Dark Souls

How to Kick in Dark Souls 3

This page explains how to kick in Dark Souls 3.

Swinging and slashing your sword across the belly of your enemy is one way to defeat them, or arrows can fly through the air to skewer them like an old dart board. But sometimes a good old kick is all you need to send an NPC or invader straight off a high place to their death. If it makes you feel better, you could yell out, “this is Sparta!”

Beware of your stamina, Dark Souls 3 isn’t Devil May Cry or some other action game where stamina is plentiful or infinite, once your stamina is down, you’re vulnerable to attacks and death comes swiftly and often. Spamming the attack button won’t get you far in this game.

For many, Dark Souls 3 is a lot tougher than past games due to the increased animations resulting in faster enemies and meaning you need to anticipate an attack and parry or move sooner.

During PvP and PvE combat it’s imperative that you have enough stamina to block and attack. Holding your shield up drains some stamina while the enemy attacks you. Your poise can be lowered by a strong attack which will see your shield arm drop and you open for punishment.

How to Kick DS3
Dark Souls 3 First Boss

If your opponent is close to a ledge, you can use spells or your weapons to knock them over the edge, but it doesn’t always work. Expect the unexpected — a kick. Since you need two inputs to do a single kick, many players don’t do it that often if at all. And sometimes, you’ll end up accidentally performing a regular attack.

How to Kick

Players can kick by pushing the left analogue stick forward and pressing R1/RB. As I mentioned, you’ll probably initiate an attack rather than a kick. It’s a small game mechanic which does take down some of the opponent’s stamina but overall, it’s not that effective in combat. The shield’s stability also plays a part so you may or may not break their guard allowing for attack.

Now for the real kicker, get it? Kicker! There’s a ring which will knock 40% more stamina from an enemy guarding against your kicks. The Horsehoof Ring is sold by Unbreakable Patches and they drop it you choose to kill them.

The NPC can be found in the Cathedral of the Deep where he will be disguised as Siegward of Catarina (onion head). He’s quite the scoundrel and can be killed or you can do some quests for this cheeky chap and buy the ring later. That is all up to you.

That page detailed how to kick in Dark Souls 3.

George Dermanakis

Hi! I'm George Dermanakis, the owner of NeuralGamer. I'm a passionate gamer, writer, and website developer. I've watched as NeuralGamer grew from a one-person team (me) to a team consisting of content writers, organizers, and more. Read some of my articles and make a judgment call — was it up to your standards? Hopefully, it was a smooth experience. I have many thousands of hours on Steam, and I consider myself an expert in any Paradox Interactive game, Cookie Run Kingdom, Dark Souls, The Forest, Civilization 6, Tropico and Merge games. Between these games, I have over 10,000 hours! If you need help, let us know through the Contact Us page. Thanks!