Does Story Progression Affect Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree? Explained

Elden Ring is already a game flush with easter eggs tied to when and how you progress the story, so we can’t blame you for wondering if story progression affects the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC. Fortunately for you, we’ve put together this explainer guide to provide you with some answers.

Does Shadow of the Erdtree Story Progression Unlock Special Dialogue? Explained

From what we can gather via our playthroughs, Elden Ring story progression doesn’t impact the Shadow of the Erdtree dialogue you can find in any substantial ways.

To be sure, some characters do make mention of certain plot points from the base game — with one character featured in the launch trailer even dubbing you champion of the Radahn festival, and noting this feat will be talked of for years to come — but this is impossible to avoid given it’s a requirement to start the DLC. As such, it definitely makes it seem like FromSoftware had a clear image of how the story and characters would interact with players regardless of their story progression.

Bare in mind, though, that this is based on a pretty standard runthrough of the game. It’s not impossible that certain dialogue lines can only be unlocked through the completion of very specific actions in a particular order. Past FromSoftware games have had plenty of instances of unique dialogue popping up for players who completed parts of said games in unique ways, and it’s entirely possible our playthrough didn’t trigger some key flags needed for some hidden dialogue in Shadow of the Erdtree.

Should any special lines be discovered in the coming days and months, we’ll be sure to update this guide accordingly with the necessary info.

For now though, that’s all we have on whether or not story progression affects the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC in Elden Ring. For more helpful info and tips tied to the sizeable expansion, check out our guides on early Scatutree fragment locations and where to find every map fragment.