Demon's Souls - Catch All

I have no idea how many times I'll play - I'm on my second character in Dark Souls, but part of me eventually wants to play other games as well.

So, here are a few important things I learned from getting Platinum on Demon's Souls:

- Extra effects that scale on stats, such as HP regen from Blessed weapons, are extremely powerful. Do not ignore these.
- Weapon scaling outpaces everything else in terms of damage output, so you'll want to find some weapon with S in something and focus that stat. Unlike in Dark Souls, there is some weapon that will have S scaling in some stat, so you shouldn't have much trouble finding something.
- Crystal Lizards decrement their counters if they successfully escape (unlike in Dark Souls where they only decrement on a kill), so make sure you kill one if you manage to alert it. Also, unlike in Dark Souls, Crystal Lizards are the only way to get some of the upgrade materials.
- Invaders always start at the beginning of the zone you're in (unlike Dark Souls where they can appear in a number of places). When you get an invasion notice, use that time to set up a trap.
- As was mentioned already, ranged weapons are pretty broken in Demon's Souls. Don't hesitate to abuse them.

My best character in Demon's Souls wound up being a Faith focused bruiser. Some item spoilers ahead:

Spoiler:

I decked her out in some semi-light armor, had a Blessed Mirdan Halberd +5 and Adjudicator's Shield +5, and Wrath of God. Run around two-handing the halberd (FYI - Mirdan Halberd is one of the longest reaching weapons in the game, and if you two-hand it you can stunlock almost any enemy for a guaranteed 3 hit combo), use Wrath of God to hit some enemies through walls, and the HP regen from shield + halberd was enough to heal me from 1 hp to full in ~45 seconds.

Man, I miss my Meat Cleaver from my previous playthrough.

Gimpy_Butzke wrote:
Fedaykin98 wrote:

If he's this game's equivalent of Solaire, I don't want to miss him. It wouldn't take much time to start over right now. What do you think?

He does offer some insight into the current events of the world. Knowing what he gives you I wouldn't be concerned with saving him on your first play through, unless you only intend to play the game once.

I usually just kill him right after I rescue him.

Black tendency much?

Yeah, so? You can't judge me! And anyway, why do you have to be so racist?!

So, when last I updated, I had beaten Phalanx without ever dying, except to the tutorial boss. I had also cleared virtually all the way to Phalanx on a previous character, also without dying except on the tutorial boss. I was feeling pretty damn good about myself. I had learned the lessons of Dark Souls, and applied them successfully to its predecessor.

One of my favorite posts from the Dark Souls thread was someone who had played DeS saying, in effect, "Hey, I've played this thing for X amount of time so far, and I haven't died yet. What is this sh*t?" And now, by having the same experience in reverse, I had proven that it wasn't about the repsective difficulty of the games - it was about having learned and internalized the Souls series playstyle. Again, feeling pretty good about myself.

Then, last night happened. Spoilers ahead, anyone brand new to Demon's Souls!

I started off by leveling up my character's vitality twice and endurance once. I'm not sure what offensive stat I want to invest in just yet. Part of me wants to go strictly non-magic for a totally new experience, but part of me wants to see what the older magic system has to offer. Then I warped back to the castle.

In the first room beyond Phalanx, there was a note on the floor saying "Run straight through." I could see at least one Hoplite waiting to spear me, and light at the other end of the room, so it seemed reasonable advice to heed. I sprinted through the room, spears whizzing by as I ran.

When I got to the top of the wall (bridgeish area) on the other side, I found another note saying "Run straight through." What were the chances? Could this be a griefer message? There were also some notes saying "This is a safe place." I advanced cautiously, and ended up getting roasted by a dragon - but not to death! I made it to the next tower and ascended the stairs to kill the crosbowmen above. I went back down to the top of the wall and advanced a bit. More signs telling me that it was a safe place. More sounds of the dragon flying. More headaches trying to cross an area without getting burnt? No thanks!

I went back to the tower and descended into the lower, inside area. The first couple enemies were not much of a threat. Then I read a message saying "Divide and conquer the next enemies." Hmm. What did that mean? Suddenly, I got a message that my game had been invaded! I had been in body form since beating Phalanx.

With the coolness of manner that only hours of Dark Souls and many invasions can teach you, I recalled ahrezmendi's tip that an invader in Demon's Souls always starts at the beginning of a level. He said to use that buffer to set a trap. Yes! I pressed on, looking for a suitable corner to leap out of.

Immediately, I was set upon by a seemingly endless pack of dogs. With the threat of invasion behind me, and a limitless stream of canine assailants before me, I promptly lost my sh*t and had my kidneys torn out and eaten for dinner.

So much for my streak.

The rest of the evening was filled with many, many dragon deaths, as I collected all the items from the first two segments of the wall. I did not, however, die to the dogs a second time. On the third wall segment, after running through the dragon attack area, I ran into a group of crossbowmen. I took them on slowly, for fear of backing into the dragon's flame zone. I took them so slowly, in fact, that a blue-eyed knight joined the party, and between him, the crossbowmen, and my fear of backing up, he got me.

And that was how my night ended. As for tonight? My wife and I got caught up on How I Met Your Mother. When I get back to taking demons' souls, I will get back to you!

Yeah, that sounds about right

The end of the dragon bridge with the blue eyed knights hiding behind the crossbowmen is one of the rougher early areas. They key is to get out of dragon flame range, not so far out as to be in range to agro the blue eyed knights. If you do agro them, you better kill those bowmen in a hurry. It's a pretty narrow range, iirc. Also, do your best to only pull one of the knight at a time. You definitely don't want to fight both of them there.

The fun part is spending an hour killing the dragon with magic at low level for a huge plunk of souls.

Or doing the same with arrows only taking even longer.

Seems like such a waste later when the souls are flowing in... but oh man was that a big score when I was new.

Yeah I used to farm that area a lot back in the day, Fedaykin98. My assumption is that I will have little issue with this section with my current build and upgrade status (not to mention skills gained from playing this and Dark Souls).

EDIT: by farm I mean get there, clear everything, then die to the blue eyed knights, then come back, get my souls, and die again. Rinse and repeat. I was so bad back then that I frequently amassed over 10k souls before finally progressing to the tower knight.

I had a tiny bit of time to play today, and got past the two blue-eyes knights. I dropped my stone, but didn't get summoned - at least, not in the maybe three minutes I waited. There are plenty of people in the area playing, as I can see their phantoms.

I also cleared the Hoplite room and grabbed the meager loot that was in there.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

I dropped my stone, but didn't get summoned - at least, not in the maybe three minutes I waited. There are plenty of people in the area playing, as I can see their phantoms.

The main reason I want the ability to coop with a friend is precisely for the reason that as the game gets older the chances of being summoned are lower as people who play tend to be more experienced and probably not care to summon anyone for help. That and decreased player count.

It is nice that there are still people online in Demon's Souls but It's nowhere near where it was when I could put down a sign and be in a game at almost every stage in under two minutes.

I'm excited for the return of server-based multiplayer in Dark Souls 2!

1-2 done! So many souls! I decided to try going with a Strength build, since I've wanted to try that in Dark Souls. Switched from Longsword to Bastard Sword for now, though I don't really like how it handles that much.

Xmas for me! A good friend of mine gifted me the UK version of Demons Souls. He's been collecting and hitting platinum on various versions of the game - talk about dedication - and having blazed through the UK version, he figured it would be a good gift for me. Good? It's an awesome gift!

I've reached the boss of 2-1, and he's a right bastard after just two tries.

I did at least use the old "run past every enemy that you can" to get back to him trick.

Is it me, or is the upgrade system much more complicated than Dark Souls?

Edit: Weapon upgrade.

Also: Have reached the boss of 2-2. Have not figured out how to hurt him (much). Man, flying bugs are annoying!

I don't recall the upgrade system being too much more complicated than Dark Souls, but there are a few key differences that make it more difficult to get certain weapons or full upgrades. Hopefully you've done at least a little research on the crystal lizards. They are not the same as Dark Souls, and you can screw yourself over for max upgrades if you're not careful.

Boss weapons are generally much more powerful in this game than Dark Souls, and I don't think you've unlocked all of the upgrade system yet. You have to beat that 2-2 boss first.

That 2-2 boss is a pretty big roadblock for a lot of people that start playing this game. He's the Capra Demon of Demon's Souls, except he's not really cheap, just difficult early on.

I have lost track of the lizards I've killed who have then fallen off ledges, etc. I'm not planning on Platinum or anything, though.

After killing no NPCs in Dark Souls, I gave Patches his desserts today.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

I have lost track of the lizards I've killed who have then fallen off ledges, etc. I'm not planning on Platinum or anything, though.

After killing no NPCs in Dark Souls, I gave Patches his desserts today.

Uhm... killing patches is a bad idea IMO. He sells some pretty useful stuff. Oh well! Also, you can get the other things you miss on NG!

Well, fiddlesticks. May have to start a second character.

BIG NEWS!

Demon's Souls will go downloadable on PSN starting January 8.

To celebrate, Pure White World Tendency from then until January 14!

I'm going to need to hit the wikis...

That's the part I'm excited about.

I actually made the decision to ignore the tendency stuff during my 1.5 play throughs. Helps that I'm not a completionist but stuff like "need to wait for a world event" and "have to play offline" reeks of a system that is broken. Glad they didn't keep it for Dark Souls, at least from what I can tell so far in my time with that game.

Mr GT Chris wrote:

I actually made the decision to ignore the tendency stuff during my 1.5 play throughs. Helps that I'm not a completionist but stuff like "need to wait for a world event" and "have to play offline" reeks of a system that is broken. Glad they didn't keep it for Dark Souls, at least from what I can tell so far in my time with the game.

Depends on the goal of the system, although I agree about the have to play offline thing. The way other people's games affect your tendency basically made pure tendencies impossible. But the world event thing is awesome.

I agree with MrGTChris. The ability to have world events (yet another commonality with MMOs) is really independent of the having to play offline thing. Heck, tons of shooters have world events in the form of double XP weekends, etc.

I might like to see them bring world events back for DS2 - just leave the tendency/offline BS out.

I can't fault them too much for trying it, though - DeS was an amazingly original and experimental game. Some ideas were bound to be better than others.

Yeah, I have no problem with actually having world events, just that I don't think they should be a requirement for unlocking significant parts of the game. I mean, I obviously still enjoyed the game immensely but was slightly peeved to miss out on stuff since the timing of the world events was never convenient and I refused to take the game offline.

I completed some stuff, online, that was world tendency related. I guess I got lucky?

For some reason, I find this game harder than Dark Souls. I mean, some of it is easy, of course, but I'm finding Dark Souls a little more manageable.

Stupid Fool's Doll!!

Dakuna wrote:

For some reason, I find this game harder than Dark Souls. I mean, some of it is easy, of course, but I'm finding Dark Souls a little more manageable.

Stupid Fool's Doll!!

I definitely think Dark Souls is easier.