Stormhill Evergaol fight by yours truly. I think I was at least somewhat underleveled for this so I had to play near perfectly, any 2 hits could kill me if I wasn't at full health. This enemy, the ||Crucilbe Knight||, appears to be a normal enough looking Knight guy but they have some interesting characteristics in their second phase that may be considered a spoiler.
[Link to youtube upload](https://youtu.be/MHiUOnx0hGY)
I absolutely love the combat design in this game. There are a lot of intricacies in the enemy's behaviour that don't come through just from watching, like how doggedly the knight will attempt to pursue and punish you when you try to heal, how they will interrupt that one Stomp-Swing-Double Spin Swing combo in between the first and second and the second and third part of it if you're not lined up properly, that one of the three new moves introduced into the second phase can be mixed in after most attacks so your windows for sneaking in punishes get even more limited. I imagine if I was a higher level or had better gear I could handle mixing in guard counters instead of just dodging but where I was at when I decided to take them down pretty much everything just reduced my stamina down to nothing.
@“Syzygy”#p61270 Also depends on your weapon since the hitboxes are nice and tight: the katana guard counter can sneak under a lot of downward-diagonal attacks, including that boss’s.
Oh, right. I forgot about that too. The ZWEIHANDER is perfect in many ways, but the guard counter move is far from agile. Faster and with similar damage to your various R2 moves, but not often fast enough to get away with in many circumstances.
@“Syzygy”#p61190 I would have preferred to be surprised by that
well, I have good news for you then. as I've done over and over in this thread, I used the entirely incorrect name for that weapon, it's actually called >!wakizashi!<.
@"Gaagaagiins"#p61275 I've found that true of many guard counters including my uchi. it's all timing. I saw lobosjr using a greatsword guard counter a lot, and the fact it's an overhead swing is super useful for tight spaces. right handed uchi guard counter is a diagonal sweep that I often nick walls and stuff with.
The world is just so dense with things to do, it is going to take me forever to actually progress the main line. I'm perpetually distracted by the next new thing I discover while exploring the map.
There's a place with enemies that have similar armor and stuff about her.
||Shadowed Castle, way up North in the valley between the Volcano and the Plateus. Theres a portait of her on a wall there, at the grace following the big boss of the area. I've been paying zero attention to the lore and story stuff so far, so there's probably more about her there.||
@“Herb”#p61441 Oh I‘ve already been there and done that, plus they also spawn up in the >!heart of the scarlet rot swamp!!< I love anything having to do with those guys. Extremely low drop rate, I’ve had just the helmet now for most of the game! But again it‘s male oriented armor, hers appears to be the only female-bodied-designed armor I’ve seen so far.
I‘ve taken a three day break now so that I enjoy the game more when I do play it. I was going way too hard, honestly, and was already 55 hours deep.
@“Syzygy”#p61362 I was wondering about that. I said before I’d gotten to the capital and stuff, but mainly I “broke sequence” to get there because I looked up an armor an NPC was wearing and saw it‘s in some place called the “manor” in the capital, and without knowing which building that is, died over and over in the capital trying to find it, probably gated by a boss as well, so I gave up on it for now. I’m so interested in late-game stuff though, because I‘ve seen plenty of the first three areas now, and the other areas seem to be shrouded in secrecy still.
In the meantime, even though I’m taking a break from playing, I‘m watching lobosjr’s first playthrough at 1.75x speed, and making a sigh checklist of stuff I missed and want to do.
@“treefroggy”#p61358 good luck getting that set. I won‘t spoil but I’ll just warn you it doesn't come easy.
Beat the game last night. Great stuff, best open world in a videogame by miles, but I think the story is a bit of a clusterfuck of different mish mashes of ideas from the earlier games and doesn't feel distinct or cohesive. Part of the problem is the sheer scale of variety of locations and things to find. It's a bit charcuterie-ish.
I must have good drop luck I guess. I have the helmet and pants and have killed maybe 5-6 of those. Equipment means nothing to me though, outside of weight. Pendant pouches are the only things that make a difference for me. I‘ve spent the whole game wanting a new katana, then a bit ago I discovered I’d been carrying a katana for a little while. I thought it was a wand. It actually seems so absurdly good that I don't even want to use it. This late in the game I sorta like the idea of beating the entire game with the starter weapon. I just need to finish the final boss now.
@“Herb”#p61529 dang, I have farmed them in both locations and didn‘t get any of that. If you’re on PC you can come drop them for me
And yeah these games are balanced that starter weapons are always viable while upgraded. Legendary and Magical weapons aren't necessarily better, but have cool abilities. Also, uchigatana has always been one of the versatile, viable weapons since demons souls. It has always been available shortly after beginning the game, with some work / secret required to get it. This is the first time they’ve had a starter class carry the uchi.
@“treefroggy”#p61539 I didn‘t even realize that transferring items was a thing. Yeah, I don’t mind if it‘s not an ordeal you can have them. I guess if anyone else has stuff they’re seeking I might be able to help. Specifically,I found a ton of neat helms and great swords for w/e reason.
This just adds to the impressive list of mechanics I managed to play through ignorant to. I saw that guard counters is a mechanic? I thought that sound effect from shielded enemies was just the game being nice and giving me a bailout window from their parry counters. At about the 98% marker in the game I got a tutorial for a mechanic I'd never seen, that was hilarious to me.
Yeah, that's the feeling I've gotten about the weapons from these games. At least the katanas, because those are the only things I've really used. I completed DS1 I believe I played through most all of DS2. I played through each of those with katanas I acquired early on for all or most of those games as well. I like that as a design choice a lot.
uh progress report from 8 hours into the game here…last night i got into stormveil but not into the castle proper, just basically ran around a lot. i killed the || tutorial invader outside the locked fort and got the invasion finger thing ||. the highlight of my session was activating the bloodstains on then very narrow cliff that hugs the edge of the fort and watching people try to walk the cliff by hugging the wall, then falling and dying lol
i gotta check my instincts and stop just running around aimlessly. i want to explore but i never find anything that makes it feel like it was worth two hours of "let me just see what's over there"
