God of War Ragnarok: How To Beat The Valhalla DLC

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How To Complete A Cycle | Valhalla DLC
Currencies And What They Do
Before Entering Valhalla
Completing The Valhalla DLC
Best Stuff To Get
Post-Game Rewards

Kratos is taking another trip to Valhalla in God of War: Ragnarok with a new (and free) DLC. Taking a rogue-like twist, you’ll have to run through a randomly generated gauntlet of battles to power up Kratos and face a challenging new boss battle. Playing the free Valhalla DLC, you’ll quickly learn that this is a dramatically different take on standard God of War gameplay. This is heavily inspired by games like Hades. There’s a lot of content here, and the further you progress in the story, the hardest each run becomes. If you’re struggling to overcome Valhalla, we’re going to run through how to complete the full expansion.

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How To Complete A Cycle | Valhalla DLC

The Valhalla DLC will hold your hand and lead you through each cycle. At the beginning, cycles are extremely short. But, once you reach a series of quests called ‘The Work’ you’ll generally follow the same formula for the rest of your time in Valhalla. To complete a cycle in Valhalla, follow these steps.

Enter doors to randomly generated encounter rooms. Complete three encounters to access a Skull door. Skull doors lead to a Valhalla’s Chosen Encounter.
Defeat Valhalla’s Chosen to unlock the Ascending Sands. Use the Ascending Sands in a Sanctuary to encounter a random boss. You may even encounter major returning bosses like Thor’s sons.
Defeat the boss to progress into the Upper Realms. This leads to the Greek Labyrinth. In the Greek Labyrinth, Kratos must clear between 3 and 6 Valhalla’s Chosen by opening rifts around the maze.
Clear the required Valhalla’s Chosen and enter the Ascending Sands. This leads to a boss battle against Tyr. Defeat Tyr to complete a cycle.

Note: Tyr changes form every time you defeat him. He’ll appear with a different and more powerful weapon after each cycle. To complete the DLC, Kratos must defeat Tyr four times. Beating Tyr rewards you with lots of permanent upgrade currencies. Those are confusing, so here’s a rundown.

Currencies And What They Do

There are tons of currencies, so here’s an easy refresher on all of them. This is what currencies you can earn, how to earn them, and what they do. Collecting currencies is important, and other consumables like Resurrection Stones and Sanctuary Keys can be critical.

Fleeting Echoes are dropped by enemies you defeat in Valhalla. You’ll lose all echoes whenever you die or complete a run. Use them all before the fight with Tyr. They’re used to purchase rewards from Tablets or open chests in the Upper Realms.
Spirit Seals are a permanent upgrade currency. Spirit Seals are used at a Tablet outside Valhalla in the hub. Spend for permanent upgrades. Can be earned by completing cycles, completing tasks or labors, and by opening chests in Valhalla.
Mastery Seals are similar to Spirit Seals. Both are permanent upgrade items. You won’t lose them until you spend them at the hub. Master Seals are used to purchase different upgrades for Kratos.
Crests: are the rarest items in Valhalla. These are dropped from rare chests or earned by completing rune chest puzzles found in question mark doors. You can also purchase Crests with Fleeting Echoes. Used to purchase very rare items like the Resurrection Stone.
Divine Triumphs: Another rare resource. Used when purchasing high level permanent upgrades. Earned by defeating the mid-way boss, the final boss, or purchased with Fleeting Echoes in the Upper Realms.

Before Entering Valhalla

The goal of each cycle is to fight enemies, make Kratos stronger, and defeat Tyr. Tyr isn’t particularly tough – as long as you collect all the rewards you can before fighting him. There’s a lot you can do to make Valhalla easier without lowering the difficulty level first.

Complete Tasks and Labors as you play. These can be done automatically just by selecting different Shields and Spartan Rage abilities. Completing these rewards you with a huge pile of permanent upgrade resources.
Select a new Shield and Spartan Rage for every new instance to collect easy permanent upgrade currencies – if you do this, you’ll have plenty of points to enhance Kratos.
Upgrade Kratos’s Vitality and Rage meters first. You can open chests by sacrificing some of Kratos’s total health and rage. An upgrade that makes you deadlier faster is absolutely worth it.
Beat the boss Tyr once to unlock a permanent Relic station, allowing you to choose a relic before entering Valhalla.

You can also earn bonus Seals by selecting the right starting gear. Certain starting gear will glow with a bright shine. These gear pieces have a high percentage bonus when collection seals. Usually you’ll earn +20% more which you shouldn’t skip.

Between runs, spend all your seals on permanent upgrades for Kratos and also upgrade the Valhalla realms too – you can unlock upgrades that make Mastery Seals drop from pots, more options from chests, and the ability to reroll. You can also eventually earn and purchase chest reroll tokens, which are incredibly useful.

Use all the Mastery Seals and Spirit Seals as you can. You’ll earn lots more for each run and there’s no reason to save – if you want to complete the DLC, you don’t need to grind as long as you swap to different starting gear and use it often.

Completing The Valhalla DLC

Here’s the main meat of the guide. Once you defeat Tyr for the first time, the Valhalla cycles will become increasingly difficult. There are three instances of ‘The Work’ quest Kratos must complete to finish the Valhalla DLC and watch his ending cutscene.

Tip #1: Make sure to complete a full run and don’t skip ahead. You can skip encounters by entering the skull door early, defeating Valhalla’s Chosen, and fighting the mid-boss. This takes you straight to the Upper Realms. Don’t do that. You’ll want to be as powerful as possible, so complete all three encounters.

Tip #2: Get Glyphs with a chance to heal Kratos. There are many healing Glyphs – some give Kratos a burst of healing from killing enemies or performing a perfect block. They only have a chance of healing, but they’re absolutely worth it. Every extra ounce of health means you can sacrifice more vitality for rewards, or complete more encounters.

Tip #3: Similarly, you’ll want to avoid using chests to heal. Certain chests will fully heal Kratos, like the chest at the mid-way boss. You’ll lose out on valuable stat upgrades if you select healing. Even if you’re low on health, there are often better ways to recover. You’ll be able to heal using a tablet at the start of the Upper Realm, before entering the labyrinth.

Tip #4: Look for Question Mark (?) doors. These doors lead into treasure rooms that give you rare Crests and other useful currencies. Make sure to stand in front of the chests for a moment – a pop-up will tell you what rewards you’ll get from each chest. Rarely between encounters you’ll also enter a room with a chest or two for more Glyphs.

Tip #5: Purchase Sanctuary Keys. You can earn them from chests in the Greek Labyrinth, or purchase with Fleeting Echos in the Greek Labyrinth. They can also be purchased in the hub. Buy them with extra currency at the end of your run to collect extras, and use them to open the barriers in Sanctuaries.

Tip #6: Once a barrier is removed, it is removed permanently. Look for temporary upgrade chests or other reward chests on the opposite side of barriers. These will refresh after each run. Other chests, like chests that contain permanent currency or cosmetics, won’t refresh.

Tip #7: The Greek Labyrinth is your final challenge before Tyr, and also where you can unlock the most upgrades. For each Valhalla’s Chosen you defeat, you’ll earn a Fleeting Echo multiplier. Even if you only complete the required number of rifts in the labyrinth, you can still often complete it with 10,000 Fleeting Echoes. Open all the powerful chests in the center and use the extra cash to refill Relics and fully heal. Never worry about the damage you’re taking in the Labyrinth because you can always heal before fighting Tyr.

Tip #8: Greek Labyrinth enemies – enemies from Greek Mythology specifically – have a special mechanic. You need to swap weapons when they become invulnerable – a red health bar can only be damaged with the axe, a blue health bar can only be damaged with the Blades of Chaos, and a gray health bar can only be damaged with the spear.

Tip #9: Use the Arenas that unlock after completing rifts to make progression easier. In the arena, the countdown timer in the Labyrinth stops and enemies don’t get harder like the rest of the labyrinth. By completing an Arena, you can earn Perfect Tier Glyphs if you defeat enough enemies to reach Gold Tier rewards. And best of all, three enemies at least count toward your Valhalla’s Chosen count, so you can easily boost your required chosen and increase your Fleeting Echo multiplier.

Go all out in the arena. Don’t be afraid to use Spartan Rage and your Relic. You’ll earn plenty of Fleeting Echoes so you can heal and recharge before fighting Tyr.

Note: You can continue to play in the labyrinth and collect more reward chests and echoes. The area is absolutely packed with special chests for upgrades or currency. The standard chests in the labyrinth very often have Sanctuary Keys, so look often and loot everything, even if the difficulty timer is going high.

Before entering the Ascending Sands and fighting Tyr, if you’re really worried, purchase a Resurrection Stone from the Greek Labyrinth Tablet. Unless you’re very underpowered, you will have enough health to defeat him. But if you don’t want to lose your run, the Resurrection Stone is an extremely useful tool.

Tyr Fight

Fighting Tyr is actually one of the easier steps for the entire run. If you made it this far, Tyr shouldn’t be a problem. Spend all your resources before entering, and be prepared. At 50% health, Tyr will retreat and try to heal. Use the Blades of Chaos to hit multiple enemies and stun them when they try to heal. When enemies glow red, that means they’re trying to heal Tyr. In my experience, if you take your time and fully prepare by getting as many upgrades as possible, Tyr isn’t too much of a problem on normal difficulties.

Best Stuff To Get

Because Valhalla is random, Kratos will need to complete his build as he progresses. There’s no guarantee you’ll get the same stuff as us, but here are certain gear pieces we think are amazing. Don’t skip if you spot them. Take them ASAP.

Perfect Glyph Perks are the highest ranking perks in Valhalla. To find them, you’ll need to complete the toughest content or save your Fleeting Echoes. They’re most common in the Greek Labyrinth area – complete the arena and earn Gold Tier rewards for a guaranteed free Perfect Glyph. Look for Shimmering Rifts – a pop-up will tell you how many are left in the labyrinth – and finally the 5,000 Fleeting Echo chest in the labyrinth hub will almost always give you a Perfect Glyph.

The ‘Weapon Path: Evasive Blades+’ improves Spinning Chaos and Evasive Embers attacks — two attacks performed after dodging forward or backward with the Blades of Chaos. They’re far more powerful than your regular attacks, hits multiple enemies, and can be spammed constantly. Even better, it deals high stamina damage. Combine with Shadow Strike Gold Perk Glyph. This increases Melee Attack damage after evading. You always evade to perform the previous two attacks, making them even better against regular enemies or bosses.

The Hilt of Angrvadall Relic launches three waves of light that deal high damage. This relic has four charges by default. If you find this Relic, save it for Tyr – it does high damage and is totally safe. Kratos is invulnerable when using this attack. Because this is a Relic in Valhalla, it can be quickly used multiple times in a row. The cooldown timer is very short.

One of the best Glyphs gives you a 70% Chance to instantly recharge your Runic attacks. That means there’s a high chance you’ll instantly recharge and can use a Runic attack immediately again — and this counts for using Runic Attacks multiple times in a row. With this Glyph unlocked, we were able to use Light Runic attacks five times in a row based on that 70% luck roll. And if your luck stat is high, there’s an even better chance of getting an additional use. Runic Attacks are basically free damage. Kratos is invulnerable when using them. If you’re lucky enough to spot this glyph, collect it for your run.

Note: There are many more useful upgrades and items. Get anything that can unleash healing bursts on Kratos – the longer you can stay alive, the more extra content you can complete to level up. Get stat enhancements to do more damage, and permanently upgrade Kratos after each run. Those permanent upgrades make a huge, huge difference.

Post-Game Rewards

For defeating Tyr four times, Kratos will finally come to some understanding about himself. The credits will roll after the fourth fight against Tyr – if you can complete a run in the Labyrinth and fight Tyr with full health and an optional Resurrection Stone, you’ll be able to beat Tyr’s final form. And you’ll get some extremely fun rewards for all your hard work.

The best new reward are the new cosmetic options. In NG+ of the main game, you’ll now be able to wear Kratos’ original gear and even change his appearance to look like his old self from the PS2 era.

You’ll also unlock the Legacy Spartan Rage, which allows Kratos to temporarily summon the Sword of Zeus. Another very cool thing you can use in NG+ as well as the Valhalla DLC.

There are also lots of new items Kratos can purchase in the hub. You can now buy Mastery Seals, Spirit Seals, or you can make Valhalla runs ridiculously difficult by activating the Penalty of Breaching. You can continue to run Valhalla, fighting Tyr and discovering lost memories you can experience from Kratos. There are also more arenas to unlock from the original PS2 games. There’s a lot left to do even after getting the ending credits!

That’s everything we think you need to know about beating the Valhalla DLC. Compared to the main game, these challenges are surprisingly gentle – some of the post-game bosses and content in God of War: Ragnarok were truly brutal. Thanks to all the permanent upgrades and temporary upgrades you can acquire, Valhalla isn’t too bad!