1749

I saw one work today, so they must have fixed something.

1750

They worked sporadically last night and altogether for me today.

I’m only 15 hours in and this thing feels just massive.

1751

I thought I was done with the lower area two days ago, but no, I have spent the last 2 days doing stuff I missed. And based on some comments here I must still have missed things.

1752

PSN is now stable after the patch. Played 3 hours tonight without getting kicked off even once. Bloodstains work. Finally in Storm castle place. These knights are a pain - especially one who whipped out dragon powers. Got a cool spell though.

1753

Someone was asking about a random rune acquisition buff (with a bird foot icon) a few days ago and unfortunately I cannot remember who it was, but I got it for the first time yesterday after I put down my first message, so I strongly suspect you get this buff whenever someone appraises one of your messages.

1754

I press Y to interact and nothing happens. What is supposed to happen?

1755

You should see a red player ghost re-enacting the final moments of its life.

1756

I think I have seen this a couple of times…without touching the blood stain.

Hmmm.

So is the idea that the bloodstains give you clues?

1757

Yeah, large numbers of bloodstains in particular let you know it’s probably a dangerous area.

And seeing how the players died can tell you whether they just blundered off a cliff or into the water or something.

You can also sometimes use it to judge jump distances, and see how close people got. I did that when jumping across to the area to the south, saw that the bloodstains were all people just missing the jump, but they made the distance fine.

It can also give hints about enemies that only appear at night or day, if there are people dying in a place where there doesn’t seem to be an enemy. Though often the messages tell you that anyway.

1758

I was expecting spiders, but I was not expecting a bear

1759

Couple handy control tips.

Holding the spell or item toggle buttons will make the corresponding icon flash red and jump to the first slot. I think the older Souls games did this, but I just rediscovered it.

The unarmed dual-wield stance has a Kick ability. You can use it with a single right-hand weapon equipped by pushing that weapon swap so your hand is empty and then using dual-wield. With multiple right-hand weapons, you have to unequip the slot you’re holding. I like having access to this without needing an Ash of War on an extra weapon.

That was me. Having your message approved only heals you. Did you add a group password recently? I think this is the correct answer:

I removed my group passwords and stopped getting the buff. There could be another trigger though.

1760

When on horse and the action gets intense I very often press the left analogue stick (L3) which dismounts me… On PS5 there is no keybinding for this action. The answer is always: git gud

1761

Nope I was solo, I never even touched any menus with passwords and groups. I was also afk at some shrine at the time.

1762

The bird foot icon is about increased runes pickup, and happens for sure when you use the bird foot (you know how traditionally bird feet are associated with getting more gold from the bodies of slain enemies? :weird:), and when someone in your group defeats ‘the shardbearer’, whatever that is. I don’t know why you’d get it without that.

1763

I found an item last night. A magic whetstone, which let me put Magic and Int scaling on my weapons. This item greatly enhanced my lethality.

I left the dungeon I found that item in and went back to Lingrave and trolled around, looking for things I missed. I found a couple catacombs that I roflstomped with my +10 magic nightrider flail. There was a teleporter in a field, I went inside and there was a boss that I’m pretty sure was a cut and paste of the Dancer of the Boreal Valley from DS3. Anyway, leaping flail to the head, she died in like 6 hits. Got invaded by some guy. Pretty sure he was an NPC. Anyway, magic flail, nbd. 5 hit combo, dead.

Then I saw Tree Sentinel. Remember that scene from Superman 2, when Superman goes back to the diner and confronts the bully again?

1764

Can you spoil text the directions to that teleporter? I thought I was done with Limgrave but that one doesn’t sound familiar.

1765

One thing I like about this game, is how the loot is consistently good.

You find loot constantly, and it’s almost always “Oh man, that’s cool.” Even in the cases where you can’t currently use it, it’s still kind of cool to find stuff because every piece of equipment has a little bit of lore attached.

One thing that I’d request, would be some kind of way to see what the most recently picked up items were, as there have been times when I’ve picked something up, didn’t see the name of it, and then had to look through all my pockets to figure out what it was.

1766

Actually not as true in this game! I frequently can eat blocks from bosses and get a block/counter stagger on them.

If you are going melee, definitely try sword and board for your first playthrough. Then you want a shield that has a 100% physical block value. I think the confessor starts with one which is nice. What you do is hold block from an attack, and immediately after you block an attack counter with a strong attack. You will hear the tell tale parry sound and most likely stun your opponent. Then you can follow with an R1. Most things you run into for the first 20 levels you can counter like this. Even giants!

But #1: If you think you will like to be a melee guy, I would suggest sword & board over duel wielding or two handing for your first attempt. It is a much more forgiving playstyle.

1767

I’ve been dabbling with the Vagabond and then the Samurai loadouts, more to familiarise myself with the controls. What class would you recommend then, for this playstyle?

1768

You guys find the barricade ash? I know the No Parry ash on shield is all the hotness (haven’t found that one), but the barricade ash is amazing. You can pop that and soak hits from bosses and you won’t get staggered, and even better sometimes they get staggered.

I forced my son to play after school yesterday. He’s 10. I had to explain a lot of the systems to him, this is a complicated game, but I also wanted him to dive in and explore the world. He had a hard time with the dying at first. I told him, you’re going to die a lot, it’s part of the game, just accept it.

Kid immediately found 2 NPCs in Lingrave I never found in my 30+ hours I’ve put into the game. The first was Witch Renna, who gave him the bell and the wolves summon. I bought them from a vendor in the Round Table hub. The second was a monkey dude that was turned into a tree. He was saying “There’s someone here and I can’t find him!!!” and we were looking for a while. Then he goes “I think the tree is the one talking!” and I told him to hit it.

I sent him back to his mom’s last night and he was pissed because he couldn’t keep playing and had to do his homework. He called me this morning to ask if he can come over after school and play Elden Ring again.