Elden Ring player spends 3 hours hiding as a bush to spite AFK rune farmer

An Elden Ring player has very cleverly gotten their own back on an AFK rune farmer.

Elden Ring is an undeniably tough game. To survive long in the Lands Between, you need not only a good strategy but a heck of a lot of Runes to level up your Tarnished. But the need for Runes has caused some unsavoury individuals to resort to a fairly underhanded tactic to acquire them.

AFK Rune farming has been ruining Elden Ring's PvP since its launch. Players park their Tarnished in a spot where they can't be reached, collecting the Rune reward when invaders eventually give up and return to their own world. One Elden Ring player recently decided to go to pretty extreme lengths to make sure a rune farmer didn't profit from them. How did they do it? By hiding as a bush for three hours.

Elden Ring fan Teasnarker posted their story on the game's subreddit. The player explains how they invaded an AFK rune farmer five times in a row, and by the fifth time, they'd had enough of this shady practice and decided to play them at their own game.

"When hunters showed up, I ran away and put on the Mimic's Veil in a bush," writes Teasnarker. "And I hid there. The bush enfolded and protected me. Eventually, the hunters gave up and disconnected, but I couldn't disconnect, or the host would get Runes. So I opted to remain in the bush." 

Three hours went by, but Teasnarker didn't move from his sneaky hiding spot. However, all that time spent as a bush has clearly taken its toll. "The bush is my home now," Teasnarker says. "I'm not coming out. You can't make me come out."

The beauty of this is that the player effectively AKF farms the AFK farmer, as Teasnarker explains. "Every time a hunter gets killed or disconnects, I get Runes and a Furled Finger. And the host is going to come back to fewer Runes than he was expecting because one of his invader slots is being permanently taken up by me, crouching in my bush."

The Elden Ring player invites any invaders who come across an AFK farmer to use their tactic, but on one condition. "You have to pick a different bush," warns Teasnarker. "This one is mine."

Elden Ring is just one of this year's great games. Check out what other titles are worth your time with our pick of the best games of 2022 (so far).