Dark Souls & Other Souls-Likes

You know, the disparity between first playthrough of a Souls game and the second playthrough of a Souls game always astounds me.

I know it was mostly the style in which I tackled it the first time, but Pontiff Sulyvahn was something I one shotted this time around heh. The first time I felt the need and compulsion to summon a friendly quest NPC to help, and she's actually quite powerful in the fight and let me make the most of my powerful weapon. This time I executed my footwork, block timing, and counters. I don't know why, but I felt completely imperturbable.

Though, Lock On did almost kill me once, damn auto target switching due to camera angles.

*tries to do Red Phantom things*

*gets ganked repeatedly*

How does anyone find being the red phantom fun?

Edit: I have since had a duel on an invisible bridge that was very intense. Quite the rush. I get it now. Moments like this lol. I just wish getting ganked wasn't so common, but I mean, having been on the receiving end of spiteful and malevolent invaders myself, I understand why people gank.

Heh, apparently a lot of newer Dark Souls players are having troubles with the knights before Aldrich, as well as extreme fear of Aldrich.

>:D

How does one gank an invader? lol They are the ones trying to gank >_>

My being invaded experience:
Me and Dame go to do the Cathedral of the Deep. I summon him and we get going up one of the shortcuts I had opened.

You have been invaded by Dark Phantom.
I look around. I see nothing. So we continue on.
Blue Sentinel has arrived to assist you.
I look around. I see nothing. So we continue on.
Blue Sentinel has been defeated!
I look around. I see nothing. So we continue on.
Dark Phantom has returned to their world.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Summon 2-3 white phantoms. Attack the invader all at once.

And hosts have the option to back away from enemies/stop progressing when invaders spawn in. I know I do.

How do you summon so many phantoms I've only been able to summon one.

Also how do you add more damn lines to your messages?

Using a password makes it impossible to see signs that don't have the same password.

And dunno, I don't use the messaging feature.

Messaging feature is really good, free heals!

I got invaded in Belfry Luna last night. Luckily the guy who invaded me was a real gent and let me ring the bell before we actually fought.

***, Patches.

well ~ i got the elite knight armor. made a new character. Had a friend help me do some item transfers. Now I'm going to invade people as 'Anri of Astora' and see if i can get anyone to freak out about the invasion

Every time I have invaded someone, there has been at least 3x people there lol. Mostly tried right before Abyss Watchers so people can be annoyed by the Wraiths

I two shot them. Second phase got me while I was still learning attack patterns and spacing.

Sewer Centipedes terrify me. Bloodborne leftover enemies. ._.

Then he failed at doing his job!

Sulyvhan is *** nuts

Should you require aid, you can use my sign. You should spot it by its brilliant aura. If you miss it, you must be blind~

You and your incredibly powerful pyromancies. My friends came over to get me today when I was gonna go with you and Dame as we took turns routing out each other's Lothric Castle. They watched you riposte with your flame and do the 600+ damage, and they're like, "Yep, Nyos is carrying. He's the bad ***."

And all I did was suck and die!

But back on the topic of invasions...

They really aren't that bad, and you can ignore the invaders sometimes, as they are dissipated upon entering a boss fight. Other times you haven't unlocked an area, and they block your progression. Earlier today I asked Dameion to come with me through the Irithyll Dungeon on my 2nd playthrough, just so it'd go faster, and also because the jailers near Karla gave me so much trouble. We were having a gay old time, and suddenly...

Dark Spirit kirara has invaded!

A mage purist named kirara comes to the landing above us and shoots a Soul Spear at Dameion. He dodged it, but it clipped his shoulder and dealt 400 damage. We double time it up the stairs, and engage her, and she flees straight away to the area of forward progression, unaware that we'd gone that way before and already unlocked a shortcut that was near where they first encountered us. We chased her a little bit, but stopped short of their magic trap. Three blue orbs glittered in and out of sight, and then there was suddenly a very catastrophic magical explosion. We were nowhere near it, so it was essentially fireworks, but it would have been lethal if we'd given full chase. Plus the invader was now in the territory of 3 lesser jailers and 4 rats with another 6 lesser jailers to fall back on.

Dame defers to following when summoned, so he followed me as we doubled back around on her. Unfortunately, the only way to approach from behind was by use of a ladder that was in sight of the aforementioned 6 lesser jailers, so we didn't try to ambush her. We set to work clearing out the jailers near Karla's cell, but the invader showed up about half way through rapid firing soul spears again. Missed me twice, grazed me once on my foot for about 70 HP. Then they went into the cluster of remaining jailers. I don't fault them for making use of monsters since it was a 2v1, but Dame was not deterred from removing the jailers. He killed about 3 more, but overextended his stamina and got hit directly with a soul spear since he was too slow to roll out of the way. He did roll, but it still hit him before the I Frames started. He took 938 damage and died. Then it was just me and kirara. He stilled tried to lure me into monsters and take advantage of monsters.

I hit him twice, but he was really nimble and deft with the dodge rolls. I'm using a straight sword as you saw earlier, my guy isn't exactly a powerhouse, and his fighting style is very simplistic. I managed to hit him twice for over 80% of his HP. He couldn't hit me with the Soul Spear, but I couldn't engage the him/jailers due to their effect on HP. I ran to the lift shortcut, and went back to the starting bonfire, knowing that the invader would now have to run all the way back around. I told Dame to put his sign down, because the fighting had worn me down. She'd use the farron darts/other quick weak sorceries to nibble at my HP. I was already low on Estus from doing practically the whole dungeon, and we'd also already traversed it in its entirety and been to the Profane capital. We were back for sidequest stuff and exploration/treasure. Dame put his sign back at the Profane Capital bonfire, instead of the Irithyll Dungeon one, and by the time I realized this, the invader caught up to me. We had a duel around the bonfire, mostly consisting of me baiting him into casting spells, and me completely dodging them. I had no more Estus and no more FP. He started doing the nibble tactics again, and did manage to clip me with a well timed Soul Spear. I was too invested at this point, and still hoping that Dame's sign would show up. I used a Divine Blessing, and kept fighting. I think kirara finally ran out of FP. She'd been dogging us for about 15~20 minutes at this point, with very active spell usage.

Whatever her reason, kirara started to attack me with her fire sword. I don't remember what type it was, but I was a bit taken aback, and got caught by a full flurry of hits. Five hits from their weapon did *** all to my HP though, probably about 1/3rd of it, which is really not a lot of damage for being hit five times. It was understandable since they were a mage purist though, so I started blocking and countering. Most of my counter swings missed or fell short. The range and arc of a straight sword swing is pretty good, but it's not really that good relative to the longer weapons like spears and great swords. I did clip her once. I think she got complacent, since I hadn't parried/riposte attempted. She kept hammering on me with the sword, all thought of magic out the window. I decided to risk a parry, despite never having adopted or honed my skill at it(I just suck so bad at it I usually won't even bother). I did not parry, but it was pure luck that I did try just then, because they did a kick at the same time. If they had kicked my shield, I would have died, because she'd wittled me down by that point. Since I attempted to parry at the exact same time they tried to kick me, the actions cancelled one another and I came out of animation lock first. Two swings, kirara vanquished.

Oh, about the messaging system... when you go to set a message, press triangle to switch message style. That's how you get two line messages and messages with phantom emotes.

Oh also, the summoning of a 3rd assistant phantom is possible with the use of the dried finger item. I don't think you can use 3 phantoms for bosses, though I have not tried.

Ah man, I've been having a blast so far.

Today I had placed my summon sign down next to Vordt dawg's fog door, thinking I'll beat him up a bunch of times without having to worry about trekking back to the door on every fail (I leave that for the hosts to do instead). I end up getting summoned in, along with another, by some host named 'lol'.

Having waited a few moments at the fog door thinking he hadn't walked far enough to trigger his cutscene for Vordt, the critical battle message pops up but we could not enter.

/siiiiiiiiiigh

The host has gone off and triggered a different, later game boss fight elsewhere. The phantom and myself run to the other location but we were no match for it. The host had no intention of attacking the boss and the good phantom died in one hit. Believing that he's just doing it to grieve with the new players, I tried to endure against this boss without attacking because I wanted to see which of us would last the longest. Aggro would shift between us randomly while we would run from one side to another, often circling each other in hopes that the other player's shorter distance to the boss will take aggro and cause them to be the target of the boss' flurries.

Little did the host know, the guy playing this near naked deprived lv10 commoner had danced this boss' dance before~

I wish I could say this had some spectacular ending, but instead the host forced a disconnect and I couldn't relish in him loosing his ember status trying to screw with the fresh characters. Although having placed that arbitrary survival challenge upon myself just made it all the more fun!

How many level ups did you receive from him? and did you cure the dark sigil? If so, that's what did it.

He offers 5 free level ups through out the game. in return for letting him brand you with the dark sigil (it should be in your key items) but if you cure it before he does it 5 times he dies.

He will also die if you go to Catacombs of Carthus before being branded 5 times.

*** is just doomed any which way lol

Well... it is related to his own personal quest and the 3rd ending.. BUT no spoilers! Look it up after you beat the game. :)

If all else fails, just blame Patches. That ***.