Demon's Souls - Catch All

Gratz on the Platinum. I'm so rusty now I don't know if I could get it. I really thought I was going to for a while there, but missed the opportunity for some easy trades with people when I was in level range. Ugh.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

THAT is impressive. Congrats. As someone who used to get a few Platinum trophies, I would not have picked that game to get one. ;)

The only reason I bothered was because of how much I enjoyed the game. I'm not an achievement guy in general, but I never once got bored of it. Plus, I thought it would be kind of hilarious for that to be my one and only platinum

Stele wrote:

Gratz on the Platinum. I'm so rusty now I don't know if I could get it. I really thought I was going to for a while there, but missed the opportunity for some easy trades with people when I was in level range. Ugh.

I think you'd be surprised at how easy it is to pick back up. My last 1.5 playthroughs went by unbelievably quickly because I was already using the final equipment set I was going to need. All of world 5 took me less than 30 minutes because you can so easily just run past everything in that stupid swamp.

I still have all of the trophy weapons casual_alcoholic left with me for trade, which is almost all of them. It would really just hinge on your desire to grind out the soul levels needed to trade. I think I ended at SL 166, and you'd probably end up close to that just playing enough to get all of the required souls for spells and miracles.

Oh yeah you do have to buy all the boss-soul stuff on multiple runs. Hm. Maybe I'll fire it up this weekend and see how bad I suck.

Well it took me almost a month, after I finished up Platinum on Infamous, started NCAA Football 12, and between my Spiral Knights addiction, and City of Heroes return...

but I finally started up Demon's Souls again today. I feel so lost. I have no idea where my progress left off, how many bosses I've killed, what souls I have or need to collect... I feel so overwhelmed.

I did manage to go into 1-1 and slaughter some things and get my feel for the controls back. But damn, I know I would suck if I tried anything harder.

Going to have to reread some wiki stuff and go check the gates for each world and figure out where exactly I stand.

SL 85 though. So still a ways to go before I am close enough to do weapon trades.

EDIT: Hm, looks like I only have 5-3 and 1-4 left to do. And I might have PWT going, hard to tell. Could be 1 away from it. Looks like there's a PWT event in 5-3, so I should focus on that for my next thing. Then look at whether I should do PBT before finishing the game. Man, didn't realize I was so close.

Stele wrote:

Well it took me almost a month, after I finished up Platinum on Infamous, started NCAA Football 12, and between my Spiral Knights addiction, and City of Heroes return...

but I finally started up Demon's Souls again today. I feel so lost. I have no idea where my progress left off, how many bosses I've killed, what souls I have or need to collect... I feel so overwhelmed.

I did manage to go into 1-1 and slaughter some things and get my feel for the controls back. But damn, I know I would suck if I tried anything harder.

Going to have to reread some wiki stuff and go check the gates for each world and figure out where exactly I stand.

SL 85 though. So still a ways to go before I am close enough to do weapon trades.

EDIT: Hm, looks like I only have 5-3 and 1-4 left to do. And I might have PWT going, hard to tell. Could be 1 away from it. Looks like there's a PWT event in 5-3, so I should focus on that for my next thing. Then look at whether I should do PBT before finishing the game. Man, didn't realize I was so close.

5-3 is sooooooooooo easy.

casual_alcoholic wrote:

5-3 is sooooooooooo easy.

You were not kidding.

So now I have to figure out what I'm still missing. I think I need PWT event on world 5. But others I'm just not sure about. Have to check my inventory and see what items I have and try to piece together what I have completed. EDIT: Yeah after completing world 5-3/5-2's event, I checked my inventory and I appear to have all PWT finished.

I know I don't have any PBT stuff, but probably should try to get it before NG+. I guess I should use the Second Chance miracle to make the switching to PBT easier right?

Huh. So I took out the dragon on 1-4. But I guess I can't beat the level or I'll be funneled into the end game?

Switched world 1 to PBT. After connecting online it only took 5 revive/deaths with ephemeral eyes. Looks like I still have 30 of those (usually play in soul form), so I can do this for every world. The interesting part looks like I have to beat 1-1 all the way through 1-3 or killing the named phantom or primeval will kick world tendency back white? Am I reading that right?

If I beat 1-1 killing the phantom and go back to the nexus I'll have to revive/die 3 more times to get back to black?

Think it's worth it for the colorless souls but I just want to do it with the minimum loss of items possible.

Stele wrote:

Huh. So I took out the dragon on 1-4. But I guess I can't beat the level or I'll be funneled into the end game?

Switched world 1 to PBT. After connecting online it only took 5 revive/deaths with ephemeral eyes. Looks like I still have 30 of those (usually play in soul form), so I can do this for every world. The interesting part looks like I have to beat 1-1 all the way through 1-3 or killing the named phantom or primeval will kick world tendency back white? Am I reading that right?

If I beat 1-1 killing the phantom and go back to the nexus I'll have to revive/die 3 more times to get back to black?

Think it's worth it for the colorless souls but I just want to do it with the minimum loss of items possible.

Well, keep in mind Tendency only sets when you return to the Nexus and restart the level. As long as you do both things without going back to the Nexus you won't have to set it then bring it down again. Dying won't reset it either, you can die 1000 times but as long as you don't return to Nexus the world tendency won't change.

Well that was some bullsh*t. Killed the primeval on 1-3 and no colorless soul dropped.

Looking at the wiki, it says this is possible.

wiki wrote:

In the event that the Primeval Demon does not drop a Colorless Demon's Soul when killed, the game should not save itself and, thus, the player may immediately load his or her file and kill it again, repeating until one is obtained.

So I stared at the screen kinda dumbfouned at my bad luck. Re-read that page on the wiki. Hit start, went to load game, saw the little save icon working as I hit it and when I reloaded nothing was there. No demon, no soul.

...

Finished world 2 PBT events. And defeating Scirvir to get the Talisman of Beasts is something I should have done a long time ago!

Magic and Miracles with the same item? Yes please.

Kinda makes me wish I hadn't used a boss soul for my Insanity Catalyst a while back. The MP penalty makes it not worth using most of the time. And apparently if you put enough points into magic/faith both the ToB will out-magic the Insanity.

Think enough people have the weapons to trade/hold around here that I could maybe get platinum on just 3 playthroughs if I had focused on spells/miracles and ignored the weapons for those couple that have 4 uses. Still think it's a little unbalanced that some boss souls have 4 uses while others only have 1, with a smattering in-between at 2-3. Would have been nice if they had given 2-3 uses to everything and not made you start an extra NG+++ just for 2 bosses.

Anyway took a few minutes to craft all the crap I had, and managed to get one trophy, and get within 1 upgrade of two others. Actually have the pure chunks I need for those, just missing the large ones. Imagine I'll stumble into a couple more during NG without farming much.

Just a couple more PBT events to finish and then I can actually beat 1-4 and the game for once.

Stele wrote:

Finished world 2 PBT events. And defeating Scirvir to get the Talisman of Beasts is something I should have done a long time ago!

Magic and Miracles with the same item? Yes please.

Kinda makes me wish I hadn't used a boss soul for my Insanity Catalyst a while back. The MP penalty makes it not worth using most of the time. And apparently if you put enough points into magic/faith both the ToB will out-magic the Insanity.

Think enough people have the weapons to trade/hold around here that I could maybe get platinum on just 3 playthroughs if I had focused on spells/miracles and ignored the weapons for those couple that have 4 uses. Still think it's a little unbalanced that some boss souls have 4 uses while others only have 1, with a smattering in-between at 2-3. Would have been nice if they had given 2-3 uses to everything and not made you start an extra NG+++ just for 2 bosses.

Anyway took a few minutes to craft all the crap I had, and managed to get one trophy, and get within 1 upgrade of two others. Actually have the pure chunks I need for those, just missing the large ones. Imagine I'll stumble into a couple more during NG without farming much. Just a couple more PBT events to finish and then I can actually beat 1-4 and the game for once.

Dyni is your best bet, I think he's closer to your level than I am. Also my PS3 is broken. Maybe send him a PM and see if he'll help?

Yeah I see he's at 166 from his last post. Assuming he stopped after platinum, I've got a while before I'm there. Think I've creeped up to 91, don't really expect to be much higher after finishing up what little I have left. Should be several more days, maybe a week or more, for a NG+ or two before I catch up.

Don't think anyone else with the items is any lower right?

Unfortunately, I'm out of the country for the next month, so I won't be able to help you for a while If you haven't found someone to trade with by Sept. 6, I should be able to help. Still same SL.

World 3 and 4 PBT are done. All I have is 5-2 left for phantom/primeval. Then finally I can finish the game for the first time.

Made it through 3-1 and 3-2 with no deaths and 4-1 and 4-2 with one death to the first phantom, then one death to the very last skeleton before the primeval on 4-2. Not bad for being so rusty. It's all been coming back to me, and these PBT runs have refreshed me on the levels and enemies quite a bit.

I'm almost out of ephemeral eyes though, so I had to finish those runs with both levels together. Couldn't afford to go out and have tendency move white, or I wouldn't have been able to kill myself enough.

And finished!

1-4 was harder than I thought. Not the level, but the boss. I had a strategy going in... Firestorm twice. But executing it was problematic. Couldn't get him close to me. Then got him too close. Then soulsucked. Then I missed with one firestorm and died trying to restore MP. And so on and so on.

Finally though, he jumped over beside me, firestorm, I rolled away, firestorm. Fight over in about 8 seconds.

Endgame was easy, but really it should be after all that you go through to get there. New game is started, but I'll give 1-1 a try later tonight. I really don't want to lose 100k souls just yet.

Congrats on completing your playthrough, Stele!

Am I right in thinking that this will be your first venture into NG+? 1-1 will be a breeze, but after that I suggest you take nothing for granted! 2-1 (Stonefang Tunnel) just about made me cry when I went through it on NG+. It felt like a totally different game...

Yep 2-1 really got me last night. Let me tell you a story...

See it all started with the first game. I did my PBT for world 2 in two parts. So wasted some eyes, but saved some headache of running through one stage into the other. But then when I finished, world tendency was neutral.

So after I was still alive and well through 1-1, I decided to try 2-1. I died, which took it closer to black. I then got the genius idea to go ahead and get PBT out of the way. So I killed myself twice, and voila, PBT. I then proceeded to slog through 2-1. Probably somewhere around 90 minutes of 2-1. Over and over. Losing souls, gaining souls, unlocking shortcuts, dying dying dying...

Just when I thought PBT was a stupid idea, I got the last area to the boss unlocked, which is a pretty short run from the start. Boss only took 3 attempts, before I finally found the right spot to stand that I remembered from my first run. 2-1 done!

Now all I had to do was run down the hall and kill Scirvir. Then I could go back to the nexus, level up, and world 2 would be PWT, and easy to finish. Need Flamelurker before I can do weapon upgrades and all. Of course there's that crystal lizard right at the start. Pew pew, he's dead! Oh sh*t, I'm being attacked by the miner. Aaah! Run!

My health is almost gone, the crystal lizard loot is still on the ground and two miners are after me. I run back to the archstone, where they can't reach me. Yeah that's right, there's an invisible wall separating the levels and they can't pass. Whew, safe. I heal up.

Now do I do the smart thing and blast them with spells? No. I do the dumbest thing ever, thinking they can't cross the line, I run up and melee one of them. The other drills me with his pickaxe.

Dead. 40k souls on the ground.

Crystal lizard loot gone.

But no worry, I can just walk 2 feet from the archstone and get the souls, and continue with Scirvir. No harm really done, just the lizard loot right?

Wrong. Since I was behind the threshold the game respawned me at the start of 2-1 instead of 2-2.

I can't nexus out and just go to 2-2 because the tendency will change, since I killed the primeval and the boss. I just finished 2-1 successfully to the boss multiple times. How hard can it be?

Famous last words... as I died to a black phantom miner, really the only hard fight on the short path from 2-1 to 2-2. All the souls gone.

Well at least I can still go after Scirvir... died again on 2-1... Ok, clearly my head is not in the game anymore, the loss of all that has really screwed me up. I don't really need the item from Scirvir, as I got it the previous run. There's no souls for me to retrieve anymore. To hell with it. Back to nexus, world 2 goes white. Done for the day.

And then of course I remembered the real reason I had wanted to kill BP Scirvir this time. I still need another named BP kill to get white character tendency. Apparently the ones I killed with Death Cloud in my first run don't count as actual kills.

So basically all I got for my 2 hours of effort was a colorless demon soul. Which I could have got just by dying, killing the primeval in about 2 minutes, and then heading back to the nexus, which would have put world 2 right back to neutral. And made 2-1 a whole lot easier in the process. What an idiot.

$15.99 and free shipping at Newegg.

If anyone out there still doesn't have this awesome game.

With Dark Souls releasing shortly, I'm finally going to give this game the love it deserves. It's going to be my backlog game for September and I need to make sure that if I can't finish it, I at least see most of the content. I had read this whole thread a few months back but never committed to actually playing the game. I plan on starting fresh: What would be a recommended build for someone who wants to get the most content possible, with somewhat ease, in the shortest time possible? I also don't want to spend half my time on the wiki, so I suppose that should be taken into account.

General wisdom is to start with a Royal. You get a wand, a decent starter spell, an MP regeneration ring, and start at a lower level. That means level-ups are cheaper, and easier to customize your character the way you want.

Technically there are no classes though. You can spec your character any way you want. And to really finish the game eventually you're going to have to learn some melee combat. Many enemies are resistant to magic.

Temple Knight is another solid start, gives you a heal miracle. Miracles are based on Faith, while Spells are based on Magic. Lots to learn about stats as you gain levels. The wiki is your friend.

Only other start I might suggest would be the basic Knight. He has two types of sword, and a shield. In this game, piercing swords (rapiers) can be used to attack while still holding your shield. Makes things a lot safer at times.

Although just like magic, it won't work for everything. Learning enemy strengths, weaknesses, and attack patterns will be the key to beating the game.

Raising your soul level really just makes the game easier. Aside from equipping certain items that require a minimum stat, you actually don't have to level up at all to beat the game. Although every bit of health, mana, etc will help you survive longer or kill things faster.

Stele wrote:

Temple Knight is another solid start, gives you a heal miracle. Miracles are based on Faith, while Spells are based on Magic. Lots to learn about stats as you gain levels. The wiki is your friend.

Even more importantly, you start with a great halbred, and some decent armor. Learn how to fight without a shield (and dodge a tonne) while wearing armor that you can dodge freely in and you're off to a good start.

Well, damn. I started using the wiki for one thing, and ended up wasting all my playtime for Demon's Souls, reading about Demon's Souls. Which is exactly what I said I wouldn't do. This game is too deep for a min/max'er not to obsess over. Tomorrow: play first and severely limit any wiki use.

My Royal's still in the Nexus. Just one more day to wait.

cyrax wrote:

Well, damn. I started using the wiki for one thing, and ended up wasting all my playtime for Demon's Souls, reading about Demon's Souls. Which is exactly what I said I wouldn't do. This game is too deep for a min/max'er not to obsess over. Tomorrow: play first and severely limit any wiki use.

My Royal's still in the Nexus. Just one more day to wait.

There are only a few key areas of the wiki worth bookmarking and reading through completely:

- The different uses for the boss souls
- Crystal Lizards
- The changes that happen with pure white/pure black tendency

The rest you'll learn for yourself.

I also thought the stats page was pretty useful, detailing what you get and what you can equip with each specific stat increase. As a "mage", trying to figure out when I could hold another spell, or when I could equip certain items was useful for planning where to spend souls.

So, I've beaten Phalanx, picked up all the items under the dragon (not without dying once :P), and have farmed the Red Eyed Knight there a few times. As much as I've read into the game wiki, I think I want to stick with the Royalty's gameplay and be a battlemage; use magic as much as possible, but when the sh*t hits the fan be able to defend myself and use a magic attuned weapon. Whether that means shield + 1h, or 2h/dh, I don't know yet. With that in mind, here are my current stats:

Soul Level: 19
VIT: 19
INT: 13
END: 12
STR: 9
DEX: 12
MAG: 15
FTH: 12
LCK: 7

I tried looking around for battlemage guides/help, but most deal with experienced players or pvp. Right now I'm using the default shield and Scimitar, but I think I'll raise STR to 13 to wield both Winged Spear, and Heater Shield. Finally, as far as I can tell, you really can't go wrong going to any of the other -1 areas, or 1-2, except for 5-1. All have their +'s and -'s.

I run with a Crescent Falchion. Think it's +4 or so now, but it's found in... somewhere... 4-1 maybe?... as a Crescent +1 already. Very good for magic damage, and also recovers MP when you have it out, so you can save up to switch back to spells.

Good news from last week. Servers will stay up at least through 2012.

Guess I will still have time to try for that platinum if I want...

Cyrax, how's your progress?

I think I may try to pick this up today since the price dropped to $20. I would like to play it while the servers are up.

My offer to help still stands if you can get your SL up high enough. I have most of the needed weapons and enchants.

Dyni wrote:

My offer to help still stands if you can get your SL up high enough. I have most of the needed weapons and enchants.

You're still SL 166?

Have to fire it up tonight and see where I left off at. Somewhere around 100 I think.