From Software The Dark Souls II Megathread™

[Blaine]

His moves are so slow and telegraphed that even someone's blind grandmother could easily dodge them all, except you have to be supremely vigilant for his rarely-used follow-up attacks. If you brainlessly spam attacks after every single swing, you gonna die. (Unless you're sniping him with a bow from the battlement beside the head, in which case spamming works just fine, provided you don't exceed the time limit.)

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

His moves are so slow and telegraphed that even someone's blind grandmother could easily dodge them all, except you have to be supremely vigilant for his rarely-used follow-up attacks. If you brainlessly spam attacks after every single swing, you gonna die. (Unless you're sniping him with a bow from the battlement beside the head, in which case spamming works just fine, provided you don't exceed the time limit.)

Also if you attack his legs he likes to do this bullshit instant kill attack that you can't see because he's big and because the camera in DS2 hates you.
The safest way to fight him melee I found is to just do hit and run attacks, but that's boring and takes too long in a fight where you have a time limit.

In short - shitty, boring boss.

 

[Blaine]

Hell, the camera gets in the way of seeing smaller giants' attack telegraphs. I can never fucking tell what the dual stone club wielders are doing at melee range; it's just a shaking mass of rock texture.

Here I am back in Sunken King. I was sure I was going to die, but wouldn't you know it, all of these retards ran into the pits while I was busy destroying their statues. The last one did his "X dash" power attack right off into oblivion.

 

[cvv]

God I hated them ghosty fuckers. One of the most taxing sections in any Souls game.

 

[Hyperion]

God I hated them ghosty fuckers. One of the most taxing sections in any Souls game.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

God I hated them ghosty fuckers. One of the most taxing sections in any Souls game.

Eh, New Londo was worse.
For one thing, the Sanctum fuckers don't phase through walls, and if you can destroy their statue they just become a normal mob.
The ghosts in New Londo are always wallhacking assholes. 24/7. You can't even make them extinct because DS1 doesn't have the spawn limit mechanic.

 

[Blaine]

Killing stuff to death is cheE-Z anyway.

The only places it's legit are when there are enemies along the path to a merchant, because that's gay (and eventually you'll probably despawn them one way or another). Ornifex and Magerold are the worst offenders.

I did do it once on purpose in the first furnace area of Iron Keep to ensure I could re-attempt the hotfoot chests. Turned out I didn't really need to and I was lucky enough to grab them all the first time through.

 

[Blaine]

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[CthuluIsSpy]

What's that shield? I don't recognize it.
On another note, I tried using the halberd. Its a really good weapon. I'm just loving the two handed move set.
Its so satisfying to just hit a guy with it.

 

[Blaine]

It's the Throne Defender's Shield, the overall best general-use standard shield in the game. It has 100% physical reduction, tops out at 65 stability (exceeded only by the Old Knight Shield which tops out at 68), and has quite high elemental and status resists also.

Speaking of shields, the obnoxiousness of executing guard breaks at 60 FPS instead of the 30 FPS they designed the game's programming around continues to infuriate me. Instead of having 400ms to enter the combo, which is just right, you have 200ms, AKA 1/5th of a second. The stick must be tilted all the way forward at the same time R1 is pressed. I can do it consistently when practicing, but not during combat. I tried using Steam's Big Picture to customize the Xbone controller, and that worked when I reassigned one of the middle controller buttons to a macro of the keyboard combo for guard break, but then the controller's haptics are a bit screwed up without fine-tuning (D-pad input errors and doubling, etc.), so I gave up on it.

The Drakeblood Knights are a massive pain in the ass without being able to do guard breaks properly, because the equipment I tend to use is pants for parrying fast attacks and they themselves spam guard breaks just like phantoms.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Huh, I don't have that much problem performing breaks myself. I use KB though.
Drakeblood knights use shields? They always go twohanded when I fight them.


You know...seeing Codex turn KB + M into KB is strangely amusing.

 

[Blaine]

You play Dark Souls with the keyboard and mouse? Damn, dude.

Yeah, on keyboard you simply have to press two keys simultaneously. It's quite easy.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

I don't know why everyone acts odd about it. The DS2 KB+ M controls are actually pretty solid, you just have to configure them a little. It only really feels awkward if you try to dual wield with my DS1 styled set up (light right hand attack = left click, strong right hand = right click, light left hand = shift, strong right hand = tab), and even then its not too bad.
It's DS1 that has shitty default KB+ M controls, but there's a third party fix for that.

 

[Blaine]

I don't know why everyone acts odd about it. The DS2 KB+ M controls are actually pretty solid, you just have to configure them a little. It only really feels awkward if you try to dual wield with my DS1 styled set up (light right hand attack = left click, strong right hand = right click, light left hand = shift, strong right hand = tab), and even then its not too bad.
It's DS1 that has shitty default KB+ M controls, but there's a third party fix for that.

The gamepad provides omnidirectional movement controls that are range-of-motion sensitive (more tilt = more speed), allowing for granular character control, and also independent and simultaneous camera control. Keyboards keys are restricted in their directionality and have no movement granularity (although a few prototypes with pressure-sensitive WASD are starting to appear), and the mouse is typically used partly for directional control to make up for the shortcomings of WASD(QE), greatly reducing its utility as a camera controller. On their own, mice are enormously superior to a single analog stick for controlling the camera.

That isn't an issue in games properly designed for use with a mouse and keyboard, but Japanese games rarely are, alongside oddities like GTA and anything that includes driving vehicles, since WASD only allows you to essentially bottom out the wheel to the left or right.

Stuff like free-aim attacking in a specific direction is surely going to be a bit more difficult with M+K.

I've looked at the keyboard controls in DS2 and they only allow a limited selection of pre-programmed key bindings, like this:

What, I can't rebind Use Item to 1? Fuck off, Fromplebs. I've also widely read the advice that you should disable double-clicking if playing M+K, otherwise there'll be input lag (for fairly obvious reasons). That's more of their restricted bogus-ass keybindings to mess around with.

Still, if you say the keyboard controls are okay, I'll give them a try.

 

[Suicidal]

Can someone explain why so many DS fans seem to hate this game? I'm playing it right now and It's literally more of the same except at least now monsters run at you when you shoot them with a bow and don't fall of cliffs and bosses take more than a couple of sword combos to kill.

 

[Excidium II]

I played for about 9 hours wondering where I missed getting an orange soapstone. Damn game should communicate changes better.

Can someone explain why so many DS fans seem to hate this game? I'm playing it right now and It's literally more of the same except at least now monsters run at you when you shoot them with a bow and don't fall of cliffs and bosses take more than a couple of sword combos to kill.

It also has a much better stats and item upgrade systems. I think a lot of hate comes from past issues + bandwagoning.

 

[Blaine]

People also tend to say that DS2 "doesn't have a unified/fully interconnected world/level design" or something, which I suppose is true, since basically you tend to take an elevator or tunnel to reach a completely different area with a very different theme. It's a lot like Super Mario 64 that way. On the other hand, I've also seen people complain that DS3 seemingly (but probably not actually) has about two unique tile sets: poison woods and creepy castle, and also that every shortcut leads back to the last bonfire from fifteen minutes ago.

People did like the more unified theme of DS1 and the fact you could often see where you were going in the distance and where you came from. I think there's something to be said for more variety in level theme, though. Plus, who wants to look back into the distance at the place they were just raped, and ahead into the distance toward the next place they're going to be raped?

They also complain there are too many weapons with same-y move sets. I can sort of agree with that. There are a fuckton of weapons in DS2, and scrolling through them all if you're a collector is like playing a damn slot machine. Again though, variety is nice.

There's also no Red Eye Orb item in DS2, unlike in DS1 and DS3. If you run out of Cracked Red Eye Orbs, presumably you have to farm more, which is p. gay.

 

[Excidium II]

It's not interconnected but feels bigger and more open early on so far.

They also complain there are too many weapons with same-y move sets. I can sort of agree with that. There are a fuckton of weapons in DS2, and scrolling through them all if you're a collector is like playing a damn slot machine. Again though, variety is nice.

People love fashion souls but complain about model variety, go figure.

 

[Blaine]

I don't think you can upgrade armor in DS3, so in that sense you have more freedom to mix 'n' match without (slightly) gimping yourself in the process or having to run off and farm a bunch of shit.

I say "slightly" because after a certain point, even the heaviest armor might as well be made out of tissue paper. That's why my favorite set is now the Llewellyn Set. It's extremely light while still offering very good protection. It'll shave a helpful several dozen points of damage off of mook attacks or low-damage rapid attacks, while not weighing you down during fights with NG++ heavy-hitters who do 900+ damage per hit anyway, which would be reduced to a "mere" 775 damage or so with fully upgraded Havel's and Ring of Iron Protection +2.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Yeah, you have to go open the option menu every time you start up the game, because the damn thing can't seem to remember that you want double clicking disabled.
After you get the hang of that though its certainly functional, and I did beat the game with KB+ M after all.
I didn't have much difficulty free aiming with the mouse either, though it does seem pretty sensitive.

I should probably use a controller one day, just to compare. Too lazy to plug it up and fiddle with it though.

 

[Multidirectional]

That's why my favorite set is now the Llewellyn Set. It's extremely light while still offering very good protection.

Yep, it's the one I always go for now, usually sticking with Wanderer's set until then. They are both really good looking sets too, especially Llewellyn, and faster stamina regen with longer rolls is just much better defense in this game than higher armor values can provide. Hell I never even use shields since my second char.

 

[Timeslip]

Can anyone recommend a good med/heavy shield & armour I can get fairly early in the game, so can start upgrading my final equipment? Doesn't have to be the best, but close to it would be good. Am at no man's wharf, currently using the dranglec armour and a kite shield.

Going for a quality build. Liked the longsword of DS1, so will likely go for sun sword, and would like to be able to block heavy attacks and not fat roll. For shield, considering dragon rider greatshield. In DS 1, used Black Iron Armour, and really liked it. Any recommendations for something similarly heavy, but not super heavy I won't have to wait for the end of the game to get?

 

[Orma]

You can go with the flow and choose vengarl set or heide set.
But that's what every noob wears (drangleic too, although not as common) so people will laugh at you in pvp/coop.

Alternatively you can buy the lost sinner set from maughlin (after you kill her obviously), it's light and has great defences if you do't mind the ragged looks.

 

[Blaine]

Can anyone recommend a good med/heavy shield & armour I can get fairly early in the game, so can start upgrading my final equipment? Doesn't have to be the best, but close to it would be good. Am at no man's wharf, currently using the dranglec armour and a kite shield.

You just named the best medium/heavy set you can get that early. It's definitely the Drangleic set. Before too much longer you'll have enough Twinkling Titanite to upgrade it to your heart's content, and you can get the helmet near the end of the game (it looks like shit IMO, feel free to skip it).

On the lighter side of medium, you've got the Elite Knight and Alva sets, which both look knightly, can simply be bought from Maughlin after spending 1k/16k souls at his shop, and upgrade with regular Titanite.

Halfway between those sets and (full) Drangleic in terms of weight and protection is the iconic Faraam set, which you'll get about halfway through the game. I used that for a while. The Heide Knight set is very comparable to Faraam, is very DEUS VULT with the standard helm and there's an alternate one available in the Gutter, but you have to farm it. Not recommended until you have a decent "farming set." Both of these also upgrade with regular Titanite.

The Throne Watcher set is arguably the coolest heavier-side-of-medium armor, since it's clearly inspired by Griffith's armor from Berserk; but it's comparable to the Faraam and Heide sets stat-wise, you only get it at the end of the base game, it costs a lot of souls, and it's upgraded with Twinkling Titanite.

Like we've all just been saying though, once you hit the really hard stuff you might as well wear some lighter shit anyway, so bear that in mind.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Can someone explain why so many DS fans seem to hate this game? I'm playing it right now and It's literally more of the same except at least now monsters run at you when you shoot them with a bow and don't fall of cliffs and bosses take more than a couple of sword combos to kill.

In terms of base mechanics DS2 is certainly superior to DS1, however where it falters is the world design (highly inconsistant and tends to feel like a bunch of concepts mashed together than a coherent area that makes since), weaker lore (again, fairly inconsistent and doesn't really connect to the previous souls series. Any connection comes across more as an after thought than something they put thought into), and of course, the sheer amount of tedious bullshit that passes for difficulty (let's see, you have the exploding mummies who one shot you that of course is next to a merchant, the chests you can't get to without dying in Iron Keep, the fuck your equipment tunnel in Shrine of Amana, the long ass bridge in the throne of want that of course you have to wait for that fucking door to open to get to)

Really, the only areas that came across as bullshit in DS1 was New Londo and Lost Izalith, and one of those was due to them running out of time and ideas. In DS2, you come across stuff like that earlier and more often, which means they started running out of ideas earlier in development.

Don't get me wrong, its not a bad game and I do like some of the changes, but I totally understand why people are disappointed with it.