Garnet the Dragon Knight
A RL 150 Dragon Communion build focused mainly on the use of Eleonora’s Poleblade and the Dragon Communion Seal. Designed for PvE and Invasions and balanced around the PvP meta level.
This is a higher-level version of my older “Garnet the Dragon Dancer” build. My goal with this build was to create a red-themed build with a focus on arcane-scaling red weapons: The Dragon Communion Seal, Eleonora’s Poleblade, Rivers of Blood, and Reduvia. This build focuses mostly on Arcane, with Faith and Dex acting as her secondary attributes.
I also chose fashion sets for this character that fit a red and black aesthetic. For light load, as before, I chose the Dancer’s Set, a very beautiful red and black dress that buffs Eleonora’s Poleblade’s Bloodblade Dance skill. For medium load, I chose a mixed set that incorporates Drake Knight and Fire Knight pieces to fit her dragon knight theme.
Enemies
The idea behind this build is to combine bleed weapons with dragon incantations. You can engage enemies from a distance with dragon breaths, then rush in and finish them off with your bleed weapons. You can also use consecutive attack talismans and the Lord of Blood’s Exultation to build up attack boosts, then hit enemies with melee-oriented spells like Dragonmaw and Dragonclaw.
Bosses
For bosses, you can open up at range with Rotten Breath or Ekzyke’s Decay to proc Scarlet Rot, then take the fight to melee range with your blood weapons. If you equip a Faith stat boost, you can also begin the fight with Greyoll’s Roar to reduce the boss’ defenses and attack power. Ancient Dragon’s Lightning Strike, Dragonmaw, and Dragonclaw all work well for big openings as well.
Ranged Weapons
In addition to incantations, you can use bows as alternative ranged options. I chose the Red Branch Shortbow for a light bow option and the Serpent Bow and Erdtree Bow for regular bows.
Use Barrage or Rain of Arrows on the Red Branch Shortbow to launch volleys of blood arrows on enemies for fast bleed build-up.
For the Serpent Bow, any status-inflicting arrow will work well due to the weapon’s Arcane scaling. Use Serpent Arrows for poison, blood arrows for bleed, and sleep arrows for sleep.
For the Erdtree Bow, use Golden Arrows to make the most use of the bow’s buff to holy arrows. Golden Arrows will dissolve undead enemies on kills, too, so it’s a good way to pick off skeletons at range.
Talismans
- Crimson Amber Medallion +3: A staple for this build. The +3 variant grants +10% HP.
- Erdtree’s Favor +2: Raises HP, FP, and Stamina by 4%, 8%, and 10% respectively.
- Bull Goat’s Talisman: Lets Garnet cross the 51 Poise threshold while wearing her Fire Drake armor.
- Lord of Blood’s Exultation: Increases attack power when bleed procs in the vicinity. Use this when using bleed weapons.
- Rotten Winged Sword Insignia: You can swap this in for an attack boost on consecutive attacks.
- Millicent’s Prosthesis: An alternative to the Rotten Winged Sword Insignia. The attack boost is lower than that of the Rotten Winged Sword Insignia, but it grants +5 Dex. You can get this one or the Rotten Winged Sword Insignia in a given playthrough, but not both.
- Shard of Alexander: Swap this in to boost weapon skills. Useful for maximizing attack power with Eleonora’s Poleblade and RoB, since these rely heavily on their unique skills for damage.
Other Tips
- You’ll use primarily Dragon Communion and Blood Oath incantations, but you can also incorporate some Dragon Cult incantations like Ancient Dragon’s Lightning Strike.
- The Faith-Knot Crystal Tear grants enough Faith to use Placidusax’s Ruin, should you wish to incorporate it.
- Sacred Bloody Flesh grants enough Arcane to use Bayle’s Tyranny and Bayle’s Flame Lightning if you wish to use these as well.
- Use Mohg’s Great Rune to empower summons and get more bleed procs. Synergizes with Sacred Bloody Flesh and the Lord of Blood’s Exultation as well. Mimic Tear naturally works well for this. I also like Stormhawk Deenh, as birds are descended from dragons in the lore of Elden Ring, tying into Garnet’s dragon theme. Spirit summons that summon multiple enemies should work as well.
- You can only get the Rotten Winged Sword Insignia or Millicent’s Prosthesis in any given playthrough. The Rotten Winged Sword Insignia gives a stronger buff, but Millicent’s Prosthesis can be equipped with the regular Winged Sword Insignia.
