Elden Ring dataminer reveals that the game might have had a ranking system at one point in development

Recent Elden Ring datamines have revealed a lot about the game’s development process and the plethora of content that FromSoftware chose to leave out in the final version of the RPG.

A recent datamining information reveals that the title might have had a ranking system during one point of its development stage. The system seems to be a lot like the Covenants in Dark Souls, with players assigned ranked tiers based on their performance.

Soulsborne dataminer StrayKurtis recently shared screenshots of some of the datamined content that they have found in Elden Ring’s files. It shows a series of messages that were once set to be displayed when an invader was defeated. The messages read:

• Bloody Finger rank advanced
• Hunter rank advanced
• Recusant rank advanced
• Duelist rank advanced
• Furled Finger rank advanced

It’s highly likely that these messages were once introduced as a sort of a faction system in the game, however, the developers removed it from the final version of Elden Ring.

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Elden Ring could have had a faction system like Dark Souls

Dark Souls had player factions, known as Covenants, built into the game. It allowed players to invest in a lot of PvP and PvE features that the game had to offer.

With Darkwraith Covenant focused on invading players, Darkmoon was all about aiding the ones invaded. Each Covenant had a ranking reward, and more the number of players who achieved a higher rank, the better the rewards got in the titles.

Similarly, it would seem that at one point in the title's development, FromSoftware might have thought about introducing a covenant system to the RPG as well.

Many in the community feel that the word “Hunter” present in the datamined files might be a reference to the Blue and White Cipher rings that allow players to help those invaded, as is seen in the case of the NPC Yura.

“Duelist,” on the other hand, might have adhered to the “Duelist’s Furled Finger” which was for consensual PvP.

In the official version of Elden Ring, the Tarnished do get to obtain a lot of PvP-related items from the Recusants of Volcano Manor and Bloody Fingers of the Moghwyn Dynasty.

Hence, while there are no factions in the game at the moment, many feel that FromSoftware might look to introduce it in a future update or DLC. However, if they do ship it in, they might remove some of the faction constraints that Dark Souls had, as like in the case of the Gravelord Servants, the covenant was rendered inaccessible once players beat Nito in the game.