Before you dive headfirst into the brutal nights of Elden Ring Nightreign, don’t overlook the Sparring Grounds-a hidden gem in the Roundtable Hold where you can safely master your character’s skills, experiment with weapons, and refine your combat tactics. This training arena offers customizable settings, animated sparring partners, and quick character swaps, making it an essential stop to sharpen your edge before facing the punishing bosses and relentless foes lurking in Limveld.
Elden Ring: Nightreign lets you pilot eight character archetypes, all of whom play differently. To test out the differences between classes, there’s no better place than the safe, reliable Sparring Grounds. Few things in Nightreign feel worse than letting your team down during an expedition because you didn’t quite know how to play that class. Look, we get it, Recluse is a pretty character, but she’s also the most complex Nightfarer. It’ll be evident if you picked her just for the fashion. But the Sparring Grounds will allow you to play around with all of her spell combinations so you’re not just stylish for style’s sake.
Whatever you do, don’t think you’re above spending some time in the Sparring Grounds. In this Elden Ring Nightreign guide, we’ll go over everything you need to know about the Sparring Grounds, plus offer some insight into how best to use the feature.
Where to find the Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign
The Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign can be found within the Roundtable Hold. After completing the tutorial, you can access the Sparring Grounds by opening the map and selecting it for fast travel, or by exiting through the door opposite the starting room and following the path to the right. This training area allows you to practice combat, test different weapons, character skills, and ultimate arts in a safe environment, helping you master your chosen Nightfarer before venturing into the challenging expeditions of Limveld.
Once you first spawn into the Roundtable Hold, you can access the Sparring Grounds via the Roundtable Hold map. From there, select the Sparring Grounds and fast travel directly there.
For those who prefer the scenic route (or want to explore the Roundtable Hold to get a good lay of the area), you can reach the Sparring Grounds by heading out the door on the other side of the initial room you spawn in and exiting out through the opening on your right.
How to use the Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign
The Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign, accessible from the Roundtable Hold, provide a crucial training area where players can practice combat skills, experiment with different character archetypes, and test various weapons, sorceries, and consumables in a safe environment. Here, you can adjust settings like character level, cooldowns, and regeneration rates to tailor your practice sessions. The Grounds also allow you to animate training dummies or spar against moving enemies, helping you master your chosen Nightfarer’s abilities and prepare for the game’s challenging encounters. Utilizing this feature thoroughly ensures better performance in expeditions and improves teamwork, as familiarity with your character’s skills is vital for survival.
Upon arrival, you’re met with a menu that showcases the passive ability, character skill, and ultimate art of the character you are currently playing as. Pressing the touch pad or the view button to access the show guide settings brings up a menu similar to the training options you can find in most modern fighting games.
In the Sparring Settings menu, you can change your level; tweak how quickly your HP, FP, and stamina replenishes; remove or add cooldowns to your character skill and ultimate art; turn on or off infinite consumables; and remove or display the pop-up showcasing your character’s skill information.
This menu also allows for quick swapping of your equipped character, allowing you to try out each playable character in a mostly safe environment. If you prefer to practice on a moving target instead of a training dummy, you can animate an enemy for you to spar with opposite the training dummies and next to the dilapidated wall.
This simulation of combat can help ease the pain once you get out into the field of Nightreign. The bosses you’ll come across don’t pull any punches, and even returning bosses from previous Souls games have new tricks up their sleeves that’ll send you straight back to the Roundtable Hold if you’re not careful. As of this writing, there’s no way to practice dedicated boss fights in the Sparring Grounds, but the training dummies and animated enemy units should suffice in honing your skills at least.
How to change weapons in the Sparring Grounds
In the Sparring Grounds of Elden Ring Nightreign, changing weapons is straightforward and designed to help you experiment with different builds and setups. You can access the equipment menu to select and equip various weapons, sorceries, or consumables for testing. During combat practice, pressing the left or right directional buttons cycles through your equipped weapons on the corresponding hand, allowing quick swapping even mid-fight. Additionally, holding down the Triangle (or Y) button and pressing L1/LB or R1/RB lets you switch between one-handed and two-handed weapon stances, enhancing your combat versatility. This system is ideal for optimizing your character’s performance and getting familiar with different weapon dynamics in a safe environment.
The equipment feature in the Sparring Grounds helps you parse the many weapon builds and setups you can create in Elden Ring Nightreign. Finding the assortment of weapons in the sparring grounds allows you to completely kit out your character with any weapon, Ash of War, sorceries, or consumables to test particular scenarios.
This aspect of the Sparring Grounds won’t appeal to all Nightreign players because it’s primarily for those wanting to min-max and get the absolute most out of their characters. For many of you, learning on the fly will work just fine, as there’s nothing more thrilling than being thrown in the deep end of a FromSoftware game. However, if you’re someone who likes to optimize your performance, the Sparring Grounds offer the tools to do so.
But like the rest of the amenities available to you in the Roundtable Hold, it’s best not to sleep on this in-depth feature. You’ll be happy you spent the extra time learning the intricacies of not only your chosen Nightfarer but of your team’s characters as well. Putting in the work to study in the Sparring Grounds will put you ahead of the game’s learning curve – and most importantly, your teammates will thank you.
Why is skipping the Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign a mistake
Skipping the Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign is a mistake because it deprives you of a crucial opportunity to practice and master combat mechanics in a safe environment. The Sparring Grounds allow players to familiarize themselves with controls, experiment with different weapons and abilities, and refine strategies without the pressure of real combat. This preparation is vital for facing the tougher minibosses and bosses in the game, where understanding timing, dodging, and attack patterns can mean the difference between victory and defeat. Additionally, the Sparring Grounds help players optimize their builds and learn dormant powers or weapon upgrades that significantly enhance combat effectiveness. Neglecting this training area can lead to avoidable struggles and slower progression in the challenging Nightreign expeditions.
How does skipping the Sparring Grounds affect my ability to farm items efficiently
Skipping the Sparring Grounds in Elden Ring Nightreign negatively affects your ability to farm items efficiently because it limits your opportunity to practice and optimize combat skills crucial for quick and effective enemy kills. Without mastering weapon handling, attack timing, and dodging in this safe environment, you risk slower kills and higher chances of dying during farming runs, which wastes time and resources. Efficient farming spots often require precise combat execution to maximize rune and item drops; lacking this preparation can lead to inefficient farming routes and lost progress due to frequent deaths. Therefore, neglecting the Sparring Grounds hampers your ability to farm runes and items quickly and safely, ultimately slowing your character’s growth and gear upgrades.
