Parry

Overview

A parry is the act of countering an enemy's hit through the use of a parry-enabled shield or weapon (e.g. the Farron greatsword). The parry frames, i.e. the frames of your parry animation that will fully parry an opponent's parryable attack, are not necessarily at the beginning of the parry animation.

Additionally to the parry there is also a partial parry, meaning if you fail to time your parry frames to the opponents attack you will take reduced damage and won't be staggered.

Frame data

Parrying tool	Starting frame	Parrying frames	Earliest attack frame
Fists and Claws	8th	10	14th
Shields	8-12th	6-12	24-28th
Daggers	12th	10	22nd
Curved swords	12th	6	18th
Thrusting swords	12-36th	6-8	0-24th
Straight swords	32-36th	2-4	0
Katanas	32-34th	4-6	0-6th
Halberds	40-42nd	6-8	10-12th
Ultra Greatswords	48-52nd	4	12-18th
Greatswords	38th	4-10	8-10th
Axes	34th	4	6-8th

Source:¹²

Player's attacks

• Running and Rolling R1 : Can be parried on every weapon except Whips.
• Unlocked, "dead angled" attacks of normally parryable attacks: Cannot be parried³

Weapon class	Unparryable attacks
All weapons	Running R2 / Jumping attack
All Ultra Great weapons	2H R1, 2H R2, fully charged 1H R2 (?)
Whips	All attacks
Fists	Leaping Slash (Claw) Flame Whirlwind (Demon's Fist)
Halberds	Spin Sweep and follow-up R2 (Lucerne, Black Knight Glaive) Chain Spin and follow-up R2 (Winged Knight Halberd)
Pikes and Spears	Spin Sweep (Partizan)
Curved Swords	Spin Slash and follow-up R2 Tornado and follow-up R2 (Storm Curved Sword) Crescent Blade (Crescent Moon Sword) Frost Blade and follow-up R2 (Pontiff Knight Curved Sword) Chained Dance (Painting Guardian's Curved Sword)
Hammers	Spin Bash (Drang Hammers)
Katanas	Onislayer (Onikiri and Ubadachi)
Straight Swords	Spin Slash (Gotthard Twinswords) Stomp (Dark Sword)
Greatswords	Stomp (Executioner's Greatsword)
Curved Greatswords	2H R2, fully charged 1H R2 Spin Slash and follow-up R2 (Murakumo, Exile Greatsword) Wolf Leap (Old Wolf Curved Sword)
Great Hammers	Spin Bash and follow-up R2 (Spiked Mace) Warcry follow-up R2s (Great Club, Large Club) Molten Perseverance follow-up R2 (Old King's Great Hammer) Kindled Flurry and follow-up R2 (Gargoyle Flame Hammer)
Greataxes	Demonic Flare (Demon's Great Axe) Warcry 2H follow-up R2s (Black Knight Greataxe) The first hit of Warcry 1H follow-up R2 (Black Knight Greataxe)
Ultra Greatswords	Stomp Flame of Lorian (Lorian's Greatsword) Profaned Flame (Profaned Greatsword)

Source:⁴

Parryable enemies

Parryable bosses:⁵

Name	Notes
Iudex Gundyr	First phase only.
Crystal Sage	-
Deacons of the Deep	-
Abyss Watchers	Both phases.
Champion Gundyr	Both phases.
Pontiff Sulyvahn	-
The Twin Princes	Both phases. Cannot be riposted.

Footnotes

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48iDk6VHwsw

2. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1OczX3fBJc8Ubb_3AOVajRlkE5GgShFISdgaOPjhmqs0

3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI59kIqMeXY

4. https://www.reddit.com/r/darksouls3/comments/4hrzmy/guide_to_parryable_and_unparryable_weapons/

5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKo9eMsyjgU