Weaponsupporting

Claymore

Claymore is a versatile ordinary greatsword found in Castle Morne. Its sweeping light attacks, thrusting strong attacks, Lion's Claw skill, and full affinity freedom make it a dependable foundation for Strength, Dexterity, elemental, or status builds.

Importance

supporting

Elden Ring · weapon

Key Takeaways

The Claymore is a versatile Elden Ring greatsword whose thrusting heavy attack and adaptable skill setup distinguish it from many heavier alternatives.

Distinctive moveset

Its heavy attack is a forward thrust rather than another sweeping strike, giving the Claymore a useful spacing option within the greatsword class.

Accessible early acquisition

The Claymore is obtained from a chest at Castle Morne in the Weeping Peninsula, making it available without a boss-drop requirement.

Build requirement

It requires 16 Strength and 13 Dexterity, so it suits early melee characters more readily than weapons with heavier attribute demands.

Flexible progression

As a standard weapon, it follows the regular Smithing Stone upgrade path and can use compatible Ashes of War and affinities rather than being locked to one setup.

Main trade-off

The Claymore offers more reach and poise pressure than lighter swords, but its attacks demand greater commitment and are less forgiving at close range.

Comparison point

Compared with other greatswords such as the Bastard Sword, the Claymore’s thrusting heavy attack provides a more direct option for linear spacing and counterattacks.

Overview

The Claymore is a versatile greatsword in Elden Ring, combining broad sweeping attacks with a forward-thrusting heavy attack and the Lion’s Claw weapon skill. It is a base-game standard weapon rather than a unique or legendary armament.

The Claymore occupies a flexible middle ground among Elden Ring’s greatswords. Its attacks provide the reach and stagger potential expected from the class, while its moveset is less narrowly focused than weapons built around only wide swings or maximum weight. That makes it a practical choice for characters that want a conventional strength-oriented sword without committing to the slowest greatsword options.

Its defining handling feature is the contrast between sweeping attacks and a thrusting heavy attack. The thrust gives the weapon a useful way to approach targets or punish openings from a more controlled distance, while the broader attacks remain valuable when several enemies are within reach. This combination gives the Claymore a distinct role within the standard greatsword roster without requiring a special weapon system.

The Claymore also begins with Lion’s Claw, a forward somersault attack that turns the weapon’s weight into a committed offensive strike. Because the Claymore is a standard weapon rather than a unique armament, its progression and skill configuration can support more customization than fixed-skill alternatives, subject to Elden Ring’s normal Ash of War and affinity rules.

For progression, the weapon is available in the base game through exploration in Castle Morne in the Weeping Peninsula. It can therefore enter a character’s arsenal relatively early, while remaining relevant as a general-purpose greatsword when the player values adaptable spacing and a mix of horizontal and thrusting attacks over a highly specialized moveset.

Statistics

Elden Ring publishes no 0–100 stat bars, so this page lists the verified requirements, scaling and handling figures instead. Taken from the project's verified weapons database, not from generated text.

Category
Straight Swords
Damage Type
Slash
Primary Scaling
Dex D / Str D
Weight
7
Skill
Stormcaller
Str Req
12
Dex Req
17
How to Obtain
Found on a corpse near a Golden Beast Statue, Limgrave

Figures verified against Consolidated Game Weapons Database.

Compared to similar straight swords

Weapon	Str Req	Dex Req	Weight	Primary Scaling
Claymore	12	17	7	Dex D / Str D
Iron Cleaver	16	10	6	Str D
Stone-Sheathed Sword	12	10	6	Str D
Troll Knight's Sword	22	10	8.5	Str D
Cleanrot Knight's Sword	13	20	5.5	Dex C / Arc D

Requirements, scaling grades and weight are the game’s own published figures. From Consolidated Game Weapons Database.

How to Obtain

01Travel to Castle Morne at the southern end of the Weeping Peninsula in the base game. The Claymore is inside the castle, not sold by a vendor and not awarded by a boss or quest.
02Enter Castle Morne and search the interior rooms around the castle courtyard for a locked-looking wooden chest. Open this chest to receive the Claymore; the pickup is guaranteed rather than a random enemy drop.
03The chest can be reached during a normal playthrough without defeating a boss or completing an NPC quest. The weapon is available before entering any DLC area, has no NG+ or mode requirement, and the chest provides one Claymore per playthrough.

Mechanics and Handling

The Claymore’s handling is defined by a flexible greatsword moveset rather than a single damage trick. Its regular attacks combine broad horizontal cuts with forward-moving strikes, giving it useful space control against groups while retaining enough precision for a single target. The weapon’s most distinctive normal attack is its thrusting heavy attack, which lets the Claymore threaten opponents from a narrower line than its sweeping light attacks.

A broad moveset with a thrusting heavy attack

The light attack chain is suited to controlling nearby targets with sweeping sword arcs. These swings cover a wider area than a straight thrust, but they also commit the player to noticeable recovery if they are started at the wrong distance. The heavy attack changes the weapon’s profile: its forward thrust reaches along a tighter line and is useful when a wide slash would strike terrain, miss a narrow opening, or expose the player to a counterattack. The charged version preserves that thrusting identity while requiring a longer commitment.

Lion’s Claw

The Claymore’s default weapon skill is [Lion’s Claw], a forward somersault that ends in a forceful overhead strike. It can close distance while attacking and is most useful when an enemy has a readable recovery window, but the animation is committed and should not be treated as a safe approach against every opponent. The skill is not a passive effect: equipping the Claymore does not by itself apply a status buildup or grant a conditional damage bonus.

Infusion, two-handing, and spacing

The Claymore can use [Ashes of War], so its skill and affinity can be adapted to the character’s build rather than remaining permanently tied to Lion’s Claw. That flexibility changes the weapon’s scaling and damage profile; those results depend on the selected affinity, reinforcement level, and character attributes, not on the unmodified moveset alone. It can also be wielded one-handed or two-handed. Two-handing changes the handling and attribute calculation, while the weapon’s reach and attack commitment still reward deliberate spacing rather than repeated attacks at point-blank range.

Upgrades and Variants

Strengths, Weaknesses and Best Uses

Strengths

The Claymore combines greatsword reach and stagger potential with a moveset that includes a forward thrust, giving it useful spacing against targets that are awkward to hit with broad swings.
Its weapon skill, Lion's Claw, provides a committed advancing attack that can stagger or knock down susceptible enemies when timed into an opening.
It is infusible and can change its Ash of War, allowing the weapon to support different attribute, elemental, or status-focused setups rather than locking the player to one damage profile.

Weaknesses

Greatsword attacks require more commitment than straight swords or many lighter melee classes, so missed swings leave less time to evade or react.
Its weight and stamina demands compete with lighter weapons and can matter when maintaining a medium equip load or repeatedly attacking during long encounters.
The Claymore has no innate status buildup; status pressure therefore depends on a compatible affinity, temporary weapon buff, or another part of the build.

Best uses

Use it as a general-purpose PvE weapon when you want one moveset to cover crowd-clearing swings, deliberate stagger attempts, and thrusting attacks for tighter openings.
It suits Strength, Dexterity, or mixed setups that value a customizable greatsword rather than a fixed skill or passive effect.
Lion's Claw is most useful against readable attacks, recovery windows, and susceptible humanoid enemies; avoid treating it as a safe opener against fast or highly mobile targets.

Compared With Similar Weapons

Compared With Similar Weapons
Weapon	Class and role	Distinctive trait	Best fit compared with Claymore
Claymore	Lion's Claw weapon skill and a thrusting heavy attack	Strong general-purpose choice for players who value both sweeping attacks and forward-reaching thrusts	—
Bastard Sword	More conventional moveset and weapon-skill flexibility	Preferable when a familiar greatsword moveset matters more than Claymore's distinctive thrusting attack	—
Knight's Greatsword	Different normal-attack pattern from the Claymore	Consider when its moveset better suits spacing and repeated standard attacks	—
Banished Knight's Greatsword	Distinctive moveset compared with the Claymore	Consider for a different attack rhythm while remaining in the same weapon class	—

Lore and Design

The Claymore’s item description associates the weapon with the knights who served Godfrey, the first Elden Lord. It presents those knights as exceptionally formidable warriors, giving the sword a connection to the military tradition of the early Elden Lord rather than to a named individual. The description does not establish that Godfrey personally wielded the Claymore or identify a particular knight as its original owner.

No official development commentary or documented real-world design reference is established here. Accordingly, the Claymore’s significance is limited to its stated association with Godfrey’s knights; visual resemblance to historical greatswords is not treated as evidence of direct inspiration.

Trivia

Unlike many greatswords in Elden Ring, the Claymore’s charged heavy attack is a forward thrust rather than a wide horizontal slash. This gives the weapon a distinctive spacing option and lets the attack reach opponents positioned directly ahead without relying on the broader arcs of its other swings.
The Claymore’s default skill is Lion’s Claw, but the weapon is compatible with Ashes of War, so that starting skill is not an exclusive identity feature. Its recognizable thrusting heavy attack remains the more unusual detail when distinguishing it from similar greatswords.