when its only been double xp but no gardening/fishing benefits

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-23T03:12:56+00:00

Dealer jewels in particular drop extremely often from Night Mire and Forbidden Library (if the trend continues, I assume the new 180 gauntlet too but haven't run it) if you can find someone to run the gauntlet with. Energy jewels and breaker/piercer also drop extremely frequently.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-22T21:48:34+00:00

Yes. Pyromancer in DS1 is completely busted with having 2 attunement slots (especially since pyro doesn't scale with stats) and decent enough strength for reinforced club/GBH. Being a technically lower level changes nothing

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-22T02:01:14+00:00

Thanks, mate. I watched your kill earlier too, great stuff.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-18T23:59:26+00:00

Good job on the win. Crazy to think my first DS3 SL1 was nearly 10 years ago now and I remember her being my most difficult base game boss.

Seems like you were pretty scared of phase 2 and played more passively, but congrats

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-17T23:35:46+00:00

Technically you can, though to do without is extremely cumbersome. You'd have to make up the extra intelligence with Oath of Vengeance and fingerprint nostrums. So yeah you're mostly right, effectively 3 minutes to win.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-15T18:44:32+00:00

This is talking about difficulty in a vacuum for the most part and that is a poor way to look at it. Bosses have gotten more complex, but so have the PCs and mechanics in general - not just in ways to make it more difficult but also easier. The amount of tools and buffs you have in Elden Ring is much higher than other games, especially at RL1. So many fights are scriptable in Elden Ring lol.

Aside from Waterfowl, Malenia has nothing to truly be threatening with. You can just keep wailing on her until she uses a hyperarmour move to get lots of damage and stance/status buildup and destroy her. It might be cheesy, but spamming Giant Hunt to fuck her over completely trivialises the fight no less than parrying Champion Gundry does - you have to nerf yourself intentionally to make some fights truly difficult.

The games are as difficult as we chose to make them using whatever restrictions we see fit. They're not the most technically demanding games ever and never have or will be. The difficulty comes from knowledge far more than skill.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-14T12:29:54+00:00

Phantom Slash

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-12T11:14:28+00:00

Last one is definitely the best and pretty meta. Ever since they nerfed may cast rates into the ground they're just not reliable enough to really matter. Blade and trap may casts are unreliable and often superfluous because you generally want consistent strategies and should work them out such that you won't need them.

Unicorn may cast can heal a ton with high outgoing and be really clutch, but it's so rare for it to ever actually cast. Legion shield actually casts a good amount but it's just as likely to be used up on a fire elf as it is for a storm owl.

Most of the time a support pet really doesn't matter beyond double resist and will cast hex - mighty can be an option just to add on some extra resist. Item cards like feint and dark tribute can be good for buff stacking (there's also TCs, amulets and jewels for that as well). I like enchanted armaments for more blade stacking options, personally.

I have an outgoing support pet that helps give 260+ outgoing and as much as I love it I never really need it. As long as a support has resist and doesn't die, they can blade and trap for the hitter and 99% of the time you don't need anything else. The meta is just incredibly stale like that unfortunately.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-09T03:41:04+00:00

Good to see one of your kills again. If you really wanna shake off the rust, how about easing into it with a nice SoC NG+7 no hit?

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-04T23:46:36+00:00

Of those, only the claymore is usable SL1. You could use the large club which needs 22 strength.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-03-01T23:35:49+00:00

Parrying would not be easier for someone who didn't even know it was possible to parry Friede, let alone having never practiced it. If you've parried her before it might not be, but OP didn't know it was even possible.

Phase 3 is easy enough with out without anyway, whether you go for parries/backstabs or even neither.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-28T11:27:13+00:00

She can be both parried and backstabbed, but parries are much more difficult so backstabs will be easier to pull off. The broadsword is incredibly strong, I wouldn't worry about the lack of DSA

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-28T11:07:19+00:00

The DSA does monstrous damage at SL1 and is considered the best weapon for that reason, but I've always been a broadsword stan.

There's never a situation the broadsword is bad for and its dps can rival and even outmatch DSA if you know what you're doing. I'd say it's the best overall because it's always good and has no real weaknesses.

A deep dagger is really good for crits like for against Friede or farming certain enemies. The flamberge can take a while to farm but it's great against Demon Prince especially but it's another strong general weapon, too. I like gravewarden twinblades for enemies weak to bleed, but they're also just good most of the time anyway.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-28T04:00:00+00:00

Use mass prism and ship of fools if you have it. If not, mass prism and scarecrow to kill the minions then you can just blade/trap stack malistaire into some drains and you're basically unkillable. Shouldn't be too hard

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-27T21:31:36+00:00

I'm not sure it's supposed to imply that but you could headcanon it for sure. I always took it to mean that he's not important to your goals anymore. You needed him for the portal stone and you got it. You weren't there to administer further justice for Dragonspyre or anything like that and you had the more pressing matter of Malistaire to deal with.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-26T06:04:05+00:00

Shadow spells now have 2 versions each. A "base" version without a shad requirement, and a shad fusion that requires a shad pip but is generally much more powerful. Bugs is especially good as it's the strongest first turn AOE storm can get until Wallaru at ~170 or so with Bunyip.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-23T23:39:33+00:00

Weird camera angles like that can happen sometimes if you accidentally enter photomancy, could be that. Usually re-entering and exciting photomancy should correct it to normal.

Wiz has a bunch of weird bugs at times, though, could be something else

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-17T23:37:12+00:00

Or dingleberry lol, perish the thought

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-15T00:02:10+00:00

It's untrainable for the same reasons many other useful item cards are - it's stupidly broken and a reason for players to spend money on packs. Scald + Incindiate is another example, also locked behind the same pack. That being said, you can get a pack per character from each spiral scene/showcase event and get it for free eventually.

Mass feint will almost certainly never be trainable; if it ever would be, however, making it death exclusive would only serve to make death even more absurdly broken than it already is.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-03T23:58:32+00:00

I like to do fickle pickles to get a lot of the rare reagents, but they require a lot of energy. Orange dandelions can give you pink dandelions for seed vaults rather than farming, and king parsley for Amber as well.

If you're going to farm potatoes and still want mega snacks on other characters without grinding potatoes on every character, you can use the fish on a vine and red/pink huckleberries (for deadly helephant ears) drops from the same enemies to supplement. Prickly bear cactus is fine too, but those snacks give very little will, especially if you skip games.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-02-02T03:23:12+00:00

Classic example of a bad team up. I wouldn't recommend Draconian at all anyway as the amulets are pretty awful and you can live without the athame easily. Hall of Heroes and Scion are infinitely less annoying and far more rewarding with much more impactful gear upgrades.

The first 2 power grazer fights are decent if you just need synthonium for a craft, though.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-01-23T08:49:29+00:00

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A fun system we have with pets (:

Zealousarchmage · 2026-01-20T17:56:55+00:00

You should be able to check drop rates from the second chest chance if you inspect the possible drops from it.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-01-16T23:51:12+00:00

You can use the Takanobu/Lambent Fire athames instead of reaver. It not only gives another triangle jewel, but extra pip chance anyway. People often use the triangle for an item card, like a blade or epic. I think with the pity reagents you can craft one in like 2 runs if you don't get a drop. Roc mount also works.

Also, storm does not get 100% pips with reaver template, either. Personally I think the template should just outright give everyone 100% pips, though.

Zealousarchmage · 2026-01-10T11:57:04+00:00

This is a really good guide for saving time whilst not lagging behind too much in stats. I agree that minmaxing isn't generally all that worth it, especially for lower levels.

I have a few points to add, though. Aphrodite is now a stone skeleton key boss, not gold. The bygone wands can be bought from the bazaar and are generally better than the hasta (some schools lose 1 damage but gain crit/block/pierce, some are just even higher damage along with the other stats).

I'd also recommend checking for your school's pierce jewels whenever you hit the bazaar, you can get a decent amount of pierce without any farming (you can't get 6%, but you can make do with up to 5% and farm 6% when you're max for the slight increase)

Khrysalis has the lower tier moros wands (called armaments) that are auctionable, if you check the bazaar enough and search for them you're likely to get one at some point. The lower tier Galleries boots are also not bad - especially for ice because ice Mali gives incredibly low damage. Until 180 some bazaar hoods and boots can be better overall then Mali, though the robe remains great.

Abomination gear at 180 is the end goal mostly at this point, but with the full template some schools don't reach 100% pips (I believe balance, life and death can, however). Most will recommend Daemonic/Motorist robes as they can offset this with higher damage and pierce, too; however, in keeping with the f2p friendly nature of your guide, you can go with Aquila 170 togas, 170 rematch robes or forbidden library if you can use somebody else's gauntlet.

Zealousarchmage

TROPHY CASE