Nightreign Duchess Build Guide and Tips

Everything you need to know about playing as Duchess, the nimble spellblade class, in Elden Ring: Nightreign.

Abilities and Relic Effects

Duchess’ abilities and relic effects are centered around agility, invisibility, and replaying the same damage you and your fellow Nightfarers just dealt.

Magnificent Poise gives you a unique dodging animation set that includes backflips and your stamina consumption from attacking and dodging are reduced. Despite its name, Magnificent Poise has nothing to do with the Poise stat.

There are 2 exclusive Relic effects that offer passive improvements to Duchess:

• [Duchess] Become difficult to spot and silence footsteps after landing critical from behind
  • Backstabs make you invisible
• [Deep][Duchess] Improved Vigor and Strength, Reduced Mind
  • Vigor D▲B, Strength D▲B, Mind B▼D
• [Deep][Duchess] Improved Mind and Faith, Reduced Intelligence
  • Mind B▲A, Faith B▲A, Intelligence A▼B

The Deep relics that adjust stats that effectively change Duchess’ overall scaling, enabling her to be more proficient with Quality weapons at the cost of spellcasting, and/or brings her performance with Incantations and Faith-scaling weapons in line with Sorceries and Intelligence-scaling weapons.

Restage is widely considered the most powerful Character Skill in the game. It can be used during any other animation and makes all nearby enemies take 50% of the damage they took over the past 3s again over the next 3s. Status effect damage and buildup is also included.

The cooldown on Restage is short (and your Relics should make it even shorter), so it’s not worth delaying for damage that might go out soon. The only time I delay it is if I see that an Ult is winding up or someone will be able to do a critical hit.

There are 3 exclusive Relic effects that strengthen Restage:

• [Duchess] Improved Character Skill Attack Power
  • Restage deals 60% of damage from the past 3s instead of 50%
• [Duchess] Successive dagger attack reprises event upon nearby enemies
  • Completing a full light dagger attack sequence triggers Restage
• [Deep][Duchess] Use Character Skill for Brief Invulnerability
  • Grants damage immunity for 0.4s

Like all Ultimate Arts, you are immune to damage during the activation animation, but the base effect makes you and your team members invisible to enemies for 15s. They won’t target you, even if you attack them, but you are still vulnerable to their attacks.

Since you have barely enough time to revive a person through 3 purple bars and the effect doesn’t provide a direct offensive boost, you’re better off using Finale as a preventative measure.

There is 1 exclusive Relic effects that strengthens Finale:

• [Duchess] Defeating enemies while Art is active ups attack power
  • Attack boost is 15% per enemy, with each stack lasting 30s

Some players swear by this Relic effect, but the time when you’d want it most is when it’s least accessible. You don’t need the damage boost for regular enemies, and while there are exceptions, like Augur and ED Libra, boss fights usually don’t have any adds.

Duchess Unique Relics

Duchess has 4 unique Relics you get from her remembrance quest, and you can purchase a couple of extremely synergistic Relics from the Collector Signboard for 3 Sovereign Sigils each.

Attributes and Weapons

A Nightfarer’s attribute scaling, described with tier letters, determines which weapons they will be most effective with, defining their playstyle. Everyone wants to use weapons that scale well with their stats.

Duchess Attribute Scaling

Duchess is a spellblade. She can deal the most damage with weapons that scale well with Dexterity and Intelligence (or Faith, if applicable) . However, she’s not built to use anything that has moderate Strength scaling and her spellcasting capabilities are outmached by Recluse.

Below, you can see how her actual stats work at levels 1, 2, 12, and 15. The numbers parentheses indicate the stat changes from using a specific Deep Relics (+ STR, +VGR, +MND | +FTH, + MND, -INT).

Level	1	2	12	15	Scaling
Vigor	7 (+1)	13	35 (+3)	39	C (B)
Mind	6 (-2 | +1)	9	24 (-14 | +3)	27	B (D | A)
Endurance	3	4	14	18	D
Strength	2 (+2)	4	9 (+24)	11	D (B)
Dexterity	5	13	38	45	B
Intelligence	4 (-1)	8	36 (-5)	42	A (B)
Faith	3 (+2)	6	24 (+13)	27	B (A)
Arcane	11	11	11	11	C

For the most part, Deep Relics effectively upgrade the scaling letter by 1 on the listed attribute and lower the other attribute by 1 letter, to the extent that it changes which weapons you should use. To be clear, these letters are just estimates.

Weapon Types

As a Duchess, Daggers and Staves are your bread and butter, but Thrusting Swords and Katanas are also great options. Other weapon types can be put to better use by other Nightfarers.

While it isn’t present on almost any of Duchess’s strongest weapons, Frostbite does pair well with her fighting style, especially if you use Caligo’s Relics.

Daggers

Duchess has a loot Preference for daggers, so they are more likely to drop for her than other weapon types, and one of her Relic effects only triggers from dagger attacks. Her stats also scale well with daggers, so they’re your best bet.

Below, you’ll see your ideal weapons, the purple daggers, minus Cinquedea, which is omitted from the list because it’s not worth using.

Cinquedea does not deal affinity damage, apply a status effect, nor deal additional damage to compensate for these drawbacks. You’re better off upgrading Misericorde or an affinity-scaling blue Dagger than use Cinquedea.

If you have an Ironeye or Executor in the group and happen to have a spare, I highly recommend giving Scorpion’s Stinger or Reduvia to them. They’ll be able apply the status effects faster thanks to their higher Arcane, and their comparable (or superior) Dexterity means they’ll deal just as much damage.

Other Melee Weapons

Duchess can be just as effective with thrusting swords and katanas, though she is less likely to get them as drops compared to daggers and they may be more desirable for another Nightfarer. For example, the Executor’s favorite weapon is the katana.

If you decide to equip the Relic effect [Deep][Duchess] Improved Vigor and Strength, Reduced Mind, you put Quality weapons on the table, making the following weapon classes (and their legendaries) more optimal:

• Curved Swords
• Curved Greatswords
• Reapers
• Whips
• Claws
• Straight Swords
• Twinblades
• Flails
• Spears

It’s still important to get weapons that deal affinity damage so you can benefit from scaling, and if you go this route, you won’t be able to cast spells as much because your Mind shrinks.

Legendary Weapons

Duchess doesn’t have any ideal legendary weapons, but if no one in the group lusts after them (Feyd Rautha-style) or the boss is weak to the associated affinity or status effect, these weapons can be competitive.

If you take the +STR, +VGR, -MIND Deep Relic, these weapons become optimal, along with others from the afforementioned weapon classes.

Staves and Seals (if applicable)

Staves are a type of catalyst that allow you to cast Sorceries, which scale with Intelligence. Duchess cannot deal as much damage with spellcasting as Recluse nor spend the entire time casting spells.

On top of that, she’s building exclusively for spellcasting and has S scaling with both Intelligence and Faith. You’re at least partially building for melee damage. As a result, Recluse should always get first dibs on any staves that drop. Don’t like it? Play Recluse or don’t play with randoms.

Thankfully, Recluse has different priorities from Duchess when it comes to ideal Sorceries, so there is less of a reason. Affinity and status effect buff spells provide an actual benefit and Carian Sword Sorceries are far more usable.

The Relic [Deep][Duchess] Improved Mind and Faith, Reduced Intelligence, your Intelligence and Faith will make it so your INT/FTH are nearly the same, with Faith being slightly higher, so Seals are totally usable in Depth of Night (DoN).

If you go this route, be considerate of your fellow Revenants. They have better Faith scaling than you, so give them first dibs on seals. Again, if you don’t like it, play Recluse or Revenant.

Recommended Relic Effects

We’re going with an ice cream sundae metaphor for Relic effects. You have your foundational effects that you really need to have as the ice cream, followed by the fudge and sprinkles as necessary to make them worthy of use, and finished with the cherries on top turning them into the delicious god roll sundae.

The sundae metaphor only applies to Duchess-specific Relic effects. Generic or universally useful effects will be listed afterwards.

Ice Cream

These are the foundational Relic effects you should seek out and equip as Duchess. If the Relic does not have at least one of these buffs, your Relic probably isn’t all that great.

• Improved Dagger Attack Power
• Stamina Recovery upon Landing Attacks +X
• Character Skill Cooldown Reduction +X
• FP Restoration upon Successive Attacks
• [Duchess] Improved Character Skill Attack Power (only need 1)
• [Deep][Duchess] Use Character Skill for Brief Invulnerability (only need 1)

Duchess’ foundational Relic effects focus on increasing the uptime and effectiveness of Restage as much as possible, and improving the amount of time she can spend slicing and dicing with her dagger, which enables her to cast spells.

Fudge and Sprinkles

If a Relic has one of these effects, on top of the ice cream, it’s a pretty solid roll and may be worth equipping even if there isn’t a third effect.

• Improved Thrusting Sword | Katana | Twinblade Attack Power
• Magic | Holy Attack Power Up +X
• Improved Carian Sword Sorcery
• Increased Maximum HP | FP | Stamina
• Max FP increased for each Sorcerer’s Rise unlocked
• Vigor | Mind | Endurance | Intelligence | Faith | Dexterity | Arcane +X
• HP | FP Restoration upon Dagger Attacks
• Dark | Night of the Miasma (Everdark | Caligo)
• Dark Night of the Champion (Everdark Fulghor)
• Boosts Attack Power of Added Affinity Attacks
• Attack power up when facing frostbite-afflicted enemy +X
• [Duchess] Successive dagger attack reprises event upon nearby enemies
• [Deep][Duchess] Improved Mind and Faith, Reduced Intelligence
• [Deep] Dormant Power Helps Discover Daggers
• [Deep] Dormant Power Helps Discover Staves
• [Deep] Max FP Up with 3+ Staves Equipped
• [Deep] Improved Attack Power with 3+ Daggers Equipped

Many of Duchess’ secondary Relic effects are just as powerful as the primary ones, but they’re more situational and build-dependent, which limits their usefulness.

Improving Holy Attack Power is valuable to Duchess because a lot of the strongest weapons for Duchess deal Holy Damage (and scale partially with Faith). More broadly, the only stat boost she doesn’t benefit that much from is Strength.

It’s important to note that if you want to trigger [Duchess] Successive dagger attack reprises event upon nearby enemies while dual wielding (power-stancing) Daggers, you need 2 stacks of the Stamina Recovery upon Landing Attacks Relic effect. Stacking enough Stamina | Endurance boosts should also work, but I haven’t tested it.

Speaking of the dagger reprisal effect, it is strong enough to be considered “Ice Cream”, but you’re gonna be held back if you don’t find a good dagger or want to use another weapon type.

Cherries on Top

The following are nice to have, and while they don’t contribute enough to be worth seeking out on their own, they are probably necessary to qualify as a god roll if they come in concert with the ice cream, the fudge, and the sprinkles.

• Improved Curved Sword | Reaper | Whip | Claws Attack Power
• Improved Critical Hits
• Improved Crystalian | Invisibility | Glintblade Sorcery
• Critical Hit Boosts Stamina Recovery Speed
• Improved Stance-Breaking when Wielding Two Armaments
• Attack power up when facing poison-afflicted enemy +X
• [Duchess] Defeating enemies while Art is active ups attack power
• [Duchess] Become difficult to spot and silence footsteps after landing critical from behind
• [Deep][Duchess] Improved Vigor and Strength, Reduced Mind
• [Deep] Arcane increased for each great enemy defeated at a Ruin

Just like the secondary Relic effects, these tertiary ones remain strong but are just completely unreliable to be considered essential.

You may notice that Improved [School] Sorceries are never recommended as Ice Cream, and that’s very deliberate. Duchess can cast spells better than most Nightfarers, but she can’t be as effective with them as Recluse and Revenant.

Play to Duchess’ strengths, not those of other Nightfarers.

Lettuce

Lettuce does not belong in an ice cream sundae. There are a few Demerits (curses) that you really want to avoid on Deep Relics as Duchess:

• Attribute Point Reductions
• More Damage Taken After Evasion
• Repeated Evasions Lower Damage Negation
• Near Death Reduces Max HP

Even though some Attributes are more important than others, Duchess benefits from having more of almost every stat. The only one that’s maybe justifiable is Reduced Faith and Strength.

Evasion-related debuffs are also major spoilers because dodging is so essential to her survivability.

Generic Useful Relic Effects

These Relic effects are useful regardless of what Nightfarer you’re using:

• Ultimate Art Gauge +X
• Increased Maximum HP
• Increased Maximum FP
• Attack power increased for each evergaol prisoner defeated
• Improved Poise and Damage Negation when knocked back by damage
• Increased Rune acquisition for self and allies
• Partial HP Restoration upon Post-Damage attacks
• Continuous HP Recovery
• Slowly Restore HP for self and allies when HP is low
• HP restored when using medicinal boluses, etc.
• Reduced FP Consumption
• Improved Physical | Affinity Damage Negation
• Physical Attack Up
• Improved Affinity Attack Power
• [Deep]Attack power increased for each Night Invader defeated
• [Deep] Runes and Item Discovery increased for each great enemy defeated at a Fort
• [Deep]Max stamina increased for each great enemy defeated at a Great Encampment
• [Deep]Max HP increased for each great enemy defeated at a Great Church.

Talismans and Spells Tier Lists

Below, you’ll find the tier lists for talismans and spells. Keep in mind that these are just default lists. Your mileage will vary depending on Relic selection.

Tier Legend

Many of you probably know how tier lists work, but there’s more meaning you can glean from one of my lists than simple “S is better than A is better than B and so on”.

• S: These are the best talismans/spells in the game for Duchess. If you ever find one of these, it’s always worth equipping. Non-Duchess players should give these to you if they ever find them.
• A: Great talismans/spells that might be the best you’ll find in your run. They are second only to the exceptional.
• B: Good talismans/spells for Duchess, but they are more situational or have less impact than A or S-tier options.
• C: Weak talismans/spells for Duchess that are better than nothing but have limited impact and situational.
• D: Minimally useful for Duchess, likely far more useful for another Nightfarer.
• F: Talismans/spells that are useless or detrimental to Duchess.

Talismans Tier List

I only recommend holding onto S, A, and, situationally, B tier Talismans. Everything below that should be given to whoever else in the group can use it more right now.

Boosts to successive attacks, effect durations, raw stats, magic and holy damage, Sorceries and Incantations, and survivability are the most valuable.

Duchess Sorceries Tier List

Duchess does best with close-range Sorceries, from schools like Carian Sword, Frost, Magma, Haima, Lunar, and Stonedigger.

Everything else requires more range and Recluse can make better use of them, though some spells are still objectively stronger than others, so the other tiers still need to exist.

Duchess Incantations Tier List

With the Deep Relic that trades some Intelligence for Mind and Faith, you can do just as well using Seals to cast Incantations. Weapon buffs are particularly valuable and group buff spells retain their value regardless of who casts them.

In general, Incantations are better-suited to close range than Sorceries, but you have to be a bit more careful with FP cost and cast time, like the Dragon Communion spells.

Keep in mind that you’re also competing with Revenant and Recluse, and Revenant’s favored Incantations are basically the same as Duchess.

Priority Locations for Duchess

Duchess benefits more than others from visiting Sorcerer’s Rises, Forts, and possibly Cathedrals and Shacks in DoN. To be clear, other locations are fine, but these places are particularly worth visiting as Duchess. 

Sorcerer’s Rises

Sorcerer’s Rises contain 3-4 Starlight Shards and a free item. The loot pool always contains 2 magical weapons, at least one of which is usually a blue or purple staff, along with either an [affinity]-Shrouding Cracked Tear Physick or a caster-focused talisman. 

If you’re playing Duchess, you need to know how to quickly unlock the Sorcerer’s Rise by breaking the Seal in or around the tower. 

It’s worth noting that even though you can technically recover an infinite amount of mana with your Character Skill, the amount recovered is a flat amount. 

Meanwhile, Starlight Shards recover 60% of your max FP immediately, making them way more valuable in the late game.

Mines

It is worthwhile to visit a Mine if it’s on the way to somewhere else you want to go, or if you find an A or S-tier spell on a white or blue catalyst. This will be more important since you are lower on the pecking order for catalysts.

Always pick the Smithing Stone [2] that drops from the mini-boss in there. You can find upgrade anvills next to merchants, which are located at all Forts, War Camps, and Castles.

If you don’t end up needing it for a catalyst, you may want to use it to upgrade your backup melee weapon or give it to a group member who had bad luck.

Forts

Forts each have a lootable holder containing 3 staves in the tallest tower. If you’re using a Relic that grants Increased Max FP for 3+ Staves, try to swing by a Fort early on to get the FP boost ASAP and fish for good Sorceries.

Cathedrals

Cathedrals each have a lootable altar containing 3 seals. If you’re using the Deep Relic that buffs your faith, be sure to swing by a Cathedral (or shack) early in the game to get that FP boost and fish for good Incantations.

Unlike with Forts, there are 2 different locations for the altar depending on the location of the miniboss. If the miniboss is in the basement, you’ll find the altar in an alcove directly across from the arena.

If the miniboss is on the main level, the altar will be on the upper level, which you can reach by climbing up the scaffolding along the outside. Be prepared to fight a colony of bats or procession of Oracle Envoys.

Shacks

Wood shacks contain a box with multiple seals in it. They don’t have any sort of puzzle, but they aren’t listed on the map as relevant locations. These are relevant for Duchess only in DoN.

Essential Weapon Passives for Duchess

Weapon passives are buffs granted to so long as they’re in your inventory. Unless they have the little hand next to the icon, your Nightfarer doesn’t need to be physically holding them in their hands. In most cases, these buffs will increase your chances of success than Relic effects.

Top Priority

You really need to get at least one of each of these if you want to maximize your effectiveness in combat. It is more important to have these effects than it is to have a bunch of legendaries with effects you don’t care about.

I’m hesitant to say this, but it may be worthwhile to hold onto a weapon that is more useful but not top tier to someone else in your group if it provides one of these buffs.

Probably don’t hold onto something like a Rivers of Blood if there’s an Executor in the group and they’re still using a blue weapon, but if you don’t expect them to use it as their main weapon, I say hold onto it for one of these passives.

• Successive Attacks Negate Damage
• Many | Multiple Periodical Glintblades
• Improved Chain Attack Finishers
• Improved Physical | Affinity Attack Power
• Attack Up When Wielding Two Armaments
• Less Likely to Be Targeted
• HP | FP Restoration upon Landing Attacks
• Increased Maximum HP | FP | Stamina
• Improved Physical | Affinity Attack Power
• Improved Stamina Recovery
• Increased Sorcery & Incantation Duration

I need to stress how important Successive Attacks Negate Damage is. The effect gives you a bubble that blocks 38%/48%/60% of the damage from the next hit and you can proc it very easily with your spammy attacks.

It’s also worth noting that the effect of the same tier does not stack with itself, but different tiers do, so if you have 2 purple versions of the effect, only one will do anything, but a purple and a blue will stack.

Secondary Priority

These Relic effects are nice to have, but they are not as important as the top priority effects from the previous section. It can feel painful to throw one of these away in favor of a top-priority option, but it’s for the best.

• Improved Critical Hits
• Critical Hit HP | FP Restoration
• Improved Stance-Breaking when Wielding Two Armaments (if applicable)
• Damage Negation While Casting Spells
• Improved Spell Casting Speed
• Improved Sorceries | Incantations
• Reduced Spell FP Cost
• Improved Skill Attack Power
• Ice Storm upon Charged Attacks
• Charged Attacks Invoke Sleep Mist
• Flask Healing Also Restores FP

Essential Non-Weapon Passives (Dormant Powers)

These passives drop directly from defeating bosses and are the only thing that drop from the end-of-day bosses. You can pick up one of them instead of a weapon, which is usually the way to go.

Top Priority

You should prioritize these Dormant Powers as Duchess whenever you see them.

• Increased Maximum HP | FP | Stamina
• Reduced FP Consumption
• Improved Physical | Affinity Attack Power
• Improved Sorceries & Incantations
• Periodical Giant Glintblades
• Blood Loss in Vicinity Increases Attack Power
• Increased Sorcery & Incantation Duration
• Improved Physical | Affinity Damage Negation
• HP | FP Restoration upon Successive Attacks
• Improved Dodging (only 1)
• Character Skill Cooldown Reduction
• Improved Stamina Recovery

Secondary Priority

If you can’t select one of the Top Priority options, consider one of these instead:

• Critical Hits Inflict Blood Loss
• Damage Boosted after Critical Hit
• Critical Hit HP | FP Restoration
• Poison & Rot Trigger Continuous HP Recovery
• Ultimate Art Gauge Charge Speed Up
• Sudden Enemy Death upon Attacks that Land

Duchess Costumes

Below are all 6 of Duchess’ appearances. Remembrance skins are unlocked after completing her quest. Dawn and Darkness skins are available as soon as you unlock the appearance changer. The named outfits are based on characters from Dark Souls and unlocked after you defeat Heolstor for the first time.