Analyzing each added stat point and its benefits to find where the diminishing returns give you the best value for your levels

Introduction / Methodology

Stat breakpoints are not always intuitive; many people think 40 and 60 are the default points at which diminishing returns start in all souls-like games, but the data is more complex than that. For instance, just look at my guide for Dark Souls 3 where the breakpoints for Vigor were 17/26/44

Elden Ring handles some stats a little wierdly; often times the benefits ramp up such that the first point you put in gives you very little but each additional point gives more and more… up to a cutoff. Thus you generally want a stat either as low as possible or directly at the breakpoint with anything in-between costing you value. That makes classes with the LOWEST starting stats in things you do NOT want, the most valuable to a min/maxer. For class starting stats please refer to the Elden Ring Wiki – [fandom.com]  and keep in mind; even with respecs, you can’t go below the lowest value allowed by your class, so a Wretch is stuck at a min of 10 while eg a Vagabond can take Arcane down to 7

Why should you trust what I say over anyone else? Because I always offer you access to the raw data for you to see for yourself.

Which is available here. – [dropbox.com]  (This data was recorded with v1.02 of Elden Ring)

Keep in mind; each level gives a baseline bonus to Physical/Magic/Fire/Lightning/Holy/Immunity/Robustness/Focus/Vitality, the table shows the ADDITIONAL increase to these, over-top that baseline. Which is why I label them eg “Focus+”

My methodology for collecting this data is as follows. I started as a lvl 1 Wretch with 10s in all stats. I… “acquired” enough souls/runes to level one stat all the way up to 99, hand recording all the stat changes for each point, and then reset and repeated the process for each different stat. My character was completely nak*d for this to avoid any unwanted contributions.

To find casting power/damage; I again stripped nak*d but for a Finger Seal, and used the Grace at Warmaster’s Shack to repeatedly trigger the nearby 3 wolf ambush. Using the Flame Sling, I recorded the damage done to these three wolves at each Faith level from 10 to 99. I’ll use this same location and technique for Intelligence/Sorceries and Arcane.

Since this information was hand recorded, there is always the possibility my finger slipped and eg hit a 2 instead of a 1 and I never noticed or something else like that, but since the raw data is available to all – you are perfectly free to rerun the experiment yourself and check the results. That said there is at least one error in this data on Fromsoft’s side and not mine. Discovery from Arcane scales linearly; as in – one point in, one point out… except at 91 Arcane, then it gives you 2 points and then zero points for lvl 92 – this seems to me to be a clear mistake, but it is in the game so I record it. Not that it’ll really affect anyone 😛

Breakpoints

Vigor = 40/58

“Attribute governing HP – Your life. If reduced to nothing, you die.

Also affects fire resistance and immunity – Your resistance to various poisons and rot.”

Hard decrease at 40, and very little benefit going from 58 to 60

Recommendation: Since HP gains ramp up there is no reason not to take Vigor to 40, but I wouldn’t bother going to 58

Mind = 40/~55

“Attribute that determines FP – Energy consumed to use spells and skills.

Also affects focus – Your resistance to sleep and bouts of madness.”

Focus hits a hard decrease at 40, but FP actually continues to ramp up all the way to 52 then slowly tappers at 55 and 57 with a hard stop at 60; best value here would be at 55, but look at the raw data to see what I’m talking about

Recommendation: If you use FP, then take Mind all the way to 57 imo, but some other players disagree with me here. At least take it to 40

Endurance = 25/50/60

“Attribute governing stamina. Endurance determines how heavy your equipment can be.

Also affects robustness – Your resistance to blood loss and frostbite.”

Stamina hard stops at 50, Equip Load has two stopping points at 25 and 60, and if you care about it – Robustness has a hard decrease at 40

Recommendation: If you primarily cast, leave this at 25, otherwise take it to at least 50

Strength = 20/51/79 (34/53 if two-handed)

“Attribute boosts attack power of strength-scaling armaments and affects your physical defense.”

STR and DEX appear to be fairly heavily front loaded with your greatest gains coming in on the way to 20, the weapons I’ve tested so far all show a benefit putting in that extra point past 50, but it could be a fluke. Since two-handing a weapon multiplies your effective STR by 1.5x you could stop at 34. Physical defense is fairly linear and diminishing returns really only start after 61

Recommendation: If you use it; take it to 20 asap, then focus on survivability/utility before coming back and making the push for 34/51, I do not think 79 is a worthwhile goal

Dexterity = 20/50/80

“Attribute boosts attack power of dexterity-scaling armaments, reduces casting time of spells, softens fall damage, and makes it harder to be knocked off your horse.”

STR and DEX appear to be fairly heavily front loaded with your greatest gains coming in on the way to 20, with slower growth between 20 and 50, and very little growth past that but yes it takes an even steeper decline after 80. I’ll need to check some A and S rank weapons to be sure tho

Recommendation: If you use it; take it to 20 asap, then focus on survivability/utility before coming back and making the push for 50, I do not think 80 is a worthwhile goal

Intelligence = 20/50

“Attribute boosts magic power of intelligence-scaling sorceries and improves magic resistance.”

At least for Magic resistance there is a hard decrease at 20, for casting power that remains TBD

For weapon damage from INT/FTH scaling, these stats also appear to follow a 20/50 split. This is still attack power tho, casting power is reported to follow a different curve with reports indicating diminishing returns past 60 presumably casting damage from INT would follow the same as that from Faith below

Recommendation: If you use it; take it to 20 asap, then focus on survivability/utility before coming back and making the push for 50/60

Faith

Attack Power = 20/49

Casting Damage = 60/80

“Attribute boosts magic power of faith-scaling incantations.”

Attack power from weapons with INT/FTH scaling also appears to follow a 20/50 split. The weapons I tested came up a point short of 50, I’m not sure if this is a fluke or if it is intended to mesh with STR… more testing is required to say for certain.

Casting damage appears to have two soft caps at 60 and 80

Recommendation: If you use it; take it to 20 asap, then focus on survivability/utility before coming back and making the push for 50/60

Arcane = 20/44/91

Attack Power = 20/50

Casting Damage = 30/45

“Attribute governing discovery – Likelihood of finding items on the corpses of defeated foes.

Also affects holy defense, certain sorceries and incantations, and vitality – Your resistance to instant death.”

Like Intelligence, Holy resistance here has a hard decrease at 20 while Vitality shows softer decreases at 15 and 39; Discovery as mentioned previously is linear (mostly) all the way to 99.

Bleed buildup appears to plateau at 44, while attack power follows (roughly) the 20/50 rule, casting damage however is much different here coming in at 30/45

Recommendation: If you use it; take it to 20 asap, then focus on survivability/utility before coming back and making the push for ~45

Example Leveling Path

• Pick two attack stats; STR/FAITH, DEX/INT, STR/DEX, etc and push them both to 20 asap
• Then branch out, maybe push Endurance to 25, then Vigor and/or Mind to 40
• From there you could go deeper into an attack stat, or Endurance, pushing it to 50 (melee) or 60 (casting)
• Eventually (assuming you do cast) I’d want Mind all the way to 52 to 57 – the gains to FP are just so good

I haven’t tested it, but I believe STR gives a 50% bonus when two-handing a weapon which could save you a few levels since 34 x 1.5 = 51

Alternatively, if you are crazy like me, you could get Arcane to 20 first, then do everything else here (I wouldn’t actually recommend that unless you really are investing in Arcane)

Basic “Quality” Build

40 Vigor

50 Endurance (I wouldn’t do less than 40 here, but that’s me)

34 Strength (two-handing makes this equal to 51)

20 Dexterity (next step can be DEX 50, or Arcane 45 if you want to make things bleed)

————–

= Level 105

(100 with Hero or Vagabond, 101 with Samurai; Hero is best if you want to go Arcane)

Basic Magic Build

40 Vigor

40 Mind (this gives 220 FP, 17 more points would increase that to 335)

20 Dexterity (faster casting)

70 Intelligence (to be able to cast ALL the spells)

————–

= Level 131

(124 with Astrologer, 128 with Prisoner, 129 with Warrior)

Basic Fire & Lightning Build

40 Vigor

40 Mind (this gives 220 FP, 17 more points would increase that to 335)

20 Dexterity (faster casting)

60 Faith

————–

= Level 121

(117 with Prophet, Vagabond becomes slightly better than Prophet if you will invest in the above AND both STR&Endurance, otherwise => Prophet)

Work still to be done

ToDos:

• Intelligence casting power (need to find a sorcery wand/focus/whatever it is called)
• Need A and S rank weapons for everything to confirm numbers, need anything better than D rank for INT/FTH/Arcane

 

Conclusion

I’ll be doing another Weapon guide later on, like I did for DS3 but that will take a lot more time.

If you have any constructive critismism or helpful comments – I welcome such feedback.

Or if you have any questions I’ll do my best to help out.

Otherwise thank you for taking a look at my guide. 🙂

And remember to rate and favorite this guide if you found it helpful 😀

PS. Anyone using my numbers had better credit their source!!! rawr

Here we come to an end for ELDEN RING Stat Breakpoints Info hope you enjoy it. If you think we forget something to include or we should make an update to the post let us know via comment, and we will fix it asap! Thanks and have a great day!