One of the best things about Elden Ring is the freedom it gives the players to build their characters and play the game exactly the way they want to. Whether it is pursuing a pure melee build and relying solely on one's skills to get past bosses, or investing skill points into intelligence and faith to make things a little easier with sorceries or incantations, there is no right or wrong way to go about progression in this game.
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Regardless of the preferred path, the start of the game can be very intimidating for newcomers. Merchants encountered early on can help level out the playing field by a significant margin. They hold certain items that players should buy at the very start of their adventure to help themselves fend off the hordes of increasingly tough mobs and bosses of Elden Ring.
Updated September 20, 2024 by Erik Petrovich: There are dozens of merchants in Elden Ring, and though not all of them offer items that are worth going out of the way for, some of the best Elden Ring items can only be purchased from these vendors. The Beast-Repellent Torch, for example, is incredibly useful for traversing areas with a lot of Beast-type enemies, but you can only get it by going deep into the Dragonbarrow and finding a specific Merchant. Elden Ring players can now find information for how to get this useful item in this guide to the best things to buy first in Elden Ring.
15 Perfume Bottles
A Crafting Material That's Essential For The Best Buffs
Perfume Bottles are a new weapon type in Shadow of the Erdtree, but the Perfume Bottles that you should buy instantly from vendors is different. The base game Perfume Bottles are crafting materials that can be used to make a variety of strong personal and AoE buffs for your cooperators, including the 
Uplifting Aromatic, which boosts your and allies' attack and grants a one-time 100% damage reduction bubble shield on use.
Most Perfume Bottles can only be found out in the world as loot in various locations, but there is one vendor that sells a single Perfume Bottle. Use it wisely, as there are only ten available in the game, and they do not come back in New Game Plus.
How To Get Perfume Bottles in Elden Ring
The Perfume Bottle crafting item can be purchased from the Hermit Merchant in the Capital Outskirts, just to the northwest of Leyndell, Royal Capital. If you take the entrance to the Capital Outskirts from the Windmill Village area, the Hermit Shack is on the cliff on your left after going through the outer walls. This is the same Merchant who sells the Sentry Torch, which reveals invisible enemies.
14 Somber Smithing Stones & Regular Smithing Stones
Smithing Stones Are Used For Weapon Upgrades
Though you can get more powerful by leveling up and equipping new weapons, you will also have to upgrade those weapons to keep up properly. When weapons are upgraded they gain enhanced base damage and Scaling, and their special properties become stronger, too.
But finding Somber Smthing Stones and normal Smithing Stones can be a bit of a chore, especially if you haven't found any of the Bell Bearings that let you purchase them en masse in the Roundtable Hold. When you find a merchant that sells these weapon upgrade materials, buy them out, as you don't know when the next time a weapon that you want to equip will drop.
Where To Buy Somber Smithing Stones & Regular Smithing Stones
Smithing Stones can be found at most merchants in Elden Ring at various rarities, typically around the difficulty of the zone – the merchants in the Dragonbarrow sell high-level ones, but in Limgrave you'll be hard-pressed to find above (2). Somber Smithing Stones are harder to find, but levels (1) through (4) can be purchased from 
War Counselor Iji just north of the Kingsrealm Ruins in western Liurnia.
13 Ghost Glovewort & Grave Glovewort
Glovewort Are Used For Upgrading Spirit Ashes
In addition to leveling up your armaments, leveling up your Spirit Summons can be invaluable in helping to overcome difficult bosses and open-world encounters. Once you have progressed 
Roderika's questline to the point that she becomes a Spirit Tuner, you can use Ghost or Grave Glovewort to increase the level of your summons up to +10.
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Both types of Glovewort grow in just about every Catacomb and most underground areas, and are relatively easy to spot as their bright white petals stand out against these often grey, drab interiors. But you can also purchase them from vendors.
Where To Buy Somber Smithing Stones & Regular Smithing Stones
Look for Merchants in the 
Siofra River Well and other underground areas, which almost all sell some amount of Glovewort. Once you have found the Glovewort PIcker's Bell Bearings, you can purchase these en masse from Roundtable Hold, too.
12 Torch
Light Up The Dark Reaches Of The Lands Between
There are a lot of dungeons and caves in Elden Ring, and many of them are dark. Completely dark. In order to comfortably explore them, a 
Torch (or another illuminating instrument) is an absolute necessity. Technically, they can be looted from killed enemies sometimes, but it's much easier (and time-efficient) to simply buy one from a merchant.
They're cheap, and unlike in other FromSoftware titles, they don't run out. Later on you can get a 
Lantern that functions as a non-weapon source of light, but the Torch is more effective at lighting large areas.
Where To Get The Torch in Elden Ring
Merchant Kalé, the very first merchant found in the game (he can be found at a campfire in the 
Church of Elleh) sells torches for a reasonable price of 200 runes. Players should take him up on this offer to be able to head into the unknown comforted by the fact that they can illuminate their surroundings whenever they need to.
11 Beast-Repellent Torch
A Unique Torch With A Unique Ability
The Beast-Repellent Torch is one of a handful of Torches in Elden Ring that provide a unique effect, either a unique on-hit effect or a passive effect of its light. The Beast-Repellent Torch, as its name suggests, is capable of scaring off all but the most fearsome enemies of the Beast category.
This won't work on a brute like a Runebear, but it works on Basilisk enemeis (the Deathblight lizards), regular Bears, Frenzy Rats, Giant Dogs that don't have glowing eyes, and many other enemy types. This is an incredibly useful passive ability to have when taking on areas like Hero's Graves which often feature packs of Basilisks, or when trying to traverse parts of Caelid.
Where To Get The Beast Repellent-Torch
The Beast-Repellent Torch can be purchased from the Isolated Merchant deep in Greyoll's Dragonbarrow. This Isolated Merchant sits on the far, far western edge of the Dragonbarrow, so be prepared to avoid the flightless dragons on the way. If you arrive at night, a Bell-Bearing Hunter may appear. The Isolated Merchant at this location will sell it for just 1200 Runes.
10 Crafting Kit
You Can't Craft Without A Crafting Kit
Crafting has been an inseparable part of the vast majority of open-world RPGs released in recent years. Elden Ring is no exception. Although one might argue that players can get by without ever really crafting anything, there is a real benefit to whipping up consumables and ammo on the go.
Elden Ring: How To Craft And Where To Find Crafting Recipes
Elden Ring allows players to craft various items to aid them on their journey. Here is how to get started.
In Elden Ring, players can craft consumables that temporarily boost their stats or various types of projectiles, amongst many other things. Collect the 
Crafting Kit near the beginning of the game and keep an eye out for various Cookbooks to unlock new recipes for it.
Where To Get The Crafting Kit in Elden Ring
The Crafting Kit that enables the crafting feature can be purchased from Kale for a very generous price of only 50 Runes.
9 Cookbooks
Unlock New Crafting Recipes With Cookbooks
A crafting kit is of no use without recipes for the many items that can be created. The crafting system in Elden Ring makes use of "cookbooks," which contain information on how to create specific things the player doesn't have access to at the start of the game.
Having at least a few of them in the inventory can make a huge difference, and the ones sold by Kale at the Church of Elleh should be considered essential in the early stages of Elden Ring. These can be found almost anywhere, so keep an eye out.
Where To Get Cookbooks in Elden Ring
These cookbooks can be found in chests, dungeons, or even dropped by fallen enemies. A lot of them can also simply be purchased from merchants scattered across the Lands Between.
8 Larval Tears
A Limited Material Used To Re-Spec Stats
Larval Tear items are one of Elden Ring's essential, especially for players who want to frequently respec their characters and try out different builds over the course of a single playthrough. Each respec with Rennala the 
Raya Lucaria Academy costs one Larval Tear.
These are limited in the game, though, so don't go changing your stats around just whenever you feel like it. Use Larval Tears only when you want to make major adjustments to your build, or swap to a new one for more than just a single boss – it's painful to run out at the end of the game.
Where To Get Larval Tears in Elden Ring
While the vast majority of these limited items are found throughout the open world, Tarnished who find themselves in desperate need of respeccing can also buy them from merchants.
Elden Ring: All Larval Tear Locations
Players who want to respec their characters in Elden Ring can find the location of every one of the game's Larval Tears detailed here.
Altogether, there are only two Larval Tears sold by traders in Elden Ring. The first is sold by 
Pidia, Carian Servent, who can be found in the Three Sisters sub-area of Liurnia of the Lakes. The other one is carried by the Nomadic Merchant in Siofra River, meaning that players wishing to buy it need to venture into the Underground to do so. A single Larval Tear will set the Tarnished back by a sizable sum of 3,000 runes.
7 Cracked Pots
Used To Craft Powerful Thrown Items
Throwables can be a huge aid, especially when facing formidable foes that are much safer to be tackled from a distance when you don't have ranged options. Plus, they can inflict status effects and deal damage over a wide area, depending on the type. Most can be crafted with the use of 
Cracked Pot.
The most basic throwable item is the 
Fire Pot, obtainable by mixing a 
Smoldering Butterfly with a 
Mushroom in a Cracked Pot. Underleveled characters wishing to take up some of the more challenging early-game enemies should get their hands on these items as soon as possible.
Where To Get Cracked Pots in Elden Ring
They are fairly common to come across in the open world as loot from enemies, but the very first pots players will come across will likely be the ones sold by Kale for 300 runes.
A Note On Hefty Cracked Pots
One great new crafting item introduced in the Elden Ring DLC is the Hefty Cracked Pot. This limited-quantity item is essentially a souped-up version of the regular Cracked Pot, and can only be found in the Realm of Shadow.
The items you can craft with Hefty Cracked Pots are incredibly strong. For example, Hefty Rot Pots can proc Scarlet Rot on all but the most resilient enemies in a single hit, while Hefty Furnace Pots can be used to demolish the HP bar of Furnace Golems and make those fights significantly easier.
Unfortunately, Hefty Cracked Pots cannot be found in any vendor inventory in the Elden Ring DLC, and there are only ten in total that can be found in the Realm of Shadow. It appears that Hefty Cracked Pots actually do not re-spawn in New Game Plus, either, so once you have ten, you have every Hefty Cracked Pot you can possibly get on that character. Be careful when you decide to craft one into a throwable item, because once you use it, it's gone for good.
6 Rune Arcs
Required To Activate Selected Great Rune Effects
While it is technically possible to beat Elden Ring without using any Rune Arc items, it would be a very limiting undertaking, considering that these items are necessary to unleash the power of the Great Runes dropped by Shardbearer bosses in the game.
Elden Ring: How to Get Rune Arcs
Rune Arc is a valuable material that increases the Tarnished’s max HP and grants powerful buffs in Elden Ring, and here’s how to acquire it.
The buffs granted by the Great Runes range from improving attributes all the way to raising stamina, FP, and HP. Only consuming a Rune Arc can activate any equipped Great Rune. To keep these runes active after dying, players have to consume another arc, so it's a good idea to keep a few of them in the inventory at all times.
Where To Get Rune Arcs in Elden Ring
Rune Arcs are much easier to find in the overworld than Larval Tears or 
Celestial Dew s, but that alone won't be of much aid to Tarnished who are in immediate need of activating a Great Rune without any such arcs in their inventory.
There are also a combined number of Rune Arcs sold by five merchants in various regions. Each Rune Arc costs 4,000 runes, except for those sold for 8,000 a piece by the Hermit Merchant in Mountaintops of the Giants. Players who want to get as many as possible at once should head to the 
Twin Maiden Husks in Roundtable Hold, as they hold a total of five arcs.