1643

I think the only quest line that locks you into anything is Hyetta’s and even then there’s a way out of it as long as you don’t kill the final boss.

1644

My favorite is Bloodborne for tone, setting, and pace of play. It’s quicker than the Souls games (and Elden Ring) but not so twitch skill based as Sekiro.

Sekiro though has the advantage of being single player so won’t suffer from the smaller online community years after launch.

The original Dark Souls I think is still the apotheosis of world design, though I have a suspicion it won’t be nearly as impressive after having played through Elden Ring.

The Demon’s Souls remake is the most visually impressive one (including Elden Ring) and is probably the shortest one.

1645

I would recommend starting with DS1 and then 2 and 3. I don’t know if the servers are back on line for them though. They took them down probably 2 months ago saying they were going to upgrade the security of them. Hacking was pretty rampant and someone finally demonstrated to FROM that they could actually damage another persons PC thru the game.

For that reason I would at least play DS1 and 2 before playing Bloodborne. DS3 is quicker and benefited from the Bloodborne development somewhat.

1646

Sekiro has some pretty amazing atmosphere if you are at all into Japan, and maybe even if you’re not. I was every skeptical that they’d be able to muster anything like the weird mystery that characterized their previous games with such a setting, but they definitely proved me wrong. The combat is the best out of all their games, in my opinion, although Bloodborne is probably second best. BB has a great gothic atmosphere but it’s a little samey from environment to environment, and the places with the most marked change are, well, nightmares.

1647

Woo! Malenia down after only half a dozen tries. I think my mimic figured out some cheese!

When she transitioned to phase 2, she died immediately. I’d summoned my mimic accidentally with seal instead of weapon; I’d been staggering her pretty well and figured I’d get there eventually. But she just died. My mimic had been hitting her with both Black Flame and Rotten Breath.

I’m assuming one of two things: she’s super weak to Rot herself in her second form for lore reasons, or somehow the DoTs killed her during the transition before she was granted her second health bar. Either way, I’ll take it. Genius, not luck. Yeah, that’s it.

edit: after looking it up, it appears it’s that if you stagger her right as she enters second phase she enters it with almost no health. So, a bug. Not a genius mimic. That’s actually a little annoying, although the odds of my beating her were probably pretty slim considering my build is not super-bleed and depends on staggers.

1648

Take the W! I had to switch to a pure bleed build to kill her, just couldn’t manage it with a Moonveil Int/Dex build.

1649

yes, this I can agree. This was not an issue in the old games, where you were guided through the world, gated byy bosses etc.

I have found a somber stone [8] but looking for a somber stone [5]. I explored an area, that was ahead of my natural progress in the game.

1650

I never use it anymore, because the debuff to your survival is real. I’ve become a big fan of mitigation. My character is sitting at about 50% resists to everything right now at it’s really helpful.

That being said, most people seem to love it.

1651

I just found one of these in a cave last night. It had a giant bear that I just couldn’t beat, so I snuck past it. I would beat it if I could, but the close quarters and the huge amounts of hit points this bear has, combined with the small arena and the game camera that doesn’t know what to do when I’m in such a small area means that it doesn’t feel like I have a realistic chance.

Of course, after the bear, I ran into my first dual bosses in the game, which also seem impossible right now. But I’ll revisit the cave tomorrow. One thing I love about From games is how things seem impossible at first, and then you beat them anyway.

1652

After stormveil castle, this game really opened up a lot. That I find sometimes the wrong smithing stones, okay. Most of the times I find the correct ones.

I had to look up elden ring wiki for rot however. I lost 16k runes in a rot infested cave and spent all my rot cure. Crafting for rot cure is difficult, I bought some at a merchant for 2K a piece.

But there is some flame cure incantaition that I will seek out. I levelled up to FAI 12 already for the tree sentinel halberd, so I want this cure incantation.

Great game, but I will never finish it… or it will take me the whole year.

1653

That’s certainly how it feels to me now. Funny part is that it’s a good feeling sometimes, as if I’ve stumbled upon the “forever game” where I can keep exploring forever; but it can also feel like dispair: Oh no, it’s a forever game, how will I ever hope to finish it?

1654

btw. there are some poison/rot slugs. What is their weakness? In old souls games, fire worked pretty well. But here nothing helps. I tried poison, rot, magic, blood. Strike and slash. Don’t tell me it is pierce, haven’t tried that.

1655

I think it’s these things.

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Skeletal+Slime

I always just try to avoid them in all the Souls games, as they take forever to kill without much reward. They’re just native creatures trying to eek out a living. They don’t need to be killed by adventurers. Leave them alone!

1656

you know how FROM games work. You run past an enemy, doing your stuff. Then 5 minutes later you stand at a ledge checking your inventory and BAM, that guy 5 minutes ago did not let go, went all the way and hits you, you fall of the ledge and are dead.

I like that they included rot (similar to frenzy). Poison and bleed go down with time, but rot builds up if you don’t cure it.

Talking about frenzy. There was a field with rats, I got frenzied within a few seconds and dead. What was that all about? What are they hiding? Another thing I need to go back, when I am brave enough.

1657

Use Glintsone arc if you need to kill multiple enemies. It’s really generous of From to include an area of effect spell like that from the beginning of the game this time. Usually handling crowds of small enemies is a nightmare in these games. Glintsone arc makes it require some skill (lining them up), but if you can do it, it’s very effective. I love it!

1658

Dark Souls was all about Vinheim sorceries, and this one all about Glintstone this, Glintstone that.
I think we need a game where we battle it out, Vinheim against Glintstone.

1659

I just got ganked by some low level soldiers who I was busy harvesting because I backed myself against a rock outcrop and was surrounded.

It doesnt take long for even lowly creeps to hurt you.

1660

I’m level 100+, still get killed more by dogs and rats than anything else.

1661

Those bears really are beasts.

Like, literally.

1662

Most games, like WoW for example, have sort of an exponential scaling as you level, the scaling in Elden Rings is very linear, so low level mobs are always dangerous, because there actually isn’t that big of a difference between them and end game mobs. You start out with 600ish hit points, and I’m guessing most people end up with maybe 2k (if that).

Higher level mobs hit harder for sure, but in the scheme of things it’s all fairly contained, its’ why speed runners can kill end game bosses, which wouldn’t be at all possible in a game like WoW or Diablo, where health and damage are light years apart from beginning to end.