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SHISHKABOB posted:Archdragon peak is a pretty good example of what dark souls is all about. You murder everyone and everything and then you kill a dude and his friend dragon. For really no reason other than they attacked you? And you rang a bell. The bell was weird. All I got out of killing that dragon lightning god guy was a set of armor and a titanite slab. Oh my god was he a pain in the rear end. You don't notice anything...interesting? About the armor description? And there was a reason for it. Tying up loose ends. 
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Apr 4, 2017 16:47
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so far I've made it down to the bonfire in the locust-man swamp, and I gotta say this DLC seems to be a combination of everything I don't like about DS. the whole forced stealth gimmick for the entire zone leading up to the first boss became obnoxious after the first time I didn't quite get into cover as well as the game thought I should and got blasted to pieces. that kind of gameplay isn't really challenging; it's just trial-and-error where you have to memorize the optimal path between each piece of cover. demon princes boss seemed pretty basic, but having to fight bosses with multiple life bars is just the only way From knows how to make a fight "hard" I guess? either way I was tired of multi-health-bar bosses by the time I had finished the base game, so seeing all of the DLC bosses pull the same stunt is just aggravating. then you get down to the ringed city, and you've got another forced stealth gimmick. learn the correct path to run between the archers and then fight the thing summoning them at the end! jesus gently caress I just did this for the entirety of the poison swamp; is it really that hard to come up with some other way to challenge the players? doing two stealth sections back-to-back is just lazy. the first part of the ringed city after the archer gauntlet, where you've going down some tower and lightning / curse zombies keep hopping out of walls or from the ceiling or wherever, was just the roof of the cathedral 2.0 and I hated playing through that area the first time last year. having annoying monsters jump out of crevices isn't tricky when that's the only kind of encounter in the zone because you expect it to happen. it was just annoying to have to creep forward one inch at a time with my bow in zoom mode so that I could shoot all of the lurking zombies before they tried to jump on my head. after I found the swamp bonfire, I started thinking about how loving annoying and pointless it would be to have to fight all the trash between the previous bonfire and the swamp bonfire more than once if you accidentally died between the two. i don't see myself ever replaying this DLC on future characters because everything about it is so tedious.
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Apr 4, 2017 16:54
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Genocyber posted:I'm liking everything about this patch, except for the defense nerf to the Church Spear item that is specifically when the host has summons, for some ungodly reason. It's not like you're unkillable as it is, in fact, you take about as much damage as the NPC version of the boss fight which means you can actually survive and it gives a reasonable amount of challenge to the host if they do summon. The only adjustment they should be making to that fight/covenant is making it so you can be summoned more quickly than an hour. Yeah, I'd prefer if the Church Spear stayed the same, but I would like it if they disabled Under Hunter Charms for the boss, because that's just mean! A boss should not be able to disable your estus! Also the boss can heal using miracles, which is kinda weird. With the health and poise boost you could probably heal yourself up indefinitely since you can have 7 ashen estus flasks, all while disabling the host's estus.
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Apr 4, 2017 16:59
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8-Bit Scholar posted:You don't notice anything...interesting? About the armor description? Yeah ornstein showed up at this place for some reason and perhaps got killed by the nameless king. Maybe ornstein went there to have a reckoning with his former dragonslaying compatriot.
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Apr 4, 2017 17:07
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Or he decided to go Full Hawkwood
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Apr 4, 2017 17:10
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Lord Cyrahzax posted:Or he decided to go Full Hawkwood Yeah that too, since his armor is just sitting on the ground, discarded. I wonder where he would have gone after that.
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Apr 4, 2017 17:11
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Got to the end of the DLC blind and without summoning (tho i cooped around the prince for 30-40 medals), but playing on NG+3 means doing Gael and Midir solo is a real challenge good Also being able to reset the boss/coop/invasion state by paying souls is a mechanic that i now wish was in the entire game, without having to resort to CheatEngine.
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Apr 4, 2017 17:13
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RoadCrewWorker posted:
Bring back bonfire ascetics!!!
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Apr 4, 2017 17:17
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Sif is at the Old Friends senior dog sanctuary
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Apr 4, 2017 17:22
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Freaking Crumbum posted:so far I've made it down to the bonfire in the locust-man swamp, and I gotta say this DLC seems to be a combination of everything I don't like about DS. Every time I read a negative reaction to the DLC I am struck by how different people's approach to games can be. I didn't die a single time to the angels (maybe because I have a good understanding of iframes? I just rolled through their barrages when they were about to hit and only took one or two minor hits every time) and thought the bridge gauntlet was quite clever. I think it's because I enjoy finding the "intended" way to play things and then optimizing that? I've always hated "breaking" games (a large part of why speedrunning is of absolutely zero interest to me, I find exploitation of glitches completely defeats the purpose) and tend to approach things with "now how did the developer want me to do this?" and then enjoying the "Aha!" moment when I get in their head and figure it out. So for me, this DLC was basically the pinnacle of Soulsborne and I enjoyed it even more than The Old Hunters. As an aside, I've figured out that the latter two angels can be easily cheesed with a bow. The first one you simply need to take a left inside the ruins with the single Thrall and run to the shack on the cliff side, then stand under the eaves and snipe the true body. The second one you just go onto the log above where you get the Harald Curved Sword (the little poison pool with the single knight) and you can shoot the true body from there. I discovered that second one by accident when I got invaded in that area, he was waiting up next to the true body and I was like "oh, I can just shoot it from here, that's easy." The poor invader was very disappointed. This is the kind of stuff I love about DS, things that are intentionally added to the game in order to allow you to bypass normally difficult mechanics and encounters. AttackBacon fucked around with this message at 17:51 on Apr 4, 2017 |
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Apr 4, 2017 17:45
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Now that they've finished all of Dark Souls, they should make a standalone game that is $20 and is just a boss rush mode.
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Apr 4, 2017 17:46
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I dodged the firebreath on the hill with the I frames twice, I am a god (I am really bad at dodging actual attacks  )
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Apr 4, 2017 17:48
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AttackBacon posted:Every time I read a negative reaction to the DLC I am struck by how different people's approach to games can be. I didn't die a single time to the angels (maybe because I have a good understanding of iframes? I just rolled through their barrages when they were about to hit and only took one or two minor hits every time) and thought the bridge gauntlet was quite clever. I think it's because I enjoy finding the "intended" way to play things and then optimizing that? I've always hated "breaking" games (a large part of why speedrunning is of absolutely zero interest to me, I find exploitation of glitches completely defeats the purpose) and tend to approach things with "now how did the developer want me to do this?" and then enjoying the "Aha!" moment when I get in their head and figure it out. So for me, this DLC was basically the pinnacle of Soulsborne and I enjoyed it even more than The Old Hunters. Yeah, I died a few times to the angels but it was basically me going "hmm, maybe I can run up to that item on that root and loot it before dying. It sure looks horribly exposed, though, I probably can't make it" then dying, which was completely my fault. I sniped the first angel's pilgrim after the Earthen Peak bonfire from safety behind a hut, then after a few tries managed to jump down on the root behind it and found a different path that would have helped against the second one. I didn't find the second angel's pilgrim, though, and just kind of left it alone, but wasn't in any real danger while avoiding it. When I saw where the body was a long time after leaving that zone, I basically facepalmed, since I'd been so close and had just neglected my exploration. "Show your humanity" is total bullshit, though.
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Apr 4, 2017 17:52
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It didn't take me long to figure out the correct solutions to the angels or the archers or the fire breathing dragon, and they aren't nearly as deadly as people make them out to be It's just not fun. I don't like stealth souls, and waiting around for an opening within an environmental hazard has never been fun for me in any game, 2D or 3D. So I don't think it's because we don't "enjoy finding the right route" as it's not like the solutions were particularly difficult to figure out, rather more that it's a gimmick that was used too frequently and wasn't ever fun to begin with Huge, open areas with random items, tons of enemies, and one clear route are also lame and not fun. This is the laziest approach to level design, and we sure saw it a lot in this entry for some reason Also what was up with all the non-deadly falls? From gets into the weirdest "grooves" sometimes KingSlime fucked around with this message at 17:58 on Apr 4, 2017 |
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Apr 4, 2017 17:54
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SHY NUDIST GRRL posted:I dodged the firebreath on the hill with the I frames twice, I am a god Under that bridge you get the Dragonhead Greatshield. I didn't have the faith for it, but I just 2-handed it, got to around 93% weight and ran up the bridge. It has 90 fire resist, and you only take damage from the fire on the ground. It's right there, too, so I'm guessing that was the point. On the actual bridge I just stood by his left hand and whacked it until he fell, and nothing he does can hit you effectively there. I had to chug maybe 2 estus and not even dodge anything while whacking away. It was kind of anticlimactic.
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Apr 4, 2017 17:56
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So, I beat Midir. Now I have to decide what to make from the soul. I want both choices, although I guess I'm leaning towards the Sword since Old Moonlight looks super cool but probably harder to use in practice. Goons, what should I do?
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Apr 4, 2017 18:00
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8-Bit Scholar posted:Bloodborne has the series' best tracks, particularly the themes for the final boss (not the "true" final boss) and the first boss of the DLC. The transition to Ludwig's second phase, synced to the music, is easily one of the most jaw-dropping moments in the entire series. Some more scattered thoughts from my run back through this game with a Katana/Pyromancy build -Seriously, Irithyll is an amazing area, it's got such a great sense of space and connectedness, and the environment has a ton of variety working around the city theme. -I like the idea of Aldritch's Faithful but it ends up just being even more of a meatgrinder than Darkmoon Garden. In theory allying with the Way of the Blue should get you some automatic summons to help you out and it will turn into a hectic and exciting team deathmatch, but in practice I got no summons to help me out and was just getting ganked by two invaders at once while trying to kill the Deacons and Giants. I just ended up going through the area unembered in the end -I'm surprised at how much mileage you can get out of Pyromancy without investing a ton of points in Attunement, Intelligence and Faith. I think I have 15 INT and 12 Faith right now? I'm still getting a ton of use out of just fireballs and applying fire to my sword even this far in the game. It's just a supplement to my katana sure but it's a good supplement, never really felt that way trying out sorceries and prayers. -Smoldering Lake is easily my least favorite area in the game. It's a reskin of Catacombs of Carthus, which already reminded me too much of the Chalice Dungeons. It's a mash-up of the most annoying enemies and mechanics in the game. Poison, toxic, rats, randomly flailing enemies with infinite stamina and attacks with no wind-ups and being able to leap into the air and suddenly fly forward 50 yards at the speed of sound and kill you in one hit around your shield. I hate the items that are placed in lava that kills you in a few seconds, I hated them in DS2 and I hate them here. The giant worm isn't any fun to fight no matter how you go about it. The boss is a good design that is dragged down by wonky hitboxes on his flames and how easy it is to get tangled in his legs or caught behind his hammer and slid around, which both looks stupid and feels like bullshit when it pushes you into an attack you were otherwise dodging properly. It's one of the only boss fights in the game that feels like it was rushed. -Apparently the dungeon jailers are a bit infamous with people and I can't really say I see the problem, they're an interesting enemy that forces you to change the way you approach them. I remember having a ton of trouble on the room where a ton of them are patrolling together on my first time through, but this time I noticed that you can let the red-eyed guy out of his cell to let him go to town on the jailers and thin them out for you. It's a cool little puzzle that rewards you for remembering the end of Farron Keep and the Abyss Watchers fight. The dungeon ended up being a pretty easy area for me, most of my deaths were from loving rats. Christ the rats are almost as bad as the dogs in this game. I hate these fuckers, they just pile on random sucker punches. Rats and dogs are the bane of my existence. -Really disappointing how small Profaned Captial is, it's a really cool-looking area but it's just one room before the boss, well and the side area that connects back to the dungeon. The hand demons are hilarious, probably up there with the giant crabs as my favorite enemies in the game. They're brutal but their moves are all telegraphed effectively. I remember I got wrecked by these guys on my first time through but this time I didn't get killed by them at all, I got killed by loving rats right afterwards though. Yhorn is an easy boss but between the music and teaming up with Siegward I really couldn't complain. -Fighting Aldritch and Dancer back to back was drat cool, they're both awesome bosses that provided a solid challenge. I love the variety of Aldritch's projectiles and how he forces you to dash around the room, and the music and lord of the fight are outstanding. This is a fight the game started building up very early on and it delivers. Dancer is very different from other melee bosses in the game because of how flowing and rhythmic her attacks are, you really need to get the timing down to dodge these properly. Gonna do Ashes of Ariandel first before moving forward now. I'm appreciating all the cool stuff in this game a lot more from this second go at it. Smoderkng Lake was the only real sour point for me so far.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:03
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Quantum of Phallus posted:Bring back bonfire ascetics!!! but really the biggest thing i miss is small soapstone signs Maleh-Vor posted:Now that they've finished all of Dark Souls, they should make a standalone game that is $20 and is just a boss rush mode. also was just on sale for like 5 bucks
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Apr 4, 2017 18:10
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I've seen the spell once in PvP and it completely owned me
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Apr 4, 2017 18:10
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Now that I've beaten Artorius v2.0 I am content to say I loved everything about the dlc. It reminded me of DS1, the feeling I got when playing it for the first time and how I dealt with the enemies and the oppressive atmosphere. It even brought back people complaining about "artificial difficultly" and "trial and error bullshit". It's the perfect send off for the series.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:27
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KingSlime posted:Also what was up with all the non-deadly falls? From gets into the weirdest "grooves" sometimes If you want to get technical the falls are explained because they're all big piles of ash that presumably cushions your fall, and they're marked in the no-fall-damage zone, but a number of them are drat near blind drops and it's telling they had to put all those developer messages in there to make it clearer. Also there's no possible way anything could be (or is) cushioning the drop to the Demon Prince or Midir, those are just falls that are there because they're cool so fall damage magically doesn't apply. Especially funny because the ladder that leads to Midir's area is a deadly drop if you fall down the hole but then ten seconds later you fall down a much deeper hole and are completely unscathed.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:34
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Seriously, I love how "fair" the bosses of the DLC feel. As I said before, they are all kinda slow and have really clear tells, and I'm all okay with dying if I can see the attack incoming while I'm attacking, mistiming my rolls, or getting my spacing wrong. I kinda gave up once or twice per boss because I was frustrated with the difficulty, but now I'm cooping and hardly getting hit! It's such an awesome feeling! In contrast, I still suck at fighting Sulyvahn - I never know how long his combos are or when he's open to attacks
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Apr 4, 2017 18:41
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RoadCrewWorker posted:oh yeah, that'd be nice too I really, really wanted to like Furi. I love the aesthetic, and I'm super into synthwave, but even coming from Dark Souls and Monster Hunter, I'm just not twitchy or patient enough for it. It becomes a huge slog when you're grinding past the first 5 easy phases on a boss before you can get to the one you're struggling with. I'd spend at least an hour on a fight, and the fourth time I'd lose my 3 lives during the last boss phase I'd be completely burnt out and not want to play it. Basically, it feels like fighting Pontiff Sullyvahn, except the only way you can actually hit him is with a riposte after parrying a full combo, and he has 6+ phases.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:45
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Surprised they are not nerfing Gaels' Greatsword, it can do a inescapable 3-hit combo that hits at least as hard as the paired greatswords L1-L1 combo.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:52
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The Gael fight is really well-designed and it's even a fitting finale thematically. My problem with it is that it's yet another boss with a glowing sword that sends out shockwaves to extend the boss's attacks, and the over-the-top anime flashiness of the battle is a bit much and kinda clashes with the tone the fight seemed to be going for. It gets way too visually busy at times.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:53
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There's a sigil circle in the landing spot of all the impossible falls
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Apr 4, 2017 18:56
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Nakar posted:This actually really bothered me because there were a number of falls in the DLC that look survivable and aren't, coupled with all these new falls that don't look survivable but are, and falls that you can't easily tell are survivable like the root to the second angel's body; that is, in fact, a valid jump, but you'd be forgiven for assuming it's just a piece of root geometry you'd slide right off of if you didn't know that area of the level is accessible from another spot. Did you ever try prism stones on them? I've never actually used one to test a drop, but they're supposed to make some noise if the fall is lethal.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:57
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unable to summon phantom eat my rear end in a top hat
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Apr 4, 2017 18:58
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Phantoms are a hot commodity.
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Apr 4, 2017 18:58
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Maleh-Vor posted:I really, really wanted to like Furi. And yeah, this DLC definitely harks back to a lot of previous patterns, obviously in a knowing wink and nod way. The dragon that breathes fire on a bridge in a trivially predictable pattern is basically required by law now, as is Patches kicking you down a hole, the callback to DS1's Great Hollow entry with the triple illusionary wall, that area that basically feels like a section straight up from the DS1 catacombs, the straight up DeS Old Monk boss fight. Probably way more than i'm forgetting or missing now. Even both Midir and Gael seem to encapsulate my favorite parts of their true-and-tried boss archetypes. All cool and good and a great note to go out on.
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Apr 4, 2017 19:01
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Augus posted:The Gael fight is really well-designed and it's even a fitting finale thematically. My problem with it is that it's yet another boss with a glowing sword that sends out shockwaves to extend the boss's attacks, and the over-the-top anime flashiness of the battle is a bit much and kinda clashes with the tone the fight seemed to be going for. It gets way too visually busy at times. There's a specific attack in phase 3, where he does a swing that explodes in those little souls that spawn lightning, like when he powers up and explodes, that he follows up with at least one jumping attack. I could never see what was happening since the whole screen got blocked by particles when he did that, so it was blind luck if I managed to dodge the followup or not most of the time. Anyone else get a kind of Dark Tower 7 vibe from the last fight? It's obviously very different in many ways, but the whole world moving on thing always fit with Dark Souls for me. Maleh-Vor fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Apr 4, 2017 |
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Apr 4, 2017 19:03
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KingSlime posted:It's just not fun. I don't like stealth souls, and waiting around for an opening within an environmental hazard has never been fun for me in any game, 2D or 3D. So I don't think it's because we don't "enjoy finding the right route" as it's not like the solutions were particularly difficult to figure out, rather more that it's a gimmick that was used too frequently and wasn't ever fun to begin with yeah, my feelings exactly. it'd be one thing if there were multiple methods to defeat each of the laser angels and you got to pick the one you liked best, but there's not. if you shoot them with a bow by popping out of cover, they just regenerate to full health, hidden body doesn't cloak you (at least until tomorrow), there's no amount of shield blocking that can withstand 100 lasers zapping you, etc. etc. so the only valid way to pass the obstacle is to scamper back and forth between cover until you reach a spot where you can whack the flesh glob that controls each angel. then you get to do the same drat thing in the very next area after the demon princes with the archers! it's similar in my mind to a rhythm game like guitar hero or rock band where there's only one "correct" way to complete a challenge (song) and you can miss a couple queues and still pass, but ultimately you either have to complete the challenge the way the designers intended or you just don't get to progress. like maybe the laser angel path could have been completely devoid of enemies, and the path that drops you into that ashen chapel would be packed with different monsters, but either one ends you at the demon princes, and then you as a player could decide whether you want to run the angel obstacle course or whether you want to just murder a path through all of the monsters.
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Apr 4, 2017 19:33
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What's the thing screaming its lungs off back at the first bonfire in Dreg Heap? I went back for the merchant ashes and I don't remember anything screaming before.
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Apr 4, 2017 19:35
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RoadCrewWorker posted:Probably way more than i'm forgetting or missing now. A fight against a dark corrupted person starts with them throwing a corpse at you off their sword (their stance is sort of similar too.)
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Apr 4, 2017 19:40
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Are the laser angels really that contentious? They've felt trivially easy to avoid with obvious cover, and their "switch" was generally found in a few minutes and taken care off. I was honestly disappointed they didn't respawn. Hidden body should've totally worked though (and will, so that's good).SHY NUDIST GRRL posted:A fight against a dark corrupted person starts with them throwing a corpse at you off their sword (their stance is sort of similar too.) It's been a while since i played that part of DS1, and probably much longer since the last time i didn't skip that cutscene. RoadCrewWorker fucked around with this message at 19:52 on Apr 4, 2017 |
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Apr 4, 2017 19:47
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I consider Gael more of a "best of" than "yet another"  also the Gael fight is better
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Apr 4, 2017 19:49
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Kild posted:What's the thing screaming its lungs off back at the first bonfire in Dreg Heap? I went back for the merchant ashes and I don't remember anything screaming before. If you mean the screaming angel, I think it's the old lady finally transformed - the things you kill to defeat the other angels look like pilgrims, so I guess that's just their final form. It's flying around in the sky if you look up (she's still enjoying the view, especially with you still in it!)
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Apr 4, 2017 19:50
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SHY NUDIST GRRL posted:There's a sigil circle in the landing spot of all the impossible falls
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Apr 4, 2017 19:50
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Jordbo posted:If you mean the screaming angel, I think it's the old lady finally transformed - the things you kill to defeat the other angels look like pilgrims, so I guess that's just their final form. It's flying around in the sky if you look up (she's still enjoying the view, especially with you still in it!) I need to murder it. Also is the bug man is another place past the Ringed City Swamp?
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Apr 4, 2017 19:52
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RoadCrewWorker posted:Are the laser angels really that contentious? They've felt trivially easy to avoid with obvious cover, and their "switch" was generally found in a few minutes and taken care off. I was honestly disappointed they didn't respawn. I haven't seen it since prepare to die edition came out. But it's burned into my skull. The rampaging bosses in dark souls are my favorite. They are so animated.
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Apr 4, 2017 19:52
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