|
Blighttown was designed to be oppressive and wear people down; the issue being it did that way too well. DS1 is like the only game where you have a token 'lovely sewer level' that is actually brilliantly designed to a fault. There's no laziness in design, everything is crafted to make a thoroughly miserable environment which, it turns out, is miserable to play through. Sure you can come back in run #2-through-infinite and feel like an ace, but don't excuse blighttown just because you figured it out now. Blighttown is a bad first experience. The torch = ladder might not have clicked with all of us; even if it did the whole place was a vertical maze. To make a level with so much vertical elements and confusing switchbacks requires real talent, and I don't think anyone can say they got through blighttown without at some point wondering where the gently caress they just dropped down to and how they can get back. When you finally find a path through that gauntlet you wind up in a swamp full of poison sludge that slows you down and infinitely respawning mobs to harass you. Plus it's a big loving swamp, your purple moss supply is very finite (and how would you know to farm it earlier?) Passing the gauntlet to reach the swamp will probably leave you with less estus than you will need. If you don't already know where the next bonfire is you will need to make repeated attempts at exploring the swamp. Trudging through slime while poisoned and low on estus, dealing with the infinite mosquitoes which you miss all the time because you don't know to use X/Y/Z weapons that hit them, and then fighting even more enemies as you explore the swamp before inevitably succumbing to poison again... I had a much harder time with Sens in terms of difficulty, but blighttown was a real low point in DS1. Sens was certainly a massive difficulty spike from everything before it, but blighttown just made me want to give up and quit playing the game.
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:29
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 6, 2024 07:37 |
|
|
RBA Starblade posted:Where's that at? I don't think I found it. In the area with the flaming heads on rails surrounding the one big room full of barrel hollows there's a visibly cracked wall, if you explode a barrel hollow in front of it then it opens a way through. There's a few hidden areas like this but that one has the best reward.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:34
|
|
|
Tallgeese posted:Why the Hell would anyone go out of their way to insult the guy for making cut content videos? Aside from the obvious stream of trolls that any popular content attracts, there were also a ton of people that just genuinely didn't understand what he was doing and got really angry at him for not doing what he asked them, even when he explained why he couldn't. For example, some people kept asking him for weeks why he didn't take off Artorias' helmet to reveal his face, even after he explained why that's impossible, and got really mad when he wouldn't do it (because, again, that's literally impossible). Other people would get mad at him because he made videos about stuff he didn't discover himself, or because he "cheated", because, yeah, apparently you're supposed to get to the unused content legitimately  For a while he just stopped doing unused content and try to change his YouTube video to solely remixes/remakes of music pieces from the series and a bunch of Let's Play videos focused on interacting with his audience, but he got a lot of poo poo for that too, so I think he just decided to give up on his online presence to focus on personal life/work. Can't really fault him for that, as much as I wish the videos were still available. EDIT: Also, obviously the hidden reward of the Old Iron King DLC were the pieces of Catarina armor. C'mon.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:38
|
|
|
Okay, I have never been "that guy" who rants about the abilities of other players, being a particularly bad player myself, but I was about ready to pull my hair out earlier sunbroing for the Fume Knight. Jesus Christ almighty you'd think these people were missing their roll button or something. I had one host--with two human summons, no less, get knocked down to 10% health shortly after the Fume Knight entered phase 2, and instead of running away and healing (the other summon had the Knight's attention), the host just rushes right back into the fray and gets creamed by the next attack. Just... GUYS! You're not going to get kicked out of the guild if you don't keep your DPS up! Man, I should've walked away tonight with four Sunbro tokens and I had to settle for one. Oh well. Praise the sun... I guess...
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:40
|
|
|
I found Mr Huggs 
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:42
|
|
|
Time_pants posted:Okay, I have never been "that guy" who rants about the abilities of other players, being a particularly bad player myself, but I was about ready to pull my hair out earlier sunbroing for the Fume Knight. Jesus Christ almighty you'd think these people were missing their roll button or something. I had one host--with two human summons, no less, get knocked down to 10% health shortly after the Fume Knight entered phase 2, and instead of running away and healing (the other summon had the Knight's attention), the host just rushes right back into the fray and gets creamed by the next attack. Fume is just a bad fight to sunbro in general since sometimes people don't even have any of the altars destroyed, and even when they do have a few destroyed half of them don't realize to keep him away from the healing auras.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:43
|
|
|
Of course, the "people don't realize they should keep Fume away from the altar" also goes for the summons more often than not.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 15:47
|
|
|
So i played a dual cestus build back in ps3 but the bone fist moveset looks so awesome that i'll have to do a new one. Have dual cestus been nerfed any? also getting two bone fist might be a bit of a pain since you dont seem to be able to get them until endgame. In any case im pondering if i should level up agility first since im terrible at rolling.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 16:00
|
|
|
If anything it's better with the addition of the Flynn's Ring. You can access the Ivory King DLC as soon as you can open the Shrine of Winter, so it isn't necessarily end game only. I think you'll have to ascetic a bonfire to get two bone fists though.Fair Bear Maiden posted:Of course, the "people don't realize they should keep Fume away from the altar" also goes for the summons more often than not. I feel like those altars were set there to deter coop more than anything else.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 16:02
|
|
|
Unfortunately, I'm having a hell of a time getting bites anywhere else for co-op since I'm waiting to make the jump to NG+ with a friend. I mean, I guess Scorched Ivory King is a possibility but... you know. Edit: It seems like Ricard's Rapier would be amazing with something like Sunlight Blade or Crystal Magic Weapon because of the flurry of attacks you get with the 1H R2. Am I missing something or is it Really That Good™? Time_pants fucked around with this message at 17:21 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 16:22
|
|
|
Time_pants posted:Unfortunately, I'm having a hell of a time getting bites anywhere else for co-op since I'm waiting to make the jump to NG+ with a friend. I mean, I guess Scorched Ivory King is a possibility but... you know. That used to be A Thing in Dark Souls 1.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 17:49
|
|
|
Time_pants posted:Edit: It seems like Ricard's Rapier would be amazing with something like Sunlight Blade or Crystal Magic Weapon because of the flurry of attacks you get with the 1H R2. Am I missing something or is it Really That Good™? Buffs don't work the same way with the multihit that they did in Dark Souls 1, as far as I can tell, so the damage on a full combo is less impressive. Combined with the merciless durability system making it impossible to lean on the R2 in PVE and the viability of other rapiers (the Espada's attack power is boss and the Estoc now does twice the poise damage of other thrusting swords) it's really not a great weapon this time around unless the recent buff to the last hit of the R2 is better than I expect. The best thing about Ricard's is sticking poison and bleed statuses with a single R2, but bleed is loving worthless in Dark Souls 2 as a strategy and poison is obviously not useful all the time (but can be surprisingly useful, especially in PVE at low levels/SM). And yeah, buffed Ricard's was indeed a thing in Dark Souls 1. You still had to land the loving thing, so it was funniest for gibbing immobile bosses like 4K and Seath.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 17:52
|
|
|
Count Bleck posted:That used to be A Thing in Dark Souls 1. It hasn't been nerfed or dialed back at all? I remember doing this with CMW in the original DkS, but I thought I heard that the Ricard's Rapier was a shadow of its former glory in DkS2... until I saw a video just now and it still looks as good as ever. Am I getting ahead of myself here or is it still viable?
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 17:52
|
|
|
Time_pants posted:It hasn't been nerfed or dialed back at all? I remember doing this with CMW in the original DkS, but I thought I heard that the Ricard's Rapier was a shadow of its former glory in DkS2... until I saw a video just now and it still looks as good as ever. Am I getting ahead of myself here or is it still viable? Ricard's is still pretty good, but not nearly as much as it was in Dks. This is because it was a monster to buff, due to the way weapon buffs worked in that game, where it added a set amount of damage per hit, based on w/e the MagAdjust was of what you cast it with. So with 40 Dex and Int you'd be doing like 350 phys 350 magic damage with each hit, which is kinda crazy. Buffs no longer work like that. Instead they add 50 of their element, then boost all of that element's damage on the weapon by a % depending on the buff. So if you got a weapon with 100 fire damage (that's base + scaling) it would boost it to 150 and then give the % increase. A weapon without that elemental would then get 50 plus the % increase. Now as to how to get the most out of Ricard's in this I'm not entirely sure, since I don't really use it much. Elemental + same element buff would probably be the best, but not necessarily since you're killing the physical damage (not only reducing the base and scaling of the physical but giving ~40% reduction to any scaling you do get). I'd say test it out against some enemy that doesn't have much physical or elemental defense, with physical buffed (With 40 dex) then elemental buffed (see this and this page for enemy defense values). Also one last note; the r2 was originally garbage but they buffed it with the Sunken King patch. Also to get the full combo remember you need to hit r2 again in the middle of the first one.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 18:01
|
|
|
RBA Starblade posted:Where's that at? I don't think I found it. Corridor with the spikes on the wall and on-rails bull statues IIRC. You have to lead the little guys with barrels. It's in one of Vatyi?'s new videos about Things You Didn't Know. There's also a door which is blocked by barrels you have to break through it to open.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 18:48
|
|
|
Hah. That wall is so obviously begging for a booming.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 18:52
|
|
|
I didn't notice that at all! I'll have to grab them before I finally move this char to NG+.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 18:53
|
|
|
There's another explodable wall in that area that has the Catarina gloves and boots behind it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:09
|
|
|
Protip for leading the barrel men. If you get them to less than 50% of their HP they will aggro on you and try to attack you, making it very easy to lead them to the proper spot. Then let them attack, back off, and throw a firebomb or w/e.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:10
|
|
|
Attestant posted:Blighttown is pretty bad though The only people that believe this are the ones that never had to deal with 5-2.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:36
|
|
|
Sheep-Goats posted:The only people that believe this are the ones that never had to deal with 5-2. I have to concur after playing DeS recently. I'd almost say I like Blighttown in comparison.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:42
|
|
|
I like Blighttown and the Valley of Defilement. Particularly the latter. I dunno why people hate these areas, really. My least favorite Demon's Souls level has to be Stonefang Tunnels. I just really don't dig that.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:48
|
|
|
I think Frozen Outskirts is better than 5-2. That's how much I disliked the no running + poison + big brutes combo. It was creepy as all hell though and I can't quite hate it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:50
|
|
|
I could never hate 5-2 for very long because 5-3 followed it, and I still think that that entire sequence was The poo poo for a whole host of reasons (not least of which was the music). As for Dark Souls, I actually rather liked Blighttown on PC, the framerate problems were 90%+ of my issues with that zone on the console version.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 19:59
|
|
|
Yeah, I only played on PC and Blighttown was one of my favorite areas. I was all worried because everyone had hyped it up and I dreaded going down there, but it wasn't that bad (I didn't even take the key route). I guess most of the hate was framerate related.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 20:08
|
|
|
Stick Figure Mafia posted:I was all worried because everyone had hyped it up and I dreaded going down there This could be said about the entirety of Dark Souls. In fact it could be said about the entire franchise.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 20:13
|
|
|
IGgy IGsen posted:I like Blighttown and the Valley of Defilement. Particularly the latter. I dunno why people hate these areas, really. My least favorite Demon's Souls level has to be Stonefang Tunnels. I just really don't dig that. 5-1 was good and 5-3 was one of the finest things that's ever been done in a video game but 5-2 is really unpleasant. I can handle it now of course but it's literally me just taking a route that minimizes it and maybe doubling back for the Moonlight sword. The first time through though holy loving lord. Can't roll in the swamp, have to roll vs. ogres, sometimes more than one ogre at once, poison, slowed movement, can't see poo poo, mosquitoes dropping on your head out of the visual area, some narrow wood bullshit you couldn't twitch-finger on and that set your teeth on edge every time you had to roll. On my SL1 run I had so much goddamn trouble with black phantom Selen too, she's a total nightmare. Can't block, can't roll for most of the fight because she'll run into the swamp and heal if you get her low, I think she kills you in two hits and if course she has the blazing fast falchion moveset, it was just hideous. I had to go make a cruddy magic short spear and two hand it to out range her. Stonefang was really unpleasant the first time for me as well. Being lost in those tunnels just sucked. However the loot in Stonefang is amazing and the rewards for killing Flamelurker are huge so at least I have some motivation when I go back there now (plus I really look forward to the Flamelurker fight). 5-2 only has the Moonlight sword which even my mages don't usually use, a ho-hum boss whose souls should be called Cheesy Soul, and it also doesn't have the variety in the world that Stonefang does (minecarts to tunnels to underground caverns to fire lakes to badass giant temple vs. unending almost featureless sewer). Also if you really hate Stonefang they put in a route so that the whole level was optional. No such luck with 5-2 until you had already gotten through it over and opened the shortcut -- but the boss there is so easy that getting through once is almost always enough. raton fucked around with this message at 20:40 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 20:37
|
|
|
BP Selen is very easy if you just follow this one weird trick! Just spam. After attacking her a bunch she'll pretty much always roll away, usually attempting to heal. This gives you plenty of time to catch up and do another spam. She'll never even try to attack.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 20:40
|
|
|
The issue with that at SL1 is stamina management. It might be possible but sometimes she moves far enough back that you have to sprint through the muck so you get to her before her heal completes -- if she does this twice I wouldn't have enough stamina to stop her second heal. Pinning her against the wood to fix this caused her to swing at me instead of run away which is an issue without a longer weapon than hers as you can't roll, can't block, and can't afford to take the hits. Also you're going to get poisoned doing this so if you don't finish the fight quickly you get one more thing to deal with. I got her eventually but they took away almost every option I wanted to use to do it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 20:45
|
|
|
Blighttown was awful the first time because I was bad enough at the game that I kept rolling off the edge when I dodged. I'm pretty sure my number one killer in my first playthrough was the cliffs of blighttown. Both world 5 in demon's souls and subsequent adventures through blighttown were fine because I got gud. I can't think of any other part of the game that made me seriously consider stopping and playing something less frustrating more than Blighttown though, not even traditional frustrations like O+S came close.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 20:47
|
|
|
I invaded and killed some guy twice in Lost Bastille. On the third time he used the cage elevators to run off to hide and popped a seed. Turns out if this happens you can aggro some of the royal soldiers from the bridge near Straids cell, stand next to Straid with a 100% physical block shield up and the enemies will kill Straid while hitting your shield.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 21:05
|
|
|
There's nothing sweeter than getting a host to kill his own NPCs.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 21:23
|
|
|
Blighttown was only intimidating at first because I managed to run down and barely make it to the bonfire, but then I kept getting my rear end kicked and couldn't manage to get out of blighttown and back to bonfires I was familiar with. The feeling of being trapped and exiled was palpable, as long as I could make it back to my 'home' of firelink I could always try going somewhere else, doing something else, or just retread undead purgatory/burg for awhile, but no; I was stuck in blighttown, and until I manned up and conquered it, there was no escape. Then I took a break from the game, and coming back to that bonfire in blighttown under the bridge, its very confusing which direction goes where. Which way is forward? Which is back? gently caress me. Course once I finished it blighttown really wasn't so scary and was actually one of my favorite levels. I love how massively vertical the whole map is, and how you think the whole thing is that rickety scaffolding and then you reach the swamp level and it just keeps going and going.... Man that feeling of going to a new zone in Dark Souls is just the best. Not knowing what enemies or traps lay ahead, which path goes to death or which to treasure or which to bosses... Its just the best.  I am so excited for playing through all this DLC. I was waiting for some friends to join me but I think I'll just plow ahead. I haven't played any of the DLC yet, but I've beaten the core game multiple times. Guess I'll do sunken king first! IGgy IGsen posted:This could be said about the entirety of Dark Souls. In fact it could be said about the entire franchise. Indeed. Zaphod42 fucked around with this message at 21:34 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 21:31
|
|
|
Does anyone ever use the Milfanito shrine? Just went back to the beginning of the console thread on accident and I saw someone recommending a bow to kill the "scary looking axe fellow" on top of the no man's wharf house. Couldn't help but smile.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 21:34
|
|
|
I'm playing through DS1 again and I can't believe I only just noticed this: Humanity looks strikingly similar to a black version of the stronger souls. Almost as if it were a... Dark soul 
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 22:42
|
|
|
Yeah, that's a lot of the fuel that went into the speculation that the Humanities are fragments of the Dark Soul and Humans are beings of Dark. Vendricks Dialogue in the DLCs for Dark Souls II confirms that, basically. Though, Vendrick may be speculating himself for all we know. Fun Fact: The only time a Dark Soul actually gets mentioned is when you talk to Kaathe. He's also who explains that an Age of Dark would be an Age of Man. IGgy IGsen fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 23:02
|
|
|
Oh yeah that's a big plot point of the first game, the pygmy found the dark soul and mankind descends from him. I just never noticed they hinted at it like that.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 23:33
|
|
|
Anyone think the Fire and Humanity are kind of similar? They're both beneficial in their own ways, but too much can cause problems; losing control of the Flame is what caused the Witch of Izalith to mutate and create the Bed of Chaos, and Manus is a primordial human whose humanity went completely out of control. I understand they share a link as humanity feeds the Fire, but it's kind of interesting to think that the Dark and the Fire are actually very similar.
|
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 23:53
|
|
|
SunAndSpring posted:Anyone think the Fire and Humanity are kind of similar? They're both beneficial in their own ways, but too much can cause problems; losing control of the Flame is what caused the Witch of Izalith to mutate and create the Bed of Chaos, and Manus is a primordial human whose humanity went completely out of control. I understand they share a link as humanity feeds the Fire, but it's kind of interesting to think that the Dark and the Fire are actually very similar. The major thing to keep in mind about this is that the Witch's Flame, which produced the demons and is presumably the same kind of (if not literally the same as) the Old Chaos in Dark Souls 2 was a false one. Her response to the dwindling of the First Flame was to try and use pyromancy to create a new one, with the kind of disastrous results that usually accompany the hubris of using magic to "take shortcuts" on divine laws. There's also a connection between pyromancy and the Dark in the lore, which we can observe from the existence of the Dark Pyromancy hand and chaos pyromancy, which is basically just the bridge between pyromancy and hexes aesthetically and conceptually. If anything, pyromancy is like a Dark-tainted version of the true Flame, produced by human endeavor; except the Witch of Izalith isn't technically a human because Dark Souls lore is nuts and impossible to really totally work out.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2014 00:10
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 6, 2024 07:37 |
|
|
I don't think that the witch of izalith created pyromancy, but she did have fire magic. I think pyromancy was created after chaos was created and the demons were created, and I think it was created either by some human guy or maybe by one of the witch's daughters (quelaana?). Here's the Demon's Catalyst, dropped by the Demon Firesage http://darksouls.wikidot.com/demon-s-catalyst Demon catalyst formed from Izalith molten rock. Can be used as fire weapon. The Demon Firesage was the first demon, and the last master of the original fire arts before the Witch of Izalith was engulfed by Chaos, creating pyromancy.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2014 00:21
|
|
