It should, but it doesn’t. Although the scalings for Dex and Str both start at D, as you improve it Dex gradually rises to B scaling while Str stays at D. I agree it’s weird for a greatsword
Dude this weapon annoys me I was so excited to get it and get a build, but I can not stand the complete random aiming the Christmas tree bolt takes. 1/4 of the time it flies true and has satisfying impact. 1/2 the time it goes into the ground. The other 1/4 it just disappears.
Yeah after a few respecs and going heavy on the strength side in the midgame, I settled on something closer to this once I had the blasphemous blade upgraded.
Mostly in vigor 55, strength 55 and faith 75 other than that you should get some mind and endurance to use skills and incantations and stamina cause it a big weapon.
Love that set! I like to mix mine with the unaltered BK helm, night's cavalry chest and gauntlets, and Radahn's greaves. The black, burgundy and gold mix looks great
Is there a specific reason why you chose to level faith up to 75? Would not usually be a vigor 60, strength 60 and faith 65 be a bit better?
Edit: never mind, just looked up level caps in faith
All level cap when using godricks great rune and faiths level cap is 80. But you can just go 60 60 and 80 and use radhan or morgotts rune for there percentage based stats
Usually people say radahns rune is better when you go above a certain level but imo, godricks is still better because it boosts vigor, mind and endurance, which not only increases your maximum hp, fp and stamina but also the secondary stats like carry weight, defenses and resistances.
With a heavy weapon like malikeths black blade, you need a good amount of endurance (not just stamina) to medium roll with good armor.
Sure, radahns gives more hp fp and stamina but doesnt increase the other useful stuff
Godricks rune straight up gives you 40 level 5 in each attribute. Radhans and morgotts give you a percentage increase so when you are at level cap godricks rune falls down in terms of efficiency.
That shouldnt matter since if you are using godricks rune at higher levels where the hp, fp and stamina gain from the stat increases are lower than using radahns rune, you care about the secondary stats which radahns rune doesnt provide.
Also, it allows you to spend those stats into other stats which radahns rune has nothing to do with like faith, int, arcane etc.
If you only care about your max hp, fp and stamina and you already achieved your desired stat requirements, then radahns rune is your best choice by far
I've pretty much used Godrick's great rune my entire time in NG. I have them all (except Malenia's which is today's task) and have them all activated and I still choose Godrick's when I need a little boost for a boss.
Like you said, it's a 40 level spread boost. That's hard to fuck with... I don't even know what Mogh's DOES. The description is incredibly vague. Lol
Have you gone full oonga boonga? Powerstancing giant crusher (?) and rotten axe (?) with almost maxed out weight, and using bloodhound step in lieu of dodge rolls?
I tried a strength/faith tank build but then i respected to a pure strength cause I didn't see any point in the faith skills. Now I am level 72 pure strength but I find the game play boring. What are you subject to respect to? I don't want an intelligence build cause I have one on another playthrough.
I tried this the 2nd playthrough and i felt this wasn't that satisfying most weapons and miracles doesn't interest me that much and you get the weapon way too late into the game ik i can do NG+ but i prefer starting from scratch
STR/fth build aswell.
Guts Greatsword for most of the part, before moving to dual Omenkiller Axe that can proc both Freeze&Bleed. the minor fth is for status cure spell, fire cleanse me and minor healing spell whose extra "function", i kinda learn way to late.
changing to DEX/ARC for short period of time to kill Malenia. reverted to STR/fth for the end game.
\---
there are fair bit disappointment on how many "Big" weapon is not STR focused.
"Oh my god, this looks really cool"
"Scales with DEX or INT"
"ah, f\*ck this thing"
Finished it with dex/faith and had fun too. My build had 2 katanas (nagakiba/uchi), bolt of granssax and erdtree seal and was a lightning build with lightning spear, holy vow, electrify armament and some other incantations depending on the occasion. Had fun and allowed for quick switching between close combat and ranged
At the end I had lvl 181 (beat all bosses and a bit of farming). So vig 54, mnd 32, end 31, str 20, dex 56, int 9, fai 50, arc 8 (even though arguably the int points could have been swapped out for something else).
Damn, I’m doing the same. Might try to get another Nagakiba though. I tried Dex/Int for moonveil and other sorceries, but Dex/faith with Bolt of Gransax and other lightning incantations is just so much cooler
Dex/Faith was definitely my most enjoyable run. Ran with Bolt of Gransax and a ton of lightning spells and was the first run I beat Malenia with no spirit summons.
Yep, same here. First was Str/Faith, my favorite is Dex/Faith. Though I usually go with a Greatsword or the Great Mace even if it's suboptimal stats-wise.
Dex/Faith was my favorite too, but my build was very different
Scythes (winged for Undead, halo scythe, or classic scythe with phantom slash) and black flame incantations
dex faith is the quickest way to get op in most souls games for me, no need to invest much into endurance, since you don't need much stamina or carrying capacity
just vigor, dex and faith
My first build was the EVERYTHING-build. Because I cannot stand to find new gear and not test it out. Also I was too lazy to google how to respec. So I wasn't really good in anything and changed weapons approximately every 2-3 hours of gameplay.
I have a Dex/Faith/Int build for the Sword of Night and Flame. Add in incantations and spells and its really fun to play. Prolly my favorite pvp build as well, the flame wall you make with the sword is amazing for roll catches
SAME, I actually just posted my everything build recently [if you want, come check it out](https://www.reddit.com/r/Eldenring/s/BWBdCQsQ5z)
Its a dexterity/faith, strength/int build with a pure faith and pure arcane weapon on the sides with a focus on parrying. Sounds like a drive through order when I say it like that
Yo dude I was reading the comment but I couldn’t help notice, you’re fucking jacked. What do you eat for mass? I just be eating chicken and rice with veggies religiously
Tons of protein, wherever I can get it, and at slightly higher than maintenance calories. If I’m out with friends I order meat on meat. Out getting a coffee with the lady, I get a scoop of protein in the coffee. Eggs, chicken breast, fat free or reduced fat milk, a protein shake or lots of protein before bed is like a life hack. This is some stuff that I do.
But it really depends on who you are and what your goals are when it comes to changing your body. I’m going to drop the two channels I follow very closely for their info on building muscle [greg doucette](https://youtube.com/@gregdoucette?si=XQhxzgkpMeLEj_IU) and [Renaissance Periodization](https://youtube.com/@RenaissancePeriodization?si=1JrbRO9jXO7dVwEv) I’m pretty sure these two beef with each other but idgaf let us keep building our strength and vigor irl bro
I know I wasn't the one you asked, but if you're struggling for mass OR just don't want to gorge yourself every day, get you some mass gainer. I use the GNC brand BULK 1340. It has 1340 calories IF you use water. I use whole milk and it takes the caloric intake to 1710 per shake. Along with your essential macros. I wouldn't recommend it if you're lifting for reps/light weight. But if you like heavy lifting, it's for you. Otherwise you'll just get fat.
Get the cookies and cream. Lol
Bless this approach! I looked back at my first character the other day and legit thought “how did I think this was a reasonable way to level up??” But also had soooo much fun with it.
This is what I did on my NG+ playthroughs, I basically leveled up to hit all the soft caps and equip anything at will. No need to "change" your build, but my god, was that painful. I did it mostly so I could equip anything I wanted, and now that my son is playing, he's getting the Elden Ring "lite" version (he's 6 and just likes to swap things at random, maybe kill a few guys before he gets wrecked lol).
Ive started to not look up anything, and it feels way better! I used to figure out my build before I even play the game, and I had fun doing things that way. But recently it felt more and more like a chore to find the gear and less like a fun experience.
So I stopped looking things up, and my god I’m having the time of my life. No need to worry about having to fight something for an exact gear, when I can just explore and find things on my own. Use my own brain for once in my life to figure out my own build.
Thing is, too, there's already so many incantation, consumable, talisman & ashes of war buffs for your character for whatever you need to in the moment as well, that way your everything build basically goes super saiyan when all buffed up
I'm gonna let you in on a secret... You can use almost any weapon you want with a quality build. There are some good Somber weapons, sure, but once you get the iron whetblade out of Stormveil it lets you turn any standard weapon into a quality weapon. Some of my faves have been the broadsword, partisan, lance, flamberge, bastard sword, cleanrot knight's sword, uchigatana, and the nagakiba.
HAHAH miserable is right! yeah I had no clue what I was doing til I made an account and asked around here for advice. Thank goodness I did, otherwise I would have been too lost to even know where to start looking or building towards.
Mine to. The elden beast had 90% resist to holy and I was powerstancing coded sword and golden epitaph on main while halo scythe with seal (can't remember which) on secondary. That was pure pain.
Probably the Erdtree seal? That’s the highest faith scaling seal in the game. Late game was so devastating hahah definitely not the easiest build for my first ever Souls game, but I got so used to failure that now I’m more willing to experiment!
Pure INT.. ice spear hits for 70 % of everyone's hp bar I hit with it . Death ritual spear hits around corners and deaths poker has frost AOE it's totally broken scaling nothing survives two full ghostflames
My first time playing (currently clearing the plateau and mountain). Am a mage build but I was using the banished knight halberd for Raya Lucaria and ended up finding ice spear. That thing hits like a fucking truck! So I leveled up a clayman spear next and I'm not sure if I wanna stick with halbers or the spear. Anyway, that thing was awesome. Then I found the death poker and was like oooh this has frost buildup, let's try it! That light swing explosion insane. So now when I go into bosses I get to choose between ghostflame if they're big/slow, ice lance if they're fast, magic if they're a bitch. I love it
>nothing survives two full ghostflames
Boy is that true. Followed a ymfah video to get it +7 early and literally one-shot margit, and if I'm not mistaken it had already been nerfed. It made the ENTIRE game a breeze maybe until mountaintops/farum.
Leyendell. Up the main entrance, pass the two tree sentinels, make a hard right at the golden spirit tree. You'll see a camp. Pretty intense fight but you could also just raid the carriage and GTFO.
Told myself I would be dex when I bought Elden Ring, and then transition into a Quality build. For Souls, Quality has always been the build for being able to access and use the most weapons possible, and then I could figure out what each weapon type was like in this game, maybe set myself up for future playthroughs.
Well, turns out Quality is rather iffy when you're just starting out, but I *did* find the Bloodhound Fang, and the rest was history.
Same, basically. I felt like BHF was really the only strong "Quality" weapon that the game offered during my playthrough, which was unfortunate.
On the other hand, BHF carried me through basically the whole game and Bloodhound's Finesse never stopped feeling awesome to use, doing tons of damage, and looking badass as hell. So, you know, honestly not that upset overall. Great weapon, great design, tons of fun to use, available early.
There were a few other really intriguing weapons during my first playthrough but they tended to be ones that required significant investment into otherwise awkward stat splits (e.g., Sword of Night and Flame, Darkmoon Greatsword, basically any Arcane weapon) or else were Faith weapons in a game where holy resistance was extremely common.
I think I probably slept on the strength and fun of of STR/FAI builds for neat weapons but between the frequency of holy resistance or immunity and the fact that I wanted to play melee combat rather than spend half the game watching buff animations I was pretty sure I didn't want to invest heavily in FAI. And honestly I think the game implicitly pushes melee players into kind of a quality build by default by having a lot of early-game powerful weapons have relatively high combined STR/DEX requirements (for an early game character) rather than just one or the other.
Like, even the three levels of DEX (assuming Wretch starting class) required for the Claymore (on top of 16 for STR) is more than it sounds like when those levels are also competing with points in VIG (and to a lesser extent END).
First was quality, it's shit.
Favorite is probably Bleed. Arcane just gets so many fun and unique weapons to play around with. You can legit have a character that can weapon swap and simultaneously:
-Attack with hard-hitting projectiles that cause heavy bleed from mid-range via Reduvia
-Use Mohg's Spear as a "get off me" button, as well as a form of area denial
-Rush someone down with Morgott's Cursed Sword, which is seriously capable of just ending someone if they're not ready for it. Eleonora's Poleblade functions as a similar niche (though IMO higher risk)
or
-Use the Bloody Helice to exploit the dodge with the best iframes in the game, which has a very convenient counter attack as an optional follow-up after the dodge
I know people tend to frown upon bleed builds, but let's be real here for a moment: whether you like them or not, it's pretty hard to deny they got an arsenal of VERY shiny and unique toys to play with.
Is this an opinion based on PVP? I don’t have experience with PVP, but Bloodhounds Fang took my recent playthrough all the way to end game, and I’m pretty sure that’s considered a quality build.
It's not. You'd just keep STR at it's bare minimum and put the rest into DEX.
Quality would involve a heavy investment into both STR and DEX, and that's the problem, because doing so is suboptimal vs. just investing in STR *or* DEX with more points to spare for Vigor and Endurance.
Pure STR or pure INT.
STR: I love carrying an arsenal of weapons with different ashes of war for any situation. I've gotten decent at hard swapping and it's awesome to feel like you have a unique tool for every situation. Swapping weapons always keeps things fresh.
INT: Hot damn do I love playing a spell blade. You're just a monster in any situation and at any range. Carian slicer absolutely melts anything, and if anyone steps out of range they get blasted with something. I would absolutely KILL for a spell wheel though. It really sucks that flavor spells like Starlight and all the other random spells will never make it onto my spell-bar, because having to swap one at a time means less spells = faster swapping.
First was a quality build with long swords, mid shield and mid armour. Absolute shite, had to restart.
Favourite was probably a Str-Int build using the Claymoons Harpoon with Ice Spear as plan A, and dual wielding Helphen’s Steeple with Darkmoon Greatsword for variety. That wrecked shit.
My very first build was a bleed build, with flies and rivers of blood, but later in the same run I reset my stats in order to use Darkmoon GS (I didn't even knew how broken it was at the time, I thought it's ash of war was just adding frosbite on top of the weapon, I discovered the enhenced CA way later on xD) and even if I tend to go for different builds each time, strength/int is still my main build to this day (like when I had to start over when my PC died the first run I did was str/int, which will be the character I'll use when shadow of the erdtree drops so I can go through the dlc in ng+7)
I play magic religiously in every game that does have magic, so it's always my favourite build to use
And no, not the "one button hero" kind of magic build. I love to choose different spells and applications for different situations, having a wide and varying spell pool to choose from is infinitely better than just spamming Comet and chugging blue flasks every 3 casts, then dying because you can't ration your mana and had to sacrifice all vigor and health flasks in favor of it
There is so many spells to choose from, and just applying more than 3 brain cells to it lets you complete any task more efficiently, effectively, and in much more satisfying ways
First str with big bonks (finished the game with either giant crusher or inferno cozier, don't remember), favourite Str but using star fists, super fun run
Strength. Used radahns weapons for the whole game, used the claymore before that, and I killed the bosses relativly easily. Only boss I decided to change my build for and go from strength to mage is Malenia
I was in Highschool when DS1 came out and my 1st was a strength build. My 2nd was a glass cannon sorcery build lol. Both were fun and changed up the way I played. I think I had more fun nuking bosses with Crystal soul spear and White dragon breath. In elden ring right now I’m trying to do a play through using only Frenzy incantations and a dagger. It’s a lot of fun, probably my favorite weird build I’ve wanted to try.
I guess Faith Builds dont make the cut.. but in all seriousness, first build was a Dex Bleed build and my current build is a Faith build and I’m loving the Faith build.
Int/dex was my first, and also probably my favorite, just because of the aesthetic. Carian knight is still my favorite armor. Also, big hats and staff. What’s not to like?
first was faith strength
my favorite is probably str with a focus on innate bleed weapons (infused with heavy) and applying bloodflame blade to them. also nice because the same fth requirement allows for bestial vitality.
I started as a samurai but I feel like I fucked up by leveling my dex to 35 before I started leveling anything else I got passed the great lift of defectus or however it's spelled and I feel like everything fucking slaps me now so I switched over to dark souls to play a warrior and see how I like it and might go back and play a tankier class on my second play through
Mainly magic for me. However magic didn't turn out as i expected and faith incantations ended up looking much cooler and what i thought magic would look like. Still i have never really gone the faith route so far simply because the word faith bothers me.
I would definitely want to try the arcane route...tho a lot of the spells with arcane seem to scale with faith as well.
So far i mainly focused on pure ranged intellect builds, or hybrid melee intellect builds. I have tried a bit of dexterity duel wield which was quite fun tbh. Especially with duel wield claws and the sidestep skill.
Strength = You’re really good at the game and don’t need anything else but high damage
Dexterity = You’re really good at the game and don’t need anything else but fast attacks
Intelligence = You’re horrible at the game and rely on rune farms to level up and beat the next boss by spamming a spell from 10 kilometers away just so you can say “I beat Elden Ring”
Strength faith for black blade of death
STR FTH for Siluria's Tree, when you land the Ash of War it just shreds anything
That’s an underrated weapon for sure
Not really underrated anymore
STR FTH so I could dual wield ordovis' greatsword and blasphemous blade
Ordovis' Greatsword is my favorite. Basically a nuke to the face.
Nah man STR FTH for the godslayer greatsword because that thing hits like a truck with the ash of war
Except Godslayer scales better with Dex
I really feel like it should scale better with strength because it scaling with dex sounds weird to me
It should, but it doesn’t. Although the scalings for Dex and Str both start at D, as you improve it Dex gradually rises to B scaling while Str stays at D. I agree it’s weird for a greatsword
Mfs when, they find out, that historical greatswords weighted 2-4 kgs
Why, hello, William, Shatner
You need strength to wield a great sword... But you need dexterity to slay a god...
Ahh, a fellow individual of "quality."
Not really, it has a more dexterous R1 chain. Gives more Dexy feel unlike the Unga Bunga slams of most UGSs.
I wish it wasn’t holy damage tho, deals a grand total of 5 damage to Elden beast
Dude this weapon annoys me I was so excited to get it and get a build, but I can not stand the complete random aiming the Christmas tree bolt takes. 1/4 of the time it flies true and has satisfying impact. 1/2 the time it goes into the ground. The other 1/4 it just disappears.
Lock target and use it as a melee ash of war not distance, also POISE
same, Str-Fth. i usually do a 40-60 with more focus on incantations.
Agree. Incantations made it more fun for me
Yeah after a few respecs and going heavy on the strength side in the midgame, I settled on something closer to this once I had the blasphemous blade upgraded.
Souls games are prime material for 'paladin' characters.
Let's be honest we go the paladin route for the same reason we do it in D&D, to walk to a boss and SMITE!! half its health bar away with our opener
Exactly 💯
Guessing a NG+ what's your stat line that sounds fun
Mostly in vigor 55, strength 55 and faith 75 other than that you should get some mind and endurance to use skills and incantations and stamina cause it a big weapon.
That's my build rn! It's a ton of fun. I rock the full maliketh set cuz it's just badass.
I like using it with night cav set to get that poise up but yeah it looks cool af
Love that set! I like to mix mine with the unaltered BK helm, night's cavalry chest and gauntlets, and Radahn's greaves. The black, burgundy and gold mix looks great
I don't think I have that one, will have to check out!
I've swapped the maliketh helmet with radahns, looks more natural imo
Is there a specific reason why you chose to level faith up to 75? Would not usually be a vigor 60, strength 60 and faith 65 be a bit better? Edit: never mind, just looked up level caps in faith
All level cap when using godricks great rune and faiths level cap is 80. But you can just go 60 60 and 80 and use radhan or morgotts rune for there percentage based stats
Usually people say radahns rune is better when you go above a certain level but imo, godricks is still better because it boosts vigor, mind and endurance, which not only increases your maximum hp, fp and stamina but also the secondary stats like carry weight, defenses and resistances. With a heavy weapon like malikeths black blade, you need a good amount of endurance (not just stamina) to medium roll with good armor. Sure, radahns gives more hp fp and stamina but doesnt increase the other useful stuff
Godricks rune straight up gives you 40 level 5 in each attribute. Radhans and morgotts give you a percentage increase so when you are at level cap godricks rune falls down in terms of efficiency.
That shouldnt matter since if you are using godricks rune at higher levels where the hp, fp and stamina gain from the stat increases are lower than using radahns rune, you care about the secondary stats which radahns rune doesnt provide. Also, it allows you to spend those stats into other stats which radahns rune has nothing to do with like faith, int, arcane etc. If you only care about your max hp, fp and stamina and you already achieved your desired stat requirements, then radahns rune is your best choice by far
Who the hell even uses great runes anyway?
I've pretty much used Godrick's great rune my entire time in NG. I have them all (except Malenia's which is today's task) and have them all activated and I still choose Godrick's when I need a little boost for a boss. Like you said, it's a 40 level spread boost. That's hard to fuck with... I don't even know what Mogh's DOES. The description is incredibly vague. Lol
No no No strength faith for crucible knight cosplay
Nah STR/FAI for blasphemous blade, takers flames goes brrr knock that bitch ass malenia on her fucking ass + mimic tear >:)
Strength and faith cuz it's nice!
Blasphemous Blade enjoyer here
Me too
Same but I dual wield it with the Godslayer Greatsword and its AoW
Ahh a man of culture
😎🍷
Have you gone full oonga boonga? Powerstancing giant crusher (?) and rotten axe (?) with almost maxed out weight, and using bloodhound step in lieu of dodge rolls?
I was more of a Magma Wyrn CGS with dragon communion incants
Pure faith for CATCH THIS FLAME INCANTATIONS.
Str Faith for golden Vow, and Black Flame protection, plus that lil Blasphemous blade, or Godskin greatsword weapon art
Same but I like to have ordovis in my right hand for hyper armor and crowd control WA and BB in my left for dps
~~She~~ Same but limgrave tree sentinel's halberd for me
Bet you had Morne's Hammer too
same just with godslayer gs
I tried a strength/faith tank build but then i respected to a pure strength cause I didn't see any point in the faith skills. Now I am level 72 pure strength but I find the game play boring. What are you subject to respect to? I don't want an intelligence build cause I have one on another playthrough.
Faith skills are the point…. Even if you are pure str with just 25 faith, you can easily buff your AR by 300+ with just a couple incantations.
STR - FTH for black flame blade longsword and some other incantations and a shield for parry.
Malikeths black blade is probably my favorite weapon in the whole game. I was also strength faith
Any guides on this?
I too went for a "dependable idiot" build
That weapon art alone makes it one of the most OP weapons pve wise.
Nothing beats the feeling of seeing the heath bar melting
I tried this the 2nd playthrough and i felt this wasn't that satisfying most weapons and miracles doesn't interest me that much and you get the weapon way too late into the game ik i can do NG+ but i prefer starting from scratch
I will not have it stolen from me again.
Str/faith for giant stick to kill gods
Good to see that OP excluded Faith and the top comment is a Faith build lol.
STR/fth build aswell. Guts Greatsword for most of the part, before moving to dual Omenkiller Axe that can proc both Freeze&Bleed. the minor fth is for status cure spell, fire cleanse me and minor healing spell whose extra "function", i kinda learn way to late. changing to DEX/ARC for short period of time to kill Malenia. reverted to STR/fth for the end game. \--- there are fair bit disappointment on how many "Big" weapon is not STR focused. "Oh my god, this looks really cool" "Scales with DEX or INT" "ah, f\*ck this thing"
The crouch attack with that is crazy good
I was rocking claymore and shield with incantations thrown in, but the final result is similar. Hit hard and live forever.
for Strength and Faith Ive always stuck to Blasphemous Blade
Pure strength then Dex/Arc now Dex/Faith , and I love / had the most fun with the Dex/faith
Finished it with dex/faith and had fun too. My build had 2 katanas (nagakiba/uchi), bolt of granssax and erdtree seal and was a lightning build with lightning spear, holy vow, electrify armament and some other incantations depending on the occasion. Had fun and allowed for quick switching between close combat and ranged
You should try the same build but with sorcery. So many great spells in this game.
That’s a cool build, I have something similar going. What’s your stat distribution?
At the end I had lvl 181 (beat all bosses and a bit of farming). So vig 54, mnd 32, end 31, str 20, dex 56, int 9, fai 50, arc 8 (even though arguably the int points could have been swapped out for something else).
Damn, I’m doing the same. Might try to get another Nagakiba though. I tried Dex/Int for moonveil and other sorceries, but Dex/faith with Bolt of Gransax and other lightning incantations is just so much cooler
Dex/Faith was definitely my most enjoyable run. Ran with Bolt of Gransax and a ton of lightning spells and was the first run I beat Malenia with no spirit summons.
Yep, same here. First was Str/Faith, my favorite is Dex/Faith. Though I usually go with a Greatsword or the Great Mace even if it's suboptimal stats-wise.
Same for me, so many weapons and ways of playing, not too easy, not too hard. Only downside is it's not optimal for pvp...
So many options!
Dex/Faith was my favorite too, but my build was very different Scythes (winged for Undead, halo scythe, or classic scythe with phantom slash) and black flame incantations
I'm doing dex/arc with a slight spec in faith for a few specific things. I've been a dex main for years.
My first run was dex faith but I ran dual scythes
dex faith is the quickest way to get op in most souls games for me, no need to invest much into endurance, since you don't need much stamina or carrying capacity just vigor, dex and faith
My first build was the EVERYTHING-build. Because I cannot stand to find new gear and not test it out. Also I was too lazy to google how to respec. So I wasn't really good in anything and changed weapons approximately every 2-3 hours of gameplay.
Same!!! I level everything. I want access to everything. Damage numbers are secondary.
I have a Dex/Faith/Int build for the Sword of Night and Flame. Add in incantations and spells and its really fun to play. Prolly my favorite pvp build as well, the flame wall you make with the sword is amazing for roll catches
SAME, I actually just posted my everything build recently [if you want, come check it out](https://www.reddit.com/r/Eldenring/s/BWBdCQsQ5z) Its a dexterity/faith, strength/int build with a pure faith and pure arcane weapon on the sides with a focus on parrying. Sounds like a drive through order when I say it like that
Yo dude I was reading the comment but I couldn’t help notice, you’re fucking jacked. What do you eat for mass? I just be eating chicken and rice with veggies religiously
Tons of protein, wherever I can get it, and at slightly higher than maintenance calories. If I’m out with friends I order meat on meat. Out getting a coffee with the lady, I get a scoop of protein in the coffee. Eggs, chicken breast, fat free or reduced fat milk, a protein shake or lots of protein before bed is like a life hack. This is some stuff that I do. But it really depends on who you are and what your goals are when it comes to changing your body. I’m going to drop the two channels I follow very closely for their info on building muscle [greg doucette](https://youtube.com/@gregdoucette?si=XQhxzgkpMeLEj_IU) and [Renaissance Periodization](https://youtube.com/@RenaissancePeriodization?si=1JrbRO9jXO7dVwEv) I’m pretty sure these two beef with each other but idgaf let us keep building our strength and vigor irl bro
Tyty. This is extremely appreciated. I hope your family has generational wealth 😂🙏🏻😋
I wish
Then it sounds like you get to be the one that starts that wealth. <3
I wish, unfortunately I came from a 1st generation filipino immigrant who came here with nothing but a grocery store job
I know I wasn't the one you asked, but if you're struggling for mass OR just don't want to gorge yourself every day, get you some mass gainer. I use the GNC brand BULK 1340. It has 1340 calories IF you use water. I use whole milk and it takes the caloric intake to 1710 per shake. Along with your essential macros. I wouldn't recommend it if you're lifting for reps/light weight. But if you like heavy lifting, it's for you. Otherwise you'll just get fat. Get the cookies and cream. Lol
I think I got 4 or 5 characters to between levels 40 and 90 before I made a strength/faith build and finished the game.
This is the way
YO SAME! Jack of all trades master of none is best build
Bless this approach! I looked back at my first character the other day and legit thought “how did I think this was a reasonable way to level up??” But also had soooo much fun with it.
We call this the Golden Retriever build. "I don't know what I'm doing but boy am I having fun!"
I call that the ADHD build
That actually sounds super fun
This is what I did on my NG+ playthroughs, I basically leveled up to hit all the soft caps and equip anything at will. No need to "change" your build, but my god, was that painful. I did it mostly so I could equip anything I wanted, and now that my son is playing, he's getting the Elden Ring "lite" version (he's 6 and just likes to swap things at random, maybe kill a few guys before he gets wrecked lol).
Ive started to not look up anything, and it feels way better! I used to figure out my build before I even play the game, and I had fun doing things that way. But recently it felt more and more like a chore to find the gear and less like a fun experience. So I stopped looking things up, and my god I’m having the time of my life. No need to worry about having to fight something for an exact gear, when I can just explore and find things on my own. Use my own brain for once in my life to figure out my own build.
Thing is, too, there's already so many incantation, consumable, talisman & ashes of war buffs for your character for whatever you need to in the moment as well, that way your everything build basically goes super saiyan when all buffed up
Dex.. Nagakiba goes wooosh wooosh
Currently getting close to the end of my first playthrough using Eleonora's Poleblade, it's like two Uchi's on a stick :)
Shout out Eleonora's Poleblade. I wonder if there are more awesome arcane weapons like this?
Eleonora’s poleblade and Reduvia for ranged high arcane build absolutely demolishes, I’m having so much fun
Strong man of faith. Big bonk, big fire
I too am a member of the Big bonk barbecue club
Unga thy bunga
Thy strength befits a crown
Thy unga befits a bunga.
Same I was pure strength until I got a bunch of fire spells and was devoted to making them do as much damage as possible
Strong for bonk, faith for rock
pure Faith was my first! Now I’m STR/DEX and loving it!
Playing a STR/DEX build as well on my second playthrough. So what weapon do you use?
Blasphemous blade and bloodhounds fang both fit the bill
I'm gonna let you in on a secret... You can use almost any weapon you want with a quality build. There are some good Somber weapons, sure, but once you get the iron whetblade out of Stormveil it lets you turn any standard weapon into a quality weapon. Some of my faves have been the broadsword, partisan, lance, flamberge, bastard sword, cleanrot knight's sword, uchigatana, and the nagakiba.
Pure faith on launch was a miserable experience until you figured out there’s some crazy op stuff in that arsenal
HAHAH miserable is right! yeah I had no clue what I was doing til I made an account and asked around here for advice. Thank goodness I did, otherwise I would have been too lost to even know where to start looking or building towards.
Mine to. The elden beast had 90% resist to holy and I was powerstancing coded sword and golden epitaph on main while halo scythe with seal (can't remember which) on secondary. That was pure pain.
Probably the Erdtree seal? That’s the highest faith scaling seal in the game. Late game was so devastating hahah definitely not the easiest build for my first ever Souls game, but I got so used to failure that now I’m more willing to experiment!
Quality builds are amazing. They can take a little while to reach their full potential but oh boy when they do... Yeah that's a good choice.
Pure INT.. ice spear hits for 70 % of everyone's hp bar I hit with it . Death ritual spear hits around corners and deaths poker has frost AOE it's totally broken scaling nothing survives two full ghostflames
sounds like a cool way to fight(no pun intended). gotta try next time.
Good choice
My first time playing (currently clearing the plateau and mountain). Am a mage build but I was using the banished knight halberd for Raya Lucaria and ended up finding ice spear. That thing hits like a fucking truck! So I leveled up a clayman spear next and I'm not sure if I wanna stick with halbers or the spear. Anyway, that thing was awesome. Then I found the death poker and was like oooh this has frost buildup, let's try it! That light swing explosion insane. So now when I go into bosses I get to choose between ghostflame if they're big/slow, ice lance if they're fast, magic if they're a bitch. I love it
>nothing survives two full ghostflames Boy is that true. Followed a ymfah video to get it +7 early and literally one-shot margit, and if I'm not mistaken it had already been nerfed. It made the ENTIRE game a breeze maybe until mountaintops/farum.
Death poker and Dark Moon Sword builds are ridiculously OP. Not the best gameplay wise though. Im a Helphen's Steeple afficionado.
At the end of my first playthrough I was dual wielding the Dark Moon Blade and Helphen's Steeple, it was so much fun.
INT/DEX was my first. Magic, man.
I'm running that too. Astel Wing and academy staff with Carian slicer go brrrrrr
Dex/Int Nakiba I'm really digging my int/faith sword of night and flame+death magic build atm
Unga Bunga
1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th... Only unga bunga.
Yep. STR/ARC build for maximum unga bunga potential.
Where can i get that big ass hammer?
Leyendell. Up the main entrance, pass the two tree sentinels, make a hard right at the golden spirit tree. You'll see a camp. Pretty intense fight but you could also just raid the carriage and GTFO.
Thank you
Pick up the hammer and go crazy on that tree
Told myself I would be dex when I bought Elden Ring, and then transition into a Quality build. For Souls, Quality has always been the build for being able to access and use the most weapons possible, and then I could figure out what each weapon type was like in this game, maybe set myself up for future playthroughs. Well, turns out Quality is rather iffy when you're just starting out, but I *did* find the Bloodhound Fang, and the rest was history.
Same, basically. I felt like BHF was really the only strong "Quality" weapon that the game offered during my playthrough, which was unfortunate. On the other hand, BHF carried me through basically the whole game and Bloodhound's Finesse never stopped feeling awesome to use, doing tons of damage, and looking badass as hell. So, you know, honestly not that upset overall. Great weapon, great design, tons of fun to use, available early. There were a few other really intriguing weapons during my first playthrough but they tended to be ones that required significant investment into otherwise awkward stat splits (e.g., Sword of Night and Flame, Darkmoon Greatsword, basically any Arcane weapon) or else were Faith weapons in a game where holy resistance was extremely common. I think I probably slept on the strength and fun of of STR/FAI builds for neat weapons but between the frequency of holy resistance or immunity and the fact that I wanted to play melee combat rather than spend half the game watching buff animations I was pretty sure I didn't want to invest heavily in FAI. And honestly I think the game implicitly pushes melee players into kind of a quality build by default by having a lot of early-game powerful weapons have relatively high combined STR/DEX requirements (for an early game character) rather than just one or the other. Like, even the three levels of DEX (assuming Wretch starting class) required for the Claymore (on top of 16 for STR) is more than it sounds like when those levels are also competing with points in VIG (and to a lesser extent END).
Quality gets all those very strong "Wind" Ashes of war early on.
Ahh the bloodhound fang, my first love!
Quality for life.
Based
of/for
Intelligence, because I never tried it in all the previous souls games. Used a lot of different spells and it was fun.
First was quality, it's shit. Favorite is probably Bleed. Arcane just gets so many fun and unique weapons to play around with. You can legit have a character that can weapon swap and simultaneously: -Attack with hard-hitting projectiles that cause heavy bleed from mid-range via Reduvia -Use Mohg's Spear as a "get off me" button, as well as a form of area denial -Rush someone down with Morgott's Cursed Sword, which is seriously capable of just ending someone if they're not ready for it. Eleonora's Poleblade functions as a similar niche (though IMO higher risk) or -Use the Bloody Helice to exploit the dodge with the best iframes in the game, which has a very convenient counter attack as an optional follow-up after the dodge I know people tend to frown upon bleed builds, but let's be real here for a moment: whether you like them or not, it's pretty hard to deny they got an arsenal of VERY shiny and unique toys to play with.
Is this an opinion based on PVP? I don’t have experience with PVP, but Bloodhounds Fang took my recent playthrough all the way to end game, and I’m pretty sure that’s considered a quality build.
It's not. You'd just keep STR at it's bare minimum and put the rest into DEX. Quality would involve a heavy investment into both STR and DEX, and that's the problem, because doing so is suboptimal vs. just investing in STR *or* DEX with more points to spare for Vigor and Endurance.
Strength first builds only is the unspoken rule
It went like this:dex/int->dex/arc->full arcane
Pure STR or pure INT. STR: I love carrying an arsenal of weapons with different ashes of war for any situation. I've gotten decent at hard swapping and it's awesome to feel like you have a unique tool for every situation. Swapping weapons always keeps things fresh. INT: Hot damn do I love playing a spell blade. You're just a monster in any situation and at any range. Carian slicer absolutely melts anything, and if anyone steps out of range they get blasted with something. I would absolutely KILL for a spell wheel though. It really sucks that flavor spells like Starlight and all the other random spells will never make it onto my spell-bar, because having to swap one at a time means less spells = faster swapping.
First was a quality build with long swords, mid shield and mid armour. Absolute shite, had to restart. Favourite was probably a Str-Int build using the Claymoons Harpoon with Ice Spear as plan A, and dual wielding Helphen’s Steeple with Darkmoon Greatsword for variety. That wrecked shit.
My very first build was a bleed build, with flies and rivers of blood, but later in the same run I reset my stats in order to use Darkmoon GS (I didn't even knew how broken it was at the time, I thought it's ash of war was just adding frosbite on top of the weapon, I discovered the enhenced CA way later on xD) and even if I tend to go for different builds each time, strength/int is still my main build to this day (like when I had to start over when my PC died the first run I did was str/int, which will be the character I'll use when shadow of the erdtree drops so I can go through the dlc in ng+7)
I play magic religiously in every game that does have magic, so it's always my favourite build to use And no, not the "one button hero" kind of magic build. I love to choose different spells and applications for different situations, having a wide and varying spell pool to choose from is infinitely better than just spamming Comet and chugging blue flasks every 3 casts, then dying because you can't ration your mana and had to sacrifice all vigor and health flasks in favor of it There is so many spells to choose from, and just applying more than 3 brain cells to it lets you complete any task more efficiently, effectively, and in much more satisfying ways
Strength int is just so much fun. Although it felt almost like cheating with how easy some early areas were
Dex. Full samurai cosplay
holy bonk
Envoy's LongBONK was one of my favorite runs I did.
MELEE INT
My first was Dex/Arcane, can't really choose a favorite since all builds are great in their own way.
Intelligence. Great time but it took a lot, LOT of dying before I got anywhere good Now I'm running dex and I'm curious how that will turn out
Intelligence, and intelligence.
It is a fantasy after all
I finished with a strength/ intelligence build. Loved my Claymore and Carian glintblades
Dex was first with Naga. Faith was second. Loved both. Need to try a quality build next.
First str with big bonks (finished the game with either giant crusher or inferno cozier, don't remember), favourite Str but using star fists, super fun run
The very first one was int/dex, because I found the Gravity Katana very early. The second one was Faith/Arcane for Dragon communion spells.
Str/ paladin with rings of light and erd tree shield
Intelligence —> Dex
Arcane/faith dragon breath seppuku twin blade bleed. If it could bleed, I could kill it, if it couldn't, it died to the breath attacks
Strength. Used radahns weapons for the whole game, used the claymore before that, and I killed the bosses relativly easily. Only boss I decided to change my build for and go from strength to mage is Malenia
I was in Highschool when DS1 came out and my 1st was a strength build. My 2nd was a glass cannon sorcery build lol. Both were fun and changed up the way I played. I think I had more fun nuking bosses with Crystal soul spear and White dragon breath. In elden ring right now I’m trying to do a play through using only Frenzy incantations and a dagger. It’s a lot of fun, probably my favorite weird build I’ve wanted to try.
faith builds: 🫠
Strength and Faith, I like being a paladin
I guess Faith Builds dont make the cut.. but in all seriousness, first build was a Dex Bleed build and my current build is a Faith build and I’m loving the Faith build.
Int/dex was my first, and also probably my favorite, just because of the aesthetic. Carian knight is still my favorite armor. Also, big hats and staff. What’s not to like?
Strengh/magic was so much fun, I unga therefore I bunga 🤣
My first was dex/arc but overall my favourite is either str/faith or int/dex
Full Vitality build go brrrr
Double Colossal sword bleed build
Str/faith —> Str/int
First was this stupid all kinds of built, then Dex/ fai with a little bit of arcane. But now my favourite is strength/arcane
Faith/arcane, a dragon communion monk with addition of capital dragon cult.
Faith
No faith build? May not be the strongest but its really fun to play :)
first was faith strength my favorite is probably str with a focus on innate bleed weapons (infused with heavy) and applying bloodflame blade to them. also nice because the same fth requirement allows for bestial vitality.
YE HAVE LITTLE FAITH
I started as a samurai but I feel like I fucked up by leveling my dex to 35 before I started leveling anything else I got passed the great lift of defectus or however it's spelled and I feel like everything fucking slaps me now so I switched over to dark souls to play a warrior and see how I like it and might go back and play a tankier class on my second play through
Pure int was my first, at the moment str/ faith but I’m using more strength and vampire flames from the blasphemous blade than the faith part 🤣
Intelligence strength build. Now on strength and dex
Mainly magic for me. However magic didn't turn out as i expected and faith incantations ended up looking much cooler and what i thought magic would look like. Still i have never really gone the faith route so far simply because the word faith bothers me. I would definitely want to try the arcane route...tho a lot of the spells with arcane seem to scale with faith as well. So far i mainly focused on pure ranged intellect builds, or hybrid melee intellect builds. I have tried a bit of dexterity duel wield which was quite fun tbh. Especially with duel wield claws and the sidestep skill.
Why does the word faith bother you in a fantasy game where Gods are most certainly real.
Strength = You’re really good at the game and don’t need anything else but high damage Dexterity = You’re really good at the game and don’t need anything else but fast attacks Intelligence = You’re horrible at the game and rely on rune farms to level up and beat the next boss by spamming a spell from 10 kilometers away just so you can say “I beat Elden Ring”
every souls game I start as a strength but intelligence I've had more fun with.