Surtling

6:09 The Surtling is a small fire creature of the Swamp biome in Valheim that spawns around fire geysers, throws fireballs, dies the moment it touches water, and drops the Coal and Surtling Cores that every smelter and portal needs. Surtlings are flaming imps with only 20 health, weak enough to fall to a bronze mace, and their geysers keep producing them every five minutes forever, which makes them the renewable half of the Surtling Core supply alongside the finite cores of the Burial Chambers (Surtling, Valheim Wiki). Until the Ashlands update of May 2024, Surtlings were also the only inhabitants of the placeholder Ashlands. The biome's other creatures are on Swamp Creatures.

Quick facts

Fire geysers and the Surtling raid

0:21 A fire geyser is an indestructible vent of flame found now and then in the Swamp. It gives off the fire effect of a campfire and holds three Surtling spawn points, each of which respawns its Surtling five minutes after it dies; player base structures nearby suppress the spawns (Geyser, Valheim Wiki). The flames themselves burn anything that walks through them, and NickRawcliffe kites Draugr straight into a geyser for free fire damage.

13:54 Surtlings also raid. Once a Surtling has died anywhere in the world, even by wandering into water, and Bonemass has been defeated, the event "There's a smell of sulfur in the air..." can send up to four of them against a base in the Meadows, Black Forest, Swamp or Plains for two minutes under a harmless red ash rain. Because each keeps its normal drops, Embr counts it among the more welcome raids (Events, Valheim Wiki; Raids and Events).

Surtling attack and weaknesses

A Surtling winds back and hurls a ball of fire at anyone within ten meters, every three seconds, for 10 blunt and 40 fire damage that sets the target Burning. One-star Surtlings burn blue and two-star ones pink (Surtling, Valheim Wiki; Status Effects).

7:42 FireSpark81's early-access damage test found slash, blunt and pierce all normal, fire, poison and silver's spirit useless, and frost arrows hitting far harder than anything else; the wiki now lists frost as its weakness. Water is the other: a Surtling takes constant damage in it, though rain does not count (Aggressive creature strategies, Valheim Wiki).

How to kill Surtlings

15:27 Surtlings die in a couple of hits from any Swamp-tier weapon, and a bronze mace is enough (Weapons and Shields). The danger is the fireballs, which keep the player Burning while closing the gap. Their projectiles can be parried, which staggers the Surtling long enough to reach it or knock it into water, and many simply drown themselves by running into the Swamp's pools, as NickRawcliffe notes (Parrying and Blocking). At range, frost arrows are the efficient choice (Bows, Crossbows and Arrows). The Swamp's constant rain also weakens their fireballs, which is why the wiki rates them as easy prey there.

Surtling drops

Starred Surtlings are the prize: a two-star drops four cores and sixteen Coal, eight times the cores and four times the Coal of a plain one (Surtling, Valheim Wiki). The trophy, which glows faintly orange on an item stand, is the one rare part of the Nimble Anklet, a trinket from the Call to Arms Update that gives 50 stamina and 15 percent movement speed for half a minute once its adrenaline bar fills (Nimble Anklet, Valheim Wiki).

How to farm Surtling Cores

1:00 The standard farm drowns the Surtlings as they spawn. With a pickaxe or hoe, the ground all around a geyser is dug below the water table until every spawn point sits in water; the geyser itself cannot be destroyed, and Kysen stresses leaving no dry spot where a Surtling can survive. He then builds a small hut in a nearby indestructible tree, close enough to keep the spawns active but out of the monsters' reach.

4:06 After one idle hour he collects 29 Surtling Cores, 171 Coal and four trophies, which fits the rates: three Surtlings every five minutes, at about 0.8 cores and 4.9 Coal each on average (Geyser, Valheim Wiki). Drops can despawn if left too long, and nothing counted as a player base may be built near the geyser, or the spawns stop.

1:18 x Topher x's variation chains five drowned geysers together with portals, so one loop through them takes about two and a half minutes and returns roughly 80 Coal and a dozen cores, while each geyser refills every five minutes (Portals).

What Surtling Cores make

The core is the gatekeeper of the Metals and Smelting chain, since picking up the first one unlocks the Smelter and Charcoal Kiln, and of fast travel, since a portal needs two (Surtling Core, Portal, Smelter, Valheim Wiki).

7:41 Its uses reach the endgame: the Battering Ram that breaks into Charred Fortresses takes two alongside Flametal and Ashwood, as Samo reminds viewers before a siege (Battering Ram, Valheim Wiki). The full list is on Surtling Core.

Lore and history

A Swamp runestone explains the name: the fire demon Surtr, a nod to the fire giant of Norse myth, was cut down by the First Men and shattered into countless burning pieces, each still wholly Surtr but weaker and forgetful, and those embers are the Surtlings, still bent on revenge (Surtling, Valheim Wiki; Lore and Setting). In early access the unfinished Ashlands were a lava wasteland populated only by Surtlings; the Ashlands update of May 14, 2024 replaced them with the Charred and the biome's other new creatures, and the wiki now lists Surtlings only at Swamp geysers and in the raid (Patch 0.218.15, Steam). The Deep North Update (1.0 Patch Notes) left Surtlings unchanged apart from the release-wide rework of rare drops, which covers their trophy (Valheim 1.0 Has Arrived!, Steam).

Frequently asked questions

How do you farm Surtling Cores in Valheim? Dig the ground around a Swamp fire geyser down into the water so every Surtling drowns as it spawns, then wait nearby without building a base; one geyser gives roughly 29 cores an hour.

What is the Surtling weak to? Frost and water. It takes constant damage while in water and is immune to fire, poison and spirit.

How many Surtling Cores does a portal need? Two, with 20 Finewood and 10 Greydwarf Eyes.

Do Surtlings still live in the Ashlands? No. The Ashlands update of May 2024 replaced the placeholder biome's Surtlings with its own creatures, and the Valheim Wiki now lists them only at Swamp geysers and in their raid.

Sources

• Surtling, Geyser, Events and Aggressive creature strategies, Valheim Wiki (weirdgloop)
• Surtling Core, Portal, Smelter, Battering Ram and Nimble Anklet, Valheim Wiki
• Patch 0.218.15 – Ashlands and Valheim 1.0 Has Arrived!, Iron Gate Studio on Steam
• 30+ Need to Know Valheim Tips for the Swamp! and Easy Fortress Siege Guide, Samo (videos)
• Swamp Creature Damage Weaknesses Valheim Guide, FireSpark81 (video)
• Valheim Beginners Guide To The Swamp, NickRawcliffe (video)
• Valheim - Infinite SURTLING CORE and COAL!, Kysen (video)
• Never Run Out Of Coal Again, x Topher x (video)
• Everything About RAIDS in Valheim!, Embr (video)