#elden ring builds

[incorrectsmashbrosquotes]

A short guide to Elden Ring STR builds

Pure STR: Unga Bunga.

INT/STR Build: I Unga, therefore, I Bunga.

Faith/STR Build: Thus Sayeth the Lord, Unga Bunga.

DEX/STR Build: Unga roll Bunga roll Unga roll Bunga

[junejasprose-addict]

This is my june egbert cosplay build in elden ring. Rotten battle hammer with royal magic grease for warhammer of zillywho. Anvil hammer for fear no anvil. Dryleaf arts for egbert punch. Stormcaller, divine beast tornado, bloodhound's step, and rotten butterflies for the windy thing. I want to do more of these but 90% of the armor in this game is beige or grey and it's pretty hard to make your character look like jasprose when you don't have access to magenta

[troythecatfish]

[skvaderarts]

These builds use DLC items, so just a heads up! More details about each build are below if you are curious. Thanks for voting! And if you spread the poll, EXTRA THANK YOU! I appreciate it! A larger sample size makes this more fun!

Saint of the Bud: An Arcane/Faith/Dex Scarlet Rot build using the Antspur Rapier with the Poison Flower Blooms Twice Ash of War and the Poleblade of the Bud. The Ant Skull Plate shield is a great contender for this build. I'll also be using spells such as Pest Threads, Pest-Thread Spears, Scarlet Aeonia, and Rotten Butterflies. Will use the rotten stray summon and makes liberal use of crafted items such as rot pots and fly pots. Wears the Full Bloom Chest piece and the Mushroom Crown for a truly unhinged look. Utilizes Maleina's Great Rune/Rykard's Great Rune.

Finger Witch: A Strength/Intelligence build with a possible touch of Arcane. This build specializes in finger weapons and spells. Uses a dueling shield. Both the Gazing Finger and the Ringed Finger scale best with strength, and despite the scaling of the staff that boosts finger sorceries requiring arcane for a spell class that USES NO ARCANE (Fromsoft stop doing crap like this. I like arcane staffs, but this was a weird one to pick for that) I will be using it and possibly adding the oracle bubble spells so that I have something to do with the Arcane requirement late game. It utilizes all of the finger sorceries such as Glintstone Nail, Glintstone Nails, and Cherishing Fingers as well as both finger weapons. One hammer and one colossal weapon. An interesting combo, to be sure. It will also use the new finger summon and the finger robes which are VERY disturbing looking. Utilizes Morgott's Great Rune/ Radahn's Great Rune.

Blasphemous Knight: A Dexterity/Faith (optional intelligence) build that uses the Blasphemous Blade (Which, funny enough, I've actually never tried despite how popular it is!) and the Spear of the Impaler. It included the now-fixed Messmer's Flame Incantations which include Rain of Fire, Messmer's Orb, and Fire Serpent. It may optionally include Rykard's Rancor (which is where in intelligence requirement would come from since it needs a whopping 40 Intelligence!) and could possibly include the Blood Incantations but only if Arcane is added to the build, so that's not likely. The core build is just the Messmer fire incantations and the two remembrance weapons. Wears the Hoslow/Messmer Knight sets. Utilizes Rykard's Rune. Still seems like a fantastic build!

Putrescent Death Bird: A Strength/Intelligence/Faith/character with an optional touch of Arcane for status build-up. Themed after the Death Birds. Wears the Death Gravebird's Blackquill set. The set boosts jump attacks like the Raptor's Black Feathers set in the base game. They specialize in different types of death sorcery. They can cast spells such as Rykard's Rancor, Ancient Death Rancor, Spectrial Rings of Light, Explosive Ghostflame, and Vortex of Putrescence. Not Tibia's Summons, though. I have standards. Putrescence Cleaver, Helphen's Steeple, and the Spirit Glave. The Eclipse Great Shield would be a good pick. Essentially, It's a very fancy frost build. Utilizes Radahn's Great Rune.

Beastial Tree Sage: A Strength/Faith build focused on pure holy damage. (which is shockingly good in the DLC but more tricky in the late main game due to the number of bosses with extreme Holy resistance.) The weapons consist of two colossal weapons that both scale to Strength and Faith and an optional dagger for a faster option if needed. Those are the Great Club and the Shadow Sunflower Blossom. The dagger is the Cnquedea. The Erdtree Greatbow is also a great fit for this build and will be included as an additional ranged option. They would specialize in Beastial Incantations such as Stone of Gurranq and Gurranq's Beast Claw as well as Holy spells like Wrath of Gold, Elden Stars, Land of Shadow, and Crucible Incantations such as Thorns, Bloom, and Breath. Wears Freya's set and uses Radahn's Great Rune.

Fire Prelate: A build focusing on strength and Faith. Utalizes the Prelate's Inferno Crozier and the Cranial Vessel Candlestand. It also uses the Giant's Flame incantations, such as Giant's Flame Take Thee and Flame Fall Upon Them. Uses either the Hoslow Set or the Fire Prelate set for cosplay purposes. A very powerful and versatile fire build. Uses Radahn/Morgotts/Malenia' Great runes. BONK.

Spellblade Cannoneer: A Strength/Int Build using the Moonrithyll's Knight Sword, the Great Mace with Waves of Darkness, and Rabbath's Cannon. It also may use the Jellyfish Shield, Carian Dueling Shield, or the Cuckoo Great Shield. It utilizes Carian Sword Sorcery such as Magic Glintblade, Greatblade Phalanx, Carian Peircer, and Carian Greatsword. It also contains Glintstone Sorcery such as Gavel of Haima, Cannon of Haima, Spiral Shard, and Loretta's Greatbow, and Moon Sorceries such as Rellana's Twin Moons. It uses Relanna/Loretta's armor sets and Radahn's/Morgott's Great Rune.

SO! Thanks for reading! I appreciate your interest in my builds XD If you want the stat sheet for any of these, just let me know and I'll post them! And if you want to see these builds in action, I'll be streaming them on Twitch. I'm SkvaderStreams. Original, I know lol! But feel free to come and lurk. It's a good time! Thanks again! It's always fun having someone to share my build ideas with. If you ever want one, let me know!

Have a great day!

[hicky-coco]

Is this a good buiLD? I havent made it past stormviel castle

[sillovn]

Cheat Sheet: Hybrid Sorcery

So you want to play a hybrid sorcerer? Here is a quick overview. (X) - more Cheat Sheets

This series started as a reference for planning my ER characters, and also as notes for spell types. Ive tried to keep this info dense and not just list things you can pull from a wiki/build tool.

As always, I recommend the following for detailed math and specifics...

Build and Inventory Planner by sovietspaceship

Glintstone Staff math by Chrightt

Magic Schools Overview

Death

Stat: INT+ FTH min - Rancorcall (16 int, 14 fth) max - Explosive Ghostflame (42 int, 30 fth)

The most stat intensive magic school with few practical uses. Main strength is throwing out persistent homing projectiles (ie. being annoying in PvP). Besides this, Death spells are slow acting and deal very little damage.

Fia's Mist is a source of Deathblight. Only 1 other spell (Death Lightning) also has this.

Tibia Summons can be blocked by obstacles (the skeletons spawn where an invisible projectile lands).

Lava

Stat: high INT + low FTH min - Magma Shot (19 int, 10 fth) max - Rykard's Rancor (40 int, 18 fth)

The only fire damage sorceries, spells are slow acting and leave lingering damage effects. This school is very weak, if you need fire damage projectiles - consider using throwing pots instead.

Magma Shot, Roiling Magma are "magic grenades", manual aim works better than locking on.

Gelmir's Fury, Rykard's Rancor focus on flooding areas with damage hazards. They are also (arguably) less useful.

Claymen/Bubble

Stat: INT + ARC min - Oracle Bubbles (19 int, 15 arc) max - Great Oracular Bubble (25 int, 18 arc)

Only 2 spells, send out bubbles that drift slowly and explode on contact. Very efficient damage per FP but very slow acting; treat these less like ranged missiles and more like environmental hazards that you can prepare a fight with.

Oracle Bubbles are very weak, leaving Great Oracular Bubble as the 1 real spell in this school.

Great Oracular Bubble has similar damage to Comet, and works somewhat like a slow-motion version of it.

Both spells are found early, with no boss kills needed.

Aberrant

Stat: FTH min - Briars of Punishment (21 fth) max - Briars of Sin (24 fth)

Has many strange properties; FTH-only requirement, inflicts bleed and costs life to use.

very low fp cost, also surprisingly fast cast speed.

damage improved by many sources. Staff of the Guilty (+20%), Alberich's Armour (+6% per piece).

despite appearance, deals magic *not* physical damage.

Glintstone Staff Breakdown

Spell scaling comparison is vs. 60 INT on Academy Glintstone Staff (~304). In short, +50 points in damage stat given most classes stat with ~10 stat base.

Prince of Death

INT/FTH staff, has the most damage given infinite levels (80 INT/FTH). However, stat scaling is low up until ~60 INT/FTH. Consider for NG+, poor choice otherwise.

226 scaling at 35/35 or 40/30

Gelmir

INT/FTH staff, more usable than the above, but still very weak. This staff is drop-only and *very hard* to farm.

248 scaling at 40/30 or 35/35

Albinauric

The only hybrid staff with reasonable damage, scales Arc>Int. However! you still need INT for spell requirements; take note, even if high ARC + low INT looks good on paper.

293 scaling at 40/30 or 45/25

Guilty

Pure FTH staff, drop-only. Large school bonus (+20% damage for Aberrant spells).

271 scaling at 60 fth

Closing Thoughts

Hybrid sorcery is difficult to work with. And with good reason.

Sorcery is *very focused* on 'long range + magic damage'. The hybrid schools don't improve/widen your strategic options. Additionally, the most usable hybrid spells also tend to be the low req. ones.

Sorcery requirements overwhelmingly ask for INT and lots of it. Even if damage seems good, having less INT limits your arsenal.

Hybrid staves tend to have low damage

All this to say; 'INT+ splash stat' is the most reasonable build for (most) hybrid sorceries.

For example: 15 Fth lets you use 3 of 4 Gelmir spells. For most characters, that is ~5 levels. Additionally, school bonuses only need the staff *equipped*. In this case, you could Off-Hand a Gelmir Staff and cast with an Academy Glintstone for much more damage.

The 1 noteworthy exception? Aberrant spells. The staff damage is pretty decent with a *very large* school bonus. At reasonable levels, dual-wield Guilty Staves is the most damage (for Aberrant spells specifically and nothing else).

[artnoutdraws]

[2024/05/06] Stormlord Thyrm (Original Tarnished)

This is the Tarnished of my 4th playthrough, which it had a pretty fun build I think (described underneath the drawing)

The entire build is based around using the Storm Blade ash of war. When you use it, you shoot a wind projectile forwards by swinging your sword. But, if your sword swing connects with an enemy, it will deal additional damage! The combined damage of the wind projectile and the sword swing will always be greater than the damage of a regular sword attack. On top of that, Storm Blade has a fixed attack time, regardless of what weapon class you put it on. This attack speed is faster than the one of a greatsword, meaning that you can attack faster by using Storm Blade on a greatsword, than by using the standard attacks of the greatsword (learned this on reddit of all places, leading to the creation of this build). You can boost this damage further with weapon buffs like Electrify Armament or Bloodflame Blade

In order to maximize our Storm Blade-ing, we need a lot of FP. This is why we'll hold the Sacrificial Axe in our off-hand and equip the Ancestral Spirit's Horn talisman, both of which restore a small amount of FP on killing an enemy. With both these combined, you regain so much FP from regular enemies that you'll practically never run out of FP in the overworld [note, this was written before the DLC came out, and I haven't taken this character into the dlc yet, but presumably the Blessed Blue Dew Talisman works better than the Ancestral Spirit's Horn]. For damage, using the Shard of Alexander [and the Enraged Divine Beast] talisman[s] works wonders

Then, to stick to the storm theme, I used the Flamberge, because it kinda looks like a lightning bolt (I know it's supposed to be flames, but if you squint hard enough it works), and you can use the Stormhawk Deenh spirit summon

[imthatfungi]

I'm doing a holy tank confessor build in elden ring. When it's done I'll post it here.

Does anyone have recommendations for one handed swords I need them

[lunarprincegarbo]

Ugh, trying to find a good builds guide for elden ring now that the dlc isn't too far from being real and I can't find any good beginer friendly stages of the game build guides. Or explanations of enemy weaknesses or what stats work well together or what they even do sometimes...

The best I got was saint riot and I think there was someone else making funny pvp builds but not thing like "good for introducing beginers to build structure" you know? Like they all assume you know how stats like dex and arcana work already, and don't even get me started in poise🙄

Idk, maybe I'll just make my own for how to get through the game in the early areas. Unless someone can send me some suggestions. Genuinely curious.

And don't fucking suggest fextralife.

[conjoinedpubes]

The Dexterity Cheatsheet

Was inspired by this video. which asked the question; 'what does Dexterity have as a build niche?'. Hence, decided to come up with a easy reference for all the reasons to play a dex-character.

At its most basic, Dex gives the following...

1. Attack Power for weapons with Dex scaling 2. Cast speed 3. Reduces fall damage 4. Harder to fall-off horseback

Bonuses 3+4 are not relevant in most combat scenarios, and should not be taken into account for buildmaking.

Weapon Infusions

Dexterity has 2 infusions; [Keen] and [Lightning].

Keen - the physical infusion. Raises weapon AR scaling with Dex, also scales damage on certain Weapon Skills.

Lightning - The elemental counterpart to Keen. In PvP, lightning is advantaged over other elemental damage - as it tends to be the lowest defense on player characters.

Lightning is also affected by environment. Wet targets (eg. in rain) have reduced lightning mitigation. Hiting water with lightning causes an 'explosion' that deals an burst of AOE damage.

However, elemental infused weapons cannot be buffed by most sources. Lightning Infusion also splits damage between physical and lightning; hence mitigated by both the enemy's physical and lightning defenses.

Cold - Adds magic damage, int scaling and Frostbite status. Also retains more of a weapon's physical scaling than other caster infusions. Hence, on a innately dex-scaling weapon - Cold will scale well from both Int and Dex; hybrids take note.

Weapon Skills/Arts

Damage for Weapon Skills is very complex.

In general - skills that swing the weapon care about the weapon's attack rating (AR). Skills that shoot projectiles care about stats. (A detailed explanation can be found in this video)

Listed here are Weapon Skills of specific Keen/Lightning affinity. There are many excellent 'general use' Weapon Arts, just not innately dex-focused.

Thunderbolt Lightning affinity, bullet art. The infamous spam tool of arena duels; effectively gives ranged magic without needing to build a caster and while using any weapon. Lightning Slash Enhanced hit. Adds a fixed lightning damage buff to your weapon regardless of whether it lands. 'Elemental Slash' type weapon arts are one of the few ways to buff weapons with elemental infusions. Beast Roar Keen affinity, bullet art. Another infamous ranged spam, this time a physical projectile. As with Thunderbolt, effectively gives access to ranged on any weapon.

Cast Speed

"Shortens the animation when casting spells"

This is a complex stat, do note that...

This is based on specific breakpoints unique to each spell, there is no global %cast speed modifier. In general, 70 Dex is the cap for cast speed. Items that add Cast Speed (eg. Radagon's Icon) add 30 virtual dexterity (vdex), treating your cast speed as if you had +30 Dex.

Hence, if you plan to make a dex-caster hybrid - spell choice and your dex-int/fth split affects how much of an impact cast speed will make.

Consumables

"Consumables with scaling in Dexterity"

Throwing Knives (All) - Exceptional dex scaling on Fan Daggers (A) and Kukri (S). Others like Poisonbone Dart have significant scaling in both Dex + Arc.

Throwing Pots (Lightning) - 2 variants, Lightning Pot and Dragonbolt Pot.

Spark Aromatic - Damaging perfume, unusual in having fire damage while being dex scaling.

Noteworthy Weapons

This is not a list of best weapons, but weapons that are noteworthy within each class for dex characters.

Many weapon classes such as Halberds have broadly good movesets and can be scaled in many ways. Similarly, a weapon can be good purely off its moveset, even if the numbers are not the most optimal.

Dagger - Misericorde, Scorpion's Stinger, Celebrant's Sickle, Bloodstained Dagger, Great Knife Dex friendly weapon class in general. Misericorde is a critical-hit tool with high AR on Lightning, it also has the longest reach in class. Though in practice, this means little Scorpion's has innate rot and a dex bias scaling. Celebrant's has sheild pierce and high AR. Bloodstained and Greatknife are both regular weapons with innate bleed, while also scaling well with dex. However, do note that unless you started as a Bandit, these weapons are hard to acquire.

Straight Sword - Warhawk Talon, Noble's Slender Sword Among regular straight swords, these 2 have a bias toward dex scaling. The difference in reach and AR between regular straight swords is quite minor. Broadswords etc. are all very useable.

Greatsword - Flamberge Of the regular weapons, Flamberge is the only one with a distinct dex bias. Most other Greatswords have a Str bias, though many (eg. Claymore, Knight's Greatsword) are very playable on dex.

Colossal Sword UGS - Zweihander, Greatsword, Godslayer Greatsword For regular weapons, Zweihander has the lowest str req and scales best on Keen. Greatsword has higher str req, but has more AR on Lightning. Godslayer has faster standard attacks and is a rare source of dex-scaling fire damage.

Thrusting Sword - Cleanrot's Knight's Sword, Estoc, Antspur Rapier A dex-biased class overall, in general... Cleanrot's has longest reach and most AR at lower dex levels. Estoc has the most AR at dex softcap 80. Antspur has a 'Scarlet Rot' status while being infusable.

Heavy Thrusting Sword - Dragon King's Cragblade Longest weapon in class, innate lightning damage, has very high dex req. (37). HTS in general is a dex-biased weapon class, any of the regular options are also good.

Curved Sword - Bandit's Curved Swords Only weapon in class with a clear dex bias. Shamshir and Scavenger's are also good options.

Curved Greatsword - Bloodhound's Fang Bloodhound Fang scales very well to dex and is obtainable early. Dismounter is longest in class and infusable, but is drop-only.

Katana - Uchigatana, Nagakiba All weapons in this class (except Meteoric Ore Blade) are dex focused. Nagakiba has the longest reach by a significant margin, Uchigatana has the most AR for both Keen and Lightning. In short; Uchi for damage over reach, Naga for reach over damage. The Hand of Malenia is also noticeable longer than other katanas but still falls short of the Nagakiba. It is also not infusable.

Halberd - Guardian's Swordspear Unusual in having mostly sweep and slash moves. Highest AR in class on Keen, the 'big numbers stick'. Its Lightning infusion is noticeably worse than Keen for some reason, also has high str req. (16) for a dex weapon. Remainder of the Halberds (beside Gargoyle and Nightrider) can all be built toward Dex. Here, Banished Knight's Halberd tends to be the jack-of-all trades in AR and moveset.

Spear - Cross Naginata, Bolt of Gransax Of the regular spears, Naginata has innate bleed and dex scaling bias. Unusual in having a slashing attack-chain by defqult. Being a spear, the min-max setup is to dual wield and ignore the 'core-moveset'. But if you already knew that, you dont need to read this post. Bolt of Gransax; unique weapon with exceptional range (2nd highest) and innate lightning damage. Has very high dex req. (40), scales VERY poorly with str despite having 20 str req.

Greatspear - Lance, Treespear Lance is the only regular weapon in class. Treespear scales very well to dex (physical damage only) and has innate holy damage, it also one of the rare buffable weapons with an innate element. Vyke's War Spear scales well to dex, but is mostly a status weapon for pvp, hence its AR is not generally a consideration.

Reaper - Scythe, Grave Scythe The Scythe has longer reach, dex bias on Keen and features a unique double heavy attack. Grave Scythe has more AR in all cases except 80 dex + Keen. However, it has higher str req. and weight. Worth noting; is that Grave Scythe is rare drop. While the Scythe is a guaranteed drop and can be found early.

Hammer - Monk's Flamemace A str biased class in general. Monk's is the only regular hammer with a dex bias, it is drop only. The default Hammer does not have any dex bias, but has great range and moveset. It is likely a better choice than the Monk's even for dex builds.

Greathammer - None A very str-biased class, no standouts for dex.

Axe - Forked Hatchet Only weapon in class with a dex bias. However, it makes a poor weapon due to low range and damage. A dex weapon by technicality not practicality.

Greataxe - Butchering Knife Only weapon in class with a dex bias, highest AR on Keen. However, Lightning infusion narrows the AR gap for many of the regular Greataxes. Worth noting, as the Butchering Knife has very short heavy attacks.

Colossal Weapons - Duelist Greataxe Class with overwhelming str bias. Both the regular Duelist Greataxe and Rotted variant are the only weapons in class with dex bias. However, they suffer from low AR and have a significant str req. Another "dex weapon by technicality".

Whips - Urumi Exceptional dex scaling, has unique charged heavy attack with great precision and reach. All other whips also have a dex bias (except Giant's Braid). Fists - Katar Only fist with piercing damage and a dex bias. Has slightly longer reach than most.

Claws - Raptor's Talons, Venomous Fang This is a status focused class. Raptor's is another case of a weapon that technically has a dex bias, but this does not make it a good weapon. Venomous Fang is the only infusable weapon with innate poison status, it also has very high base AR.

Twinblades - Godskin Peeler Weapon class predominantely used for statuses. Peeler has a dex-bias relative to other twinblades, it also features a distinct moveset.

STARTING CLASS

Vagabond - A favourite shell for PvP characters. While it may not seem like a dex starter, this class saves a ton on stats for defense. This allows one to start with general defensive base and build dex as you see fit. Most weapons also have some str req. so the base str is also rarely wasted.

Samurai - 2nd highest dex, while having a good spread of hp, endurance and str. Wastes no points for 'caster' stats, good option for full martial dex characters.

Prisoner - Exceptional dex and int, very low base faith. Great starter for that specific hybrid stat combination.

Warrior - Highest dex of all starter classes. That said, its often less efficient in the long run (vs. Vagabond/Samurai) due to having an unusual stat distribution (few use cases for having extra Mind + Int + Arc).

Bandit - High Dex + Arc. Similar to Warrior in being less effecient for pure dex due having odd 'spare stats'.

In short, Vagabond/Samurai will be your go-to for generalist dex characters. The remainders are options provided you have a specific dex hybrid in mind. When in doubt, use the Elden Ring build planner here.

Thanks and Credits

Chrightt and his community for providing much of the in-depth math this post is based on. Rorydobson for the Elden Ring build planner.

[utteringsofamadone]

People take this game too seriously. I'm people.

[troythecatfish]

Here’s a personal recommendation of a YouTube video to check out:

[vrozenfeld]

They asked why? And I say why not 🌚

[olfactomancer]

So in the name of interest convergence I think I’m gonna make a Stangg build in Elden Ring

[soporificlily]

hehe twinsiessss!!! but add frostbite to the mix!

now that ive beaten elden ring + SOTE with my shitty "jack of all trades" build that ive allowed to cross over into ng+, ive started an actual 'build' and it's just.. mushroom

get poisoned, rotted, AND bled boy

this fucking sucks. i love this. how is this actually a viable thing

(i know why it's viable. because any build is viable if you just dodge properly and learn the boss's mechanics and moveset kMFLKNMXfmn)

[sillovn]

Cheat Sheet: Hybrid Incantations

So you want to play hybrid incantations? (X) - more Cheat Sheets

This series started as a reference for planning my ER characters, and also as notes for spells types. Ive tried to the info dense and not just list things you can pull from a wiki/build tool.

As always, I recommend the following for specific with math and details

Build and Inventory Planner by sovietspaceship

Sacred Seal math by Chrightt

Magic Schools Overview

Golden Order Fundamentalist

Stat: INT=FTH or INT only min - Order Healing (11 int, 11 fth) max - Radagon's Rings of Light (31 int, 31 fth) or Law of Regression (37 fth)

Normal requirement is equal Int+Fth. However, the 2 "Law" spells that only require Int. Contains most of the game's offensive holy spells - if you want to sling holy magic, this is it. Besides that, the school contains a grab-bag of very unique support spells of variable quality.

Discus of Light is cheapest 'magic missile' type attack in the game (3 FP cost).

Law of Regression is the only way to remove enemy buffs.

The 'anti-undead' spells (Order's Blade etc.) are worse than just using throwing pots/weapon arts.

Dragon Communion

Stat: FTH>ARC min - Magma Breath (14 fth, 10 arc) max - Greyoll's Roar (28 fth, 17 arc)

Infamously flashy, every spell is big and costly. Power level ranges from 'game-breaking' to 'above average', there are no real bad choices here. DC Spells come in 2 types; up-close physical strikes and long-range elemental breath.

Rot Breath(s) give the easiest access Scarlet Rot status. Being long range + low stat requirement.

Glintstone/Ice Breath(s) are the only magic damage incantations. Ice Breath(s) also apply Frost status, which is rare for incants.

Dragonmaw is single largest hit in the game (600+ at base)

Greyoll's Roar applies the rare debuff of reducing enemy damage/defense. Only 2 other sources of this effect exist (Sword of Milos, Winged Greathorn).

Blood Oath

Stat: FTH + ARC min - Bloodflame Blade (12 fth, 10 arc) max - Bloodboon (14 fth, 17 arc)

Focused on applying the 'Bloodflame' effect - a bleed status that gradually fill-ups after the hit. Low stat requirements + poor direct damage make them good support spells for a variety of other builds.

Bloodflame does not scale with Arcane, the bleed amount is fixed (~20 buildup over 2 seconds).

Bloodflame Talons is the only spell with notable direct damage

Sacred Seal Breakdown

The 'real meat' of hybrid incantations. Compared to sorcery staves, the choices here are both good and diverse. Every item here is a guaranteed treasure - there is no need to farm. Additionally 2 of 4 can be found very early in the game.

For spell scaling comparison, assume 60 Faith on Godslayer Seal (~291).

Golden Order

Stats: INT + FTH, ~296 scaling at 40/30 or 35/35

Scales INT+FTH equally, solid choice if Int>Fth or Int=Fth. At 'post-meta' levels (80/80), this seal has the most damage.

has 0 weight, can be found without killing any bosses.

Dragon Communion

Stats: FTH + ARC, ~304 scaling at 45/25

Scales better to ARC than FTH, more damage that most pure-FTH seals at 'reasonable NG levels'.

has 0 weight, can be found at the start of the game.

scaling is 'front loaded', the 15-30 ARC range will give the bulk of it's damage.

Frenzied Flame

Stats: STR + DEX + INT + FTH

Has 0 stat requirements and 0 weight. Damage is *very low* unless you have 40+ in all stats, its main use is casting utility spells on any build.

Clawmark

Stats: STR+FTH, ~248 scaling at 40/30 or 35/35

Scales STR + FTH, can be used 2H for extra STR scaling. Thanks to weapon arts, projectile weapons and consumables - there is no shortage in range or utility for non-caster builds. Is Clawmark better than keeping a bow and some weapon grease on hand? debatable - but if you want to cast on a Str build, it does the job.

Closing Thoughts

While hybrid Incantations have fewer magic schools than their Sorcery counterpart, they have 3 major advantages.

Spell Quality

Incantations as a whole have distinct niches - the hybrid schools are no exception. In terms of function, there's nothing like Bloodflame or Dragon Breaths among the regular pure-Faith incants.

2. Equipment

All hybrid seals are good - either having solid numbers or a specific niche.

3. Diverse Strategy

Incantations have good variety even at low Faith - you lose out less options when spreading between FTH and a hybrid stat.

Put simply, hybrid incants are *very* open ended in how you build. How much are you going to use a regular weapon? what level range do you need the build to work at? Is this a PvP or PVE focused build? Unlike hybrid sorcery, the combinations are endless.