Elden Ring New Classes: Heavy Knight and Idus Knight Stats

Elden Ring shipped on 25 February 2022 with ten origins, and it had ten origins for four and a half years. Since 28 August 2026 it has twelve. The two new ones are not a free patch drop — they sit behind a paid DLC, and no class guide written before the end of August can mention them, because when it was written they did not exist.

Here is what the two new origins are, exactly what they start with, and where they land against the ten you already know.

What the Tarnished Pack actually is

Two things shipped, and it matters which is which.

Patch 1.17 went live on 27 August 2026 for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and Steam. It is free, it is required for online play, and the title screen reads App Ver. 1.17 / Regulation Ver. 1.17 once it is applied. That patch carries balance changes for everyone.

The Tarnished Pack is the paid DLC the patch adds support for. It went on sale 28 August 2026 — midnight local time on PlayStation and Xbox, 15:00 PDT on Steam — at a standard price of €4.99, per Bandai Namco's own FAQ. On Nintendo Switch 2 there is nothing to buy: the same content is included by default in Elden Ring Tarnished Edition.

Bandai Namco's FAQ lists the pack's contents as:

That gap in the right-hand column is worth flagging. The patch notes say only "added weapons that can be purchased from merchants or found in the Lands Between," and they do not list armor sets at all. The two sets that come attached to the new classes — the Steel Set and the Silver Grooved Set — are named as those classes' starting armor on both community wikis, and only named: Fandom has no page for either set, or for any individual piece of them. The other two of the publisher's four are not itemised in any source I could open.

One note from the patch notes that saves money: the equipment of each new starting class can also be obtained by purchasing it from merchants in the Lands Between or by finding it in the world. You need the pack, but you do not need to start as a Heavy Knight to swing its scimitar.

Heavy Knight: 17 Endurance, and nothing close

Bandai Namco's description is "a knight in bulky steel armor capable of mowing through foes with a substantively-sized scimitar." The Hefty Scimitar is listed under Curved Greatswords on the Elden Ring wiki, so "substantively-sized" is doing real work — this is a two-handed curved greatsword, not a scimitar in the Falchion sense.

The number that defines the class is 17 Endurance. Look at the twelve-origin table below and count: the next highest starting Endurance is the Samurai's 13, a four-point gap, and nothing else is closer than that. Endurance is the stat that buys stamina and equip load, and the Heavy Knight is wearing a full steel set from minute one, so those 17 points are already spoken for rather than being free value.

The bill is paid in Mind. 8 Mind is the lowest starting Mind of the twelve origins — again, count the table. That is a thin FP pool for skills and Ashes of War out of the gate.

It also opens at level 10, tied with the Confessor for the highest starting level in the game. If you care about summon range, that matters: Elden Ring's co-op matching band is calculated from your character level — a formula on your level, not a fixed bracket — and a Heavy Knight is nine levels above a Wretch before the game starts.

Idus Knight: a Dex class with Faith attached

"A knight of the land of Idus, famed for their lightweight attire and weaponry, which they wield with ample dexterity," per Bandai Namco. The Idus Sword is listed under Light Greatswords on the Elden Ring wiki and the Silver Grooved Shield under Medium Shields.

The interesting number here is Faith, not Dexterity. Exactly three origins open at 15 or more Dexterity: Warrior at 16, Samurai at 15, Idus Knight at 15. Of those three, the Warrior and the Samurai both start with 8 Faith; the Idus Knight starts with 11. That is three free points toward incantation requirements a Dex character would otherwise have to buy with levels.

The trade is Arcane. 6 Arcane is the lowest of the twelve origins — the Vagabond's 7 is next. Arcane governs discovery and feeds bleed and certain incantations, so an Idus Knight leaning into an Arcane bleed build is starting further back than anyone.

All twelve origins, side by side

Attributes in the order the character screen shows them. HP is the figure the wiki publishes for each origin at its starting stats.

What the table says about Heavy Knight's HP

The Heavy Knight's derived stats — HP, FP, stamina, equip load, discovery, defenses — are blank on the Fandom wiki and absent from Fextralife's page. Neither wiki has published them, two weeks after release.

You can still work the important one out from the table above. Five origins open at 10 Vigor — Wretch, Bandit, Prophet, Confessor and Idus Knight — and all five show 414 HP. The Vagabond opens at 15 Vigor with 522 HP, which is exactly the figure the wiki's Vigor table gives for 15 Vigor. HP is set by Vigor and nothing else, so a Heavy Knight at 14 Vigor opens on the Hero's 499 HP.

That is arithmetic off a table, not a published number. Treat it accordingly.

Neither class is power creep

The rule that governs every Elden Ring origin is that the eight attributes always sum to 79 plus the starting level. Both new classes obey it:

• Heavy Knight: 14 + 8 + 17 + 15 + 11 + 7 + 8 + 9 = 89, and 79 + 10 = 89.
• Idus Knight: 10 + 12 + 11 + 13 + 15 + 8 + 11 + 6 = 86, and 79 + 7 = 86.

So the Tarnished Pack did not add a stronger starting point. It added two more distributions of the same pile of points, and the Heavy Knight's enormous Endurance is bought with the game's lowest Mind and a below-average Dexterity. That is the check worth running on any paid class addition, and the arithmetic clears it.

A source-accuracy note while we are counting: the Fandom infobox for the Prophet lists Arcane 11, which would make the Prophet the only origin in the game with 87 points at level 7 and break the rule for exactly one class. The table above uses 10, the value that keeps the Prophet on the same rule as the other eleven. If you see 11 quoted somewhere, that is where it came from.

Your origin is also your permanent stat floor

This is the part of the choice that survives the whole playthrough, and it is why the Heavy Knight's 17 Endurance is not simply free.

After you beat Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon, you can rebirth at the Grand Library for one Larval Tear and reassign every level you have earned. What you cannot do is go lower than where you started: both the Fandom and Fextralife entries on Rebirth state that your origin's starting attributes are the floor, and you cannot set any attribute below its initial value for that origin. A Heavy Knight is carrying 17 Endurance and 15 Strength forever, in every build, in every rebirth. An Idus Knight is carrying 15 Dexterity forever.

Backing out of the rebirth menu before confirming does not consume the Larval Tear, so there is no cost to opening it and looking.

The pack content you can miss

The pack's three Torrent skins are world pickups, not menu unlocks:

Once you have picked up any one of them, the option to change the steed's appearance is added to the Site of Grace menu.

The pack also adds two NPC invasion events, one in Caelid and one in Leyndell, Royal Capital. The Leyndell one is the missable item on this list: the patch notes state it will not occur after the area has changed to Leyndell, Ashen Capital. If you are already deep into a run and heading for that transition, the Leyndell invasion is a now-or-never piece of content. No such condition is given for the Caelid event.

What else 1.17 changed

The balance half of the patch is free for everyone, pack or no pack, and a few entries move numbers that guides quote:

• Greatshields and shields got better twice over. A long list including Lordsworn's Shield, Briar Greatshield, Icon Shield, Manor Towershield, Dragon Towershield and Erdtree Greatshield had guard boost increased and weight reduced. A second list — Wooden Greatshield, Cuckoo Greatshield, Redmane Greatshield, Jellyfish Shield, One-Eyed Shield and others — got guard boost only. Any shield weight you memorised before 27 August may be wrong.
• Parry is faster. Parry performance improved across the board, and the recovery before you can act after a parry with Daggers, Curved Swords or Small Shields was shortened.
• Storm Wall no longer costs FP at all, and its parry performance improved. Thops's Barrier also parries better.
• Two Great Katana bugs were fixed: critical hits with Great Katanas were dealing lower-than-expected damage against large enemies, and Great Katana jumping attacks could be parried. Both are corrected.
• Rellana's Twin Blades and the Smithscript Dagger got more critical hit power, which touches what you pick from a Remembrance.
• Some Realm of Shadow field and boss drops were upgraded to higher-tier items. The catch is in the note: items you had already picked up do not change retroactively.

Quick Action Checklist

• Patch 1.17 is free and mandatory for online play. The Tarnished Pack is the €4.99 DLC it supports, and the two classes come with the pack, not the patch.
• On Switch 2 you already own it — the content is included in Tarnished Edition by default.
• You do not have to start as the new classes to use their gear. The patch notes say the equipment is also sold by merchants or findable in the world.
• Heavy Knight is the Endurance opener: 17, four clear of the field, paid for with the lowest Mind in the game.
• Idus Knight is the Dex opener with Faith: 15 Dex and 11 Faith, against 8 Faith for the Warrior and Samurai, paid for with the lowest Arcane in the game.
• Remember the floor. Rebirth at Rennala reassigns levels but can never take an attribute below your origin's starting value, so a Heavy Knight keeps 17 Endurance for the whole run.
• Grab the Leyndell invasion before the Ashen Capital. It does not occur afterwards.