From Software The Dark Souls Discussion Thread

[Murk]

I wait a second and roll through his attack (letting him come to me to open up space to run)-- don't run to the right as you'll get caught in the stupid alcove and the camera will kill you. Roll through his attack and up the stairs. If you climb on top of the stairs and go to the corner (to the right of the stairs) he can't get to you. Some of his swings still hit, but he won't persist. He drops down and you can pew pew him. The dogs are the real challenge in that they can EASILY block your roll and leave you to get carved by Capra.

Or, toss some doodoo baby: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VyzySNoXgA

No poop? Bombs away: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjjUbMo4Oqo

or just roll through mlg style bra

 

[Silva]

Dark Souls 1 has some really hard bosses.

Nothing in my playthrough of Dark Souls 2 gave me the kind of challenge that Capra, O&S, Artorias and Manus gave me. And I never managed to kill Kalameet.

 

[Murk]

How I killed Kalameet on my sl1 playthrough.

Had only pants and dusk crown on.

Used Seance ring to cast power-within as I got there, changed it for bellowing dragoncrest ring and the other was red tear stone. Had both slots taken up by chaos fire storm.

Baited his attack, ran underneath and hit him with the storm. 3 pillars hit him and took him down to about 1/3rd HP left. Would stay close and dodge hits, hoping for his panning fire breath attack to punish with my lightning reinforced club.

Was sweet and delicious. Not as hard as Manus. Fucking Manus.

 

[Gozma]

Doing most of the fight with a light crossbow (an SL1 can also two-hand a heavy crossbow) lets you maintain a range where Kalameet only does 3-4 different attacks that you can get 100% dodging down on. Takes quite a while, but if you get clipped by something minor at that range it's generally survivable even at SL1 and it's also the best way to get him to do his swoop that gives you the best tail cut opportunity.

With Manus I ended up doing the red tearstone ring + low health thing with a crossbow in the left hand and reinforced club in the right.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Dark Souls DLC bosses are easily the hardest bosses in the entire Souls series, hands down.

 

[dnf]

Dark Souls 1 has some really hard bosses.

Nothing in my playthrough of Dark Souls 2 gave me the kind of challenge that Capra, O&S, Artorias and Manus gave me. And I never managed to kill Kalameet.

Killed Capra and Artorias in the first fight, with infamous Kb+mouse. O&S was difficult to me(thank God, it was the best boss fight in the game). Don't remember about Manus.

Dark Souls 2 gave us the cyclops, Iron King and Smeug demon, the three sentinels, Pursuer(not exactly difficult in terms of dead count, but it was a tense fight), and the rotten.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Dark Souls 1 has some really hard bosses.

Nothing in my playthrough of Dark Souls 2 gave me the kind of challenge that Capra, O&S, Artorias and Manus gave me. And I never managed to kill Kalameet.

Killed Capra and Artorias in the first fight, with infamous Kb+mouse. O&S was difficult to me(thank God, it was the best boss fight in the game). Don't remember about Manus.

Dark Souls 2 gave us the cyclops, Iron King and Smeug demon, the three sentinels, Pursuer(not exactly difficult in terms of dead count, but it was a tense fight), and the rotten.

 

[dnf]

Dark Souls DLC bosses are easily the hardest bosses in the entire Souls series, hands down.

What level is necessary to have challange in the DLC? Kalamet killed me once but that's it. Artorias have some kewl moves but it died on the first try...

 

[DragoFireheart]

Dark Souls DLC bosses are easily the hardest bosses in the entire Souls series, hands down.

What level is necessary to have challange in the DLC? Kalamet killed me once but that's it. Artorias have some kewl moves but it died on the first try...

I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about why you mentioned Old Iron King at all.

 

[praetor]

Killed Capra and Artorias in the first fight, with infamous Kb+mouse. O&S was difficult to me(thank God, it was the best boss fight in the game). Don't remember about Manus.

Dark Souls 2 gave us the cyclops, Iron King and Smeug demon, the three sentinels, Pursuer(not exactly difficult in terms of dead count, but it was a tense fight), and the rotten.

none of those you mentioned are even remotely difficult. now i see your tag is warranted

 

[dnf]

Killed Capra and Artorias in the first fight, with infamous Kb+mouse. O&S was difficult to me(thank God, it was the best boss fight in the game). Don't remember about Manus.

Dark Souls 2 gave us the cyclops, Iron King and Smeug demon, the three sentinels, Pursuer(not exactly difficult in terms of dead count, but it was a tense fight), and the rotten.

none of those you mentioned are even remotely difficult. now i see your tag is warranted

My tag is warranted because i killed the "consensus difficult" bosses with ease and struggled with the "consensus easy" bosses? Or all of the above(DS1 and DS2) are easy? Let's not even discuss the fact that you are measuring my supposed lack of intelligence by my skill in playing videogames, a rather dumbfuck thing to do...

 

[Cowboy Moment]

DaS1 DLC bosses (and O&S) are certainly the most elaborate and mechanically diverse bosses in Souls overall, except for Artorias who is simple, but cool. They have lots of attacks which require different responses, they're mobile, they have high range, and Manus even has a unique mechanic with the pendant, that integrates well and isn't gimmicky.

When it comes to actual difficulty, it can be a very mixed bag because of the way stats scale in DaS1, an SL90 melee with capped Endurance, 76 poise, Havel/FAP and 20 Flasks can just tank through everything Manus and Kalameet do, chug himself back to full, and keep swinging. Doing the same to, say, Smelter Demon in DaS2 is much more difficult, and requires major investment into Vitality (honestly though, I have no idea how much HP/Def you need to just tank Smelter's combos and live).

So the DaS1 DLC bosses are certainly the best in terms of design, but their difficulty suffers from being much easier to bruteforce due to DaS1's other mechanics.

 

[Silva]

Cowboy Moment , the conclusion I take from your post is: DaS1 is a more open game in terms of possible builds and atributes investiments, so its harder for the devs to program challenges to accomodate all possible variables. While DaS2 is a more predictable game in that respect and thus easier for the devs to setup challenges. Or, in other words: if we took DaS2 bosses and threw them in DaS1 game and mechanics, they would be much easier then Capra, O&S and cia.

Makes sense ?

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Cowboy Moment , the conclusion I take from your post is: DaS1 is a more open game in terms of possible builds and atributes investiments, so its harder for the devs to program challenges to accomodate all possible variables. While DaS2 is a more predictable game in that respect and thus easier for the devs to setup challenges. Or, in other words: if we took DaS2 bosses and threw them in DaS1 game and mechanics, they would be much easier then Capra, O&S and cia.

Makes sense ?

Not really, DaS2 simply has much better balanced stats and a flatter power curve. I'm pretty sure the second game actually has more offensive options, with the introduction of Hexes and the huge buff to Miracles. Casters were always overpowered in Souls games though, so that's not an argument in favor of anything.

When talking about melee though, Endurance was simply way, way too powerful in DaS1. There was literally no reason not to pump every point into Endurance up to the soft cap of 40 after you got Str/Dex up to whatever requirements your preferred weapon had. It gave you 2 Stamina per level, equip load and defensive stats. Combine that with easily available and overpowered rings like Havel's or FAP (or DWGR if you were so inclined, that one's pretty well hidden though), chugging 20 Estus with instant healing and high poise, and you'd basically never die as melee.

In DaS2, Endurance only gives Stamina, and only 1 per level after 20. In general, you get higher SL, but the benefit of each stat point is smaller.

DaS1 feels like a game designed for non-optimal play (mostly for first time players), while DaS2 seems to take minmaxing into account.

You're right that DaS2 bosses would be easier in DaS1, simply because the first game has more forgiving and abusable combat mechanics. Whether or not they'd be easier or harder than DaS1 bosses would depend on how they'd be tuned in terms of damage/hp. My general opinion is that the standout bosses from DaS1 are significantly better than the ones from DaS2, but DaS2 has a higher average, with many bosses which are "ok to good", while DaS1 had lots of boring one-dimensional damage sponges.

Finally, having Capra is not something to be proud of. Royal Rat Authority is much harder than Capra, and that's not something to be proud of either.

 

[praetor]

I disagree about the stat difference (btw End also gives poise and defence, plus the 2HP/level), since the game throws you souls like candy and you also have really powerful rings (3rd dragon is FaP 0.9, except now you have 4 slots so yeah, there's the +50 melee damage, the +150% cast speed, the +30% Stamina regen... plenty of obscenely powerful rings in DaS2 to choose from). even if you lose all your souls from enemies, you'll get enough from bosses to be well over SL100 by endgame in NG, very easily SL150 (with plenty of shopping for items) without dying too much/using the life protection ring and co-oping/invading a bit. plus, soft caps are lower and you'll reach "satisfying" numbers for those stats relatively soon. f.e. Vig at 25 + 2nd (not even 3rd!) dragon ring will give you ~1500 HP, and 30+3rd dragon+life 2 will give you almost 2k HP, which is roughly equivalent to MoM+FaP+50Vit in DaS1. you'll rarely need more than 20Vit since poise/heavy armour isn't as important (light is better because of the %-based elemental damage reduction), and you really don't need more than 20-30adp (being generous. the max i have invested in ADP so far has been 16 and i'm not having any problems. other than the incredibly retarded hitboxes, of course). and i don't think "the benefit of each stat point is smaller", since now each stat affects more stuff (other than End in DaS1, which, as you mentioned, affected quite a few very important things)

 

[Silva]

Cowboy Moment and praetor , you guys seem to disagree with me, but at the same time your arguments seem to support mine.

See, as DaS 2 mechanics are more balanced and tight, it seems its more difficult for two characters from the same overall level to have so much difference in power. While in DaS1 the mechanics are more loose, thus allowing two characters from the same level being radically different in damage dealing. (so you could have some SL100 nuts running around with 100 Dex making absurd damage while still playable - thus giving the game an higher unpredictability for the devs to cope - , something would rarely occur in DaS2).

Does it make sense or my noobness is definitely showing here ?

Spoiler

 

[Cowboy Moment]

All of the rings you mentioned, save for Third Dragon, can only be gotten in NG+ for those bonuses (also afaik Cloranthy +2 only gives +20% stamina regen, if that). And even if you take those NG+ versions, Life Ring+2 with Third Dragon still give a smaller benefit than FAP. Nothing comes even close to what Havel's does, although the comparison isn't as obvious since equip load works differently. Point stands though, these rings were very easy to get in DaS1 - you'll note that I'm not seriously bringing up DWGR or Cloranthy (+40% regen in DaS1), because those are hard to find, and most first time players won't happen upon them. Third Dragon is hidden (although not that well) at the very end of the game, and even to get something like Blades +1, you need to do something counterintuitive.

As for stats, you do get higher SL, but you also have more useful stats to invest in. A melee character will need to increase Endurance, Vitality, Adaptability, Str and/or Dex, and possibly Vigor - in DaS1, you'd get End to 40, Str or Dex to 40, and then pump Vit because there wasn't anything else to do. For instance, if you want 13 iframes on your roll (same as DaS1 fast roll), you need 105 Agility, which is over 30 ADP - a nontrivial investment. A similar investment in Vitality is needed if you plan to wear heavy-ish armor, use a heavy weapon, and still roll decently.

I personally don't sink a lot of points into Vigor in DaS2, so maybe I'm oblivious to its brokenness, but playing the game normally (having finished it once before) with optimal stat allocation, certainly feels a lot more balanced than Endurance stacking from the very beginning in DaS1, which made me feel so overpowered, that I turned to SL1. Also, just from watching some LPs, I've seen many awful players facetank Manus or Kalameet with 20 Estus and win easily, but nothing similar in DaS2 for Smelter Demon.

On an unrelated note, the early game in DaS2 can be really fucking brutal for a player completely new to Souls, especially if they go Last Giant -> Pursuer -> Sentinels without ever visiting Heide's. Pursuer in particular delivers much tasteful rape in this scenario.

 

[praetor]

Also, just from watching some LPs, I've seen many awful players facetank Manus or Kalameet with 20 Estus and win easily, but nothing similar in DaS2 for Smelter Demon.

huh? gyrm greatshield? small orange burr/flash sweat? alonne armour that you get from the enemies that are littering that same level? unless by "facetank" you mean "never dodge, take all the hits, chug estus and attack", in which case it is not possible because of how they changed the mechanics and how they designed a lot of the bosses (lots of damage and HP... really lazy and boring). i haven't watched any LP other than most of ENB's and that was because of his insider info, but i've co-oped there more than anywhere else since for some reason people have a lot of trouble with him even though his moveset is so boring, easy and predictable you could dodge it blind, and still roughly 90% of the time people die to his most easy to avoid attack: the AoE. his only "threat" is the constant fire damage, and that's just lazy and boring and cheap and very easily offset. that said, i've died twice there because of the fucking stupid "stuck in the wall" bug that they haven't fixed yet.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Yep, that was exactly my point - that complex and well-designed bosses in DaS1 can be easy in practice because of various mechanics in that game. Tbh, it's a bit strange that they didn't do a Manus or Kalameet in DaS2 - judging from normal enemy and area design, they certainly weren't shying away from difficulty. At least fucking make Velstadt act like the 2H Mace Drakekeeper, I say, if only for the explosion of butthurt he would cause.

 

[Silva]

Playing NG+ for the first time here. Despite finding it a bit too much on the easy side (this is one thing DaS2 is definitely better), the freedom to explore and take any path you want is very refreshing. The fact in NG+ you are more powerful, and thus more confident in yourself, means the game really "opens up" in a way thats difficult to see in the default/first playthrough (at least for average players like me).

For the first time I entered Blighttown from the bottom, which raises the following question: do I miss something by bypassing the Depths entirely ? Can I do this ? Right now Ive just rang the two bells and Sens Fortress just opened up. Im not seeing the need to go to the Depths at all.

 

[Damned Registrations]

There's the ember, but you don't need that unless you're going to smith up some new weapons (and even then it's only needed for +6, strictly speaking you could make a +15 weapon without it by downgrading a lightning/crystal weapon.)

There's not much else. Some ring, irrelevant gear like an extra axe or spider shield, maybe a fire keeper soul you don't need. About the only things I'd say are worth grabbing in a NG+ are items you'd want copies of (like say, certain spells like Power Within) or things you didn't get before but want for the sake of completion or just to try out (like the various items you get for killing NPCs, like the iron round shield, blacksmith giant hammer, etc.). Kirke is down in the depths if you want his armor, but I never bothered with that myself.

As for completing the game, you need very little. 2 bells, sen, pikachu, dog, 4 great lords + mask boy (he blocks nito) and gwyn are all you need to do iirc. You can skip everything else, even centipede and ceaseless. Though that takes some shenanigans. If you don't mind taking the head off the sealer guy in new londo, you don't even need the skeleton key to skip all of blight town and half the parish.

 

[Silva]

Thanks Damned Registrations . I think I will go straight to Sen´s. My immediate goal is getting the Lordvessel as fast as I can, then go back and play with convenants and PvP.

By the way, whats a good DEX-based weapon for NG+ ? Im using Quelaag Furysword on my Thief-Pyro but its too dependent on humanity and when I die its damage gets really average.

 

[Gozma]

You'll hardly die to mooks in a second runthrough of the game, even in NG+. NG+ without any kind of handicap challenge sucks in DaS1 because basically nothing besides the DLC bosses gets significantly harder relative to the increase in power a decently built SL100+ has. Plus you can easily farm ~50 humanity in a half hour in Chasm of the Abyss.

You should pretty much use all the Dex weapons, they've all got something interesting going on. For PvE the scythes (scythe, great scythe, lifehunt scythe) have good dex scaling and do a lot of damage in a single hit. Other than the plain scythe (which sucks) they're OK in PvP because they dead angle like crazy and backstab/riposte really hard, but they're very roll backstab-able and faster weapons (balder sword, falchion, katanas) or spears/estoc for shield turtling with crystal magic weapon, lightning/darkmoon blade, or pyromancy and 45 dexterity are the standard ~SL120 PvP loadouts.

 

[potatojohn]

Alright I tried again and managed to beat capra demon. I equipped the chain mail for some poise, switched my rapier +5 for a dagger because dogs are magically immune to rapiers apparently and applied resin to kill them quicker. What a bullshit boss fight though, what with fucking trees making it impossible to see anything

 

[Ninjerk]

capra demon is pretty frustrating but you haven't seen bullshit yet