SallyNasty's Game Club - Lords of the Fallen! Spoilers open! There are those among us who beat in time!

It's the last spell in the type. 5 points!?!? I'll have to look it up if it's 5 points in the spells or 5 points banked for the one spell.

obirano wrote:

It's the last spell in the type. 5 points!?!? I'll have to look it up if it's 5 points in the spells or 5 points banked for the one spell.

I think each spell has 3 levels, so it's probably 5 points total into the tree.

Garden Ninja wrote:
obirano wrote:

It's the last spell in the type. 5 points!?!? I'll have to look it up if it's 5 points in the spells or 5 points banked for the one spell.

I think each spell has 3 levels, so it's probably 5 points total into the tree.

I can confirm its 5 points total.

I just finished off boss 4. It's been fun so far, but I am glad I'm following the guide for one major reason. Spoilers up to the 4th boss.

Spoiler:

Immortal enemies. I've not been bothering to break every bit of environment throughout the game and would have missed those tyrant hearts. Immortal enemies rank right up there with invisible enemies for me as far as a complete buzz kill.

I beat the second boss the other night. I considered going into the catacombs but

Spoiler:

im not sure which to the 2 prisoners to save and that jailer sub boss in a cramped hallway sounds like not a fun fight.

Probably not going to play much more (maybe to the third boss) before we "officially" start on the 8th.

I fired the game up for the first time today, went with Paladin class. Initial impressions are good, I like it, killed a few things, died couple times. I actually survived the first boss fight on the first try but didn't go much past that point before having to call it a night.

In honor of officially starting, I finished off the fourth boss. My goal is to stay one week ahead so that I actually have useful contributions.

I have begun! Rolled a warrior build with the brawler magic group. I think that is what I did at least. I took down the first boss. I only died once, and I even got a trophy for it. Are there any early game "gotchas" I should be aware of?

Edit: That guide SallyNasty linked in the OP does not play nice on mobile. Trying to click the link for part 1 just keeps going to the scrolling ad that is apparently just hidden behind the actual page.

I finished off boss number 6 last night. None of them have been too bad so far. The main thing that has killed me is just being careless with a combination of not being able to see what is going on. Some of those small rooms you walk into and get ambushed in have the camera freaking out to where I can't see anything until I get stun locked to death.

Other than that, enjoying it pretty well so far.

obirano wrote:

I finished off boss number 6 last night. None of them have been too bad so far.

Really? I think they've all been terrible.

Spoiler:

The first boss and the fourth boss maybe weren't so bad. The first boss had clear phases with well-telegraphed changes in his behavior, but he was also essentially just one of the knight enemies with more HP. I'm never a fan of boss fights that are "that thing you just killed eight of, but now it takes longer". The fourth boss at least had some interesting mechanics, although I found the hit boxes on his little fleshy pods to be weirdly inaccurate. Even locked onto them, I'd consistently miss them unless I was standing the perfect distance away.

But the second and third bosses were crap. Multiple adds, silly stun-lock chains, and stupid high hitpoints. They were like MMO bosses but without other players to take up the roles you needed to keep those boss fights from being annoying. I hated them both so much.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
obirano wrote:

I finished off boss number 6 last night. None of them have been too bad so far.

Really? I think they've all been terrible.

Spoiler:

The first boss and the fourth boss maybe weren't so bad. The first boss had clear phases with well-telegraphed changes in his behavior, but he was also essentially just one of the knight enemies with more HP. I'm never a fan of boss fights that are "that thing you just killed eight of, but now it takes longer". The fourth boss at least had some interesting mechanics, although I found the hit boxes on his little fleshy pods to be weirdly inaccurate. Even locked onto them, I'd consistently miss them unless I was standing the perfect distance away.

But the second and third bosses were crap. Multiple adds, silly stun-lock chains, and stupid high hitpoints. They were like MMO bosses but without other players to take up the roles you needed to keep those boss fights from being annoying. I hated them both so much.

I see what you are saying. None of them have been particularly inventive to this point. I've only had one death to a boss, which was on the last one because I got careless.

What build are you playing as?

I played through the first three bosses as a cleric with a staff which... Didn't work out. I didn't really understand how poise worked and so had an agility build that I was trying to block with. In any case, I restarted as a paladin (warrior + Solace magic) and I feel slow but nearly indestructible. I'm currently using the tower shield and a great axe with heavy armor.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

I played through the first three bosses as a cleric with a staff which... Didn't work out. I didn't really understand how poise worked and so had an agility build that I was trying to block with. In any case, I restarted as a paladin (warrior + Solace magic) and I feel slow but nearly indestructible. I'm currently using the tower shield and a great axe with heavy armor.

Spoiler:

So did you let the monk die, or are you rolling around with 1 potion?

Spoiler:

Potions are ridiculously plentiful if you do a bit of exploration. I gave one to the monk, and I currently have 8 potions on hand.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
Spoiler:

Potions are ridiculously plentiful if you do a bit of exploration. I gave one to the monk, and I currently have 8 potions on hand.

Spoiler:

Oh, well that's good to know. I haven't found any, but I've only just beaten the second boss and haven't done the catacombs. The furthest I ever got was up to the third boss.

Oi. Just ran into a situation where something I didn't do very easy on is kind of screwing me much later in the game. I'm hoping its not going to be too big a problem.

Spoiler:

apparently, if you don't give that monk a potion early on, you lose out ever being able to upgrade your potions.

Re: spoiler. Wow, figured it would have an impact but that seems like kind of a big deal.

I am playing Executioner right now (cleric hear plus deception magic). I've been using staves because I like their move set but then cloq mentioned an issue with that build. Currently specced faith and agility. And in IRC we were talking about the gauntlet, which I don't like because of switching to it being awkward and the blast and explosive gauntlets being kind of meh. So I was thinking of restarting (for like the 4th time).

Well, also based on that IRC convo, I think I have a better idea of how to use the gauntlet, and I also realized part of the gauntlet controls feeling janky was user error. And I really don't want to play the opening again. So I'm gonna keep going with my Executioner. I am probably going to refocus my stat growth though. Ultimately I think I'm gonna keep spec in faith, but I have enough of that and agility for now. So for now, I'm going to focus on survivability: enough strength to lessen my equipment burden, then vitality and endurance. And probably ought to put some points into luck. Also I just saw on the wiki there is a faith staff that I should be able to get soon. Worst case, I have to figure out hammers.

Edit: derp. Equipment burden is more affected by endurance than strength so I don't really need to worry about strength I guess.

I dropped the first four bosses earlier this week. The game has some glaring issues, but I'm enjoying myself overall. I probably would have played through more if XCOM 2 hadn't interrupted.

I've been rolling with a faith build and primarily using a staff. The gauntlet seemed pretty worthless at first, but now that I've messed around with different runes, each gauntlet mode has shown its usefulness. I use the blast mode in particular quite often. The toughest part about using a faith build seems to be the rare times I fight faith-resistant enemies like mages and the murloc looking guys. I barely scratch them, and i don't have a non-magical method of damaging them without swapping out my weapon in the menu.

My biggest annoyance so far has definitely been all of the spoken dialogue and associated narrative. It's all terrible, and all of the characters are horrendously bland. Thankfully, there isn't too much of it.

[quote="Garden Ninja"]Re: spoiler. Wow, figured it would have an impact but that seems like kind of a big deal.

/quote]

Yeah. I figured I was losing some xp, but xp is always farmable. I'm hoping it doesn't become a big problem as I'm too far in to start over now.

Anyone else playing a Paladin? If so where have you been focusing your stats in?

Also just past the first boss

Spoiler:

Have you gone down into the cellars? The spider enemies in there are pretty tough, making it seem like I should come back later

Started last night - so far, I am enjoying it. That said - the controls are really wonky for me. I was texting with Obi and he said that the controls are the same as Dark Souls(which I never played). A bit wonky, but serviceable. I made it through the first boss(got the cheev for killing a boss with no damage, natch) and did some exploring afterwards before calling it a night.

Fastmav347 wrote:

Anyone else playing a Paladin? If so where have you been focusing your stats in?

Also just past the first boss

Spoiler:

Have you gone down into the cellars? The spider enemies in there are pretty tough, making it seem like I should come back later

I'm playing a paladin. I've been putting points into strength, endurance, and vitality, mostly, with enough points put into faith to unlock the defense boost spell. I got endurance and vitality up to 17-18 each, faith to 15, and have dumped all the rest of my points into strength because that's what my axe scales to.

Now that everyone's started and made at least a little progress, I have to ask: do you find this game to be difficult, and do you find this game to be fair? When you die (if you die) do you feel like you made a mistake and understand what to do differently?

I feel like I don't like the controls yet and movement is really sluggish. I am not that far in, to be fair, but it seems like when I die it is because the camera is actively working against me.

I have beaten the first two bosses and died once to each, so far. I don't feel like the game is particularly difficult so far, but I echo SallyN's observations. It feels pretty sluggish, and the camera can be a real nightmare at times. I often find myself ignoring what I see on screen and moving how I feel I should be moving based on my last known good position. It has worked out alright so far.

I don't think the game has been necessarily unfair, but I feel like the timing for hitting some of these enemies safely is really tight. This is making the game fairly tedious since if my dodge is a few steps off from ideal I won't have time to get a hit in. Although, I echo Clock's earlier sentiment that adds during the boss fight are lame and not fun. I didn't have much issue with them during the second boss fight, but it did make the fight drag out even more.

I don't necessarily feel like the game is unfair, but as everyone has said, the camera is a pain. That's been the reason I've died mostly. I can't see the enemie or lock on and the camera is staring at the wall.

I don't necessarily feel like the game is unfair, but as everyone has said, the camera is a pain. That's been the reason I've died mostly. I can't see the enemie or lock on and the camera is staring at the wall.

Yeah, agreed on the camera. This game has a habit of shoving you into tight corridors, or small rooms. Almost no games can actually handle that, but it really doesn't work in a Souls-like.

Most of the time when I die it's because I was being greedy and not paying enough attention to my stamina. Or the monster was just way above my stats/skill level. There have been a few times however where it feels like my quick attack should interrupt the monster's longer, slower swing, but the button just does nothing because the game decided the monster's animation wins.

And in general, I'm just not great at dodging, and you need to be at 1/4 encumbrance to get the speed to make it useful anyway. I think I might switch to heavy armor so I have the poise to stand up in a fight.

As far as progress goes, I mostly just did a ton of exploring. Found like 3 empty bottles. I decided to go back to the starting area to get that Dimension Portal (skipped it the first time through). While I was in that area I found a secret path into the cellars. It made me glad to have picked up Monk's Decipher, because I doubt I would have realized that wall could be broken without the chime.

I did figure out a tactic for the big spiders that seems to work. Which is good because the cellars are filled with them. If I catch them while they are on the ceiling, I approach and cast Stab right as they drop. Otherwise I wait for them to lay an egg, and then cast Stab. That takes out like 3/4 of their health and a few staff attacks usually finishes them off.

I also found that Faith staff, but I don't have the stats to use it yet.

Good I didn't know I would be able to go back to the cellars, I'll skip them for now as the spiders just wreck me.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

Now that everyone's started and made at least a little progress, I have to ask: do you find this game to be difficult, and do you find this game to be fair? When you die (if you die) do you feel like you made a mistake and understand what to do differently?

Well, one of the things I am really enjoying about the game is how it lets you adjust the difficulty by utilizing the XP multiplier mechanic combined with skipping checkpoints. If I was hitting every checkpoint and refilling my potions whenever I could, the challenge would be pretty minimal, but I'm often pushing forward with few potions to keep my multiplier up. The game is more challenging in an interesting way for me and provides tangible benefits for using the mechanic.

Fairness is a little trickier. I find it fair for the most part, but there are some issues that really stick out:

  • The Worshipper was a terrible boss fight. It took me several tries to figure out how to survive his insta-kill move because it was so visually inconsistent. There were many places you could stand that looked like you wouldn't be killed, and running far away made it look like you were well out of range of the explosion radius. Nope. You must stand on these completely arbitrary platforms that are right next to the boss. Add on infinite adds and a channeled attack with a wonky hitbox that registered damage long before the tentacle actually popped out of the ground, and you have an excellent recipe for some bullsh*t.
  • The game shares the Dark Souls control scheme, but it does not share its responsiveness or feedback system. Rolls are one long continuous motion, so it's very difficult to judge the point at which invulnerability frames might kick in. This makes dodging tricky.
  • Auto-tracking on enemy attacks is obnoxious, and most enemies in this game seem to do it pretty badly. This means that you can't bait them into attacking and then circle around them for a counterattack on their non-shield side because their body will auto-pivot to keep pace with you as you circle behind. This is not fun, and it feels unfair because it is not something the player can do and because it really limits your options for dealing with these enemies.
  • The game uses an animation priority combat system. This means that once you perform an action, you're committed to finishing the animation for that action. This also means that you should be able to queue up an action right after your current one by inputting it at the end of the current animation. Yet for some reason, I'm able to occasionally cancel my attacks while trying to queue up other actions. This issue is most glaring when I try a forward rolling attack followed by a backwards roll to get away. The swing for the forward rolling attack will often stop halfway through, and I'll just roll backwards with no damage dealt. This is very frustrating.
  • There are damage numbers that pop off like an MMO, and it seems that this was used as a replacement for proper feedback and hit detection. There have been numerous times that I've been hit by phantom attacks when the enemy did not have line of sight on me and plenty of other times that I was hit by attacks that should not have connected but did due to wonky hitboxes. I have to keep a much closer eye on my health bar than I'd like because my character very rarely reacts to getting hit by a large chunk of damage. Enemies also seem to completely ignore me sometimes when I nail them with a big attack and continue on with whatever action they were currently executing, whereas I expect them to be reeling backwards from the blow.
  • Weapons do not interact with terrain. Swords will not ricochet off of walls in tight corridors. This means that those nasty ambushes set up by enemies feel cheap because they can attack you through the wall.

These are just a few of the things that stuck out to me while I was playing. They're also almost all related to my expectations from playing so much Souls, so I'm not sure if these issues would stick out to newer players.

Thanks for the responses. I asked because I've found myself struggling with this far more than I expected to. Each boss has taken me multiple attempts, and even some of the trash mobs have been a challenge for me. It's been a kind of weird yo-yo, though, where I'll clear an entire area without dying (although I haven't been avoiding checkpoints) and then getting killed by the same mob three or four times in a row.

But I haven't been able to tell if I'm simply bad at the game, which is entirely possible, or if it's just not playing fair. However, many of the things I've struggled against were mentioned by you all: the sluggish camera that doesn't work well in the tight environments; the adds during boss fights; the poorly communicated attack and damage patterns. I'd add to that list a poor communication about which attacks can be blocked with a shield and which can't. It seems random.

The auto-tracking on enemies that Dyni mentioned has been the biggest pain, because it's made enemies with shields difficult to attack, as well as some enemy attacks quite difficult to avoid without simply backing significantly out of range. I've also been having issues with hit boxes and collision detection. AoE attacks that I feel like I'm outside of will knock me over or (with one enemy) auto-kill me, while I feel like I'm regularly whiffing attacks that look like they should land. Recovery times for the player also feel quite long while the recovery times for enemies feel quite short. I'll struggle to hit something in the brief moment when it's shield is down, but if my guard gets broken they'll land two or three good hits.

When those things combine, it can be super frustrating. (Although to be fair, I also felt like Dark Souls 2 didn't always play fair with me in my time with it, and those games are held up as a kind of gold standard of fairness, so I'm once again inclined to think I might just be bad at it.)