given that I got sucked into Dark Souls due to discussion on the teamliquid.net forums all those years ago, I find the lack of an Elden Ring thread disturbing. There was a point where I'd pretty much given up on all video games apart from SC2, I felt I'd outgrown them entirely. Then just read the Dark Souls thread on TL made the game sound so fascinating that I had to give it a go.
I'd love there to be a general thread for people to get and give advice, to talk about cool bosses, items, locations or spells you found like there was for Dark Souls.
If there's anything you want me to add to the OP, please let me know.
To get the ball rolling: has anyone found a good straight sword early in the game that has a stabbing R2? The confessor starting straight sword doesn't, and it's a bit of a weakness in tight corridors.
Defeating the Grafted Scion in the tutorial gives you a pair of swords that have an art of war that stabs forward multiple times, also a good shield for later on (it's a tower shield and you need like ~25STR to wield it).
Besides that, the game is really REALLY good. Too bad on Steam and on PC in general a lot of folks are having technical issues with framerate and memory leaks
It takes a few (dozen) tries, but it is doable. If you want the easy way out, pick samurai as the starting class because he has a bow with around 30 arrows and get the grafted scion down as low as possible. Make sure he is not guarding with the shield, because the arrows are a lot less effective. Don't waste the good fire arrows when it is blocking or can dodge.
After that if you still have FP (mana), you can spam the uchigatana amazing ash of war skill, which is either a horizontal slash forward (light attack) or a vertical slash (heavy attack) to finish it off. If you're super paranoid you can always take something like prawns as your starting gift to use during this fight.
Aside from Samurai, both Vagabond and Confessor have 100% physical resist shields from the start, and with a bit of persistence and learning, you can kick the scion's ass and get weapons from the start.
On February 28 2022 04:44 streets-ahead wrote: No way a normal player can beat that thing in the tutorial, haha.
I found that the standard claymore has a really sweet moveset, so I'll go with that for now. I hope I can find a lightning-attunement for it.
There is an opportunity to go back and get revenge, that's how I have the gear.
And actually, while I was fighting the grafted scion I discovered why jump attacks are really interesting, they give you a kind of "drive-by" attack capability while you're dodging certain kinds of attacks, like if you could attack while rolling. Definitely digging the air attack boost at the moment as well.
I played some (last souls game i played often was DS1, dabbled a bit into 3).
Reporting in: Controller setup still as bad as it allways was but now with more buttons to press for even more convoluted controlls. Mechanics still hidden/convoluted for no reasons at all. Convoluted weapon upgrade system still there but now with more options that no one understands until someone makes a youtube tutorial. Story still impossible to follow. PC-Port is trash as allways.
A true dark souls .
A bit more serious: I'm having fun but people that aren't into Dark Souls should really think twice before buying this.
My personally biggest gripe atm (just made it into the castle): How you just "get" a mount on top of teleporting so early is soooo beyond me. It lets you explore all the zones you can access from the start whiteout any real danger and after you have been at a "bonfirething" you can teleport to it forever? Wtf? Why do NPC's even patrol and put ub roadblocks... Blocked off bridge/castel? Ponydeer goo brrrrrr....
Such a weird design decision imho. Shouldn't you at least once have to fight over the bridge or into the castle?
I barely played any dark souls but I got this and I'm pretty amazed so far. On PC the only little framerate drop happens whenever the game is loading assets at certain spots for a few seconds, otherwise it's really just smooth and looks amazing. (my pc was "entry high end" 2 years ago with RX5700, seems elden ring runs on "high" no problem, it's capped at 60fps; I just checked if you run it on 1080p for example even with just a GTX1060 you'd get 57fps average on "high", 60fps on "medium" guess you can say game is well optimized). A lot of freedom, items, exploration, wonder really^^! Stat customization and such seem solid (love that ofc) and I like that you don't get too much more powerful too fast, it seems quite quite interestingly balanced. + Show Spoiler +
+1 level is just +1 to a stat, and base lvl 1 is like 80 stat points in total. You don't level up fast and gotta choose to spend "XP" on leveling up or on items / as a currency for anything else.
I think the controls are sorta weird, basically you are locked into slow animations which you mostly need to time well, but I think it's really all a style choice and it's all good I'm gonna have lot of fun with this I'm pretty sure.
I tried playing with mouse and keyboard ofc (after starting with controller) and tbh I recommend using a controller instead maybe? Even though this game has quite a bit of inventory management and navigating maps or menus (and even aiming with bow or such potentially), you can tell the base controls are more adapted to controller as there is a little delay to account for the stick movement, it's gonna feel a little delayed if you have only 8 direction movement digital control with keyboard. (and you won't get direct access to more actions with available keys, overall control scheme seems made for controller i'd say. that said if you want to I'm sure you can play with mouse&keyboard and have a good time it's kinda details and you'll definitely aim better and faster lul or navigate the menus faster). Btw if you have a PS4 controller it works perfectly on windows using "DS4Windows".
I really like that death is punishing btw I heard death was more punishing in previous games i don't know how exactly but here you lose something on death and you have to try and get it back and maybe you don't. Anyway I like punishing death in general, having some consequence from having died in general and maybe a positive consequence from having never died or died few times (even if just the absence of loss of something).
I really like that death is punishing btw I heard death was more punishing in previous games i don't know how exactly but here you lose something on death and you have to try and get it back and maybe you don't.
It was more punishing in previous titles because of corpse runs. This is the first game in the souls series that has these Stakes of Marika positioned outside of boss rooms. In the past you had to run back all the way from a point of grace (in previous games: bonfire), and usually through a good dozen mobs that could hits you or even kill you along the way.
If you want a tip: spend all your runes before entering a boss fight (golden fog wall), so you don't have to worry about picking them up again. If you're close to level up, go farm mobs for a bit, level up, and then go fight the boss. Trust me, worrying about that phat stack of 10'000 runes you've left on the floor by dying the previous time can be very distracting and can potentially lead to making very bad decisions. You want to go into boss fights with a clear mind, and expecting to lose the fight a few times in a row, before learning the boss moveset and phase transitions.
I cannot believe how good the first "real" souls dungeon was, holy shit. So intricate, so varied, so much variety. Makes Cainhurst Castle feel primitive in comparison.
So far, the game is absolutely insane. The "souls" gameplay is as good as ever, the open world just works (so many things to do, beautiful landscapes everywhere, and a good way to just "relax" when stuck on a boss) and yet, they've managed to keep their trademark genius level design for the dungeons.
The only 2 things I have an issue with really is animation lock and enemy combos. I'm playing a melee DEX build with focus on ashes of war (weapon arts) and the 2 things above are honestly pretty infuriating.
Animation Lock and queuing actions: it seems like there is no way to cancel an attack order (R1 or R2) once given with a dodge roll command. On top of that if you spam R1 like 3x in a row your character will try his damnest to execute all 3 of those light attacks, even if you see the enemy wind up for an attack animation himself, and are franticly trying to time your dodge roll... it will NOT supersede the previous attack commands and it will NOT come out.
Enemy combos: Yeah... it's quite frankly insane how much some bosses combo you. Their attack chains are usually 5 to 7 attacks, and others even go higher. If they catch you with the 1st attack, there is little to no chance of living through it because you're effectively stunlocked and every successive hit of their chain WILL hit you. Can't roll away, can't sprint away, you can only watch yourself die, and you have a good 5-second window to reflect on your mistake as you helplessly watch the big dude pummel you into the ground... and then the "death" animation plays for another 5 seconds as you slowly collapse to the ground and turn to dust and the classic "YOU DIED" screen pops up.
edit: btw I noticed something while playing - R1 spam is only good for applying status effects to enemies, such as bleed, forstbite, poison, madness etc. The problem is that to apply status effects you actually have to be very aggressive so the meter builds up. The long enemy combos really prevent you from doing it as effectively as you'd want to. In every other occasion jump attacks, heavy attacks and weapon arts are the clear, truly superior way of attacking. All enemies have poise and a break meter and these jump and heavy attacks can really make short work out of them if you can get a stagger off and finish them off with a quick critical. Even bosses are susceptible to poise breaks.
On March 01 2022 18:05 Merany wrote: they've managed to keep their trademark genius level design for the dungeons.
I'm curious about how many of those major dungeons there are. On Fextralife it says there's two major and one minor legacy dungeon, but that seems pretty low.
This is going to be known as one of the best games of all time. I've been addicted to it since Thursday evening and am still constantly finding new areas and treasures. I can't believe how big the scope of the game is and how dense the world is. It's been a blast putting down a summon sign and only needing to wait a minute tops to be summoned for any boss anywhere in the world.
I've got about 35 hours in the game already, about how long my Dark Souls 3 playthroughs were taking when I finished playing it. Still nowhere near beating it, or feeling like I've discovered everything. Breath of the Wild was not only the first Zelda game I beat, but it was also the first open world game I bothered to play to completion, because the things you find as you explore were actually sick as fuck. Elden Ring is the second. Exploring a gorgeous area that still has some design to it, and having the thing you stumble on be a Dark Souls boss is an incredible experience.
On March 01 2022 18:05 Merany wrote: they've managed to keep their trademark genius level design for the dungeons.
I'm curious about how many of those major dungeons there are. On Fextralife it says there's two major and one minor legacy dungeon, but that seems pretty low.
Can't comment on the dungeons specifically, but re: Fextralife, it's incredibly lacking in info. I was trying to look up weapon stats and realized that a lot of it wasn't filled in, or was inaccurate
Understandable considering the game just came out, but I wouldn't worry about dungeon number just based off of Fextralife. in any case, I always preferred Wikidot in previous Souls games but I dont know if another wiki is going to be made
On March 01 2022 18:05 Merany wrote: they've managed to keep their trademark genius level design for the dungeons.
I'm curious about how many of those major dungeons there are. On Fextralife it says there's two major and one minor legacy dungeon, but that seems pretty low.
Can't comment on the dungeons specifically, but re: Fextralife, it's incredibly lacking in info. I was trying to look up weapon stats and realized that a lot of it wasn't filled in, or was inaccurate
Understandable considering the game just came out, but I wouldn't worry about dungeon number just based off of Fextralife. in any case, I always preferred Wikidot in previous Souls games but I dont know if another wiki is going to be made
Yeah, that was pretty dumb of me, considering how obviously incomplete the list was. There's of course more.
Patches told me to let one of those statues kidnap me at the bottom of the giant waterwheel. So I discovered and explored Volcano Manor until I found the Boss. Godskin Apostle. Seems way too hard now. So I wanted to activate Radan's rune, found ANOTHER godskin apostle boss, also too hard. Insane HP. So I followed Blaidd into the Lost City, no spoilers here, but the second boss there is EVEN harder.
Just recently beat Radahn, getting my second Great Rune. What a goddamn fucking incredible boss fight, from the cutscene before the fight to the cutscene after the fight, and everything in between. Holy hell. My most satisfying victory in the whole game so far, and definitely up there in all my time with the Souls games.
I went in blind and one-shot Radahn. Learned afterwards that there is meant to be a second phase where he turns into a comet, didnt happen for me I just followed him on my horse and smacked him from 100 to 0. Similar thing happened on one of my Godrick pulls, he never transitioned into phase 2.
On March 11 2022 04:04 streets-ahead wrote: Okay, I have no idea where I should be going now. I have three great runes and now everything seems to be a whole new category of difficult.
Patches told me to let one of those statues kidnap me at the bottom of the giant waterwheel. So I discovered and explored Volcano Manor until I found the Boss. Godskin Apostle. Seems way too hard now. So I wanted to activate Radan's rune, found ANOTHER godskin apostle boss, also too hard. Insane HP. So I followed Blaidd into the Lost City, no spoilers here, but the second boss there is EVEN harder.
Where should I go now?
It’s a bit puzzling that you got 3 great runes and find those 3 bosses you listed way too hard. Which one is the Blaidd boss, + Show Spoiler +
Astel
? You can definitely beat him at this time. The underground you explore during Blaidds errand contains lots of upgrade materials for both your weapons and ashen summons, are you leveling those up?
On March 14 2022 06:52 Laurens wrote: Radahn spoilers below + Show Spoiler +
I went in blind and one-shot Radahn. Learned afterwards that there is meant to be a second phase where he turns into a comet, didnt happen for me I just followed him on my horse and smacked him from 100 to 0. Similar thing happened on one of my Godrick pulls, he never transitioned into phase 2.
Definitely weird that that seems to be such a common-ish occurence. I've had some bosses myself, like the ulcerated tree spirit, that will just stop doing anything for no reason and let me freely whack away.
For Radahn, part of what I loved so much about the fight was figuring out how to survive him crashing down on you as a comet so you could even engage with him in the second half. That attack is very scary.
This game has had so much hype and praise, but I’ve never gotten far into Fromsoft titles. I have Dark Souls Remastered and Bloodbone on PS5, should I play those before I dive into Elden Ring? I see a lot of people picking up elden ring as their first fromsoft title but im not sure if that would be to my detriment. I know of several game series where playing the new shiny thing might make the original titles’ rough edges hard to swallow.
There isn't a correct answer to that question I played Sekiro -> DS 3 -> Demon's Souls -> Elden Ring Out of those 4 I'd say Sekiro is by far the hardest, Demon's Souls by far the easiest, so the 'best' order to play them in would probably have been Demon Souls -> DS 3 /Elden Ring (the jury is still out on which of these is harder) -> Sekiro but I don't feel like I ruined my own experience or something.
I find that Elden Ring being open world and a generally massive game allows for various ways to make your character overpowered, makes it more forgiving for players that are new to the series. A good introduction to the DS series imo. I don't think it will ruin your enjoyment of the other games, they hold up well, though I haven't played the 2 you listed.
I'm gonna say all this knowing how hard it is to not play the shiny, massively acclaimed new open world game, BUT. I would highly, highly recommend giving Dark Souls Remastered an honest try before anything else, especially since you already have it. I went DS1, DS2, DS3, Sekiro, Demon's Souls, and now Elden Ring, and in general I would highly recommend playing the Dark Souls games in order. However, I would say start with 1, it can take a while for it to "click", see if it does or not. From there you can kinda play whatever. Perhaps you find that it's really not your kind of game, and that's fine too. You save your time and money in that case. Elden Ring has a huge, open world, but the core gameplay is basically lifted from Dark Souls. If that isn't your thing, it doesn't really matter how open the world is.
I'd say, no matter what else, if someone is going to have a first impression of the Souls series, it should be DS1, period. I wouldn't budge on that. When it sinks its teeth into you, the experience is like nothing else. The foundational experience of Dark Souls 1 is something I would recommend to anyone patient enough to withhold on Elden Ring for a spell.
Elden Ring having the open world to explore when a fight is frustrating can be a huge boon for some players, and obviously the game is gorgeous, and having George's input in the world building gives it a whole new kind of appeal, so it's hard to say not to start there, but the skeleton and genealogy of Dark Souls/Demon's Souls are plain to see, and I think having an appreciation of where Elden Ring comes from will give you an appreciation of where Elden Ring is going, too.
On March 14 2022 16:19 lestye wrote: This game has had so much hype and praise, but I’ve never gotten far into Fromsoft titles. I have Dark Souls Remastered and Bloodbone on PS5, should I play those before I dive into Elden Ring? I see a lot of people picking up elden ring as their first fromsoft title but im not sure if that would be to my detriment. I know of several game series where playing the new shiny thing might make the original titles’ rough edges hard to swallow.
fwiw, my personal experience was DS2 -> Bloodborne -> DS3 -> DS1 -> Demon Souls -> Elden Ring.
Even tho I got into DS1 quite late, I still enjoyed it, though with tempered expectations. While I can see why people absolutely loved it, it had some faults and I know of many of first timers who tried it and couldn't get through it.
I think Elden Ring is a solid starting point, it is very forgiving in a number of ways, with a lot of QoL changes. I wonder though that it would make going back seem more difficult.
If you have trouble getting into FromSoftware games at all though, I would just go with the one that appeals to you and hit the ground running. If that is Elden Ring then go for it. If you end up hooked then you'll probably enjoy the previous ones too, if you get bored then maybe these games just not your style.
Got all achievements. 10/10 open world game, 6/10 Souls game for me. I felt punished for exploring, because I got so 'overlevelled' that the bosses felt too easy. + Show Spoiler +
Godfrey and Morgott in the first version of Leyndell
in particular felt super undertuned, 1 LMB slash did 10% of their hp bar. Not to mention the various OP Weapons/Spells/Ashes/Summons you can find in the world. Mimic Tear +10 is essentially adding an Easy Mode to the game without calling it Easy Mode.
Man I shouldn't have relied on Night and Flame so much, now that it's nerfed I'm getting my ass kicked even more than before. Are there any weapons that are still reasonably OP for PVE?
I just beat Astel and made it to Rykard's bonfire afterwards.
On March 20 2022 07:20 streets-ahead wrote: Man I shouldn't have relied on Night and Flame so much, now that it's nerfed I'm getting my ass kicked even more than before. Are there any weapons that are still reasonably OP for PVE?
I just beat Astel and made it to Rykard's bonfire afterwards.
Word on the street is that Arcane scaling bleed weapons are stupidly overpowered now. The catch is, you kinda need to progress far into the game itself for the good stuff like Rivers of Blood and trident/spear with arcane scaling. Otherwise I guess a basic Katana or twinblade or hookclaws with some blood weapon art will work fine?
The only problem is that not everything bleeds... like gargoyles and ghosts.
They also buffed sorceries so the good ol' Moonveil and/or Dark Moon Greatsword (Moonlight GS in previous games) should be good. You can peruse YT to find build videos like: + Show Spoiler [bleed] +
But honestly be prepared for the bleed build to be nerfed any second. This also happened in DS3. Bleed/Luck was very good then they basically overnerfed it and stomped it out of existence just like they did with hoarfrost stomp this patch. Seems like FromSoft is *really* heavy-handed with their nerfs and often overnerfs things into oblivion. DS2 faith is yet another example of this... released overtuned then it was nerfed into the fucking ground. But that's what larval tears are for I guess...
I ran with bloodhound fang + shield throughout pretty much my entire run. Great weapon imo, big damage, good skill and bleed. Shield was used more than usual in this game as well, guard counter is just so satisfying
The amount of content is just unreal. ~25 hours were spent just in Limgrave running around exploring shit, and I'm like going through the wiki just ticking things off.
I've spent like 30 hours or so, and I'm still pretty bad. I just power leveled my character using the rolling ball/cliff until ~40, and then proceeded to cheese bosses in various ways.
Currently just 2handing the golden halberd because it has pretty good damage when mounted, and oneshotting stuff makes life easier.
I think I'm done Limgrave and Weeping peninsula now. This game is going to take ages.
On March 19 2022 22:43 Laurens wrote: Got all achievements. 10/10 open world game, 6/10 Souls game for me. I felt punished for exploring, because I got so 'overlevelled' that the bosses felt too easy. + Show Spoiler +
Godfrey and Morgott in the first version of Leyndell
in particular felt super undertuned, 1 LMB slash did 10% of their hp bar. Not to mention the various OP Weapons/Spells/Ashes/Summons you can find in the world. Mimic Tear +10 is essentially adding an Easy Mode to the game without calling it Easy Mode.
Yeah, I felt the same way w.r.t to exploration and making the game too easy. It makes sense that the game is harder to tune with the open world but it made some bosses seem a lot less epic when I could take them down in 3-5 jump attacks, while also staggering them.
For me personally, I think Bloodborne / DS1 will still reign supreme as best Souls game, but Elden Ring has a ton of replayability and build variety. Once you know what you can skip it's a lot quicker of a playthrough and you probably won't have the same open world issues.
It is nice that the open world allows you to make the game as hard as you want. Want a challenging run? Do minimal farming. Want a cake walk? Here are some OP builds and Mimic Tear.
I am a complete noob to souls games so I basically over leveled (beat the game at like level 130) and abused mimic tear because I was so worried about getting hard stuck. Going to explore a bit more and go find Melania and the dragon lord and after that I will start a NG+ with the training wheels off and explore more side stuff since in my play through I found the ending I wanted then narrow focused on that. I missed an insane amount of content that I can't wait to discover next go.
Hopefully I can git gud training myself in NG+ Dunno what build I will go. Did a faith build with sycthes into Blasphemous Blade end game. Mimic Tear + BB really made some bosses trivial so going to do something more traditional where I actually have to learn the fights and proper dodging and dps windows.
7 shardbearers (technically Rennala isn't one), 5 of these are fairly obvious and can be done 'along the road', 2 of them are rather well hidden and could be considered post-game superbosses.
Godrick, Renalla, Radahn, Rykard, Morgott, Mogh. Now I'm trying to get Malenia's. That only leaves, maybe, Renna's, who's supposed have "cast aside" hers, whatever that means.
Oke yeah, that's the last one Good luck, many people consider her the hardest boss in the game. I personally had little trouble with her but I might've explored a bit too much and gotten too overlevelled. If you're getting desperate, + Show Spoiler +
I found that using a shield works wonders, even blocks her big whirly combo completely.
I'm at 39 hours / level 98 now and I have a +10 Moonveil, so bosses thus far haven't been an issue. The really only really frustrating one (Foreskin Duo), I just summoned a +10 Assassin.
While the bosses aren't too hard yet (currently at + Show Spoiler +
Clergy Beast
), normal mobs and areas are starting to get tedious and a bit frustrating. I probably missed around half the items in Farum Azula because I'm getting my ass kicked so much that exploration is becoming a chore.
Yeah i also found the overworld harder than the main story at times, my theory is that regular mobs scale with your level while story bosses are fixed.
It's actually absolutely ludicrous how much damage trash mobs deal in this game... I'm wearing some of the very best protection this game has to offer (Veterans) and I still get shit on in 3 hits by a normal mob in+ Show Spoiler [place names] +
Consecrated Snowfield or Farum Azula or Mohgwyn Palace...
What is even the point in wearing Heavy Armor and putting points in Endurance to midroll if it does shit-all for protection? I might just go with cloth armor or naked if so much investment in stats pays off so little. Maybe fast rolls are the answer to everything in this game.
I guess poise is only good for PvP? Not like you'll be trading hits with giants or dragons or shard bearers...
but I also was a big wimp since this was 1st From Software game so I abused summons hard (Mimic Tear OP). I legit started to summon other players to help because I just wanted the armor/weapon but they were worse then what I was doing so went back to ole reliable and myself and beat her a couple times after.
So all major bosses down and the secret ones Like + Show Spoiler +
the dragonlord who was cool af with his freak out lazer phase
so am currently collecting materials to level up a bunch of different weapons to test out different builds for NG+
NG+ scaling has its own issues I found. On your first playthrough you will probably gain ~100 levels between Margit and final boss, and they are tuned appropriately. In NG+ it’ll be more like 10 levels, and yet they both get the same 50% buff. So the predictable result is that the early bosses in NG+ are super easy/boring with your max weapons, max summons, upgraded flask etc in addition to the 100 ish levels. I quit my run after Godrick and started playing another game for now :p
On March 24 2022 07:28 Latham wrote: It's actually absolutely ludicrous how much damage trash mobs deal in this game... I'm wearing some of the very best protection this game has to offer (Veterans) and I still get shit on in 3 hits by a normal mob in+ Show Spoiler [place names] +
Consecrated Snowfield or Farum Azula or Mohgwyn Palace...
What is even the point in wearing Heavy Armor and putting points in Endurance to midroll if it does shit-all for protection? I might just go with cloth armor or naked if so much investment in stats pays off so little. Maybe fast rolls are the answer to everything in this game.
Completely agree with everything here.
Armor has always been a weak point in the series, in my view. They almost never have interesting stats or effect, you haven't been able to upgrade them since DS1, and it's all kinda pointless.
On March 24 2022 07:28 Latham wrote: It's actually absolutely ludicrous how much damage trash mobs deal in this game... I'm wearing some of the very best protection this game has to offer (Veterans) and I still get shit on in 3 hits by a normal mob in+ Show Spoiler [place names] +
Consecrated Snowfield or Farum Azula or Mohgwyn Palace...
What is even the point in wearing Heavy Armor and putting points in Endurance to midroll if it does shit-all for protection? I might just go with cloth armor or naked if so much investment in stats pays off so little. Maybe fast rolls are the answer to everything in this game.
I guess poise is only good for PvP? Not like you'll be trading hits with giants or dragons or shard bearers...
True tankiness is achieved with buffs from ashes of war, spells, and/or consumables, as well as the proper talisman. Running around with heavy armor turns 1 shots into 2 shots, or 2 shots into 3 shots, etc, which is pretty valuable, but to be able to really get beat up and survive, you need to be buffing yourself before the fight.
The way I played with heavy armor was with the Bloodhound Step ash of war. I was always "heavy load" but I almost never rolled or sprinted during fights -- just Bloodhound Stepped around.
Use Golden Vow or Commander's Standard weapon skill (or Golden Vow incantation if you have the FTH for it) + Ironjar Aromatic or Black Flame's Protection incantation (if you have the FTH for it). Those buffs with your best physical dmg negation talisman and veteran's armor, you will be able to take a beating. For mixed physick you can do the poise boost + stance breaker combo, dual wield big heavy weapons and destroy anything while your buffs last.
---
General comments on the game: the combat has so much potential but how can you have good combat in a truly open world game? The fights cannot be balanced around what tools the player has because every player has very different tools. So some fights are insanely hard for one player and insanely easy for another. And for me personally, once I got my build together and learned the gist of the game, everything became too easy. But early on, some fights were very hard. Some builds don't even really come together and make sense without one specific weapon or ash of war which a player could very easily never find in this massive world!
This was the best open world game I've ever played. Exploration and awe and surprise at things I discovered were A+. Combat is just very hit and miss. I wonder if I'd enjoy the other FromSoftware games more since they're more linear afaik so every fight can be better tuned to the player's power.
If I were iterating on this game, I'd make the essential parts of each main playstyle virtually impossible to miss, like have them be rewards after the first main story quest boss, or sitting on a vendor at the round table, etc. I wouldn't make it so expensive to level up weapons or I'd tie less power to upgrading weapons, so that people could more easily experiment with other things. And I wouldn't have such high stat requirements on the different types of weapons -- there's no need when the damage scaling is tied to the stats. Without the stat requirements, people could try everything they get their hands on and decide if they want to invest in a stat to increase the damage of their favorite weapons.
The main problem with this game for me was how hard it was to figure things out on my own. Some completionists / optimizers are going to go online, undeterred by spoilers, and soak up all the info they can. But there's SO much value in a game like this to playing without any spoilers, so it really sucks for me to do that. But asking a lone player to figure out everything there is to figure out all by themselves is asking way too much. So it would do well to have a lot more in-game guidance (but in a natural way, not an info dump. have little linear parts of the game where it's clear it's not a dead end and the only way to advance is to figure out and use a thing you don't know about yet, possibly with some tiny hints from a message or nearby npc). And well actually they do also just need better info dumps in the menus / inventory, like what effects different armors have, what buffs can stack and what exactly they do, etc. I don't understand the value in me looking at my stats before I cast a buff, casting the buff, looking at my stats after, and doing math to figure out the effect. And I for sure don't want to stop playing so I can google it.
IMO (complete speculation) the number of people saying "it's awesome the game doesn't hold your hand!!" who are going online and having their hands held by streamers, youtubers, forums and wikis is very high. Also a very high number of people who have played other FromSoftware titles and, even though this is an original title and not a sequel, correctly assumed that many core mechanics would be the same as their other unrelated games, and have no idea what it was like to be in this vast open world having no idea how anything worked.
I very much look forward to an expansion now that I've got a grip on how the game works. I'm very tempted to do NG+ with some self-imposed limitations to make it harder and also to try different builds (or just a straight up NG with a different build) but there are too many other games I want to play right now so I think I'll just wait for an expansion.
On March 24 2022 07:28 Latham wrote: It's actually absolutely ludicrous how much damage trash mobs deal in this game... I'm wearing some of the very best protection this game has to offer (Veterans) and I still get shit on in 3 hits by a normal mob in+ Show Spoiler [place names] +
Consecrated Snowfield or Farum Azula or Mohgwyn Palace...
What is even the point in wearing Heavy Armor and putting points in Endurance to midroll if it does shit-all for protection? I might just go with cloth armor or naked if so much investment in stats pays off so little. Maybe fast rolls are the answer to everything in this game.
I guess poise is only good for PvP? Not like you'll be trading hits with giants or dragons or shard bearers...
I wonder if I'd enjoy the other FromSoftware games more since they're more linear afaik so every fight can be better tuned to the player's power.
Just in that aspect, Bloodborne and Sekiro are your best bets. Those games have the best "balance" because From has a lot more control over the player's stats at a given point. Mostly, as you said, due to their linearity.
Dark Souls 1, whilst being the best game overall in my view, is probably the worst in that regard. Especially if you play unspoilered. A player who happens to find a Black Knight Halberd at the start of the game might as well be playing a different game altogether than someone who doesn't. It's ludicrous how OP you can get in the game basically by accident.
I think there's a lot of fun that can be had in these games if you tell yourself you have to do certain things, or that certain things are off limits. I did a playthrough of Dark Souls 3 where I severely limited how many bonfires I activated. The game has a ton of bonfires, which can make it kinda easy at times, but more importantly I felt like every time they introduced a cool pathway or piece of terrain, or created an interesting link between locations, they then immediately put a bonfire nearby and spoiled the point of it. So I said I'm not using those. The level design came forward more than it had before for me as a result.
I don't know if I'd do exactly the same thing with Elden Ring, but it's fun to think about that kind of thing. I think to the achievement system in the Starcraft 2 campaign, and how fun it is to hunt down all the achievements, because they all make you think of the basic missions in brand new ways and challenge yourself. I wonder if something similar could be done with a game like this.
I talked to an NPC who gave me the impression that I would have to kill her to advance her quest, no big deal I thought, but apparently there's a boss fight connected to her.
Now I'm closing in on 50 hours and I have but three bosses left.
I think something that would have alleviated the issue with the stats and fights being too easy or too hard in a open world game like that would be even less stat increase per level basically. That would also help making the general open world more open and less linear although ofc it's already quite impressive to begin with.
I'll prob write some criticism later but anyway good game there are definitely aspects where it shines and brings new impressive stuff and some aspects that i think could be improved or etc.
As a combo of a general Souls noob who has enjoyed playing somewhat so far, does Elden Ring make things a bit less opaque than some earlier games?
I'm pretty interested in properly grinding them out, and playing this one specially with only a month left of school and I've set myself a few months of relative chill time before starting a new job. Be a good time to get properly gaming away.
One issue I did find is, at least based on the info I've actually seen in the game itself it's quite difficult to build as it's unclear what some stats actually do, what certain effects do etc?
Maybe that's less of an issue with the later games, but I kind of set myself a goal of playing Souls games as blind as possible. So yeah sure I could look things up that other folks have figured out but it kind of goes against how I want my early playthroughs to go.
That kind of stuff any better with more recent titles, especially Elden Ring?
On March 28 2022 08:26 WombaT wrote: As a combo of a general Souls noob who has enjoyed playing somewhat so far, does Elden Ring make things a bit less opaque than some earlier games?
I'm pretty interested in properly grinding them out, and playing this one specially with only a month left of school and I've set myself a few months of relative chill time before starting a new job. Be a good time to get properly gaming away.
One issue I did find is, at least based on the info I've actually seen in the game itself it's quite difficult to build as it's unclear what some stats actually do, what certain effects do etc?
Maybe that's less of an issue with the later games, but I kind of set myself a goal of playing Souls games as blind as possible. So yeah sure I could look things up that other folks have figured out but it kind of goes against how I want my early playthroughs to go.
That kind of stuff any better with more recent titles, especially Elden Ring?
Mmmm the plot is just as hard to follow as in previous entries from FromSoftware. You piece it together largely by speaking to NPCs, reading item descriptions and environmental storytelling. As far as systems go, Elden Ring is truly the crown jewel of FromSoft, incorporating and improving past iterations of systems from previous games. I can see Sekiro, DkS1, DkS2, DkS3 in this. I haven't played Demons' Souls and Bloodborne but from what I've heard they've learnt lessons from those too, and incorporated them into this game as well.
As far as builds go the general archetypes stay the same, aside from Sekiro where you're locked to only a katana. While the name of the stat can change (Arcane/Luck) they all generally work the same from game to game. What changes is the breakpoints (how effective each stat point you put in the attribute is) and min/maxing to get the absolute most out of your stats (example: making sure you're not fatrolling in your armor of choice) but not a single point more, that could potentially go into damage...
There are hidden breakbars on enemies, and resistances to elements/weapons/damage types but I think you'll get the hang of those quickly and intuitvely. You also have those same breakbars and enemies WILL teach you about them, very very happily by killing you with overloading that specific breakbar.
Elden Ring improves on previous titles by making the tedious corpse runs usually shorter and that makes the game experience more enjoyable. Also, I feel like "cheap deaths" by gravity or ledges have also been reduced.
I started with the intention of playing blind and by the end of my run I had the fextralife map open on the 2nd monitor the entire time.
The fear of missing a boss / the urge to be a completionist was too strong. Playing blind on a first run and picking everything up on the 2nd run would have been preferable, would have also prevented me from being overlevelled and finding the game too easy. But I had Horizon waiting for me downstairs so I wanted to be done in 1 run lol.
Grace placing… Sometimes you get one around every corner, sometimes you get none but then usually a stake. The issue with this is that it doesn’t seem to matter if there is a shortcut you have to open nearby or not. Most «shortcuts» which felt sooo awesome when found in Dark Souls 1 plain don’t matter in this game. You either get a Stake of Marika before the tough part or even just another grace. I’m no big fan of the long ass corpse runs from DS1 but there surely could be some middle ground?
The crypts look/feel too similar in my opinion. I didn’t like the first one, i didn’t like the fifth one I entered/completed. Imho this is the only place were i feel a lack of variety truely showing (+apparently too many copy/paste minibosses later, but I only recently met the first few «copypastas»). They just feel too «same» to me.
General «issue» with souls games for me: Running/Ignoring enemies too often is just the «best» solution. The «ideal» playstyle seems to be to either «run passt/suicide run to boss/place you search» and «farm runes at the best spot you found to get some levels in». This wasn’t an issue for me in the early game at all but now in the harder areas this way of playing becomes more and more rewarding. General enemy damage seems to high, toning player and enemy damage down a bit a cross the board wouldn't hurt IF Flask numbers also get reduced.
Finished my first playthrough, after 150 hours or so. Absolutely incredible game. End game bosses are all really cool. Toughest fight for me in particular was Malenia. She probably holds my new record for # of retries. + Show Spoiler +
I haven't played Bloodborne, so maybe I'm not as attuned to a combat system that doesn't really have blocking as an option, but it really threw me that she heals on any connection, even if you block, so you have to dance blades with her and get good exchanges every time. Then the Goddess of Rot form, phew. I'm convinced I had a good run of the AI when I beat her, all my other attempts could barely get her below half.
Had to get up, take a break, and vent quite a few emotions once I finally beat her. It feels like a legitimate achievement to beat her. And then you're rewarded with the option to get her sword, which I'm loving at the moment.
Finished my first playthrough, after 150 hours or so. Absolutely incredible game. End game bosses are all really cool. Toughest fight for me in particular was Malenia. She probably holds my new record for # of retries. + Show Spoiler +
I haven't played Bloodborne, so maybe I'm not as attuned to a combat system that doesn't really have blocking as an option, but it really threw me that she heals on any connection, even if you block, so you have to dance blades with her and get good exchanges every time. Then the Goddess of Rot form, phew. I'm convinced I had a good run of the AI when I beat her, all my other attempts could barely get her below half.
Had to get up, take a break, and vent quite a few emotions once I finally beat her. It feels like a legitimate achievement to beat her. And then you're rewarded with the option to get her sword, which I'm loving at the moment.
Blocking worked fine for me. Even her whirly combo can be fully blocked and the heal she gets from it isn't that big. It might differ depending on your shield upgrade level, mine was +20.
With my bloodhound fang she died quite quickly. Regular LMB swings gave her mini stagger. A full 3-hit combo took like 15% of her bar which made her occasional healing inconsequential. Legit just held my shield up and attacked/guard countered/weapon spec'd. Super confused about how easy it was considering a lot of people name her as the hardest boss in the game.
I found the final boss harder. Guy's so big you can't see what attack he's doing lmao.
As for optional bosses both Alecto and Bell Bearing Hunter (Caelid) were hard for me. Had to come back later with a bunch of extra levels to kill them.
Ekzykes and Borealis were also annoying. They both have a one-shot attack where they jump into the air and target you with Scarlet Rot breath/Frost breath and it's an instakill. Hard to read when it's about to happen and even harder to dodge. Not a fan of them.
I'm sure there's builds that semi-trivialize certain bosses, but the whole process of playing the game, for me, is a journey of discovering what's satisfying or exciting or interesting moment-to-moment, and overcoming challenges with the character I've been developing over that time. The satisfaction I get from beating a particularly hard boss comes from the fact that I steeped myself in all the ins and outs of the encounter, and I learned and overcame that challenge with my own play style, and on my terms. It isn't so much banging my head against a wall as it is getting whipped into shape, to be a better player of the game.
That's what I got, in spades, from fighting Malenia. Beating her felt like a challenge to broaden how I approach fights, and to throw down the gauntlet with literally the undefeated swordswoman, and duel it out. Coming away from that fight and suddenly feeling like every other enemy in the game moved at half speed, and my shield was completely unnecessary for beating them was a supreme feeling.
Having finished first playthrough recently, before that I was wondering if I would want to play beyond it or not and yeah I'm still playing, I think the game does have strong replayability with the amount of possible builds, lot of content and choices at all stages so you can do different the next time, difficulty potentially always present, NG+ potential, plus pvp and etc. Solid. It's kinda hard to give a opinion without writing a wall of text lal so I'll just say i'd give this game a 8.5 or 9/10? I'd say it's innovative and kinda pioneering in its style something that i think brings progress to gaming very nice. I could list a few negatives but I don't know if I want to list all the positives to fairly balance it lolz.
10+ new bosses, and 8 new weapon types. A new map that is "bigger than Limgrave in terms of surface area". Limgrave wasn't THAT big imo but still nice I guess. And a new swamp area. Idk why this is listed as if it's a good thing lmao. Rarely have I entered a swamp area in a FromSoft game and thought "YES! A swamp!".
Super hyped though. Played Bloodborne for the first time recently. Also completed a Sekiro replay, and currently doing a DS3 replay. The plan was to do an Elden Ring replay after that and jump in the DLC, but June is a bit too far away for that. Could always do a Demon Souls replay in between xd.
In terms of scope, I wonder whether "bigger than Limgrave" means bigger than just Limgrave or Limgrave + Weeping Peninsula. Technically the WP counts as South Limgrave, so my guess would be the latter. Also, the true scope of the DLC will likely be effectively enhanced because, according to Miyazaki, they've made an effort to make the world "far more interconnected" with "a denser and richer level design." The difficulty will also be far greater, which would not affect the size, but it would certainly make it harder to trespass various areas. Furthermore I wonder if they'll be reusing existing terrain and connect it to the new area, which could also substantially enhance the DLC's scope. This is a possibility, but I'm only speculating.
I certainly hope so. I always thought ER was a bit on the easy side. Side effect of having an open world and turning up ridiculously overlevelled to all the story bosses. Not sure how the DLC would fix that, though.
I certainly hope so. I always thought ER was a bit on the easy side. Side effect of having an open world and turning up ridiculously overlevelled to all the story bosses. Not sure how the DLC would fix that, though.
And then there's the mimic tear of course.
I think the increased difficulty is a logical consequence of an experienced player base carrying over to the DLC. Everyone's a better player now. I can make ER as difficult or as easy as I want, as that depends mainly on how many dungeons I choose to clear in a single playthrough. Fromsoft made sure to give obvious hints to players who want to get through the game faster, and this also results in greater difficulty spikes.
Apparently a Sekiro mechanic will be introduced in the DLC, which would allow players to relive their experience of the base game. If a boss is too difficult, they can go elsewhere and increase their effective character power. At the same time an effort is being made that the bosses will be difficult to begin with. The Sekiro mechanic will allow for that.
The speculative part is how exactly Fromsoft is going to effectively equalize the player character's power from the base game. In the video it is theorized that the DLC would have its own power structure. That way the character level from ER will barely impact the challenge, but characters can still be powered up within the DLC.
Most people can beat ER at around RL 100-150 during a first and second playthrough. Fromsoft are not fans of grinding, so I'd guess sub RL 150 should suffice.