Elden Ring Claymore Build Guide - Spellsword

In this Elden Ring Claymore Build Guide, I’ll be showing you my Spellsword build. This is a variation of the Spellblade and Magus builds that I did earlier on. This build focuses on stance breaks rather than critical attack damage. You can play this build early on in the game, but you will have to defeat Godrick the Grafted in order to get Glintblade Phalanx.

Elden Ring Claymore Build Guide – Spellsword

Spellblade is a quality build that utilizes Claymore and Glintblade Phalanx Ashes of War. Primarily scales with strength and intelligence and heavily relies on periodic stance-breaking and critical hits. Rendering enemies unable to retaliate.

Class: Any
Flask Spread: Mostly HP, some FP
Weapon: Claymore x1, Academy Glintstone Staff
Shield: None
Armor: Carian Knight Helm, Blue Silver Mail Armor, Black Knife Gauntlets, Black Knife Greaves, or any armor with high protection and 51+ Poise
Talismans: Axe Talisman, Shard of Alexander, Assasin’s Cerulean Dagger, Spear Talisman, & more suggested talismans in the video.
Primary Stats: Vigor, Strength & Intelligence
Secondary Stats: Endurance & Mind
Skills: Glintblade Phalanx
Spells: Scholar’s Armament

We have over 110 Elden Ring Builds now, for all classes and playstyles. This build is recommended for all levels.

Beginner Builds	Level 50 Builds	Level 100 Builds	Level 150 Builds	Level 150-200	All Game Builds
Spellblade	Magus Enchanted Knight Sword Sage	Darkmoon Spellblade Battlemage Deathblade Frost Knight	Dark Knight Freezing Battlemage Royal Knight Death Knight Carian Spellknight Moonlight Crusader Nebula Knight	Soul Samurai Drake Knight Sanguine Spellblade Crucible Knight Silent Spearcaller Warrior Wizard	Ghostblade Haima Hoplite Spellsword Carian Cleaver Vanquisher

Elden Ring Claymore Build – Equipment and Gameplay

The weapon that I chose for this build is Claymore, and there are a couple of reasons for that. The charged R2 attack of the Claymore is really strong. It has a thrust attack, which only the Claymore and Zweihander have, although the Zweihander is a Colossal Sword so you can’t use Glintblade Phalanx with it. I really like using the charged R2 from a safe distance so I can attack without taking damage. Additionally, the charged R2 attack of Greatswords is about double that of Thrusting Swords. While you might get more critical damage with a Rapier, you’re not going to be able to break the guard or stance of an enemy as easily with a Thrusting Sword than you will with a Greatsword. Also, Claymore has a very long reach, so when you’re doing the follow-up attack with Glintblade Phalanx, you’re able to hit much further than you would with a Thrusting Sword. Lastly, the follow-up attack of Glintblade Phalanx does Stance damage, about the same as a jump attack with the weapon type you’re using. If you’re using a Thrusting Sword, it’s going to deal less Stance damage than a Greatsword.

The way I have the Claymore set-up is I have a Heavy infusion and I’m using the Academy Glintstone Staff to use Scholar’s Armament in order to buff my attack’s magic damage. I have about 50 Strength and Intelligence, splitting between these two attributes. If you’re wondering how to play this build from the start, you’re going to prioritize either Intelligence to get more magic damage, or Strength then buffing yourself with Scholar’s Armament and not worry about Intelligence. You’re probably not going to split between these attributes early on in the game, but once you get to NG+, it’s definitely a better way to go. At 50 Strength and Intelligence, you have about 900 attack rating when you’re buffed and using this two-handed. You can take those attributes to 80 and still get more damage all the way to NG+, which makes this build future-proof.

The damage with Glintblade Phalanx is higher if you’re just talking about the Glintblades that come out, because this deals 100% magic damage when you’re using Magic or Cold infusion. It doesn’t really do that much damage anyway, so we’re not building for Glintblade Phalanx’s damage. We’re just trying to get some damage out of it and get the Stance damage from the blades. Each blade deals 10 Stance damage for a total of 40 damage from Glintblade Phalanx. If you do a charged R2 attack while two-handing this weapon, it’s about 36 more, for 76 Stance damage. If you can hit back-to-back with these and hit with a regular R2 attack instead of the charged R2 attack, you’re looking at somewhere around 64 Stance damage, which is enough to break almost any enemy in this game. Not all bosses, but a lot of them.

You’re going to decide after casting Glintblade Phalanx if it’s better to use the follow-up attack and do less Stance damage but more damage in general, or use a charged R2 attack, get a little bit less damage, but get more Stance damage. That’s going to depend on the boss you’re facing and your spacing. For example, if you cast Glintblade Phalanx ahead of time, you’re going to follow-up with an R2 because you can only use the R2 attack immediately after casting Glintblade Phalanx.

We’re going to use the Academy Glintstone Staff here because this is going to give us the best sorcery scaling at our current Intelligence when fully upgraded. Depending on how much Intelligence you have or where you are in the game, this might not be the best staff for you. The Meteorite Staff might be better for you early on in the game, or the Demi-Human Queen’s Staff. Later in the game, Carian Regal Scepter will be much better as your Intelligence increases further and further into NG+.

I’m using different pieces of armor for this Elden Ring Claymore build. I have the Carian Knight Helm, Blue Silver Mail Armor, Black Knife Gauntlets, and Black Knife Greaves. It doesn’t really matter which armor you’re going to use, as long as you have 51 Poise. I’m using the Bull-Goat’s Talisman here to add to this in order to reach that breakpoint. If you want to use a heavier armor to free up that talisman slot, you absolutely can.

Elden Ring Claymore Build – Talismans

The talismans that we’re using for this Claymore build are: Axe Talisman, Shard of Alexander, and Assassin’s Cerulean Dagger

Axe Talisman will increase my charged R2 damage, which we use quite often. Shard of Alexander increases not only Glintblade Phalanx’s damage when they connect, but also the follow-up attack when you’re using that. Assassin’s Cerulean Dagger will refund the cost of Glintblade Phalanx if I hit enemies with it and stagger them, then following it up with a critical attack. This is similar to what I did in the Spellblade and Magus builds.

Other talismans you can use are Spear Talisman to increase your R2 and charged R2 attacks while they’re attacking you, which happens a lot during boss fights, or maybe when enemies are charging towards you on the landscape. You could also use the Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman in order to give yourself more protection. Magic Scorpion Charm isn’t a bad option for this build, because it will increase the damage of the Glintblades by 10%, since they do 100% magic damage. It will also slightly increase the damage of your weapon if you have magic damage on it.

Elden Ring Claymore Build – Spells

Spell-wise, we only really use Scholar’s Armament. This Elden Ring Claymore build has 50 Intelligence, so there are a lot of different spells you could use to further boost your magic damage. Terra Magica will boost your magic damage, though you don’t deal a lot of magic damage with this build, so I don’t find that very useful.

You could add ranged spells to damage enemies far out into the landscape to have an easier time exploring. With 50 Intelligence, especially in NG+, you’re not going to be slaughtering anything. You could pick-off enemies at a distance or soften them up before they get to you if you want. This build is really about staggering enemies, so this isn’t something that I factored in here.

Elden Ring Claymore Build – Attributes

When it comes to the attributes for this Claymore build, I have: 54 Vigor, 25 Mind, 25 Endurance, 50 Strength, 13 Dexterity, 50 Intelligence, 7 Faith, and 9 Arcane. We don’t need any Dexterity, Faith or Arcane for this build. 13 Dexterity is for the Claymore’s requirement. We’re not going to increase it at all because of the Heavy scaling of our weapon.

54 Vigor is enough for you to be able to trade damage and not die. You try not to trade damage with this build, but it happens when you mistime your attacks or dodges. You should increase this to 60 throughout NG+.

25 Mind is here because you don’t really use a lot of FP with this build. Glintblade Phalanx doesn’t use a lot of FP, and you do a significant amount of buffing with Scholar’s Armament from checkpoint to checkpoint. It’s not a substantial amount to increase Mind to around 30-35 as it doesn’t cost as much as Golden Vow. You want to keep Scholar’s Armament’s buff up 100% of the time, so you will spend some FP doing that. You’ll get some FP back from Assassin’s Cerulean Dagger, so you could even remove 5 points from this.

25 Endurance allows us to use all the equipment that we have and still do a medium roll. You can increase Endurance if you want to use heavier armor to replace Bull-Goat’s Talisman and give yourself more protection. If you’re min-maxing, that’s what you should do.

We also have 50 Strength and Intelligence. We have good scaling with Heavy on the Claymore, so points in Strength are good. We also have good sorcery scaling with the Academy Glintstone Staff, which we’ll swap out for Carian Regal Scepter at around 65 Intelligence. Increasing these attributes will increase our damage, so both of these are really good. It just depends on which damage type you’re going for, if it’s physical or magic. I suggest increasing Strength first as you’ll get more counter damage when you attack. You can increase Intelligence first if you’d rather be a spellcaster.

Elden Ring Claymore Build – Final Tips

When it comes to the Flask of Wondrous Physick, I like using Greenburst Crystal Tear to give me more stamina recovery. Stonebarb Cracked Tear gives us more Stance damage for 30 seconds, making it easier for us to stagger bosses. They can’t do anything for 30 seconds, and they’ll usually die even before that, so make sure to use this. If you want, you can also use Magic-Shrouding Cracked Tear to give yourself more magic damage, although it’s not a substantial amount.

As for Great Runes, you should use Godrick’s Great Rune early on because it increases six of the attributes you need, and it frees up points from Dexterity. Radahn’s Great Rune is also good for additional health, stamina, and FP.

Also, you gain 10% more Stance damage from attacks when you’re using it two-handed. That’s not going to apply to Ashes of War, but it will apply to your weapon attacks. For example, this will be helpful for enemies that can be staggered with 70 Stance damage, but you only have 66 Stance damage while one-handing the weapon.

That’s it for our Spellsword Build Guide! As always, let us know if you have questions or other tips in the comments below. We have a ton more builds coming for Elden Ring and Shadow of the Erdtree so stay tuned for those. If you need help finding items, and securing some personal objectives, make sure to check the Elden Ring Map. Happy building!