Frenzy

Frenzy is a Status Effect in Bloodborne.

Mechanics[]

Frenzy is a very dangerous status effect that acts similarly to Rapid Poison, meaning it will build up and then deal a specific amount of damage to the player's health.

However, there are some notable key differences between the two:

When a player receives Frenzy, that amount of Frenzy does not immediately fill up the bar. Instead, the meter will gradually be filled on the player continuously. This means that the player has time to back away and heal if necessary, or cure the status effect all together, should players be willing to drink a Sedative.
Upon getting Frenzied, the player will immediately lose 75% of their total health. This means players need to be with at least 75%+ health in order to survive the Frenzy.
The level of Insight a player has will negatively affect their Frenzy Resistance. The higher one's insight is, the more susceptible they are to Frenzy. However, this only starts occurring upon having higher than 15 Insight. As such, keeping a maximum of 15 Insight is always recommended when exploring areas that can trigger Frenzy.

Sources of Frenzy[]

Enemies[]

Celestial Child - Their bites induce the Frenzy, and multiple bites will stack the Frenzy.
Church Servant - The ones who wield the crucifix-like weapon will deal low amounts of Frenzy, but are still very dangerous nonetheless.
Clocktower Patient - The patients that are only heads and move towards the player will inflict Frenzy with a spray of blood.
Winter Lantern - By far one of the most dangerous enemies within the game. Their presence is given away by their incessant humming, so proceed with caution upon hearing them. Since they have very high poise, they are almost impossible to stagger with regular weapons. As such, high poise damage weapons like the Beasthunter Saif, Ludwig's Holy Blade, Kirkhammer, or Bloodletter could be used to stunlock it to death. Hunter Tools that knock it to the ground are also useful, such as the Augur of Ebrietas and Beast Roar.
Chalice Ghost (Cut Content) - It can shoot out several Messengers which deal damage and inflict Frenzy upon impact.

Bosses[]

Ebrietas, Daughter of the Cosmos

Others[]

Amygdala - The ones capable of grabbing the player with their hands will trigger immediate Frenzy.
Brain of Mensis - Not very dangerous in its direct encounter, but can still be a nuisance while climbing the path that leads to the castle. Upon reaching the floor it's on, players should instead turn back as there are not enough Sedatives in the world to save them from death. Note that its frenzy gaze can constantly deal damage even when the frenzy isn't fully built up. This could put the player’s health below 75% without taking damage, allowing them to die once the frenzy builds up.

Items[]

Bloodletter - Bizarrely, the Bloodletter's transformed state has an attack that will deal a Blood blast around it at the cost of inflicting Frenzy upon the player. This version of Frenzy, however, is actually very tolerable, as it will cut only 50% of a player's health instead of the usual 75%.

Resisting Frenzy[]

The following will aid in resisting Frenzy:

Notes[]

The Bloodletter's special attack can actually be used to save the player’s life, or at least save on Blood Vials. The trick here is to use it after being frenzied by any other source when it's near activating. This will cause the special Frenzy of the Bloodletter to nullify the pre-existing one and losing only 50% instead of 75%, thus saving 25% health in the heat of the moment.
The Brain of Mensis' Frenzy can constantly deal moderate damage to the player and other enemies in Nightmare of Mensis.

Trivia[]

Frenzy is widely recognized by the Bloodborne community as the most dangerous status effect in the game. Even when compared with status effects within the rest of the Souls' Series.
Those who died to frenzy will form Frenzied Coldblood in their body. The corpse from which the player can pick up the first Frenzied Coldblood appear to be pierced to death by thorny blood spikes growing from the inside of his body. This suggests that frenzy also has some sort of physical manifestation rather than a mere mental effect.
Church Attire has Low Frenzy resistance and high Beasthood. This might indicate that they are closer to beasts then some of the people of Yharnam.
In Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, there is a status effect called "Terror", which works similarly, in concept, to Frenzy, the only difference being that it outright instantly kills players if the bar fills to full.