Things seem really different on the other side of the fence. Powerful spells are slooow, as slow as a swing of a huge weapon. Estus charges have to be divvied up between HP and FP flasks. Even then, you run out of spell juice long before a grunt’s weapon would break, forcing you back to the nearest bonfire. It also forces you into a glass canon mentality in order to get the most bang out of your limited magic bucks. This leaves you very squishy. And by the way, you don’t stand a chance in pvp. Aaah, so that’s what it feels like being on the other side of a R1 spam…
I’m sure things will get easier once I get better stuff to tweak my build, but I still think magic stinks.
The only magic PvP I see (and it works because the timing is tricky even though I expect it) is crystal soul mass (the orbs above your head) and turn away from the enemy (either to confuse him or make the homing attacks stay put until later maybe??) and then fire crystal soul spear as he approaches or tries to dodge. If you time it right, one of the two attacks will tend to hit because he’ll be out of the iframe window.
One NG++ guy hit me with it somehow (lag helps!) and must have done 1500 damage.
Second phase is tough for any build at that level. The trick that works for me (without summons) is to stay close in p2 to avoid stretching out his combos. It’s much easier to dodge 2 attacks with the limited stamina that you have when you first get to them than let’s say, 4 or 5. Or you can simply (lol) parry them/him, that’s what I did on my SL1 character in phase two.
Can somebody explain PvP in this game in a nutshell? Is it possible to opt out or are there certain areas where you can be “invaded” no matter what. I ask because I was watching my son play XBONE DS3 and he had just killed a boss when several blue “watchmen” appeared and killed him. I’ve been trying to google the rules but there is no real clear explanation anywhere…just some concepts like ember status, finger bones, and covenants.
I have some bad news for you, Vic. Blues are there to kill malicious invaders. Your son is a deviant. I’m sorry.
Actually, they were probably red-blue. Those are the special zones with in-game reasons for the invasions.
Super nutshell: no invasions at all unless you’re in ember form. You get that way after defeating a boss or using a special item.
Join the Way of the Blue covenant to get help against some invaders.
But not the ones in the special zones. For that, just give it your best, and if you die, shrug and try again without ember form. You just lose the 30% HP boost and ability to summon co-op help (which increases invasion chance).
They were probably Aldrich Faithful. I’ve been doing a lot of invasions witht that covenant. If you’re in a certain zone and embered you’re pretty much guaranteed to be invaded by 2 of them.
OK thanks! It was a Watchdog of Farron so I guess that there is no avoiding that in that specific area. It was 2 v 1 and I don’t know what he could have done. One guy was a ranged fire ball thrower and the other guy was melee great sword. They were on him so quickly and it was confusing. I was telling him that players could invade his game but he was like “No, dad I think those guys are just NPC’s. I haven’t done anything to activate PvP.” LOL
So I take it that they try to level and gear match the invaders? If you aren’t geared for PvP is it best to just run for a safe spot?
Yeah you either need to summon friends to help, don’t ember, or git gud.
I had a guy 1-shot me and an invader friend with a giant axe while I was running the Aldrich covenant. We had him backed into a corner and were swinging away at him, we were certain he was done for, and he unleashed a huge attack with his axe that killed us both at full health. Whoever says poise doesn’t work in this game is wrong.
Some weapons have hyper armor during attacks so you can’t be interrupted, especially some weapon art attacks that are easy to start quickly as long as you’re not already in hitstun.
We were wailing away on this guy I don’t know how he could have started a weapon windup. I should have recorded it. I remember cursing bullshit and being impressed that his axe could 1 shot 2 players.
In another, separate invasion, this time with the red eye orb in the dungeon, I one-shotted the host and his phantom with a Black Flame Orb. It was pretty excellent. I’ve had some success shooting from the hip with my pyromancies (2, to be exact). They’re too easy to dodge when you lock on, but if you lock on then unlock during the windup, you can try to throw where you anticipate they’ll be rolling. Worst that happens is you miss, which you’ll do anyway when locking on.
You get a short window of stagger immunity in pvp after you get hit twice so that’s when he probably activated his L2. Plus the whole animation desync between host and invader due to lag.
I don’t think you get that if two people are attacking at once because the individual staggers line up differently. But I’ve escaped groups before so it’s tricky.
I don’t know what happened there, but let’s not draw any conclusions from it.
Supposedly, but I’ve literally never seen it happen ever. I’ve never had one show (both invading and being invaded) and I’ve never been summoned, so I doubt it. And that’s the most PvP area in the entire game.
I’ve had it happen to me once. You get a “proof of Corcord well kept” which is basically two ears and using one gives you two proofs of concord. Why don’t they give you two straight away? Who knows!
Righto, magic only run complete! I swear, 90% of all enemies are harder as a magic user. The fact that it was also a no shield run might explain some of it, though.
I ditched my sorcery staff for pyromancy halfway through, however, does it still count? Once I got my hands on Great Chaos Fire Orb, there seemed to be no other spell worth casting. It’s faster and stronger than sorceries and it also has a neat extra lava floor damage effect. It’s ridiculous that it also has no Intelligence or Faith requirements at all. To top it off, you get the last, strongest sorceries so late (Grand Archives) that they’re barely useful anymore, and the Intelligence requirements are 40-50.
It’s also a shame that magic builds require specialized rings for extra damage that work for only one spell type. So you can either cast sorceries or pyromancies, but you can’t do both efficiently at the same time.
