Stat Breakpoints
Vigor
Influences player HP, fire defense, poison resistance, and scarlet rot resistance. 40 Vigor is the first breakpoint for HP, and is likely plenty for most people to get through PvE.
- Each point up to 40 is worth more than the last.
60 Vigor is the next breakpoint for HP, which you’ll probably want close to for NG+ and PvP. Anywhere in the 58-60 is a solid stopping point for HP.
Mind
Influences player FP, sleep resistance, and madness resistance.
- FP gains per point increase after 15 and 35. Breakpoints are 50 and 60.
Should be more-or-less treated as a dump stat; put extra points here after getting other breakpoints.
Endurance
Influences player stamina, equip load, blood loss resistance, and frost resistance.
- Stamina breakpoints are 30 and 50.
- Equip load breakpoints are 25 and 60.
Stamina gains are pretty low overall and you should pretty much just use this stat for the equip load; rather than hitting breakpoints for equip load you should use a build planning tool to figure out how much you need for your gear setup.
Strength
Influences player physical/strike/slash/pierce defense and provides AP scaling for weapons that utilize the stat.
Breakpoints for AP are: 16, 18, 20, 30, 45, 50, 60, and 80. There is only a minor fall-off in returns after 16, 18, and 20:
- 16 for weapons with a quality affinity.
- 18 for weapons with poison, blood, the physical portion of elemental affinities, and no affinity.
- 20 for weapons with heavy, occult, elemental affinities, and innate elemental scaling.
Primary breakpoints are 50, 60, and 80:
- 50 for the elemental AP when it benefits from this stat (primarily fire affinity); gains drop substantially beyond this point.
- 60 for the physical AP on all affinities; 57-60 will get less returns than 60-80.
- 80 for all affinities, but it’s usually only worth getting this much for physical affinities and even then it can be a stretch.
Casting Breakpoints are 30 and 45 (Clawmark Seal and Frenzied Flame Seal both use strength):
Each of these values can be divided by 1.5 (rounded up) if you primarily 2h your weapon. Keep in mind that the 2h AR bonus does not apply to most ashes of war or critical attacks.
Dexterity
Provides AP scaling for weapons that utilize the stat and affects the startup speed of most spells.
Breakpoints for AP are: 16, 18, 20, 30, 45, 50, 60, and 80.
There is only a minor fall-off in returns after 16, 18, and 20:
- 16 for weapons with a quality affinity.
- 18 for weapons with poison, blood, the physical portion of elemental affinities, and no affinity.
- 20 for weapons with keen, occult, elemental affinities, and innate elemental scaling.
Primary breakpoints are 50, 60, and 80:
- 50 for the elemental AP when it benefits from this stat (primarily lightning affinity); gains drop substantially beyond this point.
- 60 for the physical AP on all affinities; 57-60 will get less returns than 60-80.
- 80 for all affinities, but it’s usually only worth getting this much for physical affinities and even then it can be a stretch.
Casting Breakpoints are 30 and 45 (Frenzied Flame Seal uses dexterity).
Intelligence
Influences player magic defense and provides AP scaling for weapons that utilize the stat.
Breakpoints for AP are: 20, 30, 45, 50, 60, and 80. There is only a minor fall-off in returns after 20:
- 20 for weapons with elemental affinities and innate elemental scaling
Primary breakpoints are 50, and 80:
- 50 for the elemental AP when it benefits from this stat (primarily magic and cold affinities); gains drop substantially beyond this point.
- 80 for all affinities (not worth for elemental).
Casting breakpoints are 30, 45, 60, and 80 depending on catalyst.
Faith
Provides AP scaling for weapons that utilize the stat.
- Breakpoints for AP are: 20, 30, 45, 50, 60, and 80.
There is only a minor fall-off in returns after 20:
- 20 for weapons with elemental affinities and innate elemental scaling
Primary breakpoints are 50, and 80:
- 50 for the elemental AP when it benefits from this stat (primarily sacred and flame art affinities); gains drop substantially beyond this point.
- 80 for all affinities (not worth for elemental).
Casting breakpoints are 30, 45, 60, and 80 depending on catalyst.
Arcane
Influences player holy defense, death resistance, provides AP scaling for weapons that utilize the stat, and provides scaling for poison, bleed, sleep, and madness.
- Breakpoints for AP are 18, 20, 30, 45, 50, 60, and 80.
There is only a minor fall-off in returns after 18 and 20:
- 18 for weapons with poison and blood affinities.
- 20 for weapons with occult affinity.
Primary breakpoints are 50, 60, and 80:
- 50 for elemental AP when it benefits from this stat (innate Arcane-scaling weapons that have elemental AP like).
- 60 for all affinities; 57-60 will get less returns than 60-80.
- 80 for all affinities, but it’s usually only worth getting this much for physical affinities and even then it can be a stretch.
Casting breakpoints are 30 and 45 (Albinauric Staff and Dragon Communion Seal both use arcane).
Status scaling breakpoints are 30, 40, 45, and 60:
- 30 for consumable status scaling.
- 40 for Serpent Bow poison scaling.
- 45 for everything else; gains drop a decent bit beyond.
- 60 for everything else as well; not worth for purely status purposes most of the time.
There are reasons to end up at different levels of str/dex/int/faith/arcane than what is listed here; these are specifically for reaching attack power soft caps.
Is 53 the “max” for any sane build, or is 2-handing at 66 str to reach 99 still a worthwhile goal for a strength build?
that’s opting for the hard cap; you certainly can, but I don’t think the savings justifies the expenditure.
When leveling up, should I take talismans into account?
Depending. While a single attribute +5 may not seem like much, multiple attribute ones have significant increases in damage taken. According to what I hear, +3 and +5 multicost 5% and 10% more damage, respectively. There are pros and cons to consider.
However, you can deduct a talisman’s bonus from the soft caps here if you never take it off.
I’ve heard that VIGOR scales up until around 60, though.
Nope, it tapers down, decreasing the significance of those final points; the raw data link illustrates this. Eg going from 55 to 56 gives 20 hp,
56 to 57 gives 19 hp,
57 to 58 gives 18 hp,
58 to 59 gives 16 hp and
59 to 60 gives 13 hp
Additionally, fire resistance gains its final two points between 57 and 58, and then nothing between 58 and 59.
In contrast, increasing from 39 to 40 results in 48 horsepower, 2 fire resistance, and 3 poison resistance.
For my level 150 Dragon incantations/Madness build, would the following be effective?
(Weapon: Dragon Communion Seal)
Prophet
Arcane 45
Mind 40
Vigor 40
Faith 55
Endurance 21
You can end your faith at 45 if you plan to use that seal.
Ah, that makes sense. So you’d put the five points into Arcane instead? Many thanks for that!
When you use a seal that caps both stats at 30/45, such as one that gains from two sources, the benefits of increasing either of the contributing stats past 45 are reduced. Again, that’s just my preference, but I’d place the excess in endurance.
There is also the option of increasing casting speed by using Dex.
I dunno, looking at those curves, it still appears to be a bump in the 50–55 range.
Though it is undoubtedly a gentler, more gradual shift than the int/faith ones.
The reason for this is that, specifically for the uchigatana, the value rounds up to the next whole number at precisely 53 dex. This portion of the whole number error is this. You’re missing the point that at 40 dex, the curve transitions from linear to logarithmic, representing precisely diminishing returns. Actually, you should level up to a value that rounds to the next whole number, but that is specific to a given weapon and isn’t helpful for general guidance.
I use different weapons to compare and contrast with each other because of this.
There is obviously more area beneath the curve around 50 even when a flat edge is held up to that section (20–80).
I performed a regression analysis using the Keen Uchigatana +25 data. First off, scaling is linear up to 20 dex and does in fact decrease by about 50% beyond 20 dex. From this point on, the algorithm changes every 20 dex; the scaling is logarithmic from 41 to 60, linear from 61 to 80, and linear from 21 to 40. As a result, the diminishing returns begin at 41 dex rather than 53. Nevertheless, because the curve is smooth, the scaling decrease is gradual and lasts until 60 dex.
Strength and dex scale in the same way. I didn’t really research int, faith, and arcane scaling, but the dex method can be repeated.
Is it possible to hit these soft caps with stat-boosting equipment like Radagon’s Soreseal? Or are base stats the only ones that receive bonuses?
How you get there is irrelevant; what matters is that everything adds up in the end.
The results of my test with Moonveil +10 seem to support that theory as well; Str, Dex, and Int have minor soft caps of 55 and 50, respectively, for the Physical and Magic components.
The mid-level cap for physical damage stats (Str/Dex/Arc) is closer to 55. Though it’s very slight, the +attack per level between 55 and 60 is noticeably less than that of 50 to 55 and 60 to 80.
The maximums for Arcane status buildup are 45 (major) and 60 (minor). It’s interesting to note that scaling is scarce until Arcane level 30.
It’s important to keep in mind that a maximum Flask of Cerulean Tears heals 220 FP. 40 Mind = 220 FP, 36 Mind = 196 FP (with Radahn’s Great Rune, this drops to 220 FP). Indeed, hitting 0 FP is quite possible. When you have at least half the FP cost (rounded down), you can activate weapon arts, which would reduce your FP to 0. However, spells require that you have the entire amount on hand.
Radahn’s STR/INT weapon has a 1.5x strength bonus when dual wielded, so you can use it at about 30 STR instead.
Can someone explain the 2 handed thing to me, do I need less str if two handing a weapon?
If a weapon takes 50 str to wield, it only takes 25 if you can wield it with two hands.
The str needed to 2h a weapon can be calculated using the formula (base stat req / 2 + half of the other number).
For instance, 40/2 + 10 would be the weapon’s base requirement if it needed 40 str.
2HandSTR = 1.5 x current STR
50 = 1.5 x ?
Solving for the unknown turns the equation into 50 / 1.5 = X
God, this reminds me of the trauma in high school.
Nevertheless, 33.3 is the unknown in that equation; always round up to 34
the formula should just be 1.5x as said in post so a weapon needing 50str if 2h you only need about 34.
Fantastic work! Regarding casting speed+Dex (using Astrologer atm.), I have a question. How does it interact with things like the Radogan icon? If it’s similar to the Sage ring from DS3, for example, you could leave it at 10 and use a +2 Radogan icon. I’m also unsure of the cast speed cap in this case.
I have no data regarding casting speed; to obtain data, one would need to use video capture and count the differences between individual frames, which is not something I can do. However, the game only cares about the total amount of stat points, not how you get them. Therefore, even if something gives you +10 ya, you could still only have 10 DEX, and the game would treat it as 20.
I believe that every casting focus will likely have a different set of breakpoints, so I will need to test them all. *sigh* That’s a lot of wolves to kill >.>. However, it appears that +NUMBER simply multiplies the bonuses rather than changing the scaling.
I believe the 50% increase to STR indicates that there is a cap of 66. Since 50% of 66 is 33, 66 + 33 = 99. That’s how every Souls game has operated.
Hello, if you would like to use it for testing, I have a S scaling Finger Seal +15.
This seems to be designed for a speed run; it wouldn’t function well in NG+, and I usually use NG9. Soft caps, however, may be increased in accordance with your supporting statistics.
On a high-quality build with 20 DEX, 50 END and 40 VIG? You’re doing min-maxing incorrectly:D
If you want to do well in NG+, you shouldn’t go below 58 VIG because the bosses in the game’s second section slap you pretty hard. Anything over 27–30 END is, well, kind of, just for comfort, I guess. I’ve been in NG+ since I left Stormveil on my first playthrough, so I’m currently at 27.
The majority of people, from what I’ve observed, dual-wield weapons because some later bosses have extremely high HP. As a result, STR builds suffer a little, but reaching the caps is still worthwhile because the best STR weapons require at least 40 STR (my favorite requires 50).
Going above 50 dex is unnecessary, if you want to reach that 80 CAP, put those points elsewhere.
As for mages… well, 60(70) INT/FTH and 40 Mind is a must
Thx my dude. Just quick noob quistion if i dual hand my Uchigatana (unsheathe skill + Samurai) Would this mean i need more strenght instead of dexterity or?
-Arcane adds bleed buildup and attack power, but at a very slow rate for a D rank weapon.
-Maybe you’re reading the spreadsheet incorrectly, but the vigor gain to HP @35 is 46.
-If the weapon has STR scaling, two handing will increase damage, but depending on the relative scaling, you might be better off just increasing your DEX. Two handing only increases your effective STR; it has no effect on your DEX. I haven’t examined weapons in-depth enough to comment further.
I’ll attempt to give it a little test. At 22, I am vigorous and dexterous. intellect and stamina 17. little effort put into strength. I simply wanted to know if 2 handing was primarily enhanced by strength and disregarded dexterity or something else. After a +5 upgrade, the Uchigatana scales with both (D), favoring dex a little more. However, you also have the sharp ashes. I’m not sure how to find out, it’s very complicated.
When using a Katana, your primary emphasis should be on DEX in order to deal damage. Afterwards, you should turn your weapon “Keen” after you reach roughly 25 dex.
After reaching level 35, vigor gains do not decrease to 26.
Excellent guide. DEX/ARCANE and sub stat INT are my choices. I made a mistake by going 25 on DEX and putting some on STR. I’m just waiting for the reset item right now, though.
wait so if I double hand my great axe I only need 34 strenght?
Yes, to reach the 51 STR breakpoint. It doesn’t seem worth it to go that far, but it’s up to you how far you want to take it. Some want to push it to 53 so that two hands gives them 79 effective Strength.
All weapons, then, have a base stat, and some scale higher with dex and some with str. Does using a dex-based weapon mean that you deal more damage if your str is higher? Or str increases any damage from melee attacks on its own.
Depending on the weapon, either one will increase damage if it lists scaling with both. However, some weapons do not have scaling with a stat, so if you increase a stat that it does not list, you shouldn’t notice any changes. However, if a weapon allows you to, you can always use weapon arts to change its scaling.
so does endurance affect physical defense or not?
No, physical defense comes from strength. The confusion most likely stems from the fact that all defense stats increase automatically with level; what matters is the bonus that is applied on top of that.
How about a build for melee? I have been concentrating solely on STR, VIGOR, and END. I’m at lv84 with 59 str, 32 vigor, and 28 END. I used to believe that maxing out my stats would only increase my damage output, but there are moments when I wish I had more FP to cast spells or call forth more expensive ashes.
What would you recommend? Because I had a magic guy or something planned. Put some in dex perhaps, so if I want to, I can dual wield as well? Alternatively, just go all out.
My main objective in terms of endurance is to be as light of a burden as possible for the better rolls because I’m playing a squishy Astrologer. Therefore, encumbrance must be less than 30%.
According to your neat excel sheet, I need to increase Endurance to 22 at my current load of 19.9 because I need a weight capacity above 66.33 (19.9/0.3). I will stop there unless my loadout increases in weight.
Since Int is already over 20, I will most likely start pumping Vigor and Mind after that.
I tested the arcane attack power and casting damage after cheating a little bit to respec without having the advantage of having unlocked the respec in-game. The results are a little strange—attack power is largely as expected (D rank doesn’t show you that much detail), but the casting damage is unexpected. You can now see the numbers for the bleed buildup.
I wouldn’t work as hard to improve my intelligence or endurance. I think I’ve reached thirty in my sorcerer’s mind, and that’s about right. My endurance, by the way, is fifteen. Melee builds tend to want more endurance, but since stamina and FP are both so easily restored, having more of either isn’t really that important as long as you have enough for a full on assault. Using those levels to increase damage or health would be a better course of action.
Similar to Luck at DS3, Arcane appears to be a (hidden?) attr for Bleed buildup. Try respeccing into Arcane after finishing Ramalla, and observe the Blood Buildup increase+dmg.
It’s interesting that most stats now have smaller soft caps of 20 and 50 instead of 40, which, in my opinion, allows for greater build flexibility.
To reach the third breakpoint not mentioned here, which is 79 (2-handed as you noted giving a 1.5x multiplier, so 53*1.5 = 79 rounded down), I would advise 2-hand PURE strength builds to reach strength of 53.
The strength stat should be maximized by pure strength builds, and 34 is far too low to stop at. The 17 AP between 52 and 79 is unquestionably worthwhile, but 80 to 99 only providing 4 more AP is obviously not.
Just to add, I looked at Faith for weapon scaling (at least in the rebirth, so this is just looking at my weapon’s attack power stat instead of damage like I was looking at previously), and sure enough, 50 is the number there as you mentioned. That the two are somewhat apart is strange (but kind of cool). However, mine is a little inconsistent when it comes to the 20. In fact, I can get a +2 on the stat up to age 21, which is the same as what I was getting before age 20. Now that I think about it, there might be a few rare situations where you can go one above a softcap and still benefit fully from the previous bracket because of rounding. This is probably just related to rounding or something similar.
Oh, I see now. I called the 20s erratic because they fluctuate between 1-1-2 and 1-1-1-2, but as far as I could tell, that was only due to fractional gains. After continuing and realizing it wasn’t seemingly random, I scratched that and realized I had forgotten to remove the erratic part.
aye, it is also possible that things change as we level up the weapons (what a headache that’d be) so far I’ve only been looking at unleveled weapons
Hi, I appreciate you taking the time to explain things to me. Regarding the 50/20 hybrid split (let’s say str/dex), I do have a question. Is it specifically because of the lower values once they arrive?
Gaining a 50/50 split makes sense, right? After all, quality weapons scale with both.
Is it feasible to reduce the weight of some items as well?
It’s best to meet the weapon’s base stat requirements and then disregard everything else until your vitality has reached 40. The effect of that HP will be far bigger than a few damage points. Early points can be wasted because weapons don’t scale very well until higher upgrade levels. Prioritize hp unless you enjoy being the only one.
Your strength is effectively increased by 50% when you are two-handing a weapon. This increase will help weapons that have strength scaling. Additionally, provided you are two-handed only, it permits you to wield weapons with a strength requirement up to 50% greater than your stat. Two-handedness has no effect on dexterity scaling.
It would be immensely helpful to find the FP flask breakpoints at different sacred tear levels for mind in addition to this.
The usefulness of your mind as a stat is limited by the amount of FP it will provide you with.
For a caster, intelligence definitely makes sense above 50. I tried increasing my intelligence from 57 to 58 after seeing this post. (Tried on exactly the same enemy type on 57 and then on 58) The spell damage (basic Pebble) increased by 5.
In passing, I notice that there is a pretty high Mind recommendation. It’s largely useless, and I barely leveled it. I have enough flasks and can deal enough damage to last me through any fight.
Vigor – 25
Mind – 25
Endurance -25
Strength – 32
Dexterity – 18
Intelligence – 9
Faith – 49
Arcane – 7
——————-
Rune lvl – 111
Starting class – Prophet
I want to use Ghiza wheel, jar canon and all incarnations except dragons with arcane.
Absolutely, a boss soul spell has seventy initial requirements.
I should point out that certain spells and weapons have extremely high requirements. A spell that required 70 int to cast caught my eye. Therefore, it makes sense to move past softcaps.
The sorcery scaling per int point investment appears to be continuing to increase as I’ve taken it up to 60. About past 60, I’m not sure. The best option, if you’re looking for a weapon to test scaling, is probably the academy staff. It drops from the academy sorcerers fairly frequently and gains S int scaling at +10 or +11.
include the fact that vigor experiences growing returns until the age of 40, after which it begins to decline.
From 19 to 20, you receive +28 health; from 29 to 30, you receive +43 health; from 39 to 40, you receive +48 health; from 40 to 41, you receive +26 health, and so on. The health gradually decreases as you proceed.
Not like any other Souls game, this one. For instance, ds3 already exhibits diminishing returns at 20.
Indeed, and resistances giving nothing until, say, Vigor 30, at which point they mostly benefit from 30 to 40.
I have a vigor of 26, dex of 44, str of 19 and lv of 59. What should I concentrate on? Is it worthwhile to push my str to 20?
You would benefit from a point in str. Dex is currently in a slow growth phase, but you can still increase its attack power to 50 by doing so. I believe you’d probably get more mileage, as the guide suggests, by stopping at 20 attack stats and concentrating on survivability before returning to top them off, but you do you
Hello, buddy. I’m attempting to complete Manor Volcano, but every boss there gives me a one-shot. + I’m a bit of a souls novice. Does equipment affect a bossfight’s outcome? Rolling with a medium or heavy load feels pointless, so I actually de-equip my equipment.
You do not take any damage if you are never hit, but I have discovered that calling in assistance significantly alters the difficulty; you can call in two people, and even one person can divert the boss’s focus, leaving its back exposed to the other.
I’m confused about how these stats affect damage output in my build e.g I have 22 intelligence and I’m using the apprentice staff, does the physical damage from the staff’s sorceries ramp up with higher intelligence?
I tested a few B and C rank STR and DEX options, and they clearly display 20/50 breakpoints. Hmm, this is interesting. It’s fascinating and will require more testing and data!