Elden Ring: Shadow Of The Erdtree Patch Calibrates Difficulty Following Gamer Complaints

Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree currently sits with mixed reviews on Steam, with players mostly pointing to the punishing difficulty in their negative assessments. It seems FromSoftware is listening as its first patch for the DLC includes a difficulty balance that should make it game a little less frustrating.

The changes come in how much of a boost players get from Shadow Realm Blessings, which come in the form of Scadutree Fragments and Revered Spirit Ashes. These items are used to increase stats for a player’s character and Spirit Ash, which will now provide a slightly greater boost with the first half that can be collected while the latter half will provide slightly less.


With this update it's clear FromSoftware is looking to give players a leg up earlier on with the Scadutree Fragments and Revered Spirit Ashes, which will likely alleviate some of the frustrations players are feeling at the beginning of the journey. It also looks to reward those who take their time to explore the world and find these items on the back half of the adventure. It seems like a sensible way to improve a player’s progression.

Of course, a change like this is certain to spark more conversation around Shadow of the Erdtree, in a similar way the initial difficulty and players’ reception did. The diehards of the community that surround this developer and its games tend to embrace the difficulty, so it will be interesting to see how these changes are received.

To see if you’re running the most up-to-date version of the game, you can look at the bottom right of title menu screen to check the Calibration Version. If it’s not 1.12.2, then login to the multiplayer server to get the latest update.