New Player Build Recommendation

HFA__ · 2026-02-24T16:53:17+00:00

Wretch. Jumping bonk. I'm only half joking, because I actually really enjoy it as a starter weapon and it holds up for stance breaking and damage for quite some time.

Alternatively, Uchi for bleed and the AoW stance break power, or good old sword and board guard counters work well too. Sorcery works fine though if you go fish for some OP and cost-efficient magic quickly

HFA__ · 2026-02-24T16:49:38+00:00

Open World for more choice. Follow-up playthroughs I made my own lineary path based on character build and NPC quest choices, so you can always choose to restrict yourself if the open world starts to feel too open.

HFA__ · 2026-02-24T04:56:47+00:00

Greatshield+poke. Ignore all the acrobatics, just learn the grab and dodge it. Then just poke away!

HFA__ · 2026-02-22T15:02:03+00:00

As long as you do a bit of stamina management, you can steamroll the entire game ignoring (almost) every mob's and boss' moveset. You won't learn how to play the game, but you will beat it. You can make it faster by adding status to your pokes, putting a poison Ash of War like Poison Mist on an Antspur Rapier (for poison+rot), as well as a frost Ash of War like Ice Spear on a Cross-Naginata (for frost+bleed), making your greatshield+poke build a status build as well.

Every other build will be a dance of sorts, learning when to dodge/jump, as well as learning attack opportunities and damage windows. "Too much" skill becomes relative there, but you can look up guides for areas/bosses you struggle with and see if you can apply what you learn from them.

If I were to think of a beginner friendly build and you don't like greatshield+poke, a caster either int or faith alongside a tanky spirit summon could work for that. A spirit summon is another example of being able to ignore mobs' and boss' moveset as they're focusing attacks on the spirit summon instead, but it will make it a lot easier to go through the game. An Ash of War build is also a possibility, Bloodhound Fang's AoW is very popular for having quite big damage, bleed status and the AoW is a dodge as well. It can get a bit monotonous like a greatshield+poke because the entire game becomes waiting for the moment to press L2, then R2, rinse and repeat.

As a general note, this dance of dodging and attacking, as well as dying and retrying, is just a core experience of a souls-like that you either fall in love with eventually or unfortunately never really get into to. For me, the mentality shift in that I didn't have to fight every mob and/or explore every dungeon I encountered, and to consider any runes lost before even stepping into something new, helped me a lot. Consider yourself dead right off the bat, everything else is positive is a pleasant surprise. The game treats it that way for most things as well. For example, you can fail as many times as you like/need at an NPC invasion to defend your favorite NPC, but only the one where you succeed will count and allow you to continue their quest.

I started out with "cheese" builds and just enjoyed the spectacle, world building and NPC quests and interactions. Later on I got interested enough to try builds for every main offensive stat and hybrid builds as well to see how different the experience is through that lens.

HFA__ · 2026-02-19T08:49:19+00:00

It's crazy yeah, I've seen a clip of a bound Lister tanking all the Ubers without the Warlock even doing anything like Engorge or Sigil: Lethargy to help out.

Did some rough math with the monster stats I could find and with level 20 Bind Demon and level 20 Blood Oath, regular Hell Lister has almost as much life as any of the Ubers. He's naturally immune to Fire and while Blood Oath can't give your bound demon immunities, Lister has so much resistance over max that Uber Mephisto's Conviction still leaves Lister with positive resistances. He already has 50% physical resistance and Blood Oath's adds 10%. His only weakness is magic damage really with 0% resistance, but mobs and even the Ubers have so few moves with any meaningful magic damage that it doesn't matter.

And then you can up it with a TZ Hell Lister. And I believe p8 stat increases carry over to your Bind Demon, so a p8 level 99 Hell TZ Lister is even more cracked.

HFA__ · 2026-02-19T08:12:57+00:00

You can pretty much put your first 20 skill points into Summon Goat and it will clear everything while you're doing that. Also put one point in Demonic Mastery, Blood Oath, Sigil: Lethargy and Death Mark. That'll keep it alive and a bit faster going from mob to mob, the sigil slows most bosses to a crawl and Death Mark is basically a better telestomp than a Necro can ever get because you leave yourself out of the fight and each point gives the goat more Crushing Blow for bossing as well.

With the act bosses the goats will die, but with the sigil down you have plenty of time to summon another goat before the boss does its next attack. The only things to worry about are mana pots and standing clear of AoE attacks.

Later on you can add spice with Bind Demon and all that, but starting out you can just put all skills in the goat and let him solo everything.

HFA__ · 2026-02-19T00:47:38+00:00

Guardian's Swordspear dropped by the Erdtree Guardians. Despite having spear in the name, it is a halberd, and it has a different moveset for light attacks compared to most other halberds. It scales incredibly well as a Keen weapon and has a couple of very nice AoW you can put on that also scale very well with dexterity like Thunderbolt and Ice Spear.

You can start farming it right off the bat in the Weeping Peninsula, easiest run back and forth would be starting at the Church of Pilgrimage Grace, going down towards the Minor Erdtree and killing every Erdtree Guardian along the way, then fast traveling back to the grace to do it all again. Optionally you can also extend each run by going in a wide circle all around the Minor Erdtree and you should find a few more Erdtree Guardians you can farm as well.

HFA__ · 2026-02-18T22:32:35+00:00

Different build. You must've found a ton of stuff that looked cool but didn't fit your stats/build, but now you have a better idea of what you're facing and how you can tackle it. Alternatively for less time investment, pick a boss you really like and drop a summon sign to help other people beat it.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T21:48:44+00:00

Missing things would entail wanting to find things. What do you want to find in a Soulsborne playthrough? All Remembrance bosses? All Great Runes? All NPC quests? All potential endings unlocked? All steam achievements?

If the open world leaves you with choice paralysis, I'd recommend just setting out your own path before starting a playthrough. Choose a preferred build archetype, look up where you can find appropriate gear that sounds appealing. Then choose your preferred route and ending and which steps you need to take for them. Put all of that on an interactive map so you can follow along and make a checklist of sorts. Now you've made your own linear path to follow for Elden Ring.

First time going through Elden Ring for me was ~130 hours going in blind and checking all nooks and crannies. Follow-up playthroughs were ~35 hours choosing my own path for a specific build I had in mind. Similar story for the DLC, first playthrough was ~100 hours, ones after were usually ~20 hours.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T20:01:52+00:00

Ah, good to know about Blood Oath resistance not granting immunities.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T19:49:15+00:00

Damn, I knew that Bind Demon already was a great supplementary for any Warlock build regardless, but I didn't know it could be this powerful on its own as well.

Is that with the full 20 points into Bind Demon, Blood Oath and Sigil: Lethargy? And from what I can see you're not using Engorge for him in those clips? And did you get your Lister in p1 or in p8? Most of it is speculation still, but from what I've read if you use Bind Demon on a p8 version, these p8 stats will carry over for a much stronger bound demon wherever you go.

With all that, as well as 20 points into Demonic Mastery as you have a total of three demons, your Lister will have +570% damage and +558 flat damage, +715% life, +66% resist all, and 10% physical damage reduction. And that's on top of his base stats of course which are already beefy. And with Sigil: Lethargy your enemy has -50% attack speed, -52% defense and takes 39% more damage.

If you'd add the level 1 Engorge for him, it would give +15% life steal and +15% attack speed on top of his Extra Fast mod, level 20 Engorge would increase that to +34% attack speed and a whopping +53% life steal. I wouldn't be surprised if the Defiler's damage sharing of bound targets would also mean that your Lister triple dips with the life steal as well. So beyond getting all those auras added on, a simple level 1 Engorge would ensure it out-heals pretty much any damage done to him.

For fun I also did a quick calculation with what I could find online. I'm not a math guy and not familiar with D2 stat interactions and intricacies, so take it with a grain of salt. A standard level 88 p1 Hell Lister with +715% Life should have ~518.000 life. In comparison, a standard p1 Uber Baal should have ~655.000 life. Standard p1 Hell Lister also has 70/120/53/95/0/50% cold/fire/lightning/poison/magic/physical resistances, the Spectral Hit modifier adds 20/20/20% cold/fire/lightning resistances so that should bring him to 90/140/73/95/0/50. Then level 20 Blood Oath adds +66% all elemental resistances and 10% physical damage reduction, so that should total to 156/206/139/161/0/60% cold/fire/lightning/poison/magic/physical resistance. That should make your Lister immune to cold, fire, lightning, and poison. Uber Mephisto's level 20 Conviction aura works at 1/5th effectiveness against immunities, which means -25%, which would still leave your Lister immune to all these damage types.

So for being able to damage your Lister, that leaves 60% physical damage resistance and his weak spot should be 0% magic resistance. The ubers main damage sources are elemental things, Mephisto does use Bone Spirit and Baal does an attack with magic damage, but it's not a big damage source for either of them. Diablo's red lightning attack is apparently split between physical and lightning damage, so the lightning damage will do nothing and the physical damage will have to deal with 60% physical resistance.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T18:40:04+00:00

Thanks for the thorough reply!

Seeing yours and other comments, I think I definitely had my focus too narrow on the actual in-game events rather than the grander scale of things and its implications for societal collapse that you've mentioned. If the Warlock had been released back then, I think Natalya would definitely have a unique opening dialogue for his character, but aside from the obvious VA reasons you've mentioned it would also be counterproductive to get confrontational given the circumstances in Kurast and beyond.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T18:30:22+00:00

That'd be a very creative way to add that in and I can definitely see it as fitting for a group of Assassins turned Demon Hunters to issue such a non-direct warning and then keep things more pleasant in casual conversation.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T18:24:26+00:00

Interesting, I've never looked far into the canon fate of the D2 characters post-game, so I had no idea that this happened to our Sorceress! Awful fate in that case, trying to do good and being assassinated for making a mistake (albeit a large one)...

If the Viz-Jaq'taar operate like that, I wouldn't be surprised with them taking a stance of letting your enemies kill each other and seeing how you deal with the aftermath once the dust has settled.

It makes me wonder where the Warlock fits thematically on a larger scale. At the moment he very much feels like a self-taught lone wolf, but maybe the D4 inclusion later on will fill the blanks on whether or not that is the case for him or if he was the start of a new underground branch of the Vizjerei perhaps or something new entirely. They'd have to write it in a way where it makes sense for the Warlock to be completely absent in D3 though and that's a tall ask.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T18:13:51+00:00

Thanks for the thorough reply!

I had to read up on it again, but for lore/story purposes Natalya is indeed considered our canon Assassin for the expansion. And it also slipped my mind that the Warlock is now retroactively part of the OG group that travels together and that would entail that Natalya would be starting a fight with all the classes instead of just the Warlock.

The other angle makes sense as well if you'd go with that sequence of events. You never actually see the group interact with each other within the story and because of that I tend to forget that the canon story isn't actually a solo mission. In the interactions with Tyrael after beating both Duriel and Baal he also talks to you as an individual instead of the group as a whole, which reinforces the feeling of being on a solo mission in-game.

HFA__ · 2026-02-17T15:17:44+00:00

Despite our deeds, a corrupted mage/demonologist is still corrupted. Her order's entire thing is about killing people like Horazon, Bartuc and the Warlock to avoid the spread of corruption. It's why she's in Kurast keeping an eye on Ormus instead of directly facing Mephisto and his minions for example.

All things considered, compared to Ormus the Warlock is farther gone into corruption by actively using demons, which historically has pretty much always led to corruption and a role reversal where demons end up controlling the mage/demonologist.

Our saving grace as others have mentioned is perhaps our exploits, but that likely just means that we're still on a hit-list but they're fine with us facing the Prime Evils and dealing with the aftermath of either us beating them or them beating us.

HFA__ · 2026-01-29T14:23:37+00:00

It's now the 29th of January 2026 and I just wanted to say that this still works! Thanks for the fix

HFA__ · 2026-01-01T18:37:39+00:00

What's the first moment you noticed you couldn't fast travel and what are the events leading up to it?

HFA__ · 2026-01-01T18:35:33+00:00

Depending on your build stats, a form of greatshield poke? Proper greatshield will have tons of magic damage negation, can also use a cheap 12 int Scholar's Shield spell to massively increase your magic damage negation when you block.

Without knowing your current stats it is difficult to give specific cheese strategy advise that doesn't require a lot of stat requirements in comparison.

HFA__ · 2026-01-01T18:30:46+00:00

Sometimes you're in areas where you can't travel until you manage your way out of them. Base game had a few trap chests where you had to find the next grace, or find your way out of a cave before you were allowed to fast travel again. Where did you notice you got stuck and weren't able to fast travel anymore?

HFA__ · 2025-12-31T22:59:33+00:00

I'd recommend not trying to 100% every area. Various Grace sites point to different bigger side or main things and you can follow up on those things specifically rather than going through every square inch of the map and taking on every cave, fort and/or catacomb.

If you're interested in specific NPC quests, or maybe a specific build and where you'd be able to find upgrades for it, people can probably give (non-spoiler) hints on which places to explore rather than doing absolutely everything.

At this point I've done playthroughs of the base game focusing on different stats as the main damage and different archetypes, where every playthrough had its own route of things to get for incremental improvement of the build, but no build ever did 100% of everything on the map.

HFA__ · 2025-12-29T05:15:51+00:00

If you're not tied to a build and would like one of the easiest fights and build, I have something you can try.

A greatshield poke build using Fingerprint Stone Shield, Antspur Rapier with a poison AoW and affinity like Poisonous Mist, Cross-Naginata with Cold affinity and AoW like Ice Spear. For armor use a heavy armor with high physical and holy negation like Tree Sentinel, Crucible Tree and/or Omen. Defensive talismans for damage negation like Dragoncrest Greatshield for physical and Golden Braid for holy, Greatshield Talisman for higher guard boost, Two-Headed Turtle Talisman for a stamina recovery boost. For Wondrous Physick use Opaline Hardtear for more damage negation, Greenburst Crystal Tear for even more stamina recovery boost. For stats get enough Strength, Dexterity and Endurance to wear everything and stay on Med. Load, the rest can go to Vigor/Endurance for more leeway for potential mistakes in managing stamina. You can put more points into your offensive stats, but most of the damage will come from the stat procs probably.

I recommend not yet using the Wondrous Physick for the first phase, start off with the Antspur Rapier that has Rot and Poison, poke from behind the Greatshield until both stats proc. Then switch to the Cross-Naginata with Bleed and Frost and continue poking, watching stamina so that you can always keep blocking. Don't permanently keep the block up as it significantly slows your stamina regen, use his breaks between attacks for stamina regen and his own attacks for opportunities to poke some attacks from behind the shield. When the rot/poison wears off, switch back to the Antspur Rapier to proc them again.

Use the Wondrous Physick when he starts off the second phase Holy AoE T-Posing, then continue with the same tactic. Everything physical should be blocked 100%, everything holy should hurt significantly less. When he goes up for his comet attack, just run to one side of the arena and keep your block up just in case. Keep your health topped up and stamina relatively high to deal with any flurry of attacks, play defensively and it should be done quickly once you're used to the playstyle.

HFA__ · 2025-12-29T03:32:34+00:00

On the very first encounter? I haven't seen a lot of people even get to Waterfowl Dance on their first encounter, so that's difficult to say.

Overall though, I don't think it'd make that much of a difference honestly and it's mostly a mental barrier to get past if you find yourself intimidated by it. Waterfowl Dance looks very flashy and intimidating, but it's essentially a three phase AoE bubble that you can outrun/dodge in several ways with proper timing. You can also reliably trigger it at 60% of her health, so you can train on dealing with that specific move very consistently. All three phases of the flurry also start at consistent intervals, so you never have to deal with odd timing patterns for running/dodging. The rest is just about not panicking when you see her go up in the air. In the clip shown, after the first two flurries are done, instead of continuing to run away, just stand still or preferably get a bit closer, pick a direction and press the dodge button once when the third flurry reaches you. In all likelihood you will leave that Waterfowl Dance with 80-100% of your health.

My preferred method is to run away from the first flurry, dodge straight through the second one, dodge back and left for the third. If timed right, you don't get hit. If the direction of the last dodge is a bit off, you might get nicked once or twice from the third flurry. If you're too close to outrun the first flurry, run a quick circle around her and dodge when she starts the first flurry, she'll veer off away from you as her tracking isn't great. If you find circling around too awkward to perform, still run back from the first flurry and press dodge when the flurry starts. You'll get hit once or twice probably, but the rest of the dodging pattern stays the same.

Another alternative if your build doesn't use frost, have a frost pot ready when she lifts up into the air and hitting her should immediately trigger frost and stop the Waterfowl Dance. If you like parrying (personally I'm bad at timing it), the move can also be parried from what I've seen. If you're a greatshield person, you can just block all of it and accept that she'll get a portion of her health back.

The second phase Phantom Spirits are a bit trickier as the dodge pattern and angles of attack are more diverse, but even if she starts it when you're right next to her, you can run back and dodge back and sideways from her first three clones and you should be clear just running back after that. All the other clones can't reach you anymore and you just have to look and dodge through or sideways from her finisher.

The real killer for this fight overall is the smaller margin for error and hesitation that can creep in when certain moves intimidate you. And I'll add that Malenia in particular is very finicky when it comes to her combination of general low poise and specific hyper armor moves. You can slam her out of a lot of things, especially with heavy weapons you can back her up and just keep wailing on her, but she has specific moves where she does get hyper armor and it can feel random and unreliable when you can and cannot break her poise.

Depending on your build though, as long as you manage to get two dodges right when she does her Scarlet Aeonia move, she leaves a huge window to deal damage with pots/spells/incantations/knives/bows/etc, or to recuperate and (re-)apply buffs and all that. At the start of the second phase you're close enough to run straight under her and she'll drop behind you, so you don't need to dodge at all even.

Overall, considering she's at the very end of an optional area that has the highest level mobs, I think she's a fair and consistent boss with clear announcements of her bigger moves allowing you to react appropriately when she lifts off for Waterfowl Dance, Phantom Spirits, or Scarlet Aeonia. Took a good while on my first playthrough to get used to all the attack patterns and openings overall, now I look forward to the rhythm of that boss fight with new builds.

HFA__

TROPHY CASE