Neither do I tbh. :lol I think I'm falling in the same trap as I did with MGSV... My hype and anticipation for it, it felt I would be doing the game, and myself a disservice of missing the game's full potential and glory (Excluding PC of course.. different ballpark, imo) Playing MGSV at 60fps vs PS3 30fps... it just had to be done.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
and had to wait for a good trade in deal for my ps3 :doge
no LUCK stat! i been meaning to finish my ng+ luck build in demon's for a while now....
my guess is arcane will govern the strength or capacity of summoning those spirit monsters
also damn, they brought back poise!?
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Apparently Arcane is just a rebranding for Luck.
Also Dark Souls 1 poise is back and you'll need to increase your strength stat to wear heavy armor. And according to Iron Pineapple, lots of powerful Faith based offensive skills this time around. :like
Beat Tree Sentinel with about 60 arrows on a platform.
I'm never beating this game.
:goldberg
Mom will give you hugs when the game gets too hard. :uguu
spoiler (click to show/hide)
For 5% of your Max HP. Worth tho.
With the Bandit... followed a guide that has you run through the map and grab a bunch of stuff that nets you 10,000+ runes, five +2 potions, the mixed flask, and a weapon that is +4 or +5 all after about 10-15 minutes.
Link?
Sorry, meant Prisoner class if that changes anything.
Follow this guide if you want to get the stuff I mentioned pretty quickly. Can be done as early as after you get your horse.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tx9IsK8qhg4
Follow this guide to get the meteor staff. The video doesn't cover it, but in the same place where you get the staff, you'll find gear and a stairwell leading downstairs to get the spell. It's all located in the ruined brick areas.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7Wd7zKDbLs
For the bloody slash. Fort Haight is on the southeast area of the map from the starting location. Just google to find it. There's a site of grace to the right of it so no worries if you die attempting it. If you follow that starter "OP" video and do the optional "quest" to level up your spirit helpers, you'll destroy it with ease. I barely had to even fight the knight at the top of the fort because the summoned wolves were just wrecking him.
Elden Rings Diary Entry #3: Do the Main Quest Line 2022 Challenge (Impossible)
Another exploration heavy day. I made my way down to the Weeping Peninsula. I found a Minor Erdtree and killed an Erdtree Avatar. I also found the Tower of Return (gonna spoiler this just because it was unexpected and cool)
spoiler (click to show/hide)
At the top of the tower is a chest with a teleporter trap that takes you to the capital city. There's a site of grace and a giant you can fight, but not much else in the area. Still, pretty cool view.
(https://i.imgur.com/GsA9uo8.png)
I went down toward the southern tip of the peninsula and talked to a lady that said her father's castle had been swarmed and she asked me to take a letter to her father. I went and checked out the castle, but I didn't feel like trying to do it yet, so I teleported back to Limgrave. I wanted to upgrade my Uchigatana and my brother told me I should go to a mine for crafting mats, and showed me what undiscovered mines looked like on the map, so I found and entered the Limgrave Tunnels. The rock bois were strong against my Uchigatana, but even they couldn't stand up to a nice two-handed slash. I made my way through most of the mine (although I probably missed a secret area or two on the elevators) and fought the Cavedigger Troll. The first time I got to him I had no flasks, panicked and I got flattened, but on my second attempt, I just Unshealthed on him a few times and knocked him down, then finished him off without even needing the heals. *flex*
After that I had enough smithing stones to do some upgrades, so I went back to the Stronghold and upgraded Uchigatana from +2 to +4. *double flex* I also went down to the basement and spent 3 Stonesword Keys to get a unique crossbow and the Assassin's Prayerbook. Kinda feels like a waste of keys since I'm not really doing much ranged fighting and I don't even have enough faith to use any of the assassin abilities yet, but maybe I'll try out the crossbow.
Total Time Played: ~10.5 hours
Current Character: Lv. 23 Samurai
Lvl 141, 73 hours in. Just have the final boss and 1 optional boss left.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
(https://i.imgur.com/nGCttH9.png)
found a video of the dude
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_teaNCKLVg
I returned to the castle to clear the second half and topple Goddrick.
(https://i.imgur.com/W8mC0bi.png)
Spent a lot of time exploring for secret areas. I found the Crucible Knight that Madrun Badrun was talking about and easily defeated him.
Totally Legit Strategy Inside(Not Cheese!)
After dying 7 or 8 times, I lured him back to the elevator room to see if I could use the elevator shaft to keep some distance from him to engage him better, but instead he just runs directly into the shaft and dies. :lol
Made it to Goddrick, and and my man was looking pretty eff'd up. That cutscene in the middle of the fight, holy crap bro, you good?? :lol With the help of my Barbarian Queen waifu and my Jelly friend, I was able to dispatch him without too much trouble. With Goddrick dispatched, I could now officially enter Liurnia of the Lakes through the front gates. Before moving on, I gave grapes to a new waifu, and headed north.
I spent a while just checking out the area, clearing out some enemy encampments, finding sites of grace, nothing major. I traveled as far north as I could go, up to the Great Lift, but there was nothing I could do there at the moment without "precious item". I talked to an old crone, however, that implied that there was another way to the top of the lift, a "coward's path, into the water and through the dark caverns". Hmmmm.....I do love a good coward's path.
(https://i.imgur.com/zPhfmSZ.png)
At this point, I decided to make upgrading my Uchigatana my current priority. I'd been stuck on +5 for a long time, and to get to +6 I needed a bunch of Smithing Stones(2), but if I could just get over that hump, I had a bunch of Smithing Stones(3) already to get several more levels. I consulted a wiki and it seems liked the Raya Lucaria Crytal Tunnels were my best option, having a bunch of SS(2) drops, plus a boss that dropped a Bell Bearing that gets the Twins to sell me more stones. I found the cave and explored the entrance, but my Uchigatana wasn't going to cut it here (pun intended) against these rock bois. I decided to go Flail and started smashing my way through them with the greatest of ease, however the mages were still giving me grief because there were so many of them, and I was taking so much damage while rushing into to melee them. Arrows were worthless too, but then I though, what about pots? I'd never really crafted any of the pot-based weapons, but I checked my crafting tab and I had enough mats to craft like 60 Fire Pots plus I had 6 cracked pots to hold them in, so I was like what the heck, let's try this. Well, the pots turned out to be super useful against the mage enemies. One pot took down the easier ones and two could take down the tougher ones, and I could hit them from far enough away that they weren't aggroed yet. I used about 20 pots, but I easily crushed the rest of the mines. The boss at the end was strong against fire damage, but very weak to strikes, and put up little resistance to my flail.
With that, it was back to the Roundtable Hold to cash in my Bell Bearing and immediately upgrade my Uchigatana all the way to +10. Making those gains, soon I'm gonna be drowning in maidens. Picture of my stat screen if anyone wants to see my probably very suboptimal build cuz I don't really know what I'm doing.
(https://i.imgur.com/dfmvKxi.png)
Not really sure where to go next from here. I guess I'll just keep looking around Liurnia and seeing what else there is to see, or maybe I'll go see what's up over in Caelid, where everything looks terrible and bad.
Total Time Played: ~24 hours
Current Character: Lv. 38 Samurai
great game you got there miyazaki :gurl
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnQ3-oSwlkY
spoiler (click to show/hide)
actually pretty polished overall on PS4, but maybe a little less than their smaller games
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Misbegotten Warrior and Crucible Knight
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It's like a codpiece he scurries around on.
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https://gfycat.com/blissfulhideousantlion
da fuq?
i did frenzied flame so early lmao. i did figure out later that you get a different ending if you do frenzied flame before the forge. no other endings for me, but im already most of the way through with new char and i'll go to ng+ eventually.
re differences if you do frenzied flame pre-forge
spoiler (click to show/hide)
you take melinas place at the forge, she doesn't sacrifice herself. she also shows up at the end and vows to hunt down and kill you.
I figured I'd visit the lake.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
There's a motherfucking Dragon at the lake. Absolutely spectacular
And it's dead now :pimp
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The fight is pretty easy, just avoid the fire. Which is a challenge but doable on the horse.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Godfrey kicked my ass at the end of Stormveil castle. Then I found a route around it and ended up in the Lakes of something something :rejoice
And I just wish I had more time and energy to play this :( job is kinda all consuming right now
Before a From game drops, it's important to remember to quit your job, divorce your spouse and abandon your children.
:rollsafespoiler (click to show/hide)
Same boat. I really only have 2 days a week to dig in, still in the second area and feel like I'm way behind.
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(https://thumbs.gfycat.com/WeightyDisastrousLaughingthrush-size_restricted.gif)
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I have use myself as kindling, but this can be reveresed? Is there any chance to fuck up the reversal quest?
To get all the endings
spoiler (click to show/hide)
I have use myself as kindling, but this can be reveresed? Is there any chance to fuck up the reversal quest?
You don't have to do that to get all the endings.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
You can save Hyetta's questline until after Melina has already burned the Erdtree, and still get the Flame Frenzy ending. I didn't do it until after I'd already beat the Elden Beast.
Oh i have to do Hyetta's questline to get the ending? I can't do that cause it's bugged out for me :( I can't get the invasion at the church to happen.
I'm not 100% sure, but I think you can still do it even if Hyetta is bugged, just by going to the final area of her questline.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
The area beneath the Subterranean Shunning Grounds, behind Mohg's altar.
Oh i have to do Hyetta's questline to get the ending? I can't do that cause it's bugged out for me :( I can't get the invasion at the church to happen.
It's not necessary for the...
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Frenzied Flame ending from what I've read. The only condition is you obtain the mark from the Fingers underground. I did that before even beginning Hyetta's questline (which I completed following).
As for what you asked earlier you'll need to (spoilered separately since it gets quite specific). I've done this. Also it can be done at any point provided the conditions are met.
Edit: an alternative would be to keep a separate save file before or after the final boss and then get the FF than trying to reverse it if you can't be bothered with the process. Initially I'd thought you'd already gone through with it.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
- Follow Millicent's questline. This requires meeting her at the church behind the Sellia town after interacting with Gowry at his shack in Caelid. After encountering her along the way a few times it culminates at the end of her questline with a choice to assist her in the Haligtree area, where you'll see two summoning signs (there's a gold and red one, choose the gold one). You'll receive an item.
I'd imagine you can begin her quest at any point and she'd just wait at the same locations or skip some, like other NPC questlines, though I'm not 100% certain.
- Then beat the Malenia boss and interact with the object left there to receive another item.
- Then beat the Placidusax dragon in the late-game area and use the item from the post-Malenia fight. It's doing this that reverses the Frenzied Flame mark (the scars will still show but can be hidden via the mirror in Fia's room in Roundtable Hold). To get to the boss it's best to look up a location guide once you're in Crumbling Farum Azula since it's an obscure process to get there.
Note that the item must only be used while in the dragon boss arena but the reversal can be done at any point (just remember to touch the site of grace in that dragon arena since you can't get back there otherwise). You can even reverse the mark after beating the final boss afaict (you can rest at the site of grace and do whatever before choosing an ending you've unlocked).
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She now regains health during various attacks even if she doesn't touch you
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boss fights can be kind of shit though :/
Just got past..
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Phantom Blaaid. He was giving me a bit of a hard time, but I found a nice cheese method of luring him behind the coffin to the left when you first enter that chamber. At the right angle, he can't walk or attack past it so I just jump attacked the shit out of him. About to trek across the giant rot pool/lake.
What's the best way to get smithing stones to upgrade early level weapons?
On your map, there will be black spots with an orange outline. There is usually one or two in every main area. These are mining caves with smithing stones and upgrade materials.
Nevermind, Nintex beat me. :P
Summoning can feel busted mostly because most of the early bosses are relatively easy. Later on is a different story and weaker summons will just be fodder. There is more than a few Ornstein and Smough situations or just overpowered bosses in late game that really feel like they were balanced for co-op or summon. And even then they are a challenge. I was well into the 4th area feeling like the game wasn't that hard...then I suddenly I ran into 2 or 3 bosses in a row that just wrecked my shit. A major wall for me were the spoiler (click to show/hide)
Valiant Gargoyles
That being said, as enthralled as I am with ER, it does make me appreciate the more focused and condensed Souls games... Open world games are crack cocaine to me... And it works in this Souls formula, but like BOTW, it does so many awesome things right, but feels slightly thinned out to missing some marks. It's hard to put my finger on it what it is exactly... It's not glaring idiocy like easily breakable weapons and the inability to climb in shrines in BOTW, but more underlying issues, like balancing and rune distribution..
Granted, with a game this massive, it's still an extremely impressive feat they've compiled.
Anywho, wrapping up Volcano Manor area. Really like that area for some reason.. around every bend is screen shot worthy... Not that it's massive, but the art direction seems to be better thought out.
LV 125 roughly. Still using the N&F sword until getting.... Something else. Lol not sure yet.
Here's a few recent screen snags...
spoiler (click to show/hide)
(https://i.imgur.com/swKX4n9.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/GBv35QQ.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/weBt1Xd.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/qcVHIVe.jpg)
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Miquella's Haligtree
It feels like I'm playing DLC pack 2 now, this game is unbelievable with the amount of content.
I went to Mt. Gelmir to get the map but the boss there one hit killed me so I got back to the castle in Caelid to see if I was strong enough now.
Where I'm sure there was a double boss before they had been replaced by Blaidd. I guess there's multiple approaches to this fight depending on the quests you do(?)
Managed to beat the General (that was a crazy epic fight btw. Holy shit. All the bois tho, RIP :fbm)
That fight apparently unlocked spoiler (click to show/hide)
the stars, a meteor strike and now I'm heading down Nokron
Given how easy it is to farm and how you can jump straight there really early in the game, seems like a great shortcut if you're playing a NG.
Lord of Blood, more like Lord of getting Bloody Killed.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5Ft3qfr9sY
Weird thing is the other fight with him at the bottom of the sewers with Dung Eater was actually a good challenge (same moveset?). Small cramped area and he wasn't melting like that. Then again I didn't have dual +25 katanas with Seppuku and didn't have Dex at 80 at that point. Could just be that.
Speaking of which, I don't mind the copy & paste boss fights because I think of bosses as just the big grunt enemies in western AAA games that you fight occasionally, but copy & paste Legendary bosses is so dumb. Oh no it's Astel again in a mine! :\
Lord of Blood paid out 400k+ souls though for 30 seconds of low effort. Can't complain.
I have VIT at 60 now, DEX at 65 + 5 from talisman + 10 from physics capping out at 80, END is 35 but don't need much more. Pretty much maxed out stat-wise for pure Dex gear.
I normally finish souls games around like lvl.60-80 or something and usually don't do NG+ or at least never bothered finishing a NG+, so I've never run into this situation before where I'm maxing out stats and have to figure out what to apply stuff to when I level up. I think I'm like 159 or 165 or something now.
Did some platformy parts and my god it fucking sucks, it's so bad, imprecise and sometimes unresponsive that I wish the game would respawn back when you fell with no souls lost as long as you're not in combat :trumps
Yeah, platforming's always been terrible in all these Souls games. I guess I'm just used to it at this point so it usually doesn't phase me though my hands get sweaty on certain bits for sure.
I normally finish souls games around like lvl.60-80 or something and usually don't do NG+ or at least never bothered finishing a NG+, so I've never run into this situation before where I'm maxing out stats and have to figure out what to apply stuff to when I level up. I think I'm like 159 or 165 or something now.
I'd probably suggest avoiding leveling further tbh and invest it in leveling weapons instead but it depends on the difficulty you want.
I mean I'm just doing the content and leveling up each time I have enough souls for a new level. Leveling weapons isn't too expensive (spirit ashes are pricey though). I don't mind being overleveled since I can put it into stuff like arcane and then mess around with dragon magics without having to respec.
I guess I could spend the souls on buying upgrade stones. That does make sense since those do add up with how many you need.
Yeah, platforming's always been terrible in all these Souls games. I guess I'm just used to it at this point so it usually doesn't phase me though my hands get sweaty on certain bits for sure.
Wait until you get to the true depths of the Subterranean Shunning-Grounds :doge
Yeah I did some of the
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Three Fingers
area, but I don't want to lock myself into that ending so backed out until I have the needle.
Finished Mountaintop of the Giants. Whoops I fucked up bleh.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Was planning on sacrificing myself to keep maiden alive and then purging the flame with the needle. Figured that would be the best ending route?
Didn't realize that was the choice to burn maiden. It makes sense, I just wasn't thinking. Thought it'd be more clear about what the choice was.
Still gonna go see Three Fingers but I guess there's no point other than to get there now :|
Also I got Rivers of Blood and did a respec to Arcane for it and I hate it. I had to lose so much to get Arcane up. I had to drop VIT from 60->50 and END from 35->30 and DEX from 65 -> 46 if I wanted to keep 17 STR/21 Faith so I can swap between it and Blasphemous Blade. These two builds are very incompatible.
So yeah, I proc blood quicker using Seppuku on my +25 Uchi dual powerstance with Rivers of Blood on main, but the damage isn't that much better than just two Uchigatana +25 keen builds with Seppuku on each. And the Rivers of Blood skill move I kind of hate. Because it's not a physical attack it doesn't hit stun enemies AT ALL like a normal attack and so I do the animation and they hit me. It doesn't even do much damage on the first hit, so you have to do the whole 3-part L2 skill combo which is a lot of time that enemies are murdering you.
AND it eats up like 75% of your FP bar at default FP just to do a single Rivers of Blood combo.
Also that stuff sacrificed to have a still short reach sword skill that's only usefulness is quicker bleed. I mean I'm sure it's great for PVP but...I get to Bleed proc fast enough already on PVE and then they build more resistance each time so it's not that great.
Not sure if the Fire Giant just has a shitton HP, but it barely felt like I was doing much damage and that fight took a while even with Rivers of Blood procing bleed a bunch of times.
So basically I'm gonna go respec again and go back to my 60 VIT and 65 Dex and 35 END and stick to Dual Uchigatanas w/Seppuku and Blasphemous Blade.
Also I guess I'll do Farum since I'm already a bit in and then go Consecrated Grounds/Haligtree afterwards and before the end area.
Also it looks like I only fucked up two things in this run going for 100%
spoiler (click to show/hide)
-Failed Brother Corbyn's/Goldmask quest because I was supposed to go solve a puzzle before igniting the Giant's Fire, which locks me out of one of the endings.
-As mentioned didn't save fire maidengirl. Not sure if this actually changes anything? I watched a vid of what happens when you burn yourself and she just tells you to fuck off and leaves. Not sure if she appears again.
Otherwise I think I've finished or will be able to finish the rest of the NPCs questlines, just a couple left and do all the rest of the content if I can clear Melinia.
Tempted to run a Main Story only quick NG+ after finishing this as a ranged INT mage just to see what it's like and try out all these spells. I did try out all the dragon spells since I have high arcane/faith right now with rivers of blood and they all seem pretty meh outside Greyroll's shriek which is nice for wiping large amounts of grunts at once but it eats a ton of FP. INT/Sorcery builds seems more fun and useful.
Also it looks like I only fucked up two things in this run going for 100%
spoiler (click to show/hide)
-As mentioned didn't save fire maidengirl. Not sure if this actually changes anything? I watched a vid of what happens when you burn yourself and she just tells you to fuck off and leaves. Not sure if she appears again.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
She doesn't appear again. I only went for the Flame mark + needle path since it seemed like the better thing to do. They could have added something imo as it's quite a convoluted quest path to take.
First part of the game where I had to resort to the old Souls method of RUN PAST EVERYTHING TO THE NEXT CHECKPOINT here and there.
Malenia wasn't an issue with mimic summon. It still distracted her enough that I could hit her in the back or the mimic doing that vice-versa and get staggers in. Took 4-5 tries of learning a few moves to dodge and how to recognize waterfowl dance to just run the fuck away, but took her down in about 10 mins.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
https://youtu.be/ee6V45qfQao
Now gotta go back and finish exploring out and getting all the treasures from the Haligtree and finishing Millicent's NPC quest and get the needle and finish up Dung Eater's quest since the last 2 seedbed curses are in the Brace.
Will probably do Farum tomorrow and finish the game up on Saturday at this rate.
Farum done.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Maliketh kept one-shotting me immediately after the cutscene midway. Was pretty annoying. On like 3rd or 4th attempt he did a different move after and I beat him.
Placidux was fun. Got one-shotted like 80% into the fight by the yellow laser. Next time I saved my damage negation physix flask for that phase and didn't die. It's nice to at least have one fucking dragon fight that isn't just the same fight you've fought 20 times against every dragon in the game.
At Capital of Ash. Will see how these final bosses are.
Story was ok, I need to watch the lore videos now. I read all the item entries and have some general understanding of the lore, but can't say I was ever super into it like Bloodborne/DS1 or even DS2 (DS2's lore is the most redeeming part of DS2, it's a real interesting though incomplete story). I already thought that Sekiro was pretty lite/weak on Lore and it followed DS3 which had the least interesting Lore/story yet in a Souls game, ER is a step in the right direction and better and more interesting lore than those two, but at least for me it was never interesting like Bloodborne/DS1/DS2's worlds and story.
Can't say I really cared about most of the npcs. Alexander maybe. Ranni was moe as fuck. I also dislike how almost every npc just ends up dying.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Legit bummed when Alexander died to give me his living shard.
Was also pretty gross. Those jars are gross ass shit.
Also I gotta disagree with Let's Cyber that the game doesn't have the usual Souls fall off in the last 1/3rd or 1/4th. Yes, Haligtree is excellent and one of the best areas in the game in level design/art. Farum is solid too though a bit repetitive with the same enemies over and over. But everything else after Leyendell is the usual Souls fall off in quality.
Mountaintop of the Giants is boring. It's spread out with very little to do or explore and nothing really new or interesting. Conscerated Snowgrounds is a complete troll fucking area of just lots of bullshit whether it's the blizzard where you can't see shit for 1/3rd of it (including a Red Wolf fight with 12 smaller wolves when you can't see shit), ganks like Sanguine Invader dropping you off your horse right when you aggro a couple of runebears so you deal with them and him at the same time, the magic archer maze, the worst catacombs dungeon, etc...there's like nothing fun in that area. Then the end stuff doesn't have much story or interesting level design or interesting bosses. It's all just kind of ehhhhh, ok after Leyendell imo.
I think ER has lots of great level design but for every great legacy dungeon there's another Souls game that does a similar kind of area but with better level design. I mean it's masterclass level design for sure. Just nothing we haven't seen before from this team.
Otoh, after killing 120 bosses, I think outside like 10 bosses they are very, very average souls boss fights. I definitely think that overall ER has the worst & least interesting/exciting/fun bosses in a Souls game. They're just so bland outside the few that are closer to Bloodborne/Sekiro fights (aka most of the Legendary bosses).
Elden Ring is like 10/10 level design and 7/10 bosses.
I think the 97 metacritic is pretty nuts and to me this feels like an 8.7/10 or something, but lots of games have way higher or lower scores than they deserve. Sekiro was a much better game imo, same great level design, way better bosses, far tighter combat and more original feeling and aesthetic.
My souls ranking is:
S tier: Bloodborne / DS1
A tier: Sekiro / Demons Souls
B tier: Elden Ring
B- tier: Dark Souls 3
C tier: Dark Souls 2
One of my favorite bits in the game:
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(https://i.imgur.com/9Q3GjLeh.jpg)
Bunch of screens I took. Art design was on point like always for From Soft.
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(https://i.imgur.com/o1fbaZqh.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/wSNqsM0h.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/FU9ywCnh.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/ABHjadPh.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/QLLZtYjh.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/MBOILtEh.jpg)
Given the enemy re-use, I can see why people didn't like that Mountaintops of the giants nearly as much. I think I was a little more forgiving on because it's a barren, frozen wasteland, so the setting saves it a bit. It doesn't have as much content the proceeding areas obviously but it fits theme of the area. I didn't kill Borealis or fight any of the dogs/crows/trolls either. At far into the game, there really wasn't any point when you know there isn't any reward for doing so outside of runes. Maybe Borealis gives like ice dragon breath incantation? I wasn't running arcane at all.
Parts of DS1 were straight up unfinished, which I think is a lot more egregious. I could see making a case that they could have drastically cut down the empty space in Consecrated Snowfield and mountaintop of the giants and condensed the relevant content down in a smaller area. The vastness of the play area really benefited most of the game in my humble opinion, but the snow area probably could have been cut down a bit.
Pretty sure if they cut the entire snowfield and just had a teleporter in mountaintop that went to Haligtree, nothing of value would be lost. The only other interesting bit in Snowfield is the deathroot in the connector tunnel since I like
spoiler (click to show/hide)
invisible walkways
Mountaintop was fine and it was nice looking enough to see a giant scale area. It just needed to be more interesting content-wise. You say you skipped the dragon on the lake, but that's probably the most interesting thing in the map after the Rise puzzle and Fire Giant fight.
Yeah, DS1 has unfinished areas, which are more funny than a big negative imo. Like hey there's an area that's almost totally empty. Weird. And a terrible bed of chaos boss after.
But almost every Souls game basically has this "ran out of time or budget in the end zones" issue. In ER even the last area is pretty much nothing besides a few fights.
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I don't mind City of Ash having no exploration/level design, but I thought when we got in the Eldtree there'd be a final stage inside the tree or something before the final boss.
I don't think ER's end zone drop off is any worse than previous Souls games, but I don't think it doesn't fall into their usual MO. Honestly, it probably makes sense to develop their games with the most time and budget going into the first half of the game since most players probably don't even get to the 2nd half :lol
Thinking about it today, I will say NG+ was good for me, in that there were a lot of bosses in the back half that I never really had to learn their moves because I'd kill them too quickly just by face tanking and roll reacting to moves coming out. NG+ felt more like a real DMCV/NG kind of game where I had to actually learn movesets and that has its own fun.
My biggest issue with the combat in ER is honestly the input delay. It's the usual Souls bad responsiveness, but man, some of these bosses the moves come out so fucking quick off an animation start it can be extremely difficult because you react and hit dodge but the input delay lags and you get hit. I even had this issue BOTH runs I did the chapel of the forsaken platforming (I did flame ending in NG+) because 2 of the last 3 jumps I roll and both runs I had a few deaths where I hit forward + roll and just...walked off the ledge edge and died.
I feel like if the game was more responsive the boss fights would be more fun.
That said I looked up some NG+/NG++/NG+7 patch 1.04 tips for the final boss and seems like
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If you just cast Lords Divine Protection for like 60% Holy Damage reduction every couple mins + Talisman+2 for another 20% Holy Damage reduction, these bosses can't really do too much damage since the majority of their attacks are holy attacks, which greatly offsets their damage increases in NG+ increases.
So between that and having learned to avoid most of their moves, I think I'll be ok for NG++ Trying to decide if I should do anything in NG+ post-game before another reset like grabbing some of the easier/quicker Larval tears or doing some optional bosses for more xp. Only gained about 15 levels total in NG+ run from all bosses/legacy dungeons combined. 179->194 post final boss.
It's interesting how different bosses are REALLY difficult depending on your build.
Shield did nothing against Fire Giant. Had to give up and just roll and River of Blood slashes. Currently stuck on Maliketh phase 2 which was never an issue in the first two runs. But his phase 2 magic blood attacks go straight through shields so I'm just a heavy sitting duck build that dies quick. Also my summons+10 are dying so fast in NG+2 on these end bosses.
But just cheesed him with Mohg's spear by
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Standing behind a piller and using the skill a bunch for blood rain
I actually find the
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Elden Beast
a lot easier than Radagon to actually learn all the moves and get the hang of dodging them
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https://youtu.be/9OZpJbiGlN4
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https://youtu.be/LIH7bGRsqMA
Also my overall thoughts on NG+2 were it didn't seem particularly harder other than my summon in boss fights wouldn't last the whole fight for the end bosses which was bad. The souls payout on bosses was great, but I felt like the multiplier gives up after NG+1 for normal enemies. Those ice elf guys at the start of the mountain top give 5k souls in NG, 10k souls in NG+1, and 11.5k souls in NG+2.
Bosses in general took a lot longer (1-3 mins instead of 30-60 seconds) but a lot of that was using a weaker 1H spear vs dual sword powerstancing or strong magic attacks. Was just running a low DPS character this time around.
Also I think after trying different builds and seeing the range of the gameplay, I'd say as a PVE game it's about a 9/10. Got it's flaws but pretty good single player game. PVP is it's own thing and can't really judge it.
Made some more progress over the weekend. Entered the Giants Valley area. Wanted to cover more of that before attempting to fight Astel again. Been juggling between, the Sword of N&F, Blasphemous Blade and the Bloodhound’s Fang… Can’t decide which to stick with. Just found out the Bloudhound’s Fang L2 -> R2 combo.
Sword of N&F looked cool, but I heard they nerfed it really hard in the first balance patch because it was god-tier initially so I never used it because the stat requirements. Blasphemous Blade is pretty awesome for a lot of stuff, especially normal enemy mobs. Don't remember Bloodhound's Fang.
Still need to go back and figure out how to deal with the caves with the chariot riding bastards… I tend to find one when I’m feeling spent and just nope out of them.
Have lots of HP to not die in 1 hit when you get knocked down
Took out some random great enemies, like the giant gargoyle right outside the beast clergyman dude’s location and the dragon on the bridge down the road from there.
Nice, once you kill one gargoyle you can kill them all.
Still need to deal with all 3 npc’s for the giant jar HQ place.
No advice here. I came back when I was OP and totally wrecked them lol. The reward is really good though and I used it for a lot of builds for the rest of the game and NG+
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Maximum equipment weight increase talisman
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Thats almost certainly fake :shh
I noticed right away that the performance on Xbox has been greatly increased. Loading times too. It's a night and day difference.
Farmed some runes up on the Atlus Plateau and beat some caves.
Also found out that
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The wolves absolutely destroy the black something assassins even if they hide themselves :lol
Then from there, went and stumbled immediately unto fighting...
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Sir Gideon… Was this a joke fight? That was sad how easy he was.
Yeah, if you beat
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Gideon
That is the end. You're like 30 mins from the ending. But you can play post-game and do whatever you want and go to NG+ at any time.
Also yeah, that Draconic Sentinel is fucking HARD. On like 2 of my 3 run builds it was a very hard fight, I think it was my shield and spear build that made it real easy.
Taking out bosses one by one, lettin' the bodies hit the flo..
Even took out Hoarah Loux with a portion of the screen covered... :P
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(https://i.imgur.com/P4a1mG0.jpg)
Got to the Haligtree..
(https://i.imgur.com/vImPunH.jpg)
I may have a chance of actually finishing this game next weekend.
Congrats, I want to return to this after I finish XB3.
But I suppose I'll have to look up some guides and builds to see what the hell I should be doing next.
The last time I played the "return stronger to spots you failed at before" trick didn't work anymore.
Maybe I need to grind myself to make progress, respec or upgrade weapons. These are the places where I can no longer progress:
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- The Capital: I'm way too weak for this, even the entry guards kick my ass
- The Caelid Divine Tower: Haven't been able to beat the boss in the basement but it got very close last time
- The Mountaintops Of The Giants: at some point I climb up a ladder where a beast is and I can't beat it yet to progress further up the mountain
- Nokron: Eternal City: The two Gargoyles kick my ass
I'm about lvl 84 I think.