I just started playing and I am getting my ass kicked every which way. Died about 5 times in the very beginning. I just reached the first bonfire after the opening tutorial..where am I supppose to go next? I went up the stairs and faced a whole bunch of skeletons and died a few times, afterwards I went down some elevator shaft and died.
I started as a pyromancer
A few questions, is there any reason to go two handed vs one handed?
What does humanity do? I found a few, should i use the humanity crystals right away or should I save them? I also some item called the souls of the undead, what does that do?
Try not to get frustrated at how much you are dying early on, that happens to everybody.
Humanity: This can be kind of confusing at first. There are two types of humanity that you can find. The first is a consumable, the type of thing that just sits in your inventory until you use it. It won't have any effect until you do. The second type is active humanity. That's what that number in the top left of your screen is. Your active humanity goes up if you kill a bunch of enemies without dying, or you use one of the humanity items in your inventory.
Remember, once humanity is active you risk losing it when you die.You are still able to corpse run and retrieve it though.
Humanity doesn't really do much if you just let it pile up in active humanity. It increases a few stats like item drop rate, and defense, but barely. The thing you want to focus on using humanity for is turning human and kindling bonfires. Turning human allows you to summon other players or NPC characters into your world to help you out, but it also allows you to be invaded by other players or NPC characters. If you aren't connected to XBL or PSN, only the NPC phantoms/invaders will be available, which you should still use. Second is kindling, each time you do this it permanently increases the number of estus flasks that specific bonfire will give you each time you rest at it. Kindle it once, and it will give you 10, then 15, and so on. You can only do this once you are human, so it essentially takes 2 humanity to do this. Doing this is a pretty good habit to get into, especially if you are in an area that's tough, the extra estus' will save your life.
From the starting bonfire, don't go down the elevator, don't go into the cemetary, head up the huge hill towards the aqueduct.
"Souls of the Undead" are consumable versions of the souls that you get each time you kill an enemy. They are nice since they will stick into your inventory even if you die, unlike the souls you get from killing enemies.
One handed vs two handed - there's a few uses for this. Two handing a weapon reduces the Strength requirement to use the weapon by 33%, so it can allow you to use weapons you normally couldn't use. Also, it will do more damage, and I believe it gives your attack a higher stagger stat. If you're still getting used to the combat, I'd recommend just sticking to the onehanding your weapon and using a shield. Twohanding a weapon is extremely useful once your familiar with the combat, and feel comfortable enough to dodge enemy's attacks without blocking.
I recently started my seccond playthrough with a new character (never finished the first one).
But man, I am doing way better than before. Knowing what gear is good and how to properly upgrade stuff is great. Plus my actual skill has gone up, just blazing through Anor Londo at the moment having no hard time whatsoever with the black knights and sentinals (who would kick my ass before)
That is still one of my favorite moments playing this game. I barely made it through the game my first time, then started a new character a few days later and realized I was actually kind of good at the game.