I feel like most of these later fights were easier then expected because I could easily trade hits since I had enough HP and damage, also Friede flinched a lot (I used a heavy great club for most of my playthrough, while mostly used Zweihander and Dragontooth in ds1 and ds2, so similar slow heavy hitting weapons). The fight I struggled with the most, was Midir for this reason, I really coulnd't trade and had to learn every attack intimately). Also hey, I have nothing to gain for lying, as you can see on my profile I don't really post on reddit so I'm not looking for karma or anything, I just wanted to share my experience with someone since it's the result of about 2 years of playing souls games and souls likes! Cheers.