Elden Ring And Fake Difficulty

My thoughts on the new Elden Ring game.
Inspired by Joseph Anderson's review: • Elden Ring - A Shatter...
Watch me die A LOT in Elden Ring: • VAUSH DIES 195 TIMES I...
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#EldenRing #VaushPit

[@calebnelson1468]

My biggest gripe with the game is I can't look at my map when a single hollow soldier is staring me down from a football fields distance away

[@Versace_sheets]

Yeah but you could get hurt with mappy open

[@KlaireMurre]

yeah why do enemies have the aggro range of an MMO?

[@_Rosa7524]

American hehehehhehehhoo

[@Basteal]

You loose countless fights, but you arent allowed to be lost while fighting.

[@hermithouse]

I've died more than once because I pick up an item off the ground, or get an item, and I suddenly get attacked from an enemy I didn't see. Problem is sometimes you cant fight/attack if a single text box is open, or I forget to close my menu screen. Which is odd because the game is made to NOT allow pausing, and you can still move around but not attack.

[@follower9698]

Using magic against a boss that jumps back 80ft or just does an epic opening pose is the souls equivalent of Indiana Jones gunning that swordsman down and is as equally funny.

[@CaH6633]

I've never used a magic build but when you describe it like that I feel like I should lol

[@omenmarin7903]

@@CaH6633 you have this big badass dude clad in amazing armor, and you just take a couple steps forward to blast him to the the moon with shiny lights, quite funny at times

[@evanleighton2634]

@@CaH6633 It's P fun sending a Kamehameha blast killing a boss in seconds, makes you feel more like you're playing a DBZ game than a souls like, but hey, fun is fun!

[@PhillerDiller]

Almost all bosses actuaply have some form of input reading to punish casters, but if your spells have quick recovery windows you can easily roll whatever attack they follow up with

[@archivelibrarian6818]

not really. both different things

[@michaelwerkov3438]

gael is such an incredible boss for exactly the reasons vaush said. you CAN memorize all his attacks and responses, BUT they are telegraphed so well that even without memorizing you can play entirely on instinct and reaction simply by being able to read how me moves his mass and sword around

[@dimwitted-fool]

I think the ulcerated tree spirits are a good example of this in ER. I remember coming across one for the first time and beating it first try, and I felt so fucking badass, because every dodge just felt natural

[@malum9478]

@@dimwitted-fool mmmmmm. i mean. those things are kinda infamous for being...sort of impossible to understand what they're doing considering how big they are, how much the move, how small the arenas you fight them in usually are, and the infamous souls camera...it's very impressive to be able to first try the first one you meet, since that's...not most people's experience!

[@michaelwerkov3438]

@@dimwitted-fool i havent fought one yet. i hope i have a similar experience. im not going to lie, it took me forever to beat gael, but once i double checked what his hitboxes were i did eventually beat him on instinct alone. its such a good feeling

[@dimwitted-fool]

@@malum9478 the first one I found was just past the two tree sentinels, right beside the first Capital Outskirts bonfire. I had a good amount of space to work with, and I may have been a bit over leveled, I just remember thinking the thing’s movements felt pretty fluid and readable

[@elk3407]

Having good tells should be the bare fucking minimum. This is why Dark Souls combat isn't as good as its older brother Monster Hunter

[@MysteryKar]

dont you love it when youre just playing elden ring and them malenia decides that no actually you should play dmc5 instead

[@krieginphernjacobson]

But with the health bar of pacman.

[@shoutykenneth5115]

As a magic build main, I can safely say that the objectively correct way to use magic is manipulating gravity to suck your opponents into range of your twelve ton hammer made from an enormous alien jawbone. The best spell you could ever cast is BONK.

[@comyuse9103]

alien jawbone? why do that when you can cut them with the power of the moon?

[@kelva1304]

Muscle wizard casts FIST.

[@Sojo214]

@@comyuse9103 That's what I did, I knew Moonlight would be in the game and wanted to use it again, since I hadn't used it in DS1 or 2, and barely got into a challenge playthrough in 3 where I beat Dancer and Oceiros after Vordt... A friend shit talked me and sorcery in general since release, discrediting my playthrough a fair bit... Till he started up a spellblade too, and now has Moonlight. He beat Morgott the other day, and summarized it as "I feel like I beat that on the fifth try in spite of moonlight, not because of it..." He's stopped shit talking int builds now, which I find funny. Meanwhile, I'm on a fist playthrough and having a blast because of how much easier it is not having paper for armor, since I didn't have to level mind and equip extra gear and shit.

[@greatscornholio]

i also mained the jaw hook. combined with the no fp cost physick it trivialized basically every fight. just throw it in the air over and over and watch them break stance, and get crits with the talismans that restore fp and hp on hit. unstoppable

[@Freelocybin]

BONK is indead a very mighty spell, but have you considered ZUGZUG?

[@ruckusuwu6294]

I think the most important issue with the waterfowl dance is that, even if you manage to perfectly roll through each part of the combo, landing right next to her when the last aftereffect flurry comes out (like what happens at 28:13), you can barely get in a punish of your own, since she can sidestep out almost instantly after the dance is finished.

[@PropheticShadeZ]

it should be a parry check, like just make it so you either have a next to impossible sequence, but just have bigger parry windows

[@malum9478]

@@PropheticShadeZ the problem with parry checks is that it's a gimmick that ruins an enemy if you master it--e.g gwyn. as well, if a build doesn't have a parry tool, then they're stuck. i don't use shields usually, nor parry daggers, and if i did i wouldn't want to put parry on it. parrying should just be an item tbh for this reason alone, like the death parry item you get for fighting maliketh.

[@bofa722]

Yeah malenia is a shit boss, she just cancels her animations mid combo or recovers instantly from moves that should very clearly be punishable. Shit boss with infinite stamina and oppressive ass moves which clearly weren't very well thought out

[@theprophet4660]

@@bofa722 i think its bs but it's still fun and cool. like you dont have any other interactions with a boss like her where she literally whiffs, you punish, she cancels her stagger and counters, and then you have to react. Like she is supposed to be crazy in lore and it's a winnable fight that deserves endgame treatment. I'd say that the fight is more cruel than bs actually, but i don't think you're wrong for not enjoying it. But i tell you learning to parry her and locking swords with her is fun for me, but once the waterfowl dance comes out i need to hold my breath. it's not the most fun, but i think people are just generally shitting on her and the game without acknowledging all the amazing things about this game. the game has room to grow but this is a thought out complete package, whether I or you or anyone have differing opinions

[@moustachio05]

@@theprophet4660 no its definitly more BS

[@Invisibleguy-kn7bd]

Biggest issue with Elden Ring is the bosses, but especially the duo bosses. In a game with 165 bosses total, not a single duo boss is unique. Feels like they were just thrown together for the sake of difficulty half the time.

[@SoulsSolstice]

the fact that best practice for Waterfowl Dance is literally 'run to avoid the first two hits, dodge through the second set of hits' and even blocked attacks heal her is really really weird

[@thanganbabp5570]

she can cancel directly into it too so you have to constantly be super passive. it's not fun.

[@Red4mber]

You can use frost pots to cancel waterfowl dance So carry a few of those (and some fire dmg to reset frostbite) and just throw one when you see her jump in the air If you're in close melee range it's your best option available since you would be too close to run away and the loop-de-loop strat to fuck with her targeting ai is kinda hard to get consistently and fast enough

[@john69420x]

@@Red4mber might as well just summon a mimic

[@Red4mber]

@@john69420x it's using the tools the game puts at your disposal to handle the situation. It feels way better after a solo fight than with a mimic, but in the end it's a solo game, you do you

[@kakyointhemilfhunter4273]

​@@Red4mberI tried this and I always die trying to throw a pot lol

[@zennim125]

one of the most lethal bosses in the whole franchise is the fume knight, he kills the player 9/10 times and he is a slow knight, he hits hard, but the difficulty with him is just knowing his rhythm and enduring the long slug match since he has so much armour

[@eavyeavy2864]

So, X-6

[@pie6088]

Fume knights a great fight. He does have some quick attacks tho. Wouldn't exactly call him slow

[@BaxBoogey22]

I like the fume Knight fight but it always felt like the sword attack he does has too much range and I always got hit by it but it felt like I shouldn't have but other than that hes definitely one of ds2's best bosses.

[@bodabodaguy3193]

Remember the 3 serpent dudes in bloodborne? Now thats a gank fight done considerably well considering you are fighting 3 bosses

[@everforward5561]

The real question is why there's a massive enemy damage jump the moment you enter the giant mountains.

[@bofa722]

Fromsoft is too stupid to make bosses be challenging but fair so they just slap on an extra +100% on everything but the player after the capital. Fire giant being a great example: shit boss with boring easy to avoid moves that do hella damage, has too much hp and constantly runs away, making the fight far more tedious than it should bee

[@michaelgoudis344]

This jump starts much earlier. I believe this damage jump starts while doing the last parts of Rannii's quest (a little before lake of rot)

[@glowerworm]

@@bofa722 they're not too stupid. But it's clear that different people within Fromsoft were in charge of the Sekiro boss-design. I think the B team made Sekiro, and they are soo good at making perfect bosses. And the A team took back control for Elden Ring, and nailed the feeling of adventure, but with shit bosses

[@Gigaover]

@@glowerworm Other way around lmfao. Tanimura the leader of the B team that made the shitshow that is dark souls 2 came back for elden ring.

[@glowerworm]

@@Gigaover Dark Souls 2 was the best Souls game until Sekiro came out. That's why I said Sekiro was B team, because so many people like to say DkS2 was B team. And if DkS3 was A team, then that definitely means Elden Ring is also A team

[@peepeestorm3187]

Magic combined with melee is incredibly fun because it allows you to solve problems in creative ways. The only spell I refuse to use is Comet Azur because it ends up becoming the best solution to any boss you can blast with it after drinking the Baja blast Physic mix

[@lossnt557]

Astel meteorite is even stronger against a lot of bosses. Very fun as well if you give it to a mimic and both spam.

[@Ocean5ix]

So the problem is not comet azur. Is comet azur + flask + summons. I used the skill just like I used every other I'm the game. Found a opening and burned through my FP bar with it. Aside from that, people that say magic is OP in this game haven't made a bleed build character yet. It was like 20x easier than my spellblade build.

[@lossnt557]

@@Ocean5ix yeah no one thinks it's op on its own unless they are stupid, the spell is fine by itself. The flask azur combo is what is broken, the summon isn't really part of the problem when it comes to azur's power. Summons are literally just a difficulty slider, nothing wrong with that

[@ArunNarasimhan_arun1997107]

some other fun combinations you can try are inflicting frost with frost imbued weapons of any sort, and using magma shot to remove the frost, and then once again apply frost with your frost weapon(can also use frost magic to the same effect). You get the benefit of the frostbite debuff multiple times in a row, and usually for not very high mana cost

[@Ocean5ix]

@@lossnt557 the summons contribution to the combo is pretty much just taking aggro from the boss for the player to sit back and melt the boss down. Without the summons you might get lucky killing a boss or two with Azur + Flask but against a boss that doesnt flinch easily he'll just side step the spell and kill you.

[@SymphonyEternally]

I agree with most of the stuff here, and I admit I had much of the same feelings, ESPECIALLY with the number of gank fights. So many of them have attack sets that dont compliment each other, but that just totally overlap each other. Niall, Valiant Gargoyles, and the double Crucible Knights feel like they were just slapped together with no real thought, Godskin Duo is a little better because theres blocking terrain but its still not really fun. Soulsborne games are at their absolute best when they're a one on one dance. Its the reason everybody loves Gael. Gael honestly isnt that hard at that stage of the game, but he feels so FLUID! Its a dance back and forth between the two of you at the end of the world, your attacks flow into one another and you're pretty much always active, always dodging, always attacking. Elden Ring has several fights that seem to specifically not want that, they do not want you to engage in this dance, and after Sekiro I have no clue why! Sekiro was built around that concept and it felt amazing when you stepped in time with your 'dance partner!' I can only surmise that the concept of spirit ashes completely broke the game, and they overcompensated for it in some pretty unfair and unfun ways.

[@linkthai1995]

fuck you're thinking the same as me when it comes to Gael. I always think it's a beautiful and intense dance, same with Gundyr, Lothric, Midir. You can always engage. With Elden Ring, it's like you're watching a performance put on by the bosses and you only have 2 seconds to do a motion, so you have to bring in a partner (ashes) to not get frustrated to death.

[@lossnt557]

Honestly way more engaging fights though. The slow attack that can't just be 'attack, dodge, attack dodge' are so much more fun. You have to wait for the perfect time to dodge, not just do it asap.

[@leonardfabian8942]

Nail was annoying he basically uses his summons against you, and even the one at swamp area has the ability to re summon stronger summons. I agree i prefer one on one battles its much more satisfying also never add one special move that one shots you thats really annoying.

[@raxes1144]

@@linkthai1995 Midir? No, you dont think the same way like him

[@TheEveryDayC]

been trying to play dark souls 2 lately and give it a fair shake because i never could get into it, and i have run into more unfair ganks and ambushes than any other soulsborne game, even though the duo fights in elden ring are annoying at least they aren't every 30 feet. i'm excited for convergence mod to see if they can make unique bosses to replace some of the repeat bosses in the dungeons

[@jaikthesnake6285]

So I think in ER they tried to make the bosses better at handling multiple enemies, but it resulted in really easy-to-exploit AI that will almost always immediately switch targets to the last person that hit it

[@emerystheimmortal417]

Yep I just completed my first playthrough a few days ago and I must say that I did not struggle in an major way and it was mainly because I had summons and my build was OP, but my build is always OP in souls games it is not my first rodeo. I will try playing again solo, but I am concerned about some of the gank encounters which feel like they were tuned for summons

[@ShadowTasos]

That's always been the case in Souls games unfortunately. They don't want to add an aggro system like in an MMO, because that'd feel out of place, so the only other options they have are: the boss picks a target randomly, the boss attacks the closest target, or the boss attacks the last target that attacked it, in a pseudo-aggro system. They will switch aggro randomly every now and then, but in general that's how boss aggro works in Souls, and the main reason why people have always been against summoning in Souls games: the difficulty is ruined by the fact that the AI just can't react to 2 players. Even if they buff the bosses with more HP & damage in co-op, the fact that it's so easy to poke them while they attack someone else and then run away and heal while they focus your teammate, makes their fights a joke.

[@emerystheimmortal417]

@@ShadowTasos I had never summoned in any of my previous games. As a result, I never realised how bad the AI is when outnumbered. I don't think it completely trivialises the experience but if you are reasonably skilled it takes away all the difficulty

[@ShadowTasos]

@@emerystheimmortal417 Yeah I think that's a pretty common situation, most people never summon so they won't know how badly summoning breaks this game. I enjoyed being a Sunbro in DS1, helping others on difficult bosses like O&S, and several NPC questlines in DS2 required that you summon them for a particular boss fight to advance their quest. It's weird how it's been the same issue since then -- as you said, if you are reasonably skilled the difficulty is just gone -- and yet they made it a core game mechanic in ER.

[@scottfromspace]

Sekiro was a cool way to up the difficulty. I had to re-wire my DS/Bloodborne brain and learn a new combat system entirely

[@MaskedMammal]

In hindsight, what stands out to me with Elden Ring is that I enjoyed it in a way I don't usually enjoy Souls games. The combat was a means to an end, the Soulslike trappings more of a familiar method to fill out a fun and interesting open world with engaging challenges. I don't know if any part of me ever expected top-tier Souls bosses - but what did strike me was how unique they were. When has a Souls game ever dropped you in a massive field with a ton of NPCs to summon so you can have this absolute raid boss of a fight? When have they ever had you fight an entire gradeschool class in a library? It wasn't that these fights were the best Fromsoft boss designs ever - the unique elements of them actually point to weak spots in the traditional Souls boss design - but they were really cool to experience. Moreso than any Fromsoft game in the last decade, Elden Ring feels like an experience more than a series of challenges. I think that's why the negativity toward it took nearly a month to actually start kicking in. I don't get the sense that they designed it to be played in the usual tryhard manner, and as such it's struggling to find that level of fandom among veterans now that the shiny dust has settled. Although, I can't fully reconcile why I simultaneously feel it's more casual than previous games ('magic' is more accessible than ever, weapon arts really round out that disparity for melee builds, ash summons are a godsend for taking the aggressive edge off tough fights) yet at the same time harder in a punishing way (dodge rolls seem less consistent, bosses having near-180 tracking on every swing in a combo, attacks coming out faster than ever).

[@Yoshimitsu4prez]

I agree generally but you DO fight a building full of grad students in Bloodborne, that area was like a direct reference to the Lecture Hall from BB

[@nathanbarrett4402]

While Elden Ring isn't the most polished souls experience, it probably offers the best 'High' fantasy open world experience in gaming since Morrowind in 2002. While I adore the other Elder Scrolls games, their open worlds were much more typical, while ER like Morrowind isn't afraid to have unique and odd concepts with its world and characters.

[@raxes1144]

„When did a souls game ever dropped you in an massive field of emptiness“. Exactly thats the problem with the game

[@littlemoth4956]

"Moreso than any Fromsoft game in the last decade, Elden Ring feels like an experience more than a series of challenges. I think that's why the negativity toward it took nearly a month to actually start kicking in." Actually read the comments here, come back, and tell me you genuinely think that.

[@Coach_Rab]

I’ve beaten the game twice with completely different builds. First was with a strength & faith, second mage and sword. The mage build I found was the most challenging. Bosses don’t let you spam most spells. They get close and are very aggressive.

[@realblickz3508]

Exactly idk what he’s talkin😂 I beat Margot on my 2nd try as a melee build he wasn’t aggressive at all when I made a sorcerer he spammed moves and gave me little room to cast any spells at all

[@savingark1528]

Yeah I think vaush overstates the ease of a magic build. Just because a boss doesn’t have a ranged option ir sometimes lets you get free damage doesn’t mean it’s trivial or even easier than a melee build. Spells often take longer to get off and do less damage and especially in elden ring bosses will charge you down.

[@SkepticSloth]

The BEST example I've seen of unfair boss attack timings is Radagan.... There are times when he jumps up in the air and throws a lightning spear that explodes on impact and then summons a holy circle that also explodes. Usually you'd expect a well timed dodge to avoid both the spear and the explosion. And that's what you're trained to do. BUT Sometimes he does something slightly different. He'll jump up and throw a spear that does NOT explode and follow it up IMMEDIATELY with a spear that does and then he follows that up with a ground slam. It's timed so precisely to roll catch that if you dodge the first spear, then he'll catch you with the second spear, explosion, and subsequent slam that seem guaranteed to hit you. The only way I've found to avoid that brutal combo is to LET the first spear hit you, the stagger is timed to let you recover just in time to roll out of the second spear. But the telegraph animation to indicate whether he's going to throw a standard spear or a brutal double spear combo is so subtle that I've only managed it by instinct and not conscious effort. And the fact that you have to beat him AND the Elden beast in one go... Fucking savage.

[@Yama-qg3il]

The normal dragons are fine in ER, but it's a shame what they did with the ancient dragons, they aren't terrible, but pretty shittass when compared to Midir, their heads should be lower and I would not have cared that much if they recycled some animations, it's just as you say.

[@veryrare2337]

dragonlord is better in every conceivable way lmao

[@AmritZoad]

@@veryrare2337 nope.

[@LuM4rex]

@@veryrare2337 It looks cool, but it's just an empty spectacle. The boss himself poses no threat, the attacks are very simple and slow. While Midir is fighting with his last strength to stay alive, you are in his lair, while you think that you are his prey - he considers you a threat. Even after the strongest attack from the combination of 6 laser attacks that are aimed at YOU, he lowers his head with the last of his strength trying to kill you. This is a real fight.

[@123NERDZ]

@@veryrare2337 not even close to being as good as midir . You spend the entire fight smacking his ankles which would likely never even kill a dragon in reality to begin with . That's what makes midir so much better you have to hit his head and fight him head on . Placidusax I would give around 7 out of 10 but that fight itself isn't very good . The spectacle gets him 5 out of his 7 points . Midir is a 9 out of 10 . Midir is much better telegraphed and his attacks are designed more fairly with the added bonus of lowering his head between attacks to let you get a hit in on his head .

[@glowerworm]

Usually dragons in the base Souls games all suck donkey balls, and each game has a really good DLC dragon boss. So since we're seemingly keeping with the pattern, Elden Ring will have a solid dragon boss in its DLC.

[@nackskott12]

One thing I noticed more in Elden Ring than previous games was getting tagged by a single hit in a combo and getting stuck in hitstun. I'd miss-role once and then I'd be smacked around while smashing the roll button, only to be combo'd to death. Sometimes this is because of attack timings just being too fast, sometimes it's because there are too many enemies on screen (that one room in Raya Lucaria with 7 sorcerers is straight up nonsense). Also for Malenia's waterfowl dance, I read somewhere that even on regular New Game the full combo does something like twice the maximum player health, meaning even if you've maxxed out your vitality stat you'll still die extremely quickly to it. It wouldn't be unreasonable if it weren't so damn hard to avoid the attack, but both of those things together is just nutty design. Still easily a 9 or 10/10 as a game but sheesh

[@Versace_sheets]

Get your poise up little man.

[@nackskott12]

@@Versace_sheets I had decent poise, I was wearing the heaviest armor I could mid-roll with and I used the arsenal charm for most of the game to make sure of that. There were still a bunch of combos that had such quick timing between hits that I'd get stuck in and be slapped to death with no chance to roll or block. It's something that happens sometimes in previous games but I noticed significantly more of it in ER.

[@hithere5553]

@@Versace_sheets wake up. It’s not 2011 anymore. Poise means basically nothing.

[@kakyointhemilfhunter4273]

​@@Versace_sheetsPoise only works while attacking after DS1

[@Nebukanezzer]

Waterfowl is not that hard to dodge, and if you're bad at the game, just use a greatshield and tank it.

[@bunklypeppz]

One issue I have with some of Elden Ring's bosses that Vaush never really mentioned is that there seem to be some combos that deal dmg with specific timing to it, such that you can't roll to avoid every hit. Like if you match your s with say, the first swing in the combo, the second one will be guaranteed to hit you as you come out of the roll, before you can initiate another roll. Maybe this isn't necessarily the case and I had just consistently mistimed my rolls on those abilities, but it really seemed like there was various instances in which I basically had to roll backwards and hope to get out of range of a hit, or just accept the fact that part of the combo was going to deal dmg if I remained close enough for the weapon to reach me. Juxtaposed with say, DS3, where seemingly every enemy I recall had weapon swing combos that were timed such that it was always possible to dodge each swing with separate rolls if you timed them well enough.

[@marciamakesmusic]

yeah it's almost like they're trying to incentivize diverse playstyles by making certain enemies punish rolling certain attacks versus blocking them.

[@bunklypeppz]

@@marciamakesmusic Probably, and frankly I have mixed feelings about that aspect of the game's design philosophy. It can certainly be considered a negative thing, but in some ways, I do kind of appreciate being forced to come up with unorthodox ways to deal with certain mechanics, as opposed to just being able to roll through every single attack-- kind of like needing a shield or bloodhound step to survive Malenia's waterfowl dance or possibly parrying the first hit of a combo to prevent an unreasonably quick followup strike etc.

[@malum9478]

nah dks3 also had that shit. i remember specifically that SoC has a combo in his second phase where does essentially six or so quick swipes that you physically cannot dodge through all of fast enough.

[@malum9478]

@@marciamakesmusic it's almost like blocking is not a viable method of avoiding damage without a good shield and a lot of stamina and that's why people roll instead. it's almost like trying to block full combos without the shield and stamina to withstand it will only just result in you getting blown open, the actual problem is that for those attacks the only thing you can do to consistently defend against them is to completely disengage until it stops.

[@bunklypeppz]

@@malum9478 I guess I wouldn't know when it comes to Soul of Cinder since he was the one boss I think I was considerably overlvled for. I did all the other bosses and the DLCs before I fought him because I was worried it would automatically put me into NG+ if I beat him lol.

[@kapelski104]

Cuphead is difficult in the exactly correct way. The bosses require you to get actually better and learn, but when you die you never lose more than like 2 minutes of progress. It's great.

[@RKM_DarKo]

Shout out to Joseph Anderson. One of the best VG review and video essay content creators on this platform. Good to see Vaush shouting him out.

[@FelisImpurrator]

His stuff is good, but I think the last thing I watched of his (Hollow Knight...? I think?) revealed his biggest weakness as a reviewer: He has a very skewed bias in favor of extremely mechanically taxing difficulty that he doesn't fully account for. If I remember correctly he just straight up says "the game is too easy" as criticism rather than leaving it as a subjective thing, which makes it weird when someone in maybe the top 1-3% of the skill curve is reviewing a game and commenting on difficulty.

[@fredotony]

goated review by Woseph Waderson

[@RKM_DarKo]

@@FelisImpurrator that's a fair criticism. I guess I'm also bias in that direction so I hadn't really noticed. Fair point.

[@thefebo8987]

Nah he copied matthewmatosis hard (like most other KZbinrs)

[@Ar1AnX1x]

you guys like Noah Caldwell as well? or Act Man? what do you think about these two?

[@stygian_sabre9208]

Dunno if anyone mentioned it in your stream, but I reckon Code Vein has a system that's similar to what you described. Everything you can play around with in that game (skills, classes, magic, etc.) Are intentionally designed to be puzzle pieces and most importantly, you get your "mana bar" back by hitting people in melee. So your hard core magic builds are going in and smacking hard hitting combos, and then when your opponent retreats, you keep the pressure on with magic skills or melee skills that close the distance using the mana you just accrued from doing the smacking, and then, bam, you're back in melee range again to repeat. Or the "magic" can be used as a combo extender, etc. Tl;Dr, the magic system you've described is wicked and there's a game that kinda already has it, and a souls-like at that. Give code vein a shot.

[@ulrichwagner7311]

Seconded, code vein is very fun. Ignore the dumb DLC shit at all costs though

[@thatonefoofrumlongbe]

​​@@ulrichwagner7311 code vein DLC bosses are tanks, but fun. The levels are not that great.

[@thatonefoofrumlongbe]

I'm kind of sketchy on using magic. I don't really like using cheesy tactics or anything that trivializes the difficulty. I think the reference to code vein where your attacks give you ichor to use your abilities feels somewhat balanced. I just don't like the idea of it making it too easy. I just want something to make the game manageable. Code vein with no companion feels very hard, but with abilities like shifting hollow, and buffs it feels like an equalizer. First impression (ER) magic looks cheesey/easy. I've also seen people doing jump attack spam. That seems like a boring playstyle for me. Is your recommendation still balanced? Seeing people that don't even play the genre beat the game feels like a red flag. Also hearing about cheap builds like bleed/magic/horse fights -_-.

[@RevolutionaryLoser]

Haven't played ER but I feel like Sekiro addressed most of the problems being brought up here. I also think the game is a lot more fair than any Souls game. Sekiro was one of the first games where I felt like using items and figuring out how to cheese a fight were a part of the elegant design. Using magic, items, terrain exploits... Anything goes. Youre a shinobi and fighting fair wasnt on the curriculum.

[@emerystheimmortal417]

Oh definitely agree here. In sekiro using items to ''cheese'' felt very intentional. Like you are a shinobi. This is exemplified in the owl fight where he is doing everything to cheese you

[@PlayWithThatBlackGuy]

I dont even think there is much cheese in sekiro personally. Sekiro made you learn the system and then get good, certain items can help you but they generally dont break the fight in my experience anyway. Where elden ring there is just so many options to break the boss that it feels almost like that's what the game wants you to do

[@emerystheimmortal417]

@@PlayWithThatBlackGuy You clearly did not experiment with the prosthetics because I remember being able to cheese multiple bosses with the spark bombs that are super effective on animals.

[@PlayWithThatBlackGuy]

@@emerystheimmortal417 I did use prosthetics but it's also been a while since I played it tbh. I think we just have different ideas on what cheese is though tbh

[@shadex0437]

@@emerystheimmortal417 the firecrackers literally specifically say that they are effective against animals

[@enbyrogue3740]

As a Soulsborne fan, talking to other people who play these games is infuriating. It's a constant fight against their ego while they defensively tell you that you're not good enough because you criticized the game. The DS3 forum comments are worthless because of this problem, go ahead and look at the comments on the Grave Warden page and the Pontiff page. They're hilariously toxic

[@Mathenaut]

Vaush isn't wrong, though. It's clear that a number of these bosses draw inspiration from Bloodborne and Sekiro. Problem is, we don't have the tools that they gave us in Bloodborne or Sekiro. A number of bosses, yes, will change their attack patterns based upon whether you're attacking them - this is why parry gods destroy them as they do.

[@Julian-cn1ey]

"Problem is, we don't have the tools that they gave us in Bloodborne or Sekiro." But we do. Elden Ring dwarfs either game on combat options. Ashes of War can give you combat mobility superior to Bloodborne's through Bloodhound Step, and a build that uses items and magic has an infinitely deeper toolbox than Sekiro gives you. I put quickstep on a Scythe and played 90% of the game like Bloodborne, until I got the Moonlight Sword, after which I shifted into a slow, heavily armored artillery build. I could have even taken a talisman to make critical attacks heal, and use Beast Miracles, if I truly wanted to play more Bloodborne in 2022. I'd argue that Strength/Faith builds in Elden Ring play more like Bloodborne than Bloodborne, and I'm saying that with Bloodborne as my favorite Fromsoft game. Gameplay customization has reached an all time high. I take huge issue with people saying making sweeping claims about game design, player options, reads, etc, when they're limiting themself to

[@SoftBoiledArt]

@@Julian-cn1ey None of those set ups is intuitive, they're overtunned strategy guide stuff. I tried playing with an upgraded medium Axe and I was chipping at bosses, wich won't happen in any other game until the DLC, if you pick this game's equivalent to Warden's twin swords with an intenssively Google researched optimal build, 4 meta rings, and like 12 magic buffs at the same time (while in BB you just grab the pellets on the ground and you're set) sure you're op but playing NORMALLY this is the weakest the player has been in any Souls and also the one where damage bonuss are more divided into various items and spells spread across the huge map...you pretty much HAVE to check guides to hit hard.

[@Julian-cn1ey]

​@@SoftBoiledArt Your idea of 'normal' is based on other games, not Elden Ring. And it's your own fault that your faulty assumption is letting you down. If you're weak, the game is telling you to develop your character and use more tools. If your character feels weak, odds are, your character is weak. Elden Ring demands you push your character farther, it demands you minmax, it demands you use items. If you treat the game like Dark Souls, you're going to have a bad time. Stop treating the game like Dark Souls, and start treating the game like Elden Ring. Knock off your useless assumptions and predispositions. My first run in ER was totally blind. Did that stop me from using my brain to parse out ability and item combos? No. Fresh game demands fresh strategy.

[@theobell2002]

This is how I felt about Dark Souls 3. I hated the game.

[@g00gleisgayerthanaids56]

@@Julian-cn1ey youre acting like elden ring isnt just dark souls 4: breath of the wild...

[@azazel166]

There is difficulty done right and difficulty done very badly. An example of difficulty done very badly would be [Prototype] on Hard Mode. It is literally "We're going to severely up the damage done by enemies, severely lower the damage you deal to enemies, stun lock you to death, have objects thrown by enemies hit you no matter what and you're going to like it" difficulty.

[@Ryan_Wiseman]

Playing prisoner class prob has been the best implementation of magic and melee together, esp if you don't go out looking for the strongest magic spells where you can pretty much off your bosses in one shot if you rune farm enough. It allows me to go hard with melee while also punishing a boss if they are doing some ranged ability. While I use a measly glinstone pebble spell, it's been fun for this play style as it makes me use far more melee and almost always that, while also giving me a deadly option to when an enemy wants to play hard to get (there are a few like that where they want distance to fuck you up) and I can punish them back into a close quarters melee fight

[@michaeltravers9866]

A really good one that I found weird is guard counter the large god skin noble, (after he finished certain moves double foot stomp I think) he might be prompted to do a unique belly pulse. So it is the punish to a natural punish and you get hit for doin a clean counter.

[@BobfatherGaming]

I've been playing as a mage and it feels way more balanced than Vaush describes. For every boss I've encountered, being in range for a magic missile type attack means they're in range for a gap closer or they have an opportunity to block or dodge it. If they block or dodge too many attacks then you run out of mana. And when they do their gap closer, you still have to dodge or block the same flurry of attacks you'd have to handle as a melee character. You also have fights like the catacomb bosses where there is little room to create distance, there can be less damage potential on punishes, and you have to manage mana including finding opportunities to drink mana pots. Maybe I could play cheesier if I really tried but Vaush has his own list of tools that are off limits so it just doesn't seem like there's a fundamental difference to me.

[@sparhawkmulder1515]

Yeah there was a lot of condescension to spell users here

[@zeptocreations5507]

Not to mention cerulean chugging can and will open you up to a good ol' fashioned heal punish. All these gap closers, ranged attacks and punishers are very high damage too. I think magic/ranged has its own flavor of read and react gameplay from its melee counterpart. Bosses in ER don't let you get away with it as much as Voosh believes.

[@cameronwise-maas5610]

True in the early game, but add in spirit summons and comet azur and things get a looot easier.

[@killahk7983]

I have had the exact opposite experience. I beat the game then played through again as a mage and it was 12 times easier (when i wasnt using bad sorceries) if i stuck to carian slicer, glintstone pebble, adulas moonblade, and comet azur i easily passed through the game cause it was spectacular at every range. Mohg got comet azured, melania got azured, godfrey got azured and none of their gap closers have the same range as your spells.

[@sundalius]

@@cameronwise-maas5610 yes, when you are not being aggro’d and can use multi second cast spells, you do get the power boost of a multi second spell. No different than long weapon art casts.

[@presidentbruh401]

i feel like alot of the bosses weren't meant to fight one person. the amount of aggression and input reading from these bosses makes it seem like you were meant to have someone around to pull aggro off of you during key points. however it feels like mimic and ashes were cheaply put into the game without any thought or testing making them an objectively easier time.

[@Missmisery42]

I feel like the problem with elden ring was that they ironed out so much of the skill based difficulty from dark souls 1, that the challenge no longer comes from mastering the mechanics, but instead the bosses and enemies just kill you in one hit

[@IvoryKknight]

I agree with a lot of your criticisms, but feel like your way over blowing how much magic trivializes gameplay. It really seems like you haven't used it that much. Tree sentinel can block magic attacks with his shield and fire a golden projectile back Radagon does the same thing, parrying a spell and firing his own back. Bosses like Malenia and Godskin apostle will side step projectiles to dodge them. Also when using magic you need to chug cerulean flasks to restore FP, meaning you have less HP flasks, and a lot of bosses become more aggressive when you are chugging a drink. Bosses like Godfrey or Maliketh are quick to close the distance meaning a mage still needs to engage in the dance of combat. Sure when using the optimal spell build bosses can be beaten in seconds, but the same could be said for the optimal melee build that chain staggers a boss while stacking frost. I certainly agree the game is tailored better towards melee but the average caster expierence is still engaging and by no means a cake walk

[@shadez123]

I remember people harping about magic trivializing gameplay since DS1, and yet from what I've seen, power is what trivializes it. In that game, a shit Int build using great soul arrows is gonna be ass compared to someone bonking stuff with a zweihander 90% of the time. I do think the games tilt to being easier using magic but the difference is really overblown, and melee player have plenty of cheese at their disposal as well.

[@Xbiggie216X]

Thank you! Glad someone else gets it. Been trying to nail this into my friends heads over and over. Not everyone infinite physick Kamehamehas just like not everyone unga bunga 80 vigor 80 str 16 health flasks the game. Both can and do trivialize parts of the game, but the game has systems in place to react meaningfully with regular magic builds.

[@PlayWithThatBlackGuy]

I'd disagree I've played every souls game minus souls 2 and demon souls and magic 100% trivializes a lot of the game. I say this as someone who didn't find any of the well known cheese spells until about half way through the game. I spent hours fighting Radahn and when I swapped to pure casting he became ridiculously easy. There's only a few bosses that are somewhat challenging as a caster and those bosses are just challenging in general anyway

[@andremattsson6270]

This is just cope

[@Nebukanezzer]

I know, right? Power stancing colossals or halberds and spamming jump attacks is what actually trivializes the game.

[@SpaghettiWithMeatSauce]

I really really HATE how many multi enemy boss fights there are in this game. It's artificial difficulty that provides zero fun in return, and I leave feeling totally unsatisfied.

[@Saicofake]

Demod covered this in his video. Essentially, the game was balanced AROUND players summon Ash. This is one of the reason why a lot of the bosses have chain locking combos/ aggression.

[@jon7911]

@@Saicofake I would agree with that. It’s like it’s possible to beat the harder bosses without summons but it feels like you’re just making it unnaturally harder. Beating Malenia with summons didn’t feel unsatisfying for me but maybe I’m a bitch.

[@sparkyspinz9897]

@@jon7911 i only fought her for the trophy, I summoned help and gave no fucks but I can't say it was super satisfying. Even with help I got clapped like 10 times though so she's not easy even with help

[@Nazeroth_]

Fair Statement but I do have to say that at least one multi enemy boss fight is quite satisfying. Godskin Duo... Yes an odd choice for me to find satisfying, but Once I summoned my mimic & tear defeated the first one, I got quite the rush of dopamine by mowing each and every single one. One by one with the relentless grinder that is the slashing of two Bloodhound's fang wielding warriors. My point is the fight is pretty bad, but once you get going, watching them fall one after the other is pretty dare fun.

[@FaptaA]

Completelly agree, many of those aren't balanced around 2v1, and we get the enemies just spamming attacks until we die. Unfun as hell.

[@vyltrix1908]

The magic in this game is actually tuned pretty well considering most of the hardest bosses in this game react to them, even if it's not consistent. I 100% agree on the spirit summons though and I think things like status effects (bleed/frostbite), certain weapon arts like moonveil/rivers of blood, and jump attack spam combined with posture breaks, trivialize the combat more than magic does in most cases.

[@FelisImpurrator]

Ehhhh. Spirit summons are mostly in a great place. The mimic tear will get chunked in thirty seconds by a stunlock wombo combo on every relevant boss if you're just passively doinking with magic from a distance. It's only strong when you're fighting in tandem after the nerf, using it to coordinate like a decent co-op player. Something like the rot dog is broken because of the bug that lets rot dogs in general hit every single frame for up to 10k damage, but that's not a balance thing. Others will either get shredded if you do nothing but offer great damage (Tiche, Latenna unless you're completely cheesing the boss AI range, etc) or do absolutely jack shit to the boss but facetank it all day (Crystalian, Greatshields, Corpses, etc). Unless you really go all in on gratuitous bullshit like stacking the deathbed dress, heals, and buffs, summons cannot and will not carry the game for you... And say goodbye to any cheese summons in mid to high NG+. Status is mostly fine. Poison sucks a bit too much, scarlet rot is okay, frost is honestly completely fine, deathblight and madness are worthless in PVE so I don't care, and bleed is grossly overtuned but an outlier. Moonveil post nerf is fine. Seriously. It isn't even super strong unless you hit with the sword now. It's just bleed proc nonsense on stuff like RoB that makes those broken. But Moonveil is hilariously predictable and heavily punishable on misses...

[@Summer_Tea]

@@FelisImpurrator What on earth are you talking about? Get the mimic to +10 and then let it rip while you emote. It's still capable of soloing a great many bosses.

[@killahk7983]

@@Summer_Tea and hes acting like if you call in the summon you cant just smack the boss in the back of the head repeatedly while they focus the summon.

[@shadez123]

This has always been a thing. DS1 had the BK Halberd, the Zweihander and Pyro, DS 2 had powerstancing STR weapons and Hexes, DS3 had buffed twinblades... There have always been dominant strats in these games that largely circumvent the difficulty. I'm not saying it's not fair to criticize it, but Elden Ring is hardly particularly bad in that respect.

[@Summer_Tea]

@@shadez123 Agreed, but there is a big difference to me when a weapon or tool feels easier to use than others, vs. When a weapon or tool makes me feel like I just activated a cheat code. I've never felt like I was hacking in a Dark Souls game before.

[@tru_spartan_117]

When it comes to boss difficulty, I think Sekiro does it best. Some of the bosses have such a wide berth of techniques and options during a fight that I feel like you are legit fighting PVP. I find that most impressive.

[@BlitzWare518]

Sekiro is always going to be the most fine-tuned game because there's specifically one playstyle that the whole game revolves around. While Soulsbournes attempt to take into account the myriad of builds which means that there's definitely builds that FromSoft didn't know about therefore tune bossfights to. Usually in Dark Souls games, this isn't too much of a problem but with Elden Ring the problem is way more noticeable due to the game's sheer content size and the new summon system.

[@taragnor]

@@BlitzWare518 Yeah honestly it's hard to compare Sekiro to the other games since Sekiro had a single weapon, no real meaningful ranged combat, no multiplayer/summons, no spells and a very minimal leveling system.

[@ulrichwagner7311]

I think bloodborne strikes a nice middleground between build variety and refined combat as well, given how basically everything is melee. And then the bowblade happened but we don't talk about that

[@king_alonne3707]

95% of the game is a joke after Isshin, I can't get how this logic work, but it is a story game in its defence.

[@jaydensolovey]

The fact that everything seems to one-2 hit me, even normal enemies, has made me just run by almost everything if i can, it just doesnt feel like its made to be fun, it feels like it was made to be hard.

[@ssj4rit]

If you’re getting killed in 1-2 hits you’re doing something wrong, you shouldn’t be dying that quickly unless extremely underleveled or low defense/vigor

[@Sai_Aye]

Gotta have at least 40, ideally 60 vigor

[@NestorVass]

Here's the deal with difficult bosses in Elden Ring. Elder Ring isn't a dark souls game, it's a souls like, just like Sekiro is a souls like. The combat is different, more versatile, faster, and more fluid. Approaching a melee character the same way you would in ds3, just handicaps what you can do in Elden Ring. Josheph Anderson's video on Elden Ring is straight out misinfo. All of the attacks he said are unavoidable are just parts of combos that are easily readable. Combos are bigger now yes, bosses won't just sit in an idle animation in-between attacks for as long as before, but we have mechanics to deal with this as melee only players. Jump attacks are more effective, you can avoid damage while attacking at the same time, crouching avoids alot of swings that are harder to avoid if you roll. Throwables can interrupt attacks from bosses, like the knife throwing from the first boss. Malenia's attack with the 13 swings can just never be triggered if you sit at a specific distance from her. Lupine0s made a video, directly debunking Anderson's vid. You should watch it vaush.

[@highlightermarca-texto3281]

Joseph Anderson literally said the jump has no effect on combat lmao. How can someone be so confidently wrong?

[@delphynenull2136]

I think there’s something of a case to be made that spirit ashes are intended to be ubiquitous no matter your build, though I disagree with that intent to some extent since I tend to agree with Vaush noting that the melee combat is the core of the series’ fighting mechanics. It’s notable that Elden Ring breaks series tradition and makes one particular npc who later becomes your merchant for upgrading spirits actually impossible to kill. Roderika spends all her time in Roundtable Hold, which is a non-combat zone, except when you meet her in the stormhill shack, when she’s protected from all damage by a golden barrier. It’s possible to kill every other npc, go through the game without using any of their services... but Roderika *cannot* die, seemingly because that would prevent you from upgrading spirit ashes.

[@Saurawr]

I think you're right, the game expects you to use ashes on every character. But doesn't that like, suck? Spirit ashes are nearmandatory for your sanity for the duo bosses. But it takes you from a very difficult fight to a cakewalk where your ashes go distract the other guy for a while while you fight what is usually a standard enemy or a miniboss, then you go fight the other one. And in non-duo fights, ashes mean you have infinite time to back up and drink, or wait for their back to be turned, or just get attacked half as often while you beat on their booty. Its like they wanted you to use your ashes on every fight, but didn't bother to make the fights interesting when you do.

[@arseniykorchevskiy1564]

Way I see it, the game doesn’t expect you to use spirit ashes, but it expects you to change the various tools you use to deal with certain mechanics. As an example, for the waterfowl dance, you can deal with it by using barricade shield, bloodhound step, running away, just timing your rolls, or using ashes to divert it. The game doesn’t expect you to use any one of these, but it expects you to pick and choose which of these to use based on what you would find enjoyable

[@delphynenull2136]

@@Saurawr I agree! the idea of "Spirit Ashes as default" fucking sucks! They're a cool addition, but the limit of one spirit per fight means they have to be really powerful to be worth the fp investment. (Speaking of which, my first run through the game also made over half of them unusable 'cause I didn't use enough magic to put points into Mind, so short of the Hidden Cerulean Tear I literally didn't have enough fp to use them.) I think it would be horrendously difficult to try and balance the game such that both approaches were equally viable and neither of them either trivialized the boss or made them impossible, but if anyone could be expected to pull that off it would be the bloodstained hands of mr Miyazaki FromSoft himself.

[@delphynenull2136]

@@arseniykorchevskiy1564 I think the point is more that not everyone's going to be able to build their character in such a way that those tools are accessible or viable to them. (that said, provided you're not right under her when she starts it, Waterfowl Dance has a 100% effective dodge formula. Sprint away for the first two combos, roll toward her as she closes in for the third, and you're safe.)

[@Summer_Tea]

I honestly think Spirit Ashes are an easy mode that they implemented because they couldn't face the backlash of putting an actual easy mode in the game. I've played the game both with and without them. The game was laughably easy with them, literally less of a challenge than many modern Nintendo games. Without them? It was equally as difficult as any other souls title. Even the hardball fights like Godskin duo, Maliketh, Malenia, etc. *didn't actually take any longer than the hard fights of previous games, solo.* I'm sorry if you felt differently, but I do think those multi-boss fights are balanced, they simply ask a different skillset of you (mostly, stop dodging forwards all the time and learn to sprint as your primary means of avoiding attacks). But yeah, Malenia took me 4 hours and that was without a spirit. I've never had a Fromsoft boss take that long, but I've had quite a few that took over 3 hours such as Owl Father or the Giant Ape in Sekiro. Godskin Duo and Crucible Duo fought solo took less time to learn than that, which should prove that you aren't "intended" to use them *just* for those fights to balance them. That's such an asinine cope.

[@darkphoenix2]

I really agree with what I think the thesis here is. Elden Ring has pushed the original Demon's Souls formula/engine/design/whatever to its limit. It often goes past its limit. Even early in the game, I felt like bosses in Elden Ring required tools I simply didn't have in the game to overcome. Avoiding certain attacks felt like luck or flat out impossible. I think Vaush focused a little too much on the way magic and melee fights play out - I can tell you that while my incantation are pretty strong, the cast time for them requires a kind of timing that feels much less intuitive than melee fighting. You get the benefit of range, but many bosses have tools to chase you down, and you get a degree of uncertainty in timing, whereas when you go to attack with it melee weapon, it's because you know It's your turn to try to land a hit. These issues are all a result of the game being built on a foundation from 2009. Magic can only be used effectively by locking on, because there's no real free aiming system. This means it's rather easy to land a lot of spells. Imagine if you had to manually aim your lightning spear. Another aspect is AI. I don't know what sort of advancements have been made since 2009, but I'm sure the overall system and logic that enemies follow is very similar. You can breeze through bosses with summons because in all of these games, enemies do not intelligently target threats. They simply attack whatever they feel like attacking, and it's why having a distraction can eliminate all of the challenge from a fight. Defense is another aspect that hasn't changed much throughout the games. Sekiro was rightfully praised for giving you several effective methods. Imagine if all of these games had a block and parry system that required skill but nullified all damage, and if jumping, crouching, quicksteps, rolling, and running were all more intuitive ways of avoiding certain attacks instead of mainly relying on the invincibility frames of the roll. There are so many areas that this FromSoftware formula can be improved. Imagine if this game had a real physics system. Spells like the crucible tail could send small enemies flying into walls or off of ledges more easily. Large monsters could smash you into walls or you could climb on top of them. Poise and weapon impacts could be more complex and responsive. You wouldn't have to just wail on a target until they stagger, if you aimed an attack well, like at their legs. I like Elden Ring, but this has to be the end of this engine and style. There's no more room for them to grow it. I want to see the same idea of combat being about learning and good timing in a intricate and amazing world, with with improved and new mechanics built from the ground up to support much better gameplay.

[@marciamakesmusic]

this comment is full of misinfo. Summons make the game harder if your summons are bad because the boss gets so much extra hp. aggro isnt random. enemies attack the last thing that damages them. sekiro does not have multiple effective methods, stealth makes the game a bit easier but you still have to learn to play it the way the game wants you to.

[@raxes1144]

@@marciamakesmusic No its correct, aggro is pure random in this game. They didn’t always attack the last thing which hit them

[@Elrealsodapop200]

@@raxes1144 they attack the thing that does the most damage to them, that's a fact. I have been using a magic build with a spirit ash and the boss usually targets me almost immediately after I dish out a full FP bar of damage. If you want to deaggro you need your spirit ash to land several hits first

[@raxes1144]

@@Elrealsodapop200 Interesting

[@bofa722]

@@Elrealsodapop200 wrong, they attack the last thing that hit them, but there is a small damage threshold before this happens. For example, if I throw a single throwing knife at a boss he won't attack me, but if I throw 5 and no one hits him he'll aggro me. Until someone else hits him for a bit of damage, but it's always the last person who's done damage, assuming this damage is a decent amount, doesn't matter if I hit for 300 and my friend hits for 700, they'll aggro me assuming I hit last. Bosses aggro u cos you're the one who hit them the most, repeatedly, and last.

[@ItsJustChurch]

Most of the gimmick boss fights from the Souls series are pulled almost directly from Demons’ Souls. It was the most experimental with its boss fights and their arenas. From might get a lot out of going back to that density of interesting bosses.

[@Kristalya]

It's so much fun to listen to you! I have died as a mage so much even with a lot of exploring, killing and leveling up! Many bosses are so aggressive and in your face so I want to take out my dual katanas. I have melee stats and vigor leveled also with like 72 int currently. 🔮🗡

[@K._Red]

As someone who has played Souls since 2009, this take itself is a 10/10. Elden Ring is an ambitious masterpiece that still has potential for dramatic improvement

[@Ar1AnX1x]

I haven't played it yet but the first time I saw Margit I was like yeah fromsoftware is hitting a new level the way he moves and how well it's all choreographed so the player can react, the mood, design and specially the animations are better than any other games by a decent margin. not to mention the game is huge without losing much quality to be so huge. I hope when Miyazaki retires he has a replacement that can move this genre forward the way he's doing, these games are great because they're One Man's vision.

[@CrossfacePanda]

@@Ar1AnX1x Not to be that guy, but this game was co-directed by the same guy who worked on Dark Souls 2 & 3: Yui Tanimura. So although there can be arguments as to how much each person did or didn’t contribute to the game’s vision (and that’s before considering the contributions of everybody else on the dev team), it’s already not “one man’s vision”, as it were.

[@Ar1AnX1x]

@@CrossfacePanda and the World Building is mostly written by George RR Martin, still, these added ideas and work helps to complete the Original Vision, it doesn't go against it and it doesn't mean they are prevented from being creative. Fromsoftware games are great because they set goals and they have a roadmap, that's why so many people work on it but the Gameplay, Lore, Characters and everything seem to always fall in the right place in terms of fitting in and contribute to the rest of the game and form a unified picture. point is the developers know the direction they're working towards, they have a clear end goal which is Miyazaki's vision. that's why the World Building written by GRRM feels more like Fromsoftware Lore rather than a GRRM story from his many books. I'm sure Miyazaki takes suggestions from his team when they have good suggestions.

[@Sqwivig]

@@Ar1AnX1x Do you mean Hayao Miyazaki? The Studio Ghibli guy?

[@greatcesari]

How would you change the game to keep the difficulty/balance consistent whether you use summons or not? It seems impossible without nerfing summons to the point of being useless.

[@tytar1037]

Guts build is so much fun. I know Str isn’t the best, but the Greatsword and stagger play style is entertaining. The thrust and jump attack just stunlock bosses. Love it

[@Kitth3n]

The roll->poke move is sick

[@cultofcheddar861]

Add waves of darkness for pvp some int/poise and you have a meta breaking build

[@specialknees6798]

That’s what I’m running rn. I’ve only ever played a little bit of bloodborne and in most games I opt for the super fast hyper mobile type builds. The extremely slow pace of the greatsword is kinda agonizing but the strength makes it worth it. Just gotta get used to this style of play.

[@tytar1037]

@@cultofcheddar861 I was going to add some faith. Is Str Int better?

[@shadez123]

STR is really good if you're good, if that makes sense. You can rip through healthbars extremely fast with jump attacks and charched R2s for stance breaks into ripostes but you movement and timing have to be on point.

[@TheFatPunisher]

God I love how the moment anyone criticizes a souls game, everyone has to jump in and talk about how they beat boss and how good they are at the game. The number of times Vaush had to stop what he was saying because of these psychos in chat is mind bending. I have played every souls game, but the fan base needs a serious fucking reality check, nobody gives a shit how easily you beat the game, or how good you are. You will never get a trophy or applause for your ability to dodge an attack in a video game.

[@messiah2203]

Ive only played a little of DS1 so i kind of get the "melee is the core of the system" stance. That being said, as someone who just has never gotten far enough to be a purist, it sounds really weird to hear complaints that different bosses are weak to different strategies and not others. In a vacuum that sounds like GOOD balance.

[@MrPatrickbuit]

It's because as you play these games, especially DS3, you get used to a certain flowstate where you will roll through attacks and attack. Sekiro nailed this flowstate even more, but that game is not an RPG so it's hard to compare the two. Using magic or any kind of summon ruins this flowstate entirely and as a result the game breaks down.

[@MarkSoupial]

Dark Souls 2 (for all its flaws) had several bosses where you could do things out in the world that would make that specific boss fight easier, like burning the windmill or lighting the prison oil lamps, and made actual material changes to the Journey 2 playthrough. In Elden Ring, there are like 4 bosses where you can equip one specific item that MIGHT help you once or twice IF you can use them at the right moment. For the most part, the way the bosses are designed pushes most players not into defeating them skillfully, but rather by becoming their own demi-god type character that acts similar to a souls boss by largely ignoring the opponent and doing highly damaging attacks. Malenia, in canon, is a counter to that style of attack, which is why that fight is so much harder in the context of the rest of the game.

[@darkphoenix2]

Dark Souls 2 is the most balanced and well designed game in the series. The average, surface level opinion is "bad hitboxes" or "bunch of guys in armor" but the enemies have fluid, rather simple attack animations that are pretty fair and the player actions are timed and restricted enough that you don't need to roll spam to survive a 7 hit combo with multiple fake outs. It even has an environmental boss design in the Executioner Chariot. Add in all of the other mechanical differences it introduced, like Bonfire Ascetics and true dual wielding, and I wish DS2 was even more respected than it has become in recent years.

[@malum9478]

@@darkphoenix2 _true and...that's pretty true etc._ dks2 DOES have bullshit in it, no doubt. hell in terms of bullshit difficulty the dual tiger fight in the ivory king dlc and the path to it is some of the absolute worst in the series. BUT. for the most part, the truth is that dks2 honestly has no more bullshit than any of the other games. dks1 nosedives in quality after anor londo, and the bed of chaos is perhaps the worst thing from has ever done. dks3 has some serious issues with progression and pacing, overall weaker level design than most of the games, and in terms of garbage bosses it has more than a few. even the ringed city, for as cool as it is, is kind of ridiculous in it's "challenge" with how many high damage aoe's exist in it(and let's not even talk about lore). they're all good games, and at their heights is when they shine, but at their lows they can get _real damn low._ that said, outside of the aforementioned frigid outskirts, dks2 doesn't _quite_ reach the lows that the other two get down to. dks2 had shit that from has STILL yet to replicate. it was honestly a brilliant game. a very "guess you guys aren't ready for that yet; but your kids are gonna love it" type of game.

[@Zayl1016]

Not to mention, he brings up gank bosses done well, and the Darklurker fight has to be one of the best designed ganks in the system. You're shown him as a single boss with these long and obvious wind ups on which move to do... Just for him to split in half and both have the same long wind ups but you gotta be spacially aware of where they're at.

[@maxcormier7821]

windmill? lighting prison oil lamps? what are u talking about o.o

[@MarkSoupial]

@@maxcormier7821 There's a boss in DS2 that heals over time and poisons you, but you can prevent this by burning the windmill arms powering the tower it's in, making the fight easier for yourself as an option. Another boss is in an unlit prison cell and it tends to jump away from you into the darkness, which even removes the lock-on, but you can light lamps around the cell to produce light and make the boss visible the entire fight, also completely optional. An example of how this could have been done in Elden Ring is the Beast Clergyman and Deathroot, either by having the Deathroot weaken the eventual bossfight, or by conveying that A) this was going to be an important boss and B) having a way to undo the Deathroot boost you've been giving it, but Elden Ring did neither of those, and the item it DOES have to make the fight easier only works on specific attacks and still requires a full parry, which at that skill level is no longer making the fight meaningfully easier.

[@FracFern32]

Elden Ring is actually my first souls game and I’m surprisingly have a blast with it. I didn’t get into the other games because I was put off by how people said the games where difficult and by my experience with a souls-like game (Lords of the Fallen). When I saw there was more hype for Elden Ring compared to the last games, I said “fuck it” and bought the game, a great choice on my end. After I complete my first run-through of the game. I’m gonna buy Sekiro just to expand my interest in souls games.

[@TheEpicPancake]

I have reason to believe that the community's emphasis on difficulty is actually rather misguided and detrimental for people just coming in. There are so many mechanics in the games that let you fine tune the difficulty level to your preference. Summons, levels, upgrades, magic, gear choices, and more change how difficult one's interactions are in a subtle way that lets nearly anyone get through and feel satisfied with their effort.

[@ethanhull3209]

Fair warning, and don't listen to anyone who tells you otherwise, Sekiro is by far the hardest FromSoft game with no summoning or help whatsoever so if you bounce off it, don't discount the other games because of it.

[@aniima5335]

sekiro has to be my favorite. it’s so smooth

[@pank3245]

Fair warning. Sekiro is a rhythm game

[@Jacob-zp5ci]

Sekiro is a fantastic game, but it isnt exactly a souls game, the core gameplay loop is nearly identical, but the more intricate details are completely different. Im not trying to deter you from playing it, just expect a very different experience than elden ring. If you want something more similar, check out Dark Souls 3 as it is the most modern installment in the same style as elden ring, or Bloodborne if you want something in a different setting. If youre not afraid of some more archaic and "clunky" mechanics, Dark Souls 1 is my personal favorite.

[@roberteriksen6434]

A variation of this take I lean more towards, is that Elden Ring only has 1 difficulty setting, and therefore implements certain strategies to increase/decrease the difficulty. If you want an calm game experience with a minimum amount of stress, Bleed and magic is right there in the game. If you want harder difficulties, Hammers and Axes is also right there. You build your own difficulty in the game, which I think is good. HOWEVER, that said, the game doesn't TELL you or warn you in anyway that hey, you are taking an unreasonably harder path. You are not gonna know these things in advance, and when the difficulty really ramps up the difficulty in the last 20%, you're not gonna have the resources to test every weapon you find. Most weapons, unlike the other Souls games, suck serious ass in Elden Ring, and your first playthrough is most likely with one of those. That really hurts ER alot imo, cause i was SO fatiqued at the end of ER and just wanted it over. The next playthroughs gets SO much easier, mostly I feel because know I know where all the broken shit is, not cause I got better. Radahn as an example took me 6 hours to beat level 32 with a +6 mace on my blind playthrough, and I can do it SL 1 now so much easier with different weapons and AOW's.

[@Farowlol]

I'm curious as to why Hammers and Axes are allegedly inferior to Greatswords or any other weapon for that matter? I know for a fact that after Sword of night and flame or whatever got nerfed and everyone moved to using the bleed katana, a stronger build at the time was power stancing big hammers because arc scaling was borked. I don't think that would be the done thing if they were the equivalent of playing on hard mode but I know PvE and PvP aren't entirely comparable, although big damage works across the board and jump attacks have practically identical start up and recovery animations regardless of weapon class.

[@JL-lu1ul]

Yup. I used the longsword in Elden Ring. In previous souls games a longsword was always a decent weapon that could carry you through the game. In a lot of ways it was better than most late game weapons. In Elden Ring it's one of the worst in the game. At least compared to all the flashy bleed, frost and magic weapons. The weapon balancing is fucking atrocious.

[@1OtherMr]

@Robert Eriksen dude, no. You are staring at the stain on the Rorschach test and seeing butterflies. It's none of that shit what if, and hear me and occam's razor out: they just suck at balancing the player in any reasonable way. They've sucked at it since Demons' souls, and there's no reason why they'd stop sucking at it because people keep buying their games

[@MaleckinJinx]

Yeah, you set your own difficulty by setting your own limitations. Not sure why this is such a controversy. It’s an exceptionally clever way of bypassing a difficulty setting and people don’t really appreciate it.

[@kelva1304]

@@MaleckinJinx I started thinking "damn this game is so much easier than other DS games". But I was overleveled for most of it because I full-clear everything multiple times to find every secret per area. I got to Margot around SL70, having cleared most of Caelid already. Anyway, now I just don't use ashes/miracles at all. I'm too used to using all tools that a game gives you... hard to self-limit.

[@Shin_FTW]

Someone in response to Malenia being hard to see when locked on and she jumps to use Waterfowl Dance: "Don't lock on?" Yeah. Don't lock onto the small and nimble human target, lol. Good plan.

[@dubiousbrick4483]

The clipping animations into endless combos is a huge issue. Multiple times on maliketh P2 he was just up in the air doing endless combos for over a minute each time. It took me a half hour kill him because he would spam combos endlessly with zero room for a melee opening but it wasn’t consistent. 100% would say the difficulty in ER feels less authentic and more absurd. Many cases it feels like the player gets killed because the boss stops obeying the rules of the game and in other cases, the player can break the game and completely cheese the boss. Even getting those bosses that disregard what was previously established, they don’t feel satisfying to beat, it feels frustrating that even though you did your all, it feels more like you got lucky and that’s what all your effort added you to was just “luck”

[@lossnt557]

Sounds like you had some really wierd bugs. Maliketh should never do more than 3 attacks mid air.

[@Coeaxe]

Idk if it's because I played after a few patches but Maliketh seemed to be the most punishable out of the endgame bosses.

[@buckyhurdle4776]

@@lossnt557 Its not a bug, its a lie lmao. That never happened. This guy doesn't know Maliketh's moveset at all if he's saying this

[@yab3146]

Such a shameless lie lmao

[@laesar2299]

This is one of the most retarded comments i've ever read.

[@vlodlukyanov7318]

My first run I went for a Dex build, and started using incantations near the end of the game. It was about as tough as I think was intended. Now I'm doing a spellcaster/swordswoman run and its a joke. I've just been trying to see how easy I can make the whole experience, and I've managed to beat Morgott with very little trouble on my part.

[@rohiogerv22]

I've had to come to terms with the fact that, even trying my best, and having played video games my whole life, I have terrible reaction speed, to the point where I couldn't do Academic Challenge in high school just because I couldn't hit the buzzer fast enough even if I knew the answer, to where I can't play DBD because I can't avoid blowing a generator if the reticule spawns in the wrong place, and I'm not very good at shooters unless I specifically build away from reaction times. I always felt like Souls games were a place where I could be good IN SPITE of that. Where I could dodge my way through a fight because I predicted, not because I reacted. It's sad to see the games continually straying away from that. I know that I can still overcome the new challenges, but I do wonder if a day comes where I can't, just as a product of my physiology.

[@TheDestoyerZ]

Echo this sentiment 100%. Bad reaction speed solidarity.

[@karlklein2263]

The input reading seems to be a response to the idea of "magic is easy mode". The enemies will jump out of the way when the spell goes out. Some, but not all of the bosses do this as well. In order to counter this you have to either be patient and time things well, or you have to spam your magic and catch them with the shotgun effect. Doing the shotgun method though requires a lot of stat investment in resources however, which in turn comes your defense and healing resources. Having recently replayed the souls series with magic. The overhaul is insane when going to eldeb ring.

[@Julian-bi5oc]

i’m still relatively early into elden ring, and have been trying to build a melee/magic combo build, but I feel that so far magic has been more helpful in the overworld than in fighting bosses. summons definitely have helped me, especially with godrick where I found the warrior in stormveil castle that lets you summon her to fight, but i don’t think magic has helped me much at all unless I’ve used a support spell like sorcerer’s armament

[@malum9478]

i promise you: you're still early. there's magic in this game that, if built right, can melt bosses in seconds. some are too mobile/aggressive to use against them, but if you knew what you were doing, you could get ahold to some spells that would've put godrick down in 60 secs flat

[@Seysande]

Just wait until you get moonveil. That sword is busted af

[@AstraAnima]

@@malum9478 I know stars of ruin spam with unlimited fp flask will melt fast bosses if you struggle to catch them with other moves

[@Akuji1987]

@@Seysande I think this got nerfed a bit. Used it on Melania and was still a hard fight as the poise break is less of a thing, and the damage is pretty low. I still think going full Str and being able to jump attack for 2k+ is easier.

[@Sleeper_6875]

My main issue with fromsoft games is how they handle giant enemies, Midir was done really well but I just wish with other large things like the fire giant that we could climb up it or something

[@Cpt_Dave]

Many issues he suggested were easy to deal with with certain builds but I agree that this shouldn't be how it's done. Like having Taker's Flames made lots of battles mundane.

[@granudisimo]

*Monster Hunter fans collectively adjust their cool guy shades* It hides our eyes when we cry after killing the 32nd Uragaan to get a stupid ruby...

[@arthurporter131]

I only ever used the ash summons for the gank fights like the valiant gargoyles, commander Niall, and Godskin Duo. I think they made those fights a lot more fun - for me anyway.

[@CascadeSpam]

Its personally why Sekiro remains my favourite FromSoftware. I enjoyed losing the character customisation. You had one mode of fighting and you just had to get good at it.

[@arjuna6224]

I am currently playing through it now, it's a really awesome game so far, I found the guardian ape to be a really hard fight and genichiro is an awesome boss too. His fight felt more like a dance and the successful deflect sounds are really satisfying to hear.

[@Red4mber]

It's what makes Sekiro so good, but that also make Sekiro have even worse replayability than Elden Ring imo

[@chrisjones5668]

Agree with most of the takes but the flow of the fights I feel are less intuitive than you made it seem. Previous souls games you can read/react pretty well to most of them. Great 3xample with Gail. This game has waaaaay too prolonged feints. I get the idea is to roll catch panic/read rolling but my god some of the feints are just dumb. You do have to learn and not just read some of the bosses moves. Margot for example looks like hes using his weapon as a back scratcher before he decides to swing. Plus some enemies float in the air longer than what's reasonable.

[@twb0109]

Bro, you've got a point, but it really feels like you mistreat your chat, they are not interrupting you by typing their opinion, that's the whole point of chat

[@rbelljr29]

Magic woven into combat huh? You mean like when Margit goes phase 2 and brings down the golden hammer of Dawn down upon you? Because I would love to do that.

[@TheTdroid]

Elden Ring is the first FromSoftware game I've gotten into and I use a mostly melee build, but I use Spirit Ashes and the occasional NPC summon for my first playthrough. It's a nice "normal" difficulty setting for someone who isn't a Soulsborne veteran.

[@jon7911]

Exactly what I did

[@gwabafett]

I spent the first half of the game playing without ashes. Eventually I gave up and started using them because so many fights seemed designed around having more than one character.

[@lllULTIMATEMASTERlll]

Me, too. And I really hate that. Summons make it too easy but it’s too hard without them.

[@maxcormier7821]

his "hit with sword to fill magic bar" is basically Limit breaks in... almost every single japanese video game lol

[@dandre3K]

The meter in any fighting game

[@alliedtadpole2531]

Extra point on the thing of being cheated out of a fight. For the queen of Raya Lucaria academy, she kept spamming the big beam attack when I fought her, so I didn't even know she had a moon attack or summons. Very sad.

[@lemmonboy6459]

Sad I missed this for so long. I am right now banging my head on Radagon and attempting to help others beat the fight as well. My biggest issue right now is THE SHEER AMOUNT of damage they do and yeah, the unfair attacks.

[@darkdeath5550]

Did you git gud tho?

[@lemmonboy6459]

@@darkdeath5550 I just started placing down my Summon Sign to help other and practice. I then summoned someone and killed Radagon and beat Elden Beast after my summon died. I’ve been non stop (trying to) help others fight Radagon, it’s very fun when he’s not coating the arena in yellow

[@joeoddi7569]

The really cool thing about the souls games is that you can have an aggressive playstyle and go toe to toe with a boss. When the boss is overly aggressive it takes away the epicness of you, a small warrior, contending with a heavy hitter and overcoming them. Btw with the commander Niall fight I parried both knights and killed them very quickly and I got commander Niall first try. So you're right the game doesn't communicate clearly whether or not you need to use summons for these ganks.

[@r4dbit416]

the crystal leveling proposition at 53:00 makes me think of The Surge where you install augments to boost your character

[@Teratoma..]

Malenia isn't that hard, waterfowl dance is just bullshit. Take that move out or replace it with something more easily reactable and she's not even in the top 5 hardest bosses anymore imo

[@ultimor1183]

I seriously just want a mod that would remove a few attacks from the late game bosses and then this game would be perfect.

[@Dare5358]

Try fighting Melania as a pure mage, where any one hit from any attack insta-kills you (you can't tank hits like a melee build), and tell me it's so easy. They just need more boss variety, like the older games had.

[@HopperDragon]

Properly optimized mages are just as tanky as melee builds lol

[@Dare5358]

@@HopperDragon citation needed bro

[@HopperDragon]

@@Dare5358 it's called level vigor

[@HopperDragon]

@@Dare5358 I'm not drunk, you just actually don't know what you're talking about. Watch some high level pvp and you'll see that pure mages are just as tanky lol. Vig has crazy returns from 30 to 40, whereas int falls off rapidly in how much extra damage it nets you. Most of your damage in this game comes from weapon level anyway.

[@Dare5358]

@@HopperDragon ok. anything else? amulets? armor? any other mage tips?

[@kahnom7364]

"Dance" with the boss is the most awesome feeling in souls games.

[@TheHeavyshadow]

And to show another example of how to do "offense vs. defense" right in Souls games: Bloodborne, the game which Vaush was the first person to ever finish in late 2021. That game has a mechanic where if you got hit by an attack, you have a very short window in which you can deal damage back to an enemy to gain some health back. That, and the lack of shields and only guns as a means of parrying (as most do very little damage), meant that a very aggressive playstyle was the main way to go. You could, for example, start a swing with the great axe if you think you can poise through the first hit of an enemy and then hit them to regain health and even knock them down. Or one could get close to an enemy, parry them with a well-timed pistol shot, and then do a special attack on them. Or one could bait out attacks that have some end lag and then get close to attack. It even managed to keep that balance while having significantly more weapons than Sekiro. Probably quite a lot fewer than Souls games usually have, but each of them with not one, but 2 unique movesets because weapons can transform. But with all of these weapons, there is always the incentive to play aggressively, either getting close to trade some hits, or getting close to be in special-attack-distance of the enemy when parrying successfully, or staying away until there's a safe opening to get close.

[@g00gleisgayerthanaids56]

Killing a certain boss gives you the bb rally mechanic youre talking about. Its late game but its in elden ring. Just goes to show that elden ring is nothing but everything from previous titles recycled and slightly out of rhythm. Nothing new really. Ashes of war feel like a modders fix to weapon arts being mindnumbingly attached to weapons.

[@axoliminator]

I'm glad monsterhunter got mentioned because in my opinion they perfected the third person combat formula. Where Elden Ring kind of missed the mark in terms of difficulty, Monster Hunter world has some of my favorite fights in all of gaming. Also, the point you make at 1:04:00 reminds me of Sigrun in God of war. Her fight is absolutely amazing

[@MalevolentDivinity]

Interesting thought. Fromsoft games don't need an easy mode, they need a bullshit mode. It's clear that the community wants the games to keep getting harder, so what should happen is that Fromsoft needs to make the basic game normal. No bullshit. Everything has a proper tell, you do the fight good you don't get hit. The games don't necessarily get harder as you go along, they're just all fair difficulty. And then add a bullshit mode. Bosses get punish punishers. The tells on the moves that you're supposed to punish now look the same as the ones that will murder you. They animation cancel. They get all the bullshit.

[@Versace_sheets]

Not community stop putting this on the community. The fucking devs say "hardship is part of the experience we want to create" so stfu about the community ffs we have no hand in the creation.

[@Versace_sheets]

Yeah you just sound salty and mad the bosses don't have easy tells. Shit man just actually get good. Scrub.

[@EllaKarhu]

I support this idea. But they should also add an easy mode. Even the normal, Dark Souls 1 level difficulty is too much for some people. There's no reason to prevent those people from enjoying the game.

[@shadez123]

@@EllaKarhu Eh, you can rip through bosses with stuff like BK Halberds and magic in DS1, and that game really isn't that hard if you play slowly and carefully. My gf could barely use a controller before and she managed to do it fine with very little help. I'm not against easy mode on principle or anything, but DS1 difficulty is very accessible to anyone who doesn't lose their shit at dying in a game.

[@BlitzWare518]

@@shadez123 The problem with the "certain builds make the game easy mode therefore don't add easy mode" point is that most people that are trying to get into the games, don't nor should have to read guides/wiki to find an "easy mode" build to begin with especially if they come mid-game.

[@king_alonne3707]

the video in a nutshell, I'm gatekeeping new players and veterans from having fun. he just said it "accessibility and difficulty don't work so well together".

[@danieljacob7145]

Thank you for putting into words what i have felt ever since beating the final boss. I completely agree with your points & have subbed.

[@Omniliptus]

I've played literally every souls game two handing an ultra greatsword and I honestly think its easier than magic. I tried a magic only run in DS1 and I swear its way harder. Elden Ring is the first game where magic has been very appealing and fun for me. I naturally gravitated towards magic in my first playthrough. Still used moonlight greatsword though.

[@sundalius]

If you think that’s easy, pick up a second colossal. Instead of 1.5x scaling, you’ll get straight up double damage. It’s been the easiest build I’ve seen outside of intentionally breaking enemies.

[@ShadowTasos]

DS1 might be the only exception to this rule because Magic was very different there. You only get a limited amount of casts of every spell so you can't just spam them willy nilly throughout a stage cos then you'll run out before you get to the boss. The regular Soul Arrow + Greater Soul Arrow are the only good spells you have until very, very late in the game, where you get the Soul Spear spells, or in the DLC, with the Black Magic spells, which are super OP. You need to increase the amount of spell slots you have by leveling your attunement stat, which forces you to have lower vigor / endurance -- that's also true in ER through the Mind stat but you can circumvent that a lot easier with cerulean flasks and the physick. It also doesn't have a spell like the Glintstone Pebble that you can spam for quick yet good DPS, you have to go through the casting animation each time, which is hard on many bosses. Starting in DS2 onwards, you could bypass a lot of these systems due to the new FP system and you get some very strong spells early on so you never really struggle with magic builds anymore. Magic was so OP in DS2 & DS3 that they had to nerf it very early on and it's still very viable tbh. ER just pushes that further by giving you a built-in summon you can use to tank stuff for you while you spam your high DPS spells from range.

[@BigaloMax]

About a magic system that recharges whit melee attacks . Phantasy star new genesis does something kind of like that. All special techniques physical or magical use stamina , and your Jab combos recharge stamina, rod and talisman jabs charge the slowest BUT the game lets you equip up to 7 different weapons in your holster and even merge 2 of them so you can combo there different techniques and jabs.if you run out of stamina doing aoe's you can just do a bunch of jab combos whit your knives or swords and then do another aoe spell.some melee weapons even take on the element of the last spell casted. There are other games that do the recharge magic meter whit melee attacks thing but the closest one to what i think he described i find phantasy star new genesis does it.

[@veronicatazri9092]

Hellpoint also has a system like this. The ability to use "weapon arts" or "spells" in the game is tied to a focus bar that is ONLY refilled by hitting the enemies with melee attacks

[@kleinornot3763]

Exactly , there is a feeling of finishing a great duel when u beat bosses like gael , lady maria, Ludwig because it felt so fluid ,but i rarely felt that in elden ring besides when fighting Godfrey , Malekith 2nd fase and Mogh. I think its bc of meta builds for consistent damage like jumping attacks , and then the boss fights becomes meh bc all you do is roll and jum R2 to stance break , tho nobody is being forced to play like this ,it is more rewarding to do it

[@unai49999]

"sitting in the Horse and shakeing their staff" sounds like the new "it's not music, it's just pressing buttons"

[@Sound_.-Safari]

The glinstone dragon took me like 4 hours with my 9 vigor 37 int build. Mage is OP if you know where all the secrets are. In an organic play through it’s brutal. The bosses have pretty good range, you still have to learn patterns dodge and get close even as a mage.

[@blazingmonolith4323]

Elden Ring just got boring after 100plus hours. It started getting so hard that I just stopped caring. The game was burning me out. At least with Dark Souls there was an end in sight, but I just feel like Elden Ring will never end and I'm sort of sick of it.

[@SuperCockgoblin]

I beat it twice now and haven’t hit 100 hours yet lol

[@sundalius]

I do not care for what people who think quality builds are the balance point for the game think about the balance of a game designed around a phys/mental stat split. It’s new, older games didn’t build this into 90% of weapon *base* scaling, you’re expected to engage with it. Especially with the ashes of war stuff where changing affinity is easier than ever! I just simply can’t get past Joseph and now Vaush having this opinion but being so defensive and assertive about “quality, no consumable, no magic/arts is the way it was designed” commenting on fairness of the first game to obviously not be balanced that way.

[@shadez123]

They should just come out and say that they don't want the games to be rpgs. They never played them as one, clearly.

[@waddledee1231]

For me, I was able to address this issue for myself by being very selective with what I allowed myself to use. I found that using the Bloodhound's Fang gave me a decently strong weapon, but due to its speed never let me really spam attacks which helped me to get really good at timing my attacks well and being more strategic with how I approached fights, along with bleed being something that proced occasionally rather than something constant. There were parts of the game where I did use the mimic tear, because it never felt that I was grossly overpowering bosses. I still found Malenia SUPER challenging even with the mimic tear, and I could still allow myself to engage with her fight in a very involved way with learning her attacks and proper timing.

[@rogerbabin8175]

I'm curious if Vaush has played Nioh 2. I very highly recommend it. On a personal note I prefer it to all of the souls genre games I've ever played (though I can't include Elden Ring in that as my PC can't run it). The game is fantastic in its monster design and MOST of its boss design. Sadly there are exactly 2 bosses in Nioh 2 where cheap moves come in to play like the examples Vaush gave in this review. I don't recommend this thinking Vaush would somehow like it more than Souls. I doubt he will. Most people don't. However, Nioh 2 does have a passionate souls following as being one of the better non-From games in the genre. Check it out. On topic. Can't wait till I can justify buying a new PC so I can play Elden Ring...and RE Village...and to lesser degree Cyberpunk.

[@malum9478]

nioh 2 is objectively the best designed souls game from a gameplay perspective. this ain't really an argument, and i'm pretty sure most people will concede on that front. it's the other stuff that people like about the souls games that people might disagree on.

[@wesleybrock315]

I think the game is designed around using spirit summons and magic. Many bosses react completely different to multiple targets and scale HP wise. Basically all the end game bosses have attacks to punish range targets. Many have the ability to kill you in a single attack. Trading off aggro to get breathing room or to spread aggro around in gank fights seems intended

[@wesleybrock315]

Maybe the problem is that you're not intended to treat this game like Darksouls 4? When people complain that their carry a big sword and nothing else playstyle works poorly I think "duh". I was primarily a magic user. But I also carried a long sword and shield, a greatsword, and a bow on top of my items. This is akin to playing a Legend of Zelda game and complaining that you have to use all these other items besides the sword. I think they expect you to adapt. To use different weapons and arts and yes..magic. And yeah I agree it often feels like the enemies are dynamic in a way you can't be and it's not fun. Like they're in a different genre. The dual sword wielding ghost banished knight comes to mind. And the bosses absolutely need more openings to punish them. But I'm not at all upset that we have to do more then roll and hit with big stick.

[@KvS1x3]

@@wesleybrock315 late game is hard, but I just carried around a big sword for most of the game and its difficulty isn't that bad. Edit: I posted this before beating the game and as I was fighting Melenia. I had to switch to a lighter sword to beat the game and it was 100x easier.

[@Killroy007]

@@wesleybrock315 I mean the thing people liked about from soft games is that you can use whatever you want and it can work But now the collossal weapons in general makes you feel like doing a stupid challenge

[@wesleybrock315]

@@Killroy007 But it's always been the case that one's weapon selection had a meaningful impact on the experience of the game. The difference is that this time big clunky weapons are getting the short end. In all previous games choosing a magic based starting class was punishing absent significant game knowledge/ experience or a guide. Because spells and weapons that compliment them were not easy to find or accessible to much later and the stat distribution required did not leave room for mistakes. Compare this to weapon builds which were straight forward and effective along with plenty of options dropped in your lap if you just followed the natural trajectory of the game. And here is the thing. I'm sympathetic to the large weapon problem of this game where they are just stupid slow compared to the frenetic nature of the bosses with not that much damage for the trouble. But this isn't a problem with other weapons. It's not even a problem with the game as a whole. It's a problem with those weapons. Which FromSoft agrees hence why the most recent patch sought to make these weapons faster in basically all ways. But no doubt there are instance of people complaining about this that has more to do with them refusing to reasonably adapt with the tools they are given.

[@MrEffectfilms]

Sekiro I think dealt with this the best because yes the bosses are difficult but I always felt like I had options, if one tactic doesn't work I can try something else or even combine some different strategies together and get creative.

[@ora5799]

i first noticed this difficulty balance issue with radhan he felt very punishing and a little unfair fighting on horse back solo but when i worked out the summons he became a literal joke he never targeted me, just the summons so the whole fight was me charge attacking him on horse back with no threat unless the summons were dead.

[@jamesgraves4724]

The problem is with certain builds the game absolutely does… waiting for openings is super boring in action games and if i learn the bosses patterns I should be rewarded with more openings… this doesn’t happen in elden ring unless your playing. With a certain if not using those builds almost every fight turns into what feels like turn based combat and that’s the worst way to design a combat system imo

[@danielemazzali9810]

"Vaush i dodged that" WTF guys, we are talking about systemic problems, don't throw in personal responsability pls!

[@jjkthebest]

In my experience, most bosses don't work the way you describe at the beginning of the video, especially in the late game. Rather than just sitting there and waiting for you to kill them, they'll close the distance in under a second. At that point, your magic is basically like fighting with a heavy weapon without hyper armour. So you're right that it often feels like the enemies aren't built with magic users in mind. It's just not always easier. Sometimes it is, but other times it is actually harder, and not in a fun way.

[@Elrealsodapop200]

Im a magic user for the first time (I always used dex builds on the other souls games) and I can say that you are wrong. The game is like a RPG, you hit, you wait for their response and then act accordingly. I Just beat radahn and it was very easy with rock sling because almost every boss has stance and you can break it. Game got stupid easy after getting the meteorite staff that sometimes I feel like im cheating

[@jimmyd1337]

@@Elrealsodapop200 that looses its effectiveness pretty fast one you get towards the later part of the game. AS the metorite staff is un upgradeable and rocks sling doesnt work everywhere

[@Elrealsodapop200]

@@jimmyd1337 By that point you should already have something like the carian scepter since its a drop from rennala. And if you can't use rock sling with other bosses you can use night comet, a sorcery that its really really good because enemies don't react to it since its an invisibility spell.

[@Boots43096]

I think it's stupid as fuck that bosses can swing faster than you can dodge, forcing you to either avoid being in their range entirely or dodging in very specific directions that aren't always clear. Also I swear switching between blocking and rolling as an enemy combo comes out is more clunky than it was in the other games. I see some people references sekiro but sekiro gives your character plenty of speed to react to how bosses mix up their combos, this game doesn't.

[@ColonelAngus3]

All the problems with malenia you mentioned I am struggling with right now. I just cant win. I either use a rapier with blood damage or the bloodhound fang, and I just cant do it. Im getting closer, but it’s been 2 days. I dont use summons or magic, just an occasional incantation if I can. Its super frustrating fighting her when I make it super far and she just bullshits her way to a win

[@hobosorcerer]

The "one thing" is mostly just magic & how it supposedly invalidates the pve mechanics. He doesn't really address the tradeoffs however, like having to give up health flasks for mana flasks or generally having lower health/armor, and how that makes your fewer potential mistakes more punishing.

[@communisticus191]

or how with a lot of the bosses in elden ring their ranged attacks have far more precise dodge timing compared to melee due to lingering hitboxes (and that strafing in melee has always been a way to trivialize most bosses, since their attacks dont track well enough to hit you). melanias slash doesnt feel that different in terms of point blank dodge timing as many of the ranged attacks of the bosses, you just have to strafe and dodge behind her at the very last second to avoid the lingering hitbox, then dodge again when she swings back around by the 3rd flurry. even has the fact that if they start the attack while you are starting one as well you are usually fucked

[@ShadowIncarnate6]

Once you get to NG+2 and beyond, no amount of armor matters lmao

[@KirillT14]

@@ShadowIncarnate6 Once you are in NG+2 you can easily spec into more than just one stat...

[@killahk7983]

@HoboSorcerer You really dont have to hit any of those tradeoffs. Just at 120 you can have 60 int, 30mind, 30 end, and 40 vig. Thats enough to wear heavy armor plus a staff and have the minimum of health for end game. And you only need three mana flasks which leaves 11 health flasks

[@hobosorcerer]

@@killahk7983 First of all, 40 Vigor lmao-- enjoy getting one shot later on. That aside... "You only need three mana flasks" is heavily dependent on your setup, how early in the game you are, and a variety of other factors. Don't forget how casters generally use at least 2-3 spell slots to get the most out of their stats, and how that cuts into your survivability itself.

[@thumbhead3370]

As a huge fromsoft fanboy that has platinumed every single game from them since Demon's Souls including the remasters and yes including Elden Ring as well, Elden Ring has some pretty horseshit design. From the moment Margit started delaying his swings to a truly laughably absurd degree I knew Elden Ring was going to be fucking brutal in the worst possible way. So many combos that end only instantly punish your attempt to punish them, a move you literally cannot predict because it is based solely on your inputs. Its just like the Joseph Anderson video says, some bosses you just cannot safely punish them no matter how well you've learned their patterns and mastered your build. Fast forward to Maliketh and FUCK dude this fight is so shitty in that sense. He will do his combo finisher and be wide open clearly recovering, but if you run in he INSTANTLY cancels out of recovering and leaps into the air starting another combo. And for fucks sake if the Elden Beast even thinks theres a slight chance you might be close enough to do a full combo it takes off across the entire fucking arena, and is almost certainly going to do so again the instant you get close enough. It is so damning that nearly all advice threads on reddit or any other forum on how to beat these difficult bosses is just "dude just rework your entire character and use a broken build lol". As for the gank fights, I genuinely dont think a single fucking one of them was play tested. Laughably embarrassingly bad design in literally every Elden Ring gank fight.

[@TheDestoyerZ]

It seems like the devs were very scared of people fighting bosses and thinking they were easy, so they added a bunch of nonsense to them. I really miss the way they designed a lot of DeS and DS1 bosses, where it felt like they just made a cool monster and had it fight the way you would expect without worrying if it turned out easy or hard.

[@pinip_f_werty1382]

Basing moveset design on player psychology is smart. Delaying moves to cause people to panic is clever design. Also, Maliketh was easy, he only swags on you if you're not deliberate in your moves. Elden Beast jumping around the map was annoying, but I'd rather that than ass-slap simulator like previous souls games.

[@honeydarlinggaming9156]

@Jbtheg Someone didn't read the entire post lmao

[@-Nihilus-]

@@pinip_f_werty1382 Making every boss delay attacks to make the flow of combat janky is not good design. They did it well with NK in DS3 because his moveset didn't rely on it. Most of the main bosses in this game have a certain thing that inflates difficultly instead of having the boss be a well designed challenge. Sword Saint Isshin is challenging because his design is perfect cause he feels like your equal while also feeling like a boss who challenges everything you have learned, Malenia is challenging because she breaks certain rules of the game. Elden beast, not counting radagon he's great, is a huge disappointment without torrent the fight sucks.

[@pinip_f_werty1382]

@@-Nihilus- Melania forces you to engage in "the dance" with her, which makes sense. This is also the only full strength empyrean we fight in the game. If you turtle all game, you will be punished here because she forces you to prove you are more skilled than her. Yes, spirit ashes won't help you here. Turtling won't help you. Only your skill as a player will save you. She's not bs either, you can beat her without being hit. Most players can beat her if they just continually learn her style. To beat her you have to beat an unbeatable swordsman. You have to be nigh flawless in your execution. Her style forces you into a proper swordfight of constant agression while expertly dodging every attack. Melania forces the player to fully understand the struggle that is at the heart of the main themes of this game. And like every challenge in life, it can be overcome by anyone, they just have to have the tenacity, the very human tenacity.

[@HiCZoK]

Would love to hear yor thoughts on more games. You are very good at game critique. I would like your tlou2 and death stranding opinions

[@l337dta]

first playthrough of any fromsoft game for me, started as a mage and there's a lot of bosses that i don't know what their movesets are, they died so easily. next playthrough is a pure melee