Dark Souls 2 - Summoning Advice

[anonymity88]

I've been playing DS2 on the 360 since it got released and have been feeling a bit lonely. I guess I was expecting it to be a bit more lively, summon signs everywhere and regular invasions but I don't ever seem to have either.

I keep alternating between Heir of the Sun and Rat King covenants depending on how helpful or malicious I feel at the time but it takes forever to summon or be summoned by other players. I'm starting to think that the problem here is me.

Bit of background:

I was pretty late to Dark Souls only getting into it nearly two years after it was released but never seemed to have a problem getting violently murdered by PVP'ers or summoning/being summoned as a SunBro but it's not really working out for me in the new game. Even now if I fire it up I can't go 5 minutes in the forest without being ganked.

I know they introduced Soul memory as a system so I'm looking for some advice with how to get it to work for me. I'm on NG with a new character trying an INT build, just cleared the Undead Crypt and got the King's Ring, I'm around level 90 - 94 (can't remember exactly) and have a soul memory of around 1.7 million. Does summoning get more common if I just forge on and start NG+? I've seen somewhere that the spreads for summoning get wider once you're on your next playthrough but no one seems to provide any evidence of this.

All I know is waiting checking my phone for 45 minutes between summoning victims in Doors of Pharos is not why I'm playing!

Any anecdotes/advice to help me get more action is welcome!

 

[A-D.]

Soul Memory has ranges, these ranges are tied to the Soul Memory and the various covenants and soapstones. There is also a divide between NG and NG+. NG being literally the first game for any character, these cant interact with anyone who has gone through the game before you. So if my character is on NG+, even if we have the same Soul Memory range, we couldnt play together as long as you are in NG. Conversly, NG+ and NG+2 or NG+3 can play together provided they are within range.

Each range has a tier, going from 1 to 41, depending on soul memory. Tier 1 is 0 to 9999 Soul Memory, Tier 2 is 10.000 to 19.999 and so forth. Later tiers have a much higher range, such as Tier 38 going from 7 Million to 8.999.999 Million. Tier 41, the last tier goes from 15 Million to 999.999.999, hence there is no range after that. This has an effect on soapstones, covenant rings and cracked orbs. Which is as follows, as explained on the Guide i saw on steam.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=259425063

 

[NeutralDrow]

I know hostile invasions get far more common as you forge on into NG+. For co-op summons, I have the most luck being summoned for certain hard bosses, especially the Smelter Demon and Old Iron King, and I've heard that the best place to be summoned is at the Ancient Dragon. Basically, it all depends on whether someone's going to bother to summon (or even unhollow) for a certain boss, and how hard they are to get to, in addition to the soul memory thing.

If you want an equivalent of the forest, try hanging out in Belfry Luna or Belfry Sol. The Bell Keepers are the Forest Guardians of DS2, and you'll generally find people waiting to gank unsuspecting bellbros.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

On your first playthrough right now, you might be a bit too high in level for the areas you're at. I had no problem being summoned, even when I put my sign down in a brand new area. You can try that. As soon as you get to a new area, place your sign and then go exploring. What usually happens is that you will be summoned while you're exploring. Some areas are really good for that sort of thing.

Once you hit new game plus though, the rules get much more relaxed and you'll find summoning and invading happen a lot more often.

 

[garjian]

Is your Cross-Region Play set to Restricted?

Otherwise, Soul Memory... Though I do not vouch for the values A-D. mentioned.
I was able to connect to my friend with 9.2mil with my 1.6mil character until later that day, we stopped being able to connect and he started getting insane soul rewards from PvP. I put the final range at 9.5mil-INF, and 1.5-9.5 before that.

 

[barbzilla]

I've been playing DS2 on the 360 since it got released and have been feeling a bit lonely. I guess I was expecting it to be a bit more lively, summon signs everywhere and regular invasions but I don't ever seem to have either.

I keep alternating between Heir of the Sun and Rat King covenants depending on how helpful or malicious I feel at the time but it takes forever to summon or be summoned by other players. I'm starting to think that the problem here is me.

Bit of background:

I was pretty late to Dark Souls only getting into it nearly two years after it was released but never seemed to have a problem getting violently murdered by PVP'ers or summoning/being summoned as a SunBro but it's not really working out for me in the new game. Even now if I fire it up I can't go 5 minutes in the forest without being ganked.

I know they introduced Soul memory as a system so I'm looking for some advice with how to get it to work for me. I'm on NG with a new character trying an INT build, just cleared the Undead Crypt and got the King's Ring, I'm around level 90 - 94 (can't remember exactly) and have a soul memory of around 1.7 million. Does summoning get more common if I just forge on and start NG+? I've seen somewhere that the spreads for summoning get wider once you're on your next playthrough but no one seems to provide any evidence of this.

All I know is waiting checking my phone for 45 minutes between summoning victims in Doors of Pharos is not why I'm playing!

Any anecdotes/advice to help me get more action is welcome!

On both the PS3 and 360 versions of the game, the majority of the players are in the 210+ SL range (which is to say they are likely in the 15m+ bracket in Soul Memory). So the majority of your issue is going to be combined with the facts that A: mostly only PvP players are still going through NG mode and that is only to level up a new 150 build, and B: the majority of players who aren't into PvP or are not at a much higher tier (MINIMUM of 2m+ and be in NG+), have left the game and moved on to something new.

That said, the PC version is still pretty alive (both community and online wise). Steam also has DS1 on sale for $6 and will be getting rid of GFWL very soon. Alternatively, you can just look on the bright side that you don't have to deal with invasions very often.

 

[garjian]

Is your Cross-Region Play set to Restricted?

That only affects Japan; Unless you live in Korea, China, or in Russia around Vladivostok, your ping's going to be too bad to play with them anyway.

("Cross-Region Play" in DkSII has been found to separate the world into only 2 "regions": Japan, and the rest of the world.)

That's odd.
Anecdotal of course, but I've set it to that to avoid Rat PvP before and never been summoned once while restricted. I also forgot to switch it back, and only noticed as I was not being summoned and there were no signs around... when I switched it back, they appeared immediately.
A few days later I did some Brotherhood duels with it on and was staggered at both the consistently good connection quality and low player pool.

UK here. It certainly seems to affect me.

 

[LostCrusader]

I'm confused why everyone is mentioning soul level ranges, as I thought the only thing that matters is the soul memory when it comes to coop. Anyway, I haven't had many issues getting summoned on the PC while going through my first playthrough, to the point where I am closing in on 5 mil soul memory and still haven't finished. The areas that I would get summoned extremely quickly at were the bridge at the iron keep or the second bonfire in the water region (can't remember the name, but it has the big frog boss and tons of caster enemies in the region).

 

[A-D.]

I'm confused why everyone is mentioning soul level ranges, as I thought the only thing that matters is the soul memory when it comes to coop. Anyway, I haven't had many issues getting summoned on the PC while going through my first playthrough, to the point where I am closing in on 5 mil soul memory and still haven't finished. The areas that I would get summoned extremely quickly at were the bridge at the iron keep or the second bonfire in the water region (can't remember the name, but it has the big frog boss and tons of caster enemies in the region).

This pretty much. Summon areas are rather limited in the sense as to where most people put their signs. Also the OP mentioned he was 1.7 million in and already finished the game, which is low all things considered because when i was done, i was at 4 million already. However there are areas which can be "farmed" effectively, or rather bosses which are co-op'd alot because they give a rather large amount of souls to the phantoms, example being Ruin Sentinels which give 9950 souls for each win plus anything you get for killing the stuff before it. The ideal summon-area is that area with the boxes, before the "ambush door". Bridge in Iron Keep is another given the large amount you gain from killing Smelter Demon. Demon of Song in Amana is also at about 8k per kill and one of the easier bosses, putting the sign down in front of it, or at the second or third bonfire in amana will net you more souls since you can kill all the Archdrake guys.

Other good areas are Dual Dragonriders and Looking Glass Knight which give a rather sizeable amount of souls, though Looking Glass Knight is a tough fight comparatively. And the last area which is good for soul-farming as phantom is before the Throne of Want, essentially Throne Watcher/Throne Defender and Nashandra, which can clock in at about 30k souls for both, more in NG+.

 

[higgs20]

Summoning and invasions do get more common in NG+ I am on xbox too and have just started NG+ at around the same soul level as you are and I have noticed an upward spike in both summon signs and invasions.

My main problem now is that only around 3 out of 10 of either invasions or summonings going either way will actually get seen through to their end point (someones death or a boss defeat) I get disconnected A LOT, not sure if it is my internet connection just not getting on with xbox live or if there is some kind of larger match making problem but it's really fucking irritating either way.

 

[BrownKing11]

hey guys I joined a few weeks ago and only started trying the summoning, I've read most of your comments already and learned about that soul memory and level range, so my problem here is that im on NG (first play through) and my level is 239 with a soul memory of 10.7 mil. and I AM HUMAN, I keep seeing that being summoned only works as being a hollow and vice versa (only being summoned whilst BEING HUMAN)I need massive advice on this because I want to get 17 "Sunlight Medals" to get that Lightning Bolt, this problem is stopping me from leveling because then there'll be no levels and shit near me (so I believe) so if you guys don't mind helping me ASAP I would extremely appreciate it <3