Shadow of the Erdtree Impenetrable Thorns location

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The Impenetrable Thorns sorcery is a Faith spell found at the Scadutree Base

Shadow of the Erdtree Impenetrable Thorns
(Image credit: Bandai Namco)

The Shadow of the Erdtree Impenetrable Thorns are a Sorcery that have quickly become one of the most powerful spells in the whole DLC and Elden Ring itself, though there's a wild card element to them: despite being a Sorcery, the Impenetrable Thorns require a high Faith stat to cast, and have no minimum level of Intelligence.

Regardless, below we'll explain how to find the Impenetrable Thorns spell in Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree, as well as what makes this sorcery just so good.

Where to find Impenetrable Thorns in Shadow of the Erdtree

Shadow of the Erdtree Impenetrable Thorns

(Image credit: Bandai Namco)

The Shadow of the Erdtree Impenetrable Thorns are found at the entrance to the Scadutree Base area of Shadow of the Erdtree, on the North side of the map. You can find out how to get to the Scadutree Base in Shadow of the Erdtree at the attached guide, then once you're there, you need to do the following:

  1. After doing down the elevator, cross the bridge into the Church
  2. Head down the staircases at the side of the altar to reach a room with a door to a yellow swamp ahead, the arena for the Shadow of the Erdtree Scadutree Avatar boss fight.
  3. Next to you will be a Site of Grace called the "Tree Worship Sanctum". Look behind it (South), to see a corpse lying in an alcove.
  4. Search the corpse to get the Impenetrable Thorns spell.

Shadow of the Erdtree Impenetrable Thorns

(Image credit: Bandai Namco)

This spell, as mentioned above, is an odd one: despite being a Sorcery, it requires 24 Faith to cast, and no minimum Intelligence score. Still, at this point in Elden Ring that's probably not too hard to hit, and it doesn't mean that the effectiveness of the spell scales to Faith - it should scale to whatever Staff you use to cast it with as normal.

Speaking of, when you cast Impenetrable Thorns, you create three lines of growing thorns that explode out of the ground at the target, dealing damage and bleed effect. This also inflicts some small amount of damage and bleed on the caster, but it's worth it, as the amount of damage and bleed is pretty devastating. Not only that, but if you get a Glintstone Staff that scales to Arcane, that increases the Bleed effect even further.

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Joel Franey
Joel Franey
Guides Editor, GamesRadar+

Joel Franey is a writer, journalist, podcaster and Very Tired Man with a BA from Brunel University, a Masters from Sussex University and a decade working in games journalism, often focused on guides coverage but also in reviews, features and news. His love of games is strongest when it comes to groundbreaking narratives like Disco Elysium, UnderTale and Baldur's Gate 3, as well as innovative or refined gameplay experiences like XCOM, Sifu, Arkham Asylum or Slay the Spire. He is a firm believer that the vast majority of games would be improved by adding a grappling hook, and if they already have one, they should probably add another just to be safe. You can find old work of his at Eurogamer, Gfinity, USgamer, SFX Magazine, RPS, Dicebreaker, VG247, and more.