Elden Ring Build Planner: How To Plan A Character

Planning a character in the Lands Between is really about one question: where does every attribute point go, and what does it cost you to get there? A build planner answers that before you spend a single rune, so you commit points on purpose instead of guessing at a Site of Grace and regretting it forty levels later. This guide walks through the whole process, from choosing a starting class to locking in a final rune level, using the free build planner on this site.

You do not need to memorise formulas or juggle spreadsheets. The planner handles the maths; your job is to make the decisions. By the end of this walkthrough you will know how to read your rune level, understand what a target level costs, and produce a clean stat spread you can actually follow in game.

Start with the goal, not the class

The most common planning mistake is picking a class first and building around whatever it happens to start with. Flip that order. Decide what your character is going to do — swing a colossal weapon, fling glintstone sorceries, stack bleed, heal with incantations — and then pick the class whose starting stats waste the fewest points on things you will never use.

For example, if you want a pure Strength character, the Hero opens with the highest Strength of any class, so fewer of your early levels go into catching up. If you want sorceries, the Astrologer starts with high Intelligence and Mind. The best starting class guide breaks down all ten origins and what each is efficient at.

Set your defensive floor first

Before you touch your damage stats, decide on Vigor. Vigor is health, and health is what lets you survive long enough to deal any damage at all. A widely repeated rule of thumb is to keep Vigor near half your level in the early game, then push it toward 40 by the midpoint. Forty Vigor is a comfortable target for most builds; 60 is the practical ceiling before returns fall away sharply.

Mind and Endurance are your other support stats. Mind governs your FP pool, which matters enormously for casters and barely at all for a pure melee build that never uses a skill. Endurance controls stamina and raises your equip load ceiling, which decides how much armour and weapon weight you can carry before your dodge roll slows down. The equip load guide covers those thresholds in detail.

A simple allocation order

When you are unsure, this order works for almost any melee build: bring Vigor to a safe level, add just enough Mind to power the skills you plan to use, add enough Endurance to keep your preferred armour in a medium roll, then dump everything else into your main damage stat. Casters swap that around, leading with their casting stat and Mind, but the principle holds: cover survival and utility first, then maximise your one or two scaling stats.

Read the rune level and its cost

Every attribute point raises your rune level by exactly one. In the planner, your rune level equals the sum of your eight attributes minus 79 — that is why the Wretch, with all stats at 10 (a total of 80), sits at level 1. As you raise attributes, the planner shows both your current level and the total runes it takes to reach it from level 1.

This matters because rune cost is not linear. Each level costs more than the last, following a cubic curve, so the difference between level 120 and level 150 is far larger than the difference between level 20 and level 50. Seeing that number before you farm helps you decide whether those extra levels are worth the grind. The rune level guide explains the cost curve and where most players choose to stop.

Use templates as a starting point

If you are new to a playstyle, load one of the built-in templates — Strength, Dexterity, quality, sorcery, Faith or bleed — and treat it as a first draft rather than a finished build. Templates give you a sensible shape: a healthy Vigor pool, a reasonable Mind value, and a heavy investment in the relevant damage stat. From there you adjust to taste, nudging points between survivability and offence until the rune level feels right.

Because the planner never lets an attribute drop below your chosen class's base, you can experiment freely without producing an impossible build. Every spread you see is one you could actually create in game.

Save, compare, and commit

Once a build looks good, save it. The planner keeps your saved builds in your browser's local storage, so you can line up two or three variants — say, a level 125 duel build against a level 150 PvE version — and compare their stat lines side by side. Nothing is uploaded anywhere; the data lives only on your device.

When you are happy, use the copy button to export a plain-text summary you can paste into your notes or share with friends. Then head into the game and level with confidence, because you already know where every point is going and what it will cost. That is the entire point of planning: fewer regrets, fewer wasted runes, and a character that does exactly what you meant it to.

Common planning scenarios

Different goals call for slightly different planning approaches. If you are building a first character for a blind playthrough, favour flexibility: a quality or Vigor-heavy melee build forgives mistakes and lets you try many weapons as you find them. If you are building a second or third character with the game already learned, you can commit harder to a focused archetype from level one, since you know which weapons and spells you want.

If you are planning for multiplayer, the process changes again. A capped rune level turns planning into a budgeting exercise where every point is contested, so you plan the entire spread up front and refuse to drift past your target. The PvP and co-op guides cover those constraints, but the planner is the same tool for all of them.

Turning a plan into play

Once your plan is saved, playing toward it is simple: at each Site of Grace, level only the stats your plan calls for, in the order that keeps you effective throughout. Most builds lead with Vigor early so the midgame stays survivable, then fill in the damage stat as runes allow. Because you already know the final destination, there is no second-guessing at the menu.

Revisit the plan whenever you find a weapon or spell that tempts you in a new direction. A quick check in the planner tells you whether the switch fits your level budget or calls for a respec. Planning is not a one-time act; it is a habit that keeps your character coherent from the first rune to the last.