Summary

• Players can't max out both hearts and stamina in Zelda: TOTK due to limited upgrade resources.
• Choosing between upgrading hearts or stamina in TOTK is crucial for combat and exploration.
• With no plans for TOTK DLC, the game won't provide more upgrades, forcing players to strategize on stat priorities.

While Heart Containers and Stamina Vessels make up a large part of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom's progression, players looking to maximize their stats will have to scrounge nearly every corner of Hyrule to do so. Using the same systems as Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom's variety of challenging enemies and terrain make hearts and stamina vital for combat, exploration, and a variety of challenges, such as taming horses. However, with both stats sharing a spendable resource, TOTK forces players to choose between prioritizing one or the other.

Much like Breath of the Wild, most of a player's extra health or stamina will come from completing TOTK's various shrines and obtaining the Lights of Blessing contained within, four of which can be exchanged for a Heart Container or Stamina Vessel at any Goddess Statue. Keeping in line with more traditional Zelda titles, however, Tears of the Kingdom also awards Heart Containers at the end of each major dungeon, serving as a source of extra health even for players who might not have explored very thoroughly. With a maximum of 40 hearts and three full wheels of stamina, however, players may need to pick and choose which stat they prefer.

Players Can't Max Out Both Hearts And Stamina In TOTK

There Aren't Enough Lights Of Blessing To Max Out Both Zelda: TOTK Stats

Similar to Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom does not allow for players to max out both hearts and stamina. Even with all of TOTK's temples, shrines, and the select few quests that give Heart Containers or Stamina Vessels completed, maxing out one stat leaves the other two upgrades short of the maximum. While it's unlikely to be any sort of problem, especially for those who fully make use of the game's vehicle-building and cooking mechanics, it can be somewhat frustrating for completionists to be left just short of a stat's maximum potential.

There are 152 shrines (and thus 152 Lights of Blessing) in TOTK, allowing for 38 upgrades to either hearts or stamina. With 29 Heart Containers and ten Stamina Vessels required to reach the maximum of both, there would need to be 156 shrines to make it possible to max out both.

Pros & Cons Of Maxing Out Hearts In TOTK

Should You Max Out Heart Containers In Zelda: TOTK?

There are many potential benefits to maxing out Link's Heart Containers in Zelda: TOTK, and the true value of doing so depends on playstyle. Maxing out Heart Containers is ideal for the combat optimizers, those who want to take on some of TOTK's hardest field bosses without breaking a sweat. The benefits are easy enough to see: with more HP, Link can take more hits before he needs to heal or dies. This effectively allows players to make more mistakes in combat without starting over, ideal for training to take on a King Gleeok.

That said, for those who don't necessarily care about beating the toughest bosses, fully upgrading Link's hearts is almost a waste of time. 20 hearts should be more than sufficient to take on and handily beat the final boss of TOTK; a little more is nice, but 40 is just excessive. Besides, if the player does want to take on a superboss every now and then, they can make use of temporary heart-granting food for a near-identical effect. By maxing out their hearts, they're inevitably denying themselves a bit of stamina, and letting all those ingredients go to waste.

Pros & Cons Of Maxing Out Stamina Vessels In TOTK

Should You Max Out Stamina Vessels In Zelda: TOTK?

On the other hand, in order to beat the game, it's absolutely necessary to level up Stamina Vessels (though not necessarily to max them out). Link will need a certain amount of stamina to claim the Master Sword in TOTK: two full wheels, to be exact.

Where maxing out Heart Containers is helpful in combat, maxing out Stamina Vessels is indispensable in exploration. Climbing, swimming, and sprinting are the name of the game. Link needs stamina to do all of the above, and the more Stamina Vessels he springs for, the deeper the pool of stamina he'll have with which to do them.

However, there are arguably more consumables to substitute for maxed-out stamina than there are those that grant temporary hearts. Much as they can with heart-restoring items, players can either use food and potions that grant them temporary stamina to increase their maximum vessels, or opt for stamina-restoring items to artificially refill their meters mid-climb. But they can also use Zonai devices to create clever machines that propel Link across hill, sea, and sky much faster than his legs can carry him.

But Zonai Devices are rare, and generally better saved for the difficult TOTK physics puzzles that require them. As a result, it's generally better to max out stamina, while getting hearts up to at least 20.

TOTK DLC Won't Bring More Health And Stamina Upgrades

Zelda: TOTK Won't Have DLC

Although many hoped a potential future DLC might have allowed players to finally max out on both stats at once, since there are no plans for Zelda: TOTK DLC, it seems players are stuck with the current number of Lights of Blessing. It is worth noting that, even with Breath of the Wild's extra Spirit Orbs from The Champion's Ballad DLC, both hearts and stamina still couldn't be maxed out - meaning that more TOTK content wouldn't necessarily have brought enough resources for players to fully max out. On the other hand, however, getting every health and stamina upgrade in TOTK does bring players closer to the game's caps than BOTW, being only two upgrades short as opposed to the base game of BOTW's three.

While the missing hearts or stamina might be annoying to completionists, TOTK has plenty of ways to circumvent the limits, such as temporary hearts and stamina from cooking or resting at inns or exchanging upgrades between the two stats at the Horned Statue below Lookout Landing. And, as with many of the extra challenges in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, like Korok Seeds or armor upgrades, hearts and stamina are likely intended more to facilitate a player's journey than to be fully maxed out.