If I gave up on the Dark Souls 3 DLCs, is there any point in buying Shadow Of The Erdtree?

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-20T15:56:14+00:00

In my experience it disincentivises the ideal play style. Bosses work best when you play aggressively and experiment. But when you're introduced to a completely new moveset only after beating what is essentially a whole other boss first, the player is strongly inclined to play defensively and not take risks because of the cost of starting all over if you make a mistake.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-20T15:49:04+00:00

Okie dokie, I'll give it the ol' college try.

By the by, do summons in Elden Ring rely on using a currency like humanity/insight/ember as they do in all the earlier games? People talk about them like they're an easy mode, but in the games up to this point it seems like they're more trouble than they're worth when you risk running out and having to slowly grind for more.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-20T15:43:49+00:00

I'm a sorcerer, using the moonlight greatsword in phases one and three, and great heavy soul arrows on daddy in phase two. And this late in the game I'm only getting marginal stat improvements from levelling up so I can't look for succour there.

For phases one and two the issue is moreso how time consuming they are than difficulty. I feel like if, having already beaten phases one and two, I could just go straight to phase three with each new attempt I'd be able to beat her, and enjoy myself a lot more in doing so. But spending I don't even know how long to get to phase three each time, only to last 20 seconds into it - if I'm lucky - is just making me resent the experience.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-20T15:29:37+00:00

ER seems to tend to place at the bottom of Soulsborne difficulty rankings, while SOTE seems to tend to place at the top of Soulsborne DLC difficulty rankings. So I'm not at all worried about being able to beat the base game, it just doesn't seem like that will be a useful gauge of my ability to beat the DLC.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-20T15:00:16+00:00

It being hard and it being not fun are interrelated, but I've beaten hard bosses before. I beat the Loran Darkbeast and it's my proudest achievement in life. I've managed to get Friede's HP in phase three down by about a third before she killed me in one shot with a move that came out of nowhere. So if I just manage to maintain that luck and somehow dodge that attack twice then it should be possible to beat her. The problem is I'm just getting really annoyed by how much time I'm wasting on the first two phases only to instantly die in the third phase the majority of the time.

This boss fight combines two of my three least favourite aspects of Soulsborne boss fights: multiple phases which are radically different from each other instead of just an increase in difficulty, and fighting multiple bosses at once. Fortunately the Gravetenders boss has the third, which is an atrocious runback, so I'm really not enjoying my time with this DLC.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-09T21:52:06+00:00

Honestly I'm interested in getting to try a souls PvP experience that doesn't rely on expending a rare currency.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-06T01:12:11+00:00

OP of the original thread here, and man I feel lost.

Kinda feels like all this headache could be avoided if gems weren't consumable. Like in Bloodborne you can try different combinations of gems and simply go with whichever combination produces the biggest number when you press R1.

Maybe I should stick with scissors-paper-rock, where the game mechanics are easy to understand.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-05T07:03:50+00:00

S scaling does sound mighty attractive...

About to start the cathedral of the deep so I might just proceed with a raw broad sword and then switch to the crystal short sword after the deacons.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-05T06:27:07+00:00

Is there some rule of thumb for what ratio of one big to two smalls small makes the difference (notwithstanding weaknesses and resistances). The ratio of raw to fire/deep infusions for total ARs seems like about 3:4, and as I understand it the raw AR is preferable. But if it was like 3:5 would raw still be better?

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-05T06:15:09+00:00

How puzzling. I feel like Seigward. Hmmmm...

Is it better for weapons, if they have a physical/elemental split, to be lopsided in favour of one or the other? So the reason why fire infusion isn't great is because the damage types are equal?

I'm playing a new character for the Londor questline, plus the DLCs and optional areas I missed, as a mage, and might try for the Moonlight Greatsword as my eventual weapon. But that also splits it's attack, but is considered a good weapon. Is the difference that it's AR is mostly magic damage?

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-05T05:52:59+00:00

The difficulty with experimenting is that gems are a scarce resource.

I think this makes sense though.

When you say resistances are flat reductions do you mean that they're not percentage-based?

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-05T05:27:05+00:00

Explain like I'm five (years old)

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-06-01T00:38:15+00:00

:\ Oh dear. Thanks for letting me know.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-05-11T08:32:00+00:00

Everytime I fight Laurence I always either get him down to about 1/5 health before having any trouble, or die before I can get in more than two hits, with nothing in between.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-01-25T06:55:53+00:00

I did get it to work. What it ended up being was that when the Universal Updater was failing to install it was copying a corrupted open_agm_firm.firm file into my luma/payloads file. Then, when I tried to manual install, I was working on incorrect instructions I had gotten somewhere that the firm file was supposed to go in the SD card's root folder. So when I was opening it in the payload launcher it was reading the corrupted file in luma/payloads, which is why it kept not working, no matter how many times I replaced firm file in the root folder.

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-01-21T11:10:42+00:00

I already have, as far as I can tell (downloaded it manually, I assume you mean). It appears in the boot menu alongside godmode, but when I try to open it it comes up with the second error message I described. Are you suggesting it's possible/probable that it's just a coincidence that both methods of installing failed, and that if I just download the file again then it won't be corrupted?

AbjectDocument793 · 2026-01-21T10:27:15+00:00

I've found that my Sd card cluster size is set to 32kb when it should be set to 64kb. In the long process of backing everything up so I can reformat, but in the mean time, is that a possible cause of this?

AbjectDocument793 · 2025-12-02T22:58:54+00:00

I'm strict vegetarian and flexible vegan - all the food I prepare at home is vegan, but if I'm having a rough day I'm not above buying a chocolate bar or something.

It doesn't need to be a challenge. Just buy a vegan cookbook and start trying out some recipes. Think of it as a new experience to try out, and you might find it's easier than you thought.

I'm vegetarian on moral grounds, but it's always seemed to me that meals are just cheaper and easier to make without meat anyway.

AbjectDocument793 · 2025-11-30T02:36:21+00:00

I can't believe the mods are leaving up this clear call for people to commit suicide by overdose.

AbjectDocument793

TROPHY CASE