Dark Souls III

[Spectacular_Insanity]

Yeah, that place was utter hell. But man, when you did get through it, you felt like a king. Or you could just summon help. But yeah, I feel like that area was not exactly balanced for single player. I burned through A LOT of Lifegems trying to get through that blizzard and those gods-damned evil unicorns.

[Rising Dragon]

It's not. All three DLCs had an area designed for a full team of Phantoms with you. Sunken King's ended with the three graverobbers that fought like hacking players, Old Iron King's had the Aged Smelter Demon, while the Ivory King's had the two giant tigers.

[DemonOfWrath]

The DLCs were what made me stop playing DS2 and start up DS3 (was playing them in order from about a month or two ago). I was playing a sorcerer, so all of a sudden hitting areas where EVERYTHING had massive magic resistance was not fun, to say the least. I was surviving through having built the stats to use the dragonrider twinblade as my melee weapon (which slaughtered most normal enemies in a full combo), but as 90% of my levels were in mage I was squishy as all hell. The Aged Smelter Demon was the last straw for that, as nothing I had hit for >70 damage. I wasn't killing that thing, even with phantoms.

A bit late to the party, but the difference between DS1/3 and DS2 is actually really pronounced in how the core gameplay feels, having played them consecutively (in order) without a break between. DS2 is a lot floatier, and tends to have less windup from enemies. In contrast, DS3 has the actual swings be about as fast (ie, a fair bit faster than DS1), but with much more windup. And the hitboxes/dodging in DS2 really do feel off compared to the other games.

40 hours of DS2 and I still never really felt comfortable rolling in that game (this was after doing DS1 full sword+board, so I had to get good at rolling there), always felt as if you had to roll really early or really late, though I kinda avoided it by being a mage. DS3 feels exactly the same as DS1 in terms of dodging, I pretty much instantly had the timing of rolls down due to DS1. Only took a few minutes of DS3 before I decided I wasn't going back to DS2 to finish the DLC/the last few areas of the main game, the core combat felt that much more solid. Then Gundyr made 100% sure I wasn't (DS3 has pretty much nailed good boss fights finally).

[Spectacular_Insanity]

To be fair, magic made DS2 a bit too easy. I mean, if you built your character right, you could potentially 3-shot the Ancient Dragon boss. It was pretty broken. Unlike DS3 where spells are quite powerful still but you have a hard limit to the number of casts you can perform because you don't have Amber Herbs like in DS2, plus then you have to make the tactical decision of Estus for healing vs. Estus for FP recovery. The only non-Estus recovery are spells, Siegbrau (limited per playthrough), or Divine/Hidden Blessings (also limited per playthrough).

[Rising Dragon]

In DS3, spells are only powerful once you get 60 Intelligence/Faith or 40 Intelligence+Faith. They were crap until you got to that point. Worse still, spells that hit for decent damage are also unable to be acquired until very late in the game, barring certain pyromancy spells.

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

Yeah spells in DS3 were very poorly balanced and set out.

[Kafriel]

Originally Posted by Spectacular_Insanity

To be fair, magic made DS2 a bit too easy. I mean, if you built your character right, you could potentially 3-shot the Ancient Dragon boss. It was pretty broken. Unlike DS3 where spells are quite powerful still but you have a hard limit to the number of casts you can perform because you don't have Amber Herbs like in DS2, plus then you have to make the tactical decision of Estus for healing vs. Estus for FP recovery. The only non-Estus recovery are spells, Siegbrau (limited per playthrough), or Divine/Hidden Blessings (also limited per playthrough).

You can also recover via rings, either for consecutive attacks, critical hits, kills or simply equipping a regen ring. Blessed weapons also have a regen effect that increases with enhancement. Plus, I think your shards fill up by themselves after you kill a certain amount of enemies.

Originally Posted by Mr Hat and Clogs

Yeah spells in DS3 were very poorly balanced and set out.

Iunno, they worked well enough for me. I preferred dark sorceries and pyromancies, but casual sorceries like GH soul arrow and magic GS helped out a lot...although not nearly as much as spook/hidden body :P Crystal weapon also gives a considerable boost in AR even with low INT. For reference, I mained a pure caster in DS2, but I still find it to be a viable path in DS3 as well, provided you don't mess up your attunement and actually use farron flashsword instead of conventional weapons.

[Spectacular_Insanity]

Originally Posted by Kafriel

You can also recover via rings, either for consecutive attacks, critical hits, kills or simply equipping a regen ring. Blessed weapons also have a regen effect that increases with enhancement. Plus, I think your shards fill up by themselves after you kill a certain amount of enemies.

I did just find out about a really good regen build as well. Refined Gotthard Twinswords for a quality build or Hollow Grave Warden Twinswords for a Luck build. (I prefer a Luck build) Put a Old Wolf Curved Sword in offhand and two-hand the main weapon. Combine with Pontiff Left and Right Eye rings, plus Sun Princess Ring. Fourth ring is personal preference (I use Cloranthy). Assuming you play an aggressive playstyle and are good enough at dodging most hits, you can fight pretty much any boss fight without worrying about using Estus. With Carthous Rouge, I procced Bleed on the Dancer in about 7 or 8 hits.

For non-boss fights or the Catacombs, I use Anri's Straight Sword for even more regen (plus it has innate Blessed properties so it does bonus damage to skeletons and prevents the ones with glowing eyes from reviving).

Stats: 35-40 END, 40 LCK, plus minimum stats to wield your preferred weapon(s). Other stats depend on your preference, though I recommend high VGR (at least 35-40) and 14 Attunement and 15 Faith for Tears of Denial, at least. Very useful in a hyper-aggressive build like this.

If you're sticking to the 120 SL meta, your build might look like this:
Luck/Bleed + Regen Build

Edit: And as a side note, to maximize a Luck build, you want your Hollowing level to be at least 15.

[ScorchingFlames]

Dark Souls 3 Ashes of Ariandel DLC gameplay trailer

YouTube

https://youtu.be/C8Xu39GOyow

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

Well then speculate away.

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

Sif got an upgrade and scythe fight is straight from bloonborne, lols.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Lol so they combined Maria and Laurence's fight?

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

DLC is out, and first thing I can say, fuck wolves. fuck them. From somehow made dogs even more annoying. Thank god Alluring Skulls work on them.

[GDB]

Originally Posted by Mr Hat and Clogs

DLC is out, and first thing I can say, fuck wolves. fuck them. From somehow made dogs even more annoying. Thank god Alluring Skulls work on them.

This makes me excited to watch TFS play it. The "dog food" meme shall be resurrected!

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

Originally Posted by GDB

This makes me excited to watch TFS play it. The "dog food" meme shall be resurrected!

Heh, I will say that the did well on their AI.

Spoiler for wolves:

They hunt in packs, they circle around you and make flanking attacks, they call in other wolf packs. Oh and their attacks stagger.

[Rising Dragon]

Their attacks stagger? It's Dark Souls 3. What attacks DON'T cause stagger?

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

True, true.

The main boss in the DLC was an awesome fight. She kicks a lot of ass.

[RWBladewing]

Originally Posted by Mr Hat and Clogs

True, true.

The main boss in the DLC was an awesome fight. She kicks a lot of ass.

Spoiler for boss:

Not enough phases IMO, she needed at LEAST 3 more. By the end of it I was half expecting the optional Gravetender boss to summon her instead of the wolf.

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

Originally Posted by RWBladewing

Spoiler for boss:

Not enough phases IMO, she needed at LEAST 3 more. By the end of it I was half expecting the optional Gravetender boss to summon her instead of the wolf.

Spoiler for This isn't even...:

She even goes all fucking super saiyan in phase three, so the meme fits.

[RWBladewing]

Originally Posted by Mr Hat and Clogs

Spoiler for This isn't even...:

She even goes all fucking super saiyan in phase three, so the meme fits.

Spoiler:

Yeah lol. And that transition not only being outside of a cutscene but also dealing damage is the ultimate troll to dumb saps like me who think they've won. I was running around trying to ragdoll her "corpse" and almost got killed by the powerup aura since I hadn't bothered to heal. They knew exactly what they were doing there.

[Mr Hat and Clogs]

Originally Posted by RWBladewing

Spoiler:

Yeah lol. And that transition not only being outside of a cutscene but also dealing damage is the ultimate troll to dumb saps like me who think they've won. I was running around trying to ragdoll her "corpse" and almost got killed by the powerup aura since I hadn't bothered to heal. They knew exactly what they were doing there.

Spoiler:

Yeah, one of my friends was in his inventory screen equipping all his +soul gear when she got back up. He was not prepared.