Arms of God Beginner Guide: Tips, Builds & Hidden Secrets for New Players

If you just bought Arms of God and got demolished by the first boss, this guide is for you. I've put together everything I learned the hard way so you don't have to waste your first 5 runs figuring out systems the tutorial barely mentions.

Let me be real: the in-game tutorial teaches you how to move and shoot. It doesn't teach you how weapon merging actually works. It doesn't tell you which Cathedral upgrades matter. It doesn't explain that certain blessings multiply each other's effects in ways that completely change how your build functions. This guide fills those gaps.

The Thing About Weapon Slots

You have 5 weapon slots and they all fire simultaneously. This is the core mechanic and the thing most beginners completely misunderstand. You're not choosing one weapon. You're building a composition, like a team.

A good composition has at least one AoE weapon for wave clear, one high-damage weapon for bosses, and one utility weapon with knockback, slow, or status effects. Filling all 5 slots with the highest DPS weapon you can find is actually worse than having a balanced composition because you'll get overwhelmed by adds during boss fights.

I learned this after dying to the Act 2 mid-boss three times in a row with a pure single-target DPS loadout. Swapped one weapon for an AoE pulse and cleared it first try. The difference wasn't subtle.

Weapon Merge Basics

You find weapons during runs from chests, boss drops, and sometimes just sitting on the ground. When you pick up a weapon with full slots, you get the merge prompt.

The basic rule: merge weapons that share something. Same element, same stat focus, same role. Merging fire into fire gives a hidden synergy bonus of extra projectiles. Merging attack speed into a heavy single-hit weapon wastes both , the stats don't complement each other.

The donor weapon is destroyed permanently. Think before you merge. There's no undo button. I've lost count of how many times I merged my best weapon into something mediocre and immediately regretted it.

Weapon drops aren't completely random. The game weights drops toward elements you're already holding. If you have three fire weapons, you'll see more fire weapons. Use this to steer your RNG.

Cathedral Upgrade Trap

The Cathedral has four stations and your currency is limited, especially in the early game. The trap is spreading points across all four evenly.

Max Training Ground first. Specifically, put points into movespeed. The difference between base speed and 15 percent bonus speed is the difference between getting hit and not getting hit. That's worth more than any damage upgrade. HP second. Damage third.

I ignored movespeed for my first 10 runs because 15 percent speed sounds boring on paper. My death count was about 25 across those runs. After maxing speed, I cleared Acts 1 through 3 in three consecutive runs. The stat is boring but it's the most impactful thing in the game.

Hidden Blessing Synergies

Blessings that sound similar often stack in unexpected ways. Projectile piercing combined with projectile chaining means your piercing shot that chains hits effectively three enemies per shot. With a rapid-fire weapon, you're clearing screens without aiming.

Blessings that add status effects to all weapons work with the Sacred Crux aura mode. Your aura applies burn, poison, and slow simultaneously to everything near you. I found this by accident during a run where I had three different status blessings and noticed enemies dying before they reached me.

The Sacred Crux Is Not Optional

The Sacred Crux looks like a gimmick weapon when you first unlock it. It's not. Its independent skill tree makes it the most versatile tool in your entire arsenal.

Beam mode at high level pierces through terrain. Aura mode applies status effects from your equipped weapons. Ignoring the Sacred Crux is like playing with about 80 percent of your potential damage. I ignored it for my first five runs. I was an idiot. Don't be me.

Level 8 Hidden Room

Every single run, go to level 8 and break the slightly lighter bricks in the northwest corner. Inside is a guaranteed legendary weapon with innate piercing. The detour costs 30 seconds. The weapon carries you through Act 2.

Level 12 has a breakable stained glass window on the right side after the first wave. High-rarity blessing inside, always one of the good ones. Two guaranteed power spikes in Act 1. Zero reason to skip either.

One Last Thing

Stop restarting runs because your weapon drops weren't perfect. The roguelite loop means every run gives you Cathedral currency regardless of how it ends. A bad run that reaches Act 3 with imperfect weapons still progresses your account.

My first Act 4 clear came on a run where I thought my build was terrible until level 40. Two merges and one blessing suddenly made everything click into place. The game is about adaptation and making the best of what RNG gives you.

Die. Learn. Upgrade the Cathedral. Queue another run. That's the loop. Embrace it.I should mention one more thing that doesn't fit neatly into any of the sections above. The Early Access build as of June 2026 is remarkably polished for a solo developer project. Dominik Sójka clearly put the time in before launching. I've encountered maybe two minor bugs across 50-plus hours. The frame rate on Steam Deck is locked at 60 even during the most chaotic Act 4 wave sections with every weapon firing and particle effects filling the screen.

The weapon balance isn't perfect , some weapons are clearly better merge bases than others , but that's part of the fun in a roguelite. Figuring out what's strong and what's a trap is half the game. The other half is execution. And the metal soundtrack.

If you're on the fence about buying this in Early Access, I'd say go for it if you like bullet heavens. The content is substantial for the price. Four full Acts, 10 bosses, 10 characters, 60-plus weapons, 100-plus blessings, a meta-progression system that makes every run feel meaningful even when you lose. And the full release with console ports is coming Q4 2026 or Q1 2027. Your Early Access purchase supports a solo developer who clearly cares about their game. That's worth something in my book.