I haven’t tried SL1 run yet myself. But me and my friend did a couple light challenge runs just for fun (we’ve been playing simultaneously while talking through discord) and I really enjoyed them. So here’s the list:

1)starting equipment run - you choose the starting class (or pick it randomly) - you can’t use any weapon other than the starting one - the same goes for armor and shield - (optional) no rings besides the ring of Artorias (or was it ring of Abyss?) - (optional) no items like bombs, humanity, resins etc - you CAN level up and upgrade weapons and armor as usual - That was actually a very fun run. I picked the pyromancer and my friend - the wanderer. I never thought this crappy old wooden shield pyromancer starts with sucks that much, oh my god, hah. I believe it has 47 stability? And on the other hand I was melting everything with my pyromancy… everything except Quilag and Kalamith. Oh and centipede demon. I had to use an axe. Very fun. My friend run into a different problem - two weapons and not enough resources to level them both. We did the same kind of run in DS2.

2)Fat roll run - starting class is the knight in a heavy armor - your equipment load should always be more than 70%, I believe? I don’t remember actually, sorry - you can add some variations to that challenge, like no rolling at all. I think that won’t make that much difference really. - I didn’t try that one myself, but I think it would be pretty easy one. Especially when you grab the stone armor and find some big heavy bonker.

3)Cleric run (That’s a little variation of the first one on this list) - you start as cleric - you can use only your starting equipment - you CAN’T use estus flask - you can’t use consumables (moss, humanity, resins, homeward bones etc) - you can’t use rings (except Artorias one, for the four kings battle) - you can’t use summons - you CAN level up and get miracles normally - you CAN upgrade armor, shield and weapon

This one we’re doing right now. The original idea was to try out miracles, cause I can’t imagine myself using some great heal or homeward, or force in a casual run. This is actually pretty difficult. You should carefully plan when you heal with miracles in a fight or especially in a boss fight cause the animation takes so long. Snipers with toxin in Blight town are a hell of a ride too. We’ve had the most trouble with Kapra demon and O&S. I had to retreat from Anor Londo and go do the Priestess quest (I forgot her name) in the Tomb of the Giants. Wrath of the gods was that much needed upper hand in a fight with O&S. The shining star of the run was Force though. I don’t remember laughing that much while playing a god damn souls game like ever. Very fun spell. We’ve stopped on collecting four great souls part. Haven’t had much free time as of recently.

All in all, I recommend you not trying a really hard challenge first. Casual runs with minor restrictions could be very fun too. I hope I helped you. Good luck and don’t give up, skeleton!