Elden Ring‘s Starting Classes act as excellent templates for building a character, though any starting class can be built into any character build with a little time and effort. Of these starting classes, the Samurai is arguably one of the best and the most beginner-friendly. Beginning with decent armor, an excellent Katana, and a longbow and a shield, the Samurai comes equipped with everything you’d need for any melee build.

This guide will offer two good Samurai builds in Elden Ring, with sections for the Base Game and Shadow of the Erdtree. These are far from the only ways you can build the Samurai Class, but they’re excellent examples of what you can do with the starting stats the class offers.

Base Game Build (Level 150)

For our base-game build, we’re going to keep things simple with an Arcane Build, leveraging the Bleed status effect on the Uchigatana to tear through most bosses. This means we won’t need to raise our Strength or Dexterity past the starting values, since the Uchigatana is the Samurai starting weapon and we already have the stats to use it properly. This build will be for Level 150, which is roughly where you’ll end up by playing through the base game normally and is the recommended level for entering the DLC if you plan to do so.

Stats

Stat
Level

Vigor
60

Mind
30

Endurance
15

Strength
12

Dexterity
15

Intelligence
9

Faith
28

Arcane
60

When starting out, you’ll want to level Vigor and Arcane first to reach the soft caps at 60. This will give you enough health to take a hit without dying and boost your damage and bleed status build-up. Once you’ve got Vigor to 60 and Arcane to at least 40 (if not 60), you can start putting some points into Faith too, since hitting 25 Faith will let you use Golden Vow to buff your attack and defense. After Vigor, Arcane, and Faith are at 60, 60, and 28, you can round out the build by boosting your Mind stat up to 30 and your endurance to 15, giving you a decent chunk of FP for using weapon arts and casting spells along with a little extra stamina for attacking and dodging.

Weapons and Spells

We’ll be sticking to the Uchigatana for this build, grabbing a second one from the Deathtouched Catacombs in Limgrave so we have the option of dual-wielding. You should also pick up the Dragon Communion Seal from the Fringefolk Hero’s Grave. This weightless seal scales mainly off the Arcane Stat, allowing us to get plenty of mileage out of it without a heavy Faith investment. Have an Uchigatana in your right hand and another in your left, with the Seal in your second left-hand slot, so you can swap to it as needed.

You’ll want the Ash of War: Blood Tax on your right-hand Uchigatana, usually with a Blood Infusion. This can inflict bleed rapidly while also healing you a little. If you go up against a foe that is immune to bleed, you should swap the infusion to Occult for better damage instead. Your left-hand Uchigatana can be infused with Cold, most easily accomplished using the Ash of War: Hoarfrost Stomp While many people choose Cold for the additional chunk of damage it deals when triggered (and this is indeed quite helpful), its greatest benefit in this build is that it increases all damage taken by the afflicted enemy.

Since status build-up while dual wielding was nerfed a while ago, you’ll want to weigh the pros and cons of using one sword at a time to build a single status or using both to inflict two status effects a little slower.

In terms of spells, we’ll be using Golden Vow and Flame, Grant me Strength to buff our damage and defense, while spells like Dragonclaw and Dragonmaw allow us to stagger enemies with powerful but slow attacks. You can also use Greyoll’s Roar to debuff enemies and Rotten Breath or Ekzykes’s Decay to inflict scarlet rot and dish out ranged damage.

Talismans

Talisman
Effect

Lord of Blood’s Exultation
Provides a 20% attack bonus whenever blood loss occurs nearby.

Rotten Winged Sword Insignia
Provides an attack bonus as you land successive attacks, which increases from 6%, to 8%, and finally to 13%. as you continue to land attacks.

Godskin Swaddling Cloth
Landing successive attacks heals you for 30+3% of your Max HP.

Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman
Raises Physical Defense by 20%.

This Talisman loadout is designed to provide a mix of powerful damage bonuses, self-healing, and a physical defense boost to deal with tougher foes. You can swap the Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman for other Dragoncrest Talismans when facing foes who deal a lot of elemental damage.

Shadow of the Erdtree Build (Level 150)

The Base Game Build above remains a viable option in Shadow of the Erdtree, with new talismans and Incantations (Like Ghostflame Breath and the Bayle Incantations) providing more versatility than ever. That said, the DLC also adds a bunch of new weapons that are suitable for a Dex build, so for the sake of variety, we’ll give you a viable Dex build using a few new items alongside some old staples. The build will be at level 150 to reflect the recommended entry level for the DLC but will include recommendations about where to invest extra points as you continue to level up.

Stats

Stat
Level

Vigor
60

Mind
20

Endurance
30

Strength
14

Dexterity
80

Intelligence
9

Faith
8

Arcane
8

This build goes all in on Dexterity to get as much damage out of its weapons of choice as possible. We’ve also grabbed the all-but mandatory 60 Vigor, setting Mind and Endurance to 20 and 30 for good stamina and a healthy amount of FP for using Ashes of War. Putting two points into strength gives us enough to use Great Katanas if we want to. As you level up past 150, put one extra point into strength to meet the requirements for the Dragon-Hunter’s Great Katana (giving you an excellent anti-dragon option) and then put the rest into Endurance, so you can use heavier armor and/or carry multiple weapons if desired. More Mind so you can use Ashes of War more often is also a worthwhile investment, or you could put points into Faith to get access to some buffing spells.

Weapons and Armor

Initially, we’ll be sticking to the Land of Reeds Set , or the White Reed Set from the Mountaintops. Once we can reach the Eastern Nameless Mausoleum and defeat Rakshasa, we’ll trade this for the Rakshasa Set . This set has below-average defenses for its weight but gives the wearer a 2% damage boost per piece. Equipping all four pieces of Rakshasa Armor grants a +8% damage boost, complementing our weapon choices.

On the subject of weapons, we’ve got some great DLC options here. The Great Katanais available without fighting a single DLC boss and serves as a slower but more damaging alternative to the Uchigatana from the base game, performing well with a Keen Infusion to take full advantage of your Dexterity. The 

Ash of War: Overhead Stance allows it to dish out some devastating overhead strikes. You can also use Rakshasa’s Great Katana , which deals a little more base damage and has access to the Weed Cutter Weapon Skill instead. This Weapon Skill is a combo attack with hyper armor that can be continued by holding the button, only stopping when you run out of stamina. As a trade-off, you take more damage if you are hit while attacking with Rakshasa’s Great Katana.

After completing Count Ymir’s quest, you can use an Iris of Occlusion on Jhoran to get the Sword of Night . This Katana deals good damage while remaining quicker and lighter than the Great Katanas, with its unique skill “Witching Hour Slash” allowing you to cut straight through blocking enemies in a multi-hit combo. If you want to try something new for the DLC and don’t fancy a Great Katana, you could also consider Milady . This Light Greatsword deals great damage and scales well with Dexterity if using the Keen Affinity, performing best when equipped with the Ash of War: Wing Stance .

Talismans

Talisman
Effect

Two-Handed Sword Talisman
Provides a 15% Damage Bonus to weapons when Two-Handing them.

Rellana’s Cameo or Axe Talisman
Provides a 15% Damage Bonus to Attacks made after holding a stance for 2 seconds OR Boosts Charged Attack Damage by 10%.

Rotten Winged Sword Insignia
Provides an attack bonus as you land successive attacks, which increases from 6%, to 8%, and finally to 13%. as you continue to land attacks.

Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman
Raises Physical Defense by 20%.

Our Talisman Loadout contains a few familiar faces from the Base Game Build, with previous advice about swapping the Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman with an appropriate elemental defense talisman against certain bosses applying here too. Rellana’s Cameo should be used alongside the Great Katana with Overhead Stance or Milady with Wing Stance to boost damage, while the Axe Talisman is effective when using the other two Great Katanas or the Sword of Night.