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Coming out of my weeks of self-imposed Souls community exile because King of Storms/Nameless King is breaking me. I can feel it. Close to SL 100 - without getting into nitty gritty, using a light-weight quality build with no shield. Gotthard's +10 is my weapon of choice, but I have a Carthus Curved Greatsword at +10 as well. I have enough resources to +10 another couple weapons pending recommendations for this particular fight. I've gotten this far without breaking out a shield but I'm willing to throw that restriction out the window if it means winning - though admittedly it's proven to be of little use. I want so hard to say this boss is "bad" (in many of the same ways Ancient Dragon was bad plus a slew of new ways), but I withhold that opinion lest it's my own bitterness talking. DS3 has an annoying habit of surprising you with new health bars when you think you've downed a boss (my surprise at thinking I was about to kill Soul of Cinder on my first try, lol). I can down King of Storms with relative ease, though it takes a frustratingly long time with pure melee. The difficulty is that it takes so long to get to the King himself that I'm psyching myself out and not getting the practice I need to master his patterns. Co-op doesn't help for poo poo, it just makes everything a cakewalk and leaves you complacent when you have to fight him alone. I've seen every move he has and on paper he's not a terribly difficult boss, but the fact that the "run up" to him is another loving boss (to make up for the close bonfire) is causing me to choke and lose my instincts that help me beat Champion Gundyr, who had a very similar feel to him. I'm willing to do anything to win at this point, save summon for help. I've gotten too far to give in now. I'd love to hear everything you've got on this guy, especially those of you who solo'ed him pure melee. As an aside, what's the thread's current spoiler policy?
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May 2, 2016 17:56
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So general advice for Nameless King seems to be:
I've personally been strafing to his weapon arm (my left) because that's pretty much ingrained in my DNA - when I tried the other way he'd often clip me with the end of a swing. What are the pros and cons of either direction? Also is Carthus Bloodring worth it with a decent armor under 50% weight? My problem is I'm switching up strategies so often that I'm not perfecting any of them. Regarding the dragon, is there a way to minimize his sky fire attack and coax out his grounded fire attack? It's just about the only opportunity I have to hit him safely.
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May 2, 2016 18:29
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Is NK weak to any elements I should be using resin for?
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May 2, 2016 18:34
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There's no need to fight over me - I'm aware of my need to dodge better. Having it pointed out doesn't bother me, but neither is it helpful. Things like what side to strafe, when to attack, when to heal, etc. most certainly are. Honestly learning more strategies to master the dragon fight is #1 on my list right now, because if I can make that fight effortless than I can start properly training for NK himself without being shaken about "oooh I've come so far, what if I mess up". Ideally I want the dragon to become an afterthought.
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May 2, 2016 19:03
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SciFiDownBeat posted:I like how the "dragon" NK rides is really just a big ol' crow that breathes fire. (a connection to velka perhaps?) we need more feathery dragons and dinosaurs in games in my opinion Reminds me of a giant archaeopteryx. 
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May 2, 2016 19:55
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net cafe scandal posted:When he's in the air. Even if I pick a direction and sprint as soon as I recognize the tell, I still get insta killed if I'm not at full health. Take this with a grain of salt because I still haven't beaten NK, but a rule of thumb that's worked for me is to just start running in a straight line the second you see he's about to take off, or better yet after every time you land some good hits. You'll miss out on some damage opportunities this way but if you just treat every take off like a 100% chance that he's going to use his flying fire attack, you'll rarely get caught by it.
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May 2, 2016 21:54
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homeless poster posted:I'm so happy you can invade as a sunbro and get a medal for killing the host. it's faster than any pve co-op boss kill that I know of, because of pve boss health scaling and the fact that hosts will always summon the max number of phantoms for a boss so now it has like 8x health and then they die halfway into the fight so you wasted all that time anyway. I mean they still summon the max amount of phantoms to gank invaders as they would for a boss so I don't see how it's faster unless you're exceptionally good. Maybe you are and I'm not giving you enough credit. I've found killing bosses to be way faster.
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May 2, 2016 22:15
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Is it ever hinted at why the Sunlight covenant item is so far away from the statue of Gwyn in Lothric Castle? Specifically why it's in some cultist's kitchen?
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May 2, 2016 22:29
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RatHat posted:Because the Sunlight covenant isn't Gwyn's? It's just that From doesn't place anything anywhere without a reason, and the room you find the medal in just seems too random. I get why they didn't wait until the last quarter of the game you grant you access to the co-op covenant, but I figured you'd find it somewhere a bit more meaningful. Like Gwyn's statue could have just as easily been at the High Wall, but they chose a dank kitchen next to some estus soup. homeless poster posted:no, you're right, but pvp is what I like very best about dark souls, so the downsides to pvp are less frustrating to me than the downsides to pve. I am the person who keeps telling people who run into 2v1 and 3v1 pvp mobs to actually try and fight them and get better and watch as you slowly start to win against them, instead of just getting frustrated with it and ignoring pvp all together. it is seriously a really awesome experience the first time you win a 2v1 or 3v1 scenario and it only gets more fun once you realize you can win 50% of the time or better. it doesn't happen overnight, but imo it's really fun and worth it. Fair. As a huge co-oper, that guy who just has to squeeze in that third phantom despite constantly being unable to summon is a pet-peeve of mine. I just lie on the ground for 5 minutes while they decide what the hell they're doing. Deified Data fucked around with this message at 22:38 on May 2, 2016 |
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May 2, 2016 22:35
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DP
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May 2, 2016 22:38
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Productive night! Defeated Nameless King and Soul of Cinder in one night. Took some of the advice the thread offered and beat NK on my first attempt of the night (after being stuck all of yesterday). poo poo got hairy in the final stretch. He had a few hits left to him, I had one and no more estus. I recognized that the only realistic path to victory I had was to stagger and visceral him so I started spazzing out with Gotthard's L1 in a last ditch gambit and fate provided. Finishing him off by ripping out his heart was immensely satisfying. Soul of Cinder was practically a breather after NK. His second phase is quite a bit easier than the first, IMO. Baiting out his closing attacks leaves him wide open. On to playthrough number 2. Not sure what I want to do yet.
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May 3, 2016 06:17
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Section Z posted:I'm not what you would call "Good" at PvP anyways, so my entire confusion is why basically everyone I have run into treat purple invaders as turbo Satan who should be taken down through any means necessary as soon as possible (okay makes sense so far) While a Red phantom is right there, trying to kill you (Aaaand now I'm confused). From a few pages back but it got me thinking about what the purpose of the Mound-builders was going to be in the long-term. Shortly after release they enjoyed a brief period where no one had an idea who they were and summoned the purple sign without reading it because, gently caress yeah, free co-op without being embered, I'm sure the mad spirit thing is just flavor, right? They were wild cards in that they could either help or harm the summoner, but I think that dynamic was entirely dependent on player ignorance. Once the cat's out of the bag, there's only so many reasons to summon a mad phantom - for the novelty or to gently caress with them. Either way, that wild card element of being summoned into the world of an ignorant and being able to do whatever the gently caress you want will be over very soon, if they aren't already. Even then, I played completely blind from day one and still avoided purple signs like the plague if I was intent on making progress. Just disappointed that the coolest aspect of the faction wasn't better implemented. Letting them fight bosses alongside hosts would give them a different endgame other than "I'm going to murder you before you get to the fog wall" (and can you imagine killing a host on the cusp of victory with a difficult boss? Or the paranoia a host would feel even if you have the best intentions?) Also not letting them mask the color of their summon sign seems like a lost opportunity. You'd still get the mad phantom text but if their sign was white there'd still be some element of surprise to them. Most of this is nitpicking but I'm just not sure what mad phantoms and the people who summon them get up to nowadays. It's basically a covenant for fight clubs/duels now, which is fine, but it sucks that their big draw is going to be forgotten.
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May 3, 2016 14:33
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That's the thing, if mound-makers had equal incentive to help or harm (like getting a vertabra from killing a boss, for example) then their wildcard conceit could be more believable. As it is, they're only getting rewarded if people die in your world, and killing you is a lot quicker than waiting for you to summon or get invaded by reds. I don't know, it's still a fun conceit and I can think of ways to make it work while still being fun for all parties, but it really requires experienced, confident participants.
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May 3, 2016 14:52
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Underwhelmed posted:The best way to blue phantom: Those sweet, sweet forked tongues are too good to resist. As a red I can be charging the host but the second I see a blue summoned I'll make a beeline for them. You're easier to kill for twice the reward.
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May 3, 2016 15:14
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An ember would be nice. Get at least as much for winning as the guy who risks nothing.
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May 3, 2016 15:17
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See I'm usually all aboard the "invasions should favor the host in all things" train, but I'm just so happy to have regular, functioning invasions back in a Souls game that my only answer to that now is don't ember if you don't like invasions. That little bit of health isn't often going to make the difference between life and death if you just learn to regard your unembered health as the default.Spanish Manlove posted:It's simple, if you don't want to be invaded, don't ember. Or play offline for super extra carebear mode. Or wait a long time for the game population to die out and then you can play online and embered in peace, or as I call it the Current Vanilla Dark Souls 2 Experience. I can count the number of times I've been invaded across 100+ hours in DS2 on one hand, vanilla and SotFS (excluding the bell towers). I like to think of it more as the Bloodborne experience, though. There's a game that really didn't want you invading people. Regarding playing offline, I'd actually argue that's the much more challenging experience for a first playthrough at least. Player signs and bloodstains say an awful lot whether you look at them or not. Deified Data fucked around with this message at 15:44 on May 3, 2016 |
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May 3, 2016 15:40
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RBA Starblade posted:The risk for invaders is them wasting an hour of their lives invading nothing but hosts with endgame battle buddies who can paste you instantly. Absolutely. In the process of maxing out Rosaria I think I encountered maybe 2 hosts who didn't have pre-summoned gank squads ready by the time I found them. And that's great, they deserve that advantage. I think the invader's lack of risk is perfectly balanced by how hard it is to kill a host with summoned allies. I really had to use my knowledge of the environments and enemy placement to my advantage. skasion posted:The pilgrims wear the shells to keep the branches under control. It's like a chrysalis. When they get to Lothric they remove the shells and the branches begin to overtake them, resulting in the intermediate form of tree dudes hanging around Lothric before they finally become a pretty butterfly. I specifically remember that the back-coverings are to prevent dark things from taking root in the first place, though I don't remember what description it was - maybe the cleric stuff. Deified Data fucked around with this message at 15:52 on May 3, 2016 |
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May 3, 2016 15:48
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ulvir posted:just bought the game on PC, and there's been a lot of talks about (really sinisert, game-breaking) hacking these last few days. is this a storm in a teacup-type thing where the outrage far exceeds the actual amount of hacking, or should I be worried and just play offline? Last I heard there was someone invading in Irithyll and getting people softbanned, but I play on PS4 (for just this reason).
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May 3, 2016 16:05
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BTW I'm hearing a lot of talk about how blue sentinels aren't working properly but in my time invading as a red they were an almost constant presence - at least 1 every couple invasions. I can't speak for how long it takes to get summoned as one but my hosts didn't seem to be having an issue getting them. People just need to invade more so the blues can get more action.
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May 3, 2016 16:10
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My goal when I invade is not to win, or to halt the host's progress, or even to test my skill. I invade solely to creep around in the level, make hit and run attacks, hide behind tough enemy mobs, and make the host's experience that much more tense. I want you to use all your estus and choke on hard enemies because you suspect I might be waiting around the next pillar. I'm just trying to make your experience better guys, now please let me kill you.
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May 3, 2016 17:34
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DP
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May 3, 2016 17:34
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Dr. Abysmal posted:I've never seen Heysel try to use chameleon on me but that's great, he's the best NPC invader. None of the others really try to use any dirty tricks or anything, they just run up and attack until somebody's dead. Heysel just fell off a cliff while I was running away to heal and lose a trash mob. A disappointing number of tough non-respawning enemies did this to me, now that I think about it. Katana-man and Havel as well. I'm don't even try to do it, I can just be running away to heal and their pathing AI goes full Wile E. Coyote.
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May 3, 2016 17:38
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BobTheJanitor posted:Does anyone else feel like Archdragon Peak was supposed to be a PvP area like the rat zones in 2? You've got the NPCs there that endlessly summon 'invaders' except the invaders are all NPCs as well. Plus it feels like there was supposed to be a covenant there that was pulled at the last minute. There's even that developer message about 'to walk the path of the dragon, do not ring the bell' or something like that. Which is pointless, because you can ring the bell and continue to do whatever you want in the level, either before or after killing NK. In general it feels a little bit like a zone that wasn't quite finished, and they just sanded off the rough edges and threw it out as-is. This was bothering me. So you miss out on nothing? This was while I was playing blind and I thought I'd just locked myself out of a covenant by pulling a lever. There's even the alter facing the giant dragon in the mountain that I was sure was the "offer your dragon scales to the almighty dragon" spot. Then I check the wiki after beating it and see there's not even a dragon covenant? Yeah, I'm not sure what the devs were going for with those messages.
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May 3, 2016 17:56
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I don't want people to play offline, I want them to be okay with playing online so I can invade them.
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May 3, 2016 18:09
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Genocyber posted:That note is referring to the twinkling dragon stone you can get, ya dummy. From a few pages back but I can confirm you can get both stones after pulling the lever. The dev notes are indeed meaningless.
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May 4, 2016 04:05
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Fight clubs and honor duels are stupid. Engage in asymmetrical invasions like civilized folk and stop pretending you can balance the game.
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May 4, 2016 04:52
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Mazed posted:PvP for me has been nothing but goobers in full Fallen Knight armor with the Dark Sword rolling around chugging Estus, and mostly only occurring when I'm doing co-op with someone. I'm sure there's actually some decent meta-game in it, but thus far this game's own NPC invaders and other hostiles are more interesting than other players have yet to be. Literally the same get-up my character wore for half the game, piece for piece. Same RP conceit too lol
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May 4, 2016 04:56
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So I really hope that peoples' frustration with some of the less-than-perfect aspects of this game don't push DS2 forward as some sort of golden age of balance and innovation. It's easy to let current frustrations overshadow past ones. Nothing in DS3 has made me think I'd like to go back and play DS2. I know it's just the normal flow of a sequalized series and opinions being opinions. Some opinions are definitely more wrong than others though.
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May 4, 2016 17:56
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Eldred posted:Is it really a bad thing to pick a good weapon? People get so weird about playing these games the "right" way. Is the AR difference between Dark Sword and other weapons really that pronounced? The thing I'll miss the most from checking out of the Souls community to keep my first playthrough blind was not knowing which weapons were loved/reviled by the community or why, so if I picked up a weapon and liked it I could just use it instead of hearing how terrible/OP it is. Now I can tell myself that if I ever want to use the estoc or the dark sword I can do so without giving a poo poo, but the seed's planted and there will always be a sperg in the back of my head calling me a scrub for doing so.
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May 4, 2016 20:17
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Just Offscreen posted:Oddly enough, I actually got and was using the Dark Sword before I read anything about it- I switched back to the Halberd once I found out. Yeah, because it looks cool and you pried it from the cold, dead hands of a skeleman. Why did you switch? No judgement, just interested in your reason.
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May 4, 2016 22:08
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May 4, 2016 22:20
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Undecided if I want to go straight into NG+ or start a new playthrough with a different build. NG was hard enough with light dex weapons and no shield, I'm honestly not sure if I could solo the game again like that in NG+.
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May 5, 2016 00:01
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So this is a thing apparently
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May 5, 2016 00:18
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turtlecrunch posted:I knew about the VA but... Hard to feel bad. Those guys are assholes. Begging for mercy once they know they're beat is hilarious. net cafe scandal posted:Does anyone know if the Dragonslayer Spear and Swordspear's entire moveset scales with faith or just the weapon art? Deified Data fucked around with this message at 00:37 on May 5, 2016 |
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May 5, 2016 00:34
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Weird that using a refined gem on most weapons makes them "refined" yet using one on the Manikin Claws makes them "skilled". Is there a difference?
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May 5, 2016 02:17
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Had a revelation last night: Mound-builders are for people who want to summon someone to invade them as red signs are to people who want to summon someone to duel. Like if you want to fight someone now but without any honorobru baggage that comes from the duelist mentality. Because no one summons mad phantoms to maybe, possibly aid them - the host is ready to fight, the mad phantom is ready to fight, I've yet to see any of the pretense of "maybe they will, maybe they won't" that people associate with this covenant. I wonder if that element was even From's intention, or if it's emergent.
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May 5, 2016 17:46
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E-Money posted:Still trying to keep my head down on a blind-ish playthrough so sorry if this has been asked recently. At what stat level do the scaling-based infusions start to do more damage? Been running fire on a longsword since the beginning. at 25/25 str/dex. At what point do one of the scaling infusions start to bring in better returns? You'll always get better returns with pure physical scaling than elemental fire, magic, dark, lightning, etc. Do you plan on using pyromancy? If not I'd use a shriving stone (or buy a new longsword if you haven't upgraded the other much) and infuse it with refined to better scale off your str and dex.
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May 5, 2016 18:00
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E-Money posted:You're saying that with 25/25 refined is gonna do more damage than fire on my +6 longsword? Thought you needed to have a certain base level of Str/Dex before the scaling beats the base damage boost of an elemental infusion. I'll give it a shot, i guess i have a million stones at this point (think i have all the infusions or am maybe one coal short at this point.) Just doing a boring sword and board on this one. What Harrow said - a classic Dark Souls deception is looking at an elemental weapon's higher AR and being fooled into thinking it's superior, and being surprised when you go out in the world and find you're dealing less damage than before you infused. Nothing illustrates this better than the Dancer's Twinblades with a whopping 3 elemental split between physical, fire, and dark that has to contend with those three defenses individually in every enemy they hit. So yeah slap a refined gem on that bad boy and you've got a hell of a weapon.
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May 5, 2016 18:10
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My second playthrough is basically a victory lap after the tough time I had with my first run. Sorcery, mound-building, summoning for literally every boss fight no matter how trivial - I plan on summoning three phantoms for Deacons because I can. Going to use MLG eventually for nostalgia purposes. I don't care if boss weapons suck, I want to co-op with peeps and shoot lasers. Early game weapon recommendations for int builds? I planned on just raw-infusing my longsword and using magic weapon on it until I pick up something cool. Probably going to use Sword of Judgement eventually, too.
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May 5, 2016 20:22
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Internet Kraken posted:Such as? I haven't used a weapon yet that felt completely terrible in PvE. This is Dark Souls. The presence of good weapons make everything else bad by virtue of their existence. Internet Kraken posted:Ah, well from what I remember the scythe weapons have always been trash Great Scythe enjoyed a period of prominence in DS1 PVP if I recall, but I've personally never liked the weapon type.
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May 5, 2016 22:16
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