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

[Strange Fellow]

So I've been playing SotE for about 15 hours now and you know what I think FromSoft have done?

I think they've fucked up the encounter design.

Never in my life have I seen open world that's so empty, boring and bland - mob-wise - as SotE. I swear there are huge swaths of land where you find like two enemies in many, many minutes. And sometimes it's a non-respawning giant or a dragon so when you kill them the level is COMPLETELY empty for miles in all directions. The only living things are just rabbits and deer.

And even in the legacy dungeons there's barely any challenge in the encounter design. There is barely anyone able - or even trying - to stop you. The only actual challenge in the game are the bosses, which are amazing. But in between the bosses you're just running through an empty land and carving through occasional - mostly trash - mobs in the legacy dungeons.

I mean, at least the vistas are fucking jawdropping. Otherwise SotE is a bit of a disappointment.

You did it. You got gud. It's all over now

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

I mean, there's not much more you can do with FROM style combat anymore. Just evolve into the most logical solution:

 

[Stoned Ape]

I mean, there's not much more you can do with FROM style combat anymore. Just evolve into the most logical solution:

No way that would pass From's design criteria... Tekken has direct, responsive controls.

 

[Odoryuk]

I beat Dark Souls 3 on release in 40–ish hours and I already spent more time in the DLC than that. They're fucking crazy.

 

[Cheesedragon117]

A bit strange to hear not just one, but two people say nobody stops levelling up at RL125 or RL150, when that's what the entire point of the Scadutree Blessing system is for. For people that don't want to ruin their matchmaking fighting overlevelled hosts and phantoms in PvP. Or "cooperating" with hosts that are OP enough to oneshot most obstacles without your help.

Hell, there's a noticeable trend of players that grinded all the way to max level (either through legit or other means) being noticeably worse at the game then those who stay at meta levels!

 

[Stoned Ape]

Hell, there's a noticeable trend of players that grinded all the way to max level (either through legit or other means) being noticeably worse at the game then those who stay at meta levels!

Grinding takes virtually no skill, just time and patience. It's not really a surprise that those that grind their way up to max level are far less skilful than players who stay within a level range that will make PvP matchmaking quicker.

 

[cvv]

You did it. You got gud. It's all over now

Nah, I don't mean that. I still need 10 - 30 runs at bosses, getting my stupid fat ass kicked like a fucking normie. It's just everything in between bosses is vast, empty and boring. Except the visual design.

 

[Socrates]

Hell, there's a noticeable trend of players that grinded all the way to max level (either through legit or other means) being noticeably worse at the game then those who stay at meta levels!

Grinding takes virtually no skill, just time and patience. It's not really a surprise that those that grind their way up to max level are far less skilful than players who stay within a level range that will make PvP matchmaking quicker.

No reason to grind in any of their games. You can smash through any challenge with enough skill. SL1 runs exist to prove that.

 

[Hell Swarm]

And even in the legacy dungeons there's barely any challenge in the encounter design. There is barely anyone able - or even trying - to stop you. The only actual challenge in the game are the bosses, which are amazing. But in between the bosses you're just running through an empty land and carving through occasional - mostly trash - mobs in the legacy dungeons.

I mostly agree except for the 'mini' boss enemies you run into. The Lion/Bird knights are a fucking nightmare of difficulty. The fire knight before Mesmer is arguably harder than Mesmer is. There's a few of those enemies just completely nuts and boss worthy that aren't. Other wise I agree. It isn't helped the hollows in this game are shadow people so they don't stand out.

I beat Dark Souls 3 on release in 40–ish hours and I already spent more time in the DLC than that. They're fucking crazy.

The DLc is about 30-40 hours, which is a solid length for a game. My only issue is a lot of it is spent doing sweet fuck all because you have to pick up scooby snacks.

 

[Strange Fellow]

You did it. You got gud. It's all over now

Nah, I don't mean that. I still need 10 - 30 runs at bosses, getting my stupid fat ass kicked like a fucking normie. It's just everything in between bosses is vast, empty and boring. Except the visual design.

I'm surprised to hear that. For me the DLC has been great fun to explore, and figuring out how to get to different places on the map or that can be spotted in the distance has been plenty engaging, to the point that I'll find enemies in the open world annoying when they get in the way of travel.

I've also been challenged by enemies in dungeons (the proper ones, not mines and catacombs). There are a lot of trashmobs, true, but I've died a fair bit to enemies like the bird knights, the red dudes in the shadow keep or the spin2win horned guys, as well as ambushes and gangbangs assisted by ranged enemies placed at vantage points. What is true, is that the discrepancy between the difficulty of bosses and regular enemies is probably the highest it's ever been, but I have that down to the bosses being a bit ridiculous.

 

[Silverfish]

More likely, they spent their upgrade materials on the first 4 weapons that seemed kinda cool, found out 3 of them are shit for some reason, and are now stuck with 1 unless they go grind to upgrade a new weapon that seemingly has a 75% chance of being shit.

One of the biggest catches in ER's design. Removing Demon's Souls' weapon upgrade system would make sense for an open world game and would encourage experimentation and reward exploring (fewer instances of "Oh, that's a cool weapon, too bad I'll never use it"). On the other hand, no upgrade system means no smithing stones, which in turn cuts way down on loot and ends up giving you less reason to explore after finding a few weapons you like.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

By what happens to my char from bleed attacks I'd say each hit ads that number to a hidden bar and when it reaches a treshold based on enemy resistance it triggers a blood loss. Is it close?

Kind of, except the threshold can channge during the fight, the bloodloss doesn't do the same thing every time, and the number added to the hidden bar is also varied based on which weapon and attack you use. The number is really only useful in context of comparing it to that number on the exact same weapon. If you want to compare say, scythes to daggers for speed of bleed buildup, or the damage inflicted, you need empirical tests or excel tables taken from the game code. Most of FS stats are like this; they give you enough info to know if raising a stat influences something, but leave out all the details required to actually optimize anything.

What you're describing here though is called "playing an rpg." No system is 100% predictable from stats alone, and if it was it would be boring. Every single RPG I have ever played required some mix of theory and practice. You do your best to come up with a build and then you see how it performs in real gameplay. No engineer ships a car without a test drive.

I can't imagine any rpg fan would be so adverse to experimentation; you're laying a bizzarely unreasonable standard on this one game. Monster Hunter for example hides so much from the player that the fan base reverse engineered all the damage and motion values from pure gameplay alone, to the point that MHW showing actual damage numbers was seen as sacrilegious. The damage stats on the weapons in those games are flat out lies with hidden modifiers out the wazoo.

I agree that the upgrade mechanics in ER are a hassle though (but again, nothing even close to MH in aggravation.) At by the late game you can buy all the smithing stones you want.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Just because a game is transparent about it's rules doesn't mean the optimal setup is trivial to find. We can't even solve chess after all. There's no reason to hide things like how much damage status ailments cause or the way stats scale weapon damage. It's just adding needless busywork of having to check a wiki. I don't give Monster Hunter a pass either; it's opaqueness was never an asset and letting me see my damage incentivized trying out more types of weapons and attacks to see what was actually doing well instead of settling for one thing because I can't be assed to spend hours taking notes to see which spear does more damage. Seeing more stats makes it easier to experiment so you have time to test more things.

I've played many games that are completely transparent about their rules that offer way more incentive to experiment and theorycraft things. It's a result of having more than one way to skin a cat and some complexity, not keeping the player in the dark.

 

[Vic]

elden gay

 

[ERYFKRAD]

elden gay

Starfailed

 

[Vic]

elden gay

Starfield

I have played starfield 15x more than elden gay, so that's a win

 

[Silverfish]

Starfailed

The final boss of Starfield isn't getting buttfucked by a femboy.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

elden gay

Starfield

I have played starfield 15x more than elden gay, so that's a win

Not the boast you think it is.

 

[Reinhardt]

Starfailed

The final boss of Starfield isn't getting buttfucked by a femboy.

yeah, it's so bad no one even bothered to mod it.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

Starfailed

The final boss of Starfield isn't getting buttfucked by a femboy.

that's why it's a shit game

 

[Hell Swarm]

Pata is a really cool weapon.

 

[Vic]

what body type did you guys select for your character

 

[Hell Swarm]

Great, Lyric finally fucks off to his own thread and Vic replaces him. Guess he finally figured out Starfield is unplayable garbage and now he wants attention.

I'm starting to think the scabbu fragments are padding. The same way the smithing stones are. From figured they needed to put -something- in the DLC to pick up in the empty fields. If they had left fragments out and kept base damage in mind when designing bosses instead of NUMBER GOES UP the DLC wouldn't have suffered in the slightest. If anything it would be an improvement on the snore fest the 2nd replay is. Now instead of 1 long drawn out hunt for flask shards you have 2 of them! Hurrah!

 

[Vic]

Great, Lyric finally fucks off to his own thread and Vic replaces him. Guess he finally figured out Starfield is unplayable garbage and now he wants attention.

I just want to know what body type you selected for your elden gay character.

speaking of unplayable garbage, how do you manage to explore an absolutely boring and empty world for 100+ hours while being dragged along by the promise of some souls or item for a build you can't use? this has got the be the worst AAA open world I have yet seen.

 

[Hell Swarm]

how do you manage to explore an absolutely boring and empty world for 100+ hours while being dragged along by the promise of some souls or item for a build you can't use?

I don't know. I didn't play Starfield.

Now fuck off and go derail another thread because you're jealous we're enjoying a game unlike the trash you play.