From Software The Dark Souls Discussion Thread

[Cryomancer]

Dark Souls and Demon Souls aren't hard.

Is only hard as longs you adopt the """amazing""" idea of not using magic, armor, spears, halberds, throw able items, greatbows(...)

 

[Silverfish]

That varies though. Magic in Demon's is baby mode for sure, but in DS1 and 2 melee is better at the start and then gets overtaken when the late-game spells become available. In DS3 magic is worthless no matter how far along you are. So far as the weapons go? Spears are good early on, but their damage scaling is pretty weak and they're useless later. Halberds are powerful, but have retarded stat requirements and scaling. They're good, but never any better than a dedicated strength or dex weapon.

 

[The_Mask]

Is only hard as longs you adopt the """amazing""" idea of not using magic, armor, spears, halberds, throw able items, greatbows(...)

You don't need armour if you don't get hit.

 

[Chaosdwarft]

Dark Souls is not hard, it really is not, I would say it is EXTREMELY obtuse with its information. Also there has been a whole generation of gamers that have played games on "normal mode" with tons of assisting bells and whistles (real time compass markers, bright shinny icons, etc...) which feels like a long tutorial.

I love all 3 games, even DS2 ( For some reason people don't like it). Cheers!

 

[Squid]

Dark Souls and Demon Souls aren't hard.

I don't understand how even today people still argue about this. These games do have the idea of overcoming challenges, yes, that bears the weight of being at least a bit difficult. No, they are not these super hard games that are so inaccessible to the mainstream audience. Obviously. They sell super well for what one would guess to be a semi-niche game. There are many harder games throughout gaming history than these. That's fine. That's not the entire appeal of these games.

 

[Silva]

Bullshit.

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells. And even so most shield faggots still get stuck in bosses like Sister Friede.

 

[Cryomancer]

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells. And even so most shield faggots still get stuck in bosses like Sister Friede.

As a Lancer/Hexer, i tried to beat Elana 40 times with Hexes and always failed. Then switched to spear and own in my first try. Magic is not easy in any situation. And on DS3, when i tried to play as a sorcerer, i ended using most melee weapons because spells costs way to much mana, stamina, takes to long to cast and deals so little damage that just doesn't worth the cost.

And Gothic 1/2 are far harder if you focus on magic. They don't need to rely on the player not using resources that the game provides to be hard. On G1, to fully maximize magic, you will need 245 LP (140 LP for circles -> 10+15+20+25+30+40 and 95 for mana) Or 25 levels investing into pure magic to maximize your circles and mana. A warrior in other hands, can maximize his STR with 90 LP and maximize one handed with 30 LP(10 + 20) or with 120 LP. And Gothic 2 NotR was the hardest game to be a magician of my life. Gothic 3 in other hands, when i played as a water magician, i felt more like i an a water DEITY at end game,

 

[Squid]

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells. And even so most shield faggots still get stuck in bosses like Sister Friede.

Wow, a game is harder if you opt to not use the tools it provides to overcome challenges? Who could imagine that? I really don't get why people say this either. I've seen plenty of discussions about Dark Souls and the like games being hard and then someone eventually says this and I'm not really sure why. The game is harder when you opt to not do things the game provides? That's not really surprising or a way to argue the difficulty of a game since it provides that to the player. It's not even a system they're abusing, these are items and stats (pertaining to wielding the shields and casting the spells) intended to be experimented with and used by players.

And most of DS3 boss fights require you to learn when to dodge, if you don't and brute force with a shield you'll just drain out your stamina and you'll lose anyway. A shield is a back up to block, hope you have any stamina remaining, and then roll out to reset your distance and regain the rest of your stamina. And like Sorcerer said, spells don't seem all that great in DS3.

 

[The_Mask]

Bullshit.

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells.

You go for INT/FTH build. 24 INT first, for NG.
If NG+ breath is garbage, so 44 should be enough.
Then you got for FTH, slowly up to whatever. 30 should be enough.
If NG+ you can even go for 50. Join sunbros. Use Velka's until 39 FTH.

Point in ATT as necessary, and according to NG.

Raise VIT to 11 for PW optimal interaction, 0 END, 0 STR and 0 DEX investment.


In total, 0 weapon usage.


You still have to roll. You still have make sure you don't die, even with this build.


Manhood can be directly correlated to the skills of the player. The owner of skill can dictate everything, imo - not build. Which is why Dark Souls is great. - You can have both build or skills matter just the same.

Spoiler

N.B.: Your access to heavy weapon damage is still not cut off BTW; join the cops and enjoy weapon of choice as lightsaber with damage going through the roof.
Still have to roll. Still have to make sure you don't die. <3

 

[Silverfish]

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells.

DS2 and 3 are actually more difficult with shields, since shield stability was aggressively nerfed after DS1. Blocking in the later games is just a fancy way to drain your stamina bar.

 

[Cryomancer]

What i din't liked about DS2 DLC's is that instead of ""nerfing"" the spells in a interesting way, example, making enemies use shield with spell parry ability, making their IA better vs spell casters, to encouraging the player to use more CQB based spells like Combustion and weapons, they just inflated enemy resistances. Some DLC enemies also has so much POISE that even using a halberd, i wasn't breaking their poise... About shields on DS2, i used when i din't had leveled ADP. After i got a decent ADP, i was only using to defend from ranged attacks and parry.

 

[NJClaw]

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells.

DS2 and 3 are actually more difficult with shields, since shield stability was aggressively nerfed after DS1. Blocking in the later games is just a fancy way to drain your stamina bar.

This is true for DS3 only if you don't use the bigger shields. With Moaning shield/Dragonslayer Greatshield you can block through every full combo of all the endgame bosses.

 

[Squid]

DS is indeed hard if you play like a man, without shields or spells.

DS2 and 3 are actually more difficult with shields, since shield stability was aggressively nerfed after DS1. Blocking in the later games is just a fancy way to drain your stamina bar.

MUH SKILL BASED. MUH GIT GUD.

I liked DS2 and 3 but some of these bosses are just roll spams until you see an opening, save a little stamina to roll out, repeat. I have yet to play Demon's Souls but I watched a video about how the uploader misses some of the bosses they had in it. He pretty much said they aren't skill testing for every boss and some of them are "gimmicky." I'd like to see a few more bosses with unique ways to fight them rather than 20 Dancers of Boreal Valley. That's not to say bosses like that are bad but rather that nearly every boss being like that makes it kinda unexciting. But yeah you're completely right, most boss fights with a shield are just either asking for a long ass attempt at the boss where you're nerfing yourself. The best way to handle a boss fight your first time beating them in these is to hold a shield up and try to roll through attacks but if you absolutely mess up the timing your shield might block most of the damage. After learning a boss well enough, it's best to just not use the shield most of the time. Or if they're able to be parried, just get good at doing that.

What i din't liked about DS2 DLC's . . . they just inflated enemy resistances

Didn't they inflate magic resistances on bosses like crazy for the DLC? It sure as hell felt like it. I played a mage through SOTFS for my first playthrough and it was pretty fun but some bosses were just wimps for me due to the range and Soul Spearing them to death. Or I did just fine with magic weapons because it did about as much as a Strength build could do I'd think. Then I hit the DLC and I'm whomping on bosses forever yet when I watched video reviews of the game later on, some people were melting health bars like I did in the base game.

 

[Silverfish]

He pretty much said they aren't skill testing for every boss and some of them are "gimmicky." I'd like to see a few more bosses with unique ways to fight them rather than 20 Dancers of Boreal Valley.

Spot on. I remember when DS3 came out and bosses like Yhorm, The Wyvern or the Deacons were written off as "gimmick fights", but they were the only bosses in the game that weren't copies of the tutorial boss with maybe one or two new moves welded on. The "get good" crowd lapped it up, but the tactics needed to beat the last boss were identical to those you used against the very first. Bloodborne had the same issue and got off scot-free as well.

 

[Squid]

Micolash while annoying, was a nice break in the way boss fights worked in Bloodborne. I appreciate fights that don't feel too samey. Either way, it doesn't make or break these games for me. It's just something I'd like to see more of. Sure, I want challenging bosses but I also want some fun bosses that make you do something differently.

 

[Matador]

I hated the abuse of delayed attacks with bullshit tracking in DS3 bosses and enemies.

Monster raising their weapons and actually swinging lightning fast after 3 seconds to mess up player timing looked retarded.

Fortunately they come back to top tier boss design in Sekiro, except the demon of the hatred, which of course had some of those delayed attacks.

 

[praetor]

gimmick bosses are the worst bosses 'cause their replayability is exactly 0. whatever your build, whatever your skill, whatever your mood, the fight will always be exactly the same. it's kinda interesting until you figure it out, but figuring it out takes about 20 seconds less than figuring out just one of the combo patterns of the average non-gimmicky boss.

i kinda see the appeal, but all of them so far have been various degrees of garbage

 

[Cryomancer]

gimmick bosses are the worst bosses 'cause their replayability is exactly 0. whatever your build, whatever your skill, whatever your mood, the fight will always be exactly the same. it's kinda interesting until you figure it out, but figuring it out takes about 20 seconds less than figuring out just one of the combo patterns of the average non-gimmicky boss.

Well said. And i rather face 100 clones of the worst CTRL C / CTRL V arena boss than Bed of Chaos.

gimmicky bosses are always the worst. Look to dragon bosses. Ancient wryvn(ds3) and Dragon God(Demon souls) with Sinh, the Slumbering Dragon(ds2) and kalameet(ds1)

 

[Wunderbar]

Gimmicky bosses are alright as long as the gimmick isn't stupid like "run a gauntlet of trash enemies and then use plunging attack".
Demon's souls gimmicky bosses are good and memorable.

 

[Black Angel]

Since I haven't yet the luxury to try Demon's Souls, I have to vouch for the Divine Dragon of Sekiro.

Literally THE best gimmick bosses Fromsoft ever conceived from my experience, I wouldn't mind fighting him as many times as I could whenever replaying Sekiro. The audio-visual presentation and the gameplay mechanic just came along together neatly.

 

[NJClaw]

Gimmicky bosses are alright as long as the gimmick isn't stupid like "run a gauntlet of trash enemies and then use plunging attack".
Demon's souls gimmicky bosses are good and memorable.

Yeah, everytime I play through Demon's Souls I can't wait to fight the Adjudicator.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Yeah, everytime I play through Demon's Souls I can't wait to fight the Adjudicator.

Storm King is the most memorable boss in any of the Souls games.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Yeah, everytime I play through Demon's Souls I can't wait to fight the Adjudicator.

Storm King is the most memorable boss in any of the Souls games.

I didn't know about storm ruler until years later and have never fought it the proper way apparently. So I always thought it was the dumbest boss, just waiting for it to fly around and shooting arrows at it as it passed by until it finally died. So I guess I'll never forget that.

 

[Cryomancer]

Storm king can be faced in a "normal" way if you have ranged attacks(magic, bows, etc)

 

[sullynathan]

Yeah, everytime I play through Demon's Souls I can't wait to fight the Adjudicator.

Storm King is the most memorable boss in any of the Souls games.

I didn't know about storm ruler until years later and have never fought it the proper way apparently. So I always thought it was the dumbest boss, just waiting for it to fly around and shooting arrows at it as it passed by until it finally died. So I guess I'll never forget that.

nah, it's still this dumb in NG+ and later because in NG his health is so low that you kill him in 3 - 5 hits rather quickly. By NG+, they've buffed his health so much you need to do about 20 hits and he constantly flies around so much that he will be out of you range for the attack and lock on. Fuck demons souls.