Elden Ring - Ashes of War

Ashes of War are items that grant an armament a new skill and, with it, a choice of affinity that reshapes how the weapon scales and what damage it deals. They sit at the heart of build crafting, turning a plain weapon into a stance breaker, a bleed engine or a spell-like ranged tool.

How Ashes Work

• An Ash of War is applied while resting at a Site of Grace once any Whetblade, starting with the Whetstone Knife, is held. Smithing Master Hewg at the Roundtable Hold offers the same service, so ashes can be applied there even before a Whetblade turns up.
• Each ash only fits the armament types named in its description, so a thrusting skill such as Piercing Fang needs a weapon capable of thrusting attacks, while broad skills such as Kick fit almost any melee weapon. An armament holds a single skill, and applying an ash replaces whatever skill it had before.
• Unique weapons, the ones strengthened with Somber Smithing Stones, keep their own built-in skill and refuse every Ash of War. Weapons such as the Blasphemous Blade or Reduvia therefore stay locked to the skill they came with.
• Applying an ash does not use it up. The ash is slotted into the armament and can be removed at any time, which restores the weapon's default skill and returns the ash, or moved straight onto another compatible weapon. Because each ash sits in one armament at a time, putting the same skill on a second weapon means moving it or making a copy.

Whetblades

• The Whetstone Knife unlocks the ability to apply ashes at a Site of Grace, offering the Standard affinity or the ash's own affinity. It lies in a chest in the cellar of the Gatefront Ruins in Limgrave alongside Ash of War: Storm Stomp, and the Twin Maiden Husks at the Roundtable Hold also sell it.
• The Iron Whetblade adds Heavy, Keen and Quality. It rests in a room behind an Imp Statue seal in Stormveil Castle, opened with a Stonesword Key, through the north-western door of the hall guarded by the Grafted Scion.
• The Glintstone Whetblade adds Magic and Cold, and sits on a corpse by an office balcony in the Academy of Raya Lucaria near the Debate Parlor. The Red-Hot Whetblade adds Fire and Flame Art, and lies in a tower of Redmane Castle in Caelid past the Chamber Outside the Plaza Site of Grace.
• The Sanctified Whetblade adds Sacred and Lightning and is found on a corpse beside an anvil in the Fortified Manor of Leyndell, Royal Capital. It has to be collected before Maliketh, the Black Blade falls, since the capital changes after that fight.
• The Black Whetblade adds Poison, Blood and Occult, and lies on a corpse before an altar in Night's Sacred Ground in Nokron, Eternal City. Every elemental Whetblade only offers its affinities to physical ashes or to ashes of its own family, so a Magic ash never takes Fire, while a plain physical ash can take any affinity on the list.

Duplicating Ashes

• Lost Ashes of War are empty ashes that Smithing Master Hewg at the Roundtable Hold turns into a copy of any ash already owned, consuming one Lost Ashes of War per copy. Hewg can even copy an ash that is still slotted into a weapon, which is how skills that only arrive pre-equipped on a weapon, such as Piercing Fang on the Nagakiba, can be pulled loose and shared.
• The supply is limited in every playthrough and cannot be farmed. Isolated Merchants in the Weeping Peninsula, near the Academy of Raya Lucaria and in Dragonbarrow sell them, as do the Hermit Merchant in Ainsel River and the Imprisoned Merchant inside the Mohgwyn Dynasty Mausoleum.
• Others lie in the world: in the Academy of Raya Lucaria, Sellia Hideaway, the Ruin-Strewn Precipice, near Sage's Cave on the Altus Plateau, at the gate and in the sewers of Leyndell, in the Subterranean Shunning-Grounds, in the Mountaintops of the Giants and in Miquella's Haligtree. The Land of Shadow adds more on the Ellac Greatbridge, in the Ruins of Unte, Belurat Gaol and Bonny Gaol, and on the Cerulean Coast.

Choosing an Affinity

• An affinity rewrites the weapon's base damage and attribute scaling. Every affinity other than Standard trades some base physical damage for stronger scaling in one stat, and the elemental ones split the attack between physical and their own damage type.
• The rule of thumb is simple: Heavy for Strength, Keen for Dexterity, Quality for an even split of both, Magic or Cold for Intelligence, Sacred or Flame Art for Faith, Fire for Strength with fire damage, Lightning for Dexterity with lightning damage, and Blood, Poison or Occult for Arcane. Standard keeps the weapon's default numbers and suits characters whose stats are still too low to profit from heavier scaling.
• Only the physical affinities, Standard, Heavy, Keen and Quality, accept buffs from greases, sorceries and incantations. Magic, Cold, Fire, Flame Art, Lightning, Sacred, Poison, Blood and Occult weapons ignore those buffs, although a skill that enchants its own weapon still works.
• Blood and Poison add their own status buildup that grows with Arcane, and Cold adds frostbite on top of its magic damage. Occult adds Arcane scaling without a new status, and Blood, Poison and Occult all lower whatever status buildup the weapon already carries.

Affinities

Best Ashes of War

Ash of War	Image	Affinity	FP
Lion's Claw		Heavy	20
Flame of the Redmanes		Fire	14
Bloodhound's Step		Keen	5
Seppuku		Blood	4
Thunderbolt		Lightning	10 (- 10)
Sword Dance		Keen	6 (- 6)
Ice Spear		Cold	15
Storm Blade		Quality	10 (- 6)
Golden Vow		Sacred	40
Barricade Shield		Standard	12

Builds

• Strength: Heavy ashes such as Lion's Claw and War Cry turn colossal weapons and greatswords into stance breakers, and Giant Hunt adds another hard-hitting stagger tool.
• Dexterity: Storm Blade on a Flamberge pours out ranged wind slashes, Unsheathe gives katanas a fast drawn strike, and Bloodhound's Step adds an evasive dash that suits a nimble fighter.
• Arcane Bleed: Seppuku and Bloody Slash carry the Blood affinity and stack blood loss quickly, while Sword Dance spreads the bleed of a weapon that already carries it.
• Faith: Sacred Blade coats the weapon in holy damage and Golden Vow raises attack and defense for the whole party, both on the Sacred affinity that scales with Faith.
• Frost: Ice Spear, Chilling Mist and Hoarfrost Stomp share the Cold affinity, piling up frostbite while their damage grows with Intelligence.
• Spellblade: Glintstone Pebble and Glintblade Phalanx carry the Magic affinity, giving an Intelligence melee build sorcery-like ranged attacks from its weapon.

Notes

• Bernahl at the Warmaster's Shack in Stormhill sells several useful ashes early, among them Kick, Quickstep, Parry, No Skill, Spinning Slash and Storm Blade; once he is gone, the Twin Maiden Husks sell them in exchange for his Bell Bearing.
• Sorcerer Rogier sells Glintstone Pebble and Carian Greatsword at Stormveil Castle and later at the Roundtable Hold, an easy early start for an Intelligence build.
• Ash of War: Storm Stomp waits in the Gatefront Ruins cellar chest beside the Whetstone Knife, and Ash of War: Golden Vow drops from a mounted Godrick Knight in Stormhill.
• Some ashes come from quests: Beast's Roar is Gurranq's reward for the fourth Deathroot, Raptor of the Mists comes from helping Bloody Finger Hunter Yura against an invader in Liurnia, and Thops's Barrier appears only after Sorcerer Thops receives an Academy Glintstone Key.

All Ashes of War