Is there a worse zone in SotFS than Iron Keep?
Playing through it for the first time right now and this shit is just pure tedium, having to draw them all out one by one, snipe the archers and pray to god I one-shot Smelter just so I don't have to deal with those clowns ever again
was it always this bad?
Yea it sucks.
>>337107360
Funny I was just playing through that area an hour back.
I had been thoroughly enjoying Dark Souls II till this point at which I thought 'so THIS is why people complain about dude fifty enemies lmao'
Why the fuck do those knights aggro from across the map? Why are there two archers on opposite ends of a narrow area ensuring if you go after one you'll get hit by the other? Why is it that one of them blocks the fog door and the other one has 4 knights instantly appear when you approach it?
Without summoning a phantom it's not even hard, just pure tedious and annoying
>>337107360
>oneshot smelter
nah no way unless your some autistic speedrunner
>>337108336
Nail on the head
It really feels like they were doing everything in their power to stop you from entering that fog gate. I can understand not wanting people to just make a bee line for it, but this is kinda silly.
>>337108386
guess I'll just have to kill them enough times till they stop spawning, oh well
horsefuck valley is worse
>>337108760
You could level up and overpower him, but that probably takes longer than just killing the mobs until they stop spawning
Iron Keep was barely changed lol, it's not even the worst area
Wait till you see the DLC bro
>>337108826
Only bullshit area in DLC is the optional area that were designed specifically with challenge and co-op in mind.
>>337107360
Heides tower. Now full of black knight equivalents and three on one fights
>>337107360
Still the best fight club arena.
>>337108826
To be fair, they did change two things about it
1) They hid a bunch of the Anonne Knights away so you can't see them, so if you try run through to Smelter you'll get ambushed and killed. Clearly trying to bait the player.
2) It's now much, much harder to run to Smelter without clearing the way.
>>337108942
Heides was one of the easier areas for me, you can pull all of the knights individually and some of the white ones don't even aggro. Easiest boss fight in the entire game as well
>>337107360
>walk through mining area
>enter a poision windmill
>take elevator up
>end up in lava fortress
What?
>>337107360
git gud you noob
>>337110703
I see this complaint all the time, and I had it too.
Do you think the elevator was meant to go down, but they fucked it up?
>>337110920
Possibly. But there's also the thing with the windmill. How does it produce the poison? Or alternatively, where is it "pumping" it from? Why does burning it (but not stopping it) remove the poison? It just doesn't make any sense.
>>337110739
This has nothing to do with difficulty, rather poor design
>>337107360
It's pretty annoying. I think they made it that way on purpose so if you kept failing, you would get their armor with high fire resist for the Smelter fight. It feels like the devs kind of knew that area wasn't designed well.
>>337107360
This shithole is why when some shill on /v/ pulls the 'SotFS fixed everything wrong with DaS2!' card you know immediately they're talking bullshit.
The shit part is you can't even run past them because there's so many, the tracking is so utterly retarded and in DaS2 you don't get immunity while going through a fog door.
>sit at bonfire
>stand up
>make weeaboo pinjata
>sit back down
>repeat until area is devoid of life
That was a really easy way to get a lot of souls.
>>337111076
It burns the flaps so the wind can't catch it, still fucking stupid though.
>>337108947
The hell are you smoking, it's the goddamn WORST arena.
Eye-destroying colors, narrow bridge, door that invaders can't open resulting in inescapable ganks. Everything about that place fucking sucked and i'm glad that DS3 arena is a comfy winter garden.
>>337110920
No way, it's completely infeasible that such a mistake could be made. You don't accidentally make a whole element like that in the wrong direction, you'd notice it was wrong before you were finished and correct it.
They just wanted the feeling of exploring an entire continent, but decided to have a connected world as well, so the intended feeling was poorly communicated and made no sense.
That area was pretty awful, but's it's not the most tedious area I had to go through.
Maybe the ancient dragon area for laziest design? I know they made it better and the gold knights bowing to you was neat, but holy shit fuck those infinite stamina huge knights, and the dragons terrible too
I was thinking of getting around to this series. I have demonzu souru but I'd have to dig out the ps3 for it. Is min/maxing needed or is it fine to just play by ear?
>>337107360
It's pretty easy to just ignore them and do what you need to do.
>>337112095
Just take it as it comes, the games aren't that hard. Sure you'll probably die a bunch as you get used to it, but after that you'll breeze through the series.
Try not to look stuff up, most agree it's best to go in not knowing anything about it first time
>>337112095
Playing blind and looking up stuff that confuses you is the best way to go about it. That is assuming someone tells you the basics, like not to put points into Resistance in DS1.
>>337112264
This pretty much, just choose a weapon you like and make it work
>>337112095
DeS is the easiest in the series, so long as you don't accidentally fuck things up thanks to mechanics that aren't explained by the game.
1-4 runs on pure black are absolute hell
>>337107360
Pre-patch Shrine of Amana was worse if you were a melee character.
>>337112628
There's so much in this game that can be trivialized by using a bow.
>>337111338
Was it different in vanilla DaS 2?
Actually, all I hear is 'yeah SotFS fixed things' and 'different enemy placements' but what specifically DID SotFS do?
One big example for me is all those Pursuers in Lost Bastille. Anything else like that?
>>337113004
>all those Pursuers in Lost Bastille
What about them? I only played Scholar and those guys really spiced up the place.
>>337113178
They weren't there at all in vanilla. The only Pursuer in the game is the optional boss fight in the first level.
>>337113231
>The only Pursuer in the game is the optional boss fight in the first level.
Plus, you know, all the other ones.
SotFS might've added more, but there was always more than one, anon
>>337113004
SOTFS made torches slightly more useful in an area or two I think and that pursuer thing. Other than that, they made every room you walk into an ambush. Or the original might have been like that too already, I cant remember.
>>337113004
Iron Keep was a lot better pre-SotFS. The Alonne Knights were stationary, and could easily be dealt with 1-2 at a time. The captains were still irritating, but there weren't 4-7 knights that would come sprinting from every corner of the room before, so you could deal with them.
They also fucked up Smelter Demon's AI in SotFS. He used to have clear patterns and ways of attacking that allowed you to call his bullshit, but somehow he gained the "Blue" Smelter Demon's AI, who fights very differently, causing him to just swing at seemingly random times with bizarre combos.
>>337113178
>What about them? I only played Scholar and those guys really spiced up the place.
In original DS2 there was only a single Pursuer in the game.
DESU SotFS didn't exactly change things much. It added Heide Knights to the Heide's Tower of Flame area, increased the number of Hammer Old Knights, etc.
Huntsman's Copse had few changes, and the changes that did happen were basically just moving an enemy to a different ambush spot, or simply shoving more enemies in a smaller space for no discernible reason.
Actually, in general SotFS just moved enemies so that they'd ambush you more. The Shadows in the cove, the mannequins in Earthen Peak, Alonne Knights sprinting out of every crevice in Iron Keep, etc.
>>337107360
>this shit is just pure tedium
That's DaS2 for you.
Z-Team fell for Namco marketing and designed everything around it.
>>337113475
>In original DS2 there was only a single Pursuer in the game.
There were two actually, and NG+ added two more
>>337113475
>added Heide Knights to the Heide's Tower of Flame area
So in the original there were no Heide Knights in the area that was named after them?
>>337113578
Yeah, they were just randomly scattered about the game. There was one in the Forest of Giants, one in Lost Bastille, and a few others scattered about, but I don't think there were any at Heide's Tower.
>>337108336
Why do you people even play this game if you hate tedious, unfun, garbage?
>>337112095
If you min/max in Demon's Souls then you'll make it so easy a Fable 3 playtester could beat it.
>>337111693
Wrong dipshit. It was a great arena. Maybe you couldn't hang with the real fighters because of your scrawny little gamer arms.
I guess the area would be bad if the Alonne Knights were actually challenging to fight in any way
>>337113884
Because it was the only striking instance of it in the game so far, and even then you can summon phantoms in co-op (other players or game NPCs) to aid you.
A single flaw does not break a game. Even if Dark Souls II is the worse than others in its series it's still a great game with loads of variety, great online integration, fun bosses, and loads of content. It's still better than 95% high profile games that came out in the last ten years and I haven't even beaten it yet.
>>337114547
I feel the same. I enjoyed playing it. I liked the variety of PVP. I liked the Agape ring, no bonfire runs and the ability to build a viable hex and mage in addition to strength and dex.
>>337114545
The fuckers are just asking to get backstabbed
>>337107360
Iron Keep is a co-op area.
>>337114843
Or stunlocked into submission, before they can even start their weeb kendou bullshit.
never had any problem with Iron Keep
>abloo bloo I have to use strategy and can't charge head on like a retard
>>337107360
eh, it's fine
the "co-op areas" in the DLC are much worse
ITT people who need to git gud. Smelter demon is entirely optional so just do it when youre stronger if the knights are too tough.
Just did a str build run, I was surprised how trivialized everything was when you're spamming ultra greatsword attacks.
>1 shot alone knights
>2 shot captains
>Stun lock lightning reindeer fuckers in frozen wastes with stone ring
>1 shot riposted invading npcs
>>337115072
You either played vanilla or just summoned someone from the get go.
There is no strategy in getting ganked by literally 7 knights. All you can attempt are cheese tactics; even attempting to run past won't work like it does in other clusterfuck areas like Black Gulch
>>337112095
Demons souls is the least linear of the souls series but it also the easiest to break if you know what youre doing.
What is the most fun:
>Halberd
>Greatsword
respectively?
For PvE.
>>337115287
>There is no strategy in getting ganked by literally 7 knights
You really have to act like a retard to pull them all at once,and I played both release and SotFS.
>>337115287
>7 knights
Wow youre a moron if you didnt realise the gimmick of that place. Get good you retard.
>>337115501
>You really have to act like a retard to pull them all at once,and I played both release and SotFS.
This is a straight up lie. As soon as you step out of the archway into the sunny area knights come running from across the bridge, while the archer keeps shooting at you.
Literally everyone who's played the game can attest to that.
>>337115287
>There is no strategy in getting ganked by literally 7 knights.
The strategy is not charging in headlong and aggroing all of them at once
did iron keep change a lot in scholar? it was one of the better areas in vanilla das2, in my opinion
>>337115714
If you'd remember the part in question or actually played SotFs, you'd know that it's impossible NOT to collectively aggro all of them at the same time as soon as you're in the area.
>>337115287
running through iron keep is pretty easy as long as your goal is to skip Smelter and go straight to the 3rd iron keep bonefire
>sprint past first knight
>juke the knight on the stairs
>run past the knight outside
>jump down to the first bridge lever
>juke knights coming down the stairs, run across bridge and jump over to the wheel (this part it's easy to get knocked into the lava by a random attack)
>spin the wheel
>hop down on the right
>open door
>up the ladder
>run past guy
>up ladder
at this point you can start playing normally because the level isn't crap from this point on
>>337115705
>As soon as you step out of the archway into the sunny area knights come running from across the bridge, while the archer keeps shooting at you.
No they fucking don't. A couple of guys will come from the left side, the ones across the bridge will not aggro until you're actually on the bridge.
>>337113004
SotFS changed a few things, mainly reducing enemy numbers.
FotFG first area has more enemies, but you can fight them one at a time.
Bastille removed a bunch of enemies before the Pursuer.
Earthen Peak shuffled the manikins around so they are more visible instead of coming offscreen.
Shaded Woods took out all enemies and replaced them with a few ghosts.
Drangleic Castle removed all the Alonne Knights and Elephant Knights and replaced them with a Chariot.
etc.
>>337115778
>Kill Knight on bridge
>Move forward
>Draw out Knight on stairs to the bridge and kill
>Move forward
>Knight shooting at you from window has most likely come down to kill you
>Kill and go left
>Kill Knight on these set of stairs
>Go through hidden passage way
>Kill this Knight
>Another Knight comes running for you
>Kill
>Move forward slowly
>Never aggro more than two sword Knights
It's really not that bad
>>337115705
The ones across the bridge won't aggro until you're on the bridge. You can even see them coming down if you stand on the bridge and watch them drop down from the ledge.
I can attest to that.
you can literally slip smelter. explore until you find a ladder. from there i dont know of you can access the bonfire. as for fighting smelter, high AR per hit is the trick
>>337115705
>As soon as you step out of the archway into the sunny area knights come running from across the bridge, while the archer keeps shooting at you.
Two of them. Anyone who can count can attest to that.
Why is /v/ so casual?
DkS2 hate stems entirely from people being bad at video games.
>>337116478
>DkS2 hate stems entirely from people being bad at video games.
And the continuity of the world being kinda fucked up. And ADP. Rest is fun though.
>>337107360
I think by that time I had a ton of castings and could one-shot all the knights, and Lucatiel tanks the Smelter Demon like a champ, so I never really had that much of an issue with it.
I don't think I ever played DaS2 with a primarily melee-based build, though, so maybe that's the issue.
>>337107360
>aving to draw them all out one by one, snipe the archers and pray to god I one-shot...
you'll have to be more specific, OP -- that could be any Souls game every made and any of its encounters, from grunts to bosses
>>337116759
Having never had a bow at that point im not sure what he needs to snipe in that part.
>>337111076
>How does it produce the poison? Or alternatively, where is it "pumping" it from?
It's pumping the poison up from underground. Didn't you notice the pits outside were all full of poison gas? When you destroy the windmill, there's nothing running the pumps any more and the shit drains off. It makes perfect sense.
>>337110920
no the game designer said it was meant to be an elevator to "above cloud" level. he said they should have made it clearer but oh well..
>>337107360
Do people actually do this? Clear entire areas to get another shot at the boss, even after you already know the area? I kill them methodically when I explore and progress, but Im not going to do that when its my third attempt on the boss
>>337117004
I never thought about it that way. I always thought they were mining titanite or something like that, not poison gas/sludge.
>>337111076
>Or alternatively, where is it "pumping" it from
The ground?
>>337117081
That sounds like one contrived bullshit exuse.
>>337117089
>Do people actually do this? Clear entire areas
Yeah. Old Knight genocide was worth every second. They sure as hell aren't respawning on my watch.
>>337110703
Its in a volcano
>>337116970
OP here, mainly talking about the area right before the smelter fog gate
you drop down the bridge, the fog gate to your left is blocked by an archer, there's an archer to your right and a knight drops down on your head the minute you move an inch to either direction
the area is a pain to clear is what I was trying to get at, the knights themselves don't pose a challenge, it's just that you need to lure them out one by one, ideally killing the archers beforehand and just inching your way forward since they aggro from a mile away
>>337117193
I actually did clear all the Iron keep knights because I wanted the katana, but in general I just rush through areas if Im trying to down the boss.
>>337117293
You do know you can use a bow to draw the knights who drop down to you, right?
I mean I'll admit that the area is tedious, but if you can't into simple threat management I don't know why you play Souls.
The alonne knights placement drives me fucking nuts. They show up out of nowhere. Smelter wasn't that bad though. Just had to switch up my weapon choice since i was using the fire longsword.
>>337107360
>was it always this bad?
I think they added more enemies into the SoTFS version of Iron Keep or at least changed the enemy placement so that the enemies are in groups instead of alone/on their own.
I have no idea why they made this change and it only adds more tedium to traversing the area which already was absolute shit in the vanilla version.
>>337117345
>because I wanted the katana
I had like three of them lying around after the weebknight genocide. Farming just isnt as a good a motivation for me as contempt for my enemies.
>>337117265
So the entire area with Huntsmans Copse and a FUCKING MINE are inside a volcano? And the elevator aswell as the giant doom fortress it leads to are invisible from the outside of the windmill?
>>337117293
Oh yeah it is a pain to clear that i can agree with. Though i dont really mind that since it gives me more incentive to not die in that part or to the boss. Its its one of the tougher bosses too so i usually do him last.
>>337117401
>You do know you can use a bow to draw the knights who drop down to you, right?
I know, read the post I was replying to.
>>337117089
I'm not sure it's physically possible to run to Smelter without killing anything in Scholar. It was easy as shit in the original version, but the new archer placement coupled with having far more knights hounding your ass the entire way to the fog door is crazy. You could probably kill them to extinction long before you figure out the tool-assisted timing needed to enter the fog door without getting gang-raped. It's also not hard to kill them at all, there's just like 12 of them in one room.
Personally I think they just realized that the area is pathetically small for even an optional boss, and their solution to that is to add more enemies.
>>337117105
Well, it probably didn't start off as sludge. It was probably being used to pump water up to the Iron Keep initially, then when they discovered Titanite down there they dug into a pocket of something toxic and it made the ground go bad. Shit like that happens all the time in mining operations.
But I guess by that point they already had the crazy lady running things and she was all, "I'm going to roll around in this shit and become beautiful!"
But she turned into a snake instead.
>>337117909
>I'm going to roll around in this shit and become beautiful!
What a flawless plan m'lady.
so the consens is that the updated DS2 made the game worse?
Vanilla version had
1 on the bridge
2 in the room through the door
1 up some stairs to the right of the door
2 knights and a captain in the next room
1 knight which aggros shortly after the archway
1 captain above the archway, 1 on the bit to the far left of the room and 1 in front of the smelter boss fog
1 knight under the stairs leading to the fire room
2 knights in the fire room
1 knight on the bridge
1 knight after the bridge
a knight underneath the captains by the archway and to the far right
Changes in SotFS
Everything has a MUCH higher aggro range
a third knight in the second room
a second knight past the archway
2 knights that drop down after you drop off the bridge by the captain at the fog door
another captain that shoots at you after you drop down the bridge
2 knights that drop down when you get in melee range of the new captain
I think I might have missed one but there's about ten more enemies in the area, which is pretty crazy since there was only a little more than ten originally. It seems like they've made optional bosses harder to reach, since chariot rider is now fucking horrible to reach since all 6 minibosses aggro at the same time, and there's two new enemies
>>337117491
>So the entire area with Huntsmans Copse and a FUCKING MINE are inside a volcano?
No, you dork. At the base of the volcano. They built the Iron Keep at the peak of it, but it was so heavy that it sank through the cap.
Volcanoes are actually pretty rich in metals and gems because they dredge shit up from deeper in the earth. They also tend to be full of toxic gasses and shit, which would explain all the poison in the mill.
The lack of a volcano in the skybox is probably just an oversight.
>>337118198
Only if you are bad at the game and really stupid.
>>337118302
>The lack of a volcano in the skybox
That would probably have fixed it quite handily.
>>337118198
Only if you're a casual who runs everywhere without paying attention, yes.
The first part is pretty good. But after smelter it goes downhill with too many enemies. I usually just run through all of them and come back over leveled to get items I missed.
>>337116120
and you know how tedious it is to do that shit every time you die to smelter?
its a shit area fuck off and stop trying to defend it
>>337118846
You only have to do that once, after the first time you can just run for the fog.
Smelter isn't even a hard boss, he has the most predictable pattern of any boss in the game.
>>337119030
you cant just run to the fog you need to kill atleast three knights because the bridge is too narrow
>>337118198
>so the consens is that the updated DS2 made the game worse?
It made it worse in some areas, but generally, no, the game became more "Fair", at least as fair as infinite stamina/poise enemies with perfect 180+ degree tracking can be.
>>337118289
>since chariot rider is now fucking horrible to reach since all 6 minibosses aggro at the same time
No they don't, you can pull them one at a time with a bow, or any ranged attack. And I don't know how anyone could consider them "minibosses", a single backstab takes off 90% of their HP.
>>337118846
Then leave this route til last and you'll be way overleveled so dying to Smelter is almost impossible. Alternatively just skip him and take the long path through the level. The game gives you a lot of options, you just chose to die over and over.
>>337118198
Yes, it made one of the worst sequels in history worse. I didn't think it would be possible honestly.
I have DaS on PS3 and DaS3 on PC. Should I get DaS2 on console or PC? Either way I'm stuck with a segregated collection that flares my autism.
>>337119656
>You can pull them one by one with a bow
How come I literally never had to do this in Demon's Souls or Dark Souls? Playing carefully should be enough not to draw aggro of ten enemies at once. Dark Souls 2 is just designed like shit and has no respect for its players. Being able to use a bow to cheese the AI is no excuse for the fact that the game fully expects you to just walk into an ambush no matter how cautious you think you're being and trying to avoid aggro ranges. Iron Keep actually pulls some fucking trick where the further away knights aggro first but take a long time to get to you, encouraging you to get ganked because you didn't know they would notice you from further away than the others.
>>337118846
git gud
Alternatively, if you can't git gud and are a shitter, just straight up don't fight him and come back later once you're SL300 like DSP.
>>337119954
saying git gud dosnt add up anything to the conversation and i hope you are proud of yourself
>>337118302
There isn't a single indicator that the top of the mill is connected to anything, just feels like they started working on all the areas at once and couldn't be bothered to make sensible connections
>>337119954
It's really cool how valid criticism of Souls games is ignored because back before Dark Souls came out Namco pushed the fucking difficulty as a marketing strategy and now everyone jerks off to blatantly unfair parts of these games like they're god tier game design even though they're cheap as fuck and if literally any other game tried this kind of shit you'd all be furious.
>>337119824
Get it on PC, it runs extremely well and has none of the drawbacks of the console version, mainly the choppy framerate.
>>337119824
If you have the choice then I don't know why you would ever get it on console
>>337119906
What knights are you talking about?>>337119287
You can run around them, it's not THAT narrow
>>337120254
It's a sad story,from what I recall the overworld was scrapped early on + they added a new director to try and fix the state of DS2, which meant he had to super quickly piece together each area
It was the same director for the DLC, though, which had way better level design
>>337120254
That's exactly what happened. I'm not sure why is isn't common knowledge by now, but Dark Souls 2 changed leads halfway through. And the director that came in saw it and went "Holy shit this is awful" But they already had a ton of assets made, so he just went and jumbled it together into an actual presentable product.
This alone explains basically 90% of 2's issues with seeming "Shoddy"
If you look at the DLCs, that's what he could have done if he was there from the start.
So I can't even imagine what it was like BEFORE the reworking.
>>337120108
I like how you ignored 99% of my post to cherrypick two words.
Triggered much?
>>337120518
I'm talking about the Alonne Knights in SotFS. They changed the aggro ranges on the enemies so that a couple knights in the back and across the bridge that you can't see will aggro before the closest knight to you who should logically notice you first. They clearly designed the knights to aggro in such a way that the player wouldn't be aware of it, but would have 4 knights on their ass plus two archers firing greatbows at them. It's easy to avoid once you know that, but cautious players literally get punished for trying to draw aggro of the closest knight to them, and will likely suffer a cheap death as a result. Vanilla DS2 had a bunch of things like this but SotFS doubles down on it and becomes a fucking chore to play.
Funny, I just completed this area yesterday since I'm playing ds2 for the first time. It was indeed a pain in the ass but most of the game is being for me, I don't like how the devs idea of difficulty seems to be throwing a bunch of enemies at you at once.
I didn't get the items in the lava, are they worth it? Also I'm using a fully upgraded Winged Spear since I like spears and nothing seemed better, is it a decent choice or not really? I'm worried mostly about pve, for some reason I'm shitting down everyone's throat in the occasional pvp.
Oh and armor, I'm using the Vengarl set didn't even upgrade it once yet since I don't know what set I'll be using eventually. Any really good sets?
I have not finished dark souls 2 because of this area.
>>337121252
Lava items are garbage unless you're a pyromancer, use whatever weapon works, armor is meaningless so again use whatever you want. Late game, armor is so meaningless against bosses that going naked will have you taking the same damage but with a much better roll.
>>337120387
>>337120474
Do you think I should cave and buy DaS on PC too? The framerate outside of the capurdemon boss area is unbearable.
>>337121489
DaS has really inconsistent framerate on every platform but it plays better on PC provided you install dsfix. It's also like $8 during sales so just wait for one of those.
>>337121116
>but cautious players literally get punished for trying to draw aggro of the closest knight to them
On the contrary, it benefits cautious players. I remember when I was going through that area the first time I killed them all 1 by 1 as they filed through. It was great.
>>337121774
Explain to me how aggroing an enemy that's out of the player's view while they're trying to draw aggro of one that should logically have seen them first is fair.
>>337108826
>>337108881
>Flashbacks of frigid outskirts
>>337122001
>out of the player's view
There's only one enemy you can't see that aggros, and that's while you're still in the first inside area.
>>337121489
Get dsfix for DaS1, maybe fiddle with the ini file as well, since even with the mod installed it's locked at 30FPS.
Just wait for the summer sale, that way you can have all three on PC for a fraction of the price you'd pay on consoles.
>>337122001
Because Alonne Knights die in like 3 hits and come at you one by one every 10-15 seconds?
I mean unless you're so bad to the point that you can't kill them so they all overwhelm you, I can see your point.
Can I play the first Dark Souls and Demon Souls on my PC with a wired 360 controller?
>>337121464
>>337121252
>that one item you can get by jumping off the broken part of the bridge
>three platforms, two of which are lava
>motherfucking bonfire ascetic
The only thing worth getting even if you're a pyro is the one in the mobile platform room that also leads to Belfry Sol, since the chest there has chaos storm. There's also a fire seed there if you need it that badly
>>337122192
There's also the guy that spots you though a wall and a floor when you go back into the outside area. Not that he's a problem. Those guys get stunlocked so easily.
>>337120932
They could have just made the elevator after the boss go down instead of up, having it go up into what appears to be thin air is just silly.
>>337122268
Isn't there a frame unlocker?
>>337120321
This is what I dislike the most about ds2. In ds1 everything was pretty fair, tough but fair; even Ornstein and Smough which were the highest level of bullshit in the game always felt fair. In ds2 it's all about tricking you into traps and into fighting a bunch of enemies at once, they even made you take damage while going through fog doors. All to push the "lol so difficult!!", "You will die meny, meny times hihihi xD" memes. It's just silly.
>>337122607
Yeah. DSFix.
>>337122309
I never said it was difficult, it's just tedious.
>>337122338
>Can I play the first Dark Souls
Yes
>and Demon Souls on my PC
No
>>337122607
It's built into DSfix now
still locked to 30 fps by default until you edit the ini file that comes with the mod
>>337122607
There is, but you'd do best by keeping the 30 fps lock. Playing the game at 60 fps makes it become extremely glitchy, as in your character phases through the ground at random and falls into nothingness pretty often, specially when you slide down ladders
>>337122754
Isn't this information a bit outdated? I played it just recently and it worked fine. Same for at least 3 other people I gave the .ini file to.
>>337122823
I played it just recently too and Blighttown was all about fucking randomly falling through the platforms the point of it being unplayable
>>337122754
>>337122823
>>337122969
Don't play with my heart
>>337122646
Agreed to a point, a lot of zones in DaS2 have places where you're going to get ambushed, granted playing online gives most of these away since there's usually a couple of messages and blood signs all over the place.
Though I think the fog gate transition was more a stylistic choice.
>>337122754
Playing at 60 FPS does three things :
makes sliding down ladders appear a bit off (your character model isn't perfectly lined up)
the helkite dragon can kill you if you run straight ahead when it lands on the bridge
makes it borderline impossible to roll onto the ledge in Firelink (if you're trying to return to the Asylum)
Other than that it's a massive improvement over playing at 30FPS, Blighttown can still cause drops in FPS no matter what system you're running the game on.
>>337122660
You said it's not fair; stop changing your argument.
I'm saying it's more than fair if you're not shit at the game.
I just tested the area myself in SotFS to make absolutely sure
If you don't rush then the knights are aggroed in a way that you only need to fight one at a time and even if another is already aggroed he will take a while to get to you. The exception is the middle of the bridge when the captain in front of the fog gate is aggroed: one knight aggroes about the same time, making you back up on the bridge, while two others are also making their way to you.
In other words the biggest "gank" unless you screw up is two knights while a captain shoots arrows at the huge archway between you
>>337123149
Just try it. You can just turn it off if you have any issues.
>>337122754
>character phases through the ground at random and falls into nothingness pretty often
"Pretty often" lol, never happened to me
>specially when you slide down ladders
This could be a problem though so just watch out for that
>>337123296
>he will take a while to get to you
from what I remember all the knights are relatively fast albeit relatively weak and die in a few hits
>>337123485
There's a grand total of one single ladder in the game it's not safe to slide down.
Either way there's a hotkey to toggle the unlocker, why not just keep it on and toggle it before you use a ladder?
>>337123713
I was on NG++ and killed them in three or four hits, still had to wait around for the next guy to run to me.
>>337123713
They're fast, but they're positioned very far in away so there's more than 8 seconds before each get to you. That's more than enough time to kill each one.
>>337115705
admit it, you sprinted like a spastic the moment you left the archway, aggroing the ones on the bridge
> was having fun killing intruders in the tomb for the rat king
> think it will be a good idea to throw a bonfire ascetic to make the area harder for the intruders
> now I have to kill the rat vanguard again to access the rat king
Is the boss much more harder after a bonfire ascetic ?
>>337125798
The only thing that may be harder is killing the 4 ratlings before the big one joins the fight, and that there's less room for mistakes since it hits harder. But its attacks are telegraphed as fuck, and even if you can't dodge for shit, keeping a shield up at full stamina will let you survive a full charge, even if it guard breaks you (it will always stop there or jump back)
Could always just visit the rat king in the grave of saints anyway
>>337125798
How would it be hard now?
>>337125798
Bonfire Astetics raise area into NG+ for each one you throw in and stay that way i.e. every area is NG except Heide's NG+1, go into NG+1 and Heide's is NG+2.
>>337107360
Yeah bruh.. But
>tfw you finally start to see them stop spawning 'cause you killed them so many times.
>>337108386
>>337108819
the fuck? do people really have a problem with smelter?
all his attacks are telegraphed from a mile away
>>337107360
Easily the best part of the main game desu.
I really wanted to drop DaS2 because it wasn't fun until Iron Keep.
>>337126119
Well that's a problem, time to join Covenant of Champions to get them back.
>>337126174
When I was first playing, I struggled with the fire damage on his second form.
But, eventually I just got gud enuff to not heal through first phase, and save my estus for the health drain during second phase.
>>337126174
But he's always on fire, he's too hot to handle!
And then my female PC in his armour, she's too hot to handle!
>>337107360He's not sprinting to the staircase so all the Allone Knights just fall down to lava.
LOL
>>337107360
In souls game I tend to be "jack of all trades" first time around, in shrine I had little issues even pre nerf but that was due to using arrows at distances.
Really the only area in souls games I thought complete bullshit were the fridged outskirts because raindeer every where and Fishing hamlet due to the giant enemies who will tackle you no matter what unless you due a near frame perfect dodge.
Souls 3 comes close with dragon belfry last section but I managed before getting frustrated. Pic semi related
>>337107360
Nothing in the series is worse than Lost Izalith.
Iron Keep was bad but it's not that big, just take it slow. Alonne knights are hard to parry but easy to backstab
>>337115374
Greatsword is literally op in 2. It has such a wide arc for the ganks and does double the damage of anything you get til endgame despite the fact that you pick it up in the 2nd or 3rd area.
Halberd actually makes you work for the tip damage so you have to actually git gud
>>337129698
>Greatsword
>Halberd
Hope you enjoy getting parried
>>337130059
>Getting parried in PvE
>Blindly responding without reading what I was replying to
>>337130146
Btw can't some of the PvE invaders parry?
>>337129698
What is a good infusion for greatsword?
>>337132187
bleed
>>337107360
DaS2 is terrible
I kinda gave up on vanilla DS2 because it lacked atmosphere and general love compared to the previous Souls games.
Is it worth it going back in with SotFS?
dark souls 2 is better than dark souls 3
>>337107360
They definitely upped the difficulty in that are for SotFS, it caught me off guard as well.
>>337132638
I don't know.The enemies in Iron Keep are pretty easy if you are two handing a great hammer.You just splat them all.
I miss Power Stance
>>337112628
I cleared that area pre-patch with a bow. Not using every tool at your disposal is foolish.
>still charging £20 for SotFS upgrade
>>337133626
I just got the whole package for ~30€. A great reminder of why one should never buy games on release.
I always liked DS2, played the original but maybe I'll pick up SOTFS.
What's the coolest build you ever did? I remember trying a quality build in DS2 and feeling like the game just beat my ass and beat me the fuck down.
How can I be OP, at least for PVE? Open to magic though I'm inexperienced with using it in Souls. Bonus points for power stance inclusion
>>337107360
I beat this area in the Vanilla version and never had to fight any Smelter Demon or whatever. Guess I got lucky
>>337134362
Sorceries make nearly every area of the game completely trivial, though you won't do nearly as much damage to bosses as you would with a melee weapon, to most of them anyway.
>>337132409
If you didn't like it to begin with you're not going to like it at all. SotFS didn't change it into a different game. Just some enemy remixes and some quality of life changes. It's still the same game though.
>>337136168
I hated literally every single aspect of 2. It was just bad design after bad design. I beat it, but just the once and never again. Love 1 & 3, though.
>>337113345
>Other than that, they made every room you walk into an ambush.
I found this to be really irritating after a while. An ambush is supposed to take you by surprise, but when it happens so regularly I just felt bored and annoyed.
>>337107360
I died in iron keep so many times that there were finally no enemies going towards smelter demon
