faith build

[achilleas_demetriou]

i've made up my mind that on my next character i'll be running a faith build (faith only?). anything i should watch out for?

[This PC]

magma sword build let's goooo

[Sephylon]

Which element; holy, lightning, black fire, bloodflame, normal flame, beast or mixed?

[void]

Faith Enjoyer here. If you're doing faith only that probably rules out bloodflame (fth/arc), dragon communion (fth/arc) and beast (fth/str). Possibly also frenzy (fth/str/dex/int) and holy (fth/int). Blackflame spells are fantastic for PvE, especially bosses who are immune to other forms of %health damage. Enemies that dodge spells won't dodge Lightning Spear so that's a good spell to keep in mind. Catch Flame is your go-to DPS tool for big openings or bursting down targets. You can annihilate some parts of the game with holy affinity weapons but generally flame art affinity will be more effective against most of the game, maybe keep one of each. Keep a flame art misericorde for huge crit damage. Giantsflame Take Thee is a really massive fireball that just looks sick. Faith also has some really good utility spells, Flame Cleanse Me and Assassin's Approach are some examples that can be obtained and used very early.

For your Sacred Seal of choice you have a lot of options. If you aren't sure just go with the Godslayer's Seal and it'll do you just fine, it has good faith scaling. If you really care about optimizing for your build and spells there are a few other options you can look into yourself.

[Sephylon]

Beast incants only needs fai to use, same with frenzied flame. You don't need to use the seal associated with the incant, they're usually worse than erdtree seal on pure fai. Can keep them off hand for the boost if you're going double seal.

[void]

True if your faith is high enough but it won't be for like 75% of your PvE experience. I assume OP is talking asking about playthrough advice and not final build advice. But yes you can use those incantations too. I highly recommend Stone of Gurranq in particular.

[Augustine]

faith is relatively a late bloomer. Some of the more interesting options like ancient dragon lightning strike are found a bit later and FP efficiency and getting good damage is harder than sorcery. Your full build and supporting items/spells are also a bit more involved.

If I'm going to play pure faith I would run a build centered around catch flame, discuss of light or just a high faith scaling weapon, maybe the coded sword or blasphemous blade if you can invest a bit elsewhere. It's nice to have an efficient, fast and high dps option to fall back on. For boss fights you can get a bit specialized though and just use heavy hitters like the dragon communion spells.

Faith also has to deal with resistance more than other builds, mohg and fire giant are very resistant to fire, wyrms are immune. Maleketh and Radabeast are very resistant to holy. But you also get some of the best weaknesses like putrid avatars or death rite birds, so it may also be the most demanding/rewarding knowledge-wise.

[Indig0]

Erdtree Seal in main hand and offhand any other for the bonuses. No weapon needed at all. As for stats - Faith > Mind > Vigor and that's all :)

[Señor Brown]

Grab the Cipher Pata in the Roundtable Hold. Weightless, fist weapon, poke moveset, deals pure holy damage, only requires and scales with faith.