a bizarre thing when you first jump in. I was with my friend when I first encountered this boss and we were both kind of speechless when I first jumped in, and then also the way that Rom isn't actually hostile until you attack him but he's terrifying looking was really cool. I circled him for a good 5 minutes or so, just waiting, hesitating to walk up to him cause it was completely against the instinct I've built up from these games.

@sarumarine: With any bolt damage he's probably one of the easiest bosses in the game. You can get him under half health easy with just a +6 weapon and some bolt paper. Just hit him from behind and watch out for the spiders because they are way more likely to instakill you.

I just fought him and was able to down in on my first try on first play through, at 30 insight. At first I would go after the spiders he spawns but when i quickly learned they are slow as shit I just ignored them the rest of the fight. The meteors never kit if you unlock and just continuously roll while they are coming down at this insight level. The only things that really hit me was his tantrum attack, twice, and his head slam. I used a total of 6 vials that whole fight. it is possible I was overleveled, was setting around level 48 at the time.

I think he's entitled to blame the game. This boss fight kind of sucks. I think it's telling that half the people here are saying 'kill the little spiders' and the other half are saying to ignore them. It's because there's an element of luck involved in it. I did 15 runs where the small spiders were encircling Rom, and being super aggressive when I got in close, then one run where they all stayed to one side of him, letting me get in round the other side. It's really hard to tell where those missiles are coming in from too.

It took me a couple of attempts, but Rom didn't put up too much of a problem for me. I only died twice because I was playing like a berk and got jumped on by a spider. The Undead Giant in the lower chalice dungeon on the other hand is kicking my arse all over the shop.

There is no shame in summoning help to kill this fucker. :D

Last Boss? No.

The hardest part of this boss for me was dodging his death from above attack. Once I figured that out, it was ok.

His spider mobs is just basic mob control 101. Can be frustrating when he starts casting magic at you, but you just have to pick your spots and don't get greedy.

I killed him on my first try both times he showed up and I thought he was one of the easiest bosses in the game, second only to Micolash maybe? Even his arcane AoE didn't seem very damaging to me. I didn't have much in the way of VIT because I'd been mainlining DPS but I was wearing the Student Set variant you find in Byrgenwerth just before him, so I had relatively high arcane resistance.

I thought the boss fight was hard until I realized I can just ignore the smaller spiders. I pretty much killed it pretty quickly.

@sarumarine: Pretty much what everyone is saying. Hunt down the Tonitrus in Yahargul or buy it after beating Paarl (does the spark badge get you the Tonitrus?) and just stay on the fucker. I find it easiest to hit once or twice, roll, repeat until you get scared, run out of stamina or he teleports.

I've never found an adequate way of dealing with him that doesn't involve the sentence "I sure hope I don't get unlucky and get hit by those falling magic icebergs". It is not a very fun - or very interesting - fight. Like the AVGN said, it's like coming out of a brutal fight, being the winner, but achieving nothing but some bloody bruises and broken bones. I mean this intrinsically, of course. Obviously your "reward" is progression. Still... Fuck.

Thread's over two weeks old now but fuck it

Here's 9 minutes of me freaking out

I honestly feel like there is two camps in regards to how to do this boss. Kill the spiders or don't. I tried maybe about 10 times NOT killing the spiders and couldn't beat it, I got somewhat close but there was too many spiders. Then I killed the spiders in just the first two rounds and I was able to beat it first try. I'd suggest doing it that way, seemed to work for me. Also you can dodge his sky attacks but it can be a little tricky- and when he goes on his back RUN and you'll escape his AOE.

Sorry to dig this up after 6 months but I wound up just getting double-buffed and doing basic attacks with the Holy Blade. Its a bit of a war of attrition but its a quick way to do it. I didn't fancy taking on the minions much due to potentially losing sight on Rom. Any situation where minions are involved I tend to tackle things at the source. Didn't find him too tough but then I do get lucky.

@sterling: This is what I did and had no problems with him.

I found he wasn't attacking before his first warp, so I took out the spiders with the tonitrus, switched to my saw cleaver, added bolt then went to town. Got him down to 50% before his first warp. After that I just kept my saw cleaver buffed with bolt and just ran around the little spiders and bashed away at his side. Was a pretty quick fight.

Isn't calling it Rom copyright infringement?