Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree introduces over a dozen new bosses, including 10 Remembrance bosses. Among these, Commander Gaius stands out as one of the most annoyingly difficult and aggressive encounters, second only to the final boss. Commander Gaius can be found in a secret area deep within the Shadow Keep. Thankfully, unlike games such as Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and Sekiro, Elden Ring and its DLC offer a massive open world filled with build potential, enabling players to overcome even the toughest encounters, including those in the newly minted Lands of Shadow.
If you want to delete Commander Gaius as quickly as possible without much effort, bleed and rot are key to defeating the mounted menace. Weapons like Rakshasha’s Great Katana or old stand-ins like Rivers of Blood, coupled with either a cocktail of the Opaline Hardtear or the Opaline Bubbletear, mixed into your flask of Wondrous Physick, both of which can be found in the base game, topped with a rot-inducing encantation can quickly demolish Commander Gaius with little effort.
For my build, I went with the Scarlet Aeonia spell, which can be learned using Malenia’s Remembrance — however, in a pinch, spells such as Rotten Breath and Ekzykes Decay can work just as well, minus having a harder window of opportunity to proc it, as Commander Gaius gives little time to engage him without getting completely trounced.
Starting the battle, immediately summon your mimic or preferred Spirit Summon, basically, anything that can draw the aggro away from yourself, to give you time to use Scarlet Aeonia or your Rot spell of choice, then immediately run behind the building to use your flask to buff your defences before hopping on to Torrent.
From here, simply circle the map, avoiding Gaius while the Rot and your mimic do most of the work, stepping in only to deal a few hits here and there if you think you can survive it. With that, victory should be yours with minimal engagement with the boss, making for a stress-free sprint outside of the Shadow Keep.
