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Each Soul of a Giant you carry halves Vendrick’s defense modifier in Dark Souls II. With none, his defense is 32× its base value; with five, it returns to the 1× baseline. The effect stops at five, so four souls leave him at 2× defense. Keep the items in your inventory—consuming one removes its effect.
How many Souls of a Giant do you need for Vendrick?
Five gives the maximum reduction. The Dark Souls II Wiki.gg entries for Vendrick and Soul of a Giant describe a 32× starting defense modifier that is halved for each soul held, up to five.
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| Souls held | Vendrick’s defense modifier | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 32× | Damage is heavily reduced. |
| 1 | 16× | The modifier is halved once. |
| 2 | 8× | The modifier is halved twice. |
| 3 | 4× | The modifier is halved three times. |
| 4 | 2× | Vendrick still has twice the base defense modifier. |
| 5 or more | 1× | The maximum reduction; additional souls do not lower it further. |
This is a sequence of defense modifiers, not a promise that every weapon or build will deal twice as much damage for each additional soul. The attack and damage type also affect the damage you inflict; the Vendrick entry discusses those factors alongside his defense.
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Why are you doing so little damage to Vendrick?
If you have few or no Souls of a Giant, Vendrick’s defense modifier is exceptionally high. Each carried soul halves that modifier, but the reductions compound: even three souls leave it at 4×, and four leave it at 2×. The Vendrick entry recommends having at least four, but five is the number required to reach the 1× baseline.
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Players often call these “Giant Souls,” but the item’s in-game name is Soul of a Giant. The effect depends on holding the item, not merely having collected it earlier. According to the item entry, consuming one grants 10,000 souls but removes it from your inventory, so it will no longer count toward Vendrick’s defense reduction.
Where can you get Souls of a Giant?
The Soul of a Giant entry lists five acquisition sources:
- A giant corpse at the end of the Memory of Jeigh, after defeating the Giant Lord.
- A giant corpse at the end of the Memory of Orro.
- A giant corpse at the end of the Memory of Vammar.
- A drop from the second of two Elite Giants killed in a hidden cave in Black Gulch.
- A drop from the Ancient Dragon, identified by the item entry as the only farmable source.
If you already have four, the decision is whether to pursue the fifth for the final reduction from 2× to 1×. The listed farmable source is the Ancient Dragon; no acquisition-time comparison is established by the cited entries.
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The item entry says Souls of a Giant are retained when entering NG+. That lets you keep them for a later Vendrick fight, provided they remain in your inventory rather than being consumed.
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How reliable are the listed defense values?
The progression is reported by community-maintained wiki entries, not presented here as an official developer statistic. A separate Fandom Vendrick entry also reports the 32× starting state and reduction with up to five souls; it notes that the displayed defense values reflect the five-soul condition. These references support the mechanic, but they do not establish that every attack will experience identical damage changes.
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