Or just bait his flurry attack at the top of the staircase and wait for him to tire out, he stays down for a good 10-15 seconds, rinse and repeat

OP ... It's your game, play your way

50 arrows!? It took me about 8 or so headshots to kill him. I'm playing a dex build, though. YMMV

Dropped great sword for me but i think its random strong equipment

I farmed the Tower Knights for about an hour before beating the Iron Golem, and he drops a number of things: 1) Tower Shield 2) Great Sword 3) Large titanite Shard x1 4) Greataxe 5) All pieces of the "Steel" Armor Set (Helm, armor, gauntlets, and leggings...basically things you can buy from the Crestfallen Merchant if you have the souls...

An interesting thing to note though (and the true reason I farmed the Tower Knight for an hour heh heh...) is that if you haven't beaten the main boss of an area (The Depths, Blighttown, Sen’s Fortress, etc), the game keeps a tally of all enemies you have killed in that area, and some enemies count towards an invisible "point-system" that rewards you with one Liquid Humanity when a specific score is reached, before resetting to zero. The point tiers are: 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 etc, all the way up to 1000, and reset to zero after each score is reached. I’ll give you an example: the first point tier is 100, and certain enemies have a hidden number that gets added up until you reach this hidden point tier. The Tower Knights are worth 20 points each time you kill one, meaning if you kill 5 of these guys before defeating the Iron Golem (totaling 100pts), you will be awarded with 1 Liquid Humanity! After you reach this, the counter resets to zero and 200 points must now be obtained in this area before you are rewarded with another Liquid Humanity. Simply kill 10 now and you will be rewarded again. You can do this in any area with a major boss, and a total of 10 Liquid Humanity can be acquired in each area by this method. Each area has its own individual point tally, so it’s ok if you defeat a boss before doing this. You can always move on to the next area and use this method if you wish. BE WARNED: most enemies are only worth about 5 points or so, so unless the area has a lot of enemies it can take a while to reach the required score count once you get to 300+. Because of this, the Tower Knights are excellent for getting liquid humanity quickly in a pinch, since they are worth 20 points each and will always respawn (I assume you’ve found the bonfire up top?). If you’re powerful enough, you can run over to him from the bonfire, kill with a few hits or pyromancy flame, and then run back down to the bonfire in about 1-2 minutes. Happy farming!

yes he goes to firelink if u talk to him

He tells you he's going to Firelink Shrine when you free him.

Yes, he goes to firelink shrine

Don't know why someone thumbed you down for stating something useful lol.

To elaborate for future readers: As soon as you enter Sen's fortress, defeat the first two Serpent enemies in the starting room with the floor trap. In the very next room you will see first catwalk with swinging axes (the big room with the titanite Demons down below). From the beginning of the catwalk, you can literally drop all the way down and there will be a ladder to your left that serves to take you back to where you just jumped from. If you do not want to drop from this high, you can also proceed to the end of the catwalk all the way across the room, and then drop down to the lower level on your right side with the lightning-throwing serpents. Either way is fine. HOWEVER, if you decide to drop down where these lightning serpents are, you will have to run all the way across the bottom floor and to get to the ladder and it will be TO THE RIGHT OF THE titanite DEMON, NOT THE LEFT. After climbing this ladder, simply turn to your right and strike the illusory wall, and another ladder will appear. Climb this ladder to reach the outside area where the Gate Giant is (you can even see the chain he pulled). I believe he drops a titanite chunk.

There is a section referred to as "The Pit" and the gate giant is mentioned there...

He's worth 1200 souls. It's largely pointless to actually get onto his platform and fight him, though. Once you're there, you can't go back, and you'll have to jump down into the boulder control room and walk all the way through the fortress again (or at least down to the first floor where the lift is if you activated it). Just shoot him in the head with a bow if you really must kill him for whatever reason.

Not entirely true, you don't have to jump back into boulder control room, I don't remember exactly how, but you can jump back in the direction you came from and even find a sniper crossbow, I think it's the only way to get it.

Yeah, I got the same thing. I think it's just a mistake though. In all fairness, why the hell is the lightning spear named the same as the lightning spear? That's like there being two master swords, sept one is a really a stick with a triforce etched on it. Not to knock the actual spear. I just have the Zweihander+10, and this spear has little benefit with the incredibly resilient foes around here. Now a thunder bolt on the other hand...

Pretty sure mimics also have a (quite slow) breathing animation too

this is brilliant. thanks for the sage advice. in newer games, you can spot mimics because you can immediately target them!

Could have been a red phantom from a gravelord servant seeding your world with an eye of death. They only appear on NG+ or above though.

Hmmm. That’s a mystery to me. I never made it to Sen’s back when I played DS1 in 2011. Finally played through with Remastered and currently in NG+, but even in NG, I was getting weird msgs about disaster and seeing strange white eye signs everywhere, lol. I don’t know what’s happening. Is this even real life?

Does sound like a Gravelord Servant. Normally it is NG+ but if your level is high enough I think it can affect you..