From Software 'n such

[Blinge]

Yo Lost Kingdoms Part 2 is up.

Just wanted to share the story beat in which we see the rival character for the first time.
at 31:04

https://youtu.be/CAIVcQ3R-w8

Will stop harping on about it now.

I don't understand the mechanics at all but that was pretty cool.

Agreed on what you said in the video about downtime. Some fighting games try to evoke that as well in supplementary material, to remind you they have a life outside of punching people for three rounds.

Aha, thanks man. Yeah I really appreciate that when i see it in fighting games too.

https://youtu.be/E9NK2lVAHKE?t=723

so 12:02 in my first episode, i do a quick run through of the different attacking mechanics / 3 different types of card you can use.

[Stevens]

Finished NG+ 3, fought DOH, skipped the last Seven Spears.

SS took two tries. Whole run wasn't charmless - I took it back at Ape Duo.

Still don't have Shura ending. I've never fought those two bosses:D

Backed up my save and went back to the boss rush mod again since I am now slightly more comfortable with the whole mod thing. I got the mod and the patch (basically gives you everything) working after a little more research and plan to spend some time with it.

Also discovered some funny stuff - I have mod engine running (it has a dinput9 - whatever that is) and I added the Enemies die twice mod's dinput8. Clearly they don't play well togther. I was warped to a shiny white Genichiro, knew shit was wrong, and got outta dodge. Deleted the dinput8 and everything was fine. Did some more reading and know how to avoid this in the future.

[Austin]

Did my first SL1 run on Dark Souls 1 over the weekend. Never thought I'd try it because I had the impression it would be nearly impossible, but it actually wasn't all that bad at all. I mainly struggled a bit with the catacombs, but I think that was due more to burnout as I had been playing for a while by that point. The Four Kings also wrecked me for a good while. Other points I thought would be troublesome, like Ornstein & Smough, I didn't have issue with. Pyromancy obviously helped and I maxed that out as early as I could. I used the hand axe in the beginning, unabashedly abused firebombs where allowed, and utilized the crossbow when it was convenient (since I didn't have the dex to use a standard bow). I do think one reason it was a fairly smooth run is that I went to New Londo early and one of the ghosts dropped a Jagged Ghost Blade. Checking a wiki it seems it is pretty rare, only appearing 1% of the time. It caused massive bleed damage on enemies and was useful even in the late game after being upgraded to +5 (Twinkling Titanite). I might have to do another run in the future without being so lucky and see how things go. I am ashamed to admit however that I did not do the DLC. Got to Artorias and kept getting wrecked in two hits. Said "screw it", went back to Gwyn and ended the game. It must have taken at least a dozen ripostes to kill him? I was humoring myself during the battle, thinking, "Man, this is the farthest I have ever heard into this tune in-game."

Oh yeah, I grabbed another disc-only copy of Demon's Souls to replace my smashed one. Figured there has been enough time for things to simmer there. The motivator was that I had a friend try it for the first time and he ripped right through it and loved it (for perspective, he's only finished the first Dark Souls, so he is far from an aficionado with the series). If he can do it, then surely I can. I just need to take my time, stop playing it like it's Dark Souls III, and rely on some safer strats.

[Blinge]

I am ashamed to admit however that I did not do the DLC. Got to Artorias and kept getting wrecked in two hits. Said "screw it", went back to Gwyn and ended the game. It must have taken at least a dozen ripostes to kill him?

Bruh I found Gwyn harder than the DLC... or maybe equal to Manus.
Basically, I've never quite been able to parry Gwyn without taking a hit, which i couldn't do at all in my SL1 run. So Gwyn killed me probably 50 times. https://youtu.be/9WY6KSWT8Ro?t=2726
Still i wonder if it would've been different with full havels/stone now I've learnt the AI exploit speed runners use.

I was humoring myself during the battle, thinking, "Man, this is the farthest I have ever heard into this tune in-game."

..what?

Oh yeah, I grabbed another disc-only copy of Demon's Souls to replace my smashed one.

Man, the different things people find difficult..

[Austin]

Bruh I found Gwyn harder than the DLC... or maybe equal to Manus.
Basically, I've never quite been able to parry Gwyn without taking a hit, which i couldn't do at all in my SL1 run. So Gwyn killed me probably 50 times. https://youtu.be/9WY6KSWT8Ro?t=2726
Still i wonder if it would've been different with full havels/stone now I've learnt the AI exploit speed runners use.

With Gwyn it's all about the parry. Just work on that timing. Once you get it down, it's a piece of cake. On a SL1 run though it does take a while. Thankfully he wasn't doing enough damage to one-shot me, otherwise my outcome would have been pretty different (I took a few hits over the course of the fight): https://youtu.be/ViWZYAouwQQ

I was humoring myself during the battle, thinking, "Man, this is the farthest I have ever heard into this tune in-game."

..what?

The final boss tune. I had never heard the whole thing before. I always kill Gwyn about two or three times faster in a normal run of the game, so the track never has time to fully play out.

Oh yeah, I grabbed another disc-only copy of Demon's Souls to replace my smashed one.

Man, the different things people find difficult..

It is interesting to see the differences in what others find difficult (example, your parry issues with Gwyn).

With DeS, I found it less "difficult" and more "tedious and annoying", along with a lot of lack-of-polish issues getting in the way of my enjoyment (i.e., poor framerate and camera on the Man Eater fight).

The reason I quit Demon's Souls was the same reason I decided to call it on the DS1 DLC (SL1 run anyway, a normal run I have no issues). I was burned out on the run by that point and was tired of getting two-shot by the boss, then having to do the run back repeatedly. It was pretty tiresome coming off failing at the Four Kings for two hours straight. Doing 2% of Artorias' health bar per hit wasn't doing my motivation any favors either. I figured, eh, whatever--I did the main game, I'm happy enough with that.

Although with Artorias, it didn't occur to me until after the fact that I had taken off Havel's Ring to replace it with one that gave me more attunement slots, so I was no longer fast rolling. I probably should have re-equipped it and tried again.

With DeS, in hindsight what I should have done is simply taken a break when the game really started getting to me. That's not something I'm used to doing--I always try to power through a game, even if I'm burned out or not enjoying it. Not a good way to go about things.

I'll get it done. Then maybe I'll do another run with better strategies in mind, then we'll see how I feel about it.

[Bananamatic]

DS1 SL1 was pretty easy, it's amazing how almost nothing can one shot you even at that level
DS2 with the crappy iframes is something else though

[Austin]

Dude, I can't even imagine doing that. The iframes are so bad it's always the first thing I pump up in the beginning, strength, stamina or vigor be damned.

Though now my interest is piqued.. I may have to try it anyway.

[Stevens]

So I finally figured out how to get all my mods to play nice together. The info was all right in front of me but I decided to not read it at first.

Boss rush + enemies die twice + demon bell = a bit too much.

I was fighting Lady B with Demon Bell and four death blow markers. I turned off the mod and just went with demon bell.

Doing this run with only two prayer necklaces.

[Blinge]

It is interesting to see the differences in what others find difficult (example, your parry issues with Gwyn).

..It was pretty tiresome coming off failing at the Four Kings for two hours straight.

Lol yep, there's another example..
my SL1 beat them first attempt
( feel free to slap me lool )

I mean, you are now required to do the whole thing again to beat manus and kalameet

(i.e., poor framerate and camera on the Man Eater fight).

Oof i dunno i feel like the camera is the same one that's in DS1-3

[Stevens]

Whew.. two prayer necklaces on True Monk was rough. Divine Dragon, a fight that was basically a gimme for me up to now, whooped my ass a few times before I broke through.

I've fought GSO a lot through the rush. I remember when I first fought him I thought I could never go toe to toe with him. Now I can beat him with just my sword.

I'm pretty close to feeling like I've become the boss in the boss fight:D

[Necronopticous]

become the boss in the boss fight

[Blinge]

heh. that's basically what the Shura ending is.

Also the last fight in Demon Souls.. you're the boss.

[Illyrian]

heh. that's basically what the Shura ending is.

Also the last fight in Demon Souls.. you're the boss.

Do you mean when you fight the slug thing? By the way, I've never played Demon's Souls - what is with the slug thing? Can someone explain what is going on with that for me?

[Stevens]

Warning - Huge nerd question incoming.

Been wondering about the value of prayer beads in comparison to new game cycles. I'll try and explain as best I can.

If for instance:

Is having no prayer necklaces on NG the same as having max necklaces on NG+7?
Is having one prayer necklace on NG the same as having max on NG+6?

Does anyone know the exact values? Just curious really.

I can say this - Sword Saint (Demon Bell and two necklaces) on NG boss rush fucking trucked me for two hours last night. Had a lot of runs into phase two and three and came really close three or four times, but ultimately decided to give it a rest and try again today.

Everything was a one or two shot.

Edit - Trucked no more, downed SS this morning. Moved on to the Shura ending fight in boss rush. Since I never got the Shura ending I debated if I should fight them, but I figured with almost 140 hours what the hell since I am not ready for another play through just yet. Really digging throwing down with the bosses over and over.

Spoiler

Emma - Wow the ost here really plays up the tragedy of you choice to stick to the code. She definitely bodied me a bit, but I opened with a Dragon Flash > shuriken > chasing slice to do a fair bit of vit damage. After that it was block, strike, jump back when she goes for grab, shuriken to slice to get in again. I have that whole affair down to about 30 seconds.


Issin -

For a game that has several fights against the same characters they did a really nice job of making it different with all of them. When comparing old man Issin to Sword Saint (based on my first playthrough) neither one has anything on the other.

Again got bodied a bunch as I learned his new moves and the alternate timing on some of his others. His Ichi is tricky here and I've mostly been step dodging and deflecting the 2nd hit as opposed to SS where I will step and punish.

Got him to the last phase a few times. Like Emma shuriken > slice is pretty good here, but oh my lord (you vets know what's coming) One Mind is ridiculous. Gotta figure that out.

[Blinge]

heh. that's basically what the Shura ending is.

Also the last fight in Demon Souls.. you're the boss.

Do you mean when you fight the slug thing? By the way, I've never played Demon's Souls - what is with the slug thing? Can someone explain what is going on with that for me?

Play it, you can probably emulate it alright now..

[ Derp was supposed to put that info about the demon souls 'slug' in spoiler text ]

Spoiler

The slug is True King Allant, the king who called to the Old One through/to vastly empower his soul arts. The Old One drew him to its bosom but apparently doesn't share power very well, or the King was too weak a vessel to become the Old One's main Demon. So he lives as a pathetic slug thing that can't merge with the Old One. I think.

On my NG+7 Pure Black WT playthrough that 'slug' hits like a truck, pretty funny!

Stevens I have no fucking idea lmao I've never done such a deep dive in Sekiro or played any sort of challenge run yet, unless you count my max stealth.

[Stevens]

Ha. No worries B, was just curious.

After I clear Isshin I'm going to stick with boss rush for a few more days and then start Bloodborne at the end of the week.

Oh if anyone is curious - the lazulite

Spoiler

flame vent

shreds

Spoiler

True Monk's vit

. It has a long recovery though and I strongly suggest NOT using it on

Spoiler

her final phase

.

[Blinge]

Meanwhile in Lost Kingdoms we've finally caught up with papa.
-9:50
https://youtu.be/DQh1ePZV69Y

and experience our first setback, due to, well, dying.

14:24 for the Undead Dragon + Lich fight. Also enter the Juggernaut.

[Austin]

All right, I can finally say I've got all the Souls games under my belt. Demon's Souls is done.

All it took was taking my time and I finished the Valley of Defilement on my second or third try. Took advantage of the bow, aggro'd certain enemies from a distance. Sniped those mosquitos with lock-on. Easy. Went on to finish Boletaria and that was pretty easy overall too (though to be fair, it was still fresh in my mind after going through it on my first failed playthrough early last year, and instead of handling it halfway through the game like I did last time, this time I did it at the very end).

I said "screw it" and sniped the silver dragon while I made some food in the other room. Not that it was entirely necessary since I beat Allant on the first try, but I wanted to make sure I didn't have to fully deal with that runback in case I did die.

I'm working on my second playthrough now and have done everything except for the second half of Boletaria. Had to save the Flamelurker for later as it was wrecking me earlier in the game. Beat the Dragon God on the first try as well. Used to think it was completely random but noticed its eyes change from yellow to red when it's aggro'd. Got the Maneater on my third try as well. I found the key is to destroying the first one before the second one even appears, then the fight is way more manageable. Using arrows when it flies away from the bridge doesn't hurt either.

On my previous run I wasn't doing a lot of damage to King Allant and ended up tanking my way through. Is going back to the Mausoleum to fight the Old King worthwhile? I know it's specifically hinted at in game and I figured maybe the weapon received there will make the Allant fight go faster.

So yeah. The game will probably never rise above "least favorite Souls game" for me personally due to a variety of design choices that don't gel with me (and the fact that the rest of the Souls games are so damn strong), but I can at least say it's grown on me.

[Blinge]

Real ballers do a whole souls without a single ranged attack

I mean, yeah you wanna get the two brandt swords to combine them as it's an intended ng+ reward but as for making allant fight faster.. it's nit an overly long fight?

[Austin]

Real ballers parry Gwyn.

I was doing very little damage per hit, so yeah, it took a while. Granted, my Longsword was still at +5 or +6 I believe (it's at +8 on my current run, so we'll see if it goes any faster).

I'm going to check a wiki, but figured I'd ask here too--Any decent place to grind for Hardstone Chunks, or are they basically limited and available only at specific moments/locations? I would like to get my sword up to a higher level on this current run.

[Austin]

Finished DeS again this morning. Pretty smooth run this time overall.

Longsword +8 was more than enough for the run. Still wasn't doing a ton of damage to Allant compared to other bosses, but it was offing enemies pretty quickly.

I did check online and chunks can only be attained from crystal lizards and miners, so I missed my opportunities there. I know the lizards respawn a couple of times under certain conditions, but I didn't feel like going to the various archstones to grind out on them. Not a big deal.

Went and got the Demonbrandt as well but it did zero damage. Turns out that its effect is based on your World Tendency (something I wasn't paying attention to this run). All black and it will do no damage, all white and it does lots of damage. Oops.

[it290]

I'm about to hop into one of the unsung Fromsoft titles, Frame Gride. Any advice for me before I start?

[Blinge]

Do real ballers parry Gwyn? I did it in my speedrun and that’s generally what i do with most characters now but it really trivialises the fight. Feel like for anything but a full Havel tank fighting him normally is much harder.

Went and got the Demonbrandt as well but it did zero damage. Turns out that its effect is based on your World Tendency (something I wasn't paying attention to this run). All black and it will do no damage, all white and it does lots of damage. Oops.

The crystal lizards inside the 2-2 mineshaft are the treasure trove for various stones including hard stone i think but yeah hardstone is a ball ache to upgrade.

Nah demonbrandt...that’s character tendency, not world tendency iirc.
However, you get it to combine the two swords into the fuckoff greatsword- Northern Regalia.

the sword that’s suspiciously similar to the one martyr Logarius has...

[Marc]

Real ballers parry Gwyn.

I think I've mentioned before, but last year I decided to try my first no-summon run of a Souls game, chose DS1 as its the one I'm most familiar with. My (at the time) 9-year old son decided he wanted to try as well. Imagine my surprise when not only did he do it (literally solo, I just advised on build & upgrades), but when he strolled into the last fight and beat it using nothing but parries like it was no big thing.

[Austin]

I think I've mentioned before, but last year I decided to try my first no-summon run of a Souls game, chose DS1 as its the one I'm most familiar with. My (at the time) 9-year old son decided he wanted to try as well. Imagine my surprise when not only did he do it (literally solo, I just advised on build & upgrades), but when he strolled into the last fight and beat it using nothing but parries like it was no big thing.

You've trained him well.

[Stevens]

NG+

Almost finished with my charmless/bell run of boss rush. Fought GSO a lot. Killed him a few times, died a lot more. True Monk went down quick though.

I really like fighting GSO - think it has to do with him and the setting. I wish there were a way to fight True Monk with the sun shining on the bridge, or a mod where the sun was always out. Think I said that already.

I have both Issins, dragon, father, and DOH left. Almost got through SS last night.

[Blinge]

bruh Gwyn is literally harder without parries.

Some of his attacks straight up miss you if you're dry humping him too.
I've successfully killed him on normal runs by just mashing parry until I get one, then healing when he's down.

[Queen Charlene]

acquired Armored Core 4 for $7

probably gonna take a crack at it tonight -- haven't played an AC game since the early 2000s.

[Austin]

bruh Gwyn is literally harder without parries.

Says the guy that can't parry Gwyn.

And bruh, in the end, it doesn't matter.

Insert Bananamatic's "Who can eat the bigger piece of sh*t" analogy here.

[Blinge]

bruh Gwyn is literally harder without parries.

Says the guy that can't parry Gwyn.

https://youtu.be/KeGdzjuLskQ?t=4934

1:22:15

For the record, bruh.
( see i can beat it )