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

[abija]

The 'game is too hard' thing is a fucking strawman though. What we're saying is that the game is too fucking spastic and random to enjoyably interact with. This would be true even if I had 10 million hp.

Because for some reason you play in a way that requires mastery of the game and keep arguing all the ways you can get stronger are meaningless...

But yeah, if you want to go back to Liurnia and tank a watchdog hammer in some random dungeon, you'll have 9000 ehp.

Counterpoint though: Since the bulk of this mitigation is from a couple temporary buffs and a talisman, I can just as easily say that a level 30 character has like, 5000 hp. The levels aren't really doing jack shit here compared to the massive investment required.

You don't quite seem to grasp how multiplicative buffs work.

 

[Damned Registrations]

You don't quite seem to grasp how multiplicative buffs work.

You people don't seem to grasp how multiplying numbers less than 1 together doesn't result in magical exponential growth.

Level 30 character with 40 vigor ~ 1.5k hp. x1.25^3 for crab, talisman and morgott rune = ~3k hp. Slap on some middling armour with phys resists and golden vow and you'll hit near 5k. I can't be assed to find a calculator for a specific armour set but the napkin math works out.

 

[Mortmal]

I'm bored with the thorns. They're an amazing noob slayer but get hard countered by your opponent actually having a brain.

I'm thinking I'll respec to fth/int and use the staff of the great beyond. If I do that I can add something like wrath of gold to the build to punish people who rush me when I do the thorns. I'd lose around 15% damage on my thorns if I do this, and a small amound of melee damage as well. The versatility is probably worth it.

Against skilled players I'm getting a lot more mileage out of my Fire Knight's Greatsword. No kidding right? It has a neutral R1 into R1 true combo and dumb AR when flame art infused. But doing melee with no poise and negations in the low 20s is a long way from optimal. As is using an ultra greatsword without a viable offhand weapon. So this build should keep casting as its primary mode of attack.

Don't waste your time with that staff; it only scales to 352 max, with D, B, B scaling. I already read a guide saying it's lame and they reverted a save to recover the upgrade material. Casters don't get many new toys of worth. The only thing was the thorn, which was hilarious in PvP, but it's likely to be nerfed.Finger magic is ok, i guess, everything else is lame and unusable. The new moons? Really, what's the point? It's slow, close-range, and immobilizes you for far too long.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Because for some reason you play in a way that requires mastery of the game.

You almost got it. I ~want~ to play in a way that requires mastery of the game. Or at least rewards it. But the game doesn't make that enjoyable, because it's like mastering a game of fucking Simon Says. The systems are shit, the combat is shit, and the exploration is shit. What the fuck am I going to master and why? Am I going to memorize whether to dodge left or right after every fucking swing of every boss in the game to abuse it's AI? That's cancer. Am I going to thoroughly explore the game world? I got like 30 minutes of satisfying experimentation with cool finds and 79.5 hours of disappointment. Am I going to theory craft the most multipliers I can string together to make the biggest hit or most HP? To do what, I already found everything and killed everything, I have nothing to use this shit on and it's made entirely irrelevant if I just use the mimic tier and overkill shit by spamming weapon arts or spells.

Taking MHW as an example, I want to master the monster skillsets because they're interactive and intuitive, letting you stagger them with a hammer or employ counter hits or focus on weak points or time offensive bursts with lulls in the monster's aggression. And I get rewarded by being able to handle more deadly variants of the same monster that give better rewards. I want those rewards because they offer major gameplay enhancements like life regen, lifesteal, immunities to status elements, abilities that trigger at full health, critical health, multiply the power of bombs, aerial attacks, and so forth. They let me radically customize a character. I want to theory craft shit and get the best gear because I can't just schlub my way past the hardest enemies by leaning on some simple cheese while barely paying attention.

 

[Odoryuk]

What we're saying is that the game is too fucking spastic and random to enjoyably interact with

Or, you know, you can't keep up with the game

 

[Reinhardt]

Taking MHW as an example,

fuck behemoth btw. i managed to defeat him in the end(well, we both died when his last meteor fell). and mission ended before i could reach his corpse. never again.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

There is some truth on the "hp doesn't matter". It's more relevant for normal enemies, when you're exploring and potentially getting ambushed, but for bosses it's more important to dodge, block, use parry and backstab when you can, and if you can, etc. It's a fighting game at its core. I've beaten the souls trilogy and Elden Ring without using buffs. I've cheesed some fights, and used summons, but in my current Elden Ring run I haven't used buffs, ashes of war or spells.

 

[Silva]

that is why I brought up Old Yharnam. In the released game that entire area present a literal plothole as you the player and the player character are outright told and shown that the beasts are Yharnam citizens turned into beasts. Its self evidently public knowledge yet the old town is for some reason hidden, sealed and there is a guy raging dropping this publicly know fact on you like you did not know it from the start. That whole place is a literal left over from a different version of the script From simply left there and never bothered to line up with the rest of the game.

I don't disagree Old Yharnam may also have suffered from retcons, but it seems to me the fuss around the city in it's final state is 1) due to the massacre that hapenned there, and 2) hints that the "ashen blood" epidemics was actually a Church ploy/experiment to advance it's agenda in some way. It being sealed would be a corolary of those two - Djura is now guilt struck and protective of those people/beasts, and the Church conveniently deems what hapenned there taboo by calling the perpetrators "heretics" and shunning the place. Also, notice there's indeed a curious thing hapenning there that gives weight to Djura plead: the beasts of Old Yharnam actually congregate and pray like sentient beings, as the chant that starts when you approach the building with the hanged werewolf shows. This could surprise the player with the idea that beasts can actually form their own, peculiar society.

Again, not denying cuts were made (and if you know datamined content regarding old yharnam, fire it up). My point is: the final result feels logical to some degree, different from DS3 where the cuts can be seen in plain light/without much scrutinizing.

And to conclude: yeah, Gloam-Eyed Queen being cut from the DLC is a disappointment, specially as she seemed so important to Marika's past and the state of things in the Lands Between. Feels like they didn't know how to develop this thread and simply dropped it/cut it.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Did they fixed the bug?

 

[Hell Swarm]

I'm so tired of how defensive these games are now on the part of the player. Get one hit, then defend, defend, defend, defend.

There's ways to avoid being defensive. I beat the Lion at RL1 using rain of arrows last night. Never stopped attacking, was full aggression the whole time.

Everyone who complains about this game has a similar build and playstyle:

I don't use that playing style and I have complaints about it. I use medium shields, dex weapons and a bow. I was watching Devil may cry 5 videos earlier (finished it at release) and holy fuck is it weird to compare to Elden Ring. Dante has so many better options and ways to interact with bosses and Elden ring is like 3 times the speed of it in the DLC. It's crazy how many options DMCV has compared to souls games and yet the combat is so fast in Elden ring now.

None of them are even particularly challenging outside of the final boss, they all have very readable movesets that you can easily learn and figure out what to roll, what to block, where to weave in attacks, understand which number guard counter will break poise and give you a crit, without having to resort to cheese.

Readable movesets? The Lion is extremely difficult to read because it moves so oddly. The finger boss is all kinds of weird and hard to understand.

and we had actual level design.

The side dungeons in the DLC are close to Demon's souls levels if not surpassing them at times. It's sad From have huge potential to do actual good levels and it's all side content here.

10 vigor character would be oneshot. That's more than barely anything.

There are ways to avoid being 1 shot at 10 vigor. Lyric might be retarded but he's right on the shield Talisman. It will stop big Mogh 1 shotting you.

And its a complete nothing burger that just nerfs the player and fixes some minor bugs.

Changing where boar rider spawns is a big difficulty change. He is instantly on you in re-fights and you couldn't get out of the door without your horse.

I think a good idea might be to use that talisman that boosts defences at max health.

Only time Lyric hasn't said something retarded in this thread EVER. Maybe he's learning?

 

[Crayll]

I want those rewards because they offer major gameplay enhancements like life regen

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Bestial+VItality
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blessing's+Boon
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blessing+of+the+Erdtree
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Icon+Shield
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blessed+Dew+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Royal+Remains+Set

lifesteal

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Godskin+Swaddling+Cloth
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Assassin's+Crimson+Dagger
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Malenia's+Great+Rune
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Butchering+Knife
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Great+Stars
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ash+of+War:+Prayerful+Strike
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ash+of+War:+Blood+Tax

immunities to status elements

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Stalwart+Horn+Charm
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Immunizing+Horn+Charm
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Clarifying+Horn+Charm

abilities that trigger at full health, critical health

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ritual+Sword+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ritual+Shield+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Red-Feathered+Branchsword
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blue-Feathered+Branchsword

multiply the power of bombs

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Companion+Jar
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Greatjar

aerial attacks

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Claw+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Raptor's+Black+Feathers

 

[Crayll]

None of them are even particularly challenging outside of the final boss, they all have very readable movesets that you can easily learn and figure out what to roll, what to block, where to weave in attacks, understand which number guard counter will break poise and give you a crit, without having to resort to cheese.

Readable movesets? The Lion is extremely difficult to read because it moves so oddly. The finger boss is all kinds of weird and hard to understand.

I forgot about the Lion boss, that's a fair critique there. I hated that fight. The finger was fine, in my opinion.

 

[Hell Swarm]

None of them are even particularly challenging outside of the final boss, they all have very readable movesets that you can easily learn and figure out what to roll, what to block, where to weave in attacks, understand which number guard counter will break poise and give you a crit, without having to resort to cheese.

Readable movesets? The Lion is extremely difficult to read because it moves so oddly. The finger boss is all kinds of weird and hard to understand.

I forgot about the Lion boss, that's a fair critique there. I hated that fight. The finger was fine, in my opinion.

If you stay on top of it with a shield it's pretty easy to keep hitting it over and over. It's difficult trying to space it properly. Either you go all in or you stay out and let summons tank it while you bleed it out.

I would argue many of the tomb bosses are unreadable but that's a Dark souls 3 problem brought forward. Hyper armour is a gay concept and should never have been put into the game. If I hit you and you flinch I expect my next hit to flinch you. A human boss suddenly getting hyper armour because he swung as I did and killing me is really frustrating. I don't mind losing a fair fight where I fuck up and get hit. I mind losing fights where I have no way to know it's not safe to attack and having to play rolly pokey or bait out an attack I know is safe. The first boss in the DLC is a problem with this. I don't want to keep baiting the jump attack to guard counter but he'll hyper armour your shit "randomly" and it makes a fun fight into a ball ache. They need to find a real answer to heavy weapons staggering if hit but this isn't the way it should be done. It can't be tough but fair if bosses can turn on/off their own staggers.

 

[Bloodeyes]

I'm bored with the thorns. They're an amazing noob slayer but get hard countered by your opponent actually having a brain.

I'm thinking I'll respec to fth/int and use the staff of the great beyond. If I do that I can add something like wrath of gold to the build to punish people who rush me when I do the thorns. I'd lose around 15% damage on my thorns if I do this, and a small amound of melee damage as well. The versatility is probably worth it.

Against skilled players I'm getting a lot more mileage out of my Fire Knight's Greatsword. No kidding right? It has a neutral R1 into R1 true combo and dumb AR when flame art infused. But doing melee with no poise and negations in the low 20s is a long way from optimal. As is using an ultra greatsword without a viable offhand weapon. So this build should keep casting as its primary mode of attack.

Don't waste your time with that staff; it only scales to 352 max, with D, B, B scaling. I already read a guide saying it's lame and they reverted a save to recover the upgrade material. Casters don't get many new toys of worth. The only thing was the thorn, which was hilarious in PvP, but it's likely to be nerfed.Finger magic is ok, i guess, everything else is lame and unusable. The new moons? Really, what's the point? It's slow, close-range, and immobilizes you for far too long.

I've looked at it in a build planner. The staff of the guilty is getting 305 at 80 faith but boosts the thorns by 15% per staff. If I were to swap one staff for staff of the great beyond at 45/45 I'd be getting 309 but not the 15% to thorns. I'd still get the passive from the other thorn staff. 309 is fine considering its an omni-catalyst. You don't expect something that can cast both sorceries and incantations to be best in class, it just lets you simplify your loadout so its more useable under pressure. Like in a boss fight or a gank I don't want to try to cast with the wrong tool. I'd trade some spell buff for that.

 

[Crayll]

If you stay on top of it with a shield it's pretty easy to keep hitting it over and over. It's difficult trying to space it properly. Either you go all in or you stay out and let summons tank it while you bleed it out.

I would argue many of the tomb bosses are unreadable but that's a Dark souls 3 problem brought forward. Hyper armour is a gay concept and should never have been put into the game. If I hit you and you flinch I expect my next hit to flinch you. A human boss suddenly getting hyper armour because he swung as I did and killing me is really frustrating. I don't mind losing a fair fight where I fuck up and get hit. I mind losing fights where I have no way to know it's not safe to attack and having to play rolly pokey or bait out an attack I know is safe. The first boss in the DLC is a problem with this. I don't want to keep baiting the jump attack to guard counter but he'll hyper armour your shit "randomly" and it makes a fun fight into a ball ache. They need to find a real answer to heavy weapons staggering if hit but this isn't the way it should be done. It can't be tough but fair if bosses can turn on/off their own staggers.

You mean the Blackgaol knight? I honestly didn't have any trouble with the mausoleum enemies, because they all behave exactly like similarly equipped players. They're not particularly fun fights, but it's no different than PVP, the poise mechanics are the same.

 

[Hell Swarm]

If you stay on top of it with a shield it's pretty easy to keep hitting it over and over. It's difficult trying to space it properly. Either you go all in or you stay out and let summons tank it while you bleed it out.

I would argue many of the tomb bosses are unreadable but that's a Dark souls 3 problem brought forward. Hyper armour is a gay concept and should never have been put into the game. If I hit you and you flinch I expect my next hit to flinch you. A human boss suddenly getting hyper armour because he swung as I did and killing me is really frustrating. I don't mind losing a fair fight where I fuck up and get hit. I mind losing fights where I have no way to know it's not safe to attack and having to play rolly pokey or bait out an attack I know is safe. The first boss in the DLC is a problem with this. I don't want to keep baiting the jump attack to guard counter but he'll hyper armour your shit "randomly" and it makes a fun fight into a ball ache. They need to find a real answer to heavy weapons staggering if hit but this isn't the way it should be done. It can't be tough but fair if bosses can turn on/off their own staggers.

You mean the Blackgaol knight? I honestly didn't have any trouble with the mausoleum enemies, because they all behave exactly like similarly equipped players. They're not particularly fun fights, but it's no different than PVP, the poise mechanics are the same.

Yea, it's a mechanic I hate. I don't think players should react differently if they hit R2. If I can get knocked out of waterfowl, I should be able to knock them out of unga bunga.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

One problem with the dlc is almost every main boss is a Margitt. Lion, Rellana, and Messmer are vastly easier with blessings but you could also fight them back to back with minimal upgrades.

 

[Ravielsk]

My lvl 232 char with light load needs 6800 physical dmg to die and at med load 9000

There is no way that's true. There simply isn't that much mitigation in the game, not in a way that stacks like that unless you're including retarded shit like buffs that last less than 10 seconds or prevent you from rolling.

Here’s a video on how powerful stacking vigor and defense can be:



It can get pretty crazy, even without the 5-10 second buff shenanigans before the very end.

This reminds me how back in the day people used to joke how you need a wiki opened to beat the game and how we mocked DarksidePhil or Yahtzee for making such a claim.

Today the souls community will openly admit the game uses a funky method to calculate damage mitigation that openly misleads the player about the damage reduction they are actually getting or is even possible and still call it "SKILL ISSUES". How the times have changed.

 

[Mortmal]

I'm bored with the thorns. They're an amazing noob slayer but get hard countered by your opponent actually having a brain.

I'm thinking I'll respec to fth/int and use the staff of the great beyond. If I do that I can add something like wrath of gold to the build to punish people who rush me when I do the thorns. I'd lose around 15% damage on my thorns if I do this, and a small amound of melee damage as well. The versatility is probably worth it.

Against skilled players I'm getting a lot more mileage out of my Fire Knight's Greatsword. No kidding right? It has a neutral R1 into R1 true combo and dumb AR when flame art infused. But doing melee with no poise and negations in the low 20s is a long way from optimal. As is using an ultra greatsword without a viable offhand weapon. So this build should keep casting as its primary mode of attack.

Don't waste your time with that staff; it only scales to 352 max, with D, B, B scaling. I already read a guide saying it's lame and they reverted a save to recover the upgrade material. Casters don't get many new toys of worth. The only thing was the thorn, which was hilarious in PvP, but it's likely to be nerfed.Finger magic is ok, i guess, everything else is lame and unusable. The new moons? Really, what's the point? It's slow, close-range, and immobilizes you for far too long.

I've looked at it in a build planner. The staff of the guilty is getting 305 at 80 faith but boosts the thorns by 15% per staff. If I were to swap one staff for staff of the great beyond at 45/45 I'd be getting 309 but not the 15% to thorns. I'd still get the passive from the other thorn staff. 309 is fine considering its an omni-catalyst. You don't expect something that can cast both sorceries and incantations to be best in class, it just lets you simplify your loadout so its more useable under pressure. Like in a boss fight or a gank I don't want to try to cast with the wrong tool. I'd trade some spell buff for that.

If you want to boost the thorn more, you need the Staff of the Guilty in one hand, but in the other hand, pick one that scales with Arcane and Intelligence instead. The new Maternal Staff scales to 412, or you can use the Albinauric Staff. Arcane is good for bleed.

 

[abija]

Today the souls community will openly admit the game uses a funky method to calculate damage mitigation that openly misleads the player about the damage reduction they are actually getting or is even possible and still call it "SKILL ISSUES". How the times have changed.

Huh? The reduction formula is absolutely standard and the game even does the math for you. Why are you talking about misleading?

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Today the souls community will openly admit the game uses a funky method to calculate damage mitigation that openly misleads the player about the damage reduction they are actually getting or is even possible and still call it "SKILL ISSUES". How the times have changed.

Huh? The reduction formula is absolutely standard and the game even does the math for you. Why are you talking about misleading?

Enemy: Deals fire damage
Accessory: Reduces fire damage

Codexers: How does this even work?!

 

[Ravielsk]

Huh? The reduction formula is absolutely standard and the game even does the math for you. Why are you talking about misleading?

The reduction as done from your final defense but the way individual defenses stack up is deceptive because its not purely additive.

Its right at 3:40 mark, he straight up tells you that due to how the game calculates damage reduction a numerical increase of 16 points can actually be more than 20 points. Hence giving people a misleading idea of what the negation values actually do for them.
Later he even shows off at 4:08 a graph showcasing how the effective HP stays for the most part barely affected by negation until it literary skyrockets at 85. Which means that the at the start of the game when you occupy the lower negation values the increases in effective HP are so negligible it easily misleads people into thinking that armor does not matter because well the early game armor simply does not beef them up enough to showcase how far the system can be pushed.

Did you even watch the video? The whole point of it is that people in general did not get how damage negation works because the math behind it everything but straight forward.

 

[Old Hans]

"Grounded in reality", seriously? These games have always been about "wow" factor. You face cool, crazy shit, as over the top as it gets and try to overcome it.

if tower knight were in elden ring it would be doing flips and endless combo attacks

 

[Seethe]

Outside of Dragon's Dogma, what action RPG has better combat? Pure action games and action games wearing RPG skins (Nioh) are better on that front of course, but nothing that's a full RPG comes to mind.

What kind of degenerate nonsense is this? Nioh 2 is far more of an RPG game than From shit. You only say this because Nioh also has a fantastic aggressive style combat system that needs to be mastered on top of the RPG elements, and maybe also because it's mission based, neither of these things invalidating or diminishing its status as an RPG. It has more RPG elements/mechanics, builds and modifiers you can toy around with and that's not even close. These are both combatfag games, so you cannot even argue that there's RPG mechanics outside of combat other than From's """"quests"""" (lmao)

 

[Damned Registrations]

I want those rewards because they offer major gameplay enhancements like life regen

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Bestial+VItality
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blessing's+Boon
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blessing+of+the+Erdtree
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Icon+Shield
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blessed+Dew+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Royal+Remains+Set

lifesteal

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Godskin+Swaddling+Cloth
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Assassin's+Crimson+Dagger
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Malenia's+Great+Rune
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Butchering+Knife
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Great+Stars
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ash+of+War:+Prayerful+Strike
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ash+of+War:+Blood+Tax

immunities to status elements

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Stalwart+Horn+Charm
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Immunizing+Horn+Charm
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Clarifying+Horn+Charm

abilities that trigger at full health, critical health

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ritual+Sword+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ritual+Shield+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Red-Feathered+Branchsword
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Blue-Feathered+Branchsword

multiply the power of bombs

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Companion+Jar
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Greatjar

aerial attacks

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Claw+Talisman
https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Raptor's+Black+Feathers

We both know almost everything you linked here is absolute garbage nobody uses outside of niche self imposed challenge runs or extreme gimmick setups. Fromsoft's version of 'status resistance' actually makes the status last longer on you once it triggers, and does nothing to reduce the buildup at all or improve the recovery time before it kicks in. You're going to compare that to having outright immunity from an ailment by using a fraction of your build? In what world is that a major gameplay enhancement? Everything else on the list is similarly outclassed by it's equivalents in better games where equipment actually matters. I think the only decent thing you listed in there was prayerful strike, which actually restores a halfway useful amount of health if you can land it.