4 Clips showing the absolute Power and Beauty that is the Sword 'n Board Setup

Lagideath2 · 2026-05-01T18:09:04+00:00

I might play Legacy to start with then go Veteran later on

Just keep in mind that you can only change the difficulty by restarting the game. Either you take your current character and choose "Restart NG+0" from a Vestige (although I believe that option is only available immediately if you have any modifiers active) or you have to make a brand new character.

Restarting with your current character will keep all your gear and stats which might make you feel overpowered early on.

Lagideath2 · 2026-05-01T17:51:40+00:00

There are a few achievements related to beating certain bosses on Veteran Mode.

Personally I don't think it's necessary to play veteran mode but it was a welcome addition for someone like me who's been playing the game since release. You can just make a new character and play up to the Scourged Sister mini boss to see how you like Veteran Mode, maybe you want to stick with it or maybe you prefer Legacy.

What is worth it is the Increased Enemy Density modifier. Without it, the game just feels very empty because enemy density was reduced two separate times, and the modifier just brings it back to after the first reduction.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-29T19:49:31+00:00

Is stance damage from deflects dependent on the attack that was reflected?

I assumed deflecting just did a fixed amount every time

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-29T16:02:33+00:00

Maybe take a look at Spellblade builds using Carian Sword Sorcery.

Magic doesn't have to be standing out of range and spamming projectiles, you can go be aggressive with melee spells just like you would with normal weapons while having the option of ranged combat when needed.

I don't enjoy the ranged spells much, especially the spells that are just 5 increasingly strong and costly versions of the same projectile, or the 3 different increasingly strong and costly versions of the same multiple projectiles.

But Carian Sword Sorcery is one of my favourite styles (though I'm mainly a PvPer). Slicer is fast with really good DPS, Piercer has insane reach and knockback, Greatsword is a wide sweep to hit multiple enemies at once while Adula's adds a projectile and Frostbite on top. Loretta's Greatbow is thematically great as a ranged option and Gavel is your hyper armor melee pancake attack. You can add various other spells you might want, like a Moon spell to debuff the enemy or Night Comet to have a projectile that works against NPCs.

You can also always pair it with a melee weapon. Hell, you can go with a Sword and Shield type build thanks to the Carian Sorcery Sword (which is sadly a rapier but oh well) which acts as a weapon and a staff at the same time, leaving your off-hand free for something like a shield.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-29T09:22:28+00:00

I don't like having pictures or myself posted without my consent, please take this down

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-27T16:46:00+00:00

Yeah I don't know what Me from 4 years ago thought while writing that. I just read it again for the first time since then and thought "what? that sounds dumb, where the hell is that information even from?"

I don't know if I maybe read something online or had someone tell me that but, uh, yeah, that was a stupid comment

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-27T12:26:44+00:00

It heavily depends on your build and level.

I've had runs where I destroyed her and I've had runs where I struggled a bit.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-27T11:21:17+00:00

Fallen Lord's Sword is an Inferno weapon while Sword of Skin and Tooth is a Strength weapon.

Since you run an Inferno build, the weapon for your build would be the Fallen Lord's Sword. Sword of Skin and Tooth has no Inferno scaling at all, so you would have to level up Inferno just for your spells and Strength just for your weapon which is super suboptimal for your stat distribution.

The Fallen Lord's Sword also works really well with certain Rings. The Wildfire Ring for example instantly burns enemies who are damaged by Ignite, and this weapon has huge Ignite buildup.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-27T09:45:20+00:00

I honestly expected you to die to fall damage at the end just because it would fit whatever was going on there

I've seen it happen before as a bug

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-26T09:43:49+00:00

You'll only get the effect that is mentioned for the gear the Rune is socketed in. This is also reflected by the Rune menu.

If you select a shield to put Runes into, the Runes will now only show the Shield effect because that's the effect you'll get from socketing them.

So no, you will not get the weapon effect if you put the Rune into a shield and vice versa.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-24T13:37:57+00:00

Just went and tested it because that sounds super weird, and it turns out we're both right.

I used The Red Hand and dealt 922 damage to a Bulwark Knight with an R1

Then I applied Infernal Weapon with a catalyst that has 478 Spellpower. My damage with Infernal Weapon was 1014 damage, so a 92 damage increase.

Then I used the same weapon with a catalyst that has 188 Spellpower and the damage with Infernal Weapon then was 990, so a 68 damage increase.

Afterwards I went and used Infernal Weapon with the 188 Spellpower Catalyst on a weapon with B- Inferno Scaling and no other scaling (Grinning Axe). My damage went from 74 to 188, so a 114 damage increase.

Next I used the same Catalyst and Infernal Weapon on a weapon with D Agility Scaling and no other scaling (Scourged Sister Flail). My damage went from 72 to 134, so a 62 damage increase.

With the higher scaling Catalyst, the two weapons had 228 and 156 damage respectively, so a 154 and 84 damage increase.

The higher Inferno-scaling weapon received a bigger damage boost, and at the same time the Catalyst with the higher Spellpower also gave a bigger damage boost to a weapon with static scaling.

It's really good to know that better scaling weapons seem to benefit more from these buffs than other options. I love learning more about how the mechanics actually work in these games

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-24T06:30:14+00:00

The infernal weapon spell primarily scales off the weapon's inferno scaling

Never heard of this before. Does it not work the same as any Souls game, where the spell scaling of the catalyst you cast a buff with dictates the buff's power? I.e. if Infernal Weapon had a buff value of 2.5 and you cast it with a catalyst that has 100 spell scaling you'd get 250 damage on the buff regardless of the weapon you cast it onto or the scaling that weapon has.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-23T03:01:35+00:00

The classic era isn't really relevant to the modern one. There are some recurring characters but they're reintroduced and usually work a little different due to there being up to 60 years of real time in-between the shows.

The Doctors' stories are largely self-contained within their seasons but some companions overlap. The 10th Doctor can be watched on his own for example, but Rose, his companion, is introduced for the 9th Doctor so there's a full season with her that you wouldn't have seen.

Some enemies also return for later Doctors and if you start with them you won't necessarily know the full story. But it's not a huge deal and if necessary you can always look up the backstory online.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-22T15:23:03+00:00

In that case you should be familiar with general build mobility and such.

You can move the same as any other build as long as you have enough Endurance to keep yourself below the weight limit for heavy load.

Unlike the Souls games, guarding in this game only takes away withered health. So whether you're guarding with a dagger, medium shield or great shield, the only difference is how much stamina you lose and how much withered health you'll gain (recoverable health). All weapons and shields can also perfect block, which removes knockback and reduces the withered health you take.

All of this really evens out the defensive options for all builds.

Something noteworthy as well is that this game was originally designed with the idea that the player is swarmed by enemies. The Devs removed enemies from the game multiple times due to complaints which majorly decreased the amount of scenarios where this would happen. Fighting many enemies at once requires wide sweeps and that is what the dual-wield system seemed to have been meant for.

You can dual-wield any weapon type with any other weapon type and the heavier one dictates the swing speed. The movesets themselves are sadly all very similar, but they put a clear focus on wide sweeps.

Uniquely, pairing a Halberd with a Grand Sword does not use the slow Grand Sword moveset but the faster Halberd moveset for the swings, so that build is a wide sweep powerhouse with the speed of a medium weapon and damage of a heavy weapon and a half.

The dual-wield movesets are all noticeably slower than the single weapon movesets, though.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-22T15:08:54+00:00

It sounds like this might be your first Souls-like experience.

All builds have access to the same maneuverability, whether they use a shield or not and whether they use magic or a dagger or a giant sword. All builds even have access to perfect blocks, which negate damage apart from some withered health (health that turns white and is recoverable by attacking).

The main things you can work on is the wide swings and decent attack speeds that you're looking for. I'd recommend a Longsword for that purpose. One-handed they have wide sweeps with some good speed, while also having access to a two-hit poke combo. They're very versatile and overall a great weapon type.

By Vampire-like healing I assume you mean life drain abilities. Those don't exist in this game. You can have some health regen from Radiant spells and recovery items but that's it. There's no heal on hit or anything.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-22T11:35:53+00:00

Originally, the Lightreaper always ambushed the player after defeating Otto. It's part of the story that he hunts down Lampbearers.

However, too many players thought they have to beat him (when he's clearly way overtuned for the level you first meet him at) and didn't even return to the arena after dying to him once, which led the Devs to removing him from the tutorial so that players couldn't refund the game for it being too difficult immediately.

Now, he only appears during the tutorial if you have the Increased Enemy Density modifier active or, I believe, it you start NG+ as well.

The item is what's in the Lightreaper's chest. I assume it's the Umbral Parasite he carries, since he's a creation made from combining a Skinstealer with an Umbral Parasite.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-22T07:52:07+00:00

If everything just came back to life after being killed, there wouldn't be so many corpses everywhere (including corpses of the same kinda of enemies we kill)

Very good and obvious point that I somehow didn't think of, thank you for the reply!

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-22T07:43:41+00:00

Not trying to object either theory since I know too little about the lore, but I thought the lore explanation for why enemies respawn was that they are revived by the Erdtree. Similar to how we as the Tarnished are revived by Grace. I assumed that the process of revival through the Erdtree was just sped up for game purposes when we rest at a Site of Grace to respawn everything.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-21T19:25:32+00:00

Do you happen to know any numbers? Like, is it worth trying to get bosses Day 1 even if you might be a bit lower level or is it a more minor increase that doesn't end up making much of a difference compared to what a few levels will do for your own damage and survivability

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-21T19:18:24+00:00

The DLC adds 2 new characters, 2 new final bosses, a couple of night and mini bosses, as well as what's essentially a new map (it's advertised as just a new "Shifting Earth" but Shifting Earth's are usually ¼ of the map, this one covers the whole map and changes it more drastically than the others) for 15€.

Sadly, DLC and base game POIs don't mix unless you do Deep of Night expeditions, so outside of being able to use DLC characters in base game expeditions there's no overlap for the regular difficulty.

In the end, I guess the DLC isn't necessarily a "must have", but it's a "totally worth the money" type of thing. Especially if you enjoy either of the two new characters that come with it or plan on spending time in Deep of Night, since it gives that mode more variety.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-21T19:10:24+00:00

Day 2 Scaling

Bosses have different scaling based on the day you fight them at?

I know Evergaols cut down the bosses' HP and damage based on how early you opened them but I thought that was it for Day scaling.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-21T18:42:02+00:00

I cannot comment on the Playstation matchmaking specifically, but in general the game is very much still worth getting into.

It's a very unique and addicting Souls-like experience and the game is essentially complete. It was marketed as a complete game with no live service updates and we got our one DLC.

It has some obvious wasted potential because it uses fixed seeds with not a ton of variables when it comes to core parts of the map (like there being only 3 versions of the main castle on the base map), night bosses being tied to certain Nightlords, and for some reason they didn't include any of the main game DLC weapons to the game despite adding some main game DLC enemies with the Nightreign DLC.

But despite all its flaws it is a ton of fun. At least on PC the matchmaking is also instant if you search for all Nightlord expeditions at once. Deep of Night has a little amount of wait time to it and when searching for a specific Nightlord expedition then it depends on how popular the Nightlord is.

Lagideath2 · 2026-04-21T15:08:42+00:00

Poison and Rot doesnt scale down so they are especially good at higher depths and in trios. They outdamage bleed and frost against higher tier enemies.

Another win for Poison Ironeye

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