The Real Dark Souls *spoiler* thread starts here

What’s a good pvp build? I fought a guy with some long spear and we just kept circling each other until lag or something let someone get an advantage. It was kinda dumb.

Also why did my dex stop adding scaling damage at 45?

There are sections on PvP builds in both wikis, but my advice fwiw is to treat it like you would the main game: when something sucks, come up with a plan B and then keep reinventing it until the problem is solved to your satisfaction. From what I’ve seen, successful PvPers often have absurd mastery of menu-switching and/or build their characters to include at least two different styles in one package (typically pyro + melee or something like that) so that they can shift gears. If they are in areas with lots of places you can fall, they pack force so they can lure you out there and blast you off.

But the good news is that you can beat people that are better than you by simply catching them with something they didn’t expect. If your Havel’d armor guy is strafing like a sack of shit and then all of a sudden it turns out they had the backflipping ring on the whole time and flip past and backstab, well, it’s not reinventing the wheel but you only need a second or two of panicked non-reaction to win.

I would say the spear build is fine if you are partnered with someone else and he can be a glass cannon for your safe melee, but I find the parry/stagger block potential from opponents on the endlessly long timeline you need to do enough damage pretty easy to mess up on. I would keep a slashing weapon or something else that mixes it up in the other slot if that’s what you’re determined to work with.

Also why did my dex stop adding scaling damage at 45?

AFAIK it doesn’t, but you need a dex oriented weapon (A or better scaling, ideally) in order to see results past a certain point. You should get diminished returns past 40 but not 0.

If you take a look at the core weapon classes that are suggested for dex builds hereand then cross reference that with the calculator, you should be able to find something that suits you.

Oh, according to the calculator it just slows down at 45 and I get a point at 46. Should I keep pumping dex or switch to endurance or something?

It’s your call, but in general I find when I max the most direct returns on my prime requisites it’s time to spread out and maybe work on getting some of the fundamentals up (vit, end) or any magic or what have you. It’s really all about which things you want to be able to do with the character. Str, for instance, would be worth getting to 50 for many that concentrate on that since that opens up the last tier of strength weapons.

Okay, I just finished Anor Londo and have the Lordvessel. I don’t want to know what happens after that, but for purposes of weekend and holiday planning, I’d like to get an reasonable idea (I know it can’t be exact, due to differences in playstyle) of how many hours I have left until I win the game.

I’m not talking about going to every last optional place (I’ll save that for another build) - just to finish up and win.

I’m level 65ish right now.

It really depends on how far you’ve explored into the various ‘final third’ areas of the game, but I’d say you have about 6-10 hours left depending on your thoroughness and skill.

started new character with bit of extra challenge (pyromancer was way too cheesy, so lets try something completely different).

  • no magic whatsoever (propably going to miss light spell in tomb of giants)
  • no drake sword (makes early game bit too easy)
  • no exploits (if im going to farm in darkroot garden, gotta be able to kill them in melee for example)
  • no master key
  • bow/thrown weapons and rest of the items are ok.

lets see how this goes. Currently wielding halberd +5 and bell gargoyles are dead.

EDIT: if anyone has suggestions about what weapons / armor i should go for (not sure if im going to focus on dex or str more yet)

If your going to stay around 50-60, then elemental weapons will out perform any scaling from strength or dexterity. However if you go the full 120 (pvp route), +15 normal scaling and then using a pine or charcoal resin will give you a significant boost over a straight elemental (fire/lightning) weapon.

Edit: I’m forgetting the Black Knight weapons, which actually scale fairly well with strength for a lowish level character. The regular Black Knight Sword and the Greataxe are pretty good choices for a straight strength build. If you go Dex, then the katanas or scythe family is excellent.

So I made some more progress along several paths this weekend, and I’m still totally impressed by this game. I’ve been doing I’d call a “light spoiler” run (first playthrough still), where I read general discussions, but try to actively avoid specific descriptions or strategies.

I’d heard people talk about the Catacombs, but figured they were talking about the Depths. I heard people talk about re-spawning skeletons / divine weapons, and so I was slightly confused why I hadn’t encountered them yet. After a very early foray into the graveyard, I’d avoided it since then because I got pretty badly beaten. So, I finally put them together in my head and figured there was probably something else to the graveyard, and I should check it out again. So, I got to experience the catacombs pretty much blind.

I had read that divine weapons are needed for the respawning skeletons somewhere, so I had leveled up a divine longsword to +5, and promptly forgotten about it, preferring the morning star for the skeleton stagger effect (in retrospect, should have made that divine. oh well). But since the graveyard skeletons didn’t respawn, I still wasn’t at all ready for it the first time it happened. I’ve been trying to intentionally vary my weapon loadout a bit after playing Demon’s souls with shield+spear, so I’m actually pretty pleased at the way the skeletons forced that on me.

Anyways, I love the way this game can surprise me and open rabbit holes of content that I had no intention of going down. Once you’ve hit another bonfire, you may as well keep going forward, since the way back is just as hard as the way forward. Thinking about that makes me appreciate the bonfire design a little more.

capra demon dead on my pure melee toon. was complete bitch because i sucked.

Halberd is not optimal weapon in that kind of fight (too slow) and i got stunlocked by his dogs 3 times before cake and huge success…

I dunno I was pure melee at the time and used the halberd on the Capra demon, granted I cheesed the hell out of it instead of fighting fairly.

A weekend’s progress: Catacombs, Tomb of Giants, Nito, Priscilla, Gwendolyn, and Ceaseless Discharge. Getting close to the end now, I think.

I feel like more than a little bit of a dick for killing Priscilla. “Hello. Mind if I cut your tail off? Thanks!”

I was hilariously overleveled for the Catacombs. Nothing in there gave me the slightest bit of trouble, and I curb stomped Pinwheel. (Crystal soulmass, crystal soulmass, crystal soulma…oh, wait. He’s dead already?) Tomb of the Giants actually required that I wake up, which was a nice change, and Nito was a bit of a pain in the neck. My favorite bit was the room filled with a billion giant skeletons and an ember–I have absolutely no idea how I managed to survive that place. It’d have been easy if I could have hit the skeletons with sorcery from above, but I actually had to jump in and mix it up with them.

At 50 int, sorcery has really come into its own. I can one- or two-hit kill most enemies. White Dragon Breath has a ton of charges and hits like a tank. It feels absolutely godly to take down one of the black knight guardians in Anor Londo with a single Crystal Soul Spear.

Is there an NPC you can summon before the two dudes boss in Anor Londo? I tried running there in human form to summon him, but kept getting jumped by PvP dudes. So I summonned up some help at the bonfire and killed the boss super easily. Felt a little bad about it.

Also, at soul level 70ish, is there somewhere I can go for PvP where I won’t get one-shotted by a laggy backstab or blast of lightning?

Solaire’s sign is located on the platform near the bow wielding Silver Knight in the large room before the Butters/Cartman fight. You can get to it by staying on the balcony and going around past the entrance to Giant Blacksmith. The knight will be shooting at you now, that’s where the sign should be.

For PvP, there’s always going to be some asshat spamming spells and/or going for the cheap backstab. For spells, try Force/Wrath of Gods. If timed right it will deflect oncoming magic to the ground. Getting backstabbed? - find a corner or tree and put your back into it. That said, I’ve found that the spots with the most “fair” fighters is either the Darkroot Garden (next to invisible wall bonfire, but not past the magic sealed gate, that’s where the cheap players fight) or the second bonfire in the Demon Ruins (right past the Demon Firesage).

Yes, you can summon Solaire on the staircase coming down from the blacksmith area on the left side of the great hall, just below that silver knight with the dragon bow. That’s assuming you’ve been doing it consistently, I think, although I know there are some fights (ie Gaping Dragon) where you can skip summoning him.

I haven’t played a ton PvP but I’ve had a lot of fun with the chaotic situations in the Forest Covenant, as I really like how on a busy night you get a chaotic ebb and flow to the fight as the human (and frequently his summoned buddy) try to finish each fight quickly before the next guy jumps in, while you stall for that killing blow until the cavalry shows up because there’s two of them and they’re pretty good. I didn’t see any overpowered gimmick builds as I think those guys are engaged in more lucrative endeavors, although occasionally a strong PvE build was just plain difficult when it was in good hands. Still, at the end of the time (hey, I wanted my ring from Shiva’s bodyguard’s corpse, after all) I was something like 15-7 counting a few victories that were handed me on a platter by a lucky break and also counting those times when I got sharked by a red phantom clearly in cahoots with the target.

I would expect the guys with the fuck you builds to be the same guys jumping up your ass every few minutes in Anor Londo or the killing fields of the last area.

What is that steam of lightning they like to one shot me with? Soul spear?

You mean the sun brotherhood faith spells?

Yeah, that looks like it. Sunlight Spear apparently does a ton of damage.

Fwiw, I haven’t ever come across it in upwards of a hundred encounters. Maybe it’s particular to certain level ranges or something. I think earlier someone pointed out the ubiquity of the wood grain ring, and that is something I have definitely seen myself. Stop backflipping you sons of bitches, I have important stabbing to do.

Soul Spear is just a ball of light that flies at you. And if you’re like most of the people I fight, you roll out of the way of. Sorcery, from my experience, is complete ass in PVP against a competent opponent–everything can be dodged with a well-timed roll. It also all looks lame compared to throwing lightning bolts or making giant fire spikes burst from the earth. Kicks ass in PVE, though, so I can’t complain too much. :>