Why so many [Weapon buff] builds go so heavily into faith?

I've noticed that quite a few builds that rely on weapon buffs go 30 points into faith - for example, this 40 dex/30 faith (which is my guess going to 60/30 by level 120). With low attunement, they are used only to buffing weapon with the Lightning Blade, that requires 30 faith. But why this particular weapon buff? You can get Carhtus Flame Arc with 10/10 int/faith (so an investment of 2-5 points, depending on the starting class) or Greater Magic Weapon with 15 int.

Is the Lightning Blade that superior, that going 30 faith is worth for the Dex/faith or str/faith builds?

dark-souls-3

Best Answer

After a bit of digging, I think I can answer my own question.

It all boils down to the spellbuff that scales with intelligence for sorceries or faith for miracles (for pyromancy it scales with both, but it would require heavy investments for both stats): in short, after hitting the dexterity softcap, it is better to invest into a "magic" stat (int/fth) to increase the potency of a weapon buff.

Example:

Sharp Sellsword Twinblades +10 at 40 Dex deal 365 damage. At 60 dex, they would deal 387 - so for the cost of 20 points you get 22 points of extra damage.

But then we can buff them: If we assume (incorrectly) that all spellbuffs require 10 int/faith then:

With 10 int and +10 Sorcerer's staff we could add 95 magic damage or 95 lightning damage with talisman +10 (or 110 fire damage with +10 Pyromancy flame). If we invest the same 20 points in int or faith (so 30 int or 30 faith total) we will have:

133 Magic damage with Greater Magic Weapon and sorcerer staff => 38 extra points of damage
157 Lightning damage with Sunless Talisman and Lightning Blade miracle => 62 extra points of damage

So it is much more efficient to start investing in secondary int/faith rather than keep pushing the dexterity.

Even more: let me look at the 40 dex 60 int/faith (investment of 50 points).

At 40+50 = 90 dex sharp selswords +10 deal 431 damage. Extra damage = 66 damage
At 60 int we have 214 extra damage from Greater Magic Weapon
At 60 faith we have extra 230 extra damage from Lightning Weapon

tl;dr

Diminishing returns make investing into faith or int more worthwhile.

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Elden Ring: The Best Weapons For A Faith Build

8 Golden Halberd.
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2 Godslayer's Greatsword.
1 Blasphemous Blade.

Does blessed weapon scale with faith?

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Can heavy weapons be buffed?

Raw, Heavy, Sharp, Refined, and Hollow infused weapons can be buffed.

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