Me after Frenzied flame ending haha haligtri go brrrrrrr

I like this boss, I do but I feel waterflow dance from melee range is kinda bs, but other than that the whole fight was the definition of fun for me. Also I want to add that at first I was super annoyed by her healing, but later on I stopped noticing entirely . Anyways, my advice is to craft Freezing pots if you are struggling with waterflow, I personally used it when she started the attack when I was in melee range, also you can interrupt phantom attack this way too. Hopefully dlc will bring more human-sized bosses like Malenia, although hopefully not as long as this fight, because roughly 35k hp + all the healing from hits is kinda a lot of hp.

What worked for me was Mohg’s spear, plus Ironjar Aromatic. Her slash attacks did little but ticks, and Mohg can burn her down faster than she was able to heal.

Tried to “get good”, but at my age and with arthritis, I need to think of a strategy that will work with my limitations.

Finally beat her totally solo. Waterfowl was nuts at first but not actually that bad after a while. The key to this fight for me was mostly patience. Most of my deaths came from swinging first. It's best to punish big swings at the end of her combos. Otherwise keep some distance and try to keep the walls away from your backside. The easiest way to dodge Waterfowl is just to hold dash and run away in a straight line until the third flurry pops, then dodge the other way straight past her to miss the fourth and fifth. I didn't even have to mess with the target lock at all and there's time to start up an attack or heal afterward. Her second phase is harder because she doesn't wait around as much, but the same rules apply. Just be careful with your stamina and try to focus on punishing moves more than trying to stun her out of them and you'll get it eventually.

Just beat her RL1 solo. It took me days and days and DAYS of attempts but I finally did it. I must have died what seemed like 200 times at least (could be more).

Used cold uchi, blue gold kite shield, radagons soreseal, ritual shield, ritual sword, and Dragoncrest Greatshield. Could not figure out how to get the parry timing down for some of her attacks so I just resorted to plain dodging and shielding as a backup for when I missed a dodge.

Ritual shield + dragoncrest ensures that most of her attacks in phase 1 won’t insta-kill you on RL1. The exceptions are her thrust, grab, uppercut, charge (all of which are pretty straightforward to dodge and leave big windows to attack her) and of course waterfowl dance.

Phase 2 more of her attacks will insta-kill but saving your physick with opaline hardtear in it for the second half of the fight helps make some of the attacks not insta-kill again.

Used bloodhounds step to dodge waterfowl dance. Even after the nerf of Bloodhounds step I couldn’t find a better solution to this attack. I found the most consistent way to dodge was to start running away immediately and then the minute she hits the ground for her first wave of strikes you use bloodhounds step. This will make it so the second wave goes off right in front of you but does not hit you. Dodge through the 3rd one. And then just mostly just stand in place for the last few (strafe a little bit away from her but no dodging or anything like that). This pretty consistently worked for me no matter how close I was to her when she started the attack.

Lvl 143, Eleonora's Poleblade L2 + mimic. Took 4 tries to beat. She didn't even get off 1 waterfowl the last time, and maybe 3min fight. Poleblade absolutely wrecks her with melt + stagger. Also I am NOT a skilled player so just a heads up for anyone struggling.

My honest reaction to dying to waterflow for the 50th time: :o

Used flame of the fell god + giantsflame take thee on the first phase then on the second phase switched to lightning spear incant and each time after she used the scarlet aeonia move i used blackflame tornado on grave scythe.
As a caster the waterfowl dance is not too difficult to dodge, but the phantom attacks were something else i had to record my attempts just to know how to dodge that move.
Black flame tornado was very powerful, when fully charged dealing ~5k dmg (with FLAME-SHROUDING CRACKED TEAR and SPIKED CRACKED TEAR) , but with my whole stamina bar as a tradeoff.
Great boss, let's see if my opinion stays the same after attempting full melee on the next run.

Easy cheese rivers of blood and the crystal tear that boots consecutive damage rotten or not winged sword insignia warrior jar shard and Flame Grant Me Strength

Tiche +10, Bolt of Gransax +10. That was how the deed was done, after many, many attempts. Still needed to learn her moves because Tiche would not always hold aggro, but if you position Malenia so she is walking towards you across the pond and away from Tiche, the water amplifies the lightning just enough so she is regularly knocked down and stunned and has barely anytime to let off Waterfowl.

The combat information's tips and strategies for Malenia recommends anyone finding her exceptionally difficult should consider a respec so they can use ROB. But I've just noticed that Mohg's sacred spear and Morgott's cursed sword aren't mentioned at all as being viable or otherwise to use against her. I got the sacred spear and cursed sword from their respective remembrances but before I respec so I can use them in NG+ I'm hoping anyone who has used either weapon to beat Malenia or anyone who found them a bad choice for this fight will reply with their experience of using them against her.