genuinely just have to poke him in the ankles until he dies
#Elden Ring (DLC hype room)
frozen olive
frozen olive
ok tried fighting Mohg but i think i will return later
the fact he heals in his phase change just makes it obnoxious to try to fight him like this
obtuse halo
just beelined the tricky quest for undertaker remembrance lmao
solo run, didn't do anything fancy with the crystals just ran there at level 2 past all the enemies
died night 1 but it DID work
frozen olive
hey, so long as it works
obtuse halo
it's out of the way enough that, like, good luck having time to do it with randos for sure
I thiiink that's the last personal objective for me though. Undertaker is the last remembrance that isn't either completed or waiting on a Heolstor win
frozen olive
oh wow i'm closer to 100% Nightreign than i thought
just need to do equilibrious beast raid and beat the Nightlord with all the basegame characters
obtuse halo
oh for the achievement it doesn't even have to be THE nightlord
I think I got that right after beating Tricephalos with Revenant (I put off playing her for a while)
frozen olive
oh beat A Nightlord with each character
wow
well i guess the annoying thing would be the Equilibrious beast raid
obtuse halo
yeah you kind of just have to RNG into that
frozen olive
rng, yummers
obtuse halo
yeah this is my least favorite thing about ancient dragons
at least the fire dragons let you lock onto the ankles
frozen olive
yeah
it was kinda ass
the boss fight itself was
surprisingly easy
like i'm lvl 60
which i think is a fairly low level for that fight
but i didn't really have much problems
just had to make sure i healed after every time i took damage
kept poking him in the ankles
my stat spread is pretty funny
i'm also getting a +5 to the strength from a talisman btw
obtuse halo
okay bullying tricephalos again didn't advance it so I looked it up and Undertaker is ALSO at the point where you need to use her to beat the Nightlord
lol, lmao
frozen olive
the nightlord is cool
obtuse halo
yeah i'm just bad at the fight lol
Guardian, Duchess, Raider, Executor, Revenant, Scholar are done. Ironeye, Recluse, and Undertaker need to fight the Nightlord. Wylder is "done" in that I got the costume but it's my understanding you gotta fight the nightlord for his real ending
I haven't actually played Wylder in a hot minute
obtuse halo
well I first try'd the Nightlord as Wylder but apparently you need to have a specific relic equipped to do the thing. Which I guess makes sense but this is afaik the first time the game has actually cared exactly which relics you have currently equipped for a story beat
median rock
Guardian, Duchess, Raider, Executor, Revenant, Scholar are done. Ironeye, Reclus...
fight heolster w his red remembrance relic equipped
the tear one
ah yeah
theres a dialogue that says smth like that iirc
from some npc
real shadow
obtuse halo
Okay I finished Wylder Remembrance for realsies this time
damn, that's a bleak ending
Crushing in combination with Duchess' too, knowing their sacrifices for the other were at mutual cross-purposes
obtuse halo
alright, maxed out all remembrances
mostly this was just running Heolstor with a bunch of characters at this point lol
median rock
such is life lol
do you have all the rememberance drip now?
since i think there's 1 or 2 that require extra steps beyond just the relic, or maybe its the other way around (relic is noticeably before garb)
obtuse halo
yeah I have them all now
obtuse halo
ooh, another painfully close failure at ED Libra
proven cloak
I like it but you & your party have to be locked in
the reward is so good though, and you can cover so much ground
median rock
i think assuming you don't get turbo ratioed with which ruins/forts it sends you to, it's by far the best raid in the game. the perk + the free runes from the balancer kill itself is so good
had it pull me while i was downed recently tho, and i learned that if you die while it pulls you / even after being on the ground at the destination fort for a bit, it will leave your runes at your original place pre-teleport
(re ruins - if it gives you sleep bears or madness flower/nomads, good luck, maybe wait for a teammate for that one)
obtuse halo
I got an unfamiliar area with a bunch of the flower girl enemies and blackflame monks in it in this case
which might not be a big deal but I've never seen this particular type of POI before so it was just kind of a "oh shit, SURVIVE" moment
(I just popped scholar ult as soon as I had the balancer onscreen and that did pretty effectively tbh)
median rock
ah yep
i don't know what the official or community names for the new POIs are but i know what you're talking about
fextra seems to call em marshes & villages? the villages can be brutal, definitely not worth doing a lot of the time, but they're 2 night invader POIs when they have a tornado
tho u can always jump around the back and just drop on the boss, if its one that has a single boss up top instead of 3 split bosses
obtuse halo
I've definitely done the marshes, and have seen them in sleep, cold, and two different poison variants
median rock
there's also rot (cleanrot knights below) and madness (4 nomads + 1 frenzyflame flower, the ones from that one section of altus in ER), and blood (2 sanguine nobles iirc)
theyre not that bad tho. the nomads one is crazy fucked but the rest feel ok to me?
median rock
it's. rough.
proven cloak
i think assuming you don't get turbo ratioed with which ruins/forts it sends you...
did have a real unlucky run once where it popped right during circle closing and sent our support to a fort half out the storm
just didn't have time to get through before they had to abandon the raid
obtuse halo
brutal. I've been in an augur raid that interrupted us right before our fight with Astel in Noktaleo and pulled only two of us completely outside the city, not only screwing us out of the blessing but leaving me awkwardly alone right at the threshold and having to backtrack urgently
median rock
yeah ive played that augur seed before
you gotta figure out how to dodge the augur bubbles coming down. that raid in particular shafts u
triceph raid is similar but the dogs don't spawn if you're considered inside, so as long as you're careful you can sorta ignore the triceph raid by not doing field bosses during it
my current strategy for dodging augur bubble is "run really far while looking at the ceiling" but idk if there's a better one :(
median rock
random thought: i appreciate that every random universally agrees not to do day 1 castle basement BBH unless we're really loaded
obtuse halo
lmao yeaaaah
Sometimes you just see someone go into the castle basement and come out like 10 seconds later
median rock
what could've been...
like, ANY other curse than continuous HP loss
(shop relic, spent down ~500k murk and this was easily the only 3/3 roll i got. got like 2 4-star relics (two good effects) and like 6 more 3-star relics (one good effect, one mid effect))
obtuse halo
oof
yeah there are a few curses that just seem not worth the trouble
Continuous HP loss goes right in the garbage no matter how good the relic is otherwise
the fact that it shuts down damage negation at full hp entirely just makes it not worth it
I'm steadily accumulating more decent Deep Relics to work with
the only annoying curse on my current setup is deathblight when hit and honestly I've never seen it trigger
like, if I'm getting hit frequently enough for that to matter I typically just die the regular way first 😛
obtuse halo
I literally got ditched right before the night 2 boss 😔 rude tbh, especially after a run that felt like being strapped to a rocket
it's like a solo run but without the revive 💀
median rock
yeah the curses i won't touch period are -runes, continuous hp loss. i really try to avoid "near death reduces max hp", its both annoying and also really bad imo
"reduce damage after (repeated) evades" is also pretty bad too but sometimes u don't get a choice
obtuse halo
yeah I got the near death one on a poleblade that had +18% phys negation and another effect I'm blanking on but seemed pretty good. I'm still not sure it was worth it
not that it mattered since we all got oneshot by Heolstor's phase transition
heartbreaking tbh
The stat ones on the other hand seem pretty minor
they're not ideal if they're hitting your main stats but it's only 3 points, which is really not that much in the grand scheme of things
median rock
i think i checked and it was like a 4% damage penalty on one of the highest scaling weapons in the game (exe suncatcher katana)
which convinced me it was never enough for me to ever care
obtuse halo
depth 2 reached, after a very tense fight with the balancers
the duchess spent most of phase 2 horizontal but otherwise pretty slick. I did pick up both the Duchess and Executor from 3 bars at the same time while actively dueling with the leader toward the end, which was the tensest part since I was out of flasks and making a mistake there would have ended the run. But I didn't!
I'm coming around to a forbidden scholar technique, previously I've been just using twin thrusting swords and trying to proc statuses and dart out, staying back, but I'm realizing there's no reason I have to do that and off-tanking with a Greatshield actually hugely increases survivability
on this run I got a red fingerprint stone shield and that was a gem. I used it alongside Vyke's for the bit (also because 2hing vykes is a pretty good spammable WA)
Also definitely realizing “just book it” is remarkably effective for balancers. They’re surprisingly passive at a distance and while they’ll close in over time, you can often just run and only fight one or two for a minute even if your allies are down
median rock
yeah the meta for ED balancers especially is to run to the other side of the arena lol
kind garden
there are a lot of parts in the Balancers fight where you just run for it
covert schooner
Yknow
Mentioned it on Vidya
But I’ve never really thought about these games through the lens of religious abandonment but it’s a totally valid read
These as in all of… soulsbornering
In Elden Ring this lense provides a really interesting thematic reason for Marika’s crucifixion
It’s a sacrifice
She sacrifices herself, abandoned by her god, to break its hold on the lands between
Which makes the endings where you reinstate it REALLY funny
Which I know her willingly blowing up the Elden Ring is like
Basically text
But I’ve never thought of it as a Christ like sacrifice before
fleet bronze
It's kind of funny how on the nose it is right at the end, with Marika having the totally unexplained spear in her side while crucified on the broken ring before she transforms into Radagon
covert schooner
Yeah
I’ll be honest I always kinda
Dismissed it as just The Aesthetic
Of Christianity
fleet bronze
Oh yeah, it's so out of left field in some respects it almost feels like it's just there for the cool factor
But there's a lot to be said for the theme of sacrifice for faith and what the cost of that is
feral linden
The shadow of evangelion design hangs over many christianity aesthetics (is it actually making a thematic statement or is it just being cool)
proven cloak
But I’ve never really thought about these games through the lens of religious ab...
I find it really interesting how hard ER specifically equates it with parental abandonment, like directly 1-1
especially since it takes the Christian Aesthetic/Narrative elements but zeroes in on motherhood over paternity for the divine.
works going "Desire for divinity is like a desire for a better relationship with your parents" rarely seem as sympathetic about that as Elden Ring, lmao
feral linden
works going "Desire for divinity is like a desire for a better relationship with...
Better relationship with the divine-as-parents or better relationship by being a divine-parent to your worshippers-children
proven cloak
first probably, but it does echo downwards
all over the place in the game
Miquella and his followers at the Haligtree, Rennala and her sweetlings/demigods, Metyr and the fingers, Malenia and the pests,
They've all felt/been abandoned (except maybe Miquella), and each of them inspire that in their children too
And you can get into details about if Renalla is in a right enough state of mind to really 'mistreat' the sweetlings, or if Malenia owes any sort of care towards the Pests in the first place, but I'm just talking about the broad strokes.
Is Metyr in a right enough mind to mistreat the Fingers? Does Marika owe anything to the Golden Order? Or her kids?
Does the Greater Will owe anything to Metyr? Or the humans of the Lands Between?
I like that the game doesn't necessarily tell you. Just shows you a lot of sad moms and sad kids.
even the Godskins were cradled newborns, aimless after their mother disappeared
I think the emotional core being presented sympathetically is important for Ranni's quest, and why I never considered it mistranslated.
It could be one of the best paths forward for the Lands Between, but it involves living with some bitter truth. It's uncomfortable the way leaving home can be, in the exact inverse way that Miquella's vision for the future sounds appealing.
and choosing her ending with awareness of the cold & the lonely nature of it makes it weightier, imo. The general sadness of the whole setting sticks with me, it's all just uncomfortable & there's no easy solution. Damn.
feral linden
Is it accurate to say that the dark souls series is about shitty dads and elden ring is about sad and messy moms
Also bloodborne to an extent
real shadow
Bloodborne is about parents unable to have kids.
Which kind of elides the idea that there's bad moms/dads in it because who even knows how they'd act to their kids.
proven cloak
basically nobody is having a good time ever
have kids, no kids, cycle unending, cycling ending
except the mushroom parents ig
covert schooner
I find it really interesting how hard ER specifically equates it with parental a...
Yeh Morgott is really interesting
IMO
And this is a deep read
Morgott is a gay kid in a religious household
Who does what some people do in real life and reacts to this, his perceived curse, by doubling way the fuck down
frozen olive
nobody locked in harder than Morgott
old brook
The metaphor gets a little foggy for his phase transition but the notes are there
proven cloak
Even when he's not in disguise, when he's fighting you as the king, he never wears more than filthy rags
median rock
if you're gonna full commit to a halo scythe build and hoard every single starlight shard in the game then
- you gotta be running dormant power reapers, come on dude and
- you gotta actually be good at using the halo scythe ash of war (which is a very low bar)
- (optional) understand that a messmer village ironeye + recluse invader duo just, isn't really worth fighting at lvl 4 with no ult
obtuse halo
man, I would settle for teammates that don't run blindly into the nearest calamity at level 2 and get oneshot
obtuse halo
It's an actual barrier to progress in Deep of Night 2 for me, for every group that kicks ass I get two composed of a duchess and ironeye that read a meta build guide and dies repeatedly failing to kill a red boss or night invader (and to be fair, I'm an idiot too for trying to do my best to support them anyway and getting killed for my trouble trying to pick them up), then quits out before the end of day 1 leaving me alone to try to solo the night 1 boss at level 3 with no consumables because I was too busy trying to save them from themselves
median rock
man, I would settle for teammates that don't run blindly into the nearest calami...
y'know what? fair enough, and yes, i do agree with bell bearing hunter in castle being always, without question, a day 1 option
kind garden
man, I would settle for teammates that don't run blindly into the nearest calami...
I hate when my teammates pull this
please
it's day 1
we don't have to do that
it's not even that much better than non-calamity camps just settle down
median rock
i'm OK with doing lvl 2 calamity camps if you go trigger the invaders but nothing else, with two exceptions: don't fuck with ironeye (and mostly also recluse, those two aren't worth it), and don't fuck with redmane knight camps. and if we die more than once, abort mission, come on
obtuse halo
They just leeroy jenkins right in, every time, die, get me killed trying to salvage the situation, and then this last run balancers raid happened with us all at level 1 so eat shit I guess
obtuse halo
it's not even that much better than non-calamity camps just settle down
apparently the current meta for deep of night involves +damage on night invader killed and then trying to rush them, so it's 100% idiots who read a meta guide and got some relics with that effect but don't actually have the skills to back it up
median rock
what they don't want you to know is that you can just walk away from the balancers raid
median rock
apparently the current meta for deep of night involves +damage on night invader ...
the current meta for DoN is bullshit and the only 100% winrate strategy i've seen is called "another chinese-name guy with 6 identical hacked relics"
obtuse halo
yeah but it dragged us a million miles away from any hope of recovering those starting souls and basically taking us back to square 1
Oh I agree, but people are dumb
median rock
lol
obtuse halo
also one of them quit out immediately so hey
median rock
i think i run +night invaders on a couple builds bc its common enough to have on ur team and obviously a strong effect, but i don't think its meta on most melee builds unless you roll a truly godtier relic w/ it that fits between dual balancers
obtuse halo
I'm gonna be back in DoN 1 pretty soon, since I'm losing 50 points on most of my attempts with this nonsense
it really is a majority of runs with randos
median rock
trust me, i'ts the roughest by far in like depth 1/2
your teammates will get exponentially better as soon as the ranking system filters out the people running around lke headless chickens
obtuse halo
that tracks
When I play with my friends in DoN, we don't always beat the nightlord but we pretty much always see it
median rock
depth 4 can be really hard to escape bc d3/4 are 2000 points wide instead of 1000, and you're still losing hella elo for each loss, but eventually you'll make it out if you just keep playing n improving
my only other suggestion is to try running builds that don't require you to roll a good weapon very early. on characters like duchess or wylder (w/o dual balancers) your starting weapon is pretty mediocre at doing anything, so you lose a lot of time early game due to low ttk/etc.
but if you've got like hoarfrost stomp starting skill, duchess starting dagger is instantly 100x better, since you can deal good dmg from range and help team dmg via frost. saves you the gambling until you get reduvia, halo scythe, etc.
obtuse halo
yeah I've been maining scholar so I do run into that. I mostly rely on consumables for early damage, as well as buffing my allies for 20%
I guess I could take a look out for a solid ash to put on the starter weapon though
median rock
blood blade is my favorite option for scholar early game ash
obtuse halo
makes sense
median rock
tho i think hoarfrost stomp is equally good
blood blade has some ???? weirdly high projectile drop tho
like the range is. really bad, because the blood blade has hella gravity or w/e
obtuse halo
fascinating
median rock
@obtuse halo im going to go solo queue trios random EDs now, lmk if u want to play
pretty sure im also allowed to play in ur depth as long as im ok with losing 10000 pts on a loss
obtuse halo
oh I just did a run with randos and was about to stop for dinner. God I am bad at dodging Libra's moves 😭
median rock
lmao enjoy ur food. i already ate so ill probably be on for the next couple hours idk
obtuse halo
We did win thanks to finally getting some not stupid randos tho
median rock
and yeahhh libra is unironically the hardest boss besides balancers imo
just moveset wise
obtuse halo
it's rough as scholar too because he can kinda just put floor bullshit under you at any moment and if you're analyzing or using an item right then you flat out don't have enough time to dodge
median rock
TIL dreglord phase 2 nuke is a melee attack
median rock
man. i really like running a giant's flame revenant build, it's a ton of fun and i've got amazing relic rolls for it
but it's so RNG. i'm terrified one of these days i'm going to be going into like ED libra with a purple catch flame as my only viable damage option
since i've got 4 stacks of +giantsflame (+11% each) and 3 stacks of +fire (+11% each), so even if i do get a different fire spell (frenzied burst/frenzied flame mostly) it's still going to be a huge downgrade from the great-damage-but-horrible-range catch flame
obtuse halo
Frenzied flame at least has madness utility against libra specifically but I hear you
obtuse halo
Did a run this morning and got a nice taste of randos I didn't hate! Actually did smart things at sensible times and tbh if anything I was the load here because I got oneshot a couple of times by red bosses (and Libra) and needed picking up. Also they actually bought a bunch of consumables at the last merchant and dropped them for me, which was nice of them - we were all level 15 with a ton of runes to spare and I appreciate the team player behavior, feeding the scholar like that
median rock
yeah from my limited messing with it, the big thing is that frenzied flame (the eponymous incant) burns fp really quick and tends to "waste" a lot of its damage when the boss moves
obtuse halo
yeah the secret to it is it's basically melee range
very tricky to actually get the full dps out of
median rock
i think its probably equally good for a build around but its just too rare for me to be willing to commit my build to it yk?
obtuse halo
I hear you
median rock
like if you could roll +incantations and +fire dmg on the same relic then sure
obtuse halo
I've done full frenzyflame build in base ER and it totally whips but like, definitely downsides
median rock
i sometimes wish that nightreign just like. removed every single buff spell besides fgms, golden vow, black flames prot
keep them outta my seal rolls
at least im willing to give frenzyflame a try tho. i tried dragonfire? that damage SUCKS
at least my beloved comically overpowered beast claw will never betray me
obtuse halo
I've definitely seen beast claw revenants do absolutely silly damage numbers
median rock
the spell itself just has hella base dmg and idk why
mellow silo
Would anyone be willing to mule me some items? I'll be on for probably the next two hours, if you see this message within that window I would appreciate the help
mellow silo
<@1041538821831004170> yeah im around
Hell yeah
Gimme a second to get on the right account and all that
mellow silo
Shadow Militiamen Hood Verdigris Gauntlets Verdigris Greaves Great Jar Arsenal Erdtree Favor +2
median rock
mm definitely have all but the hood, idk if i have the hood lol
i'll load up my guy and put a sign in church of elleh with pswd lancer all lowercase
mellow silo
Huh I am not seeing it
mellow silo
Here uhh I'll try placing a sign then, in the same spot
median rock
trila?
mellow silo
Ye
median rock
median rock
sg
put a sign same place then? since my sign seems to not show up
this char is super high lvl / +25 so it might be related to that, idk. been too long since i've done elden ring coop to say
mellow silo
Trila was at +25 lvl175 so probably not unless it's REAL high
median rock
any other random item you need while my guy is here?
mellow silo
Uhh this should be good
mellow silo
Yep, thanks for the help!
median rock
??
not sure exactly what that was. i wasn't spam-parrying it, i'm pretty sure i wasn't holding block/parry at all (it stopped on its own, rather than when i released a button) since i didn't go into the block animation when it finished
obtuse halo
Suncatcher leads to powers some might consider to be...unnatural
real shadow
frozen olive
ok i think this is fr doable tho
obtuse halo
I like morgott a lot more as a boss when you come in underleveled
playing "naturally" (exploring the dungeon and leveling up when you have the souls to), it's very easy to be already level 90 or so when you reach him and at that point you probably just roll him
whereas if you show up at level 50 or 60 you actually gotta engage with his patterns a bit and it's a much more interesting fight
frozen olive
yeah
ngl i still kinda rolled him but he did give me some difficulty
my stats are pretty massively skewed towards my damage stats
obtuse halo
you're definitely approaching the point where I'd recommend pumping Vig to 40
Usually I do so before or during leyndell but the damage just keeps climbing so
frozen olive
i was gonna do like 10 or so levels per new zone
so the mountaintop levels are going into vigor
frozen olive
Gargoyles are some of the most awful bosses in this game
languid tiger
it depends on your build! which is to say, jesus christ they sure are
frozen olive
just fought black blade on the way to mountaintops
and i genuinely kept losing cause my attacks would just
never connect
obtuse halo
Yeah I'm really not a fan of them. They have so much reach and the classic large boss problem where it's difficult to see what they're doing when you're close enough to hit them in melee
I find their twinblade moveset in particular difficult to comprehend too
old brook
Their horrid gangle limbs keep their hitboxes off too
Maybe one of the lowerest points of ER
Though the one in front of the beast church is funny he can stay
frozen olive
frozen olive
i'm in mountaintops rn
frozen olive
ok i definitely just dislike the rykard boss fight actually
i don't think i had an opinion on it previously
this is just annoying
i think it's mostly just the fucking lava making it impossible to get close
languid tiger
get close?
obtuse halo
it's a Yhorm, Freyja. You're supposed to use the spear in the Arena 😛
obtuse halo
it doesn't require you to get close!
frozen olive
i have to stand at the edge of the lava to hit anything
obtuse halo
I assure you, you do not
it generates a giant tunnel of wind with all of its attacks
frozen olive
in that case i'm just whiffing all my attacks
languid tiger
yeah
you're just whiffing all your attacks
you can stand on like
basically one side of the gigantic arena
and hit him from the center
frozen olive
big thanks to lock-on in that case for working immaculately
languid tiger
i've never had a problem with locking onto rykard
not sure where the issue's coming in
frozen olive
yeah idk i was whiffing attacks constantly unless i was standing really close
Serpent Hunter rules tho
anyway Rykard down
real shadow
Even outside that fight it's a good weapon, very solid chunky spear.
languid tiger
it's a very pretty-looking swordspear
frozen olive
yeah it's a really good reward
i don't think i could care less about the sword his soul gives but i'm a huge fan of Serpent Hunter
frozen olive
fuck i just noticed i got the blood eyes
real shadow
Gonna need some eye droppers to get that out.
obtuse halo
yeah I very specifically did NOT do Varre's quest on my snake lady invader to avoid getting the dragon eyes overridden, for FASHIOn
(even though nobody can tell on a red phantom)
frozen olive
i've been wearing full plate covering my whole body so i did not notice
frozen olive
fighting Commander Niall
i still think multi-bosses suck
but at least it's not the gargoyle duo
i won, still goated
median rock
i think the seeds are conspiring against giving me the big merchant with the +fire attack / +max fp giantsflame seal on pest & caligo runs
i only find that on like, fulghor
i just want to see it tear through those stupid bugs :(
obtuse halo
lol yeah. I've seen Heavy Weapons Revenant and Greatbow Wylder for sure
also a Raider build with visage shield
median rock
the visage shield one is crazy fucked up sometimes
kind garden
lol yeah. I've seen Heavy Weapons Revenant and Greatbow Wylder for sure
Greatbow Wylder is actually a crime
so is the Armored Core Ironeye
which wields One Eyed Shield / Jar Cannon and drops ironflesh aromatic
kind garden
it's so funny
obtuse halo
Everdark Balancers beaten tonight 😌
it was one of my friends' first time seeing it (and he spent most of the second phase horizontal) but the other friend and I locked in and we did it
obtuse halo
Lmao I did see that
obtuse halo
woo!
obtuse halo
ED Tricephalos also down, after several attempts 😌
this time I got sacred relic sword right at the end, after picking up warrior jar shard and a carian knight shield with +21% skill power
So, uh, I pretty much melted the last phase with my ult. it was very satisfying!
obtuse halo
actually we had a pretty good record last night. First ED tricephalos run went bad (we just had some cascading timing failures on day 2, we couldn't quite kill astel fast enough before the night came in despite being painfully close, missed out on probably another level and the blessing, and still came very close to winning), but got Tricephalos on the second try. Then we ran a friend who didn't get it before through ED Balancers and did it again, then ran that friend through ED Tricephalos and also got him again 😌
actual winstreak
median rock
congrats!! what EDs do you have left?
frozen olive
secret path to the haligtree sure is a sign of things to come
real shadow
frozen olive
ooooh new Miss Chalice vid, yay
proven cloak
Bowl Theory reigns supreme
what level is "The Central Sea Impact Crater (and more broadly the entire continent) of the Lands Between is the Crucible"
proven cloak
I saw someone saying night reign got abandoned
abandoned is prolly the wrong word, just because it's a finished game & was always more of a side-project
It got it's main release, some further updates, and a dlc. About as abandoned as Ds1 or 2.
real shadow
It's not really a "play forever" game anyway, there's only so much you can do in it and that's by design.
tropic stream
It's what people not poisoned by live services call 'a finished game'
obtuse halo
are people salty there isn't an Everdark Heolstor
median rock
im not particularly salty personally tho i do kinda think it'd be fun? idk. i think heolster & dreglord are among the more fun & interesting bossfights, so "hardmode" for them sound neat
but i also have seen people's ideas for ED heolster and i havent really been impressed with any of em (i've seen a couple modded iterations on "heolster but it summons another ED boss for each attack" and it doesn't look great)
median rock
just got the same seed back to back. first time in 500 hours
the duchess run was first, and was MUCH easier (not even counting the libra vs ed libra part, which goes without saying, holy hell that fight is ROUGH). got god rolls on every item (+12 magic 3x, +18 charged sorceries, +6 sorceries & +2 cast speed, and then red stars of ruin)
the rev run was second and i had like 2 10% damage buffs, a single cast speed buff, and nothing else meaningful. fuck ED libra. won both, somehow
also some interesting things different seed to seed:
- I knew that red bosses/night invaders aren't seed-dependent, that's not news and is pretty obvious
- i did not know that the circle position is actually semi random, the center/final circle is always the same but the night 2 circle can be off by a pretty large margin (50-100m? run #1 circle touching top left bird, run #2 circle just on the other side of the fire town POI). thought it was more similar than that
- i ALSO did not know that big merchant's shop isn't seed-dependent. i thought it was, nope, it's different on the same seed. got annoyed this time because the +incant +physical attack seal was there on my duchess run but not the revenant run
frozen olive
TIL that Astel, Stars of Darkness can do a multi-grab
never seen that attack before in my life and now it's decided to do it twice in a row
this boss is more annoying than i remembered
real shadow
frozen olive
lmao
proven cloak
sometimes it causes DNA mutation but luckily all the people born wrong are dumped where we don't have to think about them or see them ever
tbf if there's one place I'd expect to be irradiated, the one with the unmatched power of the sun is up there.
all that mf does is Radiate 🙄 ||lazy-ass||
hybrid perch
guys I need help with the er character customisation, how do I make my tarnished look good I'm genuinely losing it trying to figure it out
charred ember
Looks good already?
frozen olive
ngl i wear a helmet 99% of the time in-game so i just made a default at some point and keep making all my characters look the same
late latch
helmets are sick, but most of my characters end up as some sort of wizard so they've gotta look decent. and i decided to kill two birds (looking good and my self worth issues) with one stone
hybrid perch
Looks good already?
nah I feel like something looks off
hybrid perch
model them after yourself
can't really do that since my face isn't that of an adult quite yet
but thanks for the advice
late latch
you can at least get close enough
charred ember
nah I feel like something looks off
Neck width?
hybrid perch
Neck width?
Ooh good point
hybrid perch
you can at least get close enough
Okay I’ll try thanks
obtuse halo
Honestly what I usually do is grab some sliders from online and use that as a starting point, then tweak as desired
kind garden
okay crossposting from technical discussion but this image is elite
like yeah man she sure did
glossy delta
The dog went to the other divorcee
onyx trench
I am reminded of how little I like daggers lol
glossy delta
Poor daggers 😔
Bad in every game
onyx trench
probably be better to dual wield honestly
the 1h R1 is super slow considering the drawbacks
obtuse halo
I like daggers but they are generally kind of bad yeah
the dual-wield moveset is truly godawful tho
onyx trench
oh sad
obtuse halo
they just commit too much with no range
onyx trench
want some kind of theme for a playthrough that I intend to take all the way through the game and DLC
been a while since I've actually appreciated the whole game
obtuse halo
Misericorde is probably the best one outside of specific builds that would want one of the others (Erdsteel Dagger, Reduvia, and Glintstone Kris all have niches)
Misericorde also has the benefit of being the longest of them
which, like. It still doesn't have great range but it's a little easier to use
languid tiger
want some kind of theme for a playthrough that I intend to take all the way thro...
executioner's axe with ghostflame call
use one of the skelly armor sets and Live In Death
onyx trench
I've done beeg axe stuff before
including dual crescent axes
I was actually just looking at the weapon types on fextra for inspiration haha
languid tiger
i wasn't gonna rec dual crescent moon axes because i know what i am
and i know i've recced it to too many people too many times
in that case, have you done a smithscript shield run?
onyx trench
it's not your fault they're the best axes
languid tiger
i'm sure there's some kind of drip you could get Lieutenant America out of
glossy delta
I second smithscript shield
Not as your sole weapon maybe but the weapon art is extremely fun when you want to use a weapon with a weapon art you don't care for
languid tiger
oh, you could do smithscript spear + shield and dig for some bronze-looking armor
frozen olive
crucible knkght
languid tiger
and go full achilles
frozen olive
i've only toyed with smithscript for one build which was my GaoGaiGar one
had the hammer and fists
plush cliffBOT
Hmm... maybe a build where you use the weird mediocre magic weapons? Like the Carian Knight Sword, Loretta's War Sickle, Crystal Sword/Spear, and (eventually) the Carian Sorcery Sword
weirdfool ↩️
obtuse halo
oh, you could do smithscript spear + shield and dig for some bronze-looking armo...
Freyja’s armor is the way to go there
The redmane, not the one here
frozen olive
my fit is elite but it is not bronze unfortunately
onyx trench
huh, you know what I don't think I've ever played with Katanas
frozen olive
Onze Line of Stars is on some jedi shit if you wanna try that
obtuse halo
Katanas are solid and Unsheathe is ridiculous
Uchigatana is just generally a stunningly good weapon considering you can start the game with it
onyx trench
mmm, might actually go katana yeah
languid tiger
the great-katana moveset is very fun
glossy delta
Dueling Shields are my greatest suggestion for a Run Defining Weapon Choice
Cuz you really can just play a whole different game with them
languid tiger
the carian thrusting shield is really fun but i can't in good conscience recommend it to anyone
onyx trench
Mmm, I was mostly looking for something that I can start the game with and progress as I play
languid tiger
because it's just so unfathomably broken
onyx trench
With variety over time
languid tiger
that the only fun is in annihilating everything trivially
languid tiger
Mmm, I was mostly looking for something that I can start the game with and progr...
oh hm, in that case yeah you should pick up the uchi and go into great katanas
glossy delta
the carian thrusting shield is *really* fun but i can't in good conscience recom...
See for my recent run I just gave myself the normal dueling shield, not the carian one
A little self imposed debuff
languid tiger
reasonable
glossy delta
But yeah the thrusting shields, especially the Carian one, are really crazy
I want to say I first tried promised consort with it on my int character?
With the caveat that it was NG for them and NG promised consort isn't the Hellfire Nightmare Shitshow Torturefest everyone knows that fight as
frozen olive
i guess people would dislike PCR based on its difficulty
glossy delta
I definitely don't think it's a Good fight, for a host of reasons
But it certainly didn't help that everyone first played Shadow Of The Erdtree on NG+Arbitrarily High Number and the fight was scaled crazy as a result
frozen olive
i like it personally
was a helluva fight to beat though
they've toned it down a fair bit since i beat it though
proven cloak
very difficult on launch, but I liked the consistent difficulty more than Malenia (even if she's easier once you get the trick)
frozen olive
tbh i never found the difficulty to be an issue
it's a whole ass super-boss at the very end of a difficult dlc
plus because of which character/s it is
proven cloak
also pretty much my take
its the final boss of Elden Ring, and fully optional content too (so it doesn't need to be toned down like eg: Morgott for progressions-sake)
Doesn't even gate any content in the DLC, its strictly a challenge. Definitely earns the feeling of fighting a God, imo.
but I also recognize "Give me more Poison Swamps & Also a Deathblight one I'm Not Joking" is probably not going to be how most players were feeling, lol.
I probably died to PCR way more times before I beat it the first time, but I'll take it over Ordina, Liturgical Town any day.
frozen olive
you genuinely don't miss out on almost anything for not beating him
i guess technically some armor bits and one cutscene
but honestly the Miquella Gank Squad is a really good like, bookend for the DLC
onyx trench
right, step one is a go
onyx trench
Gravitas is the early game magic affinity, right?
languid tiger
Gravitas is the early game magic affinity, right?
that and cragblade
which you get right outside the bridge to castle redmane
onyx trench
Cragblade is Caelid, and I'm trying not to go too far afield
languid tiger
i consider that early game, but i know folks that don't
onyx trench
yeah I quite like following the base progression route
languid tiger
dipping your toes into Caelid is part of base prog!
onyx trench
not with a +3 weapon before margit lol
frozen olive
i did in my last run
i went up to Leyndell before i entered Raya Lucaria too though so
real shadow
In both runs I went to Caelid before getting too far into Liurnia because I'm a crazy person.
onyx trench
I mean obviously you can do, but it's a lot more running around avoiding stuff than really doing it
frozen olive
channel Ongbal and win
real shadow
Well my first run was as a caster so I'd find some spot and snipe people with spells, which worked out better than expected.
frozen olive
i did a half caster
ended up going for a faith/int build
could cast about everything but Bayles spells with the stats i was rocking
onyx trench
early drip acquired
obtuse halo
killed patches, huh?
I never do it but I respect it for the drip
(and it is good drip)
onyx trench
if the man did not want to die he shouldn't drop the best looking armour in limgrave
frozen olive
ngl the only time he's survived is when i'm doing his quest
first time i met him i killed him in like two swings
he didn't even get the dialogue to surrender
light bridge
I don't kill gostoc till he sell the very cool dragon shard
light bridge
No, you can
Sometimes he stays outside JUST after having the dialogue that unlocks it
proven cloak
plans a-changing...
your honor, consider: he's literally funny
languid tiger
shouldn't have taken my money
proven cloak
wym, he didn't take my money 
obtuse halo
just don't die in stormveil, easy
median rock
cant you also arc stuff to kill him from the unsafe zone outside the throne room?
obtuse halo
probably, though I've never tried it
proven cloak
sometimes I'll see someone just casually ascribe motivations and opinions and personhood and especially automatic He/Him pronouns to the Greater Will. and it's just a very direct reminder some people were playing a very different game to me.
wym 'He' that things like a woman. to me.
mystic void
Motherhood is a recurring trend with things associated with it
proven cloak
exactly!
Not that you can't make interesting reads about the role of women in TLB & Christianity as an influence on the GO and all that but they werent. They weren't even doing that it was uncritical maleness-as-default. q~q
fleet bronze
I think, ironically, people think of the Greater Will as male because they draw comparisons to the judgemental and domineering patriarchal God figure in Christianity
Especially negative interpretations of that
That is, people see the Greater Will as male because they assume that kind of divine bad behavior is inherently male somehow
proven cloak
Diversity win! TLB lets divine women fuck shit uppp! 😌
proven cloak
That is, people see the Greater Will as male because they assume that kind of di...
even then there's the fact that it doesn't really do much in the text, hard to even apply behavior to it in the first place, much less explicitly christian-god style stuff
honestly I apply the "smh maleness-as-default" to the Elden Beast, too. With minor exceptions for 'its just a little guy' or the sheer number of times it will automatically get referred to as he in the middle of a longer point & its not as worth bringing up.
That things not even a woman to me. It's like a tree.
not that I think it would care. It would just hit the
fleet bronze
Oh no definitely, the Elden Beast is an it if it's anything
proven cloak
fleet bronze
even then there's the fact that it doesn't really *do* much in the text, hard to...
Agreed, but people read into it. The hear "Demiurge (?) at the top of the celestial hierachy of a religious system obsessed with orthodoxy" and they just think masculine
But I feel like the game is also set up to create that expectation and deliberately subverting it to some degree
proven cloak
mhm
its the mid game reveal outright that the fingers aren't in contact
though theres some earlier hints
fleet bronze
Like everything going on with Ymir is really uncanny on purpose for that reason too
proven cloak
and to actually go into the motherhood angle for TGW requires doing sidequests like that, or going harder on the themes ||and such||
kind garden
listen
the Greater Will is an absent divine parent
but it's also an all swallowing void
so really who can say for sure what gender it is
proven cloak
part of this was me remembering very vividly while doing something else "hey remember all the womb symbolism in Nightreign. Remember the ||vagina door||."
fleet bronze
Who wins in the Absent Divine Parent contest, TGW or Oedon from Bloodborne?
kind garden
TGW
proven cloak
both sorta exist in their mediums forever tbh. but TGW.
Oedon is still, uh, fathering.
TGW hit da bricks. and maybe is dead.
fleet bronze
Yeah those blood dregs are still getting around, it's true
proven cloak
but it's also an all swallowing void
It did sort of shoot a fertile seed into a receptive planet to flourish into life. But women can do that too.
"Elden Stars" is kind of a literal Truth Nuke, huh.
fleet bronze
I can believe that the TGW is both, or at least doesn't really fit into a gender binary at all
proven cloak
oh absolutely
fleet bronze
"Elden Stars" is kind of a literal Truth Nuke, huh.
I can't believe you've done this to me
proven cloak
In some ways I think TGW is actually much more incomprehensible than any of the Great Ones
who at least seem to like having children, and generally follow biology, even if it's weird eldritch biology. They eat, they definitely bleed, etc.
fleet bronze
The Great Ones do seem to be more or less just alien animals
proven cloak
its not even clear if things like Metyr being on the planet were 'intended', and not even Metyr (whos already an eldritch thang) understands its parent.
fleet bronze
Rather than actual gods
Oedon, being formless, would be the exception, but then you can understand some of what's going on with his being in everyone's blood
The Outer Gods in Elden Ring are significantly less material, if they even exist as coherent entities at all
kind garden
The Great Ones are weird and exist in higher levels of reality in the sense of the layers of the dream
So that’s a little less “alien animal” and more “inherently different and more abstract existence”
proven cloak
You'd ask one if they're physical or not and they'd say* "This question is not even wrong"
(* if they could)
I was actually talking elsewhere about the BB animated thing being planned, and how I'd be mad if it doesn't have that underlying sympathy for the Great Ones that the game has.
kind garden
And we know that at least one Great One is in the business of dispatching humans into other Great Ones’ dreamworlds to hunt and destroy them which is sort of a weird ritualistic thing more than a straightforward murder plot
proven cloak
yeah the spooky things and the trick weapons are cool, but you gotta have the thing about the Great Ones being just big animals. Its important!
fleet bronze
You'd ask one if they're physical or not and they'd say``*`` "This question is n...
There's a big question to be asked about whether anything that happens in Bloodborne is "real" after a fashion
kind garden
They are both Big Weird Animals and abstract confusing godlike entities
That’s the best part
fleet bronze
All of Yharnam is in a dream
proven cloak
Oedon always seemed more human-y of the bunch, but tbh that might just be because theres no weird aquatic body to point to.
kind garden
They don’t have malign intelligences that scheme against humanity they have Weird Animal intelligences that scheme towards the goals most animals have
Eating, reproducing, getting enrichment
fleet bronze
Oedon comes across both more aware of what it's doing and also somehow even less tangible
kind garden
Oedon comes across as like
proven cloak
so more human-scaled
kind garden
More in touch with humanity by process of being wayyyy uncomfortably invasive
fleet bronze
Of course, you also have Mother Kos who is a great one but also kind of just a giant fish
proven cloak
They are both Big Weird Animals and abstract confusing godlike entities
& this is ofc way cooler than if they were just "raaah evil eldritch monster!"
kind garden
Basically
proven cloak
Of course, you also have Mother Kos who is a great one but also kind of just a g...
her jellyfish nun-habit(?) is pretty cool
kind garden
The Great Ones come across like, well, aliens that come from an alien place and largely are just fucking chilling before humanity was like “I GOTTA know what those aliens are up to”
And now as a result a bunch of them are like I GOTTA know what those aliens (humanity) are up to
proven cloak
And now as a result a bunch of them are like I GOTTA know what those aliens (hum...
yeah I always liked the detail that they find humans sort of incomprehensible too, at least in the way that you need to do the whole Contact thing before they fully realize you're trying to say something
tbf if a bee was trying to send me dance + pheromone communications I probably wouldn't notice at first either
kind garden
Making Contact with the Brain of Mensis is full on clown to clown communication
proven cloak
lol
kind garden
“Uhhh whats up”
“Uhhh”
late latch
"Wait...you can talk?"
fleet bronze
"The Great Ones that inhabit the nightmare are sympathetic in spirit, and often answer when called upon."
proven cloak
I remember I saw a compelling read of it giving the best version of the 'Moon' rune
the one that increases Blood Echoes from slain enemies
as it basically asking you to kill it
which is a cool read. I'll believe it!
fleet bronze
That's always how I interpreted it too
The Mensis brain has had a hard go
And who knows where a great ones goes when it dies in the dream
kind garden
Yeah I think killing it probably affects it not at all
It just wants out of this wack ass crystal prison
And is like “oh shit you can talk? Listen I gotta leave can you like”
fleet bronze
And then you get the string to go meet Yharnam herself
fleet bronze
There's some funny business with Rom
proven cloak
Kos is also superdead
fleet bronze
Because her body seems to have been where you find it for a long, long time
proven cloak
There's some funny business with Rom
Part of this is imo the funkiness that came from them deciding Ebreitas isn't Kos in development, lol
it gets me how they didn't need to change any of Micolash's lines because he's already supposed to be babbling and crazy
fleet bronze
It all works out because Kos was still there at the beginning anyway at least, so she did grant them eyes in a roundabout fashion even if she isn't the actual old one they've got in the basement
But what is going on in the Hunters Dream is another matter
Because that's descending into being genuinely symbolic
proven cloak
It all works out because Kos was still there at the beginning anyway at least, s...
true- honestly after seeing some of the changes ds3 went through I'm just impressed how often Fromsoft can make it cohere as well as they do.
fleet bronze
Like the Orphan of Kos is a monument to all the Hunter's sins as more than it was ever a physical thing
fleet bronze
true- honestly after seeing some of the changes ds3 went through I'm just impres...
DS3 is the closest to breaking at the seems because of those changes
Sulyvahn not being the ultimate villain still rankles me
Because it's all there with him
And then he just turns into a mid game boss
proven cloak
He still gets a lot of the setup, too
fleet bronze
And not even the main boss of his area
Elden Ring has it's foibles too with the changing plots being left hanging, imo. I was entirely satisfied with what was tied up and what wasn't in SotE
proven cloak
I suspect some of Nokstella changed midway, because the Eternal Cities have some weird holes from the 1.00 version, and also are a little inconsistent on being The Eternal City and the Eternal Cities. But I think it still works.
I think the setting having a stronger sense of its motifs helped
well, maybe not stronger but more varied? More consistently grouped?
fleet bronze
Yeah, the Nokstella stuff feels weirdly unfinished in a lot of ways to me but I guess it's just not actually meant to be particularly central in many ways
proven cloak
like the Crucible Knights oldest triggers all being at the tops of the Divine Towers, but fitting very well where they all ended up anyway.
fleet bronze
Like the Eternal Cities seem to have been this weird, parallel civilization track
languid tiger
this is why we need DLC2 :(
fleet bronze
What in gods name are the giant skeletons in the Eternal Cities Miyazaki?
Who are they?
proven cloak
Yeah, the Nokstella stuff feels weirdly unfinished in a lot of ways to me but I ...
the oldest map files for Deeproot Depths are actually pretty interesting, because
fleet bronze
Hey what the hell
languid tiger
ooh, more tombs
proven cloak
it seems to have had the setpiece later used for hte coffin fissure in the dlc
which makes the fact you ride a coffin upstream to it, uh, make more sense lmao
gray leaf
Shadow of the Erdtree really feels like it had 1.5 expansions worth of content.
fleet bronze
Yeah the blue coffin area in the DLC feels like it's meant to be connected to the Eternal Cities but it's also just not quite ever explained
proven cloak
ooh, more tombs
fleet bronze
Like the blue glowy stuff is clearly just the motif of, ironically, death functioning in it's most wholesome and natural way
proven cloak
the big figure on the map also matches the deeproot concept
& this concept also is sorta what NR did with the great hollow?
I remember big bones
fleet bronze
There are just giant corpses half buried all over Elden Ring
Mostly in Caelid and the Mountaintop
but clearly the giants are in some way the bones of the earth
proven cloak
true, but I suspect some of these arts meant originally deeproot was going to be about that or have some big reveal or something
like the big tree was fertilized by the big corpses, in the same way a smaller tree by smaller corpses
but its all distantly cut content now
fleet bronze
Oh yeah that actually does make a lot of sense
Yeah, I feel like that specifically might just have felt redundant, insofar as we find Erdtree roots at the back of all the crypts
proven cloak
one of the boss triggers for this area was Astel, I think. Or at least there was a big arena and it was on the enemy list.
An astel, maybe. I'm not sure if it was a specific(?) one at this point given the eternal cities.
I think at least part of the seeming rewrite for the eternal cities (and much more obviously for Miquella and Trina) was the dlc getting concepted
fleet bronze
The ultimate Arena for the main Astel does feel more than a little bit half baked for an enemy with so much wind up narratively
proven cloak
hard not to see parallels between the Horned Followers & the Uhl / Ancient Dynasty and the Hornsent
to the point where I straight up think the former are the remnants of the Hornsent's early design days before they settled on an aesthetic
it'd explain their weird connection to the ancient ruin places and rot, both of which the Hornsent have elaborated more in depth
fleet bronze
Oh definitely, I think it can sort of be reconciled as the Horned Followers being sort of progenitors to the Hornsent, or the Hornsent being an offshoot of them who lost their way
proven cloak
I think the text ends up putting the followers as a revivalist cult? Which is a sorta clever way to do it.
yeah they're similar- but it makes sense why they'd diverge. People re-discovering suppressed rituals.
fleet bronze
Actually, thinking about it, I can see the Uhl sort of being the progenitors of both with their collapse creating two divergent streams
One group trying to go back to the roots, so to speak, and another doing new stuff with the jars and the horrors
proven cloak
& thats sorta what I was pointing towards with the more elaborated setting working in favor here compared to DS3. The kingdoms and groups of people are more entrenched in the setting.
fleet bronze
Yeah, in DS3 it feels less connected (this is partly deliberate I know) but it makes everything feel a little bit like a pastiche
You don't really get the sense that there was ever a real world there
proven cloak
heres a video about some of the funky deeproot stuff still in the files, and the channel has some other interesting things.
One other fun thing in the code I remember is that the internal co-ordinates for Enir-Illm, while not really relevant for it's own map,
mean that when you overlay both maps it actually does land in the center of the divine towers.
this is very old, very unelaborated, and honestly very interesting cut stuff
fleet bronze
This loss makes me sad but I also understand why having meteors crashing around changing the map might be kind of a headache for the level designers
proven cloak
yeah
I can see the thematic angle to it, literally reforging the world as you fight through it, carving it into your shape
but the actual implementation wouldve been hard
still, very interesting to see such an early association between the Towers, the Crucible, and Meteors.
kinda like seeing the scaffolding that other elements would get built on. These were early important connections.
glossy delta
I still remember when everyone thought the entire game was about arms
Because of the grafting bit and Malenia's prominent prosthetic in the original trailer
One of the first Fake Leaks claimed swapping your arm out was a core mechanic
proven cloak
I still remember when everyone thought the entire game was about arms
Because of...
"Wait- I get it....the entire lands between is shaped like... a finger"
proven cloak
I still remember when everyone thought the entire game was about arms
Because of...
actually that trailer has the interesting bit about the rot seemingly not being locked in as scarlet yet. More of a blue-cheese style mold.
plush cliffBOT
That seem like something that would fit really well in nightreign honestly
TooClose ↩️
proven cloak
I think they could do it for a- yeah lol
languid tiger
i was thinking about the possibility of monhun Wilds being kinda like that lol
proven cloak
I was gonna say Fromsoft monhun
proven cloak
more about exploring an area than running it
languid tiger
"seismic or stellar events reshape the land" is juicy as hell
proven cloak
or should I say. reigning it. and by 'it', haha, I mean my party wipe
languid tiger
and there's so much in elden ring and/or monhun that can do it
proven cloak
Something like NR's night is also a good cheat way to do it
languid tiger
ye
proven cloak
still feels like reshaping while playing, but gives a good time to make sure no players are nearby or looking while you do
lets you chunk the changes
has anything new on Duskbloods come out I literally don't follow it
real shadow
Nope.
proven cloak
Because that's descending into being genuinely symbolic
Oh yeah, meant to add on something else earlier but forgot until now,
honestly I think ER might not be entirely different in how it presents Space
it's got the scientific framing and inspiration, but veers into the spiritual enough that I'd buy its More Complicated than just being our version of space.
Like how you can climb Enir-Illm normally, on foot, but somewhere near the top it starts being eternal daytime.
gives me the feeling that you aren't just going 'up' but also 'deeper'.
Or places like the spirit pocket realms that the Ancestor Spirit, Metyr and(? seemingly?) The Elden Beast draw you into.
I mean even the inconsistent number of moons, or the way the whole skybox can shift from mending runes.
shit is odd. It's not something people in the setting understand & so it's not something that you as the reader ever get to, either.
kind garden
gives me the feeling that you aren't just going 'up' but also 'deeper'.
up IS deeper, that's one of the premises of the Spiral religion
proven cloak
Stars is fish 📝 🙂↕️
plush cliffBOT
Just learned that if you hit the miners that have explosive rocks strapped to them with a fire weapon they explode
Neat
We've also learned that Vyke's war spear has pretty bad faith scaling
onyx trench
Fire weapons make incidental explosions at the worst of times
languid tiger
always the funniest though
median rock
We've also learned that Vyke's war spear has pretty bad faith scaling
iirc it's actually not awful, dex is better but str is the only 'bad' stat there (i did a frenzyflame run ages ago pre-DLC, and faith is also still best for the frenzy seal)
but the damage will look weird because i believe the fire damage is ONLY faith, not also str like some fire weapons
obtuse halo
my frenzy build was mostly faith and arc with some tertiary dex investment so make of that what you will
(I used the dragon seal to cast from though, with frenzy seal in the offhand)
median rock
i think unless you're doing pvp arcane casting frenzy spells probably isn't great? the frenzy self-buildup goes up if you have an arc seal
obtuse halo
It’s more efficient point for point on damage too iirc, at least until you’re pumping to the kind of levels where you should be using erdtree seal
But yes, it does lose a lot of its bite outside of pvp
median rock
just successfully cleared a depth 5 ED balancers expedition only to get 150 elo (invisible map modifier, noklateo)
wtf
im being fucked scammed
normally you get less elo if you're a higher depth player carrying in a lower depth (via stacking queue) but i don't think that should've been possible for me, since i'm solo queuing, and it shows at d5 on the scoreboard (tho maybe that just shows my elo only?)
also not like i wasn't carrying my wt or anything. like id believe it maybe if there was a secret "if you got no kills then the game gives u less" but wtf
frail sky
(Hell yeah, Madame Verre)
median rock
they had one of the most cursed builds id ever seen
a couple improved sorceries and like 3 improved giants flame incants
i think they were trying to use cocktails a lot more but they had zero affinity attack up, they had night invaders but thats it for generic dmg bonuses
it went solidly eh. tho i think thats largely bc giantsflame take thee is Not Great for ed balancers
median rock
ed caligo has a claw swipe throwing projectiles attack??
never seen this in my life
not even on fextra lol
plush cliffBOT
Apparently, the ruins greatsword's special charged R2s don't actually do any additional normal or poise damage compared to regular colossal sword charged R2s, they just split the damage and poise damage between the first and second hits
Kinda unfortunate tbh
frozen olive
that is pretty bad yeah
outer flint
I’ve been highly recommended nightreign by some friends, and had some questions 
- is it still fun/viable to play solo?
- how long are runs?
- do people here play with each other
- have people had a good experience playing with randoms on fill
light bridge
Solo as in, solo solo, or with randos?
outer flint
solo solo
light bridge
It's not amazing IMO
light bridge
Runs can be from 20 min to an hour, depending on how well you do with bosses
If you die first day, which is rare, it's over in like 15 mins
But there's two whole days (so about 30 mins) and a final boss. Depending on how much you take to clear each of the bosses at the end of each day (3 total), I've had runs last for almost an hour
I do not wish 20 minutes of balancers upon anyone.
obtuse halo
Yeah. I've played with great randoms and awful randoms
outer flint
obtuse halo
the awful randoms are usually the ones that ditch day 1 though
there isn't really a lot of practical griefing potential beyond being personally useless
outer flint
are enemies dynamically scaled to # of players
obtuse halo
yeah
obtuse halo
I guess in theory someone committed to griefing could just idle and be completely useless the entire time without the enemies rescaling to two players, but I've never seen anyone actually do that
outer flint
my friend and I still have to finish our seamless run (it’ll also be his first time doing the dlc), wonder if I can pivot to shilling nightreign after we pick it back up
light bridge
I jsut realized that the moonlight butterfly's horn thing
Is the blade of the godslayer greatsword
onyx trench
@languid tiger went back to my katana run, walked into stormveil, sneaking up on the very first axe exile with all the barrels under the stairs
In a VC streaming, and I say to my friend "watch him drop the axe" before I'd even attacked
1 backstab, item drop flash happens, friend goes "it's probably just his gloves, right"
Axe.
You ever feel like doing a crescent axe run? Enjoy doing 30+ runs for it
obtuse halo
weak. I wanted the Grave Keeper Tube Top for bow only and so I did that grind without breaking my rules for the run
low drop chance from two enemies per run in leyndell, just far enough from the nearest grace to be obnoxious
that said it really does feel sometimes like you only get those rare drops when you're not looking for them
I didn't believe the Glaive just called "Glaive" was real until it popped up randomly in Caelid on my literal 10th savefile
median rock
I’ve been highly recommended nightreign by some friends, and had some questions ...
I've got approx 450 hours in game according to my nr save file. I exclusively play solo queue trios (fill) aside from some duos/trios w friends closer to when the game came out, and ive queued w randoms i met in game and liked a couple times
useless randoms happen a decent bit but like. i have very rarely had NEGATIVE randoms
languid tiger
<@156213425859592193> went back to my katana run, walked into stormveil, sneakin...
it's fate...destiny is calling you
will you answer?
onyx trench
I dropped a second just completing stormveil
median rock
my suggestion to everybody who gets annoyed at randoms is to be assertive w pinging locations. if you're pinging where you want to next after each thing you clear, and you start running first, your randoms will probably follow
outer flint
I've got approx 450 hours in game according to my nr save file. I exclusively pl...
ty!! that's really reassuring
median rock
re playing solo i think its a lot more fun on certain characters than others. all characters are viable in solo/duos/trios, but there's some characters that are a lot more self reliant and can not care about drops the same way
outer flint
gotcha
obtuse halo
Yeah, i do find a lot of the chaos of playing with randoms can just be a lack of routing/direction
median rock
like if you end up playing a lot of executor he's great in solo and you'll not be missing much, but recluse can be a bit more annoying due to less overall staff/seal drops and not being designed for frontline combat
(the parry guy vs the mage)
obtuse halo
If you take charge you’ll have more consistent success than hoping someone else does
This doesn’t help the occasional rando who insistently takes charge but does so badly though
But more often people either know what they’re doing or will go along with a plan
median rock
dunno. the last rec i have is to play deep of night (even if you don't care about elo) if you want to actually have challenging but fun games, once you get decent at the game
i find a lot less dipshits in that mode once u climb out of depth 1/2. you don't need to be very great at the game, but it's a lot better at filtering the truly clueless randoms
