How to summon the Elder in Valheim

Tracking down and defeating the Valheim Elder boss is tricky, but it can be done. If you've gotten this far in Valheim already, you'll already have beaten the Meadows biome boss, Eikthyr. That being said, don't get too cocky; The Elder of the Black Forest biome is much stronger than he is. Taking the shape of a giant tree, The Elder's moveset consists of punishing crush attacks that can flatten you in an instant. If that doesn't sound daunting enough, he's also notoriously hard to pin down and summon.

Here’s how to summon The Elder, including the summoning materials you need to bring to this boss’ Sacrificial Altar in order to make him come to you. We’ll also explain how to defeat The Elder, what The Elder’s Forsaken Power is, and how to find his location the easy way: using The Elder's location map and a special one of the many Valheim seeds to be found in the game. Now let's go defeat the Valheim Elder.

1. How to find the Valheim Elder boss using Runestones

Although fighting bosses in Valheim can be a hard thing to do, finding them is often the true challenge. You should keep an eye out for the small location Runestones which will reveal The Elder’s location on the map. They usually appear in Burial Chambers (found in the Black Forest) or abandoned towers (there’s a lot of them near the coastline in the Black Forest biome). If you find one, simply press E to make The Elder’s location pop up on the map.

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2. How to find Valheim Ancient Seeds

Once you find The Elder’s summoning altar, you need to offer three Ancient Seeds. There are several ways to collect Ancient Seed:

• Dropped by Greydwarf Shaman: creature of the Black Forest, recognizable by their green eyes and green poisonous gas.
• Dropped by Greydwarf Brute: creature of the Black Forest, recognizable by their red eyes.
• Dropped by destroying a Greydwarf Nest: these creature spawn points are easily recognizable by their colorful smoke. You can also choose to leave the nest alone, so it can continue to spawn Greydwarf Shamans and Brutes.
• Found in chests. Since chests are quite rare and finding Ancient Seed inside is even rarer, this is not the best method.

3. Use this Valheim world seed for a guaranteed Elder location

Can’t find a Runestone or eager to fight The Elder right away? Use this seed to spawn on the map in the picture: RtE9ytMifX. As you can see, The Elder is quite far to the south, but you can also take a raft or boat if you have one. Don’t forget to use Eikthyr’s power if you’re running; it will save you some time.

If you don’t have three Ancient Seeds to summon The Elder yet, make a stop at the locations of the red dots on the map. There are Greydwarf Nests at every one of them. If you destroy all three Nests, you will have the three Ancient Seed.

4. How to defeat the Valheim Elder boss

Arrived at The Elder’s location with three Ancient Seeds? Then it’s time to fight him! Basically, The Elder is a giant tree who can hit players with a melee stomping attack, a ranged attack using his branches, or by summoning roots which will hit those nearby. Beware that the melee attack will deal damage in a small area-of-effect, meaning that it can still hurt you if you’re standing too close. 

It’s best to keep your distance from this boss; try keeping close to the large stones to avoid taking damage from the ranged attacks. If you only have early-game weapons, it’s a wise idea to use the Crude Bow together with fire arrows. You can continuously set The Elder on fire until he dies.

The Elder Forsaken Power

After summoning and defeating The Elder, you will collect its trophy. Take the trophy back to his stone at the default spawn point. Hover over the Elder’s stone and press E twice; first to place it, then to activate The Elder’s Forsaken Power. Using this power will allow you to chop down trees much faster, which is a very handy ability to have in the world of Valheim. The Elder also drops a Swamp Key, which you can use to open crypts in the Swamp.

Now you know everything to quickly summon The Elder. Bonemass, here we come!

Want to kick some more big boss butt? Check out our guides on how to beat Valheim Moder, Valheim Yagluth, and  Valheim Bonemass