Overkill

Description

Players who can Overkill an enemy will gain a bonus of 20% souls, making farming weaker enemies more profitable. Overkill is signified by a somewhat longer "soul absorb" animation and sharper SFX.

Conditions

You must be able to do greater than 150% of the target's max HP in one attack.

• Doesn't matter if the target has full health or not. (e.g. you damaged an enemy for half its HP, then do a riposte, and you'll still get the overkill bonus).
• Damage must be done in a single hit. Riposte and backstab counts as single hit, even though certain weapons have 2 or 3 damage stages.

Kills that do not count as overkill:

• Combos don't count as a single hit. This includes Homing Soulmass-type spells.
• Poisoning and Toxic effects can't trigger overkill.
• Fall damage (kicking enemies off cliff) can't trigger overkill.

Tips to Achieve Overkill

Apart from being overpowered, a few examples:

• General
  • Power Within. It raises all damage by 40% at the cost of health drain.
  • Hitting staggered enemy grants 40% extra damage and can be done with all forms of attack.

• Melee
  • Backstab with Hornet Ring.
  • Riposte with Hornet Ring. Ripostes have higher damage multiplier than backstabs, but are relatively harder to perform.
  • Counter hit an enemy, can be further increased when wearing the Leo Ring for a total of ~67% extra damage.

• Bow
  • Headshot. Extra 20% damage and staggers enemy. Works on most humanoid enemies. Signified by a sharp sound and a fountain of blood gushing out.

• Sorcery and Pyromancy
  • Equip the Crown of Dusk.
  • Equip the Bellowing Dragoncrest Ring.

• Miracle
  • Equip the Crown of Dusk.
  • Equip the Ring of the Sun's Firstborn.

Notes

• In order to maximize soul gain, equip Covetous Silver Serpent Ring and, if you are fine with the side-effect, Symbol of Avarice, for a total of 173% soul gain.
• Item drop rate doesn't seem to increase on Overkill.
• Overkill is unachieveable on bosses.
• Overkill exists in Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and Dark Souls 3, but not in Dark Souls 2.