Tomb Board Game Healing Seems to Make This Game Easy to Win

With a world as open and daunting as Elden Ring's Lands Between, there are certain important things to do first - like finding out how to level up, get the hang of crafting, learn how to summon spirits, and much more.

Unlike the linear paths featured in many of FromSoftware's previous action rpg games, Elden Ring wastes little time throwing you into a vast open world brimming with secrets, challenging encounters, and mysteries in every corner of the Lands Between. While nothing is stopping you from marching right up to Stormveil Castle - the first large Legacy Dungeon - you may benefit greatly from seeking out a few points of interest first.

Be sure to also check out Things Elden Ring Doesn't Tell You
All the Important Details You Should Know in Elden Ring
And our Essential Tips and Tricks for Combat, Exploration, and More!

Get a Crafting Kit from Merchant Kale

One of the new additions to Elden Ring from the Souls games is the ability to craft special items, such as fire pots, arrows, and even healing items for your horse. Many of the items and consumables that were staples of the souls series must now be crafted instead, but you can't do so right away.

Upon activating the first site of grace when stepping out into Limgrave, follow the golden light trail (called the guidance of grace) up the path north to the Church of Elleh - just be sure to give the patrolling Tree Sentinel a wide berth! Here you'll find a merchant that will sell you the crafting kit for just a few hundred Runes, which you may have gotten from the tutorial dungeon - otherwise you can head into the woods to the east and fight a few run-of-the-mill soldiers.

With a crafting kit, you can utilize the many materials gained from plants, beasts, rocks, and certain enemies to make into items that can serve both offensive and defensive purposes. You'll have a few basic recipes by default, and many more can be gained from books left all over the world, in dungeons, sold from merchants - and everything in-between. Everything from different types of arrows, buffs, and weapon-enhancing grease can be crafted, and most materials you find will respawn each time you rest at a site of grace, so pick up everything you find!

While you're at the Church of Elleh, you should also pick up a torch, as some mini dungeons have limited light sources, and you don't want to enter them unprepared. You can also find a Smithing Table nearby - this place will become very important during your Limgrave exploration to enhance your chosen weapon to take on tougher targets.

Locate Melina to Level Up and Get Your Mount

After visiting the Church of Elleh, the guidance of grace should be pointing you east, so follow the path along the nearby road through the trees and you'll come across a large site known as the Gatefront Ruins. Just north of the enemy camp is a large gate, and another Site of Grace lies just next to it.

Resting at this site of grace, (or whichever third grace you activate and rest at in the overworld), will introduce you to Melina, an important NPC that will let you spend your runes to level up in Elden Ring. Melina will also give you the ability to summon Torrent, your spirit horse that will be your main method of transportation across the Lands Between.

Once you are properly introduced, you'll be able to exchange runes to level up at any Site of Grace you rest at - and you should aim to do so as much as possible. It's easy to get swept up in expiration and forget to stop and spend those hard earned runes before you get killed and lose them!

Obtain the Summoner's Bell and Spirit Ashes

Whether you chose spirit ashes as your starting keepsake or not, you'll start to find more spirit ashes that can be used to summon friendly spirits to fight alongside you in certain situations - but you can't do this as you are now. Luckily, you shouldn't have to wait long to learn how to summon spirits.

After getting Torrent, fast travel (don't run) back to the church of Elleh. If done correctly, the Merchant Kale will be passed out, and an eerie fog will have settled around the place. Near the ruined walls, you can meet Ranni the Witch who gives you a Summoning Bell. This bell allows you to summon spirits to aid you in areas where a summoning icon is present (look for the white arch logo appearing in the left-middle part of the screen).

Spirit ashes come in many varieties - all based on the enemies you'll face, and will cost FP in order to summon. Generally, the more powerful or greater quantity of spirits summoned for a certain spirit ash, the more FP it will cost, and they can be invaluable in battle - whether wading into a battle against overwhelming odds alongside you, or helping to distract a tough boss and allow you time to heal or get in a strike at their back. Once you've cleared the first Legacy Dungeon, you'll even be able to upgrade the ashes you like to make them stronger, so be sure to find different spirit ashes and see which ones complement your playstyle the best.

Unlike summoning other players, Spirit Summons won't increase the difficulty of a fight - but you can't have friends join you for co-op AND summon spirits at the same time, so you'll need to choose wisely.

Note that if you kept exploring well beyond Limgrave after getting Torrent, and found your way to the Roundtable Hold hub area, the witch will no longer appear at the Church of Elleh. Fortunately, you can purchase the Summoning Bell and the Lone Wolf Ashes from a merchant in the Roundtable Hold - but it won't be for free.

To make the most of your new Summoner's Bell, we recommend seeking out the following Spirit Ashes to give you plenty of summons to play with:

The Wandering Noble Ashes and Noble Sorcerer Ashes are both found in the Stormfoot Catacombs to the north of the Church of Elleh
The Godrick Soldier Ashes are found among the graves in a cemetery in the far northwest part of Storm Hill, surrounded by Jellyfish enemies outside the Stormveil Castle
The Jellyfish Spirit Ashes are given by a woman in a small shack up the road from the Storm Gate heading towards the castle itself.

Clear the Gatefront Ruins - New Weapons, Map Fragment, and Whetstone

That large ruins at the foot of the imposing gate holds more than just a site of grace that Melina appears at - the Gatefront Ruins is a point of interest teeming with important items to get, and it's best if you explore it thoroughly.

When you first open your map, you'll notice that important locations and sites of grace are marked, but the rest is covered in a brown fog of war. You'll need map fragments for each area to expose the topography, and they can be found at the base of large stone stelles - softly glowing obelisks with writing on them. The Map Fragment for West Limgrave is located here - just be wary of approaching it due to the Godrick Knight patrolling the main path along with a scout that can sound a horn to summon his friends if he spots you.

You should also scope out the edges of the ruins for two large carriages that are lightly guarded. Each of these has a chest in the back that can be opened for two weapons that don't take a lot of stat requirements to try out, the Flail, and the Lordsworn Greatsword. Be sure to try them out, and see their weapon skills in action against the soldiers here.

Speaking of weapon skills, you can search along the south side of the ruins to find an underground tunnel that leads to some Ashes of War and the Whetstone Knife, which allows you to freely change out your Ashes of War among your weapons. These are distinct abilities that can be switched out at sites of grace to suit your playstyle, and they affect stats and stat scaling on the weapons you use. Whatever stat you're building your character for, be it strength, dexterity, or even faith, having a weapon that scales with that stat exponentially will pay major dividends in the long run.

If you're looking for other great weapons that don't have huge stat requirements, you should also check in these places:

The Dragon-burnt Ruins found in the large lake area to the south of the Gatefront Ruins has a large walled section you can jump over with Torrent to find a basement with a Twinblade

Heading east from the lake under the large bridge will trigger an NPC invasion - but if you manage to defeat them you can gain the Reduvia dagger with an impressive weapon skill
A large enemy encampment up in the northeast - far east of Stormveil Castle holds both a Lance, and a Beast Crest Heater Shield - a medium shield with full physical absorption!

Find More Ashes of War

While many Ashes of War can be won by defeating certain powerful enemies - you can also buy a few from merchants to try swapping them in for your favorite weapons.

Sprint up the road through the Storm Gate until you reach a lone shack, and head right on a dirt road away from the castle until you reach the Warmaster's Shack in the middle of a small wooded area. This merchant, Berenahl, sells an assortment of different types of weapon skills for all types of armaments. This includes a powerful storm blade ranged attack, and the ability to add the parry skill to shields and certain small weapons, or even use the Ash of War - No Skill to leave your shield blank, allowing you to make use of your main armament's skill without having to hold it in two hands!

Explore Limgrave's Mini Dungeons

While there are several giant dungeons in Elden Ring that you can't miss, there are tons of little dungeons peppered throughout the Lands Between. Each of them varies in length from a few short rooms to more sprawling cave systems - and each ends with a mini boss challenge, as well as rewards to find along the way.

Mini Dungeons can be found almost anywhere - but are mostly found as cave entrances or doors built into the side of rock walls. They can also be hard to spot, so make sure to look for telltale signs like lantern lights along the rocks, or creepy statues that point you in the right direction. You can find several in the West Limgrave region, and you can select one of the following for more details:

Stormfoot Catacombs
Groveside Cave
Coastal Cave
Murkwater Cave
Murkwater Catacombs
Limgrave Tunnels
Deathtouched Catacombs
Highroad Cave

Find Smithing Stones to Upgrade Your Weapons

You can explore the Lands Between and level up your attributes all you want, but the true measure of a warrior is by how powerful their chosen armaments are. Using the Smithing Table at the Church of Elleh, you can upgrade your weapons up to +3 at the anvil, but in order to do that, you'll need smithing stones.

Smithing Stones are found literally everywhere - and often found on bodies in enemy camps, dungeons, or out of the way locations. One of the best places to pick them up is in the Limgrave Tunnels, across the lake from your starting area. Not only do the miners inside sometimes drop these stones, they'll often be found mining deposits you can loot to stockpile a good amount of them.

Once you have enough stones stockpiled to get a +3 weapon, you should be ready to take on Stormveil Castle.

Find a Key Item to Help Against the First Major Boss

Even after exploring the breadth of what West Limgrave (and the other adjoining areas) has to offer, taking on Stormveil Castle may still be a daunting task due to the Great Enemy that guards the entrance - Margit the Fell Omen. Defeating him takes a lot of practice and patience - and perhaps something to even the odds.

Be sure to explore the small gorge running under the large bridge in Limgrave, away from the lake. Look along the left of the cliff walls and you can spot the entrance to a mini dungeon known as Murkwater Cave. We won't spoil what hides in here, but completing this area should give you the chance to procure a very special item. When used, Margit's Shackle can temporarily stun the intimidating boss for a few short moments, which can give you the upper hand to unleash some big attacks without fear of getting hit back.

Be warned - while it is reusable, you won't be able to get away with using it too many times in one fight. Make the most of the opening it presents to get those strong hits in!

Important How-Tos

As you spend your first few hours in Limgrave, you may have lots of questions or run into things that might not make sense. Be sure to get more info on these helpful how-tos to steer you in the right direction:

How to Fast Travel
How to Get the Flask of Wondrous Physick
How to Access the Roundtable Hold
How to Access Multiplayer (Co-op, Invasions)
How to Wield Weapons in Two Hands
How to Escape the Sellia Crystal Tunnel Trap

Up Next: Things Elden Ring Doesn't Tell You

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Elden Ring

Elden Ring is an expansive fantasy Action-RPG game developed by FromSoftware, Inc. under the direction of Hidetaka Miyazaki and created in collaboration with famed author George R.R. Martin.

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