If you are familiar with Elden Ring, you will know that Faith builds are very powerful in this game, as it provides players with dozens of powerful spells, sigils, and weapons. This is even more obvious in Shadow of the Erdtree, where numerous new weapons are expanded mainly through Faith.

Black Steel Greathammer introduced in this guide is a very typical example. Black Steel Greathammer can be obtained from Church of Consolation in the southeast of Gravesite Plains early in the DLC. No surprise, you need to fight Black Knight in it.

This weapon is a great choice for players who want to try out a new weapon in their STR/FAI build. So how do you choose the best build around it? This guide will answer you from its pros and cons and some directions for required items.

Pros And Cons

Before explaining its advantages, let’s take a look at some disadvantages of Black Steel Greathammer. Like most great hammers in the game, its attack range is very small and it can only be used in close combat. Also, you can only find it in Shadow of the Erdtree, so you may not bring it back to the base game.

If you don’t mind these two drawbacks, then read on! Black Steel Greathammer’s move set is pretty strong, and even without the buffs, its AR is pretty good. But if you put it in a Faith-based build and inject Flame Art or Sacred into it, it will be even more powerful.

Also, the great thing about it is that you can choose which Ash of War to inject, and it allows you to mix and match Ash of War injected to adjust the scaling. Black Steel Greathammer also has a unique form of guard counter, which will form a holy halo on the ground after the counter, and then explode immediately after a few seconds to generate holy damage.

This is also the move used by the previous owner of this weapon, Black Knights. You need to pay attention here that this holy damage will change with the changes in Faith’s stats.

Stats Distribution

Because Black Steel Greathammer is such a versatile weapon, it is great when used with a STR/FAI build. However, an FAI build is better, as FAI’s direct damage scales are better than STR.

So when choosing your stats distribution, you can increase FAI to 60 and keep STR at 25. This will give you 5%-8% more damage than if you chose 60 Faith and 25 Strength, and that’s without any Ash of War infusion.

In addition, the guard counter holy damage that this weapon can cast is proportional to the amount of Faith. This means that if you want to increase damage, upgrading Strength will not help, only upgrading Faith will help.

But you can’t lower Strength too much, because Black Steel Greathammer will help you increase your overall damage a little in a Strength-centric build. The following are the recommended allocations for each attribute data:

• Vigor 50
• Mind 20
• Endurance 43
• Strength 25
• Dexterity 11
• Intelligence 10
• Faith 60
• Arcane 10
  

Best Talismans

Because Black Steel Greathammer is a relatively melee weapon, you have to be very careful with your choice of Talismans. You can’t go wrong with Curved Sword Talisman first, as it increases the effectiveness and damage of defensive counterattacks by 20%.

In addition, Greatshield Talisman can miraculously reduce the stamina cost of blocking by 20% by increasing the defense bonus of the equipped shield, making follow-up actions easier to perform. And for Two-Headed Turtle Talisman, it can restore lost stamina at an amazing rate of 22.5%. These two Talismans can be used together.

Crimson Seed Talisman +1 is an amulet that you can bring or not, as it only increases the effectiveness of healing potions by 30%. But if you know the battle is going to be a long one, you can bring it in case of a genuine crisis.

Best Ash Of War

For Faith build required by Black Steel Greathammer, there is no better an Ash Of War than Ash Of War Sacred Blade. Because it gives you a buff that lasts for up to 40 seconds while you’re in combat. And it has a very obvious timer, so you can easily tell when it will wear off, so you can be ready to reapply it.

If you want to use Black Steel Greathammer against some high poise bosses, you can inject Ash of War Golden Land into it. This will allow you to deal 40 points of stance damage on your attack, and have armor that can protect you well.

This means that you will not be easily interrupted when using this weapon, so that you will have an easier time getting Elden Ring Runes.

If you encounter an enemy that is as agile and difficult to catch as you are, and you want to attack it at close range, you can use Ash of War Savage Lion’s Claw to make up for the shortcoming of this weapon: attack range.

If you want to expand the already excellent stance damage of Black Steel Greathammer and make this damage the major damage, you can use Ash of War Cragblade. After you inject this Ash of War, you will find that it is easy to deal with some bosses.

Best Shields

As mentioned above, Black Steel Greathammer is very defense-heavy, and you can use it two-handed or with a shield to increase the defense counter of this weapon. However, considering that it only has 76 physical damage cancellation, using it two-handed may not be a good idea, so you can choose a shield.

The choice of shield depends entirely on your Endurance and maximum equipment load. The heavier the shield, the higher the defense increase, and the better choice for you, especially if you are interested in fat rolling or have already invested a lot in Endurance. Here are the heavy shields you can choose:

Verdigris Greatshield

You can get this shield after completing Moore’s questline. This is the absolute best greatshield in the entire game, even better than Fingerprint Stone Shield in the base game.

Haligtree Crest Greatshield

There are a few variants of Greatshields, and the weight of each variant varies greatly. As the lightest variant of Greatshields, Haligtree Crest Greatshield is definitely your best choice.

Black Steel Greatshield you get from Black Knight also works well with Black Steel Greathammer.

If you don’t have either of these two options, then you can forget about the heavy shields, as they are not suitable for most builds because of their weight. Instead, you can try some medium shields, which also provide some defense boosts and have some general uses. Here are some medium shields you can choose from:

Serpent Crest Shield

You can get this from Incursion Painting in Land of Shadow. This shield gives you the best defense boost of all medium shields, up to 55. This will make it safer to pick up some Elden Ring Runes in combat.

Brass Shield

You can get this from the soldier in Limgrave. This is arguably one of the most balanced shields in the entire Elden Ring, both in the base game and the DLC. If you don’t get Serpent Crest Shield, you can use this instead.

Best Incantations

In a Faith-based build, you are free to use any incantation depending on the situation. But the most direct effect is to increase the effectiveness of Black Steel Greathammer directly. Golden Vow can help you increase the attack power of yourself and your allies by 15%, and increase your defense by 10%.

Flame, Grant me Strength can increase your physical and fire attack power by 20%. Both incantations have direct effects. If you want to try some new incantations, you might want to try Pest-Thread Spears or Flame of Frenzy, which can make you fearless when facing bosses. In PVP and PVE modes, Knight’s Lightning Spear can help you deal more ranged single-target damage.

These are some information you can choose around Black Steel Greathammer in Elden Ring DLC. I hope this guide can help you with your builds! Happy exploring!