Dark Souls 2

Yeah my first couple playthroughs will be offline, can't imagine the amount of invasions going on at launch with the press this game is getting.

Lithose_sl said:

Awesome, thanks for the link. That's good news. The way they were talking in the interview I read it sounded like the designer took personal offense if you didn't want to fight a Dickwraith at level 10 because he designed it so well.

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Invaders have the same health as when they load into your world (usually full, yes, not always).

The game won't be lopsided for pvp at first. The gear situation isn't nuts yet, healing items won't be too abundant (have to be farmed), and people have to find the red orbs to invade.

The covenant organization will help protect people too:wiki on covenants. (check the Blue covenants, they're meant to counter pvp)

Edit: Don't forget too that there are more bonfires this time around and you will be able to warp toeverybonfire in game. Also, the hub type of Nexus will be making a return, going away from the Firelink pseudo-hub.

New IGN trailer:
link

Derkon_sl said:

offline mode will still function as if playing online - National Video Games | Examiner.com

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That article is contradicting itself though. It reads to me as if they're "nerfing" offline play compared to DS1, because DS1 already had elements in it that simulated online play, invasions (Kirk, Mildred, Leeroy) were there, so were summons for bosses. Solaire for Gargoyles or O&S, Beatrice for 4 kings.. and the article reads like there will be only invasions and no AI summons.


and it won't feel like online unless one of these AI invaders can just 1-shot from both range and melee.

Can you just switch to online mode or are your characters set to offline/online?

How about you guys stop being pamper dampers and suck it up.

There are still NPC summons in Dark Souls 2. I'm pretty sure the whole system is the same as DkS, with the only real changes being that you can be invaded while hollow and covenant design isn't complete shit this time around.

Summoning is for pussies anyway.

Penance_sl said:

How about you guys stop being pamper dampers and suck it up.

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A +net for you here.

I'll go full sorc blue covenant to protect you guys too afraid to be online with a spam of homing bull shit that makes the enemy roll around.

I'll consider playing online when From puts in an option to disable bloodstains and graffiti globally.

Talking about game mechanics is apparently not allowed here anymore! Its a bad mechanic. That's all we are discussing.

I think an arena type system would have been a much better way to implement PvP .. but I'm more about competitive pvping nowadays.... griefing was cool when I was younger, but I've matured past that era in gaming. I'm still working of bad karma from uo/eq.

Needless_sl said:

Seriously though, the only thing reallywrongwith invasions are low level twinks griefing, which they're already addressing.

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Yeah, except for some builds being radically better in PvP, vs a build that's functional in PvE. Or some weapons being radically better, which you need to build around. Or you know, the difference in environmental risk due to the defender being unable to select a clear area to fight invasions. And that's assuming the gear balancing mechanism they have is actually working? And not terrible. All of these things give enormous advantage to someone for clearly making PvP the goal of their character.

Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to contradict your internet board dick swagger based on what an awesome bro you are for enjoying a mechanic that lets youavoidother serious PvPers; but lets not bullshit about why invasions appeal to you. It's because you enjoy what's wrong with them not because there is "nothing" wrong with them.

Like I said, I love DS PvP and in MMO's I like FFA with a bounty system to give the PKs risk. But DS has taken the worst elements of "wolf vs sheep" PvP and hit them with steroids. Hopefully this "blue" covenant works, and combined with the bounty system they have, it will counter some of this but I'll have to see it.

Playing Dark Souls I think I got invaded 6 or 7 times and won just the once. I also never invaded anyone. I absolutely love the mechanic. Why? Because it's a "Oh shit!" moment. The game is one of careful planning and execution. You will have "Oh shit!" moments when first discovering an area, but the potential for surprises quickly fades. When you explored a whole area and reach its boss, you might want to be assisted by other players or AI ghosts so you turn into a human which opens up the possibility of more "Oh shit!" moments thanks to the invasion system. That's very elegant and absolutely great even if most of the time the invader is too strong because he has a min-maxed build with optimized gear.

How will that work in DS2 if you can be invaded at all time? I assume you will be able to summon help at all time too.

Vorph's complain about messages and stains has some merit though (there were ghosts in Demon's Souls too... I don't remember them in Dark Souls). In a way it's a spoiler system and the mere presence of a message can be spoiler in itself... but it also creates a strange tension spike: seeing a message ahead makes you extra cautious as you wonder what deadly trap the message warns you about (or in what trap it tries to lure you). These spikes are not there without the messages, so it gives a rhythm to the game and gives this feeling that you are part of something greater than yourself.

My only issue with invades is that my characters are simply not built for PVP, and I will never change that because doing so would make the PVE less fun for me. I have never had more than 20 vit before SL100 in either Demon's or Dark Souls, and I despise the entire concept of poise. I play the game with the goal of never getting hit, so hp is irrelevant to me. This works perfectly fine in normal play, but falls apart in PVP for a lot of reasons. The biggest one being lag, of course. From isn't exactly known for their stellar netcode, and Demon's Souls' dedicated server wasn't really any better than Dark Souls' P2P shit. You're going to get hit, and you're probably going to get 'back'stabbed from the front, and if you don't have 40+ vit then odds are it's going to one-shot you. Even if you don't get lag-stabbed, you still get hit, and having zero poise just means you get combo'ed to death.

As for messages creating tension spikes, why would you want a message on the ground to create the tension instead of the actual event that the message is there to warn you of? There's basically only three types of messages: spoilers (hidden enemy/item pointers), trolling (to get you to jump off a cliff), and spam (to beg for +1's because it gives humanity or whatever). I don't ever want to see any of them. And Dark Souls has both ghosts and bloodstains, just like Demon's Souls did. DkS2 will be the same as well.

Szlia_sl said:

Playing Dark Souls I think I got invaded 6 or 7 times and won just the once. I also never invaded anyone. I absolutely love the mechanic. Why? Because it's a "Oh shit!" moment. The game is one of careful planning and execution. You will have "Oh shit!" moments when first discovering an area, but the potential for surprises quickly fades. When you explored a whole area and reach its boss, you might want to be assisted by other players or AI ghosts so you turn into a human which opens up the possibility of more "Oh shit!" moments thanks to the invasion system. That's very elegant and absolutely great even if most of the time the invader is too strong because he has a min-maxed build with optimized gear.

How will that work in DS2 if you can be invaded at all time? I assume you will be able to summon help at all time too.

Vorph's complain about messages and stains has some merit though (there were ghosts in Demon's Souls too... I don't remember them in Dark Souls). In a way it's a spoiler system and the mere presence of a message can be spoiler in itself... but it also creates a strange tension spike: seeing a message ahead makes you extra cautious as you wonder what deadly trap the message warns you about (or in what trap it tries to lure you). These spikes are not there without the messages, so it gives a rhythm to the game and gives this feeling that you are part of something greater than yourself.

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See I disagree with the "oh shit" thing. When I get invaded it just feels like a waste of time. If I win, I probably need to heal/go back to a bonfire anyway. If i lose? I start back at a bonfire. So regardless, the end result is the same. It does nothing to augment the game, it just costs me time. And now that my time is much more limited, it is just annoying. I fail to see how invading adds any value to the game outside of providing some players an avenue to grief others. I can understand if griefing is something you find to be fun; but don't try to claim its some great mechanic that greatly improves the game, because it doesn't.

I really enjoy the pve challenge of DS; that's why i choose to play. Again, it ads nothing to my experience to have other people waste my time in a single player game.

Needless_sl said:

The hell builds are you guys running that you honestly feel defenseless because you are "built for pve". This makes absolutely no sense to me.

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I clearly stated that my builds have Vit barely above base and zero poise whatsoever.

Needless_sl said:

You guys are fueling my desire to grief incredibly hard in DaS2.

Thank you for this.

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Considering its classified as a single player game with coop/multiplayer option.. id say yes.. its a single player game.

Apparently the downs is strong with you. Clearly you are new to video games if you consider dark souls as multiplayer. I'm sure Halo is also your favorite FPS, WoW is the only MMO that was ever released, and angry birds invented star wars. Do i have it right? Fucking 05'er

Needless_sl said:

The hell builds are you guys running that you honestly feel defenseless because you are "built for pve". This makes absolutely no sense to me.

"I can't defend myself in pvp because i'm playing a super sweep bow only scrub build as a PVE challenge!"
Well too damn bad bro, that's your own fault.

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LOL, build that strawman up a little more. No one said defenseless--they said there are big advantages toward building for PvP.

Do you even dead angle bro? Grain ring? Roll Speed? Anything bro?

There are big differences between effective PvE builds and someone who wants to min/max PvP. Between two people of the same skill? The one who builds for PvP is going to have very large advantages vs someone who is not. This is why very attacker oriented invasions are bad, because it essentially provides an outlet for people who are bad at PvP, or have such a weak grasp on it that they can't fight equally knowledgeable PvPers, to instead randomly invade people who are not looking for PvP and will be easier targets.