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From Software Elden Ring - From Software's new game with writing by GRRM

Sukhāvatī

a.k.a. Mañjuśṛī
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འ༔ ཨ༔ ཧ༔ ཤ༔ ས༔ མ༔
I haven't even bothered with any of the dragons. I should probably go back and fight at least one, just to see if they drop anything good, but they're very unappealing fights. Smack its leg, hope its mouth isn't oneshotting you from out of sight. Meh.

I'm at a point in the game where I don't have any clear direction for where to go next. I've killed Godrick and Rennala, I've visited the capital briefly and I've been to see Radahn, but both of those feel too tough for my character at the moment. My last session was spent aimlessly riding around looking for interesting shit. I don't mind that part of the game nearly as much as some, but I can tell it's going to get old if I have to do much more of it. For now at least, interesting shit is interesting.
The rot breath move you get after defeating 5 or so is great. Constant DOT damage on bosses once it hits.
 

cvv

Arcane
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Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is.
Meh, I eat dragons for breakfast and always on foot. Their attacks are super slow and predictable, they're a joke. Except the Lichdragon, that motherfucker forced me to press the win button after 30 frustrating minutes (i.e. summon my Mimic).

Seriously, I can't afford to spend hours on bosses like I did in Sekiro. This game is already eating my life.
 

SumDrunkGuy

Guest
Meh, I eat dragons for breakfast and always on foot. Their attacks are super slow and predictable, they're a joke. Except the Lichdragon, that motherfucker forced me to press the win button after 30 frustrating minutes (i.e. summon my Mimic).

Seriously, I can't afford to spend hours on bosses like I did in Sekiro. This game is already eating my life.

How do you survive the fire blasts, hm? Don't tell me you use a shield. Shields are for cowards, always have been.
 

cvv

Arcane
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Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is.
Meh, I eat dragons for breakfast and always on foot. Their attacks are super slow and predictable, they're a joke. Except the Lichdragon, that motherfucker forced me to press the win button after 30 frustrating minutes (i.e. summon my Mimic).

Seriously, I can't afford to spend hours on bosses like I did in Sekiro. This game is already eating my life.

How do you survive the fire blasts, hm? Don't tell me you use a shield. Shields are for cowards, always have been.

Been a shieldless, two-handed STR build for the past 40 hours. Mostly using either the Ruins Sword or Radahn's double swords.

For fire dragons I bump up my fire resist (same for the other affinities like magic or lightning), for frost my robustness. For the lichdragon you have to seriously increase your vitality. Then you should be able to survive any attack you can't dodge with 25+ Vigor.

I really have zero problems with dragons, everything they do is very predictable and easy to dodge, except that attack when they quickly jump back and breathe at the same time.
 

SumDrunkGuy

Guest
I'm ashamed to admit I used shields in Demon's Souls and early Dark Souls back in the day. I didn't know any better back then. Once I learned the way of dual weild/two-handed combat, I could never go back. A true battle hardened warrior fights with both hands.
 

toro

Arcane
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Apr 14, 2009
Messages
14,969
what the fuck are the implications of the eye surcoat being in rykard's boss room its hurting my head

ofnir you old codger got your fingers in all your pies well guess they never told you to try fingers but hole aha

he killed a spy sent by the all knowing something
 

Funposter

Arcane
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Oct 19, 2018
Messages
1,827
Location
Australia
I haven't even bothered with any of the dragons. I should probably go back and fight at least one, just to see if they drop anything good, but they're very unappealing fights. Smack its leg, hope its mouth isn't oneshotting you from out of sight. Meh.

I'm at a point in the game where I don't have any clear direction for where to go next. I've killed Godrick and Rennala, I've visited the capital briefly and I've been to see Radahn, but both of those feel too tough for my character at the moment. My last session was spent aimlessly riding around looking for interesting shit. I don't mind that part of the game nearly as much as some, but I can tell it's going to get old if I have to do much more of it. For now at least, interesting shit is interesting.
The rot breath move you get after defeating 5 or so is great. Constant DOT damage on bosses once it hits.
Spells are determined by which dragon you kill, so you only need to beat Ekzykes and none of the others if you just want the Rotten Breath spell.

Edit: The wiki says this only applies to the named spells (Ekzyke's Decay, Agheel's Flame etc.) and that the regular Breath varieties are always available for purchase as soon as you get to the Cathedral of Dragon Communion, so you might only need to beat Agheel in Limgrave and then can just book it straight into Caelid.
 

Curratum

Guest
Hurr durr, drakken spellz! Very likely completely useless by the time you get them, but hey, cool animations, right!

I was initially excited about it, but the open world was a huge mistake. There is no balancing or design in this game anymore. Bosses and enemies get an arbitrary difficulty and the player is left to deal with it on their own - by autisming through at a low power level without the summons and the dozens of ways to cheese, or using all of this and grinding / upgrading until they're broken as fuck for that boss / location.

It's a shitty way out of trying to bring meaningful progression and some sort of fun balance to an open world and I hate From for doing it, but I think they did it to make the game more accessible to people who would just hit a wall in DS games and throw them out of the window.
 

Sunri

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Poland
Hurr durr, drakken spellz! Very likely completely useless by the time you get them, but hey, cool animations, right!

I was initially excited about it, but the open world was a huge mistake. There is no balancing or design in this game anymore. Bosses and enemies get an arbitrary difficulty and the player is left to deal with it on their own - by autisming through at a low power level without the summons and the dozens of ways to cheese, or using all of this and grinding / upgrading until they're broken as fuck for that boss / location.

It's a shitty way out of trying to bring meaningful progression and some sort of fun balance to an open world and I hate From for doing it, but I think they did it to make the game more accessible to people who would just hit a wall in DS games and throw them out of the window.

Dragon spells are big MANA succ big DMG EZYKES'S DECAY is good even on Radagon, so It's viable until last boss.

lz320qkg23o81.jpg
 

Eyestabber

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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015
Since nobody posted it yet:

1.03 Patch notes said:
Major Changes Included in the Latest Update
Additional Elements Added
  • Added a function to record an icon and the name of an NPC on the map when you encounter that NPC.
  • Added NPC Jar-Bairn.
  • Added new quest phases for the following NPCs: Diallos/ Nepheli Loux/ Kenneth Haight/ Gatekeeper Gostoc.
  • Added some summonable NPCs in multiple situations.
  • Increased the number of patterns of objects player can imitate when using Mimic’s Veil.
  • Added night background music for some open field area.
Bug Fixed
  • Fixed a bug that prevented summoned NPCs from taking damage in some boss battles.
  • Fixed a bug that sometime prevented the player from obtaining item after boss battle.
  • Fixed a bug that causes dialogue to be skipped when talking to NPCs and using custom key configurations.
  • Fixed a bug that causes the player to freeze when riding.
  • Fixed a bug that causes arcane to scale incorrectly for some weapons.
  • In situation where the player cannot obtain more than 2 talisman pouches, added talisman pouch to Twin Maiden Husks shop line up.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the user from warping to sites of grace from the map at the end of the game.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the player from moving to the next area after the battle with the Fire Giant.
  • Fixed a bug which causes some weapons to have incorrect scaling after strengthening.
  • Fixed a bug which causes some weapons to not use stat scaling.
  • Fixed hang-ups in certain occasions.
  • Fixed a bug which incorrectly displays multiplayer area boundary when playing online.
  • Fixed a bug that allows player to activate Erdtree Greatshield’s weapon skill without absorbing an attack using a special combination of item and incantation.
  • Fixed a bug which causes Fire’s Deadly Sin incantation to have different effect.
  • Fixed a bug with the Ash of War, Determination and Royal Knight's Resolve, where the damage buff will also apply to other weapons without that skill.
  • Adjusted the visual effect of Unseen Form spell.
  • Deleted the Ragged armor set from the game which was mistakenly obtainable in previous patch.
  • Fixed a bug that causes some hostile NPCs to drop Furlcalling Finger Remedy.
  • Fixed a bug that causes incorrect sound effect to play in some situations.
  • Fixed a bug which causes visual animation and hitboxes to not be displayed correctly on some maps.
  • Fixed bugs which causes incorrect visual and behavior for some enemies.
  • Fixed a bug that causes incorrect stat parameter for some armor.
  • Text fixes.
  • Other performance improvement and bug fixes.
Balance Changes
  • Increased the drop rate of Smithing Stone for some enemies.
  • Added Smithing Stone to some early game shop line up.
  • Increased shield’s effectiveness.
  • Increased the damage for all offensive cracked pot items.
  • Increased the damage for the following items: Spark Aromatic/Poison Spraymist.
  • Increased the effect duration for the following items: Uplifting Aromatic/ Ironjar Aromatic.
  • Increased HP healing for Torrent when using the following items: Rowa Raisin/ Sweet Raisin/ Frozen Raisin
  • Reduced FP consumption and increased the damage of the following sorceries: Glintstone Cometshard/ Comet/ Night Comet
  • Increased the damage of the following sorceries: Gravity Well/ Collapsing Stars/ Crystal Barrage
  • Decreased FP consumption of the following sorceries: Star Shower/ Rock Blaster/ Gavel of Haima/ Founding Rain of Stars/ Stars of Ruin/Greatblade Phalanx/Magic Downpour/ Loretta’s Greatbow/ Loretta’s Mastery/ Carian Greatsword/ Carian Piercer/ Shard Spiral
  • Raised projectile speed and range of Great Glintstone Shard
  • Decreased Ash of War, Hoarfrost Stomp's damage and increase cast time.
  • Increased Ash of War, Bloody Slash's self-inflict damage while slightly lowering the damage and increasing the cast time.
  • Decreased weapon skill, Sword of Night and Flame’s damage.
  • Increased FP consumption and lower duration of Ash of War, Barricade Shield.
  • Changed FP consumption timing of Ash of War, Prelate’s Charge.
  • Decreased the damage of spirit summoned when using the item Mimic Tear Ash and changed the spirit’s behavior pattern.
  • Other enemy and weapon balance changes
The version number of this update shown at the lower right corner of the Title Screen will be as follows:

  • App Ver. 1.03
  • Regulation Ver. 1.03.1
Online play requires the player to apply this update.

We will continue to provide improvement update in the future so you can enjoy "ELDEN RING" more comfortably. Please stay tune for more news.

Undocumented changes (long article):

Elden Ring Update 1.03: Every Hidden Change Not Included in the Patch Notes

Some of the most impactful changes in Elden Ring's 1.03 update can't be found in the patch notes.

matthew-byrd.jpg
By Matthew Byrd|March 17, 2022|

Elden Ring
‘s massive 1.03 update features more confirmed changes and additional content than many people were expecting to find in the patch notes, but it’s actually the update’s hidden (or “secret”) changes that have a lot of 3 at the moment.

While it’s not unusual for a major update to feature a few changes that aren’t detailed in the official patch notes, it’s always interesting to try to figure out whether or not those changes are actually intended or merely the result of something that went wrong. More often than not, there’s a healthy mix of both.

So, while it remains to be seen how many of these changes were meant to be added to the game in the first place, here is every hidden change in Elden Ring‘s 1.03 update that we’ve found so far.

Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Smithing Stones Purchased From Twin Maiden Husks Are Now Significantly Cheaper
Elden Ring‘s update 1.03 patch notes mention that it’s now easier to find Smithing Stones on early enemies and even purchase them from select early game merchants. Well, it turns out both those things are true. Limited quantities of Smithing Stones have been added to the inventories of most of the Nomadic Merchants you meet early on, and it’s way easier to acquire Smithing Stones as drops from early enemies. I’m not sure what the new drop rate is, but the difference is certainly noticeable.


One thing that the patch notes don’t mention, though, is that the Smithing Stones you buy from Twin Maiden Husks in Roundtable Hold are now much cheaper. I haven’t been able to confirm the exact price difference for every item quite yet, but most of the ones I’ve tested so far appear to be about 4X cheaper than they were before. So, if you haven’t already gone out of your way to find those Bell Bearings that allow you to purchase Smithing Stones from Twin Maiden Husks, now is the time to do so.

Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Banished Knight Engvall’s Spirit Ashes Can Now Be Found in Murkwater Catacombs
For reasons that I can’t quite explain, it seems that you’re able to acquire Banished Knight Engavall’s Spirit Ashes by beating the boss in Murkwater Catacombs. Anyone who already beat that boss will find that those ashes have been added to the inventory.

As for the Battle Hammer you previously got for beating that boss…well, it’s not clear what happened to that. I’ve heard some players report that they were able to acquire it from random mobs, but I haven’t found a consistent location for it quite yet. If you find a consistent drop spot for the Battle Hammer, be sure to let us know.


Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Many Heavy and Strength-Based Weapons Are Now “Weaker” Thanks to a Bug Fix
Prior to this latest update, some Elden Ring players noticed that some of their fully-upgraded weapons were actually weaker than they were at the previous upgrade level. Many suspected that was the result of a bug, and it turns out that’s true.

However, it seems that the bug wasn’t affecting the total damage for those fully-upgraded weapons but was rather causing the previous upgrade levels to be stronger than intended. As such, it seems that the total attack power for several upgraded weapons has been reduced across the board. I haven’t seen a full list of weapons affected by this change, but it seems that most weapons with the “Heavy” affinity (and some others that primarily scale with Strength) have been impacted by this change.

Simply put, this is a big nerf to most Strength builds and other builds that relied on Heavy affinity weapons. While it seems like most of those weapons were never meant to be as powerful as they were, I hope FromSoftware finds a way to make Strength builds feel more viable than they currently do.


Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Arcane Scaling Weapons are Now Significantly More Powerful
Ok, so this update is referenced in the patch notes, but you really have to dive a little deeper into this change to appreciate its full impact.

Elden Ring‘s Arcane state primarily determines your Discovery rating as well as your resistances to Holy and Death effects. However, it’s also supposed to enhance the power of weapons and abilities that scale with the Arcane stat. Unfortunately, there was a bug in the launch version of the game that prevented those weapons from scaling with your Arcane stat properly. As such, nobody really knew how powerful those Arcane weapons were.

Now that Arcane scaling is fixed, though, it seems that just about every Arcane scaling weapon in the game just got a huge buff. Rivers of Blood is clearly the biggest beneficiary that players have found so far, but every Arcane weapon is now worth reconsidering. This change also makes certain Bleed builds even stronger than they already were.

I’ve even heard some players report that Arcane scaling weapons are now benefiting more from Arcane than Dexterity (even if that isn’t supposed to be the case), but I’m waiting to see the results of more tests before I recommend investing in Arcane over anything else. Regardless, Arcane is much more useful than it was before.
Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Moonveil Now Deals Less “Poise Damage”
While some of Elden Ring‘s most powerful weapons were clearly nerfed in this latest update, Moonveil players likely breathed a sigh of relief when they hit Ctrl+F and realized their beloved katana wasn’t referenced in the patch notes. However, it seems the Moonveil was indeed stealth nerfed.

While Moonveil’s base damage appears to be roughly the same as it ever was, the katana’s Weapon Skill doesn’t break an enemy’s Poise as easily as it used to. It seems that it now takes an extra hit (or two) with that ability to stagger most enemies. That means that it’s now slightly more difficult to spam that attack and “stun lock” tougher foes.


It’s probably not enough of a difference to make Moonveil players change their entire strategy, but it does seem like they may need to rely on their roster of spells more than they did before.

Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Most Shields Are Now Stronger, but the Great Turtle Shell is Noticeably Weaker
Elden Ring‘s recent update includes a reference to “increased shield effectiveness,” but the patch notes don’t say what that actually means.

As it turns out, pretty much every shield in Elden Ring now has a higher Guard Boost rating than it did before. Guard Boost determines how much Stamina is consumed whenever you successfully block an attack, so that basically means that it now costs less Stamina to use a shield in Elden Ring.

It also seems that some shields have had their Physical Damage Reduction ratings adjusted. While players are still assembling a full list of Physical Damage Reduction modifications, it does look like many of the shields in the game were actually buffed in some way.

Weirdly, though, the Great Turtle Shell’s damage reduction is noticeably weaker than it was before. Furthermore, it seems that the Ash of War that shield comes equipped with (Barricade Shield) no longer lasts as long as it used to. All things considered, Great Turtle Shell users might want to look for a replacement.

Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Endure No Longer Provides a Poise Boost (Possible Bug)
Some players are reporting that the Endure Ash of War (which reduces incoming damage and raises your Poise when used) no longer seems to actually affect your Poise rating. This makes the Ash of War noticeably weaker than it was before.


However, given that a boost to Poise is referenced in the Ash of War’s description, it’s easy to assume that this “change” is actually the result of a bug. We’ll be sure to keep an eye on this one for future updates.

Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: Staff of The Avatar and Rotten Staff’s Erdtree Slam Skill Now Deals Much More Damage
For some reason, Staff of the Avatar and Rotten Staff’s Erdtree Slam Weapon Skill wasn’t doing any damage (or any significant damage) in previous versions of Elden Ring. There was actually a debate at the time regarding whether that lack of significant damage was the result of a bug or a way to help balance those AOE abilities.

Well, it seems that the latest Elden Ring update has finally settled that debate. Not only do those Weapon Skills now deal damage, but they appear to be significantly stronger overall than they were before. As a result of this change, those staffs are much more appealing options than they were before.

Elden Ring Update 1.03 Hidden Changes: New FP Costs For Every Buffed Sorcery Spell
Finally, while Elden Ring‘s patch notes mention that the FP costs of some sorceries have been reduced, the notes don’t say how much those new spells actually cost. Thankfully, the good people over at the Elden Ring subreddit have managed to compile what seems to be a comprehensive list of FP cost reductions introduced by this latest update.

Glintstone Cometshard: 25 FP – 19 FP
Comet: 38 FP – 26 FP
Shard Spiral: 16 FP – 14 FP
Star Shower: 36 FP – 23 FP
Gavel of Haima: 37 FP – 25 FP
Rock Blaster: 30 FP – 25 FP
Stars of Ruin: 50 FP – 38 FP
Founding Rain of Stars: 46 FP – 32 FP
Greatblade Phalanx: 43 FP – 35 FP
Magic Downpour: 25 FP – 20 FP
Loretta’s Greatbow: 32 FP – 28 FP
Loretta’s Mastery: 50 FP – 43 FP
Carian Greatsword: 16 FP – 14 FP
Carian Piercer: 23 FP – 19 FP
Night Comet: 32 FP – 24 FP

While that’s every significant secret/unexplained change I’ve been able to find in the 1.03 patch notes so far, there are surely more waiting to be discovered. We’ll be updating this article as more secret changes are confirmed, so be sure to let us know about any that you’ve discovered in the comments section below!

Source: https://www.denofgeek.com/games/elden-ring-update-103-patch-notes-hidden-changes-secret-buffs-nerfs/

IMO these are all steps in the right direction. Moonveil is still gr8 after the nerfs, it was REALLY the best weapon in the game by a large margin.

I've yet to find "proof" of Radahn nerf, but EVERYWHERE people are reporting the fight is now much easier.
 
Last edited:
Joined
Mar 18, 2009
Messages
7,667
Well, I didn't get get a new GPU, but I did get a new fancier SSD last evening and along that I also had new xbox one original pad for 56 euro ordered. So that was enough to prompt me to also buy and install ER. I'm a weak man. At least performance on 1060 at 1080p isn't quite as bad as I expected. Played around with tons of different combinations of graphics settings, and eventually ended up playing it at most settings High/Maximum with just grass and shaders turned down to Medium, because those were the only ones that seemed to actually affect performance. Shadows ended up being left on Maximum because otherwise couldn't stand them flickering. 40-60 FPS in first open world area, it's far from ideal but also not unplayable. Hope it doesn't get much worse later.
Barely made any progress in game yet, started with Prophet at first only to realize I cannot be arsed starting first run with shit equipment so restarted with Vagabond. Only tutorial boss and fire breathing dog in dungeon killed yet, after quite a few deaths. Much pain awaits. Tree Sentinel today I guess.
 

Strange Fellow

Peculiar
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Joined
Jun 21, 2018
Messages
4,262
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Wrong. Shields are great. A true warrior makes full use of all the tools available to him. Besides, you need them in order to partake in the glory of guard counters.
LvO9CWi.jpg
I haven't found this yet, in fact I've only found two greatshields throughout the entire game so far, neither of which I can use yet. Not only am I a timid lordling, I can't even compensate for my inadequacies with a yuge slab of metal. :|
 

Lutte

Dumbfuck!
Dumbfuck
Joined
Aug 24, 2017
Messages
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Location
DU's mom
Wrong. Shields are great. A true warrior makes full use of all the tools available to him. Besides, you need them in order to partake in the glory of guard counters.
LvO9CWi.jpg
I haven't found this yet, in fact I've only found two greatshields throughout the entire game so far, neither of which I can use yet. Not only am I a timid lordling, I can't even compensate for my inadequacies with a yuge slab of metal. :|
There's no lack of them, but it's reaaaaaally easy to miss items in this game because of the world structure.
 
Joined
Mar 18, 2009
Messages
7,667
Tree Sentinel today I guess.

Don't, unless purely for the challenge. His weapon reqs 30 STR, you wouldn't be able to use it for A LONG time, unless you wanna pump STR at the expense of VGR and END, which is a bad idea as well.

I did manage to get him to less than half health yesterday when I was just goofing around trying to practice jump attacks on him. But it was probably beginners luck and today will get completely stomped when attempting him. Still gonna have to give him couple tries.
 

Ravielsk

Magister
Joined
Feb 20, 2021
Messages
1,792
SOTFS?
Never do SOTFS, not even once.
SOTFS destroyed DS2.
Underrated post. SOTFS is more like a romhack than a definitive edition. Its for people who already went through DS2 and want to do it again but without it being insultingly easy. For anyone new however its just a worse version of the game with extra BS on top of the old BS and some minor fixes/restored cut content.
 

perfectslumbers

Arbiter
Joined
Oct 24, 2021
Messages
1,202
I'm ashamed to admit I used shields in Demon's Souls and early Dark Souls back in the day. I didn't know any better back then. Once I learned the way of dual weild/two-handed combat, I could never go back. A true battle hardened warrior fights with both hands.
I used to think this way but the games got faster and faster paced over time, and I realised I was the harbinger of decline. Now I refuse to level dex or wield two weapons.
 

Andnjord

Arcane
Joined
Aug 22, 2012
Messages
3,572
Location
The Eye of Terror
I've goofed around restarting with the Samurai class with the goal of eventually turning him into a Dex or Arcane build, not sure yet. Sure, could have gone with the rogue, but I've never been a fan of daggers in Souls games. Not having a viable shield is forcing me relearn to parry and dodge properly, and also paying much closer attention to the ennemies movesets (I will say though that the addition of Guard Counters is really nice, makes shields a bit more active than they used to be). Got the quickstep ash of war on the Katana for now (yeah, I know the default Weapon Art is super strong, but it does feels a liiiiiiittle bit cheesy to spam it to victory). I've switched the shield to the parrying dagger, so now I have a half naked ninja running around quickstepping and parrying fools like there's no tomorrow, it's super fun but it's reminding me how much I enjoyed Bloodborne and wish I didn't have to buy a PS4/5 to replay it or try Sekiro :negative:

I'll take an average port over nothing, pretty please, From?
 

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