Elden Ring fans have found all sorts of ways to completely break the game with overpowered builds, prompting FromSoftware to roll out nerfs like there's a necessity for live-service balance--let us have our Mimics and Rivers of Blood, eh? But away from the OP steamroll setups are bizarre and fun alternative builds designed to simply make each run unique. And fans have been sharing all sorts on the subreddit.
"Zeus, no weapons besides lightning caestus," Sykobear8 said. "Primarily use lightning incantations and only use the caestus if your enemy gets close." Basically, cosplay a Greek God summoning the wrath of the skies to smite your enemies, but if they get too close, wallop them.
"Boss weapon gun game," Popular_Persimmon_48 commented. "Once you defeat a boss, you must use their signature weapon until you defeat the next [...] You'll probably want to make an exception for the regal sceptre. Farming enough to respec into it is a pain, and turns you into a glass cannon just in time for altus plateau/Radahn."
One suggestion is a little unorthodox, somewhat impractical, and likely to get you killed in even the easiest of situations, but it's definitely unique; "Farm for six crossbows, equip and load all of them, then volley away," Daylight_The_Furry said. "Effective? No. Fun? Very." Essentially, you can flip through crossbows fast enough to fire off bolts like you're holding an assault rifle.
There are of course classic Souls-like challenges sprinkled in, like genericusername9028's suggestion. "A shield-only run is actually quite fun and with a little bit of tweaking you can make it pretty strong, I recommend you use shield crash as your main source of damage. Another I just finished is a charge heavies only with troll crusher (the true bonking build) and it is not OP because finding punish windows can be hard".
But a true Souls staple for fun builds is cosplay. You can dress up as a god like Zeus, sure, but you can just as easily bring to life fictional characters--and fictional Gods. Take Zagreus from Hades, which PeejWal put together. "First, turn the Elden Ring music down to zero, and instead play the Hades OST on shuffle as the game music (I use Spotify on the PS5). In your weapon slots you must have the following weapon types equipped: a sword, spear, shield, bow, and a fist/claw weapon. There are no guns in Elden Ring, but I suppose you could also equip a crossbow/cannon as the last slot [...] When you die, you must switch to one of the others".
Failing all of that, there's always Pork-Fried-Lice's suggestion, "Naked with a big stick."