The Problem with Faith

[Bees?]

I’ve always loved being a pure Faith build in other Dark Souls games. Especially DS3, despite how people said it was awful, since ToD + Lightning Stake + Perseverence was just too fun to stop doing. The spells felt powerful in PvE, they were all a decent speed, and there were a litany of good weapons for a hybrid Faith build to use.

Not in Elden Ring.

In Elden Ring, incantations are comically weak, especially compared to their Sorcery counterparts. The Dragon Cult incantations are all RIDICULOUSLY slow, essentially being variations of the same AoE spell, while the Lightning Spear you get in Liurnia outperforms them beat for beat.

Even if you min-max your build to do as much damage as you can with something like Giantsflame Take Thee, you’ll still be getting mogged by a dude who has like 30 int and Stars of Ruin.

It’s no better in PvP.

Half of the bosses in the game resist Faith. They resist Fire and Lightning very frequently, and a certain boss HEALS FROM HOLY.

And now, the weapons.

Faith weapons will do a mix of Fire + Phys or Holy + Phys. The only viable one is Fire, since again, half the game straight-up resists Holy.

Most Faith weapons are Faith + Strength, but those are mostly all pretty bad weapons, except for

1. the Crucible Knight weapons

2. Magma Wyrm Scalesword

Every other faith weapon is Faith + Dex (and one faith + int) and they’re ALL SO GOOD.

One thing I wanted so badly was an upgrade to Lightning Spear, and while none exist in Incantation form, it does exist as an Ash of War…

On a pure Dex weapon.

Why, Miyazaki? Why must you curse us so?

[Amereth]

i do agree with you to an extent.

a lot of the incantations are very average at best.

Now i can't compare both playstyle since i didn't try an 80 int build yet.

but as a pure 80 faith build, i can do all the content without too much problem and never met an enemy i couldn't kill because they had too much resistance.

i can tell you 1 thing for sure.

when it come down to utility and tools to handle every scenario in the game, i am pretty confident to say that faith is probably superior to sorcery.

now if you want to compare only damage... isn't that the main and only goal of sorcery ?

right now the best weapon in the game is faith... i wont even bother arguing about weapons.

[Lord Freedom]

You forgot about the Blasphemous Blade, arguably one of the best swords in the game.

Also, Faith + Strength smacks harder than pure Strength with the right set up.

For that reason alone you should practice Faith, lest you be a pitiful little caster that wears a dress!

Health potions?! Who needs 'em?

[Bees?]

Escrito originalmente por Amereth:

i do agree with you to an extent.

a lot of the incantations are very average at best.

Now i can't compare both playstyle since i didn't try an 80 int build yet.

but as a pure 80 faith build, i can do all the content without too much problem and never met an enemy i couldn't kill because they had too much resistance.

i can tell you 1 thing for sure.

when it come down to utility and tools to handle every scenario in the game, i am pretty confident to say that faith is probably superior to sorcery.

now if you want to compare only damage... isn't that the main and only goal of sorcery ?

Faith is fine if you’ve completely built into it, but Sorcery gets just as much and more with half the investment. Intelligence also gets weapons like the Moonveil.

I just wish Faith was more comparable, damage wise, without needing to use a scorpion charm and double the stat investment.

Also, Gurranq’s Stone was the only way I beat the gargoyle bosses lmfao

[noobie123]

??? faith incantations are pretty good, as are the weapons?

rot breath is a boss killer.
black flame line likewise is also reliably good throughout the game.
frozen lightning spear and ancient dragons' lightning strike are hard hitters.
frenzy flame line of spells are great of pvp, and in pve has the long range spell in the game, those do great damage (flame of frenzy = win against any erdtree avatars)

1. the Crucible Knight weapons

2. Magma Wyrm Scalesword

blasphemous blade? gargoyle greatsword? there's also the faith scythes that have bleed and would work on a str/faith character

[Bees?]

Escrito originalmente por Lord Freedom:

You forgot about the Blasphemous Blade, arguably one of the best swords in the game.

Also, Faith + Strength smacks harder than pure Strength with the right set up.

For that reason alone you should practice Faith, lest you be a pitiful little caster that wears a dress!

Yeah, but Blasphemous Blade looks ugly. :(

[Bees?]

Escrito originalmente por noobie123:

??? faith incantations are pretty good, as are the weapons?

rot breath is a boss killer.
black flame line likewise is also reliably good throughout the game.
frozen lightning spear and ancient dragons' lightning strike are hard hitters.
frenzy flame line of spells are great of pvp, and in pve has the long range spell in the game, those do great damage (flame of frenzy = win against any erdtree avatars)

1. the Crucible Knight weapons

2. Magma Wyrm Scalesword

blasphemous blade? gargoyle greatsword? there's also the faith scythes that have bleed and would work on a str/fait character

Ew, bleed. Also, those require like 20 dex.

[hemorrhage911]

LOL what? I have faith at 67 right now and I'm destroying everything with lightning spear. Toss up Elden Stars while spamming other faiths kills.

If you are comparing everything to a single OP sorcery or bleed, of course it will look "weak". Faith is actually balanced.

[Lord Freedom]

Escrito originalmente por Bees?:

Faith is fine if you’ve completely built into it, but Sorcery gets just as much and more with half the investment. Intelligence also gets weapons like the Moonveil.

My current playthrough disagrees. I'm doing a faith/int hybrid and currently sitting at 40/40. I powerstance blasphemous blade in my off hand with moonlight greatsword in mainhand.

One button and you have 4 damage types that hit for well over 3K total. Everything you touch dies, but you also never die because you're passively healing the entire time.

[hemorrhage911]

Escrito originalmente por Bees?:

Escrito originalmente por noobie123:

??? faith incantations are pretty good, as are the weapons?

rot breath is a boss killer.
black flame line likewise is also reliably good throughout the game.
frozen lightning spear and ancient dragons' lightning strike are hard hitters.
frenzy flame line of spells are great of pvp, and in pve has the long range spell in the game, those do great damage (flame of frenzy = win against any erdtree avatars)

1. the Crucible Knight weapons

2. Magma Wyrm Scalesword

blasphemous blade? gargoyle greatsword? there's also the faith scythes that have bleed and would work on a str/fait character

Ew, bleed. Also, those require like 20 dex.

20 dex is easy to come by with a combination of talismans and the first great rune you grab in the game.

[NeonRed]

Only thing I find weird about Faith as a stat is that is has no secondary effect like every other stat; It should at least increase holy defense instead of arcane, which for some reason has 3 effects loaded into it (item discovery, holy defense and vitality)

[hemorrhage911]

Escrito originalmente por Lord Freedom:

Escrito originalmente por Bees?:

Faith is fine if you’ve completely built into it, but Sorcery gets just as much and more with half the investment. Intelligence also gets weapons like the Moonveil.

My current playthrough disagrees. I'm doing a faith/int hybrid and currently sitting at 40/40. I powerstance blasphemous blade in my off hand with moonlight greatsword in mainhand.

One button and you have 4 damage types that hit for well over 3K total. Everything you touch dies, but you also never die because you're passively healing the entire time.

faith/int hybrid really got shafted though. I made a post earlier on this, but the fact you have to two hand greatswords shows the problem with this build. Not having enough faith and int weapons to place ashes of war on really hurt it's viability, and not having a hybrid seal and staff was an oversight.

I hope the DLC addresses this. DS3 has this stuff in the base game for pyromancers wanting to go dark sorcery or to use certain faith spells.

[Daegon]

Faith it's not broken but not weak either, it's pretty balanced imo.
Having a hybrid faith/str or dex build it's awesome, because you can have a lot of utility incantations to buff your character or to take out annoying debuffs like scarlet rot, while still doing decent damage with your weapon and good ashes of war.

[Amereth]

Escrito originalmente por hemorrhage911:

Escrito originalmente por Lord Freedom:

My current playthrough disagrees. I'm doing a faith/int hybrid and currently sitting at 40/40. I powerstance blasphemous blade in my off hand with moonlight greatsword in mainhand.

One button and you have 4 damage types that hit for well over 3K total. Everything you touch dies, but you also never die because you're passively healing the entire time.

faith/int hybrid really got shafted though. I made a post earlier on this, but the fact you have to two hand greatswords shows the problem with this build. Not having enough faith and int weapons to place ashes of war on really hurt it's viability, and not having a hybrid seal and staff was an oversight.

I hope the DLC addresses this. DS3 has this stuff in the base game for pyromancers wanting to go dark sorcery or to use certain faith spells.

hmm, there is 2 hybrid seal and 1 hybrid staff to my knowledge.

unless you talk about being able to cast both spell and incantation with a seal or a staff.

[balmora pete]

It doesn't help that, if you go Clawmark or Dragon Communion Seal, these are highly incompatible with various spells. Your healing spells and buffs like Electrify Armament only count faith for their effectiveness, not strength or arcane. What's the point of a seal that promotes levelling a single stat, when you have to level a secondary one anyway?

Some say it's not meant to be that way, but I've a feeling it's intentional. Intentionally terrible.

[hemorrhage911]

Escrito originalmente por Amereth:

Escrito originalmente por hemorrhage911:

faith/int hybrid really got shafted though. I made a post earlier on this, but the fact you have to two hand greatswords shows the problem with this build. Not having enough faith and int weapons to place ashes of war on really hurt it's viability, and not having a hybrid seal and staff was an oversight.

I hope the DLC addresses this. DS3 has this stuff in the base game for pyromancers wanting to go dark sorcery or to use certain faith spells.

hmm, there is 2 hybrid seal and 1 hybrid staff to my knowledge.

unless you talk about being able to cast both spell and incantation with a seal or a staff.

Yeah, I'm talking about a seal or staff that allows you to cast all hybrid spells and incantations. It's worse with weapons, there are two hybrid int/faith weapons in the game that I know - one is a lowly faith dagger you can infuse with a int ashes of war and the infamous sword of night and flame. It's just a complete oversight by Fromsoftware.