Dark Souls after the patch

[Rheinmetall]

...is a pain. I know this has been discussed a lot in November, but now that I had the chance to play again the game this time with the patch, I have an opinion of my own. There are some welcomed changes, for instance the blacksmith in Anor Londo now sells twinkling Titanite, but overall so far I really struggle to adapt to the new items/spells values. With one word, pyromancy doesn't work anymore; Iron Flesh is useless and fire spells are weak. Spell casters - I always play as a spell caster in action rpg- need to reconsider their tactics into the game. Not to mention the changes in Crystal Ring Shield, and Strong Magic Shield spell that were very useful in later stages of the game and in NG+.
For any newcomers, if you want my opinion skip the patch, honestly it makes an already hard game, much harder.

 

[Windcaler]

I didnt get the game till christmas when my girlfriend bought it for me. It was a title I just passed over and didnt give much thought to, probably because I didnt play Demon's souls either. That said, I really like Dark souls. I started out playing as a knight that focused on big weapons, using a black knight greatsword at the end, then I started a pyromancer who I occasionally struggled with but eventually beat the game. I havnt had the time to start a third game because of other games Ive bought/gotten and havnt spent much time playing

From my view, the view of someone that didnt play the game before this patch, it doesnt seem all that bad. Pyromancy and spellcasters need to think about what theyre doing, true, but how is that any different from the other classes? There is no face roll class, you have to approach each opponent carefully and figure out a set of tactics that work to win. It doesnt matter what class or focus you play with. Iron flesh is certainly useful against nearly all the bosses if you want to stay near them and wail on them without much dodging/blocking and fire spells seem fine to me

I guess I just dont understand what the issues are. Can you elaborate?

 

[godofallu]

The patch really didn't do much.

Iron Flesh was still used by me to kill the 4 kings and the final boss easily. Pyro spells are still super overpowered, especially at low levels.

The only thing the patch has that I dislike is removing the infinite souls glitch but I really don't need souls on any of my 6 chars anymore.

Plus the patch made multiplayer work like 1000 times better. Who wouldn't love that?!

 

[Skin]

Pyromancy is forever overpowered. Just upgrade that glove and watch as the world burns around you.

 

[Rheinmetall]

I didnt get the game till christmas when my girlfriend bought it for me. It was a title I just passed over and didnt give much thought to, probably because I didnt play Demon's souls either. That said, I really like Dark souls. I started out playing as a knight that focused on big weapons, using a black knight greatsword at the end, then I started a pyromancer who I occasionally struggled with but eventually beat the game. I havnt had the time to start a third game because of other games Ive bought/gotten and havnt spent much time playing

From my view, the view of someone that didnt play the game before this patch, it doesnt seem all that bad. Pyromancy and spellcasters need to think about what theyre doing, true, but how is that any different from the other classes? There is no face roll class, you have to approach each opponent carefully and figure out a set of tactics that work to win. It doesnt matter what class or focus you play with. Iron flesh is certainly useful against nearly all the bosses if you want to stay near them and wail on them without much dodging/blocking and fire spells seem fine to me

I guess I just dont understand what the issues are. Can you elaborate?

If you have a PS3 I really recommend you to play Demon's Souls. Although Dark Souls is an improvement in most areas, in my opinion it simply can't beat the atmosphere of Demon's Souls.

Regarding the pre-patch values, Iron Flesh was twice as strong, a guaranteed victory against some tough bosses, especially Four Knights. Now being significally weaker, it's a sword with two edges and it can kill you very easily. Fire spells did also the difference. With a fully upgraded Pyromancy Hand you ruled in the game. The combination of Iron Flesh, Chaos Fire Spells and a magic boost ring made you invincible. Pyromancy is still a good solution in the game, but not indisputable as before. I suppose it is more just that way.

Crystal Ring Shield combined with high Magic stats could give you a relatively fast ranged attack of 900 points, or even 1100 if buffed with an other magic boost spell. This doesn't happen anymore. I haven't tried it, but I've read that it can only do now a moderate damage.

Strong Magic Shield sorcery made you invulnerable for about 20-30 seconds. This was removed as well. All these advantages may sound like a bit too much, making perhaps the game easy, or unbalanced, but I don't think it's true because Dark Souls is hard by its own, with or without the conviniences of the pre-patch game, and secondly these items were earned after great effort against tough opponents and endless searching in the areas of the game for the required shards, so these advantages were a fair reward for the player's effort.
Anyway the game is still very fun either way, I just feel that some changes were unneeded.

 

[Rheinmetall]

Pyromancy is forever overpowered. Just upgrade that glove and watch as the world burns around you.

This is definately good news! I have upgraded the glove, up to lv. 8, or 9, I don't quite remember, but I have the impression it isn't as powerful as I remember it was. But anyway, maybe you are right pyromancy is still powerful.

 

[Windcaler]

Dark souls is a game that is supposed to be soul crushingly hard. Nothing is supposed to be easy. You mentioned Iron flesh being a garanteed kill on four kings so let me ask you this, if an ability garantee's a win against a boss shouldnt it be rebalanced? This is not final fantasy, or Skyrim, its not a game made to be about the story or made to be easy. What it is is its made to be hard. If anything makes a fight a garanteed win then IMO it should not be in the game because of what the game as it is or at all.

From where I stand you sound like you just want an easier game but thats not what Dark souls is trying to be

 

[Rheinmetall]

Dark souls is a game that is supposed to be soul crushingly hard. Nothing is supposed to be easy. You mentioned Iron flesh being a garanteed kill on four kings so let me ask you this, if an ability garantee's a win against a boss shouldnt it be rebalanced? This is not final fantasy, or Skyrim, its not a game made to be about the story or made to be easy. What it is is its made to be hard. If anything makes a fight a garanteed win then IMO it should be in the game because of what the game is trying to be

From where I stand you sound like you just want an easier game but thats not what Dark souls is trying to be

I agree, Dark Souls is all about combat and skill, it isn't Final Fantasy. But a guaranteed victory against Four Knights, or the final boss doesn't necessarily make the game easy. There are many other instances that neither Iron Flesh, nor anything else can save you, except your shield and well timed dodging, like Ornstein and Smough, or Sif. I see strong Iron Flesh as a help for the not so skilled player like me, so that that they don't stuck forever in some boss battles. I think that discovering a usefull tool in the game and understanding its potentials is a legitimate way of playing a hard game, or any game really. For instance I wasn't aware from the beginning that Iron Flesh can give me the victory against Four Knights, I was stuck there for long trying everything I had in my arsenal. I used Iron Flesh as a last solution, because I had rejected it seeing that it made you move very slowly. The same with fire spells, at first I didn't trust them because of their short range, but I experimented in the game a lot and found what was best for my style of playing and my skills.
You are right, I do want an easier game, but still very challenging, like Demon's Souls, or Dark Souls before the patch. Dark Souls after the patch is perhaps out of my reach.

 

[Windcaler]

Something a friend of mine once told me about TF2 when I felt like I sucked at it and could never improve was: Knowledge + practice = skill

This applies to almost every game but doubly so to dark souls. There is no shame in practicing different tactics against bosses but if anything makes an encounter a sure win then I feel it has no place in any game for the sake of game balance. Especially not Dark souls which is trying to be anything but easy

Practice you can only earn yourself by practicing against the bosses but knowledge you can get at the Dark souls wiki.

 

[Rheinmetall]

Something a friend of mine once told me about TF2 when I felt like I sucked at it and could never improve was: Knowledge + practice = skill

This applies to almost every game but doubly so to dark souls. There is no shame in practicing different tactics against bosses but if anything makes an encounter a sure win then I feel it has no place in any game for the sake of game balance. Especially not Dark souls which is trying to be anything but easy

Practice you can only earn yourself by practicing against the bosses but knowledge you can get at the Dark souls wiki.

Yep that's true. And both Demon's Souls and Dark Souls give you an incomparable feeling of reward when you manage to make any progress in an area that at first was seeming impossible.
Wiki Dark Souls is necessary too. I always start my games with the decision not to consult any online guide, but in this kind of games it's almost impossible not to. I think it's meant to be part of the game.

 

[Exius Xavarus]

I didnt get the game till christmas when my girlfriend bought it for me. It was a title I just passed over and didnt give much thought to, probably because I didnt play Demon's souls either. That said, I really like Dark souls. I started out playing as a knight that focused on big weapons, using a black knight greatsword at the end, then I started a pyromancer who I occasionally struggled with but eventually beat the game. I havnt had the time to start a third game because of other games Ive bought/gotten and havnt spent much time playing

From my view, the view of someone that didnt play the game before this patch, it doesnt seem all that bad. Pyromancy and spellcasters need to think about what theyre doing, true, but how is that any different from the other classes? There is no face roll class, you have to approach each opponent carefully and figure out a set of tactics that work to win. It doesnt matter what class or focus you play with. Iron flesh is certainly useful against nearly all the bosses if you want to stay near them and wail on them without much dodging/blocking and fire spells seem fine to me

I guess I just dont understand what the issues are. Can you elaborate?

Before the patch, Pyromancy made you a god, both offensively and defensively. Iron Flesh trivialized many of the bosses because you could facetank them and take little amounts of damage with no flinching. Even on the final boss, I could use Iron Flesh and take all his hits to the face and laugh at him while I ignore his blows to dish out my own. The Iron Flesh complaint stems from the fact that they made it significantly weaker than it used to be. The only real complaint a Pyromancer could have is that they weakened the Mag Adjust on their flame, so the damage isn't quite as ridiculous as it was(considering how easy it was to be a stupid powerful Pyromancer).

Some of the other differences is that before the patch, you had to find Twinkling Titanite from the Crystal Lizards, and they only spawned once(if kill them or they otherwise die in any manner). And now with the patch you can buy those from the Anor Londo Blacksmith. Another example are arrows and the Master Key. Before the patch, only the Undead Burg merchant sold arrows early in the game, now you can buy them most anywhere. As for the Master Key, it wasn't obtainable at all during the game. If you wanted one, you had to start as a Thief. Well if you get Domhnall to move out of the Depths and into Firelink Shrine, he'll sell you a Master Key.

Another part of the patch was directed as weapons balance. Lightning weapons are ludicrously powerful. And since little to nothing has any real defense against lightning damage, one could forge a +5 Lightning weapon of their choosing(usually a spear of some sort or an Uchigatana) and since Lightning weapons trade their scaling damage for fixed lightning damage, those players could pump all their stats into Vitality and Endurance for stupid amounts of HP while maintaining their ridiculous damage. Their goal was to beef up other weapons so that Lightning weapons aren't the option for PvP. They claimed that they were going to nerf Lightning weapons, but they, in truth, did not. They weakened Lightning +1-4 weapons, but Lightning +5 weapons are the exact same before and after the patch.

Oh, and there were some pretty busted spells and equipment. Ring of Fog, which makes you nearly invisible in dark places, used to make it so that you couldn't lock onto anyone wearing it. So in PvP is was quite invaluable as your target couldn't constantly face you as you circle them. Not without drawing themselves closer to you, anyway. The Tranquil Walk of Peace(I think that's the name) spell would make it so that you moved as if you were under the effects of Iron Flesh, only without the defense. And Strong Magic Shield would, as long as you didn't Two-Hand your weapon, you had infinite life. You could be thrown and knocked down and all that fun junk, you just couldn't take any damage. It was not supposed to do that. Rather, it was to give your shield pretty much infinite Stability, which it didn't do at all, before the patch. With the patch, they made some favorable changes to all these problems, such as being able to lock onto Ring of Fog users, reducing the movement speed encumbrance on TWoP and making Strong Magic Shield operate as designed; it gives you near infinite Stability and no longer makes you immune to damage.

They also changed the spawn points of some monsters, but that's no real bother.

My apologies for the lengthy read. The patch made a great number of changes to the game; it practically invalidated the printed strategy guides which, believe it or not, is not a joke. As lengthy as my elaborations are, I still haven't covered the entirety of the changes that patch made.

And with all that said, I don't really see that the patch makes much of a difference, to me. To me, it means I can get arrows more easily and I don't have to farm farm farm farm farm for those freakin' Twinkling Titanite. My only real complaint is that now my Pyromancer can't farm Silver Knights in Anor Londo anywhere NEAR as quickly as I could before, thanks to the nerf on the flame's Mag Adjust.

 

[ultrachicken]

From what I understand, you're complaining that the game has actually been balanced. Which baffles me.

 

[Rheinmetall]

My only real complaint is that now my Pyromancer can't farm Silver Knights in Anor Londo anywhere NEAR as quickly as I could before, thanks to the nerf on the flame's Mag Adjust.

Have you tried Great Heavy Soul Arrow and Great Soul Arrow? For me it works better and the knights don't even react. (Well with 30 Magic that is.) With fire spells I always find it difficult because they instantly cover themselves behind their shields.

 

[Rheinmetall]

From what I understand, you're complaining that the game has actually been balanced. Which baffles me.

You shouldn't, because it's a matter of different perspectives. Before the patch I thought that it was quite balanced, in the sense that DS was a hard game that still gave to the player some means- after a huge effort to gather them- to overcome a few impenetrable bosses in my opinion. If a game gives to the player a number of alternatives to beat it, I consider that as mostly wise game premise, but if it cuts some of those alternatives, only to make it more "hardcore", then in my eyes it becomes less balanced to what I consider as a fair battle between the CPU and the player. In any case I still love this game.

 

[lapan]

From what I understand, you're complaining that the game has actually been balanced. Which baffles me.

You shouldn't, because it's a matter of different perspectives. Before the patch I thought that it was quite balanced, in the sense that DS was a hard game that still gave to the player some means- after a huge effort to gather them- to overcome a few impenetrable bosses in my opinion. If a game gives to the player a number of alternatives to beat it, I consider that as mostly wise game premise, but if it cuts some of those alternatives, only to make it more "hardcore", then in my eyes it becomes less balanced to what I consider as a fair battle between the CPU and the player. In any case I still love this game.

Half of those alternatives you mentioned were either based on exploiting bugs or broken strong weapons. Most of the really strong bosses in Dark Souls have easy to exploit weaknesses, even without abusing bugs. And you always have a unlimited supply of new potions that refills after each death.

Ceaseless Discharge can be lured over an abyss and falls down after a few strikes. 4 kings don't use their strongest attacks and are easy to dodge if you stay close to one of them. Gwyn can be parried and has a grab he telegraphes fairly well and takes long enough to hit him even with slower weapons.

 

[GundamSentinel]

To be honest, I didn't even notice the difference. I was never much of Pyromancy user, never used Ironflesh, so that may be part of it, but I thought from the start the game was well balanced for my type of play. The only thing I missed was scaling weapons that were actually useful, and they seemed to have fixed that a bit. So I'm fine with it.

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

The only thing the patch has that I dislike is removing the infinite souls glitch

Which glitch was that?
And i havent played Dark Souls since Skyrim came out, so i havent experianced this patch yet. Although i was a bit of a noob so i dont know how much it would effect me anyway. When i stopped playing i was stuck on 3 different bosses. Sif, Some stupid butterfly thing and a boss back at the the Asylum, while at the same time i had no idea how to do Sens Fortress. So when i go back i'll have to figure out what to do.

As for the rest of the patch, it sounds like they just stopped making pyromancy OP

 

[Fat Hippo]

The only thing the patch has that I dislike is removing the infinite souls glitch

Which glitch was that?
And i havent played Dark Souls since Skyrim came out, so i havent experianced this patch yet. Although i was a bit of a noob so i dont know how much it would effect me anyway. When i stopped playing i was stuck on 3 different bosses. Sif, Some stupid butterfly thing and a boss back at the the Asylum, while at the same time i had no idea how to do Sens Fortress. So when i go back i'll have to figure out what to do.

As for the rest of the patch, it sounds like they just stopped making pyromancy OP

Heh, that Moonlight Butterfly is the dumbest boss in the game. Not actually very hard, but boring as sin if you're playing as someone without good ranged capabilities. You pretty much have to dodge his attacks for several minutes, then he gives 20 seconds at slash away at him, rinse repeat. *Yawn*

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

The only thing the patch has that I dislike is removing the infinite souls glitch

Which glitch was that?
And i havent played Dark Souls since Skyrim came out, so i havent experianced this patch yet. Although i was a bit of a noob so i dont know how much it would effect me anyway. When i stopped playing i was stuck on 3 different bosses. Sif, Some stupid butterfly thing and a boss back at the the Asylum, while at the same time i had no idea how to do Sens Fortress. So when i go back i'll have to figure out what to do.

As for the rest of the patch, it sounds like they just stopped making pyromancy OP

Heh, that Moonlight Butterfly is the dumbest boss in the game. Not actually very hard, but boring as sin if you're playing as someone without good ranged capabilities. You pretty much have to dodge his attacks for several minutes, then he gives 20 seconds at slash away at him, rinse repeat. *Yawn*

Yeah im playing as a warrior and ive put no points in anything ranged so after a few tries i just gave up and decided to leave it. I think its a bit unfortunate they force you to use one tactic given that the rest of the game can mostly be played in multiple ways.

 

[Fat Hippo]

The only thing the patch has that I dislike is removing the infinite souls glitch

Which glitch was that?
And i havent played Dark Souls since Skyrim came out, so i havent experianced this patch yet. Although i was a bit of a noob so i dont know how much it would effect me anyway. When i stopped playing i was stuck on 3 different bosses. Sif, Some stupid butterfly thing and a boss back at the the Asylum, while at the same time i had no idea how to do Sens Fortress. So when i go back i'll have to figure out what to do.

As for the rest of the patch, it sounds like they just stopped making pyromancy OP

Heh, that Moonlight Butterfly is the dumbest boss in the game. Not actually very hard, but boring as sin if you're playing as someone without good ranged capabilities. You pretty much have to dodge his attacks for several minutes, then he gives 20 seconds at slash away at him, rinse repeat. *Yawn*

Yeah im playing as a warrior and ive put no points in anything ranged so after a few tries i just gave up and decided to leave it. I think its a bit unfortunate they force you to use one tactic given that the rest of the game can mostly be played in multiple ways.

Well, for fighting the Moonlight Butterfly in melee, the most important things is to just have a really good weapon, like the drake sword. With a weapon like that, I managed to take him down after two "landings" (when he gets close enough to the bridge to strike). With a worse weapon, it could take 4 or 5, and it's hard to avoid all his attacks so you'll run out of estus flasks eventually.

My tip: Just run past all enemies till you reach him, because you'll want all 10 flasks. Or just wait till you have a better weapon. OR get some ranged pyromancy, if you have the attunement slots and you've freed the Pyromancer from the Depths. Also, I don't know how much armor actually helps against his attacks, so you may want to strip to below 25% of your equipment load, as speed and flexibility will help you more against this guy.