Elden Ring - From Software + George RR Martin

Seananigans said:

I'm willing to bet if they did in fact fill all of these "empty" spaces, people would find the DLC (or game) exhausting. Pacing ebbs and flows tend to be good for us whether or not we recognize it explicitly.

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Absolutely, I thought the way they did it was okay. The empty spaces were good cool-downs between the crazier things happening. Abyssal Woods in particular was a nice quiet respite after the chaos of Shadow Keep. ...until I turned around and left because of the Frenzy mobs. Looking forward to going back there and actually seeing the dungeon next time.

Vinjin said:

Gaius gave me more rage than any other boss in the DLC, moreso because of the boar charge attacks than anything else. Definitely top tier bullshit.

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I dropped him in one on my caster run, knowing nothing about him or even expecting him there. Just stuffed him again in one attempt with my finger shield/ruins gs build. Would have been even easier if I had the stats for a bleed spear of some kind. I don't get how people are having issues with this guy. He mostly is just a faster Erd Tree Sentinel with a grav projectile added for chip damage. You can literally guard counter him for the first half of the fight then use a longer reach weapon art (or spear poke) for the second phase. His biggest trick is he runs away before most normal attacks can retaliate during his charge, which there are numerous ways to deal with. I guess people just really hate ever using a shield?

Vinjin said:

Also, in the latest patch, they changed his start point to always be off in the distance, like he does when you first encounter him, instead of right there in front of you. Just that change alone made him more manageable, even if the hit box still needs tweaking.

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I guess I never got to experience him on a second attempt, but that sounds a lot like the Bayle bullshit. I do recall helping some randos and being greeted just outside the door, come to think of it. There are a lot of encounters that the designers clearly wanted to frustrate people, particularly if they use summons (basically mandatory if you go shieldless) or have to do something story related in the arena (Hornsmet for Mesmer, Igon for Bayle).

But for actual rage inducing fights with ridiculous wombo combo bullshit, the frenzy boss is hands down the worst. I timed it on my Bunga with a shield up and he went a full two minutes of endless chaining attacks WHILE simultaneously shitting out chip damage, frenzy status, and random AEs the entire time. He leads off with frenzy fire spam, making summons almost impossible to drop in the opening part (you cant use an ash when he is in mini me form for some reason) and most of his major attacks are big AEs that cover most of the arena, not that he needs that since he can autocorrecting dive bomb you from anywhere in the room with them. Radahn is clearly harder and both him and Bayle are guilty of a lot of the same horse shit, but at least with those two you do get openings to return attack or at least flask. Frenzy guy is just a DPS fest that practically demands an ash or summon to defeat.

I often toss myself into summon pools to help randos since its risk free runes and arcs. From that perspective, its frustrating how much they seem to discourage coop in the DLC, especially for people who need the help to progress (an allowance that made ER the success it was). The Putrid Rider is the worst. It takes a cooperator a full minute to get to the fight after the host walks in and half the time the host has already been force fed their ass.

zignor 4 said:

Here's my personal difficulty ranking for a lot of the named bosses (leaving out the invaders/crypt bosses etc because I don't remember WTF they were called):

Radahn (probably)
Messmer
Commander Gaius
Midra
Finger Mother
Putrescent Knight
Bayle
Scadutree Avatar
Leda battle royale
Dancing Lion
Romina
Golden Hippo
Rellana

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Having done one full run as a caster and almost done with the second as a tanky bunga, some of those are way off for me.

Radahn - No question, every sin this game commits is in this fight. Shield and Spear basically required here, unless you are an Asian OCD click god.
Leda battle royale - Largely depends on how much you fucked up quests and how big the enemy team is. Can be easy with a tanky build.
Midra - Total frustrating pain in the ass.
Bayle- Frustrating, but manageable. Almost easy with shield/bleed counterpoke.
Messmer - Dies fast to bleed. Shield users have it easier. Casters trying to not summon or ash are in for a rough time.
Commander Gaius- I cant say a guy I one shotted both times is hard, but the concencus seems to be that he is.
Finger Mother - Trivialized if you have any ranged bleed, like Rivers of Blood will put him away easy. The Silver Mirror Shield negates most of his attacks. Complete puss.
Putrescent Knight - Again, build dependant, but a good shield and holy attacks (or golden order buff against undead) shred him. Uzi Spear plus any sort of Ash is cake.
Scadutree Avatar - A lot easier once you know the fight. Bring some good holy resist and fire damage and its a lot easier of a fight. This is an endurace test, so alpha strike builds have it rough here.
Priest guy with the Uzi Spear before Nightmare Woods- If you have a physical weapon art that can either peg him when he is behind the adds or along with his adds (Ruins GS, Rykards, Seluri Spear, Hora Luis's Earth Shaker, ect) then you can just burn him down rather easily. If you don't, this one is rough. As a caster, Ancient Rancor Call and Night Comet worked for me here. I don't know what the fuck my dagger person is going to do in this fight.....
Golden Hippo- Some people get hung up on this guy, and his hitboxes are bullshit (especially even the nerfed grab), but he is weak to lightning an in a room full of water, so......
Dancing Lion- Entirely build dependant and how many shards you have, but if you can cope with the spammy AE crap (either use an ash or keep close with shield) he is pretty much just an Erd Tree worm thing all over again.
Cerrilean Coast Death Bird- Complete joke if you have a golden order weapon or spell to merc the adds and him. Cluster fuck if you don't, but still managable.
Romina- I assume this is the dancer? Ancient Rancor call and Ruins GS weapon art flattened her so fast I barely saw ahat she did, so no real opinion here. But if no one ever summons me to help with her, she can't be too tough. If this is the scorpion centaur bitch, still easy and almost any tactic works here as she is basically just a Maleketh fight in most ways.
Rellana - Initially when adjusting to the new style of gameplay, she was rough. Once you figure out that you can jump the big tripple AE and that she (like hippo) is both weak to Lightning and mostly sitting in the water, she is pretty easy to beat. If you can't beat her any other way, Silver Shield stuffs most of her bullshit.
Cerrilean Coast Tibia Guy- Don't let the discus guy add and again golden order weapon just melts him and his adds.

Vinjin said:

I ran through ER's base game on 5 different toons. Two of those 5 I took through the DLC. None of them used a shield.

I did try a shield very, very early on in my very first toon's playthrough two years ago but hated it, mostly because I found it very difficult to switch my mentality between "I need to dodge out of the way of that attack" and "I'll just stand here and block it". Being my first FromSoft game and all, it wasn't until I began going two-handed that I started having any success, and it just carried on from there.

Even in the DLC, I just found two handing more enjoyable and higher odds for success than anything else.

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The hopalite (shield and spear) was a staple of PvE all the way back to Demon's Souls, but ER actually added more variety with the different options (cannonball shield, ect) and even building attack mechanics around their use. And Shield Counter is one of the best poise breakers in the game, even more so than two hand jumping. I honestly try to avoid relying on the shield, but this DLC has so many things to punish roll dodging and the mobs hit so fucking hard, you kind of have to in certain places unless you have Korean like reflexes.