Elden Ring

Elden Ring Patch 1.03 brought significant changes to the Lands Between, including nerfs to powerful weapons and Ashes of War, buffs to sorceries and items, new gameplay features, and numerous bug fixes. This guide details all the adjustments.

Nerfed Items and Weapons

Sword of Night and Flame Nerf

The Sword of Night and Flame has been significantly nerfed, with its weapon skill and overall damage reduced by nearly half. This change makes investing heavily in Intelligence and Faith for this weapon less appealing.

Ashes of War

• Bloody Slash: Increased self-inflict damage, slightly lowered damage output, and increased cast time.
• Barricade Shield: Increased FP consumption and decreased effect duration.
• Prelate's Charge: Changed FP consumption timing.

These changes target some of the most potent Ashes of War, making Bloody Slash more costly in health and less effective, while Barricade Shield requires more FP and has a shorter duration.

Buffed Sorceries

Sorcery Updates

• Projectile speed and range increased for certain sorceries.
• FP consumption decreased for Loretta's Greatbow.
• Damage increased for certain sorceries.
• FP consumption reduced and damage increased for certain sorceries.

Magic users will find sorceries more efficient and powerful with these buffs.

Miscellaneous Balance Changes

• Increased HP healing for Torrent when using Rowa Raisin, Sweet Raisin, and Frozen Raisin.
• Increased effect duration for Uplifting Aromatic and Ironjar Aromatic.
• Increased damage for Spark Aromatic and another unlisted item.
• Increased damage for all offensive Cracked Pot items.
• Increased shield effectiveness.
• Added Smithing Stone to some early-game shop lineups.
• Increased the drop rate of Smithing Stone for some enemies.
• Decreased the damage and changed the behavior pattern of the Mimic Tear Ash spirit summon.

Cracked Pot items are now more potent, and Smithing Stones are more accessible early on. The Mimic Tear Ash summon has been toned down due to its previous overpowered status.

Gameplay Updates & Features

• Added a function to record NPC icons and names on the map upon encounter.
• Added NPC Jar-Bairn.
• Added new quest phases for Diallos, Nepheli Loux, Kenneth Haight, and Gatekeeper Gostoc.
• Added some summonable NPCs in multiple situations.
• Increased the number of imitation patterns for Mimic’s Veil.
• Added night background music for some open field areas.

Quality of life improvements include enhanced NPC tracking on the map and new quest content.

Bug Fixes in Patch 1.03

• Fixed a bug preventing summoned NPCs from taking damage in some boss battles.
• Fixed a bug where players sometimes could not obtain items after boss battles.
• Fixed a bug causing dialogue to be skipped with custom key configurations.
• Fixed a bug causing the player to freeze when riding.
• Fixed a bug causing incorrect arcane scaling for some weapons.
• Added Talisman Pouch to Twin Maiden Husks shop if the player cannot obtain more than two.
• Fixed a bug preventing warping to sites of grace from the map at the end of the game.
• Fixed a bug preventing movement to the next area after the Fire Giant battle.
• Fixed a bug causing incorrect weapon scaling after strengthening.
• Fixed a bug causing some weapons to not use stat scaling.
• Fixed hang-ups in certain occasions.
• Fixed a bug incorrectly displaying multiplayer area boundaries.
• Fixed a bug allowing Erdtree Greatshield's weapon skill to be activated without absorbing an attack.
• Fixed a bug causing incantations to have different effects than intended.

Elden Ring Patch 1.03.3 was released on August 10, 2024, and focused on correcting a bug related to the balance adjustments made to Starscourge Radahn in Patch 1.03. The patch notes state that some of Radahn's attacks had been nerfed unintentionally, and this update fixed those specific instances.