Progress is really slow, but I played for a few hours this week, and I’m getting better. I’m still stuck on this river of blood though. If I go into the cave after carefully killing the blood-spewing arachnid ladies, there’s a guy with a mini-gun in that cave that has gotten me every time. Maybe I should go back the other way and try to defeat that super-fast lady with blades again.
The gun guy is an optional area, but you should have a shortcut nearby, so it isn’t a big deal to keep at it if you want.
I beat the screaming banshee. And on the killing blow she turned into a guy as he died. It was real laugh out loud WTF moment. Is that the first transgender enemy in Bloodborne that I just killed? The weird part about that is that this path turned out to be a dead end. There’s nowhere to go on this side. Which means that if the mini-gun guy is optional, then the only way forward left is the other way on the blood river, under the bridge.
Edit: Over the bridge was an option too, which was the shortcut, so I can get to this spot instantly now.
Unfortunately, there’s one downside to this new shortcut route. I don’t go up against enemies who drop blood vials regularly anymore. So my blood vial supply went from being relatively stable or growing slightly, to being depleted. Now if I die with 17 blood vials, I respawn with 17, meaning there are none left to transfer from my stash.
Maybe I need to back to the main game and farm for blood vials at some place again.
I don’t know how many times I need to post this, but past mid game you don’t farm vials. Go to the lecture hall and kill everything there then use those echoes to buy vials. You can get 100 in like five minutes that way.
You can also get a bunch of vials easily once you get to the second lamp in the DLC (right before the first boss). Run outside the lamp room towards the boss, there is a fence you have to run around with a skeleton leaning up against it from the other side. The skeleton won’t move and has one hit point. He also drops 5 blood vials every time you kill him.
You can run from the lamp to the fence, hit the skeleton, loot the vials through the fence and then use the hunter’s mark to return to the last lamp in under 20 seconds. Repeat for a while as you listen to a podcast. Obviously spend any echoes you have before starting since you’ll lose them by using the mark.
Or yeah kill goopy guys for a while.
Oh yeah. Sorry, it’s been a year or two since you posted that, I think. I’d forgotten. That’s a good idea, since the only time I go back to the hub is when I have zero blood on me. That’s a good use for echoes. I think the only other use would be to level up, and each level up is something close to 40k blood now, since I’m level 74.
Holy crap I’m much worse at this than Dark Souls. Without a shield I’m useless. I got to the first lamp (not much to fight before hand), but I keep dying before I can find the 2nd. The gang around the bonfire keeps wasting me. I just about cleared it and then managed to die again. I really hope the next lamp is right after that. At one point I had a ton of healing potions but I’ve drained almost all of them. I may actually need to start again.
It doesn’t look like you can recoup your souls if you make it to where you died, or am I just missing something?
Look for an enemy with glowing eyes. They have your souls. The beginning of the game can definitely be rough. Learn to dodge rather than block. You’re really mobile. Throw stones to agro single enemies to isolate them from groups. Farm the first street for a while if you need to build up vials.
Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it. I was the same way when I started playing.
It also takes a while to get used to the visual clutter. Once you get used to that, the game gets easier that way too.
Also, attacks will heal recently taken damage, so in this game the answer to certain enemies hitting you is actually to keep on hitting back. Especially later on the game will punish hard for reacting to staggers by evading immediately.
Yeah, you pretty much have to retrain yourself if you were used to a shield. Attack, attack, attack!
Your weapon choice will matter also. I prefer the Threaded Cane since it’s so damn speedy.
Phew, I was able to make some progress. The heal mechanic does take some getting used to. I was able to open the gate so I can bypass that area now. I finally cached in some ‘souls’ to get some better armor too. Now I need to find the first boss - that should be interesting.
I’m getting a little more used to using the pistol to stagger / stun enemies now too. I hadn’t been using the pistol that much. Something tells me that I’ll prefer the pace of DS combat - but hey, this is in the same family and I haven’t experienced it yet so that is a big plus.
I encountered the Cleric Beast and managed to beat it on my first try … draining all of my healing potions. I was fairly low on health too by the time I won. I kept thinking … just don’t die, just don’t die. I would have had to grind for more potions.
Thanks for that. I forgot to thank you. After you told me I noticed the glowing eyes bit.
Also note that your blood/souls drop at the location you were a few seconds before you died, so if that location has no enemies, then they are on the floor. You have to walk up to it and press X to re-absorb the blood echoes. However, if there is a nearby enemy, then that enemy absorbs the blood echoes and gets those glowy eyes. If they’re on the floor, they’re kind of hard to spot.
I think the first bunch of times I died an enemy must have absorbed them because I never saw them on the ground until later. I was expecting them to be on the ground because of Dark Souls. I guess I could have just missed them early on and then assumed they weren’t gonna be there.
Now the next boss is kicking my butt (Father something). I got him down to around 20% once - but that was it. I’ve depleted my stock of healing potions and the thought of grinding for more right now isn’t too appealing. I went through a ton.
Get yourself a few molotovs. There should be some in the area you can loot or just buy them at the shop. When he changes form near the end of the fight you should have enough time to hit him with 2 or 3 while he’s transforming. After that it should be simple to finish him off.
Also, if you happened to speak to a little girl through a window at some point the item she gave you may be of use.
I think I found Father G one of the 3 toughest fights in the game. He’s a really rough first boss.