Armor

Armor in Elden Ring is worn in four slots, and the first thing to know is what the game does not do: wearing a full set grants no bonus. Every piece is judged on its own, on the negation it gives, the poise it buys and the weight it costs.

Damage Negation

Negation is a percentage, and it stacks by multiplication rather than addition. Each piece lets through a share of the damage, and the next piece cuts that share again:

total negation = 100% - (100% - piece 1) x (100% - piece 2) x ...

Talismans enter the same product, so a Spelldrake Talisman on top of a light set is multiplied in with the armor rather than added to it.

Every piece lists Physical, which is standard damage, beside Strike, Slash and Pierce, then the four elements: Magic, Fire, Lightning and Holy. A set that shrugs off a sword can still fold to a flame.

Alongside negation sit four resistances, and these are flat points that do add up across the pieces worn:

Poise

Poise decides how much punishment a player takes before a hit staggers them out of their own attack. It is the reason heavy armor is worn at all, and it lives mostly in the chest and the legs.

• The thresholds that matter are 11, 51 and 101. 51 is the common target, and the full Knight Set lands on it exactly.
• Player poise does not regenerate. It resets to full only after 30 seconds without being hit, and damage beyond what breaks it never carries into the next bar.
• Poise stays the same whatever weapon is swung. Hyper armor during an attack is a property of the weapon, not of the armor.

Equip Load

Armor is paid for with Equip Load, and three thresholds change how a character moves:

• Under 30% is Light Load: the longest roll and the quickest backstep.
• 30% to just under 70% is Medium Load: the same invincibility frames and recovery as Light, but a shorter roll.
• 70% to just under 100% is Heavy Load: fewer invincibility frames, double the recovery, and slower stamina regeneration. Fall damage starts to rise here too.
• 100% and over is overloaded, and rolling or backstepping is impossible.

Altering

Armor is never reinforced; its figures are fixed from the moment it is found. What some helms and chest pieces can do instead is be altered, which changes the look and makes small changes to weight and negation.

• Any Site of Grace will do it for 500 runes once the Sewing Needle and the Tailoring Tools are in hand, both dropped in Coastal Cave. Demigod armor needs the Gold Sewing Needle.
• Boc the Seamster does it for free once his questline has moved on.
• The altered piece is always lighter and almost always negates a little less. Poise is a different story: it holds steady on a handful of the chest pieces that can be altered, which makes those alterations a free weight saving.
• Gauntlets and leg armor cannot be altered.

Armor Sets

Sets are how the game hands armor out, not how it rewards wearing it. There is no bonus for completing one, and a few sets carry an effect on every piece that grows with each one worn rather than switching on at four.

So mixing is the default. The usual pick is the chest that carries the poise a build needs, the helm that covers the resistance it is short of, and the lightest gauntlets and greaves that keep the load under 70%.

Every set, with its pieces and the totals for wearing all of it, is on Armor Sets.

Armor Categories