Elden Ring: Nightreign - Ironeye Hands-On Preview - IGN

In Elden Ring, the bow is traditionally used as a support weapon, ideal for drawing enemy attention, softening them up from a distance, or even causing strategic falls for rune farming. However, in Nightreign, when you choose to play as the Ironeye, the bow becomes central to your gameplay, offering a unique style that sets it apart from the other classes and positions it as the closest thing to a support class within the game. To see the Ironeye in action, check out the exclusive gameplay video below.

Playing as the Ironeye, you'll notice they are quite vulnerable, making it essential to keep a bow at the ready to stay out of harm's way. Fortunately, your starting bow is effective, with decent damage and the Mighty Shot skill, allowing you to strike from a great distance, deal extra damage, and inflict significant poise damage.

Nightreign has revamped the mechanics of bows significantly. They now fire faster, and you can move more swiftly while targeting locked-on enemies. The game eliminates the need for arrows, though this limits you to the type provided by your bow. Additional enhancements include a new animation for shooting while rolling, the ability to perform acrobatic feats like wall-running and shooting, and the option to aim in third-person mode at an increased speed. The strong attack now sends out a spread of three arrows, effective against multiple foes, and you can execute backstabs or visceral attacks on downed enemies with arrows. These changes make the bow a formidable primary weapon, addressing the shortcomings it had in the base version of Elden Ring.

The Ironeye’s main skill, Marking, is a swift dagger dash that penetrates enemies and marks them for additional damage from all sources. With a short cooldown, you can consistently apply this debuff to bosses, enhancing your team's damage output. It also serves as an excellent mobility tool, allowing you to evade danger by passing through enemies.

The Ironeye's ultimate ability, Single Shot, is an enhanced version of Mighty Shot. While it requires time to charge, you remain invulnerable during the animation, and the shot delivers massive damage, piercing through obstacles and enemies, making it ideal for crowd control.

What truly makes the Ironeye valuable in a team is their ability to revive allies from a safe distance. In Nightreign, reviving involves depleting a partitioned circle above a downed ally. Most classes must risk close combat or use valuable resources to revive, but the Ironeye can do so safely and resource-free from afar. This capability can be crucial for the success of a run. However, the Ironeye struggles to revive allies requiring all three circle partitions to be cleared, as their long-range damage output isn't sufficient without using their ultimate.

Though the Ironeye may not match the raw damage output of other classes, their utility is unparalleled. Their marking ability boosts team damage, their passive increases item finds for the squad, their ultimate clears mobs effectively, and their unique revival method from a distance makes them an indispensable asset in any team composition in Nightreign.