What game are you playing?

[wankerness]

Some DS1 progress this weekend. Got the lord vessel. Saved the flame lady. Killed a big multi-headed dragon. Made an attempt or two at Sif, but no dice yet. I'm getting pretty good at the parry timing though. You can one-shot lots of stuff with a parry + the lightning spear.

I almost never used parries in DS1 besides the one boss that's incredibly weak to parries and incredibly hard if you try anything else. The problem with the parries in those games is there's no indicator other than trial and error as to whether something is parryable or not. So you can get hit in the face 5 times with some attack trying to figure out the timing, only to discover that the problem wasn't timing, it was that you can't parry it. I think every entry has a higher percentage of attacks being parryable, but only sekiro really gives you any indication which is which (non-parryable attacks all get some kanji flashing on the screen to warn you, and the vast majority of attacks are parryable). On the positive side, parries in the three DS games are super satisfying cause you get that big BOOM noise and the enemy is always opened up for a big critical attack. Elden Ring made it worse by making a lot of boss enemies have to be parried repeatedly before they actually get staggered.

Sif is intimidating, if you play defensively you'll get wrecked. Pretty much all you have to do is roll into his attacks, use a 2H weapon for more damage, and try to stay under him. With that strategy you only really need to figure out timings on the spin and the charge, and he won't charge as much. That's one boss, though, that using a shield is a very bad idea on. Especially cause he drops the best shield in the game so you can't have it for the fight (well, unless you're on NG+).

 

[TedEH]

I almost never used parries in DS1 besides the one boss that's incredibly weak to parries and incredibly hard if you try anything else. The problem with the parries in those games is there's no indicator other than trial and error as to whether something is parryable or not.

It's sort of become part of my repertoire of things to try when the solution to getting past something isn't obvious, or if you're in a precarious spot where you can't go around and blocking drains stamina before you get an opening. Like the archers on the ledge in Anor Londo. Or honestly most of the normal guards in Anor Londo. And some spots with the lizard guys, if the room is too tight to get behind them for the backstab. It's often "can I just block until an opening? No? How about go around and backstab? No? Roll around? No? Parry? Aaaah, that worked." It's how I managed to take down Lautrec - baited him away from magic guy into the stairs, then he goes down in two parries.

Pretty much all you have to do is roll into his attacks, use a 2H weapon for more damage, and try to stay under him.

Yeah, that seemed reasonably clear. I've just been unlucky so far with the staying under part. Also haven't been doing it with summons or anything yet. I'm not one of those weirdos who must play in a self-inflicted hard mode, but I've been trying most bosses hollow the first time - like the guy on top of Sen's Fortress was easy enough to not need the summon. I got lucky and accidentally cheesed that one by staggering him, and he just fell off the building. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I didn't need it, he was almost dead, but it was funny anyway.

 

[MFB]

She is kind of tough. I don't remember if Nioh 1 has about the same dual sword skills as Nioh 2, but if it does, there's some counter moves with dual swords (I think maybe Moon Shadow was the big one? I forget. Sign of the Cross, Whirlwind, and Shrike also sound familiar) that you can pretty much spam to keep human enemies permanently locked up. I of course used the same strategy I used on basically every enemy in the game, which was sloth and then spam strong attack in mid stance with spears and dodge/block occasionally.

It sounds to me like bosses are starting to outlevel your armor. You should make sure you have heavy armor that's actually level-appropriate, when you're going through on NG it's very easy to suddenly find yourself with gear that's 20-40 levels too low and causes you to get wrecked.

Bosses in Nioh 1 IMO are generally pretty bad compared to Nioh 2 - that one they're still often quite tough, but also all much more doable without using sloth. I had to sloth my way through all of Nioh 1 but I only rarely ever had to use it in 2 (partly cause it's nerfed from 1).

The bosses I remember in Nioh 1 having a lot of trouble with were the really giant skeleton, hino-enma the vampire lady, umi-bozu the blob, the fast flying garuda guy with pistols that you can bully mercilessly with a high stance odachi but can be very tough otherwise, a particular awful encounter in the last zone with the main story boss guy and his overpowered clones (ended up having to take them all out fast with headshots from the hand cannon!), and then the DLC bosses.

Sign of the Cross is an ability for dual swords, I don't have it and honestly even forget what it was. I might try mid-stance on her, I tend to stick with low since it's a flurry of attacks and then I can still just jump right back out of it if it gets hairy. Dual swords have sadly been outshined by my new spear that does ~30 more DMG per hit than both of them, and I need all the help I can get on this fight.

Unfortunately my armor is at level actually higher as I've soul matched stuff with certain abilities, but now I've got armor that if I want to S.M., it's just so much fucking money because they're purple level; I'm level 90, and my chest armor is a little above that, I think my gauntlets/leg are a little below, like mid-80s but nothing wild, and leg armor is above me as well. I might have to fight some remnants for new gear, but the stuff I've got for me has been fucking working so I hate changing at this point.

I'll keep trying tonight, I had her down to legitimately under the "O" in her name, and she pulled out EIGHT combos in the entire time I had her there that didn't allow me to heal; EIGHT. COMBOS. And in that ENTIRE time, I never had enough ki or time to fucking pop an elixir, but she has enough stamina to spam moves? Get the fuck out of here.

 

[wankerness]

Yeah, that seemed reasonably clear. I've just been unlucky so far with the staying under part. Also haven't been doing it with summons or anything yet. I'm not one of those weirdos who must play in a self-inflicted hard mode, but I've been trying most bosses hollow the first time - like the guy on top of Sen's Fortress was easy enough to not need the summon. I got lucky and accidentally cheesed that one by staggering him, and he just fell off the building. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I didn't need it, he was almost dead, but it was funny anyway.

I don't think there's any summon available for him unless you try actual multiplayer. IIRC the only bosses I've ever summoned for in DS1 are Gaping Dragon (BAD IDEA, the NPC usually gets taken out the first time he does the flying move and then has buffed health), Iron Golem (this summon, Iron Tarkus, is so overpowered that he's a meme), Queelag (if you get invaded by whatshername the funny invader in the swamp you can summon her), and O&S (I usually do for this fight cause it sucks as anything other than an overpowered sorcery build without the summon). Otherwise I'm pretty much only in "body form" or whatever the game calls it when I know I'm in an area with an NPC invader, and most of those areas don't have a boss with an NPC summon available.

DS1 "easy" difficulty is about building your character correctly and grinding for extra levels if you're having a tough time, there's not much in the way of summonable NPCs. DS2 corrected that problem in a big way, and DS3 has a lot but not as many as 2. DS1 was also extremely discouraging for summons cause you had to reverse hollowing at a bonfire and then make it all the way to the boss, and 3/4 of the time I'd get invaded and killed before I could summon an NPC and get to the boss fog. In DS2/3, you can just walk to the boss fog and then pop the item to unhollow, making it way less risky. At this point there might not really be any invaders out there, I dunno.

Oh, here's a list of all summons. Looking at this, I was unaware most of them even existed. I do remember using the caster on moonlight butterfly my first playthrough cause I was a melee-only build and kept getting wrecked.

Locations for all NPC Summons. - Dark Souls

For Dark Souls on the PlayStation 3, a GameFAQs message board topic titled "Locations for all NPC Summons.".

gamefaqs.gamespot.com

 

[wankerness]

Sign of the Cross is an ability for dual swords, I don't have it and honestly even forget what it was. I might try mid-stance on her, I tend to stick with low since it's a flurry of attacks and then I can still just jump right back out of it if it gets hairy. Dual swords have sadly been outshined by my new spear that does ~30 more DMG per hit than both of them, and I need all the help I can get on this fight.

Unfortunately my armor is at level actually higher as I've soul matched stuff with certain abilities, but now I've got armor that if I want to S.M., it's just so much fucking money because they're purple level; I'm level 90, and my chest armor is a little above that, I think my gauntlets/leg are a little below, like mid-80s but nothing wild, and leg armor is above me as well. I might have to fight some remnants for new gear, but the stuff I've got for me has been fucking working so I hate changing at this point.

I'll keep trying tonight, I had her down to legitimately under the "O" in her name, and she pulled out EIGHT combos in the entire time I had her there that didn't allow me to heal; EIGHT. COMBOS. And in that ENTIRE time, I never had enough ki or time to fucking pop an elixir, but she has enough stamina to spam moves? Get the fuck out of here.

Yeah, soulmatching is ludicrously expensive when you're in NG and thus aren't getting 394870987 legendary pieces of gear off every boss to sell. You're pretty much stuck trying to go to the highest level side missions that you can and farming gear either from bosses (if there's a boss like warrior of the east that drops it at a high rate), blacksmithing (if you got the plans to a good armor set, again a rare boss drop), or farming revenants (this works but they tend to be lower level than the level you find them on.

If you're now using a spear, I think just mashing the poke combo in mid stance with the strong attack button is all I did on her. Some of the humanoid enemies I also used that parry move you can learn with the spear. I don't remember the name, basically if you do it right before they attack you trip them with the spear. It's insanely good against a few certain enemies, like some of the training missions in the dojo where you're stuck with a wooden spear, but I know I used it on a couple humanoid bosses too. Not sure if I used it on her or if it works on her, but hey.

 

[TedEH]

IIRC the only bosses I've ever summoned for in DS1 are Gaping Dragon (BAD IDEA, the NPC usually gets taken out the first time he does the flying move and then has buffed health)

Lol I did this and it worked out fine. Not saying it was smart, but the distraction bought me enough time to figure out a pretty fool-proof pattern to chip away at the boss slowly.

moonlight butterfly my first playthrough cause I was a melee-only build and kept getting wrecked.

Yeh, I've got a pattern of playing souls games with a very strength+endurance forward "I'm going to build a tank" kind of style so far, and that butterfly was a pain. I can't decide if it's a bit antithetical to the souls game style to have a boss that almost requires ranged fighting. Can't think of any other one I've run into like that.

I really should try one of these games as a different build style. I'm very likely missing out on some shenanigans by almost never using any of the magic / casting kind of stuff.

I dunno if it's just because I haven't upgraded any ranged weapon yet, but the bows in this one feel pretty underpowered compared to other games. So far I mostly just use it for baiting stuff out one-by-one.

 

[MFB]

Yeah, soulmatching is ludicrously expensive when you're in NG and thus aren't getting 394870987 legendary pieces of gear off every boss to sell. You're pretty much stuck trying to go to the highest level side missions that you can and farming gear either from bosses (if there's a boss like warrior of the east that drops it at a high rate), blacksmithing (if you got the plans to a good armor set, again a rare boss drop), or farming revenants (this works but they tend to be lower level than the level you find them on.

If you're now using a spear, I think just mashing the poke combo in mid stance with the strong attack button is all I did on her. Some of the humanoid enemies I also used that parry move you can learn with the spear. I don't remember the name, basically if you do it right before they attack you trip them with the spear. It's insanely good against a few certain enemies, like some of the training missions in the dojo where you're stuck with a wooden spear, but I know I used it on a couple humanoid bosses too. Not sure if I used it on her or if it works on her, but hey.

I'm actually doubly-pissed off by the game because if you do the mission "Trail of the Master" where you find Muramasa and return him to the dojo - the mission that has the AWFUL Tengu Warrior/Yuki-Onna boss combo - you can THEN reduce soul-matching cost since it's SEPARATE from the actual sale price perk; I wasted like, minimum four of those perks getting it to 10% off just to turn around and see him there with the option to get it discounted.

 

[SalsaWood]

Got about 1/4 of the way into MGSV and I'm completely fed up with it. Everything except the gameplay is shit, and the gameplay is extremely repetitive. All the things I loved about MGS 1-4 this game has none of. Fucking none. It's like the negaverse edition of MGS- or maybe a respectively terrible version of Splinter Cell or Far Cry depending on your play style. That's the entire game, over and over and over in this "open world" that's miles wide but a millimeter deep. Kill this, go get that, find these, come home to jerk off then shake hands with your staff, sit in the fucking helicopter taking 50 seconds to go from one part of your base to the other because it's somehow quicker than driving a completely barren motherfucking kilometer between stations, button mash trying to figure out all the controls and moves that are not in the fucking menus or ever explained in the slightest, get your mission dicked because the prone movement is ripped out of fucking FIFA '93, and then do it all again.

Normally I love MGS writing and different open world games, but in this title they are 100% liabilities and not advantages. Why in the shitting fuck Kojima thought we wanted all this dumb shit encapsulating an otherwise fantastic engine and potential for various gameplay approaches is beyond me. They dicked the Diamond Dog, my friends. Beware.

 

[MFB]

Got about 1/4 of the way into MGSV and I'm completely fed up with it. Everything except the gameplay is shit, and the gameplay is extremely repetitive. All the things I loved about MGS 1-4 this game has none of. Fucking none. It's like the negaverse edition of MGS- or maybe a respectively terrible version of Splinter Cell or Far Cry depending on your play style. That's the entire game, over and over and over in this "open world" that's miles wide but a millimeter deep. Kill this, go get that, find these, come home to jerk off then shake hands with your staff, sit in the fucking helicopter taking 50 seconds to go from one part of your base to the other because it's somehow quicker than driving a completely barren motherfucking kilometer between stations, button mash trying to figure out all the controls and moves that are not in the fucking menus or ever explained in the slightest, get your mission dicked because the prone movement is ripped out of fucking FIFA '93, and then do it all again.

Normally I love MGS writing and different open world games, but in this title they are 100% liabilities and not advantages. Why in the shitting fuck Kojima thought we wanted all this dumb shit encapsulating an otherwise fantastic engine and potential for various gameplay approaches is beyond me. They dicked the Diamond Dog, my friends. Beware.

I went into with the same high hopes as you, and I think I made it thru like, fucking three missions before I was like, "this actually sucks ass and isn't even fun."

 

[SalsaWood]

I do think the gameplay is fun and I would just get over the lack of gameplay and story explanation if it were the largest part of the game, but honestly I spend more time waiting around for or on the chopper/base, or riding the stupid fucking horse through all the nothingness, than I do actually on missions. It's not worth it. I could fire up Dishonored or Splinter Cell and be enjoying myself in minutes with the same playstyle and general mechanics. I seriously don't understand who the fuck needed this mountain of interminable and asinine shit in a MGS game.

"We took out the long cutscenes and people complain there aren't enough of them now" is something I've heard from Kojima fanbois for years about this game. They effectively replaced those cutscenes with three hours of fucking tapes, and then shoehorned in multiple interminably boring transitions which are entirely motherfucking pointless. Entirely. Who the fuck cares about the goddamn story cutscenes being long? It's not Candy Crush, shit goes down. At this point the main character is basically four different fucking people with basically the same name, and basically is the same person- but not. Everyone else who matters has two or three different names as well. Good luck with that shit in a game with minimal cutscenes, Shakespeare. Cutscenes a few minutes long don't kill the momentum of a game nearly as much as a single minute of doing nothing but waiting for a completely unrewarding and unnecessary transition- and just to go do the same shit over and over again. The game is full of outright bad ideas, nobody gives up on a game because of cutscenes if it's a good game.

I honestly feel robbed of a great game. It's like a cookie jar you can fit your empty hand in, feel all the good cookies, but can't fit your hand holding a cookie out of it. It befounds me how the hell this game can have so much potential and yet be so goddamned terrible.