Dark Souls 3 Weapons Tier List: All Weapons Ranked [2023] - 33rd Square (2024)

Introduction
The world of Dark Souls 3 lures us in with its melancholic beauty, dizzying scale, and challenge that demands mastery. Its expansive RPG mechanics enable deep customization through stats, spells, gear, and most crucially, weapon choice. With over 200 weapons available, players face a daunting task in selecting their arsenal. To guide your decision making, we present the definitive Dark Souls 3 weapons tier list.

Our rankings analyze weapons across various attributes like damage output, special abilities, acquisition difficulty, scaling potential, and fashion Souls aesthetic. By covering all classes from daggers to greathammers, this guide aims to help players identify the most powerful, versatile, and coolest-looking armaments to carry them through the game. So ready your best build, brace for incoming attacks, and let’s dive in!

S-Tier Weapons
S-tier weapons in Dark Souls 3 are considered the strongest, most aesthetic, easiest to style, or a combination of all. These armaments make the early game significantly smoother, dealing high damage to difficult enemies and bosses. Some also enhance your cool factor during battles with stylish skills and flashy designs.

Ringed Knight Straight Sword
With fiery embers swirling along its blade, this sinister sword channels the ancient might of Ringed City defenders. It compensates for uninfusability and average scaling with the unique Ember weapon skill. This imbues your sword with a temporary damage boost alongside hyper armor, enabling trading blows without interrupting combos.

To claim this sinister blade, locate the peaceful locust followers in the Ringed City swamps after the Judicator Giant. Dispatch them and loot the sword from their corpses. With high base damage, versatile moveset, and a badass weapon skill, the Ringed Knight Straight Sword earns its S-tier spot.

Lothric Knight Sword
This sword wielded by the Knights of Lothric embodies regal elegance combined with lethal efficacy. With superb Strength and Dexterity scaling, it brings tremendous damage output to quality builds. The Stance weapon skill can guard break enemies, adding utility in both PvE and PvP.

It’s available relatively early by farming Lothric Knights, or buying it from Greirat the Thief after his second Irithyll expedition. For only 4000 souls, the Lothric Knight Sword is an incredible bargain.

Moonlight Greatsword
From the Demon Souls Storm Ruler to Bloodborne’s Holy Moonlight Sword, this azure crystal blade has been a FromSoftware staple for ages. In Dark Souls 3, it unsurprisingly takes the form of an S-tier ultra greatsword, boasting Intelligence scaling and strong magic base damage supplemented by solid Strength scaling.

Its weapon skill summons a magic shockwave called Moonlight Vortex to blast groups of enemies. To claim this legendary weapon, defeat Oceiros the Consumed King and transpose his soul. The Moonlight Greatsword combines aesthetic brilliance with magical devastation worthy of its lore.

Other top-tier weapons like Gael‘s Greatsword, Friede‘s Great Scythe, Dragonslayer Greataxe and more also make the S-tier cut for their extraordinary power, visual flair, or both.

A-Tier Weapons
Weapons in this category still outclass most others in the game. They may slightly fall short of S-tier standards in a particular area like damage or acquisition difficulty but remain excellent choices for tackling various situations. With balanced attributes and helpful weapon skills, A-tier weapons enrich any Ashen One‘s arsenal.

Parrying Dagger
Don‘t let its diminutive size fool you – a parrying dagger in the hands of a skilled combatant becomes the great equalizer against hulking ultra greatsword users. Though its base damage is pitiful and scaling lackluster, no other tool imparts the lifesaving ability to parry enemy attacks.

As such, it‘s an invaluable asset in PvP for countering flashy one-shot builds. It also helps immensely with certain bosses like Pontiff Sulyvahn and Champion Gundyr. You can purchase this elegant and dignified weapon from Patches for 2000 souls.

Irithyll Straight Sword
This frosty straight sword with icy mist exuding from its blade makes for an excellent companion to the standard Longsword starting weapon. Though eventually overshadowed by late-game weapons, its consistent Frostbite build-up provides extra utility through the early and mid stages of the game. With solid scaling, range, and moveset, it‘s a reliable choice for Quality builds.

To obtain this alluring weapon, defeat the Outrider Knight guarding the Road of Sacrifices. Repeat the process twice more when you encounter this enemy wielding the same sword later in the game.

The Irithyll Straight Sword deserves praise for its sustained usefulness despite lacking any flashy weapon skills. It embodies the essence of an A-tier weapon – not exceptional in any specific way but great at everything.

Other weapons like the Demons‘ Scar, Wolf Knight Greatsword, Lothric‘s Holy Sword and more occupy the A-tier space as well-balanced and attractive options just shy of the pinnacle S-tier weapons.

B-Tier Weapons
Weapons occupying the B-tier in Dark Souls 3 tend to demand greater mastery, cater to specific builds, or serve niche roles compared to higher-ranked options. While viable in the right hands, their specialized nature hinders universal effectiveness. However, they can still overcome shortcomings through exceptional power in particular aspects.

Some noteworthy B-tier weapons include Smough‘s Great Hammer for its unparalled strike damage, the Dragonslayer Swordspear which harnesses the power of lightning to smite foes from range, and the Crow Quills which enable lethal dexterity-focused combos.

With masterful understanding of their strengths and limitations, B-tier weapons can still accomplish great feats. But broadly speaking, they are more likely to remain backup options rather than main weapons for most players. Their rank also stems from difficulty acquiring them compared to the effort‘s payoff.

C-Tier Weapons
Weapons occupying this tier tend to be underwhelming, serving as mere inventory fillers that rarely see real use. Whether due to awkward movesets, split damage scaling, or disappointing special attacks, they fail to impress compared to alternatives.

The Storm Ruler greatsword stands as an archetypal example. Despite its grandiose name and acquisition connected to an epic boss fight, its actual performance proves thoroughly average and non-essential.

The Caestus and Claw fist weapons also fall short, lacking the damage or combo potential expected from sacrificing defense and range. Ultimately, C-tier weapons don‘t necessarily need complete avoidance, but expect a rough time relying on them for main progression.

D-Tier Weapons
Weapons that end up bottom-tier in Dark Souls 3 tend to be objectively terrible choices outside self-imposed challenge runs or gimmicky niche builds. With awful damage, useless weapon skills, and crippling drawbacks, only masoch*sts would willingly select these arms for regular gameplay.

The Broken Straight Sword probably ranks lowest here by design, inflicting pathetic damage even when upgraded and boasting pathetic range. The Blacksmith‘s Hammer fails to deliver meaningful advantages over standard hammers and occupies useless weight. And the Whip‘s abysmal damage relative to its sluggish speed makes it an exercise in frustration.

While skillful players can potentially leverage any tool for victory, D-tier weapons serve no practical competitive advantages. Wield them at your own risk, and consider keeping your expectations low.

Beyond the weapons highlighted in the tier list, Dark Souls 3 contains over a hundred additional armaments spanning every class. Greatswords like the Hollowslayer and Black Knight Sword, katanas including the Darkdrift and Frayed Blade, mighty greathammers like Ledo‘s Great Hammer and the Dragon Tooth – the list goes on and on.

With extensive options to choose from, part of the game‘s mystique and replay value stems from continuously experimenting with different weapons to find which ones best suit your playstyle preferences and build strengths. We hope our tier list gave you deeper insight into notable armaments worth pursuing as well as ones better left untouched.

Final Thoughts
Through categorizing and detailing almost 50 of Dark Souls 3‘s extensive lineup of weapons, we aimed to create the definitive tier list ranking the best, worst, and everything between based on overall viability. Factoring statistical attributes, weapon skills, acquisition difficulty, scaling potential and visual aesthetics, this guide highlights armaments most likely to carry players to victory against the game‘s formidable enemies and bosses.

With detailed explanations of why signature weapons like the Twin Princes‘ Greatsword and Pontiff Knight Great Scythe occupy the B-tier while the Moonlight Greatsword and Friede‘s Great Scythe claim S-rank, players can make informed decisions when investing upgrade materials and attributes into their builds.

Understanding the strengths and weaknesses of all weapon categories is instrumental in mastering Dark Souls 3‘s punishing combat. We hope our tier list gives you great starting points to choose weapons that align with your preferred playstyle. Most importantly, keep praising the sun and have fun finding your preferred tools of destruction! Please share in the comments section which weapons earned your favor or regret during your own journeys.

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