Soulslikes

[sour grail]

i guess i'll just keep playing it out

[noble plover]

fun fact: DS2 is significantly easier when you actually find the emerald herald before setting off

[final smelt]

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/598855317278687242/905153075134734376/647333321512058900.gif

[velvet gorge]

miquellakind really should take some lessons from his sister saint-o'-eepy

[crystal meteor]

the idea of missing the herald is so funny

[noble plover]

look,

xP

in other news, blew 4 levels on Dex to powerstance longswords, only to find that the R2 thrust is two-handed only so i don't get it while powerstancing and might as well go back to using broadswords

but on the plus side i got to, and past, the Last Giant

[tender orchid]

Friend gifted me Lies of P+DLC and holy fuck this (DLC 1st boss) ||alligator|| is kicking my ass

I went in as soon as it was unlocked, was that a mistake and I need to come back after I get further into the main story?

[final smelt]

when does it unlock?

[tender orchid]

shrug First time doing the DLC so I dunno what the ||gator|| gives other than access to more DLC

[final smelt]

i don't have the dlc so i don't know when you unlock dlc

so i don't know the context of how far in the main game you are in

[spare summit]

ch10

[tender orchid]

Right at the beginning of chapter 10 you get a prompt telling you that the DLC can be accessed

[final smelt]

10 is fairly deep in but it wouldnt hurt to do a bit of clean up probally

buy stuff repare etc

[sweet quiver]

are you on NG+

i think they adjusted difficulty since launch

but when i went in on launch on ng+ it was, a lot harder than most basegame stuff

the ||gator|| was also my least favourite boss of the DLC i think

maybe tied with another later boss

unless the normal mobs have been curbstomping you, you should probably be fine

[tender orchid]

First time playthrough

[sweet quiver]

hmm ok

how have the mobs been to kill then

[tender orchid]

The new mob types have been annoying too

[sweet quiver]

cause i know they absolutely shredded me when i went in

[tender orchid]

Though I've chalked that up to them being new types and ||animals|| so harder to read

[sweet quiver]

the bear you meet as like, the first enemy in the dlc killed me in two shots when i first went in

tbf i think that was before i put any points into health

but the DLC is a lot harder than base game

[tender orchid]

I killed that but went through most of my pulse cells too

[sweet quiver]

the ||gator|| is an absolute fuck though

what level are you and how upgraded are your weapons

[tender orchid]

Yeah I've been able to reliably get it to like half health but after that it's a matter of perfect dodges and guards

Twp Dragons Sword is +5 and I'm like 70 levels up, maybe one or two less

[final smelt]

do you use consumables much

[tender orchid]

Most of that in Capacity for all the heavy defensive parts

Not really

[final smelt]

you should

[tender orchid]

I try not to rely on them

[sweet quiver]

what is your main damage scaling stat at

[final smelt]

consumles are extremely strong

and easy to buy

[tender orchid]

A

[sweet quiver]

no like

level

what level is it

[tough lynx]

The ||gator|| is fucking evil tbh

[sweet quiver]

correct

it's not even a fun difficult

absolute bastard creature

[tender orchid]

30

[sweet quiver]

somehow made a boss less fun to fight than that swampy fuck

[sweet quiver]

hmm i think that should be good

i will say in general that boss is just absolute misery

[spare summit]

the alligator sucks

[tender orchid]

Good to know it's not just me

[sweet quiver]

nah it's a universal experience

it's a really shit intro to the DLC

[tender orchid]

I thought I was getting good after first timing ||Champion Victor|| but guess that was a fluke

[sweet quiver]

||Champion Victor|| is a big timing boss i think

[final smelt]

i love using the one conumsables that gives you fable

[sweet quiver]

unlike the ||gator|| which crawled right out of hell to fight you

[tender orchid]

Fable Needle

[final smelt]

another really useful ablity is the repair on grindstone use ablity

[sweet quiver]

but yeah that boss is just an absolute fucker tbh

[spare summit]

it doesn't matter if you're good or not really

the ||gator|| is just

a fucking asshole

[sweet quiver]

i fought it after beating the entire game and it kicked my ass

[tender orchid]

Also debating if I should go back to using the Aegis Legion for the block and counter

[spare summit]

Aegis arm is pretty fucking great

[sweet quiver]

it is

[spare summit]

especially once you have the parry riposte for it, that shit hits HARD

it becomes a supplementary superparry that you can use to bust up even the hardest hitting, most annoying asshole moves in the game

[sweet quiver]

i don't think i ever used its parry function

[ashen pumice]

Once I got the shotgun arm in the DLC, I just used that

[tender orchid]

Killed it

[sweet quiver]

there you go

it's just an absolute fuck of a boss

[heavy agate]

yeah, I hated the boss

but despite it, the DLC is peak

[tender orchid]

Made it to the third DLC boss and damn they got hands

[tender orchid]

Man this DLC is longer than I thought it'd be

Beginning to think thirty bucks wasn't overpriced

[ashen pumice]

it's fairly long

[tender orchid]

And now I fight the... like 5th main boss I guess ||Anguished Guardian of the Ruins|| and what the fuck?

[ashen pumice]

good luck with that one

[tender orchid]

Yeah I'm not even getting it to half reliably

And the ||second phase suddenly has fucking laser beams!||

[tender orchid]

Beat the boss and jeezus christ I was not expecting ||the fatal attack to be our boi throwing gooddamn hands!||

[sweet quiver]

Yuh

Lil man got hands

[tender orchid]

Wish he did that more

[tender orchid]

Got to the final boss of Overture

JEEZUS FUCKING CHRIST

[sweet quiver]

yeah

basically

[tender orchid]

What in the goddamn hell ||kind of puppet was he to begin with?! How much of this was his own augmentation and the alchemists doing?!||

[sweet quiver]

https://tenor.com/view/laser-smite-smite-me-lizard-ncs_artist-gif-25704894

[bitter ridge]

Did strike me a bit 'why would you make this', it didn't even seem like the event had that many guards or whatever

[sweet quiver]

tbf that is pretty much the motto of ||The Alchemists||

why the FUCK would you do this

good fucking gods

[tender orchid]

It's remarkable how much shit Simon is responsible for

[sweet quiver]

||Simon and Geppetto challenging eachother to a "worst fucking person alive" battle||

ngl i'm so happy there was a half decent femme P mod around so i could play Lies of P in full comfort

cause it's such a peak game

actually one of my favourite games i've played

[final smelt]

its easily top 3 soulslike for me

[sweet quiver]

yeah

honestly agree

[final smelt]

Ds2,ER,LIES, and Nioh 2 are all really close to me

in terms osf how much i enjoyed them

[sweet quiver]

i think it'd be like

[tender orchid]

I admittedly haven't played the Dark Souls trilogy through

[sweet quiver]

Elden Ring+Shadow of the Erdtree, Lies of P+Overture and like

[tender orchid]

Cause I haven't beaten the first game

[sweet quiver]

Sekiro maybe?

[tender orchid]

Because of MOTHERFUCKING BLIGHT TOWN

[final smelt]

I do think lies being more linear and feeling like it doesnt have as many builds as the others, does keep it from being the top for me

[sweet quiver]

Sekiro or DS3 i think

[final smelt]

blighttown isnt that bad once you know about the shortcut

[sweet quiver]

man i'm honestly just like

comparing Gael to Sword Saint Isshin at this point to think of which game i preferred

idk

it's been too long since i played Ds3

i think i might just prefer Gael

tough fucking choice

[tender orchid]

Swapped from Two Dragons Sword to Pale Knight cause PK is cool as shit but TDS ability to stop comboes before they start is starting to be sorely missed against this stupid boss

In related news ||that phase transition is BULLSHIT||

[tender orchid]

Finally killed the ||Blood Artist|| that rat bastard

Having the Perfectionist Stone made all the difference

Had to go back and deal with a main story boss to get it but don't think I missed any DLC induced dialogue

[sweet quiver]

There is some stuff the dlc changes iirc

Idr what tho

[tender orchid]

The beach has extra dialogue

And a couple quests have effects in the main game

Like ||your new old friend|| and ||the painting||

[sweet quiver]

Ahh yeah

[untold tendon]

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1799840/view/515227840986219005?l=english demo for you kings fielders @glossy cloak @gloomy ibex
https://youtu.be/GYnBVbaGWK4

[glossy cloak]

the naming is subtle

[untold tendon]

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2624080/view/534368774300632293?l=english

[tender orchid]

Lies of P question, so in the DLC you find the upgrade core to further strengthen already unlocked P-Organ abilities. Is that one Quartz and done or can you dump a ton of Quartz into one node over time?

[sour grail]

Lies of P is pretty darn good so far

although I've fallen too far into the deflect playstyle without the skill to back it up 😔

[final smelt]

i ended up really likeing the parry fable art

[sour grail]

ooh yeah, i should use a handle with that

do you mean the automatic deflect for a short period, or the deflect guard counter art?

[final smelt]

neither

there is a fable art called parry

it doesnt use gauge on fail but you do eat a hit

but it completely ends combos

and does stagger damage so high most bosses still get staggered

[sour grail]

ooh dang

[final smelt]

actully it might just auto stagger if it can be staggered

there is a later boss i truggled with due to their rapid combo killing me so i just parried the first hit completely ending the combo

and because they get staggered you can often get some if not all of your used fable enrgy back

[noble plover]

first old one soul obtained

now... well, i'll figure that out next time i sit down to play, i guess.

pretty pleased with my look tbh

[sour grail]

i’m running into a boss like this now lmao

might give it a try, though I only have 1 weapon with the art

[final smelt]

make sure to buy the weapons from the merchant that was before the first boss

[sour grail]

i did that at the very beginning and destroyed one of them by accident 😔

oh it was the one with guard parry 😭

nooooooo

i thought it would disassemble it (I hadn’t gotten to the hotel yet) and there wasn’t a confirmation message

I do have a couple of other handles with it, but they scale a bit more with dex

I’ll still give it a shot later to see if i can get some interrupts, since ||Laxasia P2 is giving me trouble with the speed and the teleport mixups||

I should also remember that I have dodges instead of only the block button lmao

[final smelt]

parry her opeing attack for a ton of damage to her shield

also for p2 the perfect guard art works great for the opening

ive noticed blocking normally actully works decently in her 2nd phase

[sour grail]

might take the guard up grindstone then

and use my shield more

[tender orchid]

Yeah if you perfect guard the projectiles they get reflected back to her

Also if you have the DLC you can do that first to become so overpowered that the rest of the game is almost a walk in the park

[sour grail]

⁉️

i did think they felt a bit uninteractive, that explains a lot

😭

i was sprinting/rolling them

[final smelt]

oh one tip

[sour grail]

hot dang

[final smelt]

get the ablity that repairs when you use a special grindstone

[tender orchid]

It's part of the P-Organ minor upgrades, I think under the Green list

[final smelt]

||https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGV58wwA_1I||

this was my L fight when i refought her for fun but i did parry less than i probally could hvae pulled off

the shotput also counts as a heavy attack

for groggy

[tender orchid]

Why are you using Fulminus?

[final smelt]

Because its good

[tender orchid]

I only bring it up since she's electric, and other runs I've seen typucally ise Acid

[sour grail]

what does electric shock do to enemies?

[final smelt]

if you see i can pull off the full power shock a lot

[sour grail]

oh dang, the impale is a hitgrab not a command grab

i've been dodging them

[final smelt]

also you can increase your stagger time

so you can do a full fulmic charge and a fnisher

thew great thing about parrying the opening

is it does so much damage to the shield

ive never once had ot deal with it in phase 2

[sour grail]

beat Lies of P

😌

I enjoyed it quite a bit

and learned that you should sometimes take a break, since fighting bosses after 3 hours of playing means you don't play that well

came back and did the boss I was stuck on first try

[sour grail]

and this helped massively lmao

[tender orchid]

Did you also beat the DLC?

[sour grail]

not yet, but I bought it and got started

it'll take a bit of a back seat because I have some irl stuff coming up, but I'm looking forward to it

[tender orchid]

I only ask because completing the DLC before certain main story events affects dialogue and also because the DLC is harder than the main game so be prepared for that.

It resulted in the funny occurrence of me first timing every main game boss I went after when I did my first playthrough cause I did the DLC as soon as it unlocked since I had to get to over level 100 to beat the DLC final boss

[sour grail]

gotcha

even normal enemies are hitting pretty hard 😓

[sweet quiver]

when i got into the DLC when it first came out

the first enemy i found one-shot me

so

hopefully it's going better for you than that

[sour grail]

luckily it is

[tender orchid]

Everytime I reach the ||Krat Zoo|| in Lies of P Overture I ||feel so bad for the animals.|| Is that weird? Like we see ||dead people everywhere and I note it as "oh shit nobody got out of this"|| but then I see ||the girafe corpses at the entrace and I think "oh no those poor creatures they must've been so confused"|| and THEN I find ||the stitched together corpses and I'm like "they did not fucking deserve this what is wrong with those alchemists"||

[sweet quiver]

||Alchemists be like "time to be fuckass evil" and just do evil shit non-stop||

||Once again everything is either Simon Manus' fault or Guiseppe Geppetto's fault||

[noble goblet]

but they looked damn good while doing it

the drip was a little crazy

[sweet quiver]

thinking about Burnt Ivory King

he was him...

one of the few people to go "i can fix them" and do it

[tulip cove]

one drowned in poison, another succumbed to flame
still another did more than the other two combined

[sweet quiver]

Burnt Ivory King said "i'm him, i've been him, i will continue to be him"

[sweet quiver]

also Shaman Village remains my favourite place in all of Elden Ring

[velvet gorge]

And one day
We’ll return there
To our home
Bathed in rays of gold

[sweet quiver]

genuinely one of the most emotionally charged and pretty places in a from game

[velvet gorge]

Where it all began

[sweet quiver]

whenever i go to the Shaman Village

i feel like i am

feeling the weight of history

i can feel the melancholy suffused into that earth

[velvet gorge]

The consequences. Oh the consequences.

[noble goblet]

I like the contrast you get between it, the Scadutree Base, and the Divine Gate

these three, just, empty places

where you can almost see what the imagined future was, and how it went wrong

[sweet quiver]

Yeah

[crystal meteor]

oh finally

the demo was so good

[sweet quiver]

Thinking about Sir Ansbach again

And it's crazy how having one guy who serves someone you thought was an evil lunatic be that cool and charismatic can genuinely make the person they serve being bad seem so inconceivable

Sir Ansbach doing the entire Mohgwhn Dynasty's PR solo and succeeding purely based on how cool of a guy he is

[stable lintel]

Yeah I feel that sir Ansbach demeanor definitely proves the blood dynasty was on to something or had at least noble intentions ….before Miquella’s manipulation

[bitter ridge]

Nawh it was Ansbach and his Problematic Giant Husband

[sour grail]

Lies of P having boss rematching is awesome

[sweet quiver]

Pre Ansbach is like "what the fuck is wrong wth Mohg"

Post Ansbach is like "Everything weird with Mohg is a Miquellan psyop, all glory to the Mohgwyn Dynasty"

[velvet gorge]

Ah yes. Blood cult with noble intentions

[bitter ridge]

I feel like it'd be brought up more if it used to not be completely fucked, yeah

[velvet gorge]

Like, they’ve got literal lakes and rivers of blood

[bitter ridge]

And they don't wear shoes

[sweet quiver]

Well yeah but Miquella has clearly had a grip on Mohg's brain for a while

And you know, Sir Ansbach

[bitter ridge]

His grip on everyone elses brain did not make them do this

Also still a really needlessly convuluted plan, Miq

[sweet quiver]

Bit of a diff between Miquella puppeting Mohg around for his plans and doing a bit of a mind whammy on the others

[velvet gorge]

The formless mother is an outer god dedicated to blood. Miquella did jack shit here.

[sweet quiver]

At least i think so

[sweet quiver]

I mean yeah but there was clearly something better going on than what we seeof current Mohg at some point

[bitter ridge]

Because an old man has charisma?

[sweet quiver]

I don't think the whole blood thing necessarily contradicts this

[sweet quiver]

Yes

[velvet gorge]

Just cause it was better doesn’t mean it’s good.

[velvet gorge]

The way you get into the blood cult is by KILLING A TARNISHED’S MAIDEN AND STAINING A CLOTH WITH HER BLOOD

[sweet quiver]

¯_(ツ)_/¯

[sweet quiver]

I follow Ranni, good is hardly on my agenda

[velvet gorge]

…fair enough I follow her too

There’s no good guy in elden ring. Just like in warhammer, you’ve just gotta pick your favorite bad guy

[sweet quiver]

anyway i'm just saying that clearly Miquella completely fucked over Mohg and his dynasty and they probably had something better going on at some point

could just be me being blinded by the helper of outcasts thing again

but there are for sure hints that Mohgwyn Dynasty may have been something more noble once upon a time before Miquella twisted Mohg to his purposes

[bitter ridge]

To me he seems to help them in the same manner Nurgle technically helps in 40k

[sweet quiver]

idk Ansbach is just that much of a presence that he genuinely does change my thoughts on Mohg and his whole deal

[velvet gorge]

If ansbach followed destined death you’d be saying similar stuff

[sweet quiver]

he's too noble and kind of a guy for me to imagine him as straight up second in command to the leader of the murderous blood cultists

[bitter ridge]

That's what all the people he doesn't murder for their blood say

[sweet quiver]

?

why is Destined Death the thing you bring up here

is it problematic in some way i didn't know about

[bitter ridge]

I agree with the Tower Crone, Marika just makes Problems Children

[sweet quiver]

i mean she is objectively correct

[bitter ridge]

They all suck in fun unique ways

[sweet quiver]

all her children except maybe like, Godwyn, are fucked up and weird

[bitter ridge]

I bet Godwyn was weird just got historic revision cause he died

[sweet quiver]

i'm honestly not sure if there even was anything wrong with him cause it would be the one guy who was actually mostly fine who gets soul murdered

[bitter ridge]

His problem is that he didn't not get murdered, that idiot

[sweet quiver]

i mean i can absolutely see there being historical revisionism going on since he's the one that got fucking axed

[bitter ridge]

He did make peace with the dragons sort of

[sweet quiver]

but i also find it just as possible that he did nothing wrong and Ranni just decided to fuck him over for whatever reason

[noble goblet]

The real issue is the Othering the Golden Order does which drives people to the Blood-Murder-Love-Family Cult, tbh

Mohg's dynasty is a byproduct of the persecution of the Omen + Albinaurics

Imo her kids are all fucked up & weird because Marika herself is fucked up & weird. Both in how they were treated, and maybe in the spiritual-magical sense of Being The Elden Ring.

You ascended to godhood by mainlining a 'normalized crucible current' girl why are you shocked your kids are growing horns

[spare summit]

https://youtu.be/pqBSCZS3T30

new Dark Souls smoke spot just dropped

[sour grail]

beat the first Overture full boss fight ||Markiona and the puppet||, holy moly that was good

||really unique and fun boss design, super dynamic and a good duo fight!

not to mention the puppeteer theme being explored really well, Markiona using the puppet to strike from afar and defensively, as well as to move around was so cool ||

||also if you manage the puppet and boss HP well, you can get rewarded by skipping a huge chunk of P2 if you kill Lorian the puppet before Markiona phases||

[heavy agate]

I was really enjoying Code Vein, until I reached the cathedral

This must be the place level design goes to die

everything looks the same, the layout makes no sense and it's extremely vertical

[sweet quiver]

The Cathedral fucking sucks yes

Incoherent maze from hell

[heavy agate]

I've gotten to the point where it looks like there are real buildings, but I'm taking a break

[sweet quiver]

Wise

[tender orchid]

Did you find the secret things?

[heavy agate]

I have no idea 😄

I am usually very good at finding hidden locations and secrets

but who knows honestly

[sour grail]

oh dear

[final smelt]

the rest of the game level design is fine

but yeah i hate the cathetdral too

[untold tendon]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5fM5tG-g1E holy shit I'm so excited

1.0 version of Lost Flame will be released on 17th of February 2026. Early next year I've have decided to take a few weeks off my daily job to fully focus on wrapping up the game, hence the delay from this year.

[final smelt]

nioh 1 is 5$rn

[sour grail]

respecced into an advance build and blowtorched a boss 😌

It's a really nice change of pace from my comfy strength build, I dodge more because I'm taking 150% more chip damage when I miss a deflect

and the ||flamethrower handle|| from the dlc has a really unique playstyle too!

[ashen pumice]

That one is interesting yeah

[sweet quiver]

The dlc really elevated the weapon design tbh

[sour grail]

for sure

the ||arche sword|| is also pretty fun, the blade art is very cool

[sour grail]

got to the dlc final boss but I'm going to be away for a few days

https://tenor.com/view/uma-musume-matikanefukukitaru-fukukitaru-gif-16032220139649818123

i will beat it up with a very long stick ||silent evangelist's handle with saw blade|| dlc handle spoily

||i really like the movement and the reach, although it could probably use a faster blade; I'm just using this one because it's funny||

[crystal meteor]

Lies of P question: how stingy should i be with upgrading weapons

[ashen pumice]

all upgrades materials except the final one can be obtained infinitely

especially with the DLC as well though, there is a pretty good amount of full moonstones

[crystal meteor]

Sweet

i havent needed to upgrade my weapons yet but when i did i didnt wanna waste anything

[final smelt]

oh also handle and blade compatablit does matter like dont use a slashing handle on a stabing etc

[glossy cloak]

scaling-altering materials are much more limited iirc, idk if the dlc changes that, but don't necessarily expect to be able to change every Motivity weapon to a Technique one or vice versa

[crystal meteor]

roger roger

Fun game so far! lots of stuff just Makes Sense

made it to the... church library is what i'll call it. haha. what the fuck.

mostly just done health to 20 then motivity to 20, now cranking up weight capacity stat thingy

good ole 'big ass sword' always works

[sour grail]

🙂‍↕️

[sour grail]

not too much if you like a blade, since you can always slap it on another handle without spending more upgrade materials (slash/stab affinity and scaling aside)

I have been using the ||Mad Donkey's saw blade|| on various handles for almost the whole game and DLC

[ashen pumice]

That blade is very good yeah

Lots of attack and nice range

[sour grail]

yeah!

I've been streaming the whole game to a friend and we have been enjoying putting it on long handles

quite silly

[tender orchid]

I'd say only be stingy if you want to use a boss weapon since those materials are a little harder to come by, but not so rare that you can't tinker around a little bit.

SInce you're at the Church you should be able to find the boss weapon vendor soon too

[ashen pumice]

You can still put boss weapons to +3 without issue at least

[tender orchid]

Yeah, and Boss weapons level a bit differently. Regular weapon blades cap at +10, whereas boss weapons instead cap at +5. Plus you can't break boss weapons into blades and handle, they come as a set.

[sour grail]

what are your opinions on boss weapons being inseparable? I'm fine with it, my friend would prefer if they weren't

[sweet quiver]

It did make me not use them at all

I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing

But it deff turned me off using them since i wanted to play with the weaoon building gimmick

[tender orchid]

I don't mind it since it gives them a specific identity though I admit some of them aren't the best as a combo

But I also mainly use boss weapons so I'm biased

I used the Two Dragons Sword before swapping to the Pale Knight before swapping to the Monad Rose Sword (with the Hunting Bow as a backup/range tool)

[sour grail]

yeah samesies

they are pretty nifty with the movesets, so I'm going to give some a try eventually

but the weapon customization has held me for now

[bitter ridge]

The boss weapons are generally unique enough that I understand why they did it that way

And it's a fine little change of pace imo

Also some movesets with some blades might be a little wild

Two Dragons parry with a big ol' monster cleaver

[sour grail]

LOL yeah

I get it, I like that they feel unique (although I might still try the Boss Weapon Assemble mod)

[crystal meteor]

oh the rabbits were so cool

so so cool

need that #drip

[tender orchid]

The ones in Lies of P?

[crystal meteor]

yeah

really enjoying it so far

wondering which boss will finally claim my life

[final smelt]

still havent died?

[sour grail]

https://tenor.com/view/rabbit-gif-24545426

yeah i liked them as a fight

fun to deflect the main guy too

big sord..

[tender orchid]

If you want to dress like them I'll just tell you that you'd need the DLC to get their outfits

[sour grail]

i just want the ears not the masks 😔

I've been rocking default P all game

with a christmas hat

[tender orchid]

Ears and masks come attached to one another I'm afraid

[sour grail]

yeah :(

[potent otter]

okay the second boss is kicking my ass an it's unpleasant

[tender orchid]

Which game?

[potent otter]

Lies, but I just locked in apparently

I got 4 levels up from that, huh

maybe I was a tad underleveled

[tender orchid]

Oh yeah, the Scrapped Watchman can be a bit of an early game check to see if you've been paying attention

[sour grail]

shell yeah

[potent otter]

paying attention to what lol

[tender orchid]

Block timing for fury attacks

[potent otter]

the flashing red attacks?

[tender orchid]

Yes

[potent otter]

counterpoint: gtfo

[tender orchid]

They can only be perfect blocked or un away from, dodging through them doesn't work

[potent otter]

those weren't in any way the problem

[tender orchid]

Was the electrical after effects in phase 2?

[potent otter]

not especially - it was mostly the wind up delay sweeps and the grab

[tender orchid]

Gotcha

On the plus side you now have the ability to utilize your P-Organ

[potent otter]

also being very punishing for any mistake in a long attrition battle

I felt like my damage was not great on him

[sour grail]

the blanka ball attack was scary

fury attacks scare me but it feels good to be the deflecter

I do sometimes struggle with getting my stance break, since I favor slower weapons 😔

[tender orchid]

Legion Arms can cause Stagger, though only a few

Puppet String's big attack you get at the third upgrade can, for instance

Also some of the harder hitting Fable Arts

[sour grail]

mhm

[crystal meteor]

Scared to hit the first boss that'll eradicate me, so far i think ive been fortunate till now

[sour grail]

mine was ||The Green Swamp Monstie|| i think this is later than murdoc and weirdfool are at, definitely past the boss murdoc was talking about

although I was fighting it at the end of a 3-4 hour session, beat it quickly after coming back the next day (same happened with another boss)

take breaks everyone!

[crystal meteor]

yeah i stopped right after rabbits for now

[crystal meteor]

i think its always important to take breaks to download your new skills ye

[crystal meteor]

😭 first boss i end up dying to at all is the fucking ||mad clown. ||sob

[crystal meteor]

oh man that said right after that next boss is SICK

[bitter ridge]

The Mad Clown gets a lotta people, end of a gauntlet, shockingly tough, those arms

[ashen pumice]

that clown has hands, very literally

[bitter ridge]

And then he laughs at you v-v

[crystal meteor]

just very funny to see him in the distance, leave to heal, come back w full juice, get my ass kicked once, kill him, then one shot the next boss

clown clowned on me </3

[sour grail]

real af

yeah that stretch is dangeroussss

i felt like snake from solid when I picked them apart to finally get a 1v1

[crystal meteor]

later game lies of p boss stuff: ||oh man the green monster fight was neat as hell ||

and i may have respecced my entire build to use that weapon LOL

[sour grail]

🙂‍↕️

one day i will respec for it

[ashen pumice]

many such cases with that one

[final smelt]

I hate swamp its one of the only two bosses i hated.

[tender orchid]

Yeah a lot of people respecced for that weapon, it's just really cool

Though in the end I eventually landed on a different weapon for my NG+ runs (one you get from beating the DLC)

[sour grail]

beat the Lies of P DLC

I really liked it overall, felt like they experimented a lot as a nice addition to the base game's foundation

||I was hoping the final boss would drop a boss soul, but I'm looking forward to using the weapon you get anyways

also planning on trying the bow as a main weapon for a bit too, along with the Monad Saber
||

cleaned up some secrets and am fairly ready for NG+ 🙂‍↕️

[tender orchid]

Did you put the ||bell collar|| on the ||cat||?

[sour grail]

mhm!

[crystal meteor]

ye dlc has been neat; i just beat up ||(early boss dlc?) markiona and then did the little circus after, was REALLY neat||

[sour grail]

||yeah the circus was a highlight for me, it's fun to explore and very compact||

[potent otter]

I feel like I missed something about Act IX

Namely ||the point lmao?||

I'm pretty certain that ||Antonia told me prior to Act IX that the Alchemists base was hidden/a mystery blah blah, and then you do this loop of Krat Station for no real reason that I can tell, rescue the Hotel and then she tells you there was a secret passage all along?||

[sour grail]

||yeah my stream buddy and I found that quite strange as well, I thought we were looking for a key or something but we already got the golden ergo (?)||

[crystal meteor]

i was seeing that as a "oh yeah the people you know are More Interconnected than you thought, especially your dad"

[tender orchid]

You go through Act IX ||trying to reach an Alchemist lab in the city for clues|| but yeah it is a bit weird in retrospect, defiitely ||just an excuse for the writers to keep you out of the hotel for the next part||

[crystal meteor]

holy moly (dlc boss) ||veronique|| is THRASHING my ass

genuinely not sure when im supposed to be able to like, Heal

[sour grail]

ough yeahh

read this after beating them ||i really wish we got her weapon 😭 ||

[crystal meteor]

wheeew i got them after i respecced

[crystal meteor]

yooooo fucking ||gunblade|| these dlc weapons rule

[ashen pumice]

It's awesome

Amazing weapon

[sour grail]

yeahhh it looks so cool, I took the amulet but am itching to get it

[tender orchid]

The amulet from that boss does seem like a real get for element focused builds

[sour grail]

mhmm!!

[crystal meteor]

that was really tempting cuz i was using the ||arch tempered lightning sword, but GUNBLADE||

[sour grail]

there’s also the ||amulet from the zoo that increases element damage iirc||

[sour grail]

both are so temptingggg

[crystal meteor]

oh wow wow wow. what a great final dlc boss

[sour grail]

right???

[tender orchid]

Honestly that boss gave me some serious trouble my first time because I just could not ||get the timing right to block nor dodge all the attacks in the phase transition but once I had the Perfection Grindstone the rest was simple enough||

[crystal meteor]

that was the same solution i ended up using

[tough lynx]

So apparently ds1 remastered has support for 1280*800 resolution, but all of the other souls games don't

[final smelt]

whats that resoultion for

the steamdeck?

[tough lynx]

Yeh

[sour grail]

my tentative lies of p boss tier list (base game + dlc - enemies with healthbars I didn't consider bosses)

the first 2/3 of the game is open to movement because it's been 1-2 months since I've fought those enemies

going through on ng+ now so I'll be able to check them out again, boss rematch exists too

ng+ spoilers ||new p-organ phase?? and assuming there's 3 endings and +2 items like ds3, there might be a 7th ||

[sweet quiver]

iirc ||you get new p-organ phases up to ng++||

[tender orchid]

Yeah you get a ||second new Phase but it stops there, so the only other upgrade method is the DLC upgrade menu for enhancing present unlocked upgrades||

[sour grail]

noted!

[sour grail]

I quite like the factory area

nice, compact, more side paths than a lot of other areas iirc

[crystal meteor]

yeah i think it does "linear hallways" in an interesting way?

each hallway has a clear 'threat' to it and a nice rhythm on how to play it out / how it feeds you that info

[topaz sorrel]

Doing a knife only run and man are the anor Londo ghosts annoying to try and get past.

[sour grail]

ooh yeah, that’s a good point as well

[noble goblet]

watching someone doing a first-time lies of P playthrough, where they don't use any weapons, just the legion arms

pain

[tough lynx]

wat

[sour grail]

😨

[crystal meteor]

😭 blind run AND arms only? damn

i wonder how many arm reload items you get without having to just Buy Them constantly

[potent pewter]

is it zullie? i haven't checked her P stream vod yet, but it feels like the kind of bullshit she'd do

and the timing fits

[noble goblet]

nah its someone I know personally. whos doing it just because they have a specific sort of Something Wrong With Them.

zullie better not lmao. The game LOOKS so much less smooth without the integrated deflects.

you can tell they were clearly designing around it (as they should!)

[sour grail]

interesting that you can start the dlc on ng+ right at chapter 5 since you keep the key item

[sweet quiver]

https://youtube.com/shorts/Rks1FGee2h0?si=GtHHiCRwe_H4eV68

getting flashbacks

[potent pewter]

fucking horrendous choice of audio

absolute dogshit

probably correct on runback tedium, however

[sweet quiver]

tbh audio on shorts is so shit all the time it just doesn't register anymore

[sour grail]

😭

[ashen pumice]

that sure is the Seath runback yeah

[final smelt]

i don't even consider it bad one just a long one

[gloomy ibex]

I think the worst is the two cats in ds2

[sweet quiver]

It is

Frigid Outskirts is a hateful hellscape

[heavy agate]

I do hope future souls games have a stake of marika mechanic, in situations where you're not just putting the bonfire in front of the boss for some reason

[gloomy ibex]

yeah I am always of two minds on it

because I kinda like the modern souls games which are a really streamlined boss/enemy rush with a lot of conveniences

but I also really liked the jank and variation in earlier stuff

and difficulty in odd places

[sour grail]

sometimes runbacks can be memorable and a good chance for a mental reset!

but if you want to get back to the boss asap, if they're too easy then a stake could do the job, and if they're too stressful they can be frustrating

if I had to take the elevator down to radahn for each of the 70+ attempts, I might have gone elsewhere to level up instead of trying to do him at SL40 😭

[long flicker]

Watching Zullie play lies of p, oh gods why is she never parrying

[sour grail]

😭

[heavy agate]

what the hell

did she play Sekiro like that?

[tough lynx]

I hope not!

[sour grail]

have peeps here played code vein 1?

I tried the demo years ago and don't remember anything

maybe they had a ladder but maybe that was the AI Limit demo

speaking of, has anyone played AI Limit

[tough lynx]

We haven't played either other than their demos unfortunately

[ashen pumice]

I have played both

both have some neat ideas definitely

[tough lynx]

ngl, the only reason we haven't played code vein is because a lot of the characters and bosses seem to be very "breasted boobily" in design

But apparently you can make cool doll looking things in the character creator so I should probably force Rose to buy it

[final smelt]

the first one is where my avatar comes from

[heavy agate]

Code Vein is pretty fun, besides a couple of instances of awful level design

but the female characters mostly do feel a bit... breast focused in their design

[final smelt]

i really only hate the cathedreal

[sour grail]

👀 do tell

[sour grail]

ah 😔

[sour grail]

awwwww that's adorable

berry cool :D

[harsh shard]

I did the character creation in Code Vein and got distracted by other games and gotta get back to it and it's a pretty versatile creator and can testify you can make people with plausible proportions if you like

[sour grail]

hooray

that is good to hear /gen

[sour grail]

exactly as miyazaki intended

[sour grail]

farron keep in ds3 is a bit interesting but a slog to go through

forced heavy roll areas

[sour grail]

[heavy agate]

is that a soulslike?

[tulip cove]

Test

[tough lynx]

Answer!

[tulip cove]

aaaaaa

AAAAAAAAAAAa

wrong thread

[tough lynx]

Yeh 😔

[untold tendon]

Says it is!

[heavy agate]

Any tips before I start Sekiro?

[sweet quiver]

I'd rec coming into it expecting a different flow of combat to other from games

You gotta be aggressive as fuck

Mostly people think of the flow of combat as being centered around blocking and counterattacking

But my sage wisdom is that some attacks from enemies and even bosses can be interrupted

If you learn which attacks you can simply stop the enemy from doing by attacking you can significantly increase your attacking ability

You can completely dictate the flow of combat if you get good enough at this

[ashen pumice]

If an attack doesn't have the perilous symbol, you can block and parry it

[sweet quiver]

That is also a good one

Sekiro is cracked out of his gourd with a sword

Man blocks just about anything but a perilous attack

And you can counter perilous attacks

So you work that into your flow of conbat as well

[ashen pumice]

In general, blocks and deflects will also be your primary defense with dodges being more niche than other soulslikes

[sweet quiver]

Jumping is also a strong counter tool for perilous

You can also totally goomba stomp people if you double click the jump button

[heavy agate]

thanks!

[ashen pumice]

Oh also, once you get access to skills buy the Mikiri Counter as soon as you can

It's a very essential part of your toolkit

[sweet quiver]

Mikiri Counter is absolutely fucking essential yes

You want it immediately as soon asyou have access

[heavy agate]

Juzou the Drunkard is kicking the shit out of me, damn

after three attempts I worked out I can pick off everyone else in the arena, backstab him and then grab the friendly nearby to help

and then I died twice 😭

still haven't quite got the hang of the different types of Perilous Attacks

[ashen pumice]

yeah it can be tricky to read what type it is immediately

that's just kinda something you need to learn the tells for on each enemy

[tender orchid]

Oh yeah, he's a real pain in the ass the first time around

[heavy agate]

he's dead!

[ashen pumice]

🥳

[sour grail]

[heavy agate]

I really thought I killed Lady Butterfly

okay, the first phase is really easy actually

the second phase...

[bitter ridge]

I have such up and down feelings on the Butterfly fight

[sweet quiver]

It's kinda neat but some of the mechanics are not fun

Extremely mid fight overall

[bitter ridge]

But she's so coole..

[sweet quiver]

True

The fight is just ok though

I think my Sekiro takes are a bit off norm though

[bitter ridge]

Nah her fight has some innate problems

[sweet quiver]

I meant more stuff like my opinions on which is sekiro's best boss, saying Butterfly is mid isn't imo some kind of spicy take

[heavy agate]

took a break and killed the chain ogre, but I've died so many times that everyone has dragon rot

[ashen pumice]

Ogre sucks

Good on you for getting through, it's IMO probably the biggest early roadblock

[ashen pumice]

There will be items to cure it, and it also doesn't do all that much mostly

Mainly it just stops you from progressing quests

[heavy agate]

Gyoubu is down

that was a fun fight

[ashen pumice]

nice

enjoy your first Memory

[heavy agate]

now if this bull would just stand still!

it's dead, thankfully only had one healthbar

[sweet quiver]

MY NAME

IS GYOBU

MASATAKA

ONIWA

AS I BREATHE

YOU WILL NOT PASS THE CASTLE GATE

[heavy agate]

I managed to find some snapdragon seeds so I went for the rematch against Lady Butterfly

won on the first attempt, though it was a close thing

snap seeds*

[sweet quiver]

They certainly change the flow of the fight

[heavy agate]

Genichiro does not fuck around

but the miniboss before him was also hard as nails

[sour grail]

oogh yeah

it took me more tries than genichiro on ng+

[sweet quiver]

Genichiro got hands

he's the filter

[sour grail]

if it’s scary you can run

you cannot easily outrun ashina cross

tbf i had stopped my playthrough right before that guy

[heavy agate]

damn, I took off two healthbars on my second attempt but he had a third

[sour grail]

but owwww

[heavy agate]

oh, I killed the Ashina Elite

took me a lot of tries, but he's dead

[sweet quiver]

yeppers

the third is the easiest and if you get the fight down it's a free win once you get to that point, but before you defeat him it's an extra difficulty spike

[heavy agate]

that eight-hit combo is nasty

sometimes I get it all, sometimes I don't

he's dead, whooo!

damn, that was a great fight

10 attempts

[sour grail]

abyss watchers are good 🙂‍↕️

playing an archipelago randomizer and went up against em for more than an hour

somewhat enjoyed relearning the patterns and the fight is really novel

I have to get used to DS3 combat again, Lies of P lets me stay in a lot more and I have to run and punish a bit more in DS3

not helped by the fact that I had 5 +2 flask charges by the time I got to Untended Graves (they replaced champ gundyr) 😭

[tough lynx]

What's an archipelago randomizer?

[sour grail]

multi-world randomizer! everyone generates a config file for their game's randomization, and then you chuck them into Archipelago and it mixes up items between worlds

when someone finds another's item, it gets "sent" to them

so someone else can pick up the Moonlight Greatsword and it'll appear in my inventory, and some of my checks will be replaced with stuff from Pokemon Crystal or Hollow Knight and whatever else people are playing

it's berry cool

[sour grail]

and yeah we've been unlucky with finding heal upgrades

some could technically still be in my world but the 2 (now 3) Estus Shards and 2 Undead Bone Shards have all been in other peoples' worlds.,.,.

[heavy agate]

Snake Eyes Shirahagi is the literal devil

[bitter ridge]

The moveset somehow feels rude

People are not nice to the one armed wolf

[sweet quiver]

yeah Snake eyes Hirahagi sure is a fight

[heavy agate]

it's miserable

[sweet quiver]

oh yeah i started Demon Souls

[bitter ridge]

best of luck, it has some.. decisions

[ashen pumice]

For some reason, you can parry her grab IIRC

[sweet quiver]

it's the last one i need to do mostly for fromsouls

[heavy agate]

wait what

[sweet quiver]

then unfortunately i have to double back to Bloodborne and do the Chalice Dungeons

and then after that

[heavy agate]

(that grab by the way has crazy tracking, if I dodge to the side it always hits)

[sweet quiver]

honestly i just need to like, double back and redo Elden Ring from the beginning

[sour grail]

is that the staff-gun user in the valley

[sweet quiver]

nah the one in the swamp hole

[sour grail]

ohhh

yeah

[sweet quiver]

valley is Shirafuji

[heavy agate]

there's another one?!

[ashen pumice]

You can also just avoid Shirahagi for now and run past her

[ashen pumice]

Yes

[heavy agate]

there's a mist wall behind her

[ashen pumice]

Ah right, but there was a way to sneak around her I think

[heavy agate]

she's dead, but it took me more tries than Genchiro

[sour grail]

realll

[ashen pumice]

Nice

[sweet quiver]

bro five crossbow men in a straight line

with like 3 normal dudes stopping you from getting to them

fr?

ok it was 4 sword dudes and 4 crossbow dudes in this line

[heavy agate]

oof

[sweet quiver]

i'm magic so the runback was easier

[heavy agate]

I was stuck on O'Rin of the Water, ran past her and now I'm stuck on Corrupted Monk

[sweet quiver]

real

corrupted Monk is a boss i still am shit at

also beat first boss in Demon Souls

Phalanx down, was actually very fun

[heavy agate]

so Corrupted Monk regens posture very quickly, but also has tons of health

I'm gonna take a break and fight something else I think

[sweet quiver]

ooh

you can kinda progress in this game however you like huh

that's kinda neat

[heavy agate]

long armed giraffe thing is dead

I had to fight them and the camera at the same time

[sweet quiver]

it's good to know that obnoxious bridge dragons go back as far as Demon Souls

[sour grail]

😩

[sweet quiver]

yup it's still ass

i love getting repeatedly one-shot by the stupid drake while trying to cross this bridge

[sweet quiver]

ok the whole bridge is a boss runback

[sweet quiver]

:)

Maiden in Black is pretty peak

top tier along with Emerald Herald

[sweet quiver]

managed to kill the second boss after the bridge, can't progress through this world further though so imma swap to the next one

[sweet quiver]

lmao

dropped from one enemy

[sour grail]

now you can make 1 whole hardstone

[sweet quiver]

i have tons of hardstone but nothing to use it on

killed armored spider

not

entirely sure what i was supposed to do?

i just kinda healed through all the attacks and kept stabbing it

[sweet quiver]

aw dang, i was going to make the scraping spear since it's a boss weapon but it apparently has low damage and its special property is destroying peoples armor so it's not going to be useful for me to make

oh well, still means i have a baller +7 spear

[sweet quiver]

Don't think i've just straight up facetanked any other from bosses like that

Nah, i'd heal

[heavy agate]

I have the Mortal Blade, but have yet to beat Corrupted Monk or big monkey

only got the big monkey to its second phase once

[sweet quiver]

Both are hard

Ngl i usually cheese monk

[heavy agate]

I might have to look up the cheese soon because I'm tired of farming for confetti

[sweet quiver]

Fair

It's easy to do

[heavy agate]

it's done

[ashen pumice]

Second phase is a lot easier IMO

One fun thing there
If if does the big overhead chop and you parry it, you can use the spear to pull out the centipede for some big damage

Also use firecrackers in phase one

Let's you chop off a large part of its health snd stagger bar before it becomes resistant

[heavy agate]

I got half way through the second phase this time, the Firecrackers worked wonders

if only spirit emblems hadn't gone up to 30 a pop

[crystal meteor]

that damn ape was my biggest wall for the longest time

[sweet quiver]

One of two bosses i used tools to defeat

[sour grail]

whattt

sick

[heavy agate]

THE APE IS DEAD

thanks for all the tips!

[sour grail]

[heavy agate]

any hints on what 'dried serpent viscera' is?

[sweet quiver]

Food

[ashen pumice]

related to a somewhat secret ending

the old woman you may have seen a couple times also kinda points you towards it somewhat

[heavy agate]

she did, yeah

[tender orchid]

Yeah, you need to do a couple sorta secret things to find the snake stuff for the extra secret best ending

[heavy agate]

The lady told me there were two fruits, I have one and have the checkpoint for where she pointed me to another

though I'm at Ashina Castle atm

Dad did not like me saying 'no'

[ashen pumice]

Good luck with Owl

[tender orchid]

He's a tricky one

[heavy agate]

I'm back for the rematch and jesus

it's not going well

he has a grab that's not marked as perilous and it has killed me every time he used it

[ashen pumice]

make sure you don't try to stab him

he can mikiri you too

otherwise it might be the one he does when you run out of posture

[heavy agate]

yeah, he does it when my posture breaks or when drop prone

[sweet quiver]

Owl taught you all your ninja bullshit so he uses it against you

[heavy agate]

it's been like four attempts and I already want a break from fighting him 😄

took a break and killed the snake

[ashen pumice]

nice

[heavy agate]

wait, there are two snakes?

I went back to where they were, and one place was empty but the other still had a snake

[sweet quiver]

overburden...

fuck, i don't have enough item burden to carry the armor that just dropped and keep the armor i had on me

idk if this will make the armor despawn or not

rip plate armor i guess, there is no way for me to carry both it and the fluted armor i found, and fluted has better stats

[tender orchid]

You want me to tell you the secret?

[sweet quiver]

i sure do love trying to do jump puzzles in souls games

found a npc enemy that has a crossbow that does half of my health per hit

[sweet quiver]

just got the most cracked spell

Fire spray, you can basically full auto shoot fireballs while moving at full speed for an extremely low fp cost

[final smelt]

theres someone in the main hub that you can store stuff wih

[sweet quiver]

yeah i know

[sweet quiver]

just searched up colorless demon souls since i wanted to find some to upgrade my magic sword

what the fuck Demon Souls

why would you do that

guess i'm only going to be using this as a booster for my spells

i seem to have gotten into a situation 😭

[final smelt]

if you beat the tutorila demon you meet this guy way earlier

you get some nic efree stuff then just punch

[heavy agate]

maybe? Not sure how likely I am to figure it out

[heavy agate]

Why does every Souls game have a jump puzzle? They're always bad

the developers of the Convergence mod for Elden Ring seem to think the game needed ten times as many of them

[sweet quiver]

this boss is kinda ass ngl

[final smelt]

he is

[tender orchid]

You ||only kill one snake for the heart|| and you find ||the other viscera in a shrine in a cave with a different giant snake in it,|| but you need ||the puppet ninja technique on in order to get to the shrine||

[heavy agate]

oh, I have those

the old lady told me about them

or old ladies? since they seem to be in two places

[sweet quiver]

||Dragon God|| is kill

[heavy agate]

nice

[sweet quiver]

bro died to this

Medieval peasant with some scavenged armor and a polearm

[potent otter]

Convergence is a bit of a weird mod in general imo

You can definitely see the author's idealised gameplay in it

Same with ERR

[heavy agate]

I honestly like a lot of Convergence, I have a few playthroughs of it and it added more fun to Elden Ring

but wow, I truly hate the level design

[sweet quiver]

why does this game not have any good helmets

would also love to know how the hell i am supposed to tell what my world tendency is at

getting the feeling that Demon Souls is essentially what people who hate DS2 say DS2 is

[ashen pumice]

I think there's a thing in the hub for it?

But don't remember

[sweet quiver]

i can see a menu

but like

this means nothing

i seem to be trending toward white tendency but like, by how much

[final smelt]

tendency is bad

its easily the worst of the wacky mechnics

its the entire reason ill never try to 100% demonsouls

it basicly makes online into a requirement kinda

online or perfection

[sweet quiver]

I am seeing why Dark Souls is the legendof the genre even if Demon Souls preceeded it

Game is weird and wacky but not in a good or fun way

Game straight up has gender locked armor apparently

[tough lynx]

Yep

[sweet quiver]

Anyway i'm gonna finish the game ig, might end up just save editing some stuff so i don't have to fuck around with World Tendency

[sour grail]

😔

the curse

[final smelt]

its not a huge deal if your just gonna beat the game

basicly i know that when you are human dying moves it towrds black

as does killing npcs

but some loot is only a certain tendencies

and enemies

honestly i probally woulnd't hate the mechnic if there was more ways to manupulate it

[sweet quiver]

Yeah

[crystal meteor]

I would love to see the idea revisited

[sweet quiver]

for some reason another enemy is now spawning in my farming spot which is making it really quite fucking annoying to try to farm souls

[sweet quiver]

next time i play i'll need to get some levels for carryweight so i can use the big sword i found

[tender orchid]

Might've spawned because your World Tendency changed

[sweet quiver]

entirely possible

[tender orchid]

Where are you Soul farming anyway?

[sweet quiver]

Shadowmen Archstone

The stupid skeletons give like 330 souls per kill

[gloomy ibex]

also if you play on the totally unpatched version from one region can't remember which

all deaths push it towards black which sucks

[sweet quiver]

wow

also the enemy placement in this game is premium ass

i sure would love to have 3 knights that can kill me in like three attacks and that are using spears, which means they can all do running attacks with multihits, to rush me all at once

[tender orchid]

Yeah world 4 is baically where all the soul farming spots are. Either at the beginning with the skeletons, after the second checkpoint with the reapers, or the final world 4 boss arena

[sweet quiver]

there is no fucking smart enemy placement, this is Demon Souls, you're gonna DIE

i can kill like

one of these guys at a time

maybe 2 if i lock in

also i got the claymore

yeah ok i can't even kill one, whenever they run at me they have the spear charge which takes out like my entire healthbar and i have no time to retaliate

ok soul ray is anti-shield apparently so imma try that

magic is peak

damn, died one-hit away from killing the boss 😔

the brutal part of this game is the runback to bosses

got it

[sweet quiver]

no good enemy placement in Boletaria, take your sensitive ass back to DS2 Scholar of the first sin, we clown in this mfer

[sweet quiver]

going to go check out some of the other worlds

[sweet quiver]

ranged enemies do obscene damage

[heavy agate]

I've never played Demon's Souls but it definitely seems like it lacks a lot of the polish of the later games

[sweet quiver]

yes

yes it certainly does

ok you know what i'm just going to edit the world tendency for convenience

[sweet quiver]

damn easiest boss so far

i used like 4-5 casts of soul ray lmao

cool, time to kill patches

time honored tradition

[sweet quiver]

this game is genuinely testing my patience with this section

it's just full of long range lasers, constantly spawning ghost enemies and randomly exploding wisps

[tender orchid]

TBF Demon's Souls is the first one Miyazaki did, it makes sense he'd figure out some of the problems after it.

Yes the title is "Demon's Souls" because you're taking the souls belong to the demons, it doesn't translate well due to the pronunciation slip up

[sweet quiver]

the only thing making this remotely playable is the uncapped healing items

there are no checkpoints between bosses

[tender orchid]

Definitely the worst part is the lack of checkpoints. Some of the areas have shortcuts you open that makes it better but otherwise

[sweet quiver]

the 10x speed two-hit kill skeletons are going to drive me demented

the run to Old Hero is ridiculous

ok got the win

[bitter ridge]

Demons Souls is unforgiving in like.. oldschool NES ways

Things are placed spitefully and with intent to kill

[sweet quiver]

archdemon kill #2 complete

[tender orchid]

Did you know the trick to fighting Old Hero?

[sweet quiver]

Nah

Just took it easy and learned some patterns

Bosses in Demon Souls are not particularly hard to beat

[tender orchid]

His is just funny cause it's that he's completely blind so if you wear little armor or wear the ring that silences you he can't find you so you can take hits at him and back off

[sweet quiver]

Huh

I was wearing almost full plate

[tender orchid]

Were you moving around very slowly?

[sweet quiver]

Yeah

Aside from rolling

[tender orchid]

That would also do it

[sweet quiver]

tower of latria be a maze fr

[tender orchid]

Well it is meant to be a prison

Just be sure to find that one magic guy and noble lady, they got stuff

[heavy agate]

you know, I haven't appreciated the level design of Sekiro enough, given your movement options and the verticality I haven't really gotten lost

[sweet quiver]

i found freke

and the other lady

[heavy agate]

though I've had trouble keeping up with the branching paths

[sweet quiver]

don't know how to get back to that lady though ngl

the prison is a fucking maze

even worse than the tower

[heavy agate]

it might be my favourite Fromsoft game in terms of level design

[tender orchid]

I should replay Sekiro sometime, I stopped after getting the 4th ending and never got to the boss rush they added later

[heavy agate]

I've been taking a two day break from fighting Owl 😄

[ashen pumice]

Owl walls me every time I do NG+

[heavy agate]

I'm gonna come back when I'm less tilted and I don't have a cold

next time I play I'll just say 'yes'

[tender orchid]

Ah, so you're at the fight at the top of the castle (again)

[heavy agate]

yeah

Genichiro was a great boss, hard but fun

Owl... I do not care for him

I need to just get good

[tender orchid]

Yeah he's a tricky bitch

Fun Fact: If you use an item to get a third revive he has extra dialogue

[sour grail]

yeah that was super cool

or that extra revive that fills up every 8 deathblows

[void panther]

Best character in Sekiro

Sekiro is a game about how old people are scary

[bitter ridge]

Owl is the most I've felt the whole 'ah this guy taught me all my moves' bit

[sweet quiver]

i love magic

[void panther]

His fight encompasses his personality well

[sweet quiver]

another boss down

nah i'd soul ray

[tender orchid]

Yeah definitely good boss design, I didn't mean it as a negative, just a descriptor of all his poison and smoke bomb plays

[ashen pumice]

magic is really powerful in DeS from what I've heard

[tender orchid]

Yeah, it's part of the story telling since the allure of the power magic can bring is what drove its development and lead to the second demonic scurge

[sweet quiver]

another boss down

[sweet quiver]

gonna need to go to the swamp at some point at this rate

done with the archstones of the Burrow King, Tower Queen and Shadowmen so far

got the chieftain and small king left

feel like small king is going to lead to like, the end of the game

since the other ones have had 4 levels and that one has more than 4

guess i might as well go to the swamp now

[tender orchid]

Yeah you need to do the Swamp before you can reach the final boss anyway

[sweet quiver]

i have yet to step into the swamp at all

put together some actual drip as opposed to just wearing flute armor

with the kris and wand

lookin kinda fly 😌

[sour grail]

love the kris

[sweet quiver]

whenever i do magic i swap to the kris since it gives me a small boost to my magic

[ashen pumice]

IIRC it also regens FP slowly?

or maybe I'm thinking about another thing

[sweet quiver]

just fought the leechmonger

literally just mogged it by standing on high ground and shooting fire spray at it until it died

easiest boss fight in the game so far

[sweet quiver]

peak has arrived

[heavy agate]

the classic

[sweet quiver]

killed the second swamp boss

once again having magic genuinely just trivialized it

alright, swamp is cleared

[sweet quiver]

Old King Doran got hands

[sweet quiver]

watched Ms.Chalice vid on Sekiro and had to revisit Isshin real quick, still got it, still a peak fight

[sweet quiver]

Old King Doran down

Homing Soul Arrow is kino

[sweet quiver]

shoutout to Warding

beat the final boss

damn the game keeps crashing on the final cutscene

beat the game

officially finished all the fromsouls

now i just need to go finish the rest of the Bloodborne bosses and go back to do some of the ones in Elden Ring

[sour grail]

shell yeah

congrats!

[sweet quiver]

once i'm done with all the bloodborne chalice dungeon bosses and the SOTE bosses + base Radahn i'll have beat every single fromsouls boss in a straight fight

[sweet quiver]

wow Warding is fucking insane

who the fuck thought 70% physical damage reduction was a good idea

no fucking wonder the final boss went from 3-shotting me to dealing chip damage

me when i cast warding and just stop taking damage i guess

[heavy agate]

managed to get Owl to phase 2

after a two-day break from the game

[heavy agate]

Great Shinobi Owl is dead

[sour grail]

[heavy agate]

I've spend the 15 minutes since going back and forth between 'important places' because the gold colour keeps telling me there's more dialogue

okay, I'm confused now because I've run out of dialogue and it's still yellow

oh, the offering box

it's now... a shop?

[tender orchid]

Out of curiosity are you gonna try for any specific ending or just see which one you get by default?

[heavy agate]

no idea what the endings are

first playthrough

Corrupted Monk again?

[tender orchid]

Corrupted Monk but for real this time

Do you want me to tell you how many endings there are without detailing anything about them except how good or bad of an ending to the story they are?

[heavy agate]

sure

[ashen pumice]

there are four endings, though one is sorta intentionally incomplete

[tender orchid]

There's the Worst Ending, the Default Ending, the Better Ending, and the Best Ending

You already skipped one of them, the two besides default require doing optional stuff to proc them right after the final boss

[ashen pumice]

better ending is also missable notably

[tender orchid]

Yeah it has a minor side quest going on

If you want to max out your power you'll need to do the steps to prep for all the endings anyway since they can involve optional bosses for Prayer Beads and Memories

[heavy agate]

Corrupted Monk is dead again

[potent pewter]

dead for real this time

did you double-tap her

[heavy agate]

yeah, Mortal Blade and immortality severed

very satisfying