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

[toro]

 

[Child of Malkav]

Pretty funny.

 

[Silverfish]

I can't decide if From, Sonic the hedgehog or Bethesda have the worst fanboys at this point.

Sonic. Beth fans just enjoy bad games. From fans are overzealous, but ultimately harmless. Sonic fans get arrested for raping the elderly.

From games can be interesting to discuss and the community used to be full of life and excitement to discuss the pros and cons of the game and how to improve them even if From never actually would.

One of the funniest things about Souls discourse is how it's gone in the shitter after escaping GameFAQS.

The only time i've seen you make something resembling a positive comment on a game was Halo of all things lmao.

This is why, even if we disagree on some things, I never discount Swarm's opinion entirely.

It's always the same argument of "you expect too much from one of the biggest gaming companies in the world".

Mr. Matty's "Calling Fallout 4 a bad game is just disrespectful", but it's a million people.

 

[Hell Swarm]

Sonic. Beth fans just enjoy bad games. From fans are overzealous, but ultimately harmless. Sonic fans get arrested for raping the elderly.

Martin's pretty deep into incest himself..

One of the funniest things about Souls discourse is how it's gone in the shitter after escaping GameFAQS.

That is sadly true. I miss the days when it felt special to find someone streaming Demon's souls because it was so hard to do. I remember trying to coop with friends streaming and it never working out. It was a wld time.

Mr. Matty's "Calling Fallout 4 a bad game is just disrespectful", but it's a million people.

I'm okay with disrespecting From. They're the poster child of the potential Olympic athlete who becomes a crack whore in high school. I really like the Academy, Godskin apos is one of my favourite bosses in any souls games and Astel is one of the best enemy designs ever but it's all sitting in a pile of horse shit. I was fighting Astel yesterday and he teleports away, lock on breaks and he grabs me and one hits me. So instead of enjoying one of the best bosses From ever designed you're constantly worried the camera will break and you will get 1 shot. That's what bothers me so much about Elden Ring. If you cut it all back and made it like the dark souls games it would have some great moments and I could look past the flaws more. But they keep repeating the same mistakes and then building on top of those mistakes. Astels grab never should have broken lock on. Revenants should not teleport, break lock on and immediately spam you with a hard to dodge combo but they do.

A dark secret about sucking the food nipple.

I enjoy Doom more than I enjoy Halo on average. But Halo has the potential to be more fun with it's sandbox design. I feel about Elden Ring the same way I feel about Destiny 2, Halo infinite and Doom Eternal. They all have good games buried in so much shit it ruins the experience. Nu Bungie is getting very close to Nu From in terms of being a bad developer using a good developers old name. Not quite 343 yet but they're not far off with how they approach fan feedback (i.e. ignore it and insult the fans for wanting basic game fixes).

 

[Vic]

Judging by some of the posters here in this thread (hell swarm) I can't imagine a more autistic and toxic fandom than from soft fans.

 

[Hell Swarm]

I think it's funny Vic is stalking me because I laugh at him for being a Bethestard and he wants to talk about being autistic and toxic. He only played Elden ring for 2 weeks and doesn't like it so he's not here to discuss the game lol.

Loretta is also a cool boss. She's well designed for the most part and I liked fighting her in the early game.

 

[Vic]

I played the game for 3 days for a total of 13 hours iirc before I opted out of the absolutely horrendous open world design.

Stop making shit up about me.

 

[Lyric Suite]

This is why, even if we disagree on some things, I never discount Swarm's opinion entirely.

That to me just demonstrates that you are both retarded. Doom > Halo to such a degree it's comical to even believe otherwise.

 

[Silverfish]

That to me just demonstrates that you are both retarded. Doom > Halo to such a degree it's comical to even believe otherwise.

I'm sorry, but not altogether surprised, that you weren't invited to any Halo LAN parties back in the day.

 

[Bloodeyes]

I made a new build for the arena because I levelled my old RL 139 to 168 for invasions. He still needs to run through the DLC to get crafting recipes but otherwise he's finished. This dude is a steam roller when he's wielding his executioner's greataxe:

 

[Hell Swarm]

There's been some difficulty adjustments to the base game with the DLC.

In Mogh's palace when you go into the dark cave there used to be a a blood dumpling who would always spin you to death the moment it saw you. Was really hard to dodge and he's been replaced with a blood noble instead. Not sure which patch did it but it's a big drop in difficulty and removed an ambush which is a shame.

The Tree avatar in the hali tree is now able to enter the gate between it and the grace. Used to be stuck outside but not any more. Not a big deal since a grace will reset it but it's still a change. Harder to cheese with leeshing though.

Any one else notice any small changes like this?

Does any one want to recommend some faith weapons for doing the DLC? Looking for something that isn't a katana or a large thrusting sword. I'm going to use the spira spells and Mesmer magic with black flame toss. My build so far has been switching between black flame toss for holy resistant enemies and spamming the ever loving fuck out of sacred blade for ones not. I could do more damage buffing with sacred blade and going full poker but I'm trying to force different playing styles. It's not about being optimal, it's about forcing a non-dex melee playing style and seeing what dumb stuff I can do with it.

 

[toro]

This is why, even if we disagree on some things, I never discount Swarm's opinion entirely.

That to me just demonstrates that you are both retarded. Doom > Halo to such a degree it's comical to even believe otherwise.

Quake >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Doom > Halo > whatever shit shooter you have been playing in the past

 

[Bloodeyes]

Does any one want to recommend some faith weapons for doing the DLC? Looking for something that isn't a katana or a large thrusting sword. I'm going to use the spira spells and Mesmer magic with black flame toss. My build so far has been switching between black flame toss for holy resistant enemies and spamming the ever loving fuck out of sacred blade for ones not. I could do more damage buffing with sacred blade and going full poker but I'm trying to force different playing styles. It's not about being optimal, it's about forcing a non-dex melee playing style and seeing what dumb stuff I can do with it.

There aren't a ton of pure faith weapons added by the DLC. One that springs to mind is the Barbed Staff-Spear. Its very off-meta but it would thematically fit what you're going for. It has a solid one-handed moveset and respectable AR on a faith build. The Shadow Sunflower is also a fantastic colossal weapon that scales primarily with faith that I have used extensively. Depending on your build you may not have enough STR to one hand it (It needs 26), but its worth considering as it looks really cool, hits hard, and has a strong ash of war.

Another strong option is the weapon I used to kill Radahn, the Black Steel Greathammer. That weapon is very powerful when sacred infused and it pairs well with either sacred blade or prayerful strike. Its a bit short but it hits like a truck.

Of course there's also all the infuseable weapons that can be made sacred or flame art (sacred is better for the DLC, except against the big flower). What ones you pick would depend on how you like to play. The fire knight's greatsword is worth mentioning but I found I used my Zweihander more because of all the fire knights. I don't know what level you want to play at but for a 150 going for 60 vig, 26 mind 25 endurance and 60 faith will leave you enough points to throw the rest into strength and dex for the requirements on a couple of good weapons, while still giving you a solid amount of faith behind your sacred seal. If you're doing more melee than casting then just 50 faith is enough and you could have more endurance and less mind.

Edit: The sword of light is a str/fth weapon, but its ash gives a minute-long 20% boost to holy damage. It is a body buff, so it stacks with golden vow (which is an aura buff). Using these together along with the holy shrouding cracked tear (20% boost to holy damage in PvE, 12.5% in PvP) will give your spells a stupendous boost in damage and also give a good buff to any sacred infused weapons you are using (which end up with very roughly two thirds holy damage). This is practical to do before a boss fight, and doesn't require a complicated buffing routine. Just drink physick, golden vow, then sword ash and soft swap the sword away.

 

[toro]

I did not want to post before because I wanted to build my own opinion about the DLC.

I've reached the last area of the DLC and unfortunately I think SOTE is absolute garbage. Banal, boring, formulaic shit.

The world design is retarded - designed in way to obfuscate exploration - and most open world areas are empty shit.

The new NPCs, the crafting system and scadutree fragments are just superfluous crap intended to hide the fact that the basic systems are mostly unchanged. Ashes of war combat is a low-skill system. Every retard in this game is spamming some form of weapon art.

Scadutree fragments system is retarded. They needed a way to ramp up the difficulty but the truth is: the game is piss easy once you get over lvl100. Also the original game was completly unbalanced around Farum Azula, SOTE is completly unbalanced from the start.

Most bosses are trash. The biggest problem is that they are not fun. They are not even hard, they are just tedious. What the fuck happened!? FromSW cannot design a good boss anymore. I cannot believe saying this but Malenia is stellar compared with this SOTE shit.

I'm probably beyond my expiration date but SOTE is the first FromSW I absolute hate playing. I played the shit of all DaS games but this is the only one I cannot do anymore. I checked out of the entire experience.

Fuck.

 

[Hell Swarm]

There aren't a ton of pure faith weapons added by the DLC. One that springs to mind is the Barbed Staff-Spear. Its very off-meta but it would thematically fit what you're going for. It has a solid one-handed moveset and respectable AR on a faith build. The Shadow Sunflower is also a fantastic colossal weapon that scales primarily with faith that I have used extensively. Depending on your build you may not have enough STR to one hand it (It needs 26), but its worth considering as it looks really cool, hits hard, and has a strong ash of war.

The spear I was looking at. I don't care about meta, I just want something different to what I've been doing. It's an exploration play through.

Edit: The sword of light is a str/fth weapon, but its ash gives a minute-long 20% boost to holy damage. It is a body buff, so it stacks with golden vow (which is an aura buff). Using these together along with the holy shrouding cracked tear (20% boost to holy damage in PvE, 12.5% in PvP) will give your spells a stupendous boost in damage and also give a good buff to any sacred infused weapons you are using (which end up with very roughly two thirds holy damage). This is practical to do before a boss fight, and doesn't require a complicated buffing routine. Just drink physick, golden vow, then sword ash and soft swap the sword away.

Not going to stack buffs. I'm using golden vow only for buffs because it fits the using different things motive and balances the increased hp of coop bosses.

The world design is retarded - designed in way to obfuscate exploration - and most open world areas are empty shit.

Sums up the open world nicely. Even though Ubisoft's designs aren't much better the constant things to do every where makes the world feel fuller even if it's reused content effectively.

Most bosses are trash. The biggest problem is that they are not fun. They are not even hard, they are just tedious. What the fuck happened!? FromSW cannot design a good boss anymore. I cannot believe saying this but Malenia is stellar compared with this SOTE shit.

After going back to Malenia last night I appreciated how balanced she was compared to a lot of SOTE stuff. There's a lot of awful design in the DLC and it's made the base game more tolerable but it's still not where the series should have gone.

The base game is also broken in several places by the DLC now. The new lighting system completely destroys a few locations. Farum's tornados look like complete shit when a shadow falls on them. It's pretty awful TBH.

Another thing I noticed is the DLC's multiplayer AI now applies to most bosses in the base game. Their target switching is a lot smoother and they also have the problem where they will clearly be targeting something then attack something else. Phantom swords are especially noticeable where they will lock onto player 1/a spirit ash and then shoot off at a completely different target. It's really awful to look at too.

 

[Lyric Suite]

That to me just demonstrates that you are both retarded. Doom > Halo to such a degree it's comical to even believe otherwise.

I'm sorry, but not altogether surprised, that you weren't invited to any Halo LAN parties back in the day.

I never even had a console and none of my friends had one either. Halo was trash for that reason alone, Bungie betraying their PC fanbase because Microsoft made them an offer they couldn't refuse (except they could have). Fuck them.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Does any one want to recommend some faith weapons for doing the DLC?

Black Steel Greathammer, except do Flame Art infusion instead of Holy. You then get three different damage types but with an higher AR. Use the Sekiro hardtear and go to town with guard counters.

 

[Lyric Suite]

The new NPCs, the crafting system and scadutree fragments are just superfluous crap intended to hide the fact that the basic systems are mostly unchanged.

This is a strange ciricism. What should have changed, exactly? It's a DLC, not a new game. Were people actually expecting something radically different from the base game? From an expansion?

 

[mediocrepoet]

I did not want to post before because I wanted to build my own opinion about the DLC.

I've reached the last area of the DLC and unfortunately I think SOTE is absolute garbage. Banal, boring, formulaic shit.

The world design is retarded - designed in way to obfuscate exploration - and most open world areas are empty shit.

...

I'm probably beyond my expiration date but SOTE is the first FromSW I absolute hate playing. I played the shit of all DaS games but this is the only one I cannot do anymore. I checked out of the entire experience.

Fuck.

This is more or less where I'm at. I hit Souls fatigue pretty hard before Elden Ring launched and was close to not getting it. With the amount of hours I dropped into Elden Ring at launch, I've been pretty burnt out on the games since. Not sure if it's a result of that and me needing more time away from the series before getting into SOTE or if it's just how I feel about the DLC, but I was pretty bored with the early areas of SOTE and have actually stopped playing it for now.

I'll probably try and go back to push through the rest of it later, but I've felt approximately zero drive to get back in to it and even had started another new character to dick around in the base game rather than play the character that's in the new areas which says a lot, I think.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I've been lucky i guess because in my case i made a rebound out of the burn out. I quit my SL1 run because i couldn't continue anymore, and was expecting the burn out to affect the DLC as well, which is why i wasn't even planning of buying it just yet, but somehow my interest got rejuvenated in the interim. I'm still taking precautions though. Like i'm not being too try hard on bosses, just killing them as efficiently as i can since if i start spending two days on each i'd likely never finish the DLC. It also helps that i know in advance the DLC is shorter than the main game.

It's also helping that i'm actually able to follow the plot this time. Might just be that most of the things the DLC touches upon are related to the original game, so i pretty much know what's going on but it makes exploring the maps less boring since i'm not just walking in to pick up loot and leave. I'm actually exploring specifically to piece out the plot, which is working for me.

One thing i noticed is that they gave up on rare materials. In the original game you had stuff like Arteria Leaf or those Miquella flowers etc which often compelled you to check out under various nooks and crannies (even though after a while you got a sense of where this stuff might be so you didn't necessarely have to comb every inch of the terrain). This is completely absent from the DLC. I would also say while they added a certain complexity with the way the zones intersect with one another, especially in terms of verticality, the areas themselves are a bit more plain than they were in the base game. In fact, the verticality people have noticed in the DLC was NOT absent in the original game, was just present within the zones themselves and not the entire map. This makes the individual areas less interesting but at the same time they are also smaller and in a way it feels like the DLC as a whole is a single zone. In the base game, if you were in Caelid, you were in Caelid. If you were in Liurnia, your were in Liurnia. Here, reguardless of where you are, it's always the Shadow Lands. It's an interesting dynamic and they were probably clever going this route since the areas had to be smaller by necessity since this is a DLC but at the same time this way they can still have a lot of them and not make their smallness be too apparent since you always have the whole place in front of you at all times.

Kinda of ironic that i was the one who wasn't even gonna buy it but now i'm not experiencing the negativity everybody has. It also helps i'm not seeing anything wrong with the bosses either, at least so far. I don't know if people just forgot how the base game was. I saw people claim the Putrescent Knight was one of the more cancerous bosses in the DLC. I just killed the Death Rite Bird in Charo Grave and there's no way the Knight is even remotely close to that, even now after i killed like a dozen of them.

 

[Hell Swarm]

That to me just demonstrates that you are both retarded. Doom > Halo to such a degree it's comical to even believe otherwise.

I'm sorry, but not altogether surprised, that you weren't invited to any Halo LAN parties back in the day.

I never even had a console and none of my friends had one either. Halo was trash for that reason alone, Bungie betraying their PC fanbase because Microsoft made them an offer they couldn't refuse (except they could have). Fuck them.

Sour grapes huh? Xbox 360 halo 3 and reach were an amazing gaming experience and you're just bitter you didn't get it.

Does any one want to recommend some faith weapons for doing the DLC?

Black Steel Greathammer, except do Flame Art infusion instead of Holy. You then get three different damage types but with an higher AR. Use the Sekiro hardtear and go to town with guard counters.

No Guard counters. I spammed them the first time through.

The new NPCs, the crafting system and scadutree fragments are just superfluous crap intended to hide the fact that the basic systems are mostly unchanged.

This is a strange ciricism. What should have changed, exactly? It's a DLC, not a new game. Were people actually expecting something radically different from the base game? From an expansion?

It's not a strange criticism if you pay attention to the wider discourse with Elden ring.

The map is too large and there's nothing in it - From didn't correct this, we still have large empty fields with worthless loot
The open world loot is all mushrooms - From thought smithing stones fixed this which is strange as the DLC is post having all the bellbarings
Side dungeons are boring and there's too many - Giving credit here, From did some excellent side dungeons in the DLC. They did fix this problem
Bosses are spastics with infinite stamina bars - Made worse in many ways.
Collecting flask upgrades is boring and makes replaying the game tedious - Scadu fragments intensifies.

So what did people expect from the DLC? Better loot, better side dungeons, less empty space with no purpose, less riding torrent around and better balanced bosses. This isn't even my criticisms, it's the discourse of Elden ring since it's release. The legacy dungeons are good, there's too much padding and too much busy work to keep yourself on par with what areas expect from you.

I hit Souls fatigue pretty hard before Elden Ring launched

I got souls fatigue with 3 and it's still remained. I keep trying to find new action games and I run into Souls combat over and over. I was playing Castlevania lords of shadow and it's such a nice change of pace. Being grabbed and being able to escape with a quick time event seems refreshing compared to being grabbed by a bad hit box and watching my health bar vanish.

It's also helping that i'm actually able to follow the plot this time.

There is no plot. A big criticism of the DLC is it sets up a cast of characters and tries to tell a story but there's no story being told. Tranny boy discards random parts of him off screen, then he discards his rune and then you fight him riding his brother. Souls games aren't good for their stories in general but we're pushing the bar even lower. Most souls games at least give you a reason to be murdering random people and Elden ring doesn't and the DLC gives us no reason to go after tranny boy. He's self contained within a realm you can't escape (except we can because... reasons?) not causing any trouble for any one and not engaging with the player in any way. You go to kill him because you bought the DLC and that's the DLC content. There's no player motivation within the game, there's no purpose to any of the death we cause in the DLC. We're just murder hobos entertaining a prison planet to murder all sides in a war and then walk away.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Maybe you should check out my let's play the plot and the clues you get and where you find them are incredibly coherent. I'm only 50% through this DLC and i'm pretty sure i already figured out the main plot.

Makes me think the confusion i experienced in the base game was all just me being retarded and not paying attention.

 

[Ravielsk]

There is no plot.

And what is there is just a rehash of the main game. Only instead of the elden throne you are trying to reach the "god gate" and instead of Melina you burn Mesmer. Actually its more of a abridged version because in the main game you at least can choose between frenzy flame and Melina but the DLC(despite having Midra, a literal lord of frenzied flame in it) does not afford you even that.

In fact it kind of gets hilarious the further you go because it becomes obvious that Leda and her simp clan have no reason to be in the shadowlands and are just following Miquella to... map out his discarded limbs? Leda at the end in fact appears slightly enraged that you came to kill Miquella when in reality you have no idea if there even is a point to it. For all you know the divine gate is defunct and the only ascension Miquella is going to have is to an early grave seeing as he gored himself all over the shadowlands.

Leda: "You came to kill my dear Miquella!"
Player: "Ehm, I did? Well, thanks for letting me know. I guess..."

I have to seriously question if this is not another case of "The Old Hunters" where they had two DLCs planned out but then some exec decided it will only be one DLC so they just merged whatever was done into one package and that was the end of it. Story or coherence be damned, we got to move on.

 

[Hell Swarm]

There is no plot.

And what is there is just a rehash of the main game. Only instead of the elden throne you are trying to reach the "god gate" and instead of Melina you burn Mesmer. Actually its more of a abridged version because in the main game you at least can choose between frenzy flame and Melina but the DLC(despite having Midra, a literal lord of frenzied flame in it) does not afford you even that.

In fact it kind of gets hilarious the further you go because it becomes obvious the Leda and her simp clan have no reason to be in the shadowlands and are just following Miquella to... map out his discarded limbs? Leda at the end in fact appears slightly enraged that you came to kill Miquella when in reality you have no idea if there even is a point to it. For all you know the divine gate is defunct and the only ascension Miquella is going to have is to an early grave seeing as he gored himself all over the shadowlands.

Leda: "You came to kill my dear Miquella!"
Player: "Ehm, I did? Well, thanks for letting me know. I guess..."

I have to seriously question if this is not another case of "The Old Hunters" where they had two DLCs planned out but then some exec decided it will only be one DLC so they just merged whatever was done into one package and that was the end of it. Story or coherence be damned, we got to move on.

They followed him there because he brain washed them but it's frustrating that the NPCs feel so alive when you first meet them and then they basically have no story. I've done several NPC quests and my only motivation is to make the gank squad easier. It's just sad really.

It's never even explained why him being a God is such a bad idea. We killed the last one because She abandoned the lands between and intentionally fucked it up. What the fuck is controlling the cluster fuck now? If we had been trying to become a God it would have at least made sense. You have to stop him because you can't have 2 gods ruling.

 

[Silverfish]

I never even had a console and none of my friends had one either. Halo was trash for that reason alone, Bungie betraying their PC fanbase because Microsoft made them an offer they couldn't refuse (except they could have). Fuck them.

"Halo is bad because it's on a console" is pretty much the level of critique I expected from you. So far as Bungie 'betraying' the PC fanbase is concerned? Well, yeah. Who wouldn't? Say what you will about turn of the century console kiddies, but we actually bought the games. There's a reason why Bungie, Bethesda and Bioware persist and Troika, Black Isle and Looking Glass are long since shuttered.

Sour grapes huh? Xbox 360 halo 3 and reach were an amazing gaming experience and you're just bitter you didn't get it.

Even the ramp up to Halo 3 was unlike anything before or since. The Believe campaign, Rooster Teeth getting early access for videos, the reveal of the legendary edition. Crazy amounts of hype.

Maybe you should check out my let's play

The first Codex thread sponsored by Ambien.