Dark Souls II

4th time was the charm. I also respected my Sorcerer into having 30 STR for the Tower Shield+10. I needed the two NPC summons to tank for me while I was there, and one of them died, but I beat Sir Alonne! My hands are shaking right now from the excitement of it all, so typing is a little hard.

edited 7th Sep '17 6:15:34 PM by VeryMelon

Excitement jitters. Long time since I had them, but pretty sure they've been mostly Soulsborne related.

Only a Souls game makes me feel that way these days. Well, that and Kingdom Hearts.

edited 7th Sep '17 6:45:23 PM by VeryMelon

Wait, you summoned against Alonne rather than fought him solo in glorious melee combat? Have you no shame, good sir? :P

Maybe if I was playing a dedicated STR or DEX build, but I couldn't be assed to fight him solo as a Sorcerer again.

Return to Drangleic begins again in less than two weeks.

Now if only my friend would let me progress without him.

Damn, I forgot all about that. I'm actually let's playing Dark Souls II for my youtube channel right now, so I'm all ready in the souls mood.

So what would be a good sword for an Elric of Melnibone cosplay build?

Black Knight Greatsword?

Found a copy of SOFS deep in my library. Don't remember ever buying or playing it really.

Never played the original Dark Souls II either. Thinking of giving it ago.

Anything I should know beforehand? Anything to look for?

Invincibility frames from dodge rolling are determined by your Agility stat, which you can raise by increasing Adaptability and/or Attunement while leveling. You'll want Agility to be at least 100.

Specifically the best breakpoints are at 95 (nearly DS1 medium roll), 99 (nearly DS1 fast roll), and 105 (equal to fast roll). If you really pump agil (not recommended) you can actually get better iframes than the DWGR, but that's generally not practical. There's more on it here, but hitting 95 is generally all you need for PVE.

edited 22nd Apr '18 6:04:15 PM by Hydrall

Well, to start off, DSII is a lot slower-paced than the first game- even chugging an estus takes a lot longer, and the heal isn't immediate. The early game is also probably the hardest in the series.

Matchmaking, apart from arena battles, is decided by Soul Memory instead of your level- that is to say, the game measures the total amount of souls you've ever gained and decides who to link your game up with based on that. Look at the wiki for details; it's easily the most annoying thing about DSII in my opinion.

The game is full of multi-enemy ganks. Don't be afraid to hang back and kite and snipe, or drop lock-on to adjust your camera, or stuff like that.

Weapon durability has been changed; it now automatically restores itself each time you rest at a bonfire, but in exchange, items have a lot less durability in general.

Bonfire warping is available right from the beginning. Handy, but not without its drawbacks.

Human effigies, the game's equivalent of humanity, are used straight up rather than requiring you to use a bonfire like the first game did- there's no more humanity stat. Being hollow has more drawbacks now, too- you can still be invaded if you haven't beaten the area boss lately, and every death reduces your maximum health by five percent, up to a total of fifty, unless you return to human form.

All enemies die after being killed a certain amount of times, provided you aren't in the Covenant of Champions (which makes all enemies harder to kill, so I wouldn't suggest it). Makes farming a bit harder.

Pressing the roll button on ladders makes you jump off rather than slide down now. Hold it while moving down to slide, or while moving up to climb faster.

Illusory walls are activated by pressing the talk button rather than hitting them.

You only fatroll at 70% equip load, but the less you wear, the further your roll goes. I-frames are, as stated, tied to agility.

Stats have been messed with. Vigor is health, Endurance is stamina, Vitality is equip load. Check the wiki for breakpoints and stuff as usual.

Magic and elemental damage in general has been changed around. With few exceptions, magic damage scales with INT, lightning damage scales with FAI, fire damage scales with a combination of both but not as fast, and there's a new damage category, dark, that scales with either FAI or INT depending on which is lower.

Backstabs take a bit longer and enemies can escape them if you're too slow (to avoid shit like what you see in Dark Souls 1 pvp). Parries come out slower, but parried enemies are knocked flat on their ass and take much longer to recover. Kicking has been replaced with a somewhat slower guard break; enemies that are hit with one while blocking are stunned and can briefly be riposted. Shields in general tend to be worse than they were in the first game.

Wooden chests can be broken. DON'T BREAK THEM. It also breaks the item inside.

Powerstancing is a thing. 2-handing weapons only takes half STR as opposed to two thirds, but also, if you have two weapons with similar moveset types and 1.5 times the stat requirements needed for each, you can hold down the 2-hand button to shift into powerstance, wherein attacking with your left weapon lets you access a moveset wherein you use both weapons at once. (If you don't meet those stat requirements, holding down the 2-hand button makes you 2-hand your left hand weapon instead of your right.)

Merchants often give you goodies if you talk to them after spending enough souls on their services.

There's a ton of basic quality-of-life enhancements- being able to use multiples of the same item at once, more healing items, a more accessible menu, that sort of thing.

Miscellaneous tips- strike damage is strong against a surprising amount of enemies, poise is much less useful now, light everything with your torch you can, don't spend lockstones and branches of yoretoo greedily, don't kill NP Cs, check your scenery for interactions, don't get greedy when attacking, don't exploit the obvious opening against the Smelter Demon, don't pull the lever (you'll know which one), kill the dogs first.

I'm almost certainly forgetting a ton of other things, especially stuff I straight up forgot halfway through typing up this post. I think this covers most of the more important bits, though.

ARISEEEEE

Sooo like SOTFS is only 10 bucks during the summer sale on PS 4 which is an absolute steal(for reference that's like, the price of the DLC alone for most souls games) and I picked it up do to not having played the "true" scholar conplete edition of the game(instead I played the scholar of the first sin updated vanilla version + the DLC), so I figure the changes + 60FPS would make for a worthwile buy, plus I get to have my favorite dark souls game(though I'll admit BB is top tier) on a current gen system.

60FPS is nice for sure, and while I recall there being an issue with this regarding weapon durability in the pC version it hasn't been an issue for me so far so I guess it's not a problem in this version.

The first change I noticed was the statue in Things Betwixt and the big eyed dudes there. Turns out the petrified peeps are all over the place now, usually blocking a chest or passage. Now I figure this means that fragrant yore branches are going to be a lot more plentiful but so far I've only found like, 2 or 3, all of which I recall being the in original as well so that worries me a bit. The new enemy placements are neat and sometimes pretty drastic in what they do for the level, like heide's...whoo boy, Heide's.

Vanilla heide's wasn't too bad for a starter level despite the intimidating enemies, as if you had a mace they weren't that hard and were the only enemies there so it was just a matter of separating them and learning how to dodge their move sequences. In fact there were times I'd do it instead of forest of fallen giants first because it paid out good souls. But now the heide knights are chilling there and while they don't aggro unless provoked, there's two of them who are perpetually angry and ready to mess you up at first sight. Thing is these guys are Beef Gates and pretty tough to handle straight out of majula, so I do feel like as a result you're kinda railroaded more even if indirectly. Like you can trick them off the ledge but it's not as easy as it is with the big rusty guys. After seeing the angry one with the spear and the firedrake over there I figured I wasn't going to be fighting old Dragonslayer anytime soon so instead I went to beat the dragonrider's sorry behind. He was just as easy as I remember, didn't get hit once. Then I made the mistake of teleporting back to the first heide bonfire to grind some more souls, unaware that now every heide knight in the level is aggro'd. The stage actually got harder after beating dragonrider, which was totally unexpected. I do sort of miss finding the heide knights scattered around drangeliec but I gotta admit, heide's tower is a lot more interesting now.

Other enemy placement changes that stand out are the hunter's copse making the 2nd neromancer MUCH easier to kill, which makes the level feel easier in general. Fisherman's wharf on the other hand feels harder for some reason, it was the first place I died more than 3 times. The turtle bros are more prevalent in FOTFG and admittedly it's scary having a bunch of them bumrush you in that one section you need the soldier's key to enter. The pyromancer's in the poison valley are quite troublesome, especially the ones above you. I do feel this makes it easier to get her set at least. I'm not crazy about the changes to forest ruins or whatever scorpioness' level is called, as I liked the big bug eyed stoner there and all the lion men but now we've got the invisible jerks who seem a lot less invisible this time around lol, though it could just be how they look against the stage textures. Still annoying to fight since you can't lock on to them.

I do have *one* gripe though so far, and it's the pursuer. Okay look, I like the pursuer, he looks awesome, is a good skill gate boss for the very beginning, and it was cool how he showed up twice more in vanilla. But the guy showed up like 4 times in Lost Bastille which is just a bit overkill IMO. Also he has a new move now where he sends a bunch of dark energy at you? It's really hard to avoid, curses, and deals nasty damage. I don't remember that move...I do feel like they went overboard on him though. Maybe it's just lost bastille that has a bunch of pursuers but I wish he'd bugger off lol.

Still I'm having a blast with the game, and I forgot how cool lances were.

Pursuer's not exactly got new moves, it's just that he can normally do those moves only after getting you with the curse grad, sir alonne style -and the grab is most often lethal to the player so you didn't get to see thsoe attacks. the added pursuers removed that restriction.

Ah so that's what it is.

Beat Iron Keep. They made it tougher and I heard a lot of complaints about the changes there but it wasn't that bad and I feel people definitely overblew the difficulty of it. It's still one of the coolest looking areas IMO. Smelter demon is also a fun fight, and the only boss aside from Old Iron King and Chariot(who kills me at least once every playthrough) I died against. Beat him 2nd try, feels like once you learn smelter demon you never quite forget him lol.

the iron keep isn't too bad in normal gameplay, it's just that they severely nerfed it's efficency as a farming zone.

I remember DS II. Despite all its flaws it was still a fun game. I especially liked wielding the Greatsword. Really made me feel like Guts from Berserk.

Sadly, I found that the Ultra Greatswords didn't work as well for me in DS III. I found myself preferring straight swords and regular greatswords instead.

I forgot how cool drangelic castle is. The rain, the journey towards its depths to finally reach a hollowed Vendrick, the various traps, the sense of escalation as you learn more about vendrick's fate and drangelic's history...also the embedded guy who is just...weird. The whole journey through the castle is probably my favorite part of the game, *despite* you know where lol.

I feel SOTFS made drangleic castle even better. I was NOT expecting the chariot horse to be there, nor was I expecting a gargoyle. They also made that poison mask room faaar less annoying. Sadly amana shrine is still a pain due to the dumb priestesses, but I suppose it wasn't as bad as pre-patch vanilla. Undead Crypt was harder due to having a LOT more bells which means you're that much more likely to get swarmed by ledia pyromancers. The lead hallway leading to the Big V is harder too since there's now 3 hollows making for the bells instead of 1, and you've got to deal with a dragonrider now which by itself is easy but aggro'd with others can be a problem.

The giants are a lot tougher than I recalled. Not the giant lord, but the big swole ones with the massive clubs. Trying to go melee with these guys is not easy, with their wide arcs and stamina devouring attacks. I couldn't even block it. You know I actually liked the lore revolving around the giants and paradox with you slaying the giant lord.

I forgot how to rescue Ornirex, is the key with one of the petrified lions? Also is there a way to buy fragant branches? It's actually annoying just how many statues conveniently pop up to screw you over. That's probably my biggest issue with the SOTFS changes especially in how frequent they are. Sometimes it doesn't even make sense, like the one on dragon's aerie? Nonsense.

Also does aldia's bone dragon not roar and strike you anymore? Weird change...I think that's one area I kinda prefer in the original.

It doesn't seem like the DLC areas changed too much? I'm doing shulva right now(stopped right before elana because...it's elana lol) and so far it seems not to have any major changes. It is slightly easier but I'm chalking that up to doing it enough times in the past to get used to it. Regardless Shulva is still one of my favorite souls areas period. It has a lot of fun mechanics to the stage and the enemies while threatening aren't too OP to where they feel cheap and it's great how you're able to use traps against them too.

Honestly playing this game made me question why of all places to reference in DS 2 did Ringed city choose Harvest Valley? It's not even that important of a location and doesn't seem like a good choice to reference DS 2. The fact that sucked didn't help. I think they just wanted to have the desert sorceresses in again lol.

you need to do something to trigger the bone dragon in aldia's keep. he drops a key you can use for to access the room with the lever for the cages.

Huh so that's why I couldn't enter those rooms.

OMG I managed to beat elana first attempt, first playthrough I've ever done that. 60 FPS makes avoiding her flame swathes easier IMO but my god I came THIS close to choking at the last stretch from getting greedy. She was on her last chunk of life(like 15%) and started calling up affinity while I had just one estus left, so I figure I could kill her before affinity fired off. But as I was one hit away from victory she fires a dark orb, it hits me, than one of the affinities hit me and then she does the darkstorm thing which blasts me back and leaves me with barely any life left(mind you I was like near full health when she did this hence my greed in the first place). I thought I died actually since you couldn't even see the red on the health bar but I barely survived. I used the estus, and as she was recovering from the darkstorm I ended her. Thankfully she only called the Big V once this fight, and while he was annoying I was able to handle him in a timely manner and eventually kill him. Next time she summoned the skeletons which were easy with the upgraded blacksmith hammer(which is a good weapon actually) as they went down one hit each.

Phew, I got the Souls Jitters right now lol. I cut that match WAY tooo close for comfort but it's suuuuch a relief to have one of the hardest bosses in the game go down first try. I wasn't expecting it to go down like this, and I'm thrilled haha.

Edited by Vertigo_High on Aug 17th 2019 at 1:08:07 AM

Beating a tough boss on the first try is always pretty exhilarating. That's how I felt when I managed to beat Gael from DS III on the first try.

Sadly Sihn gave me trouble this time. Took me 4 tries, I forgot just how hard his headbutt hits. Kills me in literally two hits. Funnily enough I had actually sort of given up as I downed all my estus while he was barely at half health yet his AI kept using the fire breath moves and claw swipes when I was between his hind legs so I managed to actually take back the match and win lol. Still a really fun boss, losing to sihn doesn't get me salty like I do with some other bosses since his big damage moves are pretty avoidable. I just hate when he does the tail swipe combo. Thankfully he didn't do it at all this fight, probably because of how I was positioned.

I remember beating Gael first try too, which was surprising considering how the judicator or whatever his name was took me like 6+ attempts lol. I do like the fight with how spectacular it is but much like the farron watchdogs gael's fight is a lot of intimidation and hype but rather fair compared to say friede or sulyvahn who are just overwhelmingly difficult at first.

Edited by Vertigo_High on Aug 17th 2019 at 1:35:53 AM

Halflight was pretty easy. Probably because the Spear of the Church I got was not very good.

Now Elfriede and Midir...those took quite a few tries to beat.

I think the DS II boss that gave me the most grief was Raime. It didn't help that I fought him with keyboard and mouse controls.

Edited by M84 on Aug 17th 2019 at 4:41:29 PM

Raime is objectively the hardest boss in DS 2 IIRC, something Fromsoft said about the data they collected is that there was at least at one point a 93% rate of failure against him lol.

First playthrough he took me many, many, tries though it wasn't quite as much as elana the first time. I think last playthrough I beat him first attempt. He's so much more manageable when you know how to dodge through his slow fire swing which is typically a/near OHKO otherwise.

Beat the trio, took one attempt and it was pretty easy, just time consuming since I was trying to minimize risk. With a shield and lance/spear this fight isn't even hard and just takes patience.

Also goddang sihn's theme is incredible. Dark souls music is typically combabastic with a lot of trumpets and chanting but this one stands out in how fittingly grandiose is is, much like O&S's theme which is another great one.

Edited by Vertigo_High on Aug 17th 2019 at 10:52:45 AM