I Molotived his third form to death, but it wasn’t very satisfying.
I am very much enjoying this game, but I’m finding the boss fights unsatisfying. I think this has a lot to do with how limited the character “builds” are in BloodBorne. In a Souls game, I’d always reevaluate my approach. Sometimes I don heavier armor, sometimes I go ligt and use a shield. Okay, against his guy a 2-Hander is really awesome. Use a bow at distance here, etc.
In BloodBorne I always conclude “Well, I’ve got the best weapon I can possibly wield, and I’ve got that gun I always have. Yup on the best armor possible. Okay, so no reason to change anything. Let’s just charge back in and figure out the trick the developers put in there, since they know I’d look almost exactly like this for this battle.”
It has made all the boss fights feel a lot more like a puzzle and less like me figuring out the enemy then a Souls game ever did, and it sucks a lot of the fun away from it. I miss going and enchanting up an item specifically to face a tough boss, or digging through my gear to find the right whatever that would get the job done.
This might go away as I get further into the game, but right now I’m not enjoying the bosses very much. They’re far more about timing and exploiting the pistol at the right time, and less about “How I’m approaching the game”, which is what I really loved in the Souls series to date.
There’s a way to get help with the Father G fight without summoning in another player and it makes it much, much easier. Died twice fighting him and then beat him pretty handily after discovering that little plot wrinkle.
Its possible. I don’t know because i am dumb and unexperiended in Dark Souls type of games, but Is possible that Bloodborne is a game that want the gamer to 1) Farm, 2) Get good 3) Explore.
You should probably take note of the interesting drops, and farm these mobs repeatly to boost the damage of your weapons.
Just like this, except spell spoiler correctly:
[spioler=“”]Spoiler text[/spioler]
You have to put the =“” in the first tag even if there’s nothing in the quotation marks.
I’m concerned about this too and I’m curious how the blood gems (I think that’s what they’re called?) will play into this as the game progresses. I only have two that have damage and a minor affect, but theoretically you could have a smaller number of weapons to choose from with more variability added based on the slotted gems that give a similar breadth to approaches as Souls games. It definitely feels significantly more restricted up front, though.
Ah, this is my first rodeo. What I think they did with this is added shining coins so if you try to farm indefinitely you’ll end up getting those. Not what I was trying to do, I was just dying a lot.
You want to go looking for a relative of his. You can find her in one of the NPC windows lit by a red lantern and she’ll offer you some assistance in the fight that’s pretty invaluable (and very sad, from a story beat perspective)
Music Box that stuns him for a bit? Yes I figured that out but I don’t think it works on his beast form does it? That’s the part I’m having trouble with.
[spoiler]Yes, I’m referring to the music box. I’ve seen anecdotal evidence that it only works a limited (3?) number of times in the fight. I know that in my fight, I used it once when he was in human form and twice more in beast form. The hard part about using it in beast form is that he closes so fast, but you can use the environment to block him off from charging while he uses it.
Additionally, I’ve heard tell that you can make him ram the scenery and stun himself if you position yourself correctly.[/spoiler]
Wooooo!! Also, sorry. But this sounds good to me, other than the run back after you die.
Also yes, dodging to the side seems to be the name of the game. It curves you around a little so it acts like a forward diagonal roll, which was super powerful in DS2 but unavailable in the original.
Did a lot of messing around with the other starting weapons after I was able to purchase them. I did not like the saw cleaver at all, though the saw spear and hunter axe are pretty cool. I was able to refill my health after being wounded a lot quicker using the hunter axe rather than the cane. I would have used the axe as a secondary weapon if not for it being strength based. Ended up using the saw spear which does some good damage. I also like its transformation attacks, the transformation attacks for the cane feel too slow to me. It’s great being able to quickly switch between weapons based on the situation.
Re: the spoiler, here’s how it works, along with the tactics I used to beat him.
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The music box will stun him 3 times. It’s up to you when to use it. I recommend saving it until at least after he switches into two-handed mode with his axe.
It WILL work on him after he transforms, but only until he howls. Ideally, you want to use two shots on him in 2-handed mode, and one immediately after he transforms.
What I would recommend is this… Use the hunter’s axe, in single handed mode. Try to riposte him with your gun combo, as this will do massive damage to him. Then, once he switches to two handed mode, use the music box (make sure you have room, as it will NOT interrupt his attack. Put some obstacle between you and him when you use it, but also be close enough to move in on him fast). Then, when he’s stunned, go up to him and hit him with the heavy attack, which will come downward and knock him down. Then immediately charge up the heavy attack, and he’ll get up and immediately get slammed down hard. Then back off and repeat. This will usually end up doing enough damage to cause him to transform.
Once he transforms, you get get the music box in one more time, and do the same move.
Then, it becomes a race to beat him down, but at this point he’s super fast and does HUGE damage. You cannot effectively run away from him, and at range he’ll wreck you with sweeping attacks you can’t sidestep away from. So, what you want to do is constantly dodge TOWARDS him, which will end up putting you behind him. Dive at him, hack at his back, then dive towards him again, hack at his back, repeat until he is dead.
I tried to take on the cleric beast a couple times and got squished last night. I need to figure out my favorite weapon still (and learn its move set better!) I’m not 100% happy with any of them so far.
The biggest thing I can tell you about cleric beast and about bosses in general in this game is that playing aggressively is much, MUCH more rewarded than in the other Souls games. I tried dodge rolling all around CB for my first half-dozen attempts and failed each time by a large margin. And then I went straight at him with a 2H’er and ended up punch-for-punching him. I still had to heal and roll on occasion, but I feel like with health regain and much more generous staggering, BB really wants you on offense more often than not.
I’m not sure if I agree with this entirely, at least in terms of the boss battles I have seen. I tried repeatedly to take down Father G using the ‘gimmick’ with zero success. Finally I said screw it and just decided to smack him around with my giant hammer. Bang done.
I’d say that shows some flexibility in weapon choice and approach…and that hammers hurt.
I agree that there are fewer builds without viable things like bows and magic, but I also think that the melee is richer for it.
This is why souls games are great, because they are brutally difficult, but you DO get better at them, and when you finally get past a section it feels like a real accomplishment.
Yeah, I think I’m going to bow out of this thread too so I don’t spoil anything. I think I’m about a third of the way through, and at this point I think it is one of my favorite games of all time. It keeps finding new ways to surprise me and make me go wow, which hasn’t happened in a long time.
I love the level design and setting. It is dark, gothic, and in some places down right disturbing. There are places where I just stop and look around and think ‘what the fuck happened here, what is this place’. The contiguous world from dark souls is back, so you can go to a new area, look back and see where you have just been. There are usually only 2 bonfires in an area, one at the start and one at the end. You make progress by unlocking short cuts. The levels are massive and twisty and multilayered, so much exploration.
I tried co-op a bit, and I like the way it works. No more laying down summoning signs, or walking up to a sign and having it vanish as you try to summon someone else. If you want to be summoned you ring a bell, it puts you in a queue, and usually within a minute you are in someone else’s game. Same thing if you want to summon someone else, you ring a different bell and it pulls someone out of the queue.
I’m still pretty meh on the bosses. I enjoy them for the spectacle, but coming off a 200 hour Monster Hunter addiction I am kind of just over bosses at this point. At least I haven’t run into any gimmick bosses, they are straight up fights. Thankfully assisting with co-op makes learning their patterns mostly painless, and summoning others to help makes the bosses practically skippable.
The sound design is amazing, and the music keeps getting better. It is equally effective with its use of silence, which is really rare for a video game.
