Elden Ring comes with a vast variety of different sorceries, buffs, and attack styles that give players a lot of freedom when building a character. Players can focus on pure magic or ranged-based damage output with sorceries and incantations, focus on melee combat and get in the faces of their foes, or even a combination of the two that involves using specific spells to buff their character.
When it comes to the latter, there are many different items and spells in Elden Ring that provide various buffs, debuffs, damage boosts, and more. These spells and consumable items give players a lot of flexibility throughout their playthrough.
With the game still fresh, and a lot unknown, many wonder if Iron Flesh, a pyromancy from the Dark Souls series, made a return to this new FromSoftware title. Unfortunately, this is not a spell in Elden Ring. Instead, FromSoftware brought the same concept back in a different system.
Iron Flesh in Dark Souls was a pyromancy that provided a personal buff to the player. It would greatly raise the user’s physical defense and poise at the cost of significantly reduced mobility. While this buff was active, players were not able to run, roll, dodge, or jump, and they were only able to walk. This may seem like a negative, but the buff it provided was very strong.
While this buff is not available as a specific spell in Elden Ring, players are able to access the same buffs through other means.
Black Flame’s Protection
Black Flame’s Protection is an incantation unique to Elden Ring. This spell provides the player with an increase to their physical damage negation, making it similar to Iron Flesh. The buff provides roughly a 35-percent reduction in physical damage taken and lasts for about 70 seconds. Those strictly looking for the increase in physical damage negation can acquire this incantation in a couple of ways.
The first way involves talking to Gideon Ofnir at the Roundtable Hold about the secret medallion that leads to the Haligtree. Opening a dialogue about the medallion only becomes available to the player after reaching the Haligtree.
The second option takes players a lot longer to accomplish. It is purchasable from the Twin Maiden Husks in the Roundtable Hold once the player has reached Journey No. 5. This involves beating the game multiple times and players would have an easier time coming across this incantation using the first method.
Aromatics
While Black Flame’s Protection offers players physical damage negation, like Iron Flesh, players may be specifically looking for the increase in poise that Iron Flesh provides.
Aromatics are part of Elden Ring’s unique crafting system. They are consumables that provide various buffs when used. As players venture around the Lands Between, they may come across Perfume Bottles, which are used for creating these Aromatics. Similar to the Golden Seeds and how they increase the number of uses in Cerulean and Crimson Tear Flasks, Perfume Bottles influence the number of Aromatics players can have at once. This number will refresh when resting at a Site of Grace as long as players have crafted enough Aromatics to resupply.
There are a good number of useful Aromatics to craft, but one, in particular, is similar to Iron Flesh and is currently considered very strong.
Ironjar Aromatic
The Ironjar Aromatic is a consumable for players to use and create once they’ve found the Perfumer’s Cookbook [3]. Here is the recipe:
- Altus Blood x2
- Budding Cave Moss x1
- Living Jar Shard x3
When players use this Aromatic, it will turn the user’s body into steel for a short time. This gives the player an increase in physical damage negation and a massive increase in poise. Similar to how Iron Flesh worked in previous FromSoftware titles, using this Aromatic heavily limits the user’s mobility. Though those looking to get in the enemy’s face and be a tank won’t mind this limitation. When it comes to PvP scenarios, those up against another player using this can simply run, or even walk, away for 30 seconds until the buff runs out. Players can’t have too many of these Aromatics at one time. Strength builds with heavy weapons may be able to break through the Ironjar user’s poise, but those with more Dexterity-based builds will have a much harder time and should consider waiting out the buff.
This Aromatic is the closest thing to Iron Flesh in Elden Ring. It provides the physical damage negation and a boost in poise, with the downside of significantly reduced mobility. Those looking for comparable physical damage benefits without the movement penalty can seek out Black Flame’s Protection and invest 30 Faith levels to meet the requirement to use it.
