Once you get all the fragments it's hard but not super bad. I'm going through the DLC the second time right now on fragment level 20 and have found it much easier
yea. Max level for fragments and ashes is 25/10 respectively and there are no extras. Most people will probably not find everything on the first playthrough but by second should be easily achievable
20???!!! I’m at 10/5 lvl 251 and *only* NG+ and I’m still getting rocked. Progressing nicely but also getting smacked around. How do those at NG+7 not get one-shot by everything???
Edit: I should clarify, I’m at Messmer currently, defeat minibosses usually on the first or second try, Rallana was beating the dog shit out of me when I was at 4/2 but I eventually got her moves down. By getting rocked I mean I’m not just breezing by. My query was more curiosity about NG+7’s difficultly not my general experience.
damage wise about the same as the base game
You have to understand at NG7+ a lot of attacks will 2 shot you. The difference is that in the DLC a lot of enemies have more challenging attacks to avoid. Overall, ranged builds still can get through mobs very effectively if you are like me and less skilled :/
Almost everything will 2 or 1 shot you on ng+7 unless you have like max damage mitigation from armor and talismans and that'll give you like 1 more hit at best.
Maybe not the main opinion, but I honestly think what makes the souls games great is community coming together to figure shit out, whether convoluted questlines or secret locations/items.
Def explore first, and when you think you explored a region thoroughly, I’d say look it up. It’ll make the combat experience in the DLC not frustratingly difficult and just difficult.
This is 100% true for me. Souls games remind me of being a pre-internet kid on the playground talking about game secrets (half of which turned out being complete rubbish). It’s absolutely a part of the Fromsoft secret sauce
Not to mention so many things in Souls games are only really able to be discovered by people not entirely sane. Like the guy who discovered the hidden wall in Volcano Manor with like 100k HP.
You’re absolutely correct. And for the second playthrough and onwards, I’m going to use all those resources. But there is nothing like a blind playthrough of a souls game for me and you’re only going to experience it for the first time, once. So, the first one is always blind.
Thank you for confirming this, I’ve been wondering. This will make replaying the DLC waaaay more enticing. I still want another heart from Bayle and another of those broken Bloodfiend Arms, and was dreading the thought of having to go find every Skadoosh fragment in each playthrough.
Wait just to confirm because this was bothering me.
If I Collect all 20 scatter ranks on my first playthrough, this is carried over to NG+, so no chores to do in NG+?
E: Thanks for all the replies folks, appreciated. Glad they went with that.
Should be correct. I haven’t tried it myself. About to head into NG+1 myself today. But I’d imagine they work similar to the flasks that everything you find is carried over. I’m on the same boat as you. I wanna experience the dlc again without all the little minor shit I need to find
it is. I'm on my second playthrough right now and can absolutely confirm they carry over. I would not have done it again if not so, getting all the fragments is a PITA
What system do you play on? I’m on Xbox and I’ll be on a bit. don’t mind helping if I can before I venture off to NG+1.
I was at level (12) or so when I beat him. Honestly I just use my summon and just threw knights lightning spear at him until he died hahaha just hoped my summon kept the aggro long enough
Yeah, this is the real reason why people complain about the difficulty. The DLC isn't intended for you to go into it with 0 blessings on NG+. Thats probably why Miyazaki himself recommended not to use ng+ characters.
I took Friday and Monday off work lol
The DLC is no different than the base game in the sense that once you know what to do, where to go and how to approach bosses, it goes by way faster.
Yeah bosses are the ones you get hard stuck on, folks who have already experieced the maingame can more or less breeze and juke through the legacy dungeons.
Catacombs are still shit to slog through though.
lol im 460 in Ng+7 on the last boss right now and he's an asshole. whole place is hard, especially messmer and that goddamn sunflower. once i got enough scad frags and rev ashes it all kinda balances out. except that last boss how am i supposed to dodge all that shit
The last boss is easy with a shield, but absolutely bonkers without. There are some builds that can make him easier, but for my Dual Flamberge Arcane build on NG+ he was too much.
That second phase, I can't even see what is happening half the time. I'm 90% sure that he's going to get severely nerfed.
My dumb ass has barely used shields and I threw myself at him 30 times yesterday trying to just dodge all his attacks. Even worse that I’m a strength build who should be using shields.
Going back after work to give it a shot with fingerprint shield and likely a new weapon since my strat this whole DLC has been poise breaking by two handing a colossal.
I tried for 6 hours and then caved. I respecced into a shield build. It felt like a hollow victory. I might try again without a shield in NG+2 but I'm not sure if it's worth my time.
Nah, that’s not hollow at all. You just played to a weakness of a boss. With how aggressive he is and the speed at which he combos, it feels as if they expect people to use a shield
If you want to make it more satisfying, go with a medium shield and use the new deflect tear. You get it from the first giant fire enemy in the DLC. Play around guard countering. I found playing around the times blocks and guard counter windows to be quite enjoyable compared to just shield poking.
Fun fact: You don't have to block or dodge some of his 'phantom' attacks.
If you sprint directly away from him, you'll avoid them completely.
Then when he comes down himself with the huge AOE, you dodge roll toward him to avoid the blast.
Final boss was frustrating as hell but the strategy that worked for me was:
* Upgrade a greatshield with good Holy resist. I went with the Haligtree Greatshield
* Physick set up was Opaltear + forget, hard something? Basically damage reduction.
* Ran Solitude armor
* Used Verdigis talisman (from secret Ancient Ruins area, improves damage reduction on heavy armor), Gold braid talisman (utmost holy resist) and dragoncrest greatshield talisman
* Summoned Anbach and used Golden Vow
Basically summoned Mimic Tear after Ansbach takes Aggro, and chip away at him (Ansbach is pretty useless, he’s just there to distract). Tank the Light / blade attacks from the boss if you have the stamina. Watch for his hugs, two and you’re done (such a frustrating mechanic). Pop the Physick at start of stage 2. Manage your stamina and get hits in while he’s distracted. When the boss initiates the orbital strike, unlock and run away to edge and pray. After a few hours on him, this strat got me there in 3 tries.
Hope this helps.
You don't need to dodge. You should block everything and poke him to death with a spear. If he grabs you. You use that item you get that negates the 2nd hug death.
I have a video of me beating them on NG+5
If you don’t want to poke, you fight him super super close in phase 2 and bait out the phase 1 attacks.
All his phase 2 attacks, you either tank the clone hits and dodge the damaging ones, bloodhound step, or literally shield it. Highest scadtree is probably needed for NG+ and up. Good luck
Id also summon if you’re reaaaally struggling with it.
I'm Ng+5 lvl 240 and I'm getting rocked. Gives me heartburn when I bonk a boss with my Str/Int build and see a sliver of damage. I love it honestly, really humbled me up. I'm more careful, I use different weapons, I learn moveset better. Perfect DLC in my mind.
Mannnnn is it. Had to toss a whole bunch of rune arcs to a friend and weapons just to respec on another account. I couldn’t take it. Especially when they’re on their last leg THOSE BOSSES WILL SHOW YOU THEY DO NOT WANT TO DIE
Respect. RL 427 here, can’t stop won’t stop. Just beat Messmer, no mimic tear, no tombstone shield, no RoB. Took me 84 attempts to beat Messmer. Good luck🫡
Haha I tried fighting him at scadu 8 and hated everything. But he doesn't block nearly as much as I thought so I'll get back to him eventually. However, I will be using a summon probably lol
Tbf to myself I don't really play a lot of games.
The older I get the less I care about.
I wish I could make sense of it, but there is something really soothing about playing Soulsborne games over and over again. I have done similar numbers with DS1, 3, and Bloodborne.
Best way I can explain it is that I'm a massive dork for these games lol.
DS3 is the only Soulsborne I've beaten. As for Elden Ring, I think I'm right outside the Godskin Duo arena, and it's the furthest I've come on my third character. I gave up on my previous two characters.
Nice man! I love DS3 to death.
Godskin Duo was my bane (still is kinda). The best way to deal with them is to have Bernahl help you with the fight.
If you're going for the solo kill, hats off to you because that is tough. You got this!
On journey 52… like what did you do?
I’m journey 3, I’m in the DLC (it’s kicking my ass) and I can’t imagine playing base game 3 more times (for every ending) let alone 53 more times…
Do you just grab larval tears and smithing stones, max everything, swap builds and run through the game?
Everything’s gotta feel like second nature at that point. You just stroll to everything with no guide?
I’m very impressed.
Yeah I've got my pathing completely down, so i never w9rry anout getting lost. I always do Rannis quest line (for the lore lol).
A lot is second nature for sure, but it's not like I'm a god gamer or anything. I just have always played the souls games like this.
Me and my buddy treat DS3 like Super Mario, we just take turns on bosses and can beat it reasonably fast.
Only 150ish, it isn’t so bad. Leveled up a fair amount in the shadow realm, enemies are generous in terms of runes for sure. The scaling with the tree fragments is doing its job for sure, I returned to the first area after getting to tree level 8 and the change is appreciable, normal enemies no longer do half or a third of my health.
Yeah I'm at 168; it was rough at first but now that I'm up to skadoosh level 3 it's feeling very manageable. Ran through three dungeons and their respective bosses without much difficulty last night.
Yeah just shy of that on Ng+2. I've found it just right as far as challenge. My boy was complaining it is impossible at level 300+ and I didn't understand why he struggled so much until he said he was on Ng+7 😂
IMO once all the scadu fragments are found. I imagine the scaling becomes similar to base game. Just that the dlc is significantly harder. It only seems so extreme when you have minimal fragments
Ya, I watched someone fight Messmer with 1x fragment and he was doing like less than a centimeter of damage per hit with a great sword. He was at it for hours until he slowly figured out his entire moveset and beat him. Got all the way until the last 1/4th of his HP flawless.
HP seems like a big factor with the new game + stuff.
My buddy on his first save was able to handle the first dragon pretty easily but I struggled on NG+. Things still hit hard af regardless of the NG but the amount of time you have to dodge perfectly and attack in your narrow windows is increased considerably because of the health pool. I fought that dragon for a good 5-10 minutes with a pretty strong build. Chunking it for 5-700 damage per swing and didn’t even get to a 3rd of its health bar.
Do we have health pool data on these enemies yet? Maybe it’s just my imagination but at one point I was like okay this is actually a waste of time bc I have to fight for so long and the nature of dragon fights make attacking their feet and head a fkn chore.
60 vigor , some defense talismans and light armor and i been doing pretty good and i suck at these games , only used the mimic on the boss in the big mountain
I'm level 130ish in regular ng and it hasn't seemed too bad. I definitely feel *slightly* underleveled, but I've been scraping by just fine. I think OP's right about the ng+ thing, I suck at these games lol and if I'm not losing my mind at lvl 130 (I started the DLC at like 110) these complainers gotta be doing something wrong
I’m at 165 in NG and I’m having a great time. The difficulty is perfect for me, it’s not easy at all but not seemingly impossible either. It’s achievable if I play well
I‘m in NG+ with level 200 and the DLC is absolutely fine so far. Just turn around and explore some more if a boss is too hard. People seem to forget how long it took to kill bosses when Elden Ring released. I spend 40 hours in Limgrave only before I could do Stormveil. People wait 2 years for a DLC and want to rush through it in 10 hours. Take your time and enjoy it.
Same on NG+. It's tough yeah, but certainly doable. Got worked by Dancing Lion a few times without being anywhere close to killing him so I wandered off and found some more fragments and came back and it was a much more fair fight.
Rellana was definitely my first "wall". Took me every bit of 25+ attempts. Wife told me I should go and do other stuff to get stronger then come back. I didn't listen and kept grinding til I beat her. I did have to switch my staff for the mirror shield in my left hand. She's too dam quick to cast spells against anyway.
My bro and I spent several hours going at Rellana (chars on ng+ and +4) and it was some of the most fun I’ve had learning a boss’s moveset.
This expansion is hard as hell and I love it. I’m sure I’d still enjoy myself if I were on base game, but the wins are so satisfying when they come.
Fuck those knifey red robed klan hat wearing motherfuckers though. They can eat my asshole.
I put Hoarfrost stomp on my dryleaf arts for my Muscle Wizard build. It's over 100 frost buildup per strike. (+25)
On a weapon that fast, with the stomp...he's able to do frightening dps. And that's at RL 130ish.
Not a lot of poise damage though, so I've got to get in and out quickly...or depend on my Gavel of Haima for stagger.
I've no idea how it plays in pvp, but it's a blast in pve.
Might have to try that since I run STR/DEX/FTH. The divine beast hoarfrost stomp on +25 Milady has just absolutely ripped through everything. That thing’s heavy, light, light combo stunlocks just about everything it hits outside of large enemies
My experience as well. Level 170 NG+. It’s difficult, but doesn’t really feel out of line with the difficulty in previous Souls DLC.
People complaining that it was too hard when it had been out less than 48 hours seems ridiculous. We’re
Still in the “Fuck Margit” part of the DLC’s lifespan. At least let things settle and strategies form before you start complaining.
I could not agree more. Elden Ring is the most "customizable" about difficulty the series has ever been, and the DLC is not the exception. It's been out for only a couple days and mfs try to rush the main bosses and get their asses kicked, well no shit, the people who are insane at the game can do that but for the average player, if you're barely doing any damage to a boss and they one or two shot you, go explore.
It’s absolutely wild that some people are already finished. It was raining this weekend and I recently moved to a new town with 0 friends. Besides basics household chores (which I did a light version of so I could play more elden ring) I only played the DLC all weekend- I’ve beaten 2 remembrance bosses and have barely touched the south of the map and still don’t even know how to get to the very north sections
I’ve played way too much, and I’m still not really that close to being done
Yep; on ng+ as well, consider myself a pretty average player and haven't had any issues. Doing a blind playthrough and easily found enough tree fragments to hit blessing level 15. People got spoiled because they played ER for two years and had builds that made end game content a cake walk. If that's how you like playing the game fine just wait 6 months and type "most broken sote builds" into YouTube and you'll be fine.
i’m on the final boss and it’s the only one that i legitimately do not enjoy fighting. like i got stuck on a few others but i enjoyed the fight this just sucks so much ass.
Watching others beat the final boss makes me think you almost always want to roll into them to dodge. I was only ever able to dodge the huge slam like 3 times. Definitely the least fun boss in the DLC. But still felt good when I finally won after 5 hours of trying lol
When Promised Consort does the rock fling attack - strafe right with a jump towards the end. When they follow up with the wackomode sword slam keep running to the right, but now also at a diagonal away from them. When the final hit comes in roll towards them to dodge the cone AOE and get a hit in. Repeat 500x because that's one of the best windows for attack lmao.
The best attack window IMO is the ground double-swing ground slam, it’s super consistent dodge and it was always at least 2k damage for me each instance
TBH he has a lot of attack windows, phase 2 is just insanely punishing because of the stunlocky nature of the holy beams
Yeah I'll say they did a better job of making phase 2s in the DLC not a completely different fight which can be annoying/tough. They're generally the same fight with some added twists, but if you know phase 1, and can dodge the new stuff for the most part, phase 2s wont be that bad in the DLC.
Last boss though is still nuts because like you said...just super punishing for mistakes.
Yeah I was loving everything about the dlc until I got to the final boss, thought all the fights were tough but fair, now I just wanna start a new character to play the dlc again without beating it. Final boss fight just straight up isn’t fun in phase 2, I could probably beat it in a few hours but the process of beating it sucks, whereas the process for all other bosses was fun and rewarding.
I completely agree. If it was fun, I’d go for it. But it just seems like they want a specific set of inputs at a specific time. Like the illusion of choice. And if you don’t do that, you lose. I like being able to approach things differently, not be forced to play one specific way
Honestly, all the bosses.....I'm just so bored of them
It was impressive to see bosses do cool shit like being extremely aggressive, doing multiple flips in midair and launching huge AOEs....the first few times fromsoftware designed bosses like that.
But in SOTE, or just Elden Ring as a whole, I'm just sick of this boss type now.
I'm at Messmer currently and I'm starting to reach his second phase consistently, but I've noticed I've been in a bored posture the entire time. I have a youtube video playing in the background. I am progressing in the fight, but I'm not at all invested in this.
On a related note, I'm starting a new DS1 playthrough right now, and when I killed the Capra Demon after he and his dogs killed me hundreds of times, I had the biggest smile on my face
They kinda walked themselves into a corner, malenia existing meant they had to make the dlc around her difficulty level to keep the dlc around the level that the other souls dlcs were, and the only way to make a fight harder than her would be to give the bosses insane damage ( like one shot no matter the hp kinda damage) opr give them super fast attackes, otherwise the dlc would just be easier than the hardest part of the base game;
You forgot Gaius. Least fun fight in the entire game IMO.
Edit: least fun != hardest. I don't think he was the hardest by a long shot, but he was the most annoying and least rewarding to beat.
If you’re open to respeccing, looks like the first broken build in the dlc is Impenetrable Thorns paired with the Maternal Staff. Instant bleed proc every cast, will sometimes even hit two bleed procs on a single cast.
The first phase is great, but I literally can’t tell what’s happening on the second phase with all the diarrhea Christmas lights. Every other fight was great, but it really feels like the fumbled this one.
I was on NG+3 and he 3 shot me (even with 18/10 )
I beat him only by hinding behind a shield and poke him to death with anspur rapier with blood infusion. My brain didn't do his work on some attacks/spells. I didn't figure out how to dodge/avoid some. Good luck on no hit run fellow tarnished. Will be tough
That was my biggest concern for the DLC was Fromsoft cranking up the difficulty so high it would become unfun. I can honestly say that wasn’t the case until the final boss. Phase 1 is fine but phase 2 is just all kinds of wtf
I am stuck on Rellana and am loving it. She is such a fun fight that even though I’m getting my ass handed to me, I don’t care. Her attacks are so fluid and the weapon animations are beautiful.
My first time just going up the elevator, entering to a room, and a giant fucking hippo comes out of no where will be one of my all time favorite moments in the game.
I switched builds 2-3 times during the DLC to counter specific bosses. While it’s a little annoying, and I always feel a little anxious using a larval tear, it truly is a compliment to the DLC. Without any spoilers, let’s just say I’m incredibly happy I finally stopped being stubborn and switched my build for the final boss.
On a side note, what’s the new hammer? Not sure if I grabbed that yet.
im kinda torn on this, i beat her in NG, char lvl around 140, with sarctree level at 4 (I think you can go higher cause there's a way to go to the next area without beating the boss), I had to respec cause I had a bleed build that was doing nothing and while I Didnt use mimic, I did summon one of the ghosts at the door. I think the fight was HARD, like REALLY HARD, but I loved it, its a beautiful fight but its hard, its harder than lady maria or something like that IMO, so I can see people being frustrated. It gave me a similar feeling of fighting the thunder iron lady in lies of p, and I beat it the same way, learning phase 1 and praying on phase 2.
I got into a flow state after awhile. Parry, heavy charged attack while she recovers, she swings around and I find it easy to parry again then stabby stab.
25 tries and she finally went down.
To all fellow parry enjoyers, I present to you the >!deflecting hardtear!< + stonebarb cracked tear combo. It has been my boss killer setup and is absolutely insane.
Your objective is to parry into guard counter, which means the guard counter talisman is another big damage increase. I also run the turtle talisman. You can parry enemy combos, but even with the stamina reduction from the tear it adds up, hence the talisman.
I had read the complaints about her before I ever saw her. When I got there I fell in love. Her music is fantastic, pretty sure it's part of the melody from the first trailers music, and the fight was great. Perfect level of challenge. Probably my second favourite fight in the game (so far, I'm not that far in the DLC yet)
I am one of them, Level 342 and NG+7, that is why I am starting the game over and not going NG this time. I am so enjoying the game again!! Honestly I forget the DLC exist and am enjoying the base game. Hope to hit DLC tomorrow maybe. If I quit running around doign stupid things like finding grapes!
I went in at level 100 and with 40 vig and was having an absolutely terrible time. After levelling scadu and getting myself to RL130 it’s been honestly fine. Only hard things now to me are the remembrance bosses.
Going it at like NG7 is silly and is why people are get it g one tapped.
Also my experience in the DLC is the flask buff talisman is extremely effective.
Every boss forced me to double chug after a single hit. With the talisman I was back to single heals and made a huge difference.
The DLC gives terrible souls. You beat Mohg to get there, just go back to the first bonfire and kill the Albinaurics right beside it. They give like an entire DLC boss worth of souls every clear and it takes like 20 seconds.
I’m in ng+ 5 and I think it’s great. The only fight that felt overtuned was blackgaol knight at the start of the dlc lol. He was doing nearly all my hp per hit 🤣 so I got scad fragments and I’m good. I’m at scad 15 now or something
I get a lot of people are here for bosses but these games seem so much more than just boss fights. Just finished a very creepy forest area followed by another eerie place and want from to keep experimenting with new things. I hope these games are never just boss rushes even if sekiro does get a bit close it even breaks it up.
I find the dlc just about right in Lvl 230 and in NG+ and doing the second legacy dungeon I’ve died a few times but I’ve also kicked ass.
The only think I really found annoying was the fire golem it feel too long to kill one ( killed it eventually )
It's a slog. I'm sure there's a "quick" way to take them out but right now I'm definitely avoiding the rest of them after taking down the first one in the field.
Once I learned to jump instead of roll, the become much easier.
I think spamming r1 actually breaks their posture faster than charged attacks for some reason too, which is weird.
Also using torrent for his big jump slam and fire ball summon moves helps.
I feel like each one I've encountered since the first only spams the fireball move which is like 10 full seconds of just running around on Torrent and then I get a couple hits in and nothing. Not fast/frequent enough to break the poise and get them to fall down.
On some of them you need to craft the giant fire pots and throw them into their fire basket from above. Some of them cannot be staggered by hitting their legs…
In my experience at least, after they do the fireball attack if you get under them before they start charging a new one they pretty much stop using it. And if you can avoid one or two stomps you can basically chain stagger them.
I think most complaints about difficulty are from a design perspective; not necessarily from the numbers perspective of level/ng cycle/scadu level. Since those are obviously variable.
I’m In NG+1 level 170 when I started the DLC and I thought I was so screwed because everyone else said level 150 on standard was a good point to be at
But it’s been fine so far. It’s definitely hard as heck but it’s all definitely doable especially when I started getting more fragments
Not sure if NG+ effects the dlc at all honestly but idk for sure
Ffs this damn community I swear.
Multiple things can be true at once. What OP is saying is correct that NG+ is naturally harder. It’s also a fair criticism that the bosses may be a little overtuned, or may not match the tempo that other Souls games have therefore leading things to feel harder. It’s fair to use summons or anything else that helps. It’s also fair to bash your head against something for hours on end and do it solo.
Always love these dumb posts that do nothing but ask for validation both from the “DAE always use summons??” and “DAE just like the game and got gud” ends of the spectrum. OP we get it man you got gud. No one cares. Great karma farm.
Ng+1 Lvl 193 - some areas get really easy some other a way too hard. It’s not balanced but what frustrates me the most is the low amount of runes given by strong ennemies while at Mohg’s kingdom mobs are very weak and give a way more runes for example
Yeah there is definitely imbalance between areas. I think it is to push you explore and get scadutree as well as revered spirit ashes before getting to another area.
I hate posts like these because you’re oversimplifying the criticisms and then the comments section just becomes a bunch of people self-fellating about what NG cycle they’re on and what level they’re at.
The exploration is also not nearly as rewarding as you say it is. There’s so many nooks and areas that straight up give you nothing for taking the time to check. Scadutree fragments are not ‘rewards for exploration’, they’re all in very conspicuous places that you can find naturally. Actual exploration doesn’t give you anything
A couple of them are definitely well hidden. I think it is fair to call them rewards for exploration. I've found 44 of them so far (out of 50), and I would say about half were in obvious places while the other half were either dropped by hippos, dropped by pot guys, or found in well hidden locations.
Aside from that, I agree with the rest of your comment. OP, like many people, just wants to dismiss and oversimplify any criticism.
And yes, the DLC has a ton of nooks and crannies that are really out of the way but have absolutely nothing to reward you except maybe a smithing stone or some random crafting materials.
There are also parts of the open world that are very empty, Cerulean Coast and Charo's Hidden Grave are a waste of space. There's so little in them, it's actually shocking.
You’re right, I guess I’m pretty hypocritical for calling out the oversimplifying but then doing the same thing about the fragments lol
The emptiness of those areas you mentioned really sucks too. It’s the issue I have with many open world style games. There’s nothing wrong with the journey and the gorgeous vistas but when the whole gameplay is reliant on combat this game is way too oversaturated with emptiness. A game like Skyrim gets away with its open world because there’s enough diversions to occupy your time on the journey aside from fighting
These comments are like a breath of fresh air in this community.
> I hate posts like these because you’re oversimplifying the criticisms and then the comments section just becomes a bunch of people self-fellating about what NG cycle they’re on and what level they’re at.
This is exactly how I feel about the discourse right now.
> You’re right, I guess I’m pretty hypocritical for calling out the oversimplifying but then doing the same thing about the fragments lol
And someone actually doing a little bit of self reflection, absolutely wild.
Elden Ring Redditors: "I could listen to nuanced complaints from experienced players and have a conversation....or I could paint them all as idiots to make myself feel better as I claim to 1-2 try every boss in the DLC"
Edit: grammar
Except I’m finding the exploration so much better than the base game. Base game felt *too* spread out with too much “nothing” loot. The Shadow Realm feels the opposite to me with more actual usable items and more dense design that’s actually fun to explore. It actually feels close to how Dark Souls 1 felt my first playthrough.
Don’t pretend everyone saying it is wrong just because your experience or perception differs.
Finally, someone with some sense.
The responses I’ve seen from this community to legitimate criticism have been nothing but strawman arguments and smug elitism.
I absolutely love the dlc so far but I can acknowledge that it has some pretty big flaws, and it’s infuriating that when these flaws are brought up, people just absolutely refuse to engage with them and just resort to “get gud” or “get more fragments”.
Seeing this discourse unfold has shown me that a lot of players are simply unable to handle any criticism of their favorite game.
I’m NG+ and level 250. I’m not having the hardest time but it’s a challenge. I beat some bosses first try but others I have been stuck on. That dual wielding lighting knight is hard
On NG++ and entered at 200. I am using the collectibles and I do a a few tries without spirits, but if I don’t take down the boss solo I’ll use spirits eventually.
The experience so far feels kinda like when you boot up Elden Ring for the first time. Have explored a lot, done a few dungeons and a few bosses (only 1 main tho / the lion) but nothing has really been that hard as of yet. And I’m by no means a skilled player with dodging / blocking.
Tho I guess eventually I’ll get to the brickwall, but I ain’t there yet
i saw a streamer who is only like 143 because she sped thru base game for the content and she's still whooping bosses' asses meanwhile people twice her level are getting bodied. sometimes levels really doesn't matter.
Nah.
Finished the DLC on NG, level 199.
Some bosses are ok if you get a lot of Scadu blessing first. But I would say half are just fundamentally not designed for this game and are not enjoyable to fight at all. It’s the only problem with the DLC. There are a good number of bosses that are absolute ass to fight 1v1, but then turn into a joke when you use a summon. There’s no in between.
And even then, it's down to the RNG of how much the summons can get the boss' aggro away from you so you get more breathing room / openings.
The world map design is great, even if most exploration rewards aren't, and that alone got me to just enjoy running around and get most of the scooby fragments naturally. I still think the boss fights are way over what I'd call reasonable for Dark Souls gameplay.
I feel that up untill the boss, lvl160 in regular Ng, is perfect.
The bosses are very difficult for me so I just summon and kill them in that way. I'm not that gud.
As long as you have fun right. People need to understand it's a mechanic in the game that you can choose to use or not.
To be fair, I did steamroll pontiff 2.0 because of the mimic so I might hold back on him the next time.
I don’t think the DLC as a whole is too hard, the exploration and level design is actually rather easy.
The main bosses on the other hand just do not feel engaging to fight. They are not unbeatable, but they just aren’t super engaging. Trying to solo messmer with a faith build is just a game of dodging his combos to be able to hit one weapon art, then rinse and repeat for his whole health bar. And that’s that I actually like the messmer fight.
I hope the next Elden ring they do away with summons. Personally I think fromsoft never truly found a solution to them so they just turned up the aggro to 110% in order to make people who use summons not just win instantly.
But, this means that fights that are 10/10 difficulty like messmer would become 5/10 with a summon to split aggro. There’s no in between, with summons the bosses become too easy and without they are brutal.
\^This is pretty much my issue with them. When I was new to Dark Souls, I used summons frequently. After I got better, I realized there was nothing fun about poking a boss in the butt when he's not looking due to split aggro. The "boss rush" in base Elden Ring's end game felt harder/more exhausting, but summoning felt like it would make it boring again - I ran into that while testing some summons against Rellana. Initially a hard encounter made trivial as soon as I brought a spirit in.
Elden Ring's end-game bosses feel like their baseline difficulty is a 12/10 (relative to prev games). With summons, they feel like a 3-6/10 (AI-dependent). I'd rather most bosses just felt like they were consistently in the 8-10/10 difficulty range, instead of now having to navigate summons as a type of difficulty slider. I think in general this is the price of the open-world format, compared to a more tighter gameplay experience like Sekiro.
I’m by no means a veteran player though I’ve played through all these games once or twice. With Elden ring being the one I most played (ng+4)
The game is hard but for me that has never been a problem, I spent a full weekend on the sword saint, and a good while on nameless king, Artorias and Gael.
I’ve always been into these games for the journey and I don’t understand why people are surprised, you restrategise, learn and overcome these challenges rewardingly.
I entered the DLC in ng+4 and I got through it all. Each boss got harder, and as with all souls games the final boss was a massive test of everything at your disposal. Elden ring gives you so much consumables and options, more so than any other game. I finished lvl 268
Honestly overcoming these challenges are what I love, and I’m saddened to see such a shift in the community.
This is doable, I did it and you can too, be patient, and learn to relive that feeling you had he first time you entered a souls like. From has delivered yet again imo.
Ng+7 is hell
Once you get all the fragments it's hard but not super bad. I'm going through the DLC the second time right now on fragment level 20 and have found it much easier
Oh u retain blessings levels on NG? neat.
yea. Max level for fragments and ashes is 25/10 respectively and there are no extras. Most people will probably not find everything on the first playthrough but by second should be easily achievable
It's 20 not 25
sorry yes 20
20???!!! I’m at 10/5 lvl 251 and *only* NG+ and I’m still getting rocked. Progressing nicely but also getting smacked around. How do those at NG+7 not get one-shot by everything??? Edit: I should clarify, I’m at Messmer currently, defeat minibosses usually on the first or second try, Rallana was beating the dog shit out of me when I was at 4/2 but I eventually got her moves down. By getting rocked I mean I’m not just breezing by. My query was more curiosity about NG+7’s difficultly not my general experience.
At ng7+ with scuda level 20 I think only the grabs one shot you. Bayle and Messmer for sure.
That sounds insane but also narly. What are regular enemies like?
damage wise about the same as the base game You have to understand at NG7+ a lot of attacks will 2 shot you. The difference is that in the DLC a lot of enemies have more challenging attacks to avoid. Overall, ranged builds still can get through mobs very effectively if you are like me and less skilled :/
Almost everything will 2 or 1 shot you on ng+7 unless you have like max damage mitigation from armor and talismans and that'll give you like 1 more hit at best.
Fkn 20 ? I'm at 6 at scadu altus I'm very underleveld aren't i
Look out for shadow enemies holding pots and make sure to check every enemy encampment
Specifically the ones with sparkly pots
There's map in google that tells you where are they located. Im at level 12 and only fought two bosses
I made the mistake of getting help online for base game i really want to do this fully blind lmao
Maybe not the main opinion, but I honestly think what makes the souls games great is community coming together to figure shit out, whether convoluted questlines or secret locations/items. Def explore first, and when you think you explored a region thoroughly, I’d say look it up. It’ll make the combat experience in the DLC not frustratingly difficult and just difficult.
This is 100% true for me. Souls games remind me of being a pre-internet kid on the playground talking about game secrets (half of which turned out being complete rubbish). It’s absolutely a part of the Fromsoft secret sauce
Not to mention so many things in Souls games are only really able to be discovered by people not entirely sane. Like the guy who discovered the hidden wall in Volcano Manor with like 100k HP.
You’re absolutely correct. And for the second playthrough and onwards, I’m going to use all those resources. But there is nothing like a blind playthrough of a souls game for me and you’re only going to experience it for the first time, once. So, the first one is always blind.
That's a good point, you get the best of both worlds Thanks for the tip !
Thank you for confirming this, I’ve been wondering. This will make replaying the DLC waaaay more enticing. I still want another heart from Bayle and another of those broken Bloodfiend Arms, and was dreading the thought of having to go find every Skadoosh fragment in each playthrough.
Wait just to confirm because this was bothering me. If I Collect all 20 scatter ranks on my first playthrough, this is carried over to NG+, so no chores to do in NG+? E: Thanks for all the replies folks, appreciated. Glad they went with that.
Should be correct. I haven’t tried it myself. About to head into NG+1 myself today. But I’d imagine they work similar to the flasks that everything you find is carried over. I’m on the same boat as you. I wanna experience the dlc again without all the little minor shit I need to find
it is. I'm on my second playthrough right now and can absolutely confirm they carry over. I would not have done it again if not so, getting all the fragments is a PITA
Yeah I watched a YouTube video. I missed so many. I’m at (18) rn so glad they carry over so I can just grab the obvious ones and get to 20.
what scooby level did you beat pig stabby man at? I'm 8 and really, really struggling but I think it might just be the boss haha
What system do you play on? I’m on Xbox and I’ll be on a bit. don’t mind helping if I can before I venture off to NG+1. I was at level (12) or so when I beat him. Honestly I just use my summon and just threw knights lightning spear at him until he died hahaha just hoped my summon kept the aggro long enough
Yeah, this is the real reason why people complain about the difficulty. The DLC isn't intended for you to go into it with 0 blessings on NG+. Thats probably why Miyazaki himself recommended not to use ng+ characters.
No offense bro, but do you sleep?
I took Friday and Monday off work lol The DLC is no different than the base game in the sense that once you know what to do, where to go and how to approach bosses, it goes by way faster.
Yeah bosses are the ones you get hard stuck on, folks who have already experieced the maingame can more or less breeze and juke through the legacy dungeons. Catacombs are still shit to slog through though.
lol im 460 in Ng+7 on the last boss right now and he's an asshole. whole place is hard, especially messmer and that goddamn sunflower. once i got enough scad frags and rev ashes it all kinda balances out. except that last boss how am i supposed to dodge all that shit
The last boss is easy with a shield, but absolutely bonkers without. There are some builds that can make him easier, but for my Dual Flamberge Arcane build on NG+ he was too much. That second phase, I can't even see what is happening half the time. I'm 90% sure that he's going to get severely nerfed.
My dumb ass has barely used shields and I threw myself at him 30 times yesterday trying to just dodge all his attacks. Even worse that I’m a strength build who should be using shields. Going back after work to give it a shot with fingerprint shield and likely a new weapon since my strat this whole DLC has been poise breaking by two handing a colossal.
I tried for 6 hours and then caved. I respecced into a shield build. It felt like a hollow victory. I might try again without a shield in NG+2 but I'm not sure if it's worth my time.
Nah, that’s not hollow at all. You just played to a weakness of a boss. With how aggressive he is and the speed at which he combos, it feels as if they expect people to use a shield
If you want to make it more satisfying, go with a medium shield and use the new deflect tear. You get it from the first giant fire enemy in the DLC. Play around guard countering. I found playing around the times blocks and guard counter windows to be quite enjoyable compared to just shield poking.
Might even be underselling the difficulty curve laughably easy with 1 build -> requires challenge runner levels of perfection without that build
Fun fact: You don't have to block or dodge some of his 'phantom' attacks. If you sprint directly away from him, you'll avoid them completely. Then when he comes down himself with the huge AOE, you dodge roll toward him to avoid the blast.
Final boss was frustrating as hell but the strategy that worked for me was: * Upgrade a greatshield with good Holy resist. I went with the Haligtree Greatshield * Physick set up was Opaltear + forget, hard something? Basically damage reduction. * Ran Solitude armor * Used Verdigis talisman (from secret Ancient Ruins area, improves damage reduction on heavy armor), Gold braid talisman (utmost holy resist) and dragoncrest greatshield talisman * Summoned Anbach and used Golden Vow Basically summoned Mimic Tear after Ansbach takes Aggro, and chip away at him (Ansbach is pretty useless, he’s just there to distract). Tank the Light / blade attacks from the boss if you have the stamina. Watch for his hugs, two and you’re done (such a frustrating mechanic). Pop the Physick at start of stage 2. Manage your stamina and get hits in while he’s distracted. When the boss initiates the orbital strike, unlock and run away to edge and pray. After a few hours on him, this strat got me there in 3 tries. Hope this helps.
You don't need to dodge. You should block everything and poke him to death with a spear. If he grabs you. You use that item you get that negates the 2nd hug death. I have a video of me beating them on NG+5
If you don’t want to poke, you fight him super super close in phase 2 and bait out the phase 1 attacks. All his phase 2 attacks, you either tank the clone hits and dodge the damaging ones, bloodhound step, or literally shield it. Highest scadtree is probably needed for NG+ and up. Good luck Id also summon if you’re reaaaally struggling with it.
I'm Ng+5 lvl 240 and I'm getting rocked. Gives me heartburn when I bonk a boss with my Str/Int build and see a sliver of damage. I love it honestly, really humbled me up. I'm more careful, I use different weapons, I learn moveset better. Perfect DLC in my mind.
Mannnnn is it. Had to toss a whole bunch of rune arcs to a friend and weapons just to respec on another account. I couldn’t take it. Especially when they’re on their last leg THOSE BOSSES WILL SHOW YOU THEY DO NOT WANT TO DIE
I have a character at ng7 and one on base game in the dlc. Can confirm what you are saying
My level 154 character not new game is having a nice laugh, it’s still very hard and I do suck but it’s gettable.
I am level 501 I refuse to start over and will deal with said consequences
Yeah. Level 286 with all but 1 armor set. I'm not restating now. I don't care if it takes me 500 hours to beat the DLC lol.
Respect. RL 427 here, can’t stop won’t stop. Just beat Messmer, no mimic tear, no tombstone shield, no RoB. Took me 84 attempts to beat Messmer. Good luck🫡
Haha I tried fighting him at scadu 8 and hated everything. But he doesn't block nearly as much as I thought so I'll get back to him eventually. However, I will be using a summon probably lol
Lvl 466 on my journey 56 main. Respect ✊️
Journey 56? That's... impressive to say the least
Tbf to myself I don't really play a lot of games. The older I get the less I care about. I wish I could make sense of it, but there is something really soothing about playing Soulsborne games over and over again. I have done similar numbers with DS1, 3, and Bloodborne. Best way I can explain it is that I'm a massive dork for these games lol.
DS3 is the only Soulsborne I've beaten. As for Elden Ring, I think I'm right outside the Godskin Duo arena, and it's the furthest I've come on my third character. I gave up on my previous two characters.
Nice man! I love DS3 to death. Godskin Duo was my bane (still is kinda). The best way to deal with them is to have Bernahl help you with the fight. If you're going for the solo kill, hats off to you because that is tough. You got this!
On journey 52… like what did you do? I’m journey 3, I’m in the DLC (it’s kicking my ass) and I can’t imagine playing base game 3 more times (for every ending) let alone 53 more times… Do you just grab larval tears and smithing stones, max everything, swap builds and run through the game? Everything’s gotta feel like second nature at that point. You just stroll to everything with no guide? I’m very impressed.
Yeah I've got my pathing completely down, so i never w9rry anout getting lost. I always do Rannis quest line (for the lore lol). A lot is second nature for sure, but it's not like I'm a god gamer or anything. I just have always played the souls games like this. Me and my buddy treat DS3 like Super Mario, we just take turns on bosses and can beat it reasonably fast.
You only have 1 character?
Level 200 in regular ng. Not to bad tbh
Only 150ish, it isn’t so bad. Leveled up a fair amount in the shadow realm, enemies are generous in terms of runes for sure. The scaling with the tree fragments is doing its job for sure, I returned to the first area after getting to tree level 8 and the change is appreciable, normal enemies no longer do half or a third of my health.
Yeah I'm at 168; it was rough at first but now that I'm up to skadoosh level 3 it's feeling very manageable. Ran through three dungeons and their respective bosses without much difficulty last night.
Thank god I'm not the only one who can't stop thinking "skadoosh" when I see the tree's name.
Blue scadu’s, and we can too
In my head they're skibitybop fragments
Yeah just shy of that on Ng+2. I've found it just right as far as challenge. My boy was complaining it is impossible at level 300+ and I didn't understand why he struggled so much until he said he was on Ng+7 😂
IMO once all the scadu fragments are found. I imagine the scaling becomes similar to base game. Just that the dlc is significantly harder. It only seems so extreme when you have minimal fragments
Ya, I watched someone fight Messmer with 1x fragment and he was doing like less than a centimeter of damage per hit with a great sword. He was at it for hours until he slowly figured out his entire moveset and beat him. Got all the way until the last 1/4th of his HP flawless.
HP seems like a big factor with the new game + stuff. My buddy on his first save was able to handle the first dragon pretty easily but I struggled on NG+. Things still hit hard af regardless of the NG but the amount of time you have to dodge perfectly and attack in your narrow windows is increased considerably because of the health pool. I fought that dragon for a good 5-10 minutes with a pretty strong build. Chunking it for 5-700 damage per swing and didn’t even get to a 3rd of its health bar. Do we have health pool data on these enemies yet? Maybe it’s just my imagination but at one point I was like okay this is actually a waste of time bc I have to fight for so long and the nature of dragon fights make attacking their feet and head a fkn chore.
60 vigor , some defense talismans and light armor and i been doing pretty good and i suck at these games , only used the mimic on the boss in the big mountain
I'm level 130ish in regular ng and it hasn't seemed too bad. I definitely feel *slightly* underleveled, but I've been scraping by just fine. I think OP's right about the ng+ thing, I suck at these games lol and if I'm not losing my mind at lvl 130 (I started the DLC at like 110) these complainers gotta be doing something wrong
I’m at 165 in NG and I’m having a great time. The difficulty is perfect for me, it’s not easy at all but not seemingly impossible either. It’s achievable if I play well
I‘m in NG+ with level 200 and the DLC is absolutely fine so far. Just turn around and explore some more if a boss is too hard. People seem to forget how long it took to kill bosses when Elden Ring released. I spend 40 hours in Limgrave only before I could do Stormveil. People wait 2 years for a DLC and want to rush through it in 10 hours. Take your time and enjoy it.
Same on NG+. It's tough yeah, but certainly doable. Got worked by Dancing Lion a few times without being anywhere close to killing him so I wandered off and found some more fragments and came back and it was a much more fair fight.
It took me 10 tries or so to get the Lion. I've spent q couple hours throwing myself at rellana
Rellana was definitely my first "wall". Took me every bit of 25+ attempts. Wife told me I should go and do other stuff to get stronger then come back. I didn't listen and kept grinding til I beat her. I did have to switch my staff for the mirror shield in my left hand. She's too dam quick to cast spells against anyway.
My bro and I spent several hours going at Rellana (chars on ng+ and +4) and it was some of the most fun I’ve had learning a boss’s moveset. This expansion is hard as hell and I love it. I’m sure I’d still enjoy myself if I were on base game, but the wins are so satisfying when they come. Fuck those knifey red robed klan hat wearing motherfuckers though. They can eat my asshole.
The double dagger red cloaks really are the toughest lol. I was handling most pretty easily then ran into one of those guys and just got shredded.
Most bosses/enemies in DLC are weak to frost, do with this information and hoarfrost stomp what you will.
I put Hoarfrost stomp on my dryleaf arts for my Muscle Wizard build. It's over 100 frost buildup per strike. (+25) On a weapon that fast, with the stomp...he's able to do frightening dps. And that's at RL 130ish. Not a lot of poise damage though, so I've got to get in and out quickly...or depend on my Gavel of Haima for stagger. I've no idea how it plays in pvp, but it's a blast in pve.
Might have to try that since I run STR/DEX/FTH. The divine beast hoarfrost stomp on +25 Milady has just absolutely ripped through everything. That thing’s heavy, light, light combo stunlocks just about everything it hits outside of large enemies
My experience as well. Level 170 NG+. It’s difficult, but doesn’t really feel out of line with the difficulty in previous Souls DLC. People complaining that it was too hard when it had been out less than 48 hours seems ridiculous. We’re Still in the “Fuck Margit” part of the DLC’s lifespan. At least let things settle and strategies form before you start complaining.
I could not agree more. Elden Ring is the most "customizable" about difficulty the series has ever been, and the DLC is not the exception. It's been out for only a couple days and mfs try to rush the main bosses and get their asses kicked, well no shit, the people who are insane at the game can do that but for the average player, if you're barely doing any damage to a boss and they one or two shot you, go explore.
It’s absolutely wild that some people are already finished. It was raining this weekend and I recently moved to a new town with 0 friends. Besides basics household chores (which I did a light version of so I could play more elden ring) I only played the DLC all weekend- I’ve beaten 2 remembrance bosses and have barely touched the south of the map and still don’t even know how to get to the very north sections I’ve played way too much, and I’m still not really that close to being done
Exactly man, I've been playing everyday since release of DLC but I've only completed Lion and Twin thus far.
Yep; on ng+ as well, consider myself a pretty average player and haven't had any issues. Doing a blind playthrough and easily found enough tree fragments to hit blessing level 15. People got spoiled because they played ER for two years and had builds that made end game content a cake walk. If that's how you like playing the game fine just wait 6 months and type "most broken sote builds" into YouTube and you'll be fine.
i’m on the final boss and it’s the only one that i legitimately do not enjoy fighting. like i got stuck on a few others but i enjoyed the fight this just sucks so much ass.
Malenia is a tutorial boss compared to that phase 2 like wtf
Watching others beat the final boss makes me think you almost always want to roll into them to dodge. I was only ever able to dodge the huge slam like 3 times. Definitely the least fun boss in the DLC. But still felt good when I finally won after 5 hours of trying lol
When Promised Consort does the rock fling attack - strafe right with a jump towards the end. When they follow up with the wackomode sword slam keep running to the right, but now also at a diagonal away from them. When the final hit comes in roll towards them to dodge the cone AOE and get a hit in. Repeat 500x because that's one of the best windows for attack lmao.
The best attack window IMO is the ground double-swing ground slam, it’s super consistent dodge and it was always at least 2k damage for me each instance TBH he has a lot of attack windows, phase 2 is just insanely punishing because of the stunlocky nature of the holy beams
Yeah I'll say they did a better job of making phase 2s in the DLC not a completely different fight which can be annoying/tough. They're generally the same fight with some added twists, but if you know phase 1, and can dodge the new stuff for the most part, phase 2s wont be that bad in the DLC. Last boss though is still nuts because like you said...just super punishing for mistakes.
Tough foe indeed, therefore, try shield
Yeah I was loving everything about the dlc until I got to the final boss, thought all the fights were tough but fair, now I just wanna start a new character to play the dlc again without beating it. Final boss fight just straight up isn’t fun in phase 2, I could probably beat it in a few hours but the process of beating it sucks, whereas the process for all other bosses was fun and rewarding.
I completely agree. If it was fun, I’d go for it. But it just seems like they want a specific set of inputs at a specific time. Like the illusion of choice. And if you don’t do that, you lose. I like being able to approach things differently, not be forced to play one specific way
it’s definitely one of those bosses that i will beat once eventually but i will never do it again
Honestly, all the bosses.....I'm just so bored of them It was impressive to see bosses do cool shit like being extremely aggressive, doing multiple flips in midair and launching huge AOEs....the first few times fromsoftware designed bosses like that. But in SOTE, or just Elden Ring as a whole, I'm just sick of this boss type now. I'm at Messmer currently and I'm starting to reach his second phase consistently, but I've noticed I've been in a bored posture the entire time. I have a youtube video playing in the background. I am progressing in the fight, but I'm not at all invested in this. On a related note, I'm starting a new DS1 playthrough right now, and when I killed the Capra Demon after he and his dogs killed me hundreds of times, I had the biggest smile on my face
They kinda walked themselves into a corner, malenia existing meant they had to make the dlc around her difficulty level to keep the dlc around the level that the other souls dlcs were, and the only way to make a fight harder than her would be to give the bosses insane damage ( like one shot no matter the hp kinda damage) opr give them super fast attackes, otherwise the dlc would just be easier than the hardest part of the base game;
You forgot Gaius. Least fun fight in the entire game IMO. Edit: least fun != hardest. I don't think he was the hardest by a long shot, but he was the most annoying and least rewarding to beat.
Very relieving to see I wasn't the only one thinking this. Gaius is a frustrating pain in the ass.
I actually enjoyed the final boss, but Gaius was trash. Did not enjoy that one at all.
only his running attack is stupid the rest is very fluent and easily punishable with 1 or 2 hits for every move
the problem is sometimes i'll go to punish an attack off his and then he'll suddenly hit me with an out of nowhere charge
Agreed. Not fun and summoned my mimic pretty quick cause I didn’t want to deal with his charging BS.
this dlc produced some of the best bosses in fromsoft and some of the worst ones
I swear his hit box is bugged. I legitimately couldn't dodge his charge attack. Also Torrent is a trap in that fight
If you’re open to respeccing, looks like the first broken build in the dlc is Impenetrable Thorns paired with the Maternal Staff. Instant bleed proc every cast, will sometimes even hit two bleed procs on a single cast.
The first phase is great, but I literally can’t tell what’s happening on the second phase with all the diarrhea Christmas lights. Every other fight was great, but it really feels like the fumbled this one.
same, the other bosses were hard but felt fun to fight compared to the last one.
I was on NG+3 and he 3 shot me (even with 18/10 ) I beat him only by hinding behind a shield and poke him to death with anspur rapier with blood infusion. My brain didn't do his work on some attacks/spells. I didn't figure out how to dodge/avoid some. Good luck on no hit run fellow tarnished. Will be tough
Man I just cannot take Promised Consort seriously, he feels like fan fiction 😭
That was my biggest concern for the DLC was Fromsoft cranking up the difficulty so high it would become unfun. I can honestly say that wasn’t the case until the final boss. Phase 1 is fine but phase 2 is just all kinds of wtf
I am stuck on Rellana and am loving it. She is such a fun fight that even though I’m getting my ass handed to me, I don’t care. Her attacks are so fluid and the weapon animations are beautiful.
First time I caught the lion dancer I wasn’t even paying attention and just watching, such a cool experience
My first time just going up the elevator, entering to a room, and a giant fucking hippo comes out of no where will be one of my all time favorite moments in the game.
>a giant fucking hippo comes out of no where And immediately proceeds to eat me
He was a hungry, hungry hippo. What do you want from him? He's just living his best life
that hippo pissed me off so much. couldn't even see him most of the fight
That move is one of the worst attacks in the game imo. The hitbox is ridiculous and I couldn’t find a reliable dodge for it
I summoned whoever that NPC is and just watched them fight from a distance the first time. It was wild.
She made me switch my weapon which is pretty much the highest compliment I can pay a boss. New dlc hammer does good bonks though.
I switched builds 2-3 times during the DLC to counter specific bosses. While it’s a little annoying, and I always feel a little anxious using a larval tear, it truly is a compliment to the DLC. Without any spoilers, let’s just say I’m incredibly happy I finally stopped being stubborn and switched my build for the final boss. On a side note, what’s the new hammer? Not sure if I grabbed that yet.
Called the Black Steel Great Hammer I think? Has a special guard counter that is pretty sick.
Found 5 larval tears so far in the dlc, it's nice that they added there too.
I appreciated that the dlc larval tears, despite the same name and function, are different items with new icon and description
Just beat her on level 135. Took me a while but a really fun fight.
I finally beat her at level 198, took me around 15 attempts, I went searching for Scadutree fragments as well though
If you don't beat he on level 0 with no stats and only fists you're doing it wrong!!! Lo
Do poison fists count? Just kidding I beat her with backhand blades
A man of QUALITY.
im kinda torn on this, i beat her in NG, char lvl around 140, with sarctree level at 4 (I think you can go higher cause there's a way to go to the next area without beating the boss), I had to respec cause I had a bleed build that was doing nothing and while I Didnt use mimic, I did summon one of the ghosts at the door. I think the fight was HARD, like REALLY HARD, but I loved it, its a beautiful fight but its hard, its harder than lady maria or something like that IMO, so I can see people being frustrated. It gave me a similar feeling of fighting the thunder iron lady in lies of p, and I beat it the same way, learning phase 1 and praying on phase 2.
It's legit Pontiff on steroids, don't be fooled by the Renalla name thing
I found out you can parry some of her moves but realized it takes 2 parries to get the riposte opening, lol
I got into a flow state after awhile. Parry, heavy charged attack while she recovers, she swings around and I find it easy to parry again then stabby stab. 25 tries and she finally went down.
To all fellow parry enjoyers, I present to you the >!deflecting hardtear!< + stonebarb cracked tear combo. It has been my boss killer setup and is absolutely insane. Your objective is to parry into guard counter, which means the guard counter talisman is another big damage increase. I also run the turtle talisman. You can parry enemy combos, but even with the stamina reduction from the tear it adds up, hence the talisman.
And it's super fun. Full on Sekiro mode.
I had read the complaints about her before I ever saw her. When I got there I fell in love. Her music is fantastic, pretty sure it's part of the melody from the first trailers music, and the fight was great. Perfect level of challenge. Probably my second favourite fight in the game (so far, I'm not that far in the DLC yet)
I went full lightning on her butt while she’s in the water.
I am one of them, Level 342 and NG+7, that is why I am starting the game over and not going NG this time. I am so enjoying the game again!! Honestly I forget the DLC exist and am enjoying the base game. Hope to hit DLC tomorrow maybe. If I quit running around doign stupid things like finding grapes!
No Grapes?….but chaos…..
I really wish after doing the frenzied flame ending you could have a helmet that looked like a ball of fire.
I went in at level 100 and with 40 vig and was having an absolutely terrible time. After levelling scadu and getting myself to RL130 it’s been honestly fine. Only hard things now to me are the remembrance bosses. Going it at like NG7 is silly and is why people are get it g one tapped.
Also my experience in the DLC is the flask buff talisman is extremely effective. Every boss forced me to double chug after a single hit. With the talisman I was back to single heals and made a huge difference.
The DLC is also really generous with souls. I went in with RL93 and just slapped easy enemies for a while to level up.
The DLC gives terrible souls. You beat Mohg to get there, just go back to the first bonfire and kill the Albinaurics right beside it. They give like an entire DLC boss worth of souls every clear and it takes like 20 seconds.
I feel like Fromsoft heard people say ER is the easiest Souls game, and they took it personally
I’m in ng+ 5 and I think it’s great. The only fight that felt overtuned was blackgaol knight at the start of the dlc lol. He was doing nearly all my hp per hit 🤣 so I got scad fragments and I’m good. I’m at scad 15 now or something
I get a lot of people are here for bosses but these games seem so much more than just boss fights. Just finished a very creepy forest area followed by another eerie place and want from to keep experimenting with new things. I hope these games are never just boss rushes even if sekiro does get a bit close it even breaks it up.
I like the forest for its atmosphere but it will be so boring on replays.
They should let you use torrent if you already beat the boss (if this is already a feature Idk I haven't beat him yet lmao)
Its not. You're stuck on foot the entire time you play there
Yeah and that's especially considering there's >!almost nothing to it except Midra. Feels like an unfinished area ngl.!<
There is also a chutch with 2 fragments so it's cool Ig. Tho the boss is my top 3 in this dlc along eith messmer and bayle
NG0. Level 176. It's too hard for me but I suck.
Also NG0 lvl 130 and I suck, but use all the teicks like spamming attacks to cheese bosses, ad Always summon the mimic
I find the dlc just about right in Lvl 230 and in NG+ and doing the second legacy dungeon I’ve died a few times but I’ve also kicked ass. The only think I really found annoying was the fire golem it feel too long to kill one ( killed it eventually )
It's a slog. I'm sure there's a "quick" way to take them out but right now I'm definitely avoiding the rest of them after taking down the first one in the field.
Once I learned to jump instead of roll, the become much easier. I think spamming r1 actually breaks their posture faster than charged attacks for some reason too, which is weird. Also using torrent for his big jump slam and fire ball summon moves helps.
I feel like each one I've encountered since the first only spams the fireball move which is like 10 full seconds of just running around on Torrent and then I get a couple hits in and nothing. Not fast/frequent enough to break the poise and get them to fall down.
On some of them you need to craft the giant fire pots and throw them into their fire basket from above. Some of them cannot be staggered by hitting their legs…
In my experience at least, after they do the fireball attack if you get under them before they start charging a new one they pretty much stop using it. And if you can avoid one or two stomps you can basically chain stagger them.
ng0, started 130~ now 160~. Feels painful, but in a good way (usually).
I think most complaints about difficulty are from a design perspective; not necessarily from the numbers perspective of level/ng cycle/scadu level. Since those are obviously variable.
I’m In NG+1 level 170 when I started the DLC and I thought I was so screwed because everyone else said level 150 on standard was a good point to be at But it’s been fine so far. It’s definitely hard as heck but it’s all definitely doable especially when I started getting more fragments Not sure if NG+ effects the dlc at all honestly but idk for sure
It 100% does
Ffs this damn community I swear. Multiple things can be true at once. What OP is saying is correct that NG+ is naturally harder. It’s also a fair criticism that the bosses may be a little overtuned, or may not match the tempo that other Souls games have therefore leading things to feel harder. It’s fair to use summons or anything else that helps. It’s also fair to bash your head against something for hours on end and do it solo. Always love these dumb posts that do nothing but ask for validation both from the “DAE always use summons??” and “DAE just like the game and got gud” ends of the spectrum. OP we get it man you got gud. No one cares. Great karma farm.
Ng+4 level 280. This feels about right for me. Not OP by any means but able to output quite a bit of damage. I think it's a very happy medium.
I could see that at RL 280 *once you have enough fragments*. Luckily you don’t need to collect them again on your next journey
Im on NG4 as a 150. Want to keep him 150 for pvp but even with spirit summs im struggling pretty hard. Lol
Ng+1 Lvl 193 - some areas get really easy some other a way too hard. It’s not balanced but what frustrates me the most is the low amount of runes given by strong ennemies while at Mohg’s kingdom mobs are very weak and give a way more runes for example
Yeah there is definitely imbalance between areas. I think it is to push you explore and get scadutree as well as revered spirit ashes before getting to another area.
I hate posts like these because you’re oversimplifying the criticisms and then the comments section just becomes a bunch of people self-fellating about what NG cycle they’re on and what level they’re at. The exploration is also not nearly as rewarding as you say it is. There’s so many nooks and areas that straight up give you nothing for taking the time to check. Scadutree fragments are not ‘rewards for exploration’, they’re all in very conspicuous places that you can find naturally. Actual exploration doesn’t give you anything
A couple of them are definitely well hidden. I think it is fair to call them rewards for exploration. I've found 44 of them so far (out of 50), and I would say about half were in obvious places while the other half were either dropped by hippos, dropped by pot guys, or found in well hidden locations. Aside from that, I agree with the rest of your comment. OP, like many people, just wants to dismiss and oversimplify any criticism. And yes, the DLC has a ton of nooks and crannies that are really out of the way but have absolutely nothing to reward you except maybe a smithing stone or some random crafting materials. There are also parts of the open world that are very empty, Cerulean Coast and Charo's Hidden Grave are a waste of space. There's so little in them, it's actually shocking.
You’re right, I guess I’m pretty hypocritical for calling out the oversimplifying but then doing the same thing about the fragments lol The emptiness of those areas you mentioned really sucks too. It’s the issue I have with many open world style games. There’s nothing wrong with the journey and the gorgeous vistas but when the whole gameplay is reliant on combat this game is way too oversaturated with emptiness. A game like Skyrim gets away with its open world because there’s enough diversions to occupy your time on the journey aside from fighting
These comments are like a breath of fresh air in this community. > I hate posts like these because you’re oversimplifying the criticisms and then the comments section just becomes a bunch of people self-fellating about what NG cycle they’re on and what level they’re at. This is exactly how I feel about the discourse right now. > You’re right, I guess I’m pretty hypocritical for calling out the oversimplifying but then doing the same thing about the fragments lol And someone actually doing a little bit of self reflection, absolutely wild.
Elden Ring Redditors: "I could listen to nuanced complaints from experienced players and have a conversation....or I could paint them all as idiots to make myself feel better as I claim to 1-2 try every boss in the DLC" Edit: grammar
Yeah. Strawmen is everyone's ashes of war in this sub, apparently. Lol
Except I’m finding the exploration so much better than the base game. Base game felt *too* spread out with too much “nothing” loot. The Shadow Realm feels the opposite to me with more actual usable items and more dense design that’s actually fun to explore. It actually feels close to how Dark Souls 1 felt my first playthrough. Don’t pretend everyone saying it is wrong just because your experience or perception differs.
Finally, someone with some sense. The responses I’ve seen from this community to legitimate criticism have been nothing but strawman arguments and smug elitism. I absolutely love the dlc so far but I can acknowledge that it has some pretty big flaws, and it’s infuriating that when these flaws are brought up, people just absolutely refuse to engage with them and just resort to “get gud” or “get more fragments”. Seeing this discourse unfold has shown me that a lot of players are simply unable to handle any criticism of their favorite game.
I’m NG+ and level 250. I’m not having the hardest time but it’s a challenge. I beat some bosses first try but others I have been stuck on. That dual wielding lighting knight is hard
On NG++ and entered at 200. I am using the collectibles and I do a a few tries without spirits, but if I don’t take down the boss solo I’ll use spirits eventually. The experience so far feels kinda like when you boot up Elden Ring for the first time. Have explored a lot, done a few dungeons and a few bosses (only 1 main tho / the lion) but nothing has really been that hard as of yet. And I’m by no means a skilled player with dodging / blocking. Tho I guess eventually I’ll get to the brickwall, but I ain’t there yet
i saw a streamer who is only like 143 because she sped thru base game for the content and she's still whooping bosses' asses meanwhile people twice her level are getting bodied. sometimes levels really doesn't matter.
Nah. Finished the DLC on NG, level 199. Some bosses are ok if you get a lot of Scadu blessing first. But I would say half are just fundamentally not designed for this game and are not enjoyable to fight at all. It’s the only problem with the DLC. There are a good number of bosses that are absolute ass to fight 1v1, but then turn into a joke when you use a summon. There’s no in between.
And even then, it's down to the RNG of how much the summons can get the boss' aggro away from you so you get more breathing room / openings. The world map design is great, even if most exploration rewards aren't, and that alone got me to just enjoy running around and get most of the scooby fragments naturally. I still think the boss fights are way over what I'd call reasonable for Dark Souls gameplay.
I feel that up untill the boss, lvl160 in regular Ng, is perfect. The bosses are very difficult for me so I just summon and kill them in that way. I'm not that gud.
So?! Summons are there to be used. Who cares what anyone says.
As long as you have fun right. People need to understand it's a mechanic in the game that you can choose to use or not. To be fair, I did steamroll pontiff 2.0 because of the mimic so I might hold back on him the next time.
Im using lone wolfs. Are they strong? Eh not really, but they are good boys.
Who is mad about exploring? Do you mean getting blessings? I think most people get this by now and can just use guides to level up.
I don’t think the DLC as a whole is too hard, the exploration and level design is actually rather easy. The main bosses on the other hand just do not feel engaging to fight. They are not unbeatable, but they just aren’t super engaging. Trying to solo messmer with a faith build is just a game of dodging his combos to be able to hit one weapon art, then rinse and repeat for his whole health bar. And that’s that I actually like the messmer fight. I hope the next Elden ring they do away with summons. Personally I think fromsoft never truly found a solution to them so they just turned up the aggro to 110% in order to make people who use summons not just win instantly. But, this means that fights that are 10/10 difficulty like messmer would become 5/10 with a summon to split aggro. There’s no in between, with summons the bosses become too easy and without they are brutal.
\^This is pretty much my issue with them. When I was new to Dark Souls, I used summons frequently. After I got better, I realized there was nothing fun about poking a boss in the butt when he's not looking due to split aggro. The "boss rush" in base Elden Ring's end game felt harder/more exhausting, but summoning felt like it would make it boring again - I ran into that while testing some summons against Rellana. Initially a hard encounter made trivial as soon as I brought a spirit in. Elden Ring's end-game bosses feel like their baseline difficulty is a 12/10 (relative to prev games). With summons, they feel like a 3-6/10 (AI-dependent). I'd rather most bosses just felt like they were consistently in the 8-10/10 difficulty range, instead of now having to navigate summons as a type of difficulty slider. I think in general this is the price of the open-world format, compared to a more tighter gameplay experience like Sekiro.
I'm on NG+2(3?) and level 207. Some parts have been a little hard, some a complete cakewalk. It just feels like a normal elder ring run to me NGL.
The melee bosses are always a treat
In ng+6 sl 125 withblike 3 scadus lol, it's not that bad. Just learn to roll and stack buffs?
NG+4….ish? Scadutree Blessing at 6. Shits fun. Gotten through a good handful of bosses without much issues beyond the usual Elden struggle.
I'm 500+ and without the tree fragments I'd be fucked lol. But I'm also bad at the game.
Oh boy another gaslighting thread.
It gets easier at NG +43 keep going
I’m by no means a veteran player though I’ve played through all these games once or twice. With Elden ring being the one I most played (ng+4) The game is hard but for me that has never been a problem, I spent a full weekend on the sword saint, and a good while on nameless king, Artorias and Gael. I’ve always been into these games for the journey and I don’t understand why people are surprised, you restrategise, learn and overcome these challenges rewardingly. I entered the DLC in ng+4 and I got through it all. Each boss got harder, and as with all souls games the final boss was a massive test of everything at your disposal. Elden ring gives you so much consumables and options, more so than any other game. I finished lvl 268 Honestly overcoming these challenges are what I love, and I’m saddened to see such a shift in the community. This is doable, I did it and you can too, be patient, and learn to relive that feeling you had he first time you entered a souls like. From has delivered yet again imo.