Support NeoGAF

[RiverBed]

This is where I am stuck right now:

It is the boss a top of one of the castle's top corridors. I can't for the life of me get his health down by even %20. I am using the Pryo guy with an axe. I cannot figuer out how to shoot flames. I have no arrows nor do I know how to use them (item structure and use is still weird although they supposedly made it less ambiguous than the first game).
To top it off, the fight takes place in an extremely narrow corridor (so small you think the boss can hardly turn around, but of course he does it with ease). I die in three hits. The most I could strike him were 3-5 times before he paints the floor with my face. I do not see a way of beating him at my levell and there is no where else to go.

There is a passage beneath that area but it is guarded by the badest-looking motherfucking knight I've seen in the game yet. And as soon as that fucker sees me, he chases me around and he can kill me with 1-2 hits.

Any advice?

 

[Dresden]

This is where I am stuck right now:

It is the boss a top of one of the castle's top corridors. I can't for the life of me get his health down by even %20. I am using the Pryo guy with an axe. I cannot figuer out how to shoot flames. I have no arrows nor do I know how to use them (item structure and use is still weird although they supposedly made it less ambiguous than the first game).
To top it off, the fight takes place in an extremely narrow corridor (so small you think the boss can hardly turn around, but of course he does it with ease). I die in three hits. The most I could strike him were 3-5 times before he paints the floor with my face. I do not see a way of beating him at my levell and there is no where else to go.

There is a passage beneath that area but it is guarded by the badest-looking motherfucking knight I've seen in the game yet. And as soon as that fucker sees me, he chases me around and he can kill me with 1-2 hits.

Any advice?

1. take off your armor

2. roll back when he winds up a swing

3. come in and hack a few times before repeating above

4. run between his legs when you get to one end of the area

5. also utilize the tower by climbing the ladder and doing a plunge attack

6. FINALLY, as a pyromancer, just toss fireballs at him.

 

[gdt]

This is where I am stuck right now:

It is the boss a top of one of the castle's top corridors. I can't for the life of me get his health down by even %20. I am using the Pryo guy with an axe. I cannot figuer out how to shoot flames. I have no arrows nor do I know how to use them (item structure and use is still weird although they supposedly made it less ambiguous than the first game).
To top it off, the fight takes place in an extremely narrow corridor (so small you think the boss can hardly turn around, but of course he does it with ease). I die in three hits. The most I could strike him were 3-5 times before he paints the floor with my face. I do not see a way of beating him at my levell and there is no where else to go.

There is a passage beneath that area but it is guarded by the badest-looking motherfucking knight I've seen in the game yet. And as soon as that fucker sees me, he chases me around and he can kill me with 1-2 hits.

Any advice?

Semi cheese.

Run back, climb up the ladder, come down with the downward slash as he reaches the ladder under you. Repeat as needed.

No cheese.

Man the fuck up.

100% cheese.

Lure him to the gap in the wall, have him fall off the whole thing.

 

[mickcenary]

Totally just slayed 2 Black Knights and got a Claymore. I got a lot of titanite. Does that stuff do its thang automatically, or do I have to equip it in some way?

 

[Dresden]

Totally just slayed 2 Black Knights and got a Claymore. I got a lot of titanite. Does that stuff do its thang automatically, or do I have to equip it in some way?

Gotta go to the blacksmith to upgrade.

 

[Jake Tower]

This is where I am stuck right now:

It is the boss a top of one of the castle's top corridors. I can't for the life of me get his health down by even %20. I am using the Pryo guy with an axe. I cannot figuer out how to shoot flames. I have no arrows nor do I know how to use them (item structure and use is still weird although they supposedly made it less ambiguous than the first game).
To top it off, the fight takes place in an extremely narrow corridor (so small you think the boss can hardly turn around, but of course he does it with ease). I die in three hits. The most I could strike him were 3-5 times before he paints the floor with my face. I do not see a way of beating him at my levell and there is no where else to go.

There is a passage beneath that area but it is guarded by the badest-looking motherfucking knight I've seen in the game yet. And as soon as that fucker sees me, he chases me around and he can kill me with 1-2 hits.

Any advice?

1. To shoot flames, you have to equip the "Pyro Glove" - on the equip screen, for your left and right hands, you can place two items into 'quick select' slots, press left to switch the items in your left hand, right to switch items in your right hand (press up to cycle through your attunement slots for magic, down to cycle through 5 slots of misc items which you press X on Xbox or square on PS3 to use). Each item placed in a slot for left and right hand counts against your encumbrance level, regardless if you are currently using it.

2. To use arrows, equip arrows in your arrows slot on the equip screen, put a bow in your right hand, then press Y on Xbox or triangle on PS3 to hold it with two hands. Click the right stick to target, or press LB/L1 to zoom in to free look and snipe. Arrows can be bought from the Undead Merchant described below.

3. Try to equip a shield with 100% damage reduction, but it is better to roll away from hits.

4. Firebombs are effective against Taurus Demon (and probably flames, I didn't have any Pyromancy when I fought him). Buy some Firebombs from the Undead Merchant (he's near the bonfire in Undead Burg, downstairs past two Spear Zombies, the stairs are obscured by crates, roll into them to bust them)

5. LOL at that badass looking knight... the same thing happened to me. He's too tough for you right now, he is guarding a shortcut to another zone you don't need to go to yet. His weapon is (no shit) a Dragon's Tooth.

6. If you want to level up, "farm" souls by killing enemies near the bonfire. Kill as many as you can, then rest at bonfire to respawn them, repeat as desired. This is also useful for getting souls for buying items from the Undead Merchant which is near the bonfire.

Hope this helps...

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

You have to be quick with the plunging attacks, though. I thought I could take my time and he ended up jumping on top of the tower.

Oh, also, there's an item called Golden Pine Resin that you can find somewhere in the Undead Burg. It imbues your weapon with deadly fuck-off lightning that will make you do massive damage.

 

[Dresden]

That's the best part, though. Up on the tower you have a bit of room to have an epic melee battle with a taurus demon.

Honestly its attacks are so telegraphed (and slow) that a bit of patience means you will never be touched.

 

[Zeliard]

I miss this game. I want to get back into it but I feel I should probably wait for the PC version. It's a weird state of limbo and I don't like it.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

That's the best part, though. Up on the tower you have a bit of room to have an epic melee battle with a taurus demon.

Honestly its attacks are so telegraphed (and slow) that a bit of patience means you will never be touched.

I'm all about dat brute force and wonky behind-the-leg positioning. Patience is for wimps.

 

[Jake Tower]

My favorite way to build up humanity is to just help people defeat bosses. It's not the fastest, skeleton baby farming is the fastest that I know of but it was the most satisfying way. I did nothing but help people defeat O&S for days and days. Good times.

I farmed humanity from the Squid-Snake things in the Duke's Archives prison tower.

I'm currently sitting on over 60 Humanity (and it's over 10k souls per run).

 

[The Teachinator]

Cheers, guys. Yeah, I was more just really fucking irate for a moment there. I died in a passage that I had gone through a hundred times; it was completely avoidable. I was really enjoying it up until that moment, but the anger has dissipated now and I'm back in the swing of things.

Taurus Demon has been dealt with. I just killed that bull-like creature past the Dragon bridge. Is there anything you'd recommend that I get?

Did you get the drake sword??

 

[mickcenary]

Did you get the drake sword??

Nope! Got no bow, man. I did get a claymore, though.

Dumb question: what am I even to do with Humanity? I've 5 right now.

 

[Alucrid]

Nope! Got no bow, man. I did get a claymore, though.

Dumb question: what am I even to do with Humanity? I've 5 right now.

You can reverse hollowing which makes you human and lets you do things like summon people into your world.

It helps increase the drop rate of items.

You can pay humanity for certain benefits.

 

[Dresden]

Nope! Got no bow, man. I did get a claymore, though.

Dumb question: what am I even to do with Humanity? I've 5 right now.

Use them to kindle bonfires, turn human to summon help, and carrying them around also boosts your item drop rate and passive defences.

 

[perorist]

Haven't played this since launch. Did they ever fix the scaling for faith etc. to eventually become stronger than just using an elemental weapon?

 

[SiegfriedFM]

Keep the claymore, forget the Drake Sword. Save the humanity until you've found Andre past the church area and upgraded the claymore with as many titanites you can find/afford. Then use one to turn human at the bonfire near Andre, and go back to the big church to look for someone to summon.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

Nope! Got no bow, man. I did get a claymore, though.

Dumb question: what am I even to do with Humanity? I've 5 right now.

Five Humanity items, or you have the 5 next to your health/stamina bars in the top left?

 

[SiegfriedFM]

Oh, and once you're safely saved at the bonfire you can explore the forest (run past the stone demon). The awesome Elite Knight armor is in that area past loads of tree monsters.

 

[mickcenary]

Five Humanity items, or you have the 5 next to your health/stamina bars in the top left?

5 next to my bars.

Just reached the Blacksmith and purchased 2400 souls worth of titanite shards; I then reinforced my Claymore into Claymore +1. Really have no idea what I just did.

 

[The Teachinator]

Nope! Got no bow, man. I did get a claymore, though.

Dumb question: what am I even to do with Humanity? I've 5 right now.

You canuse them to kindle the fire. Kindling the fire will give you 10 swigs of eustus instead of 5. You can also reverse hollow. Reverse hollowing allows you to summon other players. Make sure yiu have a white stone. Also you can buy a bow from the merchant in undead burg. I grinded the shit out of the steps at firelink. I feel the hiher my soul level the easier later parts will be.

I'm currently stuck in Darkroot Garden and wont pick it up again until tomorrow night.

One question when does the drake sword become useless? And what does dexterity really do?

 

[Mik_Pad]

5 next to my bars.

Just reached the Blacksmith and purchased 2400 souls worth of titanite shards; I then reinforced my Claymore into Claymore +1. Really have no idea what I just did.

You can use that humanity to kindle the bonfires, when you kindle the bonfire you can carry 5 more estus flasks!

 

[The Teachinator]

Oh, and once you're safely saved at the bonfire you can explore the forest (run past the stone demon). The awesome Elite Knight armor is in that area past loads of tree monsters.

Those slow knights are there too! I'm trying to get the wolf ring and theyre making my life a living hell.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

5 next to my bars.

Just reached the Blacksmith and purchased 2400 souls worth of titanite shards; I then reinforced my Claymore into Claymore +1. Really have no idea what I just did.

You should have enough shards to reinforce your Claymore some more. It's definitely worth it.

 

[The Teachinator]

Keep the claymore, forget the Drake Sword. Save the humanity until you've found Andre past the church area and upgraded the claymore with as many titanites you can find/afford. Then use one to turn human at the bonfire near Andre, and go back to the big church to look for someone to summon.

The dake sword is such a cheaper investment early on though? Just some arrows.

 

[EternalGamer]

I played this game for over 60 hours on 360 last year amd this fucking thread isgoing to cause me to pre-order it again on PC.

I already have Darksiders 2 coming and since Implayed Dark Souls already I was trying to wait for it to get cheaper.

But damnit if my will power isnt crumbling by reliving the gsme vicariously through these posts.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

The dake sword is such a cheaper investment early on though? Just some arrows.

Drake Sword's no fun. It doesn't benefit from any stats and it's difficult to upgrade.

 

[EternalGamer]

Drake Sword's no fun. It doesn't benefit from any stats and it's difficult to upgrade.

I dunno, I used it on and off through the entire game and it was a life saver in early boss fights. It becomes awesome again when you upgrade it.

 

[Dresden]

I dunno, I used it on and off through the entire game and it was a life saver in early boss fights. It becomes awesome again when you upgrade it.

Nah, it's pretty terrible after Blighttown.

 

[The Teachinator]

Drake Sword's no fun. It doesn't benefit from any stats and it's difficult to upgrade.

Its not worth putting dragon scales into but it has been a fucking life saver for me. I know it has a shelf life but it doesnt cost souls...so why not get it?

 

[EternalGamer]

Nah, it's pretty terrible after Blighttown.

It helped me immensely against Orstein and Smoug, but I upgraded it like three times.

 

[SJRB]

Even though you can summon npc's or human players when reverse hollwing, you have to keep in mind that reverse hollowing also enables the possibility of getting invaded by other players. It's a risk/reward kind of thing.

 

[Booshka]

It helped me immensely against Orstein and Smoug, but I upgraded it like three times.

You would have done much better with the Crystal Halberd, which the game gives you right when you enter Anor Londo if you just look around before going down the elevator. The Drake Sword is discouraged because it allows people to get away with not learning about upgrading their equipment and ascending it through blacksmiths, so they just use the Drake Sword, lightning spear and then a Black Knight weapon, all the while thinking there are no better weapons.

 

[EternalGamer]

You would have done much better with the Crystal Halberd, which the game gives you right when you enter Anor Londo if you just look around before going down the elevator. The Drake Sword is discouraged because it allows people to get away with not learning about upgrading their equipment and ascending it through blacksmiths, so they just use the Drake Sword, lightning spear and then a Black Knight weapon, all the while thinking there are no better weapons.

Well, it is true that lightening spear and drake were my mains but I did mess around with upgrading a few others. Worked for me, but I played as a heavy armored knight with high END. I liked to get in close and dance. And I knew its animation cycles and had all the times down so the drake sword felt like home.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

You would have done much better with the Crystal Halberd, which the game gives you right when you enter Anor Londo if you just look around before going down the elevator. The Drake Sword is discouraged because it allows people to get away with not learning about upgrading their equipment and ascending it through blacksmiths, so they just use the Drake Sword, lightning spear and then a Black Knight weapon, all the while thinking there are no better weapons.

Tangential aside: Crystal weapons can be enhanced with Resins. Using Golden Pine Resin on the Crystal Halberd produces some serious mojo.

 

[mickcenary]

Those slow knights are there too! I'm trying to get the wolf ring and theyre making my life a living hell.

Ha. I ran right through those cumbersome bastards. It worked a treat.

I've currently got a Black Knight shield and a +4 Claymore, which seems to be going well. If I put anything other my initial Pyro rags on, my maneuvering slows quite a bit, but I'm guessing that's to be expected. To what + level can the Claymore be reinforced? And should I be reinforcing anything else?

Also, thanks for telling me about the kindling! I had no idea. I was wondering why sometimes I'd have 5 and then 10 and so on and so forth.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

Ha. I ran right through those cumbersome bastards. It worked a treat.

I've currently got a Black Knight shield and a +4 Claymore, which seems to be going well. If I put anything other my initial Pyro rags on, my maneuvering slows quite a bit, but I'm guessing that's to be expected. To what + level can the Claymore be reinforced? And should I be reinforcing anything else?

Also, thanks for telling me about the kindling! I had no idea. I was wondering why sometimes I'd have 5 and then 10 and so on and so forth.

That's some good stuff, dawg. Armor is worth reinforcing. Shields, not so much.

For now I think you can only go up to +5 or +9, but as you progress you'll find Embers that allow you to reinforce weapons further and/or imbue them with various modifiers that have their own benefits and penalties. For instance, the Divine Ember will allow you to modify +4 weapons into Divine Weapons that reduce its standard attribute bonuses and instead give you a bonus to damage based on your Faith.

Embers are sort of key items and are difficult to miss, so don't worry about them for now. Getting your Claymore to +4 is plenty.

 

[KSai]

You can upgrade it to +5. Then you have to bring a large ember to the blacksmith so he can upgrade it to +10. Then you'll need to give the blacksmith a very large ember to upgrade to +15 or you can find another blacksmith to make it an elemental weapon. Just keep on playing.

 

[2AdEPT]

God, the Master Key kind of breaks the game in my opinion. You wont get to see the world From built unfold how its supposed to. IMO, you really really really shouldn't have picked that.

But good for you! And 3 Humanity is noooooooooooooothing. A drop in the ocean. Whatever souls you lose too. You'll get bigger and bigger amounts, plus the game difficulty/ramp up seems to account for you losing souls along the way.

Why do you think FROM makesthe master key the ONLY choice worth anything?????? The fans wanted an open world....FROM delivered......there is no "secret" route unless you portray the facade that there is a "regular" route.....FROM's INTENT was for you to take the route LESS travelled....facepalm for having to explain this again....and again butthere are lots of interviews with FROM including the director himself that confirm that the open concepts was their intent NOT a target route. They did a masterful job I might add.

 

[ekim]

I really hate Dark Souls for its design. Although I appreciate the difficulty it is just ridiculous that you have to try and fail. Also some vital features aren't described within the game and everything from the UI to the NPC behavior seems amateurish to me. I can't understand why so many people confuse that with great video-game design.

 

[QisTopTier]

Ha. I ran right through those cumbersome bastards. It worked a treat.

I've currently got a Black Knight shield and a +4 Claymore, which seems to be going well. If I put anything other my initial Pyro rags on, my maneuvering slows quite a bit, but I'm guessing that's to be expected. To what + level can the Claymore be reinforced? And should I be reinforcing anything else?

Also, thanks for telling me about the kindling! I had no idea. I was wondering why sometimes I'd have 5 and then 10 and so on and so forth.

I beat the entire game as a cleric build using the claymore for most of the end game. Hold onto it. When you get the abililty to make it electric later on upgrade it to that and have fun

I really hate Dark Souls for its design. Although I appreciate the difficulty it is just ridiculous that you have to try and fail. Also some vital features aren't described within the game and everything from the UI to the NPC behavior seems amateurish to me. I can't understand why so many people confuse that with great video-game design.

Real talk I probably died about 30 times my first play through it's not that hard it's more about knowing how to take your time and analyze things. Some people like the feeling of being on an adventure or quest in an unknown land. Do you really think that in that enviroment people would be like OH HEY YOU SHOULD TOTALLY DO THIS TO DO THIS. LET ME TEACH YOU HOW TO PARRY AND MANAGE YOUR SPELL COUNTS LOL. Half the npcs in the game are all greedy dicks. The other half are just trying to get by and not die. The game is trying to put you in the situation of barely scraping by lost in a land you never seen before. Hand holding tutorial stuff kills that

 

[double jump]

I beat the entire game as a cleric build using the claymore for most of the end game. Hold onto it. When you get the abililty to make it electric later on upgrade it to that and have fun

"are you a cleric or something ?"

 

[QisTopTier]

"are you a cleric or something ?"

Healing based builds are the true easy mode for dark souls and demon souls. Shit at the start of the game you literally have 10 heal spells and 10 flask. Flask you use in combat and heal spells between areas. You literally can make a ton of mistakes and learn things. Pyro only helps you kill faster but if you don't know what to do, killing super fast doesnt mean jack besides you pyro isnt based on a stat so it's easy to soup up a glove later on and use the nicer spells from it and still maintain mega heals and utility. Plus you got to wreck house in pvp easy as hell with the most broken spells for vs

 

[edbrat]

Thanks, dude. So, these "backstabs" you speak of... Is it more or less hitting him in the back, or is it an actual maneuver?

when you backstab it has to be at the moment you are right behind the enemy and with no other controller inputs except R1 - can take a bit of practise to get down pat but quickly becomes instinctive.

Also learn to manage your stamina bar.

fucks sake GAF now I want to play Dark Souls again, have you not seen my backlog?!!

 

[edbrat]

This is where I am stuck right now:

It is the boss a top of one of the castle's top corridors. I can't for the life of me get his health down by even %20. I am using the Pryo guy with an axe. I cannot figuer out how to shoot flames. I have no arrows nor do I know how to use them (item structure and use is still weird although they supposedly made it less ambiguous than the first game).
To top it off, the fight takes place in an extremely narrow corridor (so small you think the boss can hardly turn around, but of course he does it with ease). I die in three hits. The most I could strike him were 3-5 times before he paints the floor with my face. I do not see a way of beating him at my levell and there is no where else to go.

There is a passage beneath that area but it is guarded by the badest-looking motherfucking knight I've seen in the game yet. And as soon as that fucker sees me, he chases me around and he can kill me with 1-2 hits.

Any advice?

1. run towards tower to start fight, when he jumps down, run back and climb opposite tower, two hand weapon, plunge attack when he is below you

2. run to other tower following plunge attack

3. either go toe to toe with him for a while, LEARN attack pattern, roll away, if you must block LEARN TO MANAGE YOUR STAMINA BAR. Roll through his legs to get behind him.

4. run round him and back to plunge attack tower, climb, rinse and repeat

5. repeat steps 2-4 till victorious

6. optional: use buff to weapon (can't recall which one you get early, makes your weapon spark IIRC) and bombs which you can also before that area.

7. make sure you've recovered before you reach capra demon, who will dominate your rear end with the force of a herd of irate buffalo.

 

[edbrat]

One question when does the drake sword become useless? And what does dexterity really do?

Around Sen's Fortress which usefully is where you can chance upon another sweet piece of kit

 

[2AdEPT]

I really hate Dark Souls for its design. Although I appreciate the difficulty it is just ridiculous that you have to try and fail. Also some vital features aren't described within the game and everything from the UI to the NPC behavior seems amateurish to me. I can't understand why so many people confuse that with great video-game design.

you makin no sense brutha!!??

Dark souls bosses and dungeons (sens fortress) continually rank high on top ten lists not just for RPG's or this generation but all time best lists....picking on the NPC's etc is noobish when you are talking about a game that is the gold standard for level design and boss AI is part of that as well. "So many poeple" makes it sound like theonly people that like this game are the blind masses.....justthe opposite actually....but I could care less that a bunch of 12 year olds find this game scary....its my favourite game ever based on its DESIGN and Ican't wait to hear how you think I am wrong in my preferences.

@teachinator:

strength and dex both don't affect your characters ability except through the weapons you are holding...it enables you to meet the requirements of certain weapons, and later allows you to beenfit from stat bonuses to those weapons....these stats will never make you run faster or carry more equipment etc.....that is what endurance is for.

 

[edbrat]

It helped me immensely against Orstein and Smoug, but I upgraded it like three times.

The Drakes Sword debate - like many others about aspects of this game - helps to illustrate one of the reasons it is so so great. There is no one correct answer and many, many strategies will work depending on your playstyle and what you are trying to achieve. Don't get hung up about finding the optimal strategy. Enjoy your visit to Lordran and realise you have something which EVERYONE in this thread is jealous of: the chance to play Dark Souls for the first time.

If you want my 2c re Drakes, for a first run through Drakes is fine till Sens and using this and what you find in Sens can help you progress without worrying about weapon updgrading till you are pretty sure about what you want to invest in and are more confident about how the systems etc work.

 

[SiegfriedFM]

That's only delaying the brick wall. Lightning Spear is weak against several enemies (including a boss) in Anor Londo so you need to start crafting eventually.

 

[Moral Panic]

Dexterity slightly lowers the casting times on spells/pyromancy.

I always go faith in these games so I spammed Sunbro's thunderbolt move for a lot of the game. Then once you get Darkmoon Blade you are stupid powerful.