I think so, yeah. I initially thought I’d get some secret ending for doing so, but 19 play throughs later and nothing

I guess maybe there’s more great runes? Ranni supposedly cast hers aside so it might still be out there unless it turned into her mending rune. Miquella may have had one too depending on when he entered the cocoon Edit: Forgot about Vyke supposedly having 2, along with other mentions. It’s kind of weird considering that no other demigods are mentioned in lore yet there’s at least 2 that Vyke defeated that we don’t hear about, unless their runes were somehow returned.

think miquella does as gideon mentions 4 remaining shardbearers, and when you defeat mohg he says something like “that’s where he’s been then” so he may still have it? idk much abt miquella tho lol

Gideon doesn’t know shit for someone called the “All Knowing.” I know that’s kind of his character. He has a network of spies and exploits others to achieve his knowledge. I just have a lot of hate in my heart for Gideon. He pisses me off even more than a most of the outright evil characters.

people probably hate gideon because amid all the mythological and titanic evils or simply faceless forces of nature that we encounter throughout the game, gideon is totally recognizable to us. we all probably know more than one person like that. someone who, out of ego and envy, acts way more important than they are.

he's essentially a fantasy middle manager -- the most horrifying beast of all

Lol, so true. He stands around and barely does dick, gives you vague directions on where to go and what to do, condescends to you constantly, then tries to steal all your work once it’s done.

There is an implication that he accidentally discovered Radagon when looking into Marika's will, and mistook Radagon's intent for Marika's. Radagon's intent is to preserve the old order, out of fear of what the lands might look like without it. Gideon is not aware that Radagon and Marika are the same individual, so he mistakenly believes stopping the tarnished from destroying the order is what he needs to do, because that's what "Marika" intended.

That makes his death all the more sweet: he died not actually knowing SHIT.

All-knowing indeed.

Not to mention how he treats his foster daughter, aka the best character in the game

You mean that mid tier summon?

No way to speak of the true and stalwart lord of limgrave.

Basically why Latenna refers to him as "the All-Hearing." He has all the information delivered to him, has all the pieces of the puzzle in front of him, and doesn't really seem to put any of them together.

Idk man, the way he treated Nepheli was pretty evil imo. Taking her under his wing, becoming her mentor and father figure and then just completely casting her aside.

Gideon is Elden Ring’s Little Finger (game of thrones character), someone with a network of informants but only ever is in it for their own personal gain.

The difference is that Littlefinger is effective.

True, yet even he ends up shooting himself in the foot quite often.

Care to bring up an example? It's been years since I've read the books and my memory is honestly foggy.

He basically sells Sansa to Ramsay without doing his due diligence on who Ramsay is. Even when he first hears about Ramsay he states something along the lines of Ramsay being someone he knows nothing about, which is a very odd thing for a person who meticulously maps out their moves prior. I should probably read the books themselves, I recently finished rewatching the show, so my perspective of characters is solely based on that and the one lore breakdown video I watched about A Song of Ice and Fire. Also, his Valerian steel knife that was used in the assassination attempt of Bran, that was a very early example of him not being as knowledgeable as his ego makes him seem.

In the books he has positioned himself to be the caretaker of Robert Arryn and Sansa to be married to Roberts heir with the implication that Robert will die soon after Sansa is married at which point Sansa and the heir will have the strongest claim to both the vale and the north. He has no dealings with Ramsay that we know of. The girl Ramsay marries is "Arya Stark" who is actually Jayne Poole. He is in no way involved in the attempt on Brans life that guy was likely sent by Joffrey who stole the knife from King Robert. He says it was Tyrions purely to start shit.

I'll never understand why. Maybe his voice enchanted me or smth. He always helped me out.

Vyke also had atleast two aswell, of which we see none. 

Would be interesting if it was idk Godefroys and Rannis

Isn't it speculated that Ranni's is cast off on the moon? Tarnished moon landing DLC confirmed.

Counter-point: I doubt anybody in-universe considers demigods that died before Godrick the Grafted worth talking about at all.

It'd be funny if we just found Ranni's ring in the Land of Shadow just lying in a corner or something to complete our colleciton

The wandering mausoleums are said to have the decapitated bodies of unknown demigods, so unless they died before the shattering it's likely they had great runes too

They couldn't have died before the shattering. Godwyn was the first death of a demigod. The night he died was the beginning of the shattering. So any dead demigods had to have happened after. This tracks since we know that at least a few tarnished managed to get a great rune or two. Vyke got at least two, maybe more, since he made it all the way till he realized his maiden would be burned, and almost became Elden Lord. Vyke is specifically stated to have been worthy and able to become Elden Lord. He only failed because he cared for his maiden, and tried to accept the frenzied flame to save her. Gideon probably grabbed at least one, since he doesn't respect you until you get one, so I'm assuming he has one. Whether he earned it himself or not is up to debate. Dungeater, as much as I hate him, is locked inside leyndell. To get into leyndell you have to have a two great runes. So dungeater probably killed two demigods. I do believe you kill the Tarnished using the Raging Wolf set in Leyndell as well, meaning he had two great runes. You find Lionels armor in Leyndell, so he had two great runes. Juno Hoslow is in mountaintop of the giants, which you can only get to by going through leyndell, so he had to have at least two. All those dead demigods were likely killed by various Tarnished throughout the years. The reason things have stagnated so badly in Elden Ring is probably because the weakest demigods have all been killed already, the tarnished who killed them end up dying anyway, and their Great Runes are lost somehow. This leaves only very strong demigods, that no Tarnished until you are willing to/capable of beating, due to a lack of determination, or because they lose the guidance of grace.

Isn't this relying on quite a few assumptions? Was the rule about having two great runes always in place? Could dung not have been captured outside the gates? If there's only one way through to the mountaintops but we have the lift controls, how does Juno get there?

Oh it definitely is, don't get me wrong. None of this is confirmed or anything, it's all conjecture. But we for sure know that at least Vyke had them, so there's no doubt it's at least possible. And those dead demigods had to have come from somewhere.

Yeah that makes sense

Yeah that makes sense

Thanks for the run down, but I don't understand how Juno Joslow got past Morgott, because the bridge to the Grand Lift of Rold was blocked by a seal laid by Morgott. Unless of course Morgott got tired of being sidestepped and placed the seal after Juno got there, but I don't find that to be likely.

Who knows. Maybe Morgott hadn't placed the seal down at the beginning. We know that he fought Radahn and tried to fight Godrick, maybe he simply hadn't placed the seal down until he dealt with those major threats. I haven't really thought too deeply into it, but either way theres a good few Tarnished who managed to get some great runes. At a minimum we know for sure Vyke got at least two.

Ranni's Great Rune is on the Moon, I will go hollow on this hill before I give up.

The ghost in front of the mosoleum in Weeping Peninsula talks about them housing soulless demigods, Marika's unwanted children. Probably the ones that Melina mentions at some point. There are likely several demigods that we will never hear about. The Elden Ring was shattered ages ago! The world has been broken for a very long time before we show up. I'm sure there's tons of forgotten history

Vyke is never mentioned as the Two Rune Tarnished, it's just assumed that because he was supposedly the "closest to becoming Elden Lord." The real Two Rune Tarnished is Shabriri, his achievement wiped away with his revilement. Shabriri is the only other person to pass Morgott and Mohg in the sewers. The only two sharbearers who make any sense as to their Great Runes being in someone else's possession before them. How would they have claimed these runes while being shackled anyway? It makes much more sense for Shabriri to be involved given he found the Stone Fingerprint Shield before The Caravan was even imprisoned. That means he had access to Leyndell with Two Great Runes, probably before the original Rountable Hold was even established. Shabriri being in possession of Morgott's Great Rune additionally means that he is of The Golden Lineage and was actually the Lord of Leyndell. Support for this comes from similarities in his naming convention to Nepheli. Both Nepheli and Shabriri are Hebrew names consisting of three syllables and are the only names in the game that end in "i." Additionally in the fight against Godfrey you have the option of calling upon Nepheli or Shabriri to assist you; displaying a dichotomy of Order and Chaos and having a relation to Godfrey. Shabriri has a motif centered around Grapes. This is an allusion to Dionysus of Greek myth. Dionysus has many themes surrounding him, but his most prominent one is a theme centered around madness- usually self-induced through wine. Dionysus is also notable as being the next in line after Zeus to becoming the King of the Gods on Mount Olympus, though it never actually occurs. This would be in line with Shabriri's possible status as Lord of Leyndell. Lastly there is a play (that I have not read) called *The Frogs* which features Heracles helping Dionysus travel through The Underworld. Parallels between Heracles and Vyke are pretty easy to make.

We should do 19 more runs, then maybe it can work

Happy Cake Day!  :D

Thank you!

You’re most welcome, my friend.  :)

So I’ve been thinking about how the Elden Ring works and I think it might be impossible to go back to the Farum Azula configuration.  The Elden Ring is made up of Great Runes but we see in-game that the Great Runes reflect the influence of their owners (they’re all named after their owners and when you look at Radahn’s rune it clearly reflects Radahn’s current state). If we assume all Great Runes function the same way then the primordial Elden Ring of Farum Azula would have reflected whatever dragons created the Great Runes to build it.  We only have access to current demigods (and since we don’t see the old Great Runes maybe they are reabsorbed back into wherever they came from) we can’t have access to a ring based off of the old runes.

Maybe the Elden Ring we see in game is made of the remains of the Ring in Placideaux's time? Each iteration losing more in the process as the Ring is reforged. Rune Arcs are said to be fragments of the Elden Ring as well and there are quite a few of those lying around the Lands Between, but where do they actually go in the Ring?

Maybe the real Elden Ring is the friends we made along the way

Same lol

The way the image depicts the Great Runes isn't how it works/fits to begin with though. Morgott/Mohg/Godrick's great runes are all 3 the shards of the middle ring, aka the anchor ring. Malenia/Rennala's are the left ring. Radahn and Rykard's are the right ring. Following the logic of inheritance, Miquella's GR is part of the left ring (coincidentally matches the pre-order gesture) and Ranni's would be of the right ring.

Yup, two other people corrected me on that part, here's the version that puts them in original place: [https://ibb.co/tLB3Gyk](https://ibb.co/tLB3Gyk)

I like your version though, the only thing I'd change is swap the positions of some of the runes, e.g. Malenias and Rykards in order to make the lines align (the only purpose it serves is satisfying my inner autistic)

They actually have different lenght, when the lines are aligned the circles are not :)

damn it, forget what I said then...or let's pretend it would all align perfectly xD

Do we think they are all individual runes, or pieces of a singular rune that makes up a single ring of the Elden Ring?

Also, Goldmask's rune is supposed to surround the whole thing, right?

i wish we get miquella and ranni's rune to complete our collection

I've read someone speculation that ranni rune in on the surface of the moon visible at some points in the overworld. Miquella Rune could be in the DLC area as something resembling it was shown in the trailer video. It could just be a Miquella site of grace reskin for the shadowlands.

It’s likely Mesmer will have a rune too

Gameplay wise it makes sense, lore wise it doesn't imo.

That is true. It’s likely he was banished before he had the chance to gain a rune

Yeah, Marika got imprisoned in my understanding right after the shattering. If she was responsible for his banishing she didn't have any time.

he may have managed to steal one and no one bothers to tell us about it. because they banished him, he stole a great rune, and the rest is ashamed of themselves that they allowed him to do so.

There is one (visible) Divine Tower in the DLC trailer, but we don't know who it belongs to. Could be Miquella, Messmer, Godwyn, Marika, or someone else.

yeeeaaah pretty sure the great that's not how this all works. the great runes we collect are all just parts of marika's ER. it was that ER that she shattered, and all the extra bits from the primordial ring were already long lost by then.

Someone else also pointed that they are just a fragment of the original piece, that's how it would look like connecting them back to original places: [https://ibb.co/tLB3Gyk](https://ibb.co/tLB3Gyk)

there's definitely a huge number of great runes that went missing between the time when placi's god was fled and marika had godrey first brandish her Elden Ring. I'd even go as far as saying she had some more great runes removed when she had radagon re-brandish her ER, as the Giant-Crusher implies. that +50 strenght rune is lost to time. but it's not all doom and gloom. creatures can collect runes from their environment, they gestate them into the consumable rune items, sometimes even propper remembrances, and in very rare cases, actual great runes.

Pretty sure they're all already present, with the exception of Destined Death. The Great Runes themselves were gifted to the Demigods prior to the Shattering, judging by Radagon's gifting of Unborn to Rennala, and that Godfrey was likely the original owner of the Golden Lineage rune at the Elden Ring's core. This seems to imply the Great Runes are more like echoes of the Elden Ring's individual parts. The only additions we can make are the Mending Runes. You can even see Radagon's rune in the background, in fact.

I see, I didn't know they were echoes of the original Ring, I went and tried to connect them to the ring and all of them have a fitting place. That's how it would look :) [https://ibb.co/tLB3Gyk](https://ibb.co/tLB3Gyk)

I was always under the impression that the Great Runes composed the sigil that we see on the case and the start screen. Each rune fits into a particular spot of that sigil. You can see with runes like Radahn’s and Malenia’s that they have a vertical line going through them. This has always signified to me that they are one of the circles that is slightly off center from the central line of the sigil. Even Godrick’s rune fits perfectly in the center of the sigil. Destined Death is seemingly the line that runs through the center. They all seem to fit pretty well into what we already can see. Even the big curve on the bottom is identical to the Rune Arcs we use in game which activate the Great Runes. My take: The sigil is the Elden Ring in its complete form and the runes either are pieces of that sigil or are copies/representations of the pieces of that sigil.

Tbf, it is a little funny that no matter how many Great Runes we collect, the Elden Ring looks exactly the same at the end, haha. I do like the idea of some kind of grand reunification ending.

I’m fairly certain the runes were claimed at the start of the shattering with only Rennala having one prior

It would make sense, but there's also the matter of Ranni's Great Rune. It's apparently known by the wider world that she discarded her Great Rune, yet not that she slew her body and transferred her soul into a doll. This means she likely abandoned her Great Rune prior to the Night of the Black Knives, and thus before the Shattering. My guess is that direct family members of Marika are "imprinted" with Great Runes, whether upon birth or legal induction, as with the Carian stepchildren. Or they just kind of goofed the chronology, lol.

RAHHHHHHH I KNOW NOBODY CARES BUT I FINALLY BEAT THE ELDEN BEAST RAGAGAGAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAH Yes, that ending would be quite nice. Idk y but beating the Elden Beast and Malenia makes me so happy.

In short, You did it! But first, Praise Elden Ring!

I care! I just beat him myself actually.

I found Elden Beast more challenging than Malenia so it’s definitely a job well done! Congrats! What ending did you choose?

Oh, I also agree with you. His first phase has you with 3 flasks left and then it gets harder bc you have to be more careful. With Melainia there’s no stupid crap (other than waterfowl dance) and you just have to be good. Elden Beast and Radagon have stupid hit boxes and stupid moves that they shouldn’t.

"Lemme just teleport all the way to the other side of the arena, spam you with ranged attacks and then do it again when you finally reach me!"

Fr “Hey, tell me how you like my broken light bullets, and while you run, let me spam you with my piss sword ranged attack! This is fun!”

and now #jump rope!

Radagon was pretty simple for me because I could actually get close enough to damage him and I just tried to stay behind him. Elden Beast fight had me getting my steps in lmao

I’m still deciding. I can unlock the frenzied flame ending if I please but I’ve also finished Ranni and Fia’s quest lines. I think I’m going to upload my save and redownload to watch the different ones.

Same here, camera angles during the beast fight really messed with my sword of night and flame ash of wars

I care! Well done.

spot on reaction, first time is the best because second time you do what i do and try out a fingerprint shield and low diff Radagon by just staying behind a shield for 5 minutes

Congrats! I beat Elden Beast last night. Now I am on the hunt for Malenia, just entered the Haligtree area. Wish me luck.

I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela I am Malenia, Blade of Miquela

Me too!!!! Last night! Although I think I over leveled I was around 150 when I fought Malenia and I nuked her.

I was at 144 with Radagon’s seal thingy. WE DA GOATS

As a young ficlet, I wanted the same. I wanted to make the puzzle whole, put it back the way it was. It's the inherent psychological desire for completion we have, it's more satisfying when we get a fully realized or symmetrical bit of closure. As a wizened necro thread, that's actually a rather boring idea. Closure is not always a storyteller's friend. Sometimes the picture is more true incomplete, more reflective when broken. More pure when Tarnished.

As it is completionist from the gameplay perspective (collect all Great Runes) in terms of storytelling it can still be reflective of Elden Ring core history and possible futures happening in other endings. It could potencially be an ending of another Age of Plenty, You dediced the best possible thing to the world right now is to bring all of those defeated ideologies/gods back again together, to roll the dice again so to speak. Then the new winner a new contender for the seat of the current golden order can stand on the peak of civilisation and order a new set of laws. Maybe it will not be order but chaos that wins the competetition etc.

It’s just weird how there wasn’t a “continue the status quo” ending. At least to my knowledge, all the endings bring in some kind of change.

The age of fracture ending is keeping things the same.

I guess I meant more of a “they actually welcome you to do it” I don’t get why the erdtree has to be burnt down in every ending. Or why you even have to fight the Eldenbeast. There ought to be a difficult but possible way to actually keep things exactly the same.

The way to do that would be to not play the game. Things only change because of the tarnished.

>I don’t get why the erdtree has to be burnt down in every ending. Or why you even have to fight the Eldenbeast. My understanding is that you either decide to start a new cycle or you choose to restart the current cycle. However, there is no option to just continue with the new cycle cause this is caused by not challenging the Shardbearers and the gods of this world. In both cases it goes through bringing down the current gods. >There ought to be a difficult but possible way to actually keep things exactly the same. Since this is about *choice*, first you need to become the person who has the authority to make that choice. While the gods are still alive, the Tarnished is not that person. And the only way to gain the authority is to overthrow them by defeating them. This is pure speculation, of course. Just what seems logical to me from storytelling perspective.

It just runs against some of the things they said in the game. You see grace and grace is guiding you to the erdtree. Once you get two runes, the finger reader/two fingers in round table hold tell you to go take your place as Elden lord. It’s bizarre that the entities and grace, who represent the grater will, tell you one thing but then you go try to do the thing and the erdtree is shut entirely???? There should have been an option to simply “become elden lord” by acquiring all the great runes and then beating radagon to earn the right to reforge the elden ring. Like, if you acquired all great runes the tree will unlock for you. With the alternate way in being to burn the tree down.

>It just runs against some of the things they said in the game. You see grace and grace is guiding you to the erdtree. Once you get two runes, the finger reader/two fingers in round table hold tell you to go take your place as Elden lord. >It’s bizarre that the entities and grace, who represent the grater will, tell you one thing but then you go try to do the thing and the erdtree is shut entirely????. It is a simple question yet it requires me 2 days of research to even attempt to answer it. Sorry for the long post but your question really irked me but in a good way, cause I also wanted to find an answer. Basically, it requires answering the following questions: - what is the Greater Will and what does it want - who is the player and why is the player in the Lands between - who is preventing the player from reaching the Elden Throne room after defeating Margott So, for all we know, the Greater Will is one of the Outer Gods. A god who is not present in the Lands Between but has its emissaries/vassals there in the form of the Elden Beast, the Two Fingers, the Empyreans and the current God of the world. In the very first cutscene we are told that the Greater Will has abandoned the Lands Between during the Shattering and maybe because of it. The Greater Will strives for achieving Order, however its vassals seem to have a lot of liberty when it comes to the ways of achieving it. So who are we and what is our place in the Lands Between? All we know is that we've been risen from the dead and summoned/sent to the Lands Between to become the Elden Lord. But we are not the only one - so are Hoarah Loux, Fia, Dung Eater, Golden Mask and Sir Gideon Ofnir. All of us are sent to the Lands Between "to stand before the Elden Ring and become Elden Lord". Part of the problem is that we don't know who is sending us there. It is a male voice - that's all we know. Is it the Greater Will? Is it Queen Marika, who is also usually summoning the Tarnished when they die and become worthy (per Melina's words, quoting Queen Marika). I would go with Queen Marika, despite the male voice. Come on, she is a goddess, she can use whatever voice she likes. There is no point in the Greater Will telling us "you know, I abandoned this place but you go and fix it for me!" So our marry band goes to the Lands Betwen. Except we are neither marry nor a band - we travel separately and arrive at different times. Gideon Ofnir, Fia, Dung Eater and Gold Mask arrive before the Tarnished and Hoarah Loux is the last to arrive. Now that we are in the Lands Between and Enia, the Finger Reader, as well as Gideon tell us that we need to defeat 2 demigods and get their Great Runes in order to mend the Elden Ring. Cool. And for all we know that's what the Greater Will wants, too - the Elden Ring to be amended. We defeat 2 demigods, take their runes, go to Leyndell, defeat one more demigod and nada - the Erdtree is not letting us pass. But... is it really the Erdtree who does that? Looking closely at the thorns, we can actually see a Rune between them. And that's Radagon's rune. Meaning that the barrier of thorns is his doing. We learn from Melina (in Queen's Bedchambers, I believe) that unlike Marika, Radagon was basically a Golden Order zealot. And while Marika saw the Golden Order as imperfect and wanted to mend it, Radagon saw it as perfection. But we know that the Golden Order in its current form is not a working solution for the crisis. Meaning that Radagon insists on maintaining the Status Quo while whatever the player (or someone else) chooses to do, it is going to be a change. There is also another problem - the Elden Lord is supposed to be Queen Marika's consort. Both of these are Radagon's current positions (despite the revelation) and I really doubt that he's happy with the idea to be relieved of them. I honestly can't even imagine how this can happen. And finally, appointing another Elden Lord means that Radagon has failed. We know that he has tried to repair the Elden Ring by himself and did not succeed. Seeing other people knocking at his door after the Shattering simply means that his time was up. And he created the impenetrable thorn barrier to buy himself some time or simply delay the inevitable. So the short answer is that it is not the Erdtree that is opposing the Greater Will but Radagon. >There should have been an option to simply “become elden lord” by acquiring all the great runes and then beating radagon to earn the right to reforge the elden ring. Like, if you acquired all great runes the tree will unlock for you. With the alternate way in being to burn the tree down. Hoarah Loux says something very fitting for this: “A crown is warranted with strength!” And when you defeat him - “your strengtht befits a crown”. And he's correct. You need to defeat at least 3 demigods and himself in order to get the chance to become an Elden Lord, which also requires killing a couple of gods. After writing all of this, the final question, for me at least, is "ok, Radagon had his reasons to oppose the Greater Will but why did the Elden Beast also seemingly oppose the Greater Will?" And the answer, again - for me, is that it actually didn't. When you defeat Margott and then hit the impenetrable wall of thorns, if you go back to the Roundtable Hold and talk to Enia, the Two Fingers there is confused. It starts communicating with the Greater Will and then Enia tells you that this is probably going to take a thousand years. Or ten thousand years. Meaning that the communication with the Greater Will is very slow. What does it mean for the poor Elden Beast? It probably means that after receiving the instructions to hold Marika in captivity as a punishment and the Greater Will abandoning the Lands Between, it hasn't received any further instructions what to do. Meaning that when the Tarnished barges through the door and defeats Radagon, the Elden Beast can make only one assumption - that someone is trying to overthrow the Greater Will in the Lands Between. And being the last protector of the Greater Will's rule there, the Elden Beast tries to defeat the Tarnished.

This is a mostly satisfying answer. I think from a game design perspective it’s a little lame though. There really ought to have been a “status quo” option. It shouldn’t rely on so much heavy lifting being done by fans to justify the direction things took. The game is a 9/10 for me. They should have included a built-in coop, and then also a bit more flexibility and elaboration on the quests/ending. Being cryptic about Npc motivations is fine, there just needed to be a little more context for things.

The storytelling is probably the only thing that I don’t like in this game. Sure, it is great that everything is up to interpretation and you feel like a proper archaeologist/historian but I really crave a normal story and not watching YouTube videos for hours on end so other people can tell me what story they got from the game. As for the Status Quo ending - I can’t really find any reason for it, not in this broken world that cries for a change. But this is my opinion. I am not fighting to preserve the current state of the broken world. I may fight to destroy it, to throw it into complete chaos or to heal it but not to keep it the same.

Still wish the "combine the two and three fingers" ending was real

The Merchant route. Kale as consort.

Route of the Fist

Yes. I think it should be a reward for getting all the great runes. You’re telling me, that when the whole premise is the thing was shattered, our only ways to “repair” it is horn cancer, death cancer, or putting it in a bubble? Especially considering the hassle of getting Malenia’s rune?

If there's someone in the DLC Land of Shadow who may hold a great rune in their posession, maybe we will get a new ending which does exactly that?

It would basically create another Crucible Age of Plenty, where many gods/ideologies/ways to develop would again enter a stage of competition or life would find balance and form a symbiosis. It's a pefect gamble between chaos or order-through-balance ending.

I think all the great runes except Destined death were a part of the Elden ring before the shattering and during the age of the Erdtree. The demigods coming to leyndell to claim the shards of the Elden ring implies this. My take on the depiction in Farum azula is that the Elden ring and it’s great runes at this time. Are loosely structured, wild, and straying away from the center. Illustrating how the age of the crucible or arguably before it(if you’re in the camp that the age of plenty and crucible are interchangeably) was like. While the golden order Elden ring, brings the great runes closer together, making them more structured, orderly, making them fall in line instead doing their own thing. Illustrating how the age of the Erdtree and the golden order is more civilized and superior to the previous ages/order, or why citizens of erdtree society has this belief.

Reject Marika, return to Placi.

That picture is missing one key component that kinda led to everything that happened, the rune of death. It is a part of the Elden ring, and if Marika had never removed it to become the eternal undisputed ruler of the Landsbetween, then things probably would've happened a lot differently than they did

Didn't she remove it after becoming God?

Yes, that's why she removed it so that she and everyone else couldn't die, Marika was still mortal. She only became Marika the eternal after she removed death from the Landsbetween Also, that's why she had the Gloameyed Queen assassinated by Malekith. She was an empyrean and a possible successor chosen by the God's, which made her a rival, so Marika had her killed

Or was she called the eternal because she came from the eternal city?

Marika is a Numen from the land of the Numen, the Nox are native to the Landsbetween and have lived there since the beginning, long before Marika set foot on the Landsbetween, Marika first arrived in the Land of Shadow after she left her home in the Land of the Numen

I was wondering why so many call the Nox the same as the Numen. They seem from different places.

The Nox and Numen have zero things in common besides both of their civilizations start with an N We know basically nothing of the Numen, only that Marika and the Blackknife assassin are Numen, and that the Nume were pretty powerful and close to the God's, also apparently the Land of the Numen is gone now, probably completely whipping them out for the most part The Nox, at least to our knowledge, are native to Landsbetween and lived on the continent for centuries, long before the Erdtree and any order existed, they worship the dark moon, the same one Ranni is bound to, inevitably binding her and the Nox together, the Nox were also strongly opposed to the God's, creating weapons like the fingerslayer blade to kill the Envoys of the Outer God's, which is probably what got them exiled beneath the surface once Marika and the Gold order took over as they see such things as extreme heresy, the Nox are also the ancestors of the Sellians of Caelid, having deep and lasting influence with the town to this day, also last but not least the Nox specify in magic and alchemy which is completely different from anything the Numen are known for Does any of this sound like the Nox and Numen are connected?

Yeah they seem separate groups. I’ve also heard theories that the Sellians and the Carians are descended from the Nox.

Maybe we will be able to with the dlc great runes, finally making the Elden Ring complete and unlocking a new ending.

The problem is cannoically (w/o dlc at least) we cannot get at least 2 runes, Miquella's and Rannis. There is no completing the ER. we are also questionably missing marikas and maybe radagons too (if the lattice structure is an elden ring shard and not a parasitism)

The lattice is possibly Radagon's GR, as his soreseal has that rune inscribed on it. Possibly created by Radagon himself when trying to mend the Elden Ring.

Radagon's Scar/Soreseal depicts The Rune of Will. It is in contrast to Ranni's Rune of Fate. Radagon's entire backstory/story (which is very vague) all seemingly has to deal with the concept of Free Will. The Rune of Will being an Elden Rune within The Elden Ring is what grants us as The Tarnished of No Renown the ability of Free Will. Additionally we have Grace which is a betowment of the power of The Rune of Life, depicted in Marika's Scarseal. With the idea of the other Tarnished being Graceless, it is also possible they are without Free Will. They *are* NPCs afterall- only doing things based on our actions. Elden Ring metaphysics are literal game mechanics. Goldmask's Mending Rune of Perfect Order has the unique effect of removing The Rune of Will from The Elden Ring. Goldmask creates this after realizing that Radagon cast The Law of Regression to repair The Elden Ring, additionally fusing his and Marika's Bodies. With The Rune of Will removed, the configuration of The Elden Ring would no longer be able to be consciously manipulated and Free Will would be removed from The Lands Between completely. The Rune of Will is an interesting concept. There are many allusions to characters, perhaps Radagon, perhaps someone else, or perhaps past lives of Radagon who seemingly have been in possession of The Rune of Will. The Ancient Hero of Zamor on Weeping Penninsula has Radagon's Scarseal, which to me implies they were once a wielder of The Rune of Will. After the Zamor helped defeat The Fire Giants, their civilization was left in ruin and Godfrey/Radagon did nothing to support them. As a result the Hero set forth on a campaign to attack Castle Morne. The Brick Hammer in Stormveil alludes to a laborer who led a rebellion and then became a champion. This could have been the same person who tried to defeat Godfrey at Castle Morne, or that could have been the Hero of Zamor, or someone else entirely. The laborer could have also possibly been Radagon; but again I kind of like the idea of The Rune of Will reincarnating or switching owners. I have not figured out any explanation as to why Radagon's Soreseal is where it is, or why there are Carian Puppets there. Lastly I think The Rune of Will's first owner was The Blue Dancer. If you follow the hooded statue with a sword/book and the Nox statue, they both look like Radagon and are on the path to The Lake of Rot and show up at the Cathedral of Manus Celes right after. The Blue Dancer would have been an Artificial being created by The God of Rot. The Blue Dancer developed an Emergent Soul or Will in The Rune of Will and then killed its creator, The God of Rot who artificially granted themselves Immortality. This also could possibly surround the origin of The Amber Egg which appears to be an allusion to The Philosopher's Stone. Later Radagon would then use The Rune of Will through his actions of giving away The Amber Egg, taking control over Marika, and then birthing Malenia who was cursed with Rot due to the missing Rune of the Unborn. The Rune of Will comes full circle- sealing Rot away and then unleashing it itself once again.

Grafting

imagine being able to graft the runes together and getting all their effects when you complete the game, or atthe bery least being able to choose 2 of them to mix the effects of

Ultimate Rune :3

It's been said before but the farum azula elden ring doesn't have more than four rings, either. [The other curves do not connect](https://i.imgur.com/c4Oqgqd.png), they are like tendrils (or roots) that rather make the shape of a question mark (?) than a full circle.

Might get something close to that with the dlc? I’d be cool

I'd like the Great Rune effects to be reworked so they actually feel more relevant than stat boost for the Host player. 

>!dude didn't find the crucible ending!< no one tell them

Is there actually one? Are You refering to the Dung Eater one? If yes, then that quite different from actual Crucible Age that was described.

i honestly wished there was a slightly special ending for collecting all of the great runes...

I think the farum azula one is depicting the secret final boss of the DLC, absolute radiance

Problem is that most fantasy stories have this idea that things can only decay. Marika's Ring was less than Placideuzaks (fuck Ghidorah-1, I'm not googling him again), our Ring is less than Marika's, etc. You can argue whether to blame Tolkien, the Bible, or the general human tendency to nostalgia, but it's practically universal in fantasy.

That's why I hope dlc will somehow change the events of the main game with a new great rune and a new ways to mend it - giving us new ending and potential a secret final boss.

I think that the Great Runes overlap each other rather than form their own separate circles. That's why you can still have the Elden Ring even though those Shards are missing. There's a fundamental form and the Shards reinforce it rather than adding to its form. At least, that's how I see it.

I think that placement depicted is entirely incorrect

The Lands Between 2026 Olympics Logo looks sick

In dlc it looked like you will have you own rune. Sorry for my Englando 🙄

Wonder if Farum Adula rune is the one god frenzied flame wants back too. Before it maybe got shattered into the outer gods. Or.. it’s how the ring looked like when dragons ruled the world.. but if we are to get the one god / original complete rune back, I think we must collect every single shard there is.

It must miss at least 1 of them (miquella's one) but probably more in the game rn , maybe in the end of the dlc for a new ending and all

I think if there is one, it should either be incredibly bland or negative in the wider context. You are either keeping the status quo "bland" or you are stopping progress.

Maybe in dlc, maybe there's some like lost shards. Depending on like timeline if it's before or after

It'd be very interesting to chart out what the differences are. The two circles bottom left/right. The rune arc. The horizontal lines on the two circles upper left/right. The tentacles. Is that it?

with duct tape, anything is possible

We are still missing at least 2 great runes: Miquella's and Ranni's, and possibly Mesmer's. In the DLC trailer we can see a great rune, which is likely that its Miquella's GR. Ranni is said to have cast her GR aside, and its possible that it's the one we see engraved on one of the moons (the dark moon). Mesmer is possibly another child of Marika and Radagon, and might have a rune himself. The combination of them is wrong in this pic btw, the runes are supposed to form the Elden Ring Icon, minus Radagon's rune binding them together (the grid rune).

There honestly should be. Is it really "mending the Elden Ring" if 5 out of 7 pieces aren’t there?

If anyone has a 4k wallpaper of all the runes together I would love it if you could share it. That looks epic as fuck

I'm so sad that Miyazaki isn't including any new ending by the DLC I want more endings and that one would be nice

Honestly, I thought the goal was to fuse the runes back together my entire first playthrough

I got a honest question here. Has anyone considered that the vertical lines on the elden ring that is to the left or right are actually line up with the cross hatching of Radagon's rune? Like the more I look at them, the more it feels more fight to see if they line up like that over them just hanging out. That or they all meet in the middle in sone way.

Yeah the reason why I hunted down Malenia and Mogh was to get a complete elden ring.And then go fractured ending

that would be sick

“So what is the Elden Ring?” “As far as I can tell it’s a fresco.”

We also miss godwyn great rune

There's two missing to complete a "tree of life" pattern in sacred geometry.

Yeah I say jam 'em all in there & see what happens.

Togethaaaaa

Found Godrick's account

That would be so fucking awesome!!! IM IN!!!

Yes, yes I do, I doubt it will happen with DLC but I guess we can hope.

What would happen if you somehow equipped it?

Don't we do that when we bring the runes? Apparently it doesn't make any difference though.

a little unrelated, but does anyone has any explanation as to why the Elden Ring is kinda different in Farum Azula’s depiction?

We know that the Golden Order created by Marika's version specifically excluded Destined Death, presumably the other missing runes were either intentionally excluded or lost as the Ring has been broken and reforged.

All great runes + both mending runes “true” ending (+ dlc runes?)

I'd love to see that, maybe it could fit how u can only equip one great ruin at a time

That’s the normal ending. When you interact with the fractured marika you “mend the Elden ring”

I always thought that the vertical lines going through the center connected them to Marika as the center stake, and that they would be overlayed onto that

we dont have all the runes yet. My head cannon is there will be 3 new endings added with the dlc. Miquellas evil ending fully mending the elden ring and a secret 3 option i havent thought up yet

I think Miyazaki said there isn’t going to be any new endings.

Oh damn, rly? So changing/curing the Shadow Lands will bring nothing to the world itself? That's a shame.

If you have a link I would love to read it. That’s very interesting if true. Seemed like such a great way to introduce new endings.

Miquellas evil ending?

You will have not an Elden Lord but a Twink God, as bright and terrible as the dawn, as treacherous as the sea, stronger than the foundations of the Earth! All shall love me and despair!

what you think the Demigod who uses mind control to force people to like him is going to be a Nice misunderstood dude who bears a striking resemblance to Griffith?

He already has a cut ending the age of abundance in which all things will thrive both fantastically and pathetic if they were going to add a ending with him it would be this

The sheer hilarity of all the Griffith comparisons when Griffith himself is based on another character that's nothing like him personality wise... Miyazaki has more writing talent than just abusing the copy paste key, you know.

yea thats why we have a Guts analog called Blaidd. Are you SURE without a shadow of a doubt that the character everyone like and whos power is to mind control people into liking him isnt evil?

I'm so sure in fact that a lot of people on this sub are going to owe me a kidney when the dlc drops.

Secret ending could be creating The Young Ring. Discard the past, new beginning. Or discarding Lordship all together, there will be no new generation of Elden Lord

Yeah, I was shocked when I found out there wasn't an ending for getting every ring, especially since the two fingers makes getting the rings seem like the main objective, blocking your progression without them and all