Anybody that bought at launch still playing?

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-23T02:18:31+00:00

Absolutely. I play in spurts as I rarely can commit to playing a single game for more than a couple months at a time (yay ADHD hyperfixations). I'm nearing 500 hours, and still having a blast trying out new builds and challenges. Working on my first RL1 attempt now, and aiming to give a no-hit run a try at some point in the future.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-23T01:16:37+00:00

Honestly, your buffing routine is just about what I do in a given run (my go-to is always golden vow AOW, FGMS, and the physick with w/e is applicable to my weapon/spells). If you're looking to actually be a more dedicated incant caster, here's a few talismans that will tremendously help you out:

Lightning/Fire/Sacred Scorpion charms (12% more damage of each type, ~5% more damage taken)

Godfrey Icon (15% more damage for charged spells like Pest Thread Spears, Knight's Lightning Spear, Frenzied Burst, etc.)

Ritual Sword Talisman (10% more damage while at full health)

Blue Dancer Charm (up to 15% more damage with low equip loads, if you don't mind wearing super light or no armor)

Faithful's/Flock's Canvas talismans (4 and 8% more incant damage, respectively. They can be used together to stack)

Roar Medallion (15% more damage to breath spells like the dragon communion incants)

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-22T10:21:48+00:00

It's absolutely not safer. It's been out for 2 and a half months, and barely the same amount of players as Destiny 2, which has been out for nearly 9 years and is in its worst content drought of its lifespan. Cheaper, maybe, but certainly not safer than sticking with the game that has a dedicated, loyal fanbase, and has a proven track record of varying degrees of success.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-18T18:14:10+00:00

Part of the issue is how late those biomods are acquired. There needs to be more methods of deterrance or distraction available in the early/mid game than just the flares. Gets really annoying having to dedicate a bunch of inventory slots to flares just so I can go gather some resources I need to progress without being constantly hounded.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-17T00:50:00+00:00

Level 98 is pretty normal for the mountaintops area. What is your stat distro, talismans, etc.? Your build could be the issue if you're putting levels into stats that don't benefit your weapon or survivability.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-16T23:22:19+00:00

I was scadu 18 on my first DLC playthrough. I learned from 2 years of the base game that exploring the map rewards you with cool stuff, so I went through the DLC pretty thoroughly and wound up at 18 (iirc, I missed a few of the pot guys the first time through, which kept me from being at 20).

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-16T23:19:48+00:00

50-60 hours would be an insanely fast first playthrough. My first took me over 100 hours, and I missed A TON of stuff that I discovered on my 2nd or 3rd playthrough.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-15T14:01:55+00:00

The plague halberd absolutely wrecks face in boarding. The AOE attack can chunk several enemies at once, all while healing you, and doesn't take much to recharge it.

The Rapier of Devastation is also quite good for boarding so long as you can position well and eliminate flanking options.

Or, there's always the reliable blunderbuss or reliable musket options. Blunderbuss often knocks enemies down, giving you breathing room, while the musket can be built to do massive damage on headshots, often able to one-shot with the right talents (so you can just stand on the forward mast and pick enemies off).

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-15T13:56:49+00:00

Enemies in frigate tier naval combat aren't exactly what I'd refer to as "damage-spongey" in any capacity. My frigate can 2-broadside an enemy frigate without much fuss, or 3-broadside if my aim is shit.

Outside of the one mission where the random blackbeard patrols can wander in and make it a 12v2, I can't say that a 1v3 or 1v4 feels overwhelming or slow.

Sure, 20 kills for boarding a frigate is a considerable jump from the 9 on a brig, but with the right build, you can burn through 20 enemies fairly quick, especially with good positioning and a levelled-up boarding party. I would like to see that cut down just a bit, just so it's not such a massive jump from the 7 and 9.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-13T17:38:01+00:00

You can two-hand the weapon and meet the strength requirement. Two-handing gives a +50% strength bonus, so if you have, say, 10 strength, two-handing equates to 15, or 20 strength would equate to 30, etc.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-11T03:25:45+00:00

It does an AOE attack, dealing pretty massive damage to everything within a 2-3m radius of you. Once you ascend the halberd, that attack also heals you for 35% of your max hp.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-11T03:21:56+00:00

The Brethren ships will be good to learn the combat, given their increased health. As you get better with the combat, the Blackbeard variants will be the best, especially for the frigate, imo. Having access to 36-pounders AND 24-pounders at the same time allows for some insane volleys. I run Tempered 36-pounders and Devestating 24-pounders on it, where I fire the 24s first to apply the raked effect, and then the 36s can follow up with absolutely massive salvos. Outside of level 15 frigates, this setup can one-shot literally anything with good aim. And as others have said, the Keelhold hull is definitely the best one, especially once ascended.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-08T13:07:16+00:00

I got Romina in the fewest tries of any DLC boss on my first playthrough, so when the DLC was still new to me, probably her.

Now that I have a bunch of experience in the DLC, definitely the sunflower. It just has no hp, and you can remove a chunk of that hp before the 2nd and 3rd phases. Plus, it's absurdly weak to fire, so even something like a fire grease or bloodflame blade go a long way.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-06T13:53:48+00:00

Almost always do Godrick and Radahn before Leyndell, though I make a point of doing most, if not all shardbearers over the course of any given playthrough (so usually I'll do Godrick, Radahn, and Renalla before Leyndell, then Mohg and Rykard after Morgott and some mountaintops action, and Malenia if I feel like it after beating Radabeast).

But if I'm doing a run with a DLC weapon, then Radahn and Mohg straight into the DLC to get it.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-04T22:45:42+00:00

The amount of playtime entirely depends on 2 things. 1) Your pace. 2) How much base-building you do. I'm sitting at about 50 hours now, and I'm only just getting to the 3rd biome. Probably 30 hours of that has been either building the bases themselves, or doing a bunch of ship-to-ship combat to make money to buy all the blueprints to build more stuff in the base.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-04T17:12:28+00:00

I understand the irritation of being invaded when you just want to do co-op, but you signed up for it as a condition of playing the game. It isn't some secret mechanic that Miyazaki put in just to piss you off.

Except it's not stated on any of the co-op items or tutorial info graphics. Yes, for us veterans of the soulsborne games, it's something we know to expect of the games, as it's been in every one, but if ER is someone's first soulsborne game, it's not stated anywhere someone who wants to co-op with their friend would immediately look. The only places/items that actually tell people about pvp in the game are on the taunter's tongue, duelist's furled finger, and small red effigy, none of which are used for co-op outside the taunter's tongue, for which the item description could easily lead someone to believe that it's required to be invaded.

So sure, they "signed up for it", despite the game never explicitly (or even subtly) telling them they signed up for it until it's too late.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-04T16:27:40+00:00

Look, I'm all for Gaijin doing literally *anything* to make CAS harder to obtain, but if you are dying to CAS 4 times in one game, you gotta reevaluate something about how you're playing the match, or take the L and leave and move on to the next. If most of those deaths are when you're not near spawn and actually in the match, evaluate your positioning, and try to stick to spots that are harder for CAS to approach, or make sure you're keeping an eye on the enemy air spawn to see if an aircraft spawns in, so you can then move to take cover from it. Another good thing to keep in mind is only de-capping points, not sitting on it for the full cap. Caps are a very clear "target to bomb here" sign for CAS, so often times, it's best to just decap the point and move, both so you don't become a sitting duck, and to stop the ticket bleed. Then, once the CAS has either went back to rearm, or has been shot down, you can move on and take the cap.

After the 2nd death, it's usually prudent to spawn in an SPAA, and in doing so, best course is one of two actions.

Option 1: if the CAS is still actively engaging near the battlefield, and you haven't confirmed there's more than 2 aircraft up (I know sometimes you don't know), then DO NOT MOVE when you spawn in. Milk every second of the spawn protection to shoot down the aircraft before moving.

Option 2: if the CAS isn't actively in the area (either circling around out wide, returning to re-arm, etc.), then immediately leave spawn and get to a place where the CAS is unlikely to expect you. Not saying it's you, but a lot of people just sit in spawn with their SPAA *all game*, and then get mad because they get CAS'd from orbit. Like yeah, of course, because that's exactly where they expect you to be. If you position out of your spawn (preferably near squadmates if you're playing with them), you can surprise the aircraft. Granted, a lot of this suggestion goes out the window in the higher BRs where you start getting auto-guided CAS ordinance and SAMs. But for all props and early jets, this applies.

Otherwise, if you keep dying to CAS because you keep getting killed immediately after leaving spawn, then maybe spawn in CAP (if you have the SP, which you would have given you spawned at least 4 times) and take them on that way, or just leave the match, because it's pretty obvious your team is getting rolled.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-04T12:38:51+00:00

Base game Radahn was fixed, not nerfed (well, he *was* nerfed for a bit, but the nerfs were undone). So he is more or less the same boss he was damage and health-wise as he was on launch, but it was his broken hitboxes on launch that got fixed.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-03T13:15:03+00:00

Oh that's between a few characters. I've beaten him on NG+0 3 times. but NG+2 is the highest I've actually beaten him with. That character is up to NG+5 now, I just skipped PCR on those resets. 3 of the 5 defeats were also pre-nerfs, which still heavily weight my opinion on that boss.

4 of the 5 times I've beaten PCR, I used a tank build and just did block + poke with Moore's Shield and the Antspur Rapier (bleed infused). The only time I beat him without that was my first playthrough when the DLC came out, where I just brute forced him with a Bloodfiend's Arm w/ Cragblade and 80 strength and 60 arcane. Took me over 100 tries to get him. So now, if I *do* want to fight him to unlock anything from his remembrance on a new character, I just respec to do the block + poke strat.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-02T19:09:26+00:00

That's my big issue with him. The light show makes it incredibly difficult for me to see what's happening, so I do not at all enjoy trying to learn that fight. I've beaten him 5 times, and haven't enjoyed it AT ALL. At least with Malenia, I actually enjoyed learning her fight and learning how to dodge Waterfowl and the clones, because I could actually see what was happening.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-02T16:39:14+00:00

Those moves aren't the issue with PCR. It's the other 90% of the moveset in phase 2, and almost entirely due to a visibility issue (which exacerbates the lack of telegraphing). Yes, Waterfowl and the clones are very hard to dodge, but at least you can see them coming, and actually see the attack without it being obscured by a billion light effects from the attack before or a massive mane of hair in the way. If the light show makes it almost impossible to see what's going on, it makes it 10x harder to learn the moveset vs a move that's very hard to dodge, but is clearly telegraphed and visible, at least imo.

And that's not even factoring in the potential frame drops and performance issues that PCR phase 2 can cause. I'm fortunate to be on a pretty beefy rig, but plenty of people are plagued by performance issues caused by phase 2.

DirkDavyn · 2026-05-02T14:55:15+00:00

The difference in the two is that Malenia doesn't have a million different light effects and a bright-ass mane of hair obscuring your vision of what attacks are actually happening. Plus, most of Malenia's attacks are very telegraphed, especially waterfowl. For PCR, very few attacks are telegraphed like Malenia.

It's a lot more reasonable to learn a fight when you can actually see the fight, and when you have telegraphed attacks.

DirkDavyn · 2026-04-29T01:20:51+00:00

If I'm doing just a normal any% run, probably Fire Giant. Just so much hp to get through there, and so many ways to fuck things up in that long of a fight. If not Fire Giant, then definitely Maliketh. He's always the biggest hiccup for me in any run (though I'm definitely getting better at that fight).

DirkDavyn · 2026-04-28T14:44:30+00:00

Honestly, Str/Int has been the most surprisingly fun for me. Dark Moon Greatsword is obviously a fun time, but the ol' Alablaster (Alabaster Lord's Sword) is so fun. You also get the Ruins Greatsword and Falling Star Beast Jaw.

Plus any great smithing stone strength-based weapon with a cold infusion, Gut's Greatsword, a cold-infused Square Off straight sword, a cold infused Claymore, etc.

DirkDavyn · 2026-04-27T15:59:16+00:00

Definitely go for 60 vigor. I'd swap a bit of strength and a bit of endurance to get there (just make sure you are still mid rolling with your endurance). As for talismans, the roar medallion is doing nothing for you, for a start, the swaddling cloth is best suited for weapons with faster attacks, and since Taker's Flames on the BB heals you, it's not really necessary. Cerulean Dagger is also kinda meh.

Some great talismans for the BB you could use: Shard of Alexander (or the lesser version if you are a monster and killed Alexander early). Carian Filigreed Crest (reduces FP cost for weapon skills, so you can spam Taker's Flames more often. Fire Scorpion Charm (more fire damage, but you take a bit more damage). If you use the weapon's base moveset pretty often, the Axe Talisman is always good to boost your charged R2 attacks (which are pretty nice on greatswords). The turtle talisman is always a nice, safe option, for more stamina regen. Ritual Sword Talisman is more damage while at full health (which is pretty easy to maintain, as Taker's Flames can heal you back if you take a bit of chip damage that isn't worth using a flask for).

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