From Software The Dark Souls II Megathread™

[meanwhileInPoland]

Fuck Darklurkerwhat the fuck am i supposed to do when he and his faggy clone attack with sword at the same time? i am not going to cheese him with pyro/magic because than he is as difficult as parring Gwyn

I just noticed that Straid is voiced by the same guy who did Frampt and Kathe in DS1 Nice. Although Titchy Gren and Grandhal are probably my favourite VA.

I never really realized just how slow and clunky DaS2 feels compared to the other games until I started replaying DeS today. Enemies doing leap attacks at me and still able to block them when I press the block button just before their attack connects and just general flow of movement when attacking, walking, running, dodging etc. feels so much better in DeS. They definitely were taking major ques from Monster Hunter when they were designing the combat for DaS2.

I have character with 38 ADP and other with ADP at 4. Difference is fucking huge

 

[dunno lah]

The rolling attack was just perfect in DeS. I remember beating rolling skellies by just rolling back myself and r1ing...

 

[Kanedias]

Blocking was always instant in the other Souls games (you were considered in a blocking stance as soon as the button was pressed) while in this one there's a short animation where you raise your shield and you're not considered to be blocking until you have fully raised it (this is why it feels clunky for some people). I actually liked the change because shields were always overpowered in the Souls games, mainly Dark Souls 1. They are still overpowered now, don't get me wrong, but nerfs to blocking are always welcome in my opinion.

The other thing they did to the combat is making it slower, and making stamina management more punishing (it regens slower, and you're punished more for running out of stamina), something I also liked because it makes PvP more tactical in that it's easy to punish roll spam and r1 spammers.

What I do hate about the combat system is the fact that you can no longer aim attacks as well (in other games you could do the windup facing a certain way and then change the direction completely when performing the attack) the fact that roll attacks have a very restricted direction, and the fact that you can't go from an r2 attack to an r1. I really don't know why they changed this stuff, as they made the combat more dynamic. I wonder if the R2 -> R1 thing is a bug, there's this awkward delay before the R1 comes out and it feels very wrong.

I still prefer the combat in this game to the combat in Demon's and Dark Souls 1, but still.

 

[Hobo Elf]

I don't mind the changes to movement speed, but bare with me, they are bullshit in the context of the rest of the game. It's pretty obvious how they made it just to be blatantly unfair compared to how the enemies can move in this game. Every enemy in DaS2, even the giant hulking monsters in towering armor and weaponry, can suddenly gain cat-like agility and speed just like that, doing surreal acrobatics, footwork and swordplay.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

I dunno about cat-like agility, but it depends heavily. Anything vaguely knight-like is generally easy pickings due to how staying close allows you to easily avoid their huge attack arcs, with the exception of Ironclad Knights which remain exceptionally tough bastards throughout the game. Generally speaking the hardest change in the game is that a LOT more enemies are completely unfazed by poise damage (ie, aforementioned Ironclads, who on the other hand have unblockable attacks that are harder to dodge than most attacks), and in DaS2 a lot more encounters are against multiple enemies who CANNOT stagger (this is what I'd call plain unfair).

 

[80Maxwell08]

I dunno about cat-like agility, but it depends heavily. Anything vaguely knight-like is generally easy pickings due to how staying close allows you to easily avoid their huge attack arcs, with the exception of Ironclad Knights which remain exceptionally tough bastards throughout the game. Generally speaking the hardest change in the game is that a LOT more enemies are completely unfazed by poise damage (ie, aforementioned Ironclads, who on the other hand have unblockable attacks that are harder to dodge than most attacks), and in DaS2 a lot more encounters are against multiple enemies who CANNOT stagger (this is what I'd call plain unfair).

Agreed. Running around with that giant greatsword was only worth it to stagger just about anything but with the enemies who never get staggered it's worthless and there's so many of them.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Nah it's still worth it, but for a different reason. The issue in favour of big swords is REACH. Big swords are the best way to deal with large swarms (which are also more dangerous this time around due to poise nerf), and you are also able to get a good stab in when there's an opening for good damage (a maxed out Greatsword can deal around 900 damage to most enemies with a single R2, and leave you plenty of time to retreat or dodge afterwards).

With a Greatsword, you can keep multiple enemies at bay and kill them with relative ease, compared to say Lance weapons or Whips.

 

[80Maxwell08]

Nah it's still worth it, but for a different reason. The issue in favour of big swords is REACH. Big swords are the best way to deal with large swarms (which are also more dangerous this time around due to poise nerf), and you are also able to get a good stab in when there's an opening for good damage (a maxed out Greatsword can deal around 900 damage to most enemies with a single R2, and leave you plenty of time to retreat or dodge afterwards).

With a Greatsword, you can keep multiple enemies at bay and kill them with relative ease, compared to say Lance weapons or Whips.

Eh I had a huge amount of trouble with thlse little manikins from Earthern Peak because they were fast enough to hit before I could hit once. Died like 5 times in a row once. I'm probably going to stick with the Drangleic sword for a while and maybe alternate once I get the royal soldier ring +1 and second dragon ring.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Manikins were easy-peasy for me, the Greatsword once upgraded to a proper level can easily destroy a mob of them in two swipes. At +10 one swipe is all you need. Since the Manikins have such weak attacks most shields can easily stagger them on block.

 

[felipepepe]

Had to turn off the internet to play on NG+. There we people invading me every 5 minutes, and I was lagging so bad that it was impossible to kill anyone.

Shit was so broken that I managed to backstab a guy, take damage from his sword during the process and dying just as I smashed his head to the ground with the mace.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Beat the game in NG+ with only 1 invasion. I've heard other people report that they keep getting invaded every second and then some people, like me, never see an invasion. The online invasions don't make any sense at all.

I dunno about cat-like agility, but it depends heavily. Anything vaguely knight-like is generally easy pickings due to how staying close allows you to easily avoid their huge attack arcs, with the exception of Ironclad Knights which remain exceptionally tough bastards throughout the game. Generally speaking the hardest change in the game is that a LOT more enemies are completely unfazed by poise damage (ie, aforementioned Ironclads, who on the other hand have unblockable attacks that are harder to dodge than most attacks), and in DaS2 a lot more encounters are against multiple enemies who CANNOT stagger (this is what I'd call plain unfair).

I'm not arguing that dealing with the enemies is any more or less difficult than it is in previous games, I'm just saying that instead of giving the enemies good AI and tactics they opted to throwing more enemies at you at the same time and giving some of them speed boosters that they may or may not activate suddenly at will while taking speed away from the player. Take for instance the two giants with two handed swords you meet in the Dragon Shrine stairs, or the knights you meet in Heide. They hulk around like you'd expect them to, but then they sometimes just suddenly become very graceful, perform physics defying back steps and really fast swordplay. It's not hard to avoid, but it feels really silly if you stop to think about it.

I don't think this game is any easier or harder than past Souls games, but.. it just feels like the devs are trying to be subtly cheap on purpose. It's like they are running out of ammo to shoot at us and are almost desperately trying to come up with new ways to keep the games challenging.

 

[80Maxwell08]

I actually got invaded before I ever leveled up at the forest of giants on my sorcerer but that was only once. Everything else has been rat summons or the bell covenant invading.

 

[felipepepe]

I had only like 3 invasions outside of PvP zones during more than 40 hours of NG, but as soon as I entered NG+ I had more than 10 in the first hour.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Do you have sin? I think I heard that black phantoms have a priority of invading sinners, but who knows.

 

[Invictus]

I actualy adapted my melee playstyle for that; I would carry a good one handed sword like the longsword (good speed, recovery speed & damage) through the levels and then pull my longsword for boss battles. I like the more deliberate pacey fighting here and the spam attacks and poise damage mechanics from DS would have been really gamebreaking for this game.
I disliked the dragon shrine enemies a lot because I also felt they had better moves than the rest of the enemies (especialy the double weilding keepers) and the AI of the smaller dragon defenders was better than normal invader AI
I also played DS recently and it felt very...safe; you can raise your shield instantly, no penalties for running out of stamina and you can chainlink your attacks like Street Fighter compared with the sequel

 

[deuxhero]

And I'm pretty sure poking from behind shields is WAY better in DeS and DS. Don't think I ever used it too much in DS2 despite being a mainstray in the first 2 games.

Using a really similar build in all 3 games really shows what has changed.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Personally I think "better" AI is the last thing Souls games need if they keep the current style. The core of the gameplay is in patterns, since the AI has a huge edge in raw power and you deal with certain handicaps (in the sense that you don't have many advantages that games usually give you, spiritually it's very close to original Super Mario Bros on NES in that sense), so unless you fundamentally change the game's core you don't want too advanced AI behaviour.

I also think it's intentional, given how FROM clearly has very good grasp of advanced AI, since Verdict Day's AI designer feature did possess the means to create an AI behaviour set that's all but unbeatable to a human player. Can you imagine how hellish playing Souls against an AI that can do things like Mortal Kombat AI or Geese Howard AI from back in the day could? Not. Fun. At all.

 

[deuxhero]

Yeah, the idea that you have to fight smarter, not harder, and outwit the AI is very ingrained into the Souls series, it's why you can pull off SL1 runs without doing anything real cheesy (unlike most jRPGs where you can do a low level run and are forced to exploit broken shit and or tool assisted luck).

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

One thing I'm not sure about, but certainly feels different, is the camera. I don't know why, but it seems the camera is a LOT better when fighting huge monsters this time around. In DaS1 I often felt like it was too close and how that in turn made it more difficult to react to things, but here the only issue I've faced is that if those damn dragons start walking around their wings sometimes obscure the camera briefly. Could be enemy design being more closer to the ground level. Back in DaS1 I hated figting big enemies, especially giant fatass demons, but here a big enemy is just another thing to kill.

But yea, I'm not sure. Could be just acclimation.

 

[deuxhero]

Not sure about the camera, but having gone through as a caster I can say the lock-on is just as much a bitch, if not more, than it was in earlier games. Now if you get beyond the range you can initiate a lock on, you will lose the lock instantly. Have lost WAY too many casts due to the lock on disappearing mid cast.

 

[Kanedias]

I get invaded every second but it's because I have a ton of sin. More than 90% of my invaders are blues, and I get them in every area. If I loiter around an unsafe area for a couple of minutes it's mandatory that I'm going to be invaded by blues. Now reds....I got a couple of them, and most of them were when I was messing around in Huntsman's Copse, then never again.

One of the reasons is that red eye orbs only invade on the area you're currently in, while blue orbs target the whole world, but still reds seem to invade much less than blues. As a red, I prefer the arena much more to invasions, and our arena is free (unlike the blue one) so maybe that's it? It can't be the red eye orb netcode because I have invaded with it and I always find people instantly.

 

[Elwro]

I'm somehow managing to stay alive in NG, but no one invades me :-(

 

[Morgoth]

Not confirmed whether fake or genuine, but we shall find out soon anyway.

 

[Invictus]

SSAO? Yeah that shit is as fake as a porn star virgin
In our fucking wet dreams we would get stuff like that
Fuck the guy who made that for messing with our emotions
Edit: although a pretty damn good image forgery; look at the watermark images on the menu background and the spacing between the settings themselves...but it couldn't be could it? From doing a A+ port with all sorts of modern bells and whistles like SSAO? Especialy with the rather modest requirments they posted those AA setting seem suspicious too
I want to believe...

 

[praetor]

I don't think this game is any easier or harder than past Souls games, but.. it just feels like the devs are trying to be subtly cheap on purpose. It's like they are running out of ammo to shoot at us and are almost desperately trying to come up with new ways to keep the games challenging.

they're not even subtle about their cheapness. the mentioned Shrine Drakekeepers... the hammer wielding ones are cheap enough by themselves (if the first hit connects, the second one pretty much kills you), then the new directors decided it was a good idea to put there a sniper firing homing lightning bolts that knock you down and go through all the possible level geometry (like a shitton of other enemy ranged attacks, while we're at it). cheap? doesn't even begin to describe it. the overabundance of 1shotting enemies/bosses? cheap and lazy. i'm giving them the benefit of the doubt on hitboxes, but considering how cheap the rest of the game feels, i wouldn't be at all surprised if they were made so retarded on purpose... and one final note on their way too obvious reliance on cheapness: remember how in DaS1 you could recognize mimics visually, and even if you didn't, with decent HP and L1/R1 mashing you could survive being eaten with relative ease? now there is no visual cue, at all, you are dead instantly (at least i was @22 vig with 2nd dragon ring) and the only way to spot them is precognition or throwing talismans at every chest (and considering those are pretty rare until you can buy them infinitely from the cat in late game, it's fucking retarded)

and where's the goddamned 1.03 patch? multi fails way too often