I know the merchant too.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Dark Souls |OT4| Victory achieved for Scamco, text defeated
- Thread starter duckroll
- Start date
- Status
GoddyofAus
Banned
The Undead Burg/Parish is pretty much done for me except for the Bridge Wyvern. I have killed the Butterfly and now I'm facing off agains Havel. He killed me twice before I gave it away for the night.
SiegfriedFM
Member
Another option is repeating the drop attack, by luring him away a bit and rolling past him to run back to the ladder. However, it's risky as he may strike you or even catch up to attack while you're climbing.
Try using the pine resin before jumping down to make your weapon fiery, that's useful on Taurus.
Try using the pine resin before jumping down to make your weapon fiery, that's useful on Taurus.
AnonymousTipster
Neo Member
Gold pine resin will absolutely wreck the Taurus Demon's day.
You can find some in a locked room in the Undead Burg, which you can access with either the Residence Key or the Master Key.
Deified Data
Banned
Took me a few tries to realize you could get a plunging attack on the Taurus Demon. I thought the "trick" was to lure him atop the tower where he'd be more manageable, but that actually make him harder in my opinion. His attacks are really easy to dodge so long as you stick close, so I like to keep him down on the walkway where he can't jump around.
Deified Data
Banned
Gold Pine Resin did him in good.
Now what though?
Continue to the Parish, past the dragon.
Should I get the Drake Sword or not? How do I do that?
AnonymousTipster
Neo Member
Shoot the end of his tail with arrows from the pathway under the bridge. Make sure you stock up on arrows, it takes a while.
The Drake Sword can be really useful at the start of the game, but it has no stat scaling, so once you level up enough it will be easily outclassed by other weapons.
Edit: nm
Came across my first cheater today. A forest Hunter spamming WotG and had infinite Divine Blessings. :/
Deified Data
Banned
Nah, don't bother. Pick up the Zweihander in the graveyard or the claymore on the dragon's bridge.
Huevos de Oro
Member
Making my way through Blighttown. Whoever designed the toxic dart guys has my undying hatred secured for all eternity. but mosquitoes are not too far behind them in terms of annoyance.
I'm using the shadow set (OMG I can roll now! I roll everywhere
), spider shield, divine halberd/zwei5+. I got to the swamp and fooled around it a bit before getting killed by a leech.
I'm using the shadow set (OMG I can roll now! I roll everywhere
), spider shield, divine halberd/zwei5+. I got to the swamp and fooled around it a bit before getting killed by a leech.AnonymousTipster
Neo Member
I'd go with Chaos or Lightning. Since you won't be increasing your stats at all, the usefulness of standard reinforcement/scaling will be diminished.
Huevos de Oro
Member
Blighttown is done!
Ended up getting the ring when revisiting the asylum. Good thing since there were two knights over there and it's always nice to pick up the titanite they drop. Plus I got to battle the asshole demon (seriously, being a melee knight made me stare at his horrendous asscrack and asscheeks for almost all of the fight) and got snuggly to give me stuff. Back in Blighttown I assed around, died a lot, lost some souls, and in the end kicked some ass with my trusty friend Mildred. Blighttown is done for good except for that bit inside the tree that I'm not planning to visit right now so it's Sen Fortress time for me.
I spent most of my loot leveling up so I'm at SL 43 or so, with 30 STR, 21 VIT and 18-ish END right now, with 14 DEX since I wanted to use a 5+ uchigatana I just had upgraded. Too bad the uchi sucked ass against the first enemy I tried it with, the lizard people from the fortress. That made me focus on my +6 zweihander that knocks them down with L2, now I feel more comfortable. I wanted to use the uchi because of the bleed bonus, but the damage it does seemed negligible to me. maybe it's because it needs DEX instead of STR?
At any rate, I kept rocking the shadow set, divine halberd +1/zwei +6, emblem shield, wolf and steel protection rings and that's about it. I love to be more mobile now and I found out I don't need to be a slug to shrug off most of the damage from heavy blows.
Ended up getting the ring when revisiting the asylum. Good thing since there were two knights over there and it's always nice to pick up the titanite they drop. Plus I got to battle the asshole demon (seriously, being a melee knight made me stare at his horrendous asscrack and asscheeks for almost all of the fight) and got snuggly to give me stuff. Back in Blighttown I assed around, died a lot, lost some souls, and in the end kicked some ass with my trusty friend Mildred. Blighttown is done for good except for that bit inside the tree that I'm not planning to visit right now so it's Sen Fortress time for me.
I spent most of my loot leveling up so I'm at SL 43 or so, with 30 STR, 21 VIT and 18-ish END right now, with 14 DEX since I wanted to use a 5+ uchigatana I just had upgraded. Too bad the uchi sucked ass against the first enemy I tried it with, the lizard people from the fortress. That made me focus on my +6 zweihander that knocks them down with L2, now I feel more comfortable. I wanted to use the uchi because of the bleed bonus, but the damage it does seemed negligible to me. maybe it's because it needs DEX instead of STR?
At any rate, I kept rocking the shadow set, divine halberd +1/zwei +6, emblem shield, wolf and steel protection rings and that's about it. I love to be more mobile now and I found out I don't need to be a slug to shrug off most of the damage from heavy blows.
Maybe start as a thief and kill the undead merchant to get a Katana extremely early. Use the bandit knife to parry and backstab normal enemies and the uchigatana for everything else.
Should I buy the bow and arrows off of him first and try and get the Drake Sword?
No, just upgrade the Uchi to +5. Skip the Drake Sword.
Have you beaten the game yet? I sort of assumed you finished and wanted to try a new style of character. I wouldn't use the drake sword at all, to be honest. Or at least not past the gargoyles. Prioritizing weapon upgrades is a good habit to get into. Almost every +5 weapon in the game is better than the drake sword.
LOL, I only beat the Taurus Demon today. I just don't think a big heavy tank was my style.
Try a Wanderer, Warrior or Hunter. Level Strength to 14 or 16 then Dexterity up to 40, but not before leveling Vitality and Endurance to at least 25 for both. Try light weapons and experiment with lots of different weapons, upgrade the ones you like.
Then I would say to start off as a Wanderer, Hunter, or Warrior since they all start off with decent str/dex and vit/end. If you want to use the drake sword early on, the hunter starts with a bow. Or you could get adventurous and cut off the tail like this (he doesn't do it, but using the gold pine resin makes it much easier). I definitely recommend killing the undead merchant to get that uchigatana. It's an awesome weapon and is suited for the kind of character you described. He doesn't really sell anything important that can't be bought elsewhere. If you do end up using the drake sword, make sure to keep upgrading the uchigatana in the background, it'll be better then the drake sword very quickly. Focus on VIT/END/DEX and upgrading your weapons/armor early on and make sure you stay under 25% of your equip load.
The thief is fun to play since his starting weapon gets a big bonus when you backstab or parry riposte, but that can be pretty frustrating when you are new.
AnonymousTipster
Neo Member
Well, depends on what you want to end up using. It sounds like you generally want a dex-build, so go for dexterity and endurance (vitality is also an important stat, but I tend to raise it after getting my other stats down - if you're having trouble or dying a lot though, raise VIT first).
A lot of dex weapons have quick attacks, so there's great synergy with weapon buffs. You might want to look into raising your intelligence enough to be able to use magic weapon.
For new players, Vitality and Endurance are going to be the two most important stats in the game. Dexterity will be your weapon requirement/scaling stat if you want to use the faster weapons like katanas. Intelligence can be awesome to buff your attacks with a spell called Magic Weapon, but I think newer players should focus more on VIT/END and an attack stat. Intelligence really starts to shine once your have 20 or more point in it, and you need to sacrifice quite a few points that would have otherwise gone to vitality and endurance.
Vitality
Endurance
UPGRADE YOUR WEAPONS AND ARMOR
Dexterity
in order of importance
Upgrading your weapon is almost always going to increase your damage more than putting points into your scaling stat(dexterity).
Deified Data
Banned
Yeah, after buying everything you need off him, take him out and take his Uchigatana. That's the real prize of the Burg, not the Drake Sword.
As for your starting class, I'd say it depends on where you want to take your character. I'm rolling a dex/int build right now so I chose Wanderer instead of Thief because he had less points wasted in Faith, and 1 more in Strength, Vitality, and Endurance.
Had my first round of invasions tonight in the Parish (SL14), using the 4 cracked red eye stones you find in Firelink Shrine. 3 wins, 1 loss - my loss was to a twink with Quelaag's Furysword and two summoned phantoms. Oh well. Doing a lot better with this character than I was with my first. All the pressure's off when you have nothing to lose from invading, and hosts (myself included!) always seem to panic when they see you, despite them holding all the cards.
The_Hitcher89
Member
Is Quelaag's Furysword the best weapon in the game? Its so good, it makes me wonder why there isn't a big drawback like low durability, massive stat requirements or constant health depletion
Deified Data
Banned
I wouldn't say "best", but it's probably the most formidable weapon you'll come up against mid-game.
Dark Bead or Pursuers alone is more powerful than any offensive spell in DeSouls. You can also stack spell charges with additional attunement slots, which is also more forgiving than the intelligence stat. Don't underestimate ease of use, either. SC or Warding is what made magic so good in the first game.
Well its mostly useless in the Demon Ruins.
The_Hitcher89
Member
That's when I switch to the trusty Halberd+10
Kind of want to turn it into the Lifehunt Scythe just because I like having the special weapons, but fuck the health loss
SJRB
Gold Member
It has high fire stats, but low physical stats. So like others said, it's a good weapon until you run into an enemy with high fire resistance, because then you're fucked with your 80dmg output.
I use the Silver Knight straight sword +5, damage output is over 300 per hit. Awesome weapon.
Use this to learn about the upgrades:
http://darksouls.wikidot.com/upgrade
Not linking to the actual chart here as some may consider it a spoiler because it includes smiths' names and how many there are.
Uchi is based on DEX and has no STR mod. You can try using a Washing Pole if you want your STR status to factor in. But it is only D STR rating.
Red Liquorice
Member
Starting classes really aren't that important. There's a few point differences here and there, but they really don't make much difference - you'd only have to level up a few times to even out any differences between them all. I tend to go for the Knight class a lot, because it has high VIT and that is the last thing I tend to upgrade.
It's pretty decent but I prefer other boss weapons such as the Chaos Blade for instance.
That's when I switch to the trusty Halberd+10
Kind of want to turn it into the Lifehunt Scythe just because I like having the special weapons, but fuck the health loss
If you equip the bloodbite ring or the blood shield you can use the lifehunt scythe without worrying about the bleed build up.
AnonymousTipster
Neo Member
It's a great heavy-hitting option for DEX builds, but I dislike the move-set and that it can't be buffed. And yeah, as a few other people have mentioned, if you run into enemies with high fire resistance you're kind of up a creek.
I love using a combination of the Estoc and the Balder Side Sword.
The_Hitcher89
Member
Wait, a half upgraded Silver Knight Sword does more damage than the Halberd? Titanite farming o'clock
Wait, a half upgraded Silver Knight Sword does more damage than the Halberd? Titanite farming o'clock
Silver Knight Sword is a unique weapon, +5 is its max upgrade.
It's a decent weapon, fast and you can buff it if needed.
The_Hitcher89
Member
I haven't killed him because the only other person to buy firebombs from so far is in Sen's Fortress
Residence Key and Orange Soapstone.
Equipment-wise, maybe the heater shield and chainmail set if you want lightweight armor.
Reinforced club/daggers if you're doing an SL1 run.
Finally, you don't need to kill him to get an Uchi. Joining the Forest Covenant lets you buy them from Shiva.
I hear it's not as good later on in the game, but I never used it much.
For dex builds, I liked the Lifehunt Scythe and the Gold Tracer (gold tracer is lc only).
You get the residence key and orange soapstone as a drop when you kill him, so those are a waste of money. If you really want a bow, buy that, and you might want to buy the bottomless box too. Maybe buy 20 or so throwing knives for blighttown. He really doesn't sell much worth buying. Firebombs are pretty useless.
He's the only one that sells repair powder until the DLC, but that's not a problem if you have the repairbox unless you use moonlight greatsword/dragon greatsword etc
- Status