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

[perfectslumbers]

There's an incantation called flame cleanse me southeast of the church of vows that cleanses scarlet rot for 14 fp. It only requires 12 faith to use, so a low investment, but you can equip marikas scarseal (found in siofra river,) to cast it on any character with 9 or more faith. It made even the worst rot zone a pretty fun experience tbh

 

[BLOBERT]

Turns out both my PS4 controllers have been ruined by being pissed on by a cat.

Is the Xbox controller simply much more durable? I bought one like 10+ years ago and it's still the same controller I use with Elden Ring.

BROS FUCK ME

IVE RAN THROUGH LIKE THREE OR FOUR BAD XBONE CONTROLLER

IVE GIT ONE FOR PC AND ONE FOR FAGBOX THAT STILL WORK

CANT USE FAGBOX 360 CONTROLLER CAUSE GAMEPASS SHIT FUCKS THAT UP

 

[Wunderbar]

there's a merchant in Caelid that sells anti-rot boluses, he's near the path that takes you to the giant jar.

W8, what!? That place only accessible trough the Siofra River!? Why do RPGs keep pulling this crap? You do an entire Fire Area and then at the end you find "Ring of Fire Resistance", you do the poison area, RING OF POISON WHATEVER, and now you're telling me the merchant who sells Rot cure happens to be at the very last place you can visit in the Rot Area!? Ffs... ¬¬'

scarlet rot is only a problem when you explore the Lake of Rot (where you can just do suicide runs, or wait for rot buildup to wane while standing on small patches of clean ground) and during bossfights against Commander O'Neill or Crystalline trio. All of that can be tackled after Caelid.

 

[HumanTotemPole]

100 hours almost on the dot to usher in the Age of the Duskborn. I skipped some portions of the game (e.g. Volcano Manor and Mt Gelmir, most of Altus Plateau, The Haligtree, Nokstella). Leaves room for another go at some (distant) point in the future. Doubtless balancing will improve over time as things get patched and playtimes will drop as guides get better. Some collected end of playthrough thoughts and criticisms:

- The decision to go open world versus earlier From Soulslikes will remain divisive on here for as long as we're discussing this game. In normie consumer land it's a major critical and commercial darling, so the structure is likely here to stay regardless. My own thoughts on it haven't shifted much. Bloated if I had to use a single word.

- Story: Didn't pay attention which probably says something. Hard for individual stories to maintain any kind of pacing or structure in the context of an open world. Melina is a good example as a major character. Turns up a few times in starter areas then largely disappears until you beat Morgott. Had a brief who dis bitch moment when she reappeared after 60 hours.

- Levels: as others have said legacy dungeons are good to great. Leyndell, Deeproot depths as visually impressive as any area in a DS game. Leyndell in particular. Those trumpet guys are great - outright inspired design, weird & interesting. From have still got it sometimes when it comes to creating unusual fantasy worlds. Probably too many castles and forts overall e.g. Redmane didn't really need to exist as more than a staging ground for the Radahn fight and Fort Faroth was just a bit shit all round. Also standing remarks on cutpasted side locations still apply. I lost interest in them beyond the items therein after 3 to 4 repetitions of each type.

- Combat: good as it is, the seams are starting to show. For enemies variable attack timings, stunlock combos, AoEs, roll catching, unblockables, uninterruptibles, instakills etc were all cool variations when first introduced to Soulslikes and used sparingly but From can’t help themselves. Feels very contrived when every bastard is queuing up a meme combo/weapon art or suddenly alters their animation speed for a gank input read or chains attacks like they’re Champion Gundyr (fucking ogres). In general the input reading feels more obvious than before as well. Crack lions are particularly unsubtle about it but even the average greatshield soldier has a very generous backstep to follow up his shield bash should you try to punish him. For the player it seems like there’s an emphasis on punishing the use of normal weapon attacks or dodges. Pushes players towards use of special attacks like jumps/charged or towards actions attached to consumption of finite resources in combat e.g. weapon arts or spells. Especially noticeable late game. Big difference even from DS3. Your mileage may vary. Personally if the enemies are memeing hard I will too. Can't confirm it but it seems like the enemies have reduced input reading towards weapon arts and don't respond to them as effectively as normal attacks. Guard counters are great but some weapons will whiff everytime vs certain enemy hit boxes - rats are frequent offenders.

- Bosses: The big fights that I did were excellently visually presented. Not the case with most of the mini bosses. Too many repeated encounters secondary to too many side dungeons. Definitely most bosses are designed with the use of summons or spirit ashes in mind to tank damage output and aggro. I caved pretty quickly for someone who soloed every DS game first time through. Started to struggle a bit post Godskin Duo but I suspect that was a build problem. Was fed up with exploring to find more gear, treated the late game bosses as pure DPS races instead but didn’t have reliable DPS post hoarfrost nerf. Alleviated the problem somewhat with a switch to Moonveil. Hard to output enough with a single weapon though. Huge boss HP pools made very noticeable by Radagon and Elden Beast in particular given their immunity to most status effects. Lots of frigging AoE shit in general. Used well with Godrick not sure I’d say the same about any of the other instances.

- Itemization: Even with the recent patch the normal smithing stone upgrade path is fucked. Too many levels, too many stones. Feels like deliberate padding which then evaporates at Mountaintops of Giants to Farum Azula as you’re suddenly drowning in high level miner's bells and runes with very little game left. Just wanted to be done by then, no desire to explore more or experiment. No reason it can’t be a simple 1 to 10 upgrade path like every other one in the game. Crafting is fine but would rather be able to buy the relevant items by late game. Too many fucking cookbooks as well, more flab. Nice to see a buff for uniques vs standard items but maybe a little too far in favor of uniques now.


Overall, I’d say it's pretty good. Probably below the entire Dark Souls series for me courtesy of the switch to an open world. This is more a reflection of my personal distaste for that type of game structure and shouldn’t put off anyone who enjoys Soulslikes. Made me keen to play Bloodborne. Would love a PC port of that game to help understand why it’s combat design has been so influential on From’s subsequent output.

As a final aside, I wanted to contextualise Elden Ring relative to other open world ARPGs after finishing. Went back and finished the main quest (for the 1st time) on a modpack'd Skyrim setup I'd forgotten to uninstall. Disgusting. It reminded me that, for all my criticisms of it, ER's minute to minute gameplay is still better than most modern OWARPG competition.

 

[SumDrunkGuy]

It's a rather important element of the lore. Kinda interesting element, for me at least. They should not remove it.

Also a high density of bonfires caused, that I never really felt distressed by it in a similar way to toxic status in blighttown DS1.
The only place where the rot was a threat was that big lake of scarlet rot soup underground, where dragonkin boi was fought. And it was the only place, that made me bothered to craft some balls for rot cure. It was the only situation that made me want to prepare for a fight in such a way, so yeah, I don't hate it.

Every single boss that uses it is insufferable. I beat a Tree Guardian today (took about 50 tries). He kept spamming an AOE attack that filled the entire area of the shit. And don't even get me started on the Decaying Dragon. These bosses are the opposite of fun. These bosses make me want to break my tv in half and throw it through the mother fucking window.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Scarlet Rot is just toxic by another name. Actually, I think it might do damage more slowly than toxic. I get more worried about the things that do burst damage like frenzy, bleed, and frozen - generally in that order. And the tree and dragon aren't that bad and you can even mount up and cheese it if you're having a ton of trouble. Generally speaking though, I haven't fought a dragon in Elden Ring that I thought was as bad as Midir in DS3 and even Midir is fairly predictable once you learn him + you can't cheese Midir with a horse or status effects.

Re: magic in general, I think the thing about it is that it's far more flexible than the weapon skills since you can have up to 10 slots, it doesn't weigh anything, and you can easily slot a bunch of damage types and status effects tailored to where you are. You can do it with weapons a bit, but you're locked into one move per weapon and whatever damage type the weapon has at base. YMMV

 

[Great Deceiver]

Eh, you can heal through it if you need to, though it's generally a pain in the ass and I hate the friggin' flowers and pods or whatever they are.

Yes, I didn't mean that you can't heal through scarlet rot (although it's harder to do that with a smaller health pool), I just meant that I would have liked there to have been status effects in the game that you had to deal with immediately. But of course, people would cry about them.

Generally, Elden Ring has a ton of consumable types but doesn't really require you to use any of them. It's a shame.

 

[Lutte]

Scarlet rot doesn't really need to be dealt with either. I fought the boss in the Lake of Rot without using any anti scarlet rot resistance and without curing myself of the rot. As long as you can dps race it reasonably then the status effect means nothing.

For the other bosses that can apply the effect.. just learned to dodge the attacks that dealt it.

I ain't farming shit to craft things like boluses or farm runes to buy stuff at vendors. Better to die a few more times at a boss fight until you learn the moves, at least that's actual gameplay.

 

[Cromwell]

Every part of the game should be useful enough to be called essential, if it isnt its mostly not worth to bother from an effectiveness standpoint. I couldnt use grease because I used Moonveil, and the only thing I ever really wanted to craft was the anti holy liver for the final boss, I skipped that because it seemed like more work than the boss itself. Greases are probably useful for people with normal not as strong weapons that can use them but the question would be why not use a stronger one from the get go and spare yourself the crafting.

 

[Zurbo]

It's a rather important element of the lore. Kinda interesting element, for me at least. They should not remove it.

Also a high density of bonfires caused, that I never really felt distressed by it in a similar way to toxic status in blighttown DS1.
The only place where the rot was a threat was that big lake of scarlet rot soup underground, where dragonkin boi was fought. And it was the only place, that made me bothered to craft some balls for rot cure. It was the only situation that made me want to prepare for a fight in such a way, so yeah, I don't hate it.

Every single boss that uses it is insufferable. I beat a Tree Guardian today (took about 50 tries). He kept spamming an AOE attack that filled the entire area of the shit. And don't even get me started on the Decaying Dragon. These bosses are the opposite of fun. These bosses make me want to break my tv in half and throw it through the mother fucking window.

If you mean that attack, where the tree jumps on his ass, then I thought so as well, till I found out that he only spreads the rot in front of him and maybe to the sides. If you roll, so that you end up behind him, you're safe to apply some hits.
Also I observed that the attack itself deals some nasty damage rather than the rot status. In the end the boss was not that excellent, but not bad either. Or maybe it's just an impression after having to cut down the tree like 10 times or more.

The dragon I didn't even find, (and didn't feel an urge to, cause I dealt with enough dragon reskins that are almost identical to fight), so can't say whether it was shit or not.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I just meant that I would have liked there to have been status effects in the game that you had to deal with immediately. But of course, people would cry about them.

Generally, Elden Ring has a ton of consumable types but doesn't really require you to use any of them. It's a shame.

Yeah, I generally feel that the burst types mentioned above (frost, bleed and frenzy) tend to make you want to deal with them if that bar starts adding up. The smaller health pool can make them deadly and frost affects your stamina regeneration and frenzy hits your FP. Actually, frost is kind of cool for pve too because it makes the enemies move more slowly.

 

[Silva]

Yes, I didn't mean that you can't heal through scarlet rot (although it's harder to do that with a smaller health pool), I just meant that I would have liked there to have been status effects in the game that you had to deal with immediately. But of course, people would cry about them.

I agree. Enemies bullsittry is so strong that everything else feels minor in contrast: status effects, level/environmental threats, crafting, etc. IBy lacking a proper balance in it's threats, certain elements simply feel superfluous.

 

[Dedicated_Dark]

It's a long rant but just watch from where I timestamped.

 

[Lutte]

If you mean that attack, where the tree jumps on his ass, then I thought so as well, till I found out that he only spreads the rot in front of him and maybe to the sides. If you roll, so that you end up behind him, you're safe to apply some hits.

Running away also works fine. I think a lot of issues people might have with certain attacks can be summed by : they try to dodge everything instead of dodging away once then maintaining the sprint button and bugging out.
Sprinting is also the only reasonable way of avoiding its magic attack that spams fast targeted projectiles.
Then just wait until it catches up to you instead of walking on the shit it spread on the ground.

Running away also helps a lot with certain enemy combos, it's how I dealt with all the assassins, dodge once, then run, then jump attack them once they hit the last hit of their combo in the air. Why dodge if you can just walk it out?

 

[Great Deceiver]

If you mean that attack, where the tree jumps on his ass, then I thought so as well, till I found out that he only spreads the rot in front of him and maybe to the sides. If you roll, so that you end up behind him, you're safe to apply some hits.

Running away also works fine. I think a lot of issues people might have with certain attacks can be summed by : they try to dodge everything instead of dodging away once then maintaining the sprint button and bugging out.
Sprinting is also the only reasonable way of avoiding its magic attack that spams fast targeted projectiles.
Then just wait until it catches up to you instead of walking on the shit it spread on the ground.

Running away also helps a lot with certain enemy combos, it's how I dealt with all the assassins, dodge once, then run, then jump attack them once they hit the last hit of their combo in the air. Why dodge if you can just walk it out?

People who don't run away never killed Midir

 

[Matador]

If you mean that attack, where the tree jumps on his ass, then I thought so as well, till I found out that he only spreads the rot in front of him and maybe to the sides. If you roll, so that you end up behind him, you're safe to apply some hits.

Running away also works fine. I think a lot of issues people might have with certain attacks can be summed by : they try to dodge everything instead of dodging away once then maintaining the sprint button and bugging out.
Sprinting is also the only reasonable way of avoiding its magic attack that spams fast targeted projectiles.
Then just wait until it catches up to you instead of walking on the shit it spread on the ground.

Running away also helps a lot with certain enemy combos, it's how I dealt with all the assassins, dodge once, then run, then jump attack them once they hit the last hit of their combo in the air. Why dodge if you can just walk it out?

Running away as powerful evasive maneuver became a thing in Sekiro. In that game you had to use it to avoid some dangerous boss attacks. That fit the theme perfectly for an action ninja game. I stomped my head against some bosses like the Ape, Ishin and the Bloodborne like Demon until I started to use it.

Another testament of the varied combat options in that game.

 

[ghostdog]

BROS FUCK ME

IVE RAN THROUGH LIKE THREE OR FOUR BAD XBONE CONTROLLER

IVE GIT ONE FOR PC AND ONE FOR FAGBOX THAT STILL WORK

CANT USE FAGBOX 360 CONTROLLER CAUSE GAMEPASS SHIT FUCKS THAT UP

Original Playstation controllers are almost immortal. I had been using my ancient PS1 controller with the PC up until 2018, and I only stopped using it because the rubber coating of the analog sticks eventually started to peel off. Otherwise, it still works perfectly, and I've angrily thrown it on the ground/walls various times during those years.
Since then, I've been using my PS3 controller (with DS4) and it seems equally strong, though I haven't rage-thrown it around, since I don't get mad about games anymore. It's probably not as durable as the PS1 controller anyway, that thing is a beast.

 

[Zurbo]

If you mean that attack, where the tree jumps on his ass, then I thought so as well, till I found out that he only spreads the rot in front of him and maybe to the sides. If you roll, so that you end up behind him, you're safe to apply some hits.

Running away also works fine. I think a lot of issues people might have with certain attacks can be summed by : they try to dodge everything instead of dodging away once then maintaining the sprint button and bugging out.
Sprinting is also the only reasonable way of avoiding its magic attack that spams fast targeted projectiles.
Then just wait until it catches up to you instead of walking on the shit it spread on the ground.

Running away also helps a lot with certain enemy combos, it's how I dealt with all the assassins, dodge once, then run, then jump attack them once they hit the last hit of their combo in the air. Why dodge if you can just walk it out?

In case of the tree and rot wave I sometimes happened to aggro other mobs or trigger the ranged attack spam by a tree, if I was running away, while rolling behind it was quick and gave an easy opportunity to attack.

In other cases you mentioned I completely agree that sprinting can be clearly superior. Some attack waves are simply too fast for roll spam.

 

[cvv]

It's a long rant but just watch from where I timestamped.

I've watched the boss part and the "mechanics I don't like part" and it's all almost completely retarded. He's wrong about so many things - apparently poise didn't work in DS2 (it did), in DS3 they "buffed" poise (actually it didn't work at all, it was switched off in the config) and in Elden Ring it doesn't work again (it absolutely does).

Ad bosses - the usual "artificial difficulty" argument of royal retards. He IS right that some boss attacks are bullshit - like the patterns are contaminated by input reading therefore they aren't consistent therefore they can't be reliably learned in some cases - but everything else he says is stupid. Like "you have to learn a boss and then....and then you have to learn another boss..." like what the fuck. Where have you dug out this dumbass?

 

[Great Deceiver]

Poise works in Elden Ring when fighting regular mooks but it doesn't seem to do much against bosses, at least in my experience.

The guy in the video has a good point but he doesn't really get it across the best way: I think what he's trying to say is that pretty much every modern From boss is some coked-up variation of Artorias. The early games had gimmick bosses but even regular bosses had a "trick" that you had to figure out but which trivialized the fight: he's right about that. The novelty factor just isn't there anymore. In Elden Ring pretty much every boss is a helicopter with delayed roll catching attacks. It's degenerate gameplay that stems from the simple fact that Souls combat has grown incredibly stale - From hasn't moved beyond iframe roll spam or greatshield block (except for Sekiro).

This stems from the fact that sperglords don't seem to think games should be finite and want to keep killing the same boss a hundred times over to copy their favourite faglord YouTuber and see big numbers go up.

To me, novelty has a lot to do with my enjoyment of these games - so much so that my favourite is still Demon's Souls. Bloodborne is an exception because it's just stellar in so many regards. There's no denying that the formula is stale as shit, and ER - especially the later portions - positively reeks.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

 

[cvv]

The novelty factor just isn't there anymore. In Elden Ring pretty much every boss is a helicopter with delayed roll catching attacks.

The point about novelty is valid but whether or not it ruins your fun is highly subjective. Some people require an entirely original experience every time, some people never play anything new and there's an army of people in between. Objectively there's nothing wrong with iteration if it's well done. And ER is well done.

As for all bosses being helicopters - not all, but too many, yes. Then again, compared to what? I love Nioh but the boss-type repetition is much higher than in ER, most bosses are dudes zooming around the arena at light speed, over and over again. There is SOME type repetition in ER (not talking about reusing btw) but not as bad.

The real problem with ER bosses is most of them are just way too hard for most people. Most gaymers won't be able to beat them without summons....but summons trivialize p. much all of them.

 

[Haplo]

Haven't played Nioh 2 much. But I liked most of the Nioh 1 bosses far more then the Elden Ring bosses I've fought (Magrit was fine, Crucible was ALMOST ok - if he wasn't quite so relentless, I guess Sentinel and Night Cavalry were ok).
Edit: oh, and Rennala was pretty cool for what that was.

 

[HumanTotemPole]

Haven't played Nioh 2 much. But I liked most of the Nioh 1 bosses far more then the Elden Ring bosses I've fought (Magrit was fine, Crucible was ALMOST ok - if he wasn't quite so relentless, I guess Sentinel and Night Cavalry were ok).

I imagine it's because Nioh 1 gives you movesets and tools tuned to match or manage the speed of the bosses. The fights feel fairer as a result. They're much faster than most ER bosses (Umi-Bozu is a notable exception) but are consistent about timings - if a Nioh boss looks like they're about to hit you, they are about to hit you. None of ER's 'holding my weapon above my head for 4 seconds' to bait out a roll or poising through a player's attempts to punish the same.

 

[deem]