Don’t sell D’s armor in Elden Ring — you will regret it

I can’t bear clutter in my real life and in my videogames. Those people who save up all of their potions and power-ups, not breaking them out even when they’re facing the last boss of a video game? It’s hard for me to relate. If I get something in a game, I use it. I will sell the item if I don’t intend to use it. This is what I have been doing in Elden Ring ,, and it has all been great — until the past week when I realized that I had made serious tactical mistakes.

[Warning: The following contains spoilers for Fia’s questline in Elden Ring.]

I’d like to emphasize that I made it quite far in Elden Ring before my penchant for selling items became a problem. At the time of writing this post, I’ve played for 87 hours, and I still keep my inventory as clean as a whistle. Except for Fia’s questline, when I felt strongly regretting my decisions, I have no regrets.

Fia, an NPC from Elden Ring , offers you a hug whenever you visit the Roundtable Hold. This safe place is where you can upgrade your weapons and perform administrative tasks. After you have reached a certain level in the game Fia will ask you to give her a dagger.

She won’t tell you to whom the dagger belongs, but if you happen to talk to a guy named D, you’ll have the option to give him the dagger. If you do give it to him, though, Fia will use it to murder him, after which you’ll be able to grab the armor off of his corpse.

You can guess what I did next. I sold the entire set. I’ve been wearing Radahn’s set of armor since I beat him, and it’s stronger than D’s armor, which was worth thousands of runes. I often sell armor to the blacksmith while I’m upgrading my weapons, because many times I need only a few runes to pay for the job, and he’s got a “Sell” option right there (although, importantly, there is no buy-back mechanic).

After selling D’s armor, I continued on in Fia’s questline. Next came the battle against Valiant Gargoyles of Nokron. Even with my Mimic Tear summon to help me out, I found it to be a tough fight. They spit out a lot of poison, and there are two of them; you’ve got to keep one distracted so you can take out the other. After a few tries, I looked up whether or not I could summon any NPCs to help me get through this fight. It turned out that the NPC outside of the boss arena was D’s brother. He’s cursed to go to sleep forever unless I give him D’s armor. It would have been possible to awaken him and get his assistance with the gargoyles if I had held on.

Folks, I still have not beaten those gargoyles. I’ve gained several levels. I beat some mid-bosses at the Mountaintops of the Giants. I also redid Renalla’s character build to make me a stronger force. When I return, I believe I will be able take out the gargoyles.

Yet I have to admit: I fucked up. Also, I was repeatedly warned about my behavior. Whenever I would stream Elden Ring with my pals on Discord, they would tell me that my empty inventory screens made them feel “stressed out.” My coworker Mike McWhertor saw me bragging in Polygon’s Slack about how often I sell stuff in Elden Ring and he didn’t mince words, telling me, “I cannot support this behavior.” Readers, I admit: I thought this mindset was ridiculous. What’s the point of holding on to weak swords or leggings that I have never worn? It was worthwhile, even if it cost a few ranes. Each rune is important!

But if I had only searched online as to whether D’s armor had any plot relevance, I would have easily avoided this — and usually, I do check that, but I saw the high rune cost and cashed in. I regret my mistake, yet I don’t intend to change my lifestyle choices, even though I also regret the time period when I sold my GameCube and all of its games (including Super Smash Bros. Melee) because I was short on cash at the time and I didn’t think I’d care that much in the future.

It can be difficult to decide what is worth keeping and what should be thrown out. My penchant for getting rid old stuff has helped me keep my home clean and not stress me. However, in Elden Ring , I have no reason to make this mistake. I could have simply Googled it. It is my hope that I will do it again next time. But no promises.