When starting a new game in Dark Souls 3, you‘re given the option to choose a Burial Gift to aid your journey. With 9 options available, it can be difficult to determine which is the best to select for your playstyle and build. In this comprehensive guide, I‘ll be breaking down each Burial Gift, weighing up the pros and cons, and providing recommendations on ideal situations for selecting each one.
Overview of the Burial Gifts
Here is a quick overview of the 9 Burial Gifts available in Dark Souls 3:
- Life Ring: Boosts HP by 7%
- Divine Blessing: Fully restores HP and cures ailments
- Hidden Blessing: Fully restores FP
- Black Firebomb x5: Throwable pyromancies that deal high fire damage
- Fire Gem: Can infuse weapons with fire damage
- Sovereignless Soul: Consumable soul worth 2000 souls
- Rusted Gold Coin x7: Temporarily boosts item discovery
- Cracked Red Eye Orb x5: Allows invasion of another player for PvP
- Young White Branch: Temporarily transforms player into object
Now let‘s take an in-depth look at each gift…
Life Ring
The Life Ring passively boosts your max HP by 7% as long as it‘s equipped. As one of the more useful starting gifts, the bonus HP can provide increased survival early on where your HP pool is smaller. The ring weighs only 0.3 units, making it negligible enough to keep equipped.
For melee focused builds, the Life Ring provides substantial benefit throughout the whole game. More cautious players who take more hits will also gain great value from the ring.
As only one version of each ring can be equipped simultaneously, acquiring another Life Ring later on will have diminishing value. However, the starting Life Ring remains useful regardless.
Ideal For: Melee builds, less experienced players, tankier builds
Divine Blessing
Divine Blessing is a rare consumable item that fully restores HP and cures any status ailments when used. With only a single use, Divine Blessing serves best as an emergency heal in boss fights.
The main limitation is that Divine Blessings can be easily acquired later on from enemies and vendors. As well, without any status effects present early on, the item‘s usefulness is delayed until encountering enemies that can inflict bleeding, poison, etc.
But for inexperienced players, having this rare consumable available right away can be reassuring. And Divine Blessing retains value better than common healing consumables which players amass in greater quantities.
So while it doesn‘t provide an immediate benefit like some other gifts, having a full heal available does offer helpful insurance on your journey.
Ideal For: Less experienced players, challenging melee builds
Hidden Blessing
Hidden Blessing fully replenishes the player‘s FP (mana) when consumed. This can allow additional casts of spells or weapon skills early on when your FP pool is smaller.
With spells not being particularly viable for most starting classes though, Hidden Blessing favors faith and intelligence builds instead. But only one use means its advantages taper off soon after.
The main limitation is that Ashen Estus Flasks already recover FP when rested at bonfires. And with mana-related gifts not being available at the start, FP consumption is low initially regardless. So the benefits here are quite narrow.
Hidden Blessing is more useful later on for spell-focused builds in boss battles or difficult areas. But with only a single use, its advantages are short-lived.
Ideal For: Magic/faith focused builds
Black Firebomb x5
For players wanting an early offensive advantage, Black Firebombs offer a great starting gift option. These consumable pyromancies deal high fire damage, providing an excellent boost against early foes and bosses.
What gives Black Firebombs particular strength over other consumables is their high damage output versus bosses and demons specifically. The first boss Iudex Gundyr is weak to fire, so beginning with these can help immensely in this notoriously difficult starting battle.
And with 5 provided, you‘ll have sufficient quantities to carry over into the next areas. Just note that fire resistance becomes more common later on, reducing their effectiveness over time.
For these reasons though, Black Firebombs give newer players a great head start on their initial areas and boss fights. Their usefulness tapers off eventually, but 5 free bombs offer substantial early game value.
Ideal For: New/struggling players, all builds
Fire Gem
The Fire Gem starting gift allows weapons to be infused with fire damage via Andre the Blacksmith. This enhances a weapon‘s fire damage at the cost of removing stat-scaling bonuses.
Infusing an early weapon with fire can give notable bonuses to damage at minimal upgrade cost. And the Fire Gem itself allows this without having to search for a gem out in the world.
However, fire infusions diminish in power later on as enemy fire resistance grows. And removing a weapon‘s stat-scaling cuts out substantial damage benefits from leveling strength, dexterity etc.
As well, Fire Gems can be found elsewhere, letting you acquire the item fairly soon even without choosing it as a gift.
So while the initial damage boost is nice on early weapons, the long term drawbacks reduce its overall utility. Enhancing weapons with better gems later on will outclass what the Fire Gem provides.
Ideal For: Boosting early weapon damage
Sovereignless Soul
A rare consumable soul, Sovereignless Soul grants 2000 souls when used – a substantial sum in the early areas. This allows you to gain levels quicker or purchase items that can aid your build.
Without consuming the item right away, it can be saved as emergency souls if you die and lose your current stock. This provides a nice insurance of soul wealth.
The main catch is that by the late game, 2000 souls becomes less valuable as soul acquisition accelerates. So the item‘s usefulness declines over time.
As well, skillful players can amass souls fairly efficiently even early on through careful play. So the need for a soul boost becomes less necessary.
However, for newer players who die more often, having a bank of 2000 souls available right away provides helpful insurance for progress.
Ideal For: Newer/struggling players
Rusted Gold Coin x7
These consumable items provide a temporary boost to item discovery rates, increasing the odds of enemies dropping loot when defeated.
Having 7 coins available right from the start allows you to benefit from improved loot drops as you progress through areas. This can let you acquire useful items more quickly – whether crafting materials, armor pieces, etc.
However, the item discovery bonus only lasts 60 seconds per coin use. And with the plentiful common item drops early on, the advantages of boosting discovery tends to be minor.
The coins prove more useful later on when hunting rare loot drops from enemies and bosses. But with limited usage time and acquireable through vendors regardless, the Coins have limited unique benefit.
So while nice to have on hand later, the item discovery boost is hardly game-changing given its short duration windows.
Ideal For: Boosting odds of rare enemy loot drops
Cracked Red Eye Orb x5
These consumable orbs allow the player to invade another player‘s world to engage in PvP combat. Having 5 available right from the start allows some early aspirants to test their skills versus other humans.
However, newer players face substantial risk attempting invasions this early. And without fully developed builds, most will want to avoid PvP initially regardless.
As well, Red Eye Orbs can be easily acquired later on from NPC quest lines. So what‘s given here allows only a minor head start on potential invasions.
Overall, the Cracked Red Eye Orbs offer very limited real advantage. Unless you specifically want to engage in high risk PvP immediately, they serve little purpose when first starting out.
Ideal For: Players already experienced in PvP combat
Young White Branch
When used, the Young White Branch temporarily transforms the player into a non-moving environmental object, concealed from enemies. This allows a stealthy escape or potential ambush opportunity.
With only a single Branch though, just one use largely wastes its potential. And the item is already acquirable very early from Firelink Shrine regardless.
Hiding from enemies also rarely holds practical advantage. Instead of stealthing away, most will want to stand and fight to collect precious souls from foes.
So the Young White Branch offers extremely narrow specialized use. Outside specific ambush tactics, it presents little real benefit to most players.
Ideal For: Niche stealth builds
Recommended Burial Gifts
Based on the above analysis, here are my top recommended starting gift choices:
- Life Ring – The HP boost complements any melee build through the whole game
- Black Firebombs – High boss/demon damage aids newer players immensely
- Sovereignless Soul – Good soul stash insurance for struggling players
- No Burial Gift – Allows customization, with gifts acquirable soon after
The Life Ring and Black Firebombs provide the most universally useful advantages. The former grants reduced deaths and better survival, while the latter helps conquer difficult early game hurdles.
Meanwhile, players preferring natural progression can safely skip any gift as well. While the early benefits are useful, none prove absolutely essential.
So choose based on your combat preference and desired playstyle! Hope this guide helps you decide on the best Dark Souls 3 burial gifts to choose from.
