Dark Souls - Bonfire of the Profanities - The Something Awful Forums

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IGgy IGsen: Apr 11, 2013; "If I lose I will set myself on fire."

Yes. It's either that or starting a new game. Unless you really need something from that covenant I'd recommend to just move on. However, if you want to join it then you better do it soon before leveling up because Ozzy's price only gets higher the stronger you get.

# ? Oct 9, 2014 19:36

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# ? Apr 26, 2024 15:06

lessthankyle: Dec 19, 2002; SKA SUCKS; Soiled Meat

Farm the hunters for souls to beg forgiveness into the covenant you just spent an hour slaughtering.

# ? Oct 9, 2014 20:16

The Zombie Guy: Oct 25, 2008

I did some DS pvp the other night and spent some time fighting invaders in the Parish. I faced off against one guy who had Crystal Soul Mass on as I ran up. I threw an Alluring Skull and proceeded to wail on him. I think he panicked a bit when the spell didn't fire off. I guess that trick is still relatively unknown.

# ? Oct 9, 2014 23:58

HaB: Jan 5, 2001; What are the odds?

The Zombie Guy posted:

I did some DS pvp the other night and spent some time fighting invaders in the Parish. I faced off against one guy who had Crystal Soul Mass on as I ran up. I threw an Alluring Skull and proceeded to wail on him. I think he panicked a bit when the spell didn't fire off. I guess that trick is still relatively unknown.

Wait...what?!??

Alluring skulls prevent HCSM from firing? Or does it fire at the Skull?

# ? Oct 10, 2014 16:35

EC: Jul 10, 2001; The Legend

HaB posted:

Wait...what?!??

Alluring skulls prevent HCSM from firing? Or does it fire at the Skull?

Prevents it. Haven't tried it out in DS2 yet.

# ? Oct 10, 2014 16:57

HaB: Jan 5, 2001; What are the odds?

EC posted:

Prevents it. Haven't tried it out in DS2 yet.

Does it work on HSM/Pursuers as well?

# ? Oct 10, 2014 19:05

EC: Jul 10, 2001; The Legend

HaB posted:

Does it work on HSM/Pursuers as well?

I'm sure it works on HSM, not so sure about Pursuers.

# ? Oct 10, 2014 19:08

double nine: Aug 8, 2013

EC posted:

Prevents it. Haven't tried it out in DS2 yet.

Holy mother of whoa!

# ? Oct 10, 2014 19:12

The Zombie Guy: Oct 25, 2008

double nine posted:

Holy mother of whoa!

It's a blast to use the Skull because nobody expects it. I haven't had a chance to test it with Pursuers, but HSM and CSM with both not fire off after throwing a Skull. I don't know how long it lasts, but I always toss another one every 20 seconds or so.

Its like the Mimic/Lloyd's Talisman trick. How do people figure these things out? :iiam:

# ? Oct 11, 2014 00:54

theblackw0lf: Apr 15, 2003; "...creating a vision of the sort of society you want to have in miniature"

I left Anor Londo and came back to defeat the bosses, but Solaire is no longer at the bonfire, and I can't find his summon sign.

Did I accidentally hit him and not realize it?

# ? Oct 11, 2014 08:31

neetengie: Jul 17, 2013; Shittiest taste in anime and video games.

theblackw0lf posted:

I left Anor Londo and came back to defeat the bosses, but Solaire is no longer at the bonfire, and I can't find his summon sign.

Did I accidentally hit him and not realize it?

No, he does disappear from that place, his summon sign is near the fog gate for the boss fight, on a staircase. You'll find it, trust me.

# ? Oct 11, 2014 08:42

Addamere: Jan 3, 2010; by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Does there exist a Save State plugin for the PC version of this game? As much as my friends crow about how it's all part of the ~difficulty~ I find nothing at all endearing about repeating a 2-5 minutes corpse run back to a fog door and would love to have a quicksave/quickload style functionality so that I can just revert back to being right outside the boss door rather than make that slog. I have done a Google search on the topic, and the closest I've found is someone talking about backing up the save game to use for that purpose - which I suppose would work, but is a bit clunky.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 02:22

Captain Internet: Apr 20, 2005; HOTLANTA
IS WHERE YOUR HEART IS

Nietzschean posted:

Does there exist a Save State plugin for the PC version of this game? As much as my friends crow about how it's all part of the ~difficulty~ I find nothing at all endearing about repeating a 2-5 minutes corpse run back to a fog door and would love to have a quicksave/quickload style functionality so that I can just revert back to being right outside the boss door rather than make that slog. I have done a Google search on the topic, and the closest I've found is someone talking about backing up the save game to use for that purpose - which I suppose would work, but is a bit clunky.

This game seems patently Not For You (tm). Sorry but nothing like that exists because no one who likes these games found it to be an important thing to mod in. Making it harder, sure, adding weird original half life style quick save and loads, no way.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 03:00

Addamere: Jan 3, 2010; by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

That's an amazing impression of one of my friends when I brought this up to him. :shobon:

Anyhow, I've beaten the game and this isn't a gripe about difficulty. I really liked how pretty much any monster could kill you if you let it, and enjoyed the hell out of learning the various bosses' attacks and how to avoid dying in stupid ways; i.e., getting owned by terrain on the Bed of Chaos. Mods that make it even more difficult sound neat, but the tedium of a 2-5 minutes corpse run for some bosses multiplied by however many times you need to die on a boss to figure him out does not equal difficulty. That's just a time sink that I would like to avoid if possible on future playthroughs, thus the question.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 07:10

Bogart: Apr 12, 2010; by VideoGames

Use your souls more liberally? I took to Homeward Boneing my first time through whenever I'd beaten a boss so I could level up, but now that you know where the bonfires are, you should be able to gauge yourself and think okay, I can fight this last dude and get to the bonfire. :shobon:

Or co-op so you can see what the boss will be like for free before having to actually face him yourself. Is there a specific run you're having trouble with? I know Gwyn, Seath, and Queelaag all kicked my rear end the first ten times through.
The curse of life is the curse of want; forget about your souls and the rest will follow.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 07:36

Raygereio: Nov 12, 2012

Nietzschean posted:

That's just a time sink that I would like to avoid if possible on future playthroughs, thus the question.

Making a backup of the save file is the only way I'm afraid. You don't need to quit out of the game: You can just alt-tab and quickly copy-paste the save file. The game will likely bitch that you didn't quit the game properly when you load that save, but it'll work fine.
Note that if you want to make a manual save like this in Dark Souls 2, you will have to quit to the main menu first.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 12:12

EC: Jul 10, 2001; The Legend

Nietzschean posted:

That's an amazing impression of one of my friends when I brought this up to him.

Anyhow, I've beaten the game and this isn't a gripe about difficulty. I really liked how pretty much any monster could kill you if you let it, and enjoyed the hell out of learning the various bosses' attacks and how to avoid dying in stupid ways; i.e., getting owned by terrain on the Bed of Chaos. Mods that make it even more difficult sound neat, but the tedium of a 2-5 minutes corpse run for some bosses multiplied by however many times you need to die on a boss to figure him out does not equal difficulty. That's just a time sink that I would like to avoid if possible on future playthroughs, thus the question.

The runs back to bosses from bonfires aren't all that terrible except for one or two locations, and even the most egregious has a fairly quick shortcut (New Londo, I'm looking at you). Running back is just a part of the game that you get used to. Personally, I think that's how you get to know the level and enemy design the best, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't frustrated by it on my fourth or fifth way back to Gaping Dragon during my first playthrough.

There aren't any mods to change it though, so the point is moot anyway.

Captain Internet posted:

This game seems patently Not For You (tm). Sorry but nothing like that exists because no one who likes these games found it to be an important thing to mod in. Making it harder, sure, adding weird original half life style quick save and loads, no way.

This is like the shittiest attitude to have about Dark Souls. The game is already known to be filled with :smuggo:

dicks, no reason to prove it out even more.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 14:50

Captain Internet: Apr 20, 2005; HOTLANTA
IS WHERE YOUR HEART IS

EC posted:

The runs back to bosses from bonfires aren't all that terrible except for one or two locations, and even the most egregious has a fairly quick shortcut (New Londo, I'm looking at you). Running back is just a part of the game that you get used to. Personally, I think that's how you get to know the level and enemy design the best, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't frustrated by it on my fourth or fifth way back to Gaping Dragon during my first playthrough.

There aren't any mods to change it though, so the point is moot anyway.

This is like the shittiest attitude to have about Dark Souls. The game is already known to be filled with dicks, no reason to prove it out even more.

This is pretty funny considering I advocate this game to all people at all times for all skill levels. When someone goes so far as to wanting to add a quick save and quick load to a game where that goes completely against the design philosophy, it sounds like the game might just not be for them.

I am not spewing "GIT GUD, SCRUBBLE SCRUBBY" I am stating that feeling the need to change something that fundamental is maybe a tip that you aren't enjoying the game. This was before he mentioned he beat the game, but as others have said the best way to continually avoid boss runs but still get to fight the boss is to throw down a soap stone. It's not the full experience but it's something.

If I could load up a boss fight and just roll in and fight it using a new build or stat that'd be great but taking the stakes out of it would make me worried that it would make things much less special.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 18:11

Addamere: Jan 3, 2010; by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Bogart posted:

The curse of life is the curse of want; forget about your souls and the rest will follow.

I'm not trying to save my currency from disappearing. I mean, I suppose that would be a side effect of it but by the time I killed Gwyn on my first playthrough I was already level 114 or something and killing any one boss was not enough to level up anymore.

EC posted:

The runs back to bosses from bonfires aren't all that terrible except for one or two locations, and even the most egregious has a fairly quick shortcut (New Londo, I'm looking at you). Running back is just a part of the game that you get used to. Personally, I think that's how you get to know the level and enemy design the best, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't frustrated by it on my fourth or fifth way back to Gaping Dragon during my first playthrough.

The run back from Oolacile Sanctuary to Knight Artorias is a bit over 3 minutes of sprinting. I died to him probably twenty or more times before I downed him, which means I spent an hour holding down the action button and running. The run back from any of the bonfires in Lost Izalith to the Bed of Chaos is even longer than that, and I probably died a similar number of times; again, that's an hour or two that could have been saved by just quicksaving outside of the fog door and quickloading as soon as I die and respawn at the bonfire.

Captain Internet posted:

I am not spewing "GIT GUD, SCRUBBLE SCRUBBY" I am stating that feeling the need to change something that fundamental is maybe a tip that you aren't enjoying the game.

In some respects you are right: there is one particular part of the game I do not enjoy. I'm a slow and methodical player in any RPG, because SNES titles drilled it into my head that advancing in the correct direction might leave me forever cut off from some optional area I've not yet explored; so, by the time I'm facing a boss I've already killed every enemy I can find and hit every wall in search of secret paths, died dozens of times trying to make crazy jumps or otherwise explore, and so on. I am talking entirely about the corpse runs, not anything else: not about level design, enemy design, boss mechanics, encounter difficulty, etc. By the time I am focusing on killing the boss for an area, I am to the best of my knowledge ready to move on. I know the enemy spawn locations well enough that I am blatantly running past them without engaging them or taking damage, because that just slows down the run back to the boss. Some bosses have a bonfire right near them, like the Demon Centipede; though, that particular boss I killed on my first try. Others like the example above have a several minutes of tedium between the bonfire and your next attempt. And that particular part of the game -- running back to the boss through an obstacle course of enemies for several minutes so that you can get another couple of seconds of boss gameplay before you get swiped into a bottomless pit or whatever -- is the one major criticism I have of the title.

Raygereio posted:

Making a backup of the save file is the only way I'm afraid. You don't need to quit out of the game: You can just alt-tab and quickly copy-paste the save file. The game will likely bitch that you didn't quit the game properly when you load that save, but it'll work fine.
Note that if you want to make a manual save like this in Dark Souls 2, you will have to quit to the main menu first.

I am somewhat amazed that someone has not thrown together something that effectively does the same thing for you with a single keypress, but oh well. Thanks anyway!

# ? Nov 4, 2014 18:49

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Quickload seems like it would mess up the multiplayer functionality unless the programmer had a way to disable it when phantoms are present.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 19:32

IGgy IGsen: Apr 11, 2013; "If I lose I will set myself on fire."

Paracelsus posted:

Quickload seems like it would mess up the multiplayer functionality unless the programmer had a way to disable it when phantoms are present.

Easy, just allow phantoms to savestate as well and commence a savescumming war. There's gonna be a whole new meta to the entire thing it'll be amazing.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 19:34

HaB: Jan 5, 2001; What are the odds?

Nietzschean posted:

The run back from Oolacile Sanctuary to Knight Artorias is a bit over 3 minutes of sprinting. I died to him probably twenty or more times before I downed him, which means I spent an hour holding down the action button and running. The run back from any of the bonfires in Lost Izalith to the Bed of Chaos is even longer than that, and I probably died a similar number of times; again, that's an hour or two that could have been saved by just quicksaving outside of the fog door and quickloading as soon as I die and respawn at the bonfire.

What route are you taking from Sanctuary to Artorias that takes 3 minutes? Less than a minute maybe. Cross the bridge, go right, run past the two Treemen, hug the right wall till you get to the cliff, head left, go into the ruined building and take the elevator down. Come out by the merchant guy and Arty is right there.

And Bed of Chaos - if you aren't cheesing that fight via quitting the game every time you take out one of the orbs, you are just making it harder on yourself. But even the run from the secret bonfire in the lava field isn't that long. The Chaos covenant shortcut even less so. Tell me you know about those two routes and you're not running all the way form the bonfire right after Centipede Demon. :what:

Gonna agree with other people in saying that a Quicksave feature sorta defeats the point of the game. The whole thing is about balancing Risk vs Reward. That's such a central mechanic that altering it would make it a different game entirely.

# ? Nov 4, 2014 20:14

Bogart: Apr 12, 2010; by VideoGames

(anybody saying oooh the journey is part of what makes it so good is maybe kind of up their own rear end though. the boss run-ups are usually bummers.)

# ? Nov 5, 2014 02:00

Facepalm Ranger: Jan 17, 2012; SOME PEOPLE FIND HOME APPLIANCES SEXUALLY AROUSING! ZORDS ARE NOT APPLIANCES, DAMMIT!

Fired my Dark Souls character up again for new game+, defeated the asylum demon at its first appearance, defeated the Minotaur no problem, defeated black knight at the top of the tower no problem. Then I died when I got surrounded by wights and skeletons Knights at the undead parish.

No problem thought I, go back reclaim the souls (which I had not spent since starting up new game +) I thought. When the same poo poo happened again with me trying to reclaim, souls gone, poof!

Truly not playing for a while and arrogance is the undoing of many a chosen undeads.

You are a harsh mistress Dark Souls, I dunno if I can keep playing after losing that many souls...

# ? Nov 16, 2014 08:27

The Zombie Guy: Oct 25, 2008

Facepalm Ranger posted:

You are a harsh mistress Dark Souls, I dunno if I can keep playing after losing that many souls...

You need to be able to let go of souls and Humanity. Just accept the lesson and let it make you a better player.
The key thing is, you know how you messed up, so you (hopefully) won't make the same mistake again.

My record for one-time loss is 99 Humanity and about 1.5 million souls down the tube. Got careless twice in a row. Oh well. Lesson learned!

# ? Nov 16, 2014 14:18

EC: Jul 10, 2001; The Legend

I've lost millions of souls from simply not picking them up again after an invasion. What were you gonna use them for anyway?

# ? Nov 16, 2014 14:28

The Zombie Guy: Oct 25, 2008

EC posted:

I've lost millions of souls from simply not picking them up again after an invasion. What were you gonna use them for anyway?

Buying more poop to throw at people, what else?

# ? Nov 16, 2014 14:46

forpush: Jan 6, 2006; We don't like it when the city light start fading
When the city lights fading then we can't get down

On boss runs, my first time through the game, I didn't know there was that bonfire inside the building of Anor londo. So not only did I have to do all my boss runs from the first bonfire there, but I also had to make it through the entire building to open the front gates without dying and it was such a tense experience for me cos I wasn't as used to fighting Knights at that point.

# ? Nov 16, 2014 15:33

TravBot: Oct 10, 2004; If we can hit that bullseye the rest of the dominoes will fall like a house of cards Checkmate

fruitpunch posted:

On boss runs, my first time through the game, I didn't know there was that bonfire inside the building of Anor londo. So not only did I have to do all my boss runs from the first bonfire there, but I also had to make it through the entire building to open the front gates without dying and it was such a tense experience for me cos I wasn't as used to fighting Knights at that point.

I think at least twice I was invaded immediately after getting passed The Archers. That taught me to ever be human for that section...

# ? Nov 16, 2014 19:59

MokBa: Jun 8, 2006; If you see something suspicious, bomb it!

I got invaded the first time I got to the bonfire. Like, RIGHT when I got there. I was a total chickenshit and turned off my game. I just didn't want to deal with those archers again.

# ? Nov 17, 2014 19:48

Facepalm Ranger: Jan 17, 2012; SOME PEOPLE FIND HOME APPLIANCES SEXUALLY AROUSING! ZORDS ARE NOT APPLIANCES, DAMMIT!

The Zombie Guy posted:

You need to be able to let go of souls and Humanity. Just accept the lesson and let it make you a better player.
The key thing is, you know how you messed up, so you (hopefully) won't make the same mistake again.

My record for one-time loss is 99 Humanity and about 1.5 million souls down the tube. Got careless twice in a row. Oh well. Lesson learned!

It was more the fact that I had already completed the game. What's there really to new game+? As I understand enemies get a little bit harder, you stay the same level and can keep your equipment but besides that it doesn't really have anything else to offer right?

# ? Nov 26, 2014 02:39

Nahxela: Oct 11, 2008; Execution

You can get Sunlight Spear now that you have Gwyn's soul, does that count?

# ? Nov 26, 2014 02:56

Facepalm Ranger: Jan 17, 2012; SOME PEOPLE FIND HOME APPLIANCES SEXUALLY AROUSING! ZORDS ARE NOT APPLIANCES, DAMMIT!

Nahxela posted:

You can get Sunlight Spear now that you have Gwyn's soul, does that count?

I guess? I'll just wait till I buy Dark Souls II. I like the game just not enough to replay it seriously after completing it.

# ? Nov 26, 2014 03:24

The Zombie Guy: Oct 25, 2008

Facepalm Ranger posted:

It was more the fact that I had already completed the game. What's there really to new game+? As I understand enemies get a little bit harder, you stay the same level and can keep your equipment but besides that it doesn't really have anything else to offer right?

If you want to get all the achievements / trophies, you'll need to get to Anor Londo in NG+3. It takes that many runs on the same character to get all the boss soul weapons. If you don't care about cheevos, then NG+ is just for getting more copies of spells or picking up items you missed the first time. It's also fun to have bosses alive again so that you can be invaded.

# ? Nov 26, 2014 04:10

forpush: Jan 6, 2006; We don't like it when the city light start fading
When the city lights fading then we can't get down

I previously played this on pc but decided to get the xbox version, is it supposed to play like poo poo, and if not, why does it play like poo poo on my xbox? Would grabbing the DLC help, does it have anything that improves the performance? Its like a slideshow.

# ? Nov 27, 2014 00:51

SubponticatePoster: Aug 9, 2004; Every day takes figurin' out all over again how to fuckin' live.; Slippery Tilde

fruitpunch posted:

I previously played this on pc but decided to get the xbox version, is it supposed to play like poo poo, and if not, why does it play like poo poo on my xbox? Would grabbing the DLC help, does it have anything that improves the performance? Its like a slideshow.

Are you in Blighttown? :v:

# ? Nov 27, 2014 00:54

forpush: Jan 6, 2006; We don't like it when the city light start fading
When the city lights fading then we can't get down

Nah, I just returned to the undead asylum and noticed it was pretty bad, it's been bad elsewhere too but this is most noticeable.

# ? Nov 27, 2014 01:13

cat doter: Jul 27, 2006; gonna need more cheese...australia has a lot of crackers

fruitpunch posted:

Nah, I just returned to the undead asylum and noticed it was pretty bad, it's been bad elsewhere too but this is most noticeable.

The engine's kinda weird, since everything is programmed around the 30fps framerate (physics, collision detection, even the in game timer) and the game can't maintain that framerate, if it's dropping frames it just cuts the framerate to 15fps instead of, say, waiting to render the frame in 66ms instead of 33ms like a modern engine with v-sync might.

So yeah any time something in Dark Souls makes the framerate drop it just plummets to 15fps. It's kinda bullshit. Not even the PC version is immune to this crap since even my relatively high end PC still can't maintain a perfect 30fps. It's kind of a mess all round.

Thankfully the 360 version of Dark Souls 2 is much better in this regard, most of the time it hangs around 35-40fps and opts for frame tearing instead, which is fairly minimal.

# ? Nov 27, 2014 05:40

forpush: Jan 6, 2006; We don't like it when the city light start fading
When the city lights fading then we can't get down

Yeah I played DS2 mostly on xbox and that was absolutely fine, had no issues with it. Is that weird programming why I kept falling through elevators when my PC was trying to run it at 60fps?

# ? Nov 28, 2014 00:26

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# ? Apr 26, 2024 15:06

ChaosArgate: Oct 10, 2012; Why does everyone think I'm going to get in trouble?

fruitpunch posted:

Yeah I played DS2 mostly on xbox and that was absolutely fine, had no issues with it. Is that weird programming why I kept falling through elevators when my PC was trying to run it at 60fps?

Yeah collision detection is hosed in 60 fps, as is gravity, so you'll never make the jump to return to Undead Asylum in 60 fps.

# ? Nov 28, 2014 00:31

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