The much-anticipated Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree DLC is officially released on June 21st. Are you ready for the new challenges that await us?

With a ton of new content coming, it can be overwhelming, especially for players who haven’t played in years. What’s more, players who have managed to play DLC say it’s a challenging experience.

So, I’m going to share my 16 most important preparation tips or things you should do so that you can save time, avoid a lot of trouble, and be ready for the most anticipated DLC. The primary goal of this guide is to point you in the right direction or give you a general idea of ​​what you should focus on. Let’s get straight into it.

1. Prepare For Lost Ashes Of War

Now let’s start with the first tip on the list, which is to prepare some Lost Ashes of War. This is important because we will be getting new Ashes of War in DLC area, and it would be great if you are prepared with a lot of Lost Ashes of War because you never know which new Ashes of War you need to copy, especially if your build revolves around dual wielding.

When you need to copy Ashes of War, you will already be prepared, so you will save a lot of time and keep your DLC experience intact.

2. Get Whetblades

Most of the time, Whetblades help define the build and make it stronger. Speaking of character build diversity, Whetblades often define our build by granting us Weapon Affinity and even providing diversity. It unlocks the maximum potential of a weapon or greatly changes its use in combat by adding different types of scaling.

Must-have Whetblades, such as Iron Whetblade or Glintstone Whetblade. Of course, other Whetblades are great too, so make sure to get them all.

3. Get And Upgrade Spirit Ashes

Next up is the next tip, which is to get the best Spirit Ashes and upgrade them to the maximum. Now, we don’t necessarily need to use Spirit Ashes because it will mess up bosses and mess up their target system, but beginners, especially newbies entering a similar soul space for the first time, may need the help of Spirit Ashes.

Since we are talking about upgrading Spirit Ashes, it is wise to pile up its upgrade materials, such as Ghost and Grave Glovewort, especially Great Glovewort. We will never know if DLC will provide new Spirit Ashes, so you better prepare in advance.

4. Make Sure You Have A Lamp Or Torch

The next tip is very basic. Make sure you have a Lamp or a Torch in your gear. I know what you are thinking, this tip is boring, but in hindsight, it can provide you with a lot of help when exploring dark areas, and even save your life.

Shadow of the Erdtree will provide new intricate Legacy Dungeons and more caves or underground areas. Therefore, make sure you have a light source.

In addition to Lamp, my personal favorite is Ghostflame Torch, because it provides white light. Of course, any type of Torch will do.

The easiest way to get Torch in Elden Ring is to get it from Merchant Kale who resides in Church of Elleh. Torch sells for 200 Elden Ring Runes. From there, you can equip and use Torch as often as you want.

5. Crystal Tears

Straight on to the next tip, which is to get as many Crystal Tears as possible. Crystal Tears, after popping Flask of Wondrous Physick, will give your build a limited but insane buff that can almost turn the tide of a battle.

My build revolves around Katanas, especially Moonveil. So in my case, utilizing Magic-Shrouding Cracked Tear to further increase my magic damage, paired with Stonebarb Cracked Tear for more Stance Damage, would be beneficial.

There are a lot of good Crystal Tears in the game, such as Greenburst Crystal Tear that increases Stamina Recovery, and many more.

6. Unlock All Talisman Slots

The next tip on the list is, of course, to maximize your Talisman Slots. You can get Talisman Pouch by defeating key bosses in the game, or by getting one when you first encounter Enia in Roundtable Hold.

Without four Talisman Slots, your combat performance will be severely compromised, so make sure you unlock all of them before DLC.

7. Optimize Item Farming Setup

Straight on to the next tip, which is to optimize your Item Farming Setup. DLC will offer 100 weapons, and we don’t know how much time it will take to farm these secret weapons from enemies, but there are many ways to optimize your farming setup.

The first is to equip Mimic Crystal Tear Headgear, which increases your Arcane Stat by 8. The higher your Arcane Stat, the higher your Item Discovery. The higher your Item Discovery, the more likely you are to get a drop when trying to farm a weapon.

In my farming setup, I also equipped Silver Scarab to further improve my Item Discovery, and paired it with a bunch of Silver-Pickled Fowl Foot.

8. Fully Upgrade Flasks

The next tip on the list is to fully upgrade both of your Flasks using Golden Seeds and Sacred Tears. By using both, you will increase their charges and potency. The stronger their effects, the more charges you have, meaning more room for mistakes in combat. The fewer times you stumble, the faster you progress in general.

9. Prepare Enough Runes

Tip nine is to prepare runes for general use. Of course, in a DLC, we don’t know how many new weapons and items will be available for sale, or even how many weapons will be upgraded, not to mention that weapon upgrades require a lot of runes, so stockpiling Elden Ring Runes isn’t a bad idea.

10. Upgrade Your Character To Rune Level 150

The next tip ties into the rune farming tip I just mentioned, and you’ll need to upgrade your character to around Rune Level 150.

While there are no set requirements when playing DLC, like in the base game, players can make their experience harder or easier by keeping an eye on their Rune Level.

But in the recent Elden Ring event, players managed to experience DLC, and they got a level 150 character at the start. This gives us a rough idea of ​​the recommended starting level, so it would be wise to stack the runes and use it later when upgrading your character.

11. Accumulate Weapon Upgrade Materials

The next tip I’m going to give you is to get all Somber Smithing and Ghost-Glovewort Bell Bearings in the game. I highly recommend tracking down the aforementioned Bell Bearings because they give you an unlimited amount of upgrade materials as long as you have the runes. So you can always access them in case you need them while traversing DLC areas.

While Somber and Regular Ancient Dragon Smithing Stones cannot be directly obtained from any shop, it’s a good idea to have some ready in case we need to maximize our DLC weapons.

Remember that we will have 100 new weapons, so we’ll need a lot of these weapon upgrade materials. Although the materials mentioned are quite rare, you can still get a lot of them every time you play.

12. Play What You Missed

Now for the next tip, if you are one of the many players who left after playing through the game once or twice two years ago, then you have most likely missed a lot of content.

Since DLC is coming out and you will be playing it anyway, now is the time to play what you missed, such as hidden bosses, NPC quests, or playing with different weapon types or character builds. This way you can get your bearings while waiting for DLC, and when it comes out, you will be firing on all cylinders and in good shape.

13. Optimize Your Build

Now for the next tip, which is to optimize your build. It is worth mentioning that any good build will play in DLC, which has been proven recently.

That being said, I still strongly recommend picking one or two builds that you like the most or that you find yourself liking, and have at least one or two maxed out weapons for each build, so that you are flexible for the challenges that DLC will bring.

14. Preserve Walking Mausoleum Chance

Coming up next is the next tip, which is to save your Walking Mausoleum chance and not copy any Remembrances before DLC comes out.

We have confirmation that we will have new Sets of Remembrances in DLC, so it is wise to save your chances. However, if you have already used your chances, it is not the end of the world. The more chances we have, the faster we will get the new items that DLC Remembrances offer.

15. Stock Up On Larval Tears

For this next tip, it is highly recommended to stock up on Larval Tears in case you need respect while playing DLC.

The new weapon may interest you, so respecting your character and building around it can be fun. However, if you don’t have Larval Tears, you will need to get Larval Tears elsewhere in order to respect, which can be very frustrating.

16. Know How To Access DLC Area

The last tip is also one of the most important, which is to prepare your access to DLC area. In order to access DLC area, you need to defeat Radahn first, for reasons that are currently unknown and will be determined in DLC.

After defeating Radahn, you need to defeat Mohg in Mohgwyn Palace. You can enter Mohgwyn Dynasty or Palace by completing Varre Questline or visiting the teleporter in Consecrated Snowfield. After defeating Mogh in Palace, interact with Miquella’s Arm and you will be teleported to Land of Shadow.

All in all, in my opinion, these are important tips to help you prepare for Shadow of the Erdtree. If I missed an important tip, please share it. How is your preparation for DLC going? See you in the game!