Dark Souls

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » October 1, 2011, 2:21 pm

Are you prepared to return to this harsh world?

Thread for the original game Demon's Souls:

http://www.veeshanvault.org/forums/view ... &sk=t&sd=a

Dark Souls is out this Tuesday and it looks great:

http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/09/30/da ... deo-review

I need to bed in the right mindset to deal with this game. It sounds like ranged magic has been toned down a bit so crafting those awesome + weapons will be even more important.

Demon's Souls was one of the few games that I didn't mind constantly dying.

Fairweather Pure · Post by **Fairweather Pure** » October 1, 2011, 2:45 pm

I tried the first one 2-3 times but have never been able to get into it. I won't buy the sequel until I play through the first one or see it for 20$ or less. At least I can play the sequel on the 360.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 5, 2011, 5:18 pm

Got through the second boss fight last night, and I've died about a bazillion times. I think I'm going to farm souls around a bonfire for a while and level up a few times before I move further.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 7, 2011, 4:26 am

I'm trying not to give up on this game because I do like it, but I think the difficulty level is unnecessary. There are enemies that I've died 30 times trying to kill, and it ceases being fun at that point. We'll see how it goes.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » October 7, 2011, 6:08 am

Funkmasterr wrote:I'm trying not to give up on this game because I do like it, but I think the difficulty level is unnecessary. There are enemies that I've died 30 times trying to kill, and it ceases being fun at that point. We'll see how it goes.

Did you look online for hints? This series is the type that it doesn't ruin the game to get some strategies on certain bosses/areas since it's so damn hard.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » October 7, 2011, 12:51 pm

Sounds fairly similar to the first one. I havent started yet because I am still working my way through Disgea4 and the last of the New Vegas DLC.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 7, 2011, 4:59 pm

Winnow wrote:
Funkmasterr wrote:I'm trying not to give up on this game because I do like it, but I think the difficulty level is unnecessary. There are enemies that I've died 30 times trying to kill, and it ceases being fun at that point. We'll see how it goes.
Did you look online for hints? This series is the type that it doesn't ruin the game to get some strategies on certain bosses/areas since it's so damn hard.

I tried. I just got past the bridge where the dragon breathes fire on you. I'm having troubles with the big ass black knight, and with the skeletons with red capes. I've leveled myself to like 18 and raised my strength high enough to use the sword you get from shooting the dragons tail but still haven't been able to clear them out.

Aslanna · Post by **Aslanna** » October 8, 2011, 1:08 am

I am going to pass on this one because I play games to have fun not be frustrated. Which is why I usually check reviews (and trophy guides!) first. I think they probably amped things up because of the last one and how everyone said how awesome it was because of how hard it was. But if that's what some people like they're free to enjoy. They wont be seeing any of my money though!

Oh and what's the deal with Atlus being dumped as publisher for this one?

miir · Post by **miir** » October 8, 2011, 11:42 pm

Atlus was just the NA publisher for Demon's Souls.
I wouldn't say they were dumped, it's just that the publishing rights for Dark Souls were never actually openly available to third party offers.

Late last year, From Software signed a publishing deal with Namco Bandai... which gave them publishing rights to Dark Souls and Armored Core 5 for every region except Japan.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » October 15, 2011, 2:59 pm

Dark Souls Strategy Guide:

http://beta.demonoid.me/files/details/2753745/

Good guide. .pdf indexed so easy to find what you're looking for.

Well, My eyes are officially on fire from staring at my laptop...

BUT it was for the greater good and I have no problem with that.

This is the COMPLETE GUIDE to Dark Souls

I destroyed my Strat Guide just to make this release for you, so you better damn appreciate it.

I also used OCR so every word in here is searchable, its not just image scans. I also took the time to create chapters that almost 99.9% match up with the Table Of Contents in the beginning.

There is 1 page that is slightly askew, but 100% legible.

I highly recommend anyone with a Tablet to use their E-Reader and load this on there, looks great and easy to use while playing.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 17, 2011, 3:53 am

Awesome, I was actually going to ask you if you could try and find that guide

Hopefully it'll work on the ipad.

Fairweather Pure · Post by **Fairweather Pure** » October 17, 2011, 9:46 am

Funkmasterr wrote:Awesome, I was actually going to ask you if you could try and find that guide Hopefully it'll work on the ipad.

Strategy guides on the iPad is one of life's little pleasures.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 17, 2011, 9:19 pm

Fairweather Pure wrote:
Funkmasterr wrote:Awesome, I was actually going to ask you if you could try and find that guide Hopefully it'll work on the ipad.
Strategy guides on the iPad is one of life's little pleasures.

Fuckin right!

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 19, 2011, 4:29 pm

Spent a bunch of time getting my armor all up to + 3, and four weapons up to +5. Beat the Capra demon, hellkite dragon and gaping dragon last night. Hoping to ring the second bell tonight.

I'm determined to beat this before the end of the month so I don't get distracted when games start coming out.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » October 19, 2011, 4:48 pm

Well, I killed the first fucking merchant accidentally, so the game has been extra hard for me thus far. Should probably restart since I am out of arrows and have no way to drop the fucking dragon.....

This game is really hard, but not as frustrating as the last one for some strange reason. Holy shit did they nerf magic and soul farming spots, though.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 19, 2011, 6:18 pm

My buddy killed him too and started over. I still haven't came across another vendor with arrows so you're hosed there.

I haven't done a ton of soul farming yet, but am at about level 25. After killing the gaping dragon and getting the 25k souls though I'll jump up a few! I'm not sure I'm allocating my stat points right, but not having too much trouble yet so I can't be doing that bad.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 22, 2011, 6:21 pm

So I spent a bunch of time farming in blight town for titanite. Got my and winged spear to +10, and got my hollow soldier shield to the same and all my armor to +7(wanderer set). I am around level 50, and the next thing I'm supposed to do is revisit the undead asylum. Well, the stray demon is one shotting me before i can even get behind him. I've tried using the black knight shield for fire resist too and nothing.

Any suggestions from any of you that have done this fight? I was thinking about going and doing send fortress but there's no point in me going there without getting the doll for the painted world of aramis.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 22, 2011, 7:45 pm

Never mind. Once I timed my roll right and got behind him he was dead in under a minute. On to sens fortress!

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 23, 2011, 7:10 am

Sen's Fortress can blow me. That's all.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 23, 2011, 9:19 am

I wish there was a way to choose not to participate in pvp in this game without also losing the rest of the online features. I got invaded twice on the roof of sen's fortress by the same guy. The first time I got myself killed, the second time the pussy kept running from me when my katana took half his health with one swing, he was trying to lure me to one of the giants so he could do the heavy lifting for him. That's cowardly bullshit and beyond frustrating. This game is hard enough without that shit.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 23, 2011, 8:31 pm

Indicted that dude from last night, so I feel a bit better. Beat the iron golem in sen's fortress on my first try today. Amir london is really cool looking. Gonna see if I can clear this and the painted world of aramis out tonight. I'm really likin this game despite the frustration level.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 25, 2011, 7:46 am

Beat the four kings tonight, that was a bastard of a fight. It's looking like I'm on track for beating this before uncharted comes out!

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 25, 2011, 7:48 am

This whole time I assumed you couldn't target lock people that invaded your world, but found out its because they are using the fog ring. Supposedly they are going to patch a change to that, which will be nice.

Got invaded by two people at once in darkroot basin today and I beat them senseless. Was a good feeling.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » October 27, 2011, 8:34 pm

Beat it last night! I'm going through a second time to see how quick I can do it. Rang the second bell after playing for about 45 mins.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 3, 2011, 1:14 pm

Is there any way to beat the fucking Hydra as a mele focused build? I really do not want to start blight town before the heart of the forest area, but I am getting raped by the hydra, despite plowing nearly everything else up this point with my armored halberd guy. Can you Poison Arrow Sploit him?

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 4, 2011, 12:17 am

[Show]: If you run past him to the stone dragon, hang out there for a minute then run back, he should just glitch and die on your way back. May have to try a couple of times but it worked for me on the first try.

Other than that, you just have to have high stamina and a good shield. Get into range so he doesn't use his water spray attack, block until he slams his heads down, hit him a few times, repeat for like 10 minutes.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 4, 2011, 12:32 am

If you need hints on any other fights let me know. I'm almost done with my second play through and have gotten to know everything pretty well. I got through the catacombs and tomb of the giants in about 15 minutes this time through.

Blight town was the low point of the game for me. Tons of lag, the blow dart snipers will inflict strong poison (toxic status) in like two shots whether you're blocking or not, the first 2/3 of it is all on narrow walkways which makes the lag really spice things up. Probably doesn't help I spent like 6 hours farming large titanite shards off the leeches either. Do yourself a favor and go up the water wheel and open up the shortcut through valley of the drakes/new londo. Makes any return trips before you can warp way faster.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 7, 2011, 5:18 pm

Decided I'm going for 1000 points on this one, just need to get a few spells and the third weapon from sif's soul. Should be done today.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 9, 2011, 12:42 pm

I am doing things in kind of a fucked up order, mostly because I am largely tackling this spoiler free (outside of crafting) when I can. I have not set foot in Blight Town yet, but I have already completed the Sif, Moonlight Butterfly, Pinwheel, Stray Demon, and Gaping Dragon encounters. I wasted most of last night fucking around in in the Land of Giants, or whatever its called, but that place is soooooo fucking annoying. Is Blighttown really worse than that? Also, looking for a good soul farming spot, since I want to up my STR to be able to swing the heavier weapons, since I am going the tank route. I have heard that opening the forest door allows for some creative farming of the Forest Guild derps. Is it worth doing that?

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 9, 2011, 12:46 pm

ps- The Sif fight was probably the most satisfaction I have had in the game, largely because there were no gimmicks to beating him and you don'y just circle around and poke him in the ass to win. I finally figured out how to get in the narrow postage stamp area of the shoreline to avoid getting blasted by the Hydra without falling to my death. The Stray Demon was the most annoying fight ever, until I figured out where to stand and blast with my shitty soul arrow spell. His hitbox sucked, as in how does my fucking halberd miss this fat fucker kind of suck. Not to mention, trying to tackle him with a fire weapon was not a good idea....

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 9, 2011, 3:09 pm

I guess tomb of the giants and blight town are about tied. Blight town is annoying cause of lag, but on my third play through I was able to breeze through it. Tomb of the giants is easy to breeze through if you don't care about getting the items, otherwise it's rough. In tomb, I did a lot of the fights by using the cast light spell and killing the giant skeletons from the ledges above them with arrows or magic.

If you open that door in the forest that is a good farming spot, probably as good as or better than anywhere else since the dudes are relatively easy.

Circling around sif and poking him is exactly how I beat him, haha. The stray demon does suck, just wait until you fight the beefed up version in the demon ruins, he's a real treat.

The second time through, the gwyn fight was really hard. I probably died 20 times. I just beat smough and ornstein again, and that one gave me some trouble too. I have to go beat the stray demon again so I can go to the painted world and farm souvenirs of reprisal, and I'm not looking to either part of that at all.

I'd say the dumbest boss fight is the bed of chaos. You don't really attack him, and I suffered a fair amount of cheap deaths due to his sweep attack knocking me into a hole in the floor.

The spoiler free route is fine as long as you aren't trying to get most or all of the achievements. If you do want to go for them, it's nearly impossible to not use the guide due to the ridiculous order you have to do something's in to get some of the spells/items.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 9, 2011, 7:01 pm

I'm not really a trophy whore and most of this game can be figured out on your own, with the crafting being the major exception. I should probably backtrack out of Tomb of Giants and eat the giant Blight Town shit sandwich to ring the second bell, because that hike in and out of there sucks balls.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 9, 2011, 7:56 pm

Yeah if you aren't going for trophies it's easy to figure out on your own. Getting into blight town sucks until you open up the valley of the drakes/anor londo short it, then it's not do bad.

If you're using pyromancy you may want to get some spoilers on one of the npcs, I personally wouldn't have figures it out on my own. Let me know.

I just have to beat sif and craft a weapon with his soul, then beat the bed of chaos and get one last spell and I'm at 100%.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 10, 2011, 12:41 am

All achievements done. Good thing too, ive taken about all the frustration I can stomach from this game.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » November 10, 2011, 10:27 am

How may hours of entertainment/frustration/satisfaction did you get out of Dark Souls II?

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 10, 2011, 11:04 am

I think my save file says 160 or so, but 10-20 of that was probably me leaving the game on when I wasn't playing. Not bad though!

Fairweather Pure · Post by **Fairweather Pure** » November 10, 2011, 11:56 am

What did you like better, Demon Souls or Dark Souls? There's some interesting debate out there!

160 hours?!? Sounds like a nice warm up for Skyrim!

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 10, 2011, 12:33 pm

I never finished demon souls so I can't really say, but liked it a lot, despite some cheap mechanics and high frustration factor.

Definitely! I'll be getting into that tomorrow. One upside to being unemployed is I've been able to keep up with games as they come out.

Fairweather Pure · Post by **Fairweather Pure** » November 10, 2011, 12:39 pm

You should update your finished games list!

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 10, 2011, 12:46 pm

Yeah the thought occurred to me when I finished dark souls. Now I just have to remember what I've beat. By the way, I'm counting gears 3 as being 100% complete when I get all of the achievements except seriously 3.0. That achievement is a joke and shouldn't have been put in the game.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 10, 2011, 5:04 pm

Did Blight Town and all the small zones connected to it at the bottom. The actual zone was not bad to me, but getting back out after going all the way to the Stone Dragon and Queelag sucked total ass. Granted I had some light armor and the rusty ring for the swamp and had lots of moss from doing the Sif area first. There needs to be a fucking shortcut back from there, though, getting back to firelink sucked balls. Second Hydra was a joke, since there was nice open ground to zig zag in on it. That climb down the fucking tree can eat my ass, though. I will be back there once I get the teleport thing.

As for my character setup, I am mostly mele focused. Started out Deprived, wearing mostly stone armor, with mask of mother and a flaming halberd (divine spear is my backup) and a mix of sorcery spells for pulling. Stats are something like 36 END, 24 STR, 14 Atune, 14 Int, 12 Faith, 16 Dex at SL 52ish? Poise is stupid good in this game and if I didn't need the poison resist and less weight in the swampy part of Blight town, I never would be in anything less than full tank mode in this game. Such a radical shift from the last one in that respect....

Still the best game I have played all year. Reminds me of old school EQ feeling, without the drama.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 10, 2011, 5:32 pm

As for which is better, well I am playing both at the moment (Demon Souls in the bedroom to go to sleep, Dark Souls in the livingroom when the wife is not playing Batman) and I feel I can comment:

Dark Souls-
Pros- More Sandbox feel, better online concept, much superior atmosphere, better paced character growth, less missable drops, better crafting system, humanity system is better than the Tendency system, better variety of viable weapon options, more save points for shorter recoveries from death, lots of optional side quests

Cons- Some framerate lag in certain areas, targetting and camera is much worse than before, mele is the only way to go after a set point in the game, absurd gear scaling issues, uneven difficulty places, online code and balance is for shit, needs more shortcuts in certain zones (notably Catacombs and Blightown Swamp), weapon movesets mean more than the actual damage most of the time, early game is balls hard then goes retard easy for a long while

Demon Souls-
Pros- Every area runs completely clean (might be cross platform design issue?), controls are a touch smoother especially the camera lock, more viable playstyle options, clear goals to complete the game, better online net code, more gradual difficulty curve, combined talisman and catalyst item made playing an all around mage bearable, magic point system was better than the limited uses horseshit in Dark Souls

Cons- Tendancy system was so obscure as to be unusable without spoilers, crystal lizards dropping all of two moonstones per cycle if you were fortunate, Sorcery greatly overpowered at all stages of the game (as opposed to Pyros being OP in early DS), Spear and parry shield being stupidly better than any other PvE option, Heavy tanking characters being complete shit in PvE, ridiculous recovery runs to retry fights where you get two shotted, ludicrously grind intensive soul and ore farming

Of the two, I prefer Dark Souls, though Demon Souls was more polished of the two games. Being able to tank it out in the game and explore more made this game way more fun, plus a lot of the frustration factor was scaled back in this game. Finally, the only real farm grind you need to do is the ore grind right before the Gargoyles to gear up a little, after that you pretty much get what you need to progress through normal play.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 15, 2011, 1:21 pm

Completed Dark Souls:
Highlights of the game-
Andor Londo, Ash Lake, Painted World, Duke Archives

Low Points-
Crystal Caverns, The Hollow, Sen's Fortress early mario bullshit

Hardest Fights-
Four Kings, Gaping Dragon (at the time you tackle it), Smough and Ornstein

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 15, 2011, 2:41 pm

Yeah crystal caverns was definitely a low point for me too. I'd add new londo ruins to that list personally.

Four kings was tough until I figured out how to go about it, then it was a joke. Smough & Ornstein. I thought the gaping dragon was a cake walk, you just need to make sure to kill the Mage up above beforehand. I had a real tough time with gwyn on my second play through.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 15, 2011, 4:20 pm

New Londo I didn't mind at all, but then again, I had a cursed weapon from doing Silf first and by then I had already done the entire catacombs, so nearly everything else seemed easier at that point. Gaping was hard mainly because it was early on and I had issues with weapon durability at that point. Plus, his hitbox kind of played havoc with my mele, since I was a halberd user most of the game. The damn death hike into the catacombs is probably my least favorite part of the entire game. There should have been a bonfire right after pinwheel that you could warp to. Once I went back to finish it, I had white dragon breath and those crawly guys were a joke, but I can't imagine what infinate respawn Nito is going to be like on NG+, with how annoying he was the first time around.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 15, 2011, 8:02 pm

It war curses that bothered me in new londo, I had plenty of transient curses. It was the groups of ghosts and their quarter fucking mile death grip.

Yeah catacombs and especially tomb of the giants was the downside of the game to me. Trying to fight shit with big range and stamina draining attacks in such a small place sucked.

I had no problem with nito. Right when you drop down, I stuck right on the edge of the rock and hit him with arrows. His adds didn't move, and all he did was hit me with his blade attack maybe 4 times.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 16, 2011, 12:21 pm

Sounds like you were more archery focused than I was. My stats are mostly in tanking and sorcery. Speaking of which, holy fuck is the crystal shield broken as hell. Finally started using it the second playthrough and never knew how ridiculous it was. Plus, having a Chaos Halberd +5 and Homing Crystal Soul Arrow trivializes most of the first half of the game.

Funkmasterr · Post by **Funkmasterr** » November 16, 2011, 12:36 pm

I did a fair amount of it, but with that game I was always looking for ways to be as cheap to it as it was to me, and a lot of times you could kill bosses or mini bosses like that. I hardly used magic at all.

Yeah once I knew my pace, the second play through was smooth sailing aside from a few parts. I probably rang both bells in under a hour. I had a quelaags furysword +5, lightning winged spear +5, iaito +15, and black bow of Pharos +15 as my main weapons.

All my grinding paid off in that respect though, once I upgraded my weapons/armor/shield and started wearing the ring of fog whenever I was human, I never died to an invader again (so for almost two times through the game).

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » November 23, 2011, 1:24 pm

Were you able to skirt around the considerable difficulty of Dark Souls by finding potent tactical combinations, like casting Iron Flesh and Homing Soulmass in tandem to turn yourself into an invincible, automatic killing machine? Well, you can't do that anymore: Dark Souls patch 1.05 was recently released, adding a handful of new features, tweaking a few abilities and outright nerfing some spells, including the two mentioned above.

You guys had it easy!

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » November 29, 2011, 10:51 pm

After getting chain invaded by people with stacks of bombs and retardedly upgraded armor, I checked the interwebs and figured out it was from people using the dragon head soul cheat to keep their levels artificially low while pumping their gear. I got sick of it in the Archives and Crystal Caverns, especially, along with the stupid amount of grinding it was going to take to cap off my weapons, so I cheated up to pump my level outside the normal PvPer range and upgraded my stuff as much as vendor shards would allow. I don't really feel like I cheated myself, having beaten the much more difficult Demon Souls legit, but I really did not feel like sitting through that grind again and was tired of people constantly trying to get cheap kills when I would get close to the end of Seath, so I figured fuck it I will save myself some time before Skyrim hits. The impact was pretty minimal, outside of the time issue, since the vast bulk of main bosses tend to two shot you anyhow, if you do not know how to play, and all the hall trash is very trivial. It really was not relavent in PvP since I was not abusing Tranquil Walk or anything similar, and you can be level zillion and the backstab lag sploit will still two shot you.

To me, the biggest nerfs in that patch are the across the board stability nerfs to medium shields (parry is huge in a large number of fights, especially the last one) and the attempt to get people to wear more than two main armor sets. The problem is the game supports two main playstyles and there is (still) one best set for each style. I never really abused Pyromancy, as I found it too quirky and knew more about sorcery from the first game. I also used either golem armor or (later) Paladin armor to keep from being dependant on the Havel Ring. I never used the Gilded armor, as I had enough Strength in my build to use the Ornstien stuff in light armor mode. The weapon nerfs mean zero to me, since I almost always use either my Chaos HAlberd or the Magic Lucern Hammer. Ultimately my Hallow Soldier shield being nerfed will be the biggest negative impact of the patch, as I relied heavily on parry.

I guess I would leave the dragon head bug in the game since everyone has already used it to make optimum builds in the game and can do so again by deleting patch data and playing offline for a time. All thats going to happen is the PvPers who got to make opimized characters will be able to rape the poor bastards who didn't. Balance changes I am largely indifferent to, but that Captain America Shield needed to be nerfed for certain.