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

[Lyric Suite]

You are barking off the wrong tree if you are looking for realism in this game.

This is an arcade game. No matter how grounded it may be compared to other Japanese games it's pedigree stills goes back to the arcade and coin-op games of yore. It's obvious the introduction of the Atari "stamped" a particular conception of what a video game is supposed to be in the psyche of Japanese players and game developers that is still dominant today no matter how much Japanese companies may seem to take from western games.

Simulation is a purely western thing. It probably has to do with that fact that unlike Japanese people, gaming in the west has stronger ties to hardware development and the early IT culture of the 60s and 70s. Indeed, most of the signature western genres were developed almost right away back then. Adventure games, RPGs, flight simulators, hell even online gaming (Empire) was all being experimented with back in the 70s. The first CRPG is actually almost contemporary with the creation of PnP D&D itself.

Of course, with the advent of the Xbox and console faggotry in the west this IT gaming culture was essentially ruined where as the Japanese remained pretty much what they have always been and FromSoft is no different.

The only proper way to judge this game is compare it to other Souls games and the like. Citing Kingdom Come Deliverance is just retarded.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Other than that, please name one game that plays like a Renaissance HEMA duel.

KCD, Warband, Sekiro, Witcher 3 (with a mod).

Even if you can (not holding my breath), why would you expect it from an established game series that has never suggested it would do such or was even trying to? You're a complete dumbfuck.

You are really struggling with abstractions. I am not saying Elden Ring's combat should be exactly like HEMA combat, I am just saying HEMA combat is elegant and has a logic to it, and a nice flow. It's like high speed chess, at any given moment there is something clear that you should be doing based on what's going on. If the other guy is swinging like this, you should parry like that, if he is thrusting like this, you should move to the side and do this, and so on.

Elden Ring combat, on the other hand, is a complete fucking mess. What should you be doing when 2 enemies with humongous reach are attacking you in a staggered fashion? Panic roll away 4 times? Summon an ash? Accept a loss of a chunk of health to deal damage?

What should you do when you are under a massive dragon or giant, and he is about to attack you with a killing blow and you can't even see his attack coming because of the camera angle?

What should you do when a Crucible Knight attacks 20 times straight without a stop and eats through your stamina, without having stamina limits himself?

That's my rather simple point. There are no elegant solutions to ER combat because it's very badly designed, and people come up with inelegant solutions to overcome it.

 

[Efe]

try blade symphony though its quite dated. its also pvp only so you can showcase ur skills to us quite easily.

Was watching my friend die to crucible knight. all i said was "why dont you parry it?". he just destroyed it right then and there. See the tool was always there, he was just too used to his bleed katanas to remember.

reminds me of you.

 

[Lyric Suite]

So the flamberge is a little slow in proccing bleed compared to my dual curved swords so i'm trying to work in a standard weapon art to see if it's doable. Using double slash (which has a follow up with five slashes lmao) and it's tricky to sqeeze it in but when it works it's beatiful. I just shredded a lance horse rider in Altus and the last downward swipe caught him as he was falling down the horse and killed him before he landed on the ground. Stylish as hell.

Doubt i'll be able to use it all that much on bosses though.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Summon an ash?

Yes, pretty much.

The game is obviously balanced with ashes in mind. From didn't want ashes to be something you can use to just skip content they obviously designed some encounters to be hard WITH ashes (in theory anyway).

Those of us who enjoy a good challenge may be without them but you clearly aren't supposed to.

With that said, i have no idea what exaclty your complaint is here. In real life, fighting two skilled opponents is even worse than anything in this game. If realism is what you are after than Elden Ring is handling multiple opponents very well because in the real world fighting more than one person with weapons means you are fucked 99% of the times.

 

[Lim-Dûl]

Other than that, please name one game that plays like a Renaissance HEMA duel.

KCD, Warband, Sekiro, Witcher 3 (with a mod).

Even if you can (not holding my breath), why would you expect it from an established game series that has never suggested it would do such or was even trying to? You're a complete dumbfuck.

You are really struggling with abstractions. I am not saying Elden Ring's combat should be exactly like HEMA combat, I am just saying HEMA combat is elegant and has a logic to it, and a nice flow. It's like high speed chess, at any given moment there is something clear that you should be doing based on what's going on. If the other guy is swinging like this, you should parry like that, if he is thrusting like this, you should move to the side and do this, and so on.

Elden Ring combat, on the other hand, is a complete fucking mess. What should you be doing when 2 enemies with humongous reach are attacking you in a staggered fashion? Panic roll away 4 times? Summon an ash? Accept a loss of a chunk of health to deal damage?

What should you do when you are under a massive dragon or giant, and he is about to attack you with a killing blow and you can't even see his attack coming because of the camera angle?

What should you do when a Crucible Knight attacks 20 times straight without a stop and eats through your stamina, without having stamina limits himself?

That's my rather simple point. There are no elegant solutions to ER combat because it's very badly designed, and people come up with inelegant solutions to overcome it.

You are complaining that a game with anime spinning katana attacks and invincibility when you're rolling on the floor isn't intuitive or logical. You didn't know this when starting the game? Plus looking at your videos, you play like a retard; hiding behind a shield, no concept of spacing or timing. Have you considered playing a different game?

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Was watching my friend die to crucible knight. all i said was "why dont you parry it?". he just destroyed it right then and there. See the tool was always there, he was just too used to his bleed katanas to remember.
reminds me of you.

Because I am playing ER like an RPG. My build matters. If I am playing a greatshield and sword guy who blocks, why would I switch to parrying for one boss and then to something else for another boss and so on? Is this a shooter now?

Summon an ash?

Yes, pretty much.

The game is obviously balanced with ashes in mind. From didn't want ashes to be something you can use to just skip content they obviously designed some encounters to be hard WITH ashes (in theory anyway).

If you design your game combat in such a way that you need to summon help, then you are not a very good designer. Which is my original point.

With that said, i have no idea what exaclty your complaint is here. In real life, fighting two skilled opponents is even worse than anything in this game. If realism is what you are after than Elden Ring is handling multiple opponents very well because in the real world fighting more than one person with weapons means you are fucked 99% of the times.

In RL, you can use positioning to fight multiple opponents, ie constantly changing your position so that you are only facing one of them at a time directly. In ER you can't because bosses have unrealistic range and movement, their fucking weapons literally extend 6 times their length to hit you.

You are complaining that a game with anime spinning katana attacks and invincibility when you're rolling on the floor isn't intuitive or logical. You didn't know this when starting the game?

And another idiot appears...

To answer your question, Dim-Dull, no, I didn't, because Dark Souls 1 and Sekiro have pretty logical combat systems compared to this shitpile.

Plus looking at your videos, you play like a retard; hiding behind a shield, no concept of spacing or timing. Have you considered playing a different game?

Yeah, that's why I am wrecking all the tough bosses left and right, while you are just sitting and whining here. Try again bucko.

 

[Andnjord]

I do actually, I upgrade my sword/shield, level up, get better gear, etc, but at the same time, I originally got into Dark Souls because they had somewhat realistic melee combat stuff, like parrying, blocking, etc. The stuff like dual wielding 2 great swords, or giant swords that look like street signs, or anime shit with flashing spinning bullshit, that's not for me. So I try to create a somewhat realistic medieval knight type build most of the time.

I think your main issue lies there, you're looking for something that doesn't even have the pretention of being there. You keep bringing up Dark Soul, but have you looked at the title of this game? This is not Dark Souls, it might share some of its combat fundamentals, but it is not the same game, no matter how hard you try to hope it is.
It appears that as a result of this fundamental misconception, you refuse to accept as legitimate any tools that weren't already present in Dark Souls, forgetting that those 'badly designed' fights were designed with the use of the tools previously mentionned resulting unsuprisingly in a frustrating experience. Sleep pots, Rot spells, Spirit Summons, fancy weapon arts...all these tools that the developers spent time designing and balancing if used properly end up making the fights faaaar more sensible to engage with rather than as, as you call them, purely roll fests. Mediocrepoet is a good example, by stacking damage high enough he never needed to perfectly memorise the Godskin Duo pattern and execute a perfect roll fest. Utilising properly the tools available to you is a skill all of its own.

You mentionned Sekiro which I just started playing myself. Take Gyoubu, the horse rider boss. Sure, you could try and 100% perfect deflect him to victory, but you could also use the firecracker prosthetic in addition to the Grapple Attack skill, two tools that are pretty explicitely mentionned, one by the soldier mourning over his horse, the other by the giant grapple icon that keeps appearing over him. But then, which one is more skillful, the one that only uses one single tool to perfection or the one that utilises all the tools the game explicitely makes available to you? Who's more skillful, the man who manhandle the rock over the hill or the one who uses a wheel to help him? Who was more skillful, yesterday me who missed the tools or today's me who backtracked and found them?
Your argument, over and over, seems to be to refute the legitimacy of the tools the developper offered you by calling them 'cheese'. I suggest you rethink your approach to this game and experiment with these tools you so stubornly refuse to engage with.

I mentionned RPGs in jest before, but for real this time. If you look at my posts while I was playing through the first time, you'll see that I changed my loadout and tactics, not my stats mind you, all the time. I started using a greatsword and shield, purely used spells, spells and a single sword, used powerstanced longswords, then curved swords and even a colossal weapon; medium rolling, light rolling, defensive buffs, offensive buffs, etc etc. All of this, not by looking up meta guides and builds, but simply by opening up my inventory and looking at all the tools the developer had showered me with over the course of the game, experimenting to see what worked best against each and every situation following the options available to my stats, the options available to my build. Only late game did I check the wiki to see the exact benefits and the precise mechanics of these tools. This, at least for me, is the essence of what an RPG is, a vast toolbox for you to pick and choose depending on the situation and your approach to the game.

All of that to say that no, I don't find Godskin Duo a well designed boss on its own either, nor do I condone their excessive reuse throughout the game, but using the right tools for the job changes them from an infuriating encounter to a manageable one and the existence of this type of fights does not make Elden Ring an inherently terrible game. Elden Ring has a vast array of tools for you to use, refusing to do so is only an indictement of your willingness to adapt to it.

 

[mediocrepoet]

mediocrepoot

YES! FUCKING YES! A NEW NICKNAME!

Welcome to the club, mediocrepoet. Zed Duke of Banville, as president, will officiate your initiation ceremony.

Thank you. I will say though, that this is a distant second to the bequeathing of the title "mediocreposter" to me by Crispy, which was an honour that also made me cry a little on my keyboard. I'll never forget that.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Yeah well last I heard Crispy never got laid so I would not worry about it.

 

[Lyric Suite]

If you design your game combat in such a way that you need to summon help, then you are not a very good designer. Which is my original point.

You are being retarded they didn't design the "combat" with ashes in mind. The combat is the same as it has always been in the Souls game, none of which had this feature.

What they actually did is design some ENCOUNTERS around this new mechanic, and it's only logical that they would.

In RL, you can use positioning to fight multiple opponents, ie constantly changing your position so that you are only facing one of them at a time directly. In ER you can't because bosses have unrealistic range and movement, their fucking weapons literally extend 6 times their length to hit you.

Bitch, please.

In real life you get ganked by more than one person with swords and spears and you are pretty much fucked. Positioning my ass this is just bullshido nonsense. Real life isn't like the movies where you get to fight opponents one on one even if they come at you in a group.

And imagine complaing about the range of enemy weapons being "unrealistic" in a game with giant dragons and t-rex sized dogs lmao.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

...

Sorry, I play RPGs (and games) for fun. LARPing a cool character is fun. Playing someone who wins tough fights by throwing pots and summoning help or whatever... is not. But you do you, girlfriend.

You are being retarded they didn't design the "combat" with ashes in mind. The combat is the same as it has always been in the Souls game, none of which had this feature.

What they actually did is design some ENCOUNTERS around this new mechanic, and it's only logical that they would.

Yeah, ok, SOME encounters. Go google any of the last 10 bosses, almost every reply starts with "mimic tear".

Bitch, please.

In real life you get ganked by more than one person with swords and spears and you are pretty much fucked. Positioning my ass this is just bullshido nonsense. Real life isn't like the movies where you get to fight opponents one on one even if they come at you in a group.

And imagine complaing about the range of enemy weapons being "unrealistic" in a game with giant dragons and t-rex sized dogs lmao.

You are wrong. If you fighting opponents of equal skill, then yes, 2v1 won't end well for you, but if you are better than them, say a knight versus some bandits, the knight could definitely have a chance, because the bandits would not be trained to act in unison, and it would be possible for him to get them out of position and face them 1v1 at a time. In addition to that, the knight would have heavy armor, allowing him to absorb some damage while dispatching one of the opponents.

And you missed my point, bitch. The issue is not the range of the dragons, it's that weapons literally grow in length or enemies teleport to gain range while attacking. For example they will be 20 meters from you, attack, and hit you somehow from 30 meters away. It's complete retardation.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I think most anyone overly familiar with the game noticed that my videos are generally specifically avoiding cheese* on purpose and that I've always acknowledged that my sense of rhythm is completely terrible (TB/RTWP RPGs 4 LIFE) which is why I don't try to memorize timings or any of that. I play a purely reaction based playstyle, which was awesome when I was 20 and these days... well, it's getting less awesome by the day.
I generally don't use any consumables because I'm a hoarder and I can't quite shake that long-grown habit. Other than that, I mostly try to post things that either put my money where my mouth is since I trash talk so much, or because I think it's hilarious like grinding someone from 100-0 with the buzzsaw on a stick. So here, I thought it was appropriate to show a bit of cheese, even though I still basically didn't use consumables. (In the second phase transition, I realized I'd forgotten to pop a turtle neck and ran into stamina problems... because I generally don't use any consumables.)

Anyway, cheers!

*Pro-tip: if you think dual purely physical, non-status, non-Beastman curved swords on a strength/faith build without using any enchants or greases are meta of any sort, you're completely retarded.

 

[Monstrous Bat]

Elden Ring is the worst Dark Souls like game.

People are just sperging about stuff but the decline is there once the novelty factor wears off.

It's definitely different in a variety of ways, so it doesn't surprise me it's about as divisive as Sekiro. I'm actually leaning the opposite way, where it's definitely in my top 3 Soulslikes, I'm just not sure exactly where yet.

I'm pretty sure that one of the big indicators of how favourable you'll find Elden Ring is what your opinion is on open world games in general. It seems like many of the people who like it are ones who tend to be open to or like open world games independently of whether or not they like Soulsborne games.

I dunno, I hate all open worlds with a burning passion (including ER's implementation of it) and I liked ER quite a lot. Seems to me the main source of division came from the combat; specifically, how triggered you are that you can no longer beat the entire game with only longsword R1 and rolling.

 

[Bloodeyes]

I'm sure it's been said before, but the no pausing thing is stupid. There needs to be a pause button. I've lost count of how many times I've died to a knock on my bedroom door, my cat asking to be fed or my phone ringing. This is stupid. I get not pausing in online mode but I play in offline mode.

This doesn't do anything to improve the gameplay or make it more hard core. An active pause would, a quicksave would, but a simple pause? What the fuck kind of advantage would that give the player? I'm so over needing to squat in a bush to look at my map or read my stats. This is DUMB!

PS: Yes I'm aware there is a way to exploit the menu to pause. That wouldn't help in the above situations as it takes about as long to quit to menu as do that.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Lol, I had one combat against the Fire Giant where I REALLY had to go to the bathroom, number 2. But it was going well, and I didn't want to lose progress, so I kept fighting his mile long hitpoint bar. He starts doing his thing, there's fiery rocks flying everywhere, and my stomach and intestines feel exactly the same way, and I keep doing it. Until finally with him at about 5% health, the need became too great so I jump out of the chair and run to the bathroom, and unload a fireball explosion to make the Fire Giant proud.

 

[Efe]

a knight with a shield that doesnt or cannot parry with another shield.
Maybe ur roleplaying a set of weapons instead of a character?

 

[Bigg Boss]

Games without pause should be illegal. I shit all over the toilet as a child due to a NES game like that. I think it was Burger Time.

This pic is somewhat accurate about the bathroom situation.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Yeah, ok, SOME encounters. Go google any of the last 10 bosses, almost every reply starts with "mimic tear".

This game has had the player base expanded drammatically.

I haven't gotten to the later bosses in Elden Ring yet but i'm thinking of stuff like Sister Friede and how many people would probably abuse something like a mimic tear if it had been available in DS3. A boss with three stages? Unfair!

But what i'm thinking of specifically is all those encounter with recycled bosses where you meet two or three in the same arena. I think the use of ashes was implied not only because the combat system of this game doesn't handle multiple opponents well but also because an ash allows you to skip the repetition if you wanted to since a lot of those encounters are stuck in caves which some people may not care about (i do, but again i'm made of a different personality than the average normie playing this game, if all the people i help in co-op are to go by).

You are wrong. If you fighting opponents of equal skill, then yes, 2v1 won't end well for you, but if you are better than them, say a knight versus some bandits, the knight could definitely have a chance, because the bandits would not be trained to act in unison, and it would be possible for him to get them out of position and face them 1v1 at a time. In addition to that, the knight would have heavy armor, allowing him to absorb some damage while dispatching one of the opponents.

You are already changing the context, because since we are talking about "boss" fights, it's implied this is a fight between opponents of "equal" skill, you, and the demons and demi-gods you are engaging with.

BTW, how does KCD handle multiple knight fights? From what i remember, people complained group fights weren't particularly enjoyable. With a combat system that makes 1vs1 so complicated and elaborate, i can see why once you throw two or three enemies into the mix it becomes a kind of clusterfuck.

 

[Lyric Suite]

BTW, having done several multiple boss fights, i will say one thing.

After a while you actually start to develop an instinct towards what's happening outside your peripheral vision. Not saying you develop psychic powers but after a while you get a sense on when to roll from an unseen attack, and not to roll blindly and pray for the best.

You can see it somewhat on my Putrid Crystalians video, not so much on others where i managed to win with only a few tries (so i hadn't memorized everything yet).

Yes, there's still a lot of unfair RNG but i wouldn't say i found them so random not to be enjoyable.

 

[pakoito]

Seems like I'm the only idiot who played this game without meta-ing my equipment. I did the first half with Sacred Mace and buffs, the second half with Sacred Fists and Godkiller fire, wearing the largest armor and shield I could find. I was underleveled for most of the game. It felt like my character, and bosses were hard because I had to learn them. Heck, even my Doppelganger had issues hitting with the fists with ten times my life.

If you are always at max level, use the best weapons, oneshot spells, and pick the best summon per boss ofc the game will be garbage piece of cake hahaha

 

[Lutte]

I haven't gotten to the later bosses in Elden Ring yet but i'm thinking of stuff like Sister Friede and how many people would probably abuse something like a mimic tear if it had been available in DS3. A boss with three stages? Unfair!

"three stages" doesn't mean anything, Friede in first phase is less dangerous and has less poise than a Lothric Knight, the second phase has her doing almost nothing while you fight a boss, Father Ariandel, that's barely a cut above DS1 Asylum Demon, it's a duo fight that's really a single fight. For all intent and purpose, Friede's third phase is the only real phase and the rest is a freebie that exists to waste your time if you die to the third phase. She's, as far as I can recall, the only boss that can even be backstabbed to boot. She's really not a good example to compare to ER boss balance.

Plus in all three phases combined she probably has less HP (or defense) than Nameless King, Gael or Midir.

 

[Andnjord]

Sorry, I play RPGs (and games) for fun. LARPing a cool character is fun. Playing someone who wins tough fights by throwing pots and summoning help or whatever... is not. But you do you, girlfriend.

Sorry, but all I'm getting from you now is vibes of IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO TOTALLY AVOID COMBAT IN FALLOUT 1 AND 2

Yes, the game was never designed to accomodate your hyper-narrow definition of what a realistic knight would do, but that's not the game's fault, just means you two were never meant for each other. By your logic though, you shouldn't even be only using a shield and sword, but rather polearms, maces, daggers etc etc, but that's neither here nor there.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Lol, what is this i thought i had to get him down considerably since i heard that people killed him by mistake but instead he pacified after a few hits:



I was expecting some epic fight instead it was over in literally a minute.

 

[Andnjord]

I was expecting some epic fight instead it was over in literally a minute.

That's what you could call a trailer...