The Shattered Elden Ring Thread: Tarnished Edition - (Shadow of the Erdtree p. 85)

[hanselthecaretaker]

Well that's usually a choice done by a player who already knows what they are doing. And the master key doesn't let you skip THAT much of the game really. It let's you access areas earlier than you otherwise would, but you aren't really doing any skipping.

Doesn’t that key mean you can skip one of the best boss encounters in the game Gaping Dragon? Really though, it seems to tie into one of the main design differences here vs other open world games, in that FROMSOFT/Miyazaki are pretty indifferent to what a player might be missing.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Well that's usually a choice done by a player who already knows what they are doing. And the master key doesn't let you skip THAT much of the game really. It let's you access areas earlier than you otherwise would, but you aren't really doing any skipping.

Of the 22 bosses in Dark Souls, 9 are skipable (leaving... 13). Master Key lets you skip The Depths completely, Darkroot Basin is optional, The Catacombs can be almost completely skipped with a few shortcuts, The Great Hollow and Ash Lake are so well hidden that most players probably wouldn't find them without hints, and the Painted World is also quite hidden and requires an equally well hidden method of backtracking to the Undead Asylum.

My first (second attempt) playthrough of Dark Souls took 40 hours. Afterwards I managed a run in under 5 hours (NG, not NG+) after 3 attempts not using any glitches or speedrun routes. Most of the game can be either ran past or just skipped entirely.

 

[Dalisclock]

Well that's usually a choice done by a player who already knows what they are doing. And the master key doesn't let you skip THAT much of the game really. It let's you access areas earlier than you otherwise would, but you aren't really doing any skipping.

It lets you skip everything between the undead berg and lower blighttown(including one of the worst bosses in the game). That's not inconsequential added in with all the other optional areas(as others have pointed out). And if you know where the shortcuts and bonfires are you can run basically rush between them skipping nearly everything that isn't a boss.

And how is that much different then mainlining two dungeons in ER to skip to the capital? You're someone who knows what they're doing skipping the optional stuff. Hell, even before you know where everything else, you can skip 90% of the overworld or just grab shit from your horse while riding around and the enemies can almost never touch you. It's hilarious to see guarded bridges and chokepoints like in limgrave and you just gallop on through without having to fight any of them and all those guys can do is yell at you.

These games tend to last a lot longer if you're poking in all the nooks and crannies, don't know how the levels are laid out, don't know the enemies and do the optional areas(such as castle cainhurst or the painted world). If you just doing the strictly required stuff and you've beaten the bosses before, the game can be a hell of a lot shorter. Maybe go do some power leveling in between by making a bird kill itself a bunch of time to boost stats so you can wield your favorite weapons and spells but if you aren't exploring you realize the games really aren't that big. I mean, god knows how much time I wasted in DS3 doing the archdragon peak, getting the dragon stuff only to realize that the dragon stuff sucks ass and I wasted my time pursing it(not ADP, which was fucking awesome).

 

[Brokencontroller]

It lets you skip everything between the undead berg and lower blighttown(including one of the worst bosses in the game). That's not inconsequential added in with all the other optional areas(as others have pointed out). And if you know where the shortcuts and bonfires are you can run basically rush between them skipping nearly everything that isn't a boss.

And how is that much different then mainlining two dungeons in ER to skip to the capital? You're someone who knows what they're doing skipping the optional stuff.

These games tend to last a lot longer if you're poking in all the nooks and crannies, don't know how the levels are laid out, don't know the enemies and do the optional areas(such as castle cainhurst or the painted world). If you just doing the strictly required stuff and you've beaten the bosses before, the game can be a hell of a lot shorter. Maybe go do some power leveling in between by making a bird kill itself a bunch of time to boost stats so you can wield your favorite weapons and spells but if you aren't exploring you realize the games really aren't that big.

But doesnt skipping all that still require knowledge on the players part as to what they are doing as Critical said? Because even if a new player stumbled into skipping all that stuff, which is highly unlikely, they are just as likely to double back through the stuff they skipped not knowing that they has skipped it in the first place.

When comparing to Elden Ring i dont see it as being comparable but Drath has a point in that Fromsoft doesnt give a shit what you miss. That being said Elden Ring is vastly more skipable because of how big it is.

And by the time a player gets to the Plateau or maybe the snowfields, they already have realized how samey all the caves and shit are and will be more likely to skip that crap by then. And that might happen earlier if they have a working build that they like. And even if a player was determined to 100% the game, that is a feat theyd probably only do once and any future playthroughs will be linear paths to whatever shit they need for that run and moving on.

This doesnt directly compare to any previous game because even if you skipped all the possible bosses in Dark Souls, you still have to do over half of them. And in ER 13 is nowhere near half of 150. So it is like comparing a fishing boat to the Titanic.

 

[sXeth]

Spoiler

Ranni definitely did have a Great Rune in the past; Gideon Ofnir mentions that she has cast it aside, and as a result he's uninterested in hunting her down.

I mean, we get plenty of notes that Gideon the All-knowing is actually not All-knowing. Ranni had half a rune that she stole (or made?) as that goes. It gets kind of wonky cause the Mending Rune of Death (which is half from Rannia and half from Godwyn) is clearly a new thing, but the Rune of Death/Destined Death is also a thing (that Marika removed and gave Maliketh to hide outside of time)

Does it affect the endings if you only have the minimum number of runes or is that entirely based on NPC stuff you do?

I know FROM games have some wierd citeria for unlocking endings other than the standard one but it would be interesting if you had more options for endings if you got more runes because theoretically the ring would be more "Complete" when it was reforged.

4/6 endings are based on you adding a new Rune that you created during a questline. And the other two are variants of "F*** this linking the fire cyclical BS"


Worth noting, you can do all 5 alternate questlines right up until the final choice point. the main difference is what cutscene you get at the end. (Also doing one questline will mostly lock you into choosing that at the end, unless you do another optional questline that is otherwise unrelated to endings)

 

[BrawlMan]

​

 

[CriticalGaming]

The speedrun is under 7 minutes now and requires absolutely no fighting anything at all.

 

[CriticalGaming]

The following is an explaination of how the speedrun is done from Distortion2:

" This time I'm going to give a thorough explanation of what is going on in this category as this run was insane. To start off, this run is done on CURRENT Patch as we believe it has more stability, and this falls into the UNRESTRICTED Any% category on https://www.speedrun.com/eldenring This category allows ALL use of glitches and the ability to ALT+F4 the game to achieve the Wrong Warp. This allows us to enter Farum Azula and is why you see the game close during that segment.

The zip glitch further explained below is also extremely hardware dependent and requires a stable 60 fps as well as stable frametimes. I also decided to use a keyboard mouse cam to further show legitimacy, and I switch to controller mainly for movement as that is what I mainly play the game with. The timer also pauses as we use in-game time, which only continues when you are loaded into the game. We check the load screen at the end for the final time. The run has pretty much come down to a test of a runners patience, nerves and the ability to perform 13 FRAME PERFECT glitches known as "The Zip".

This zip glitch allows us to teleport a wide range of distances using a combination of blocking, holding walk, and pressing W to move forward with a combination of 139 frames. If the two actions add up to 139, you teleport, and this distance can vary depending on the combination. The longer you hold W, the further you go. Some zips are so precise, that you need the walk and block duration to line up perfectly, which makes them double frame perfect I'm not even done yet, as we also have a newfound discovery which is the reason why we no longer have to fight bosses. This is thanks to speedrunner SeekerTV, and it is known as the "Megazip". This is done by performing a normal zip, and pressing W to walk forward again within a 12-14 frame window after the initial zip. This nearly quadruples your momentum launching you significantly further. We can use this megazip to kill Maliketh as well as Elden Beast.

We don't fully understand what is going on behind the scenes, but we believe that by going far enough away from a boss arena, the platforms deload and the bosses begin to fall to their demise. In normal circumstances, we wouldn't be able to use this as our character would normally die before the boss does. This is due to the inherent fall timer in Elden Ring which will kill you after roughly 13 seconds of falling. However, by doing a mid-air attack we can actually reset this timer allowing us to fall even longer than the normal 13 seconds. This buys us just enough time to fall for long enough where the boss will die before us.

Maliketh "Megazip" requires extremely specific positioning and angles as to have your character get "zipped" high enough where you can fall for roughly 8 seconds before attacking. If you launch too high, the game wont let you attack. If you launch too low, you will die before the boss does. You also have to deal with performing a frame perfect glitch under high pressure with an angry Maliketh trying to kill you

The Elden Beast "Megazip" is a bit easier as we start as the Vagabond class, which has enough starting equipment that we can reach "Heavy Equip Load". (We also use this for the second zip of the run). This heavy equip load causes zips to go roughly 8% further and allows us to get just enough distance enabling us to more consistently to kill Hoarah Loux. It is a blessing that he has a cutscene, as when his first phase dies, it teleports us saving us from very imminent death. Elden Beast takes a bit longer to fall for whatever reason, and lucky for us the timing lines up perfectly where we can get piledrived by Hoarah Loux and receive the "God Slain" message indicating Elden Beast is dead right as the screen fades to black.

The final boss is now dead and we are teleported to the final platform where we can beat the game. Radagon gets to survive, as the only trigger check for being able to activate the Statue is whether or not Elden Beast is dead. Hope this explanation helps and thank you for watching! "

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

The following is an explaination of how the speedrun is done from Distortion2:

Spoiler

" This time I'm going to give a thorough explanation of what is going on in this category as this run was insane. To start off, this run is done on CURRENT Patch as we believe it has more stability, and this falls into the UNRESTRICTED Any% category on https://www.speedrun.com/eldenring This category allows ALL use of glitches and the ability to ALT+F4 the game to achieve the Wrong Warp. This allows us to enter Farum Azula and is why you see the game close during that segment.

The zip glitch further explained below is also extremely hardware dependent and requires a stable 60 fps as well as stable frametimes. I also decided to use a keyboard mouse cam to further show legitimacy, and I switch to controller mainly for movement as that is what I mainly play the game with. The timer also pauses as we use in-game time, which only continues when you are loaded into the game. We check the load screen at the end for the final time. The run has pretty much come down to a test of a runners patience, nerves and the ability to perform 13 FRAME PERFECT glitches known as "The Zip".

This zip glitch allows us to teleport a wide range of distances using a combination of blocking, holding walk, and pressing W to move forward with a combination of 139 frames. If the two actions add up to 139, you teleport, and this distance can vary depending on the combination. The longer you hold W, the further you go. Some zips are so precise, that you need the walk and block duration to line up perfectly, which makes them double frame perfect I'm not even done yet, as we also have a newfound discovery which is the reason why we no longer have to fight bosses. This is thanks to speedrunner SeekerTV, and it is known as the "Megazip". This is done by performing a normal zip, and pressing W to walk forward again within a 12-14 frame window after the initial zip. This nearly quadruples your momentum launching you significantly further. We can use this megazip to kill Maliketh as well as Elden Beast.

We don't fully understand what is going on behind the scenes, but we believe that by going far enough away from a boss arena, the platforms deload and the bosses begin to fall to their demise. In normal circumstances, we wouldn't be able to use this as our character would normally die before the boss does. This is due to the inherent fall timer in Elden Ring which will kill you after roughly 13 seconds of falling. However, by doing a mid-air attack we can actually reset this timer allowing us to fall even longer than the normal 13 seconds. This buys us just enough time to fall for long enough where the boss will die before us.

Maliketh "Megazip" requires extremely specific positioning and angles as to have your character get "zipped" high enough where you can fall for roughly 8 seconds before attacking. If you launch too high, the game wont let you attack. If you launch too low, you will die before the boss does. You also have to deal with performing a frame perfect glitch under high pressure with an angry Maliketh trying to kill you

The Elden Beast "Megazip" is a bit easier as we start as the Vagabond class, which has enough starting equipment that we can reach "Heavy Equip Load". (We also use this for the second zip of the run). This heavy equip load causes zips to go roughly 8% further and allows us to get just enough distance enabling us to more consistently to kill Hoarah Loux. It is a blessing that he has a cutscene, as when his first phase dies, it teleports us saving us from very imminent death. Elden Beast takes a bit longer to fall for whatever reason, and lucky for us the timing lines up perfectly where we can get piledrived by Hoarah Loux and receive the "God Slain" message indicating Elden Beast is dead right as the screen fades to black.

The final boss is now dead and we are teleported to the final platform where we can beat the game. Radagon gets to survive, as the only trigger check for being able to activate the Statue is whether or not Elden Beast is dead. Hope this explanation helps and thank you for watching! "

…Basically fodder for another good South Park gaming nerd episode in the near future.

 

[CriticalGaming]

…Basically fodder for another good South Park gaming nerd episode in the near future.

What i find interesting, is that i think a lot of speedrunner lingo is designed to make speedrunning seem a lot harder than it is. Terms like "frame perfect" for example, if you actually watch the speedrun I feel like most people could do it if they wanted to and frame perfect is a lot easier than it sounds to most people. Same thing for the speculation of how the game's code runs in the background when performing certain actions, it's a lot of words to say, "We trick the game into killing the boss for us".

In a way it's probably designed to be gatekeepy, but at the same time also just make the speedrunning more impressive which I just think is overkill.

 

[BrawlMan]

In a way it's probably designed to be gatekeepy,

Most speedrunners are pretty open and exclusive last I checked. The terminology is nothing more than to sound fancier and techier than what is. Some of these terms have been around for a while, but the rest sounds like they're trying to one up the fighting game and brawler community.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

What i find interesting, is that i think a lot of speedrunner lingo is designed to make speedrunning seem a lot harder than it is. Terms like "frame perfect" for example, if you actually watch the speedrun I feel like most people could do it if they wanted to and frame perfect is a lot easier than it sounds to most people. Same thing for the speculation of how the game's code runs in the background when performing certain actions, it's a lot of words to say, "We trick the game into killing the boss for us".

In a way it's probably designed to be gatekeepy, but at the same time also just make the speedrunning more impressive which I just think is overkill.

Well they are hardcore nerds so it’s probably a mix of both. Who the hell else could reasonably discover these exploit conditions by playing the game normally anyways.

Meanwhile there’s a new meme going around in the Reddit -

Spoiler

Turns out it’s actually a real player -

 

[EvilRoy]

Well they are hardcore nerds so it’s probably a mix of both. Who the hell else could reasonably discover these exploit conditions by playing the game normally anyways.

Meanwhile there’s a new meme going around in the Reddit -

Spoiler

Turns out it’s actually a real player -

If nude man wearing a pot on his head and carrying a weapon walked up to me I would probably lose the fight too. I'm surprised Melania doesn't just get out of her chair and quietly leave the room.

 

[CriticalGaming]

Well they are hardcore nerds so it’s probably a mix of both. Who the hell else could reasonably discover these exploit conditions by playing the game normally anyways.

Meanwhile there’s a new meme going around in the Reddit -

Spoiler

Turns out it’s actually a real player -

He has copy cats!

 

[Dalisclock]

Been exploring the Atlus Plateau and man does that whole area just drip in lost grandeur. There's certainly a "Fall of the Roman Empire" feel to it, and it gets more and more pronounced the closer you get to the capital. I love the details of how the whole area is just falling into ruin(the fact the battlefield outside the capitol still hasn't been cleaned up after god knows how long is telling how little anyone in the capital cares at this point and the roads are becoming overgrown because apparently nobody is bothering to perform basic road maintenance). I haven't entered the capitol other then via that one trap chest but yeah, it's breathtaking. It puts Lothric castle to shame.

In other news, I've been doing Varre's quest which I think I'm beginning to regret my decision (jokes on him, I invaded 3 times and only killed one person in an honorable duel). I think when he did...something to my finger I realized I made poor life choices and even more so when I used the medallion and ended up in what's probably Tartarus(aka the shitty part of the greek afterlife). So I might stay away from there for a while.

I'm also doing the volcano manor stuff and...that's weirdly interesting. It's basically doing NPC invasion contracts for a different faction.....maybe? I mean, I thought Varre and Rya were working together but they seem to be two separate factions, except I'm not sure if Varre even has a faction as opposed to being part of a creepy blood cult whereas Volcano manor is more professional griefers or something.

On an unrelated note, I keep bumping into these big elaborate amphitheaters all over the map and I think they're supposed to be for duels(considering you find a pvp item at the door of one of them and there's even a ghost saying he wants to go in and fight) but as far as I can tell none of them are accessible(The caelid one is hard as hell to reach and has a big fucking jarboi in front of it...and yet there's nothing there to interact with). Does anyone know what's going on with that? I mean, if FROM didn't want them to be used they could have been removed or made the doors collapsed or something but it very much looks like they had a purpose in mind for them, to the point they programmed a ghost NPC just for the sole purpose of pointing out battles are meant to take place there. DLC content? Upcoming patch?

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

He has copy cats!

The game too haaaarrrd!!!

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Been exploring the Atlus Plateau and man does that whole area just drip in lost grandeur. There's certainly a "Fall of the Roman Empire" feel to it, and it gets more and more pronounced the closer you get to the capital. I love the details of how the whole area is just falling into ruin(the fact the battlefield outside the capitol still hasn't been cleaned up after god knows how long is telling how little anyone in the capital cares at this point and the roads are becoming overgrown because apparently nobody is bothering to perform basic road maintenance). I haven't entered the capitol other then via that one trap chest but yeah, it's breathtaking. It puts Lothric castle to shame.

In other news, I've been doing Varre's quest which I think I'm beginning to regret my decision (jokes on him, I invaded 3 times and only killed one person in an honorable duel). I think when he did...something to my finger I realized I made poor life choices and even more so when I used the medallion and ended up in what's probably Tartarus(aka the shitty part of the greek afterlife). So I might stay away from there for a while.

I'm also doing the volcano manor stuff and...that's weirdly interesting. It's basically doing NPC invasion contracts for a different faction.....maybe? I mean, I thought Varre and Rya were working together but they seem to be two separate factions, except I'm not sure if Varre even has a faction as opposed to being part of a creepy blood cult whereas Volcano manner is more professional griefers or something.

On an unrelated note, I keep bumping into these big elaborate amphitheatres all over the map and I think they're supposed to be for duels(considering you find a pvp item at the door of one of them) but as far as I can tell none of them are accessible(The caelid one is hard as hell to reach and has a big fucking jarboi in front of it...and yet there's nothing there to interact with). Does anyone know what's going on with that?

I mean, why don’t they just hire a few of the giant trolls and their cohorts to clean up? They’re always roaming around Limgrave. Send ‘em up the lift!

No clue about the arenas, or the magic blue doors that are scattered around different ruins. Usually they’re accompanied by a message about making a grand gesture but holding my arms up in a big circle has never done squat. I’m sure I’ll eventually stumble across a solution like most of the stuff so far.

 

[EvilRoy]

I mean, why don’t they just hire a few of the giant trolls and their cohorts to clean up? They’re always roaming around Limgrave. Send ‘em up the lift!

No clue about the arenas, or the magic blue doors that are scattered around different ruins. Usually they’re accompanied by a message about making a grand gesture but holding my arms up in a big circle has never done squat. I’m sure I’ll eventually stumble across a solution like most of the stuff so far.

There is a talisman and another item that indicates ritual combat used to be performed to honor the erdtree, and since the arenas are present in each region and typically at least within sight of a minor erdtree, the going theory is the arenas were intended for that. People got into them via glitches and found they are fully modelled so it may be upcoming DLC.

The caelid one is hard as hell to reach and has a big fucking jarboi in front of it...and yet there's nothing there to interact with

There is something to do with the big lad but it's not super obvious. Have a chat and look at the ground.

 

[sXeth]

Been exploring the Atlus Plateau and man does that whole area just drip in lost grandeur. There's certainly a "Fall of the Roman Empire" feel to it, and it gets more and more pronounced the closer you get to the capital. I love the details of how the whole area is just falling into ruin(the fact the battlefield outside the capitol still hasn't been cleaned up after god knows how long is telling how little anyone in the capital cares at this point and the roads are becoming overgrown because apparently nobody is bothering to perform basic road maintenance). I haven't entered the capitol other then via that one trap chest but yeah, it's breathtaking. It puts Lothric castle to shame.

In other news, I've been doing Varre's quest which I think I'm beginning to regret my decision (jokes on him, I invaded 3 times and only killed one person in an honorable duel). I think when he did...something to my finger I realized I made poor life choices and even more so when I used the medallion and ended up in what's probably Tartarus(aka the shitty part of the greek afterlife). So I might stay away from there for a while.

I'm also doing the volcano manor stuff and...that's weirdly interesting. It's basically doing NPC invasion contracts for a different faction.....maybe? I mean, I thought Varre and Rya were working together but they seem to be two separate factions, except I'm not sure if Varre even has a faction as opposed to being part of a creepy blood cult whereas Volcano manor is more professional griefers or something.

On an unrelated note, I keep bumping into these big elaborate amphitheaters all over the map and I think they're supposed to be for duels(considering you find a pvp item at the door of one of them and there's even a ghost saying he wants to go in and fight) but as far as I can tell none of them are accessible(The caelid one is hard as hell to reach and has a big fucking jarboi in front of it...and yet there's nothing there to interact with). Does anyone know what's going on with that? I mean, if FROM didn't want them to be used they could have been removed or made the doors collapsed or something but it very much looks like they had a purpose in mind for them, to the point they programmed a ghost NPC just for the sole purpose of pointing out battles are meant to take place there. DLC content? Upcoming patch?

I mean, without spoiling too much. Your assessment of Varres pretty spot on lol. The Volcano dudes at least have a compelling cause that they seem to believe in, though I'll leave it to you to find out how truthful that is.


Boundary Break on Youtube did the colosseums, They're fully modelled and even have lifts. There is a lot of the game left on the cutting room floor really. So you find more then a few of these sort of things. (Or even the ones they left in and didnt notice then had to rush patch up.


Probably by now you've found the Weeping Peninsula, which is clearly staged out to set up the Frenzied Flame... except theres barely 4 lines of dialogue there between two NPCs. You can find the village where everyone got infected but theres nothing to connect it to the castle, it seems to have been written out and replaced by random demihumans.


Dataminers on the old youtube have dug up the network test version and found the whole missing Sleep/Dream mist quest, if you were wondering why that element comes up so rarely (on two whole pieces of loot).

There are of course the two quests they barely patched over because the NPCs got left in accidentally. But 3 or 4 come to kind of abrupt non-conclusive endings as well,

 

[Dalisclock]

Still poking around the capital and the plateau, searching for bonfires, weak points in the defenses, easily grabbed items, etc. Stumbled upon the Windmill village and ....yeah, that place is fucking creepy. I would not be shocked if there's a wicker man somewhere around there because these people have clearly been out in the middle of nowhere for too long.

Once I'm done poking around I have to decide if I want to attempt to storm the capital or head down to Calied. Some of the NPCs have mentioned a Festival and I think I know where it's supposed to happen so I think I could try to get invovled with that somehow(and I'm pretty sure that has something to do with the Radaon battle that I've heard a ton about). I know I've exhausted what I can do in the underdark so far(at least until I can find another way down there), There's some stuff on the plateau I can do still, there's the volcano area to the west. I know some of these are later game areas but I'm not sure exactly how later game.

Also, I noticed there are tree sentinels guarding some of the Capital gates. Lovely. Clearly they're meant to deter me and they're doing a pretty good job of it to be honest. Oh, and the stinky poop man is squatting at the roundtable like a stinky hobo. Hoo-ray. Like he's an invader but he's also just sitting there in a room full rotting corpses because.....why the fuck not?