A bit confused (build related)

[Dirak2012]

After finishing the game with a Int build, I wanted to try a faith build, but I'm not sure what to do with this one.
Most incantations seem more support based, so I need something to make damage, so that probably means to diverge into strength or dexterity.

I went for dex, and got it to 18 to be at least able to pick up some weapons. But now, I'm not sure if I should keep pumping dex up, or maybe faith? And since I'll need some mind for more FP and at least some endurance, I fear that I'm spreading too thin.
Any advice?

[Tao314zdin]

I have one cast heavy faith build, works as follows:
-use bolder throw as main attack, it hits far, creates AOE, can be free-aimed, staggers good and have OK damage. Also can be recast fast if you keep at it.
-use Caestus for fisting things if needed, one with Endure one with Bloodhound
-have in offhand a couple of seals to boost different incantation types. Seal in the right hand is the one giving the highest spell bonus.

Work’s pretty good IMO.

[Imperator Ricardo]

There are alot of incantations that deal very good damage, actually.

All the Lightning Incantations are very powerful and easily buffed to become even stronger.

Triple Rings of Light can also deal alot of damage, you can make every ring hit once on the way out, and once again when they come back, but this requires a little Int investment.

There are also all the Fire-based Incantations. Particularily Giantsflame Take Thee is very useful, and Black Flame deals percentage-based damage in addition to the raw damage of the projectile itself.

And ultimately, if you do not mind putting a few points into Arcane, you can also use the Dragon Incantations, wich are also very powerful. Dragonmaw in particular comes to mind.

Other than that i can only recommend levelling 20-20 in both strength and dex. That way, you can use a good amount of weapons in the game anyways, and with your Faith levels you can apply a Flame Art infusion.

[LuckyCheshire]

It sounds like you're setting yourself up well for one of my favorite builds, lightning themed dex/fth. Pretty much all of the best damage incantations are found in the midgame, and in the case of lightning spells iirc mostly around Leyendell. Based on that, I would invest more in Vigor and Dexterity first, and possibly a few points in Endurance if I feel like I really need it. You can start pumping Faith later once you have some better damage spells to offhand, and Mind is usually my last big investment. Raw stats honestly don't affect support spells much if at all.

One of the really cool things about a faith build is that once your stats are high enough (which will take some investment) you can cast healing spells and drink FP flasks much more efficiently than you can just drink HP flasks. Each cast takes marginally longer, but I can pretty easily find an opening in any boss fight.

The Erdsteel Dagger is a really good choice for that build, and you can get one by just wandering over to Kenneth Haight. It's one of a very few weapons that scales with Faith but can still be infused, and it's a pretty decent dagger all around. If you want to lean more heavily on the Dexterity for now, the Guardian's Swordspear is awesome and really easy to grind for. And if you decide that you don't want to use any Dex after all, and that you're borderline a masochist, you can grab the Cipher Pata.

Once you get farther you have some great options for damage incantations, but near the start of the game the options are definitely a little thin.

[baito]

My man get the madness eye lasers from liuria and enjoy obliterating enemies from 500 miles away.

[Sc0rpiTr0n]

Black Flame and Lightning Spear are great offensive spells.

But as a Faith build you also have access to
Blasphemous Blade and Envoy's Long Horn weapon skills.

[Greywander]

Faith builds are extremely versatile and quite strong. In terms of weapon affinities, you have access to both Flame Art and Sacred. In terms of incantations, there are a variety of fire, holy, and lightning damage incants, though in practice you'll only have access to fire and lightning unless you invest into INT. This still gives you a nice elemental variety.

Grab two weapons and slap Flame Art on one of them. On the other put Sacred Blade with the Sacred affinity. It will be great for putting down skeletons or death birds, and can be used against anything strong against fire (and lightning, e.g. dragons).

Catch Flame is your bread and butter incantation. It comes out extremely fast and there's a fair number of enemies and bosses weak to fire. I can't overstate how good this spell is, it's so good.

Black Flame will work on just about anything thanks to the damage over time effect, even against bosses like the gargoyles that are normally immune to status effects. You can also use it for dragons that normally resist fire and lightning, though you might find it easier to use your Sacred weapon instead.

Lightning Spear makes short work of enemies like the abductor virgins that are strong against fire. Some enemies will try to dodge Lightning Spear, so you might get better mileage out Honed Bolt which enemies won't dodge. Neither of these spells have as long of a range as I wish they did. Speaking of...

Frenzied Burst is a long range incantation that IIRC enemies won't try to dodge. Very useful for sniping.

Inescapable Frenzy is a spell with but one single use in the entire run, but it is absolutely worth it. And that use is to share your internet history with Sir Gideon Ofnir until he decides to unsubscribe from life. So far, I've been able to cast this spell repeatably until he dies without him rolling out or interrupting me, and with the right build I've seen people one-shot him.

Also, don't forget that healing spells will damage and stun revenants. Revenants are such a pain to deal with, and not everyone seems to know about this trick, so definitely capitalize on this on a Faith build. AFAIK the damage is the same regardless of the healing spell used. You can use the stun to follow up with a second cast, which is usually enough to kill them.

There's a variety of other incantations you can use, including damage and buff spells. Between those, and your two weapons, you have a pretty solid kit that has an answer for almost anything you encounter. This does mean you need to be able to switch tactics depending on what you're fighting, rather than using the same tool for every job, but that's part of what makes it so effective.

[Urist Microcline]

The humble Lightning Spear beats every enemy in the game with a pure Faith build. You can get it from the very beginning of the game before killing any bosses too. An uncharged Lightning Spear is one of the few spells in the game that enemies can not dodge too.

[Yal]

Originally posted by Dirak2012:

I went for dex, and got it to 18 to be at least able to pick up some weapons. But now, I'm not sure if I should keep pumping dex up, or maybe faith? And since I'll need some mind for more FP and at least some endurance, I fear that I'm spreading too thin.
Any advice?

One of the most fun weapons in the game is the Bolt of Gransax (found on top of the giant spear stuck in a building in Leyndell) which needs 40 dexterity (and is faith-based secondarily) and grants you an attack that has ridiculous range, major power, AND looks cool. And the Winged Scythe (from... Witchbane Ruins, if memory serves?) also needs a whole bunch of dexterity and also has tons of potential once you figure out the timing on the special skill (which lets you instantly hit a large area AND potentially dodge attacks). So keep pumping dex, it opens up some really fun options!

Also as has been mentioned, the Erdsteel Dagger is an immediately-available faith/dex weapon. But everyone sleeps on another option: the Wakizashi from a cave right at the start of Caelid. It's a katana with the range and speed of a dagger, if you twohand this thing it's ridiculously fast and strong enough to stunlock unarmored opponents (including other players in PvP). Slap Frost on it for a defense debuff, Sacred Blade for power, Flaming Strike for crowd control; the possibilities are endless.

Going dex/faith is overall a good choice because lightning scales with both those stats, and faith spells usually have slow cast speed so they really benefit from the casting speed bonus you get from dexterity. It's less flashy than the werewolf str/faith build and dragon faith/arcane build, but the handful of weapons and spells that work well with this build are all very fun to use.

[Sc0rpiTr0n]

Originally posted by Urist Microcline:

The humble Lightning Spear beats every enemy in the game with a pure Faith build. You can get it from the very beginning of the game before killing any bosses too. An uncharged Lightning Spear is one of the few spells in the game that enemies can not dodge too.

Since last patch you can charge Lightning Spear and AI will not react to it.
Night Comet too. And Frenzied Burst but I am not sure if that was same before patch or not.

[LuckyCheshire]

Originally posted by Yal:

the werewolf str/faith build

Isn't the werewolf build Str/Int? Or do you mean Bestial incants?

[Yal]

Originally posted by LuckyCheshire777:

Originally posted by Yal:

the werewolf str/faith build

Isn't the werewolf build Str/Int? Or do you mean Bestial incants?

Bestial incantations, yeah.

[Marmarmar34]

Originally posted by Dirak2012:

After finishing the game with a Int build, I wanted to try a faith build, but I'm not sure what to do with this one.
Most incantations seem more support based, so I need something to make damage, so that probably means to diverge into strength or dexterity.

I went for dex, and got it to 18 to be at least able to pick up some weapons. But now, I'm not sure if I should keep pumping dex up, or maybe faith? And since I'll need some mind for more FP and at least some endurance, I fear that I'm spreading too thin.
Any advice?

Get the twin jesus needles from the round table area down by the wizard. I think you need something like 30 or 50 faith to use them, but they scale great and do amazing damage. They also have a block break move that puts block heavy people in their place.

Pair that up with that sky lightning spell, lightning spear spell, the madness sniper spell, and a couple of buff spells and you're all good.

Oh yeah, and the best part is with this build you only have to level faith.
The needles are as fast as a dex weapon, and build up stagger quicker for large/tanky enemies.