Best Elden Ring bleed build: Elden Ring Rivers of Blood build guide
Learn how to make an unstoppable Elden Ring bleed build with the Rivers of Blood
Looking for the best Elden Ring bleed build? Bleed is the best status effect in Elden Ring, as it applies an extra burst of damage to enemies after just a few hits. With that in mind, you may be searching for the best Elden Ring bleed build. For this, we recommend using Rivers of Blood, a late-game weapon with a remarkable skill that inflicts the bleed effect incredibly quickly. With the Rivers of Blood, you can make the best bleed build and one of the best builds in Elden Ring overall.
In this guide, we'll explain how to make the best bleed build, covering the Rivers of Blood location, required stats, and any important items that you'll need to make this build incredibly powerful.
Elden Ring bleed build: how to make a Rivers of Blood build in Elden Ring
Rivers of Blood is a katana that deals blood damage. However, its real strength lies in the Corpse Piler skill, which is the key to this build. It unleashes a 6-hit combo that will almost always inflict the bleed effect onto an enemy, destroying any foes with ease. This makes Rivers of Blood one of the best weapons in Elden Ring, and a must-have for any worthy Tarnished.
If you want to see some other Elden Ring bleed builds, check out our Bloodhound Dexterity build and our Arcane Blood Lord build.
Elden Ring Rivers of Blood location
The Rivers of Blood is a katana that you can get in the Mountaintops of the Giants, which is a late-game area. When you reach the Foot of the Forge Site of Grace, head West to find the Church of Repose. Here, an NPC named Okina will invade your world and attack. Kill Okina to get their signature weapon, the Rivers of Blood.
Before patch 1.04, Bloody Finger Okina would only spawn before killing the Fire Giant boss. If you had already slain the Fire Giant for the main quest, you wouldn't be able to get the Rivers of Blood weapon. FromSoftware have since fixed this issue, meaning you can now get Rivers of Blood at anytime. Simply head to the Church of Repose to trigger the invasion.
Rivers of Blood build stat requirements
The Rivers of Blood katana requires the following stats:
- 12 Strength
- 18 Dexterity
- 20 Arcane
This means you’ll need to invest in a range of attributes as you level up in Elden Ring. Since this is a late-game weapon, you can simply respec to reshape your character if your current stats don’t allow you to use this weapon.
After meeting these requirements, continue to invest in Arcane and Dexterity for increased melee damage. You should also put points into Vigor and Mind to increase your health and FP. This allows you to soak up some damage if hit, while boosting your FP so that you can continuously use the Corpse Piler weapon skill on Rivers of Blood.
Important gear for the Rivers of Blood build in Elden Ring
To get the maximum potential from this Rivers of Blood build, there are a few powerful items that you should equip. We'll explain the talismans and Crystal Tears that you need for this bleed build below.
- Rotten Winged Sword Insignia: a talisman that boosts the power of successive attacks. Since the Corpse Piler skill makes 6 attacks in quick succession, this talisman will massively increase your damage with the skill on Rivers of Blood. You can find it by completing Millicent's questline. This starts in Caelid, but it ends in the late-game legacy dungeon Elphael, Brace of the Haligtree, where you can also find Malenia, Blade of Miquella. When faced with a choice to either help or fight Millicent, help her to earn the Rotten Winged Sword Insignia as your reward.
- Carian Filigreed Crest: another exceptional talisman for this Rivers of Blood build, as it reduces the FP cost of the Corpse Piler skill. This talisman is much easier to find, as you only need to complete a few steps. First, meet Blaidd in the Mistwood and help him kill Bloodhound Knight Darriwil. After winning this fight, head to Caria Manor in Liurnia and follow the path southwest to meet Master Iji, who will sell the Carian Filigreed Crest if you mention Blaidd.
- Lord of Blood's Exultation: a talisman that increases your attack power when a nearby enemy receives the bleed effect. Since this Rivers of Blood bleed build is focused purely on haemorrhaging every enemy, it will benefit greatly from the Lord of Blood's Exultation talisman. You can get this by killing Esgar, Priest of Blood in the Leyndell Catacombs, a dungeon hidden beneath the Subterranean Shunning-Grounds.
- Thorny Cracked Tear: a Crystal Tear that makes you deal more damage with successive attacks, just like the Rotten Winged Sword Insignia. As explained above, Corpse Piler is an incredible weapon skill that makes this bleed build shine, so use the Thorny Cracked Tear to boost its power even further. You'll get the Thorny Cracked Tear by killing the Putrid Avatar at the Consecrated Snowfield Minor Erdtree.
- Cerulean Hidden Tear: a Crystal Tear that temporarily makes spells and skills cost no FP. This makes Corpse Piler free to use, so you can use it just before starting a big fight and then sweep up in seconds. Since you won't need to worry about chugging FP potions between each use of Corpse Piler, you can swing Rivers of Blood around like Darth Maul slicing through a clone army. You can get the Cerulean Hidden Tear from the Ulcerated Tree Spirit boss at the Mt. Gelmir Minor Erdtree.
There isn't any specific armor set that we'd recommend for this build. Take a look through our list of the best armor sets in Elden Ring and consider using something that will give you either a light or medium load, so that you can quickly dodge enemy attacks. This will give you an opportunity to quickly follow up with the Corpse Piler skill as a counter.
That covers everything you need to know to make an Elden Ring Rivers of Blood build. If you want to slice through some of Elden Ring's hardest bosses to test this build, take a look at our Elden Ring boss locations guide. To push forward with Elden Ring's main quest, check out our full Elden Ring walkthrough. If you're replaying to see every ending in Elden Ring, take a look at our Ranni and Fia questline guides to get through some of the longer quests in the game.