| “ | A champion's greatsword, capable of sundering all things in the universe. | „ |
The Durandal is a Greatsword in Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
Description[]
The Durandal is an overhead-swing weapon that, in the style of the game's greatswords in general, features a superior ATK stat in exchange for a slow and delayed swing motion. Its 65 ATK is the third highest ATK value in the game without considering items crafted using 32-bit Coins, with the only weapons stronger than it being legendary-tier greatswords it can be "upgraded" into through crafting. Its Slash attribute makes it good against "fleshy" or "clothed" enemies, slightly worse against "armored" enemies, and "general-purpose" overall. It is the last greatsword-style weapon that can produce and teach the Sickle Moon technique (↓ ↘ → + [Attack], 60 MP/s), which can be seen as a more unwieldy version of the Penetrate technique seen on spears like Gondo-Shizunori in terms of being usable as a stand-in for the distance-covering function of the endgame Accelerator shard. It can only perform the Trucidating Gyre technique (↓ ↙ ← → + [Attack], 50 MP) once you have mastered it on a weapon like Pelekus or Berdiche.
The remarkable feature of the Durandal is how deceptively early it can be acquired in the game, despite its ATK value and positioning as a weapon that can eventually be upgraded into one of the "ultimate" greatswords by the end of the game. To players unfamiliar with the game, it might appear that the recipe book that unlocks it, Very Fine Equipment/R, is hidden in an area atop Dian Cécht Cathedral that requires Invert or High Jump to reach, placing the Durandal's availability shortly before the Oriental Sorcery Lab very late in the game. However, it is possible to use the Dive Kick move of the Double Jump shard to reach that chest by kicking off a hanging lantern near the bell you need to land onto. This makes the Durandal's availability restricted only by the materials used to craft it: one each of all three "elemental greatswords," those being the Lohengrin, Schedar, and Steel Lightning.
All three of the component greatswords are acquired by "upgrading" a Gram greatsword with a Crystal and the corresponding "elemental ring": Flame Ring, Ice Ring, and Thunder Ring. These recipes are unlocked by the Fine Equipment/R recipe book that can be found fairly easily in the Hall of Termination. Gram is crafted out of the midgame-tier materials Mithril, Damascus, and Silver after finding Damascus Equipment/R in Underground Sorcery Lab. Crystals start being found in blue chests in the later regions of Forbidden Underground Waterway, which effectively means you can start crafting elemental greatswords by that point, and then merge them into a Durandal if you have already reached Very Fine Equipment/R. Durandal can thus be used against the boss in Hidden Desert coming up. (This is not to mention that a free Steel Lightning can be found in the part of the Waterway just off the west exit of Hidden Desert, and a free Lohengrin can be found in Inferno Cave later on.)
With money, it is technically possible to assemble a Durandal at an even earlier point by disassembling certain weapons for Crystals. Once you defeat the Glutton Train at the Bridge of Evil, the Schedar happens to become one of the various weapons that get added to Dominique's supply post without even requiring you to craft it, and you can buy copies of it for 12,600G. You can dismantle a Schedar (using 8 Alkahests) into a Gram and a Crystal, making you capable of crafting the other two elemental greatswords just by supplying the extra required elemental ring and finding Fine Equipment/R in Hall of Termination. Once you have also found Very Fine Equipment/R in the Cathedral through the dive-kicking "trick," you can fight Bloodless with a completed Durandal.
It is not particularly difficult to optimize the Greatsword Expertise passive shard for this weapon's benefit. Even if you are avoiding spending gold whenever possible, assembling Greatsword Expertise at both Grade 9 and Rank 9 simply amounts to spending 18 Bronze on nine Claymores, 6 Iron on three Pelekus, 6 more Iron and 6 Obsidian on three Flamberges, and 2 each of the aforementioned Mithril, Damascus, and Silver on two more Grams. Having both the passive shard and skill shard versions of a maxed-out Greatsword Expertise shard active at the same time makes for enough of a hefty improvement to Durandal's damage and performance that it can easily carry you through to the end of the game, especially when Augment STR and Optimizer are also added to your skill shard collection.
Once you have reached the Den of Behemoths near the end of the game, you can start "upgrading" Durandals into the final greatswords of the main game. Presuming you have collected Crimsonite Equipment/R and a Crimsonite from a blue chest in Oriental Sorcery Lab, getting a Fiend Fang to drop from the Marbas and Silver Wolfman enemies in the Den lets you turn a Durandal into a Dies Irae (an unexpectedly weaker greatsword whose dual Light and Dark attributes might not be enough to compensate for the missing ATK points). Then, that Dies Irae can be "upgraded" into one of two final greatswords unlocked by Legendary Equipment/R (found in a part of Hall of Termination requiring Invert or High Jump): Eternal Blue and Ukonvasara.
Availability[]
- Arvantville:
- Crafted at Johannes's laboratory by spending the following Materials (requires Very Fine Equipment/R):
- Lohengrin ×1
- Schedar ×1
- Steel Lightning ×1
- Purchased from Dominique's supply post for 24,300G after crafting it.
- Crafted at Johannes's laboratory by spending the following Materials (requires Very Fine Equipment/R):
Usage[]
While Durandal is equipped, Miriam's attack becomes the "greatsword overhead swing" with an ATK +65 boost and the Slash attribute.
It is initially capable of the Sickle Moon Technique (60 MP per second, Down → Down-Forward → Forward + Attack), which will be passed on to all G-Swords once mastered.
Durandal is a material used to craft the following items:
- Dies Irae (Durandal ×1, Crimsonite ×1, Fiend Fang ×1)
Origins[]
Durendal, also spelled Durandal, is the sword of Roland, legendary paladin of Charlemagne in French epic literature. It is also said to have belonged to young Charlemagne at one point, and, passing through Saracen hands, came to be owned by Roland.
According to La Chanson de Roland (The Song of Roland), the sword was brought by an angel to Charlemagne who was at the vale of Moriane, and Charles then gave it to Roland. In that poem, the sword is said to contain within its golden hilt a tooth of Saint Peter, blood of Basil of Caesarea, hair of Saint Denis, and a piece of the raiment of Mary, mother of Jesus, and to be the sharpest sword in all existence.
At the Battle of Roncevaux Pass, Roland took the rearguard to hold off the Saracen army troops long enough for Charlemagne's army to retreat into France. Roland slew a vast number of enemies wielding Durendal. With the sword, Roland even succeeded in slicing the right arm of the Saracen king Marsile, and decapitated the king's son, Jursaleu, sending the one-hundred-thousand-strong army to flight.
Roland later attempted to destroy the sword by hitting it against blocks of marble, to prevent it from being captured by the attacking Saracens, but Durendal proved indestructible. After being mortally wounded, Roland hid it beneath his body as he lay dying along with the oliphant, the horn used to alert Charlemagne before succumbing to his injury.