Elden Ring follows the trend set by From Software in their Souls series of games with its high level of difficulty. Due to a few key reasons, this entry is the most accessible game to date. The main reasons for this lie in the wealth of combat options provided to suit the many dangerous situations you may come across.

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Things like summoning NPC ghosts with helpful Spirit Ashes and making use of powerful Ashes of War make the experience more manageable. There is an absolutely massive amount of content in Elden Ring, but you need not suffer to experience it all. Follow these tips, and the experience will surely be a smooth one.

Updated on October 29, 2023, by Alfredo Robelo: With a game as popular as Elden Ring, players have found new ways to make the game easier, and perfected the old ones. So we've updated this list to reflect that, so you can tackle the Lands Between without having to worry if you'll see the ending or not. Brace forth, Tarnished.

12 Explore The Lands Between And Level Up

elden ring map menu of the lands between

Nothing is more annoying than getting stuck on a difficult boss fight. But in Elden Ring, there are many things to find in the open world that could make your journey easier. The most obvious is Runes, which can be used to level up, thus making you directly stronger. Before looking up guides and strategies, consider simply coming back later to any given fight.

Golden Seeds and Sacred Tears are two of the incredibly helpful things you can find hidden around Elden Ring's open world, both of which increase the effectiveness of your healing flask. Other things like new weapons, armor, Spirit Ash, and especially weapon upgrade materials make exploring a surefire way to achieve victory.

11 Level Up Your Vigor

Mohg, Omen of Blood and servant of the Formless Mother in Elden Ring

One of the easiest traps you can fall into in a Souls game is neglecting to level up your health. In Elden Ring, the stat is called Vigor, and while it is easy to see the benefit more health provides, you must sacrifice damage output for the health increase. This makes the decision a hefty one, but your first time through you'd need only to focus on Vigor, Endurance, and a single damage stat.

It is impossible to be ready to dodge attacks all the time if you are not expecting them, so the best strategy is to have some extra breathing room in case you do take damage, so aim to have at least 20 points in each of the three mayor stats. For the mid-game raise them to 40, and on the endgame you can branch out. This is easy since you can alter your stats later on.

10 Use Better Armor

Elden Ring Easy Mode Heavy Armor

The reality is that your choice of armor is up to you. No set is necessarily better than another, but one thing that is certain is that some armor sets will absorb more damage of a specific type, like the super high physical damage-absorption Bull Goat Armor. Remember that the heavier the armor, the more Endurance you'll need to move properly. But it's worth it since tank builds are among the easiest to play as.

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This damage absorption is usually physical, but some sets like the Scaled Armor reduce magic damage, meaning that changing your armor to suit the damage type of your opponent will make the fight easier. Make sure to pick something that absorbs a good bit of damage, in addition to looking cool. If one fight in particular is giving you trouble, think about the damage type and dress accordingly.

9 Use A Shield

elden rin character with shield walking away from camera

One thing that will almost always make fighting in Elden Ring easier is making use of the plethora of shields included in the game. These shields allow you to block a portion or even the entirety of the damage from enemy attacks in exchange for stamina. You can see how much they block in the details screen of the shield; you're aiming for the percentage to be 100, so all damage is negated.

Keep in mind that the size of the shield will dictate how many attacks you can take before you are guardbroken and made vulnerable to attacks. Generally, great shields will block the best, followed by medium shields, and lastly small shields that will block the least amount of damage before your guard is broken. Good stamina management between guarding and dodging will be the key to victory.

8 Optimize Your Build

Antspur Rapier, Dragon King's Cragblade, Frozen Needle Elden Ring

This tip is a little subjective since your build in Souls games is really up to you. There are pros and cons to each stat: investing in one stat means neglecting another. But overall, there are some rules you can follow when leveling up in Elden Ring. If you're already invested in your playthrough, remember that you can respec your character, meaning that no stat would be wasted.

The basic rules are to level up Vigor for health and Endurance for a higher equipment load and stamina. Then, pick only one or two damage stats, like Strength or Faith. Following these rules reduces the chance of becoming out-scaled in the late game and increases the chance that you will be capable of crushing foes instead. Once on the late game, remember to look up the soft caps for each stat, since for example having more than 60 points in Endurance is not worth it.

7 Try A Magic Build

Queen Rennala holding aloft a staff before a full moon in Elden Ring the video game

There's a common joke among the FromSoft community that playing a magic build is 'easy mode.' And frankly speaking, there's some truth to that. Magical spells allow you to deal significant damage to enemies and bosses alike, all from the comfort of far away. Having a wide variety of spell options also means you can adjust your attacks to fit the situation without having to level up multiple weapons. Yet this does not come without risks, particularly in the early game.

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You'd want to be summoning friends or using spirit summons, as they can keep the enemy's attention while you fire away from a distance. While you'd most commonly be using Spirit Summons, they can be slain easily early on, so make sure to take the tankiest ones you find. While using the same spell over and over may not be the most exciting perspective, it's still plenty of fun, especially when you expand your arsenal to the real big hitters.

6 Make Use Of Ashes Of War

Ash of War: Prayerful Strike Elden Ring

Ashes of War make Elden Ring's combat feel even more massively open than it already does. They allow you to change one of the attacks on your weapons to a frankly humongous pool of choices, some of which can only be equipped on specific classes of weapons. And best of all, you can freely change these between weapons without expending anything.

Some of these are simple, like a damage buff or a sweeping slash attack, but some are specialized like the Giant's Hunt that allows you to lunge forward with a high damage poke. Experimentation is recommended, but the massive damage Ashes of War are capable of makes Elden Ring feel much more comfortable to play through.

5 Retain Medium Or Light Equip Load

elden ring samurai armorerd character in field

This is another one of the many gameplay quirks that have been a part of the Souls formula since the very beginning. The equip load system limits the weight of the armor and weapons you have equipped, incentivizing leveling up the Endurance stat as well as preventing everyone from wearing the heaviest armor they own all the time.

If you want the best movement with the heaviest armor, you'd be better off focusing your levels only on Endurance, Vigor, and Strength.

Consider that the status of your roll is determined by your equip load as well as your stamina consumption. Staying under 70 percent equip load is recommended to retain the normal roll state, but going under 30 percent will give you even more effective rolls.

It ends up depending on how you're more comfortable playing, or what the situation demands for; if a given scenario has you die in one hit no matter what, you might as well wear lighter armor and dodge your way around it.

4 Acquire Poise

screenshot of elden ring players in coloseum

Poise is an integral stat for melee and magic players alike, particularly with the tank strategies that end up being the easiest. The poise stat determines at what point you will be interrupted by enemy attacks.

Basically, if the enemy hits with a massive attack, you will need high poise to resist staggering. Although a lot of small attacks can also break posture, something that affects both you and your enemies, so keep it in mind. There are ways to increase poise, but you cannot level it up directly.

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Instead, you must use equipment or consumable items to increase your poise. Heavy armor, with the Bull Goat set giving the maximum possible poise, the Bull Goat Talisman that increases your poise by 33 percent, and a number of consumable items including the Baldachin's Blessing, Inronjar Aromatic, and the Leaden Hardtear in the Wonderous Flask of Physick.

While you don't have to chase these items specifically, just keep in mind the word poise as you travel, and know that the term is integral to winning fights.

3 Make Use Of Spirit Summons

Spirit Ashes in Elden Ring being summoned and taking the form of tattered humanoids

Spirit Ash allows you to summon NPC followers in certain places throughout the world of Elden Ring. Essentially they allow you to recruit enemies from the game to help you defeat bosses and groups of strong enemies. If there's any summon you particularly like, remember to level it up at the Roundtable Hold. You can even summon a copy of yourself with the Mimic Tear summon, considered one of the most powerful summons in the game.

The reasons investing in this feature makes the game easier are very similar to summoning help, but Spirit Summons do have some distinct advantages over human cooperators. Namely, bosses get more health in co-op, but they do not with Spirit Summons making the fight quicker if not easier overall. They also don't consume any resources, and come with unexpected advantages, like Hawks being able to avoid certain area attacks by never touching the ground.

2 Summon Players

Elden Ring summon sign ner player laying down

Two heads are usually better than one, and that is definitely the case for Elden Ring. You can use the Furlcalling Finger Remedy item to summon helpers into your game at various intervals throughout the game, though boss fights are the main reason people usually summon help. If you think a given boss is giving you trouble, it's likely that other players went through the same thing. Which in turn makes it likely that plenty of people are offering help at the boss gate.

This allows new strategies to come into play. Whereas alone it is difficult to be an archer, add on a friend who can take the attention of the boss, and suddenly your Legolas build actually works out.

This balance of aggression is also useful if you still play in the same way as usual, if not just for more healing opportunities. Yet plenty of times, your strategy won't matter, since you'll end up with someone that just wants to show off and kill the boss without your help. Few things are easier than not having to do the boss at all.

1 Use The Power Of Rot

Elden Ring Picture Showing The Underground Lake Of Rot

If you've played Elden Ring for a while, you'll know how devastating the Rot status can be. Much like being poisoned, this effect will drain your health while in effect, only much faster. While there are plenty of enemies that can apply the effect to you, you can also apply it back. And you can do it fairly early too, if you know where to look: the Rotten Stray Ashes will let you summon a small enemy that applies the effect for you, but it does require a trip to Caelid.

For the mid to late game, you'll want different sources of Rot, namely equipment or spells. Rotten Breath is notable among them, since the wide area of attack will let you hit big groups of enemies, or hit large bosses multiple times to guarantee the effect landing. It's best used in combination with Spirit Ashes, since they can draw the attention of your enemies as you do your thing.

While this won't work every time (particularly against immune enemies like Malenia), it works often enough to make most of the game a breeze.

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