Dark Souls

That's not cheesing. Using the Thief's Ring and walking behind Old King Allant to poison him and kill him without him ever reacting, THAT'S CHEESING.
 
Well it was a less tactical, less skill based affair as far as how I felt. That's why I'd call it cheesing. I was just mashing the left mouse button 99% of the time. But it was great that the boss even gave me enough of a challenge that it required me to switch my fighting style, it made the eventual win more satisfying, although the number of tries did that more.
 
Akratus said:
I've been using a +5 divine halberd [...] it's complete shit against the four kings though.
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The Four Kings are resistant to Magical Damage, that's why. If memory serves, they have 50% Magical Resistance, and their damage is 50% Physical and 50% Magical, so they usually damage you through blocks, but all of their damage CAN be blocked, though evading it is the best option.

Akratus said:
Even though I cheesed the fight like fuck, beating the four kings is probably my most satisfying win so far, just because of how many tries it took me.

I cheesed it, by putting on havel's armor, two handing my halberd, and simply not doing anything but attacking, occasional roll, and occasional roll away to avoid the purple AoE.
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Akratus said:
Well it was a less tactical, less skill based affair as far as how I felt. That's why I'd call it cheesing. I was just mashing the left mouse button 99% of the time. But it was great that the boss even gave me enough of a challenge that it required me to switch my fighting style, it made the eventual win more satisfying, although the number of tries did that more.
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As others have pointed out, that's not cheesing it at all. That's just one of the many methods. I personally preferred the deft approach of dodging everything, which is far less manly, but when you're attempting the game with the Master's Challenge, you CANNOT afford to take damage from bosses, so being crafty is simply a necessity.

I'd suppose it's time to warn you now to be prepared for total disappointment. NONE of the rest of the game is as challenging as the Ornstein and Smough or Four Kings battles, so it's all downhill from here. If you let your guard down, the final bosses will make short work of you, but that's IF you let your guard down... literally. There is one section that harkens back to certain gimmicky older games with an unreasonably impossibly difficult death trap to avoid, but with an equally unreasonably simplistic solution to it, so once you get past that the first time you'll never think much of it from then onward.

. . . . .

Korin said:
WorstUsernameEver said:
That's not cheesing. Using the Thief's Ring and walking behind Old King Allant to poison him and kill him without him ever reacting, THAT'S CHEESING.
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That sounds awesome.
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*In thick, poorly-emulated "elderly" speech*
Back in my day, that's how we beat ALL our bosses, cause they was too tough to beat otherwise, n'yessir. *wags cane*

But really, Demon's Souls WAS the far superior game in most ways, aside from the Thief Ring / Poison exploits on certain bosses. However the sheer difficulty that they presented (unlike Dark Souls' bosses) made those tactics seem much more justifiable. =)
 
I don't know if, aside from Allant and Flamelurker, Demon's Souls bosses were that much more difficult, but they were certainly a lot more interesting. Dark Souls has very few experimental bosses, and while most of the duels/demons are cool, it kind of wears thin by the end of the game. Same with Dark Souls 2, which also has the additional flaw of simply having too damn many boss battles. Granted, a ton of them are optional, but I still feel they could have easily trimmed quite a few encounters and focused on polishing the rest.

EDIT: Also, an addendum to SnapSlav's post: while it's true that there's nothing as hard as Four Kings and Ornstein and Smough in the main path, the DLC bosses hold their own.
 
WorstUsernameEver said:
Korin said:
WorstUsernameEver said:
That's not cheesing. Using the Thief's Ring and walking behind Old King Allant to poison him and kill him without him ever reacting, THAT'S CHEESING.
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That sounds awesome.
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*In thick, poorly-emulated "elderly" speech*
Back in my day, that's how we beat ALL our bosses, cause they was too tough to beat otherwise, n'yessir. *wags cane*

But really, Demon's Souls WAS the far superior game in most ways, aside from the Thief Ring / Poison exploits on certain bosses. However the sheer difficulty that they presented (unlike Dark Souls' bosses) made those tactics seem much more justifiable. =)
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Yeah, I can see how people would think that's cheap... but in Demon's Souls/Dark Souls, games that are intentionally grueling I actually enjoy finding much simpler/easier ways of overcoming obstacles. It's like... yeah, you can fight that Taurus demon like straight on and maybe die a few times and it's a legit hard fight when you first meet him... or, you can position him so he just falls off the bridge and dies instantly. I think any time you beat something playing smarter than harder is just as satisfying. Though maybe poisoning example is a little more of an exploit/bug... but somebody had to try that to figure it out. They were like, "I wonder if I don't have to fight him head on... could I sneak all the way up there?" This series of games is one I take pleasure in exploiting as much as possible. People come up with all kinds of different ways to get stuff done. That's some of the appeal in my opinion.
 
To be clear, the Souls games received update support, so things that would be considered strictly bug exploitation WOULD be removed. Things like falling through floors to skip entire halves of Dark Souls for the sake of speed runs. Things like lagstabbing. Things like the insta-kill "Crystal Field" or the "Dragon Head Glitch" or many other things. What could be fixed was fixed, and I'm sure it was intentional that many of the bosses in Demon's Souls were MADE susceptible to Poison damage, and could be evaded with the Thief's Ring, hence why it was never patched. Of course those features weren't present in Dark Souls, but the game as a whole was different from its predecessor, so it's not entirely because the Thief/Poison combo was unintentional, FROMsoft just didn't want it in the sequel.

I get a kick out of fighting the Flamelurker like a badass, but I don't feel shame when I decide to just AFK poison him to death because I don't have the time or I'm lacking in patience, because it wasn't a bug exploit. Nor do I feel ANY shame when I kill the first Maneater with a bow on the other side of the Fog Gate because that fight is unreasonably deadly. I'd feel more shame about doing something similar towards the Bell Gargoyles, because they're piss easy, and by comparison so is most of Dark Souls compared to Demon's Souls. But lagstabbers.... those guys really OUGHT to feel shame, and it's despicable that they simply don't.
 
The trick to the Maneaters is to stay aggressive and kill the first one relatively fast. Unless you take too much time the second one spawns while you've almost killed the first and you should have time to land a final hit. One-on-one they're slightly tricky but not too much to handle. Other people have used the brazier to separate them and fight the two of them at the same time, but I don't really like that tactic.
 
Oh trust me, I know the "tricks", I HAVE played far more Demon's Souls than Dark Souls, thus why I often state that the original was so much more (delightfully) challenging. I was pointing out that the Bell Gargoyles are often complained about being "too hard" for the portion of the game they're fought in, and my experiences up against the FAR more difficult Maneaters- despite NOT appearing early into their respective game -makes me cringe towards such complaints. It's like reading players calling Gwyn "tough", players who never knew what a tough fight was because they never went up against the False King. Or reading players complain about Blighttown who would never have dared utter such complaints had they ever set foot in the Valley of Defilement.

I was merely commenting that at times I don't want to bother with "trying" against particular bosses, and the Maneaters top that list. Too much walking to reach too irritating of a fight, too easy to fall to your death because of ONE dodge roll, and so on. Despite the journey being MUCH more arduous to reach the Old Hero, I enjoy that fight, and I rarely cheese it with the Thief/Poison trick, despite the fact it's one of the fights where that exploit can be most viciously employed. the fight itself I enjoy. I enjoy fighting the Flamelurker. I enjoy fighting the False King. I just don't enjoy dealing with the Maneaters.

Incidentally (and totally off-topic) WorstUserNameEver, is your sig by chance a reference to Steam traders? XD
 
No, my signature is a quote from Gavlan bro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHvudgB-nsY

And I guess it might be because I played Dark Souls first, but frankly I found Blighttown much more annoying than Valley of Defilement. Aside from the notorious framerate problems, you have to deal with annoying toxic darts, a ton more ladders, crazy dogs and the boulder throwing dudes near the end. 5-2 is annoying, but once you get used to the area layout you can run past most enemies, and once you unlock the shortcut it's a fairly short ride to Dirty Colossus (who's frankly a bit of a pushover, but after all that annoyance I wouldn't have it any other way). Shortcuts are actually something that Demon's Souls generally did better: you'd almost always get a shortcut before a difficult boss or after a very hard level. It's not coincidential that the stage I consider the worst in the game (4-2) has no shortcuts and a boss that isn't trivial, unless you're already in Soul Form.
 
It's funny that you say that, cause I DID just say that I enjoyed the Old Hero boss fight (4-2). Though it's not true that the stage has no shortcuts... they're simply RIDICULOUSLY difficult shortcuts to make, and considering the logistics of it I think it was unintentional as part of the design, and mostly an exploit, on top of being FUCKING HARD.

But regardless, I still hold that Blighttown is NOTHING compared to the Valley of Defilement. The swap section of Blighttown is a fraction of the size of 5-2, the swamp doesn't sap away your endurance and prohibit you from dodging while it poisons you, nor is it patrolled by the most deadly NPC Black Phantom of the game without ANY safe ground to fight her on, thus granting her an unreasonable advance (she can dodge roll, you cannot, AND there's no Rusty Iron Ring to circumvent this), and there are no giants. Yes, the Giants. Those "boulder throwing dudes" in Blighttown are pushovers, but the Giants of the Valley of Defilement??? Wait, let me finish my thoughts, first. The rotting wooden maze section of Blighttown is ALSO smaller in size than that of 5-1 (though 5-1 is largely a really, really, REALLY deep climb downwards, while Blighttown's equivalent is a lengthy journey latitudinally, so the difference is smaller), enemies don't drop down behind you and backstab you with poisoned weapons, nor are there shamans inflicting plague upon you in huge clouds you cannot simply sidestep, nor do the denizens of Blighttown have an attack animation designed SPECIFICALLY to push you off the ledges to your doom, and to top it all off Blighttown is divided by several "checkpoints" (the Bonfires) so even if the plague dart enemies (which do NOT respawn, so they're negligible) or dogs were particularly irritating that would still be mitigated by the zone itself being so much smaller and simpler to tackle. Now where was I about the Giants of the Valley of Defilement? Oh yeah, FUCK THEM! Unlike the "boulder throwing dudes", the Giants could not be backstabbed, stunned, or in any way slowed down, their attack animations could not be blocked AND tossed you around while dealing insane amounts of damage, and these were further exacerbated by your surroundings: they'd knock you off the wooden ramps to your death (a running theme, you might notice) or knock you into a poison swamp that crippled you to a crawl while it slowly killed you, guaranteeing an even easier attack than the last, and likely a finishing blow.

So, in a quick summary:

Blighttown:
-Somewhat dark and difficult to navigate
-Narrow passages lined by fatal drops
-Enemies with impeccable accuracy firing plague darts, but they'd never respawn after being killed once
-Dogs are agile and deadly
-Poisonous swamp that slows you down, but you can wear the Rusty Iron Ring to negate the latter aspect of this
-Tough Ogre enemies that attack you while you're slowed by the swamp or balancing on a narrow ledge
-Mosquitoes infinitely spawn (always in pairs, never more)
-NPC Black Phantom spawns near the end of the swamp, but only if you're in Human form

Valley of Defilement:
-Incredibly dark and difficult to navigate
-Narrow passages lined by fatal drops
-False floors give way to traps or fatal falls
-Enemies will play dead and ambush you when you pass them
-Enemies will drop down and ambush you from spots you did not see
-Enemies will push you off the ledge with a special attack animation that breaks your guard if you block it
-Enemies use flaming weapons
-Chokepoints are blocked by giant ticks that erupt in poison if killed, and cannot be passed without "bursting" them
-Chokepoints are blocked by swarms of plague-infected rats
-Chokepoints are guarded by Giants that will knock you off the ledges with their regular attack animations
-Giants cannot be stunned, backstacked, or hindered in any way, and their not-slow attack animations stun you and knock you around
-Poisonous swamp that encumbers you and restricts your movement to a draining crawl
-Swamp patrolled by a powerful and agile NPC Black Phantom that suffers none of the debilitations you do
-Poisonous jellyfish lining the swamp that you can easily mistake for rubble that litters the space
-MORE Giants than before that attack in groups this time!!!
-MORE passages and ledges with deadly drops, even in the swamp
-Mosquitoes that if ignored can swarm you in large groups that can kill you or knock you off the narrow passages
-World Tendency NPC is located RIGHT in the middle of the swamp and all of its perils

Blighttown was easier and less demanding in every way compared to its predecessor, which is why it irks me to no end when people complain about it, because they're being spoiled little pussies. The framerate complaints, I'll grant them, cause that wasn't an intention of the place's design (though curiously *I* never encountered any such framerate drops on my system, and *my* PS3 was on its last legs when I played the game, so.....) but not their incessant bitchfests about the difficulty of the setting. Play a REAL challenge before you complain about a walk through the woods, you wimps! A swampy, rotten, GIANT ROOTS sort of woods, but a walk through the woods nonetheless!
 
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I don't consider jumping down ledges a shortcut, to be honest, and that's the only thing that comes to mind to cut the descent in 4-2. As for Valley of Defilement.. none of what you say is untrue (well, actually, there is safe footing near the BP spawn point, but I guess most people don't go through that part of the swamp?) but I still found it fairly easy. 5-1's only real problem is the giant depraved one and some of the ledges, but as long as you're cautious you can lead the enemies to you or use ranged attacks to kill them before they reach you, and 5-2... it was only annoying until I realize I could merrily skip pretty much all the enemies except the mosquitoes and the two giants near the island before the fog gate by running. :V

EDIT: Just to be clear, I'm not really complaining about either levels, just putting forth an argument for people that had problems with Blighttown, because frankly, I can understand that.
 
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The shortcut in 2-2 is also jumping down ledges. 4-1 as well. The difference between the shortcut in 4-2 and the shortcut in 2-2 is that I don't believe the 4-2 shortcut was intentional, however both are jumping off of ledges to skip large portions of the area. In 2-2 it is a MASSIVE pit, in 4-2 it's a particular cliff.

And I understand that you're stating that the Valley of Defilement's difficulty can be mitigated, but the exact same things can be said of Blighttown, where its considerably lesser degree of difficulty simply shines through even further. Yes, there are spots of land to fight the Meat Cleaver BP, but they're too small to feasible engage her, and the only one large enough is near the first Fog Gate that's blocked by a Giant (so you need to clear it, first) and the distance to it from the area where the BP patrols and can be aggro'ed from is long enough and made up of enough stamina-draining poison swamp that if you attempt to lure her to the large island where the Giant (once) was, you're not likely to get there unscathed. It can be done (I do it all the time), but it's tough. By contrast, Mildred will spawn while you're near a Bonfire that is located on dry land, near a slope that leads to an "arena" of more dry land, if you decide to lure her. Add to that her weapon doesn't toss you around whether or not it hits you and doesn't hurt nearly as much and CAN be blocked, and the fights are nothing alike. If you levy one suggestion to lighten the load, if that same could be said about a contrasting location, then that suggestion's impact on "this isn't harder" becomes moot. Viable all the same, absolutely, but moot.

I've taken part in forums where people insisted that Dark Souls was the more challenging of the Soul series, and they're just crazy. It has much tougher areas (Tombs of Giants, specifically), but on average everything is far less demanding. More open spaces with room to breathe, more resources to avoid being stunlocked and swarmed into oblivion (many have suggested that the very implementation of Poise was a terrible mistake), more "checkpoints" that divide the areas and provide "safe zones" for players, and so on. I have no idea what it takes to be so oblivious to the obvious as they were. All that said, that doesn't mean that by comparison, Demon's Souls is unreasonably difficult to beat. Just harder. That's all.
 
I'm completely stuck on Gwyn right now. Thought I'd persevere tonight and try to finish the game today, but I just can't do it. I'm not making any progress. After every death I don't learn anything to make the fight better or easier in any way. I get maybe 1/5th of his health away at most, but I can never ever hope to dodge his attacks for more than a couple times. Blocking them is of course out of the question since he makes so many attacks in quick succesion I don't have enough stamina to take them. I really don't see how I might get through this one, unless I summon another player.
 
How hard does he hit ya? You can try parrying him, that's a pretty effective strategy. He makes some pretty big/telegraphed attacks. I'd say make a few runs where you should just parry his attacks and learn the timing. Target shield has a longer parry animation, if that makes it easier.
 
Parrying can absolutely trivialize Gwyn and summoning Solaire distracts him and gives you the chance to sneak in a ton of blows. If it wasn't for those two strategies, he'd actually be a fairly hard boss, he has a ton of reach and doesn't really give you a lot of time to heal, plus even if you turtle he takes a lot of stamina and does some fire damage anyway (I don't remember what shields, if any, have 100% in both fire and physical). Also, remember that once you're done with Gwyn the New Game cycle ends and NG+ starts! Do everything you need to do (like upgrading your weapon and armor, optional bosses, the DLC areas, etc.) before killing the Lord of Cinder!
 
Seconded. Gwyn seems more imposing than he really is. Unlike the False King he constantly closes the distance, but being able to parry him at all, let alone block most of his attacks (and I'm guessing your Stamina isn't maxed, because I was ALWAYS able to block his longest combo) renders him quite trivial indeed. He's also EXTREMELY susceptible to magical attacks, so I suppose if you're having any difficulty you've gone all-in on a melee build. For battles such as this which are somewhat demanding on fighters, the Mask of the Child, Cloranthy Ring, Grass Crest Shield, any combination of 2 or even all 3 offer INCREDIBLE boosts to your sustainability, because your stamina replenishes absurdly quickly. As long as you learn something from each attempt you make, you'll succeed after a few more tries. Just keep it up. =)
 
I've indeed realized since fighting gwyn for a number of tries that there's more left for me to do. I farmed some materials and upgraded my armor, and fought the sanctuary guardian just now. I defeated the sanctuary guardian in the well known manner of stripping down armor, learning the attack patterns and dodging, dodging, dodging. I don't know why I never felt the need to do that on any other bosses prior to this, but I surely think that this will help me a great deal when I finally face gwyn.

Now the question is how far along I can manage to get in the dlc. These bosses seem so imposing, though I realize they are quite beatable.
 
That area before Gwynn is also great for farming various chunks. But yeah, make sure you clear all the bosses and get all the items etc. Now is the best time to farm materials for weapons. Head on down to old Anor Londo and kill those black death assassin whatchma callits, they drop slabs and chunks.

Edit: ALSO, now is the perfect time to do some pvp... a lot of people choose not to defeat Gwynn at all because that area is extremely pvp active (it's also got a pretty good layout for pvp). If you go in there in human form you'll get a fog wall almost immediately from getting invaded. Plus it's a great place to put down a summon sign and farm some souls helping other people kill Gwynn.
 
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