In Elden Ring, Tanks are known for absorbing and dolling out massive damage. These builds are great at letting you brave through some of the game’s toughest bosses while letting you easily breeze through less tough areas.
In this guide, we’ll go over two Tank builds in Elden Ring: a Melee Tank Build and a Healer Tank Build. The builds below cover everything including the basic stats and starting classes up to weapons, Ashes of War, Talismans, and more.
Elden Ring Melee Tank Build Overview
The Melee Tank Build in Elden Ring is built around maximizing your total damage output while maintaining good defense. This allows you to tank through most mobs and almost every boss in the game. The equipment this build uses is heavier, but with the right stat distribution, this shouldn’t be a problem.
- Class: Hero
- Flask Spread: 3 to 1 ratio of HP and FP
- Stats: Strength and Endurance (primary) Vigor, Faith, and Dexterity (secondary)
- Weapons: Giant Crusher
- Shield: Fingerprint Stone Shield
- Ash of War: Lion’s Claw and Shield Crash
- Incantations: Golden Vow and Black Flame Protection
- Spirit Summons: Dung Eater Puppet or Lhutel the Headless or Mimic Tear
- Armor: Fire Prelate Set or Bull-Goat Set
- Flask of Wondrous Physick: Leaden Hardtear and Opaline Hardtear
- Talisman: Pearl Shield Talisman, Verdigris Discus, Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman, and Claw Talisman
Elden Ring Healer Tank Build Overview
The Healer Tank Build is centered on tanking damage and restoring your HP as quickly as possible. Both of these feats are accomplished while maintaining a very high damage output. The damage won’t be on par with the Melee Tank build, but this build’s healing setup more than makes up for it.
- Class: Hero
- Flask Spread:
- Stats: Strength, Dexterity and Endurance (primary) Vigor and Faith (secondary)
- Weapons: Butchering Knife
- Shield: Icon Shield
- Ash of War: Wild Strokes and Shield Crash
- Incantations: Golden Vow and Black Flame Protection
- Spirit Summons: Lhutel the Headless or Dung Eater Puppet or Mimic Tear
- Armor: Fire Prelate Set or Bull-Goat Set
- Flask of Wondrous Physick: Crimson Burst Crystal Tear and Opaline Hardtear
- Talisman: Blessed Dew Talisman, Taker’s Cameo, Godskin Swaddling Cloth, Assassin’s Crimson Dagger
Best Stats Choices
Stats at level 60
| Stat | Melee Build | Healer Build |
|---|---|---|
| Faith | 18 | 15 |
| Mind | 9 | 9 |
| Dexterity | 11 | 21 |
| Strength | 33 | 30 |
| Endurance | 28 | 27 |
| Vigor | 22 | 19 |
| Intelligence | 7 | 7 |
| Arcane | 11 | 11 |
Stats at level 100
| Stat | Melee Build | Healer Build |
|---|---|---|
| Faith | 21 | 21 |
| Mind | 9 | 9 |
| Dexterity | 15 | 26 |
| Strength | 45 | 42 |
| Endurance | 38 | 39 |
| Vigor | 33 | 24 |
| Intelligence | 7 | 7 |
| Arcane | 11 | 11 |
Stats at level 150
| Stat | Melee Build | Healer Build |
|---|---|---|
| Faith | 23 | 27 |
| Mind | 9 | 9 |
| Dexterity | 24 | 31 |
| Strength | 58 | 56 |
| Endurance | 53 | 53 |
| Vigor | 44 | 35 |
| Intelligence | 7 | 7 |
| Arcane | 11 | 11 |
Best Weapons for Tank Build
We’ll use heavy weapons that require a significant investment in strength and endurance stats for both builds. For the Melee Tank Build, go with the Giant Crusher, which can be found in the back of a Carriage near the Outer Wall Phantom Tree site of grace.
Like all Colossal Weapons, the Giant Crusher weapon scales with Strength and Dexterity and deals massive damage. Attack animations can be long and slow, but given the tanky nature of our build, this shouldn’t affect you too much.
We’ll go with something slightly lighter for the Healer build: the Butchering Knife. This Greataxe weapon can be acquired after you defeat Anastasia, Tarnished Eater. It scales with Strength, Dexterity, and Intelligence and is decent at dolling out high amounts of damage
Best Shields
Shields are a pivotal part of this build because you’ll be tanking a lot of damage with both builds. Like the heavy weapons discussed above, both builds use heavy shields.
For the Melee Build, we recommend going with the Fingerprint Stone Shield, which can be found inside the Cathedral of the Forsaken. To wield this armament, you’ll need to have 48 points invested into strength. The best part about this shield is its ability to provide 100 guard damage, making it almost impenetrable.
On the other hand, for the Healer Build, use the Icon Shield which you can pick up in the Woodfolk Ruins. This shield grants you passive healing at 3HP/second, which makes it a perfect fit for this build, and unlike the Fingerprint Stone shield, you only need to have 22 points invested into the strength stat to equip this shield.
Best Ashes of War Picks
For both shields, use the Shield Crash Ash of War. Not only is this a great way to deal some extra damage, but this Ash of War also lets you quickly dispel enemies in your vicinity if you’re overwhelmed.
As far as the Giant Crusher is concerned, imbue it with the Lion’s Claw Ash of War. This ability sends your character hurtling toward your target, followed by a large ground attack that can damage several nearby enemies. Given the colossal damage output of the Giant Crusher, Lion’s Claw makes you an absolute powerhouse regarding damage.
For the Butchering Knife, go with the Wild Strokes Ash of War. This ability lets you pull off a series of far-reaching successive strikes that, combined with the weapon’s damage output, lets you deal devastating damage.
Best Incantations
Our goal with these incantations is to acquire additional damage negation to increase the tanky nature of both builds. We recommend the following indications for both builds:
- Golden Vow: This Incantation increases your damage output by +15% and your damage negation by +10% for 80 seconds.
- Black Flame’s Protection: Black Flame’s Protection increases your physical damage negation by +35% for 70 seconds.
Best Spirit Summons Picks
Regarding the spirit summons, you’ll want a summon that complements both your builds’ tanky playstyle. For this reason, we recommend the following
- Dung Eater Puppet: The Dung Eater Puppet is a tanky single-unit summon that deals bleed damage to enemies. His large health pool makes him a worthy addition to your arsenal.
- Lhutel the Headless: Lhutel the Headless is a tank that works slowly, with harder-hitting attacks and a huge health pool that makes him perfect for tanking enemy attacks while you work to chip away at your enemies’ health.
- Mimic Tear: The Mimic Tear summons a replica of your build that fights alongside you. With this Spirit Summon, you’ll essentially have twice the damage output.
Best Armor Choices
Like the Incantations and Spirit Summons, the armor in this build can also be interchanged between both builds. We recommend the Bull-Goat Set or the Fire Prelate Set in keeping with blocking damage. Both these armor sets provide great amounts of protection and have some of the highest poise in the game.
You can acquire the Bull-Goat Set by killing Great Horned Tragoth at the Ruin-Strewn Precipice Overlook while the Fire Prelate set is routinely dropped by Fire Prelate enemies in the Mountaintops of the Giants area.
| Stats | Fire Prelate Set | Bull-Goat Set |
|---|---|---|
| Damage Negation | ||
| Physical | 36.5 | 38.5 |
| Physical (Strike) | 32.7 | 38.2 |
| Physical (Slash) | 35.0 | 34.9 |
| Physical (Pierce) | 35.0 | 34.9 |
| Magic | 26.5 | 26.1 |
| Fire | 37.4 | 26.5 |
| Lightning | 25.6 | 28.9 |
| Holy | 26.2 | 25.3 |
| Resistance | ||
| Immunity | 159 | 170 |
| Robustness | 150 | 197 |
| Focus | 215 | 110 |
| Vitality | 120 | 130 |
| Poise | 96 | 100 |
Best Flask of Wondrous Physick for Tank Build
The Flask of Wondrous Physick allows you to use two temporary buffs in a single-use Flask. For the Tank builds, we recommend the following:
Melee Tank Build
- Leaden Hardtear: This Tear increases your poise by +33%, making you less likely to get staggered.
- Opaline Hardtear: The Opaline Hardtear increases all damage negation by +15%.
Healer Tank Build
- Crimson Burst Crystal Tear: This tear slowly restores your HP over time.
- Opaline Hardtear: The Opaline Hardtear increases all damage negation by +15%.
Best Talismans
Talisman allows you to buff your builds in several ways. There are a total of four Talisman slots that you can unlock and use. For the Tank builds, these are the best Talisman:
Melee Tank Build
- Pearl Shield Talisman: The Pearl Shield Talisman boosts all your non-physical damage negation while you’re guarding.
- Verdigris Discus: This Talisman increases your defense, the higher your equipment load is.
- Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman: The Dragoncrest Greatshield Talisman greatly reduces all physical damage you take.
- Claw Talisman: This Talisman increases the potency of your jump attacks. This significantly buffs the Lion’s Claw Ash of War.
Healer Tank Build
- Blessed Dew Talisman: This Talisman slowly restores your HP
- Taker’s Cameo: Taker’s Cameo grants you a little health boost every time you successfully take out enemies. This is especially useful against mobs.
- Godskin Swaddling Cloth: This Talisman restores your HP if you use successive attacks, it works particularly well when used with the Wild Strikes Ash of War.
- Assassin’s Crimson Dagger: The Assassin’s Crimson Dagger restores your HP every time you get a critical hit.
