Elden Ring Starting Class Guide: Which One to Pick
Compares every Elden Ring starting class by stats and gear, with picks for new players, melee builds, and casters, plus keepsake advice.
Picking a class is the first real decision Elden Ring asks you to make, and the game does a lousy job explaining what you're even deciding. Short version: a class is a starting stat spread plus a bag of gear. Nothing more. You can't swap classes later, but you can rebuild your stats from scratch once you beat Rennala at the Raya Lucaria Academy, so almost nothing is locked in forever. What the choice really shapes is your first ten or fifteen hours, and some starts are a lot gentler than others.
Starting Stats by Class
Every class hands you the same eight attributes, just spread differently, plus a starter kit. People fixate on the numbers, but the gear honestly matters more during the opening hours. Numbers first, though, since that's what the table is for.
What the stats do
Quick rundown, because the game sure won't give you one:
- Vigor is your health pool. Boring, powerful, and the best early stat in the game by a mile.
- Mind is your FP, the blue bar. Spells and weapon skills drink it.
- Endurance covers stamina plus how much gear you can carry before your roll turns to mush.
- Strength is for heavy weapons like greatswords and warhammers.
- Dexterity is for fast stuff - katanas, daggers, spears, bows. It also speeds up spellcasting a little, which sounds made up but isn't.
- Intelligence powers sorceries, the glintstone wizard magic.
- Faith powers incantations, the fire and lightning cleric magic.
- Arcane handles item discovery and status buildup like bleed, plus some strange magic later on.
The full stat spread
Ten classes at launch, plus two more added by the Tarnished Pack DLC in Patch 1.17. Here's every stat, straight off the wiki (stat names shortened so the table fits):
| Class | Level | Vigor | Mind | End | Str | Dex | Int | Fai | Arc | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Vagabond | 9 | 15 | 10 | 11 | 14 | 13 | 9 | 9 | 7 | | Warrior | 8 | 11 | 12 | 11 | 10 | 16 | 10 | 8 | 9 | | Hero | 7 | 14 | 9 | 12 | 16 | 9 | 7 | 8 | 11 | | Bandit | 5 | 10 | 11 | 10 | 9 | 13 | 9 | 8 | 14 | | Astrologer | 6 | 9 | 15 | 9 | 8 | 12 | 16 | 7 | 9 | | Prophet | 7 | 10 | 14 | 8 | 11 | 10 | 7 | 16 | 10 | | Samurai | 9 | 12 | 11 | 13 | 12 | 15 | 9 | 8 | 8 | | Prisoner | 9 | 11 | 12 | 11 | 11 | 14 | 14 | 6 | 9 | | Confessor | 10 | 10 | 13 | 10 | 12 | 12 | 9 | 14 | 9 | | Wretch | 1 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | | Heavy Knight (DLC) | 10 | 14 | 8 | 17 | 15 | 11 | 7 | 8 | 9 | | Idus Knight (DLC) | 7 | 10 | 12 | 11 | 13 | 15 | 8 | 11 | 6 |
A few things worth noticing. The Vagabond's 15 Vigor is the healthiest start of the bunch. The Astrologer's 9 is the frailest, and you feel it. Four classes top one chart each: Hero at 16 Strength, Warrior at 16 Dexterity, Astrologer at 16 Intelligence, Prophet at 16 Faith. The Bandit owns Arcane at 14 while sitting at level 5, the lowest martial start in the game. And the Wretch is ten straight across at level 1, holding a club.
What your starting level actually means
Count it up and every class has exactly 79 stat points plus its level. A level 1 Wretch has 80 points, all tens. A level 10 Confessor has 89. Level any class to 10 and it also sits at 89, so way down the road the difference isn't how many points you own - it's where they're parked.
That's why build planners talk about "wasted" points. A pure Strength character starting as a Confessor drags 14 Faith around that it will never use, plus 13 Mind it barely needs. The Hero dumps Intelligence (7) and Faith (8), exactly the stats a big-weapon bruiser ignores anyway, so its points all pull weight. Lower starting levels also give you more say in where each point goes, since fewer were pre-spent for you. For a first character this is trivia. For your third character, it's the whole game.
Starting gear, class by class
| Class | Starting kit | | --- | --- | | Vagabond | Longsword, Halberd, Heater Shield, full knight armor | | Warrior | Two Scimitars, Riveted Wooden Shield | | Hero | Battle Axe, Large Leather Shield | | Bandit | Great Knife, Shortbow with 30 Bone Arrows, Buckler | | Astrologer | Astrologer's Staff, Short Sword, Scripture Wooden Shield, Glintstone Pebble and Glintstone Arc | | Prophet | Short Spear, Finger Seal, Rickety Shield, Heal and Catch Flame | | Samurai | Uchigatana, Longbow with 20 Arrows and 10 Fire Arrows, Red Thorn Roundshield | | Prisoner | Estoc, Glintstone Staff, Rift Shield, Magic Glintblade | | Confessor | Broadsword, Finger Seal, Blue Crest Heater Shield, Urgent Heal and Assassin's Approach | | Wretch | A Club, and no armor to speak of |
The kit is what you actually feel in hour one. A Heater Shield blocks 100% of physical damage, so the Vagabond can hide behind it and study a boss instead of eating every swing. The Samurai's Uchigatana stacks bleed fast and its Unsheathe skill does real damage for a starter weapon. None of this gear is exclusive - everything on that list can be found or bought later - it just decides what's in your hands when the Tree Sentinel comes galloping at you.
One housekeeping note for 2026 players: the Tarnished Pack (free if you're on the Switch 2 Tarnished Edition) adds the Heavy Knight and Idus Knight shown in the table above. Same rules apply to them. Stats and gear, nothing more.
Best Class for New Players
Vagabond, and it isn't particularly close
First FromSoftware game? Take the Vagabond and don't overthink it. The 15 Vigor means a mistake costs you a chunk of health instead of your whole bar. You get a Longsword for normal fights, a Halberd for reach, and that Heater Shield for when you'd rather block than gamble on a dodge roll. Playing careful behind a shield is a completely legitimate way to learn enemy patterns, and the Vagabond is built for it from minute one.
One heads-up: the starting knight armor is heavy, and a heavy load makes your roll slow and floaty. If dodging feels gross, take the helmet off and see how much better it gets. Problem more or less solved.
Samurai, the strong runner-up
The Samurai might be the community's favorite class overall, and the reputation is earned. The Uchigatana is arguably the best starting weapon in the game - quick, bleed-inflicting, with a skill (Unsheathe) that chunks bosses early. The Longbow lets you pull one enemy out of a group instead of fighting six at once, and it comes with 20 regular arrows plus 10 fire arrows for the things that hate fire. Medium-weight armor keeps your roll honest, and 13 Endurance means you can actually afford to wear it. If "knight with a shield" sounds sleepy and "wandering swordsman" sounds right, pick Samurai and you'll do fine.
Starts to skip on a first run
- Wretch - level 1, a club, no armor. Everything in Limgrave outlevels you. Great second character, punishing first one.
- Bandit - level 5 with paper defenses, and its Buckler is built around parrying, a timing skill most new players haven't got yet.
- Astrologer and Prophet - casting is a harder first run. Squishy body, mana management, and you'll spend your early levels buying Vigor just to stay alive.
Whatever you land on, feed your early runes into Vigor. A common rule of thumb is to keep it around half your character level until it reaches 50 - call it 20 Vigor by level 40, then stop at 50. New players die from small health bars far more often than from small damage numbers, and the hit to your kill speed barely registers early on.
Best Class for Melee Builds
Already sold on bonking things with metal? Now the choice gets interesting, because this is where a class's junk stats start to matter.
Strength: Hero or Vagabond
The Hero is the min-maxer's Strength pick: 16 Strength at only level 7, with Vigor 14 and Endurance 12 backing it up. Its dump stats are Intelligence (7) and Faith (8), exactly what a pure bruiser never touches. Two-handing a weapon gives your Strength a real boost on top of that, which is why big-weapon builds hit so absurdly hard early. The catch is the kit - a Battle Axe and a Large Leather Shield are fine, but "fine" is the whole review.
The Vagabond at 14 Strength is the smarter practical pick. You'll pass 16 Strength in an afternoon of leveling anyway, and you start with better weapons, a real shield, and that fat health pool. Pick Hero when you're planning a build down to the last rune. Pick Vagabond when you just want to play.
Dexterity: Samurai, or Warrior for the dual-wield crowd
Samurai again, at 15 Dexterity with 13 Endurance and the best starter kit going. For basically any dex build - katanas, spears, twinblades - it's the easy answer.
The Warrior technically edges it at 16 Dexterity, and it's the one class that starts with two copies of the same weapon (a pair of Scimitars). Dual curved swords attack fast and layer damage beautifully. The cost shows up at the smithing bench: taking one weapon to +3 costs 12 Smithing Stones, and doing it for both Scimitars costs 24. Early on, when stones are tight, that bill stings.
The Bandit is the sneaky third option - 13 Dexterity and 14 Arcane at level 5, the exact shape of a bleed build. Just know the opening hours are rough on those thin defenses.
Quality and offbeat melee
For a Quality build (Strength and Dexterity raised together), the Vagabond's 14/13 split is the cleanest start. The general rule for anything unusual: match your class's junk stats to your build's junk stats. The fewer points parked in stats you'll never raise, the happier your endgame character is.
Best Class for Casters
Sorceries: Astrologer pure, Prisoner hybrid
The Astrologer is the wizard, full stop. 16 Intelligence, 15 Mind, and it comes out the gate casting - Glintstone Pebble for single targets, Glintstone Arc for crowds, staff already in hand. Starting at level 6 keeps early leveling cheap too. The price is the 9 Vigor, which leaves you exceptionally squishy, plus the whole FP lifestyle: you'll be shifting flask charges over to the Cerulean Flask at every Site of Grace just to keep the spells flowing. Pure glass cannon, and a fun one.
The Prisoner is the hybrid take: 14 Intelligence and 14 Dexterity, an Estoc for poking, a Glintstone Staff, and Magic Glintblade already learned. You give up a little casting power next to the Astrologer and get a real melee fallback in exchange, and that matters more than you'd think during the stretches where sorceries run dry. It even carries the lowest Faith of any class (6), so nothing leaks into magic you'll never cast. Fair warning - most guides tag the Prisoner as a veteran's start, since it asks you to juggle two damage types at once.
Incantations: Confessor over Prophet
On paper the Prophet wins faith builds: 16 Faith, 14 Mind, level 7. On the ground it starts with a Short Spear, a Rickety Shield, and robes, a grim little kit for a game this hostile. Early faith play as a Prophet is mostly poking things with a stick between heals.
The Confessor is why hardly anyone starts Prophet. Fourteen Faith instead of sixteen, but it brings a Broadsword, a Finger Seal, Urgent Heal for a quick patch-up mid-fight, actual armor, and 12 Strength / 12 Dexterity so the weapon half of the build works. It also starts at level 10, the highest of the original ten classes, meaning the most pre-spent points - and here they're parked in useful places. For a first caster, Confessor is the easy call. Prophet is for min-maxers who don't mind a rough first three hours.
A note on Arcane casting
Arcane-flavored casting is more of a mid-game project, but the on-ramp is the Bandit's 14 Arcane if bleed weapons and dragon breath sound like your thing. Park that thought for now and come back to it on character two.
Why Starting Gifts Barely Matter
Character creation also makes you pick one Keepsake from a list of nine, or nothing at all. The full menu:
| Keepsake | What it does | | --- | --- | | None | You start clean, no bonus | | Crimson Amber Medallion | Talisman, +6% max HP while equipped | | Lands Between Rune | Sells for 3,000 runes | | Golden Seed | One extra Sacred Flask charge | | Fanged Imp Ashes | Summons two imp spirits whose attacks inflict blood loss | | Cracked Pot | Three pots for crafting throwing items | | Stonesword Key | Two keys that break imp statue seals | | Bewitching Branch | Five branches that turn an enemy friendly for 3 minutes | | Boiled Prawn | Five prawns, physical damage negation for 1 minute | | Shabriri's Woe | Talisman that constantly pulls enemy aggression onto you |
Look at that list and notice the pattern: everything on it is small, replaceable, or both. The Crimson Amber Medallion's 6% health is genuinely nice for about an hour, and you can buy one for 1,500 runes from a merchant in the Weeping Peninsula, roughly the game's second area. Stonesword Keys drop as loot all over and run about 2,000 runes from merchants when they don't. The one item you can never get any other way is the Lands Between Rune, and all it does is sell for 3,000 runes. That buys a few early levels, which feels like a windfall at level 6 and like found change by the time you're deep in Liurnia.
If you still want the "right" pick
- Golden Seed - the one gift whose value lasts, since an extra flask charge keeps paying out every fight until you find the seeds sitting in the world anyway.
- Stonesword Key - two keys means two imp statue doors opened for early loot, if you like front-loading treasure.
- Lands Between Rune - a few free levels at the start. Perfectly fine, perfectly forgettable.
- None - the speedrunner special, for when you'd rather the game hand you nothing.
The honest answer is that the Keepsake screen matters about as much as your character's jawline. If you want the practical pick anyway, grab the Golden Seed - an extra sip of the flask is still helping you in Liurnia, while the medallion and the prawns are vendor trash by then.