Top 6 Elden Ring BEST Faith Builds [DETAILED]

FromSoftware, ever since their first Dark Souls game, has always aimed for providing a rich, diverse experience, scattered with all kinds of weapons, magic, equipment, stat combinations, and much more. This primarily promotes hefty customization, allowing players to envision a certain playstyle with a particular look and then sort through the game’s different customizations to achieve their vision. That is exactly what a build is – cherry-picking select weapons, equipment, rings, and maintaining a specific soul level composition to accomplish and maximize on a certain role.

Builds in Elden Ring are few and far between – just about anything you can imagine can be well-adapted in this game. For instance, if you’re a huge fan of strength weapons, you can make a pure strength build that capitalizes off your Strength and ensures the highest physical damage output possible. On the other hand, if physical weapons aren’t your forte and you’re somewhat of a magician yourself, Elden Ring offers two different kinds of magic: sorceries and incantations. These are further divided into sub-categories like pyromancies, miracles, gravitational spells, and much more!

And just like that, the possibilities become endless, which may beg the question of what the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring. While that is a very debatable discussion and too much for the scope of simply one guide, I will be listing 6 of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring that I have tried, had my friends recommend me, or see other players use in PvP and co-op.

Arcane Dragonslayer (Level 100) [By Fextralife]

Ever since the previously bugged Arcane scaling was patched in 1.03, Arcane builds have begun to storm the Elden Ring community as one of the best builds in general, bleed builds being on the forefront of this storm at the moment. Arcane is a relatively new stat introduced in Elden Ring that caters to a bunch of different effect, most notably Item Discovery from previous Dark Souls games. What’s different, however, is that it also now serves as a scaling attribute, meaning any weapon in Elden Ring may scale with Arcane, making it viable for even making one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring.

• Vigor – 40 
• Mind – 20
• Endurance – 25 (Could be turned down – I’ve used it mainly for my armor choice)
• Strength – 20 (Enough to wield my weapon of choice)
• Dexterity – 15 
• Intelligence – 9
• Faith – 30 
• Arcane – 50 (Second Arcane soft cap)

Weapon Choice

Dragon Communion Seal

As far as weapon choice is concerned, I would definitely recommend the Dragon Communion Seal, which is the best sacred seal to use on Arcane Faith builds in general due to it being the only sacred seal in Elden Ring that can achieve an S-scaling in Arcane. You’ll notice that it requires 10 Faith and 10 Arcane to wield, and rewards you with only a natural scaling of C in Arcane, its viability sky rockets when you upgrade it to +10 with Somber Smithing Stones, where it achieves a B scaling in Faith and S scaling in Arcane. What’s more is that, as you may have expected from its name, it also buffs Dragon Incantations by 15%, making it perfect for this build that will be centered around those. The best part is that this sacred seal can be obtained very early in the game in the Fringefolk Hero‘s Grave, right next to the Stranded Graveyard Site of Grace, though you’d need two Stonesword keys!

Iron Greatsword

Moving onto the real meat of one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring, I would go with the Iron Greatsword as the main armament. While there is actually much freedom here with regards to the main weapon, you ideally want to go for a weapon that has a good arcane scaling. This means that you can either go for a unique weapon that has naturally good Arcane scaling, or just a normal weapon on which you can induce Arcane scaling through infusing with an Occult Ash of War (such as Bloody Slash), which I would highly recommend. The Iron Greatsword requires 18 strength and 10 dexterity to properly wield, coming with a nice base damage of 149. Additionally, it can be obtained later in the game from large red-maned Misbegotten field bosses that can be encountered in Leyndell, Royal Capital, Ordina, Liturgial Town and Miquella’s Haligtree.

Smoldering Shield

Having a shield at your side to support you in times of need is as important as having a strong weapon, and in the context of Faith builds, having a shield that scales with Faith is a bonus. The only shield in Elden Ring that has a natural Faith Scaling is the Smoldering Shield, a shield that is pretty decent at both blocking and parrying. As such, it requires 10 strength, 9 dexterity and 12 faith to use, making it a piece of cake to wield. In return, it offers its wielders a solid D scaling in faith, which can be bumped upto a C scaling through normal reinforcement upto +14 with Smithing Stones. The shield itself can be found near the Prison Town Church Site of Grace in Volcano Manor along with a Golden Rune [9] which you may have come across before.

Armor Combination

The armor combination for this build is arguably more versatile than its weapon selection, the only compulsory armor piece being the Silver Tear Mask, a standalone helm which is dropped from the Mimic Tear boss in Nokron, Eternal City. While the helmet weighs a measly 4.6 units, the primary reason for using it is that it boosts your Arcane by 8 attribute points – we take those! Other than that, you have all the freedom in the world to decide on the remaining three armor pieces, though I would highly recommend rocking anything which not only appeals to your fashion (personal preference) but is light enough for you to medium roll with because fat rolling is never a good thing. 

Related: Best Faith Armor Elden Ring

Talisman Options

Radagon’s Soreseal

As far as talismans are concerned, the first I’m using is the Radagon’s Soreseal, a high-risk, high-reward talisman, except that we’ll reduce the risk here! The Soreseal greatly increases your attributes across the board, at the cost of damage taken, which is quite significant – we will be minimizing that after-effect with the Golden Bow incantation, which greatly increases both attack and defense. This a very viable combination, and you’ll be seeing it pop up multiple times on my list of the Faith Builds.

Curved Sword Talisman

Using the Smoldering Shield, a shield that will scale with your 30 Faith, you will no doubt have a really good tool to rely on with regards to blocking or performing guard counters. Guard Counters are a new combat mechanic in Elden Ring that are very viable, and what’s the best way of maximizing their damage/stagger output? That’s right, using the Curved Sword Talisman which is specifically tailored towards enhancing guard counters!

Flock’s Canvas Talisman

Last but not least, I’ve used Flock’s Canvas Talisman as my final talisman, something that you can get a little late in the game. As its item description goes, it significantly makes incantations more potent, which is a rather general term that can mean enhanced damage, shortened casting time, or more support if you’re using a support incantation.

Magic Scorpion Charm

One thing you’ll eventually notice in this build is that its two main powerhouse incantations (won’t spoil yet) deal massive magic and fire damage respectively. In this regard, it would be wise to use your fourth Talisman slot to equip a Talisman that boosts either one of those, as a Talisman that boosts both simultaneously sadly does not exist. My personal preference is the Magic Scorpion Charm, which increases magic damage by 12% at the cost of 10% damage reduction.

Spells to Memorize

Agheel’s Flame

The first Dragon incantation you should memorize is Agheel’s Flame, an incantation that allows you summon the Flying Dragon Agheel himself and scortch your enemies with his fire breath. Costing 36 FP and 60 stamina to use, this incantation is phenomenal at inflicting damage at short to medium range, making it particularly effective on bosses and hoards of enemies. However, as expected, you must defeat Flying Dragon Agheel in the Dragon-Burnt Ruins – he’ll be one of the first few field bosses you’ll encounter in Limgrave!

Smarag’s Glintstone Breath

The second Dragon Incantation that goes exceptionally well with this Faith Arcane build is Smarag’s Glintstone Breath, the incantation whose magic damage output I spoke of increasing with the Magic Scorpion Charm. For those familiar, Smarag’s Glintstone Breath is considered to be the regular Glintstone Breath incantation, except that it’s not steroids, dealing a good 12% damage more. To obtain it, you must first defeat the Glintstone Dragon Smarag, who is battled in a few parts in the course of Ranni’s Questline.

Lightning Spear

None of the Faith Builds in Elden Ring are complete without a lightning spell, and seeing that this build has some strong AOE spells, I decided to toss in a quick ranged spell – the Lightning Spear. Upon activation, your player will generate a spear made of lightning in the palm of their hand and hurl it towards their enemy. This is a chargeable weapon art that increases both in length, damage, and area of effect.

Golden Vow

Do not confuse this with the Golden Vow ash of war, as this is its incantation-counterpart. As mentioned earlier, this is a good combination with Radagon’s Soreseal as it helps greatly offset its con of raising your attributes at the cost of damage taken. Furthermore, the attack and defense buff it veils over you and your allies last 80 seconds!

Flame, Grant me strength

Having buffed Smarag’s Glintstone Breath with the Magic Scorpian Charm, it would be unfair to leave Agheel’s Flame as it is – which is why the final spell in this build is Flame, Grant me Strength. Upon casting, it grants you a 20% damage increase to physical and fire attacks, making Agheel’s Flame deal much more damage than before! It is found between two huge flamethrowers located behind Fore Gael.

Dragon Cult PvP God (Level 125) [By RPJames]

Lightning used to be just one category of spells in previous Dark Souls games. However, with the release of Elden Ring, FromSoftware has integrated different kinds of lightning spells, all distinct in their color, mainly known as Dragon Cult Incantations. These incantations are very powerful and rival the blood-red energy emitted by several dragons you encounter in the game, making a build centered around them one of the Best Elden Ring Faith Builds.

• Vigor – 40 (Sufficient for PvP)
• Mind – 26
• Endurance – 20 (As this is a Faith build, we will rely more on FP-consuming attacks)
• Strength – 20 (Good enough for the equipment I’ll be using)
• Dexterity – 40
• Intelligence – 9
• Faith – 50
• Arcane – 10

Weapon Choice

Finger Seal

The Finger Seal is one of the best, most early-to-obtain sacred seals in Elden Ring that also serves as part of the starting kit of Confessor. But in case you didn’t choose Confessor, you can buy the Finger Seal off the Twin Maiden Husks at the Roundtable Hold for 800 Runes – relatively cheap. Regardless, the Finger Seal comes with a meager stat requirement of 4 strength and 10 faith and possesses a C-scaling with Faith. Additionally, its Faith scaling peaks at an impressive S-scaling at +14 reinforcement through Smithing Stones, although once again, I would recommend going all the way through to maximize your spellbuff.

Bolt of Gransax

What makes this build stand out from the rest of the Faith Builds in Elden Ring and really serves as the connoisseur of Dragon Cult incantations is its main weapon, the Bolt of Gransax. Being one of the nine legendary armaments in Elden Ring, the Bolt of Gransax requires its wielders to have 20 strength and 40 dexterity, rewarding them with a D scaling in both. Don’t be alarmed by the fact that it possesses no faith scaling, for it still practically synergizes very well with the build due to its weapon art, Ancient Lightning Spear. Upon activation, your player will charge the spear with the ancient dragons’ red lighting, hurling it at distant weapons with incredible speed and power!

Banished Knight’s Shield

Running a build with a spear armament never sees its true potential unless you pair it with a shield! In the case of this PvP build, you should be looking for something light that has a solid guard boost, such as the Banished Knight’s Shield. Categorized as a Medium Shield, the shield comes with a base guard boost of 55 which can be significantly increased with Barricade Shield. You must infuse this shield with the Barricade Shield Ash of War, enabling it to achieve 100 guard boost and tank incoming attacks with little to no stamina damage. This is will allow you to adopt a more cautious playstyle if necessary, hugging your shield and poking enemies from behind it with your spear.

Armor Combination

I went with the Drake Knight set for purely fashion-related reasons for this build. The Drake Knight set can be found in the Crumbling Farum Azula, particularly the Beside the Great Bridge site of grace. Here, instead of going forward towards the Malekith boss room, run in the opposite direction towards the outside balcony of the building. From here, you’ll see a Beastman below, which is an indication that you should jump down and sprint across the bridge. From here, take the elevator down to the outskirts, where you should find the Drake Knight set tucked away in a chest.

Talisman Options

Two Fingers Hierloom

Moving away from the high-risk, high-reward model brought about by Radagon’s Soreseal, we will adopt a more straightforward strategy – gain without loss. Starting with the Two Fingers Hierloom, the talisman is found in the lower levels of the Purified Ruins located in the Liurnia of the Lakes continent. The Two Fingers Hierloom increases your Faith by 5 attribute points.

Flock’s Canvas Talisman

The Flock’s Canvas Talisman is an excellent Talisman responsible for significantly raising the potency of incantations. The talisman is obtained a little late into the game and requires you to complete Millicent’s questline, after which upon returning to Gowry, you will find him dead with the talisman peacefully resting on his corpse.

Old Lord’s Talisman

The Old Lord’s Talisman, similar to the Drake Knight set is found in the Crumbling Farum Azula, so you should pick it up on the way. Weighing in at only 0.5 units, the talisman blesses you by extending the duration of your spell effects, significant for this build as you will want to keep your buffs active for as long as possible in PvP. This is a very key component of this PvP build and really elevates it to one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring.

Starscourge Heirloom

The Starscourge Heirloom, as you may expect from its name, has its origin tied to Starscourge Radahn, arguably the mightiest Demi-god in Elden Ring. It is obtained in Fort Gael in Caelid – you’ll find it in a chest right outside the watchtower located in the later levels of the fort. Similar to the Two Fingers Hierloom, this talisman increases your Strength by 5 attribute points.

Spells to Memorize

Golden Vow

The Golden Vow is a very common incantation you’ll observe on most of the builds I have listed on my Best Elden Ring Faith Builds, partially because it increases your attack (by 15%) and defense (by 10%) and benefits your allies – at the reasonable cost of 47 FP. Furthermore, it can be found in Mt. Gelmir, in the Corpse-Stench Shack. The Golden Vow is commonly paired with the Radagon’s Soreseal to help minimize its damage negation reduction.

Ancient Dragons’ Lightning Strike

The Ancient Dragons’ Lightning Strike is a powerful Dragon Cult incantation that can rain terror upon your enemies. Requiring only 26 faith to memorize, casting the incantation summons a flurry of red lightning from the sky that spread in the form of an AOE attack. Using this up close on your enemies will almost guarantee them getting caught in the crossfire.

Ancient Dragons’ Lightning Spear

Right behind the Ancient Dragons’ Lightning Strike, we have the Ancient Dragons’ Lightning Spear, an incantation similarly obtained by giving Brother Corhyn or Mirei, Pastor of Vows, the Ancient Dragon Prayerbook, an important relic of the Dragon Cult. Upon activation, your player will generate a red lightning spear in their hand and unleash it on the ground to generate a massive shockwave.

Frozen Lightning Spear

The Frozen Lightning Spear is a powerful incantation that is dropped from the Dragonkin Solider of Nokstella boss encountered in Ainsei River. Requiring a whopping 34 faith to even use, the incantation allows you to conjure a blue spear from the palm of your hand and stab to create a two-stage attack, one a shockwave and the other a lightning burst.

Lightning Blade

No faith build is complete without a lightning spell, and seeing that this build has some strong AOE spells, I decided to toss in a quick ranged spell – the Lightning Blade. Upon activation, your player will generate a spear made of lightning in the palm of their hand and hurl it towards their enemy. This is a chargeable weapon art that increases both in length, damage, and area of effect.

Holy Paladin of Leyndell (Level 100) [By Fextralife]

You first encounter a patrolling Leyndell Knight quite early game, outside the Artist’s Shack in Liunaria of the Lakes. From the first moment I laid my eyes on these strut knights, roaming the lands in gold, shiny armor with mastery over the lightning arts, I knew I wanted to cosplay them somehow and transcend them into one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring. This will be a melee-faith build, more leaning on the melee side that you can prep at level 100.

• Vigor – 25 (Sufficient as I will focus more on poise)
• Mind – 17
• Endurance – 34 (More stamina is essential for a melee-leaning build)
• Strength – 34
• Dexterity – 22
• Intelligence – 9
• Faith – 34 (Good enough for scalings and the incantations I will be using)
• Arcane – 9

Weapon Choice

Gravel Stone Seal

As Level 100 hovers somewhere in the mid-game stages of Elden Ring, the Gravel Stone Seal would serve as an excellent catalyst. Coming at you with an easy stat requirement of 4 strength and 18 faith, the Gravel Stone Seal naturally comes with C in Faith. Moreover, its scaling in both reaches a whopping S-tier when reinforced up to +16 with Smithing Stones, though I would recommend going up to +25 to get that juicy spellbuff. One of the main reasons why I chose this sacred seal is that it particularly boosts Dragon Cult incantations, which is what we’ll be using in this build!

Treespear

Given the thrusting nature of Leyndell Knights, you must’ve quickly expected me to use the Treespear as my Armament, or at least some thrusting weapon that deals holy damage. The Treespear requires a heavy stat investment of 15 strength, 22 dexterity, and 18 faith to use, although it scales equally well in all three attributes (D-tier). However, at +25 reinforcement with Smithing Stones, it peaks at a massive 193 holy damage on top of 298 physical damage. Its holy damage can be further buffed with its weapon art, Sacred Order, making it highly effective against undead enemies.

Golden Greatshield

Keeping up with the whole holy knight aesthetic, the Golden Greatshield conveniently works very well with this build, one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring! The main reason why this level 100 build has 34 strength is that the Golden Greatshield, being the heaviest component of our loadout, requires 34 strength to wield. Regardless, the greatshield greatly complements the Treespear, as shields and spears are a common combination to use. Furthermore, I would highly recommend infusing it with the Barricade Shield Ash of War, as it allows for 100% guard boost, making it so that you don’t take any stamina damage at all! Thus, guard counters are very abusable on this build.

Armor Combination

As the name of the build implies, this won’t be a Leyndell Knight build without the Leyndell Knight set. The Leyndell Knight set is dropped from Leyndell Knights, who can be easily farmed outside the Outer Wall Phantom Tree Site of Grace in the Capital Outskirts. You’ll come across three separate Leyndell Knights here, which can be quickly taken out individually by means of stealth – you can also use the Silver-Pickled Fowl Foot to boost item discovery when farming. The Leyndell Knight set itself weighs a total of 28.1 units and comes with 40 poise, which is quite self-sufficient.

Talisman Options

Radagon’s Soreseal

The Radagon’s Soreseal is a widely sought-after talisman due to its benefit of greatly increasing attributes, each by 5 points, but at the cost of less damage negation. However, given that this is a faith build where we can utilize support-based incantations, the counter-effects of this talisman can be significantly negated with the Golden Vow incantation, thus making the combination very successful!

Spear Talisman

Given that this is partly a melee build, we want to capitalize off our spear as much as possible – this is where the Spear Talisman comes in. Spears have the unique trait of inflicting counterattacks due to their thrust-based moveset, and that is exactly what this talisman complements by increasing the damage dealt by the Treespear when striking an enemy that’s in the middle of an attack animation.

Curved Sword Talisman

While there are no Curved Swords on this build, don’t be misled by the item’s name. At its very essence, the Curved Sword Talisman is supposed to enhance damage dealt by guard counters by 20%, making it uniquely useful on this build. With the Treespear combined with the Golden Greatshield (infused with Barricade Shield), guard counters will become a common part of your playstyle.

Green Turtle Talisman

Stamina is a very important proponent of this build, as it will be expended in both maintaining your weight, blocking against incoming attacks, and of course, swinging your spear. Therefore, you should definitely invest in faster stamina regeneration through the use of the Green Turtle Talisman, which raises stamina recovery speed by almost 18%, reflecting about 8 stamina points per second.

Spells to Memorize

Blessing’s Boon

The Blessing’s Boon is a really good support incantation that constitutes as one of the ancient Erdtree incantations found in the game. Upon activation, your player will pledge to the Erdtree and be bestowed with its blessings which will be shared among your allies. This blessing comes in the form of passive HP regeneration, almost 8 HP per tick. What’s more, the buff lasts a whole one minute 30 seconds!

Golden Vow

Do not confuse this with the Golden Vow ash of war, as this is its incantation-counterpart. As mentioned earlier, this is a good combination with Radagon’s Soreseal as it helps greatly offset its con of raising your attributes at the cost of damage taken. Furthermore, the attack and defense buff it veils over you and your allies last 80 seconds!

Electrify Armament

Electrify Armament is a very important part of this build, requiring as little as 15 faith to use. Your player will enchant the Treespear with lightning damage upon activation (in the form of 0.75x incantation scaling), adding to its already great holy damage. Additionally, this incantation only requires 21 FP and 10 stamina to use and lasts for a total of 90 seconds, making much of boss fights a damage frenzy.

Honed Bolt

The Honed Bolt is one of the strongest lightning incantations in Elden Ring, dating back to the incantations used by the ancient dragon cult. Upon activation, your player will raise their sacred seal to the sky, calling down lightning bolts on your enemies. This incantation has solid tracking and deals impressive damage at the cost of just 12 FP.

Lightning Blade

No faith build is complete without a lightning spell, and seeing that this build has some strong AOE spells, I decided to toss in a quick ranged spell – the Lightning Blade. Upon activation, your player will generate a spear made of lightning in the palm of their hand and hurl it towards their enemy. This is a chargeable weapon art that increases both in length, damage, and area of effect.

Godslaying Tank (Level 150) [By iSeraph]

Suppose you’ve encountered the Godskin class of bosses, such as the Godskin Apostle and the Godskin Noble. In that case, you’ll quickly realize that god slaying tech in Elden Ring mainly refers to black flame incantations. Additionally, even Godskin bosses utilize black flame attacks, particularly in their second. Thus, taking inspiration from these masters of the black flame arts, I present the Godslaying Tank build, a well-poised build that hits like a truck, easily making it one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring.

• Vigor – 45 (Good amount of HP coupled with high poise = tank)
• Mind – 20
• Endurance – 24 (Don’t worry, we’ll be using a talisman to increase our equipment load)
• Strength – 23
• Dexterity – 39
• Intelligence – 14
• Faith – 55
• Arcane – 9

Weapon Choice

Godslayer’s Seal

The Godslayer’s Seal is a particular choice for this build, mainly because it is the only sacred seal in Elden Ring which boosts Godslayer Incantations. While it can be obtained quite early in the game (from Stormveil Castle), it does require 4 strength and 27 faith to use, rewarding you with a C scaling in Faith. However, fret not for upon reinforcing this seal to +14 with Smithing Stones, it achieves a whopping S scaling in Faith, and at +25 reinforcement, it achieves a massive spellbuff of 274! While it is generally a good catalyst for incantations, its affinity towards Godslayer Incantations makes it nothing less than perfect for this build!

Gargoyle’s Twinblade

The fact that I’m running a twinblade on this build should be an immediate indicator of some high incoming damage numbers – twinblades were broken way back in the network test, and the Gargoyle’s Twinblade is no exception! The Gargoyle’s Twinblade, dropped from the Valiant Gargoyle (Twinblade) requires only 18 strength and 15 dexterity and scales particularly well with Strength. Now you may be wondering as to where the faith scaling is, and that’s where its ash of war infusion comes in. This build must infuse the twinbalde with the Black Flame Tornado ash of war, obtained from the Godskin Duo boss fight – it enhances its flame art affinity, granting it a C scaling in Faith.

Buckler

Before I proceed to talk about the Buckler, I’ll give a disclaimer that a shield is not essential for this build as most of the time, you’ll be either two-handing the Gargoyle’s Twinblade or switching to the Godslayer’s Seal for casting incantations. Therefore, as far as whether or not you want to equip a shield, and what shield to equip, that is completely up to you as long as it doesn’t compromise your equipment load and consequent poise. My personal preference is the Buckler as it is incredibly light and extremely effective for parrying due to its extended parry frames – look no further if you seek a light shield that’s just good at parrying.

Armor Combination

There is much freedom in this category – it frankly doesn’t matter what kind of armor set or combination you choose to put on, just as long as your overall poise is well around 100. My personal preference is the Veteran Armor, Gauntlets and Greaves, and the Black Wolf Mask. Blaidd is one of my most revered NPCs in Elden Ring, and nothing makes me feel more dangerous than wearing his Black Wolf Mask. The rest of the Veteran Set has a very tanky look to it, not surprising considering it drops from Commander Niall himself. Regardless, you should peak at 100 poise (given the following talismans) with 42.8 units of mass with this armor combination.

Related: Best Elden Ring Early Game Armor

Talisman Options

Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman

The Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman is a unique talisman that depicts the ancient dragon itself, signaling to powerful effects. It does live up to that by massively boosting your physical damage negation, once again adding to the poise I am going for in this build. More specifically, it grants you a 20% multiplicative resistance on top of your current resistance – you can do the math!

Bull-goat’s Talisman

The Bull-goat’s Talisman is a unique-looking talisman found in the later levels of the Dragonbarrow Cave – from the entrance to the cave, take a hard left and stealthy scavenge the section to find it on a corpse. As far as the talisman’s effects are concerned, it raises poise by roughly 34%, taking the poise granted to you by your armor combination to almost 100!

Curved Sword Talisman

While there are no Curved Swords on this build, don’t be misled by the item’s name. At its very essence, the Curved Sword Talisman is supposed to enhance damage dealt by guard counters by 20%, making it uniquely useful on this build. With the Treespear combined with the Golden Greatshield (infused with Barricade Shield), guard counters will become a common part of your playstyle.

Faithful’s Canvas Talisman / Flock’s Canvas Talisman

The Faithful’s Canvas Talisman can be obtained quite early in the game, right in Sellia Crystal Tunnel, to which you can warp to early on from a chest in Dragon-Burnt Ruins. It boosts your incantations in general and is a good alternative for the Flock’s Canvas Talisman that requires quite a bit of effort and questline-progression to do to get it. But if you’re willing to go that extra mile, feel free to!

Spells to Memorize

Black Flame

The Black Flame is one of the most fundamental Godslayer Incantations in Elden Ring, requiring you to only have 20 faith. The incantation allows you to hurl a ball of black flame at your enemies to the point where you can charge it up for a more potent but delayed execution. The spell itself can be purchased from Brother Corhyn after giving him the Godskin Prayerbook which is found pretty early (Stormveil Castle).

Black Flame Ritual

The Black Flame Ritual is a superior Godslayer incantation than the preceding Black Flame incantation, serving as a core component of one of the Best Elden Ring Faith Builds. Ideally, it would be best if you used it when being overwhelmed with hoards of enemies since it costs more FP and stamina. Upon activation, you will free your hands and encircle yourself with a protective layer of black flame. The incantation is obtained from beating the Godskin Apostle and Noble in Spriticaller Cave.

Scouring Black Flame

The Scouring Black Flame, lying somewhere between the Black Flame and the Black Flame Ritual is something you should usually rely on for crowd control. Upon expending 27 FP and 36 stamina, your player will use their sacred seal to sweep the area before them with a deadly black flame that will scorch anything in its path. It is obtained from the Godskin Apostle defeated in the Weeping Evergaol.

Black Flame’s Protection

The Black Flame’s Protection is more of a buff-type incantation as opposed to an offensive one like the previous three. Requiring 30 FP and 13 strength, it buffs your physical damage negation by 35% for a whole 70 second period at the cost of 20% less healing from your Flask of Crimson Tears. The incantation can be obtained from Gideon Ofnir, the leader of the Roundtable Hold, after unlocking Miquella’s Haligtree.

Flame, Grant me Strength

Flame, Grant me Strength is the polar opposite of the Black Flame’s Protection, focused more on the offensive-related buffs. Upon casting, it grants you a 20% damage increase to physical and fire attacks, which are highly beneficial towards my build, regardless of whether it is a Fire Monk Incantation. It is found between two huge flamethrowers located behind Fore Gael.

Bi-Elemental Caster (Level 150) [By Moxsy]

Magic has always been a powerhouse of builds across FromSoftware builds, capable of almost one-shotting most of the enemies in any game, and Elden Ring is no exception to this phenomenon. Now that magic has been divided into just two categories, sorceries and incantations, that means nearly half of the spells in Elden Ring scale pretty well with Faith – so slap a heavy load of attribute points into Faith, and with some buffs, you have one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring! This build will be mainly focused on lightning and pyromancies, just a heads up.

• Vigor – 35 (Will be increased with Radagon’s Soreseal)
• Mind – 25
• Endurance – 25
• Strength – 16
• Dexterity – 30
• Intelligence – 9
• Faith – 80 (Maximizing damage output at the hard cap)
• Arcane – 9

Weapon Choice

Uchigatana

As I’ve reiterated in my magic-related guides, having a melee weapon by your side as a caster is very important not to fail in close-quarters combat. While you could go for a specific faith-based weapon, I would recommend getting your hands on any generic weapon because with suitable ash of war infusion, and you can make just about any infuse-able weapon into a faith-based weapon. In this case, specifically, I’ll be infusing the Keen Uchigatana with the Royal Knight’s Resolve weapon art, which increases damage output by 80% on your next swing, including incantations! Whether or not that is intentional from the end of the developers, at the moment, this can easily take my Faith build to one-shot potential.

Gravel’s Stone Seal

Given that my build partly relies on lightning, a sacred seal that mainly boosts that would be amazing – fortunately, there is, and it’s known as the Gravel’s Stone Seal. As its item description goes, the Gravel’s Stone Seal boosts Dragon Cult Incantations, which is the particular term used for lightning-related spells. It requires its wielders to possess 4 strength and 18 faith in order to properly use, having a natural scaling of C in Faith. However, at +16 reinforcement through the use of Smithing Stones, the Gravel’s Stone Seal peaks at an S-tier scaling in Faith, making it the perfect Catalyst for using dragon cult incantations.

Giant’s Seal

Let’s not forget the other half of the build which is focused on fire damage and pyromancies. This is where the Giant’s Seal comes in, which, similar to the foregoing Gravel’s Stone Seal, boosts fire incantations. Furthermore, its stat requirements are a little more forgiving, requiring you to have 4 strength and 14 faith, while similarly having a C scaling in Faith. However, similar to the Gravel’s Stone Seal, the Giant’s Seal also achieves an S-tier scaling in Faith at +16 reinforcement with Smithing Stones. With two Catalysts, both of which individual enhance the potency of lightning and fire incantations, you’re all set to obliterate enemies that stand in your way!

Armor Combination

With one of the Best Elden Ring Faith Builds, I was more inclined towards a dark magician vibe, for which I went the extra mile of getting the Maliketh Set. In order to get the Maliketh Set, you need to defeat Maliketh, the Black Blade in Crumbling Farum Azula, one of the toughest areas in the game. However, once you beat him, you can purchase his set off Enia in the Roundtable Hold. However, if that is too challenging for you, you can always substitute it with the Night Cavalry’s Set dropped from the two Night’s Cavalry escorts found in Consecrated Snowfield. Regardless, for the headpiece, go for a hood; my personal favorite is the confessor hood, as it helps solidify that dark magician look.

Talisman Options

Radagon’s Soreseal

The Radagon’s Soreseal is a widely sought-after talisman due to its benefit of greatly increasing attributes, each by 5 points, but at the cost of less damage negation. However, given that this is a faith build where we can utilize support-based incantations, the counter-effects of this talisman can be significantly negated with the Golden Vow incantation, thus making the combination very viable!

Flock’s Canvas Talisman

While the Flock’s Canvas Talisman is much better than the Faithful Canvas Talisman, I would strictly recommend running it and not its weaker counterpart since we want to maximize the potency of our incantations. The Flock’s Canvas Talisman, at the cost of significantly raising incantation potency, weighs 0.7 which is almost a steal. However, nothing good comes for free, and this talisman requires a lengthy questline to complete.

Godfrey Icon

The Godfrey Icon is particularly suitable for this build as I will be making use of several chargeable incantations and what’s better than the Godfrey Icon in this regard? Dropped from Godefroy the Grafted, a variation of Godrick the Grafted encountered in the Golden Lineage Evergaol, the legendary talisman depicts the First Elden Lord Godfrey himself!

Fire Scorpian Charm / Lightning Scorpian Charm

It would be best if you ideally had both charms as I am going for a dual-elemental build, featuring two major powerhouse elements: fire and lightning. As their name states, the Fire Scorpian Charm raises fire attack at the cost of some damage negation, greatly benefiting my pyromancies while the Lightning Scorpian Charm raises lightning attack at the cost of equal damage negation, greatly benefiting my dragon cult incantations.

Spells to Memorize

Fortissax’s Lightning Spear

The Fortissax’s Lightning Spear is a very powerful incantation reminiscent of the Lichdragon boss. In fact, you obtain the incantation itself by trading the Remembrance of the Lichdragon with Enia at Roundtable Hold. Regardless, when used, the incantation allows you to spawn not one but two red lightning spears and shove them into the ground in quick succession. You want to be standing right next to your enemy to maximize the damage output.

Golden Vow

The Golden Vow is a very beneficial support-based incantation that just about any faith-build user should consider memorizing. As mentioned earlier, this is a good combination with Radagon’s Soreseal as it helps greatly offset its con of raising your attributes at the cost of damage taken. Furthermore, the attack and defense buff it veils over you and your allies last 80 seconds!

Vyke’s Dragonbolt

The Vyke’s Dragonbolt constitutes one of the few incantations mentioned on this list of Elden Ring Best Faith Builds that imbue your right-hand Armament, in this case, the Uchigatana. Using this incantation will buff it with red lightning damage for 70 seconds, which is similar to the Electrify Armament incantation except that it also increases 15% more equipment load. It is obtained by defeating the Roundable Knight Vyke at the Lord Contender’s Evergaol.

Giantsflame Take Thee

Giantsflame Take Thee will be our main source of lightning damage on this bi-elemental caster build, purchased from either Brother Corhyn or Mirei, Paster of Vows, after handing them the Giant’s Prayerbook found in the Mountaintops of the Giants. This incantation is essentially Fireball but not steroids, unleashing a much bigger, much more damaging fireball – thus, it takes two memory slots instead of one.

Flame, Grant me Strength

You must’ve seen this coming, considering I’m utilizing fire incantations in this build! If you’re even half a pyromancer, you must use this incantation! Upon casting, it grants you a 20% damage increase to physical and fire attacks – we take those. It is found between two huge flamethrowers locatedbehind Fore Gael.

Blasphemous Pyromancer (Level 150) [By iSeraph]

Coming in as the last of my six Faith Builds in Elden Ring, we have the Blasphemous Pryomancer – this is for all the pyromancer lovers out there who have always wanted to see the mightly Blasphemous Blade get integrated one of these days. The Blasphemous Pyromancer is a somewhat balanced build between melee and pyromancy, but it is certainly very hard-hitting and one of the best ways to utilize the Blasphemous Blade.

• Vigor – 45
• Mind – 25 (Sufficient FP to utilize incantations and weapon arts)
• Endurance – 25
• Strength – 40
• Dexterity – 15 (Enough to wield the Blasphemous Blade)
• Intelligence – 9
• Faith – 60 (Soft cap for Faith scaling)
• Arcane – 9

Weapon Choice

Blasphemous Blade

The Blasphemous Blade is undisputedly one of the best greatswords in Elden Ring, and simply laying my eyes on it motivated me to make a build around it as soon as possible! It is a very good faith weapon, requiring you to invest 22 attribute points into Strength, 15 into dexterity, and 21 into Faith in order to properly use it. In return, while it starts with a base scaling of D-tier in all three attributes, they see significant returns upon +10 reinforcement with Somber Smithing Stones. A Blasphemous Blade +10 achieves a C scaling in Strength and Dexterity as well as a B scaling in Faith, making it quite lethal in both PvP and PvE, particularly with its unique weapon art, Taker’s Flames. Just the Blasphemous Blade alone earns this build a spot in one of the Best Faith Builds in Elden Ring.

Giant’s Seal

Nothing serves a pyromancer better than the Giant’s Seal, a sacred seal forged for boosting fire incantations that I will be making extensive use of in this build! The Giant’s Seal only requires you to have 4 Strength and 14 Faith in order to properly use, rewarding you with a C scaling in Faith that can easily compete with the best. Don’t believe me? Reinforce it to +16 with Smithing Stones and you’ll notice that it achieves a whopping S scaling in Faith, which, coupled with its affinity towards fire incantations, makes it a force to be reckoned with in the hands of a pyromancer.

Parrying Dagger

While the Blasphemous Blade and the Giant’s Seal are quite self-sufficient for this build, I would recommend going the extra mile and putting on some kind of parry tool to utilize those extra weapon slots. What makes a parry tool good is how many parry frames as has – the more the parry frames, the larger the window of parrying any physical attack that comes into contact with you. In this regard, while the Buckler is a viable option, the Parrying Dagger is a pretty good competitor. While its parry frames are slightly lacking, you can also riposte with it, making it a good, well-rounded parry tool.

Armor Combination

As this is more of a melee-leaning build instead of a pure caster pyromancer build, you need not to put on mage robes or light clothing like that. While you have a great deal of freedom in this regard, find an armor set or combination of different armor pieces that are fashionable and provide solid poise. For me personally, I’ve found that the Night Cavalry’s set goes particularly well with this build, not just in terms of fashion. The Night Cavalry’s Set dropped from the two Night’s Cavalry escorts found in Consecrated Snowfield. Overall, the Night Cavalry’s set provides a solid 44 poise at the cost of 30.5 units mass – totally worth it, in my opinion!

Talisman Options

Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman

Damage negation is quite important for melee-leaning builds, considering how close up you are to the enemy more than half the time. This is where the Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman comes in, which significantly boosts your physical damage negation, more specifically by a multiplicative factor of 20%. The talisman is found near the Elphael, Brace of the Haligtree site of grace, in a chest on an raised platform.

Ritual Sword Talisman

If you’re wielding the Blasphemous Blade, you have to abuse its weapon art, Taker’s Flame by spamming it from a distance to catch your enemy off guard. Most of the time you’ll be doing this will be when you are at full HP, which is why the Ritual Sword Talisman will benefit you by increasing attack power, maximizing the damage output of Taker’s Flame from a safe, optimal distance!

Faithful’s Canvas Talisman

As this build is not extremely incantation heavy, you can make do with the Faithful’s Canvas Talisman and don’t need to go out of your way to get the Flock’s Canvas Talisman. The Faithful’s Canvas Talisman is obtained quite early in the game, all the way in Stormveil Castle and will serve you well by increasing the potency of the fire incantations you’ll be using.

Fire Scorpian Charm

The Fire Scorpian Charm is a must-have for pyromancers as it increases fire attack, both coming from your incantations and from the Blasphemous Blade, by 12%. However, at the cost of such a perk, you lost 10% damage negation, which you can make up for with a certain incantation. Regardless, the talisman is found on a wooden platform to the best of Fort Laiedd in Mt. Gelmir, just outside of Volcano Manor.

Spells to Memorize

Flame, Fall Upon Them

The Flame, Fall Upon Them is a Fire Giant Incantation, a subset of Fire incantations that only takes up on memory slot. Upon activation, your player will lift their sacred seal and use it to unleash a flurry of fireballs that will spread out in all directions, raining hell upon your enemies. This can be purchased for 10,000 runes off Brother Corhyn or Mirei, Pastor of Vows, by handing them the Giant’s Prayerbook.

Flame, Grant me Strength

Flame, Grant me Strength is an integral incantation to have on this build, as it benefits your fire incantations and the Blasphemous Blade. Upon casting, you will be granted 20% increased fire damage, and 20% increased physical damage, giving your greatsword that extra oomph. In order to obtain this incantation, you must make your way to Fort Gael and go around it to find it between two flamethrowing machines.

Burn, O Flame!

Burn, O Flame! Is special fire incantation obtained through trading the Remembrance of the Fire Giant with Enia at Roundtable Hold – quite a challenging boss to beat if I say so myself. Regardless, this incantation is really good for protection, especially when you’re overwhelmed with multitudes of ads because it surrounds you with a protective ring of fire that scorches anyone who dares to cross it.

Giantsflame Take Thee

The Giantsflame Take Thee fire incantation will be your biggest source of damage next to the Blasphemous Blade, and thus it rightfully takes up two of your memory slots. It requires 30 faith to even memorize, and when activated, it uses up 32 FP and 43 Stamina to generate a huge fireball which explodes on impact and has a solid area of effect. What’s more, is that you can also charge it up!

Black Flame’s Protection

Remember when I talked about countering the damage negation loss that the Fire Scorpian Talisman curses you with? This is the incantation I was referring to. The Black Flame’s Protection requires 30 FP to use and buffs you by increasing your damage negation by 35%, more than just offsetting the side-effects of the Fire Scorpian Talisman for the next 70 seconds. This, however, comes at the cost of reduced healing from your Flask of Crimson Tears.